I think a lot of people are missing the point of this question by referencing real world coat of arms with a foreign animal, in regions that don’t have that animal.
No one on the Eastern kingdoms would have ever seen or heard of a lion before. They just simply do not exist to their perception. There are cougars on the continent, but not maned lions. It’s a question that has popped up in the community for more than a decade.
The simple answer is, Blizzard didn’t think that far ahead. They thought it would be cool to have a lion as a crest, but when they fleshed out the continent for the MMO, they never included a desert or savanna location. Slipped their mind.
Recently, yes. The orcs and humans travelling to the continent only happened four years before the time setting of World of Warcraft. And the symbol of Stormwind had presumably been a lion for at least 100 years before that.
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u/Durffus Feb 08 '25
I think a lot of people are missing the point of this question by referencing real world coat of arms with a foreign animal, in regions that don’t have that animal.
No one on the Eastern kingdoms would have ever seen or heard of a lion before. They just simply do not exist to their perception. There are cougars on the continent, but not maned lions. It’s a question that has popped up in the community for more than a decade.
The simple answer is, Blizzard didn’t think that far ahead. They thought it would be cool to have a lion as a crest, but when they fleshed out the continent for the MMO, they never included a desert or savanna location. Slipped their mind.