There’s really no indication that the forsaken are lacking in the free will department. Even with Derek, ‘conditioning’ can mean anything. Most likely the ritual just showed him that fate of Admiral proudmoore in Durotar and other events from the past.
The datamined text has Derek saying “the horde spewed lies, but BAINE told me the the TRUTH”
So, first of all, Baine wasn’t even there. If it was Chen Stormstout, Rokhan, and Rexxar moving against Sylvanas, I would buy the idea that maybe Sylvanas used the ritual to program Derek with lies, but I could care less what Baine told Derek. Chances are Derek is just going along with Baine so he can get back to the Proudmoores and slash their faces.
Valid point. I imagine Lilian Voss’ sketchy history also renders her disapproval uncompelling to you.
Where as my opinion is that Blizzard’s writing isn’t that clever and so the most likely intent with these three characters isn’t to show individual opinions as much as it is to portray cultural norms.
I think I would be more concerned if Stone or Zelling were so quickly on board, considering how they were made.
Zelling just wanted to survive to protect his family, and didn’t truly count the cost of what he was doing.
Stone is pretty much just assassinated by us, and her head is still spinning.
I imagine they are also a little concerned about being ‘conditioned’ or manipulated and used some way, considering they were raised not long before him.
I think Forsaken free will is mostly a myth. I think the most powerful of the Forsaken such as the player charachter or Lillian Voss etc do have free will. For the vast majority, especially the newer Forsaken that Sylvanas is raising with the Valkyr it’s the illusion of free will.
I am utterly convinced people like Derek are doing exactly what Sylvanass wants.
Derek is different because he’s supposed to be a tool. I suppose Sylvanas doesn’t have the time to sit him down to try to try to teach him the conventional way. I think she wants no chance of Derek siding with Jaina and the others, which is more likely if she did just say “Go kill your family.”
I’m surprised they didn’t just give all the forsaken Scourge tabards and have a Crypt Lord pop out of the ground next to the geists in Darkshore. If we are going to be the Scourge, we should just drop the pretense roll out the meatwagons and unleash the frost wyrms, and obsidian destroyers.
Derek wasn’t raised to be forsaken. He was raised to be an assassin slave to go and kill and die for one purpose. He wasn’t a person to Sylvanas, and that is telling.
I mean, as people mentioned she’s done some similar things in the past, so I wasn’t all that surprised to see it happen. It’s when people use it to fill in the “Sylvanas, the Forsaken, and the Horde are evil” narrative is when I have a problem.
Yes, currently it seems Sylvanas looks evil, yes the forsaken and the Horde are being poorly depicted, but I don’t think overall it’s supposed to be evil. As I said, the Derek situation was not surprising for me and doesn’t say much about Sylvanas or the Horde as a whole.
Intention and perception are very different.
I’d simply be lying if I said that the Horde doesn’t look evil, but I don’t think that’s the intention they’ve been trying to portray. They’re trying to make it look like they’re being influenced by darkness within (Sylvanas) but it ends up looking like all of the Horde except those who help Saurfang as evil.
Which, in itself, obviously, in itself, is a frustrating situation.
Not the Horde as a whole, but it says a lot about Sylvanas. Her reasons for raising Derek are in effect the reason most Forsaken were originally raised as Scourge: to use them as disposable weapons against their living compatriots.
Which is why it should raise questions from other Forsaken. It’s one thing to kill Forsaken who refuse to join, but raising undead for the express purpose of using them as tools is literally what she claimed to have liberated them from when she led them against the Scourge.
Which becomes doubly sinister when one considers that if she can brainwash or condition undead into service, it means she could feasibly re-kill existing Forsaken and then bring them back again as pliant slaves. Just like the Lich King would. And little about her personality suggests that she wouldn’t do that very thing if the situation became such that it would be more expedient than leading Forsaken who can think for themselves.
Characters in the game tell you Sylvanas is evil.
Devs at Blizzcon tell you Sylvanas is evil.
Sylvanas does evil actions such as use undead as slaves like Arthas did, whose actions were also evil.
I don’t see how you’re supposed to find any nugget of goodness in this.
I trust most in-game character’s judgement less than I trust N’zoth’s.
Did they?
Citation please.
She’s using Derek as a tool to take down the threat that’s about to knock down the door of Atal’Dazar, or already have (I’m not entirely sure on the chronology of ptr spoiler stuff).
I don’t because I’m not supposed to.
But this is Blizzard we’re talking about, they love redemption arcs, they love twist and turns, and they love to “subvert” expectations.
It has been.
It’s keeping the Alliance out of Kalimdor, which was her aim. They’re fighting to keep a hold on it at all, which is good anyway because it diverts the Alliance’s attention elsewhere in the mean time.
No it isn’t. Tyrande and Malfurion are there, right now, killing Horde beside Maiev and other night elves that matter so little to me that I don’t remember their names.
The only alliance who are staying out of Kalimdor are the ones who did not want to war to begin with and still don’t.