It felt appropriate to end off the expansion in the same place I started out at. This is my second most liked post I have made, and it still holds true:
Night Elves have been routinely used to start storylines, and then almost always dropped out of the story completely after, and such has been the case for almost all Night Elf related lore since Cataclysm:
Garrosh efforts almost entirely directed towards the Night Elves → Night Elves not involved in Battle Field Barrens or the end of Garrosh’s invasion of their lands beyond a token appearance at the Gate of Orgrimmar.
Deathwing destroys the “Night Elf District” of the Park in Stormwind → Left as a carter for years until it’s finally rebuilt as a memorial for Varian.
Night Elves defending Pandaria and welcomed in to the Vale of Eternal Blossoms → No part of the lore involving them in the defense of the Vale from Garrosh.
All of Tyrande’s and the Night Elves’ presence in Legion and their history with it punctuated with the idea of seeing them at the Legion’s final defeat → Not even a token Darnassian Night Elf on Argus.
Illidan resurrected from the dead at the Nighthold → Never comes to talk to the other Night Elves, not even Malfurion or Tyrande in person despite their having been around at the start of the story but - as is my point - not on Argus or even the Tomb of Sargeras. Illidan never even came back to talk to the Illidari and the Demon Hunter player personally. His end cinematic of staying to take on Sargeras just served to remove him from the story in preparation for BfA so that it wouldn’t have to be explored how Illidan would react to the Horde attacking the rest of the Night Elves again and burning down their capital.
And of course now the entirety of BfA starting off with a war of devistation against the Night Elves and we get the empowering of the Night Warrior and the raising of Night Elves as Forsaken → [Avoided and dragged on for as long as possible.]
This is not unique to Night Elves, however.
Make Vol’jin Warchief. → Do nothing with him then kill him.
Have Sylvanas make a deal with Helya → Have Sylvanas completely disappear from the storyline and kill Helya. Never speak of it again.
The entire Suramar Campaign to get the Eye of Aman’thul → Never actually have us use the Eye of Aman’thul.
Forsaken and Blood Elves defined by what Arthas did to them → Not present to take down Arthas.
Kil’jaeden manipulates the Orcs → Orcs aren’t even shown to be aware of Kil’jaeden when he’s taken down, let alone present for it.
Blizzard just has a really bad track record of starting plot threads and then not tying them into anything.
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