Justice For The Witherbark

Lore Story Forum
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Are you seriously debating that parasytes non native from Azeroth(which their main goal was to corrupt said planet) has rights to stay only to fight against the fact Amani got their land stolen from humans?

Seriously dude sometimes I wonder what kind of values you have.

No, they didn’t even finish the job even. They went off for millennia and the Trolls had to beat them back from raising in the Aqir Wars while most of the titanforged contructs and Keepers were already broken by Loken betrayal or in some particular case the death of the Pantheon.

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I think it’s worth noting too that the Trolls are not some long forgotten/extinct race that abandoned their territory. This isn’t ancient history. This is still going on.

Most every inch of land given up by trolls in Azeroth has been because some other race moved in, the local troll tribes said “No, go away”, and the other races then proceeded to simply kill any trolls that stood in their way until they had enough breathing room in order to settle the land anyway. And the local troll tribes have never accepted it, as evident by the thousands of years of near endless border skirmishes and raids as humans/elves continued to expand.

Trolls have been fighting their eradication and displacement every single step of the way and are still actively being killed and still actively losing territory.

And no, they aren’t the only ones. Quillboar, Centaurs, and other peoples in Azeroth are in a similar boat.

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I was talking with Frank about how cool it would have been if instead of WoD we got The Mongrel Horde, where Garrosh after escaping united the Gnolls, Murlocs, Quilboar etc.

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With axes and fire. I doubt any actual words were said. Trolls typically just kill first, ask questions later when their Witch Doctors rip the souls of their fallen enemies from the Shadowlands to answer questions and possibly become their personal slaves waiting for them in the afterlife.

Interestingly, when the Trolls engaged in diplomatic pursuits with other races, they tend to really flourish. The Darkspear went from zero’s to one of the strongest remaining tribes in the world. The Amani had been reduced to nothing by the High Elves and Humans, but made great headway during the Second War thanks to the aid of the Orcs. The Zandalari were at risk of losing everything until the Horde came along, and now that they’ve allied with the Horde, they’re getting the support needed to remain the top troll civilization.

I’m not saying there ISN’T hatred and prejudice on the Alliance side of this, mind you. Simply that the vast majority of Trolls on the planet made their bed a long time ago and they’ve been forced to sleep in it since. It’s only through the arrival of outside races they’ve even had the opportunity to pursue another path and, ultimately benefit from it.

The Horde may well have saved Trolls from eventual extinction, and most importantly, from themselves.

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According to history told by the filthy Humans who we know are liars.

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Actually I was going by some old vanilla-era Horde quests involving Yenniku, the son of Vol’jin, and how the Witch Doctor had you killing trolls to interrogate their spirits after the fact. Something about skulls and a cauldron. It’s been a while since I’ve done the quests, mostly because I never could get into Horde too much, but I do distinctly remember it because when Bwonsamdi was revealed as the Darkspear Patron Loa, it kind of made sense the Darkspear Witch Doctors could mess with souls like that.

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Even ignoring the absolute absurdity of there being absolutely 100% no verbal exchanges in any way shape or form between any troll and any member of any race- do you think a sternly worded letter or statement is going to get determined invader to accept that they are forbidden from and not welcome on any particular piece of land?

The trolls respond with axes and fire and are met with pretty much near eradication so long as they continue sitting on a patch of land others want.

The Darkspear joined the Horde, who went on to conquer lands and wipe out peoples on Kalimdor and Eastern Kingdoms- and made to feel terrible about it. Although in order to do so, they had to give up a bunch of traditions and self determination.

The Zandalari actually seem to have accepted Vulpera and Tortollans living on their island, although they do so “by the grace” of the Zandalari. The Zandalari have, however, made it clear that they will not tolerate any infringement on their sovereignty by the Horde. Talanji doesn’t hang out in Orgrimmar like other leaders. Their forces even seem to operate independently of the Horde’s forces, rather than as a part of it.

And no, it’s not just the Alliance either. It’s just mostly them when it comes to trolls because all the troll tribes exist in what’s now the Eastern Kingdoms, which is where the Human, Dwarven, and Elven cultures flourished. But as mentioned before, Thrall was all too eager to throw them under the bus, and Horde forces also join in when it comes to driving trolls out of Arathi. Blood Elves and Qul’thas became part of the Horde, and they still fight with the Amani over the territory they took centuries earlier.

There’s also Stranglethorn Vale, where Horde, Alliance, the Steamwheedle Cartel, Venture Company, and Pirates have moved in to settle/exploit the region for its resources, defile ruins, and slaughter the local troll tribes whenever they get in their way.

Zul’aman has been covered.

It’s not that various troll tribes don’t have anything to gain by allying with outsiders or inviting them to settle amongst them. But in instances when they clearly don’t want to, it’s not unreasonable that they’d want that to be respected on some level and aren’t monsters for it. They certainly aren’t deserving of being slaughtered and pushed off their land and treated like nuisances.

But the game rarely ever frames it as such.

The Horde does some introspection. There, trolls are more likely to show up as something more than monsters and loot pinatas and the game kind of sometimes explore the consequences of this. Being a troll and fighting other troll tribes over territory and troll matters also has a different context compared to being a troll and fighting night elves or humans over territory.

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For a reason, maybe? Trolls have been portrayed as violent, sadistic, and vile peoples who have a superiority complex because their race once, long ago, ruled the entire world. The only sympathetic trolls are, interestingly, the ones whom choose to engage in diplomacy, and it works for them.

I’d say an interesting in-lore parallel is the Night Elves. When the Horde and Alliance pushed into Ashenvale, the Night Elves attacked first, did not walk up to them and say, “Hey, this is our land, I’m sure you feel you have a good reason to be here, but we’re going to have to ask you to leave.”

Despite the above, the Night Elves ended up joining the Alliance. If circumstances had been tweaked, maybe they’d have even joined the Horde.

We have examples of what happens when people use diplomacy, and it tends to work out well for them. We have examples of what happens when people just attack indiscriminately, and it tends to end badly for them.

If the Lore has done anything regarding Trolls, it’s to paint them as the sort who don’t care for diplomacy, and would sooner settle territorial disputes with an axe.

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Well except for when they aren’t. They’re only really particularly violent, sadistic, and vile when they’re in opposition to the player character. Yeah, it’s no surprise that when they’re intended to be subservient/allies, that the stuff that was once so scary about them is now cool. It’s not like Zandalari are any less haughty or pragmatic or fierce.

But think about that. There are so many other races that don’t get wildly flipfloped like that. There are times when you fight humans, and night elves and blood elves and tauren, etc. And they don’t seem to collectively flip flop between irredeemable savage you should exterminate and perfectly fine dude you’d hate to kill depending on which flag they’re waving at the time.

I’d say difference is that the night elves are elves and are pretty. Like you said, they to are about killing first and asking questions later. But the narrative also took us inside their society, and tried to give us all these reasons about why people should EXPECT to get killed for entering their land, and ultimately respecting their wishes. One of the biggest reasons why the Horde is pointed out as being evil is because they keep refusing to respect night elven requests to stay out of their lands and just won’t stop expanding in pursuit of resources and territory. They even went out and burned hundreds/thousands of elves alive. An act for which the Horde can truly never atone.

Pretty sure that had night elves looked like trolls and been coded as such, that the narrative wouldn’t have been as sympathetic. It wouldn’t have had any problems justifying their slaughter, and would even hail the player as a hero for burning down Teldrassil and ending the “Night Elf Menace” once and for all.

It’s an issue of framing.

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You should check the Wowpedia page on Yenniku. Some of the things trolls do to one another is… well, vile, sadistic, and violent, and that is completely independent of the player character too.

The narrative is sympathetic because the Night Elves had done nothing to warrant that level of aggression. They defended their lands and the interests of the world, and Sylvanas, on a whim, decided to go from occupying their capitol, to burning it and everyone on it alive.

The end of the Troll Wars was a completely different narrative element.

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Zanzil being reprehensible -even to the point where other jungle trolls are working to stop him- doesn’t mean one should should be lauded for continuing the millenia old slaughter/expulsion of all trolls everywhere for the purposes of taking their land. Especially not when…

Several individuals and factions among the Night Elves have repeatedly placed the entirety of Aeroth, and in some cases even the cosmos, in existential danger.

Yet the reason the Amani were deserving of such aggression is because they were at times really cruel to one another.

You’re letting night elves off the hook way too easily here and holding them to a totally different standard. I’m willing to wager that even if I could find an example of Night Elves being really cruel to one another, that this still wouldn’t be considered justification for expansion into or attacks against night elves in Northern Kalimdor.

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Nor did I ever imply it was. I was pointing out that trolls act vile, violent, and sadistically even without the player character being involved.

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But that was never really called into question.

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I may have misinterpreted your words here. Sorry about that.

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Which is only relevant insofar as it serves as justification for others to take their land and not have to feel bad about it.

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Or when we need to engage in wholesale slaughter and genocide. I don’t think anyone really took Zul’Farrak after it got purged. And I don’t know about Zul’Aman either, actually. You’d figure the Blood Elves would’ve taken that land if the Amani had been truly removed from it.

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These are some pretty unjustified standards. This is like tying all Trolls or worship of Hakkar or G’huun.

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I think that’s basically her point. There is always conveniently an excuse for the slaughter, genocide, and robbery of trolls.

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I agree. The game never asks us to judge certain races by such standards.

But others…

It does get applied to the various “primitive”, “savage” and almost always “ugly” races on Azeroth as a reason why they should shut up, sit down, and stop using force to protest their continued slaughter/expulsion at the hands of more “civilized” peoples. An act for which we the player actually get lauded.

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Maybe the Horde should stop killing Quillboars and Harpies then. And maybe the should have sided with the Centaur over the Tauren.