Midnight 12.X Patches & World Soul Saga Speculation Thread

[Raetary]

Why can't a fantasy race from a race-war heavy franchise be a bit racist?

It's less that a fantasy race is racist, but that Blizzard doesn't want to get accused of being racist themselves, by adding an element of bigotry to a new tribal race they added.
(Even though that bigotry is already part of their whole concept, since its literally just a deeply isolationist off-shoot of proto-nelves who's who where notoriously supremacist, but that detail is lost to them apparently)

It's a mix of Blizzard wanting to pander to the most common denominator, being your average liberal consumer, but also wanting their image to look as progressive as possible, so they sanitize their worldbuilding and minimize all the elements that could be framed as problematic.

Which is why i always find it a bit funny when people here ask for the writers to get fired and replaced, as if a new set of writers is suddenly going to change company policy.

It doesn't really matter how good an individual or group of writers is, you can't really have a cohesive and satisfyingly written world in the long term, in an environment that's obsessed with corporate identity and the bottom line.
Those writers will inevitably get either laid-off, bullied out, or be overworked and underpaid and simply lose much of their interest, if they had any at all.

It's just capitalism siphoning passion out of a creative project for the sake of marketability.

[Cheezits]

I don't think WoW is better or worse without the racism, but it's definitely less interesting. And no, less interesting doesn't mean objectively worse IMO. Undermine was great, even if it wasn't up to old wow standards of how races interact.

It's just a different kind of story, now, because it can't exist otherwise. It's this or nothing.

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It's just capitalism siphoning passion out of a creative project for the sake of marketability.

It's 99% that but I do think 1% is people changing out of certain ideas over time- see Metzen being embarassed by the Alex/Ysera designs. I don't think he was lying.

[Viridiel]

I'm pretty keen to see how Tyr ties into everything. He still hasn't shown up to speak to the Silver Hand despite their order being based on him, and he's such an obvious connection between the Light and the Last Titan.

[Cheezits]

I'm pretty keen to see how Tyr ties into everything. He still hasn't shown up to speak to the Silver Hand despite their order being based on him, and he's such an obvious connection between the Light and the Last Titan.

I'm thinking 11.2 if it is Lordaeron, as there may be a connection between Tyr's involvement in the Lordaeron area (beyond where he died) and his connection to the Light. Like the First Flame, if it's a real thing.

Like there's this big source of Light under the area and it's why Tyr and later the humans took such a shining to it.

[KOREAN DAVE]

I don't think WoW is better or worse without the racism, but it's definitely less interesting. And no, less interesting doesn't mean objectively worse IMO. Undermine was great, even if it wasn't up to old wow standards of how races interact.

It's just a different kind of story, now, because it can't exist otherwise. It's this or nothing.

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It's 99% that but I do think 1% is people changing out of certain ideas over time- see Metzen being embarassed by the Alex/Ysera designs. I don't think he was lying.

Friction inherently makes a setting more interesting and believable. It’s hard to care about different neon colored cosmic armies being the bad guys in comparison.

[Reive]

funny how people went from "midnight will be the new legion" to... this lol. blizzard should really consider delaying the expansion

[Vakir]

funny how people went from "midnight will be the new legion" to... this lol. blizzard should really consider delaying the expansion

No delay is going to fix any of what we're talking about. Minus maybe QA related stuff that comes up in other situations. And wouldn't you know it, every AAA company is sodomizing their QA department.

Also, the hype and de-hype cycles of WoW are eternal. Including good expansions. Hell, including Legion.

[Reive]

It's less that a fantasy race is racist, but that Blizzard doesn't want to get accused of being racist themselves, by adding an element of bigotry to a new tribal race they added.
(Even though that bigotry is already part of their whole concept, since its literally just a deeply isolationist off-shoot of proto-nelves who's who where notoriously supremacist, but that detail is lost to them apparently)

It's a mix of Blizzard wanting to pander to the most common denominator, being your average liberal consumer, but also wanting their image to look as progressive as possible, so they sanitize their worldbuilding and minimize all the elements that could be framed as problematic.

Which is why i always find it a bit funny when people here ask for the writers to get fired and replaced, as if a new set of writers is suddenly going to change company policy.

It doesn't really matter how good an individual or group of writers is, you can't really have a cohesive and satisfyingly written world in the long term, in an environment that's obsessed with corporate identity and the bottom line.
Those writers will inevitably get either laid-off, bullied out, or be overworked and underpaid and simply lose much of their interest, if they had any at all.

It's just capitalism siphoning passion out of a creative project for the sake of marketability.

nah the writers are just bad. you can tell it from the quality of the dialogues or from their inability to make anything feel epic

[Cheezits]

funny how people went from "midnight will be the new legion" to... this lol. blizzard should really consider delaying the expansion

Arator being a generic MC is not only never going to be changed but it also doesn't kill the expansion. He and Turalyon may be the biggest issues I've seen so far and a lot of the Turalyon stuff just got recontextualized today to make a hell of a lot more sense.

[Reive]

No delay is going to fix any of what we're talking about. Minus maybe QA related stuff that comes up in other situations. And wouldn't you know it, every AAA company is sodomizing their QA department.

Also, the hype and de-hype cycles of WoW are eternal. Including good expansions. Hell, including Legion.

maybe they can't fix the story, but they can definitely fix the gameplay. atm midnight is bad on both fronts

[Vakir]

nah the writers are just bad. you can tell it from the quality of the dialogues or from their inability to make anything feel epic

Both can be true.

...also "make anything feel epic" is subjective and also dumb and intellectually bankrupt.

It's like Metzen's stupid "Geek Is" bit, being lazy pandering and commodification of imagination when they had absolutely nothing to announce. "Epic" is just a word. You need to be able to explain why something isn't working, and the two sentence responses you're giving are to people actually putting in the effort of doing that.

maybe they can't fix the story, but they can definitely fix the gameplay. atm midnight is bad on both fronts

Hard disagree on the gameplay end. The gameplay loop is about where it always has been and a good number of reworks are a blast.

Some are absolute dogwater, of course, like Fire or a number of healing specs.

As far as bugs and QA, well, see my quote.

[Viridiel]

I'm thinking 11.2 if it is Lordaeron, as there may be a connection between Tyr's involvement in the Lordaeron area (beyond where he died) and his connection to the Light. Like the First Flame, if it's a real thing.

Like there's this big source of Light under the area and it's why Tyr and later the humans took such a shining to it.

I was under the impression that Tyr was on his way to Uldaman and just happened to be in Lordaeron when Zakazj and Kith'ix caught up to him, and subsequently the reason the vrykul/humans found the area to be holy was because of Tyr's hand being left behind there. I'm sure that could always be retconned, though. The riddle in the First Flame story definitely could be interpreted to refer to the easternmost part of Lordaeron (i.e., where the sun sets "into" the Maelstrom).

Speaking of Tyr's fall, though, the fact that Kith'ix was involved and is now ostensibly buried under Atal'Utek definitely makes me suspect there could be a cohesive link there. I wonder there's actually a subversion of expectations and the trolls have corrupted Kith'ix's body rather than the other way around.

[Reive]

Both can be true.

...also "make anything feel epic" is subjective and also dumb and intellectually bankrupt.

It's like Metzen's stupid "Geek Is" bit, being lazy pandering and commodification of imagination when they had absolutely nothing to announce. "Epic" is just a word. You need to be able to explain why something isn't working, and the two sentence responses you're giving are to people actually putting in the effort of doing that.

how subjective can it be when the general consensus is that the story sucks?

Hard disagree on the gameplay end. The gameplay loop is about where it always has been and a good number of reworks are a blast.

Some are absolute dogwater, of course, like Fire or a number of healing specs.

As far as bugs and QA, well, see my quote.

other wow platforms are on fire because blizzard is removing addons without implementing a proper replacement.

edit: class design is also a big deal. blizzard is pruning specs in the worst way possible. instead of getting rid of all those modifiers and passives they're reducing the number of abilities while leaving those untouched

[Vakir]

how subjective can it be when the general consensus is that the story sucks?

That's not what I mean. Nobody is satisfied with it, but the idea and understanding of it being subjective is analyzing what makes a story work or not work.

My point is that two sentence all lowercase posts gives you all the robustness of a head of lettuce.

other wow platforms are on fire because blizzard is removing addons without implementing a proper replacement.

Other WoW platforms are perpetually on fire and these are people freaking out about addons that haven't actually been removed, their continued updating was ceased out of being reactive by their creators and not Blizzard, and they're judging UI elements that we know already technically exist but aren't implemented yet.

There's plenty of stuff that needs to be tweaked, like coloring nameplates for clarity that are being opposed with stuff like Ion saying it "invalidates instance knowledge," but it's massively exaggerated.

This is what I'm talking about with the takes being devoid of nuance.

[Limayria]

A lot of modern audiences for whatever reason see any negative characteristics or social failings as reflective of something encouraged by the creators, even if any fiction, not just fantasy, needs characters and groups and entire societies that have flaws or even complicated belief systems.

This extends even to shows for children where friendship and hugs are the solution. No, the fascism of the Diamond Authority is not an endorsement of fascism, but try telling that to some very angry teenagers to 20-somethings a while ago.

tbf the SU criticism is more on steven instantly forgiving the diamonds and them making no actual effort to atone for their crimes to earn that redemption which happens over like... 4 episodes? or something


anyway I just saw theres nethermancers assisting the Ethreals in the murder row tmog spot!!

[extasy]

how subjective can it be when the general consensus is that the story sucks?



other wow platforms are on fire because blizzard is removing addons without implementing a proper replacement.

edit: class design is also a big deal. blizzard is pruning specs in the worst way possible. instead of getting rid of all those modifiers and passives they're reducing the number of abilities while leaving those untouched

Yes they are, well for me atleast.

[Super Dickmann]

Arator being a generic MC is not only never going to be changed but it also doesn't kill the expansion. He and Turalyon may be the biggest issues I've seen so far and a lot of the Turalyon stuff just got recontextualized today to make a hell of a lot more sense.

The reaction to Turalyon and the Vanguard vs blood elf content has been pretty telling. We are now four and a half expansions deep of a cast and plot whereby everyone who we’re meant to like does nothing except be nice to each other and exist in vegetative peace, with every issue easily resolved or earning a finger wag. Turalyon has in that landscape been more of the same - despite being a 1000-year old veteran who got his start in the franchise in an existential war against demonic orcs he lets a demon kill his archangel, lets demons into the Alliance, immediately becomes tolerant of zombies and takes no aggressive action and stands on no principle. On a personal level, a blueberry mummy steals his wife to no complaint. He is plainly, self-evidently written as a wet blanket without taking into account Tides of Darkness or even beyond he dark portal.

In midnight though Turalyon does have beliefs. He is militant as you might expect and has trouble settling into society. He is strongly aligned with the Light (phrasing chosen deliberately as the expression of actual faith is shoddy as hell) and his allegiance is strong enough to result in conflict. He doesn’t become a straw man mind. He doesn’t go off on a killing spree or have the narrative laboriously split him from his family but still allows him and them to love each other. See also Alleria’s poor life choices.

And the reaction to this is the immediate assumption that he’ll begin eating babies and die a villain, as friction has been so sanded off the franchise that surely groups with contradictory beliefs and attitudes can’t possibly both be allowed to the player. People cling to his godawful non-characterization from Legion up to now as a lifeboat, when it, the Vanguard and the elves not getting along are about as far as the writers have dared to go in a decade and, some horrid framing aside (“the radiation made me do it” which in the stay awhile Turalyon rejects as an explanation), it’s handled decently well. This used to be the default.

[Limayria]

I just did the side quest about the corrupt magister kidnapping people in silvermoon and I was on the verge of tears at the ending ( I'm still doing all the side quest before starting the main quest but so far the quest writing has been really good?

[Merryck]

I just did the side quest about the corrupt magister kidnapping people in silvermoon and I was on the verge of tears at the ending ( I'm still doing all the side quest before starting the main quest but so far the quest writing has been really good?

Sure, there's always side quests with good writing. It all falls apart in the main quest.

[Schwert]

I will never understand - nor care to - the people who picked up a fantasy war game based on an RTS with warring factions and groups and complain about the fantasy racism in it.

This game was not for them, but people showed up, cried for years, and now we're playing some weird DnD campaign with Warcraft skins.

But, people can't separate fiction from reality and demand these games go cozy.
It's exhausting.