Why Sylvanas or any other banshee does not posses any of Alliance leaders?

Community General Discussion
1

I thought that Banshee can take control over a body as we could see in one mission in W3.
Why wouldn’t she do it against someone like Jaina? Or why won’t command any other banshee to do so?

2

I had pondered that too. I had assumed that she and he banshees lost the ability. Then the opener for BFA made me realize that theory was wrong.

3

If you ever find yourself wondering “why doesn’t (character) do (obvious thing)?” or “why did (character) do (dumb thing)?” there is a simple answer. Blizzard has decided the outcome they want and will push the story down that path no matter how much sense it makes.

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4

That’s kinda how things work.

5

While this is definitely true, I don’t think we need to resort to this rule to explain this particular thing. Sylvanas as a banshee desired to regain her body rather than being in incorporeal form and went to some lengths to do it. To possess another body would be to leave her own, which is probably not a state of vulnerability she would be willing to risk very often, especially given that she already went through one coup attempt already.

As for other banshees, I think it’s always been implied that possession is easier against weaker or weak-minded targets, which makes top-tier Alliance leadership a difficult proposition. Power magic-wielding targets in particular would seem likely to have stronger ability to fight off possession. Even without Blizzard explicitly stating that, I think the playerbase would mostly agree that this is just kind of an implied reality of the world. After all, the demons had plenty of possession-capable soldiers, but it took massive plot lines for Sargeras to accomplish possessing Medivh, and even at the low end, substantial devices were needed for them to possess even Archmage Vargoth (er, spoiler I guess to anyone who never did the mage campaign of Legion). Possessing someone like Jaina is probably not something people would naturally think of as being an option for Sylvanas.

On top of that, assuming there WAS a successful possession of any major Alliance leader, how long would it take for the Alliance to sniff that out? The Alliance is saturated with Light-aligned power-houses. If a banshee was discovered, they’d probably be annihilated in fairly short order, making a possession of a major Alliance leader even more harrowing and risk-intensive for Sylvanas or any other banshee.

Also, I assume it’s not easy for Sylvanas to get new banshees. That was more a Lich King-derived power. Sylvanas’s Val’kyr have generally only been able to raise corporeal undead, as far as I can remember, so her supply of banshees is probably a limited and valuable commodity.

So all of that is to say, while it’s definitely true they often have characters refrain from doing obvious things they should do because it would interfere with their plot goals, I think this doesn’t fall into that category, because just from the story as it already exists, I think it actually makes more initial sense that this is something that’s not a realistic option. I would expect banshee possession to be rarely and carefully utilized, and focused on middle management type figures less likely to be scrutinized for their decisions.

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6

because BFA writing isn’t logical.

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7

Dominating wills takes alot of power and Jaina is pretty powerful. Also I’m pretty sure Demonhunters would somehow be able to detect possessed people (if they can do it with demons why not undead).

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8

This is why in Warcraft 3 Banshees could only posses troop units, and not heroes.

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9

Mayb she lost it? Lost her touch? :hugs: idk I heard she’s on a rocky path might lose her job? Who knows

10

By far BFA has the worst writing ever. Hopefully with next layoffs we can get fresh writers in with the new , out with the old narrative team.

11

going by game mechanics alone here since we have little lore on how banshees actually work.

Banshees appear to lose most of their powers after possessing something, sylvanas (and most other banshees) used their possession to get back their own bodies.

Sylvanas’ new mist/ghost powers are a retcon that hasn’t ever been seen until BfA.

HOWEVER! Sylvanas has been shown to have the ability to mind control people (since WC3), what the actual conditions are to accomplish this is unknown.