The Problem With Shadowlands (What Makes Warcraft Lore Good?)

TWW giving me similar SL vibes lol

I seriously appreciate that TWW has been less "cliffhangy". Of course it keeps suspense, it needs to drive the mysteries at least until the end of the expansion. But I believe stories are ending more conclusively than Shadowlands did

I think the largest missing piece of the whole sylvanas and shadowlands bullshit would be the parts to the puzzle we're supposed to have ahead of time so that there was at least some chance to see what was coming. It was all simply written as they went. They probably had no idea who the Jailer was speaking of at the end of the expansion, and we don't have enough to go on to imagine the correct answer either. At this rate i'm expecting like 10 more ultimate big bads that are all simultaneously greater threats then the Lich king, Deathwing, the Void lords etc and we'll meet them exactly when the writing team is done inventing them. wholesale out of nothing.

I think the best WoW character stories are told through their interactions with the world and events around them, rather than them being the cause and driving force of the events and world

Legion was such an awesome expansion. Everything afterwards, not so much.

warha,,ernarrative of any of its iterations moves way slower

I enjoyed Shadowlands, it’s just so beautiful and versitile

I found Shadowlands to be meh at best honestly, SOME highs and a whole lotta lows.

Pandaria though I hated so much I basically skipped it.

For me, shadowland was one of the most epic WOW additions. It has its own dark atmosphere, beautiful music, a choice of covenants, and additional skills. I was never bored with this add-on. It was the best time spent in WoW.

One major problem with this thesis: who the fuck cared about Sylvanus, the Banshee Hitler?

Who DIDN'T care about Lo'gosh the White Wolf, who sacrificed himself against the Legion, and who was given one single look in the entire expac?

I've never been too interested in WoW's lore. The story in BC and WOTLK were quite good, but I lost interest after that. For me, the problem is that as the events of the game have ascended into the realms of ultra high-fantasy, the limits of what is possible have become meaningless. In classic, we fought dragons, but by Legion, we watched an interdimensional monster stab a planet with a sword from the bridge of a space ship.

Good fantasy needs to have some sort of internal rules of what can and can't happen or it just becomes a mess, which is what WoW has become.

Even through whole DF and the beginning of TWW, the story is still vague cliffhanger BS. I will never simp for purple elf with naked feet.

Shadowlands is also a very bad setting, I don't think they should set expansions in outer planes filled with supernatural entities. Its the cosmic realm of death and there are merchants?

Man I've never even really played WoW. The free 20 levels 15 or whatever years ago was enough mind numbing mmorpg gameplay for me

Oh boy two years of no answer to who the jailer was also fingers crossed that they actually explain who the jailer is and what his motivation is. I honestly think he is the sole reason the shadowland campaign was as bad as it was. literal definition of unexplained, surprise, boss with no substance, which is a shame because I actually like the design of this guy, despite it having a little bit too much light gray in my opinion.

Happy to see someone give mop some love, I feel crazy for loving it for the world and stories it told

oh yes, legion was so good and epic, it really felt exiting to explore Argus and to wait for what's to come

Haha slow. Have you heard of Warhammer40k?

Nah I'm having fun in shadow lands=

Every amazing moment in Shadowlands story is undercut my 5 to 10 terrible moments. It’s hard to take the good with the bad when the bad is so damn irritating.

What Makes Warcraft Lore Good? pretend like Shadowlands NEVER HAPPENS! Bolvar is still chilling on throne at icecrown... none of the after nonsense has happened!

TWW feels like a continuation of Legion in multiple ways, feels like they're back and actually have a plan now.

nerd cope lmao it was fun 🤡

Fully agree with specifically two things you said

1. The story is the backdrop to the game
2. The story should focus on the world

The world feels so much more alive when there is no clear plot but a lot of mini stories. Having the story be not so in your face is nice too. A game like elden ring takes it too far with how ambiguous it is but classic wow did it perfectly. The world is the main character and you slowly learn about the big threats of the world through hints and quest chains.

Eg the defias brotherhood

You initially think them as some organisation of thieves and thugs.

Then you find out they’re plotting to destroy stormwind

Then you find out they used to be stormwind stonemasons

Then you find out they’re involved in the kidnapping of the king

Then you find out they’re being manipulated by onyxia

Wish they would return to having the world as the main character

I think all of the Jailer storyline was conceptualized around "We need a Thanos".

the opening of this video... didnt age well

My first experience with wow, was coming in from BfA's ending, and playing the start of Shadowlands.

It is a miracle I came back to play Dragonflight, which I am now playing as of the last 2ish months. And god is it delightful to just do the story and have a fun time right now.

Re-subbed and have been using Chromie time to replay the xpacks I've missed - Legion and BfA - mostly for the story. But Shadowlands reputation is such that I intend to skip it entirely and basically pretend it didn't happen.

everything about this is just.. so fundamentally accurate

even though shadowlands was decent, denathrius and winter queen, along with revendreth and ardenweald, are my favorite stories and questlines, tbh. (i haven't played dragonflight, because my computer is a modern potato, and i also can't wait to play war within though)

Shadowlands may have had the worst story ever. But I have seen a lot of games and shows with way worse writing. Examples

Rwby Volumes 5-9
Afterlost
Fena Pirate Princess
Darling in the Franxx
Synduality Noir episodes 13-24
Game of Thrones Season 7 and 8
Star Wars Acolyte
Fire Emblem Silver Snow/Verdant Wind
Fire Emblem Fates and Engage
Tokyo Ghoul Root A
Diablo 3
Soul Calibur 5
Gen:Lock
Naruto Fillers
Bleach after the Aizen Arc
Attack on Titan Series Finale (manga version)
Sly Cooper Thieves in Time
Jak and Daxter Lost Frontier
Final Fantasy 13-2 and Lightning Returns
Kill the Justice League
Red Riding Hood 2011
Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
MCU Phases 4 and 5
DC Extended Universe
And worst of all, Velma seasons 1 and 2

Platinum Wow: I only make lore videos on stuff I find interesting, it's why I only made one Shadowlands lore video.
Me: Looks at recent videos and sees that the only Dragonflight video is of the alpha that's not a good sign.

Warcraft ended with the beginning of WotLk

they did arthas so dirty....

Coming back to this at the end of dragonflight and was comparing a lot of what he said about the story building to what we have seen the past few years. I think Blizzard did well. They gave us a clear villain(s) and built out lore in a direct and fun way. Each major patch had an ending to one plot point and a cliff hanger to another. First we kill Raz and the incarnates are released, then we move to focus on the sundered flame to kill sarkareth while the other incarnates take advantage of this distraction and begin their plans, finally we kill fyrakk saving the new world tree which wraps up the burning of teldrassil storyline and restablishing the aspects, but then also hinting that there is more to come with the void being the next major focus as an antagonist. With the next expanision saga moving back into the realm of WoW storylines and lore we all have known for years (unlike shadowlands which popped tf up out of nowhere) I am excited to see how the story runs. Plus hopefully more void themed mogs for my void elf shadow priest heh

"what makes warcraft lore good"
nothing, it's been a mess since before wow was even released.
I mean warcraft 3 was the beginning of the whole
>fight each other
>big bad appears
>oh no we have to work together now
>horde gets magically forgiven for all of their atrocities
It's been absolute shit forever now and the first expansion the burning retcons just made it worse

Yeah my main gripe with WoW is what was introduced in Battle for Azeroth...level scaling. Whats the point of leveling when every enemy you face is the same level as you?! I loved leveling and exploring new zones, watching as my character grew stronger and could gain a gradual edge over the environment he or she was in. It felt like lifting weights! Hard at first but little by little you eventually grow past that zone your in and are ready for the next. But now? There's a reason why I'm playing Wrath of the Lich King Classic these days. which I highly recommend, it's a nice nostalgic trip to the past with some new added features.

i think the issue is with the jailer is they tried to make him vader, when his plans made no sense

I feel like with Dragonflight, which was probably already under development when Shadowlands hit, they finally kinda got the hint that this kind of storytelling isn't engaging long-term. And that's why they just wiped everything and started DF with a clean slate. At least this is how it felt at the start. Put a halt to building ever more outside worlds never revisited, setting aside conflicts drawn out far too long and returning to very basic fantasy world building. "Look, we screwed up, here have dragons". And I think, at least at launch, it worked, and was a step in the right direction.

All the problems people mentioned can be summed up to: 4 years of build up topped by a rushed expansion. I really think Shadowlands cuold have been great. They shuold have given the Jailer more time to develop. Same to Sylvanas. Keep it vague a bit more and make the ending count.
I m ok with Arthas not showing up and not been redeemed. The arc was alredy done

Shadowlands is first expansion which create the add-on effect from Final Fantasy 9 design to gears. I love how world of warcraft become one of the best game to use a lot copy and fourthwall breaking. Like everyone you got to play WoW everyday✌🏻

for me it went downhill with wod.. time travel bullshit milking characters that played their role to the end..

I skipped shadowlands after I learned that the renowned system was just another way of timegating content. Everything in warcraft is design to be slow moving. The slower and lazier the design the longer you spend wasting your life on their game. Warcraft players accept and justify shitty game design because wow players have no life or job or goals in life and your /played shows it.

i quit the game after 15 years due to cliffs hangers;

Wow has been on a steady and FAST decline since WoD. Nothing good has come from wow since WoD. Every expansion is a cheap joke and blizzard just knows they can mail it in half assed and everyone’s still gonna buy it cause most players are dumb af. Classic is the only thing that saved wow cause a game from 2007 is still better than anything they’ve done since WoD. Wows sub count has only gone down since WotLK and is less than half of what it was. Blizzard is a joke

Slow narrative? laughs in warhammer 40k

The worst part about Shadowlands for me is how it indirectly broke my enjoyment of playing Horde characters.
BFA already did a heavy damage to that. But there was some kind of cliffhanger promising that all of what happened will be explained and that it will be satisfying.
Well,it was poorly explained, and it was outrageous.

What I do not get is what Blizzard thinks the Horde players are or want. They paint us as default easy baddies. They want us to be the evil aggressors who always start shit for their selfish stupid evil reasons. And they don't even provide us with kind of satisfying explanation we can hold onto. We are bad guys, but "not" bad guys. If we at least we're full baddies who charge at you screaming, trying to kill you just for the fun of it, and trying to gain the darkest evil powers under your command, you could at least play with that mindset. But no, they go with "morally gray". The Horde commits a "morally gray" genocide. The word genocide comes from Ian, so it's not just my impression.

Why does Blizz think the Horde players are comfortable with the actions their faction makes? They painted the entire BFA Horde story as: "ends justify the means, we will do anything for victory in a war we started, no matter how horrible. In fact, the more horrible the better, because the horrible nature of it what weakens the opponent."
And after all this preaching from Sylvanas that being honorable and dead is stupid and that winning by any means necessary is the way to go, she then reveals she hated the Horde, played everyone as a fool and just did all of this just for the sake of casualties alone. She mocked anyone who cared for anything in this conflict, and she held a disdain for anyone who would care for life. By that, she completely betrayed not just the Horde as a whole, but also the Forsaken.

And now, every time a discussion comes about the morality of the Horde, everyone points to the fucking burning of Teldrassil. Blaming the Horde for it. "It's a myth that it's all Sylvanas's fault." What? The entire war was Sylvanas's idea. She pursuaded everyone into it. The attack on the Elves was her idea. The attack on Teldrassil was her idea. Her getting emotional and deciding on the spot to burn the tree instead of capturing it was all on her. And then I, who always hated Sylvanas from the very beginning, need to take a collective blame for her actions, even after she betrays me and my faction, mocks us and tries to kill us? And it's still supposed to be the Horde's fault? Who would find enjoyment out of that notion?

And now the WoW story wants us as players to keep two contradictory thoughts in our heads. Thoughts that I both hate. One that the Horde and the Horde player by extension is responsible for Teldrassil' s burning. And the other is that Sylvanas was redeemed after the events of Shadowlands, and her service in the Maw, she is good now, and she will return as a hero. (and they literally added a text in game suggesting Sylvanas returns soon and she's redeemed).

Blizz wants to have their cake and eat it too. They will have this bitch define the player character and the identity of our faction by her evil deeds, and at the same time cleanse her of those evil deeds. This is one of the worst... Nay, the worst aspect of WoW's story ever.