I’m not sure about that given Shandris wasn’t there, my point was that they weren’t Night Warriored Elves, not that I remember anyway.
But Saurfang acknowledges that inflicting a grievous wound that would split the Alliance was always the plan. Just capturing Darnassus alone doesn’t do that, they needed to push the situation beyond just a hostage crisis.
No, but it does happen to be regardless.
Saurfang in a moment of conflicting emotions acknowledges something that isn’t even discussed in the first page of the text.
No it doesn’t. As I said, the strategy that we see laid out on the very first page is still in effect despite what both Sylvanas says and Saurfangs emotional thoughts succumb to, they just have to capture the tree.
Typo on my part, because spellcheck pointed out that un-unifying isn’t a word, but that’s what I meant:
“In what way is that un-unifying?”
Which doesn’t affect unity, as we see with Shandris still being unified with the rest of the Alliance upcoming in Nazjatar. As I said, not mutually exclusive.
Over all the Alliance is unified on that the fight has to be continued, and taken to Sylvanas to end the war, not the Zandalari:
Lady Jaina Proudmoore: Press the attack as the Zandalari mourn their fallen king? That would make us no better than the Banshee.
Master Mathias Shaw says: She’s the real problem here. I imagine she is already finding ways to turn this to her advantage.
Anduin Wrynn says: We must continue the fight. But as we push towards victory, we must never lose sight of who we are and what we stand for.
You’re free to present your own analysis if you want.
Though, of course, that will only be your reading.
I argue that it isn’t irrelevant, since, as also stated up above, the Night Warrior ritual enhances the Worgen as well.
Because it would be Elune saying that Malfurion and Teldrassil is more important than the Gilneans or Gilneas, which by Sylvanas’ logic should upset Genn enough to make him want to leave the Alliance.
I’ve come to find conversation with you rather poor, yes, and actually admitted that to Imerus in that conversation as well:
I generally do not agree to disagree, because that’s just the death of a conversation right there. But if what you’re reading different from what I’m reading then we’re not even having the same conversation in the first place.
Same applies to Sylvanas, as was my point:
That Sylvanas found some success in her tactics and strategy, her failure comes in not even understanding the people she was trying to break in the first place. Not Genn, not the Night Elves. Now, to say that Sylvanas being wrong about one thing makes her wrong about everything is no more true than saying Sylvanas being right about one thing makes her right about everything. But it does show she has a fundamental misunderstanding of the people she went against.
The quest before that, The Warchief Awaits, covers that this conversation with the player was something that Sylvanas could not have in public and had to be said in secret because of all the SI:7 spies, and no where else does she say this. Not to Saurfang, and not to the Horde soldiers. Which was Spuddyc’ point with this thread.
Which is part of Saurfang thinking emotionally rather than logically, as the grieve would that would split the Alliance was the Gilneans leaving the Alliance if it prioritized Teldrassil over Gilneas. Saurfang was caught up in Sylvanas’ throwing the baby out with the bathwater when he just started emotionally focusing on the “grievous wound” and jumbled it in his mind into the literality of the burning tree before him rather than metaphor it was supposed to be. Saurfang never actually says the grievous wound of killing Malfurion or burning Teldrassil would split the Alliance. Opposite, he says it will unite them, as they all will be coming for the Horde now. And Sylvanas admits it as well:
“I know.” She was calm, as though nothing were wrong.
Because Genn was never going to leave the Alliance in the first place, not because Malfurion survived.
I think it will, in the long term. Shandris may be okay, but Tyrande and the Army of the Black Moon probably won’t be.
That first quote doesn’t necessarily mean they’re only coming for Sylvanas, and neither does the second. If they wanted to end the war only through Sylvanas, it makes no sense to attack the Zandalari to begin with.
It might not be as inventive as assuming that both characters are unhinged, unfortunately. But as it is, we’re talking about your analysis and how you reached those conclusions, which I still don’t understand.
How does it enhance the Worgen? They all look and act the same during the Warfront and revamped Darkshore.
I’m not sure it would be Elune saying that at all. But more importantly, I don’t see how that plays into Sylvanas’ logic. The idea is that Genn would be upset at the Alliance choosing to aid the Night Elves in retaking their homelands over the Worgen’s homelands, IE he would be angry at the Alliance leadership, not Elune.
Though I guess in the end Anduin decided not to push towards reclaiming either place, so instead it was Tyrande who decided to go off herself, with Genn choosing to help her. The theory did happen, just with different players in different positions.
Same to you I suppose. But then we’re just at an impasse because we’ve taken away different things from the same passages. It’s as much of a dead conversation as not speaking to begin with.
I will say, the scenario she presented didn’t occur according to her prediction, but a version of it did happen. The Alliance has an underlaying division every bit as real as the one the Horde is currently dealing with. It just lay along different lines than Sylvanas originally thought.
Again, still off-board with this on multiple levels.
That was the original idea, anyway. But plans change according to the circumstances. You say Teldrassil united the Alliance, I think that’s very wrong. The Alliance was already united. But with Teldrassil, different parties within the Alliance now want different outcomes for this war. Anduin only seems to want Sylvanas deposed, but will Tyrande and Genn accept another one of those stalemate, status-quo endings? Genn doesn’t even want to help Baine.
And that’s just the thing, Saurfang says “They will come for us now”. But later, he excuses himself from “us” and puts the blame all on Sylvanas. At some point, because of the Horde rebellion, a time will come when the Alliance has to choose who to blame, and at that time I don’t think Tyrande is going to give Saurfang the same excuse he gave himself.
Well, times change and all that. Things didn’t happen along the original lines, and we’re not sure exactly how it was supposed to happen to begin with.
I didn’t want to go to Kul’Tiras after the War of the Thorns, either, but here we are, characters bent around the locations and story Blizzard wanted to write.
I didn’t call them unhinged, just emotional. I’m also not sure what you don’t understand, nor where you think the text of A Good War doesn’t reflect them as emotional, because it literally describes them as such:
Both Sylvanas and Saurfang were emotionally compromised.
Check a video of the Horde quest “The Dead of Night” and you’ll see Worgen joining Tyrande with this buff:
By that logic, Elune’s involvement in saving Malfurion wouldn’t change Sylvanas’ opinion that Genn’s would be angry at the Alliance leadership choosing to aid the Night Elves in retaking their homeland over the Worgen’s homelands. My point being that Sylvanas didn’t think that through, or at all.
Theory didn’t happen, because the Alliance didn’t split.
Which is the answer to a question you asked in another thread:
You have your scales a bit off if you think the leadership of five of the Horde races (Saurfang, Baine, Thrall, Rokhan, Lor’themar, and Thalyssra) turning against Sylvanas versus the three supporting her and the three on the fence (and that’s being generous and saying Mayla isn’t siding with Baine and Ji is still busy off punching dinos) is the same as the leadership of two Alliance races going off on their own but still simultaneously supporting Anduin (once again, see Night Elves at Nazmir, Shandris in Nazjatar, and Genn heading to Darkshore and still coming back for the Battle of Dazar’alor).
I stand by my analysis.
People in this thread (https://us.forums.blizzard.com/en/wow/t/so-shandris-feathermoon-is-the-night-elf-representative-for-the-nazjatar-story/187767/38) have already covered their disgust at the idea that Tyrande would kill Saurfang and continue the war. Would Blizzard do it? Possibly. I also presented an alternative scenario where Tyrande could work with Saurfang, which I would far rather hope for.
But if Blizzard does villain bat Tyrande to prop up Anduin as the voice that should have been listened to all along there will be plenty more complaining than what we’re already getting now.
Except times didn’t change. Malfurion surviving and Genn not turning his back on the Night Elves are two ideas that Sylvanas didn’t connect dots together for or even thought about at all.
I can only assume sylvanas thought the alliance would break ranks as fast as the hirde does when she planned all this.
Had they any interest in ye olden tactics, Tyrande splitting off to attempt to retake Darkshore is exactly being a wedge. In her and the Gilneans’ withdrawal from the other fronts, they’ve just given Sylvanas a divide and conquer play to work with, while the Alliance is out of reinforcements and is now down to farmer conscripts.
Her burning Teldrassil was morally abhorrent, but her plan would have worked, if the writing team was any savvy with old time lance boards. There just wasn’t any consequences for deviating from the plan. This isn’t to say that their attempt on Darkshore was doomed to failure (though it had some extreme logistical problems to contend with), it just meant them parting from the other fronts they’re fighting on and drawing almost all of their forces with them would have more or less doomed the Arathi front and the Zuldazar front.
All things considered, I doubt anyone would have been fond of that either, because it would have been a repeat of ‘A little patience 2.0’ and would have absolutely rubbed a lot of people the wrong way. The easiest way would have been to withhold the Darkshore front until things were more logistically in favor of the Alliance, but big B does not care what puzzle pieces are supposed to fit where, they just jam it in.
To the first one, yes, it would have been evil. War is evil by its very nature, even if the reasons it is waged over can sometimes be debatable on whether or not it was justified, or if the people who wage it aren’t evil.
To the second one, Teldrassil burning might have been the bridge too far. Sacking everything up to Darkshore would have been far more tolerable and understandable, though. A druidic society might not get starved out of their tree, but it’s an isolated spit of land and if the occupying force controls the harbor (via boats and land weapons) and air (bows, guns, ballistas, et cetra), they can’t exactly flee. Their choice is to surrender and enter captivity or have the army that’s meant to protect them meet demands in order for release, such as paying reparations for wrong-doings performed.
To the third, it probably would have been less morale striking if it were the case, but evil should not be paid back in kind with evil. Non-combatants who have no part of their kingdom’s political policies or armies shouldn’t suffer the consequences intended for a government that rules over them.
I’m not really sure how that’s a response to what I wrote.
I was exaggerating, but given that the idea was that their thinking was being undermined by their emotionality, it’s accurate to say that your conclusion requires the text of those passages to be false and misleading to the reader, and for the reader to believe that both of their own minds cannot be trusted. I don’t think the narration really provides support for that idea.
Whereas, for example, the notion that Sylvanas didn’t tell the whole truth to Saurfang is referenced outright multiple times throughout the story, there are no statements of either of their internal dialogs being inherently flawed, untrue, or faulty in construction. The notes of them being emotive around that time doesn’t reach that point or support that idea, it’s a very weak connection.
It’s true the text describes their emotional states, but nowhere does it show their thinking to be faulty on that basis. Not to mention the entire thing is written in the third person, which doesn’t work towards selling someone’s internal dialog as being emotionally upset.
That’s the thing, both of them have their emotions shown, neither of them are shown as being compromised by those emotions.
I’ve seen it before, but that’s just a buff. The description even suggests it was cast by Tyrande, not Elune. There are no changes like the Night Elves.
It wasn’t just about Genn, it was about the Night Elves and the rest of the Alliance as well, about forcing a schism in their ranks. Saurfang is the one who first brokers the idea of the Gilneans causing this divide. Given Sylvanas’ intent to hunt the Night Elven leaders from the very start - And the fact that she hesitates to launch the attack when they confirm that Tyrande is away in Stormwind, to Saurfang’s bewilderment - He clearly didn’t know the full scope of what she was aiming for. He knew she wanted to wound the Alliance, to cause a situation where they would become divided, but he also thought that she wanted to defeat it, not destroy it.
That’s why Malfurion’s miraculous survival mattered. Not only did they not get Tyrande, but Malfurion also surviving would invigorate them. In fact, that’s why she wanted Saurfang to kill him, because a ten thousand year old master Druid being killed by an aging Orc with an axe would be wildly demoralizing and destabilizing.
Debatable. I know you seem to think Tyrande will just end up falling in line behind whatever peace Anduin wants to make, but that makes no narrative sense at all. And haven’t the devs even said they’re building towards division in the Alliance?
And yet we’re having a conversation right now.
I didn’t say it was the same, I said it was as real as the Horde split. I maintain, there is no way Tyrande will accept ending the war on the terms Anduin wants to end it.
It seems like they’re more disgusted at Tyrande not showing up for Azshara or possibly being made into a villain, not for her continuing the war or diverging from Anduin.
See above.
On end by the boy kings terms i think you firget this is blizz so unless she is going to be the next big bad she will give in.
You know its strange … out of all of the things wrong with BfA, Sylvie’s characterization is one of the things I’ve felt has been most consistent.
Without knowing her true goals, its extremely hard to judge the actions she takes to achieve them … but tbh, nothing she has really done this expansion has really surprised me. She is still very much the same character from “Edge of Night” and the very same one from Cata (who DID attempt to blight an entire city with its civilians inside; and ONLY failed because she wasn’t aware of the evacuation being used). The major thing working against this would have been the beginning of Legion (but she heel-turned back to her old self REAL quick with Stormheim).
Hell, thats the reason I managed to avoid a rage-quit moment in BfA so far (because I had my rage-quit moment in Legion for several months after I made the mistake of doing Stormheim questing first and realized she was still very much on her character arc given to her in Edge of Night; and the Horde was in for a VERY rough ride under her leadership). ![:stuck_out_tongue:](https://d38bqls1q93fod.cloudfront.net/en/wow/images/emoji/twitter/stuck_out_tongue.png?v=6" ":stuck_out_tongue:")
Leave me out of that. My character still wants Saurfang’s head on a pike, alongside that of Sylvannas’. She might be persuaded to hold off on the first by an order from Anduin, but never the second.
As a horde player, I want nothing more than to give the Night Elves Sylvanas Windrunner (to with as they please). They don’t just deserve her head on a pike, they deserve an opportunity to take BOTH of her remaining lives (her one extra due to her Val’kyr and her remaining mortal life). Allow them to return her to her greatest nightmare, no one else (horde or alliance) should say otherwise.
That being said, as clunky as his narrative has been … I do think the Horde still needs Saurfang. I would also (for the first time ever) like to have an old orc that realizes a quick death is not sufficient to make up for mistakes in life; nor does it work to serve his people in the long run (its a form of “Hiding”, a quick death). A life of Service to his People and attempted atonement for his mistakes is a better route for the Old Soldier.
Whatever goals she has seemingly involves committing genocides and raising large numbers of people, horde and alliance, from the dead… so I am gonna go ahead and say I can make a judgement that her goals probably aren’t very good.
I agree. I like Saurfangs story that’s displayed in both the novella and cinematics because it’s one of the only things that makes the Horde worth continuing to play if you aren’t one of the people who loves being the Baddies. I am however afraid they are probably gonna give him his “honorable death” by the end of this.
“It is the death he wanted. If that troubles you, you’re free to join him.” - a hero of our time.
Say it enough and it happens?
This is the same company that had catapults from Darkshore burn down Teldrassil. Adhering to things that would work or not isn’t Blizzard’s strong suit.
But yes, a repeat of A Little Patience would be a huge blunder on Blizzard’s part unless their intention is to piss off fans. But we’re still in risk of that, as people are worried that Tyrande is going to do something to flame the fires of war again just as Anduin is going to achieve peace, and Anduin can say Tyrande just should have had a little patience again.
The relevence is such: Why we don’t actually see the Alliance go after Sylvanas again right away? And instead we spend our time talking with Baine, watching him get arrested, getting Xal’atath, and then falling into the Nazjatar trap? Because those are the locations and story Blizzard wanted write, and characters are bent around that to prolong things so Blizzard can do that.
The narrative supports that rather consistently, as it has portrayed Saurfang as suicidal and escapist, and people generally regarded “Warbringers: Sylvanas” as Sylvanas simply screaming “BURN IT!” because she was pitied when that reveal came out. And looking at A Good War makes it even more evident why Sylvanas was so easy to push over the edge by Delaryn.
Once again, I stand by my analysis.
It doesn’t have to state it, when, as analyzed, Sylvanas doesn’t even remember what her plan to split the Alliance was any more, which when added to her emotional state covers that her faulty thinking.
If anything, it’s even better, because it’s an objective fact by the writer that she was emotional.
As covered above, both are shown to be emotionally compromised.
Cast by Tyrande as the Night Warrior aspect of Elune. Which was my point, that the Worgen actually end up closer to the Night Elves because of Elune embracing vengeance, not the merciful light that was trying to save Malfurion.
That’s another example of the burning to Teldrassil uniting the Alliance even more, as, for example, Ivar Bloodfang and his pack shows up at Darkshore, where as previously the Bloodfang pack was purely concerned with Gilneas and the surrounding regions. So, once again, the opposite of what Sylvanas expected.
Which, once again, was Spuddyc’s point with this thread, that Sylvanas lied to Saurfang and the Horde and sold them an honorable war she probably was never going to deliver.
That was the theatrics that cost her everything, yes.
They said the Alliance would show signs of division in an interview that came before Tides of Vengeance. I find it likely that Tyrande storming off to Darkshore by herself and Genn supporting Tyrande will be all it amounts to.
I consider this likely because of the softening of Genn’s broadcast text over the development of Tides of Vegence, from:
To:
As long as you don’t delve back into your “we must assume status quo” headcanon world.
And my point was that “as real” is a misleading statement, as the Horde split is meaningfully worse.
If you’re right you’ll be right, and we’ll have a worse A Little Patience rehash, and many fans will be quite upset.
If you’re wrong, at the very least, I will be quite happy.
Tyrande not showing up for Azshara is definitely the main focus of the thread, but here’s some samples:
Yes, villain batting is the concern, on the idea that Tyrande would continue the war.
Same to you.
Sure, but from what I can tell, you’re like our token contrarian Night Elf fan. I think the only way to get you to like Saurfang would be for the narrative to tell you not to like him.
As me the real person, I can find Saurfang likeable. Some of my Horde characters would worship the ground he walks on.
Drahliana sealed her opinion of him after the massacres of Ashenvale. She’s not particularly impressed that a Human who’s barely a child by Kal’dorei standards finds him “honorable” and she’s never been big on the whole “Honor” schtick.
I’m not a fan. I tend to think of myself as having a broader view of Night Elves as whole instead of grounding it mainly on it’s half-dozen most famous… or infamous. What I always did like about them was Blizzard’s inversion of the usual Dark skinned Elf trope.
Well hey, me, too.
I don’t think honor or Anduin would be the right angle, no. Here’s what I proposed:
Which is more in line with what Droité proposed up above.
Well, you obviously have made the choice to post on your Night Elf character over any of your others, so by forum interpretation, that makes you one of us, apparently.
Maybe she just wants to become guldan and lead the horde from the shadows with a puppet warchief, so she gets varok to “overthrow” her and put baine in charge. That way the horde and alliance make peace before the alliance races get their revenge and they turn on themselves.
Nah.
But my point was that attacking the Zandalari doesn’t make sense with Anduin’s supposed motivations in-universe and the decisions made after the raid are self-defeating. The fact that it’s writer fiat isn’t really relevant to that. I get that you’re saying “Well that’s just how they wrote it”, but in terms of character relations, cause and effect, and the story going forward according to what we know, that doesn’t matter very much.
Most Orcs are portrayed as wanting a glorious death though, Saurfang’s cultural beliefs and his despair at the situation doesn’t show his internal logic and thinking on events to be wrong. And in terms of Sylvanas, the Warbringers doesn’t show her thinking at all, while Good War does, and the story even notes that her anger evaporates after the order. While Warbringers leads the viewer to believe she acted out of spite, the novella shows that she’s thinking, reasoning, and looking for a solution in advance, and it doesn’t show her mind to be “clouded by rage” or anything like that, not in any way that undermines her cognitive functions.
As I note before, the story is quite blunt with statements of foreshadowing when things are supposed to be hidden, I don’t think it’s reasonable to suggest that those passages were subtly lying to the reader without signposting it.
Also, when you say that she just forgot the plan, you’re assuming what her plan was to begin with. As I’ve said, many things within the story show that Saurfang’s suggestion was not what she was aiming for.
It only says she was angry. It says nothing about that anger making her thinking faulty. And by that logic, most of that section is presented in an objective manner, most of it isn’t even presented in the form of dialog, but rote exposition.
You say it’s covered, nothing I’ve seen you present actually shows that to be true.
So what, everything cast by Tyrande carries some deep meaning and connection to Elune just because she’s the Night Warrior? It’s just a buff that’s only present for a short part of one quest, it has no relevance or lasting impact on the Worgen and doesn’t carry forward into the warfront or the updated zone.
The Worgen and the Night Elves becoming more united doesn’t mean the Alliance is more united.
His point was that she admitted the Alliance could only be split by fighting honorably and then went back on that thus undermining the entire idea, my point was that she was simply lying about that being the only way to split the Alliance.
Look at her dialog at the start with Saurfang, she tells him that the Horde doesn’t trust her to wage war honorably. If the point was to influence the Alliance, what the Horde thinks wouldn’t matter. Seems to me that getting Saurfang on board to plan and lead the invasion was primarily about intra-Horde cohesion and PR.
Basically, she wanted to fight the war according to her old MO. She wanted to allow most of the Horde to fight according to their own ideals so they would stay united, while she worked things behind the scenes to achieve her greater strategic goals, like how she’s behind the overall direction of the war and how she tried to take out key targets instead of leading outright.
Saurfang randomly sparing Malfurion effectively shot all of that down, so now she’s taken direct command.
It was a fine enough idea, and it probably would have gone off without a hitch if there hadn’t been literal divine intervention.
If anything, I think the change in dialog is meant to make it more of a slow boil. If they wanted ToV to be the divided moment, they would have stuck with the original version, as it is nothing has come to fruition yet.
Funnily enough, assuming otherwise is the actual headcanon.
It’s certainly more intense now, but Horde division has also been building practically since the start of the game. For the Alliance, most of their schismatic factors have only been recently introduced. Probably as a result of being told for years that the faction is “boring”.
Why do you assume it would be a rehash of ALP? I think it’s more likely to be an avenue of continued faction conflict going forward.
But similar to what I noted, all of those posts are about Tyrande becoming a villain. There’s no reason her diverging from Anduin and pursuing the war has to be contingent on her becoming a loot piñata. People have said for years that they want the Night Elves to get their fangs back, that they should stop being these bog standard Elf hippies that dress in Stormwind armor and constantly get rolled over by the story knocking them down and them never getting back up to fight. The whole Night Warrior thing seems like a direct response to that, what sense does it make to immediately backtrack it and have Tyrande kowtow to Anduin’s peacemongering?
I don’t think the devs can ever give up the faction conflict in this game, so they’re either going to need to retread the aggressive Horde angle a third time, or they need to establish Alliance characters that don’t just want peace.