I’ve started a Bastion character so I could get the full view from their angle. Just into Chapter 2.
1 Like
I thought the memory wipe and fallibility of the Kyrian was a little off but tossing souls into the Maw is downright evil. If you can give me insight as to why they are tossing souls into wickets knowing they are going to the Maw please let me know.
The only thing I’ve seen is “because The Path said so”
What is so far unstated are the consequences of the Kyrian simply going on strike for the duration. Maybe souls not collected soon enough turn into restless dead, and that can cause it’s own problems.
The Forsworn for their part, aren’t exactly being a helpful alternative.
Now I could post on my Bastion character on this but I don’t want to upset Amadis and the others any more than I have already.
Right there are a few reasons that we can think of but I don’t think any of them outweighs tossing them into the worse place in the WoW Universe. I’m looking more for an explanation from Kyrian.
4 Likes
Solarion covered this. I have completed the Bastion covenant campaign on my Night Elf Warrior, and the Kyrians never give an explanation or even complete a thought on what they’re doing.
There is a chapter in the Kyrian covenant campaign where you go with a the Kyrian Kleia - who was the first character you meet when starting leveling in Bastion as is with you throughout your Bastion leveling experience - to carry her first soul from the mortal plane to the Shadowlands, which coincidentally was a farmer from Redridged named Ben Howell who died because the rampant Scourge made it all the way to Lakeshire after Sylvanas broke the Helm of Domination.
You live through Ben Howell’s final moments in life trying to protect his family, and Kleia tells him how it’s time for him to move on and that she looks forward to seeing what afterlife he will be sent to - because somehow, despite that she was with you the whole time you were trying to tell the Archon about the Maw and the reason for the drought, Kleia somehow doesn’t know that all souls are going to the Maw. Kleia finds out when you bring Ben Howell’s soul to Oribos, and there she watches him get flung down to the Maw along with all the other souls still being carried into the Shadowlands by the Kyrians.
I have made a thread about how in the Night Fae covenant people can get special quests to save Night Elves who don’t deserve to be in the Maw, on top of the weekly souls you go into the Maw to save for sanctum upgrades. I expected a similar quest to save Ben Howell.
Such a quest never happened during the Kyrian covenant campaign. Even in the end, where you literally go into the Maw with Kleia to confront the new leader of the Forsworn being empowered by Helya.
After Kleia watches Ben Howell’s soul be sent to the Maw she says she needs a moment to think. She takes that moment. And then doesn’t think:
- Kleia says: Why do we continue to ferry souls when we know they are being sent straight to the Maw?
Polemarch Adrestes says: It is not our duty to ensure that souls are reaching their proper realms. It is our duty to bear them through the veil.
Polemarch Adrestes says: The Archon, along with the rest of the Eternal Ones, is working to solve the problem. We must support her by fulfilling our duty, no matter what.
Kleia says: …I understand. Thank you, Polemarch.
https://www.wowhead.com/quest=58793/faith-through-the-darkness
Kleia never questions it again, and the rest of the campaign focuses entirely on fixing the ritual device used to make new winged Kyrians and the Forsworn’s ever increasing radicalization and use of Maw powers.
I can only conclude the following:
The Kyrians are too low on the intelligence pay-grade. They do not seem capable of mentally tackling problems outside the scope of their magnitude. I suspect not even the Archon can wrap her head around the problems they face, and is completely dependent on the Arbiter. I would assume the Archon knows that she is incapable of experiencing the totality of each life of ever soul passing in the Shadowlands the way the Arbiter could, and seeing herself not up to the task has chosen to not do anything but try to wake the Arbiter up, though there is no indication that anyone has had any leads on how to do that (though I haven’t started the Necrolord or Venthyr covenant campaigns yet to say for sure).
The following is pure speculation:
It would unlikely end well for the Kyrians if they started placing souls themselves into the Shadowlands. I highly suspect (but without any lore citations to prove it) that Devos had been bringing souls that did not belong in Bastion to Bastion ever since Arthas’ death, and that this is the origin of the Forsworn. The Forsworn’s numbers are too great for the drought to have caused this much doubt in people just because they were bored waiting for their turn to get wings. The souls sent to Bastion were meant to become Kyrians - should have been suitable and willing for the memory erasing process, same as the souls suitable to be undead soldiers for the rest of existence being sent to Maldraxxus. That there are so many souls in Bastion for which the memory erasing process has such a negative affect on them indicates to me that these souls should never have been sent to Bastion in the first place. As there has been a significant enough time between Arthas’ death and whenever it was during Legion that the Arbiter stopped functioning, it would be during this time that I suspect Devos would have brought souls to Bastion to intentionally undermine the system so that people would see it as flawed as she did.
Would being sent to Bastion if you didn’t belong there be better than being sent to the Maw if you didn’t belong there? Almost undoubtedly. However, on the other hand, with the number of Forsworn that ended up in service of the Jailer as the Mawsworn, being sent to an afterlife one doesn’t belong to might make one susceptible to the Jailer’s propaganda and end up in the Maw any way.
Another piece of speculation I would pose is the possibility that the Kyrians trying to place souls themselves could leave to further unstabilization of the Shadowlands as a whole. Two of the houses from Maldraxxus attacked Bastion out of want of anima and body parts because of the drought - all playing into the Jailer’s hands, as the houses were talked into it by Helya and Kel’Thuzad. While the rest of the Necrolords vilify those houses for attacking Bastion, if instead the Kyrians were placing the souls in various realms, how quickly would their placements be called into question? How easily would the Necrolords be swayed by an argument that the Kyrians might be keeping the most anima for themselves, or otherwise unfairly distributing the souls, and rather than being against the houses that attacked Bastion would have joined in on the assault instead? All playing into the Jailer’s hands rather than the covenant realms allying together to oppose him.
But as I said, the last three paragraphs are pure speculation. The most direct lore answer on why the Kyrians keep carrying over souls when they know that all souls will go right to the Maw is that the Kyrians simply don’t think about it.
5 Likes
If a system has worked for basically all of creation, there was no credible reason to think it could be broken.
Anyway, as to the main topic, I think the reason the Kyrians are still doing their job is because there’s a very real, observable consequence to doubt and rebellion from their job. Kyrians who think they know better become corrupted, that’s the reality of the situation. A metaphysical aspect of their being.
1 Like
so its the archon’s or arbiter’s fault for making such a dumb system for the kyrians
have these shadowlanders never heard the saying better safe than sorry? well they weren’t safe and now they will be sorry
One thing to consider is those souls don’t belong in these realms either. Most souls don’t get judged to these four covenants. Taking them there if they aren’t suited for the place now also poses a threat to the covenants as well.
Where would they stay? Just in a big soul cage? Or would they be allowed to roam free, and cause potential problems just because they don’t fit in? There’s the logistics of space, resources, who’s going to manage all that and that it’ll be going on for an unknown amount of time. The refugees would get progressively bigger and bigger and probably not even dent the river of souls going to the Maw.
It gets out of control really fast and upsets the balance and integrity of all of these covenants intaking all of that. It’s not fair to the spirits too being treated that way. Another possibility is leaving them to wander the borderlands between life and death, but that’s also an injustice to them. They don’t know what’s going on, they just died. And supporting that is the kyrian’s entire reason for existence so it’s hard to say no.
It’s like a no-win situation. No one knows how to wake up the Arbiter, so they’re kind of locked at a stand still. All they can do is what they’ve been doing for eternity. The SL isn’t used to change, it’s a place that’s meant to be consistent. That’s how it differs from life so it takes some learning and adjustment.
1 Like
That’s presuming they created these aspects. They might be a fundamental part of the magic involved.
Hindsight is 20/20.
well the archon is the first, so somebody had to make this system, that bastion’s kyrians operate off of.
that doesnt really cut it when failure means all of the realm of death screeches to a halt, they should have put in measures to prevent something like this from happening. maybe have a waiting room for souls in case the arbiter is down so they dont all get yeeted into super hell
Somebody didn’t necessarily invent the nature of the magic, no.
Again, said from hindsight. You can claim you know better, you ultimate benefit from the knowledge it messed up. Something that didn’t happen for possibly millions of years.
the arbiter literally creates every single realm of death. so its likely that somebody writes the rules for the realms of deaths she makes, either the arbiter writes them when they are made, or whoever leads them do
these blokes going “woopsie, hindsight is a pain” isnt going to cut it, even if you think nothing will go wrong in millions of years it is still better to put in measures in case things do go wrong as they have done now, so that everything doesnt unravel at the seams
there is no argument against having a backup plan if things breakdown other than laziness
Likely? If you have a source, feel free to link it. Just seems like a forced attempt for criticism.
Should I get volcano insurance in Maine? Or maybe that’s a waste of effort for an exceedingly unlikely scenario.
Wow, just wow.
I dread to see their “Return Souls” from the Maw quest.
These are truly the worst beings in the WoW universe.
yes likely, unless you are trying to argue that when these realms are created the laws they operate on are made via rng
if i had a prisoner who constantly wanted to get out and is more than likely scheming to do so as we know he was. i wouldnt call that exceedingly unlikely. i would instead call that “something i shouldnt ignore and have counter measures if the need ever arrives” after all its better to have it and not need it, then need it and not have it.
You’re erroneously applying your limited mortal conception of things to a system that’s operated without issues for literal eons. As in, millions possibly billions of years, if not longer (between time being wonky in the Shadowlands and us not really knowing just how old the WarCraft universe is, it could be as many as trillions of years or more.)
It’s odd how so many players come waltzing into the Shadowlands demanding to know why this impossibly ageless plane of reality operating according to a universe-spanning paradigm older than any species or continent on our own planet hasn’t been adhering to our narrow, twenty-first century human understanding of right, wrong, and how things work. As if somehow we’re to expect that the timeless workings of the cosmos should have grabbed onto our own, presumably perfectly balanced and functional moral, ethical and administrative ways of thinking, realized that we’ve got it all figured out and then adopted our ways.
Just the sheer volume of souls coming into the Shadowlands at all times potentially defies simplistic ideas of things like “a waiting room.” Cosmically speaking, Death is a process that just happens; by most indications, the system of the Arbiter and the Eternal Ones’ realms was just installed in front of Death’s natural “flow” to organize and direct what was already going on as best they could.
We can bandy about “they should have had a backup plan,” yet that refuses to realize that what we’re told about these things is contextualized such that we, as mortals, can marginally grasp what we’re seeing, while the First Ones, Eternal Ones and Arbiter as they deal with the machinery of Death directly are wrangling forces and concepts that exceed our capacity to even fully comprehend them.
When dealing with harnessing and organizing a cosmic force of reality, it’s not only possible, but probable that what we see was the only plan in place because it was literally the only sort of system that the fundamental laws of Death allowed for, and anything else tried would inherently snowball into a catastrophe on its own.
Yet here we sit, demanding to know why the WoW cosmological parallel of Heaven, Hell and countless similar concepts all at once isn’t operating according to the standards and expectations of things like free-thinking liberal democracy and mortal human ethics.
I don’t know how they’re created. But if there’s not a source said magic is made by a will, I don’t feel a need to make that leap. Seems excessive.
Believe as you will, you can look back pretty easily.
well now there is a issue and the entire shadowlands is shutting down as a result of the shadowlanders being incapable of any sort of forsight
you know saying that the first ones, the eternal ones, and the arbiter are beyond our ability to comprehend them makes it even more silly that they couldnt even think of putting in a backup should something mess up and we can. if anything that makes them sound absolutely stupid
honestly this all just sounds like blizzard didnt think too much into it, and opted to just have conflict by giving the shadowlanders the stupid ball
again if i had a prisoner that was actively scheming against me and wanted to kill the arbiter. i would have some contingency plans.
also who’s idea was it to have that if the arbiter goes down all the souls go the maw, who was dumb enough to think that up!?
i believe its said either the first ones or the arbiter makes each realm of death and that the arbiter can make new ones should she need to.
3 Likes
Said while sitting in your armchair.
I was talking about the rules of the magic specifically. It seems more likely to me the magic functions on certain pre-established aspects rather than being designed with inherent flaws with no upside.
you’re sitting in your armchair too, and im certain blizzard were too when they wrote up this stupidity that breaks down under scrutiny
its almost like blizzard operates on rule of cool or whatever they need to get a conflict going, logic be damned
i find it difficult to believe that they cant edit the laws when they make these realms, the rules of magic differ from realm to realm. maldraxxians dont become forsworn if they despair and forsake the incredibly stupid path
also this is the realm of death, the first ones and the arbiter made this realm to what it is. to say they have no control over it is dumb