Dragonflight Alpha/Beta General Discussion

[AOL Instant Messenger]

Sounds awful tbh

So, instead of gradually unraveling a massive conspiracy that connects several smaller threats together with plenty of foreshadowing and which will help provide a very interesting conclusion to a good chunk of the plot whilst also bringing in a degree of moral profundity which could be explored to make players question whether or not they are really the heroes, we ought to instead follow more evil bald men speaking in deep baritones and hot waifus getting redemption because of their lovely pair of personalities?

[Fahrad Wagner]

Imagine if they limited it to where it actually was always sufficient—the Old Gods. That's what started the Mystery Box storytelling, and that's where it was effective and people actually enjoyed it. It made sense to gradually build up a Cosmic Horror-themed baddy whose entire shtick is manipulation and long-term schemes. They were unpredictable, greater-scope, and very mysterious—this made it very interesting to deconstruct their foreshadowing. Conversely, no one cares what the fucking Bald Man we just met is up to. You can't foreshadow anything substantial about someone we just met, you have to actually establish them for them to be interesting. The Old Gods were around for a good while and we knew their themes and tendencies—any action could've been their handiwork. The Jailer was just a nobody dicking around who we can't really foreshadow anything interesting with because we have few themes to associate with him.

Honestly, as hacky as it was, the best foreshadowing or cryptic "next episode on ... " thing they ever did with him was somehow his mind-numbingly cliché "what is to come" line.

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The reason why some think "Pelagos" instead of "Turalyon" is because it would imply, by association, villain-batting the lunatic who is actively meddling in powers beyond her comprehension and has generally only been acting out of suicidal envy and a desire to bring her kooky cult of time bombs to Silvermoon—you know, the place where it is already established that there is a massive fountain of energy that could be turned into a world-ending portal to the Void just by the passive presence of one of the Void Elves..

So many missed opportunities to do a good job with the storyline. I really hope they eventually understand what makes a story great is how well written its characters are, and how coherent the plot is, rather than constantly going for a bigger Mr. Evil and fitting trying to fit squares into triangles cause "we thought squares were cool lol". What pains me is that people taking decisions on these topics should be lore experts but also good storytellers, people who KNOW what they're doing and have proven so; clearly it is not the case. And it's not isolated to Warcraft, Star Wars is another good exemple of how a handful of people with not enough knowledge of a universe can easily ruin it.

Anyway, remaining hopeful for 10.0, but the frustration is real. It's not all bad, of course, but the execution on some key aspects of the story just baffles me.

[AOL Instant Messenger]

So many missed opportunities to do a good job with the storyline. I really hope they eventually understand what makes a story great is how well written its characters are, and how coherent the plot is, rather than constantly going for a bigger Mr. Evil and fitting trying to fit squares into triangles cause "we thought squares were cool lol". What pains me is that people taking decisions on these topics should be lore experts but also good storytellers, people who KNOW what they're doing and have proven so; clearly it is not the case. And it's not isolated to Warcraft, Star Wars is another good exemple of how a handful of people with not enough knowledge of a universe can easily ruin it.

Anyway, remaining hopeful for 10.0, but the frustration is real. It's not all bad, of course, but the execution on some key aspects of the story just baffles me.

Remember the entire Defias conspiracy and Onyxia plotline in Classic, where with very minimal timegating they gradually revealed a very interesting underlying plot which starts as soon as you meet the Defias ~level 5 and gradually extends through the entire Alliance questing experience to reveal a satisfying conclusion which ties these disparate but vaguely-connected plotlines together into one plotline?

[Fahrad Wagner]

Remember the entire Defias conspiracy and Onyxia plotline in Classic, where with very minimal timegating they gradually revealed a very interesting underlying plot which starts as soon as you meet the Defias ~level 5 and gradually extends through the entire Alliance questing experience to reveal a satisfying conclusion which ties these disparate but vaguely-connected plotlines together into one plotline?

That's precisely what constitues good storytelling, especially for a videogame medium, in my humble opinion.
I believe we can have that again, and it will make the bigger villains even more interesting... we just need the people in charge of the story (Steve and others, cause let's face it, he clearly isn't alone in this mess) to shift paradigm. One can dream right?

[Skildar]

I maintain, like you point out, that they're simply shit at their job and have been zombified by watching too much Mystery Box TV and have attempted to transplant an incompatible form of storytelling to the medium, which is how we reach what I hope is the nadir, but know won't be. I.e, where you can't have a plot as basic as "Robot Satan wants to kill everyone" without having to play coy for 99% of the runtime as to whether that's what he really intends or whether Robot Satan might not actually have some valid points about the tax code.

That's what I find to be pretty comical. Lorewise we never needed to understand his motive to gain the motivation to stop him. But on an entertainment pov it's a complete fail for the character to be so secretive about his own goal and motivations.

[Vakir]

Remember the entire Defias conspiracy and Onyxia plotline in Classic, where with very minimal timegating they gradually revealed a very interesting underlying plot which starts as soon as you meet the Defias ~level 5 and gradually extends through the entire Alliance questing experience to reveal a satisfying conclusion which ties these disparate but vaguely-connected plotlines together into one plotline?

Another thing that made this work that people underrate is that it unfolded largely in gameplay and not soap opera cutscenes where we're god powered flies on the wall or in a tie-in book that'll be obsolete in 6 months.

You can argue RP walking with Windsor feels like a slow and plodding experience compared to the fast gratification we're used to now, but after experiencing everything up to that, the environmental storytelling, all the clues, and putting the pieces together, to have that march to the keep, it's a damn MOMENT because it feels so earned and authentic. To connect it to such a major mark of player power, your key to the raid, is some peak implementation to the medium of a damn game.

Breaks my heart there's no strong Horde equivalent, but they made out like bandits in Cata to compensate, especially having the best overall zone in Silverpine.

[Grimbold21]

Another thing that made this work that people underrate is that it unfolded largely in gameplay and not soap opera cutscenes where we're god powered flies on the wall or in a tie-in book that'll be obsolete in 6 months.

You can argue RP walking with Windsor feels like a slow and plodding experience compared to the fast gratification we're used to now, but after experiencing everything up to that, the environmental storytelling, all the clues, and putting the pieces together, to have that march to the keep, it's a damn MOMENT because it feels so earned and authentic.

Breaks my heart there's no strong Horde equivalent, but they made out like bandits in Cata to compensate, especially having the best overall zone in Silverpine.

It's no coincidence that Vanilla's - or some of them - long quest chains are remembered fondly, by some anyway.

[Pheraz]

That's precisely what constitues good storytelling, especially for a videogame medium, in my humble opinion.
I believe we can have that again, and it will make the bigger villains even more interesting... we just need the people in charge of the story (Steve and others, cause let's face it, he clearly isn't alone in this mess) to shift paradigm. One can dream right?

I am pretty sure that they realized it's a nice way to make extra cash via books by hyping people with that "if you only know what I know" cinematics and then leave plot holes as vast as the twisting nether

Money>gameplay>lore

[Varodoc]

I expect to be proven right about a great many things I predicted on April 19.

[Sondrelk]

That's precisely what constitues good storytelling, especially for a videogame medium, in my humble opinion.
I believe we can have that again, and it will make the bigger villains even more interesting... we just need the people in charge of the story (Steve and others, cause let's face it, he clearly isn't alone in this mess) to shift paradigm. One can dream right?

I think we still have some of it, just not in the greater overarching plots. Drustvar had a really solid and engaging (if campy) plot where it took us on an odyssey across the zone until we finally learned that one of the people we were trying to save was the mastermind behind the whole disaster, all ending in a solid dungeon.

I have said before, and I stick by that the writers are at least decent at their work, but that it would take a genius to write epicstorylines on the fly even as random bits gets set in stone and valid criticism is hailing in.
Afterall, it isnt like Blizzard could change the Sepulcher cinematic once it was out, but once it was they were bound to it and likely couldnt change much of the remaining plot of Shadowlands in a natural way as the assets were already made and the work on the next expansion was already ongoing.

What Blizzard needs is to completely disentangle themselves from the overarching plot, and instead focus on smaller zone specific plotlines that require little easing into or out of.
Doing this they can then take the lovely cinematics and general effort that goes into often doomed projects like the Sadfang cinematics, and instead put them into showing a ressurected Ragnaros blow up Blackrock Mountain. Or Feralas being attacked by a giant Botani.
Something that lets the writers really focus on writing solid stuff, and also let the greater development team do what they are the best at without needing to share the baggage of Sylvanas' botched speech about Arthas.

[The Stormbringer]

Intergalactic narratives where beings of untold power are scheming agaisnt one another, using the heroes' world as the ring sounds distant, disconnected and unfamiliar. Not only that, but the heroes are guaranteed to always find an edge with which to undermine such beings. Beings, by the way, that are who knows how old and immensely powerful, but somehow managed to get upstaged by the equivalent of ants, because of.... special - borrowed - powers.

Well, except Zovaal. In his case, we just showed and beat him

Not to mention that the wider the expanse in which the story takes place, the more probable plotholes are. Here we have Zovaal, who was apparently a master manipulator, moving pieces here and there to his benefit, and in turn he gets squashed by the little guy. Also, the new Lich King, who we can only assume reigned over the entirety of Icecrown Citadel, apparently was unaware that he had a soul sucking mechanism underneath his throne.

But I guess Zovaal just planted a fail safe mechanism in the Crown to keep him blind *shrugh*

You know what we are? Or might eventually become? WoW's equivalent of Diablo's Nephalem.

You could argue the special, borrowed powers we had when fighting the Jailer was all the Covenant/Soulbind stuff, combined with the various Shadowlands gear and other stuff we got from that realm to help boost us up to another level.

[Dracullus]

Great question, let's see how the next couple of weeks will go!

There were already few encrypted builds for 9.2.5. No way PTR will start in 6 weeks and no way PTR would be shorter than 6 weeks.

[Marlamin]

An easy way to miss more than a few clues, however. Second hand reports are never as accurate as first hand observations.

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Looks like right now it's just for typoing version numbers. Which is weirding me out, because i wouldn't expect those to be handwritten to begin with...

Actually don't think it's a typo. I remembered that they use 99.0 and 99.1 in some stuff so they might just be doing the same for that.

[DiscipleofCazicThule]

Ages ago, Magic: the Gathering had this event where an evil plane, Pyrexia, attacked other planes. This caused tons of other factions to fight for their lives, and eventually, ending up fighting together. At one point, an army was being overwhelmed by the evil machine monsters when the undead rose and fought alongside the living.

I'm told that in Warhammer: End Times, the undead, destruction, and order factions (or what remained) ended up fighting alongside each other to stop the forces of Chaos. Granted, in this case, the combined armies failed.

I guess what I'm getting at is that it's a fairly common fantasy trope and I can see that being the story down the line, where the six are united against the..."Yuuzhan Vong" or "Archaon" of Warcraft but I'm really hoping we come back down to Earth..er...Azeroth for a little bit before we do that.

[AOL Instant Messenger]

I think we still have some of it, just not in the greater overarching plots. Drustvar had a really solid and engaging (if campy) plot where it took us on an odyssey across the zone until we finally learned that one of the people we were trying to save was the mastermind behind the whole disaster, all ending in a solid dungeon.

Drustvar, Revendreth, most of Zuldazar and Mechagon were easily some of the most solid plots Blizzard has done in a while. They actually had an underlying scheme and evil plan which we could gradually unravel and a nice, consistent set of events that went into their quests and foreshadowing. The main plot as a whole has been a huge burden on Blizzard since BfA, when they started having to pivot more from their zone development to focus more on the overarching plot. Legion did this very excellently—several zones were initially totally divorced from the main plot and gave us an interesting storyline that could operate well enough without being bogged down by the Legion's presence. They eventually came together when it was necessary and proper to face the Legion, and since this was an interesting plot with a lot of room to operate with, there could be an interesting conclusion on Argus where we finally got to resolve a very long-running plot.

Shadowlands does roughly the same with the zones in terms of them having their own interesting plots, but Sylvanas' plot is generally so disinteresting and all-encompassing it drags them all down. Most of the individual zone plots are very good and interesting on their own, but the schemes are too predictable and the themes not varied enough in terms of the story. Despite how disparate the zones are, they are generally all connected to the most disinteresting story Blizzard has concocted in a good while. It's simply bland and superfluous.

Cataclysm, despite having one of the most banal main storylines in memory, had an extremely good set of zones to back it up and a huge number of disparate plots. They did tie into the main theme of "Big Evil Dragon destroys things" fairly well, but they also had a huge number of independent and interesting plots which each carried their own weight. This is probably part of why Cataclysm is considered to have some of the best zone storylines, yet easily one of the worst main plots.

Meanwhile, Shadowlands is just a theme park where we continuously chase Sylvanas. We get a little bit of interesting philosophical questions in Bastion (even though the ultimate conclusion and the majority of the plot is mind-numbingly boring and just makes the Kyrian look extraordinarily unintelligent) and an excellent villain in Denathrius, most of the plots outside of Revendreth were just "hey, here's a bunch of morons getting tricked by the transparently-evil minions of the Jailer. Have fun cleaning up after these extraordinarily stupid people and their bad decisions". It's all to do with the Jailer and his mind-numbingly banal minions as we march through a sequence of set pieces and see the same general plot repeated a few times with a slightly different coat of paint.

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I expect to be proven right about a great many things I predicted on April 19.

What are your predictions, anyway? You seem to bog them down with single-topic ramblings that don't really matter to the topic at hand.

[Atriel]

Pelagos' story is not over.

The Golden One claims a vacant throne. The crown of Light will bring only Darkness.

Pelagos is likely to become a villain and we'll go back to Shadowlands eventually to put him down like his predecessor.

The Golden One could also refer to Calia taking the throne of Lordaeron for the new leader of the Forsaken. The throne is vacant at the moment.

I really doubt that Pelagos' character likely was not even thought of when they made all of the whisper lines. Not saying they couldn't retcon that, sure. But Pelagos is definitely grasping at straws when there are other characters that fit the bill more.

[AOL Instant Messenger]

The Golden One could also refer to Calia taking the throne of Lordaeron for the new leader of the Forsaken. The throne is vacant at the moment.

I really doubt that Pelagos' character likely was not even thought of when they made all of the whisper lines. Not saying they couldn't retcon that, sure. But Pelagos is definitely grasping at straws when there are other characters that fit the bill more.

I'm just keeping Occam's Razor at hand and saying it's Turalyon. It could go another way, but I feel like it would be a "shocking swerve" to make it someone else. Then again, Blizzard isn't known for sticking with the predictable but interesting plot and will instead swerve us over to the most boring and banal plotlines possible solely to "surprise" us—but, usually, the plots will end up far more predictable than we think, and no one is surprised. A surprise is interesting and worthwhile, and tends to get a reaction. Pulling something unexpected out of your ass isn't a surprise or twist, it's just a thing. It's like a pivot in a conversation.

[Alanar]

*facepalm*

Xavius? Barely a pawn... you can't tell me he's the Big Bad of the Life cosmic force.
N'zoth, Azshara and the Black Empire have nothing to do with the Dream, so i don't know why you even bring them up.

The face palm is on you big man.

Anyway that applies to this as well.

The charm is kinda gone, just like the black empire for example.. we have been there and going there a second time is just not as exciting.

It's flying over your head, but this has been said like 3 times already.

Yes ofc they can create 6 new areas in the ED out of thin air and come up with another pantheon, but this time it's LIFE.. so with that in mind, I ask you again, do you really think that is such a good idea and not try to do some worldbuilding first?

[AOL Instant Messenger]

The face palm is on you big man.

I wonder what the guy who is responsible for the Emerald Nightmare or the ruler of a race highly interconnected with it might have to do with the Emerald Dream.

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This has been said like 3 times already... you still question what the black empire or Nazjatar has to do with it? this is what happends when reading is hard.

What about the Drust? Thros apparently connects to the Emerald Nightmare somehow. Gorak Tul could become a new Nightmare Lord—that's actually part of a concept I had for an old pre-Shadowlands concept for a Shadowlands expansion.

[Fahrad Wagner]

I expect to be proven right about a great many things I predicted on April 19.

How will you feel though dear, when the focus of the next expansion is confirmed to NOT be the Void?