The vindication of Sylvanas

Lore Story Forum
82

That’s not Sargeras’s motives at all. Sargeras yes started out fearing demons until he met the dreadlords and found out about the Jailer and Death’s intentions, but along the way he decided that, with his grand view of the cosmic war, that reality is flawed due to it’s innate duality. That’s what Chronicle said and Medivh agreed with him and that’s why Medivh sided with him for a bit. Medivh ultimately realized that instead of destroying reality he needed to use a firm hand to help shape it.

Regardless Sargeras believed what he was doing was in the best interests of the universe if the universe was destroyed and remade to be better but better is subjective and in the eye of the beholder. A universe remade by the Jailer for example would NOT be a fair or just universe…

And that’s why I believe in Sylvanas and her endgame, and yes… her vindication. I believe she’s the firm hand Medivh wanted, the one the universe NEEDS. She’s the one who will “Master Death” and stop the jailer and through him she may have the power to form a more just cosmos.

I think it’s pretty clear that there are many who don’t share your analysis of Sylvanas being “selfish.” I’m not looking to start a debate on who she fundamentally is as a character, because if you know, you know. We shouldn’t have to keep defending our stance on this character, or why she has redeemable qualities simply because you and others fail to see or acknowledged those qualities.

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83

This whole narrative (supposedly) started with Sylvanas being sent to the Maw and forced to stay there (undeservedly, at the end of Wrath) until she agreed to a deal. Eternal torture is pretty high on the coercion scale.

It took one play through of the beginning of this and I actually was rooting for the Forsworn. Shadowlands is that terrible. If displaying that isn’t their goal then they failed miserably. Obviously we learn further on how bad the Forsworn are, but it doesn’t make the Kyrian (or any other group) look much better. It just showed us that the Mawsworn were “more” evil.

The solution so far seems to be “Jailer gonna Jailer.” It seems pretty likely that the Jailer is going to implement something “worse” but even that isn’t clear what worse is. I agree that there’s no reason to expect it to be “better” - though this system is awful - but a bit of a clue other than “bad stuff” would be nice.

She was in the Maw being tortured. She saw Arthas. She was not viewing an image through a viewfinder here. While there she was actually shown visions of the fate of the Forsaken.

Just for my two cents:

From my point of view, it appears Sylvanas is (once again) stuck without control of her own fate - this time at an eternal-level. How many options does she really have? Choose to be tortured for eternity? Work for an evil force to continue postponing that fate?

It seems like an easy choice. Ultimately, over the course of working for the Jailer, maybe she’s obliterated in some cosmic battle, or she ends up being tortured anyway, or there’s an opportunity for her to break free from him, or maybe he wins and everything probably dies anyway.

At worst, it’s the same outcome for her. At best, she can end up helping defeat the guy holding her eternal fate hostage (and - you know, threatening the universe, and responsible for lots of … well … death) and maybe she can be free in some way, shape, or form.

Please don’t pretend anyone really expects characters to say, “Yeah, I’m picking eternal torture,” and then stick to that choice for very long.

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84

It’s funny that people use the excuse “Ner’zul and Arthas were being manipulated” and fail to also recognize that Sylvanas, and Bolvar are currently being manipulated in the same system.

The system is play by the rules OR WE WILL MAKE YOU WE HAVE THAT POWER.

Freedom is relative, the Jailer entertains giving Sylvanas, Ner’zul, Arthas and anyone under him the illusion of freedom but at the end of the day he has an ultimatum of “Serve or be made to serve.”

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85

It truly baffles me. I don’t know if it’s hypocrisy, sexism, faction-pride, nostalgia, time-since-event, lack of knowledge, or all of the above.

I mean if it’s just that the Lich King died, Sylvanas has died more than a few times (tongue-in-cheek comment - I know what folks meant).

I am willing to accept that even though Arthas (canonically) made his decisions, he was still under the influence of … Frostmourne, Ner’zul, Helm of Domination, the Jailer, I don’t know, pick whichever one was whispering the loudest (it’s getting hard to keep track).

Sylvanas’ eternity is being held hostage by the Jailer.

If Arthas’ level of culpability is questionable, why is Sylvanas’ level of culpability not questionable?

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86

It’s clear the Jailer is the real evil here.

87

If she is incapable of making the simplistic moral math of her singular soul suffering vs aiding the suffering of countless souls she is still a horrible, psychopathic, selfish monster.

On top of her time spent experimenting, torturing and plaguing others.

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88

The Jailor can be the true evil all the day long, the base line is that Sylvanas had countless chances and opportunities to lay her cards on the table and unify Azeroth against the “unfairness” of death, if she’s genuinely been so concerned about it.

Instead of taking a sensible approach which could lead to her redemption, though, she decided that genocide, and the torture and murder of Azeroth’s denizens was the right path. No matter what her end game was, her deliberate and persistent attacks against the living (from as far back as Vanilla) cement her as evil: immoral and wicked; harmful or tending to harm.

If they’re trying to write it as “she’s doing this so we go in and kill the Jailor”, then there were much easier and sensible ways to do it. Being stupid evil on the alignment chart (or duped by a greater evil) doesn’t afford a bus ticket to redemption station.

It didn’t work out in the narrative for Grommash in WoD, and it certainly won’t work for Sylvanas here and now either.

Blizzard can certainly write them as being “redeemed” in the Shadowlands, but that’s a different realm. It’s not Azeroth, where the redemption needs to carry weight.

What is a farmer from Westfall, or an orphan in Orgrimmar, going to get out of Sylvanas’ bat guano plans in the Shadowlands? “Oh gee, thanks hero for coming back from the SL to tell me that Sylvanas redeemed herself; that really helps with the fact that 99% of my family is dead and I’ll never financially recover from the crippling debt I’m in due to the 10th world war she started. Love me some Sylvanas, thanks!”

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89

Ok… sure. Also, she is probably the only being on Azeroth capable of facilitating the defeat of the jailer via subterfuge. Every gritty spy movie where the scummy CIA guy has flashbacks to decisions he made that put him in the position of being able to do the thing that saves the entire eastern seaboard… thats where Sylvanas is now. Shes going to find herself with two trucks full of Afghan contraband, or the chance to save the world and shes going to have to make that choice.

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90

Nice headcanon. Too bad it has basis in the reality of the all the story we’ve been given. Enjoy your fancanon, I suppose.

91

The story will need to show some sort of reason as to why Sylvanas couldn’t just rally the horde against death, if not all of Azeroth. Whatever the explanation will be, it’d be hokey, but you can’t help that because the story path to get here was silly to begin with. But I think that reason needs to exist, or else the premise will be her having jumped to the nuclear option Just Because.

92

See, I thought it was already explained.

No one trusts her.

That’s why she can’t just rally anyone to her cause. Sylvanas isn’t trusted by anyone and she doesn’t trust anyone for good reason.

94

I thought the pre-BFA material stated that her acceptance / popularity among the horde was at an all-time high due to her leading during Legion? I could be wrong on that, though.

But what trips me up is that I personally can’t see how convincing any of the horde leaders that “yo death is broken, gotta find a way to fix it” would be any more difficult than selling them on going straight to war with the alliance. And they’d be in a much better shape to try to help do something about it.

95

I don’t know about that. It’s hard to tell if the Horde had a high approval rating of Sylvanas because of her Legion victory or they were just happy to be alive after defeating the Legion. She certainly wasn’t popular with Baine or Saurfang and it seemed like in Before the Storm that they were already suspicious of Sylvanas and were accusing her of not doing enough for the Horde.

I think the good ol’ undead bias caught up with her in BfA.

97

Sylvanas had control of her fate. If she hadn’t been enslaving people like those of Emberstone village and plague-bombing civilians in Vanilla, maybe she wouldn’t have earned herself a place in the Maw. She chose to do evil, but didn’t like the consequences in the afterlife.

According to Sylvanas herserlf, she regained her free will in WC3 Frozen Throne - “For some reason I no longer hear the Lich King’s voice in my head. My will is my own once again.” iirc “My will is my own.” is one of her unit quotes in WoW. Arthas was wearing the helm which, post retcon, gives the Jailer a key to his mind and did the same for Ner’zhul and Bolvar.

She’s like the criminal being sent to jail for multiple felonies who, instead of thinking “maybe I shouldn’t have committed those crimes”, thinks “No one tells me what to do. The system is unfair! Bring it down, bring it all down!”

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98

I agree; then Blizzard compounded their error by saying the “Draenei forgave them” as part of a poor attempt to villain-bat them with that nonsensical “Lightbound” arc. I like and agree with everything else you said in that comment.

99

Negative ghost rider. Unless you are seriously sitting there trying to suggest certain historical figures can be redeemed for their crimes. Some things go beyond redemption, and yes some of the Warcraft villains have absolutely crossed that line. Sylvanas is one of them. And before you try to put words in my mouth, so is Arthas and others.

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100

I think scope and scale is also really important to.

Bringing morality into question when we’re dealing with cosmic beings like the Titans is really tough, because mortal (Azerothian morality, specifically) is vastly different.

Judging Sylvanas as a villain is something we’re able to do, but what can you really compare the Burning Crusade to that isn’t abstract?

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101
  1. Sylvanas didn’t earn her place in the Maw at the time she was sent there. The val’kyr picked her up and took her there. This is at the end of Wrath of the Lich King. The Maw was a rare place for people to ever be sent to, and folks like Garrosh (who was a monster) didn’t even get sent there. Arthas was only sent there due to Uther breaking bad.
  1. There is a difference between having her own will and having someone control your ultimate fate. When the Jailer can literally send you to eternal torture - no Arbiter judgment, just “Maw” - you have the greatest possible threat leveled at your head. That’s not being sent to jail and being upset about the system. That’s having someone hold a gun to your eternity.
  1. Self preservation is the option any reasonable person will take. You’re just lying if you say you wouldn’t. She may rationalize it by hoping she can overthrow him, stop him, help others, but ultimately none of that even matters. Any person put into that spot makes the same choice eventually. It’s just a matter of how long and how damaged they become in the process. It’s why the whole concept of us fighting against “eternal” powers is silly - they’re far beyond our grasp and yet somehow we’re supposed to murder hobo our way through them.

Redemption tends to be subjective anyway.

In StarCraft, Sarah Kerrigan is narratively portrayed as being a “good guy” at the end but I can guarantee anyone who had family on any of the worlds the Zerg destroyed would probably not accept that definition.

If some of the worst historical villains ended up undertaking some action that saved the entire universe including millions of previously unknown worlds and trillions upon trillions of lives - some of those folks saved would likely see them as “good guys” - though anyone privy to their previous actions would not see them as such.

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No I was just referring to ingame.

Please don’t make this about the real world.

Anyone in this game can be redeemed, because it’s fiction.

103

For me the problems are Sylvanas’ plot armor and the clear disconnect between her actions/words and the contradictory claims from the writers. Not hypocrisy, not sexism (you should see my discussions standing up for Yrel, I did think at one point Sylvanas was getting a pu$$ypass to be a war criminal but then I remembered Azshara - a far better and more consistently-written villain), faction-pride (I’m a bit more Alliance, but have some regard for the Horde), time-since-event (not a factor) or lack of knowledge.

Sylvanas might not have burned Teldrassil back then, but as I said she’d been enslaving and plagueboming civilians (ordering it done if not doing it personally). This all happened in Vanilla before Wrath of the Lich King.

Sylvanas is worse than Garrosh (the burning of Teldrassil was a bigger war crime than the Bombing of Theramore - Teldrassil had surrendered, Theramore hadn’t) and Sylvanas being taken to the Maw by the Jailer (assuming that’s how it happened; the WoW afterlife system wasn’t established back in Wrath) is like the difference between being executed by the legal system for a crime and being killed by a vigilante - Sylvanas had done actions to earn herself a place in Revendreth at the very least.

I agree with the rest of your comment.