About Pandas, and about FACTION WAR, OLD GODS, TROLLS, and MOGU.
For instance, the entirety of 5.1 is about the faction war. Are pandas important in that patch? No. Their land simply becomes a battlefield and the action often moves elsewhere like in Darnassus (with the Divine Bell Theft), Dalaran (Purge of Dalaran), and Echo Isles (when Garrosh besieges it). 5.3 also has little to do with the pandas, it's mostly about the preparation for the Siege of Orgrimmar with fights in Durotar and Barrens.
So really the pandas weren't that important after the questing experience. Even in the Thunder King patch, the player forces were mostly led by Jaina and Theron, with the panda ninja tagging along to spew his usual nonsense about peace and balance.
In fact did anyone even care about the pandas after the questing experience? Nope. All focus was on Garrosh, Jaina, Varian, the Mogu, the Sha, Y'Shaarj.
So really just because the continent was called "Pandaria" doesn't mean much. The pandas certainly didn't carry that expansion when they are barely had any involvement in the content patches (as a people).
Last edited by Varodoc; 2021-08-08 at 01:46 PM.
Because Dragons are a big sell for the nostalgia crowd.
Besides, I doubt there are many that actually really care about how important the enemies we fight are, what is importnat is how much they care about fighting them. And as Shadowlands has shown clearly is that no amount of universal stakes can make up for something that most players don't really care about.
Besides, Cataclysm was also big on dragons, and that one had scale to spare when it came to lore. Just tie the Dragons into the World Soul and we have a universe ending plot there if that is so important.
The world revamp dream will never die!
Okay? You don't think I'm suggesting we'll get a Dragon Expansion with nothing but dragon npcs and dragon lore, right? Knowing Blizzard, if they did a Dragon Expansion, we'd get these floating Dragon Isles, with unique enemies, threats, and lore, in each zone. Perhaps the overarching theme, or at least initial premise, could be about Murozond or something, with a void subplot or something on the side akin to Suramar or the Emerald Nightmare.
I think people just forget that we deal with cosmic attacks on Azeroth too.
I don’t think they can make a Void or Lightlands. There isn’t enough to vary there: see Argus/Twisting Nether being cut to a patch because it’s just green poop. But stuff like the Scarlets, Azshara, the Sunwell, Elementals... lots of ties on Azeroth. Turalyon will probably be a big one.
The thing is, it is really not. All the locations and their denizens easily fit into what already we had on the Azeroth. If zones weren't in afterlife and the races werent about "finding your place", people wouldn't notice. Legion was full cosmic at the end, where we literally fought space ships and had sci-fi architecture everywhere. And we just had an Azeroth expansion in BfA, where you deal with things like pirate rebellion and mysterious cults.
Sometimes, the light of the moon is a key to other spaces. I've found a place where, for a night or two, the streets curve in unfamiliar ways. If I walk here, I might find insight, or I might be touched by madness.
Did you even read the context of the conversation before jumping in? Because apparently I have to explain this, No I didn't say the Dragon Isles will never appear, I simply said they'll appear in an expansion about the Void, with a purple logo and a purple login screen.
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I'm going to press X to Doubt. An expansion with C'Thun on the cover art would be more nostalgic than dragons. Since C'Thun is probably one of the most iconic bosses of "old WoW" (before Cataclysm). Along with Yogg-Saron naturally.
Besides the expansion that destroyed people's nostalgia the most had a dragon on its cover art so, not really.
If I was a betting man I think Turalyon putting on the Crown of Light will be the big marketing thing for 10.0 with the name being “Awakening” or something similar (maybe the worlds soul)
The plot in MoP was about Faction war in Pandaria up to 5.2. And even that is debatable since the very infamous questline "Purge of Dalaran" had nothing to do with Pandaria.
After that the plot of the Faction war moves to Durotar and the Barrens and culminates in the Siege of Orgrimmar.
So not only it is incorrect to say that the pandas carried that expansion, it is also incorrect to say that that expansion took place mostly in Pandaria, because half of that expansion took place elsewhere. Even the scenarios of 5.3 (that had relevance to the plot) took place elsewhere. Like that Alliance scenario that took place in Dun Morogh, or that scenario that took place in some generic sea setting.
Funny that you mention how MoP pivots away from Pandaria because it looks like Shadowlands is doing the same thing. All the zone storylines are effectively finished save for the fate of Denathrius.
Unless we get covenant ARs we are probably done with the Shadowlands themselves this patch.
Not that I think dragons are the biggest and best Nostalgia can offer, but players do like Dragons, and they do know to some extent who the important dragons are.
Besides, if you just want to go for dragon bosses as a source then they are pretty up there as far as nostalgia goes. We have Nefarian, who is one of the truly iconic raid bosses. We have Cata, which was just aghast with dragons. We have WotLK with big raid fights against dragons, including an entire 3 mini-raids dedicated to them, including an entire zone.
Pretty much every single expansion the devs make a point of having us fight a dragon in a big way, and the reason is very clearly that fighting dragons is the quintessential RPG staple, players generally just like dragons.
Why not have an expansion that focuses on Dragons to an extent? It is heavily hinted at, it is often mentioned as somehting players want, and there are loads of different avenues you could take to make a story around it.
The world revamp dream will never die!
Guys, we all know why Varodoc demands a Void expansion and brushes other ideas under it. It's so he can have a cheeky wank to his waifu Alleria.
Sometimes, the light of the moon is a key to other spaces. I've found a place where, for a night or two, the streets curve in unfamiliar ways. If I walk here, I might find insight, or I might be touched by madness.
The plot was about Faction War in Pandaria in that the story was squarely focused on the Alliance and Horde going to Pandaria and what ended up happening as a result.
Yes we moved out of Pandaria midway, but I hardly see how that changes how the ending of the expansion is the Alliance and Horde teaming up to defeat Garrosh because of what happened in Pandaria.
The entire big macguffin the plot centers around is literally the Sha, which was found on Pandaria.
This is like arguing that Legion was not about defending Azeroth from the Burning Legion because the final patch was on Argus.
The world revamp dream will never die!