Uther and Illidan were once just fixed ideas of a Pen&Paper group. Some heroes from World of Warcraft have a peculiar story.
When it comes to developing new characters in video games, artists often draw their creative ideas from unexpected sources – such as a Pen&Paper.
Blizzard’s Senior Art Director, Samwise Didier, recently held an “Ask Me Anything” (AMA) on Reddit and answered fans’ questions. This led to some amusing anecdotes coming to light.
Who would have thought that both Uther Lightbringer and Illidan Stormrage were once characters from a Pen&Paper adventure?
Didier, along with his friends (who later founded Blizzard), had always enjoyed playing Dungeons & Dragons as Pen&Paper – and still does to this day. In 1995, he created a lawful paladin who was blind and equipped with two books: Honor and Righteousness. What a blind paladin did with these books, unfortunately, was not revealed.
It’s also amusing that ultimately Illidan and Uther swapped a few character traits – because in the end, it was Illidan who became blind, not Uther.
Didier was also the creator of the Pandaren in the Warcraft universe – one of the most controversially discussed species in Warcraft to this day. Not everyone liked this race, but Didier doesn’t have any major problems with it.
“That was okay for me. I understand how important WoW is to some people. One person’s WoW is different from another’s. Some people love the original Warcraft and don’t want anything to change. Others love an evolving world. However, I’m glad we were able to implement them [the Pandaren] into the world.”
If you want to read the entire AMA, you can find the relevant link to Reddit in our sources.
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