I seem to be in a heated agreement with Curse over Stormheim being one of numerous justifications characters other than Sylvanas use for the war. Our difference of opinion seems to come in somewhere around my using Genn and his actions in Stormheim interchangeably within the context of the question “Why must Saurfang go to war?” - because Curse seems to think Genn has committed more catalyzing actions, and that Saurfang recognizes whatever those actions may be as the root cause sending him to war.
Nope! Deliberate. We agree very much that Stormheim was a drop in the bucket. An Azerothian tuesday.
Like I said. The disagreement seems to be that you think Genn has done more. And that Saurfang believes whatever those things may be are why he “must” go to war.
A commander of one of 2 Factions going rogue and circumventing orders, attempting to assassinate the leader of the other Faction is not typical. I can not think of something like it happening since the third war and founding of Orgrimmar.
Especially after the two leaders of the two factions just fought back to back and died.
I would go back to Garona to think of anything close, and I don’t blame Sylvanas or Genn for that.
We will agree to disagree cause if Sylvanas/Garrosh had stayed out of Gilneas Genn would never had been a problem cause a blood feud never would have started. Everything Genn does to the horde is a direct result of those two starting the entire thing.
Genn has reason to hate the Horde in general and Sylvanas personally and the Horde and Sylvanas have earned that hatred. Long since past time for them to acknowledge their responsibility for their actions.
If Stormheim is one action among many, as you say. And Saurfang believes those many actions are cause for war. Name them. Citation needed.
So far the closest you’ve come to describing these “many” other acts of transgression is here:
You assert Saurfang has more in mind than the one action he thinks of in that scene. Name them. Because what I see in this scene is a warmongering monster disingenuously convincing Saurfang there’s more reasons than just the spinal fluid from Stormwind’s unborn fetuses she’s unilaterally decided the Horde will go to war over.
Genn was a non-factor in the dispute between the Alliance and Thrall’s remake of the Horde. After the second war he walled off his kingdom and stayed behind his wall (with mixed results). He and Gilneas stayed out of WC3, Vanilla, TBC, and WotLK. It isn’t until the forsaken invasion that he gets involved and the feud gets started.
Kinda like how the Alliance is blamed for the Goblins joining the Horde, Zanadalar Trolls joining the Horde, and Nightborne joining the horde. Highmountain is the only one we aren’t blamed for?
BTW Do you even think Sylvanas even thinks in terms of if she hadn’t invaded Gilneas then Genn wouldn’t be out for revenge and thus wouldn’t have been in Stormheim to save Eyir from Sylvanas?
Or does she compartmentalize everything and thinks of Stormheim only as Stormheim and Gilneas as Gilneas with them being unrelated?
Uh the real world’s a knockin’ and that is not the truth. The United States history is built upon a mountain of innocents killed in their goal of divine providence and Manifest Destiny to mention perceived slights which demanded near extinction of those they deemed inferior. Not saying that vigilantic revenge isn’t wrong, but that’s sorta the American motto. Just think 9/11, remember the Alamo, remember the Maine, #Bostonstrong, Pearl Harbor, Custer’s Last Stand etc etc etc.
This narrative in World of Warcraft is largely written by Americans who have a historical bias as does the player base for might makes right approach to transgressions and to ultimately annihilate those who do not agree with them.
In WoW we have Remember Theramore, Taurajo, Teldrassil, Sacking of Stormwind, the Sunwell, Fall of Lordaeron versions 1 and 2, Southshore, Ambermill, Gilneas, etc etc etc. See how real history is reflected in our own stories.
What you are arguing against is the nature of what it means to be human or rather specifically American/ Euro-centric. History is written like this - The civilized races must end the savage ones because their savagery makes us mad and they’re inferior for whatever reason trolls, orcs, Indians, commies etc it’s the same story just different faces.
I agree here. But the thing is, that doesn’t speak a single word to vigilantism, which is what we were discussing. That’s demonization and dehumanization. While it’s true that those seeking revenge DO tend to demonize their targets to justify themselves and relieve cognitive dissonance, that doesn’t mean violence following/excused by demonization is revenge. I would also point out that even if it was revenge, it’s not vigilantism because it’s duly established policy of the state. Genn’s revenge in Stormheim effectively hijacked another state’s forces* in defiance of their standing orders. No state imprimatur there.
*In actuality, Genn was brought along by the commander of those forces who intended from the beginning to go beyond her orders, to help her in doing so.
Genn and Sky Admiral Rogers are cut from the same cloth. Both are victims of atrocities from people they see as monsters and in the narrative of WoW it’s hard to humanize Forsaken especially with current lore, but like you said,
This is how I see the lore, Greymane’s and Rogers’ vigilantism was justified in their minds just the same as Teddy Roosevelt’s even if their stated goals and their government’s stance on the issues was counter to this. It actually reminds me of the War of 1898 when the U.S.S Maine went to Cuba against the desire of Spain who ruled there. The US government’s faction who wanted to conquer Puerto Rico, Cuba and Spanish holdings in the Philippines etc created an incident which caused their ship to sink and lost American lives. They then used that reason to say, “Bad Spanish mongrel races!” Spain of course was against the war and offered condolences, but America blamed them for the loss and contrived a reason to begin a costly war which created a chain of events which we live with to this day…
Genn and Rogers did the same thing. They created the circumstances to force those within their government to declare war on an enemy they perceived as inferior both by race and culture to justify their utter annihilation. In this case instead of a neutral ally who had no history to justify such a war we have Sylvanas. Like the United States and its entry to Latin America and destruction of the Spanish Empire’s influence there we have the Horde/Zandalar representing the dying empire.
Like Spain in the Late 19th century, the Horde is weakened due to Civil War and several defeats by outside aggressors. From the thefts of Florida from Spain in this case the loss of Pandaria, as a Horde foothold, earlier in the century to the United States to losing many of it’s holdings and colonies to insurrection, civil war and outside forces. Sound familiar? Siege of Ogrimmar, losses in the Eastern Kingdoms.
Spain like the Horde was weakened and looked like an easy target. A contrived excuse was used to set the wheels in motion for a war. Similarly to the Spanish American War, the Horde’s leader reacted. Unlike the Spanish in the real world the Horde did have a leader who was actually up to no good, but the results are the same.
Escalation. Vigilante justice on the frontier. Murder of entire groups, but instead of the Alliance murdering most of the Horde’s forces and their people. The Horde responded by destroying Teldrassil. It would be equivalent to the War of 1812 when Britain sacked Washington DC and destroyed the White House.
In the game history we see a merging of our Real Life History into two to three major wars into our fictional Alliance-Horde War. We have a cruel despot i.e Sylvanas representing the beleaguered Horde and the “mongrel races” i.e in real life the Spanish (Forsaken), Native Americans (Tauren) and orcs/goblins (African, ethnic minorities), along with the Trolls (Mexico) think War of 1846 aka Mexican American War. The war America won North Mexico aka California, New Mexico, Texas, Arizona, Colorado, Montana and Nevada. In our game we see the Loss of Lordaeron for the Horde and the Siege of Zuldazar which is equivalent to the incursion American forces made right to Mexico City. Something Mexicans get so angry about.
I think you know how this story will end. Either an Armistice similar to World War 1 to the utter decimation of the Horde where pressure from outside forces and internal doubts cause insurrection and chaos within the Horde. I bet that Sylvanas will somehow keep her mantle as warchief. In spite overwhelming derision and desire by the Alliance and internal Horde forces who’d wish otherwise. Sorta like Saddam Hussein kept being president after the first Iraq War in the 1990s or Fidel Castro was expected to be usurped after the Cuban Missile Crisis of the 1960s. The Alliance forces will assume that she will somehow not keep power, and as such will stop short of deposing her outright expecting the Horde to do it for them. How did that work out in real life? Hmmmm
To be accurate what Sylvannas said that a war between the Horde and the Alliance was inevitable once the Alliance felt they had a secure enough military advantage.
From her statement it’s not about WANTING a war, but starting the next inevitable conflict on her terms, instead those of Anduin’s or the advisors like Genn who push him into one.
From her point of view the only way to prevent the Alliance from being a future threat to the Horde is to dismember it politically and her plan was to use Teldrassil to sow division between the Kal’dorei and the Worgen, using that wedge to put Anduin in an impossible position that would fracture the Alliance and force each state to negotiate a separate peace.
In some ways in others no. The Horde started a war and has been overal pretty complicit with the zombie elf’s actions thus far overall. But maybe the Alliance couldve assaulted another city?
It is hard for me to sympathize with many Alliance Posters and their complaints, when the Horde is in a constant state of chaos. The Alliance may have a stagnant, boring motif, but that makes it stable and consistent.
The Horde writing seems like stream of consciousness at a psych ward.
Yet, you make a point.
Thunder Bluff or Silvermoon make much more sense - but I suppose Darkshore and Arathi are bogging down any continental sieges on Capitals. And Anduin and Jaina might hope to make individual peaces with the Sindorei and and the Tauren.
Thunder Totem might be hard to establish a foothold if the Skyhorn have control of the air. Suramar’s strength is debatable - I have seen good points on both ends.
The naked aggression of invading Dazaralor , demanding Talanji, and killing Rastakahn doesn’t match up with how the Alliance let’s them mourn… If they wanted Talanji enough to invade, Rasta’s memorial service would be the place.
i disagree, they are attacking dazar’alor because of the golden fleet that is now under horde control. attacking thunder bluff or silvermoon won’t solve that problem
it sounds like genn only demands talanji as a hostage in the zandalari scout’s retelling of the situation. there is another set of voice lines where it is super similar to that but instead of demanding that they bow down to anduin as their new master and hand over talanji as a hostage, greymane simply asks rastakhan to surrender and when he doesn’t then we kill him
edit: here is the line,
king rastakhan of zandalar, on behalf of the alliance and king anduin wrynn, i hereby request your surrender
rastakhan refuses
so be it, heroes…you know what to do
here is the other line i suspect to be the hordes version from the scout they talk to
KING RASTAKHAN OF ZANDALAR, I ORDER YOU TO SUBMIT, YOU WILL BOW TO YOUR NEW MASTER, KING ANDUIN WRYNN AND YOU WILL DELIVER YOUR DAUGHTER TO US AS A HOSTAGE
rastakhan refuses
SO BE IT, HEROES OF THE ALLIANCE, STRIKE HIM DOWN, NO MERCY FOR THIS SAVAGE
they are both the same yet different. one is diplomatic while the other is aggressive. which is why i say one is the one alliance witness in real time, and the other is the horde scout’s retelling of the event especially since rastakhan only has one voice over where he refuses to surrender
Anduin and the Alliance could have taken a moment, just A moment, to try and open some dialogue with Talanji and figure out what she was looking for. They could have explained what Sylvanas did to Teldrassil which might have convinced Talanji that the Horde was untrustworthy and then they could have offered their assistance and denied the Horde a new ally. That would have put the Horde at a HUGE disadvantage as far as naval powers go.
Instead, they threw the trolls in a jail cell. Because…they’re trolls?
If you really want to fault what happens in Zandalar on anyone, fault it on another famous moment of incompetent Alliance diplomacy.
Of course if the Alliance was properly diplomatic would the Zandalar opted for the Horde as opposed to staying neutral (Zul not with standing).
There is also Talanji’s diplomatic inexperience showing as well since she was rolling around with Zul with all that happened under Zul in past x-pacs. Zul may well have been the target of the Alliance and Talanji just in the wrong place, wrong time.
Reminds me of the time Thrall showed up to have talks with Varian and Thrall brought along Garrosh and Rehgar. While Thrall likely didn’t know the history between Varian and Rehgar, there was no valid reason to bring a hothead like Garrosh along to diplomatic talks that had to be tenuous after Wrathgate.
Neither faction in this game has ever been a bastion of diplomatic excellence.
![:confused:](https://d38bqls1q93fod.cloudfront.net/en/wow/images/emoji/twitter/confused.png?v=6" ":confused:")