Lore Watch Podcast

Our listeners wanted to know about the legacy of the Troll raid. We've been killing those poor saps a lot -- just about every expansion in either raid or dungeon form, in fact, to the extent that "the Troll raid" is almost a meme. Midnight may be bringing us another chance to murder a whole bunch more Trolls, with rumors swirling about islands off the coast near Zul'Aman -- which, incidentally, was the Troll raid for The Burning Crusade.We start off with a brief recap of the myriad of times in the past when we defeated one branch of trolls or another in a variety of settings. Of course, with such a broad topic, the rabbit hole goes deep. Matt and Joe discuss the Loa, notable troll heroes like Zul'jin, and the future of Trollkind. Since we're going into Midnight without a Troll raid as such, they also speculate a little on how it could come to pass before the expansion is out.

This week we have four listener questions answered by our lore experts Joe and Matt. First, they discuss the Ethereals and what their timeline is in relation to the timeline on Azeroth. Has this race existed for years, decades, milennia -- or something different entirely. They pivoted to the dragons and their aspects, and how choice figures in. Chromie, for one, clearly got some element of choice in how she appears in her bipedal form. How might other dragons choose, and how might new discoveries change what they choose? Is Alexstrasza going to become a Kul Tiran? Then, we pivot a third time to the old-school class quests like the Paladin's Charger questline and how they tied in to the class fantasy of the player, plus how they might be brought back in the future. Finally, we pivot once more, back to where we started, with Ethereals. This time you asked about Ve'nari and her secretive nature. The Ecodomes hardly seem nefarious or easily sabotaged -- why did she keep them a secret from us?You ask us questions and we luckily have some loremasters on hand to explain the answers. If it were just me you'd be listening to hold music while I frantically scanned through everything in our Warcraft in print guide looking for something approaching an answer. Hope you like the muzak version of Careless Whisper!

As we make our way toward Midnight, Joe and Matt are making sure we know what we need to before the expansion launches. Chief among those things is the lore of Blood Elves. It starts with the Highborne and the schism between Night Elves and High Elves, which eventually led to the Blood Elves and the creation of the Sunwell.But ancient history isn't all. Joe and Matt also discuss some of the notable figures in Blood Elf society that are important to know. Lady Liadrin and Lor'themar were in the Midnight cinematic, and the Windrunner sisters are a trio to rival the Schuylers -- with their own "and Peggy" in Vereesa -- but there are tons of characters who have had their fingers on the scale of Blood Elf nobility to discuss. From Azshara all the way to Xavius, and with the entire Scourge in the mix, the history of Blood Elves is twisty and fascinating -- and a little hard to remember. So let Joe and Matt guide you through what you need to know before Midnight.

Because we aren't all constantly filled with existential dread, Joe and Matt are answering some deep questions asked by some of our listeners. The first concerns the afterlife in Diablo, namely where we all go when we die. Heaven and Hell aren't really in keeping with our religious afterlife paradigm, after all. Then, they're asked about what the moon or sun is, really, in WoW. This one is a little less harrowing, since we see lots of things like magic derived from these celestial bodies, and some of them are characters in their own right. There are also other solar systems in other planes to worry about, and what all these celestial bodies working in concert might mean for the fabric of reality.And now we have to go lie on the floor and think about why the sky is blue, what dogs dream about, and what makes us humans. It's fine.

As we head into Midnight, we know this act begins with a direct assault on the Sunwell. But what is the Sunwell? Our Loremasters Joe and Matt discuss the history of Xal'atath's next target. The Sunwell isn't even the only well of power to be found on Azeroth -- they discuss the Well of Eternity, and the Nightwell, too.This isn't the first time the Sunwell has been directly assaulted -- and hopefully, it won't be the last, if our champions have anything to say about it. (Which is to say that hopefully it will be around to be attacked again in the future.)

Matt and Joe sit down this week to discuss Vampire: The Masquerade: its lore, some of the source material that inspired it, and how it rippled vampires forward in pop culture. They break down what you need to know about the history of vampires in this setting, which goes back almost to the beginning of humans, so there's kind of a lot to discuss. Clans are the core concept to be aware of, as the demi-families Vampires belong to with certain shared traits. They also have Sects, which are political affiliations, adding to the mess of machinations that make up the Masquerade.There is ton to discuss, just from the sourcebooks, let alone the novels and video games. So let Matt and Joe get you up to speed before you play Vampire: The Masquerade Bloodlines 2 which comes out this week.

Now that we've seen Lorewalking a bit, a listener asks the Lore Watch team what other events in Azeroth's history we should get to go visit through that system. While the listener suggests the War of the Three Hammers -- which Joe and Matt are on board with -- the response runs the gamut of Azeroth's history, from ancient events to a couple from WoW we just weren't there to see, all the way back to the creation of Azeroth herself. They ran through events with dizzying speed, some of which are well known to us, and others which are mostly only known to the loremasters among us.Or maybe we should kill Arthas another time, that would be fun, too.

The ultimate fight of The War Within, Dimensius is a hulking purple Void Lord, and several developer interviews have led us to believe he may be the last one. Or, at least, that's what two of our listeners asked about -- is he the last Void Lord? And if he is, what does that even mean? So Matt and Joe start off explaining the Void and Void Lords a bit, before making a turn -- in the way only Lore Watch can. If Dimensius is the last Void Lord, which weren't not sold on, what does that mean as we make our way toward the final expansion of the arc, which we already know is The Last Titan? Seems a bit convenient to have a whole bunch of "lasts" in one place, doesn't it.And what might happen if the last Void Lord and the last Titan meet?