If you decide to write a story based on your character, is it better to read the books relevant to the character’s journey, or the Chronicles are fine as Blizzard retconned the living hell out of their previous stories? I intend to create an actual story for the toon that involves major events like the 3 wars, Dalaran, High Elves, etc, however, all I see on forums in the lore section is the sad fact of retconning
Is it still worth building your own fiction from the books?
Warcraft as a franchise is something like 30-years old, retconing is an unfortunately reality at that point. Not sure they need to change stuff from a mere five years ago but here we are.
On topic I’d just use the wiki as a general guide, it’s broadly up to date from what I’ve seen but the books, a few anyway, DO still make good cultural references. Getting the feel of certain cultures, backgrounds, places etc.
That said you could also use point of view. Maybe in your characters story x person really was the bad guy in that situation. It is -their- story after all, not a factual account.
Thank you, I’ll have a deeper look at the wiki pages and also in the Chronicles, then try to find the book I need for that part.
I wouldn’t want a I-was-everywhere-champyon kind of character, I’m more interested in short stories, personal stuff, maybe creating something completely different.
For the character I’m working on she has family stuff going on, studying in Dalaran, roaming the world looking for artefacts then accidentally moulding into the wars against the Horde. I wouldn’t have time walking, cosmic whatever and probably her main story would be closed in BC. I just need clarification on stuff as everything I remember from original BC times (when I started eons ago) seems to be different.
Perhaps you are looking at it too hard and there is a simpler way .
It depends on what you want to create .
Do you want it to be for your own personal enjoyment ?
Share with friends ?
Post on the internet and wider ?
Do you want your character to be living in the events or do you want to be a spectator ?
Do you want to create your own branch story?
What I mean is that if you wan to share it on the net and want to make it credible (like you were that guy that went to Argus and saved the world) than you need research . On the other side if you do it for enjoyment , or just you were along side that guy who saved the world , than you can have much more creative freedom .
In fact you can just spin your own story and just base it off warcraft universe .
Meaning : " Your protag lived there during that time , and things happened to him/her specifically ." No one knows if murloc 109993019 was actually capable of granting wishes , or spoke 10 languages , but your character does cause he was the one that met the murloc during his time swimming to the bottom of the zangaran swamps .
Think of how Japanese animes create filler episodes . Most of the time something happens like " they never met again , or because of magic they all forgot about it " . It lets you create pretty much anything .
You can just take an era you feel you like and spin your story for your own joy . Don’t stress too much if it is cannon or not .
You re not writing for blizzard , and even their authors just “retcon” stuff .
Somewhat it’s still in the make, first it was one toon, now it’s split into two characters, but mostly for my own enjoyment. It’s a motivation for me to learn art and stay on track/focused, on the other hand it’s RP related, so my toon is not a mush out of thin air and makes sense.
However, after reading some forum topics regarding lore, read some speculations, some really stuck in my mind and made me wonder “what if this and that and this…” eventually changing it as a whole. It’s still in the make though.
Thank you for the link, I’ll definitely check it out!
I would say a mix of both. Go by what you have experienced in the story, you can even add in a conspiracy type element regarding the retcons, like someone/thing is spreading lies about what happened but you were there you know the truth etc.
Also I would advise that you avoid mentioning all the big events that your character has been a part of. In a sence self retconing your achievements. For example my character has been in every raid, dungeon, zone and has done all the quests and defeated every single bog bad we have had in this game, if I were to write a story about this character I would try to pair up only the adventures that make sence thematically. For example I was present in Outland and hunted Illidan Stormrage, after a few years the Legion attacked and helped free Illidan, I was not pressent in Northrend, I was buzy dealing with evacuathing citizens in Cata, missed the boat to Pandaria, didnt go to WoD. Avoid being the chosen one.
