Forum:The Old God page is full of Fanon from WoWinsider being passed as "lore"

Forums: Village pump → The Old God page is full of Fanon from WoWinsider being passed as "lore"
(This topic is archived. Please do not edit this page!)

Well, as mentioned in the title we've got a bit of a problem. Sourceless lore trackable by direct quotes to "Know your Lore". And I can find no official canon to back any of it up, some even directly contradicts official canon. This must be corrected but I doubt my writing quality or the aesthetic appeal the page would have if I surgically removed all of the baseless statements under the non speculation or theory sections.

So I beg of whoever is truly passionate about the true and proper lore, please do what you can to stop the spread of misconceptions and those further misunderstandings built upon those misconceptions that are posing as fact.

The page is in dire need of cleanup and I doubt my own ability to provide it.

--Kra'Khed (talk) 00:17, 22 September 2012 (UTC)

Old Gods kept being edited poorly in a way that was not quite vandalism, but was not very good either. User after user completely revamped the page in their own image. I felt it pointless to attempt to revert it all or fix it with my own revamp, but it really needs another one, actually good this time. Or we can make a template that marks pages as stupid (mostly kidding). The page as it is is unacceptable. I (probably me, but maybe another admin) need to get around to cleaning up the page. It died a slow death. I need to reach a harmony with infobox usage and ignore the fan fiction. I thought it was at least better now than it was, but no. Every user (including me) has their own contradictory views, but mine are probably more correct.--SWM2448 01:09, 22 September 2012 (UTC)

For the time being, I've thrown the {{cleanup}} tag on it. -- Dark T Zeratul (talk) 01:48, 22 September 2012 (UTC)

Well if my opinion is wanted I would say the page needs to stick to what can be gotten and traced back to official sources. With those sources listed so they may be checked and as little guesswork as possible. --Kra'Khed (talk) 01:55, 22 September 2012 (UTC)

How about making a list of statements that either need to be removed or put in the speculation page of this article? It might be helpful to avoid another infobox-edit-war. --LemonBaby (talk) 06:18, 22 September 2012 (UTC)

I'll see what I can do, please note I am only listing those to which I can easily reference their sources.

-"N'Zoth waged an eternal war against the forces of C'Thun and Yogg-Saron with their endless number of Faceless ones."

While not obviously incorrect the source only states that the soldiers of N'zoth waged war against the forces of C'thun and Yogg-Saron. There is nothing in the source to state that the forces of C'thun and Yogg were "endless numbers of Faceless ones" as the page suggests.

-"The Pantheon shattered the Old Gods' citadels and casted the remaining ones down into eternal imprisonment deep beneath the earth, the place of their confinement hidden from all and their powers bound until the end of time." Has an obvious error with "casted" which should be "Cast" and anyhow is referenced to the RPG. Now that I think of it, I could probably correct a few things myself...

-"Even though the Old Gods are imprisoned or sleeping, so great is their power that their unconscious but destructive, maddening auras seep out and influence some denizens of Azeroth." is apparently from the RPG.

-"The Old Gods are unfathomable to mortal minds. They seem to delight in chaos, anarchy and constant elemental warfare, pitting the enormously powerful elemental lords against one another seemingly as a form of amusement. The Burning Legion under Sargeras has a twisted ethos that maintains that all existence is a mistake and that all things should be reduced back to entropic nothingness" Is a word for word quote off of WoWinsider and the given source only speaks of the Burning Legion.

-"in contrast, the Old Gods have no ethos, no morality and operate through a raw amorality (one might even say they transcend things like motives and ethics) that seeks nothing more than endless, meaningless, motiveless destruction for its own sake. Under the Old Gods rule, nothing like a society or civilization could ever arise since those who survive communing with eldritch masters will little remain of their sanity." Is a near direct quote from WoWinsider, only with a few words added at the end, and the given source does not entirely support those added words. This whole entire quote is also contradicted by the existence of the Aqir Empire.

-"Old Gods might not be allied with each other as N'Zoth commanded Warlord Zon'ozz to wage war on C'Thun and Yogg-Saron. However it's more likely that this 'war' was not based on enmity with each other, but rather as a twisted form of amusement as mentioned above." What has been mentioned above is largely from WoWinsider.

Now that I've gotten a simple starting list I'll try to see what I can do on my own. I'm sure there's plenty of things I've missed but I'll have to get my books out to check all of them. -Kra'Khed (talk) 19:56, 22 September 2012 (UTC)

The first RPG statement is, I believe, actually from the Warcraft 3 manual. The second, while possibly sourced from the RPG, we know to be true anyway. Just look at Loken. Or better yet, Deathwing. -- Dark T Zeratul (talk) 01:45, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

It seemed true enough which is why I left it untouched. Though I did erase what was quoted from WoW Insider where proper sources were lacking. -Kra'Khed (talk) 01:54, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

"Those who survive communing with eldritch masters will little remain of their sanity." came frome High Priestess Azils Dungeon Journal entry.--LemonBaby (talk) 07:41, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

Which I took note of. but if you look it actually says, "High Priestess Azil is one of the few who has survived communing with the Twilight's Hammer cult's eldritch masters, although little remains of her sanity. She instills terror in lesser cultists so that they will sacrifice themselves without hesitation when their masters command it."

She is a single example of a person who survived communing with the Old Gods, and while little remains of her sanity, we should not just assume this applies to everyone as the usage of the general term "those" seems to suggest. And secondly it was mentioned in why no civilization could rise under their rule which contradicts the existence of an Aqir empire. Leaving that little bit in serves no purpose when it doesn't have a huge WoW insider quote over it.

And I check my sources. I would not register a complaint unless I had found that source to not state the specific information claimed in one form or another. -Kra'Khed (talk) 13:19, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

Calm down ^^ I just noted that not everything from that deleted section is from WoWinsider. We are on the same boat here ;-) I understood it as: thought many communed with the Old Gods only few survived - and those who did became insane like her, Deathwing, Cho'Gall and so on. By the way: The Aqir were created after the titans visited Azeroth. At that time the Old Gods didn't rule over the world. So there is no contradiction :-) --LemonBaby (talk) 13:34, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

Actually I was quite calm, tone does not carry though very well in typing. But to the point the Mantid worshiped Y'shaarj before the Titans destroyed him, which suggests he had been free and the Aqir created before the Titans came to combat the Old Gods. Now from what I see it is true that most don't survive communion with the Old Gods and most of their followers we do see are insane. I still do not believe the general statement that all who survive communing with them will have been driven insane. It is a statement I feel is to be avoided until the lore plainly says that. If it were to be said that most who survived communing with them had little left of their sanity I would be harder pressed to find complaint. -Kra'Khed (talk) 00:14, 25 September 2012 (UTC)

After thinking about it I must say: You are totally right - those civilization existed under their rule. However I still think we should keep the information in some form , that communicating with them has driven a lot of examples insane.--LemonBaby (talk) 04:52, 26 September 2012 (UTC)

Personally I agree, it must be noted that they do drive most others to madness. Though I doubt if Old God minion races like Faceless or Insectoids to whom Old God worship is their native culture really go mad like other races do. They don't seem anywhere near as crazy as Twilight Cultists or Deathwing. Really, I don't want to be the one responsible for fixing this page in its entirety. I just deleted the largest and most obvious errors.

If you feel that a mention should be on the page then just remember, you can edit it too. -Kra'Khed (talk) 17:15, 27 September 2012 (UTC)