Now I have been a fan of Warcaft's story line for some time, though I am far from an expert. I lack WoW and the rpg books, so perhaps some you who are more knowledgeable can alleviate my worries. My concerns are the following:

1) The Warcraft universe is too crowded. Azeroth is not a very big planet, and while it is true that some relatively small areas of our planet have rich and conflict filled histories (Greece is an excellent example), I for one am afraid that Blizz might be trying to pull off too much in too small a space. There are countless varieties of monsters, several major races and nations, but no clear indication as to how many beings actually exist in the world (or how many resources they need).

2) Too much havoc. I realize that war is the very basis for this series, but I think that if the story is to have any semblence of realism, that they need to take a longer rest from combat. WoW only takes place a few years after Warcraft III, which saw a plague decimate Lordaeron, a demonic invasion, and various other fun things. So as Blizz strives to throw more evils at the mortal races of Azeroth, they are really stretching how much said races can take before being reduced to nothing.

3) Compromise becoming permament. When I speak of compromise I mean compromising the story for gameplay purposes. Certainly, I am not saying that no such things should take place. Far from it. As a developer, Blizz's first duty is to make a fun game and thereby turn a profit. And sometimes to balance the game they need to make alterations. I just hope they don't make certain things permanent: as an example, in WoW paladins' light attacks do not wipe the floor with the Forsaken.

I've actually got a "theory" on how the Forsaken are supposedly able to resist light attacks.

When you die, your soul is said to go to some kind of heaven (or hell dimension...or whatever place the Loa/Spirits/something decides.) With no soul in a body, it becomes a husk...a fragment of your being left behind on the planet. With necromancy, you are animating that husk, and essentially using chaotic magics to force it to do your will.

When a Paladin uses exorcism, they are severing that connection, removing a portion of the Necromancer's control from its minion. In a more literal sense, it is like using mana burn or dispell on a minion. It's harming the minion as feedback from disrupting the puppet master's connection to his pet.

The Forsaken are no longer under the Lich King's control, and thus no longer have magic animating their bodies. Instead, it's more as if the plague has trapped their souls in their own bodies, but the souls are no longer being controlled from afar. Now, when you try to exorcise them, you are trying to sever a connection to themselves. Like using exorcism on a normal human being, it only works if there's a force controlling their actions; otherwise you aren't severing anything.

Of course this is a simple theory, and probably full of holes, but i'm hoping that's the general lore someone will use behind the change.

I do believe that game balance and lore must mesh, (deeply so), but if Blizzard wants to turn a profit, they must always look for a balance between the two. A compelling storyline is nothing if you cannot enjoy playing it. A great game is boring if you have no goal to work towards. Even hack and slash games like Diablo and Baldur's Gate survived by a balance of these forces.

I am worried though, and wondering if Blizzard must implement another world (beyond the ruins of Draenor) from which to continue their epic storyline. Azeroth may be one setting for epic conflict, but there are surely others out there that the Legion, Titans, and other forces fight for.

Well, Warcraft has no clearly defined set of metaphysical principles, so your theory might very well be true. However, I find it unconvincing. This is because exorcism is not the only spell that paladins are able to use against undead. Judgement is one such other spell, and it involves unleashing "holy power" against the undead units in question. Of course, I don't have WoW so I don't know which specific spells affect what. But your theory is also flawed in another regard. The death knights of old were souls infused into corpses, and yet they could be exorcised.

I tend to agree. If Warcraft were more story oriented it might lose some of its general appeal, but if it were to stray too far away from a sound story line, then it would lose its more hardcore fans.

Yeah. I am not sure how they will resolve the problem. Some have speculated that a third continent exists on Azeroth. I think a possible alternative is to have another mass of land rise from the sea floor because of some sort of calamitous upheaval (like and Old God's return).

I believe Judgement was removed/changed before the ending of beta (with most of the Paladin's initial abilities.) There are only three Paladin spells currently available for the express purpose of fighting the undead. Exorcism, Holy Wrath, and Turn Undead. While I'm not quite sure the lore mechanics that could work behind Turn Undead, I do believe Holy Wrath is works similarly to Exorcism (if we use my theory.) It is essentially an AoE version of Exorcism, so it can't stray too far away from the concept...at least I hope anyway.

Hmm. I see.

A thought has occurred to me, however. Here is your original claim:

The question arises: where were their souls when they were under the Lich King's control? Were their souls transported elsewhere in accord with the removal of their independent consciousnesses? In the case of a normal ghoul in the Scourge, it clearly has no independent mind. It is mindless. But with the Forsaken we suddenly have freely thinking creatures that retain all the physical attributes of undead beings. Now, assuming that exorcism is a severing the magical control of a "husk" then we must determine whether or not the undead still have their souls within their bodies, and if their bodies lack souls, then how their souls were able to return so readily to their bodies when the Lich King's power began to wane. Was his plague some sort of manipulation of their souls/minds/consciounesses?

As I said, my theory definitely has holes in it. The hole we're looking at now I've thought about though. It could be that the souls of the plague victims aren't allowed to pass on into the afterlife, and thus are trapped in their own bodies.

Ghoul's are said to be final stage of undeath, so it could be that by this time the Lich King has attained so much control over the animated body he no longer needs the soul to keep it. This might also explain why there are no ghouls within the Forsaken, but there are Forsaken along various stages of undeath. But as I said before, this is a simple theory, not something I'm sure of at any major junction of the storyline.

I've only got a minute here but to answer your first point: Don't believe the size based on how it looks in WoW. WoW is a scaled down version of Azeroth, meant to be small so it's manageable. I mean, under normal circumstances it would take something like a month to cross the Barrens for example. But you can't have players traveling for a month just to cross one zone. That would be disaster. So yeah, imagine Azeroth closer to the size of Earth and scale everything up appropriately. Then it will make a bit more sense.

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That makes sense. I think that's a good way of looking at it, though it sort of makes it a fantasy version of a fantasy world, since players are operating in not what the world actually is but in an altered form of it.

Cantus: I appreciate your attempt to iron out what Blizz has done, and I think you actually might be onto something. Perhaps we should make a Waracraft metaphysics thread to try and figure out what exactly the soul's role is in Azeroth. I for one am not sure if there is a heaven in the Warcraft universe, but the Abyss has been mentioned (according to Blizz's lore site, the spirits of the Old Gods lieutenants were sent there).

Yeah like if you read DotD they cross the sea between South shore ( or sumthin ) and over to the other side took over a day with griffin. in Wow you use like a minute.

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" I got a feeling the Murlocs are the new Alliance race, by the sound of it the Submarines have been controlled by Murlocs since warcraft II."

Bash.

Heh, thanks for the vote of confidence. For me, it's more pleasure than actual work to ask "Why?" in Warcraft. I'd love to setup a discussion thread though, as it's WC lore is one of by biggest hobbies (or at least finding/theorizing/creating it).

Also stated in DotD is that Southshore and Hillsbrad are days away from each other.

Guys...the playable Forsaken were changed for balance reasons, the NPC ones still show up as Undead I believe. There is no lore behind it, just a gameplay change to stop paladins from ganking forsaken and from Forsaken being godlike. In the lore the undead are the undead, there is no diffrence, free will or not.

That I know, but game balance doesn't have to be completely separate from lore. While Shadowmeld may be completely out of context, Exorcism does have a chance to meld back into the lore.

So instead of being just basicly immune to sheep, sap and such while being vulnerable to Paladins, they changed it so they aren't affected by Paladins stuff but now affected by sheep. But then they give them a Racial talent that beats apart everything they're now weak to. So really all this did was make Paladins weaker against our Banes Mages and Warlocks.

Aye, truth be told.

Im sure Paladins are going to get a full re-working come 1.9 patch. They might get the biggest change of any class if I would guess right.