That was the whole point for them to be a blank slate. I mean I understand if someone is not a fan of such concept, but it is not a writing failure or so since that was the goal all along.
Btw their visages are created after the Waking shore questline, so it has nothing to do with what was 20k years ago.
I canât rate this post high enough.
Doesnât really work. This is supposedly a lore significant elite hero class meant to rub shoulders with DKs and DHs. To say they fell a little short would be a solid understatement.
Even tho this game has been taking significant steps to devolve from an rpg to an avatar creation tool over the past few years. This is subpar even by those standards.
Somehow we evolved from Dragons being mythological, ancient monsters who had selfish interests and rarely involved themselves in mortal affairs into teenagers with identity issues.
The whole visage thing got changed from Kânaak using it as a sort of way for Dragons to interfere unseen in mortal affairs, to a metaphor of identity.
Itâs comedic that an ancient race like Dragons use other races to cope with said problems.
Almost like this was written and taken from some Tumblr blog or a comment on Deviantart.
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I really want to argue against you but I just canât.
In my opinion, it should have been like this;
Neltharion foresaw visions that a great war was coming against the Incarnates, and their current numbers and ranks werenât enough, and so the idea came to him, a chromatic army wielding all Aspectral powers that could blend effortlessly with any and all flights to bolster and strengthen them enough for the coming wars.
The visions were of course all sneakily aimed at Neltharion by Nâzoth all along so that Neltharion would craft an army of super soldiers for the old gods, unbeknownst to Neltharion.
Neltharion pitched this idea to the others, and the keepers gifted him the control gauntlet as a safety precaution so that there was never any risk of the army going rogue, and they would stick to Nelthyâs ideals - and thus the Titanâs orderly ideals; or so they thought anyway.
After much experimentation with alchemy, magic and presumably some degree of physical fusion surgery he creates the Dracthyr from the currently existing trolls and dragonkin eggs. This the weyrns are born.
Theyâre trained up over some period of time, then as we see in the cinematic, Raszageth attacks them as Neltharion is addressing the weyrns, destroying the control gauntlet. Forcing Nelthy to unleash old god power to stop, and finally imprison Raszageth.
Suddenly realising that the result of this means the Dracthyr can no longer be directly controlled and are bereft of any safety control measure, as well as thousands of them just witnessing him using old god powers - Neltharion panics and turns to Malygos for help containing them.
As Nelthy explains to Malygos that the Dracthyr need to be contained because Nelthyâs safety measure over them is now destroyed, he conveniently leaves out the other reason - theyâre all witnesses to his old god power. This is why Malygos described Nelthy as âbeside himselfâ when he came to him for help.
Neltharion chose to lock them away rather than kill them all, because they were still his children/creations that he cared for. And he wasnât quite Deathwing as weâd know him yet.
But they still had to be locked away to conceal his dark side, they were a loose end that needed tying up.
This also explains why he continued to search for an alternative way of creating a chromatic flight despite already having one - he needed what he already made, but with added control. No sense of autonomy or self thought. He needed a Dracthyr 2.0, but with the inbuilt obedience of the gauntlet. So never told his children about them, and used them to help him try to create the 2.0 Dracthyr. And thus we got Dragonmen, etc.
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I love this. This would be a solid foundation for the race to build on and itâs exactly what I thought it would be too. But itâs not, the lore isnât there, the characters arenât there, the reveals arenât there. Itâs not there!
I wonder if that gauntlet will come back into play as a sign that Neltharion also didnât want anyone to know what the titans gave him to help fight their enemies. A tool to mind control people in huge numbers. Such a thing would be unheard of and be a massive red flag.
And not just that, a solid foundation like what you wrote would allow for so much to be built on. Maybe some drakthyr only saw those old god powers but donât know what they saw. Maybe thereâs loyalists who think what Neltharion did was right, or who believe he didnât go mad and that theyâre being lied to by Nozdormu and the mortal races. Some potential for internal conflict.
Theyâre not even a faction despite the fact they clearly should have been one. One that doesnât side with Horde or Alliance and maybe even scolds those of their kin who did. Some could even suffer from the same mental instability or lack of control as the chromatics. So much could have been done with them.
The drakthyr are just⌠disappointment embodied. Like much of the game, the potential is all there and the execution is the worst it could possibly have been⌠
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I literally banged that out off the top of my head while sat in a waiting room for 40 minutes too. If I can churn something like that out then imagine what the dedicated writing team could have done.
Perhaps there is some really great content coming up in 10.0.7 for us, but itâs just too late. Why was there no proper set up for their introâŚ
First impressions are what count. Theyâve let themselves down
There isnât.
Letâs be real for a second, because this is the lore forum and not general chat.
The people who write this stuff are not deserving of the name âwriterâ and should be let go. They are actually, objectively unqualified for the job. Even if I did like the tone of this expansion, the amount of grammatical mistakes, spelling errors, and basic sins against writing - on the nose dialogue, exposition dumps, narrating the obvious, cardboard characters and so many more - is unforgivable.
I honestly have no idea how these people scored their job but I think it might be due to the US seemingly undervaluing writing qualifications. A lot of what they make is ruined by unskilled âwritersâ. It becomes obvious when you look at the work of an actual writer - who has written their own books and earned their own fame, not Golden because she just made bank on WoWâs fame - that whatever passes for lore and story in WoW is not just sub-par, itâs downright amateur drivel.
I sincerely hope Metzen can do something about it because I personally have no doubt that part of the gameâs drop in numbers is because people do not care about the lore or story. In an MMO whose world should be engaging, compelling and urging people to immerse themselves in it, this is a capital sin.
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Iâve noticed this as well, massively. There are so many mistakes - not even glitches but actual straight up mistakes. There is zero quality control either. I can only assume things behind the scenes are far worse than the public know in terms of Blizzard from an organisational standpoint. But I wonât go into that, this is all about lore here.
Totally agree with everything youâve said. Blizzard, do better by us.
Working with what they have done(as far as Iâm aware anyway) Iâd say the best way to approach it is to lean into the whole artificial supersoldier thing. Making a core part of their journey figuring out their place in a world they donât belong into. Theyâre wholly unique in that they donât have a history, a culture or any such thing. They were made by Neltharion for one purpose, which without the gauntlet they werenât even used for and now they have neither Neltharion nor that purpose beyond the immediate Primalist nonsense, which for the time being is not terribly urgent, because theyâre laying low.
Iâd expect anything they build or do to be efficient, utilitarian and distinctly straightforward, because they donât have the frame of referrence for anything but this sort of hyper-militaristic, rigid structure. By all means they shouldnât have an understanding of why one would bend or even disobey their orders, for (to them) seemingly trivial things. (Meaning theyâd have difficulties with about 90% of the stuff in DFlight like⌠âWe have primalists to fight, why am i gardening?â, âHow can we use these books on ancient history?â, âYes, the old chief died, very sad, now can you tell me where the leyline is?â, etc.
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Preach. Preach this so hard.
I would dare to expand this lore-void assertion even more: The whole Dragonflight is a Lore failure in my opinion. Cause there is nothing in it what makes me willing to stay in game or at least in Dragon Isles, so that I still enjoy the rest of WoW world feeling good that nothing bounds me to these new lands.
This! This SO much!
I also assumed this is how they would be when I started so I engaged with the quest like this. Playing it stoic, somewhat aloof. But the longer it went on, the more I felt disconnected because all the drakthyr I met were insecure weaklings or just childish idiots. All the quest I was doing were things my character would not give a sh*t about and I ended up feeling like I was a clown in a circus, pretending to be a soldier in a war.
âHelp my flowers!â
âOh no, not the otters!â
âPlease give a pretty gift to my fianceâ
âLook after the whelps for meâ
âWe have to save the frogsâ
âPlease find a runaway girl and her birdâ
âLetâs go climbingâ (I have wings!)
âSee you at the spaâ
âHelp us get marriedâ
âHelp me figure out my goals in lifeâ
âOh no, my friend is sadâŚâ
âIâll teach you all about fishâ
âI wish I was a painterâ
âMy dog is sad, please help.â
âWheeee birds!â
âSILENCE!! I am here to fight! I am here for the Primalists and you fools can all go to hell!â
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My biggest problem here is the clear impression, that this is a feature, not a bug. I mean⌠I am not a fan of the number of these activities, but if I felt that they were a 10.0-thing that will go away with a patch or two, it wouldnât be so bad. Especially since we always had some of that, though the quantity is unusual, even by fluffy Pandaria standards. But considering that this addon is explicitly a ânew chapterâ, and we should be getting a glimpse in which way the wind is turning⌠yeah, doesnât seem to be a good fit for me. Seems more directed at the crowd that strayed to FF14 than the surviving WoW players. Without the reasonably well-constructed main plot with characters that people seem to actually care about, mind you.
I canât believe you forgot about the worst of it.
âHave some soupâ.
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I have the eery feeling that this isnât some attempt to lure people away from FF14 - which it will not succeed at because those people want a good story, which WoW doesnât have - but that this is what they want to write and create.
The old team of writers was a bunch of nerds who liked Warhammer, metal music and epic fantasy. Their work reflected this.
This team seems to be a forced diversity clown circus who are more into anime, My Little Pony and happy drugs. They seem to want this safe, clean, always happy world where everything is whimsical and funny and if not those, melodramatic and nauseatingly emotional. And vague and vapid too. Mostly that, thereâs nothing beneath the surface.
So yea, if this is WoW going forward and not just a brief change of tone - and I fear it is not - I am super done with even keeping up with its âstoryâ. And I think Iâm not alone, but most people who cared about this stuff, have looooong since left for greener pastures.
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I have two assumptions about Dracthyr and their biology. Please donât think Iâm weird, Iâm just curious about it since we have nearly nothing to work with.
My initial thought was that they were completely sexless, not male nor female. There has always been some definition of masculine and feminine anatomy with the playable races, except Dracthyr. They were created to be the perfect soldiers and nothing more it seems. Their âVisageâ is a scuffed way for them to express their gender identity, but it doesnât go beyond that. We also havenât seen any Dracthyr children, so reproduction is off the table as well which is another indicator of this.
My other thought was that they do have sexes and they function just like every other dragonkin in the game. Doing the do, laying eggs etc.
Again, not much to work with. Itâs crazy how little the race is developed, not even a vague hint at how the race works.
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The less we know about Dracthyr and how exactly they were brought into existence the better imo.
Though I do realise that some people would love to see if they truly are some unholy product of experimenting on mortal and dragon blood, trying out to create ultimate soldier that is superior to the previous creations like Drakonids and Dragonspawns, since those two can only use magic of one flight.
In Blackrock Caverns we can see how Drakonids are being made. They are simply âascendedâ mortals infused with Dragon Magic. Which means they do not pro-create among themselves.
I would not be surprised if Dracthyr are completely impotent and also require some kind of âforgeâ âlaboratoryâ or other artificial womb to make them.
Who knows maybe we will be once again introduced to this Titan Anima thing we saw in MoPâs Throne of Thunder that was used to shape life.
I really hope it does turn out to be that weâre freaky lab experiments, thatâs a playable flavour Iâd like to have on the table.
SPOILER (i think? I guess) Iâve seen vague screenshots on a lore discord that looks to be an area of âdiscardedâ or failed Dracthyr experimentsâŚ. From PTR
I mean this is the problem? That we donât know? Because by not knowing, we canât even try to roleplay a drakthyr in our heads. Would they wanna be romantic or seductive? Would they seek a partner? Are they influenced by hormones so men are more âGraaaahâ and women are more emotional? Who knows!
If theyâre vat-babies, every one that dies is one less, with no ways to replenish their number. This means they might go extinct unless they fix that, which would be a good angle for a story or questline.
Thatâs not how good lore works. You can do this for old gods and titans to keep them mysterious but you canât do it for a playable race because it gives people nothing to work with. I mean you can do it for the origins but drakhyr have nothing at all so lacking an origin just compounds the issue.
Are they? They existed way before that in Blackrock Mountain and they deffo didnât use such magic so I doubt it. Even the first boss in Vault is supposedly the âsonâ of the second to last boss - who is a dragonkin who spawned a drakonid, these writers are legit retarded - so they are born somehow. I think even Activision doesnât know either because they havenât thought about it or because they have and are too dumb to be consistent.
I want this too but⌠I mean. Look at the tone of this expansion. Look at the people doing the âwritingâ. Look at how they portray DrakthyrâŚ
I donât think these people are able to create a cool sicko dungeon of experiments gone wrong, corpses on tables, dragon parts and all the crazy things a lab like that would contain. Itâs too gritty, too metal.
Itâs more likely weâll probably see some âtitan engineâ or âforgeâ that is nice and clean and Neltharion put a dragon egg in there with a troll egg - or whatever, who even cares anymore - and the engined fused it and then he did that 10000 times or whatever.
I dunno, the more I think about this, the more sad I become at the state of the loreâŚ