If Arthas was actually building an army to fight the burning legion…
Why did he allow Kel’Thuzad to claim the book of medivh and use it to summon Mannaroth, Kazzak, and Archimond (who finished off the city with the sand castle thing) during the siege of Dalaran.
Arthas wasn’t the Lich King at that point, he’d only gained Frostmourne. Ner’zhul wasn’t ready to move against the Legion until afterwards.
As a rule of thumb, when it comes to WoW’s story, you shouldn’t think about it too hard.
True but he was still under direct control of Ner’Zhul getting his orders from him and not the legion.
Ner’Zhul had already flipped at this point from my understanding.
The legion was controlling and watching ner’zhul. The lich king was essentially forced to assist the legion in summoning archimonde otherwise face repercussions. The dread lords specifically kept watch over him.
When the legion went to Kalimdor he sent arthas to assist in their downfall by having him lead illidan to the skull, which caused him to beat tichondrius and prevent the corruption of the forest severely weakening the legion And leading to archimondes downfall and the lich Kings eventual freedom.
cause arthas was’nt the lich king, he was just a normal dk like the rest of us.
It still makes zero sense why he let them be summoned in the first place. Arthas and by extension Ner’Zhul was the one in control of the scourge army not the dreadlord.
He could of easily beat tich then and there.
“Few understood my use of the Scourge…”
Ner’zhul originally created Arthas because he needed an agent who could circumvent Dreadlord supervision.
The Battle of Mount Hyjal was the turning point, where Ner’zhul was given enough freedom to use Arthas to sabotage the Legions efforts, whereas afterwards the Legion knew they’d been outright betrayed (but with the deaths of a bunch of higher ups on Azeroth, it was hard to directly respond), and thus Illidan was sent to kill Ner’zhul.
Because if you don’t summon them, then they know you’re plotting against them, and they can take steps to eliminate you. Especially since they’re on entirely different worlds and out of your reach.
If you do summon them, then they only have suspicions, and oh look… now they’re here, on your world, with all of your forces between you and them, and we’re just one big happy family right up until they are sufficiently distracted and you can shove a knife in their backs.
Remember, also, that the Lich King is at odds with the entire planet. Bringing in the Burning Legion to weaken the planet and themselves so that you can beat everyone is not a bad idea.
Ner’zhul was stuck in a crystal, defenseless. The jailers could easily kill him off. It was the deaths of tichondrius and archimonde that let him escape the legion for enough time to merge with arthas. As the remaining dreadlords in charge were incompetent and uniformed.
Ner’zhul was using Archimonde’s summoning to his advantage. It gave him an excuse to resurrect Kel’thuzad, one of his most powerful and trusted servants.
Ner’zhul always had plans to rebel, but he had to be cautious. Once Archimonde was summoned the Legion basically ignored him after that. He was out of their constant eyes and could better act on his own. It was anticipated the Legion would probably lose too, Archimonde was only there with a small force.
The Lich King was playing the long game. Sometimes you have to give some ground to progress later on. Play your cards too soon and you could lose the game.
i mean, you can just replay warcraft3. Nerzul wasn’t ready to strike and KJ still needed him. Their confrontation started only in TFT where nathrezim tried to kill Arthas