Jaina was there to pretty much worry about Anduin, that seems all she is doing this patch. She’s like Finn shouting “Rey!” in Rise of Skywalker.
Thrall… I can only guess because she killed Saurfang and tried to assassinate him(for who knows why. Like seriously, what was Sylvanas doing in BfA, nothing seems like it matter to her Shadowlands’ plot).
Barthlomew, Faol and probably others like them are not Forsaken role models. They are not part of the questing experience that describes, demonstrates and explains, who, what and why the forsaken are.
They are specifically heroic role models for their orders, Argent Crusade, and church of light, not role models for forsaken. This is not to say a forsaken player may not choose them as role models of his or her character going forward, but that they are not representative of the general forsaken experience.
Without understanding or appreciating the basics of who and what the forsaken are, you can’t really appreciate the ‘special’ nature of these characters. Engaging with the past, their former lives especially to draw upon the light is like playing russian roulette. They a risk fate worse than true death, and that is zombification. Some little trigger in their mind/soul that can destroy them. This is not a normal forsaken’s life. And is not encouraged.
Now we’re moving the goalpost to rolemodels, eh?
Guess that means I can’t bring up the Desolate Council or Before the Storm.
I mean, I don’t see how he’s wrong. The dividing line he’s laying out seems pretty clear to me.
I mean;
“There are many lessons that the Forsaken have learned through experience–things that some races can only begin to fathom. And although our path lies in darkness, you will find that a great many things rely on both the light and the dark. Your lessons shall teach you to use both… and with discretion. But heed my words: never forget we were forged in corruption and left to rot like so much carrion. The Darkness is our home”
The Cult of the Forgotten Shadow encourages Light magic use. Though it does heavily suggest caution when playing with Holy Fire.
It’s interesting because the Forsaken are innately better suited to use the Shadow for self explanatory reasons. That’s usually the more dangerous aspect to pray with. But no matter what every Priest communes with dangerous if not outright capricious powers. The Shadow has obviously driven many to madness. But the Light has done the same with some regularity.
They’re using forces that can dominate minds and set souls on fire. And must have absolute faith to do so. All of them walk a very risky path.
All? Maybe not.
But their depiction in most zones is “we are the edgy bad guys working for the good guys”
Your the one who shifted the goal posts to Leonid Bartholmew of all people dude, he’s not anything like the majority of the forsaken. He thinks being undead is no worse than a dose of the fleu. Thats nobodies experience but his.
I mentioned role models -quest givers in the very next sentence of my post if you’d bothered to read.
Nothing will ever be weirder than Derek Proudmoore. Because you free him in the loyalist questline but you do this undercover.
So… why? She went to no small effort to dredge up the guys corpse. A lot of work behind enemy lines to even figure out where the guy’s corpse was. And we would’ve been completely stumped if not for a stroke of luck with Zelling. A Tidesage volunteering to become undead isn’t exactly something you bet on happening.
You have to actually dive into the deep and inspect corpses to find him, fighting off a frost wyrmm that’s there for some reason in the process. Only to learn the Alliance attacked the ship while you were under and the aftermath looks brutal. Your ship is the only one left standing out of like six.
So just a tremendous amount of time, resources and dangerous work just to get the guy. Then her only idea is to torture him publicly for some reason. Then she let’s him get freed.
To what end? Idk maybe starting a Civil War within the Horde to cause more death but then she ruins that over a grudge match before throwing a literal tantrum.
What even.
Which is exactly why he’s important. He’s proof that being undead doesn’t make you a mindlessly evil fophat. But since only Forsaken rolemodels is where the goal has shifted, how about the cockroach salesman?
He was a good guy, too.
He’s proof that some people are exceptional. Thats it. But he chose to leave the forsaken and not share his wisdom with his fellow dead brothers and sisters thats the end of it.
I mean, again, the Cult of the Forgotten Shadow- the predominant religion of the Forsaken- preaches balance between the Light and Shadow. Obviously they really love the Shadow, they put it in their name and everything.
But they do not fear, abhor or even disrespect the Light. It’s also a big part to the faith.
You could argue that attitude might be uncommon outside the clergy but I’d hardly call their beliefs a fringe in Forsaken society.
The complicated relationship Forsaken have with the Light is actually a really fascinating and underutilized topic. But suffice to say I’m not at all surprised to see many undead Light worshippers in the Argent Dawn. They’ve only been undead for about a decade. Clearly they had their faith shaken about as thoroughly as one’s can be but yeah some would stick with it if it was a huge part of their existence until fairly recently.
Omg… they aren´t even respecting their pets now?
Is. He IS a good guy. Thank God Jeremiah is well and dandy in Orgrimmar, Treng.
Do the Desolate Council even have that much characterisation beyond the generic ‘cares for other undead’ that Voss fills out at this point?
Unlike the Forsaken and Sylvanas, the Sin’dorei got to immediately take part in the effort to bring down Kael’thas during Burning Crusade once it was revealed that he’d turned traitor. They serve as the Horde representation in the Shattered Sun Offensive, the Scryers in Shattrath are Blood Elves, Liadrin is present in the resolution of the Sunwell raid, and as of Chronicle the Horde also gets the canon credit for killing Kael’thas in Magister’s Terrace. For all the issues with Burning Crusade lore, the Sin’dorei at least did get to confront Kael’thas. We even get a much-belated epilogue to that plot thread now in the Venthyr campaign.
I don’t know that there’s any specific mention of them, but I’ve assumed that the many Kael’thas statues in Silvermoon were Rommath’s doing. We know that he led a lot of the rebuilding efforts in the city, and at the time he was also very loyally devoted to Kael’thas and would do things to boost Kael’s profile, such as attributing the teaching of mana tapping to Kael’thas and not Illidan.
I hadn’t made this connection, but you’re absolutely right. Lilian was a trained spy and assassin even before she became undead, the House of Eyes would be of interest to her.
It’s even worse than that, finding Derek was a complete accident, we just happened upon him while looking for Marshal Valentine’s corpse. We spent that entire portion of the war campaign looking for Valentine for…reasons (I literally can’t remember why), raised him, and then got him killed in the very next quest. The Horde war campaign doesn’t make sense, it just comes off as Sylvanas throwing stuff at the wall to see what will kill the most people.
Oh yeah! Valentine. I remember him because he dies immediately and Nathanos doesn’t even entertain the idea of trying to help him.
“Huh figured that guy was going to be important but nevermind I guess”.
Which was good foreshadowing. Because that’s pretty much my feelings on all the Forsaken characters at time of writing.
Wielding the light though is not something anyone can do. I believe it is stressed that it is an act ‘will’ rather than faith or belief. It is something reserved for the leaders, or potential leaders of forsaken society, and I’m fairly sure there would be a vetting process to determine whether an individual is stable enough and has the capacity to embark upon the undertaking safely.
Feel blessed that your spirit was not released to the nether. Feel even more blessed that I decided you were worth the effort to write this scroll for you.
The people you once knew, perhaps even cared for, are no longer. You must learn to live with that for the rest of your now unnatural life. I suggest you learn to deal with that first.
If you think you are ready for the trials ahead then seek me out in the church in Deathkenell.
-Priest trainer Duesten-
He goes on to say.
… allow me a moment to explain a thing or two before you decide its time to seek whatever drives you forward; the holy light no longer concerns you, the spirits of your forefathers were fairy tales, and creatures of the nether don’t want you.
Do you understand me so far?There is only one thing you must know. We have survived through will alone. It is faith in ourselves that separates us from others, and with our powers, we will cause great change in all of Azeroth. The weak will come to lean on you. The lepers will call you Lady/(Lord). And the ignorant will look to you for guidance. It is my duty to make sure you have the necessary tools, so when the time comes, you are prepared.
So what that implies to me is not only do the forsaken access the light in a manner different to most other people, but also that everything they previously knew and understood from their past life is irrelevant, an impediment, and can not help them in their pursuit of greater understanding, or pursuit of power.
Just for the record here is another sample of the foresaken attitudes to their previous lives.
William Saldean – Grain and feed vendor
I was here visiting relatives when Lordaeron fell, and then … well. I suppose I won’t ever be returning to Westfall, now.
Sometimes I wonder if my family is still alive. More often, though, I wonder why I no longer care.
The point I am trying to get across is that for the forsaken, is that embracing who they are, and not dwelling on who they were is as important an aspect of forsaken identity as freewill.
Agreed on the last point. But my counter point is the main difference seems to be how undead view their time as a human.
Some very clearly want nothing to do with that old life and actively want to forget it. Some seem indifferent overall but can’t forget persay because they still have scores to settle and inheritances to claim from their human time. And others seem to barely distinguish between their past as human vs their present as undead, looking at it more as one unbroken span of existence than a pre / post undeath sort of thing.
I agree with the first two paragraphs of yours, and the last flows from this one so I’ll respond to this.
There is a very good reason those Forsaken you cited are slanted towards the Light; they were all people devoted to following the Light in life, and they remembered and kept their faith after their deaths and reanimations.
While I’ll concede the Cult of the Forgotten Shadow should’ve been fleshed out more, I disagree with the notion that the Forsaken are continuously slanted towards the Light.
The Risen aren’t Forsaken, they’re Scarlet Crusaders reanimated and commanded by Balnazzar. Sir Zeliek was always Scourge in undeath; the Light preserved his mind but Kel’thuzad controlled most of him. And there’s good reason Faol and Calia have ties with the Forsaken and the Light - Faol and Calia led many of them in life as an Archbishop and Princess priestess respectively. Can you name any other Light-pursuing Forsaken NPCs apart from Priest trainers and Leonid Bartholomew?
Plus in the Conclave you seem to have a roughly equal number of Light and Shadow Undead Priests.
Granted these were just throw away units. Though at least two Shadow and Light undead Priests proper appear to have something intimate going on in the corner which was hard not to notice. So I’m not sure how much thought went into that but a modicum at least.
Suffice to say the Shadow would be the Forsaken’s predominant religious demographic. But Light worshippers seem to make up a sizeable minority if not strictly amongst the Forsaken then at least amongst the greater population of Lordaeron’s undead.
I’d also love to see how Trollkind rubbed off on the undead. Bwomsamdi seems to have no qualms about employing the living dead these days, and he was keen to offer this toon a job everytime I died in Zuldazar. But you also have Shadra and Hi’Reek who would no doubt be popular amongst Forsaken spider breeders and bat handlers. Then of course there’s Jani, the patron of the discarded and abandoned, who seems like a natural fit for people calling themselves Forsaken.
This actually could be really interesting in a light themed expansion. It would be a Forsaken civil war. Calia is a theocratic zealot in the making, and Lillian Voss is a shadowy rebel, who would quickly be disillusioned with the Lightforged Calia. Opportunities exist for the Alliance to move against the Forsaken civilians in a way that perpetuates the cycle of hatred, and creates an impetus for Lilian Voss to finally sieze her destiny as a leader of the forsaken (not a ruler).