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

[geco]

Kel'thuzad got anally devastated, Mograine is close enough. Uther got his best showing since WC3 and Kael and Vashj are better than in TBC. Draka remained aggressively, stupefyingly boring. It's mostly a wash, but they came out a lot better than the Bland Gang.

To me Kel'Thuzad was still alive before SL. So get on my list of "living pj who screwed up".

[Super Dickmann]

To me Kel'Thuzad was still alive before SL. So get on my list of "living pj who screwed up".

KT has the advantage that there's zero chance any of this coming up again now that he's dead and we can pretend it never happened. On the other hand we're stuck with the Elune retcon until they change her nature for what'll be the fourth time now.

[geco]

KT has the advantage that there's zero chance any of this coming up again now that he's dead and we can pretend it never happened. On the other hand we're stuck with the Elune retcon until they change their nature for what'll be the fourth time now.

Elune is dead to me.
For me, the relationship between her and the Kaldorei has to become 100% utilitarian.
It's more if the next expansion was a Kaldorei religious revolution (without the light) for me great.

Everyone adore Vrozbandi (How to write)

[Soon-TM]

KT has the advantage that there's zero chance any of this coming up again now that he's dead and we can pretend it never happened. On the other hand we're stuck with the Elune retcon until they change her nature for what'll be the fourth time now.

Looks like Elune gurl is going to get the Sylvanas treatment, at least to some extent.

- - - Updated - - -

It's more if the next expansion was a Kaldorei religious revolution (without the light) for me great.

Cue Andy stepping in and telling nelfs how to solve their religious issues and everyone blindly following him, except the bad/unreasonable/edgy people.

Do you remember how Varian managed to solve the whole Dwarven civil war with just a wave of his hand?

[shise]

The only good thing about Shadowlands was the design and art. Absolue kick ass and best equipment design we might have seen ever since Tier 6 sets.

But the rest is simply the worse X pack ever. It has been half baked and it has little to nothing to do with Warcraft at all. An absolute mess. Christ.. .even BfA seems good next to it. That says it all.

[vian]

It's a fucking train-wreck, that's what it is.

Like interns first story bad.

[geco]

Cue Andy stepping in and telling nelfs how to solve their religious issues and everyone blindly following him, except the bad/unreasonable/edgy people.

Do you remember how Varian managed to solve the whole Dwarven civil war with just a wave of his hand?

It IS true that humans are always there to make alliance lore more boring.

Anduin is the best way to make the Horde always the most popular

[Super Dickmann]

Looks like Elune gurl is going to get the Sylvanas treatment, at least to some extent.

Elune is a whole other animal because prior to SL she wasn't a character. The reason she won't recover from this the way she did from the naaru business is because she was given (bad) lines and was confirmed to have engaged in (bad) actions. She's no longer an abstraction you can project powers to or an ineffable god but a dumbass who got conned on her FedEx delivery of night elves.

It's the same as what Chronicle + Legion did with the Titans. Prior to Chronicle they were absentee gods producing robotic beta versions of the playable races in a factory and experimenting on them while leaving the intern to casually give a signal to destroy the planet if something fucks up. After it they became a bunch of dudes who chat with the players to deliver cliches and it's impossible to recover from this. Danuser wisely decided to copy-paste the pre-Chronicle version as the First Ones but given how he did Elune I fully expect him to fuck it up within 1 to 2 expansions.

[Progenitor Aquarius]

I'm not sure what to vote for since we don't have the ending cinematic yet. We don't know how Shadowlands will end, and even if it ends positively, don't forget we have Dreadlords in the raid, and they probably prepared something for us, where we will lose either way.

[shoc]

Worse. It has zero respect for the 25 years of Warcraft lore that came before it. It almost feels like it was written for another game and then haphazardously elbowed into WoW. There's no more mystery left in the Warcraft universe, therefore nothing to speculate about, which was all the fun of Warcraft lore. They pulled the video game fandom equivalent of telling kids that Santa isn't real.

[Kokolums]

I think SL was the worst expac ever. Making the lore worse was only part of what earned that medal.

- - - Updated - - -

The only good thing about Shadowlands was the design and art. Absolue kick ass and best equipment design we might have seen ever since Tier 6 sets.

But the rest is simply the worse X pack ever. It has been half baked and it has little to nothing to do with Warcraft at all. An absolute mess. Christ.. .even BfA seems good next to it. That says it all.

naw the sets are ugly as hell. I have no interest in collecting any of it. its like 2/10 for art design.

[geco]

Worse. It has zero respect for the 25 years of Warcraft lore that came before it. It almost feels like it was written for another game and then haphazardously elbowed into WoW. There's no more mystery left in the Warcraft universe, therefore nothing to speculate about, which was all the fun of Warcraft lore. They pulled the video game fandom equivalent of telling kids that Santa isn't real.

In truth, mysteries remain. (or were left)
But between SL and BFA they burned them.

Before BFA for example we had Nzoth and the Nagas.
Before SL we had Elune.

Things that burned in a patch and could be used for one or two expansions.

[Eggroll]

For one, they really ruined Elune as a concept. As Elune can be considered "world" they ruined this part of the world, of the player's imagination.

They ruined Tyrande even more than they had already, Malfurion isn't even in the game anymore.

They ruined Sylvanas, stripping her of her agency, making her just a victim instead of the interesting shady character she was up until Legion.

The moral bottom line of BfA-Shadowlands is: the ends justify the means, even the most horrible actions will be rewarded in the end, there's no wrong in it.

Sylvanas committed genocide to evade her judgement in hell and by current story, in the end, she succeeded. Not only that but she gets her life back and gets redemption on top.

The morals of this lore is a receipe to breed sociopaths. People who respect no boundaries, who don't care for right or wrong in the pursuit of whatever they want, even genocide is justified.

I'm saying this because this is a PG12/PG13 game in most countries. You just have to consider how a vulnerable, impressionable age group, especially young male gamers are exposed to this kind of morals. As adolescents who are in the process of forming your morals, where you need nothing more than learn about boundaries, they are being told to glorify a mass murderer, that the ends justify the means and there will be no repercussions whatsoever.

Well, the stuff we learned about Blizzard this past year, we understand that they are morally bankrupt, and apparently it shows in their storytelling, too.

[SinR]

Basically saying everything has been this one dude's plan the E N T I R E time, from WC1 to present, is terrible

To reiterate, EVERYTHING has been the Jailer's plans since the entire beginning of Warcraft. This dude that, until just recently, has been a literal #Who.

[OwenBurton]

For one, they really ruined Elune as a concept. As Elune can be considered "world" they ruined this part of the world, of the player's imagination.

They ruined Tyrande even more than they had already, Malfurion isn't even in the game anymore.

They ruined Sylvanas, stripping her of her agency, making her just a victim instead of the interesting shady character she was up until Legion.

The moral bottom line of BfA-Shadowlands is: the ends justify the means, even the most horrible actions will be rewarded in the end, there's no wrong in it.

Sylvanas committed genocide to evade her judgement in hell and by current story, in the end, she succeeded. Not only that but she gets her life back and gets redemption on top.

The morals of this lore is a receipe to breed sociopaths. People who respect no boundaries, who don't care for right or wrong in the pursuit of whatever they want, even genocide is justified.

I'm saying this because this is a PG12/PG13 game in most countries. You just have to consider how a vulnerable, impressionable age group, especially young male gamers are exposed to this kind of morals. As adolescents who are in the process of forming your morals, where you need nothing more than learn about boundaries, they are being told to glorify a mass murderer, that the ends justify the means and there will be no repercussions whatsoever.

Well, the stuff we learned about Blizzard this past year, we understand that they are morally bankrupt, and apparently it shows in their storytelling, too.

I understand, I think Elune's "revealed" nature is confusing also - I mean, why does Tyrande and her Priestesses use Arcane spells if she is based in Life? Why did Anduin and Velen and Khadgar others think that she was associated with the Light and the naaru? How was she as a being of Nature able to give Tyrande dark Void-like powers as the Night Warrior?

Nothing seems to make much sense, honestly.

And I just watched the newest cinematic, I thought seeing Varian and Varok again was great, but the rest was quite horrible. I don't necessarily wanted Arthas to return, but this ending to his story just felt like a very cheap and un-original effort to wrap things up. And of course, Sylvanas (his victim) had more lines than Jaina (his one true love).

Someone else commented on this video:

https://www.wowhead.com/news/anduin-...poilers-326152

Blizzard 2020: "We want to be careful with Arthas in SL and honor his memory and legacy"
Blizzard 2022: "May Arthas fade into nothingness and be forgotten"

yiiiiiikes. Cinematic would have been perfect if you had done literally anything else with Arthas lol.

[Soon-TM]

@OwenBurton and here I was trying to find a little solace in the fact that they had left Arthas more or less alone... Until now. #$&%ing Danuser is going to throw any and all of the Warcraft cast under the bus if he thinks it's necessary to redeem his e-girlfriend.

[Skytotem]

Y'know what bugs me?

Blizz is bending over backwards to lay the blame of the Sylvanas narrative on Afrasiabi, that he made her super villainous as some kind of spiteful gesture. If that's true it's a dick move, but it doesn't address the fact that Blizz isn't really addressing the rest of the narrative impact on that, especially with Tyrande's "Elune didn't know the afterlife was broken but didn't intervene... somehow, in saving Teldrassil."

They didn't even really elaborate on why people expected divine intervention in that particular moment.

[Rozz]

Y'know what bugs me?

Blizz is bending over backwards to lay the blame of the Sylvanas narrative on Afrasiabi, that he made her super villainous as some kind of spiteful gesture. If that's true it's a dick move, but it doesn't address the fact that Blizz isn't really addressing the rest of the narrative impact on that, especially with Tyrande's "Elune didn't know the afterlife was broken but didn't intervene... somehow, in saving Teldrassil."

They didn't even really elaborate on why people expected divine intervention in that particular moment.

I agree with this to an extent.

It's fair to acknowledge that Sylvanas' shift into an open villain was not their call and the outrage for this change shouldn't be directed towards them.

But the story after that point is absolutely their fault.

If the story looks confused, disjointed, and contradictory it's because the team clearly was. T&E aren't my favorite, but them informing us the writers were handed a scenario they didn't want and tried to work around is important. But their work in SLs not only failed to address/close the initial problem but created new ones. That can be tough, but doesn't make the mediocre storytelling any less deserving of criticism.

[OwenBurton]

@OwenBurton and here I was trying to find a little solace in the fact that they had left Arthas more or less alone... Until now. #$&%ing Danuser is going to throw any and all of the Warcraft cast under the bus if he thinks it's necessary to redeem his e-girlfriend.

Yes, according to lots of people, Warcraft lore truly has been ruined. Even the top YouTube reviewers, such as Bellular Gaming and Doronsmovies, have voiced their intense dissatisfaction at the recent cinematic. I don't know how there's anything left worth admiring, honestly, at this point. Sylvanas and Arthas both butchered, nothing really resolved from the last expansion either, and this entire new expansion wasted on an uninspiring "villain" made from a robot shell that will almost certainly never make an appearance again. It might be better if they just moved everything that transpired recently to a parallel continuity.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d8vdJ_VgDI0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vmGyT_3IS4o

[Magical Mudcrab]

Not only was it worse, it has irreparably damaged the old lore to such an extent that it'll likely never be able to be fixed. What's worse is that the team has done this damage while opting to gaslight players (i.e.: stating the story played out as intended; claiming very obvious retcons were the truth the whole time; etc.) and trying to shift blame to Afrasiabi. While I think we can all understand that Afrasiabi may have been pushing the Sylvanas becoming evil angle (although I think the few people stating that he was using this as a vehicle to attack women are likely stretching), the fact that they've tried to play it off as it still being his fault when he's been off the Warcraft team for around 4 years at this point is an incredible degree of dishonesty; the Burning of Teldrassil was not the problem, the subsequent story is.