Do you think Shadowlands was better or worse for the Warcraft lore as a whole?

[OwenBurton]

There have been lots of complaints about Shadowlands from some parts of the player base, especially recently after Sylvanas was revealed to have her soul split (her fans think she is no longer a really strong, awesomely inspirational or independent character, and her haters dislike the fact that she is seemingly being let off easy).

Looking at Shadowlands as a whole - do you think Shadowlands was better or worse as an addition to the overall World of Warcraft lore, was its new lore and changing everything (for example, Elune being the Winter Queen's Life-realm bound sister and then not saving her people to save that newly introduced sister)? Is Shadowlands and everything this expansion has brought largely positive or negative for the overall story development and evolution? I mean, if you could theoretically do a reset, would you?

My positive points for Shadowlands:
- I really liked that Uther animated video, I thought that was really nicely done and very engaging, the others were not so interesting though.
- I (kind of) think the idea of the "Pantheon of Death" was promising for sure, but I'm not sure about the Arbiter and Jailer bits, they just don't seem that likable and / or original as characters, supporting or opposing.
- I liked the idea that the Pantheon of Death was not as "benevolent" as most people assumed, but they threw that idea out fairly quickly.
- Kael'thas Sunstrider and Draka returning as characters was really nice, I hope they can actually become Horde characters next expansion, seeing Ysera was also nice, although for some reason, I thought she might become a secret villain ("beware the eyes of emerald").

I didn't like the confusing lore pieces (such as the fate of most paladins and priests, do most of them now go to Bastion or the Light; the confusing relationship between the Emerald Dream and Ardenweald as afterlives, where exactly do most green dragons go; the bizarre Elune "revelations"; that statement about alternate realities and threads binding together, while not necessarily the worst one, also needs at least better clarification; the fact many prominent "dead" characters were completely ignored, etc.).

Everything just felt so out-of-universe and not as grounded, so distant from Azeroth's storyline, and the recent development with Sylvanas and the Jailer is pretty horrible also, and of course the whole thing with the night elves and the Horde is probably beyond resolution at this point. I understand that people are tired of the faction war, but this expansion is not better than the last one at all, it just felt very distinctly un-Warcraft in many ways.

https://www.reddit.com/r/warcraftlor...ve_failure_in/
https://www.reddit.com/r/warcraftlor...ailure_it_has/
https://www.reddit.com/r/warcraftlor...l_part_of_the/
https://www.reddit.com/r/warcraftlor...were_scrubbed/

This was the top-rated comment (over 350 upvotes) from one of the the threads, and I have to agree with them for the most part:

I think that Shadowlands has irrevocably hurt the lore of WoW. All the mysticism is dead. Just robots and factories now. I have zero interest in continuing from this new basis.

[Varodoc]

This is a rhetorical question right?

It was obviously negative, as it asspulled Bob the Janitor into existence. He is apparently responsible for all the events that happened since at least the Human campaign of WC3 (the creation of the Plague is directly attributed to him by Bolvar Fordragon. So you thought Ner'zhul/Arthas were responsible for the Scourging of Lordaeron? Nope, it was the Janitor actually). It also has the negative of white-washing Suevanas Windrunner, the Forsaken, and the entire Horde for actual genocide (twice).

So this expansion has no problem white-washing Sylvanas and all the Forsaken because "oh they had their souls stolen!!!! poor guys!!!", but God forbid the Alliance kills like 10 people at Camp Taurajo or Jaina kills a bunch of elves

All in all this is just another Horde-biased expansion, with the added "Bonus" that it retconned the "behind the scenes" events of everything since WC3.

[LordVargK]

I don't really think it has any impact at all. Like WoD it feels like a filler arc in a series. You could ignore all of SL's lore and it would make no difference.

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This is a rhetorical question right?

It was obviously negative, as it asspulled Bob the Janitor into existence. He is apparently responsible for all the events that happened since at least the Human campaign of WC3 (the creation of the Plague is directly attributed to him by Bolvar Fordragon. So you thought Ner'zhul/Arthas were responsible for the Scourging of Lordaeron? Nope, it was the Janitor actually). It also has the negative of white-washing Suevanas Windrunner, the Forsaken, and the entire Horde for actual genocide (twice).

So this expansion has no problem white-washing Sylvanas and all the Forsaken because "oh they had their souls stolen!!!! poor guys!!!", but God forbid the Alliance kills like 10 people at Camp Taurajo or Jaina kills a bunch of elves

Sorry, you talking about asspulls and at the same time presenting the void elf logo in your signature is pretty ironic

[Varodoc]

I don't really think it has any impact at all. Like WoD it feels like a filler arc in a series. You could ignore all of SL's lore and it would make no difference.

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Sorry, you talking about asspulls and at the same time presenting the void elf logo in your signature is pretty ironic

The idea of Blood elves messing with the Void is an old one, dating back to TBC, where one of Kael'Thas' minions messed with the Void to the point that she turned into a Voidwalker.

The idea of "Zovaal the Jailer" is not an old one, it dates back to 2019, when Blizzard (Danuser) decided to create a plot device to conveniently blame for all of Sylvanas' actions.

Because Blizzard can't go one expansion without redeeming at least one Horde psycho, naturally at the expense of Alliance cities.

[LordVargK]

The idea of Blood elves messing with the Void is an old one, dating back to TBC, where one of Kael'Thas' minions messed with the Void to the point that she turned into a Voidwalker.

The idea of "Zovaal the Jailer" is not an old one, it dates back to 2019, when Blizzard (Danuser) decided to create a plot device to conveniently blame for all of Sylvanas' actions.

Because Blizzard can't go one expansion without redeeming at least one Horde psycho, naturally at the expense of Alliance cities.

Yeah, I'm not saying you're wrong on the jailers part. But it's still funny to me.

[czarek]

I would say story wasnt that bad but story telling was just horrible tbh. Too many misinterpretations to many cliffhanging. No character creation Jailer is just fluffy donut.

[ro9ue]

Absolutely terrible. Really for four major reasons:

1. Death - It makes death not matter. If you die you're just in another zone and can go back like we all will in 10.0.

2. First Ones - They spectacle creeped all the way up to the "First Ones" and their life laboratory after being on just a few islands in the last expansion.

3. The Jailer - I actually don't mind the concept of the Nathrezim being duplicitous schemers - that was obvious to anyone who played this game for an extended period of time. To underpin it all to one main character, Zovaal, and not even build him up or give him any kind of backstory made it all seem hamfisted and didn't make anyone give a shit about it.

4. Sylvanas - Maybe one of the most highly regarded, truly morally gray characters in the history of the game reduced to rubble. They could've done a few other things that would've made more sense for her. I actually think I speculated a better story arc for her back during the Teldrassil events in that she knew N'Zoth was emerging. She made a deal with Helya to make a pocket dimension death realm (which she has done in the past lore so there's precedent) and then basically goes on a killing spree. People are either raised or have their souls preserved in the pocket realm. It's a major concept in the game that undead have mind control and fear resistance (Will of the Forsaken) and the old gods use those psychological forces to control and manipulate.

The concept here is Sylvanas's plan is to make an undead / spirit army capable of defeating N'Zoth. At the end we're losing and she comes in and saves us with the army she's raised who are all mostly immune to N'Zoth visions, maybe we all die and she raises us. A throwback to when Turalyon rezzed during LK fight. We're all undead.

At the end of the fight, she still killed people but she could sit back as the cunning master planner who did the "ends justifies the means" plot and tell the other heroes "but we killed N'Zoth, didn't we?" And they'll have to grapple with that. That should've been her story.

That's a little rough around the edges but my point is she shouldn't have had a split soul, she should've just been a cold strategist as we've all thought her to be this whole time. And her major character arc should've been something that displays her "at all costs" ruthlessness and we would have to sit back and say, yeah we might not have done it but we're glad you did or we would all be dead.

[The Stormbringer]

I definitely feel like it hurt things, yeah. The afterlife is nothing but a machine to strip you of your anima, some mystical energy created by the experiences of living, stolen away from you without your consent. You're then sorted into one of a countless number of specialized 'afterlife islands', if you're lucky, where you get to spend your remaining time until you eventually die again. This is no immortal afterlife, as you only get a brief stint in another dimension before you wind up permanently dead. Not only is that bad enough, but most of the leaders of this place seem incompetent in some way or another. You'd think the First Ones would've created better rulers for somewhere as important as the Shadowlands... then again, maybe it's not all that important? Who can say.

[TheFirstOnes]

Better? No.

Worse? Not really.

I'm just happy we now have a cause for this fucking Cosmic Chart, and we now know how the "Big Bang" came to be, as sure Light and Shadow are part of the chart, but if they're bound, why would the Chart have LIGHT as the starting power, as it is existing clearly without Shadow? Unless, the Chronicle wasn't meant to have a lasting factor outside of it being a "Bible" and a singular perspective of the overall far bigger Cosmos. A perspective WAY too many people took as "real" and decided to either think of the Titans as the true shapers of the Cosmos outside of the Big Bang, which was almost NEVER the actual backstory of the Great Dark, not even in the Old CANONICAL Lore, but some people also thought the Titans were the BAD GUYS...which is also dumb.

We know the Forces were created and Balanced, 2 songs to keep the 6 together, but to also tame something greater so the Cosmos can fucking exist. These First Ones exist, but have no beginning nor end or anything. That's how it is. That's how they work, they same first, they made Duality, and gifted their children AKA the Pantheons with these abilities and realms for them to rule over. Their Automa are the constructors but on a Divine scale, etc etc.

I always said the First Ones being akin to Titans didn't make sense, but y'all still tried to argue this shit. And while I was wrong on some things, I am at the very least happy most of the First Ones stuff went well.

[Super Dickmann]

At the start of Shadowlands the Horde and Alliance are interchangable blobs wherein every participant is a peacenik hugging it out. Sylvanas is absent from the world and Tyrande has been chastised for being angry about her people and settles down after a limp-wristed non-compromise. Anduin is an infallible god-man.

At the end of Shadowlands the Horde and Alliance are interchangable blobs wherein every participant is a peacenik hugging it out. Sylvanas is absent from the world and Tyrande has been chastised for being angry about her people and settles down after a limp-wristed non-compromise. Anduin is an infallible god-man, but with PTSD.

Everything else is by and large irrelevant and won't come up in any meaningful way going forward, except for possibly the Dreadlords. We will not see any of the Shadowlands NPCs again and the First Ones will just fill in the role that the Titans did before Chronicle+Legion removed them as the original progenitor race creating sentient mock-ups for the characters we meet in factories. The races worst affected by the demystification involved, i.e the Forsaken and the shamanic races, come pre-ruined in those regards and whether the previously dead characters got off better (Uther among few others) or worse (KT, among many others) they remain dead and so don't matter. All except Elune, who is either the absolute worst treated character in the SL who's treatment actually matters or will be retconned again as her previous conceptualizations as an (elder) naaru were.

I voted for worse, but in terms of damage done it's laughable compared to BFA in that the vast majority of it doesn't matter as it has no bearing on the playable races or factions on the actual living world. Just find me how many are still assmad about Thrall wrecking the space time continuum, the infinite potential Legions or the five other times the dreadlord/Sargeras story got swapped.

[Aleksej89]

what kind of flamebait question is that, Sl is universally reviled as some of the worst lore mangling ever done to Warcraft universe.

Bfa was worse as an expansion but in terms of lore mangling Sl did far more damage.

[TheRevenantHero]

Shadowlands involved more retconning than any other expansion. It has completely destroyed any integrity and consistency the lore had remaining. It's now at a point where you really have no reason to care about the story during the expansion because it's probably going to be completely changed in the next expansion.

[aceperson]

i'm a person who rather closely follows the lore. i forget things here and there like any person but even when we had the weird/bad story of wod, i didn't find it too bad. it was obvious the story was rushed which ended up skipping the grommosh "redemption" arc but most of the lore from the expac was limited to that world. there were only three things we really got from that expac that affected our world. one, alternate guldan was sent to our world. two, we found out the twisting nether was above space and time which means they could affect any timeline and any world. three, it's possible to connect different timelines the same way you could make a portal to a city.

the first was great overall but without using hindsight, it was worrisome at worst. the third is at best worrisome but i don't think their going to try anymore alternate timeline stuff for the moment. at best, we'll probably see yrel and her fanatic light army invade our timeline. the second one is the biggest issue i have with the expac as it means the legion could go to every timeline, get every single sympathizer to their cause or power hungry fool, and have an army literally no one could match (beyond the necrolord army since they are also above space and time apparently). there was really only one plot hole for me that made me mad.

almost all of shadowlands is non-sensical and breaks a lot of wow lore. what exactly is the "path" the kyrians followed to the point of ignoring a literally warning sign at face point? why do ghosts exist at all since kyrians ferry souls to the afterlife? where did undead squid lady from legion go since she appeared in the intro to shadowlands? why is the jailer called that when he is quite obviously jailed? what exactly are the sigils, what do they do, and why are they some important if new ones can just be made? why do we need anduin to break domination magic when we have the literal original user on our side with big bone daddy? where is malfurion in all of this? his wife jumped head first into a death realm while on magic drugs. you'd think he'd be along to save her. is shadowlands a one way trip like we expected it to be or is it now come and go at will since we've see bolvar's daughter and other characters randomly appear and then disappear? why did the waystone activate for our character? i understand it has something to do with the heart of azeroth but azeroth is a creation of the first ones and not a first one itself. so why did the heart activate it? etc, etc.

there are just so many stupid or unanswered questions caused by shadowlands.

edit: here is another big one i just realized. when we fight zovaal, he is close to having the power to rewrite reality. so when we defeat him, why don't just use that power to rewrite reality so the burning of teldrassil didn't happen, the jailer is locked up again with tighter security this time, a denathrius who isn't a dick, a bone daddy who can learn to talk with people, angel people who can use their brains, and install a phone line between the winter queen and elune so they stop doing incredibly stupid things like "sending the souls of my followers to your realm to relieve the drought"? THIS IS SO STUPID! oh, and fix every soul 'split' by frostmourne so we don't have to deal with anymore of that stupid crap either.

[McNeil]

Shadowlands lore is so bad that I've never wanted a ''it was all a dream'' sequence as badly as now. Other expansions have done retcons that has damaged Warcraft before but Shadowlands is nothing but retcons from lore that was established and beloved from all the way back to the RTS games. They keep frontloading Sylvanas as the central character and her writing simp is willing to completely bend over the lore just to put her in a more positive spotlight. Afrasiabi might have been the one who originally ruined Sylvanas but Danuser is just digging up her corpse to literally have his way with her. Other than that I'm very dissapointed in the whole afterlife which really is more of a purgatory for the ones being unable to move on. Being death was already kind of a joke in Warcraft because it basically means taking a longer break than usual, but now its apparent that a character can never be truly dead in the game. Even Garrosh could always reappear in Super Shadowlands with the way the writers keep coming with these idiotic ideas. And to finish it all off we got to venture into a plane where our universe was created... just no, we didn't need this.

[Sorrowseer]

An MMO should NEVER visit its own afterlife.

[Houle]

An MMO should NEVER visit its own afterlife.

this. all the other nonsensical, stupid and dumb things in this xpac aside (and there are A LOT), this is the thing thats worst for the lore in the long term. we now know precisely what happens when a character dies. we know they still exist, and we could potentially come and get them. "death" has no meaning whatsoever anymore.

[Syegfryed]

I can't think, any, any good thing that came out of shadowlands, except maybe Garrosh saying fuck all in the raid and nope out.

Literally everything else was damaging to the lore or to the brain, and, the worst part is, you can't ignore it like you could with WoD, as shadowlands actively change how things,(most important death) worked. We could at least salvage some things from wod like races and yrel plot, shadowlands is just awful.

[Khaza-R]

I'd say worse overall just because of the limitations it now imposes on the story by elaborating on the afterlife.

That and the jumbled mess it made of trying to attach itself to the WarCraft III story. You almost need to treat WoW as a spinoff at this point and not a part of the main franchise anymore.

[justandulas]

an unmitigated disaster. I've never seen a single expac or "addition" to the story, remove so much of the lore and invalidate the rest.

The story and lore of SL is not only the worst i've ever seen in WoW, but in ANY mmorpg in my 40 years of playing them since MUDs. Even MUDs ran by handfuls of people offered better story than this nonsense that isnt even fit for saturday morning cartoons in the 80s.

Whoever approved this should have been let go of their position

[Skirdus]

I miss when I thought the Arbiter was going to be an actual character and not just a plot device