I can't really answer your questions. Just wanted to say I felt the same way as you about Shadowlands and Dragonflight. Granted I came into Dragonflight this spring at the tail end of the story...
I can't really answer your questions. Just wanted to say I felt the same way as you about Shadowlands and Dragonflight. Granted I came into Dragonflight this spring at the tail end of the story and expansion, but just playing through the quest story arcs and the final chapter with the World Tree just felt blah to me. I know that the Primalists were going to destroy Azeroth and yada yada yada, but I think after Legion and it's end story ark of Argus, nothing really compares to that scale of world ending that was felt during the Legion campaign. I mean there is still a giant fucking sword sticking out of Silithus and thus the World Soul. Varian and Vul'jinn were killed in the first five minutes of the expansion. We were complete underdogs in the fight it felt.
I am glad we are coming back around to the World Soul Saga and maybe finishing WOW for good with it.
I was hugely invested in WoW’s storyline, grew up playing the games, loved it all…. Until wotlk. My guess is that WoW lost most of the people who truly cared about the story some time in the...
I was hugely invested in WoW’s storyline, grew up playing the games, loved it all…. Until wotlk.
My guess is that WoW lost most of the people who truly cared about the story some time in the cata/mop era. Wotlk really was the conclusion of the original Warcraft story, which is part of why I think Classic is so popular.
I personally haven’t played retail since MoP, but I’ve raided in Classic since 2019 and I’m seriously considering playing TWW at launch. The game now is less about the story for me and more about the organized group gameplay.
——-
Since the "gameplay" part of the expac was received well, this put people in a positive mood and led them to interpret the story charitably. This might go the opposite way too. For example, both BfA and SL were also criticized heavily for gameplay reasons.
I think you hit the nail on the head here. Asmongold says “gameplay is king” and on that specific thing I think he is right.
I would say that TWW is the best point in time to return after a long absence. You are going to be confused about all the new systems, the UI, gameplay, talents, etc. etc. But in terms of story,...
I personally haven’t played retail since MoP, but I’ve raided in Classic since 2019 and I’m seriously considering playing TWW at launch. The game now is less about the story for me and more about the organized group gameplay.
I would say that TWW is the best point in time to return after a long absence.
You are going to be confused about all the new systems, the UI, gameplay, talents, etc. etc. But in terms of story, TWW is the first chapter in the new 3-expansion arc and while there are of course characters you may not be entirely familiar with, it really is the beginning of something new. It's the perfect time to return to the game, in my opinion.
Nice, that’s what I was thinking as well - I spent too many hours last week reading up on new stuff and just flying around doing world quests in dragon isles and the new radiant echoes thing The...
Nice, that’s what I was thinking as well - I spent too many hours last week reading up on new stuff and just flying around doing world quests in dragon isles and the new radiant echoes thing
The game feels fun right now, my class (Druid) feels cool, and the story is pretty engaging
It's possible you aren't as invested in the dragon story since you joined WoW later in the game. The dragon aspects were a huge part of the story in WotLK and were obviously the central part of...
It's possible you aren't as invested in the dragon story since you joined WoW later in the game. The dragon aspects were a huge part of the story in WotLK and were obviously the central part of Cataclysm. The Dragonflight story felt like closure for a decades long story arc so I can see why it might not be as engaging if you're coming to it fresh.
I kind of wonder if what you're seeing on r/wow is a bit of survivorship bias. I am an old Blizzard fan, one of the first games I ever played was Lost Vikings. Then grew up playing SC and WC. I...
I kind of wonder if what you're seeing on r/wow is a bit of survivorship bias.
I am an old Blizzard fan, one of the first games I ever played was Lost Vikings. Then grew up playing SC and WC. I made my first WoW character in November 2005, played every expansion + a little raiding until Dragonflight.
I don't think I would have ever called WoW a "story driven" game. The world, community, and mechanics are what kept me engaged. But I would say that some expansions have a more palpable aesthetic: TBC, WotLK, MoP, BfA scored high with me on wanting to explore the world and stick out prominently in my memory. Some areas in Cata, Legion, and SL were also executed well but as expansions they kind of just drift around in my head as "things I played." Notably I can barely remember WoD.
When I try to play Dragonflight several things happen: I immediately feel "been there, done that" and I'm on an on-rails Disney ride that will get me to max level without making any decisions about where I want to go.
I agree that the dragons in WoW are boring, and I think they always have been. In fact I think dragons are boring 90% of the time they're used in fantasy. Counter example: think of Smaug, he's the big bad and shit is going down when leaves his mountain, and he's a relative weakling in dragon terms and we spent a whole book building him up. I think Miyazaki has a decent handle on dragon size/strength but there are too many in Elden Ring. Matt Mercer does a good job with dragons: independent actors pursuing their own ends, rarely encountered except for one major arc in the first campaign.
So, my questions are;
Why do you think Dragonflight's story was received so positively?
I guess my question back is, was it? Here's a post on Icy Veins with player counts and subs. It looks like Dragonflight only beat BfA and most other expansions out performed it. While I'm a fan of BfA it wasn't well received.
Why don't people seem to care about the aspects I mentioned?
I think the people on r/wow are a mix of real diehards and relative new comers. Most people I know with active subs are playing vanilla hardcore. I think the fan base from Vanilla-MoP have either walked away or are playing classic servers.
I find Dragonflight to be average but competent. Which after Battle for Azeroth and Shadowlands felt like a refreshing breeze. Dragonflight is a basic story, but they were incapable of telling the...
I find Dragonflight to be average but competent. Which after Battle for Azeroth and Shadowlands felt like a refreshing breeze. Dragonflight is a basic story, but they were incapable of telling the stories they wanted to tell in BFA and SL competently. It had some standout quests, like the dwarf you mentioned and I enjoyed the bronze dragonflight's storyline in this expac.
As a long time night elf player, I have some mixed feelings over the burning of Teldrassil. For one part, the BFA pre-launch quest in which the Alliance fail to save the tree in my opinion is one of the best quests they ever made, and it's a shame it's no longer accessible. We also later have a trailer for the battle of darkshore with Malfurion being a scary and vengeful marauder hunting down horde. That was cool, shame we didn't get more of that.
But the rest of the writing around the burning of Teldrassil seemed to mostly be in service of horde storylines, and night elves just suffered setbacks with no payoff. Unless you count getting burn scars and black eyes in the character creation a big deal. Like even in the PTR, they originally had the Forsaken raise Night Elves who then promptly joined them because they felt betrayed somehow? It was changed before release, but it just felt like the writers didn't think about alliance players much.
Then shadowlands rubbed salt in the wound by having Tyrande lose her powers as she's about to get revenge. We get told by Elune herself in her first speaking role that she let the night elves die for no good reason. And the story mostly focuses on Sylvanas and well I don't know how that finished I didn't stick around.
Anyway, all that said, I kept feeling like the last half of Dragonflight was the Night Elf apology tour. We get to regrow a tree, we get a new home and are no longer destitute refugees. Bel'Ameth had some night elf cosmetics to discover, quests to expand on Nelf stories. It was fun exploring this zone and just seeing NPCs in their new home.
Just felt like Teldrassil was burned for cheap drama that they never capitalised on, and with Amirdrassil they seem to be trying to undo that. I was always waiting for a new night elf home, back in BFA I thought it would have been more interesting if the alliance retook Gilneas and the Night Elves were invited to reside as a thanks for taking in Gilnean refugees during Cataclysm. But I'll take Amirdrassil and Bel'Ameth.
Can't add much to the discussion that hasn't already been said by other commenters - I can just only join the choir and say that I think it's 1) recency bias and 2) DF only seems good because of...
Can't add much to the discussion that hasn't already been said by other commenters - I can just only join the choir and say that I think it's 1) recency bias and 2) DF only seems good because of how bad Shadowlands was. For me, it was a very mediocre expansion in every way. Like you said, it's been very unengaging. Just boring storytelling. Contrived, even. None of the dragon characters interest me in the least. A high point was the Tyr quests but that still wasn't much at all.
For me, the story hasn't been worth following since Legion. Legion was a one of it not the best expansion but you could still make arguments that the story was a mixed bag. I mean we ride a space ship to Argus lol
A big part of what has me really hyped about TWW is Alleria. I've always really loved that character and I can't wait to see what they're going to be doing with her now that she's center stage! I've had her as my profile picture on battle.net for 10+ years. I mean I'm not holding my breath after what they did with Sylvanas, but I'm still really excited. And the announcing of the 3-expansion arc has also got its hooks in me! For Midnight, it looks like we're going back to the blood elf areas which, I mean, can't wait to see Silvermoon and those zones get updated!!
I've played LVL 20 F2P ever since Shadowlands, and during the free weekend, I played through most of the DF story. I guess for me, Shadowlands (and BfA) just absolutely destroyed any ties I have...
I've played LVL 20 F2P ever since Shadowlands, and during the free weekend, I played through most of the DF story.
I guess for me, Shadowlands (and BfA) just absolutely destroyed any ties I have with the world in any deep way. So I enjoyed the DF story far more than SLs and BfA, but in the same sense I might enjoy a Power Rangers episode. I like looking at Alexstrasza, and the evil fire dragon cackling evilly, and the frozen lafy becoming the sixth aspect, and whiny Wrathion. I enjoyed playing through it. And I do think it's better than the last 2 xpacs, but I mostly enjoyed it because I'm no longer thinking about Dalaran's political stance or where the Forsaken are going to live or what the lightforged spaceship is doing, and am happy to just take the flying elf dragons as they are in their own world.
I enjoyed the stupid story, which stands in stark contrast with Shadowlands, which I actively hated so much that it burnt my love for the game.
I can't really answer your questions. Just wanted to say I felt the same way as you about Shadowlands and Dragonflight. Granted I came into Dragonflight this spring at the tail end of the story and expansion, but just playing through the quest story arcs and the final chapter with the World Tree just felt blah to me. I know that the Primalists were going to destroy Azeroth and yada yada yada, but I think after Legion and it's end story ark of Argus, nothing really compares to that scale of world ending that was felt during the Legion campaign. I mean there is still a giant fucking sword sticking out of Silithus and thus the World Soul. Varian and Vul'jinn were killed in the first five minutes of the expansion. We were complete underdogs in the fight it felt.
I am glad we are coming back around to the World Soul Saga and maybe finishing WOW for good with it.
I was hugely invested in WoW’s storyline, grew up playing the games, loved it all…. Until wotlk.
My guess is that WoW lost most of the people who truly cared about the story some time in the cata/mop era. Wotlk really was the conclusion of the original Warcraft story, which is part of why I think Classic is so popular.
I personally haven’t played retail since MoP, but I’ve raided in Classic since 2019 and I’m seriously considering playing TWW at launch. The game now is less about the story for me and more about the organized group gameplay.
——-
I think you hit the nail on the head here. Asmongold says “gameplay is king” and on that specific thing I think he is right.
Edit: I just went to YouTube and got recommended this short video about TWW story from “Thor” who used to be a blizz dev https://youtu.be/1PJK27HYGBw?si=_SKatJGK45H2tW1W
I would say that TWW is the best point in time to return after a long absence.
You are going to be confused about all the new systems, the UI, gameplay, talents, etc. etc. But in terms of story, TWW is the first chapter in the new 3-expansion arc and while there are of course characters you may not be entirely familiar with, it really is the beginning of something new. It's the perfect time to return to the game, in my opinion.
Nice, that’s what I was thinking as well - I spent too many hours last week reading up on new stuff and just flying around doing world quests in dragon isles and the new radiant echoes thing
The game feels fun right now, my class (Druid) feels cool, and the story is pretty engaging
It's possible you aren't as invested in the dragon story since you joined WoW later in the game. The dragon aspects were a huge part of the story in WotLK and were obviously the central part of Cataclysm. The Dragonflight story felt like closure for a decades long story arc so I can see why it might not be as engaging if you're coming to it fresh.
I kind of wonder if what you're seeing on r/wow is a bit of survivorship bias.
I am an old Blizzard fan, one of the first games I ever played was Lost Vikings. Then grew up playing SC and WC. I made my first WoW character in November 2005, played every expansion + a little raiding until Dragonflight.
I don't think I would have ever called WoW a "story driven" game. The world, community, and mechanics are what kept me engaged. But I would say that some expansions have a more palpable aesthetic: TBC, WotLK, MoP, BfA scored high with me on wanting to explore the world and stick out prominently in my memory. Some areas in Cata, Legion, and SL were also executed well but as expansions they kind of just drift around in my head as "things I played." Notably I can barely remember WoD.
When I try to play Dragonflight several things happen: I immediately feel "been there, done that" and I'm on an on-rails Disney ride that will get me to max level without making any decisions about where I want to go.
I agree that the dragons in WoW are boring, and I think they always have been. In fact I think dragons are boring 90% of the time they're used in fantasy. Counter example: think of Smaug, he's the big bad and shit is going down when leaves his mountain, and he's a relative weakling in dragon terms and we spent a whole book building him up. I think Miyazaki has a decent handle on dragon size/strength but there are too many in Elden Ring. Matt Mercer does a good job with dragons: independent actors pursuing their own ends, rarely encountered except for one major arc in the first campaign.
I guess my question back is, was it? Here's a post on Icy Veins with player counts and subs. It looks like Dragonflight only beat BfA and most other expansions out performed it. While I'm a fan of BfA it wasn't well received.
I think the people on r/wow are a mix of real diehards and relative new comers. Most people I know with active subs are playing vanilla hardcore. I think the fan base from Vanilla-MoP have either walked away or are playing classic servers.
I find Dragonflight to be average but competent. Which after Battle for Azeroth and Shadowlands felt like a refreshing breeze. Dragonflight is a basic story, but they were incapable of telling the stories they wanted to tell in BFA and SL competently. It had some standout quests, like the dwarf you mentioned and I enjoyed the bronze dragonflight's storyline in this expac.
As a long time night elf player, I have some mixed feelings over the burning of Teldrassil. For one part, the BFA pre-launch quest in which the Alliance fail to save the tree in my opinion is one of the best quests they ever made, and it's a shame it's no longer accessible. We also later have a trailer for the battle of darkshore with Malfurion being a scary and vengeful marauder hunting down horde. That was cool, shame we didn't get more of that.
But the rest of the writing around the burning of Teldrassil seemed to mostly be in service of horde storylines, and night elves just suffered setbacks with no payoff. Unless you count getting burn scars and black eyes in the character creation a big deal. Like even in the PTR, they originally had the Forsaken raise Night Elves who then promptly joined them because they felt betrayed somehow? It was changed before release, but it just felt like the writers didn't think about alliance players much.
Then shadowlands rubbed salt in the wound by having Tyrande lose her powers as she's about to get revenge. We get told by Elune herself in her first speaking role that she let the night elves die for no good reason. And the story mostly focuses on Sylvanas and well I don't know how that finished I didn't stick around.
Anyway, all that said, I kept feeling like the last half of Dragonflight was the Night Elf apology tour. We get to regrow a tree, we get a new home and are no longer destitute refugees. Bel'Ameth had some night elf cosmetics to discover, quests to expand on Nelf stories. It was fun exploring this zone and just seeing NPCs in their new home.
Just felt like Teldrassil was burned for cheap drama that they never capitalised on, and with Amirdrassil they seem to be trying to undo that. I was always waiting for a new night elf home, back in BFA I thought it would have been more interesting if the alliance retook Gilneas and the Night Elves were invited to reside as a thanks for taking in Gilnean refugees during Cataclysm. But I'll take Amirdrassil and Bel'Ameth.
Can't add much to the discussion that hasn't already been said by other commenters - I can just only join the choir and say that I think it's 1) recency bias and 2) DF only seems good because of how bad Shadowlands was. For me, it was a very mediocre expansion in every way. Like you said, it's been very unengaging. Just boring storytelling. Contrived, even. None of the dragon characters interest me in the least. A high point was the Tyr quests but that still wasn't much at all.
For me, the story hasn't been worth following since Legion. Legion was a one of it not the best expansion but you could still make arguments that the story was a mixed bag. I mean we ride a space ship to Argus lol
A big part of what has me really hyped about TWW is Alleria. I've always really loved that character and I can't wait to see what they're going to be doing with her now that she's center stage! I've had her as my profile picture on battle.net for 10+ years. I mean I'm not holding my breath after what they did with Sylvanas, but I'm still really excited. And the announcing of the 3-expansion arc has also got its hooks in me! For Midnight, it looks like we're going back to the blood elf areas which, I mean, can't wait to see Silvermoon and those zones get updated!!
I've played LVL 20 F2P ever since Shadowlands, and during the free weekend, I played through most of the DF story.
I guess for me, Shadowlands (and BfA) just absolutely destroyed any ties I have with the world in any deep way. So I enjoyed the DF story far more than SLs and BfA, but in the same sense I might enjoy a Power Rangers episode. I like looking at Alexstrasza, and the evil fire dragon cackling evilly, and the frozen lafy becoming the sixth aspect, and whiny Wrathion. I enjoyed playing through it. And I do think it's better than the last 2 xpacs, but I mostly enjoyed it because I'm no longer thinking about Dalaran's political stance or where the Forsaken are going to live or what the lightforged spaceship is doing, and am happy to just take the flying elf dragons as they are in their own world.
I enjoyed the stupid story, which stands in stark contrast with Shadowlands, which I actively hated so much that it burnt my love for the game.