Is the World of Warcraft story anti-justice?

Between all these “revenge is bad” stories, letting edgier characters escape punishment for their crimes and being contrarians attacking everything even vaguely resembling objective morality in their setting, it feels like Blizzard is saying “justice is bad”.

Think about it, there’s all these stories in Warcraft about people seeking to take down those who’ve wrong them (eg; Genn, Tyrande, many minor characters) where the person seeking to hurt someone who’s done wrong is treated as in the wrong. While there’s a valid point to being against revenge, in a lot of these cases the ones who’ve done wrong that someone else is hunting them down for need to answer for those crimes. For example, Arthas deserved punishment for his crimes, and Garrosh deserved punishment for his.

While forgiveness is good, Blizzard’s use of it in the story is hit and miss, a prime example of this is the Draenei. During Velen and Kil’jaeden’s last meeting in “Legion”, Velen is implied to have forgiven Kil’jaeden, despite Kil’jaeden showing no remorse or desire to atone for his many, many crimes before he dies (not even a “sorry for trying to genocide the Draenei” or a “sorry for what I did to your son” to Velen). On AU Draenor, in WoD, Yrel and the AU Draenei forgave the Orcs of the Iron Horde despite them showing no remorse or desire to atone and no punishments for the Orcs (if the Mag’har recruitment scenario is to be believed). Another example is Garrosh’s trial after Mists of Pandaria; despite showing no remorse for his crimes, doubling down on them and having done plenty to earn execution… SPOILERS, at the end of the book, we learn the August Celestials not only planned to let him off the hook despite all the harm he wrought… they used Garrosh’s trial to test the character of everyone else there; I think everyone there had already proved themselves for better or worse.

There’s a clear pattern of characters being spared the consequences of their actions without having to make it up to their victims or be punished. While there’s many examples, look how often two of Warcraft’s biggest edgelords - Illidan and Sylvanas - keep escaping punishment for their actions.

Illidan keeps being freed, he keeps getting blocked from having others restrain his actions and even his Illidari were freed (while they were fighting the Legion, they’d done alot of harm on the way that earned them punishment). Illidan even killed a naaru in front of a literal army of her followers (there’s a difference between self-defense and excessive force, despite what Illidan fans say) and the only consequence he suffers - if even that - is one of them cutting his hand.

As for Sylvanas, she commits a terrorist attack burning down a city full of people and tons of other war crimes when others have been sentenced to death for less. But Sylvanas not only keeps escaping punishment - especially from past victims of hers, she has thicker plot armor than a 40k space marine special character and the story keeps hinting her actions are justified despite them clearly being for selfish gain.

This all culminates in Shadowlands, where the cosmic justice system for mortals - where all actions are judged after death - is not only broken at the moment, the story keeps suggesting it’s wrong. While Blizzard keeps kicking the can down the road by setting up one question after answering another about the cosmology, the recurring theme is that the way things are doesn’t work, but no one presents a better method.

So between Blizzard’s overused “revenge is bad” stories, letting certain characters get away with their crimes, their pre-WoD aversion to redemption story arcs, making the settings’ final justice system as flawed and broken AND an almost total aversion to anything even vaguely resembling objective morality (the closest I’ve seen to any objective morality is ill-defined allusions to the Seven deadly sins in Revendreth), I think the story is being written to attack the concept of justice and/or being written by people who dislike the concept of justice.

I’m not looking for personal revelations in the story, I’m criticizing its apparent opposition to justice.

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No, it’s saying “an eye for an eye will only make the whole world blind.”

I mean, it’s not a shock that venegence is framed as bad in Shadowlands when we had a whole Uther story and Warbringer on how venegence is not the same thing as justice.

Blizzard IS saying “Vengeance is bad.” not justice.

  1. Justice involves the concepts of moral rightness, while revenge focuses more on a personal vendetta. 2. Justice is observed by the courts of law, while revenge is ‘enforced’ by an individual seeking retribution for a wrongdoing.

I hope Tyrande gets justice, but I don’t think Elune did a bad thing by stopping Tyrande from taking vengence. Sylvanas is owed justice too for some things that happened to her. She too was denied vengence towards Arthas. This feels like the story just coming full circle in a way.

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Did you read everything else I said before that part?

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First off, if you’re looking to World of Warcraft for any sort of deep philosophical revelations…don’t. This game’s story is, at best, on par with 80’s pulp action cinema. You’re not going to find any kind of big, meaningful messages about the world here.

Secondly, I don’t think the story is letting a lot of these characters off the hook. I think it’s usually more of a “Getting revenge can wait, a universe-ending army of demons is right over there” kind of situation, or else they just haven’t managed to catch up with them. Just because particular characters are obsessed with forgiving the sociopaths of Azeroth doesn’t make them right.

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What things is Sylvanas still owed justice for? Arthas was thrown into the Maw and we’ve killed many of those, if not everyone, involved in the ravaging of Quel’thalas (in fact, we’ll be putting Kel’thuzad down once and for all before we reach Sylvanas… and funnily enough, we don’t see Sylvanas objecting to the Jailer’s employment of Kel’thuzad).

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maybe she does, we really have no idea why she decided to side with the Jailer or Kel’thuzad at all. It makes NO SENSE why she would willingly align herself with the Jailer who is responsible for everything that happened to her.

Maybe she’s there to stop the Jailer. Maybe that’s her whole purpose and why Elune wants her alive. We have no idea why Elune decided to spare Sylvanas.

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Kel’thuzad in particular rankles; bringing him back was one of the two reasons Arthas and the Scourge attacked Quel’thalas and Kel’thuzad actively helped with that by giving Arthas advice as a ghost. You’d think Sylvanas might have learned of his role in that.

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but lets be real how much knowledge did Sylvanas have of that? did Arthas bring her into the team Scourge huddle and tell her his plans to raise his lich friend who only he could see?

Kel’thuzad is probably the lowest on Sylvanas’s hit list. Actually there’s the Ashbringer comic that suggest that either she or Varimathras may have been working with Kel’thuzad in WoLK and that’s how they got the blight/plauge they used in the Wrathgate. A “forsaken” was seen sneaking the recipe out of Naxxramas.

I guess we will know soon enough how far back Sylvanas’s plans go and what they have lead to.

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Saying the World of Warcraft story is anti-justice implies it HAS a message, rather than being a collection of darts randomly thrown against and idea board to see what sticks. The result has been a teetering pile of desperate directionless flailing loaded with retcons to help prop it up.

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Blizzard’s morality lessons as told through WoW are utterly deranged.

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I’m thinking Sylvanas could’ve learned about that after it happened. Between when she was raised to serve the Scourge and after escaping Arthas and the Lich King’s control, Sylvanas had ample time to interact with both Arthas and Kel’thuzad.

yeah but after she was dead what’s the point? she was already being forced to work with Arthas and Kel’thuzad. I could maybe see her having issues about Kel’thuzad not letting her kill Arthas in Lordaeron. Who knows she may yet pull the Uno reverse card and finally get her revenge on Kel’thuzad and the Jailer in the raid. She’s a duplicitous character by nature it’s hard to tell who her true allies are.

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Only if you think justice and revenge are always the same thing.

The devs clearly don’t think so, but they’re also not good at explaining where the dividing line is.

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I am pretty sure its more like there are more important things than revenge and maybe even justice. As an example, Varian/Genn let Zaela/Sylvanas free because they would have rather save Jaina/save his people even if it meant they escaped!

In Zaela case, Varian was even thinking others would stop her, or not. But someone needed his help more than he need to kill.

That is not the interpretation I got. It was more like he lamented that his old friend took the path he did. They were friends a very long time ago and that he at least didn’t enjoy seeing him suffer and was more “the deed is done”.

Illidan was killed by us heroes/put in static. He was also physically beaten up by all us in the Black Temple. And now he is just as much a prisoner as Sargeras, forever guarding him.

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Thadus, I have come to understand that you are Catholic. But not understanding why Velen could forgive Kil’jaden is very un-catholic. Catholicism is all about forgiving your enemy and turning the other cheek. I don’t want to make assumptions about you but I do question where you are learning religion and how maybe you are following a church that twists Catholic teachings into fire and brimstone.

Not that it’s wrong, but you have a take about religion that is all about punishing evil and not anything else in the faith. Velen’s faith in the Light and his willingness to forgive others as well as himself, for making bad decisions, is actually a pretty good take on Catholicsm.

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Not getting “justice” isn’t exactly a new for Warcraft just ask the blood elves, forsaken or, orcs.

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Maybe for some, but mostly only applicable for christians. Catholicsm is old testament eye for an eye and tooth for a tooth.

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War is about a lot of things, but justice is only one of them, and only on occasion.

WoW is hardly anti-justice, though. Heck, the first thing we get out of WC3’s story is that Justics is good- Uther and Arthas are defending Lordaeron, and killing the invaders who are slaughtering and sacrificing their people. Justice only becomes bad when you make it about yourself, or you let hatred for your enemy fester.

What Xe’ra was doing was invasive in a creepy way. It’s no wonder why everyone let him off the hook, just look at that cutscene.

In the case of Genn’s “justice” against Sylvanas- he prioritized his personal vendetta above the defense of Azeroth by instigating hostilities between the Horde and Alliance during the Legion invasion. That definitely falls under “vengeance”.

Tyrande’s story is different- she is like Rastakhan. In the raid, Rastakhan was… less than reverent towards Bwonsamdi, and paid the price. In the same fashion, Tyrande says outright “I demand this power, or you are not our deity anymore”, which is presumptuous and shows that she places more value in getting vengeance her own way, rather than seeking council and thinking things through and trusting that justice will eventually be served.

Just like how they’re showing that Uther- when he fell to Arthas, he was not following the virtues in that confrontation. He is absolutely pissed at Arthas, and is more concerned about hurting Arthas back personally, than actually executing justice.

I don’t even think Anduin was truly pursuing Sylvanas in the name of justice. He was getting personal revenge because she ruined his idealized vision of peace between humanity and the Forsaken. He had condemned her long before Teldrassil.

It’s like Sylvanas has said from the beginning. They are all lashing out at her in pain, and forgetting who they are in the process, and that is why they continue to lose.

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Try mid-90’s super edgelord comics. You know, where the “hero” is a psychopath monster that’s a villain in all sense of the word. But slap this “anti-hero” label on them while ignoring the actual definition of the term, and throw in so cringe one-liners by people who watched too much Buffy growing up and you got a recipe for WoW.

It also explains why the Alliance as a faction is such a spineless pushover as well as Blizzard’s reluctance to put in any effort writing for them.

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Omgggg who CARES? It’s a VIDEO GAME.

It is not. That. Serious.

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