I have no idea how after seeing this cinematic people think that:
NElves were created by Elune - they are her “children” as in “favourite worshippers”, not literal children.
Elune took an active part in the burning. - huh? She did not make it happen, she was a witness of it already happening and sent the souls to Ardenweald instead of intervening in an usual way (turning them into wisps [which already happens rarely], or whatever, I don’t really know what normally happens to kaldorei after death).
Overall I am torn. On one hand I LOVED Tyrande’s appearance, the visual effects were simply stunning! I loved the way she fought with Sylvanas, it was veeeeeery cinematic. And badass!
But only the visual part was badass.
The arc was pointless. Kind of. It feels like she is meant to be a parallel to Sylvanas. She is better than the banshee because she didn’t become obsessed, she could go back to her senses. She can forgive and focus on renewing, rather than destroying.
But… she legit made the choice of pursuing the vengeance in the last cinematic??? She said “my life for hers” and after Elune took her powers IN THE WORST POSSIBLE MOMENT and she says “it’s her choice lol” after she had already made the choice?
I don’t want to be fed the narrative of “vengeance bad”, we are literally avenging something in every second quest - latest example would be avenging Akarek, a big part of DH class identity is vengeance, and honestly? Burning of Teldrassil is the biggest tragedy that happened to a playable race caused by another playable race (faction). And… the resolution is to just forgive? No justice? This is insulting, not gonna lie.
To sum up - I think the storyline had potential. But many things about it feel… random or ill-considered.
I suppose one could make the argument that Elune “guided” the Dark Trolls to the Well of Eternity, and so had a hand in the creation of the Night Elves, but otherwise I’m on board with what you say. However, one does need to ask the question why they are her favoured children? Is it because they are on Azeroth (basically the center of the universe at this point) or is it because of their connection with Cenarius (though who knows how many children like Cenarius she’s got across the cosmos) or is there another reason?
Yeah. I like the theory that Elune simply decided to turn none of the victims of the burning into Wisps and instead send them all to the Shadowlands.
I think it’s partly to make Night Elf players feel special.
I mean, with the Shadowlands we learn that there are many other races on other planets. So Blizzard makes us special by having a unique connection to Azeroth - and Azeroth is special. Maw Walker and all that.
With Night Elves it’s a bit the same. Seemingly Elune has lots of races that worship her. It kind of kills the fantasy if Night Elves are just random worshipping race #47834, so Blizzard throws in the line that the Night Elves are Elune’s favored. That preserves the fantasy that players adopt when they play Night Elf - that they have a special relationship with Elune.
I’m sure Blizzard will dig into it more when they eventually allow Elune to take center stage.
It’s the same with Tyrande. It’s important to the story to underscore that the other Night Warriors all failed and died because they chose vengeance. Thereby Tyrande can be special and not just another Night Warrior, because she is the one who makes a different choice - a better choice.
There are to many not random things that have happened.
Taurens. It was a race of yaungols who were living under Cenarius control in his lands. Then at one point of their history one tribe of that race have traveled to the Well Of The Eternity. Where this race was transformed into Taurens. Taurens is a race that loves nature and also believes that Elune exists, but with different name.
Night Elves. It was a race of dark trolls who were living under Cenarius control in his lands. Then at one point of their history one tribe of that race have traveled to the Well Of The Eternity. Where this race was transformed into Night Elves. Night Elves is a race that loves nature and worships Elune from the day one.
Now lets remind also that Cenarius is Elunes son (Winter Queen tells that he is part of their family). And Ysera the best friend of the Night Elves who is Elunes pet. And now Elune tells that Night Elves are her children…
Lets sum up. It was Elune who have created Taurens and Night Elves. It was she the one who have used The Well Of The Eternity waters to create Nature loving races.
I won’t say it’s impossible. Blizzard can go anywhere with this. But children can just as well mean adopted children. She nurtured them like a mother, which is wjy the night elves know her as Mother Moon, and possibly why Elune sees them as her children.
That is only the point of view of the Titans. Just to remind that they did not mention any details about the Elune in their book, so her deals are mystery for them.
I know only 2 WoW races that are crazy Nature fanatics.
The prophet Elune?
Well that’s possible. She did seen that the Wolf will defeat the Horde in Cata. Maybe she did see that Sylvanas will be Kerrigan 2.0
Man I don’t know who is interested in the Night Elves anymore.
Blizzard is smart though, sure Orcs had their supposed prime time in WoD but there you can actually criticise it.
One word about Night Elves and suddenly it gets political.
Agreed. You may be able to trace the bread crumbs that eventually lead to Sylvanas working with the Jailer and say “look, the evidence was there all along!” … but there are many bread crumbs scattered across a wide surface that essentially lead to nowhere.
Complex narratives are fine, but I feel like people underestimate the value of simplicity. All these revelations about mystical powers does not enrich the world, in my opinion. The world was richer when they were mysterious. Did Elune exist or was she just the night elven interpretation of the Light? A way for them to make sense of something they can’t explain – like a religion. The legends we hear are they actually true or are they invented? Perhaps a bit of both! Perhaps they are partly true but aggrandized over time? Such ambiguity in the details of the world are completely lost when the author decides to come out and say “no, Elune is 100% real and all the legends are true” and it makes the world less interesting.
This is my major issue with Blizzard story telling in general, their elevation of powers. They always have to have this GRAND powerful what ever thing in their story, and they have to go into niggly details about just how GRAND and powerful this thing really is. And they always, without question, have to escalate to another GRAND powerful thing.
Elune is just another one of those escalations. Instead of having her - as you say - as a worship, they have to go into details and explain her. And then they start building on just how “Powerful” she really is. They made this mistake with Sargeras, making him so immensely powerful that in the end it would be impossible for us as “heroes” to deal with him. So we just had to work on a lesser - new born - titan instead, and watch a cutscene on how this powerful being was taken down by others.
Gods are well and good in a story, as long as they don’t become part of the narrative. In my book, that’s a cardinal sin in any writing and shows lack of imagination on the author. It’s a cheap device to revolve your story around this powerful entity you know can do what ever it wants to do. David Edding’s books are a good example of how Gods can be used as a successful narrative, without being this powerful beings that the story revolves around.
I think I would find Warcraft pretty frustrating if it always kept the truth out of reach.
I think when the fictional universe involves entities like Sargeras and Elune and Old Gods, then it’s kind of the fantasy to see those entities up close and learn what myths and legends are true.
And Blizzard have always been good to introduce two new secrets for every one they reveal the answer to.
When I started WoW and came from Warcraft III, one of the big story motivations was definitely to see Arthas. Blizzard could easily have gone with the idea that Arthas is some distant and permanent entity in the far beyond, and all anyone gets to experience is his scourge minions that invade Westfall or Mulgore every once in a while.
Blizzard could have gone with that and we’d still be running around as the simple adventurer after 17 years who just kills boars in the forest whilst hearing about the legends and myths that are always beyond our reach.
But I think Warcraft is built around huge events like The Sundering, the destruction of Draenor, or Archimonde’s defeat at Mount Hyjal.
That’s the appeal and that’s what’s exciting to be part of – to experience for yourself.
If you take that away, then what’s left? Tranquil Elwynn Forest and its local problems with the Defias Brotherhood? How long is that exciting?
Well some elements in a story is there to build the world. Gods and religion per example are there as world building tools, but they are never “active” participants in the story. Eddings realised this rather quickly, where he had to show the “powers” of the God, how devastating it could be if they got involved and so “limited” them from ever participating directly in the events. Same with Tolkien, he showed how the Valar destroyed Beleriand, and so they refused to directly get involved again, less the world would be utterly destroyed (and why they sent the Istari instead to guide Middle-Earth against Sauron).
Gods are just that, Gods. They have by their nature, unlimited power and potentials. The problem with having that amount of power however, is that you have to limit it somehow. And when you have “cosmic entity number 2 million” entering the story, it sort of loses its mysticism and power, it becomes the “normal”. And as long as you keep escalating your cosmic powers in your story, you eventually come into a realm of ridiculousness that hurts the story. That is where WoW is right now. The story has devolved, rather than evolved.
Warcraft 3 is a perfect example of how you can write story with powerful adversaries, without escalating into the point of ridiculousness. The human campaign of Arthas story line (which is the best story line in a game to day in my opinion), Kael’Thas story line, Sylvanas story line and the Night elven story line are all perfect examples of good stories without cosmic overlord powers every 2 seconds.
In my opinion, if a writer can’t write subtle story lines that doesn’t evolve around cosmic powers and all that, then it’s not a very good writer to begin with. Just look at the storyline of FF14 as an example, you have “great” powers and powerful allies, but they’re always limited to their powers to a degree that you’re never certain what is going to happen. And the storylines are progressive and move forward with interesting twists and turns, without having to resolve to all powerful Gods. You can threaten the world without having a God on your side.
That’s whatz we have with the main plot, though. The truth of Sylvanas’ true intentions has been out of reach for at least 5 years, arguably since Cata. And different from the true nature of the gods usually was, these truths are actually relevant to the plot we are meant to follow.
Sounds great, I’ll take it. I’m in it for the world-building, not the plot.
I suppose I prefer a fictional construct more akin to Greek, Egyptian, or Norse mythology where the Gods do actively participate and meddle in mortal affairs and have their internal conflicts and strife that innocent humans sometimes get caught up in.
A fictional world that largely applies the same limits and boundaries as our real world is not what I’m super keen on. That’s too ordinary for me.
I’m not sure I agree. Or rather, it depends.
Dragonball Z? Absolutely.
Marvel’s multiverse war? Very debatable.
World of Warcraft? Too soon to say, I think. The cosmic powers in Warcraft haven’t actually expanded much beyond the titanic powers we’ve always known about. We’re just having a front-seat experience to them now.
Blizzard’s universes tend to have a few power layers to them.
There’s the moral plane (Humans, Protoss, Orcs).
Then there’s the God plane (Angels, Xel’naga, Titans).
And finally there’s the creator plane (Anu, ???, The First Ones).
And Blizzard does seem to take their sweet time moving from one to another and in-between all of them.
I think it would be a problem if the speed was akin to that of Dragonball Z where the power level goes off the charts from the start, and then off we go!
But WoW will stir around in the God soup for years to come.
It works for me. But of course there are lots of different fantasy universes and they each have their approach that appeal to different audiences. I just don’t think WoW is very different from what Warcraft has always been, beyond the fact that we now get to experience more of the story and lore, rather than just reading or being told about it.
