Meet the New Lore
With Varendil and I playing SWTOR, we haven’t had much chance to catch up on all the WoW news going on, but I still subscribe to a few Twitter and Facebook pages to try and keep up to date with things.
While scrolling through Tweetdeck, I see the MMO Champ post about NEW LORE for Lor’themar. The new short story has been posted! Excited, I alt tab from losing Warzones to overgeared Imps to read the story. Maybe there are some questions answered about the current state of Blood Elf lore. Maybe they talk about tearing down all those tacky Kael’thas statues, getting rid of the Fel Crystals, maybe some awesome High Elf/Blood Elf action, oh yeeaaahhh. Maybe this can be a chance for me to jump back into WoW-RP! Oh how I’ve missed Lanuria!
So, I get to reading and realize the title sounds awfully familiar.
And it’s based during Wrath?
And I coulda sworn I’ve…
“Lan, you do know this is the story that won the fiction contest in 2008, right?”
Varendil looks at me from across the bedroom, scrolling through his Googlereader. “Yeah, right here on WoWinsider, ‘While it is not a new story…’”
But..but..
IT SAYS NEW LORE RIGHT IN THE GODDAMNED TITLE.
This is just…awful, a spit in the face of RPers everywhere, honestly.
This story was written in 2008, during Wrath. Since then, we’ve had Arthas die, the Scourge basically destroyed, we’ve had the Horde taken over by Garrosh, we’ve have the world torn apart by dragons, our closest ally become a little crazy and we’ve had adventurers from Silvermoon go off to new places to defend their homeland that wasn’t even affected by the goddamned dragon and this is what you give us? A story from goddamned 2008?!
The first Leader Short Story was Garrosh’s, published on December 3rd, 2010. It has been over a year since we were introduced to new lore of our faction leaders and the goddamned Belf story is just a repost!? Why the hell didn’t you just post this story when you introduced the Leader Short Story page, since it was already written?!
ARRRGGHH. I am just so utterly pissed right now. There have been a lot of developments with Blood Elves, but we don’t get a real story to help answer questions? What is going to happen to fel magic users in Silvermoon? How do they feel about High Elves now that the Sunwell has been reclaimed? How does a Blood Elf in the Horde Military feel about Garrosh being a complete and utter dick to anyone that isn’t an Orc? But I guess Blizzard doesn’t care about that part of the lore, since it isn’t about Thrall and his baby mamma or about LO’GOSH and awesome Mary Sue wolf powers~
Every. Single. Fucking. Race in WoW has gotten something new and improved in Cata, minus the Draenei and the Blood Elves. Sure, we got TBC, a whole expansion for our races, but it’s been since 2007, we deserve some goddamned updated lore on those races. Just give us something, anything, please? We didn’t even get updated starter zones in Cata and now you do this?
I wonder what the Draenei story is going to be about, if they even write the damn thing. I’m sure it’ll be all about Anduin Wrynn’s super happy fun adventures with Velen just sitting in the corner, saying a few Yoda like things to the human kid. Because, ya know, those belfs and spacegoats had a whole damn expansion to themselves, they have enough lore already, right?
Right?
Another Route to our Lack of Updates!
Hey, guys! We’re on Google+ now, contributing to the lack of real content! At least we’re not posting reddit gif rehashes.
Mists of Blandaria
So. Blizzcon, hm?
Believe it or not, the announcement of a big old missing island-turtle of Pandas, or whatever – I’ve skimmed – has some big implications here at RPL.
0 for 2
See, we need to stop assuming other human beings are decent people. That’s our problem.
As a commenter pointed out to us, and as was found on Reddit, this funeral drama might be more drama than funeral.
A Somber Note
Normally, I don’t like giving you all bad news, but I was informed today that Caritrina, the leader of Moon Guard’s Silvermoon Blood Knights, recently passed away.
I had the privilege of roleplaying with ‘Carrot’ and the Blood Knights many moons ago and those times are always looked back on with a smile and a laugh. Caritrina was a fantastic roleplayer. She was always looked for ways to make her guild fantastic and ways to improve the image of it. She was also a fantastic person and it is such a shame to see someone like that leave this world.
Because I knew her and roleplayed with her and I am sure anyone who had a belf on MG had an encounter with the SMBK, I wanted to pass long that there will be a small funeral for her in game at 8 server time at the Shrine of Dath’Remar. I wanted to let you all know of this so you could pay your respects if you wished to do so. EDIT: The funeral is a smaller occasion, so unless you knew her, feel free to pay respects on the realm forums or elsewhere in your own way.
Things like this are always depressing. It’s always hard when you a character dies, but the person behind the screen is still there to make a new one, to continue on, or chat with you on vent or AIM or whatever. But when a person is gone, both IC and OOC, there is no rerolling, it’s so real and you have to deal with the loss in two ways, through a character and through your own emotions.
It’s my hope, even if you didn’t know the person behind Caritrina, that we all take a few moments out of our day to enjoy not just the character your roleplaying with, but the person who developed that character. Take a few minutes to enjoy the company of those people in guild chat or vent and tell them how you feel. Life is much too short to hold it all in.
Light’s Blessings, Caritrina. Rest in peace.
Space Dumpsters & Revelations
The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its contents. We live on a placid island of ignorance in the midst of black seas of infinity, and it was not meant that we should voyage far. The sciences, each straining in its own direction, have hitherto harmed us little; but some day the piecing together of dissociated knowledge will open up such terrifying vistas of reality, and of our frightful position therein, that we shall either go mad from the revelation or flee from the deadly light into the peace and safety of a new dark age.
–H.P. Lovecraft, The Call of Cthulhu
This is a bit of a nontraditional post, but I came to a realization this morning that I now feel my entire life has been leading up to. I feel obligated to share this with all of you.
Trolls Trolling Trolls
Reader Corey L. posted the following video to our Facebook page:
I could only make it four minutes in.
A Pause
I’m sure some of you have noticed we haven’t been keeping up on posts lately, we haven’t been logging into WoW as much and our Twitter and Facebook are oddly silent. It’s nothing to worry about, the site isn’t going anywhere, but Varendil and I are in the middle of moving and we haven’t had much time to work on posts with all the crap we need to do.
Once we get all moved in and settled down, RPL will be back with all sorts of tips, advice and tons of purple prose to make your blood boil. We should had everything up and running once more by the end of the month!
So, until then, keep sending us the MRPs/RSPs you find to our e-mail so we can do a little bit of writing while we are taking a break from moving. Anyone in the South Wisconsin area wanna help us move some crap? We’ll pay with autographs.
The Hand That Feeds
I wonder if stuff like this is what the people that hate us think we do.
Don’t know what anyone else here thinks, especially when we’ve received so many readers from WarcraftSues, but as far as I’m concerned this is across the line. Assuming every new person is using a beginner roleplayer tag as a copout to do whatever they want, attacking someone else because they made a title that happens to be in use already – because they obviously know all their lore despite seeming young and probably somewhat new to this roleplay thing.
At the end of the day, we always try to make sure, or at least pretend, that we’ve somehow helped, that 1% of what’s here isn’t vitriol. We’re not that caring, and it’s definitely straight attacks on hubris as often as it’s tough love, but half the reason we don’t post more often is that we always try to make sure we’re making fun of people that deserve it. The minute you lose that, you’re just a bitter old troll.
Maybe I’m just posting this because I got offended by something too soon after waking up. Maybe I’m just turning into a softie. In any case, we have comments here for a reason, and I’d love to hear what you think.
Be Nice So We Can Be Mean
When running a site like RPL, you get a lot of flak from people asking why we aren’t more constructive. Don’t worry, we deal with it.
Our thoughts as Lan and I philosophize over Great Value spaghetti invariably become “Lots of people will give good advice, we’re the Perry Coxs, the Ron Swansons, the Severus Snapes. We’re better at being that bad guy.” And yes, we know that’s hypocritical since we often give advice to not play the anti-hero in actual RP.
But what I’ve been discovering lately is that there are fewer and fewer examples of friendly people giving roleplay advice for Warcraft. What gives? I can’t take three steps without tripping over a website or blog devoted to, say, 4th edition Dungeons and Dragons, and that’s a pariah of an edition among ‘hardcore roleplayers.’
In short, shame on us for playing the bad guy in a field that isn’t even full of other bad guys (WarcraftSues and bad-rpers-suck notwithstanding), but full of silence. We, as a community, have to do more to make sure that when we complain about idiocy, that we have a resource there to point people to to improve.
Take this guy. RP Made Simple is wonderfully written and has some great resources on basic and beyond roleplay. I literally don’t have time to read all of this, there’s that much.
So why does @RPmadesimple have fewer Twitter followers than we do? Why is it that not a single post on his frontpage has any comments? Well, I suppose that his requiring folks to register puts a damper on it, but still.
Even RP Made Simple’s list of resources is full of blogs that are no longer updated. Come on, roleplay community. You have to make the friendly, constructive community so that Lanuria and I can be the sarcastic people cracking jokes from the peanut gallery.
We are all counting on you.
Oh, There’s Your Problem
EDIT: Looks like the thread’s gone. Not surprising. But! Here’s a screencap of the OP’s entire thesis, thanks to a friend of the blog with good timing.
Apparently that’s what happened!
In Warcraft I, which never mentioned our Lord White Jesus by name, everything was hunky-dory for the humans that we know in the end lost to their invaders because they had a real, more copy-pasted from western religion faith.
Then, apparently someone sued Blizzard because putting religion in a game is bad. Or something. I don’t know exactly what they could be sued for, and all the details have been lost to the mists of time, but it totally happened and the result is that Blizzard made the orcs good guys. Not in Warcraft II, which came out next and merely fleshed out orcs’ stories, but in Warcraft III, when they became pitiable.
Because the idea of a humanized opponent and that anyone can be good does not fit in a Christ story.
This has let to less clear good/evil distinction, cats and dogs living together… mass hysteria! and all the other bad portions of today’s lore – never mind the awesome stuff we’ve received (Titans, Old Gods, the Lich King) that happened in Warcraft III onward.
So curse this Bigfoot lawsuit that might exist but even if it doesn’t Blizzard should put more church back in the Church.
P.S.: Of course he’s friends with Argunon. They’re the ‘decide what the lore was’ buddies.
Update Your MRP!
Hey guys, Lan here. I’m on vacation right now, but I wanted to pass along some information for you!
It looks like 4.1, AKA Trollpocalypse, broke MRP! If you use MRP (Which you should, because it is amazing and you can use it with FlagRSP) you should head over to Moonshyne’s site and get the updated version!
Don’t worry, your MRP information should be saved, but if you’d rather be safe than sorry, head into this folder:
/WTF/[AccountName]/SavedVariables/ folder
and copy the MyRoleplay.lua file! Paste it in the updated one if your stuff doesn’t load!
I will be back on Friday! Have a great one!
Opposition
It’s no secret that RPL is at least as reviled as it is loved by the WoW populace at large. What’s interesting, though, is when you look at the maturity level of those that seem to think we’re destroying roleplay and bringing about the rapture. Or something.
A Limitless Font of Wisdom
Today the first part of the “Ask the Devs Q&A” was posted on the World of Warcraft forums, providing a wonderful window into what Blizzard isn’t planning on implementing at the moment. If you’re like me, though, you want as direct a line as possible into the minds of the dev team and what fun and useful features they’re not actively working on.
In this spirit, I’ve worked with my contacts at Blizzard and Formspring.me to provide the AskABlizDev account! Simply head over and ask a question, and the Bliz dev team will keep you up to date on just what overdue features they still haven’t put in game, like an appearance tab or improved voice chat. Tell your friends! Let’s get the word out on what you can’t expect from World of Warcraft in the near future!
You’re So Funny! [NSFW Language]
Say what you will about this site, at least we don’t log into World of Warcraft and actively harass people. Sure, maybe this guy isn’t harassment in the sense that the person is stripping down to their knickers, /train’ing and interrupting an event, but this is still a form of harassment and it needs to be addressed. (more…)
Creative Development Take Two!
We all remember the amazing thread that was Ask Creative Development, where we learned important things such as how The Light actually hurts forsaken and death knights, how goblin shamans actually work, and heard the wonderful news that Med’an would not be showing his face in Cata. Now Blizzard is opening the forums for another Creative Development thread, Ask the Devs Part 2: Electric Boogaloo.
Using the new Like system, Blizzard will most likely be answering the questions that are rated highly. We’ve asked a question about elven aging, which is something Varendil and I have been curious about for a long while. There are a lot of other fabulous questions dealing with lore as well, so go through, like the ones you like, dislike the ones about LOLBARAD and OMG NERF MAGES and post your own! If you throw a link to the questions you asked, we’ll be sure to like them, if they aren’t something stupid like “how i mine 4 fish.”
Here’s hoping we get a lot of our questions answered and those answers can improve the roleplaying community.
Now With Even More Time Wasters!
Varendil and I are proud to introduce you to our latest social experiment…
The Roleplayer’s Lament Forums!
What? Forums? Whyfor?
I’ve been visiting the World’s End Tavern for a good solid week. Between the 500+ page threads of single-sentence IC responses by Death Knights with wings and the threads about how awesome it is to play things that break lore, I developed a drinking problem.
After a brief stint in rehab, I made these forums. Forums for our readers, you guys, to talk about things amongst yourselves. Need someone to help with a storyline and your realm forums aren’t cutting it? Head on to the RPL forums to ask around. Need advice for a new character and people are telling you to “RP whatever you want! ^_^”, swing by and let us help you! Need a place to store some sweet image macros for the occasions you can’t think of anything to say? We have that! Hell, you can even talk about the site or rant about people without having people yell at you!
The place is a little barren at the moment, since we just started it today, but with time, and people like you, it’ll grow. So swing by, register and have fun with your fellow…Rplers? Ripples?
What the hell do we call you people?
Happy Winter Veil!
Happy Winter Veil/Christmas/Life Day to everyone! We know today is a very special day to a lot of people, so we won’t take up much of your time. We know there are gifts to be opened, family to be seen and amazing food to be devoured!
In the spirit of Winter Veil, we would love to give each and every one of our readers something special, but we don’t have the means just yet. Maybe next year, after we get jobs at Blizzard working for the lore department, we can just that, but for now we can only do a little something.
In the comments below, tell us what Great Father Winter brought you or your character! We will randomly pick a comment and give them something from our awesome store! (You get to pick, no worries!) That’s right, now you can look good while advertising our site showing that you care about lore and you can do it on our dime!
So comment away! Make sure you have a valid e-mail address when you comment so we can contact you if you win. Be sure to comment before we get our next new post up, which should take a day or two. (It’s a tough one, lemme tell ya!)
Varendil and I hope you have a wonderful Winter’s Veil! Be safe and have a wonderful time!
It Almost Beats Nudity!
We sorta… forgot about this post until after Black Francis Friday, of course, but it’s still here!
Looking for a gift for someone this holiday season?
(Sorry, I’m an athiest, I’m not even allowed to say Christmas or else I AAAH IT BURNNNNSSSS)
Anyway. Why not clothe yourself or someone close to you with our new line of Roleplayer’s Lament swag?
Believe it or not, we’ve painstakingly designed a number of snazzy t-shirts using state-of-the-art freeware image editing software and have made them available to you, our ungrateful fans. Consider picking up a “Product of a wild night in Goldshire” tee for yourself, a loved one, or your youngster that doesn’t know how to read. While you’re clothing the offspring, nab our “Baby Declaration” shirt and demonstrate that you have standards for how your kids come about. Single? Make sure potential ERP partners know they’re getting a pureblood with our “Zero Percent” shirt. We also offer two different pins for sticking on your satchel or laptop bag, you hipster.
100% of the proceeds from our products go toward allowing us to buy Cataclysm and keep doing the stuff we all love, so we hope you’ll at least take a look. If you get an idea for something you’d like to see on a shirt or any other product, let us know!
Once again, everything’s at http://zazzle.com/RPersLament* – including that little asterisk nets us a bigger chunk of the money if you buy anything, so be generous!
Varen Being Smug
We recently got a comment (unapproved, because we decided we don’t really want comments on the submissions page) with this in it:
Yes, this is Blair. Shocking, huh? Well, I cleaned up my entire RP and now am on Wyrmrest Accord as a Human, playing a Zombie Slayer. That’s all! Simple, and fun!
So I bet you’re wondering what I’m submitting… well, ironically, it’s exactly the kind of thing I had—except WORSE!
And sure, you can give me full credit for the screenshots and whatever, I don’t mind. I feel like an elitist ever since you guys taught me a lesson! 
This being the ‘Blair’ that was one of our earliest posts and definitely some of our earliest drama. Take that, haters. And congrats, Blair. Keep living the dream!
That New Veneer
Alternate title: Rally to Restore Readability
Pretty snazzy, eh?
Today’s the first anniversary of the Lament, so it seemed the fitting time to give everything a nice facelift. New features include a sidebar that stays with you as you navigate the site’s posts, a snazzy new mini-nav to the upper right with all of our static pages and a link back home, fun bios of the writers at the bottom, and a new banner that replaces hypothetical Sues with real ones we’ve enjoyed over the past year.
There’s also a ‘Support Us’ page linked from the sidebar and the nav-thing in the upper corner. On that page you’ll find a number of buttons that you can drop in on your websitespace, blag, deviantArt page, forum signature, wikia page, business card, et cetera, anywhere that you want to let people know that you support teh lorez and non-Sueness. We’d be extra-grateful if you then hyperlink said buttons to us, since that’s kind of why we made them. We’d love to come up with some kind of link directory thing to unite all of you roleplayers and writers out there in vehement opposition to badness if those buttons catch on.
There’s at least one big hiccup with the site at the moment – if you go back into the archives and find any text that we directly colored black, it’s no longer readable on this blue. We’re probably going to go through and correct those. In the meantime, highlighting them works well. If you find any other kinks in the design, let us know.
We’ll be back with Actual Content soon. For now, enjoy the new site!
Flagacylsm 2: Electric Boogaloo.
So I promised an update last night with the Flag issues, but I got distracted by playing with my hunter, omg focus is bad ass.
We have a few working flag add ons, mainly FlagRSP2! Rejoice! Last night I successfully saw Varendil’s RSP and he saw mine. And best of all, when he installed this new FlagRSP2, his profile wasn’t wiped! We can’t guarantee this won’t happen, but a few of our readers gave us some tips on how to harvest your old RSP if you haven’t updated any of your add ons yet!
Checking your saved variables folder in your WoW folder may bring up your RSP!
C:\Program Files\World of Warcraft\WTF\Account\ACCOUNT NAME\SERVER NAME\CHARACTER NAME\SavedVariables
Thanks a lot, metalsyko! :]
So, we got FlagRSP2 working. Mary Sue is also working as well, and MRP is still being worked on. Pretty sure Mary Sue isn’t working with any other add on at the moment, though.
And be warned, the Flags are taking a bit of time to upload, so just be patient, go afk and make me some breakfast while you wait. In a few weeks, we’ll all be back to normal. If you’re still craving some humor, why not check out some of our inspirations like MST3k and their new and improved selves, Rifftrax and Cinematic Titanic! Or…you could always log into WoW and one shot things for hours. I don’t think that ever gets old!
We’ll have some real, humorous content posted in the next few days. Stay tuned!
Lanuria Dawnblade, a.k.a. Courtney Adler, aspires. She's an aspiring DM, aspiring photographer, and aspiring wife. She lives in Monroe, Wisconsin and complains about the weather far too much. She enjoys The Big Bang Theory and singing the songs from Glee.
Varendil Dawnblade, a.k.a. Taylor Vincent, is a 22-year old writer, student, World of Warcraft player, and 4th Edition DM. He lives in Monroe, Wisconsin with his fiancé and their jade plant, Esmeralda. He likes Douglas Adams and The Venture Bros. He hates Toni Morrison. Don't even ask. 
