Minor spoilers.
I’ve played through the Pandaren starting experience more times than I can count, and I have always found it pretty obvious that Aysa Cloudsinger was absolutely wrong in both her arguments at the end of the chain, and badgering Ji the entire time after he saved everyone.
Even today after a decade or more, no alternative has been presented. Had her advice been followed, everybody dies pretty horribly, including the turtle.
What makes it so weird is, literally nothing bad happened. Shen-zin Su got healed up as good as could ever have been expected, and nobody died or was even harmed by his choice. Yet somehow Ji becomes enough of a pariah he felt he needed to leave his home?
Ultimately the story of the Wandering Isle was intended to convey the need for balance between both philosophies, but it didn’t quite manage that because in this particular situation the time to act really was NOW.
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Ji has an advantage. A quick survey of Orgrimmar will reveal the truth. There’s two Ji Firepaws that we know of. Possibly more. One hangs out by the Pandaren hot air balloon and one is in the allied race embassy.
I suspect a Council of Ji’s scenario. A kabaal of clandestine Ji Firepaws that meet and decide the fate of Shen-zin Su and beyond.
What hope did Aysa have against that? What hope do any of us have.
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What if he was secretly behind it all along? You can’t spell Jailer without Ji.
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If this is anything like the Council of Ricks we’re all doomed.
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We’re through the looking glass here, people.
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It was indeed reckless and it could have gone wrong. Nobody knew if the healers would be able to heal such a massive wound.
But he took the gamble.
You’re right, there was no alternative given either. Slowly excavate the wreckage?
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Ji only did nothing wrong because his plan worked.
Imagine the turtle had died.
First of all, the turtle dies. That is sad.
Then it sinks, and all the Pandas who live in the turtle die too.
Along with all the Jinyu, the Virmen, etc.
The alternative was to basically do turtle surgery. Remove the ship piece by piece while healing the turtle. It would have taken longer, but it would have been safer.
There’s a reason we usually don’t use explosives in surgery, it’s likely to do more harm than good lol
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Usually implies that there’s a use case for pyrotechnics in surgery … which is news to me. I’m not hatin’ – generally, I’m a fan of explodium in all its forms – just surprised. Still, I can imagine the scene…
“Nurse, give me ten micrograms of C-4.”
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As best as we can tell, the turtle was circling the proverbial drain of the maelstrom and there wasn’t time to go slow. Unfortunately Blizz seems to have 404ed the zones page which is cited by all the wikis to confirm this.
It was imperative to restore the Turtle’s ability to steer itself as quickly as possible to avoid that, so there wasn’t time to take it slowly.
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Goblins use explosives in surgery all the time. What better way is there to open up a body? It’s just so time efficient, and as we all know, time is money.
Yeah, sure, sometimes the patient explodes a little too hard. But then we get to pick through the remains for any undamaged organs, spare limbs to sew onto the patients that explode only slightly too hard, etc.
Plus their wallets. They don’t need it or its contents anymore. Or anything at their house. Or in their bank account. Really, why wouldn’t you use explosives in surgery?
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The patient is the size of an entire Island. Changes things a bit.
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Even then, there are solutions to that.
For instance, Dalaran is a flying city. Jaina’s ship is a flying ship. Mages can make things fly. Couldn’t all those Mages in there just join together and float the turtle somewhere safe?
The reality is that both characters lacked something. While Aysa lacked the sense of urgency to find a safe solution fast, Ji lacked the good sense to look for a safe solution at all.
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The god-tier mages of the Kirin-tor make cities teleport with a lot of prep work. The garden variety isn’t moving an entire zone on short notice, or probably at all. Could they have pulled the thorn out? Possibly. I am not sure how many mages were actually present on the Skyseeker
Yeah, taking my bias out for a second, when playing the Zone I went “I agree completely with Ji here, should we just wait for the Turtle to die?”.
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Context notwithstanding, the title could be changed to ‘Ji Firepaw did nothing…for 12 years…and counting’
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Welcome to philosophy:
Do you choose unwise action that can lead to greater benefits but risks everything, or do you choose wise inaction to make a less risky plan of action but the inaction itself risks everything?
Neither did anything wrong, because neither did anything right either. It is a question of action versus inaction, and that’s always a contextual question. It is entirely possible that Shen-zin Su could’ve been healed over a longer time with no scar or blood trees growing on his shell. Would that have been better? Impossible to say.
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If you are removing a giant spear from a dragon, it is best to heat the metal tip until slightly molten and yank out quickly and swiftly.
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Aysa wanting a different path I can understand. At times, her path works better. I don’t think this would have been one of those times though.
And it’s not like he did it unilaterally. She was there. She let him do it, acquiescing to his chosen course. I won’t say they had a complete consensus, but if she really thought it would kill the turtle she could have tried stopping him.
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Even if we consider that it would be impossible to float the whole turtle, there are still possibilities.
The turtle wasn’t sinking, which means it still had some ability to swim, it just wasn’t able to escape the maelstrom.
Maybe the Priests and Druids could have soothed the turtle’s pain so it would be able to swim while hurt.
Maybe the Shamans could have reinforced all those rocks around the Maelstrom so they would stop the turtle from falling into Deepholme.
Maybe the mages wouldn’t be able to move the turtle on their own, but they could work with the turtle and help it move itself by pushing it on the right direction.
The point is: There are infinite ways to solve every problem. Ji took the first way he saw, and it was really reckless.
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