Lorekeeper lore Q&A steve danuser

[Aresk]

So the alternate Garrosh where he was an actual good leader and respected gets fucked and is sent to Revendreth because of our Garrosh? lol

This was my first thought upon reading that section, too. Are the other Garrosh threads still alive, so right now only our Garrosh thread exists as part of the Shadowlands "rope"? And if so, when those other threads show up, will he suddenly be transported somewhere else? If there are multiple threads already woven into the rope, then was our Garrosh just so bad that he screwed over the rest of them? And most importantly, will Blizzard remember what they said about every other incarnation of Garrosh if they ever put his rope in the expansion in a meaningful way?

[Sargerus]

Geez that AU quote. It's like opening the "Burning Legion is the only one in the multiverse" can of worms all over again. They should just forget about it tbh.

Also, does this means Maldraxxus Draka has memories of AU Draka interacting with Thrall?

[Hubbl3]

I like Blizz' tendency to overexplain concepts and then leaving everyone even more confused. Don't think about it, just enjoy mindless fun!

[Feanoro]

How can you be certain of titan origin, considering it is all written in their personal view, so they can't know with certainty how they came to be.

Let me help with some of the answers you're bound to get.

"Because Blizzard says so, do not question them! Quit thinking things through, that's not the purpose of this forum! Stop pointing out that the Chronicles retcon was borderline fraud!"

I hope that helps you understand where some answers are coming from.

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the best part of this is confirmation that thrall and draka will be reunited. that's going to be...phenomenal.

Thrall never knew her, and the Maladraxxus cinematic showed she could give a damn less once she woke up there.

[Aresk]

Thrall never knew her, and the Maladraxxus cinematic showed she could give a damn less once she woke up there.

Thrall knew her on Draenor. She's also part of the rope, according to the interview.

[Feanoro]

Thrall knew her on Draenor. She's also part of the rope, according to the interview.

Was AU Draka aware of being his not-quite mother?

The Draka in Maladraxxus is supposed to be MU, who died when Thrall was a baby.

[Aresk]

Was AU Draka aware of being his not-quite mother?

The Draka in Maladraxxus is supposed to be MU, who died when Thrall was a baby.

Specifically about AU vs MU, Danuser had this to say:

The way I would have you think about it is think of a rope… If you look at a rope, it is one thing, right? It’s something that you can grab onto, you can hold it, you can see it; think of that as a character. Think of that rope as Draka or Velen.

If you look at that rope more closely, you can see there are different threads that make up the rope. There are different twines that pull together, and you can pull off one of these threads if you want. But it’s still a rope, and each of those threads you can think of as one of the realities of the character, one of the streams of time… There is a thread that is the Draka from Draenor we visited in the Warlords of Draenor. There is another thread that is Draka on Azeroth as we know her… And there are many other threads that could be other realities that we never peered into. But all of those threads at some time come together to make that rope. And remember also that, as you’ll see, that there are many characters in the Shadowlands when they refer to time, they usually say that time is not a construct of Death. Time and Death are not related. Death is about eternity, not linear time. The manner in which these threads come together, that can take a very long time from mortal perceptions. Those threads can be separated for a time, but sooner or later, they do combine to make one rope that is that character. You can think of it as the threads of that rope, all the individual threads, are just waiting. And over time, they will come together but they can exist as separate entities for a time. That still doesn’t change the fact that they are part of one rope.

So the Draka in Shadowlands should be both Drakas, one of which knew Thrall as an adult and one of which only knows of the infant Go'el. I'm not sure if the two would piece who he is together, but presumably AU Draka's part of the "rope" would recognize him as the person who came from Azeroth should she encounter him in Shadowlands.

Edit: I guess technically the two threads might not have come together, so it might not be both in the Draka in Shadowlands, though if that's the case, it seems odd to choose her as the example.

[Lady Atia]

Which doesn't make sense since we see garrosh as sinner yet we "know" that many AU garroshes were saints.

Its just yet another "don't count dem blades of grass".

Well, going with the "time works differently" comment maybe there are some fragments of a good Garrosh somewhere else in Shadowlands, waiting for our Garrosh to get redeemed?^^

[VinceVega]

This whole confusion could have been solved by saying every universe has their own Shadowlands and demons have been a special case. Done.
Burning Legion is over. So demons are now tethered to the reality the last have been in which was mostly ours.

Now we have
1. What happens to alternate souls? The merge together in SL. But how is Draka then our Thralls Draka? Not every Draka had a Thrall...
2. Why are memories in Bastion just ours?
3. How does the arbiter decide which soul goes where if the soul is composed of infinte possibilies?

IF they say the alternate timelines are nor real and so to say pocket dimensions only coming into existence if someone from our universe splinters the timeline... that still means there are at least more than one of nearly every orc and dranaei. If the alternate ones don't have full souls... what of our maghar orcs? Did they get souls when they moved into our universe? Do they stop existing the moment they die?

Why the hell did they not kepp it seperat? Alternate universe NEVER make sense. because the concept is way to difficult to handle with logic.
God damn... i hoped they never mention the alternate universes again. This will fuck up every point of lore from now on as aparantly every cosmic power is spanning across AUs...

[mrsohta]

This whole confusion could have been solved by saying every universe has their own Shadowlands and demons have been a special case. Done.
Burning Legion is over. So demons are now tethered to the reality the last have been in which was mostly ours.

Now we have
1. What happens to alternate souls? The merge together in SL. But how is Draka then our Thralls Draka? Not every Draka had a Thrall...
2. Why are memories in Bastion just ours?
3. How does the arbiter decide which soul goes where if the soul is composed of infinte possibilies?

IF they say the alternate timelines are nor real and so to say pocket dimensions only coming into existence if someone from our universe splinters the timeline... that still means there are at least more than one of nearly every orc and dranaei. If the alternate ones don't have full souls... what of our maghar orcs? Did they get souls when they moved into our universe? Do they stop existing the moment they die?

Why the hell did they not kepp it seperat? Alternate universe NEVER make sense. because the concept is way to difficult to handle with logic.
God damn... i hoped they never mention the alternate universes again. This will fuck up every point of lore from now on as aparantly every cosmic power is spanning across AUs...

It ruins the identity and importance of those characters yeah. I feel like they are just added to the soul of MU character as more anima but I don't think we've seen it happen in game. AU souls don't matter at all I guess. It sounds like even he didn't know what he was saying while he was explaining tho

[Good ol Stroggylos]

So Xera is putting her pieces back together getting ready for a come back

[MatPandaZ]

Isn't there basically infinite timelines, so why does Draka in Shadowlands begin her "story" after she dies in MU timeline, surely there is a timeline out there where she trips and falls, one where she dies in childbirth, one where she gets a peanut allergy and dies etcetera

Also, how can there be an anima shortage, surely in some timelines Arthas never became the lich king and as such, never killed and raised Sylvanas, like with the Aedelas Blackmoore alternate timeline, so in that timeline no one makes a dark pact with the Jailer to starve the rest of the shadowlands.

They shot themselves in the foot doing time/AU travel to then claim there is only one definitive place for afterlife. The thing we have to think about is *why* they want that to be the case. Who from the AU do they want to show up in SL at some point? Gul'Dan? I highly doubt it, but I think we will see at least one WoD influenced AU char show up.

[Newname1234567890]

So the Lightmother is still alive....

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So Old Gods are still alive then, they are just regenerating in the Void. Maybe N'Zoth might be dead dead simply because he died in Ny'alotha and not strictly on the mortal plane of Azeroth, but the other Old Gods will definitely return in the future. Blizzard will need raid bosses for the Void Lords expansion, after all.

Perhaps this is what Alleria meant when she said "Despite N'Zoth's defeat, the whispers have worsened and new voices have joined the chorus". Maybe the previously "deceased" Old Gods have finally returned to the Void realm, where they will be regenerated and ready to return.

When we go to the Void, cue Old God Council fight.

[Varodoc]

So the Lightmother is still alive....

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When we go to the Void, cue Old God Council fight.

Don't worry, we'll defeat them with the assistance of the Void elves. They know the secret weakness of the Old Gods as well as their plans.

[Aucald]

It definitely does seem like they're re-opening the doors on persistent AU continuities with this whole "rope" analogy and having AU individuals be reflected or somehow merged in the Shadowlands - which strikes me as a bad idea all around. WoD dabbled in that and it became a huge continuity snarl they had to retcon back out of existence, reopening that wound in the overall narrative isn't going to play out well, either. Better to keep AU continuities sealed off as much as possible - there a thing that can exist, but to not have them reflect on or impact the primary continuity in any real way beyond what's already happened.

Guess we'll see how they actually handle it when it comes time.

[Shedaar]

I see a lot of AU/MU mentions here
Has it ever been confirmed that MU is the "main" universe/timeline?
Because I don't remember this being mentioned anywhere, it is "main" for *us*, but is it for, I don't know, other Garrosh or Velen?
I'm not sure how to phrase this question, but I tried my best

[Aucald]

I see a lot of AU/MU mentions here
Has it ever been confirmed that MU is the "main" universe/timeline?
Because I don't remember this being mentioned anywhere, it is "main" for *us*, but is it for, I don't know, other Garrosh or Velen?
I'm not sure how to phrase this question, but I tried my best

The MU/AU distinction is mostly codified by Aman'Thul in his charge to Nozdormu:

Unto you is charged the great task of keeping the purity of time. Know that there is only one true timeline, though there are those who would have it otherwise. You must protect it. Without the truth of time as it is meant to unfold, more will be lost than you can possibly imagine. The fabric of reality will unravel. It is a heavy task--the base of all tasks of this world, for nothing can transpire without time.

The "one true timeline" has always referred to our (as PC's) timeline, the one that the majority of the events of the Warcraft universe center upon.

[Shedaar]

The MU/AU distinction is mostly codified by Aman'Thul in his charge to Nozdormu:

The "one true timeline" has always referred to our (as PC's) timeline, the one that the majority of the events of the Warcraft universe center upon.

Oh this is cool info that I didn't know about.
So the other timelines that were created by someones, umm... "intervention" are undesired and were never meant to be created, yes?

[Wyattbw09]

Honestly it's easier and better for my own sanity to just think that blizzard writers are incompetent and we're never gonna have cogent storytelling again.

I think its probably easier to say they have told a lot of stories over a lot of year and they are not going to let some inconsistency with War Crimes completely scrape an idea for an entire expansion.

I would rather have Shadowlands with some inconsistency, then have the designers go well how do we merge AU and MU when it comes to death? I don't know, well lets throw out Shadowlands then because it won't be a consistent narrative.

Some stuff you just gotta let go.

[Aucald]

Oh this is cool info that I didn't know about.
So the other timelines that were created by someones, umm... "intervention" are undesired and were never meant to be created, yes?

Not necessarily undesired, per se; just not the true timeline and not permitted to replace or otherwise interfere with its course. AU timelines kind of exist as a natural occurrence in the Warcraft metacosm, which is explored in Twilight of the Aspects. It kind of operates on the Many-worlds Interpretation of quantum mechanics, every decision or action's possible outcomes all unspool simultaneously - those outcomes that aren't part of the true timeline generate echoes or shadows of the timeline that in WoW are called "timeways," and most of them are unstable and transitory, they wink in and out of existence randomly - the more important the outcome, the longer they last, but they're still only echoes of the true timeline Aman'Thul refers to.