So, uh, where are the Nephalem?

[Dark Sun Gwyndolin]

Diablo 3 was my introduction to both the Diablo setting and ARPG's as a whole, and I strongly identified with the Nephalem PC's. The primary theory among religious scholars is that the concept of "Nephalem" originated when classic heroes like Heracles and Gilgamesh were adapted to monotheistic religions like Judaism and Zoroastrianism; instead of being the children of small-g gods, they were the children of angels, since the former had become impossible in a belief system with a capital-G God. As a result, the Nephalem were compatible with a Christian view of fantasy superheroes.

SPOILERS FOR D3 AND THE END OF D2:
When the Worldstone was smashed in D2, it allowed latent Nephalem genes to awaken in some human heroes, and it was implied that the D3 PC's were merely the first of a new generation of heroes. When the death of Malthael inadvertently smashed the Black Soulstone, it seemed to be setting up a sequel hook where sometime in the future, the Prime and Lesser Evils would return, to be fought by a second generation of Nephalem.

Instead, D4 seems to jettison that entire plot hook and return to the grounded dark fantasy of D1 and D2. While this was great for nostalgia, it seems to have come at the expense of all the successes in D3 (the return of the Nephalem), while keeping the defeats (the slaughter of humanity by Malthael).

What do people think? Should the D4 protagonists have been second-generation Nephalem, and if not, should the plot have made more references to D3 (i.e. explaining why the Nephalem aren't around, not just retconning them as though they never existed).

Note: Yes, I'm aware of Rathma, I'm ignoring him because he's an original Nephalem, not a post-Worldstone one.

[Bakimono]

Near as I can tell they just retconned them out like it was never a thing in D4.

[ᴛᴀʟᴜ 🐦]

I thought the Nephalem was stupid, i kinda liked being a normal person on an adventure, not superman.

A normal adventurer who starts at the very bottom, slaying undead and lesser demons with rusty swords and rags before slowly gaining fame and money, facing more difficult challanges. Diablo 1 and 2 did that pretty well, though could be even better. The start of the game is always the best, end game gets pretty boring.

[Jolly Devil]

Basically they were too powerful so they were written out of the story. The single nephalem (or the small group of them) was able to kill the Prime Evil and the Angel of Death. If they were still around then they could solve the issues in D4 quickly. I think it was stupid to just write them out, instead of coming up with a way to nerf them, but with the world stone gone, it kinda removed the main source of their nerfing that was used in the past. I don't think our playable character is a second gen. I think they were just fully written out (minus Rathma and some references).

[MrSoul]

Just like midi-chlorians we dont talk about that anymore.

D3 is a fine game but plotwise they butchered the lore and added in an excuse so everyone could be air bender super heroes like a marvel movie and justify the attack animations looking dude just mainlined 500kg of caffeine, speed and cocaine in one go, while fighting with basic attacks even.

For what worth tho, by extension all
humans are nephalem, just become weaker over time like ancient ancestors in d2 versus barbs getting slaughtered on mt arreat. Time has diluted those bloodlines to being mostly meaningless by time of d2, so never made sense except the plot macguffin of the world stone why all sudden everyone is a super hero, nor does it make hell or any demon too imposing when humans are written as that powerful.

In other words, no sorry, they’ve ditched the whole Korean mmo “you’re a god hero and so is everyone else” stereotype plot. I’m sorry.

[Dark Sun Gwyndolin]

Originally posted by Mr.Soul:

Just like midi-chlorians we dont talk about that anymore.

D3 is a fine game but plotwise they butchered the lore and added in an excuse so everyone could be air bender super heroes like a marvel movie and justify the attack animations looking dude just mainlined 500kg of caffeine, speed and cocaine in one go, while fighting with basic attacks even.

For what worth tho, by extension all
humans are nephalem, just become weaker over time like ancient ancestors in d2 versus barbs getting slaughtered on mt arreat. Time has diluted those bloodlines to being mostly meaningless by time of d2, so never made sense except the plot macguffin of the world stone why all sudden everyone is a super hero, nor does it make hell or any demon too imposing when humans are written as that powerful.

In other words, no sorry, they’ve ditched the whole Korean mmo “you’re a god hero and so is everyone else” stereotype plot. I’m sorry.

The problem is that just like the midi-chlorians, removing it creates just as many plot holes as it fills. If the D3 Nephalem never existed, what happened to the Prime and Lesser Evils? Where are Belial and Azmodan, if they weren't bound into Tathamet?

Why did Malthael go in his crusade, if there were no Nephalem to purge? Remember, a key plot point of D4 is that Malthael's crusade 50 years ago caused humanity to regress into the dark ages, explaining the much more grimdark world.

[All Day I Dream About🪓]

I think the whole Nephalem dilemma was not written off, but rather left for later expansion or dlc.

[RodHull]

I presume the hero (you) in D4 is supposed to be a descendent of said Nephalem. All humans are but the war between heaven and hell has sent the planet back into the dark ages.

I personally thought it was a rather neat clever way of jettisoning the horrendous story of D3 while still keeping aspects of it that make the world what it is now.

In current season at end of the vampire quest Erys says something about how you should be a full vampire but a power in you has stopped it taking hold, I took that to mean some form of divine power, but I could be wrong

[Coldhands]

Originally posted by RodHull:

I presume the hero (you) in D4 is supposed to be a descendent of said Nephalem. All humans are but the war between heaven and hell has sent the planet back into the dark ages.

I personally thought it was a rather neat clever way of jettisoning the horrendous story of D3 while still keeping aspects of it that make the world what it is now.

In current season at end of the vampire quest Erys says something about how you should be a full vampire but a power in you has stopped it taking hold, I took that to mean some form of divine power, but I could be wrong

Pretty sure it's because you got Lilith's blood put in you at the start of D4's campaign.

[RodHull]

Originally posted by Coldhands:

Originally posted by RodHull:

I presume the hero (you) in D4 is supposed to be a descendent of said Nephalem. All humans are but the war between heaven and hell has sent the planet back into the dark ages.

I personally thought it was a rather neat clever way of jettisoning the horrendous story of D3 while still keeping aspects of it that make the world what it is now.

In current season at end of the vampire quest Erys says something about how you should be a full vampire but a power in you has stopped it taking hold, I took that to mean some form of divine power, but I could be wrong

Pretty sure it's because you got Lilith's blood put in you at the start of D4's campaign.

Yes it could be that, but that in itself is odd because you are able to resist her. Point being its implied often you are slightly more powerful than an average person.

[Coldhands]

Originally posted by RodHull:

Originally posted by Coldhands:

Pretty sure it's because you got Lilith's blood put in you at the start of D4's campaign.

Yes it could be that, but that in itself is odd because you are able to resist her. Point being its implied often you are slightly more powerful than an average person.

They say in the game that all the inhabitants of Sanctuary were nephalem originally, but Inarius was worried their ****'s were bigger than his, so he suppressed their power and they devolved into humans over time.
I'm guessing the process wasn't perfect and humans closer to true nephalem pop up every now and then. Usually in groups of 3-5 right around the time a new Diablo game is set. : p

[RodHull]

Exactly, its not like they retconned the lore they just neutered it and left it deliberately vague (which imo is a good thing)

[YummyWong]

Originally posted by Jolly Devil:

Basically they were too powerful so they were written out of the story. The single nephalem (or the small group of them) was able to kill the Prime Evil and the Angel of Death. If they were still around then they could solve the issues in D4 quickly. I think it was stupid to just write them out, instead of coming up with a way to nerf them, but with the world stone gone, it kinda removed the main source of their nerfing that was used in the past. I don't think our playable character is a second gen. I think they were just fully written out (minus Rathma and some references).

they did nerf them or did you miss the story where they said they made them produce all the way down to nothing, almost like how were all related to gengis but its so far down the line it wouldnt matter who we made off spring with because the connection is too far down the line. hence now neph are just regular humans with potential

[Jolly Devil]

Originally posted by YummyWong:

Originally posted by Jolly Devil:

Basically they were too powerful so they were written out of the story. The single nephalem (or the small group of them) was able to kill the Prime Evil and the Angel of Death. If they were still around then they could solve the issues in D4 quickly. I think it was stupid to just write them out, instead of coming up with a way to nerf them, but with the world stone gone, it kinda removed the main source of their nerfing that was used in the past. I don't think our playable character is a second gen. I think they were just fully written out (minus Rathma and some references).

they did nerf them or did you miss the story where they said they made them produce all the way down to nothing, almost like how were all related to gengis but its so far down the line it wouldnt matter who we made off spring with because the connection is too far down the line. hence now neph are just regular humans with potential

I know, that's why I said "but with the world stone gone, it kinda removed the main source of their nerfing that was used in the past". Since they were nerfed in power by Inarius and then by Uldyssian later on. The old nephalem (the ancients) are humans now, as you said, but the OP was talking about the new nephalem that rose up during D3. We don't know what happened to the new nephalem (the player characters) after D3 going into D4. They were called naphalem specifically, and had more power than any of the previous player characters, so its safe to assume they weren't just normal humans with more potential, which is what the characters in D4 are.

[Morkonan]

Sorry for the TLDR, skip it if ya want - I ended up going down a lore-hole and jotted... useless thoughts on the way to typing replies. Still, there may be junk-food for thought.

Originally posted by Fear Denies Faith:

...The primary theory among religious scholars is that the concept of "Nephalem" originated when classic heroes like Heracles and Gilgamesh were adapted to monotheistic religions like Judaism and Zoroastrianism...

The word, particularly, points to its origin in Hebrew/JudeoChristian sources and apocrypha. Other religions and myths have some similar analogues, particularly Greek in which Zeus was a very active fella... :)

Nephilim vs Diablo's Nephalem is... I guess their own spelling?

Giant myths and super-hero-type myths abound everywhere - Nobody has an exclusive claim for those. Hero symbols generally get elevated to "superhuman" status with explanations for their wondrous abilities coming from all sorts of influences.

I'm no Biblical or Myth/Folklore Scholar, but I don't know of any religious scholars that would support your claim by combining "likes" in that way. Though, the notion that giants or some other super-human beings had children that produced such things isn't uncommon, either. eg: Titans

(Sources welcomed)

; instead of being the children of small-g gods, they were the children of angels, since the former had become impossible in a belief system with a capital-G God. As a result, the Nephalem were compatible with a Christian view of fantasy superheroes.

I think the Diablo setting has pushed itself far outside of an Abrahamic setting. It simply just uses some of the words and associations. As you imply, the superhuman qualities are very much linked to the mysterious magical beings of the forces of Good and Evil - Angels and Demons. For... reasons.

Basically, the franchise's namesake, "Diablo," had to go somewhere and couldn't leave behind the taint of what that name drew on. So, to embiggen and enrichen it to serve a more matured, savvy, audience present in various eras of gaming, they doubled-down on it as much as they dared. They borrowed names from JudeoChristian folklore/apocrypha to both hook into that knowledge base for "richness" and to serve as inspiration for themes/etc. (IMO)

SPOILERS FOR D3 AND THE END OF D2:
When the Worldstone was smashed in D2, it allowed latent Nephalem genes to awaken in some human heroes, and it was implied that the D3 PC's were merely the first of a new generation of heroes. When the death of Malthael inadvertently smashed the Black Soulstone, it seemed to be setting up a sequel hook where sometime in the future, the Prime and Lesser Evils would return, to be fought by a second generation of Nephalem.

Instead, D4 seems to jettison that entire plot hook and return to the grounded dark fantasy of D1 and D2. While this was great for nostalgia, it seems to have come at the expense of all the successes in D3 (the return of the Nephalem), while keeping the defeats (the slaughter of humanity by Malthael).

What do people think? Should the D4 protagonists have been second-generation Nephalem, and if not, should the plot have made more references to D3 (i.e. explaining why the Nephalem aren't around, not just retconning them as though they never existed).

Note: Yes, I'm aware of Rathma, I'm ignoring him because he's an original Nephalem, not a post-Worldstone one.

I think that the setting ideas being progressed in D3 concerning the mysteries surrounding the Nephalam should have been expanded and continued, but only just "so much." So, additional mysteries should have been built up and introduced with limited... question-answering about exactly what all this stuff is about. :)

The story, itself, is... just badly told. There's the spark of what could have been an interesting idea, but then it went straight down the pipes and into "rushed development heck." Someone, somewhere, only had a limited number of rendered cutscenes for a story that WOULD NOT actually take place in the game... and the release date was looming and the marketing department had already scheduled all the high-cost billoboard ads... That's my opinion, so I'm stickin' to it rather than implying the designers had no skill. My gripe is the non-game-centric story that just does not do well at all in a game. (And, that destroys a classic narrative approach they could have easily hooked into, but chose to run out into the weeds of boring...)

(An interesting article: https://gamerant.com/diablo-nephalem-unknown-trivia/ )


I just want to point out:

The only "good," as in seen as "traditionally good, supporting today's standards for same" principle campaign story character that the player engages with in D4 is... Lilith. Why? I dunno, 'cause of some dumb___ reason, I'm sure.

In this "Fantasy Game" the developers decided to become edgelord coolchads and promote a world where there are no "Good" or "Evil" antagonists. /yay/s

But, wait, there's more... Instead of building up these characters to up-size them truly intimidating heights, they tapped their little feet with glee and decided that a "twist" was in order. Like a bad M.Knight movie, they forgot that a "twist" is only good when the story has been spent clearly in building up sensible, story supported, expectations. Instead, Blizz decided, "naw, that's hard and stoopid to do.. or sumthin', let's TWIST!" And, of course, because "game has to game" the player is then pitted against the only "good'ish" antagonist in the game, 'cause putting in effort to write this plot FOR A GAME was not a priority.

Black mixed with White makes Grey. If there is no Black and no White and everything is Grey, then... it's not a good Fantasy Story.

(Note: For those stories that deal with or include themes of good and evil. But, it'd be difficult to find one that's popular that didn't use those themes in some way - They're engagement magic.)

To save: I don't think it's possible in D4 without an expansion. That expansion would have to find bedrock in some idea that formed an island of Black/White in a see of Grey. That could be the Nephalem, since that's already in-game. BUT, and here's the thing, gamers want to see "new" in game expansions...

Originally posted by Fear Denies Faith:

The problem is that just like the midi-chlorians, removing it creates just as many plot holes as it fills. If the D3 Nephalem never existed, what happened to the Prime and Lesser Evils? Where are Belial and Azmodan, if they weren't bound into Tathamet?

Nephalem were very much a "poison-pill."

If ignored in Lore/narrative, then it kills.
If explored too fully, it could run out of control and destroy the impact of other things.

This is why both magic and superpowers in popular stories come with some kind of "cost." There's no cost for being a Naphalem, it requires no effort to obtain, and no downside for divine Ubermenschen. GG, great idea! Now there are beings that are superior with divinely inspired superpowers that can destroy the "most scary and unstoppable dire threats that the ENTIRE REALM OF EXISTENCE FEARS FEARFULLY."

During the meeting, everyone clapped and thought that this was a good idea and paychecks were cashed.

Midichlorians, indeed - Welcome to even more "Grey."

Why did Malthael go in his crusade, if there were no Nephalem to purge? Remember, a key plot point of D4 is that Malthael's crusade 50 years ago caused humanity to regress into the dark ages, explaining the much more grimdark world.

This has a slightly different take on that: (Relinked for convenience) https://gamerant.com/diablo-nephalem-unknown-trivia/

...Where are Belial and Azmodan, if they weren't bound into Tathamet?

https://diablo.fandom.com/wiki/Azmodan
https://diablo.fandom.com/wiki/Belial

https://diablo.fandom.com/wiki/Soulstone
https://diablo.fandom.com/wiki/Black_Soulstone
https://diablo.fandom.com/wiki/Soul_Shards

Soul Stones/Shards are the "recreational vehicles" of demons, angels, and the Primes, I guess. Too many darn magic rocks in the Lore, though. It also appears that despite their fondness for using them for transport, the Prime Evils are allergic to them... or love them. They're probably made out of cryptonite chocolate.

I am no Diablo Lore expert. I read the wiki, now and then, but stuffs gets twisty really quick. :)

Belial and Azmodan are supposedly now free agents, again, I think - After Malthael was defeated, all the Primes captured were supposedly released, but I don't know if that means "freed" or that they occupied Soul Shards or those are some... pieces of latent essences/corrupted bits or not. In any case, they can be reborn now, but I also don't know if that method must be via a shard or that they can just now be found under cabbage leaves or something.


Prediction - The first expansion has been underway since before D4's release. My guess is that it's going to be that one of the Prime's gets a host and starts causing trouble again. Or, they can use what we already have -Mephisto.


Ain't no Diablo when he's... gone.
It ain't Hell when he's... away.
Ain't no Diablo when he's gone,
he's always gone too long,
It ain't the same when he goes
Awaaayyyyyy.


Note on criticisms - I am not a Diablo Lore Scholar. And, that lore is pretty deep with a lot of bits that are assumed, written in scattered places, dribbled out here and there - It isn't presented in a linear way, so it's hard to grasp it all. Its influences are all over the place and some assumptions come from those influences, correct or not. My criticisms only focus on applying a story to the game we play and, IMO, that places certain demands on the beats and themes that must support player activities to make those experiences... more betterer. D4 doesn't do that very well with the main thrust of the story involving the principle antagonists, no matter what some would feel the "Lore" dictates. Whatever skill and enthusiasm was dedicated to developing more lore to fit the game's intended design, it's just not evident in the result, IMO.

[RodHull]

Originally posted by Morkonan:

Black mixed with White makes Grey. If there is no Black and no White and everything is Grey, then... it's not a good Fantasy Story.

Speak for yourself, some of us enjoy a more morally grey story.

Apart from which many amazing fantasy stories have morally grey characters doing morally grey things.

D3 was an abomination and should have been excised, thank god it was.