Character has been a hero of the Alliance for literal decades and has had a statue up in Stormwind in WoW for the last 17 years. Please don’t ruin the character and inexplicably turn him into some Horde-hating warmonger or something worse just because you need a new story hook.
Guy is more reasonable than Genn in their side-by-side depictions and not even Genn has gone full villain. Go sacrifice Admiral Rogers to another two-bit faction story or something, instead.
Hitting Turalyon with the villain bat would be a bad idea, especially since becoming “pro genocide-the-Horde” or “Light fanatic” goes against his character and doesn’t have a set-up.
Well he’s married to a Windrunner who had a dark rebirth and has said she’s one dead kid away from going full Cthulu Phtagn.
So he’s either going to go along with her or more likely have to kill her and that leads him down the villain route.
That’s the most predictable way they could do it at least.
Why would that lead him down the villain route? His wife’s choices are entirely her own and not the fault of anyone else. I can see him becoming a depressed recluse a la early Tirion if that happens, but villain?
You know what sucks? The Fact that the writing has been so bad and lacking in nuance that being an “Antagonist” is akin to being “Villain Batted”. In the wide, wide world of competent writing there is normally a wide gap between the two. Shame we don’t exist in that world anymore…
Also, in a scenario where Turalyon is made an antagonist, the only real way to even suggest that settup would be to pull a bit of a Ner’zhul. With his faith and heroism used against him, with a catalyst given that he’d be susceptible to falling prey to. And back in the good-old days, this wouldn’t outright make him a villain … but could make him an antagonist. At least temporarily. And while he’s not the only character who could be placed in this “grey” role … he is one of the few remaining Alliance characters who “might” be susceptable to it. As well as being left in an influential enough position atm to do something with it … that wouldn’t allow the Alliance to immediately disassociate with it to maintain their purity test.
Excluding the Old God Whisper (which when made about Alliance characters are about as meaningful as OatMeal) … we have Turalyon being the current High King of the Alliance. Being backed by the House of Nobles politically for that position. And a Dread Lord having his trust. He has known only Warfare for 1000 years, and is one of the few remaining Alliance reps of note who might still wish to see Lordaeron rebuilt. On top of this, he has no reason to care about the Horde … or see that groups races as anything but dangerous and evil. With his first real experience with them being the 4th war and Teld. Him succumbing to Anduin’s way of thinking actually feels more artificial given his own life experiences.
So … with so many peaceniks away in the SLs on both sides (including Calia and Feathermoon atm) … the environment exists for something to happen. Say, the Lightbound show up as friends. Its not as if the Alliance has reasons to be wary of them unless they oust themselves; least of all Turalyon. And during that time either Faol or Velen are killed for getting too close to the truth of that group’s nature; with the death being pinned on one of two very easy targets. Belmont of the Forsaken or Geya’rah of the AU Mag’har. Add in the fact that the dogma of the Lightbound is “Saving the evil races from themselves” and their whole “blaming the AU Mag’har for the crystallization of the planet” shtick … and you do have a recipe for action.
Means, motive, and opportunity … to truly body the Horde (and get some long overdue hits in) while we’re all gone. With Turalyon realizing too late (like Ner’zhul) his deal with the devil. And by then, any number of Azerothians may have bolstered the Lightbound foothold (either willingly or by force).
Well he already helps her mind torture civilians in front of their freshly traumatized children, so
It’s likely going to happen because Blizzard storytellers can’t write anymore.
But it would be very stupid. Especially since it’ll only really serve to A) make him a villain, and B) make him stand opposite of Anduin and we know how that makes people cry around here.
God, I wouldn’t put it past Blizzard to pull some garbage like this. Wouldn’t be the first time in WoW.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women_in_Refrigerators
My ideal situation is that Blizzard gives both Turalyon and Alleria adequate attention and development. The most pressing issue I could see them facing is their widely diverging principles and how they can reconcile them and find balance, or whose ideology might win out in the end–if their marriage survives that at least.
Yeah I’d really want to see that mess get addressed. I’m praying Blizzard doesn’t just plop it into the story and then drop it just as fast.
Considering we were dropped into Shadowlands without ever addressing the Alliance’s darker elements from that book, I highly doubt they will be revisted in any way that makes sense.
I actually didn’t hate it from a story perspective. The Alliance seldom gets to do anything darker than stay up past their bedtime, much less the sort of thing that makes an Apothecary stand up and be the voice of moral reason.
So two people so heroic they get statues in something literally called the Valley of Heroes doing something so completely cruel and completely futile was refreshing if anything.
That coupled with the LForged going all Lux Vult in Draenor has me cautiously optimistic the Alliance might actually get to be a shade darker than Panton coral white for once.
No! NEVER! The Alliance can’t even be so untoward that they’d eat a Sandwich with the crust still on. Or, pearl-clutch, have said sandwich cut horizontally, rather than diagonally like civilized folks. Which is why IF Turalyon is actually the “Golden one taking an empty throne, that will bring only darkness” … its just him installing Dimmer Switches in Stormwind Castle so he can see himself in various states of glow-in-the-dark.
Right now I don’t think he will. There’s a couple hints he might change. Like in Shadow’s Rising he was starting to abuse his powers a little and Il’'gynoth had a quote, “The golden one claims a vacant throne. The crown of light will bring only darkness.”
But that’s still not really confirmation and most of that was in response to the frustration of finding Sylvanas. A war with the Horde will never happen again, Blizz has said that plot thread is done. I don’t think Turalyon will break the truce anyways when there’s still Scourge to deal with first. And when Sylvanas falls in SL that motivation will be done too.
So something else big and unexpected would need to happen for him to really usurp Anduin and go all extremist on everyone. For now we can assume he’s still staying a good guy. 
We’ll see.
In BFA it sure seemed like humans were using Teldrassil as an excuse to expand. They launch an invasion of Tirisfal when Sylvanas isn’t there and the Kaldorei have been routed, so it’s not about opening another front to relieve pressure or cornering the Banshee Queen.
Then they commit huge amounts of troops, resources and their most capable battlefield commanders to reconstructing Stromgarde. While the Kaldorei are fighting for their lives in Darkshore, and they would’ve stood alone if not for Genn going against orders to send reinforcements.
So the legworks already been done to portray a more Imperial Stormwind.
Though frankly that can be chalked up to the tangled mess BFA was. Because it was equally bewildering the Forsaken, who have a full army dedicated to fighting humans in Arathi, were in Darkshore. I get Sylvanas wanted Unnelves but I still don’t know why, and West Horde forces were occupying it before.
My head canon is Tyrande’s terror of the Night Warrior was effective psychological warfare, and so the spook proof bone bois and “All my pay is hazard pay” Goblins got rolled out to counter them. Really could’ve had some fun"The dark is our home, too" banter but ah well, I’ve probably put more thought into it then Blizz did.
Oh, I agree in that case. I just hope Blizzard doesn’t toss things like that in the story without addressing them later, like mindless sprinkling them in but they’re forgotten/forgiven in an instant.
Wasn’t that kind of…his whole thing? I don’t see why he’d suddenly start liking them, given he’s missed all the parts of WoW where they did okay things.
There’s no indication that Turalyon is going to be villain batted and I’m not sure where the idea came from.
Speaking of, people really throw the term villain bat around way too hard. I feel like it’s applicable to characters whose turn to villainy seems sudden and underexplained, like Benedictus or TBC Kael.
A character (in this case potentially and hypothetically) developing into an antagonistic role, over time, for reasons that make sense for that character (as they do so far) isn’t being villain batted, it’s just…a story.
Here in lies an issue as well. Turlayon has never been given reason to either “like” or even “trust” the denizens of the Horde; beyond Anduin’s influence. That is not to say that he’s zealous to blindness, but that is also not to say that he cannot be manipulated through that faith either. He wasn’t as opposed to what Xe’ra attempted with Illidan as many would like to believe; only admitting that “will” should not be ignored outright in such a situation. That however does not guarantee that such sentiments extend to the wills of people he gauges are destructive or “evil”. Nor that “saving them from themselves” wouldn’t be tempting as an alternative to “destroy them” … if put in a position where he felt he had no alternatives.
Off the top of my head, since WotLK we’ve had “Varian will be a villain, Genn will be a villain, Jaina will be a villain, Sky Admiral Rogers will be a villain, Vereesa will be a villain, Alleria will be a villain, Tyrande will be a villain” and now we’re finally at “Turalyon will be a villain.”
The community has a very poor historical track record of accurately identifying villains, possibly because it keeps on misinterpreting “is mad at and/or scared of things that hurt them” as “very very naughty” when it comes to Alliance characters.
Alliance fans are sensitive to any accusations of wrongdoing on the part of their characters because every time they do something even remotely edgy, no matter how justified, the community starts to scream for their heads.