What's an aspect of the "new" lore that still confuses you?

[yinyatto]

The arcane makes no sense as a force of order. Its just a lazy retcon so they could establish this new "cosmic force" nonsense.

well the cosmic powers diagram is as written by the perspective of "THE TITANS" this was confirmed at one of the blizzcons story panels so ofc they align arcane as an opposite to their foe "Fel" or as they describe "Disorder" where just like light and shadow they are just as bad as each other

Also any one of the cosmic power "winning" life ends up with uncontrollable growths as see in WoD with the spore mounds, death ofc is bad for obvious reasons but there has to be some death otherwise life becomes unbalanced

the same is said for light and shadow, when light starts winning it brings with it fanaticism killing all non believers as seen in the Mag'har orc race unlock quests Shadow agian ofc is bad things end up being taken over by old gods and such madness insanity.

[geco]

well the cosmic powers diagram is as written by the perspective of "THE TITANS" this was confirmed at one of the blizzcons story panels so ofc they align arcane as an opposite to their foe "Fel" or as they describe "Disorder" where just like light and shadow they are just as bad as each other

Every time you read this I feel like in a moment they are going to say that Cronicas is not cannon and that everything he says there is wrong because it is what the titans believe.

[Psychotrip]

well the cosmic powers diagram is as written by the perspective of "THE TITANS" this was confirmed at one of the blizzcons story panels so ofc they align arcane as an opposite to their foe "Fel" or as they describe "Disorder" where just like light and shadow they are just as bad as each other.

So then what is it? I feel like we're going in circles. Both arcane and fel are clearly chaotic on their own.

How do we make sense of any of this?

[Soon-TM]

Uh, most if not all of the books released in the past 15 years are canon...

Incorrect. Many of them have been effectively retconned, for example everything about Med'an (granted, that stuff was pants on head retarded even for WoW standards) or, more recently, the key story beats of Before the Storm.

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So then what is it? I feel like we're going in circles. Both arcane and fel are clearly chaotic on their own.

How do we make sense of any of this?

Not only this, but also, if you have a mage toon (Alliance) in Classic and talk to the mage trainer in Northshire Abbey, the first thing the guy tells you is that magic is dangerous and corrupting, traits that you would associate with Fel or Void magic these days - but not, the guy is talking about Arcane.

[Mehrunes]

My personal favorite is necromancy in Shadowlands, even though its inhabitants are supposed to be gone for good once they die there again.

[Polyxo]

Not just him. Every Venthyr is an ugly soul vampire and every soul in their care is a featureless ghost, but Kael is still Kael with a new paintjob and Garrosh is still Garrosh. Ysera is still Ysera. Maldraxxus is the worst offender, with every Baron and Margrave otherwise looking like body parts stapled together but Draka, Vashj and Alexandros looking like more glamorous green Death Knight versions of themselves. At least Kel'Thuzad can be excused by already being a Lich.

In general Azeroth is IMO too important to the Shadowlands. Thinking about it, every single major lieutenant of the Jailer- Helya, Mueh'zala, KT, Sylvanas, all come from there in some form despite the guy having countless souls coming from who knows how many worlds to choose from. When the dust settles in Maldraxxus damn near every Baron and Margrave still standing is from Azeroth with the exception of Sin'dane. Teldrassil is treated as a major game-changer but in the grand scale of things it was one disaster happening to one race on one world, it should be a drop in the bucket against the thousands that must die every second across the universe. To say nothing of Mawduin of course. It really does feel like the afterlife of just Azeroth, rather than that of the universe entire (hell, multiverse even, but I'm not opening that can of worms for the sake of my sanity).

Eh, I don't really mind Azeroth being kind of an unusually important cornerstone of the universe, in a similar way that Earth tends to be super important to the MCU. However, I do kind of feel like not expanding upon some of the other worlds out there was a bit of a missed opportunity in foreshadowing perhaps new worlds for new expansions.

[yinyatto]

I'd say what blizz is going for is that you want to balance the forces because in the end they are all corruptive in some way when you let them take over the titans show arcane as order cus well the titans want to order everything they want to be the dictators of the cosmos the emperors of the universe nothing can step out of line otherwise it gets reoriginated

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I wouldnt be at all shocked to find out that the shadowlands wasnt even suppose to exist that it was an ordering thing that was created the true machine of death broke the moment the shadowlands was created since things no longer properly die, thus creating an imbalance in the forces of life and death

[Grythletubs]

SL does not feel like an afterlife at all.

I feel like it removed the impact of any character death in the game. like "oh hey theyre actually not dead lol".
Like Blizzard might as well invent that there's another afterlife for the inhabitants of shadowlands that die there, it would make as much sense as the current story.

[Syegfryed]

Every time you read this I feel like in a moment they are going to say that Cronicas is not cannon and that everything he says there is wrong because it is what the titans believe.

they basically didn't say that already? making canon that chronicles are from titan perspective mines every credibility the book should have

Now we will be in this schrodinger dilema that everything there is canon and not canon

[Chromeshellking]

Gave up on the lore, At this stage Danuser is gonna be writing his ultimate waifu fanfic so chuck it all into a black hole for all I care.

[ohwell]

The most confusing of all this is that we do not know what is canon and what is not. Not what forces are for.
Elune is from life but can use: Death, Arcane, Dark and Light. So what does it mean to be from life? a Nationaldiad?

Or is it that now Elune can no longer use all powers and all those events are no longer cannon.

It is not so bad that things change in the cannon if it were not for the fact that they do not tell us what change and what not.
For instance:

Does Maiev hate the Arcane or not? he changes every time he goes out.
Does the Mak-Gora use magic or not? it changes every time it comes out.
The triology of the ancestors is or is it not cannon? Because in Cronicas it says that it was a different time line or something like that.

Mak-Gora is literally just a fight to the death for honor where the rules are determined on the spot. If none are stated, then nothing is banned.

[geco]

they basically didn't say that already? making canon that chronicles are from titan perspective mines every credibility the book should have

Now we will be in this schrodinger dilema that everything there is canon and not canon

Certainly almost nothing is cannon in WoW.
But I mean that at one point someone explains the "6 forces" and has nothing to do with what they say in Cronicas.

[Syegfryed]

Mak-Gora is literally just a fight to the death for honor where the rules are determined on the spot. If none are stated, then nothing is banned.

that is not how it works, they stated in the shattering that there is the determinate and default rules, the participants can, whoever, change and adapt things based on the situation/context, like the makgora between the shaman and the paladin, it was adapted for the context they were in, cause it would not be practical.

the default rules were used by Garrosh and Cairne: participants are in loincloth, there are witness, a shaman bless their weapons, only one weapon for each, if it falls you use your fists, and to the death.

As it is a fight for honor, it can be absurd advantages, like using weapons and bs magic against someone who just use weapons. The thing is, they screwed up with Thrall and Garrosh fight, and had to do mental and lore gymnastics to not make it look like Thrall cheated.

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Certainly almost nothing is cannon in WoW.
But I mean that at one point someone explains the "6 forces" and has nothing to do with what they say in Cronicas.

it is canon until they retcon, the problem is, the chronicles it was supposed to be the defacto book about lore, when people could guide themselves on what is truth or not, but now it is just like the ingame books, created by characters, they can be mistaken, miss context and so on.

[Awelon]

Everything. This has become a playground for retarded, by retarded.

[ohwell]

that is not how it works, they stated in the shattering that there is the determinate and default rules, the participants can, whoever, change and adapt things based on the situation/context, like the makgora between the shaman and the paladin, it was adapted for the context they were in, cause it would not be practical.

the default rules were used by Garrosh and Cairne: participants are in loincloth, there are witness, a shaman bless their weapons, only one weapon for each, if it falls you use your fists, and to the death.

As it is a fight for honor, it can be absurd advantages, like using weapons and bs magic against someone who just use weapons. The thing is, they screwed up with Thrall and Garrosh fight, and had to do mental and lore gymnastics to not make it look like Thrall cheated.

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it is canon until they retcon, the problem is, the chronicles it was supposed to be the defacto book about lore, when people could guide themselves on what is truth or not, but now it is just like the ingame books, created by characters, they can be mistaken, miss context and so on.

Except this topic has been beaten to death on these forums and the last time it popped up with the most recent one, it was pretty much proven that you're not correct. The rules have wildly differed in many cases where they remained unstated and the only times that certain ones were adhered to specifically were ones where they were laid out before the event(thrall vs garrosh I think specifically said no magic). So, no, it is in fact how it works.

[deenman]

Gave up on the lore, At this stage Danuser is gonna be writing his ultimate waifu fanfic so chuck it all into a black hole for all I care.

heh...if only the sylvanas fanfic was the only thing it wouldnt be so bad,did this danuser dude do the nonsensical tbc lore also?

[Chromeshellking]

heh...if only the sylvanas fanfic was the only thing it wouldnt be so bad,did this danuser dude do the nonsensical tbc lore also?

I dont believe so he more or less stepped in much later but again it hardly matters the OG vs the New teams have greatly differing ideas on the storied lore and what should kept and what needs to be replaced.

[Aresk]

PS: SL seems to be written as being just the afterlife of Azeroth. That's why Teldrazzil is important that's why the only recognizable ones are from Azeroth. But at some point it occurred to them that it had to be the one in the entire universe.

That's an odd stance to take when we have other worlds previously unheard of being explored in the Shadowlands. We gather Night Warriors from multiple other places, for instance. We can read sinstones from all sorts of other worlds. It's just most souls from other worlds are vaguely humanoid because Blizzard doesn't want to paint itself into a corner (e.g. introduce a new race in a few expansions and then have people wonder why that race was never seen in the Shadowlands). Souls of individuals appear as those individuals when the souls are from Azeroth for that reason, but it's far from the only world that the Shadowlands appears to service.

[DatToffer]

PS: SL seems to be written as being just the afterlife of Azeroth. That's why Teldrazzil is important that's why the only recognizable ones are from Azeroth. But at some point it occurred to them that it had to be the one in the entire universe.

Nah, it's been stated from the start that the Shadowlands are for all the cosmos.

The fact we don't recognize the souls outside of Azeroth is mostly technical, because they couldn't be bothered to make a shit town of new designs for individuals we don't really care about. Which is why they resorted to faceless ghosts, animal soulshapes, standard skeletization, smurfization, etc.



After a few reddit conversations, one part of the new lore that confuses me is that now that Fel and Arcane are cosmically separated, is there still Arcane in the Twisting Nether ? And why ?

[Accendor]

Mak-Gora is literally just a fight to the death for honor where the rules are determined on the spot. If none are stated, then nothing is banned.

Yeah, but that's not how it worked in the past. I get that it seems to work that way now, but nobody really knows. Not even Blizzard probably.