More proof that the factions are pointless plot devices now.
Its just for show so the handful of heroic idiots can take turns as megalomaniacs since blizzard can’t invent new compelling villains anymore.
No one gives a crap about the Jailer, much less care if he even does conquer or kill anything of worth.
Be prepared to get dissapointed cause as Valko correctly put it, Golden only knows how to write female characters as hysterical irrational individuals that get either magically cured thanks to “non toxic masculinity D injections” or simply don´t evolve and stay in the aforementioned hysterical nonsense phase, period.
Underlined is frankly 
worthy… dude they´re kinda STILL stuck in their “muh Jaina” / “muh Thrall” phase, or did you already forgot the disgusting intro to this expac with the 20th rate Maw content?
If anything I predict their Anduin / Sylvanas phase to become worse and worse over time.
Pfff as if this notion wasn´t stupid enough (heck, is people actually INTERESTED in the n-esim iteration of Blanduin magically convincing people with the power of his stupid naivetee and cheaply copied Talk-no-Jutsu? Cause frankly I think this “book” is a waste of resoruces that would had been better employed in the model customizations or in another set of dungeons or whatever else ACTUALLY relevant).
Lol, certainly NOT. Jaina is a joke and Blanduin is literally static and nondeveloped.
The only thing she´s good about is to make the plot resemble the average 4th rate Latin American Soap Opera (even Golden´s “characters” are as parodical as the characters from the 4 pages “Corin Tellado” novels of my aunt´s teenage magazines).
I don´t pretend to know the reasoning of other posters, but she´s an awful writer in several accounts (pet character favoritism is obvious in her stories precisely cause those pet characters get forced fown into the story in the most melodramatic ways possible, she basically downgrades the worldbuilding to irl game levels -I mean let´s be grateful she doesn´t say the Zeppelin from Org to Thunder Bluff takes a couple of minutes- and worse rather retconns stuff instead of you know… research the things she´s tasked to write about -A.K.A. BtS fiasco in regards to the Forsaken cause instead of actually CONSULTING Forsaken lore she limited to make the society into poor wittle opressed humans with a skin condition and leave it at that-.
In this I agree considering current Blizzard writting is trash tier and her less than decent writting skills.
Well let’s hope its good.
Golden’s got an uphill battle if I’ve ever seen one. Personally I just don’t know how you could hammer out something resembling a satisfying, coherent narrative out of the inconsistent tangled mess of stupidity that is Sylvanas’s motivations and personality.
Plus she’s dealing with the most skubtastic character in all of WoW. I’ve seen people accuse you of being a genocide or rape apologist depending on what your opinion on the pretend ghost lady is. So at any rate this is sure to drum up some uh, ‘interesting’, correspondence if nothing else.
I’ve always thought that was weird too. Makes me wonder how much disagreement there was behind the scenes about how that was going to play out and/or what tone to take. Because it’s very much at odds with the treatment in, say, Elegy.
Apparently this post blew up on reddit, on which I do not have an account.
Where do I pick up my solid gold trophy and the check for those internet points?
I hope she fixes the genocide bomb. All it would take is an inner monologue from Sylvanas placing the “genocide” claim on her opponents, and rejecting it.
If Sylvanas tells herself that she didnt even commit genocide, and that the alliance and her political rivals are being hyperbolic, it would go a long way toward bringing the the discussion back to earth. Its not even a ret con. Just a tonal change. It would be Golden, through Sylvanas, backpeddaling her own work and preserving it in universe at the same time.
In reddit ofc. If you are already reading the cesspool you very well may take the last step and create the account.
Evil villain declares act of complete villainy was good, actually.
Further news at 11.
I thought this was a joke when you posted it, then others referenced it, what the heck? This is a thing? They made a pop-up burning of Teldrassil?
I can’t even fathom the thought process that went into it.
Yeah, exactly. I dont want to rob Sylvanas opponents of their position. I want Golden to give Sylvanas fans a handhold and reconcile the fact that the horde perspective novella makes no mention of Genocide.
I think the thought process is pretty clear - part of the development team has a dark sense of humor.
That was made obvious to me just from the flavor text of the item you get off the corpse of a Night Elf found in the Maw that goes into detail of the various torture methods used on her before she finally broke. (One of which was playing gnomesish tavern music at max volume for hours on end, but another of which was making her relieve her last moments in Teldrassil over and over.)
It’s absolutely twisted, but they seem to be poking fun at the fans.
Without retcons? Multiple personalities.
I don’t mean dissociative identity disorder, I mean literally, when she died and went to the Maw, all 9 of those Val’kyr took over her body as if it were a meat suit and at various points in time a different one of them has been driving.
There are, literally, multiple personalities driving her body around. It can be a wild and whacky spin off of Weekend at Bernie’s if you will, where instead of waving her arm at people to make them think she’s alive, they’re all inside frantically trying to undertake whatever actions they think the Jailer wants. Every time we read her internal monologues, it’s just one of the 9 voices in her head.
Or maybe, every time she dies, a new Val’kyr joins the ride - that’s why they leave Azeroth. They’re busy trying to control her corpse.
Why, exactly? Sure, if you want to stomp on Alliance players, and their investment in the game, sure. Otherwise, sod off.
What discussion is there to be had? Sylvanas is evil, and serves someone even more evil. I’m sure she tries to justify and rationalize her actions, but so does every other evil person. That doesn’t make them less evil.
Why not do the opposite, and instead have Sylvanas mention the genocide, use the word genocide, and make her try and justify it. Not to redeem her, but to really explore how messed up her mind is, and has been for a long time.
Walking that word choice back would sure be nice for the Horde as a whole. Unfortunately it also does what you described in reducing the “Sylvanas is evil” angle that they are aiming for.
It’s really hard to see where the Horde can go from here with genocide on the table.
If next expansion the Alliance invaded Orgrimmar - yeah I would quest through whatever I’m supposed to do - but not out of faction pride or anything.
That’s pretty much dead.
Right, at the cost of trivializing an event they created to be as gut-punching and rage inducing as possible for Alliance players. To create a reason for us to want to fight the Horde. To then do what you describe would be nothing but sheer emotional manipulation. It would be worse for Alliance players than never getting a proper resolution for Teldrassil. It would simply erase the event’s significance, years after it’s impact. Calling it cheap would be the understatement of the century.
I feel the same way, but personally I don’t think that walking back the term genocide would do anything to help at this point. It’s already been well-ingrained in my mind for over 2 years at this point. And even if it did, it doesn’t really help the fact that as far as the story cares, the horde basically started the war once again whether or not it makes sense pinning WoT as the moment.
Wait, why did you need WoT for this? The horde was already on the moral back foot as far as the narrative cared, and if that wasn’t enough, Before the Storm pushed it further with the whole gathering fiasco and making Sylvanas a character that needed to be righteously deposed.
I guess the pop up book didn’t already do that?
How so? The pop-up book depicted burning houses and had this caption:
In the wake of the Burning Legion’s unsuccessful third invasion of Azeroth tensions between the Horde and the Alliance boiled over. The opening salvo of the war was a surprise attack on Teldrassil. Although the Horde planned on capturing the world tree, Sylvanas ordered her army to burn it instead, an act that plunged the world into a ruthless, bloody conflict.
That’s pretty fair.
Meh maybe we just dissolve the Horde.
Wipe out large chunks of our populations and then the nice ones can join the Alliance.
Because there were still players like me who didn’t give a flying feck about the faction war, and was far more interested about the inevitable old god stuff that would pop up. They thought an event like that would grab our interest. They were correct, to a far greater degree than they thought.
I guess a large part of why I care so much about Teldrassil is that Blizzard deliberatly did that event to rile people up, headless of the consequences. Now i’ll hold them accountable until they fix the mess they created. And if they can’t or won’t do that, then i’ll just leave the game.