Breakfast Topic: How important is lore to raids?

Recently, we Blizzard Watch folk got into a discussion regarding the various boss encounters that have occurred over the course of Warlords of Draenor‘s lifespan. While it’s been a relatively widespread opinion that the “Warlords” of Draenor didn’t get the deaths they probably should have — killing Ner’zhul in a five-man, anyone? — the conversation quickly turned into an argument over which past raids have actually had lore-relevant bosses that deserved their place in raids. On this topic, we were quite divided.

Some of us explained that Tempest Keep and Serpentshrine Cavern represented all-around good raids with bosses relevant to the expansion’s major themes while criticizing the comparative irrelevance of Blackrock Foundry’s bosses. Others felt Karazhan was an excellent raid, relevance or not. And still, others completely disagreed with both of these assessments. For my part, I think I fall somewhere in the middle of “we need lore-relevant bosses” and “as long as the encounter designs are good.” I may not have found relevance to Hans and Franz, Operator Thogar, or Kromog outside of the fact that they were allied with the Iron Horde, but I still loved the encounter design and felt close enough to the Iron Horde in Blackrock Foundry that I’ll hold it in pretty high regards as a raid.

Had those bosses been entirely irrelevant to the Iron Horde, I may have been more critical. But lore-wise, they were close enough that it didn’t bother me. Now, I’m slightly more critical of Highmaul. Yes, I see how it fits into the story. And yes, some of the encounters were great. But overall, it felt just a little too far away from the main story to pull off being the introductory raid and the downfall of a warlord as the first encounter.

But if the Blizzard Watch chat taught me anything, it’s that opinions will vary quite a bit. So, readers, how important is lore to your raid encounters?