In the Legion expansion, AU Gul’dan is sent on a mission to retrieve Illidan’s body from the Vault of Wardens. His plan is to then conduct a ritual in the Nighthold, assisted by the Nightborne, to make said body a vessel for Sargeras. Given all the work involved, it would’ve been great for Gul’dan if there was an alternative to use…
Oh wait, there is. The Avatar of Sargeras! AKA the Fallen Avatar (which was the second last raid boss in ToS)
That body had literally served as a vessel for Sargeras’ soul already. Even better, it was down below the Tomb of Sargeras, which was almost completely under the Burning Legion’s control.
There’s no need to break magical locks and corrupt or kill the Wardens protecting it, as there was with the Vault of the Wardens.
There’s no need to corrupt, coerce or kill the Nightborne, as they did to do the ritual in the Nighthold.
The Tomb’s defenses clearly weren’t working, since by the time we get to the Avatar a demon has already reached it; Kil’jaeden himself.
Even the excuse of the demons’ malice and sadism doesn’t fly, as this plan was being spearheaded by Kil’jaeden, and he’s supposed to be all about subtlely and willingness to play the long game.
In short, why did the Burning Legion need Illidan’s body as Sargeras’ vessel when an Avatar made for just that purpose already existed?
Either Illidan’s body would have provided more power than the Avatar or out of pure spite against Illidan himself. Considering what Sargeras did to the aldrachi I’m willing to put money on spite.
What followed was a duel between the champion of the aldrachi and the lord of the Burning Legion. The Legion host watched with rapt attention as Sargeras dueled with Toranaar. The Dark Titan could have simply annihilated his foe at any moment, but he did not seek to destroy Toranaar, but to corrupt him. For days, Sargeras battered the aldrachi with just enough force to wear him down. Toranaar recognized Sargeras’ ploy and knew that he could not best the Legion’s ruler in combat. Thus, he decided on one final act of defiance by feigning submission. When Sargeras let his guard down, Toranaar struck, his warblades ripping through the titan’s hide and drawing his molten blood. Though it was only a minor injury, the other aldrachi howled in triumph.
Infuriated by Toranaar’s defiance, Sargeras instantly ripped him and his fellow aldrachi champions to pieces, leaving nothing of their bodies but dust. The Legion’s ruler then commanded his armies to bathe the aldrachi world in an inferno that would smolder for eternity.
Illidan can get to more places due to his size. The Avatar of Sargeras is really big, I don’t think it’d be able to fit through as many doorways as Illidan can.
The Avatar of Sargeras might not have been very attractive or even viable as an option for possession, since it was still visibly damaged by its previous defeat and so might not have been as powerful as it was when he fought Aegwynn. For that matter, in that damaged state it might not have even been capable of housing a shard of Sargeras’ spirit any more.
I always thought the Illidan soul, body storyline was some way for Sargeras to have a physical body, and perhaps a physical beacon to Azeroth. That was until Illidan opened a portal to Argus, thus bridging the space needed for Sargeras.
Because the Avatar wasn’t made for that purpose. It was made to project Sargeras’ essence into Aegwynn in order to create Medivh. Sargeras was still looking to put his full presence into Azeroth’s reality. By logical progression, the Avatar itself could not do so.
Illidan however has a connection to Azeroth’s magic His body would suit as a suitable anchor.
There’s also the fact that for reasons never properly elaborated upon, Illidan and seemingly only Illidan was able to (by all appearances, almost effortlessly) use the Sargerite Keystone to open a portal between Argus and Azeroth that could accommodate Sargeras’ true form. Something Sargeras and the Burning Legion evidently couldn’t do themselves when they still had it. So it could be that Sargeras wanted to temporarily “be Illidan” in order to do that very same thing and allow his real body to finally cross over.
Sargeras also attempted to get the Scepter of Sargeras using Medivh so he clearly wanted a host with the power of the Council of Tirisfal to use his Portal weapon to open a big enough Portal.
Illidan consumed the powers of the Skull of Gul’dan who was inside Medivh when he got killed off therefore Illidan gained what lingering remnant of Sargeras and the Council of Tirisfal’s power was left inside Gul’dan after the experience which is what allowed him to master the Sargerite Keystone.
Illidan’s corpse had the power that Medivh had and Sargeras wanted to use it to get to Azeroth with either the Scepter of Sargeras or the Sargerite Keystone.
Wouldn’t that mean Illidan did the Burning Legion’s job for them when he opened the portal between Argus and Azeroth? Because while we besieged Antorus, Sargeras was engulfing Azeroth in his cloud form.
I might be misreading this, in case I’m not, when was Gul’dan inside Medivh? And in that case, wouldn’t he have been able to use AU Gul’dan, since he also had opened the portal in the Tomb of Sargeras?
The Tides of Darkness Novel mentions that Gul’dan dived into Medivh in order to get the Tomb of Sargeras’s location and when Medivh died it sent Gul’dan into a temporary coma that he eventually awoke from.
MU Gul’dan only dove into Medivh after arriving on Azeroth while AU Gul’dan never got anywhere near Medivh thus Illidan was the only suitable candidate.
Once Illidan was thrown out of the running to the Legion’s mind they switched to using Archmage Xylem to use the Focusing Iris to steal all of Azeroth’s Arcane Energies turning the Void Revenant inside him into a Void Titan under the Legion’s control according to https://wowpedia.fandom.com/wiki/Closing_the_Eye
Sargeras didn’t care if the Titan he controlled was Azeroth or a Void Revenant as long as it was utterly under his control! I’m sure the Void Lords would have been mortified to see a Void Titan under the Legion’s control invading their Cosmic Realm!
Sargeras naturally of course opportunistically took advantage of Illidan doing Sargeras’s Avatar’s job for him by opening the Portal to Argus making Azeroth viable again so he would not need to send another loyal Void Revenant to steal to Focusing Iris again!
After all, the massive sky-portal is closed behind us as we leave after beating Argus. Meaning it actually could be closed, something that wasn’t even treated as a possibility after he opened it. Consequently we weren’t actually facing the “invade Argus back or be overrun” scenario we thought we were. So he opened the way to Argus, then let us all keep thinking that with the portal there, the only available option was to attack Argus and halt the current invasion by destroying the Legion at its source.
With Kil’jaeden defeated and the Tomb’s portal being sealed, he saw our plan succeeding and just couldn’t bear the possibility that his plan might not get used. So he opened a giant portal from Argus, then neglected to inform anyone that said portal could just be closed again. As far as anyone else knew, even if we won on Argus, Azeroth could forever be stuck with that hole in the skies. But nope, turns out the portal was closable and he let everyone keep thinking it wasn’t so we’d treat invading Argus as the only option.
He’s referencing how MU Gul’dan was poking around in Medivh’s mind for the location of the Tomb of Sargeras when the Guardian got killed. The psychic backlash of Medivh’s death was what put Gul’dan into a coma at the end of the First War, leading the warlock to wake up several weeks or months later (my recollection of the time frame is hazy; been a while since I read the materials) and find out that Doomhammer had overthrown Blackhand, slaughtered the Shadow Council and outlawed warlocks during his absence.
Misunderstood