Anduin Isn't Flawless

The only comparison I am making is your ridiculous standard of “never suffering from the consequences” of his/her actions.

I mean, it’s not like she did the wrong thing. As far as everyone knew it was supposed to be an occupation, so the best course of action was to facilitate that in the most peaceful way so they didn’t just butcher everyone. Fighting in that instance was pointless, they’d already lost. The best course was to play along and live to fight another day.

So what are Tyrande’s consequences supposed to be and what actions? She fought to protect her people and ensure they would survive an occupation only for them to be burned alive anyway and attempted to evacuate them. Following that she took on the night warrior ritual to avenge them and drive out the people who did it. I fail to see how any of that is putting her beliefs before her people.

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Yeah I mean this is why classic era questing and stuff was the best. The past few expansions really have just been us for the most part following along beside these major lore characters rather than being the hero ourselves.

Edit: More thoughts though. We still are the hero in alot of the questing zones and stuff though, just the overall story narrative involving the major characters we kind of take a backseat to.

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Anduin’s flaws are born from being young and inexperienced, not so much from him making calls that come back to bite him (such as Rastakhan making a deal with Bwonsamdi). We pretty much never see any of Anduin’s bad choices come back to bite him, or anyone really acknowledge them as bad choices to be honest.

No, Anduin is not flawless. But he’s treated as such within the universe. Everybody always pats him on the head and tells him “hey, you tried your best,” instead of “hey, maybe we shouldn’t let this literal child lead a global superpower.” Maybe Stormwind. If Anduin was just centralized to leading Stormwind, I think he’d be criticized less.

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Which is the issue, exasperated by the fact he represents only half of it. If there is a greater main character in a videogame, such as in Borderlands or Oblivion’s main quest, you can’t choose to oppose that person and still have ways to impact the world despite how the other person drives the plot.

If you go back into cataclysm, you will see a similar reception to thrall from alliance players. Their effectively tellling half the playerbase your wrong and there is nothing that can be done about it.

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And Tyrande losing her city made her an avatar of vengeance. Hell, no matter how many times Tyrande was caught/put in a precarious situation she always came out on top.

Considering he is sending his people to die right now his dream is at the very at the backburner.

My beef with the Horde there is they abandoned what was always suppose to be a desperate gamble against the Legion! The chances of success was always slims but we all rush in the hopes of ended the invasion. I honestly think if the Alliance was on the ridge and trying to buy Sylvanas the time to end Gul’dan it wouldn’t have run away like cowards and died to buy the chance to stop them.

Teldrassil as acknowledged by himself. I would also say the incident with Tyrande and Genn involving Darkshore portrays him somewhat negatively. He is questioning himself, his aspirations and decision making a lot more. (Well maybe not so much his aspirations more how to go about achieving them.) I agree that some other character within the Alliance should question these flaws more but I just wanted to point out what I think the narrative is trying to show not necessarily whether it has done a good job at it.

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i didn’t say that she did the wrong thing, only that for better or worse, she is paying for her actions, even if other things that she had no control over happened. like not knowing that teldrassil would burn.

blizzard is trying to sell that anduin has flaws and mistakes (like teldrassil and lordaeron) the problem would be, that he should not have that responsability in the first place.

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Oh definitely. Like others have said above including me, he should never have been the high king just because he’s Varian’s son. Varian earned that position by actually being a decent leader and commander, Anduin has not. Tyrande, Velen or Genn would all have been far superior choices but that goes against human potential so I guess that’s why it never happened.

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Anduin suffered when he failed to protect Tedrassil and save its people. The point is neither him nor Tyrande have had to experience a directly negative action to themselves, it is people around them who end up getting hurt, and in turn that hurts both these characters.

Anduin has lead his people and the Alliance though an entire demonic invasion of the Legion, that alone should be a good enough reason to actually trust him. More importantly, Stormwind and him are currently trying to hold the Alliance together. The diplomacy racial is a human trait for a reason.

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The whole High King situation could have been a great source of conflict for the Alliance, but everyone just let the kid have it. Anduin continues to toe the soft line of moral uprightness, however, which disadvantages him against a Sylvanas who had decided to put on her best Saturday morning villain mask. Other people pay the consequences, he is still High King.

Seriously, just play up Tyrande and Genn frustration and the problem that is Anduin will become a worthwhile story element. If we keep pivoting back to “Oh shucks, we’ll get back in line Your Majesty…” I don’t see the appeal.

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You don’t think that losing your home to an invading force, a vast swath of your friends, family, and people to the torching of Teldrassil, and a crisis of faith are consequences? Really?

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As oppose to having to send nearly all your soldiers to fight in a war you failed to stop and having to live with the fact your decisions lead to Tedrassil’s destruction?

Are you arguing that guilt from being arguably culpable for deaths somehow outweighs the suffering of the characters who are then forced to bear the reality of those actual, horrific deaths?

I am arguing that Anduin and Tyrande both have their own traumatic experience and saying that Anduin has never had to bear the weight of his choices is a ridiculous concept!

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Teldrassil isn’t so much seen as a failure of Anduin the individual. Teldrassil is more seen as him failing the position of king. And even though Teldrassil hits him hard, within moments Tyrande kisses him on he cheek and thanks him for what he does do. Hell, Teldrassil would be one of the things I wouldn’t really consider his fault.

As for Darkshore, that doesn’t even really portray Anduin badly either, at least from a narrative perspective. Even from a meta perspective, neither Anduin nor Tyrande are really wrong. Tyrande has every right to want to reclaim her homeland sooner rather than later, and Anduin is thinking practically in terms of the whole war. Neither side is really portrayed as the “wrong” side.

Were it to be critical of Anduin, we’d likely have to see more than just Tyrande and the Kaldorei criticize him. What especially highlighted it is the old version of the interaction between him and Genn after Maiev leaves. In the live version, Genn tiptoes around the subject and clarifies he “doesn’t mean to defy him.” In the beta version, Genn is very harsh with him, telling him how much the Kaldorei owes him. Had this meant to be a legitimate flaw of Anduin, the game certainly didn’t seem to advertise it as such.

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This is a silly complaint.

He isn’t going to die or be permanently crippled. The bulk of the consequences are always going to fall on people who are close to him or under his care. That doesn’t mean there aren’t consequences.

Anduin is a caring and sensitive person, the suffering of people he’s responsible for is just as devastating to him as any physical injury he could recieve.

You want something more tangible so you don’t appreciate the emotional wounds. But they are there and have caused him to grow as a character and leader.

Before the Storm was all about developing Anduin.

People don’t like to acknowledge Anduin’s development because it isn’t as damaging as they’d like and it’s left him in a place they prefer. But it is there and it’s significant.

If Anduin was as static and unchanging as you say, he never would have been leading an attack on Lordaeron.

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Yeah, Anduin having guilt is really not much of a profound argument re: him ever experiencing consequences. And to be clear, I believe consequences in this case would mean something with a noteworthy impact on the story at large. Tyrande openly defying and challenging his position as High King would be a consequence of his alleged failures. Or even Genn, given that he was hellbent on avenging his son, the loss of his kingdom, and Varian’s death at the hands of what he perceives to be another of Sylvanas’ betrayals.

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Nobody is contesting that Anduin isn’t part of a Coming of Age storyline.

To lesser extents Baine, Talaanji, Geya’rah, and Mayla are as well right now. However, I do think the issue is that while its perfectly fine that he’s an idealist (as are many of the younger generation of leaders), Anduin is too much of an idealist (and too inexperienced) to be leading a joint-nation military operation within the spectrum of a World War. His Gambit with Saurfang seems to have payed off in the short term, but that’s about the ONLY “plan” I’ll give him credit for atm.

I think generally people would be a whole lot more OK with Anduin if he was NOT in the High King position, but rather remained merely in the confines of the King of SW (especially during his development). Not that I want Tyrande to replace him (I think I’ve made it clear that of the remaining Alliance leadership Muradin would be the best for the current needs of a “High King” role) … but yeah; Anduin’s influence (and inexperience) is too potent right now.

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i don’t that he had much of a choice there.