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ossirian the badass
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During the War of the Shifting Sands, as the anubisath constructs crumbled under the bronze dragonflight's assault, a single anubisath did the seemingly impossible — he found a way to fight back.
Ossirian targeted one of the leaders, the massive dragon Grakkarond, and hurled his obsidian sword through the beast's wing. The crippled wyrm descended, crushing the qiraji as it fell. The dragon mauled Ossirian nearly to death, but the remaining anubisaths and qiraji now had a target on the ground to focus on, and they swiftly converged and overwhelmed the noble dragon. Ossirian's beaten body was dragged back to the Ruins of Ahn'Qiraj following the battle, where he should by all rights have perished. It is whispered that Ossirian found the favor of the malevolent force that reigns over the qiraji, for in spite of his wounds, the construct survived. When the mighty anubisath awoke, he found himself transformed, his strength bolstered and his wounded head bound in the visage of a hawk. Emperor Vek'nilash himself explained what had occurred: Where all others — including the qiraji General Rajaxx — had failed to find a way to counterattack, the Anubisath had succeeded. For that he received a gift; Ossirian's essence had been bound to several ancient crystals of distant origin, which would grant the Anubisath champion near invulnerability. There was a price for this boon however; Ossirian's life was maintained by the crystals, and if he should ever stray too far from them, the Anubisath would swiftly die. As others learned of Ossirian's survival, the Anubisaths began to refer to him as the "Unscarred", revering him as a nearly invincible hero. The legends say that Vek'nilash secretly entrusted Ossirian with the responsibility of maintaining a watch on General Rajaxx, to ensure that the commander would never fail again. Ossirian serves the Emperors to the best of his ability, despite the frustration of being eternally bound to a single location. The bones of Grakkarond have become a sacred site to the Anubisaths; a testimony to their ability to defeat even the most powerful of enemies taken from wowwiki. |
58 Undead Death Knight
90
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Actually, they might become a sacred place for the Qiraj (or Aqir, as they were then called), and maybe for the most intelligent Silithids, and not the Anubisath, for the latter were magically animated constructs akin to the Obsidian Destroyers. They cannot really hold anything "sacred". |
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Edited by Omgneed on 05/05/12 08:26 (BST)
although that is true this just proves the badass might of an anubasith (well it was epic spear really)
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Edited by Vercetti on 05/05/12 08:47 (BST)
I don't know why you posted this, but it sure is refreshing to learn some in-depth lore about a boss who isn't even the main characrer in a patch, where as until 4.3 Catacylsm had zero lore on 90% of its bosses, and even when 4.3 game out it was only a small paragraph.
Also, anyone find it surprising that Blizzard haven't reused Ossirian's model? Sure, it's a reskin of anubisath which itself is a reskin of the titan models I believe, but you'd expect Blizz to use it atleast twice, being the great model recyclers and all. |
70 Draenei Warrior
910
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yup i would have expected it no doubt.
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The whole Ahn'Qiraj war had epic characters left and right, or at the very least, characters that were described rather well. The Twin Emperors, Ossirian, The Prophet Skeram....they werent just bosses. We knew precisely what they were, what place they had in the Qiraji army...it was quite epic really.
Comparing it to ICC.....the only ones who actually had a backstory were Dranosh and Sindragosa(and ofc the Lich King, but hey). The rest were just fodder to be expended....i mean, Putricide? Come on....... |
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Edited by Maliku on 07/05/12 15:27 (BST)
The whole Ahn'Qiraj war had epic characters left and right, or at the very least, characters that were described rather well. The Twin Emperors, Ossirian, The Prophet Skeram....they werent just bosses. We knew precisely what they were, what place they had in the Qiraji army...it was quite epic really. The same can be said of every raid though. Going with your Ahn'Qiraj example: Ruins of Ahn'Qiraj (20) Kurinnaxx - random giant Silithid General Rajaxx - character with backstory in and out of the game Moam - character with a flavour text article Buru the Gorger - random giant Silithid Ayamiss the Hunter - random giant Silithid Ossirian the Unscarred - character with a flavour text article Temple of Ahn'Qiraj (40) The Prophet Skeram - character with a flavour text article (and a small in-game text) Three Bugs - random giant Silithids Battleguard Sartura - random giant Qiraji Fankriss the Unyielding - random giant Silithid Viscidus - random giant Ooze Princess Huhuran - random giant Silithid Twin Emperors - characters with several flavour text articles Ouro - random giant Silithid worm C'Thun - the Old God behind the whole thing Comparing this to ICC, we have: Icecrown Citadel (10/25) Lord Marrowgar - random bone construct Lady Deathwhisper - random Lich Icecrown Gunship Battle - long-term characters battling it out Deathbringer Saurfang - conclusion of an existing character arc Festergut - random giant flesh construct Rotface - random giant flesh construct Professor Putricide - random plague scientist Blood Prince Council - three existing characters from across the continent Blood-Queen Lana'thel - the first Darkfallen, heavy backstory detailed on the Quel'delar story Valithria Dreamwalker - random Green dragon Sindragosa - existing character The Lich King - existing long-term character Most instances are full of "trash bosses" there to bulk out the content. Not all of them need a massive backstory. As long as thhey feel like they belong there, I think it's fine. There's nothing in ICC that looks out of place, just as there's nothing in AQ20/40 that looks out of place. Even if you've never seen half of the namec bosses before, does it matter? I mean, plague development and undead flesh golems have been part of the Scourge lore sinace day 1... Just as when we cut into the Silithid hives we got exactly what we expected: monster bugs. |
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Edited by Vercetti on 07/05/12 16:43 (BST)
True, not every boss needs lore behind it - infact, too much lore overwhelms your average player and so they won't bother to read up on them. But you do need atleast a third of the bosses in a raid to have some lore. AQ works in this regard : bug bosses with no lore where the player enjoys fighting and nothing more, and every now and then "That boss sounds interesting - I'll look it up, oh look theres some lore about the Slithid War, I'll read a page or two".
Now, look at Catacylsm dungeons, e.g. Lost City of the Tol Vir. The average player isn't bothered by the bosses until the last one, Siamat. "He was cool, i'll look him up. Oh, only a paragraph of information on him? Disapointing". And this carries on for every Cata dungeon and when Bendictus appears in Hour of Twilight. "Wasn't he that holy guy? No lore on his change of sides? I guess WoW is just a mindless video game after all". Now, I know mindless video games are fun (Angry Birds,CoD etc.). But in a fantasy game, the fact that you believe you are fighting for a reason immerses you in the game and thats what makes it fun, and when a boss goes "My previous death was a setback" it breaks immersion, and turns it rather dull. |
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Edited by Maliku on 07/05/12 17:45 (BST)
I'll agree that Cataclysm should have gone to more trouble to connect the bosses inside instances and raids to their appropriate zones. The awful thing is, that the information is kind of there, you just have to do a lot of reading around the subject and connect the dots together. This is really evident in an instance like the Dragon Soul, where there is a really solid reason for just about everything that is there to be there. They are all forces we've faced before, returned for one final push. There's just no direct link that players can follow before stepping into the instance. It's something I feel at the very least the Bastion of Twilight does very well this time around. There's plenty of lead up to the Ascendants, you're fully expecting to encounter Twilight Drakes and Cho'gall himself was arguably more of the villainous face to the events following the Cataclysm than Deathwing himself was. Compared to that, Throne of the Four Winds and Blackwing Descent especially feel like there is that one middle step missing. We get exactly the same thing with the 5 mans as well; the Throne of the Tides is an example of an instance that players are properly introduced to by the zone it's in, while the Lost City of the Tol'vir is so close to having that lead in that missing it is painful. All it would have taken would have been a couple of quests at the end of the Neferset quest line introducing the Neferset instance bosses and their intentions and voila, we know exactly who we're dealing with. Reading around the zone, you can get a pretty good idea of what's going on in there... but it's missing that little extra detail. |
The whole Ahn'Qiraj war had epic characters left and right, or at the very least, characters that were described rather well. The Twin Emperors, Ossirian, The Prophet Skeram....they werent just bosses. We knew precisely what they were, what place they had in the Qiraji army...it was quite epic really. I would expect that if Ahn'Qiraj can have its share of 'above average' described bosses, Icecrown Citadel, which is a huge lore place both in Warcraft and WoW, to have just about ONLY well described/known characters. It really bugged me that they used stuff like Marrowgar or Putricide for a raid that is so rooted in Warcraft lore. |
