Silvermoon of Quel'Thalas and the holy city of Stratholme

Lore Story Forum
1

This thread is to discuss the lore features of what each city should hold towards lore, in regard to another thread I made upon the General Discussion forums :slight_smile:

For the holy city of Stratholme

It’d be cool to see:

  • The Chapel of the Silverhand
  • The Chapel of the Argent Crusade
  • Perhaps one standing between the two as a unified front (with some banter questlines of friendly competition & quests between the two).
  • A sanctum for the friendly spirit denizens that still yet remained in the city, despite it being purified — of which the Argent Crusade & Silverhand have managed to coexist with and even worked side-by-side to help restore the city (and another reputation for players to have)
  • A portion of the city that remains charred or slightly ruined – a remnant of its grim history, perhaps with an underkeep that leads to chambers which goes deep until it reaches a stone door guarded by Paladins who indicate they’ve yet to purify the darkness that goes beyond …

For Silvermoon of Quel’Thalas

I’d love to see:

  • Runestones within the city itself, rather than just the border — as a bonus barrier should a threat somehow breach pass the others; learning a lesson from the past and having placed them as a contingency & addition safeguard to their prosperity.
  • Beacons, conduits or vessels of the Sunwell’s power for the elves to channel its glory & wondrous benefits.
  • Light-Infused Trees — Trees imbued with the power of the Sunwell
  • A few Suramar Trees — as a token of Lor’themar & Thalyssra’s relationship :blush:
  • ‘The Phoenix Tree’ — Perhaps a light-infused tree far GREATER than the others; similarly akin to a small world tree, born from a prime monarch seed of Thas’alah (The Mother Tree) which could perhaps be noted to have been saved & safeguarded from the very heart of Thas’alah before it was cruelly cutdown by Arthas and his Scourge forces, who ultimately had Deatholme mockingly erected upon its withered roots.
  • Blood Golems & Arcane golems – Both the original models (with updated graphics of cause) and the ones of which designs were seized by the Sin’dorei from the Throne of Thunder — of various colour varieties on the nature of the magics that fuel them.

Anyway! :clap:

That’s what I can come up with simply from the top of my head, but I thought I’d ask the forums at what lore-references, easter eggs and other story-relevant subjects would you like to see in each city? :grin:

In accordance to the above :point_up: What would YOU love to see in each city? :thinking: …

2

Just to get the elephant out of the room…

…I am 99% sure in legion they stated Stathholm is cursed to burn forever because of what Arthas did.

So, I do not think anyone is settling there.

If they were to put a purely Alliance hub in, I suspect it would be Windrunner spire and its accompanying village, honestly. Could be a base for the Silver Covenant high elves, I suppose.

3 Likes
3

Hence why I stated towards them ‘Purifying’ the city of Stratholme :slight_smile:

That’d kind of still cheese Horde players off, given their connection to Sylvanas — and the Forsaken having had helped the Sin’dorei against the Scourge in the Ghostlands.

Last I checked too, the Windrunner Spire was also situated with Banshees — Rangers of Sylvanas who met the same fate that she did.

1 Like
4

It is in the worst hit part of the Western Palguelands, which I am pretty sure isn’t nearly cleansed yet, I am not sure they will want to touch lands outside Quel’thalas as it makes for a natural zone cutoff.

In the three sister’s comic the windrunner sisters purged the area of the undead, and ye olde banshee queen’s heart grew three sizes so she did not murder them both like she planned to.

So its free realestate.

5

I hate this for two different reasons:

  • Reason 1: Stratholme is a demesne of dread. They can’t put out the fires. They just come back. The dead just rise again. It’s just permanent spooksville for the evil Arthas did, and that’s cool.

  • Reason 2: The Alliance has overwhelmingly more land than the Horde, and of all core races, I think only Tauren and Gnomes have less lands than Forsaken. So making even more of northern EK Alliance stings.

9 Likes
6

They had restored landsites from the Argent Dawn towers throughout the zone and that was back in Cataclysm …

Whether it’s held by forces or not — It’s not free realestate, because its in the lands of the Sin’dorei :no_mouth:

:clap: Plus lets be real here for a moment …

Ultimately it comes down to Blizzard and what they feel like writing. :person_shrugging:

They could say the gnoll Hogger and the murloc Cookie were reborn as a paladin & priest and did what no other could in purifying the land — and we’d have to accept it. lol

7

This is a rare moment where we might sort of agree. If anyone should reclaim that area to any extent, I feel like it should likely be the Forsaken who came out of the scourge that rose in that area.

9 Likes
8

Warning, I’m going to rant a bit here: I hate that the Silver Hand was positioned as a separate entity from the Argent Crusade in Legion, and also that they were made to be the lead order hall faction over the Argents. The Argent Crusade was already meant to be a merged faction made up the Argent Dawn and Silver Hand, as Tirion explicitly says in Wrath. If that is no longer the case (or never was to begin with), then let all the Argents go back to wearing the Dawn tabard rather than Tirion’s revamped Crusade version, and make it clear that they’re actually separate. There’s a reason that the Argent Dawn banners don’t have a hand sigil in the middle and the Argent Crusade banners do! At least clarify who exactly is still using the Silver Hand moniker rather than joining the Argent Crusade!

…anyways, I’m fine with the Argent Crusade having a major presence, but I don’t want the Order of the Silver Hand to be in charge of anything, especially since it’s not clear if there’s any Lordaeronians among their number still aside from Turalyon. Let Alonsus Faol have his chapel back and return it to being a sacred space, and let the Silver Hand visit and live in the city if it’s successfully cleansed and residences are built, but let the Argents be the main paladin presence. They have a strong tie to the area thanks to the original founders of the Argent Dawn mostly being Lordaeron Silver Hand survivors, as well as the organization’s strong connection to Tirion. The Argents also command respect from both the Alliance and Horde and have always welcomed members from both factions, so they’re a good choice to help steward the area, as both factions can make a case for a claim to the city. Stratholme is also positioned between the Argents’ major holdings at Hearthglen and Light’s Hope, so it holds strategic sense for them, and they’ve been working on taking it over for years.

Stratholme has so much lore attached to it. There’s the obvious, that it represents the turning point in Arthas’ descent, and that it continued to burn for years after he slaughtered everyone. Before that, it was the second largest city in all of Lordaeron. It’s where Tirion was tried and excommunicated. Thrall attacked it early in his days as Warchief in an attempt to rescue Eitrigg. It’s where Balnazzar was hiding after Sylvanas attacked him, and where he killed Saidan Dathrohan. It’s also where Alexandros Mograine was killed by his son Renault. It’s the last place Jaina, Uther, and Arthas all saw each other alive. If one wants a creepy space for questing or a dungeon, there’s plenty of inspiration to choose from!

As for Silvermoon, I don’t have a ton of specific ideas, but I do like the idea that the Sin’dorei have learned from and improved on weaknesses in defenses that were made apparent in the Scourge invasion. The Nightborne would be a good resource to help with this; perhaps some emergency teleporters to Suramar set up with Oculeth’s help, to evacuate the population quickly and safely should the worst happen again? I also want to see Dark Rangers and death knights have their own spot in the Ghostlands to hang out in, as a recognition of many of them being the fallen that the name “Sin’dorei” was chosen to honor. Maybe a spookier version of a Farstrider lodge in Tranquillien?

I don’t think that they’ll touch Stratholme in terms of story updates in Midnight, but they may have to do something with it in order to make the world map work. We can’t fly over it currently, and it’s current location relative to the Ghostlands on the world map would make it an obstacle for flying between the zones. It’s also possible that the map will get shifted so that Stratholme and it’s wall of no-fly-here smoke can stay put, though.

I can’t fault your logic. I do want to see Stratholme’s status get addressed, but I’m okay if in the end it’s just too thoroughly cursed for anyone to deal with. I’m okay with the Dead Scar never being fully healed for the same reason.

2 Likes
9

I’m not an elephant.

1 Like
10

really it’s the best spot in the whole plague lands with fresh meat and warm fires for all

11

The whole of the Plaguelands are cursed.

There’s a great bit where the Argents mention having to constantly work on maintaining their watch towers in the EPL. Because they start to degrade into ruins with preternatural speed.

Personally I think if it’s revisited the EPL should still be a stronghold of the Scourge Remnant, which would’ve received ample reinforcement with the destruction of the Lich King’s crown. Ghouls rampaged as far south as Redridge afterall.

Not powerful enough to meaningfully project force out’ve the Plaguelands or even remove the Argents and their allies. But powerful enough that they can’t be eradicated because the dead just don’t die in this accursed land.

If there’s Horde presence it’d obviously be Forsaken but for the Alliance I’d chose Worgen. Because A. They always need more to do and B. They have the distinct advantage of being largely immune to undeath. Meaning at least they don’t join the enemy’s numbers when they fall.

7 Likes
12

To be clear, it’s just the forsaken’s blight that won’t raise them.
The Scourge has had undead worgen forever.

13

We don’t need another human city, we have enough.

5 Likes
14

I mean, parts of you might be. I don’t know what you’ve stitched on.

4 Likes
15

If the plaguelands were to ever have more humans I’d either like to see the Argents overall abandon their towers in favor of more Forsaken and Horde control better connecting Quel’thalas and the Forsaken through a nominally Horde controlled land route. In return, the Argents can retain Lights Hope and gain Tyr’s Hand and that whole eastern section where the Scarlets were.

Otherwise, and similarly, if we’d like to see a non-Argent, non-Scarlet, human presence, I would want some revanchists in Tyr’s Hand and that eastern coast as it seems to be one of the few areas spared any substantial curse. Not a big area, nothing particularly substantial, but just a plain angry Alliance general and some fanatics who want to ‘reclaim’ Lordearon while, similar again, Quel’thalas and the Forsaken control more of the border entries into the EPL and/or some towers in between.

1 Like
16

I think Alliance in Silvermoon will be like with Bal’amath/Amadrissil. They will just turn off the NPC hostility.

3 Likes
17

I dont really care for Blizz’s gradual cleansing of the Plaguelands. They’re such a cool area. So nah I dont want Stratholme cleansed. I wouldnt be surprised if the Alliance player hub in Midnight is the draenei city they teased in the draenei heritage quest.

As for Silvermoon, I honestly fully expect it to not be a hub at all and to be the Suramar of the expansion, with Xal’atath having seized control of the city.

1 Like
18

Every time we kill or purify some deific thing or place, it is effectively eliminating another well to draw from for cool stories or obstacles. WoW is running out of real estate. These things should be treated as sources of obstacles and threats instead of the actual obstacle and threat itself, imo.

6 Likes
19

Honestly, I got Argent Dawn and Argent Crusade mixed up in the thread :sweat_smile: My apologies.

So to correct myself & clarify a bit, the “One standing between the two as a unified front” would be the Argent Crusade, and the other that contests friendly competition with the Silverhand would be the Argent Dawn. :slight_smile:

1 Like
20

Got it. Again, my irritation isn’t directed at you, it’s at Blizzard who can’t seem to make up their mind about what the Argent Crusade is.

The Argent Dawn seems to be essentially defunct as a separate organization these days, as even Tyrosus has switched to wearing the Crusade tabard; very few NPCs still wear the Dawn tabard, and they haven’t had any meaningful story presence separate from the Crusade since the merger. In any case, either version of the Argents would be odd to have in Stratholme if your aim is for Stratholme to be an Alliance city, because the Argents have always included Horde citizens in their ranks. The Argents (both Dawn and Crusade) are some of the few “neutral” factions that actually behave like it consistently. That’s why they’d be great as stewards of a neutral Stratholme instead, because they hold respect from both the Horde and Alliance.