It’s interesting ‘cause going back to when we were pitching this, we were pitching this long before Battle for Azeroth had come out, we were pitching before Sylvanas: Warbringers went live, before “Old Soldier,” before any of it, right? So the audience had not even yet had the reaction to the burning of Teldrassil. But, as we’ve discussed in similar medium that the burning of Teldrassil was very much supposed to do what it did. And that’s ignite a war. And it had to be big. It had to not be something that some people could objectively say “You know that, it wasn’t that bad, I don’t want to go to war,” right? It had to be something so absolutely war inspiring.
Which matches both the pop-up book’s caption and something Morghel said earlier:
Because while it may “preserve” the Alliance’s position, it also casts doubt on it. And there are some events i’d rather there be no doubts about, Teldrassil being one of them.
But I don’t understand. Do you think retconning it would solve anything? No. It would still be a genocide in people’s eyes. Too much time, and yet too little, have passed for the event to be percieved differently.
And what kind of discussion do you want? That Sylvanas isn’t evil? That loyalists aren’t misguided fools? Sorry, but that train has passed. There is no discussion regarding those things. A retcon won’t change that.
Dude, is English your first language? You are answering rhetorical questions and missing the point.
I’ll try to answer your questions and comments where they at least make sense.
It wouldn’t be a retcon. Thats the point. Christie Golden was the only writer to use the term genocide at first. And that was a bad decision. Cannonically it wasnt really a genocide until Christie said so and then only because she said so. The majority of the Night Elves evacuated. The entire Blitzkrieg was designed to shock them into evacuation instead of defense to ease the taking of the tree. If you want to kill all the night elves you dont try to scare them into running away before you get there. Kill camps and box cars are the preferred method.
We can go over this, like it has been gone over, time and again, but youre response will predictably be “something something genocide” and thats a problem. Thats why Christie should never have touched that word. Say mass murder. Its less slanted and more accurate.
But pandoras box has already been opened, and you are entitled to your position. They shouldnt take it from you in a retcon. They should have some character (Sylvanas works good) express a position shared by the fans who disapprove of the genocide categorization.
Just to make it clear… in case its hard for you to decipher my confusing writing style-
According to whom? We don’t have any numbers, but we do know that Sylvanas wanted to burn the place down to increase the tally, and to plunge the world into a world war. I somehow doubt most made it out, based on how it is portrayed.
She never intended to take the tree, ever. She allways wanted it to burn.
But they didn’t? The Horde reached the tree as fast a possible, and that allowed Sylvanas to have it burned as soon as possible, to maximise the casualties.
Does it really matter that much? It doesn’t change people’s perception, and neither does it change the Horde’s debt.
Why does the categorization matter so much to you? It doesn’t actaully change much. It doesn’t change how evil Sylvanas is, or how foolish loyalists were, or how much that still remain unpaid.
Only in Elegy, until that became the dominant narrative. Even in Elegy, Golden does a poor job carrying that narrative, because she uses the term genocide and on the next page she is describing a Stormwind bursting at the seams with Night Elves. They are pouring out of the gates and into Goldshire.
But you need to understand that there was always AGW which portrayed the events differently. There were of course deaths, but the significance of the burning of Teldrassil in AGW was less the stragglers remaining inside and more the cultural devastation.
Let me put it this way, on 9/11/2001 Terrorists destroyed the World Trade Center in New York City. A bunch of people died. There was no strategy involving getting the people to evacuate. Killing people was part of the point, as well as destroying a cultural symbol. In fact, destroying the cultural symbol was definitely the greatest hope of the terrorists. It was a shocking moment for the United States, and the US has been at war with Islamist Extremists ever since. At no point did the term genocide need to be used. It was never suggested. It would have been idiotic to make the claim that the terrorist attacks on 9/11 were an act of genocide.
There are nations committing acts of genocide, and that is not what it looks like. Big, flashy terror attacks and acts of genocide typically have little overlap.
Here I am again, trying to explain to someone what genocide is and why burning a tree is not genocide… because Christie Golden thought the word genocide was neat…
This is the problem. And listen, I like the Alliance. I like Worgen and my Worgen characters are deeply wounded by the burning of Teldrassil. That doesnt make the term genocide good and that doesnt mean that I think there is any good that comes from giving either side, clear moral highground.
@Mawthorne
Both sides? The night elves and Sylvanas? The Alliance and the Horde? Scream.
Along with “moral superiority” to get a little “power fantasy”? By destroying Orgrimmar or its population. Nothing of the sort, the elimination of a legitimate military target that has become the source of many casualties.
@Ceanea
And remember Camp Taurajo. Stony. Sing it. Remind that the dead tauren were not avenged and their memory was betrayed by their own leader. Shout out how the Alliance was acquitted.
Okay, so-so it turned out. Intention: To inform that the Horde is dissatisfied with the fact that the Taurajo camp was forgotten, all the guilty ones were punished, but the Alliance as a faction was not punished.
Are you implying that I don’t think Taurajo is just a way for Horde fans to get time on that highly sought-after moral high ground that Allys have been hogging? Because that’s exactly what it is.
And how does recognizing Teldrassil as mass murder raise the “moral superiority” of the Horde? The Horde had blamed Sylvanas for all the blame.
Or are you ready to repent by voluntarily offering a bloody sacrifice?
Okay, I’m not playing fair right now. But you will still be in a moral pit.
The Horde has been in a moral pit for a while. But reading some of the posts on here just makes you think that certain fans actually prefer all Nelfs be killed permanently so that they can be angry and vengeful at the Horde forever, instead of “fixing the Nelf fantasy” or whatever it is you people want.
Repair of night elf fantasies - “prove strength”, “become the third faction”. That is, to punish the offender yourself. It is desirable - as early as possible. No, you can, of course, restore cities, forests and population … And then the Horde must die, since the elves live long and the memory will not disappear due to the change of generations.
That is actually something I’ve seen a few times. The reason is like people have said in the past; out of all the villainous groups that have popped up in WoW, it’s the horde that has made the most visible negative impact on the night elves. I figure it’s just easy to narratively target them because they’re the minority faction on Kalimdor and their territory is literally right next door to Orgrimmar. But whatever the reason, their fans have seen horde NPCs pushing on their territory at least three times now, and they want to push back.
I’ll never get the whole “leaving the alliance” bit, though. Maybe they’re not portrayed as doing enough for the night elves for fans’ liking, but that’s a far cry from doing absolutely nothing, or being actively antagonistic like the horde.
You do realize that game events do not have to mirror real life events, right? As long as you intentionally target a certain group of people and try to exterminate them, that’s genocide. It can be long, and it can be short. As long as the intent is there, and the actions reflect that, you can call an event a genocide.
There’s another game that comes to mind, DOS2. In that game, or before the events of the game, the elves were hit by deathfog which decimated their species and their lands, initially believed to simply be collateral when attempting to wipe out the black ring. But as it turns out, it wasn’t unintentional. I’m not gonna spoil anymore, but the point is a genocide does not have to happen over a prolonged period of time. If the intent and means are there, it can happen in a few hours.
That ship sailed three years ago. There is no way to undo that, no matter the retcon. They’re just gonna hve to solve it going forward, however that may be. of course, the first step will be to see Sylvanas defeated, dead, and forgotten.
I don’t want it to be resolved through a retcon, no, because it would solve nothing. Blizzard dug themselves this hole the size of the Mariana trench, and they will be the ones to dig themselves out, properly.
Sylvanas: “Hey Nathanos, baby how are you?”
Nathanos: “Well, I’m dead… again … and mostly just … wispy. And everyone says it’ll take a while to make my body.”
Sylvanas: “Right! Sorry! Let me see if I can find you a temporary one.”
A minute later she comes back with a lifeless Anduin body.
Nathanos: “Is that Anduin?”
Sylvanas: “Anduin? No, just a suit they had lying around. It looks nothing like him… I mean a little I guess… but only because he’s human too…”
Nathanos: “It could be Anduin’s freaking doppelganger!”
Sylvanas: “Hush, just go into the body.”