That doesnt necessarily mean the bulk remains, its likely that the main piece of nelf fan service (the darkshore warfront) was released sooner rather than later because of the backlash from Teldrassil. They tossed in the night warrior eyes as an apology.
The fact that Tyrande was desperate enough to conduct the Night Warrior ritual (after pleading for immediate aid from the Alliance and being rebuffed) suggests that they dont have the “bulk” of their forces available anymore. I mean a night elf army isnt exactly crucial in this xpac.
Velonara also doesn’t have the most positive take on Sylvanas when you talk to her at the Trueshot Lounge:
I fell in battle as the mad prince cut a black scar through the land I loved. But at least I was at peace, I suppose. For a time. Until the Banshee Queen pulled me back from beyond and damned my soul into her service.
It’s very much Sentinel and Warden inspired. Right? And Wardens are, as we know, the keepers of vengeance. And while they were crated very specifically they’re still, you know, at their core a Night Elf institution. The concept of wielding vengeance as a weapon. And I felt that actually factored into this. This was just my feeling in putting this story together. If they are capable of being empowered by vengeance, then that means they’re more powerful after they lost Teldrassil than they were during the fight of Teldrassil.
Terran Gregory: Kind of more recently at Blizzcon we revealed the "Terror of Darkshore" cinematic which was really exciting revisiting the Night Elves. You know, in all these years I'd never gotten to put Malfurion in a cinematic, right? And so, there was a lot of build up, a lot of expectation. I feel like the audience was definite after the events of Teldrassil feeling like the Night Elves needed to bear their fangs again. And that was principally the goal going into that cinematic, right? Is that we wanted to go back, we wanted to revisit those classic Warcraft III Night Elves. Reminded of their ferocity, that in the dark of the forest we should really be afraid of them. And that scene was a lot of fun to take, to bring through its paces.
Steve Danuser: Yeah, that was a great moment that really set the stage, again, for kind of setting up that new warfront that's in Tides of Vengeance of the fight over Darkshore, and it really got to help us introduce not only, you know, some gravel on Malfurion there, but, as you play through stuff, a new side for Tyrande, as well. And- to really- you know, it's- When you consider all that the Night Elves went through, as characters, seeing their home, not just taken from them, but burned to cinders, it was tough, and so we wanted to show how they were reacting to that. So we brought in, if you play through the Darkshore Warfront and the quests leading up to that, you see this murderers row* of great Night Elf characters coming back and seeing their different perspectives on how they're reacting to things. Seeing some of that payoff between Tyrande and Maiev after all these years and all this stuff in their background to see them kind of acknowledge that. But it was a great opportunity to, like you say, put some teeth back on the Night Elves, show their reactions to things. And, we thought, well, you know, that's a great moment. We have this transformation of Tyrande, that energy that she's calling upon, this dark side of Elune, how that infuses the other Night Elves in the warfront, hey, why not give that, as an option, to players. Allow them to tap into that power as well.
Terran Gregory: Character customization, yes.
Steve Danuser: Character customization.
Terran Gregory: And a lot of people were interested online in how exactly the players came to have the black eyes.
Steve Danuser: It is.
Terran Gregory: The darkened eyes.
Steve Danuser: Yes, the darkened eyes. And I think that speaks to the power of that ritual. This ancient ritual that Tyrande taps into - again, sorry, spoilers, but - Tyrande taps into that ritual, that calling upon- it's not even calling upon, she's demanding, she's like, "Give me this power. You turned your back on us, as those 'so-and-so's' took our home from us. Now you owe us. Give me this power." And that so infused her that it could change those Elves. So we wanted to give players that opportunity, to say, "You know what, I'm part of that, too. I stand with Tyrande," and show that off in their characters.
Terran Gregory: And if you'll notice at the warfront, all the NPCs that are Night Elves actually have the darkened eyes. So there's definitely a sense that, in proximity, fighting on behalf of the darkened element of Elune under the darkened moon, that's what happens. And whether or not the player has customized themselves, that of course is player choice, but I think in the story sense that any Night Elf that's fighting on behalf of Elune in that confrontation their eyes would be darkening.
*I was unfamiliar with the phrase “murderers row,” and looking it up it turns out to be the nickname given to the battling line up of the 1927 New York Yankees that were considered at the time to be one of the best line ups in history, and now the phrase is used for any particularly successful or powerful groups of people.
If you look at my first posts on this thread, youll see me mention that that their military is now a small group of highly trained individuals struggling to keep things together.
I imagine this happening after windrunner turns the tables on the alliance again with some over the top cinematic where Derek kills Katherine in her sleep while jaina is in stormwind planning the final assault on the horde in kalimondor it cuts to the docks in boralleus the ashvane trade ships pulling up in the dead of night everyone is convinced it is just a routine market ship it cuts inside the ship is filled to the brim with dark rangers and the bells begin to ring as everyone realizes what Derek did the rangers burst out seize the docks and burn the fleet in the harbor. It cuts to silvermoon. Rommath bursting into the throne room to confront loth they argue about darkshore and rommath asks him what makes him better than arthas. Long pause loth replies with there is nothing they can do even if they wanted to alleria enters with her sister and thalyseria ( misspelled I know) it cuts to stormwind the leaders talking a messenger bursts In With an urgent message for jaina about the attack the leaders are stunned hope is lost the forsaken are already amassing on the border of darkshore. Then enters zappi boy with a message from saurfang. Then basically we play the filler of the rebellion and alliance losing on all fronts as windrunner raises the dead on the battle fields. Then we see the tauren making there move the elves the alliance and the orcs to push her out of kalimondor only to find that she had already left org then we do our final raid in the ruins of undercity as everything else plays out
And if you look up a bit you can see my analysis on that the Night Elves have already won Darkshore:
My guess for what comes next is that Sylvanas is going to use Xal’atath’s blade to raise Nazjatar up right under the Kul’Tiran navy and wreck it, so both sides will be equal again.
But I have never guessed any predictions right, so, for the most part I try to stay out of speculation unless I want to put on a tinfoil hat and just go completely out there with no regard to likelihood.
My ideal scenario is Derek truly isn’t brainwashed, because I can’t take emotional whiplash Jaina any more.
Rather, I’d like the Night Elves to win Darkshore, but then are being assaulted from behind on the coast by the Naga, so they decide to deal with the Naga first instead of being caught between two enemy lines. So they head to Nazjatar for 8.2, since Tyrande and Malfurion not being involved with Azshara would be really annoying.
If we combine this idea with your idea, the other Elves could have been at Nazjatar, too, and that’s where they all agree to work together to overthrow Sylvanas, and it buys Nathanos the time to set up his trap at the border of Ashenvale, only for the Elven army to show up like you proposed.
Both good scenarios sadly it will probably end up being the kul’tiran fleet lead by jaina attacking org while saurfang continues to be a hermit and the writing team will be like the horde isn’t evil anymore and the alliance only killed 20 major horde characters everyone wins!!
Edit the horde is now lead by the edgy demon Hunter murloc
TBH … the NEs have enough veterans of WotA to be in both places at once. While, yes, it would be annoying for Tyrande and Malf to be out of the Azshara fight, it could be a neat opportunity for characters like Feathermoon and Shadowsong (Jarod) to really get some love and attention. Or, reverse it, and put the latter two in Darkshore, while Tyrande and Malf deal with the Azshara thing.
The NEs have important things to do on two fronts. But, they are one of the lucky few races that still has enough big names to handle two fronts simultaneously. If they really wanted to pull the Feathermoon and Shadowsong route, they could balance out their need for the limelight by having someone from Kul Tiras that still desperately needs development (but wont steal the show) support them (because, by the looks of those ships, the Kul Tirans are going to be involved in this issue whether they want to be or not). Rather than Jaina being invested in the Naz’Jatar campaign, have Tandred lead the Kul Tiran forces supporting the NEs within that region instead. Guy could use some attention.
And back on the other topic … yeah, I really do want to see a reconciliation of the Elves this expansion. There is a reason (beyond their distance from Kalimdor) the BEs were largely kept from being involved in the WoT (and are only connected by affiliation). I can’t wait to see how that reason manifests itself.
I think the major problem is not replacing major characters after a death it’s called passing the torch one bows out a new one takes it’s place instead we go through warchiefs like coffee paper and the alliance goes through cities like they’re made of particle board( maybe that’s why they refused to pay the stone mason’s guild?)
Definitely doesn’t help when everything new gets taken out, too. Lor’danel was literally a replacement for Auberdine, and now it’s wrecked, too. And what’s that, a new, likable Forsaken character, Thomas Zelling? Nope, he’s dead, too.
Blizzard also has a disturbing obsession with killing Night Elves, too. Couldn’t even go to the Brawler’s Guild without Quackenbush the Night Elf Balance Druid quartermaster turning up assassinated.
Chrome is being weird and won’t let me highlight text to make an actual quote but you’re forgetting that if they had a Kul’tiran helping Feathermoon and Shadowsong then that Kul’tiran would immediately take over the entire spotlight. Could be someone as minor as the guy manning the boat at the docks. His human potential would outshine two well established Kaldorei anyday.
Sorry to break it to you but the Kul Tirans are going to be involved. Also, can I ask, while I get the frustration of “Human Potential” from the NE fans, what exactly do you want from the NEs writing wise?
They have strong isolationist tendencies when they are allowed to act on them; have a history of minor xenophobia; and have never been shown (since they became NEs) to have any interest in expansionism. They, as a species, would likely just sink back into their forests if given the opportunity to be left entirely alone from outside threats; and the vast majority of their stories revolve mistakes and enemies from their past (outside of the Faction Conflict), rather than goals of the future.
Also, let me remind you, I’m part of a faction that was literally just along for the ride the entire last expansion. While the execution may not have been great, the NEs got portions of Val’sharah, Azuna, Suramar, and the Emerald Nightmare Raid devoted to them. Anduin was fairly worthless throughout Legion; Jaina didn’t exist past Broken Shore; Khadgar and Turalyon were the primary sources of “Human Potential”; with Velen and Illidan also taking up much of the spotlight.
I get being salty about the game focusing so much on Humanity within the Alliance (but hey, guess what, they’ve been the focus since WC1), but their representation within Legion wasn’t really that overwhelming … while the Horde representation in Legion was … “Yup, guess we’re here too. Oh, Vol’jin gets killed by a trashmob and our only real contribution is our new Warchief going on a shady personal errand in Stormheim? Not even Legion related? Tha’s cool I guess…”
If the Kul’Tirans have to be involved, I hope it’s Brother Pike and the Tidesages. That would make the most narrative sense, and Stormsong Valley was my favorite of the Kul’Tiran zones (even if while leveling I was begrudging being on Kul’Tiras at all).
I definitely think the whole “human potential” thing is overblown, especially since the line didn’t even make it to the live game. But even I was bothered by all the questing in 8.0. I was upset we had to spend our time fixing Kul’Tiras and Jaina’s problems instead of helping the Night Elves (with hindsight, this probably could have easily been resolved by switching the release of the Arathi Warfront and the Darkshore Warfront, but that obviously isn’t something that could have just happened given gameplay design time and workflow. But in an ideal world where we could jusyt snap our fingers, that would have been better).
But the intial Alliance War Campaign quests were even worse. Night Elves weren’t seen at all except to die to make the San’layn look threatening, while Rambo got to live, and then to add insult to injury, Wyrmbane then said that avenging Shandris’ sisters in arms was not a priority because we were going after Gallywix instead, only for it to be based on bad intel and it not be Gallywix at all.
This was really bad for two reasons: First of all, before this we had a quest where Wyrmbane was trying to take out some targets in an overly elaborate plan and Shandris instead just takes the targets out efficiently while Wyrmbane flounders around, so for Wyrmbane to mess things up again left a feeling of “Why is this chump in charge?” But secondly, and more importantly, the War of the Thorns happened entirely because of bad SI:7 intel, and so avenging Night Elves being brushed aside based on more bad SI:7 intel was salt on an open wound.
But that was 8.0. To answer your question, what we want taking Darkshore back, and the success or failure (Edit: Who am I kidding? We only want success) of that based solely on Night Elf leadership.
I think the saying goes something like, “More dangerous than a wise enemy is a stupid ally.”
You might also have remembered that Malfurion sacrificed the bulk of Night Elf power at Hyjal in order to destory Archimonde in what seems to have been a very permmanent destruction because he hasn’t been seen since.
To preserve the Night Elf race in the way you seem to want it would have meant that they could not have been player characters. And that would have been an extremely wrong move for Blizzard to take.
And I take contention with your assertation that the Night Elves have been useless hobbled etc since then. The Night Elves got virtually their entire pantheon brought back to life in Cataclysm, and Jarod Shadowsong was pretty much the co-factional leader of the military side of the anti-Deathwing effort. He also played a key role in Legion and he does so in the Darkshore Warfront as well. Shandris Feathermoon hasn’t been exactly sitting on her hands either and we got new Night Elf character in the Warfront and a somewhat lesser Night Elf just made herself the key figure in the advancement of Alliance leather working. (I wonder who is motivating Horde leatherworkers now)
The Night Elves in WC3 for all their power were really just pretty Trolls with a bit more magic, in their xenophobia. Being part of the Alliance lets them expand beyond that cardboard cutout role.
![:smiley:](https://d38bqls1q93fod.cloudfront.net/en/wow/images/emoji/twitter/smiley.png?v=6" ":smiley:")