Posts with tag Infinite

The World of Warcraft is an expansive universe. You're playing the game, you're fighting the bosses, you know the how -- but do you know the why? Each week, Matthew Rossi and Anne Stickney make sure you Know Your Lore by covering the history of the story behind World of Warcraft.

The past week, both Anne and myself have been discussing major lore figures of the Well of Eternity heroic 5-man, Queen Azshara and Illidan Stormrage. This week, however, I wanted to talk about something a little different, namely the nature of how we're going to meet those two figures in the distant past -- why we go there, how we go there, what "there" actually is, and what it means. This KYL is about time, time travel, and the Bronze and Infinite Dragonflights, about Nozdormu and Murozond, and about how you destroyed time.

This KYL is so chock-full of spoilers for the novel Thrall: Twilight of the Aspects and the patch 4.3 heroics that if you read any further, you may well go mad. Or just get mad, I guess. It's also a THE, or Tinfoil Hat Edition, which means it's loaded with speculation. Take it with a grain of hourglass sand.

The World of Warcraft is an expansive universe. You're playing the game, you're fighting the bosses, you know the how, but do you know the why? Each week Matthew Rossi and Anne Stickney make sure you Know Your Lore by covering the history of the story behind World of Warcraft.

They're not called that because they're fat. Because they're not fat. Sure, they seem to be blistering out of their skin but that's glandular. Too many chronotons. (If you thought we were going to go an entire KYL about dragons who want to alter the fabric of time and space and not once mention Futurama, well, you were wrong, Mister I'm my own grandpa. Now let's steal the dish and go home.)

The Infinite Dragonflight are a conundrum. In many ways, they're the opposite number of the Bronze Dragonflight, with an agenda wholly opposed to that of the stewards of time. Where the Bronze seem to shepherd time along its normal flow and prevent strange incursions, the Infinites are all about strange incursions. Strange incursions that seem to be aiming at nothing more and nothing less than the total destruction of the established history of Azeroth proper and the creation of a wholly new order.

All the World's a Stage is a source for roleplaying ideas, commentary, and discussions. It is published every Sunday evening.

Your character is like an arrow. He was launched from the birthplace of your imagination with the aim of creating spontaneous stories with other creative people. Your character's personality is the particular direction he travels in, and his background story is the bow which set him on his way.

The bow-string tension that gives a good backstory its momentum is its lack of resolution. The desire to find resolution propels your character forward into the game, but it doesn't predict with certainty where your he or she will end up. Realizing this can free you of a great burden: your story doesn't have to make the New York Times Bestseller List. In fact, the whole idea here is to purposely leave your backstory unfinished, ready to be resolved through roleplaying. Too much emphasis on a dramatic background leaves you with not enough room for an interesting foreground, and little else to contribute other than the saga of your epic past.

Obviously, people aren't logging into WoW to read your miniature novel. They generally won't want to hear your backstory unless they specifically ask you about it (which they might!), but even then they'll care less for its narrative value and more for its ultimate impact on your character as a person. It's best to think of it less as a story in itself (e.g. "How I got to be this way"), and more as a prologue to the story you want to roleplay (e.g. "How do I get out of this mess?"). Its purpose is to set up challenges for your character to overcome with other people, and it should establish a direct line to your character's desires and aspirations.