The Sylvanas encounter is on a scale that exceeds a vast majority of what has ever been tried in past raids.
Ion looks forward to seeing the community discuss and dissect what is next for Sylvanas after the events in Chains of Domination.
The specific details of the patch, such as twists and turns, raid bosses, and even some major narrative moments came together at the end of last year and the beginning of this year.
I donât know wether to laugh or to cry.
Also on their fairytale book:
The team fell in love with the idea of diving into the stories of people who inhabit Azeroth outside of the larger narrative.
Steve wanted to explore how a dragon chooses their humanoid form with the short story involving Chromie and what it would mean for a male dragon to choose a female form. It is meant to show that the world of Azeroth has love and acceptance and an opportunity for people to see themselves represented in this world.
I highlighted the part. Isnât this ironic this game started out as a fantasy game where races battle it out with eachother over cultural difference, land or other rivalries and we are now supposed to believe that the game revolves around friendship and sunshine?
People have done so crazy things for love in real life, such as kiling themselves, others, etc in the name of loveâŚso why is it so hard that in a video game about war that the same does not happen?
Maybe it is a problem because we donât know since the Cataclysm if the Dragons are able to breed or not. What their status is. All we know is a bit of vague information of Wrathion but itâs good to know Dragons take interest in mortalâs sexualities I supposeâŚ?
âŚThatâs your problem? in the story? That specific bit is the whole thing that bothers you to the point that youâd rather have one-dimentional bloodthirsty themes?
Itâs pretty much just easy pandering and an obvious retcon for some free marketing towards a niche community. Throw in some self virtue signaling while the lore is at its lowest and you can imagine why people hate it.
Welp, there it is. The inevitable âI just think gay people are weird and the only reason theyâd exist in something I like is if people force them in for social brownie points, because no-one would ever want to see LGBT content otherwise!â
(And again, define âretconâ. Because, like, this is either an âI refuse to accept queerness in my game, so Iâll pretend thereâs no evidenceâ when most other people were constantly asking âis she trans?â, or an interview Iâve forgotted where someone said she wasnât, but was either personal opinion, Blizzard changed their mind, or they wanted her to be trans for years, but felt unable to until now)
Blizzard themselves stated Chromie was a female dragon with a male name.
Her dragon form was also female.
So yeah it is a retcon.
That Blizzard used this for easy pandering doesnât make me homophobic.
Have a bit of respect for LGBT people. Theyâre not some market you can cater to with half intended attempts because you just want money from them.
Feels like this thread has turned from the actual problem of a story dev literally stating theyâve left things made up open to yet another pointing out gender politics.
I repeat. Not the biggest problem. (Did it ever have to be?)
I havenât read the book (yet), but isnât Chromie trans instead of gay?
That said, from what I know about the story (and please correct me if I am wrong), its the way they went about it that annoys me.
So Chromie is trans because (s)he took on the form of a female gnome, but that makes no sense, especially since its been established for ages that dragons take on the mortal guises that suit the best in the situation they are in. For example, Korialstrasz while usually in his elven form, also took on the form of an elderly orc. During the War of the Ancients, there was a red dragon that hid itself in Cenariusâ glade by turning himself into a branch.
So, yeah, does that mean that when a female dragon takes on the form of a male mortal (or a male dragon the form of a female mortal) because that is the best form for the situation that dragon is trans?
Absolutely no one (except the Wowhead smooth brains) are really surprised here.
Even if I donât think that this issue is at the peak of whatâs currently making the story worse, one must put on some thick blinders to not note that the way they are handling this stuff sort of reeks of virtue signalling.
Throwing yet another flying pig, rat or bull mount, but probably not publishing this book in China, or choosing to highlight these themes instead of far more urgent narrative issues that are being left unattended, in a book thats supposedly about expanding story, should be enough for people to see some of the intentions and company mindset.
There are ways to develop these sort of characters in tandem with a richer story, as seen in other franchises (Oberyn Martell, Loras Tyrell).
The way Blizzard is doing such, and the lack of commitment to fully develop such in the context where it is thrown (the story), highlights the fact that they see it as a marketing strategy.
And Iâm sorry, but people are entitled to point out whenever these moves come in detriment of actual storytelling.
Iâm honestly surprised people are under the assumption that any of the new story developments were planned in advance.
Those clickbaity videos tagged as âThey were hinting at it all along!â, while pointing at WotLK or even Cata stuff always felt sort of funny.
This is really bad. I never believed them that Sylvanas story was meant to go this terrible way, or that theyâve planed this out over years. Now we know. This is indeed a major problem and does not bring any confidence back.
Did they also mention if one of the devs played a D&D Shadowlands campaign?
Thatâs not whatâs written or meant with that statement. Thatâs why I disagree with you. It is not meant as in everyone in the story loves each other. Itâs to accept all players. Thatâs very different.
That interview made me think that they care more about telling stories to each other than about the audience.
Ever seen a decently portrayed relationship in the game? (depends on what to call âdecentlyâ, of course)
The currently mentioned idea in the interviews that the separate factions are the core. Also, we had a bunch of stuff in WoW till Cata that was depicting the faction concept rather well.
To âleave culture differenceâ would require change in the gameplay and marketing to work. Otherwise, we have Algalonâs comment that the destiny of mortal races on Azeroth is war.
Do we have more personality though? I see commonly comments that Cosmology stuff explores the story better, adds more layers, etc. Yet in practice I see Shadowlands throwing away a lot of believe-related stuff from different races for homogenized afterlife concept, cosmo forces are the same thing with different colours, faction members lose more and more personality, etc.
I get that justification might sound nice, but the question is IMO how it translates to real âfruitsâ over time.
If itâs simple, yet effective, coherent, and have more than repeating the same story - I would consider it no worse than attempt to tell âcomplexâ or âdiverseâ story relying on retcons to move the story and barely not to fall apart.
You get me wrong if I am in any way defending this hot train that is coherent Blizzard Storywriting. In fact, I would enjoy a field day of slagging it off if the charm was still there.
You have answered my question yourself however with:
What drove my original point is that why is it so wrong to have more personality that stands away from being a one-dimentional bloodthirsty war war war maniac? I did not in any way say that all forms of simplistic - coherent or otherwise - forms of personality were therefore abhorred and should be cancelled in favour of more complex minds.
There is no versus here but an illusion made by wrong interpretation.
I get that on paper there is no versus. But there is a reason why I mentioned what are the actual fruits of what we get over the suggested reasoning for why it was done.
I do not see enough âpresonalityâ in the story to have a 2 faction system in general. There is 1 approach highlighted as what is right (iirc it started in the MoP legendary quest line, involving Anduin), and the rest is different flavours of wrong. Canât have a good story involving factions in a case like that.
So, to me the question is not âwhy not have more motivations and complexityâ, but when itâs added, is it presented as the right⢠way to go, is it done in detriment to the rest, is it a story like Anduin, that suffocates the rest of the plot and race individuality in the process, etc.
Specifically with Chromie - my answer is I care only about the fact that previously the whole âunusual nameâ was clarified already. So itâs a clear case of minor but retcon. In the sea of more of them happening around.
When it comes to the stated motivations - the bigger question to me is coherency. Is the game about factions? Is it not? To me either way is better than going back and forth. If that motive is relevant, than the main question I would have to the other stories - so how does it reinforce the main theme? And if it does not, since then there are so many resources, no stories cut short, and all relevant elements are shown in the story, so that there is a luxury to add unnecessary things?
And I also do not like their focus on mutual approval over the interests of the user base.
On paper what youâre suggesting with more complexity is fine. Itâs just not the situation that I can relate to since I do not see requirements for it manifesting in my snippet of reality.
Well yes, âdo it rightâ and âit has to be done rightâ would be pretty much applicable to anything in WoW. Not just its flow of story. Your fears are warranted and agreed to, but I still stand on that hill that this reason alone shouldnât be what makes one-dimensional characters with about as much personality as a cabbage is much more preferable.
In fact, itâs just another way of making the game even more bland as it is.
Likewise. This whole âWe plan the story few expansions in advanceâ always felt like a lie, and I guess that now we have a definite proof that it is.
Well, I still think they do to a degree. But a âgameplay first!â-degree. This is just idle speculation, but I think they plan how the next raid will look, what kinds of bosses they design, what kinds of zones they design and what kinds of animations they want to create well in advance. And the story team might be in those discussions, but they arenât deciding anything. Their job is to get the story from A to B, not to choose what that stands for.
But there are some freedoms that come with that. For example, they can discuss what arc they want their characters to go through well in advance, and the rest of the team wonât care. They just have to be vague about it to fit it to the events that have to happen to fit what the devs are creating. They might well have planned that Sylvanas was in league with some higher power to get what she wants all along. They probably just didnât know what power that might be. They donât know when and how they can tell their arcs, they have to take what they can get.
So while I am quite happy to poo on the story teamâs efforts, I donât think they have much room to maneuvre. That doesnât excuse the way they use that room, but it would put things like the statement that they only decided at the start of the year what would happen into context.