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I really enjoyed this LP. I think I'm closer to your stance than a lot of goons, but even where I didn't agree, I appreciated your perspective and how well you stated it. Also, talking about the tension between what WoW and Warcraft seemed like it could be, and what it too frequently was, really resonated with me too. When WoW came out I'd just graduated from college and was living with three of my college friends in a new city. We all loved playing MMOs together and chatting. I was the only one who had a schedule that let me do things during the work day, so I rode a few hours on the train and then walked fifteen minutes in the pouring rain to get four copies of the game from the last Best Buy in the city to have it in stock. Vanilla WoW itself was of course the best and worst of times all on its own. Both in the MMO sense of high highs of exploring a giant-seeming world and hanging out with friends old and new vs. a subscription-based business model that relished in wasting your time, but also in the story sense. With so much content (even if it wasn't finished) I found vanilla hinted at a truly large and complicated world far better than most of the expansions just due to sheer scope. I was frustrated by the strong faction divide and inability to even grind rep with the "other side," but too there were fascinating glimpses of what could be a world coming together, especially in some of the neutral areas. Of course, as always, Blizzard pulled that football away pretty quickly. Still, like you I played for a long time, and have a lot of great memories (and met some great friends!) in that game. So it was really interesting to look back to the lead-in and reminisce a bit. Thankfully, it hasn't raised any interest in going back. I'm not holding the kind of grudge against the company that you are, though I think it's reasonable to do so, but for me the game's moment has passed. I predominantly played WoW solo, and did group content with friends or not at all. In Vanilla you could get a lot of the world and relatively complete storylines that way, and I found parts of the world challenging enough to be fun, but even in Burning Crusade and only more so after, zone stories started culminating in dungeons at best and series of raids at worst, and all gameplay interest concentrated there to boot. Never mind all the limited-time events and just straight out plot points in books or whatever. In short, I've moved on, unless they pretty fundamentally change how they design the gameplay experience. Anyway, I digress, the point being just to say - thanks for giving me a reason to think about this again, and putting in all the work to get through the whole thing.
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Feb 4, 2024 06:47
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While I've never played Warcraft (or WoW), I've always maintained a bit of curiosity about it, given it's popularity. Seeing this LP pop up after lurking in the Blizzlols thread, I immediately dove in. ...I suppose it says a lot about Blizzard's writing that every time a lore post dropped I went, over the course of reading it from "this seems interesting/like it has story potential" to "how is Blizzard gonna screw this up" to "oh, *that's* how they screwed it up". Thank your for this LP, regardless!
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Feb 4, 2024 06:52
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And one more bug for the road, an invincible admiral proudemoore. Thanks for the LP, Cythereal. All in all, your descriptions, explanations, and fiction were all good reads.
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Feb 4, 2024 07:16
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You did good, Cyth. Congratulations.
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Feb 4, 2024 07:30
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Thank you for the LP - A long, massive project it has been but an excellent one to read all the way.
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Feb 4, 2024 08:33
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congratulations on finishing the whole series in ONE thread. Now we have a complete LP of Warcraft 3 
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Feb 4, 2024 09:33
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Congratulations, you're free.
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Feb 4, 2024 10:59
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Thank you for this LP, Cythereal. It's been interesting to read both the going-on of WC3 and the happenings in WoW, which are often incoherent even by the standards of long-running series in general.
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Feb 4, 2024 11:40
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Thanks for the LP, this has been a fun project to follow, especially as someone whose only knowledge of WoW has been by osmosis through knowing people who played the game and occasionally brought it up. Also one heck of a project, close to a year and a half of work. Thanks for sticking it out even when the audience got unruly at times.
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Feb 4, 2024 11:45
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NGL, this LP has been an eye-opening trip down memory lane. Thanks!
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Feb 4, 2024 13:01
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Nice work slogging and suffering through this for our entertainment. Thanks for all the hard, and sometimes unpleasant, work. It's been interesting learning and seeing things from a different perspective.
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Feb 4, 2024 13:14
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Cythereal posted:Use any of the plot devices at your disposal to undo the War of Thorns. Accept the mulligan, acknowledge that you are not and never were up to the task of writing a story about genocide, and move on. For what it's worth, if I was writing Warcraft, I wouldn't do exactly what the writing team did. I wouldn't do Shadowlands, because it was bad for business and retconned al ot of things, but that also means I wouldn't have that plot device where all the elves went to the Maw. That's contrived as hell, they should have been allowed to become wisps who in turn heal the wounds of the cataclysm. But, as early back as Cata, I was calling for the night elves and forsaken undead to take massive losses. I thought the most logical path for Warcraft was for an entirely Horde-controlled Kalimdor and an Alliance controlled Eastern Kingdoms, eventually leading to making Northrend the battle ground. I've tried to avoid psychoanalyzing someone I don't know, keep my mouth shut about what feels to me like a deep-seated desire you have to either be a do-gooder or not at all. There's nothing wrong with being a writer with an opinion, but do keep in mind not everyone who disagrees with you is trying to be an Internet Rational Debater and persuade you to their side. Sometimes they just say they see it differently than you, as though it's simply an entitlement for listening to something they conflict with. And while the discourse around WoW has completely memed, dirtied, and dunked on the phrase 'shades of gray' I think there's more of it in WC3's cast than there is in WoW Sylvanas. (Though again, I'd rather Sylvanas have eventually been an evil comic book villain without apology than spend another decade as an obviously evil weasel hiding behind the combined might of the Horde. But I'll admit I was never a huge fan of playable undead in WoW, there just wasn't much reason for Sylvanas to have the benefit of anyone's doubt after Wrathgate.) Regardless, this LP shows how much dedication you've put into this line of games over the years, even if your desired reaction for all this knowledge is something like "whoa what a load of crap decisions they made there huh." Cythereal posted:Enough of the goddamn dragon rape. Craptacular! fucked around with this message at 13:58 on Feb 4, 2024 |
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Feb 4, 2024 13:54
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Thank you for this LP, Cythereal. I've really enjoyed your analysis, criticism and prose. There's a mix of humour and melancholy to your writing that really appeals to me. You take some time to recover and I'll look forward to reading your next project.
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Feb 4, 2024 14:11
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Thank you, and I look forward to your next work, whatever it may be, whenever it may come. Be proud of it, and of this.
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Feb 4, 2024 14:41
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Cythereal posted:Warcraft: Devolved Elementals and Mutant Robots Now that this LP's wrapped up, I want to just say how good this first lore post was for immediately letting readers know what the gently caress they are in for.
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Feb 4, 2024 14:49
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Congratulations on finishing this project, and thank you for this weird psychically-damaging trip down memory lane.
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Feb 4, 2024 15:25
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Congratulations on finishing the LP. Warcraft is... I still have some fond memories of WoW, but in a similar way to you, I like my story front and center. Even if I wanted to play the game again, today, I'd always be itching to know what happened at the end of BFA and all of Shadowlands, but with my main being Horde (Tauren Warrior from vanilla on), I did get pretty tired of Warcrimes: I Did Not Sign Up For This poo poo - the game.
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Feb 4, 2024 16:32
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I was feeling nostalgic and thinking about purchasing Reforged when I sought out this thread. Played a little bit of vanilla and raided hardcore in BC so I was considering trying one of these classic wrath of the lich Kings as well. But the thread scratched all of those itches! Thanks for suffering so I didn't have to
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Feb 4, 2024 16:35
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Cythereal posted:
This part of the very first update was what got me hooked on this LP, a complete screwball to the face. It's been fun(?(??)) to see the story threads in Warcraft slowly roll into a terrible ball of yarn, fantastic job
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Feb 4, 2024 16:38
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I probably should have put this in the post-script, but I'll just note that my personal favorite thing to come out of this LP was that I somehow got myself and people in the thread cheering for a happy ending for Onyxia of all people. 
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Feb 4, 2024 16:44
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Huzzah! (Also, I liked Isidora more than Azélie - but I liked the wc2 crew more. Maybe cause less cast is more focus?)
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Feb 4, 2024 16:57
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Just caught up right at the end. Congratulations Cyth for somehow getting through all of this. What in the gently caress is this franchise.
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Feb 4, 2024 17:19
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Quinntan posted:What in the gently caress is this franchise. Approximately thirty years of making poo poo up as you go, while switching authors multiple times.
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Feb 4, 2024 17:23
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So when does the WoW LP start, Cyth? Or are you planning on doing all the Battle.net maps first? Some of those have lore implications! I jest, I jest. Thanks for this. I really enjoyed it. I don't always agree with your takes, and even when I do agree I sometimes disagree with the reason for your takes, but I have to say you always explain yourself pretty well, and it's incredible how much effort you put into all of this. Take a rest, you've earned it and then some. Thanks and congrats, you, like Draenor, are finally free.
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Feb 4, 2024 18:29
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Congratulations, and thanks!
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Feb 4, 2024 18:32
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Cythereal posted:I probably should have put this in the post-script, but I'll just note that my personal favorite thing to come out of this LP was that I somehow got myself and people in the thread cheering for a happy ending for Onyxia of all people. You advocated for grace and redemption very well through the framing story. Especially since Onyxia's now in the afterlife - she already died for her misdeeds, she's facing who she was and what she did, and eternity is a long time to be tormented for ultimately temporal sins.
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Feb 4, 2024 19:14
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Ah, an ending! Thank goodness. Good job, too. Now, if we can just have someone do a mechanics screenshot LP of Warcraft 3... VLPs are all well and good, but for RTS, I prefer screenshots because you can cut out so much of the tedious "build-up" phase.
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Feb 4, 2024 19:25
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disposablewords posted:You advocated for grace and redemption very well through the framing story. Especially since Onyxia's now in the afterlife - she already died for her misdeeds, she's facing who she was and what she did, and eternity is a long time to be tormented for ultimately temporal sins. It's got me wondering how their relationship might work out though- I'm still unclear on how Warcraft's afterlife works, but I am hoping they get some kind of Elysian Fields analogue instead of whatever fate they were 'supposed' to face  In any case, thanks for the informative LP, Cyth! I admit some of the lore updates got a little word-salad near the end, but they way I see it that's just an excuse to re-read the whole thing all over again!
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Feb 4, 2024 19:45
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Congrats on finishing and thanks for the LP! I spent years wondering what I had missed by never playing Warcraft 3 or WoW, and now I'm kinda glad I never did. But my curiosity is firmly satisfied.
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Feb 4, 2024 21:35
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Cythereal posted:I probably should have put this in the post-script, but I'll just note that my personal favorite thing to come out of this LP was that I somehow got myself and people in the thread cheering for a happy ending for Onyxia of all people. Well, you write some drat good fanfiction.
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Feb 4, 2024 21:45
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CommissarMega posted:It's got me wondering how their relationship might work out though- I'm still unclear on how Warcraft's afterlife works, but I am hoping they get some kind of Elysian Fields analogue instead of whatever fate they were 'supposed' to face Given that Shadowlands' response to players going 'But what about alternate timelines?' was 'poo poo! I didn't think of that! Uh... it's all strands in a rope! Strands in a rope!" I decided to make the conclusion about their relationship rather than about the specifics of afterlife. I am kind of tired of thinking about Warcraft as a setting harder than Steve Danuser ever seems to have. Just can't help being a bit maudlin about it because that's how I roll. Cythereal fucked around with this message at 23:02 on Feb 4, 2024 |
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Feb 4, 2024 22:56
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Congrats on finishing this long rear end saga and making me think about WarCraft in ways I never did. I was mostly lurking in thread from around the time WC3 started up, but I remember being a huge lore dude in previous incarnations of WC LPs, and while I didn’t exactly live up to that (somewhat because I moved on, somewhat because of your own very well written lore posts), I appreciate you letting me know where the story has gone since I stopped keeping up with things (albeit with your own viewpoint on what has happened). I too was an Alliance main, so I didn’t feel you were too harsh on the Horde for the most part, but even a new viewpoint on the nature and necessity of things like creeps and what was effectively colonization of Kalimdor made me see a couple of things in a new light, so I do thank you for that. Now go and take a break, you’ve more than deserved it here.
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Feb 4, 2024 23:13
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Cythereal posted:I probably should have put this in the post-script, but I'll just note that my personal favorite thing to come out of this LP was that I somehow got myself and people in the thread cheering for a happy ending for Onyxia of all people. At least some good has come out of this. o7
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Feb 4, 2024 23:22
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Thank you for all your hard work and dedication.Cythereal posted:I suppose the question is worth considering: do I think that there is hope for Warcraft as a franchise? "Hatred is a cycle. One that is all to easy to perpetuate. And forgiveness does not come easily to those who have been wronged. Years ago, I implored others to set aside their grievances and bring that cycle to an end. Only now, after so much has happened, do I grasp the enormity of what I was asking." Rogue AI Goddess fucked around with this message at 00:39 on Feb 5, 2024 |
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Feb 5, 2024 00:33
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As someone who never played WoW or the RTS games, I enjoyed seeing where all of it began. Doest feel like its been 2 years. Congrats
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Feb 5, 2024 01:45
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Cythereal posted:I am kind of tired of thinking about Warcraft as a setting harder than Steve Danuser ever seems to have. Considering that Danuser only showed up around, what, 2015-16? And they were teasing a mysterious something that eventually became the Maw back in 2011, how much of it rests solely on him? Not that I don't think it's stupid, I just remembering editing wikis when Sylvanas got a glimpse of "Warcraft Hell" because it was a change from her previous grumpy attitudes about how sad it was to be denied death's sweet release.
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Feb 5, 2024 03:18
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Not going to lie, that last fiction segment hit me hard in a good way. You are very talented which I have seen time and time again in this LP. Thanks for the amazing ride in this and I look forwards to your next one, and gonna be reading your previous ones while I am "working" evening shifts later this week.
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Feb 5, 2024 03:24
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So a key point I haven't seen about the final mission: It's DotA! OK, kind of. Your allied bases continually spawn units to help you take Proudmoore, who will also run around the map with some hero units. Theramore island is flooded with the Proudmoore's troops and units and buildings. You need to steadily demolish them to make progress (this isn't very hard on Normal mode). Slowly, you push the tide. Jaina saying "please don't kill the men I know" is an actual mechanic. Some of the buildings on Theramore are invincible and 'belong' to Jaina. They will still regularly spawn units to try and push the Horde back, but the buildings themselves can't be destroyed.
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Feb 5, 2024 10:06
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Cythereal posted:I probably should have put this in the post-script, but I'll just note that my personal favorite thing to come out of this LP was that I somehow got myself and people in the thread cheering for a happy ending for Onyxia of all people. And yet... Thank you for the LP, for the effort, for suffering through the nonsense. And for that last piece of fiction. I have felt genuinely bad a couple of times because.... yeah, looking back at it, even for the time the writing's rough. For what it's worth, I think I might still be playing WoW - or play Blizzard games in general - if something closer to your ideas on how to run the company or write the setting had been implemented. But since this is still, apparently, necessary Cythereal posted:
I don't forsee myself buying another Blizzard product either. Finally, please enjoy your break and do something fun and enjoyable. Oh, and since you reminded me that I had the game, I blame you for getting me to play Civilization: Beyond Earth again, too!
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Feb 5, 2024 11:23
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Congratulations on finishing a fantastic LP.
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Feb 5, 2024 15:25
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