Does anyone else feel like the pacing of the war within story is a total slug so far? I mean we came to Khaz Algar and defended Iron Forge 2.0 because one of the most iconic cities blew up within 5 seconds of the expansion (shock factor I guess) because of feet lady and then we killed some queen for what ever reason, corruption or something like always, and then 11.0.5 happened and actually absolutely nothing happened, and then 11.0.7 brought us the shortest and most boring story quest ever and a forgettable island nobody actually cares about. Seriously, I couldnāt care less about the Harronir. Their main characters and the story is just so incredibly uninteresting and forgettable and boring. And now we are going to the goblin city for whatever reason because black blood or some sh!t I mean, when are we actually coming to the good stuff? In the trailer before WW launch we saw Thrall and Anduin and Silithus and that big sword and it was all emotional and stuff, when will we start going in that direction?! Everything we are doing right now feels like filler.
Totally agree. The island thing was just a distraction, and the forthcoming Undermine patch just seems like a pivot from the main storyline or āvibeā of the expansion because it was Goblinsā turn to get some focus and they wanted to try another new travel mode (car racing) - basically just feels like a mini game patch.
To be honest, I lost faith when Alleria fired one arrow and broke Xalatathās relic - way to build up the main bad guy character and then make her look stupid. Compare with something like Wrath where the sense of Arthas looming over everything was so cool , the whole expansion had that sense of LICH KING watching everything and the final battle was epic. Instead we have a lady who canāt afford shoes or dodge an arrow.
With the plot Iām missing direction more than pacing right now. What even is the main plot? I mean, for now it basically is just a manhunt for Xal, isnāt it? Everything else is a distraction or a sideplot.
We have no real idea about what Xal actually plans in detail, or even who she really is as a character, but we know that she is evil and is presumably preparing the destruction of the world. And to stop herā¦ we follow wherever she wants us to follow. We arenāt even really tracking her, nor are we preparing weapons against her or traps for her, weāre just stumbling about and look surprised when we find out that we are actually playing into her plans, when we arenāt rolling a critical 20 and thwarting her by accident.
Soā¦ a manhunt without any hunting. Prey that we arenāt personally connected to. Impersonal and unrelatable stakes. A hunting party of a PTSD paladin/king, some half-crazed Windrunner sister, and a constantly changing cast of side-characters. And the usual overlong wait-times for the next chapters. What exactly are we supposed to look forward to? Ressource battles with goblins to mildly inconvenience Xal?
Yeah no, I guess the idea is to enjoy the journey and not look towards the destination. Look at all the nice side-stories and enjoy. Get to know and love Earthen and cheer for them while they throw off the rule of the paternal but abusive Titans. Learn about the underdog kobolds and their fear of the dark, and save them from the ones that would have them give in. Get intrigued by the idea of the Arathi empire, their culture and politics. Learn how talking spiders are just slightly different people and help them overcome oppression. And get hooked on finding out about the mysteries of Circeās Circlet or whatever one would do on Siren Isle if one actually paid attention that I didnāt care to spend.
The main plot that might or might not get totally epic any minute now is just the backdrop. Making the world itself more of the center of everything instead of this or that heroic questline was already presumably a goal in DF, and they are continuing with that direction, with no sign of stopping. I guess thatās their way of trying to go back to making the world feel a bit more like classic, where the world itself was basically the only main character.
I might even have liked that direction, if I liked the character of the world they are showing me now. But either way, I do think the pacing of the main plot is not getting any better any time soon. Itās just too much of an afterthought, after the more plot-driven BfA and SL failed.
Thatās well written and thoughtful - some good points.
For my part, the idea of Undermine though is just not something I want to explore. Yes just personal taste but goblins and all the mech type stuff (pollution, cars, indiustry etc) is just not my scene. So I would just like to get on with exploring the Xalatath mysteries (and finding out that sheās just grumpy because no shoes, so we quest for the legendary Boots of Azeroth to help her become a good guy 
)
To be honest I quit after the island patch, I played for a few hours did the same quest on 3 toons for that ring which I couldnāt socket the one gem I had in. And suddenly realized I spent months doing the same delves because m+ was ruined once lower keys were taken away and made an elite end game system, and that the story Iāve been playing has been made to represent the cultural ideals of one side of Americaās political spectrum and had nothing to do with the GAME. And effectively I have been playing a hamster wheel propaganda game and spending hard earned cash on it. Anyway I hope the game, pacing and general experience improves one day but untill then Iāve unsubbed and started enjoying irl like a lot of people who used to play.
I think the biggest disconnect stems from the notable lack of a Horde presence. Almost every major character involved in the expansion is either directly affiliated with the Alliance or some variant of an an existing Alliance race or faction.
I cheered when Dalaran was destroyed. Iāve wanted to see the place suffer ever since the disgusting actions of the Kirin Tor back in Warcraft 3 when they sided with Garithos against Kaelāthas. In Mists of Pandaria, when Vereesa and Jaina tried to play at genocide and started murdering and torturing innocent Blood Elves in the streets of Dalaran I desired justice for that, too - yet none came.
Now the faction has been unceremoniously rendered obsolete for the most part, all because the writers are terrified of the idea of holding women accountable for their actions in the same way male characters are brought to justice and outright slain as raid bosses for the exact same crimes that are mysteriously brushed aside and excused.
At this point I mostly stick around for friends and for the sake of raiding. Mostly because the other MMOās on the market right now are even more obnoxious with the pandering and low stakes storytelling.
Itās a slim hope but I would very much like to see the game pivot back towards the sort of tone and aesthetics at the forefront in earlier expansions.
I found the main story of this expansion the worst of all . Even SL was more interesting for a first time playthrough . The story is basically strong female comes to replace incompetent males , the remaining males being mellow ( to put it extremely light) and the windruner sister is basically a teen with hormonal disbalance and not a 1000 year old soldier , mother and wife .
The side quests were OK , but nothing really to mention as memorable . Also Contrary to what people say about the new kobolts , I did not like them .They are basically niffen 2.0 and I did not like them also . Not sure how to frame it , but somehow childish in the way that is annoying and out of place . I do not feel Like I am interacting with a new culture , but rather with overgrown sheltered children .
Up to SL I would usually replay the expansion on some of my alts , or at least do the āhorde side of the storyā , sometimes multiple times as I enjoy leveling via quests . In SL I almost stopped playing retail . In DF I would "maybe " complete a few quests in one zone till my alts reach max level .
Here in TWW I have 7 max lvl characters , and I have completed the story and the zones only once on my original play trough .
None of the quests make me want to replay them and on top of that with the constant free experience buffs to time walking I donāt feel motivated to quest at all . You can do 10 time walking dungeons and you are max level . My characters just sit in a main city soaking rested exp and than log once in a while to gain 3-4 levels from one 10 minute dungeon , than log out ā¦
To me this speaks that blizzard themselves hate their own story , so instead of enticing players into replaying it , they push them away , by making everything else be the go to level experience .
And honestly it is true , the main story is so bad , that I literally feel good when I press that " skip story" button at lvl 80 .
One of the biggest issues is the inability to really discuss these problems anywhere outside of this sub-forum due to the risk of being banned or having posts removed if you dare criticise the DEI/ESG influencing many of the narrative decisions.
Iāve already had multiple green posters whine at me for bringing up āpoliticsā because it is āagainst the rulesā. (Not that it stops them whining about āchudsā or ātoriesā at any given opportunity before their posts are removed in turnā¦but I digress).
Iāll say this, not that it hugely matters but I happen to be gay. I liked the exaggerated art style with big, muscular men. Some were hot-tempered, others were more stoic, yet more were rather handsome - yet the hot-tempered and stoic tropes have fallen away in favour of weak, whiny men who need dysgenic looking self-inserts like Faerin to teach them basic lessons that have already been bestowed by far better and more iconic characters in the past.
Words cannot express how much I loathe this settings nutty obsession with giving women a free pass. I canāt even put the blame entirely at the feet of ESG/DEI simply because the likes of Sylvanas, Jaina, Vereesa and Kerrigan have been written to stick around long after theyāve overstayed their welcome despite there being ample reasons to hunt them down and slay them for the many atrocities that they are responsible for.
Furthermore, speaking as a role-player even the quality of role-play has seen a sharp decline over the years. Anyone who actually wants to embrace the core elements of the setting such as the faction war and racial tensions is treated with contempt because it gets in the way of ādate nightsā and generic low stakes adventures.
Ngl when I read your first post and you mentioned women ānot being held accountableā compared to men and so on raised some eyebrows, but I didnāt make much of it because charitability is generally important when dealing with an unknown person. Reading your second post now mentioning DEI bs my suspicions were absolutely correct. 
What suspicions would they be, out of curiosity?
Itās a bit too late to try and brush aside concerns over DEI/ESG as overblown when practically every major gaming company has doubled down on their commitment to performative tokenism whilst denying any meaningful input from those of us who are minorities yet do not want to be placed atop a pedestal simply for existing or granted special treatment.
I have seen many great settings sanitised to pander to narcissists and so I speak out against such policies when and where I can. Women being given a free pass and handled with kidās gloves despite committing atrocities is a very common problem in many games, TV shows and movies.
For example, if we consider Garrosh to be an example of a character who - quite rightly - deserves to die for his reprehensible actions then it really isnāt unreasonable to expect the same for the likes of Vereesa or Sylvanas. Letās not forget that both of them are complicit in the deliberate murder and torture of innocent civilians.
To me, it is simply proof that the push for āequalityā is not one made in good faith.
Has nothing to do with the topic.
I think youāre just wrong in assuming that these things are still core elements of the 2020s Warcraft. Iāve been drifting out of WoW RP for some time because of this, but I canāt honestly say that the peace-loving organizers of parties and cultural exchanges, with the occasional inclusive and heroic adventure against cardboard villains, arenāt reflecting exactly what I see in the game. The funny thing is that my long-running RP main was actually all about conflict avoidance and mutual understanding from the start, but somehow he is now close to an extremist bigot in comparison to characters that were created in the more current eras of Warcraft.
I disagree based on pattern recognition alone. Itās a large part as to why so many elements of the setting have been heavily sanitised.
Just yesterday another RPG launched called Avowed, which incidentally happens to be available through Battle.net as well. It, too, is heavily influenced by the trend of pushing women to the forefront in traditionally male roles whilst treating every male character as incompetent, whiny and buffoonish.
I would prefer a healthy balance and for more characters along the lines of Kaelāthas (as depicted in Warcraft 3), Varian and Garrosh rather than more characters like Anduin and Baine. I play fantasy settings for conflict, intrigue and nuance as opposed to preachy lectures that have more in common with modern day real world talking points.
Which server? Argent Dawn?
German, die Aldor. Iāve dipped my toes into AD once or twice, but it didnāt stick.
In what universe is diversity, equity, and inclusion bad? Please hijack somewhere else. Your weird opinion on DEI has nothing to do with the topic 
Youāre perfectly welcome to come to whatever conclusion you so wish, weāre clearly not going to see eye to eye on the subject. That being said, speaking as someone who is actually gay and who has seen how subversives operate in their quest to sanitise various settings out of spiteā¦I thoroughly disagree with your own conclusion.
Iām hardly āhijackingā the thread, which was barely active to begin with - this place hasnāt exactly been flooded with activity compared to the gameās golden era when more players were actively invested in the gameās story and discussed it more actively.
I already answered your question, too, though to repeat it for the sake of clarity I will do so. Performative pandering and tokenism is not equality. Iām tired of seeing women in various forms of media being excused for horrific atrocities, including attempted and actual genocide.
Iām not sure what is meant to be controversial about wanting the likes of Vereesa and Sylvanas to be killed off for crimes that are equal to atrocities committed by the likes of Garrosh. That would be true equality. Not coming up with reasons to keep them around, excuse them altogether or worse yet retcon their actions. Imagine the outrage if the writers went back and declared that Garrosh didnāt actually kill anyone during the Mists of Pandaria campaign? Which is precisely what they did with Jaina and Vereesa after years of backlash against them for their horrific actions during the Purge of Dalaran.
Ah, fair enough. I was referring to my experiences on Argent Dawn. Thereās a lot of push-back against anything involving racial or factional focused tensions these days - which is a shame, since in the āglory daysā there were very deeply satisfying campaigns on both sides of the faction divide.
Thereās a lot of different reasons for it, mind you - it canāt really be attributed to one specific element. For example, the addition of Void Elves caused a lot of Blood Elf players to ditch the Horde for the Alliance.
Oh, itās the same over here, though the faction part isnāt exactly what Iām missing, personally. I was more demoralized by the more running than creeping acceptance of all the fun kinds of users of highly unstable dark magics into everyday activities, but on the blue side that was always more jarring than on team red, I guess. But the faction and the magic stuff mostly coincided anyways. If youāre excluding any kinds of character concepts for any reason, or create events about conflicts that arenāt in the current story, youāre in for a discussion.