Blizzard would sooner turn one of the few benevolent forces into villains than make an interesting new enemy that will last more than a single expansion.
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Somewhere underground there is a quietly crying Iridikron.
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#PrimalistsWereRight
Yeah this is just more of them not treating the ants (people) as if theyâre anything more than little cogs in their grand machine of the universe. Entirely in keeping with the Titans portrayal up til now.
It doesnât really explain why the Khaz Algar Earthen are different with regards to the edicts/free will stuff to all the other Earthen, but fundamentally I donât think this new ârevelationâ actually impacts on the Titanâs morals compared to how we knew of them before.
Theyâre not - as a group - benevolent. Some (Eonar) might care more than others, but grand scheme the Titans donât really care about individual mortal lives all that much, and they never have.
The Ultimate Visual Guide once described them as
Bastions of purity and good, [âŠ] unable to conceive of evil or wickedness in any form.
and idk what they were thinking when they wrote that because lol, lmao.
It is tedious all this what a twist the good guy was actually bad⊠OR WAS HE! DUN DUN DUN
I donât need endless masks falling off everyoneâs faces to reveal more masks underneath. Just let the hero be a hero and the villain be a villain.
If thereâs one thing Iâve learned. Being forgotten by blizzard prevents them from torching your lore and character assassination.
Back then the Titans were more akin to the Valar from Tolkienâs tales. Genuinely good beings constructing the world and making it a habitable place. And Sargeras was their Melkor.
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Everything you love will be jailored.
Every setting you love will be Veilguarded
You will baarv
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To be fair to Veilguard, it only made explicit what was already being laid thick in Inquisition: that the Andrastian faith was wrong and it was all ancient elves. Veilguard simply spelled that out in the most explicit terms possible.
Sorry for the off topic tangent.
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The UVG was released in 2013, years after Wrath brought us their âwiping the planet of all life to stop the Old Godsâ machine lore, the burning of a âmillion, millionâ lives before Algalon even got to Azeroth.
Their beef with Sargeras started not because he wiped out a planet worth of corrupted mortals, but when he killed a corrupted World Soul, specifically. They believed they could have purged the world soul of its corruption without killing itâŠbut that sort of attitude isnât seemingly extended to mortal lives. They just ramp up the Genocider 9000.
And Iâm note sure theyâre super Tolkien - the name Titans is from Greek stuff, and the Aesir/Vanir names that got used for a bit are Norse. Both pantheons have a slew of gods that are, for want of a better word, very human in their flaws.
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And the Valar sunk a continent the size of africa during a fight with Morgoth. The Valar where very destructive. And they made a lot of mistakes too, thereâs a subreddit called r/F***Manwe for a reason.
The Valar ordering the world, the Titans ordering the cosmos. Regularly botching their interactions with mortals. Servants going rogue, maia going rogue. One of their number fallen who goes on a destructive rampage to tear down all thatâs been built. They have a lot in common.
Yeah the titans have been at best, deeply suspect for as long as theyâve been a thing.
One of the things the War3 early WoW version of blizzard did quite well was having most of its factions that werenât a demon or undead be at least somewhat morally grey.
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I mean Iâm not a tolkienhead, so I was just responding to the idea that they were âgenerally goodâ, without knowing any more than that. If the Valar actually very destructive and sank a continent, then yeah, I guess they are like the Titans, but then I wouldnât really align them with the description of âBastions of purity and good, unable to conceive of evil or wickedness in any formâ ya know.
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To probably butcher Sir Terryâs writing âGood ainât always Niceâ.
Compared to, say, the Old Gods? Yes, the Titans are pretty Good. At the same time, the scale they work at is alien to mortals, and vice versa. The same sort of âworking on probailities and percentagesâ order that leaves them surprised when the little mortals rise up and achieve the impossible.
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Nuance is fine. I like nuance.
Iâm just tired of the trend of jumped up mortals somehow overthrowing everything in existence and being fawned over for âmortal potentialâ that in reality just equals being bestowed every plot device and convenience in order to win whilst their opponents are more often than not smacked around with the stupidity inducing bat a fair few times.
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This is also something I agree with, yes.
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Thanks, I didnât know that!
That was actually a textual flaw of the leader of the Valar. He eventually released Melkor from imprisonment precisely because of his inability to comprehend evil.
âŠand it seemed to ManwĂ« that the evil of Melkor was cured. For ManwĂ« was free from evil and could not comprehend it, and he knew that in the beginning, in the thought of IlĂșvatar, Melkor had been even as he; and he saw not to the depths of Melkorâs heart, and did not perceive that all love had departed from him for ever.
As for the Titans, to me, in their old lore, they were âneeds of the manyâ types, concerned about Life as a whole but willing to make sacrifices for its sake. Itâs not that they donât care, but wiping a planet and starting over was preferable to having it fall into the grip of the Old Gods. A sort of cold machine logic.
There were, however, no indications in old lore that they were evil or desired to suppress free will.
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Well, youâre forgetting that the Valar work in harmony with the AinulindalĂ« / Songs of the Ainur, which you literally canât do if you go against the will of IllĂșvatar. A core component of why Morgoth becomes weaker over time during the Legendarium is not only because he literally invests part of his power in his servants, but metaphysically because he goes directly against the Music by sowing discord by trying to create his own.
And, yes, IllĂșvatar and the Valar are unquestionably benevolent entities in the context of Tolkienâs lore, despite them doing questionable things, but that is sort of the point - it is rooted in the very Biblical belief that the insurmountable good and righteousness of âthe Creatorâ canât be put under scrutiny by mortals, because we are not capable of understanding the reasons or even powers behind divine decisions. You may not agree with it, but that doesnât matter, itâs literally how the world functions in those specific works.
There are some people (and I know, because I am one of them) whose problems with turning the Titans into proper villains stems partly from 2 points:
- The âbeyond mortal reckoningâ aspects of their being (IS it wrong to quote-unquote purge the world to prevent the potentially catastrophic corruption of the Old Gods? Perhaps it is, we donât have the meta knowledge required to make that call.) In this light, the Titans are less evil and more willing to do things for the âGreater Goodâ - from which they may even be swayed away, like Algalon was.
- The more cynical aspect of critical analysis that indicates Blizzard has a hit-list out on conservative (no, I donât mean in the political sense) power structures and authorities that be. Itâs not really a coincidence that the old establishment (both in terms of narrative and in-universe lore) is continuously being annihilated, swept into the background, or retconned.
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Which makes me wonder how Last Titan will play out with their slave race in the Earthen radicalsed against the titans and suffused by Azeroth on awakening and (i know this is a sore spot for some.) The dragon aspects now empowered by Azeroth herself, a primal incarnate included. Factoring in their pet Keeper Odyn having been humbled by a dragon and his own pet slave dragons turned against him.
curious times.
This is such a strange quote as well when you take into consideration Sargeras. Blizzard, isnât HE called the âDark Titanâ for a reason???
Yeah, but the point of the quote is to show the Luciferian âFall From Graceâ, its a common literature trope. Sargeras by this point was no longer a Titan and in the older lore his fall was still perceived as a great blow to the universe as a whole because he was corrupted unnaturally, not by any natural means.
Going from a being whose existence was once âI will be the sword and shield of the universe against the endless tides of darknessâ to âI have become the blade of the darkness, raised against the universeâ.
This was before they started their shtick of everything being made up, 10D plans within 10D plans and AmanâThul somehow having the power to rewrite all quest text and history ever.
" This is my gift: compassion for all living things. A drive to protect and nurture them. And the ability to heal that which others cannot, birth what others may not, and love even the unlovableâwho surely need such grace more than any other souls."
The Old WoW Encyclopedia also cites them as âbenevolentâ.
I struggle a bit to see the moral difference to be split between âwiping out problemsâ (such as a corrupted planet) or âreprogramming a problemâ (thraegar).
Like neither is good, but itâd be a stretch to say that the former is âfine under their needs of the manyâ concept while the latter is a bridge too far for them, which is why I donât see this new lore as a great departure from their attitudes/morals. Weâre just getting more of the same.
ehh
As far back as MoP we had lore of Sargeras/the Titans enslaving creatures to use in their war against the demons*, and that was before he did the whole planet-cleaver. He wasnât even corrupted until after he split off from the Titans. His fall from grace was entirely due to personal ideology shifting from what he saw on the frontlines, not because of magic.
Doomguard says: What an odd demand. Not even my own kind care about our origins. Why should you?
Kanrethad Ebonlocke says: If you do not care then there is no harm telling me.
Doomguard says: âŠbefore Sargeras freed us, we were the Titanâs hounds. Forever enslaved to police the use of arcane magics.
Doomguard says: Sacrificial magic was considered the greatest violation of life and we were attuned to instantly punish those who delved into such⊠delicious sorcery.
I guess this is predicated on the Doomguard answering truthfully, butâŠagain, wouldnât really surprise me? The Titans go âaight, these guys can be used, so weâll use them - forcefully. Greater good, needs of the many, etc. etc.â
I guess part of the problem is that theyâre described as benevolent but then every single piece of lore weâve had since kinda contradicts that.
Slight exaggeration, but slight. What benevolent acts do we know the Titans have taken? We have a laundry list of moral issues and failings over the years, but have we seen them do anything benevolent? Even their wars against the Old Gods and Legion canât be called that explicitly, 'cos theyâre the Titans enemies too. Theyâre not fighting out of any real care for mortals. The care given to Azeroth is motivated more for protecting the world soul than mortals.
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I would argue in MoP we were still in the period of Demons as completely, objectively evil satanic beings in all regards still though. Titans putting them into a circumstance where theyâre no longer chaotic evil burning 500 orpahanages but instead punishing the RP-PVP Orphanage burners is arguably benevolent. They could eradicate them instead.
I think its unfair to say they do it because theyâre opposed enemies alone. That definitely wasnât the lore-case for 30-odd years until very, very recently when you take into account how long Titan lore has actually been around. Theyâve given birth to trillions of planets and trillions of lifeforms upon them, protecting them from external and interdimensional threats all the while and ridding the universe of entirely-objectively-evil forces like the Void and Demons.
To be fair I understand what youâre saying Elenthas but my grievance is that these mfers just constantly ping-pong in extremist, radical ways when it comes to portrayal of the Titans and none of it makes coherent sense when combined with older or newer lore !
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