Why are we arguing about population numbers? Its never ever mattered in WoW.
Like, Teldrassil was an event with an ambiguously large death toll, that killed a percentage of the Night Elf population. Do I honestly believe that it equals the 90 percent lost with the Fall of Quel’thalas to the Scourge? No… Do I think it equals the destruction of Kezan & the Undermine to Deathwing when the island blew; the Alliance attack on Wix’s Yacht; and Wix enslaving the survivors on another exploding volcano? Very unlikely. Do I think the NEs are worse off now than the Darkspear theoretically should be with all the crap they’ve dealt with since WC3? Definitely not. But it is substantial.
As for “Resolution”. We need to rescue as many NE souls as possible from the Maw. As a Horde it would be nice if I were allowed to rescue at least Saurfang before he’s processed into soul dust, but I don’t mind bailing out any NE soul I see. Outside of that, I stand firm that like the Forsaken, a new NE player hub + questing zone Capital City should be created. Hyjal for the NEs, with a terraced city flowing down the mountainside. I would also like another World Tree. One birthed from the first healthy acorn of the Reborn and Healed G’Hanir. A true sibling tree of Nord, and one itself representing healing a rebirth.
Beyond that? Yeah, its unreasonable to expect such an Anti-Cata experience. But, hey, its the topic isn’t it.
Well thankfully Blizzard did not make a parallel comparison of Teldrassil burning to Quelthelas.
I mean boy would someone look silly if Blizzard did that.
I am aware they did that. More parallels than you can probably imagine tbh, including both Malf and Tyrande’s character arcs in BfA. But, as always, they bungled the same damned stories their predecessors have already told. Just like they did with Ner’zhuling AU Grom AND Ner’zhuling Vol’jin.
Regardless, they’ve never given numbers, and I would be absolutely shocked if the NEs shoved 90 percent of their population into that 16 year old tree. The only reason they would have is if Blizz wanted the death toll to be that staggering. Not because it would actually make any sense.
Blizzard was drawing parrallel of how much of a devastating attack and destruction to both infrastructure and population both events meant for each race.
Whatever % it was is irrelevant.
Arthas and the Scourge caused the destruction of the High Elves.
Sylvanas and the Horde caused the destruction of the Night Elves.
That is the comparison and message Blizzard is stating. Any other detail and nitpicking frankly doesn’t matter of how much of a big deal it is, or it isn’t.
Weren’t you the very same one that was stating the Horde was villain batted and told we’re evil all expac? Or that the Horde weren’t being shamed for that fact? Because pretty sure being equated to both the Scourge AND the Legion in the same story does both?
And as a side note, the WoT was not meant to destroy the Kaldorei civilization, in fact it required both it and their leaders survival to work. At least with how Saurfang planned it. So, while I know this is going to piss some people off, the Horde was merely made a tool for an act of genocide. There was not intent to eradicate the NEs either culturally or literally before or after that event beyond anyone but Sylvanas herself. And she was aiming for Omnicide by the looks of things. In fact, that event operated directly in opposition to the very motives Sylvanas gave Saurfang.
What are you talking about? What do you mean? And whats your point?
Doesn’t matter.
Whatever the plan was or wasn’t Blizzard was very clear on their messaging. They could not be any more clear if there were random popup notes telling you what the comparison means.
Sylvanas and the Horde did unto Night Elves what Arthas and the Scourge did unto High Elves. It could not be more clear.
My point is, you yourself constantly make light of how much Blizzard both villain batted the Horde and actively shamed the Horde Playerbase for that. While then turning around and being like “Yeah, you’re just like the damned Scourge … because of the deliberate parallels Blizz hamfistedly wrote into the story”.
So which is it? Or is it that Blizz has actually been actively shaming the Horde playerbase repeatedly for what they chose to do with the faction, and it doesn’t matter?
Keyword is actively.
You had to actively seek it out and pay attention to see all the little clues. For game that offers you 100s of hours of content… or really 50 hours of unique content a 2 minute cinematic you could skip and is no longer front and center is not what I would call “Actively” shaming unless you are parking your character infront of the cinematic prompt and watching it over and over again.
Please. I am not stupid. You are changing the subject of this little back and forth on the population issue.
Blizzard is making a comparison of Sylvanas and Arthas. Their tools were the Horde and the Scourge. It is undeniable that Blizzard is making a comparison of the scale of bloodshed of both events and where Sylvanas stands each time.
What was the amount of Night Elves killed? Who knows and who cares.
All we need to know it was as bad as what happened in Quel Thelas.
Can you concede to this point or not?
The Night Elves have dominated the WoW narrative since W3, you guys are hardly the pity objects. You have an A Plot in Shadowlands all about your pain and tradgedy. Hell it would be nice if ANY other race besides Humans, Nelfs and Orcs got as much attention, the rest of us are just footnotes in this story.
No, I wont. Because there is no indication of that. Nothing concrete. And no attempt by the Horde DURING the invasion or AFTER to eradicate the NEs. Unlike the Scourge with Humanity and the BEs. Just because of some haphazard parallels that went absolutely nowhere where arbitrarily shoved into an equally haphazard story does not automatically boost the death toll. Sorry, that’s not how that works.
You’re argument is essentially, "I will ignore literally 2 and 1/2 years of storytelling for the Horde, as “subtle queues you can just ignore” … while you’re going to pick up on some arbitrary parallels that were poorly used and went nowhere to argue that the WoT was as devastating as the Fall of Quel’thalas to the Scourge.
This confuses me. You’re telling me about a plot in Shadowlands that’s all about my pain and tragedy, but you’re offering this to tell me that Night Elves aren’t pity objects?
That would seem to be the point of such a plot, no?
Yeah. Andiun needs to pop out a balance sheet of the dead for you to accept it.
Maybe have the dead audited as well? We got an NE accountant here maybe they can get right on it.
Blizzard made a clear comparison between Sylvanas and Arthas and their armies and what they did. Simple as that. This little debate of “Oh its not that bad…!” doesn’t really work.
Im looking forward to the day Sylvanas disapears from the narrative so we can put his awful storyline behind us and forget it happened.
During i grant you you’re right- but to be perfectly fair, didnt the goblins and the forsaken (the other ones were there too, but those two jump to mind the most) go back to night elf lands to continue to wreak havoc, rub salt in the wound, etc?
I mean, the horde was trying to make those lands uninhabitable during that warfront/questiline/world quests and they did manage to raise some night elves into undeath
She has been in 3 expansion trailers now, I thought this one would finally be her last but now we’re getting to a point of redemption and the possibility of her actions justified. It’s quite possible that she will continue taking all the spotlight after Shadowlands.
We’ll see I guess, but yea it was quite a bummer for me to see that instead of bringing her to justice, we’re supposed to symphathize with Sylvanas now.
It also makes me think that Tyrande is not going to make it out alive in her quest to justice.
Pessimism is the natural consequence of watching this story for a while. It’s the closest thing we have to a data-driven approach to predicting future story events.
Especially where anything related to the Night Elves is concerned.
The three most recent expansions have been what I call “The Sylvanas Trilogy”. It’s shown her rise and fall as the Horde’s warchief. This was a copy of “The Garrosh Trilogy”, as seen in Cata-MoP-WoD. If this pattern continues, I assume Sylvanas will be disposed of during Shadowlands and we’ll be focusing on a different faction leader for the next three expansions, presumably Turalyon. This would mean that we wouldn’t hear much about Sylvanas except every now and then, however that might be.
Ill say it again. Easiest way to do this is to have the Horde leave Kalimdor of their own volition and move to Northrend and Broken shore and build new capitals. They get the Appropriate books, comics and out of game media to develop their new nation along with new characters to flesh out their rosters.
The Alliance in the mean time gets back its lands for better or worse and that will cause internal struggles and strife as they attempt to rebuild as it puts strains on them(mongrel horde may rise up to take back some). Allowing the Alliance to develop some internal conflict but at the same time rebuild.