I decided to token up for the new patch. I played through the Darkshore scenario (Alliance side) and I’m curious about other’s thoughts on it.
For the most part, I enjoyed what Blizzard was trying to do. Thanks to the rewrites I hadn’t looked into, the Night Elves didn’t feel like pushovers. It was nice to see a divorce of interests between the Humans and Night Elves.
My only problems with the story, really, come into play with Sira, Dark Wardens and such, though that has already been discussed hundreds of times here. Blizzard made an attempt to address it, so I hear, on the Horde side.
I have not played the Horde quests, so I am curious to hear about the takeaways on that too.
Basically on the Horde side you can only revive people that are willing to be revived. Anyone else spawns as an angry wisp and tries to murder you for trying.
Sira herself mentions having reasons for joining the Forsaken, but she doesn’t mention them. I’d like to think it’s because Blizzard plans to address it later, but we’ll see if they do or if it turns into another Koltira situation where it’s left alone for six years and then handwaved away once it comes up again.
My takeaway from Horde questing is that we are monsters who will utterly defile the zone and make it uninhabitable, and the Alliance are heroes who are trying to stop us.
Is there another narrative I was supposed to pick up?
-Sylvanas lost a Valkyr, a big deal.
-We got the joy of having all the cut scenes show how cool and righteous the Alliance is in stopping villains like us. But then I already realized that when Blizzard says they want players to be heroes, they don’t mean Horde players.
-Blizzard clearly intended to reinforce that the undeath is voluntary.
-The writing for the raising of Sira and her sister was ham fisted.
-I have no idea why my post is displaying (on my screen at least) with a different font all of a sudden.
It was interesting on The Horde side. Raising a Warden and hearing Maiev from the Alliance telling her on the lines of to not loose faith. Even Tyrande tried to hold on faith when she became a Night Elf warrior. I believe Sira felt abandoned by Elune and questioned her faith she had held for a long time. Tyranda not arriving in time to save her broke her faith completly
Pretty sure more story will be told. Like Cordana she knows many secrets of the Wardens. What else is hidden there in the Vault of The Wardens that could be used on the Horde side to gain an edge in the war. As for Delaryn she was strong night elf ranger captain. Her skills and leadership would be useful for the Horde’s war effort
Just realized something else. You now can compare her to Azshara. Both sought aide from a higher power to save their people. Azshara had N’zoth that turned them into Naga to save them from drowning. While Elune granted Tyrande her power for Elune’s wraith and have night elf warriors again.
Honestly, I thought the Night Warriors look very sinister not just from their designs but how…brutal they are in contrast to how we usually see elves portrayed.
Heck, I think the fact the Night Warrior ritual is rarely successful on account of it killing just about everyone who tried since the originals until Tyrande performed it just goes to show this power is treading dangerous ground, much like the ritual for becoming a demon hunter is.
The only difference is, this power is revered instead of despised simply because it came from Elune. I wouldn’t be surprised if this Night Warrior deal ends up having negative consequences.
At least, there better be some consequences. I’m a little tired of us Horde being the only ones having bad consequences from messing with higher powers.
Benedictus and Fandral, old god worshippers and traitors to the Alliance, say hi. Melris Malagan, the entire town of Darkshire, and numerous other plants within Alliance hierarchy, all agents of the Burning Legion, say hi.
Sira and Delaryn are like Kael’thas: Kael’thas also turned on his allies(first the Alliance than Illidan) to side with his most hated enemy(the Legion) when he thought his allies abandoned him.
Sylvanas was lucky not to face the abandonment that Kael’thas, Sira and Delaryn did. She may have been alone in the fight against Arthas but that was of her own choice. She chose to send her followers to Silvermoon while she bought them time with her life.
Due to all that she was able to retain hatred for Arthas and not blame her own allies. She still succumbed to villainy yet still has some ties to her people rather than cut off from them like Kael’thas did.
I had read (from here mind you) that far fewer Night Elves were going to be willing converts. But the first 5 I killed all raised, and out of a group of 3 after that, 1 more did. Wasn’t that a sticking point for Team Blue that Blizz supposedly captitulated to?
I don’t know Benedictus and there’s hardly any info on him besides he’s Lillian’s dad and gets killed by her, but wasn’t Fandrel corrupted by the Nightmare? He only gained great power well after he was corrupted.
I don’t see anything in Darkshire that resembles the Night Warrior deal at all either. It’s the standard corrupted town/tribe/community deal.
I should probably rephrase though and say I would like to see a major Alliance figure go off the deep end for a change. Not even just to balance out how Garrosh went and Sylvanas is going, but just to show that things aren’t so clearcut good and evil. WoW has moments like that but most of the time Blizz falls back into “Alliance = Good, Horde = Evil” in the narrative and it’s annoying since the Horde post-WC3 is supposed to be more a diverse group of races that are misunderstood because they’re so culturally different.
I had already figured this was more or less what you meant since really only Garrosh comes close to the criteria your phrasing set. Which is why my answer was less “This is an exact mirror of the Night Warrior ritual!” and more a minor sampling of all the Alliance characters who have gone off the deep end into immorality.
Garrosh and likely Sylvanas since that whole Helya deal is raising some suspicions of what’s going on.
And I think it goes without saying a lot of people on both sides had gotten into shady dealings for a good while, with the most recent set of examples being Legion.
Personally, I think we can agree BfA has a lot of shoddy writing that makes a lot of failed attempts at making people “morally grey”. Nope, it’s just more “Alliance = Good, Horde = Evil” stuff. The only reason I’m bothering at all with the War Fronts is just to progress the story.
Yeah I generally am fine with BfA’s story beats but I feel it has completely botched nearly every single character it has tried to portray. From motivations to their actions. It is abysmal.
i actually really enjoyed it.
the parts were i was angry was at the sira and delaryn, then i realized that there are many,many dead kaldorei but only 2 are raised,they intended to raised them all. so i can take that as a win.
and the darkshore warfront is far more better than the arathi, i love how the nelfs go to a place,restore the land and create a base.
i have 0 sympathy for the scourge masked under the victim complex.
I’m under the impression the night elves present during the ritual gained the Night Warrior powers by proxy from Tyrande. I guess she made it less dangerous for them by being the primary vessel or something?