I find its a bit of the reverse. While humans in the Cult of the Damned (necromancers and acolytes alike) formed the support backbone of the Scourge, it’s main force, the undead, were controlled by the Lich King. The Scourge wasn’t 90% necromancers/acolytes marching on the front lines. The Scourge used swarming tactics, throwing massive numbers of the undead (controlled by Ner’zhul) at their targets. Comparatively, a single Necromancer would be like a single fish in the ocean of undead.
Let’s examine this again then.
The Dreadlords were all over the north and influencing everyone. As I said earlier, we do not know when Garithos was being controlled/influenced), only that his actions drastically changed from post mind control, compared to what we saw before it. One way or another, it’s safe to assume the Dreadlords were involved.
The Alliance did not allow a genocidal racist to join their military or rise in it. Garithos fought in the Second War, and prior to that was not noted to have any prejudices or racism. This instead was a direct result of his home, family, and peasantfolk being slaughtered while he was off defending Quel’Thalas. He was appointed a Grand Marshal out of pity, not because the Alliance wanted a racist in a position of authority. It’s doubtful anyone was even aware of his new prejudice when he was appointed.
Saying he was genocidal as of the time of his appointment makes no sense. As far as we can tell, he never had such tendencies until encountering the Blood Elves, and then while the Dreadlords were all over the place and influencing him at some point. Again, considering he goes from, “Let’s try to get these elves killed on suicide missions and then condemn them all to execution for failing to die,” to, “I’m going to ally with this undead elf,” it paints a rather extreme shift in priorities and actions. He wasn’t any less of a racist prick. Instead, we saw him working beyond his prejudice to do his duty. That doesn’t absolve him of anything or suddenly make him a saint. It’s just more evidence in favor of the idea that he was being manipulated by the Dreadlords at the time he was actively trying to kill the Blood Elves.
Yes, he well enough said that the one who wrote the letter did not cause the malfunction… but remember, the letter was written in dwarven, the ambassador who have been dilligently asking questions about the sanctums, and have drawn and written detailed instructions about them and handed said letters down to Night Elves with the note: “I want to see one malfunctioning” and the Night Elves just so happened to be near a malfunctioning sanctum.
I am aware that they advised not to increase the load, it was a risk, but nowhere does it state a certainty for malfunction.
Read the quest thoroughly.
No, the Blood Elves already admitted that the overload could cause a problem, but that was still not a certainty.
I hardly think that believing the Night Elves caused the malfunction is a reach. They were quite good at making themselves the culprits in the scenario.
Holding onto letters that have detailed instructions on the sanctums with a note saying: “I want to see one malfunctioning” while also happening to be near a sanctum that just so happened to malfunction.
Me thinks you did not read the quest properly.
It is true, however, that there is no definite proof of it. But blizzard sure as hell writ them off as the most likely culprits in the scenario, whether they intended it or not.
I might suggest the same. I don’t see a line in those quests at all suggesting the Dwarf wanted the Sanctum to Malfunction, only that he wanted the Malfunction to be observed.
The documents contain detailed maps of different strategic buildings in Eversong Woods. A diagram of an arcane sanctum is also sketched in good detail. There seem to be numerous notes in a language you don’t recognize.
As these were carried by a Darnassian spy, it might be a good idea to bring them to the Captain of the Guard - Aeldon Sunbrand.
Are you sure you found these on a night elf? They’re clearly written in Dwarven…
From what I can understand of this letter, whoever wrote this did not cause the malfunction, but rather was sent here as a spy to observe the results of it. They call our endeavors reckless and dangerous… but who?
Of course! That envoy from Ironforge! We were fools to trust anyone belonging to the Alliance!
You could of course try to argue that the Ironforge dwarf was sent there the moment the sanctum malfunctioned, and within a few seconds he just so happened to be in Eversong Wood, coming all the way from Ironforge, and the Night Elves too for that matter.
They all just happened to come to Quel’thalas within few seconds of the malfunction.
The dwarf’s purpose of being in Eversong Woods, was to observe a malfunctioning Arcane Sanctum, and one just happened to malfunctioning while he was there, quite lucky indeed.
Yes, and in a few seconds happened to draw up a detailed diagram and pass it off to a Night Elf spy without anyone noticing…
/sarcasm
Or (and more likely in my opinion), the Dwarven Ambassador had been in Quel’Thalas for some time, heard of the additional strain being put on the West Sanctum, obtained details, and asked Night Elves to go check it out once he’d heard of the Malfunction.
It says there black in white that he was sent to Quel’thalas to observe a malfunctioning arcane sanctum.
And yes, he did gather information about the Sanctums for that purpose.
A better argument would be that the Blood Elf did not properly translate the letter.
As said, there is no solid proof, really. But blizzard sure as hell writ the dwarf and the night elves as the most likely culprits in this scenario.
Kind of beat me to my point that the Blood Elf isn’t even translating the letter absolutely correctly.
We still do not know the entire sequence of events, either. All we know is the Ambassador nor the Night Elves caused the Malfunction, but were told to observe it. For all we know the Night Elves had been spying long before the Ambassador showed up, learned of the Malfunction, and asked him to observe it while keeping their presence covert.
Regardless, we’re told outright the cause of the Malfunction was the result of additional strain.
Well, the idea is that the dwarf did not cause the malfunction, but the Night Elves with the information on the “incriminating documents” caused the malfunction.
That was the proposed theory before we found evidence of Night Elven spies, rather than just having it be rumours, yes.
That is also hinted to in the quests. The Blood Elves also doubted that Night Elves could have been guilty of it, up until the documents.
Overall I do question Blizzard’s logic on writing it anyway. It is not like the Arcane Sanctums are any different from what the High Elves dealt with, and there was no issues then.
It’s more evidence of inconsistent writing I think. I don’t think there was even a hint anywhere of this guy being anything but a racist who wants to kill all the elves. If you look at the voice acting, looks etc. If he was manipulated they’d shown us directly. This is a direct quote from the Chronicles: “Garithos was an ill-tempered and xenophobic man who scorned the non-human races in his ranks. Prince Kael’thas Sunstrider and his blood elves were not spared from the grand marshal’s bigotry. He made no attempt to hide his disdain for the elves”. I think at some point manipulation would be mentioned.
There was also something about Garithos being mad because his village was burned down, and he blamed the High Elves (And then Blood Elves) for that because the Alliance focused troops on protecting Quel’thalas.
Something like that.
He was angry and indeed just a racist through and through.
Oh. so you’re just assuming and your assumption just so happens to downplay Garithos’s actions. Got it.
Sorry, I had to read this twice. This is…a horrible excuse. So he was given the title out of pity (which is a terrible stupid move to make in a military alliance) and no one ever once noticed that after his family died he became a raging racist? This is not a realistic scenario for a competent military alliance. Everyone just looked the other way? Garithos was making no attempts to hide his racism at all. Also, he was moderately racist toward Dwarves too. Did the dwarves kill his dad or something?
It doesn’t matter if you WANT a racist in charge. You can develop a society that ends up allowing them to do so. You’re describing exactly that. Are you telling me no one, not one single Alliance authority between the second and third wars, noticed that after his family died he suddenly hated Elves?
I’m not responding to you anymore regarding this topic. This is going nowhere.
I think Garithos was self-promoted, as he was the last high ranking officer in Lordaeron at the time. He was therefor also recognized by Ironforge as legitimate. He was not made the highest ranking on the virtue of his abilities or his personality. He just happened to be the only one with a higher military ranking.
The wowpedia does imply that he was promoted. But by whom I would ask, seeing as he was the highest ranking survivor of Lordaeron’s military and there was no royalty left. So the only thing I can think of, is that other survivors just looked at him, knew about his family name and was like: “Alright then, you lead”.
First of all, a military alliance is an alliance of militaries, not every nation’s military becoming one. Garithos was promoted in the Lordaeron military. Feel free to blame Terenas I suppose?
Not sure how many Dwarves, Elves, or Gnomes were in Lordaeron’s army to be honest. Chances to flaunt his shortcomings were likely scant.
Well, in WC3:TFT he sure wasn’t. Do you have any evidence of his behavior prior to that?
Let’s be honest, who noticed Blackmoore was a drunk who was trying to organize the Orcs into a personal army to throw a coup? No one. Arthas even visited that internment camp. You’re welcome to say Lordaeron was grossly incompetent if you like, but the Alliance itself is not/was not a single entity wherein the Alliance of Lordaeron is concerned, and the Grand Alliance did not condone the promotion or actions of Garithos. Even in the Alliance of Lordaeron, it’s not as if Magni could stomp up to the throne of Lordaeron and tell Terenas how to run his military. That’s not how Alliances work.
I wasn’t aware Varian had marched up to Magni to tell him how to run his military…
Jesting aside, I see your point, but it’s not the same thing. Assuming this is in reference to the, ‘Blood in the Snow,’ scenario. Varian didn’t tell the Dwarves how to run their military. He told them outright they were failing to uphold their obligations to the Alliance because they were too paralyzed by fear of another forceful take-over of Ironforge by the Dark Irons to mobilize their forces.
Less of a case of dictating how another nation run’s its military, and more of a case of pointing out they’re not fulfilling their duties as members of the Grand Alliance.
Nah, I was ribbing about the short story where the dwarves were having a coup and Varian went in with soldiers (Anduin was visiting and Varian thought he was in danger) and set up their current council to solve the succession crisis.
When you’re 10 percent arguing against the 90 percent, that does put you in a bit of an awkward situation as to who is in sedition against whom.
As far as the races they got in bed with…
The Orcs and the Darkspear are recent contacts… (the only trolls that were trying to genoicde Quel’thelas are the Amani and they are hostile against both the rest of the Horde and the Alliance.)
There’s no beef against the Goblins, either group of Tauren.
While there are issues against the Orcs that was mainly due to the Elves getting involved in the original Orcs Vs. Humans conflict. And that was recent… not millennia.
The Forsaken have been traditional allies of the Quel’thelan Elves since the founding of the line of Arathor.
To bad that’s not the numbers though. 90% of the Kingdom of Quel’Thalas was wiped out during Arthas’ attack on it. That percentage does not apply to High Elves existing outside of the Kingdom, of which such populations did exist. We have no idea what the actual ratio is.
Forest Trolls in general have been happy to go after the High Elves. The Revantusk weren’t exactly an exception as of Vanilla WoW either, and they were a part of the Horde.
I’d also point out if we’re discussion sedition, your best example are the Scryers, and a murkier example would be Lor’themar and the current leaders of Quel’Thalas, whom raised their blades against their rightful ruler, Prince Kael’thas. They rejected Kael’thas’ decision to ally with the Burning Legion.
Yeah, I just dont get these arguments that the Blood Elves fit more in the Alliance, or that the Horde was so much worse to them. One side was mind-controlled and on drugs, the other was sober. One side had open racists in charge (and I still dont buy the excuses for this. Blame it all on Dreadlords, I guess!), the other was full of races that had been mistreated by the Alliance just like them. One side spied on them, the other sent aid in their darkest hour of need.
It’s just silly that we’re still litigating this, and downplaying the actions of one side to prop up another.
ANYWAY
Blood Elf shadowpriests should be canon. Rommath should be exiled to the Alliance for being such a prude. There’s no place for cowardice among the sin’dorei
The High Elves are 10 percent of those who survived Arthas. Aside from two maybe three lodges, the only other group of note is the Allerian Stronghold… and that’s mostly Human.
