Jaina's Arc in BFA. Full circle or Properly Developed?

Here is the problem, the horde never has been in the right during the WoW era.
Sure, daelin attacking at the time he did was wrong. but that was WC3.
That doesn’t mean that the alliance is exactly “clean”.

But please, name me one instance of the alliance doing “bad things” that isn’t reacting to a previous horde action that was considerable worse to what the alliance does in return.
Even jaina killing some “innocents” in the purge of dala is literally reacting to a previous horde action when those sunreavers betrayed dalaran in two occassions and one of them being the one who destroyed her city.

Thinking a while back when we were fighting a common enemy the horde stab the alliance in the back like in the whratgate and the broken front of icc.
so apologies if i don’t see the horde actions in a sympathetic way.

What? i never said that this was right and i understand that helping their supposed enemies is bad, no one is denying that.
Of course that having your supposed enemy as your friend is wrong in a context of faction war when you are supposed to feel pride for your faction. Not being saved by your enemy. that must suck and i do sympatize with the feel.
sure as hell i remember it with thrall.

Because leaders are supposed to represent their people, the best and the worst of those who they lead. and it happens to be that sylvanas was the supreme leader of that faction meaning that all her actions can be easily attributed to the entire faction. considering that is the nature of the position.
And while it doesn’t make jaina exactly “good” at least she isn’t as rotten (put intended) as her apparent counterpart of the other faction.

i never once did this. not sure where you got the idea that i was advodcating for this.

well it happens that she didn’t exactly did the same things as the horde so she simply cannot apology for something that she didn’t do.
This idea that she, or the horde can be seen as the same level is simply wrong.

in any case, the ones who did a speech was anduin, not her.

What are you even talking about SHE SHOULN’T BE THEIR FRIENDS.

SHE IS NOT THE FRIEND OF THE HORDE PLAYER she is simply the friend of baine and thrall. why do you think that she should be portrayed like this in the first place’.

Not sure why is a ad-hominem attack i am not personally attacking anyone.

i never denied that horde side has valid complains, but i don’t agree some of their arguments such as “the alliance is as bad as the horde because hmm…camp taco…?”

Because the horde, with their warchief is supposed to be the entire horde.

So any action that the “horde” does is shared as whole because the “warchief” is the one who wants it.
there is a reason on why the position was removed, you know.

i don’t refer the alliance as the same way because is not ruled by just 1 person (in theory at least).

What exactly makes you think that i am saying an “alliance POV” as “how things are” are you willing to challenge the things i just said?

did i said something wrong? i am not correct when i say that the blizzard made the horde the villains that are actually in the wrong?

I didn’t said that their players don’t have valid complains, but the faction, in the story was written this way.

is not that “their opinion doesn’t matter” is just that blizzard, in the way they wrote the story simply portrayed the horde in the wrong, so what their players only can do is to try to justify their actions in the story as hard as possible to not get into their idea that their faction sucks. i do not blame them for it.

i blame blizzard for putting them and us into this position, nobody wants this.

well i think we all feel that they just don’t listen, how we can talk to them without crossing the line of harassment?.
they just probably don’t care.

we don’t really have any true evidence that it was she the one who orderes such attacks. and really, she, of all people starting an invasion of conquest for no reason?

apparently, he could not predict everything, hm?.
but just to be clear, i am all in for characters who makes mistakes. reason why such character shouln’t have died, but i am repeating myself. enough.

Not only this but also in the way their helped the horde during this war after the horde genocide .

Sure,you know who else had a lot for the world? The alliance, does that makes it okay?. i guess not. : p

Yes, i don’t seeing a will to actual even consider another point of view because it may taint your view over the facts.
you admited that you prefer ingame lore so in other words, is headcannon.
i do agree that retcons sucks but we can’t just ignore them.

i know what they said and i said that the nelfs and worgens aren’t exactly happy with it.

if arathi bringed something interesting to the table then sure but so far it only seems to be stormwind 2.0 with prettier buildings. Meh.

Fair enough.

well just to be clear i don’t really agree with the direction blizzard has been doing with the factions and where they remove any sigh of grey for the alliance because it only creates anger and frustration for not letting us actually strike back at the villains they created for us.

Fair enough.

i wish they listened where it actually matters, in darkshore when nelfs were switching sides for no reason.

well i am sorry if am a little at the defensive, but in my experience liking something about the alliance is apparently wrong, is instantly attacked and being laught at for liking it in the first place, one can get tired easily.

Oh i know the problem of generalizing but sadly my bad experiences with horde players are many, i know is wrong, i know that is not exactly ideal but like i said, it is just my experience and way to approach it.

Well no one is obligating anyone to reply me, i am not “baiting” for fun i just speak what i think is the thruth, nothing more. can i be wrong? of course.

Good day.

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Amusingly something that the Night Elves did for Varian.

She´s actually much MUCH worse, Ethel. Not because of her in-universe behaviour, but because of the consequences the way she´s written has on the overall narrative.

To put it simple, maybe if anyone else sans Golden would develop her from now onwards soimething from her character could be rescued; otherwise: not a chance in hell. That caricature of a character (cause her character development is so BAD it´s but a joke at this point -Jaina has a worse record than “merely a setback!!” Kael´thas meme wise if we look at her flip-flopping attitude towards the Horde; especially taking into account how UNREAL have been some of her reactions-) is merely the cheap-free famous vehicle for a mediocre writer to impart ethical education to her child, period.

At least Sylvanas became a massive self-insert lore black hole until Legion; I´ve had to SURVIVE Jaina and her badly written drama queen narrative SINCE THE END OF CATA FFS!!! I´m SICK of it!! I´m so sick I frankly lost any ounce of sympathy I could had ever had for her story!!

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She Isn’t a bad person in comparison to really any horde comparison. i agreeHer writing has been atrocious and the writing of Golden makes me cringe every time she makes jania slip back into forgiving the horde in everyone of her books and now the ingame writing.

Honestly she is a ruined character that doesn’t make a lick of sense anymore. As much as I loved warmonger Jaina it would be worst to change her again to that rather than just killing her off and replacing her with someone else.

if that is your opinion, totally fair.

But that is not what i am discussing, you can have whatever opinion you want about the character, but when people say that she is in-universe as bad as sylvanas due to her actions. or that the alliance is as bad as the horde those people are simply wrong.

you cannot blame me for feeling more justified with my faction and their characters or for keep liking it, like hell i wouln’t have buyed the expansion if it wasn’t for her. because i truly detest faction war for what hate does to me.

i understand if it cause frustration on horde players after what blizzard did with yet another evil warchief and making jaina not really their enemy but rather their victim that is actually willing to help to get rid of said warchief due to baine/thrall.

But you cannot blame ally players either for pointing out when the horde, as a story faction is wrong. and by extention, the alliance “in the right” including the characters.

i wish we could had this expansion without involving the other faction and i bet that we all would be far more happy because you actually deal with your own faction. But sadly, i don’t control the story.

Well i disagree, i think that both of them needed a new direction after arthas was dead and they didn’t really had much story left anymore. (and they didn’t participated much on it either)
So if started somewhere, it was at the begginning of cata.

Funny, i feel the exact same about the horde.
i do get the feel because at some point in time i had enough of having to deal with the horde atrocities who left unpunished for no other reason than plot armor, if jaina is a poison to the narrative, imagine the entire horde faction that is composed by far more characters.

i am so sick of it that i lost any sort of sympathy that i could ever had for said faction.
but i always try to have sympathy for their players, even if it doesn’t seem like it. :slightly_smiling_face:.

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I am conflicted on this one. I really thought the past issues and guilt that she broke free of to become the Lord admiral and unite Kultiras again as fantastic.
Then there was this rush to end the faction conflict in 8.2 and 8.2.5. I think that Felt like a forced 180 on the resolved character she had become.

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Is it really so unbelievable that people might flip flop? Especially when new traumatic information is given to then. If there was a character I would compare her to, it would be Steven Universe. A person who has always tried to do the right thing even though the right thing has probably caused a boat load of trauma. Using him as an example, he could end up being sweet and well meaning(even though he might cause more harm then good) and suddenly turn into a roid raged filled person.

In the part of the post where you say…

You cover most of my points in this thread close enough that it doesn’t matter. Though I disagree on you confidence on what Blizzard intends to do with Jaina.

There is also a lot of irrelevant stuff. The idea that the Horde has always been evil or always been wrong it one that a lot of players don’t share. The same is true of the “Jaina did nothing wrong” and “killing shopkeepers was justified” comments. Taking the stance that such arguments don’t exist doesn’t seem to serve any purprose other than bait for some long thread repeating the old arguments.

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She needed some statement on how her new view of the conflict between the factions is different than her “they all deserve to die” phase. Some rejection of it. Instead, Blizzard has her deal with her conflict with her father and then pretend everything since then didn’t happen.

I mean, I can understand that Blizzard had realized what a load of “Bull Trash” BfA was and was quick to get out of it. But it would only have taken one short cut scene.

The only thing i did is to pay attention to what blizzard has been doing.
While of course is all open to interpretation is clear to me the direction they went in. or at least, what they tried to do. and i base my opinion knowing exactly what they did before in the story and what it has been presented ingame and the novels.

i don’t agree with people who says “lul she just changed for thrall arms” ignoring everything blizzard has been doing before it. like, even in this same thread people think that she went to “peace mode” right at the end of Dazar’azlor and that is simply not true.

i am not trying to bait anyone when i speak what is my opinion. you are feel to agree or disagree with me. so far nobody has been able to change my mind when they present weak arguments such as “jaina is evil and must die!.. because… hmm she killed 5 belfs that one time that we betrayed her again to get a superweapon!.”

Yes ignoring that in the thros questline we do have a mention to what happened in the purge with she being lectured by rhonin how she let her emotions take the control and being tortured by her guilt.

Right before baine returns derek in theramore she says that is not the first time that is wondering if she is becoming her father, after then is when she actually seems to be more calm after what baine did for her following with her dialogue with thrall where she admits that is not innocent either.

While sure, blizzard presentation could be better and it certainly felt rushed, to me is pretty clear what they tried to do.

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Indeed the problem is not the character reactions per se, is how the narrative warps itself to justify the choices Jaina makes (cause just like with Anduin, she HAS TO be in the right, no chance in her making a mistake -and if she makes a mistake (see: ToW), good luck trying to get an aknowledgment in the narrative of this fact and pointing her responsability on the disaster caused.

Man, making Jaina forgive the traumatic events regaring Theramore (that btw don´t excuse her responsability regarding those events) just thanks to her dragon boyfriend threatening to leave her without her D regular intake was humiliating from a woman perspective. That´s the caliber of the bad writting Golden imparts on Jaina -she doesn´t even act with some modicum of coherence-.

Not wrong, probably blind, stupid or both. The fact the writers since Cata heavily favor an absolute “Morally White Knight” trope regarding the Alliance and it´s characters is old news. You will NEVER EVER get aknowledgment from actual morally gray / crimical actions taken by the Alliance against the Horde (those are either ignored like the culling of the Stonespire or retconned with villain batting involving the victims like the Sunreavers in BfA).

Sorry man, I´ll NEVER consider Jaina a victim simple for the FACT she let her city be used as a military asset in a war unrelated to her while she tried to play the neutral card. That´s not how things work, you can´t enter a fight and then complain someone broke your nose.

As a matter of fact this is precisely why I DESPISE her character. Cause it´s misused to sell the “Big Bad Horde Full of Eviul Warmongering Idiots Attacking Poor Wittle Innocents” while ignoring her own blame and responsability on this narrative. Literally NOBODY in-universe has had the pants to call her on this.

She´s a tool to sell Kindergarden worthy moralistic BS and worse of all a cancerous one that literally cauises the destruction of other character´s portrayal to achieve this (see: Aethas), period.

Absolutely unless the individual is aknowledged has having clear and diagnosed mental sickness (her post Theramore behaviour -and no, not the one regarding the homicidal rage. That one was coherent and understandable to a point if we ignore her hypocritical double standards- is worthy of a psychopath).

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i don’t think that it was really used the “neutral” card, because theramore was an alliance city since vainilla, but rather that she did tried that both factions stopped fighting like idiots so i think the frustration comes from that part, that all what she did was for nothing. and then she basically admits her own blame for it. something that until recently she wasn’t accepting. that is also why she is not into daelin mode.

now of course i don’t expect you to see it that way due to you status as horde players but that is how i think blizzard more or less tried to do and like i said, your opinion is valid.

i guess that the sunreaver dude in the baine rescue doesn’t exist.

Blizzard always has been clear that the alliance is supposed to be the morally “right” faction. And that, in fact, the alliance having the “moralhighground” is intended.
like, you see? it makes you angry, it means that blizzard succeded in making you hating the other faction and/or their characters.

A job well done, Can you believe it? they actually did something right.

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Its not like WoW has pyschologists to prove it one way or another. But yes, Jaina does exhibit PTSD.
The entire point of her arch was to show her healing slowly from all the trauma she has had to experience over the years.

Not a pyschopath, just a person victimized by the Horde.

The difference is Majority of posters aren’t arguing that Horde isn’t ruined. The writing for this faction was artocious with few exceptions like Zandalari content. It made as much Horde players uncomfortable and plenty wished they had been portrayed in better way.
There is very little to defend on Horde side, the only parts where I felt it’s old spirit was captured was when I was Interacting with the likes of Lasan, Rokhan and Eitrigg. And these are B-tier characters at best.

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Almost all of the above happened because Thrall abandoned his duties as War-Chief handing them off to someone clearly not mentally or otherwise qualified out of sentimentality. He rightly deserves that blame. At the time he makes that confession though, he hadn’t been “the leader of the Horde” for years by his own action.

You miss the point. Blizzard is also retconing the Horde as the objective bad guys in the last war. If the Horde hadn’t been in the wrong, there would be no blame for Thrall to take responsibility for.

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Actually Blizzard seems to have dumped all the guilt on Sylvannas. The Horde was merely “misled”.

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What are you talking about? What “villainous” direction?? LMAO.

The conversation started due to that reason.
i am not going to agree that the horde should kill alliance characters because “they are ruined, they ruin my experience” because the only thing that it will do is push me to the other extreme of thinking that the horde existence is a problem because they ruin mine.

and certaintly why at this point my simpathy for said faction was burned the same way teldrassil was.
i am sorry for their players, i truly do. but the horde as a story faction is as much of a problem like jaina for some people.

We cannot repair the damage. not us, the players at least.

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But then they go an add in those speaches to make sure everyone sees them as the bad guys from the beginning. So that the best they can claim is that they helped in common threats (which have been, for a while now, tagging along with leaders form Alliance lore) and dups of evil character that came out of their ranks.

So much for faction pride.

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