Dragonflight 10.X Patches & World Soul Saga Speculation Thread

[Nymrohd]

Ah, that's...fair...shit I'm sorry, I am quite tired so if I argue from my ass VIA my lack of actually reading the damn thing I'm responding to proper and shit, my bad.

Regarding Magic in WoW tho, that depends imo. Cause in some cases, primarily in Mortals and the Mortal Plane, Magic can very much be used interchangably and whatnot as you've said (tho in many areas, rules still exist). But in Cosmic Realms, there are sets of rules in place for those Cosmic Forces and there is a way for how it all MUST work, etc.

We have only really seen Death and we saw the denizens of Death able to cast pretty much ANYTHING they wanted. They did not really have restrictions beyond THEME which is a completely surface level restriction (unless you are dealing with fey creatures that are often powered by theme and story). In hard magic systems, magic is practically a science in how it is defined.

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Welcome to the house of We.

Yeah I think it's just a case of someone not very familiar with fantasy. You cannot really believe these things about WoW otherwise.

[Raetary]

How you'll need a strong conviction and faith to wield it

Archbishop Benedictus was a traitor to the church, he held no faith and was an Old God worshipper, and yet he could channel the Light simply because he wanted to.

So much for "needing strong faith and conviction" to wield it.

Ah, that's...fair...shit I'm sorry, I am quite tired so if I argue from my ass VIA my lack of actually reading the damn thing I'm responding to proper and shit, my bad.

Regarding Magic in WoW tho, that depends imo. Cause in some cases, primarily in Mortals and the Mortal Plane, Magic can very much be used interchangably and whatnot as you've said (tho in many areas, rules still exist). But in Cosmic Realms, there are sets of rules in place for those Cosmic Forces and there is a way for how it all MUST work, etc.

You mean like the cosmic realm we just visited?
Where Death magic was portrayed to have the exact same function and powers as any other magic type?

[Le Conceptuel]

Yeah I think it's just a case of someone not very familiar with fantasy. You cannot really believe these things about WoW otherwise.

I think the main issue is that the whole conversation has been very confused on all sides to some extent or another—although my initial point was that WoW should have remained a soft magic setting, or at least that its magic should've been defined in a way that doesn't make it seem like there's far too much overlap between otherwise-exclusive entities, the dichotomy of soft and hard magic was misunderstood to mean degrees of definition and creativity. Of course, the point remains on both counts—WoW is neither the most advanced and creative fantasy setting (see: Lord of the Rings, the funny parts of Elder Scrolls lore) nor home to a particularly well-defined magic system in terms of how magic physically operates.

The specific reason I was complaining about the setting going too far into the realm of hard magic is that it is incongruous with certain instances we've been exposed to before in which entities from one category demonstrate mastery over another. Yogg-Saron being the God of Death, for instance, becomes nonsensical in the wake of the revelation that Death is a wholly different transcendental category from the one which spawned Yogg-Saron.

[Nymrohd]

Archbishop Benedictus was a traitor to the church, he held no faith and was an Old God worshipper, and yet he could channel the Light simply because he wanted to.

So much for "needing strong faith and conviction" to wield it.

I think it's possible to believe in both tbh. I think the presence of void worship in the Stormwind branch of the Church of the Light is meant to be tied to the fate of the Twilight Canticle, Cho'gall's collected thoughts on the Void through his interaction with the Pale. The Void seems to have a radically different view of the Light than the inverse; it's always shown to consider the Light as a lost sibling instead of an adversary. So it makes sense that someone who believes in the Void could also still value the Light. And I am not sure you need faith and conviction in the Light; rather you need faith and conviction period.

[Le Conceptuel]

And the Magic of Death doesn't really share the same stuff as other Magic Types at all, what? I don't remember the Magic of Death, namely Anima and whatnot to be of Disorder or share Light, etc.

Again, I'm talking about continuity. What we've been introduced to following the introduction of the Cosmic Forces is unique to itself, but not anything prior. Prior to Chronicles, there was significant overlap between Necromancy, Fel, and the Void in practice—Warlocks freely used Void magic, for instance, and both the Old Gods and Legion were associated heavily with Necromancy.

[Nymrohd]

The specific reason I was complaining about the setting going too far into the realm of hard magic is that it is incongruous with certain instances we've been exposed to before in which entities from one category demonstrate mastery over another. Yogg-Saron being the God of Death, for instance, becomes nonsensical in the wake of the revelation that Death is a wholly different transcendental category from the one which spawned Yogg-Saron.

I think it can work, they'd just would need to do the work. With how close Maldraxxus and Nerubian aesthetics were, they really should have given a cleaner picture of perhaps the Void Lord that originated Yogg having assaulted Maldraxxus and stolen from them secrets of Death and Necromancy and then Yogg as his extension sharing those with the Aqir who became the nerubian and codifying it as necromancy.

[Super Dickmann]

The specific reason I was complaining about the setting going too far into the realm of hard magic is that it is incongruous with certain instances we've been exposed to before in which entities from one category demonstrate mastery over another. Yogg-Saron being the God of Death, for instance, becomes nonsensical in the wake of the revelation that Death is a wholly different transcendental category from the one which spawned Yogg-Saron.

While I generally agree, I'd contest that example because Yogg was just talking shit. He at no point uses any necromancy.

[Nymrohd]

I mean, considering the Void has invaded the Shadowlands before, and considering guys in Maldraxxus have FOUGHT the Void Lords before (and prolly got 1 shot by the Void Lords, let's be real lol), it's not hard to imagine Yogg'Saron getting some knowledge of the realm. He was also able to cause the Emerald Nightmare, I'm pretty certain, something which was originally credited to N'Zoth in the old lore.

I shouldn't have to imagine it. In a setting that wanted to be well defined, I would not be imagining it, there would be detail of it happening. If this happened in Elder Scrolls I'd have at least two lore books giving opposing accounts of what happened and a third one describing it in a parable.

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While I generally agree, I'd contest that example because Yogg was just talking shit. He at no point uses any necromancy.

Death is not necromancy though. (Shadowlands was not really the realm of Death, it was the realm of the Dead, which is why they could have made it a transitive plane like the Emerald Dream instead of a Plane of X). Death is just end of life. And maybe he has necromancy, just not the kind that raises undead but rather the kind that binds souls. It could tie with Saronite being able to deliver a final death.

[Super Dickmann]

Death is not necromancy though. Death is just murder. And maybe he has necromancy, just not the kind that raises undead but rather the kind that binds souls. It could tie with Saronite being able to deliver a final death.

Possibly on the ghost front, but we don't see it. We have seen void-related undead later, but they're really more like constructs infused with the intent of the one raising them, not really raising the person themselves. I do like the idea of him meaning he's the god of murder, though I maintain he was just bragging, since he doesn't really have the credentials for that either.

[Nymrohd]

Possibly on the ghost front, but we don't see it. We have seen void-related undead later, but they're really more like constructs infused with the intent of the one raising them, not really raising the person themselves. I do like the idea of him meaning he's the god of murder, though I maintain he was just bragging, since he doesn't really have the credentials for that either.

I mean Yogg IS the god of mortality given he gave us the Gift/Curse of Flesh and that has killed more people on Azeroth than everything else combined. He absolutely has the credentials of a god of Death. He defeats Immortality. What's Deathier than that???

[Super Dickmann]

I mean Yogg IS the god of mortality given he gave us the Gift/Curse of Flesh and that has killed more people on Azeroth than everything else combined. He absolutely has the credentials of a god of Death. He defeats Immortality.

Yeah, that's actually entirely true, he is the source of mortality in general so he has dibs on that title. Withdrawing my point re: the title.

[Nymrohd]

That book anology would unironically be incredibly confusing, possibly even more confusing than simply saying "oh yeah, the Void Lords adopted the fear of Death that Mortals have, and instilled it as a primary factor in Yogg-Sarons arsenal"

And that's why you never have retcons in Elder Scrolls. You have people giving biased accounts, historians giving their own takes on how something happened, fiction and myths from different cultures that integrated events. The way these things WOULD be recorded. And it's not books written by an omniscient third person and then suddenly retconned into "the titan's viewpoint". Elder Scrolls would have had the Chronicles be written by a constellar, it would name it and it would have had little notes scatted on how different information was collected.

[Le Conceptuel]

I mean Yogg IS the god of mortality given he gave us the Gift/Curse of Flesh and that has killed more people on Azeroth than everything else combined. He absolutely has the credentials of a god of Death. He defeats Immortality. What's Deathier than that???

Yeah, that's actually entirely true, he is the source of mortality in general so he has dibs on that title. Withdrawing my point re: the title.

In that case, I'd also still have to withdraw my point regarding the strict categorization of the various forces impacting Yogg-Saron, because his relationship with Death is wholly detached from the Cosmic Force per se and more to do with his rendering the Titans' constructs vulnerable to mortality.

[Nymrohd]

In that case, I'd also still have to withdraw my point regarding the strict categorization of the various forces impacting Yogg-Saron, because his relationship with Death is wholly detached from the Cosmic Force per se and more to do with his rendering the Titans' constructs vulnerable to mortality.

There is also the thematic link of the Nerubians with Maldraxxus. Which may well be incidental but could always end up not being if they want to pick that line later on.

[Le Conceptuel]

And that's why you never have retcons in Elder Scrolls. You have people giving biased accounts, historians giving their own takes on how something happened, fiction and myths from different cultures that integrated events. The way these things WOULD be recorded. And it's not books written by an omniscient third person and then suddenly retconned into "the titan's viewpoint". Elder Scrolls would have had the Chronicles be written by a constellar, it would name it and it would have had little notes scatted on how different information was collected.

I've always found Elder Scrolls to be an excellent canvas for worldbuilding due precisely to that devotion to ambiguity and subjectivity on the part of the writers—not only does it allow you to avoid accidentally concocting messy retcons when you expand the lore too much, but it also creates a sense of realism because nobody in our world is quite certain of everything, either. Even simpler sciences, such as history, are subject to a great deal of debate. The subjective approach to writing utilized in Elder Scrolls fluff provides worldbuilding that is not limited to the subject of the work per se, but rather illuminates details of how the people of the setting perceive the world and interpret information.

Conversely, I've never felt quite that way about practically anything written in Warcraft. I recall there was one exception, however—there was some fluff from an Ask CDev round, which featured Velen suggesting that Elune could be a Naaru before Tyrande curtly requested that he can the topic. I think this made for an interesting case of in-universe theory and showcased the cultural attitudes of both interlocutors. It would be more fulfilling for the setting, I think, if we saw in-universe flavor lore like that put on display more frequently, with more ambiguity as to whose interpretation is correct. It would also be cohesive to WoW's nature as an MMO, since the "living world" of Azeroth is ideally more the focus than any particular character. It would help immerse people and allow the world to feel more open-ended.

[Varodoc]

Yogg-Saron dubbing himself the God of Death is in mockery to the Lich King and the Scourge. Their entire system is built and forged on Yogg-Saron's corrupted blood. He is the real lifeblood of the Lich King and the Scourge.

Yogg-Saron also created the Emerald Nightmare, which is a twisted mockery of the Emerald Dream, where life decays and dies.

[Le Conceptuel]

Only because back then, explanations of it all was hazy at best. Now we actually have a foundation and actual explanations as to why these things occur/occurred.

Focusing on the past isn't going to push this argument anywhere, cause this isn't the past.

Not strictly—we have a foundation, yes, but not one which provides strong explanations for any of the exceptions made to the domains allegedly covered by the Cosmic Forces or the points of exclusivity therebetween.

On the point that you believe I'm focusing on the past, that is true—that is because I believe that sensible continuity is crucial to establishing good worldbuilding (insofar as the lack of continuity per se does not constitute part of said worldbuilding).

[Revamp Man]

I'm ready for a new old god reveal

[Aeluron Lightsong]

And that's why you never have retcons in Elder Scrolls. You have people giving biased accounts, historians giving their own takes on how something happened, fiction and myths from different cultures that integrated events. The way these things WOULD be recorded. And it's not books written by an omniscient third person and then suddenly retconned into "the titan's viewpoint". Elder Scrolls would have had the Chronicles be written by a constellar, it would name it and it would have had little notes scatted on how different information was collected.

Ret-cons aren't the end of the world. Calm down and well speaking of ES there have contradictions more then once so...not a good example

[Lady Atia]

And that's why you never have retcons in Elder Scrolls. You have people giving biased accounts, historians giving their own takes on how something happened, fiction and myths from different cultures that integrated events. The way these things WOULD be recorded. And it's not books written by an omniscient third person and then suddenly retconned into "the titan's viewpoint". Elder Scrolls would have had the Chronicles be written by a constellar, it would name it and it would have had little notes scatted on how different information was collected.

I don't know, "everything may be biased" is just an excuse for lazy writing. Retcons aren't that much worse tbh, especially if they make the story better (which they do, in case of WoW).