There’s potential, but I don’t trust the current writing team to develop it (either be neglected or botched) and I don’t like that the Alliance lost another mid-to-high importance female character who (from team blue perspective) turned evil in a way that was not foreshadowed or explained or had any groundwork (Sira and Delaryn being the others).
And whatever failings that WoD had, I thought the Alliance leveling was really good, especially SMV. The Yrel/Blackhand cinematic is one of my favorites. WoD falling apart in later chapters does not stand against my Yrel-crush. And yes, I get that her arc was nothing new, but it was really well done IMO.
And to anticipate a likely response, I’m not saying that female characters Alliance side have been treated worse than those Horde side or that we’ve had it worse in general as compared to team red, but I’m not going to agree that I like this direction Yrel.
One, I can see your trepidation about Blizzard handling this story well…but the same could be said about any story idea right now. I mean, they haven’t exactly covered themselves in glory, this expansion.
But, assuming they can pull it off, I love the concept of a fanatical Army of the Light, because it is something different. It isn’t just eeeeevil, but an adversary with the best of intentions. That gets blinded because it is so single-minded. This makes sense (religious crusades don’t exactly have a great track record, in the long run) and gives us something different, both in terms of themes and, importantly, aesthetics. And as a paladin aficionado, I am intrigued by the idea of a plot that will force my character to do some serious self-scrutiny.
Secondly, I point out that Yrel is not and was never actually an Alliance character. You did quest with her a lot, making her broadly analogous to Durotan (who sadly dies offscreen). And I strongly dispute the notion that Sira and Delaryn were “mid-to-high importance” characters. They were only brought into the story to die precisely so that Blizzard didn’t have kill off any actual mid-to-high level importance characters (Shandris and Maieve being the obvious candidates).
I’ve got no problem with a fanatical army of the light story line, but don’t make Yrel the antagonist. I also don’t want her to be a dreadlord, or mind controlled or a damsel in distress.
I think most folks would identify Yrel as an alliance character in all but name.
And Sira has been around for quite a while; I don’t think it’s accurate to claim that she was “only brought into the story to die”. You could make that argument re: Delaryn, but it still sucks to have a character that you get to know in a novella and in questing flip like that.
We never had the chance of asking A’dal about his opinion on Illidan, the book flesh out a bit more, also the dude did a lot of bad stuff and he admits that, only Xe’ra tries to make him look better, so we can use him against the Legion which end up with the total defeat of Sargeras
I think the lightbound are a good and believable way to bring an “evil” to the alliance.
Anduin is still a naive teen. Even more naive when it concerns the light. If Yrel came to our world and offered to “help” in the fight against the horde, he’d accept without a second thought. They were allies before so why not?
Next thing you know, void elves are showing up dead around SW and there’s brainwashed/converted trolls, orcs, Tauren and other horde forces fighting for the lightbound. Some of the more Warhawk members of the alliance approve of the brainwashing, but Anduin thinks it’s wrong and takes pity on them.
Alleria wants justice for the void elves, but lack any substantial evidence pinning it on the lightbound. The alliance needs battle hardened soldiers to end the war and Yrel provides exactly that. So they let it happen for the time being. For now.
The alliance needs some strife, a kind of evil or morally grey thing in it. Besides void elves, it’s pretty boring. This, in my opinion, is a believable outcome and doesn’t feel forced at all.
Unlike vol’peran death squads in vol’dun where the heck did that idea come from?? mORaLly GReY
If the Alliance and Horde weren’t at war with each other currently I’d imagine the more zealous, light worshiping parts of the Alliance would already be in disputes with the Void Elves. Which makes me think that this expansion is WoD 2.0 insofar as its filler for the much-lambasted “World of Warcraft: Light and Shadow” expansion that actually tackles the various religions of WoW (and retroactively homogenizing them in the process).
Aside from a … very random villainbatting to Archduke Benedictus, I don’t think there’s been many cases of Light worshipping sects (within the Alliance, Y’rels Holy War and Scarlet Crusade don’t count) being evil or even militant. I’m worried the writers might change that with the next expansion in a hamfisted way.
Sira was almost unknown NPC who was only given prominence for that story arc, and Delaryn was literally created for it. Saying it sucks to become attached to them just for them to die is missing the point of the story: you’re supposed to feel bad about their fates, so that it adds emotional weight to the proceedings. But not too much weight, because they are just redshirts.
Characters dying in stories, movies, etc. is supposed to make you feel something.
My problem with their fates is not that they die, it’s that it is handled in such a predictable way. Kind of like Kindy in The Shattering. “Will meet a terrible fate that she doesn’t deserve” was basically tattooed on her forehead from the start, which to me, meant that her fate meant very little. Same with Sira and Delaryn, or Lorash Sunbeam. They represent cowardly writing choices - if you really want us to care, kill off someone who matters.
Their deaths reek of cheap manipulation. It should have been Maieve and Shandris. Instead of Lorash, kill off Halduron. Then someone might actually feel something.
It’s less about being sad that they died, and more being upset that they didn’t stay dead. Their deaths were tragic, and in Delaryn’s case made me cry. But then she comes back as a mini-boss that you can literally complete the Darkshore Warfront so fast that you can skip right by her.
Her being raised and joining the Forsaken was not only narratively stupid, it actually softens the emotion of her death and robs the tragedy Blizzard was trying to inject into the story.
By the way, that warfront sucks for Horde players. Not only is your mission basically to be the biggest a-holes ever by intentionally blighting an entire corner of the continent, you aren’t even following a Horde character. The whole thing plays out as a series of arguments between two Night Elves who sound exactly the same.
I’m just more jaded, I guess. I can’t have an emotional reaction to characters who were clearly fated to die from the start. It actually just makes me kind of mad about the lazy writing.
ok so my thought on the whole thing is that the light is inherently evil and they are going to prove that during and after dragonflight but also grommash will never be broken so i believe yrel will capture and torture him for the next year we will go back to draenor next expansion get to yrel in the final raid with everyone yrel will blast off into space on her big exodar thing and we will save grom aand as we watch her blast off there is a massive explosion the old gods returned to combat the light but the light is gone they brought their troops through and then when one of the sees us they close the portal to draenor leaving us stranded on au draenor with troops and a tortured grommash versus the full might and returned strength of the old gods
I think this is a horrible idea. For one; “Was it a mistake to wipe out the Legion as they kept those who follow the light in check?” No! The Burning Legion was trying to wipe out the entire universe. Yrel’s group are sweethearts compared to them. Xe’ra’s a sweetheart compared to Sargeras - she only gets a lot of hate because she dared try to Lightforge Illidan stans’ precious Illidork. But I suppose trying to forcibly Lightforge Illidan is worse than trying to sadistically genocide the entire universe
This “Lightbound” tripe is poor writing. For one, we’re expected to ignore the Iron Horde and side with the Mag’har and AU Grom. Second, there’s a lot of plot holes. For example; If the AU Light Mother is AU Xe’ra, why wasn’t she fighting the Burning Legion like her MU counterpart since AU Kil’jaeden, AU Tichondrius, AU Sargeras and a ton of demons were still around?
We don’t even know what the outcome would be if Yrel’s group won - all we have on that is speculation. We know they not trying to destroy the universe unlike Sargeras and the Void (which undermines the whole “Light and Void need each other to be kept in check” claim) or rewrite reality like the Jailer.
These fanaticism stories are tired and played out. Blizzard is like the aging rock star half-heartedly performing their most popular songs because it’s what’s expected or all they know how to do. Even when such a story can be good, a winning hand can only be played so many times.
If Sargeras’ actions aren’t enough to write him off as evil, why should Yrel or Xe’ra get the label of evil for far less?
Well, there are no AU Kil’jaeden, Tichondrius or Sargeras, so whoever this Light Mother is, she’s still assembling her universe’s Army of the Light the way our Xe’ra was, except she’s potentially doing so to defeat the Burning Legion without realizing that we already defeated it.
I’m still not 100% convinced Xe’ra was even serious about converting Illidan. She was acting according to some prophecy that we were never definitively shown, so for all we know she “tried” to convert him specifically so he’d blow her up and set events in motion just the way they happened. The whole thing where he was shown visions of himself as a champion of the Light could very well have been a way to prime him so he’d react the way he did when it seemed like it was about to actually happen. The way things actually turned out could quite possibly be the real prophesied future she was trying to instigate. People have a tendency to think “prophetic” visions granted by someone else hold some form of truth, when they could easily be that someone showing you what they want you to see so the real prophecy will come true when you react to it.
The same thing goes for anything the Old Gods and their minions whisper. When someone can see all ends, why would you trust them to truthfully tell or show you what “will happen” and not tell you what they want you to hear so you’ll act a certain way that ushers in the future they actually want?
You have an interesting theory that I think could make a cool or compelling story. Better than the ideas from the “screw that fascist/evil windchime/chandelier” whenever Xe’ra’s brought up crowd.
I doubt Blizzard is going your direction with the story, but I’d like to see that. It’s like we said before, Xe’ra referred to her rescuing Illidan’s soul as “her last act of service to the Light.” Seemed like she knew she’d die.
![:roll_eyes:](https://d38bqls1q93fod.cloudfront.net/en/wow/images/emoji/twitter/roll_eyes.png?v=6" ":roll_eyes:")
where the heck did that idea come from?? mORaLly GReY