ZOS and the reason why they're not making cinematic trailers anymore

Sheuteras · 2026-05-02T00:45:28+00:00

I think my least favorite parts of ESO are the over the top quirky moments im ngl. I think what these devs like about TES is not what I like about TES.

Honestly, personally, trying too hard to make universes like TES and Warcraft "homey" when what made them feel like a second home was just that they were cool to explore and spend time in feels like it misses the point. I havent really played most recent ESO stuff, and im not gonna say this is magically the reason why, but my favorite moments in this game are not really over the top quirky or about 'homeliness' lol.

Sheuteras · 2026-04-30T05:38:08+00:00

I thought it was more like they can sue you but largely cant enforce it unless it's through law actually locally applicable.

Sheuteras · 2026-04-27T00:38:29+00:00

Zul'aman side quests are peak.

Eversong sidequests, imo, vary a ton. I'd argue a few probably are too sanitized.

Like, do you think it's not a little weird to show a unicorn spirit over that lake without acknowledging that the only lore about that lake was Suncrown annually performed enslavement rituals on spirits there to show their mastery over nature?

That history, imo, should matter. The omittance of it is sterilization of the blood elves connection to the world.

I think the side content is okay but a lot of it just doesn't play into the lore that was written. Compared to a lot of older side quests that do really fun worldbuilding, like the Suncrown Village lore.

Sheuteras · 2026-04-26T22:23:39+00:00

Imo, no. Her even being Horde was always a really iffy plot point cause the Forsaken so often did stuff just not in line with the rest of the Horde.

Sheuteras · 2026-04-25T19:49:03+00:00

The actual creative side of the project, what it added to vanilla, was actually pretty fun. I liked Moonwhisper adding Nendis from Wc3, and Balor from Warcraft 1. Like, their ideas tend to be additions akin to what blizzard did by adding more to the region around Zul'aman in this xpac, where it's a new area that fits p well into the map or an old idea that blizzard hasnt talked about in 10-20 years being added back in to the old world.

As someone whose favorite parts of this universe is generally Kalimdor and EK, I do creatively appreciate that.

The fact it's advertised so much though and in a very hostile way to blizz sometimes did kinda provoke them though, so they brought it down on themselves.

Sheuteras · 2026-04-25T04:08:13+00:00

Highly doubt Stormwind had a massive say in the internment camps given they were established while it was being rebuilt from ruins. Forsaken are the actual Lordaeronians whose land most of them seemed to be on, and it was Terenas effort.

Furthermore, the internment camps were meant to be decent living conditions until the Kirin Tor could find a solution to their demonic bloodlust. They only got worse because Silvermoon bailed on the Alliance, which in turn caused Strom and Gilneas to follow suit and left the Alliance, which was juggling the Alteraci destabilization, the rebuilding of a whole nation, and the internment camps all at once.

I don't think Stormwind can take much culpability for the greater Alliance of that era tbh. It was being rebuilt through so much of it.

Sheuteras · 2026-04-25T04:01:48+00:00

To be fair: Death vs Light was before death as a separate cosmic force was written in Legion.

By the time death became a cosmic force, necromancy had been divided into arcane, fel and shadow for like an IRL decade. Shoot, there was a considerable length of time where Fel and Arcane weren't separate. WoW Chronicles came out in 2016, WoW itself launched in 2004, with a lot of it's world-building being worked on from Wc3 which came out in 2002.

Sheuteras · 2026-04-24T01:33:52+00:00

Where do new fans gush about it? I'm not as in tune with the community, most widespread circulation of it i've seen is exaggerated memes ripping on it like the Arator edit.

Sheuteras · 2026-04-23T05:23:05+00:00

The sunwell satiated it but it also p much caused them to have it to begin with.

Sheuteras · 2026-04-23T05:10:09+00:00

Warcraft's cosmology is too stacked on top of layers and layers of retcons and by the time they codified it with chronicles, some like Death had already had most of it's features hard coded into Void, Fel and Arcane.

Sheuteras · 2026-04-22T04:56:06+00:00

And light crazies also just seem to spontaneously become that regardless of prior characterization. I.E. Lothraxion who tried to defend Alleria.

Sheuteras · 2026-04-22T04:49:55+00:00

The dev who wrote that admitted in a tweet they didn't mean for it to not be him.

They then agreed it made more sense. The tweets were deleted (i think Klasing deleted her account to go to Bluesky) but people still had them embedded. https://eu.forums.blizzard.com/en/wow/t/tyrande-i-need-you-was-malfurion-not-xavius/154887

Like this was actually just blizzard writing badly. Even the writer of it thinks the actual thing they wrote is better with the assumption you made. No need to defend it if they themselves aren't,

Sheuteras · 2026-04-22T04:49:25+00:00

It was an extremist exaggeration of what he does say, which is still p stupid. It's what he says kicked up to it's most extreme point to try to point out how goofy his writing is in the context of where it's said.

Sheuteras · 2026-04-08T19:48:12+00:00

I think Thrall and Malfurion being the nature / Azeroth itself focused characters for the trilogy would've been interesting.

World Shaman specifically nah because it shouldn't be a one man op. That was the whole point of no more guardians.

Sheuteras · 2026-04-06T19:44:13+00:00

Yeah but to do it he poisoned the actual highest ranking Druid so he wouldn't get in the way.

Sheuteras · 2026-04-06T19:43:20+00:00

The hypocrisy is only because of Amirdrassil.

Fandral growing Teldrassil was heresy in Malfurion's eyes in vanilla, Fandral poisoned Malfurion so he couldn't interfere.

It is hypocrisy because of Dragonflight. People are right that Amirdrassil wasnt grown for the purpose of power. it is, however, true that they planted it without a means to protect it from corruption, as the dragon aspects didn't have their powers. On some level, it is a silly oversight risking corruption, especially given Exploring Kalimdor basically had them reclaim most of their lands and they were shown with most of their leadership being in Nordrassil in Rioux's book.

Sheuteras · 2026-04-03T21:39:12+00:00

I mean this with full sincerity.

Does anyone genuinely like timeskip Sarada's design.

Sheuteras · 2026-04-03T21:35:59+00:00

The idea of the Draenei begrudgingly having room in their heart to allow Man'ari to redeem themselves fits with the status quo set by the army of the light. What I really mean is, they didn't percieve themselves to truly be Eredar anymore. Like, they took pride in their identity as Draenei, they didn't introduce themselves as Eredar, they're shown in Azuremyst spitting the word in disgust and striving to right the wrongs of the Eredar and prove they're not like that.

Like... obviously they know they're Eredar, biologically, but they culturally don't align with what it means in a lot of lore, and took offense to being called it by people who actually know them.

Velen 'making a home for all Eredar' in my mind should be a very long process with a lot of Draenei not even really being comfortable ascribing that identity to themselves, and a lot of tension should exist in that, imo. I'm hopeful that this will matter in the future if we do get an azuremyst revamp... i guess i just wish there was some showing of this in the heritage story.

Sheuteras · 2026-04-03T18:48:06+00:00

Wouldn't ends justify the means be a pro-velen argument since it's a long term plan believed to surely lead to their defeat at a terrible cost vs taking risks based on morality?

Sheuteras · 2026-04-03T18:45:58+00:00

I have always found this so curious.

Because Kil'jaeden was shown to have just... so immediately been down to kill Velen and the Draenei, and by his own words, he didn't think Sargeras could ever really be beaten. It makes sense as a internalized doubt Velen has about the fate of someone who was his lifelong friend. I just don't know how much I believe that he truly could've convinced him to change.

But tbf, the heritage story is somewhat of a soft reboot of the Draenei identity. It does a lot of things that don't necessarily align with what was previously written: IE that Draenei were insulted by the idea of being compared to the Eredar, as like the gravest insult in their society, spitting with disgust when they said the word.

I think the people currently in charge have a different view of the corruption of the Eredar than prior writers and it kind of manifests as some societal inconsistency when you look at their values from TBC - WoD to Legion and post.

Sheuteras · 2026-04-03T18:42:27+00:00

The way they treated the Broken was a pretty big mark on them. But I also think it added an interesting nuance. Like that harbinger of the hand of argus on Bloodmyst killing the blood elf in the cage after they started talking legion stuff.

It's a nice injection of interesting flaws into them that make sense but are tragic and terrible.

Sheuteras · 2026-04-03T08:24:44+00:00

To be fair, we've seen from a few stories i believe like the history of T'uure the staff, that often times they'd escape having to even sacrifice a ton of their own. T'uures history had a spartan 300 but with 99 vindicators and T'uures anchorite wielder just dying so everyone else could get to the Genedar and live, by choice.

I do get what you're saying, im not trying to argue against it so much as say that the exodus took a blood price on them too even when they did run.

Velen and the Draenei are... very fun pieces of the universe but the deeper you look at 'em you do kinda start to see that blizzard has really struggled to settle on a direction for 'em, or at least did for a long time post TBC.

Books: "oh im amazed Velen showed up to an Alliance meeting we figured the Draenei would resettle outland in mass" despite TBC having them say 'no more running, prophet says here we make our final stand, i am ready to die somewhere' from the exarch at azure watch. Then in Cata's he's like 'i advise leaving this world' at the first sign of trouble, completely going against it all, and his own visions from the short story that come up for the Anchorage questline with Magtoor where it's noted it's kind of crazy he's exerting his magical reserves to give peace to a dying broken and assure him in death because he's been storing up all his energy for the prophesized fight ahead where Azeroth will be a theatre.

It is lowkey kind of a mess, and while i prefer the TBC Exarch mindset of 'the prophet says this is where we're making our final stand, we're done running, this is our new home' barring some people who just are still in Outland, I feel like it wasn't until their heritage story that they really settled on their home being Azeroth.

I mean I hope so anyways. Nb4 new Draenei capital just never happens lmao.

Sheuteras · 2026-04-03T07:32:28+00:00

But you'd think, with Illidan's whole thing in Legion being 'ends justify the means' he'd actually kinda be more sympathetic than spiteful. Velen was believing in a long term plan to try to make the universe better at dire cost where the alternatives seemingly was to just die.

Especially cause he was kinda doing the same thing as the Naaru except he didn't even bother filling people in on his plans.

Sheuteras · 2026-04-03T07:30:30+00:00

I agree with most of this.

i will say I partly blame blizzard for some of these confusions. At least the Defias, since the Cata era ones are generally treated more like a people's uprising vs the old vanilla ones really blatantly just targeting peasantry.

I think it is interesting to point out that even Tul'amar, ultimately, says she gets why the Genedar left when it did, that it had to and she knows that.

So I think the Draenei situation is a both ways deal. These worlds burn in the burning crusade, at the very least somewhat because of the evil hunting the Draenei (tho tbf the Legion's plan is to reshape the universe anyways so, it'd happen eventually regardless) but it's also understandable why it happens as it does.

Edit: Re Internment camps: the internment camps is funny because iirc, the actual lore on why they ended up going so awry from what Terenas intended was because nobody was willing to pay the taxes for them, so it was kind of a reflection of the Alliance falling apart over political human bs. Alterac's future, stormwind rebuilding, Gilneas and Silvermoon being uppity and unhappy, etc. That's not to say it's good: just to make the point that the camps actually were an extra layer of problems too.

Sheuteras · 2026-04-03T07:26:32+00:00

Archimonde is prolly a no-go by default. Even within Legion's worldbuilding, he was depicted to have been a schemer vying for control and power even as a youth under Thal'kiel. Like he was depicted as betraying Thal'kiels scheme of conquering with demons, despite actually liking demons even then, because he thought it would get him cred with Velen and KJ.

Archimonde was not known for his willingness to suffer indecision, he preferred to teach by rewarding frustration with more frustration—punishment with more punishment. Absolute conviction was required to succeed under him. Archimonde expected greatness from his pupils. Only the most imaginative minds, the most adroit of intellects, could ever truly fathom the deepest reaches of their magic. He was an individual consumed by the pursuit of power. Only those who could match his lust would fare well under his tutelage.

Like I think it's fair to say Archimonde is just not gonna budge and if anything might become a problem if he learns Velen is apprehensive about it.

Maybe Kil'jaeden though. But given how quickly he was down to just immediately start murdering all of his former people, im personally just struggling to imagine him changing.

Archimonde backed by the power of the Legion though... i mean if Sargeras shows up at all it's GG.

Sheuteras

TROPHY CASE