Here’s the thing for me, and I think it affects how any Sylvanas story will be received in the future.
Sylvanas’ story revolves around being dominated and refusing to be subdued ever again. She uses her wit and cunning to stay one step ahead of allies and enemies alike. She and her Forsaken were like a Jarlaxle Benrae and Bregan D’earth. She could pop in any time as a dominatrix deus ex machina. Her royal apothecaries could do some morally questionable stuff and turn the tide of any situation. She was dangerous enough and cunning enough to get away with casting overt shade over powerful and hostile superiors. But above all else, she would not be dominated again.
What we got is a defeated and deflated Sylvanas; dominated if only by her own guilt. No one wants this. No one wants to see it. No one wants to take part in it. I say no one, but maybe there’s some sadistic person out there that gets weird gratification watching powerful women be turned into a shell of their former self, who also plays WoW and wants to see Sylvanas come back. But this isn’t really the appropriate medium for that story.
I mean, her conscience caught up to her actions, of course she will be drowning in guilt. Doesn’t mean she will be drowning in guilt forever. Hopefully we will see her rise above that and find her confidence and some of that snark again. I don’t think she will come back as Alliance coded ranger-general, but won’t come as the former banshee queen either. There’s a fair middle ground there to be explore, should the writers care to put some brain power into it.
While I think they can make her that character, I think that’s too much to ask in an MMO.
That type of story takes a lot of words to communicate fully. Many people will only get the surface image and Sylvanas’ old surface image was always strong enough to get the theme. Certainly, many of Sylvanas’ fans will dig deeper into whatever number of books they try to publish to explain, No, actually she’s stronger and girl-bossier than ever but deeply feels true remorse for her past actions
The stories are serious and nuanced, but the game is candy. It’s junk food that should taste good and any real meat is what the rest of us go looking for on our own. I don’t think they can make Sylvanas candy again. But if they do, I want it to be the anise flavored niche candy that I loved and not some version of “made with real fruit” BS that they are inevitably going to try selling to my alliance parents because it’s part of a balanced breakfast.
Edit: They could Hexadecimal her. They could even split her into two individuals rather than give her split personalities. They could make the ranger general her new broken mask and the Banshee Queen could secretly be the true Sylvanas. They could even make it so whichever Sylvanas you like is the true Sylvanas, giving you different text depending on if you play a Loyalist or a Separatist. There are options that they could explore that don’t involve doubling down on SL, but I predict they will double down on SL.
I don’t disagree with you, but do you not think that it’s endemic of how little Horde content is offered that just seeing Kael’thas was enough to make people like him? Like, they even cut Lor’themar meeting with him.
The Banshee Queen worked as a character in an MMO because she is a caricature. You can tell what she is without having to look too long. Without needing too many lines of dialogue. The Forsaken (without the nuance you can find if you go looking) are the cartoonishly evil undead and she is their Macabre Madonna. She is driven by negative emotion and a quest for vengeance. Death to the living. She hates existence. She is a slave to her own torment. This characterization is simple. As simple as the noble savage trope of Thrall. These iconic heroes are not complex dishes. They are candy.
A middle ground is complex and a game like wow does not have time for complexities. Not in the game. You can hint at complexities and explore those in in-game item descriptions and supplementary media. God knows I love me some WoW novellas. And certainly, the subtle complexities of Sylvanas, the Banshee Queen were enjoyable, but as the bitter herbal notes of Black Licorice. Since those notes did not change the reality of the iconic, undead, monstrous banshee queen, they were just a subtlety appreciated by the person for whom that particular candy was an acquired taste.
The kind of story required to make the Ranger General satisfying requires… Less cartoonishly huge weapons. Smaller biceps. Less hypersexualized character models. Maybe not a blood elf doing a Brittney Spears dance on top of the mail box in her underwear. The story needed to reconcile the blue eyed Sylvanas with the Red Eyed Banshee Queen is a story you can tell in a Warcraft movie sequel. You can touch on it, perhaps, in the high quality cinematics like the Mok’gora. But it’s a story that has to take itself serious enough to demand the audience do the same.
… And that’s not why I play WoW. I’m not here for a serious grown up meal. I’m here to consume candy.
That’d be a valid argument if we were not already getting extensive exposition to NPCs through quests and dialogues. Her change can be shown in a pallatable manner.
I agree that an animation, comic or light novel would be the perfect media vehicle to show that, but if done correctly it can be shown in the game while we quest with her. Nelf players would hate it, but then again at this point it would be just another slap to their already bruised faces.
I mean, I like both. I’ve been enjoying these more proper meals of character development. You are here for just the candy, so just skip the main dish, but it doesn’t mean other people can’t enjoy a main dish as well.
It would depend on which Sylvanas we get. And no I don’t mean the ‘two Sylvanas’ in Shadowlands.
Sylvanas as she was written from WC3 to the end of Wrath was, bar none, one of Blizzard’s flagship characters, I would argue THE most popular. The old official site had a fan art section and the majority of the pieces there were of her, even before she got her Wrath model. This only slowed down in Cataclysm, and even then had moments of resurgence here and there.
All the old WC3 crew that eventually appeared in WoW were popular, sure, but for her it was on another level. The mishandling of her character writing and the fumbling of what was absolutely a flagship creation for nearly all of the 2000s will probably be studied at some point.
In short, I don’t think they can avoid bringing her back, especially if this xpac trilogy ends up being a closing arc for WoW. If they bring back Sylvanas as she was in the early days of WoW? It won’t hurt the game. Hell, if she comes back for some big final battle, with Cairne’s spirit alongside her to fight too (I’d include Vol’jin but I think he’ll be back earlier than The Last Titan), it’ll probably be a fist pump moment.
It cracks me up in a depressing way that every time Kael’thas shows up somewhere, he is an entirely different character. We’ve got the Jaina obsessed incel Kael → the grim pragmatist who is a selfless shepherd for his people → the inexplicable tyrannical turn as one of Illidan’s lieutenants → the inexplicable Burning Legion Stan that is suddenly kinda racist toward Illidan → spoiled, arrogant, prideful brat carrying around a sinstone in Revendreth.
WC3:TFT Kael’thas was a great character. I miss that dude.
Quite. I disliked how much his Shadowlands portrayal borrowed from TBC, because the explanation we were given as to his megalomania was that fel magic rotted his brain. He didn’t have that excuse as a ghost. It felt like they were writing the character people would recognize instead of the character he should have reverted to.
His dynamic with Vashj bothered me as well, mostly for her inexplicable attitude problem. Like really, you, the literal snake who tempted this guy down damnation’s road, are wagging a finger that he walked it to its logical conclusion?
… and yet, for all that, the Kael’thas rehabilitation was still my expansion highlight. Still waiting on that promised reunion with Lor’themar…
MoP was one of the best expansions ever, and among the most revisited expansions for leveling. It housed the last great moment of WoW world PvP. The fight over rares, all for cosmetic collection was heated. People loved the faction conflict. They didn’t love Siege of Orgrimmar.
And the devs assured us there wasn’t going to be SoO 2.0. They assured us that we just had to wait and see and it would all make sense. Sylvanas, after the Mok’Gora told her loyalists that it would all make sense. I honestly believe that whatever they originally had planned was supposed to make those statements true.
NEVER, I wish 100% she was all the way a villain, they copped out last second, I don’t care what anyone says.
The fact that I played through Shadowlands just to see her get her comeuppance (yeah, I never thought I’d say that) says something. I hated her so much I PREORDERED and played EVERY.SINGLE.DAY.
That’s the perfect villain right there, and they pull the rug! WHY!?
I heard a lot of people say they were going to quit because of that. And a lot of people said they were going to quit if they tried to give her a slap on the wrist. And a lot of people said they were going to quit if they killed her because death was too lenient.
A lot of those people are still here.
The ones that quit probably quit for reasons unrelated to Sylvanas burning the world tree. No matter how much they say otherwise.
Oh no you don’t understand, you think you know, but the vast majority of people posting here are not the people who were posting then, they did quit, vanished of all social media too
Not until Dragonflight. The expansion that was supposed to be better. And not because they villain batted Sylvanas. Even during our daily lamentations we enjoyed the community. The story forums community thread is one of the most popular threads on the forums. For a while during SL the hunter community tried to emulate it.
And people who did leave have real lives and those lives have much more weighty burdens that can and do inspire taking a break from beloved hobbies; moreso than being disappointed in plot developments in one’s favorite media.
While I was very disappointed in the handling of Sylvanas in SL, I was even more disturbed by the DF aesthetic and lack of compelling narrative in DF’s promotional media. That still wasn’t the reason I took a break. I took a break because I had real life marital issues.
And even if people did leave because they were unhappy with the writing it doesn’t mean villain batting Sylvanas was the reason. People enjoy stories that upset them if they are well written. Of Mice and Men is considered, alongside Herman Mellville’s whaling book and Tom Sawyer as “The Great American Novel”. People don’t complain that Lenny killed the pretty girl. That George killed Lenny. It’s part of the story and we like to be inspired to feel even negative emotions. And people are at this moment tempted to respond “Yes but this was different because reasons” and those reasons are what made it bad. Not the inclusion of the event itself.
