Loyalty to the Lich King does not mean he wasn’t bound to the Lich King by the helm of dominion. Kel’thuzad may never have been forced to act by the Lich King, but he was always beholden to the Lich King regardless. If Kel’thuzad had decided he wanted to start a settlement of free-willed undead that were not under the sway of the Lich King, he’d probably have been prevented from doing so, for example.
Thus the idea that with the Lich King’s defeat he was free to pursue paths that once were sealed to him, such as allying with the Forsaken. The fact that he never wanted to pursue such paths to begin with, does not change the fact that he wouldn’t have been able to do so.
But why would he? He wanted the scourge and by extension, the Lich King to win. He would never betray the Lich King, which is why he was Arthas’ most trusted advisor and friend.
Doing what you suggested would be out of character for him. Therefore he would never do it. Likewise he would never willingly join Sylvanas’ team as he sees her and the Forsaken as traitors. He saved Arthas from her after all. Likewise Sylvanas wouldn’t side with Kel’thuzad. The reason why she is an undead in the first place.
Another reason why Sylvanas only turning on Zovaal at the end of SoD made no goddam sense. Kel’thuzad being a servant of Zovaal should’ve been the biggest red flag in the history of red flags.
Why would he side with the Forsaken? People he views as traitors. Talk about a bad lore take.
Keep in mind that around WotLK, Blizzard was fine putting stuff in-game that you had to have slogged through either a book or a comic book to know anything about. I’m referring specifically to Varian just kind of appearing and now he’s king again. Like yeah we knew he was missing but not having some epic double-body double-soul gladiator barbarian adventure where he’s a slave in Orgimmar and now he’s Lo’gosh but also Varian and there’s a super hot blonde elf babe and a bro druid and he gets the respect of the Orc shaman/slave master he fights for. Or something, it’s been a while. Point is, none of that was in the game. He just showed up one day and was like “I am Varian…but I am ALSO Lo’gosh”. We went with it because as a character in WotLK he was pretty metal.
But yeah if in Cata there was some new Forsaken leader who stood around and said “I’m the King now” and you had to find out second hand about Sylvanas’ seppuku’ing herself off of Icecrown off-screen, that would have been miles better than what we got after. A major character should have an arc, and once it’s over, they either ride off into the sunset like Thrall almost did or they die. I fear we haven’t heard the last of Sylvanas, and my worry is she’ll come back as a lightforged undead or some nonsense.
I feel like Shadowlands is getting more or less swept under the rug. At this point I’d settle for “uh…it was all a dream. A mass hallucination you see, an aftershock of N’zoth’s horrific visions. Everything that happened in Shadowlands wasn’t real but Sylvanas went back to Icecrown and got killed to death by Bolvar and we’re all pretty ok with that.”
Lore-wise they remarked it as the Alliance only getting to take down Arthas, after the gunship battle that defeated the Horde before taking down Deathbringer Saurfang
… And Sylvanas wasn’t even present during the confrontation of Arthas. The only NPC characters that were there, were two human paladins.
Which awefully sucks for both the Blood Elves who lost 90% of their entire population, along with the Forsaken who … well, lost their lives. lol
In terms of “Getting even” with Arthas, the Horde got a hard kick in the balls.
The Lich King is dead. Paladins will be hunting him down. The question is, why wouldn’t he want to ally with one of the two major powers in the world, especially when his knowledge could be put to use for the Forsaken?
Lest you forget, the Val’kyr were also loyal to the Lich King in a manner very similar to Kel’thuzad, if not a stronger sense of loyalty. Kel’thuzad as a living man came to the Lich King for knowledge, only to realize he’d gotten in so deep there was no turning back. The Vykrul actively strived to become Val’kyr and worthy of joining the Lich King’s ranks.
Kael’thas’ villain-batting in Burning Crusade was so bad, Blizzard apologized for it. The only other two characters to get that treatment after villain-batting were the Creator’s Pets Illidan and Sylvanas.
Kel’thuzad was fine up to the point where he went “FOOLS, I ACTUALLY SERVED THE JAILER ALL THIS TIME!!” in Shadowlands. I just rolled my eyes and sighed as I deducted most of his neat villain points.
BC Kael’thas was just poorly written. It was early days for WoW then, though, and story was an afterthought, which while not excusing it at least explains it. They did a surprising amount of patch work on him in SL at least.
Sylvanas suffered from being the victim of a tug of war between very different interest groups, which made her come across as oddly bipolar. It is an issue the forsaken overall have suffered from.
Zovaal… I have come to see as the alpha edition of what Iridikron came out as as far as a master tactician whose methodology is work smarter, not harder.
I chalked that up as Kel’thuzad getting a chance at vengeance against Ner’zhul that he always wanted:
Fight or flight: those would have been the heroic choices. Heroic, but pointless. His death would serve nothing. By agreeing to become the necromancer’s apprentice, Kel’Thuzad bought himself time in which to bolster his own skills. With enough training, he could surpass the necromancer or catch the man off guard.
Maybe both Sylvanas and Jaina did not think they would survive given the last time they confronted Arthas (Halls of Reflection). They lost to him and he wasn’t even at his true seat of power. Where he is the strongest.
But the truth is that Tirion was meant to be the antithesis to Arthas in Wrath. After all, the 3rd gen DK’s were just disposable tools to get Tirion out of hiding. Most likely why Tirion was the only willing lore character present during the Lich King encounter in ICC.
A lot of people wanted Arthas dead. We even had a stupid AvH raid encounter based on that fact. (Gunship)
If this was the route they had gone with I would’ve been fine about it. I mean Kel’thuzad thought his trip to Northrend was just to see what necromancy can do in the hands of a master. He did not think that sailing up there meant he was a servant of the scourge regardless. It was a bit of a dick move by Ner’zhul to do that.
However Ner’zhul did follow up on his promise to make Kel’thuzad more powerful than he would ever be as a human. He just had to die first. Ner’zhul rewarded those who were faithful. Hence why I don’t understand certain peoples view that Kel’thuzad was mind controlled by the Lich King when he became a Lich. It defeats the purpose of Kel’thuzad having faith in Ner’zhul.
The Jailer made the same promises, and having been the source of Ner’zhul’s power could have bought Kel’thuzad even easier if that’s what Kel’thuzad was after.