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[WoW] Battle for Azeroth has landed!
Roe
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Battle for Azeroth is World of Warcraft's Seventh expansion, following Legion.
Race to level 120 in two new islands that are separate for both the Horde and the Alliance.
The first Island is the Alliance's Kul Tiras, Birthplace of Jaina Proudmoore.
The second island is the home of the Zandalar tribe,
Aquire new items that grant increased power from minerals called Azureite. The dwarf Magni Bronzebeard entrusts you with a necklace and armor that will act like Artifact weapons did. These items will replace your Legion weapons, which will be replaced by normal ones through quests.
Unlock new Races by completing achievements, or gaining exalted with certain factions.
The allied races are for the alliance: Void Elves, Lightforged Dranei, Dark Iron Dwarves, and Kul Tiras humans.
The Horde races are: The Nightfallen, Highmountain Tauren, Mag Har Orcs, and the Zandalar Trolls.
Complete zone quest stories on your alts, Vanilla zones scale on level.
Explore islands with your friends for loot. Islands randomize every time you visit, face new challenges every time.
Fight against other players to create bases and lay siege against other player fortifications in the siege maps inspired by Warcarft RTS games.
Brand new PVP instancing. Players can join same faction player groups and PVP on that player's server. This ties into a new feature called 'War Mode', where players toggle PVP on in cities and fight against opposite faction players who are also flagged. PVPers gain 10% XP from quests and kills with this toggled on.
Dueler's Guild is a new PVP mode where players who are flagged in the city can take part in duels against other players in Dueler's Guild. Play until you are defeated for prizes daily by fighting through 3 players in a row, your cooldowns will not reset.
Join social groups across server. Talk to players no matter the faction or server. Talk over the Bnet app in the game or not.
Battle for Azeroth has Launched!
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-Bolvar, probably.
I know Shambler Milk is active, but they're Horde and I'd rather play an Alliance char because that's what I know.
That stuff is not possible within the world. Except when Blizzard makes up new shit just to animate a cutscene.
If the miracles they perform were possible, the world would be a much different place.
Also, the cutscene
The story of Warcraft is over. It ended with Sargeras.
He was setup as the big bad way back in Warcraft 1, and he's dead now. The story is over. An RTS trilogy and an RPG, and now the story is over. Anything more is just a grab for cash on an ended series.
Kinda like how Terminator ended with Terminator 2, and yet they keep making movies even though the story has been done for like 25 years.
Nah, I like the new characters that have been cropping up and want to know their stories too. I like Anduin, I like Saurfang, I like this world I've spent so much time in. There are more, good, stories they can tell. It remains to be seen if they'll actually pull that off.
Are you guys active? I used to play on DI back in the the day when Gabe and Tycho played, but stopped when the guilds started to fall apart from lack of people playing. I logged back in a few years ago and there was no one on in any of the PA channels.
That was my take as well. He hands it back to her afterwards. Baines standing there as well so he didn't go off to kill him.
I literally am an archmage though! I've got the title and everything!
He's totally not dead, he's imprisoned in his chair on the titans' throne ship thing, with Illidan and the other titans, off in space somewhere. And there's strong hints this isn't the end of his plans. The Sargeras 2: Electric Boogaloo hook is there.
It comes and goes, more active when expansions are dropping. 3-4 months ago it was pretty dead but there's still quite a few people in the guild that are actively playing here and there.
But I don't like the retcon of Jaina's imagery. She's not the ship mage. She hasn't been the ship mage. And this whole thing calling her the "Daughter of the Sea" and having her sail in with a giant magic boat is just all wrong. That is not who Jaina is. She is a member of the Kirin Tor and she wears a pant suit, and boats have never been a part of who she is.
And I'm not talking about her being from Kul Tiras. That is established. But she's never used the iconography of her people. Not once. And now out of the blue they have changed her entire image and it's super annoying. Especially since right now, in pre-patch week 3 the Kul'Tirans are not even a part of the story. Not yet.
It would make sense to have her start being the Boat Mage after a reunion with her mother and homeland. But they are doing it in the wrong order.
I'll admit, as much as I've been shitting on the writing, it's been a blast talking/arguing with y'all about lore and shit. :heartbeat:
J'Elsa. Let it boat, let it boat...
The blight never bothered me anyway.
Seriously, so far BFA has been pretty stupid. From their treatment of Sylvanas to trying to retcon Jaina into the boatmage and turning Anduin into... whatever that was in those cutscenes (because it wasn't Anduin).
Only saving grace is that supposedly there's a hint in the novel / novellas that
Glad to hear there's people here still on Dark Iron though. If the gold comes through like I'm hoping it will, I may need to join up to use the guild vendor for some things.
If there's no pet ability bar showing up when you summon them you can't manage their abilities, but dungeon and raid bosses are immune to pet taunts so it's not an issue there. I'm not sure if it messes with tank aggro on trash though. That's been a talent forever so I would guess it doesn't do annoying things in groups but I don't actually know.
Actually, if they try the whole making one faction evil, I really do see that putting them in a legal gray area. Players would be able to legitimately argue that Blizz had deceived them after they spend years and hundreds of dollars on the game before getting told they didn't get what they paid for. Now whether anyone tries it in court and whether the courts agree this is bait in switch is another thing. It is fucking terrible for their credibility, how can their customers trust them to not dick them over and pick a story that pretty much ruins the game because the writers are lazy. There just isn't a good pay off for going this route and it shows that the company doesn't have a good leadership either. The moment the writers proposed what we know, the leadership of the company should have shit canned it on the spot and told the writers to do a better job and fucking remember that it's too late to turn a faction into the evil faction and they can't exactly fuck over a faction either (it does annoy me that the ally dailies seem a touch easier than the horse ones, with having to kill less shit in dark shore). Hell, the game did just fine for over a decade without an evil player faction.
The thing that pisses me off the most about this story direction. Is that the writers pissed away a golden opportunity to shake up the the dynamics in Azeroth because they are fucking lazy and stupid. Fuck the Horde vs Alliance conflict and the hard on that some have for faction vs faction nonsense. Order halls created a scenario where members of each faction worked with one another to tackle an issue their faction failed at. It was where they became leaders of a multinational faction. A more interesting story hook would have been having people from those order halls going back home and really criticizing how backwards it to continue the Alliance vs Horde conflict, while getting push back from elements within their own faction that feel an end to the conflict is a threat to their way of life or are unable to forgive and move on. So rather than a battle between the two factions, it ends up being tons of small skirmishes and power plays between people that want to reform things and those that want to continue the conflict. A literal battle for the heart and soul of each faction. Where some are pushing for a moving beyond the old conflicts that don't mesh with the current state of affairs, while others refuse to let go and forgive or are two invested in the old ways. Like we had the setup for an interesting direction to shake things up, but nope someone needed their fix of tired as evil red vs righteous blue drivel.
It totally does fuck tanks over on trash. It just hadn't been an issue until recently, because trash generally died so fast and wasn't dangerous. Now trash is a nightmare in some of the 30-60 dungeons and that talent can be really annoying.
Edit: Oh, and it also kinda ends up not being good because the treants don't have anywhere near the health or defenses they need to survive a hit from an ogre in dire maul or whatever, so they end up dying as soon as they taunt something.
Partway through the battle for undercity I was like, "stupid cat elves, what did we ever do to ... oh right. Okay."
My undead rogue enthusiastically hosed the battlefield with blight. I as a person was horrified, but HE had a blast.
where do I sign up for my class action check
COME FORTH, AMATERASU! - Switch Friend Code SW-5465-2458-5696 - Twitch
During Legion and WoD, take advantage of the closer ties between the sides to allow the other side see more of the internal politics and factions. The Alliance should become aware of the Undead faction seeking re-connection with the living families. The Horde, the irradiated gnome faction (or whatever side faction they decide would make sense throwing in with Sylvanus or be responsible for attrocities and able to take advantage of the situation). Calia Menethil could be introduced and take an active role in the Horde side stories attempting to reconnect the Undead with their families once the Legion crisis is over. During the Legion leveling, you can have all sorts of conflict and infighting like was presented in the game, but once the whole "secret legion spies/infiltrators" issues are worked out, at max level allow cross-faction grouping and raids here. Make battlegrounds more of a wargames type event. For an apocalyptic event, any hint of faction conflict once the double agent issue is sorted, really does not work and it could be very much a "together we are stronger" type deal. This does sow some potential seeds of distrust and even after the victory there could be additional legion infiltrators who are discovered stirring things up trying to get revenge. That can be an excuse for some of the actions the different NPCs take.
The changes don't have to be massive, but there's all sorts of things that could be done to allow the same overall storyline to happen, but to change player's interactions with the story so former heroes don't have to become villains just because Blizzard writers decided to make one faction evil. I'm sure if someone spent more than 5 minutes thinking of the way it could have been written and told better, they'd come up with a much superior way of telling the same overall storyline.
So, I have issues with the broader structure of the narrative being played out here, yes. The return to the faction was has not been done well. I won't repeat the gripes since we've gone over them repeatedly already.
The broad structure of the Battle for Lordaeron is, actually, I think fine. Once you accept the broader premise of the faction war resuming, then sure, the skeleton of this is good shit. But the details of it are pretty atrocious: (Note: I've only done Horde side so correct me if the Alliance side changes some details up.)
Annnd then a random azerite war machine comes out of nowhere? We've never been introduced to it nor even the idea of it, but suddenly we have to attack/defend it. It's literally a McGuffin right smackdab in the middle of the battlefield.
Which, as Horde, we do. But then Anduin just fucking cutscenes onto the machine and destroys it with a sword - even though I thought he was a priest? - completely invalidating everything the players just did. So, uh cool, thanks for making players feel irrelevant.
But the Horde is fine! Sylvanas has a backup plan! Unleash a lot of blight everywhere! Now how this is done is already a little problematic, as we've argued/tried to figure out together what the fuck this blight shit actually is - again, not described in game at all, but sure, Hordies strap on gas masks and start shooting green goop everywhere. Annnd then Jaina comes in with her fucking magic boat, undoes all of that, AND takes down the walls to Lordaeron.
So the Horde has to retreat. Saurfang is pissy and stomps off about how dishonourable Sylvanas is being, and it's like... dude, did you not fucking see the giant magic ship shooting lasers at us? Is that honourable? Or is it cuz we're looking up at her when we get blasted in the face with a laser cannon instead of looking away, that's how honour works? And did you not see the part where we were LOSING? Wtf dude?
But fine, Sylvanas has plans within plans. It's a bait and trap scenario. The Horde has the Alliance where they want them. Except BAM, Alleria shows up all of a sudden, and... I dunno, somehow that changes everything? And also I guess it's always just been possible to teleport Gnomish armies right into the middle of Undercity? Which makes the full frontal assault plan seem pretty stupid in comparison, eh?
So so far, Anduin's had his cool moment, Jaina's had her cool moment, Alleria and Mekketorque, of all people, have had their moment. Sylvanas finally gets her cool moment, reminding everybody she still has banshee powers and blowing up Lordaeron as a giant fuck you. Everybody else significant on the Horde has more or less been a useless twit. Baine's big thing is walking around asking, "Hey, what's going on? Won't somebody fill me in?" Lor'themar, I don't think Lor'themar even does anything. Nathanos, who I don't even like, gets to hold on to Sylvanas' bow. Seriously.
So to sum up:
The Horde defeat should have come from something more than just, "Oh hey, looks like we just got here in time!" x2. Give me something Night Elf hippogryph riders swooping in, or Druids of the Claw stealthing in, as was ALWAYS the plan - plus it'd give the Night Elves a chance to show off/fight back - or lampshade it and tell me that Alleria was always going to come in at a contingency or they knew Jaina was coming or something. Give the Horde's iconic leaders something to do, even in a losing cause (as iconic as Baine and Lor'themar are, anyways). Give Saurfang a meatier reason to bail rather than friendly fire in the face of total defeat.
(I guess he doesn't even bail, but is committing suicide by pointless last stand? This is not making me like Saurfang more, despite the fact that I'm supposed to be liking Saurfang. Vol'jin, at least, rose up and tried to overthrow Garrosh. Saurfang's plan is to say, screw it, screw the Horde, good luck y'all with Sylvanas? This is the guy who I'm supposed to think is the embodiment of the Horde spirit? Is resilience not a foundational brick of the Horde's very existence?)
All this makes me think more fondly about Legion and how the player was placed relative to the faction leaders. The various faction leaders did not just completely invalidate shit that you did. They weren't 9000x more powerful than you were. You fought side by side with them. Having Illidan and Velen with you in Tomb and Antorus, "helping" out, but not, you know, striking down Varimathas themselves or whatever strikes me now as real smart and real smooth, compared to how BFA seems to be handling this.
gameplay skeleton first, plot second
(a critique i would argue is maybe applicable to the entirety of the faction war storyline)
I edited a bit to try and make things clearer. Hopefully it's not too jumbled still.
From my perspective, I'd say I think they had the key moments set in stone, but didn't actually know what they wanted to do with this scenario. They wanted several cool moments to happen, one/two important plot events to happen, and then just drew the straightest possible line between those few plot points to connect them together. I imagine, actually, that this is how priorities are often ordered, I guess, but the execution on the connecting bits, which are actually the most important parts - not the rad movie trailer moments - is just atrocious. It's just... inside-out narrative construction, Bay-esque "plot driven by climaxes" rather than "climaxes derived from the plot."
I am, right now, mentally comparing it to the Broken Shore scenario, and ... man, honestly, I can't think of any complaints I have about the Broken Shore scenario. That was a rad scenario. Maybe I'm just biased right now by being so close to this scenario, but I don't have any of these problems with the Broken Shore scenario. Well, the Alliance was also dumb in that scenario, but so were the Horde, and that was an important point in the broader narrative, that they were completely unprepared for what they actually found and so they were defeated, which is fair enough. I guess that the Horde was make to look like useless twits again too, but 1) that was also part of the point kinda, and 2) at least only Varian had his awesome moment (in defeat, too) so the Horde didn't look as egregiously useless, in comparison.