On Living Planets and Frozen Thrones

For the first time in a while its just Nick and Katie to talk about Warcraft lore. Katie hasn’t been playing much lately, so Nick talks about his time with his warlock working on the Broken Shore quests and also trying to get the hidden artifact appearances. He also started leveling his rogue through Legion, and this leads to a discussion about Outlaw rogue and the pirate-based class fantasy.

In the news, Russell Brower was let go from Blizzard, and Nick and Katie talk about his impact on the music of the game and how they hope he will be involved going forward. Alisaunder emailed in to ask about applying the Curse of Flesh to a planet, which Katie thinks might produce the Old God corrupted planet (with a giant tentacle sticking out) as seen in Nighthold. This leads to a discussion of the Mogu as a race who could wield the Curse of Flesh in either direction, and Nick laments that we didn’t get to see the giant Mogu statues from the Vale of Eternal Blossoms come to life.

Alisaunder also asks about how to kill a Titan, and this leads to speculation about how Titans turn from planets (world souls) into actual beings. Nick suggests that maybe TItans don’t change – that they remain inside the planet as a consciousness, and they simply create and control avatars of various sizes for different purposes. Next, Katie talks about what it is like for children living on Azeroth, who are growing up in a world with such mixed races and elements, while their parents were alive during the first and second wars and must have a very different outlook on the world.

With Hearthstone’s Knights of the Frozen Throne coming out, Nick and Katie focus on Death Knights. Katie picked up a copy of the Death Knight manga, which tells the story of Thassarian, one of the first Death Knights you meet when playing through the new character intro. The comic shows how he became a Death Knight and explains his bromance with Koltira Deathweaver. This leads to a discussion about how Death Knights are (or are not) accepted in greater society, and how even if Death Knights aren’t respected, our characters must be because of all we’ve done for the world. Assuming of course that the world knows what we’ve been doing.

Finally, Nick brings up the Hearthstone comics promoting Knights of the Frozen Throne. While the stories are fun and do a good job of introducing the Death Knight versions of the Hearthstone heroes, Nick appreciates how this shows that Hearthstone lore consists of stories told within the Warcraft universe, as these stories are the product of the Pompous Thespian from One Night In Karazhan. This establishes that Hearthstone has an unreliable narrator, and allows the lore to wind whichever way it wants without setting any Warcraft facts in stone.

Hosts

Nick Zielenkievicz

Host of WoW! Talk! and The Tauren & The Goblin. Sometimes known as the Video Games Public Defender. Wants to play more Destiny and Marvel Heroes but WoW is all-consuming. Decent F2P Hearthstone player. Sad that he lost the Wii that had Wrecking Crew on it. Would be happy if the only game ever made was M.U.L.E. Gragtharr on Skywall-US. Garresque on Ravencrest-US.

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Katie Grace

Katie is a long time gamer who has fallen in love with multiple genres. She started young by playing Nintendo 64, Spyro, and Blizzard games such as Warcraft II with family, then eventually moved into playing games in both my leisure time and as a occupation. She loves being immersed in different universes and exploring the characters that live in them, as well as just playing games for a good time.

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