Midnight 12.X Patches & World Soul Saga Speculation Thread

[Wangming]

I don't get why y'all trying to give Xal character depth that she doesn't have.

Also why does an alien creature need a human motivation? For creatures of the Void, doing as the Void should be automatic.

Finally someone with a functional brain. What are you doing in this thread?

[Ersula]

I don't get why y'all trying to give Xal character depth that she doesn't have.

Also why does an alien creature need a human motivation? For creatures of the Void, doing as the Void should be automatic.

Not a human motive, but a mortal one. She now know she was once a normal person. We're assuming her goal is to become like Dimensius but we don't know what her goals are yet.

[Cheezits]

I don't get why y'all trying to give Xal character depth that she doesn't have.

Also why does an alien creature need a human motivation? For creatures of the Void, doing as the Void should be automatic.

Incorrect, per the 11.2 campaign. She was a mortal.

Also most "alien characters" including Zovaal and Denathrius have their own motivations, also the Titans, etc. Dimensius is typical void eater monster, Xal is not.

[Joshuaj]

Incorrect, per the 11.2 campaign. She was a mortal.

Also most "alien characters" including Zovaal and Denathrius have their own motivations, also the Titans, etc. Dimensius is typical void eater monster, Xal is not.

She ain't naturally a creature of the Void, sure, but aliens can be mortals lmao. Alien usually equates to someone that's a foreigner of any kind, but it's most attributed in fiction to any foreigner off world.

[Wangming]

Also most "alien characters" including Zovaal and Denathrius have their own motivations

It wasn't a particularly good idea with them, either.

[Joshuaj]

Also, Dimensius has his own motives. His motives are just very chaotic compared to guys like Zovaal and Sargeras.

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Heck, I literally made mention of this a couple pages back.

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It wasn't a particularly good idea with them, either.

If only because their execution sucked narratively.

[Cheezits]

Also, Dimensius has his own motives.

Are the motives in the room with us? Because I think they are replacing Dimensius with Xal BECAUSE he didn't have any motivation besides eating everything.

[Raetary]

Dimensius destroyed Xals homeworld, so she probably was mortal at some point.

As she herself repeatedly stated, Survival of the fittest is her entire stick.
Gobbling up Dimensius and then heading towards Azeroth to gobble up the Worldsoul is very much inline with that mantra, i don't see what other motivation she really needs.

[AOL Instant Messenger]

The main issue with expecting Blizzard to competently represent alien cognition is that good writing is a prerequisite for that expectation. While I'd like if creatures from the Void were more alien (I detest the stupid council cinematic where all the old gods were sitting around as gigantic zits in a room together monologuing at a generic voidwraith model), that would also require the Void's characterization as a force to be far tighter—there's room, as I've gone on about before at length about in the past. Beings with purely gradient cognition with no absolutes or concept of truth would be interesting, as could beings wholly defined by perpetual evolution and conflict (which they've already done with the Primal Zerg in Starcraft II), but Blizzard has thus far entirely failed to or simply been disinterested in portraying anything from the Void according to the Void's established qualities.

[Joshuaj]

Are the motives in the room with us? Because I think they are replacing Dimensius with Xal BECAUSE he didn't have any motivation besides eating everything.

His motive is to claim the universe for the Void, especially VIA claiming the Worldsouls and feasting upon their essence. He is the literal representation of the heat death of the universe, and is chaotic by nature. He's akin to an Outer God in that sense. Xal has a more understandable motive to us, as she started out as a mortal and has been around mortals for eons. Meaning, she has a personality and vibe we can someone get.

[Foreign Exchange Ztudent]

I don't think providing characterization here is an impossible task. Again, we get that her motivations don't matter because she will die before she lay claim to it in a Ark of Covenant way or she gets defeated by us. But, its' a bit lame to repeat this cycle again and again.

[Wangming]

Dimensius destroyed Xals homeworld, so she probably was mortal at some point.

No matter what people were, if you spend thousands of years being something else, your morals and personality is bound to chance.
I mean, I have a totally different personality from ten years ago. Now imagine the change 100,000 years can cause.

[Joshuaj]

Dimensius and the other Void Lords are a bit different than Zovaal, Sargeras, Elune, etc because, unlike the Void Lords, the gods I mentioned are also inherently connected with mortals in some way, or have some compassion or humane ordeal to them. Prior to becoming the Jailer, Zovaal used to be the Arbiter and judged the mortal souls of the universe. Prior to becoming the God of Fel and Flame, Sargeras used to be the defender of the Titans order, and likely aided in preserving mortal life. And Elune? Well, she has connections to other forces, and even worldsouls like Azeroth. Heck, the Night Elves are her favored children, which means her connections and motives are far more humane or understandable than those of an unknowable horror of the Void like Dimensius.

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Sure, Dimensius made Xal his herald, but note he seemingly only did that as both a warning to her, and because it benefitted him. Heck, the only mortal "allies" he had outside of her were seemingly some of the Ethereals, and that's simply because he needed easy access to the Physical Universe (which is why he made Xal'atath his harbinger).

[Wangming]

The main issue with expecting Blizzard to competently represent alien cognition is that good writing is a prerequisite for that expectation. While I'd like if creatures from the Void were more alien (I detest the stupid council cinematic where all the old gods were sitting around as gigantic zits in a room together monologuing at a generic voidwraith model), that would also require the Void's characterization as a force to be far tighter—there's room, as I've gone on about before at length about in the past. Beings with purely gradient cognition with no absolutes or concept of truth would be interesting, as could beings wholly defined by perpetual evolution and conflict (which they've already done with the Primal Zerg in Starcraft II), but Blizzard has thus far entirely failed to or simply been disinterested in portraying anything from the Void according to the Void's established qualities.

As shit as his writing became over time and tiresome his constant rebirth was, in the early days I think Bioware did this well with the Sith Emperor, Vitiate. When confronted by the Hero about how his plan (consume all life in the galaxy to achieve true immortality) makes no sense as he will have no subjects to rule, he just shrugged it off saying that other galaxies exist. And that with immortality he has time to wait for life to evolve again. I think this is the closest we can get to inhuman logic. The other way to go about it is to just....not talk about their motivation and leave them as true unknowable Eldritch beings that may have a goal and motivation, but it is not discussed.

[Nymrohd]

No matter what people were, if you spend thousands of years being something else, your morals and personality is bound to chance.
I mean, I have a totally different personality from ten years ago. Now imagine the change 100,000 years can cause.

In a good story that can support nuance (so not an MMO) I'd say you could perhaps use that original concept as a foil to the character now, where they are convinced they are holding to their original motives only to be confronted with the reality that they have long bent from them. But this is not the medium to do this and make it successful.

[Wangming]

In a good story that can support nuance (so not an MMO) I'd say you could perhaps use that original concept as a foil to the character now, where they are convinced they are holding to their original motives only to be confronted with the reality that they have long bent from them. But this is not the medium to do this and make it successful.

Not to sound like a meme, but have you played Shadowbringers? In it there is a villain who very much does what you are saying, and it is played for absoolute drama. If you'd like to do more, send me a message. I don't want to just send a blacked out wall of text.

[Joshuaj]

The main issue with expecting Blizzard to competently represent alien cognition is that good writing is a prerequisite for that expectation. While I'd like if creatures from the Void were more alien (I detest the stupid council cinematic where all the old gods were sitting around as gigantic zits in a room together monologuing at a generic voidwraith model), that would also require the Void's characterization as a force to be far tighter—there's room, as I've gone on about before at length about in the past. Beings with purely gradient cognition with no absolutes or concept of truth would be interesting, as could beings wholly defined by perpetual evolution and conflict (which they've already done with the Primal Zerg in Starcraft II), but Blizzard has thus far entirely failed to or simply been disinterested in portraying anything from the Void according to the Void's established qualities.

...All you did was essentially pull a Fairly Odd Parents by making "Anti-Titans". Like yeah, the concept is neat and all, but your argument kinda falls apart when you don't even give your own Void Lord ideas their own identities.

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Like, do they HAVE to be linked to the Titans in any way? Ffs, Order and Shadow aren't even counterparts, Order and Disorder are.

[Nymrohd]

Not to sound like a meme, but have you played Shadowbringers? In it there is a villain who very much does what you are saying, and it is played for absoolute drama. If you'd like to do more, send me a message. I don't want to just send a blacked out wall of text.

And the difference is that FF plays like a CRPG with MMO elements. WoW is MMO first.

[Wangming]

And the difference is that FF plays like a CRPG with MMO elements. WoW is MMO first.

Which is funny because Yoshi-P explictly mentioned that it was Cataclysm/MoP era WoW that he looked at for inspiration of what a successful MMO looks like.

I'm also using kinda what you are saying in my novel. Well, used. It was written and published. Currently working on the English translation. About 50 manuscript pages left. Once that is done, time for publisher hunting.

[COBRAstriker]

Damn, WoW is getting completely picked apart on various social media platforms right now. Millions of views total and tens of thousands of likes
So much damage is being done to the game because of the way they chose to portray it, with no real benefit. All these hundreds of thousands of people, perhaps even more, now making fun of it are lost customers, with nobody to replace them
I will never understand why they chose to sabotage WoW's image in this way

But, perhaps this outrage will be a wake up call. This writing team needs to be purged