The War Within 11.X Patches & World Soul Saga Speculation Thread

[SilverLion]

This is something that I really have been feeling a lot lately but haven't been able to articulate myself. There were some interviews about how they are expanding QT for Midnight's rework and one of the quotes went something like, "were expanding out the zones so that they fit a full expansion story, but also so we have space to add in smaller stories that explore the culture of the places we're adventuring in." And like I get that its a nice sentiment and its good that we don't focus 100% only on old stuff in new zones. But I do really think its emblematic of an overall issue of Blizz's worldbuilding/storytelling. They are so laser focused on making each zone its own little warcraft style take on a real world culture they completely lose any semblance of integrating those peoples into the greater world as a whole (or even just beyond there one zone). Its something I thought Vanilla did very well, probably on accident just as a by product of the 1-60 experience being the bulk of the game, but still. And MoP also did really well for Pandaria. Blizz should really try and put more emphasis on how the different settings and events they create in a zone have impact beyond the 2 hour leveling campaign. Like in MoP the Sha impact everywhere, which means the mantid are affected, which starts theyre cycle early, which impacts all the zones along the wall, and then beyond. Then there's mogu everywhere, and turns out theyve allied with the Zandalari, and also the faction war leading up to the horde rebellion is touched on in most zones and every patch.

In DF its like, well each zone has its own thing. Most won't impact anything in the future or even in the zone next door. Like taking back Aberrus should have had a direct link to taking back Obsidian Citadel since its supposed to be connected. Amirdrassil really should have been a zone before 10.2. Feels very weird that Fyrakk just decides to attack it basically out of nowhere. That wouldve also really helped give it the gravitas of being the finale of the xpac. If it'd been a place we'd already quested in and had recently bloomed into Azeroth proper it wouldve felt way more gratifying imo than as a pretty standard patch zone. Like imagine if Ohn'aran planes on launch had half the zone be in the emerald dream protecting it from a primalist assault. Then either at the end of the zone or as a patch questline it blooms into the zone proper with more quests establishing Bel'ameth, only THEN is it attacked by fully unhinged Fyrakk and becomes the center piece of the final patch raid.

They just need to put more effort into making stuff feel interconnected. If not with the existing world and its races we already know, at least with the world created specifically for that expansion.

I'm usually very critical of how people word criticism on here because it's usually pretty garbage 9/10 times, but this is really good. I agree with some of it. World building is something that for me, peaked in Pandaria. I was hyped for WoD until the Draenei got absolutely shafted after Shadowmoon, and we learned practically nothing about them. Legion had terrible world building except Suramar which was amazing, and BFA had very good world building for the Zandalari and middling for Kul Tiras. Then Shadowlands was just a disaster. What strikes me so well with Zandalar and Kul Tiras is that both cultures feel distinct on Azeroth. Zandalar gives that glorious Continental African SuperKingdom vibes and Kul Tiras' take on Druidism and Shaman is incredibly refreshing.

Dragonflight kinda loses a lot of this. Ohnaran plains has a bit, the Maruuk are cool and all, same with the Tuskaar of Azure Span, but imo it's not enough. It also doesn't feel like, as you pointed out, connected. They feel like separate landmasses, not just different regions.

[Nymrohd]

Damn ok the new remix changes rock. I'm now sad I spend Bronze on my "Remix main" for cosmetics since I can buy it all with alts but what can you do.

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and BFA had very good world building for the Zandalari and middling for Kul Tiras. Then Shadowlands was just a disaster. What strikes me so well with Zandalar and Kul Tiras is that both cultures feel distinct on Azeroth. Zandalar gives that glorious Continental African SuperKingdom vibes and Kul Tiras' take on Druidism and Shaman is incredibly refreshing.

I think the world building in Zandalar in particular was middling. It failed to capitalize on existing lore and tie the island better to the rest of Azeroth. Meanwhile Kul Tiras did a better job at this though imo it should have explored the Drust link to the Vrykul better.

[SilverLion]

Damn ok the new remix changes rock. I'm now sad I spend Bronze on my "Remix main" for cosmetics since I can buy it all with alts but what can you do.

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I think the world building in Zandalar in particular was middling. It failed to capitalize on existing lore and tie the island better to the rest of Azeroth. Meanwhile Kul Tiras did a better job at this though imo it should have explored the Drust link to the Vrykul better.

Fair. I don't really agree but I despised the old Zandalari lore. I also didn't give a shit about the Drust because I'm sick of Vrykul. Different strokes.

[Nymrohd]

Fair. I don't really agree but I despised the old Zandalari lore. I also didn't give a shit about the Drust because I'm sick of Vrykul. Different strokes.

About how they handled Zandalar;

I think they should have just used Hakkar. Nazmir' blood trolls are former Hakkar worshippers, we find out how Hakkar's plague shaped the history of Zandalar and yet for some reason we get an entirely new villain . . . who has identical themes to Hakkar (blood and disease). Like, make Hakkar a loa that the keepers experimented on with Old God blood like that boss in Uldir and everything else works. Also changing Zul from a proud nationalist to a pawn for a slug was just horrid. Finally I think they should have done a better job representing the rest of the troll subraces (why was there not a snowy subzone at the top of Mt Mugamba with Tal'Drak? ) Any of these changes would have linked Zandalar so much better to the troll lore we already had while keeping its own themes.

To tie this in with TWW, I am probably the only one but I am extremely annoyed that they used Nerubians instead of using Qiraji. Of the three Aqir civilizations we know almost nothing about the Qiraji. We have a ton of world building on the Mantid and while world building on the Nerubian was limited (still much better than the Qiraji), they could always have kept them for Azjol Nerub.
Meanwhile the only Qiraji we have interacted with are those trapped in Ahn Qiraj and all we know about them is some descriptions from the raids. They even failed to use them properly in Uldum. Given that the majority of the civilizations of the other Aqir were NOT trapped with their Old God, having the Qiraji survive largely intact in their underground kingdom would have made so much sense and would tie Khaz Algar to the Southern Kalimdor better.

[allegrian]

What expansion story was changed because of Twitter?

The only thing I can think o is that single Alex quest which was small beans and complained about every where.

They put bwomsandi in shadowlands for being popular in bfa, they saved denathrius for the same reason. They backtracked from wanting to kill malfurion for ysera permanently in DF and they added the tyrande speech about going back to kalimdor because of twitter whining about night elves leaving their sacred lands.

And that's only the things we know, many more changes could have happenned internally.

[Makabreska]

They put bwomsandi in shadowlands for being popular in bfa, they saved denathrius for the same reason. They backtracked from wanting to kill malfurion for ysera permanently in DF and they added the tyrande speech about going back to kalimdor because of twitter whining about night elves leaving their sacred lands.

And that's only the things we know, many more changes could have happenned internally.

Ummm, I'm fairly sure that giving new and well received characters more screen-time is NOT something negative, and that was the entire point of that guy posts. "Lul Blizz is caving in and adjusting story cuz Twitter-crowd". Were any of these changes even caused explicitly by peeps on Twitter?

[allegrian]

Ummm, I'm fairly sure that giving new and well received characters more screen-time is NOT something negative, and that was the entire point of that guy posts. "Lul Blizz is caving in and adjusting story cuz Twitter-crowd". Were any of these changes even caused explicitly by peeps on Twitter?

Twitter, forums, whatever. Twitter itself is not important in this discussion, just a way to say social networks in general.

[SilverLion]

About how they handled Zandalar;

I think they should have just used Hakkar. Nazmir' blood trolls are former Hakkar worshippers, we find out how Hakkar's plague shaped the history of Zandalar and yet for some reason we get an entirely new villain . . . who has identical themes to Hakkar (blood and disease). Like, make Hakkar a loa that the keepers experimented on with Old God blood like that boss in Uldir and everything else works. Also changing Zul from a proud nationalist to a pawn for a slug was just horrid. Finally I think they should have done a better job representing the rest of the troll subraces (why was there not a snowy subzone at the top of Mt Mugamba with Tal'Drak? ) Any of these changes would have linked Zandalar so much better to the troll lore we already had while keeping its own themes.

To tie this in with TWW, I am probably the only one but I am extremely annoyed that they used Nerubians instead of using Qiraji. Of the three Aqir civilizations we know almost nothing about the Qiraji. We have a ton of world building on the Mantid and while world building on the Nerubian was limited (still much better than the Qiraji), they could always have kept them for Azjol Nerub.
Meanwhile the only Qiraji we have interacted with are those trapped in Ahn Qiraj and all we know about them is some descriptions from the raids. They even failed to use them properly in Uldum. Given that the majority of the civilizations of the other Aqir were NOT trapped with their Old God, having the Qiraji survive largely intact in their underground kingdom would have made so much sense and would tie Khaz Algar to the Southern Kalimdor better.

Oh I'm not calling out your opinion at all. I despise Hakkar, I despise a lot of the old Troll lore because it's just badly ripped off real voodoo. At the very least, the way Loa worked was way closer to Black Panther for a modern comparison, how the Wild Gods have Avatars that are distinct to a particular culture (Baast vs. Man-Ape). I don't think anyone who likes Hakkar is wrong at all, I just personally want him as far away from the story as possible. He's boring, he's unoriginal. G'huun wasn't particularly interesting, but I'd rather have a nobody as the big bad for the questing campaign than a villain who's a walking trope imo just to tie into old lore.

[Lorgar Aurelian]

They put bwomsandi in shadowlands for being popular in bfa, they saved denathrius for the same reason. They backtracked from wanting to kill malfurion for ysera permanently in DF and they added the tyrande speech about going back to kalimdor because of twitter whining about night elves leaving their sacred lands.

And that's only the things we know, many more changes could have happenned internally.

Bwom and denathrius id say is just generally listening to fans and not a twitter thing, I don't think the Malf Ysera thing was ever implied to be permanent but people did make a fuss about it either way and every thing about Tyranda and the tree was encrypted so that's no real reason to think any thing there changed.

[Raetary]

They put bwomsandi in shadowlands for being popular in bfa, they saved denathrius for the same reason. They backtracked from wanting to kill malfurion for ysera permanently in DF and they added the tyrande speech about going back to kalimdor because of twitter whining about night elves leaving their sacred lands.

And that's only the things we know, many more changes could have happenned internally.

None of those things have anything to do with the "twitter crowd", but with Blizzard responding to the general player reception.

The community liked Daddy D and Bwon, so instead of ingoring/gutting them, they stuck around.
The community reacted badly to the Nelven narrative direction, so they pivoted to save face as companies tend to do.

I find it hilarious that people single out wow twitter space as some giant pillar of influence, as if we didn't have the exact same arguments on here as over there.

We generally have the same discussions everywhere, the only thing that differentiates wows online spaces is how fast information gets around.
The resulting "discourse" is identical across the community.

[Ersula]

None of those things have anything to do with the "twitter crowd", but with Blizzard responding to the general player reception.

This. Bwonsamdi appears in shadowlands because people would have insisted on an explanation as to how the troll death god relates to the Shadowlands & Denathrius not dying at the end of the first raid has nothing to do with his reception because that plot development was obviously part of the same content tier & decided long before any players even saw Denathrius.

[Makabreska]

This. Bwonsamdi appears in shadowlands because people would have insisted on an explanation as to how the troll death god relates to the Shadowlands & Denathrius not dying at the end of the first raid has nothing to do with his reception because that plot development was obviously part of the same content tier & decided long before any players even saw Denathrius.

Dudewat? You said "this", then you contradicted him.

Both of these characters carried on mainly due to reception.

"Denathrius is voiced by Ray Chase. Blizzard originally planned for Denathrius to die at the end of Castle Nathria, but after being impressed by Chase's voice performance, they decided to keep the character alive so that he could potentially appear again in future storylines."

"Blizzard always planned to include Bwonsamdi in Shadowlands but didn't originally have a big plan for him. His role in the expansion was expanded after the developers saw the positive fan reaction to the character in Battle for Azeroth".

Not sure how you keep being wrong on stuff that is easily Googled.

[Makorus]

Dudewat? You said "this", then you contradicted him.

Both of these characters carried on mainly due to reception.

"Denathrius is voiced by Ray Chase. Blizzard originally planned for Denathrius to die at the end of Castle Nathria, but after being impressed by Chase's voice performance, they decided to keep the character alive so that he could potentially appear again in future storylines."

"Blizzard always planned to include Bwonsamdi in Shadowlands but didn't originally have a big plan for him. His role in the expansion was expanded after the developers saw the positive fan reaction to the character in Battle for Azeroth".

Not sure how you keep being wrong on stuff that is easily Googled.

Both of the quotes literally said that it has nothing to do with fan feedback? Did you even read the whole quotes before you posted them?

[Khaza-R]

I think its pretty clear that as they were working on BfA they knew they wanted a death themed expansion after. But the Shadowlands as a concept weren't fully fleshed out at that point. So likely the Drust and Bwomsamdi were suppose to bridge us there but instead we got the unfortunately mess that was SL.

[Makabreska]

Both of the quotes literally said that it has nothing to do with fan feedback? Did you even read the whole quotes before you posted them?

???

Denathrius was saved due to positive feedback from Blizz AND the players, or did you miss the general praise he received in SL? They planned him to be killed in Nathria, but he wasn't. And Bwon role in SL got literally shaped and expanded by "positive fan reaction" from BfA. None of these were due to some prior "big lore plans" Ersula claimed to be.

So how about that reading comprehension?

[Ersula]

Dudewat? You said "this", then you contradicted him.

Both of these characters carried on mainly due to reception.

"Denathrius is voiced by Ray Chase. Blizzard originally planned for Denathrius to die at the end of Castle Nathria, but after being impressed by Chase's voice performance, they decided to keep the character alive so that he could potentially appear again in future storylines."

So nothing to do with player reception: The character stuck around because the devs liked the actor's performance. A decision made long before players first see Denathrius...like I said. Reading comprehension.

[Super Dickmann]

I think this tickles me the most. People insist that this is some modern "woke" pivot but it doesn't even reconcile with that. It's rooted in regressive bubble era bullshit where everyone is treated as identical and there was zero celebration of any cultural differences that the modern zeitgeist wants, whether they succeed with it or not.

Yes, 'woke' is more correct on this point. Say what you will about blood elf reparations to the Amani or people assmad that tauren don't get their due, but the worldview acknowledges the basic fact of different groups with competing, incompatible interest and the impact of preceding actions. There's a reason that the most politically left author in their stable, Roux, was also the last one to actually portray meaningful cultural distinction and conflict and remember the grievances of component races, while it's largely their older stable who're all out on pushing for world peace and homogenization. The only thing that goes against arguing that a more 'woke' mindset would do well for conflict in the game is that the racial revenge fantasies of the people involved tend to be against pushovers and also lean towards having a defined point of equilibrium, neither of which lend themselves to a narrative of permanent conflict between competing groups.

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I take two exceptions with that,..

I generally agree with the premise of both your points, though 'heaps of artistic value' is pushing it. Yes, Warcraft is massively Americanized in so far as the people writing it can conceive only of ideological wars of choice and understand neither resource wars, or ones of territory or ethnicity. Their constructivist view also bleeds into this, which is why their desired endpoint (and that of Starcraft, which manages to be worse even than the current mess) ultimately boil down to everyone assimilating the same values and no more conflict coming out of it. Boiling down conflict to pure good vs. pure evil, which is the only real end point if both groups are ontologically the same and only compete based on belief systems of which one is nakedly correct, is a handicap. This also hurts any anti-war message, which shouldn't be made in the franchise anyway, because casting war as being between good and evil caricatures defuses any real-life applicability.

[Vakir]

The only thing that goes against arguing that a more 'woke' mindset would do well for conflict in the game is that the racial revenge fantasies of the people involved tend to be against pushovers and also lean towards having a defined point of equilibrium, neither of which lend themselves to a narrative of permanent conflict between competing groups.

And even then, there's something to be said that I think even that would be received well if the method of them introducing it between Wrath and Cata-era wasn't so awkward and scorched Earth. Pun not intended. You don't even need to like characters that are opposition to conflict: just introduce the catalysts against it without suspending the audience belief over a cliff.

I don't hate the idea of war, Metzen! I didn't even hate the idea of your Moses boy having to begrudgingly crack skulls almost 20 years ago! I just don't trust y'all to do it right on the logical basis of the established setting.

Tense, cold war following a soft reboot after Worldsoul Saga let's gooooo

[Super Dickmann]

They put bwomsandi in shadowlands for being popular in bfa, they saved denathrius for the same reason. They backtracked from wanting to kill malfurion for ysera permanently in DF and they added the tyrande speech about going back to kalimdor because of twitter whining about night elves leaving their sacred lands.

And that's only the things we know, many more changes could have happenned internally.

These changes, and others, are good actually. A SL where Denathrius permadies in the first raid, a BFA which is just a straight worse Mists repeat sans the loyalist questline and a Mists which continues with its intended route of being a Thrall return tour would all be worse than what we actually got.Lines like how the Forsaken are there to 'tirelessly defend the living' are better off in the pits. In turn, DF would be better if it committed to Ysera's return and Malfurion's permanent vacation. The Alex quest was much better than those that ended up being kept and was the most stark portrayal of the Bronze's role made. These things are not points of principle - the lesson isn't 'let Blizzard decide', it's purely one of pushing which things are good and which things aren't and chancing that the loudest lobby group succeeds. For TWW, the next three expansions and beyond, the lobby group going endlessly on about how the removal of factions is a cancer succeeding is the best possible result.

[Pheraz]

Has this thread become the new general chat or what? I thought I's about speculation of the next xpac