First off, I'd suggest people take a listen at this new music coming with 5.1. Be warned, there's a lot of seeming repetition, as there are many variations on certain themes. But still, there's some really top-caliber music going on there. For those of you who play with the music turned off... You have something wrong with you.
This article's just going to be a list of things I'm curious about in WoW Lore. There's an enormous depth of lore to this game, what with its 13 playable races, not to mention all the zones and non-player races and its mysterious history.
Bug People: The Aqir and their Progeny, and the inconsistent Will of the Old Gods
Way back when, before there were even Night Elves to speak of (they were still Trolls at that point,) there was the Zandalari Empire and there was the Aqir. The Aqir seem to have been created by the Old Gods, though by "created," we cannot be sure if they were truly made from scratch, or merely uplifted from an original state as just, well, bugs.
Just as the Zandalari split off into the Amani and Gurubashi (and then into smaller groups,) the Aqir split into three species we know of: the Qiraji, the Nerubians, and the Mantid. Each formed huge, powerful empires, and we've been to each of them, mainly to kill those guys. Now, admittedly, Ahn'Qiraj was less an empire and more a Titan facility designed as a prison for C'Thun (though whether through wear and tear, repurposing by the Qiraji, or just a change in artistic direction over at Blizzard, it doesn't look all that Titanic.) The Nerubians had a vast underground empire in Azjol-Nerub, but thanks to the combined efforts of Anub'arak and Arthas, the Scourge has control over most of it (hm, a faction created by the Burning Legion overpowering a faction created by the Old Gods... hm...) Meanwhile, the Mantid have their Kypari trees in what is now known as the Dread Wastes, but are falling to the power of the Sha of Fear.
The Aqir-descended races worship the Old Gods as just that, gods. In fact, the Mantid believe that the "Usurpers," (aka the Titans) are false gods, and that indeed all the races of Azeroth should worship the Old Gods. But given what we've seen of the Old Gods over the course of World of Warcraft, they don't exactly seem to want us around all that much. Twilight's Hammer (which oddly enough began as an Orc clan, but has since transformed entirely into an Old-God-worshipping doomsday cult) clearly just wants things to get destroyed. Indeed, the Old Gods seemed very happy to watch the Elemental Lords duke it out in the interest of destroying everything.
So why would these guys go to the trouble of creating complex species? It's very possible they just wanted to see them fight each other, or perhaps wanted to use them to get rid of the pesky other races that might interfere with the chaos they were interested.
Then there's another possibility. What if the Old Gods really are interested in creating a stable world, where the people they created can live and flourish, and in so doing bring glory to their names?
On the other hand, there's a slight issue with that, which is the existence of the Faceless Ones. The Faceless Ones seem much more closely related to the Old Gods than the Aqir (though the Vezax lookalikes have a similar fringe thing to the Prophet Skyriss, or whatever he's called.) Yet when we come across possibly the last three non-Scourgefied Nerubians, they react with great fear and hatred toward beings like Herald Volazj.
There is another example of Aqir acting somewhat odd toward the things they claim to worship. The Klaxxi are still devoted to the Old God Y'shaarj, yet they oppose the Sha. Now, certainly, the Sha appears to be something somewhat different that the Old Gods. As much as you loved grandma, you probably don't want her body rotting in the living room. (Sorry for that sentence.) The Sha, is, kind of, the will of the Old Gods, but without real form or direction. It almost makes you wonder if the Klaxxi would be fine, even prefer, that the Sha of Fear had infested some other race.
Deathwing: Did he mean well?
So let's say that the Old Gods ultimately wanted to rule over Azeroth, using the Faceless Ones as enforcers to keep the various Aqir races fighting each other for their amusement. We now that Deathwing was driven crazy by the Old Gods, but what if it was a slightly different kind of crazy?
One of Deathwing's plans in Cataclysm was to use the re-origination device in Uldum. Now, given my understanding of it, I thought that this device would completely atomize the entire planet, and then begin to rebuild it. We've heard that the Titans did not want to kill the Old Gods even though they could, because they were worried what would happen to Azeroth if they had (and given the Sha, it seems to have been a valid concern,) but if the planet's getting destroyed, I would imagine the re-origination device would also kill the Old Gods as well.
So what if Deathwing's "destroy the world" goal was actually him (crazily) misinterpreting the role assigned to him by the Titans? He's supposed to watch over the deep places in Azeroth. He finds the worst kind of corruption there. He starts hearing whispers that drive him insane. Insane does not necessarily mean "being controlled by outside forces." He goes "ah, it's simple. I've got to just blow up the planet!"
Ok, so that one's a bit of a stretch.
Lo'gosh and Goldrinn:
In Cataclysm, we met, face to face, Goldrinn. This guy's a pretty important figure to the Worgen, but also to other races, including the Orcs. Now, the Orcs had never been to Azeroth before the First War, but they had a wolf deity called Lo'gosh that they worshipped. In Mount Hyjal, we more or less get confirmation that these beings are one and the same.
Which has pretty big implications. Goldrinn, at the very least, exists on multiple planets.
The Age of the Draenei:
Oftentimes, questgivers will adress you as a "young mage," or something similar, usually with the implication that if they are an old veteran, they are much older than you are.
So I was a bit surprised about four years ago when I was doing the Death Knight starting experience on Oterro (who is kind of my Vice Main - the Commander Riker to Jarsus' Picard) and I realized something. When talking with the guy of your race who you have to kill, he talks about knowing you from back on Argus, begging you to remember your homeland.
That made me realize: Oterro is OLD.
We know, of course, that Velen obviously has been living since Argus, seeing as he was one of the three leaders of the Eredar people. His brothers (though this may have been figurative rather than literal) Archimonde and Kil'jaeden were corrupted by Sargeras, and Velen led the Draenei away with the help of the Naaru. The thing is, we also know that the Eredar (specifically, the Mannari Eredar, as in, the demons) fought in the War of the Ancients.
In fact, according to the novels (which I have not read. This is from WoWpedia) the flight from Argus was a whopping 25,000 years ago.
Now, granted, many playable Draenei could have been born during the millennia of running from the Legion. Your Draenei mage might be an adorable little 900-year-old. But Oterro, and actually all Draenei Death Knights, are at the very least, 25,000 years old.
And you thought that Night Elves were an ancient people.
Actually, though I don't really role-play in-game, I like to think that any time Oterro comes to some place like Mogu'shan Palace, he's like "well, it's kind of old, I guess. You should see Mac'aree, assuming the Legion hasn't, you know, turned it into a smoking crater."
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