I was looking through my toy collection earlier when I stumbled upon Brynja’s Beacon, a Horde only toy that makes your Spirit Healer a Val’kyr.
Simple enough right? But I did a bit of a double take when I looked at the fine print: ‘it is said only the most powerful can dominate the wills of the risen.’
Key word ‘dominate.’ Maybe I’m reading too much into this, but this toy seems to bring into question just how much of the will of those raised by Sylvanas’ Val’kyr is actually their own. Regarding the rather contrived reasoning as to why Night Elf undead would so happily join the Forsaken, it would make a lot more sense if they were undead slaves versus fully sentient beings choosing to do what they’ve done.
I’ll be first to say Blizzard’s storytelling really is that bad, but how many people would realistically want to join the faction that just callously burned down their home? It’s one thing to lose faith in Elune in their darkest hour, it’s another to join your people’s murderers out of…spite?
If the Val’kyr have truly begun raising the dead against their will and enslaving them under Sylvanas’ control to such a widespread extent, then there really is no longer any real distinction between the Forsaken and the Scourge. If it’s true, how many Forsaken would really be ok with this?
Zelling seems to have had some very strong feelings in this regard, so could something like this end up being a catalyst that drives her own people away from her? Could we see a civil war ensue?
I think you are reading too much into it, yes. Per an interview, their intent is to show varied opinions among the Night Elves.
As for Sira and Delaryn being raised and joining the Forsaken, that was a “very deliberate choice,” according to Danuser. The team wanted to show various aspects of the Night Elves, as opposed to presenting them as a monolith. We should expect to see them return, too, he says: “These characters are important to the Night Elf culture.”
See, I will continue to just call that bad storytelling.
I get it. Tree burned down, innocent civilians callously slaughtered, your ancestral forests blighted and ravaged, and Elune is seemingly nowhere to be found. That’d be rough for anyone, nobody would deny that.
But saying that you’re joining the enemy responsible for all of that and just killed you because Elune didn’t show up to save you? No, I don’t buy it. That’s an extreme beyond just betraying your people for money, power, or ideology and it just doesn’t fit.
Which is a bit strange as the Traveler series had an Undead (Former Forsaken) claim that it “takes a bit more” to bestow free will on to an Undead, implying it take more power to create independent Forsaken.
I’ve always held the opinion that Blizzard doesn’t know how their rules for Undeath work because they never had any. It just works as it needs to, changing as the plot demands.
You are. You must remember it’s a gimmick toy, whose item description should not be taken as a compelling lore point. Also, it is explicitly stated during the questing that the souls are given a choice to come back. Is it likely that the process is taking advantage of their hatred/negative feelings? Sure. But the val’kyr aren’t making them feel that way.
It’s bad storytelling only because it was done in such a short period of time, relying on a few things that it should not rely on: reliance on dialogue and information obtained outside of the game that most aren’t aware of/have’t read, and that. Well, basically just relying on that, but they didn’t expand enough on it - it feels very contrived since it all happened within the space of a few quests. If they devoted more time to expand on it, it would be a lot more sensical. Basically, it makes sense, but it should have only been implemented if they dedicated more time to telling the story.
They aren’t, so this isn’t something you have to worry about.
Zelling only cares so much because within the span of a very short amount of time, his allegiances changed dramatically and he saw one of the shining heroes of his first allegiance be defiled. Also, he doesn’t have the hatred for the living like the rest of the forsaken has, so he has more empathy (rather, has empathy to begin with!) - he chose to become a forsaken on his own terms, as opposed to the rest of the forsaken who were mindless thralls of the lich king, before having their minds returned to them, and then having their former kin turn on them spectacularly.
Zelling is about as much a classic forsaken as Anduin’s left toe.
“Important to Night Elf Culture.” If that isn’t one of the most insulting, narrow minded things to come out of his mouth…
Sira was a neutral floating head in Legion. That was it.
Delaryn was put in the game to die and be raised as a Forsaken character.
They have contributed nothing to the Night Elven culture, story, lore whatever. It’s not the first time I’ve seen that quote but damn does it get on my nerves. It just goes to show how truly out of touch he is.
This is why I think he’s hinting that they will eventually return to the Alliance and be the important (first) representatives of Dark Night Elf Wardens. And I’ll hate it probably more than you will, because you’ll be happy to have them admit they were wrong and come back over to your side.
Someone made a thread a while back saying the only way to explain the MANY MANY cases of all the characters acting completely insane in BFA was that Azurite causes mental illness. Alternately, it may just be the writers of BFA that are…
Look … when it comes to this topic, all I’ll say is it … its very possible.
Sylvanas has a long history of using people as tools for personal objectives, then discarding them. She spent years studying (torturing) Koltira Deathweaver (an undead Elf) to alter his will, purge him of his compassion, to make him a loyal servant of the Forsaken (those studies failed, but it doesn’t mean that research didn’t amount to something). She has also shown that the “Free Will” mantra of the Forsaken is more of a guideline, than an actual rule for her; and that all she has to do to justify denying someone like Derek or Valantine their “Free Will” is merely state that while undead (and brought back by her) they don’t count as Forsaken (and thus their Free Will is irrelevant). On top of it all, her Val’kyr (and their capabilities) have ALWAYS been rather … undefined.
Fact of the matter remains that warping the “Free Will” of these risen NEs (to make that will more convenient for her and her Forsaken) is absolutely something she would do; if she had the motive to. Its also something that she may actually be capable of with her research on Koltira and her Prime Val’kyr. But, we’ll only likely find out as the story progresses; one way or another.
Something that hasn’t really been touched on but seems to be somewhat implied is that the very method by which someone is resurrected has an effect on how they behave once brought back to life. This seems to be amplified and compounded by disorientation when someone is first reborn as an undead. This causes some to lash out at their former friends and allies, others to become almost mindless and catatonic, and still others to go completely mad. Some recover and some don’t.
It seems to really matter who it is that is with them when they are first reborn and what state of mind they were in when they died.
Be it plague or Valkyre, it’s shadow/death magic that is being used to raise the Forsaken and the effects are that their negative emotions are amplified and their positive emotions are suppressed.
Even with Zelling, the poster child for a ‘good’ Forsaken, his love for his family could not match the rage he felt at their rejection after he was first resurrected. If not for Voss intervention he likely would have murdered his family in his anger…which would have only fed his negative emotions further and led him to become a very dark creature indeed.
In the case of the newly risen Night Elf Dark Rangers, the rather hastily concocted reasoning is that they died cursing Elune, with hatred for the leaders that ‘allowed’ them to die, or plain and simply doubting their place in the universe when confronted with their own mortality. The very nature of their resurrection enhances those feelings, which the Forsaken then further encourage by offering them safe haven while their living friends and relatives invariably reject them (or at least they are given to believe that they would be rejected by them given their undead state.)
It’s not so much mind control as an undead individual (especially the newly risen) are often the very worst version of themselves, given to despair, paranoia, rage, and hatred. No matter how petty or nonsensical it might seem to the living it’s clear that Blizzard intends for the newly undead to have undergone and extremely traumatic experience and for them for the most part not to be in a place mentally to deal with their situation in a way that we would deem to be logical.
Yeah, Val’kyr can dominate the dead. They served the Lich King.
Word of god is that they don’t do that under Sylvanas. She has to torture Derek to control his brain, she doesn’t use magical enslavement. Hell, she controls the Horde’s compliment of DKs and any of them could have just used Control Undead on him for her - She opted to alter his will with force, not to subvert it entirely.
This whole ‘Sylvanas Goes Too Far By Enslaving The Dead’ thing is really ironic when you’re standing next to the character saying that as an Unholy DK. Over the course of a boss fight I probably enslave and damn 15-20 souls, but IM a hero.
But there is no dissension. They didn’t develop them as Night Elf characters, let alone Alliance Characters.
Oh, that’s optimistic of you. I’m a proud card carrying member of the “I wan’t them dead” brigade. They have done nothing but cause trouble for the story. They had their chance to come back to the Alliance, and Sira literally throws a fits and calls for the Death of the Alliance. They’re not even bothering with Delyarn anymore.
Kill them off screen unceremoniously and be done with them. They’ve contributed nothing to the lore except for more holes in an already shaky subject.
From what I’ve read about undeath it’s been stated that when someone is raised they are generally in a state of confusion and if they died in a violent way they are often violent, it also states that most when raised are loyal to the one that raised them in the beginning. it makes sense that the risen night elves joined the horde because when someone is risen they are in a state of confusion and often rage so manipulating them into fighting for your cause wouldn’t be very hard at least in the beginning. I also think that the free will of the newly risen undead is greatly exaggerated by the forsaken. in the battle for Gilneas we see plenty of people brought back and fighting against their former friends and loved ones. I don’t think the val’kyr raise anyone with free will.
They’re clearly fighting against the Night Elves with the view that Elune/their leaders abandoned or failed them. If they uniltaterally rejected the Forsaken, that would be a lack of dissension.
Not really sure what all of them think. We only have the two named characters, yeah? And whoever else being raised, from my understanding, died in the War of Thorns.
I’d probably call it a little too late to seem impressive. Genocide already went down.
I mean, either way, I agree the presentation was poor regardless. Just clarifying their stated intent rather than rumors of mind control.
Sylvanas is totally mind controlling people… In addition to your point, go back and watch the Zandalar into cinematic. Zul and Nathanos have very strange dialogue when you really play attention.
Zul: “Your Queen seems very powerful, certain… In control” ((He puts an emphasis on the bolded part))
Nathanos takes a moment to respond, giving what seems like a blank stare at Zul before responding with some that doesn’t seem out of place, but kind of is.
“It is an honor to serve my Queen.”
Then Zul comes back and says “My Princess is also strong willed.”
Notice anything?
“Strong willed”
And now Talanji’s Patron Loa is the Loa of Death… Hmmmmmm