The Queue: I’ll open this one

Hello and happy “It is Wednesday, my dudes” day! It is Wednesday, my dudes, and we’re here to Queue.

So let’s Queue.

Random-guess answer: I think the joke is about someone being so drunk that they walk into a tavern, vision ablur, and assume that what they grab is a drink, so they’re happy to “open” it. But in reality, it’s probably someone’s [REDACTED].

Actual answer: It’s complicated. But there’s actually quite a bit of discussion in at least one Reddit thread that talks all about what it could mean, the context for the joke (including the line before it that may have informed the joke), and even how many jokes often used animals in place of people. The bottom line is still that we don’t actually know the joke, because the context has been lost to time and could’ve sent the punchline in any number of directions.

I made it pretty far into Dragonflight without realizing this, too. I happened to be in voice chat at the time, so I definitely got a lot of good-natured crap for that one. I’d been going to Org for all my pre-Mythic+ needs 🤦‍♂️

Did you know there’s also a portal to Uldaman and a Black Market Auction House in Valdrakken? Pretty sure I only know that because of the official WoW social accounts.

I’m gonna give most threatening to either Mecha-Gnomes or Worgen. The former just sounds like a children’s toy gone wrong, while the latter has me picturing a rabid dog walking down the street with clown makeup that isn’t smooth or even at all (because of the fur), which is just kind of eerie. Even if it was well-intentioned, the combination of fur and makeup feels like it would make all the creepy parts creepier.

Least threatening? Dracthyr, I think. I don’t know if I have an explanation I can quite put into words, but something about them makes it feel a lot less intimidating. Like, with Worgen, the fur is what disturbs the makeup. But with Dracthyr, it’s more like putting normal and smooth makeup on an iguana, which sounds silly and cute.

I wasn’t actually sure at first and assumed something small. Turns out, he first went to Orgrimmar to buy Mahka a nice bracelet from the Trading Post. Later, he was part of the Orc Heritage Armor questline and appeared alongside Mahka as part of a celebration of Orc stuff.

With how fast raids get cleared nowadays, I think it would’ve felt like a very unfun and arbitrary wall in progression. So, not really.

But I think the true test is of how long it takes for what comes next. Maybe, in hindsight, staggering and extending content (even artificially) would’ve been the right call. I think Blizz has a pretty solid release plan, so it’s less likely — but who knows!

(Yogg knows.)

Okay, my get-out-of-jail-free answer is that how I feel would depend on how naturally it fit into the story. The Expansion of Ne’er-do-wells Who Get Away would only be so fun if getting away was always done in a “Hahahaha, come try NEXT TIME, fools! After I’ve done my thing!” way.

But you can totally have a lot of bad guys and plot threads and still keep it interesting. It’s been a minute since I’ve touched FFXIV, but I feel like one of its biggest strengths in story is keeping ongoing story threads that don’t feel like the NEED to end to pleasantly end an expansion. Sure, kill some big bads along the way — but if one of them gets away for next time, it’s probably not going to be an exponentially bigger threat because they disappeared laughing as their plans all came together. It’ll likely be a different form of the evil they were already doing.

To your more specific questions: Individually, no. But if all three were in one expansion and got away to fight another day? That would feel cheap to me. I’d rather re-introduce Denathrius or Yrel and fight new bad guys that they’ve recruited. I think WoW has, at least in the past, had a habit of relying on its “main” characters for larger-than-life moments. But sometimes what feels better narratively are heroes and villains who aren’t much better or more powerful than us, but rather a different flavor of the kinds of things we’re capable of. I’d love to see a whole bunch of those introduced.

Also, if Elune kill steals any final boss, I’ll stream Warbringers: Sylvanas on repeat on the BW Twitch channel for a week straight.

That’s The Queue for today! I hope you all have a lovely Wednesday and stay safe, healthy, and joyful. Also please ask questions for tomorrow’s writer.