For myself personally. When the time to pick a side came up I was playing my BE Priest. At the battle for Lordaeron she handed out gas-masks and helped Horde warriors escape. She conducted the hunt for Saurfang with the utmost discretion. And then when the choice was to be made, I the player questioned what I wanted to support. I didn’t like supporting Saurfang because his honour prevented him from doing what needed to be done. And his guilt now threatens the Horde.
But then again, the journey is not mine but my priest’s. So. What would her choice be? She was not a butcher like the Forsaken. She didn’t dabble in demon magic like the Orcs. She chose to save lives where she could. She is also loyal to Silvermoon. That last bit there, loyal to Silvermoon. Not the Horde, not the warchief but to her people. Above all else. She would choose Saurfang. Not out of “honour” but because his path represented the greatest potential to save the lives and salvage the Horde. Though, I feel it is worth noting that though she sided with Saurfang, she did not raise arms or spells against Sylvanas or her agents. A healer not a harmer.
So. Friends and fellow champions of the Horde. Have you given similar thoughts to your path? Did you look from the characters eyes? There are of course no right or wrong answers.
I had it be that Rosenivy tried to help save troops in the battle. But she’s still siding with Sylvanas. Even if she couldn’t bring herself to do that final blow to Sira later on.
Short story here. Saurfang/zappy boi are not really giving the player much to go on. We’ve already betrayed one warchief so they need to put a bit more on the table for us to risk the integrity and future of the horde.
Saurfang. He best represents what the Horde I and my troll here joined so many years ago.
I won’t follow a selfish psycopath who only sees us as meat for the grinder and a future slaves to raise after death.
Honor has meaning. You have to have something more than survival to believe in. If you don’t, you are no better than an animal. And that is what Sylvanas reminds me of, an animal afraid if death who is willing to do anything and sacrifice everyone else, including everyone in the Horde to save herself.
To quote myself from a similar thread on Story Forums (which I’m most active on) on the same topic…
But to elaborate. I chose Sylvanas not out of RP but for narrative. Saurfang represents a regression of Horde narrative in treading the “Honor Horde” archetype Blizzard doesn’t care to write for, if they did, then we’d still have Vol’jin here. Thus as long as Blizzard doesn’t care to write for an “Honor Horde” we’ll forever be stuck in a cyclical loop of the Horde narrative going through Civil Wars of killing off characters and/or Warchiefs until we are left nothing but a “Blue Horde” as it were.
On top of that, Saurfang also risks… well… playing out hte Civil War narrative we already did in MoP. I’m not interested in retreading old ground Blizzard has already wrote. Put simply, as Saurfang embodies this, he also embodies Blizzard’s creative bankruptcy.
As for Sylvanas, for all the issue of her character and direction she’s taking the Horde in, she is still a “new” direction of the Horde narrative. Therefore, as a consumer of storytelling, aside from personal biases, I’m more interested in whatever storyarcs Blizzard has planned right now with Sylvanas as the head instead of going back to a past, again, that we’ve already experienced.
Good thoughts. I hadn’t really considered the regressive versus course change. Then again I like to get inside the head of my pixels even if I avoid the RP scene.
Sylvanas because I want the horde to be conquerors, not “noble” savages. I want a Warchief who will proactively eradicate the horde’s enemies
Under her leadership, Gilneas fell, the humans were pushed out of Hillsbrad and Western Plaugelands, and now as Warchief, she destroyed Darnassus.
She is the first Warchief since the original horde to destroy an alliance capital.
After the victory in Teldrassil, she drew the most important alliance leaders into a trap that nearly took all of their lives if not for Jaina showing up to the surprise of both sides.
Sylvanas is the horde’s Conqueror Queen and is the only leader I will follow.
I served Alleria in the Second War as a Ranger. I got captured by the Twilight’s Hammer at Caer Darrow thanks to Perenolde’s treachery and I survived the mind-magic his ilk wrought on my mind.
You think I’d willingly serve the same forces?
To be sure, Alleria is mad to wield such darkness. That’s a fact, and the Grand Magister’s exile of the Ren’dorei was justified. But her sister is far, far worse, for despite her accursed fate she had free will to choose a new fate beyond undeath.
She squandered it. Nobunaga believed in her, and his faith was betrayed.
The whole of the Horde has been betrayed with such conduct. My friends who remain, were and remain a part of the Horde that believed in aiding those who had no prayer. We saw the Alliance for hypocrites, and yet despite that; we never were never conquerors but merely grim survivors.
I survived one Windrunner’s foolishness. I will survive another.
To boil it down to the absolute barest of reasons… Sylvanas is sassy and fun. Saurfang is sad and preachy. I don’t like being preached at by my video game characters. I don’t play the game for lessons in morality.
Saurfang obviously because he represent the values of the “true” horde and because he failed to kill Malfurion and everyone loves Malfurion right? It’s not like Malfurion was going to kill hundreds and hundreds of fellow hordies when he would recover right? We all friends here right?
Oh and also because now Saurfang is siding with the boy king and the boy king looks so goody goody so we obviously have to side with him right? Because we all know the “true” Horde is a horde leashed down by the alliance like the good little puppies we are… for the Allia… oops… I mean… for the Horde anyone??
Yeaaaahh… nope… I can’t… choosing Sylvanas with all my toons.
Saurfang all the way. Thrall and his Horde are what i like about this game. Thrall - Cairne -Vol’Jin are the Horde. Sylvanas was a mistake to add to the Horde - they should have been Alliance and the NIght Elves should have been Horde.
Saurfangs writing is very in-depth and nuanced. I am really getting to know his character and Zappy’s too.
Sylvanas feels like a character that belongs on The Really Rottens with Dirk Dastardly.
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