Who do you have winning and why. battle takes place in a open field with no one stepping in to help a true 1v1
Brox. Varian was evenly matched against Garrosh but had an edge in endurance thanks to Wolf powers. Garrosh was a powerful Orc, but nowhere near the legend Brox was.
Edit: even the Night Elves, with all their experience, saw Brox as a peerless pure warrior.
Further edit: And I mean no disrespect to Varian; he is one of the best ever with an incredible list of accomplishments. But Brox is the GOAT. He soloed the Legion until Sargeras himself intervened, and even then is the only mortal to have gotten a hit on Sargeras.
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Oh this is a tough one. But I wonder if Broxigar would have been able to do everything that he could with without the Axe of Cenarius? That’s what’s keeping me from choosing a winner.
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The popcorn vendors.
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Does Brox get the Axe of Cenarius or his old axe? Because I feel like the answer changes depending on that artifact.
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Yeah. Without the Axe of Cenarius Varian keeps it close for awhile. With it, Brox wins in seconds.
So to make this as even as possible lets say he doesnt get the Axe of Cenarius
Are we assuming neither had any magical weapons, etc.? I would still put my money on Brox but I definitely would watch that fight!
Varian is high up there, but where exactly? As I noted, skill-wise he and Garrosh were very closely matched. But Garrosh was seriously outclassed by Cairne, for example. And where do legendary warriors like Grom and Lothar fit?
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Hard to say.
With regular weapons i think Varian could win, but Axe of Cenarius is too powerful compared to Shalamayne.
I’d give the edge to Varian then. While armored he’s still faster and he did fight and kill a dragon. Killed a fel reaver too. Not to mention, he was likely trained in Stormwind, got whipped into such good shape he was pretty much the star combatant of the arenas for a while… He also has the more varied arsenal.
Most of what Brox did was still with the blessed axe… which was a major boost in power, though the skill was still his. With the axe itself? The fight is over the moment Brox can hit Varian, I feel.
The axe isn’t why Brox could kill infinite demons until Sargeras himself showed up. That’s pure stamina / staying power.
Varian doesn’t stand an ice cube’s chance in heck. We’ve seen how well he does solo vs demons.
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He killed a load of demons on his own in Hyjal so yeah, it’s not just the Axe.
IIRC the whole deal with the axe is that it was just an obscenely hard/durable/sharp axe. It wasn’t protecting him or granting him powers or anything. He went doomslayer on the Legion on his own, the Axe just helped his cuts and didn’t break or lose it’s edge more than it boosted his actual combat ability.
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The axe completely ignored any kind of armor if my lore is correct, which makes a huge difference, meaning his attacks couldn’t be blocked or parried.
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Okay but that’s still infinite demons he cut through. Varian got tired long before he got to twenty.
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Oh absolutely it was the difference maker and the reason he got as far as he did, but he still had to do it himself. It wasn’t like it was granting him magic powers or protecting him or anything.
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Varian spec’d into raid friendly support/leadership skills. Brox dumped everything into damage stats, min/maxing hard. So Brox in a 1v1, but Varian’s more fun for the other players at the table.
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So basically, Varian is a 3.5e Marshal/Fighter, whereas Brox is more of a Barbarian/Fighter.
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The Axe of Cenarius was said to be basically weightless, while at the same time being as sharp as diamond. It was basically the closest thing we’ve had to a lightsaber in WoW. That’s a significant advantage over a sword like Shalamayne, which is a heavy, 2-handed sword.
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I’m not saying that Shalamayne is as good of a weapon as Brox’s axe (I was fully disappointed to not get the Axe as a Legion artifact as Arms), but saurfang did a whole hell of a lot more with his axe than Varian was able to do in very comparable situations.
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While I understand, I think this was for the best. For two reasons, actually.
For one, Arms is more of the more finesse style of Warrior. I think it fits better with Alliance, personally, and so I feel like having it be an Alliance weapon was the right call.
And yeah we’ve definitely had Orcs wielding 2-handeds before, but they always felt more in-line with Fury Warriors. Like, Grommash or Garrosh.
In any case, I definitely felt like a sword matched Arms better than an Axe could.
Secondly, the Axe of Cenarius deserves to remain as a legendary item that is out of our hands. It was truly a shame to give players the Ashbringer like so. While, don’t get me wrong, it’s an awesome weapon… It just felt like it was too awesome to be ours. Nothing was more disheartening than seeing the Paladin sword that shattered Frostmourne be wielded by the likes of Holycows, Lolrets, and Bubbleosevens.
Especially so since they killed off Tirion to give us the Ashbringer. I truly felt like he was one of those few characters that deserved to pass in his sleep. He earned his rest.
As for this, I’m not sure how much of a difference this would actually make, but, in Varian’s defense, his death to the Legion happened way after Broxigar’s death to the Legion. And, the Legion by Varian’s time wasn’t at all the same Legion that existed in the War of the Ancients. They had evolved by quite a bit.
That doesn’t excuse Varian, and I definitely still think Broxigar held his own better, since he was literally piling up corpses, but I felt like it was worth noting, at least.
Though, I do still think the Axe of Cenarius really helped with his achievement. Like, it’s the same with Alexandros and the claim of him killing thousands of Undead at a time. Ashbringer is kind of insane, lol.
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