Game Vs Lore: From Warrior to Mage

Welcome to Game Vs Lore A new thing i decided to add to my list of things i do on this blog space of mine. Here we'll look at how things in lore are ignored, changed, or just plain destroyed in game, and vice versa. To start we'll look at arguable the most bad-ass class to every exist in WoW lore, the Orc Blade Master.

It's one of the few reasons I wan't to make a warrior (the others being Troll Berserkers and Blood Elf Spellbreakers) The Blade Master was in my opinion one of the coolest things in Warcraft III, along with the Shadow Hunter and Beast Master, but what happened to this awesome class? Well according to blizzard the Blade Master along with the Mountain King and the Tauren Chieftain became the foundations of the warrior class. This can be seen in the abilities Bladestorm, Thunder Clap, and Shockwave. But the Blade master had a bunch of really cool abilities.

Bladestorm - Causes a bladestorm of destructive force around the Blade Master, rendering him immune to magic and dealing 110 damage per second to nearby enemy land units

Mirror Image - Confuses the enemy by creating illusions of the Blademaster and dispelling all magic from the Blade Master.

Wind Walking - Allows the Blademaster to become invisible, and move faster for a set amount of time. When the Blademaster attacks a unit to break invisibility, he will deal bonus damage

So warriors eventually got their hands on Bladestorm in WotLK but what about the other two abilities both of them sound awesome but what about the others. Well Wind Walking, sadly, doesn't exist but worse than that They gave Mirror Image to Mages. Now I have no problem with the fact that mages have Mirror Image. It's a great spell that fits well. I just would have opted to given it a different name than the iconic Blade Master ability (Arcane Reflection, Doppelganger, Prismatic Copy) yet with the coming of Cataclysm arms warriors, who are the embodiment of the Blade Master, look to become more mobile their an opportunity for these abilities to return, but not as spells. A better idea would be talents.

After Image - When ever you use Charge, (Intercept, Intervene) or Heroic Leap to switch from a one living target to another, you leave an after image on the original target that continues attacking for 6 sec or until the target is dead.

Not only does this maintain much of the feel of the Mirror Image, which I believe wasn't meant to be magical in nature, but its cool as hell. A warrior could get a target to low health then charge to another leaving his after Image to finish the job.

Wind Walking - Your Intervene ability is now usable in Battle Stance. In addition it now lowers your threat by 10% and renders you invisible for 3 sec.

Warrior threat dump. The originally ability was used for the Blademaster to flee combat. The same principle here. Instead of increasing movement speed it's just rolled into Intervene the defensive charge. So not only does it lower your threat but also someone else. Like that hunter who never FDs or a Healer who landed a massive crit during a tank switch. Powers like this represent the return of the iconic Blade Master. The mobile and elegant warrior with the massive sword. Coupled with new abilities and new talents like these could mean the most awesome class from lore returns with a bang.