It’s not about you holding the position, we know you don’t. The point is others do and it’s wrong, which is what OP, myself, and others are pointing out.
And look at the comment section above. Some people are definitely saying she was worse than Illidan.
The Well of Eternity was what let the demons know about Azeroth in the first place. And a major factor in Illidan’s decision to make a new one was his magic addiction (plus he killed some of the elves who confronted him over it). Even if we remove that one, the other six points still stand.
The Dragon Aspects making the World Tree Nordassil over it was their way of cleaning up Illidan’s mess.
Well, after the first invasion the demons already knew about Azeroth. So it’s not like another one would make a difference, they DID invade the planet again several times, after all. Especially since Sargeras was specifically interested in Azeroth because of the slumbering world soul (a fact that post-retcon Illidan was made aware of, I think?)
But given the information the Elves had at the time, I can’t blame them for thinking another Well of Eternity would lead to another invasion, and that putting a tree on top of it would prevent that.
True. That first invasion happened because the demons used the Well to locate Azeroth. It was in that invasion where Sargeras learned of Azeroth and became infatuated with her.
Yes, plenty of people have said this or loosely implied this. You can keep repeating they don’t but they do, sorry. I’m sorry you don’t… I guess? I saw what I felt was a consensus among a non-trivial portion of the community that I felt was hypocritical and I made a thread about it. I don’t think it’s necessary for me to approach it neutrally as I don’t feel Xe’ra’s actions are completely equivalent to Illidan, generally being less immoral, I’ve also said multiple times that there’s no issue with saying you like one character more than another.
I just think it’s stupid to stick for people to stick their heads in the sand and act like Blizzard has retconned things you see with your own two eyes in the game. Which a lot of players seem to feel Blizzard has.
As I mentioned before, I don’t think anyone seriously thinks Xe’ra is more wicked than Illidan or even remotely that close. I think it’s as simple as people like Illidan as a character more.
Example: Freeza is my favorite villain in the Dragon Ball verse. I actually like him more than Goku however I fully acknowledge its by the character itself, not the actions or intentions of the character.
RIP Akira Toriyama
The way quite a few people have gone on about that Naaru in the past, or criticized those who called it out such as myself, says some of them seriously thought she was worse. Some may have changed their minds now, but they used to go on about her like that.
For example, look up Xe’ra in the forum search engine and see what comes up. Or take a look at this thread, and to a lesser degree this one, and you’ll see how much rabid hatred some WoW fans held for that Naaru;
Sort of. Obviously, you don’t forget something that makes a strong impression, so there is an argument that people must not have cared too much about Illidan’s crimes in TBC. But TBC was a long time ago, and not one of the most popular expansions. Players may not have touched it in a while, and the details kind of blur together.
And since, as you say, it was Vashj who was actually doing the slavery, it’s more of a mental leap to “remember to blame Illidan” for it.
No, but they didn’t go out of their way to remind us of all of them in Legion either. Don’t forget, not everyone who played Legion also played TBC. Some of them joined the game later and never even visited Outland. So they’d be relying on the information presented in Legion regarding what Illidan actually did during that era.
There’s also the fact that the storytelling in TBC was less polished and engaging than later expansions. The Slave Pens were a justification to put more enemy variety in a multi-winged dungeon that otherwise would have been mostly naga enemies and isn’t really explored much outside of that.
Illidan’s big moment exploding Xe’ra was a narrative and emotional climax that had been built up to for a while.
Looking through the first thread you linked and so far - not seeing any “rabid” hatred. Some people saying she’s obnoxious and didn’t care for her, some people saying she’s an amoral cosmic force that doesn’t really fall under good or evil, and some people saying that rigid inflexibility leads to evil eventually.
But ‘rabid hatred’ ? Frankly she never had enough of a presence in the story for anyone to have such strong of a reaction to her.
I remember a lot of Xe’ra hating threads, but I’m sure they disappeared with the old board. People objected to her trying to tell them that they, the PCs, were too mean to Illidan back in the day because he was just sooo speshul. They were totally convinced that she was the voice of Blizzard trying to shove a retcon down their throats, and they didn’t like that. However, all that died down pretty fast after Illidan exploded her.
Xe’ra was more of a programmed construct than a person, which would explain her inflexibility and inability to adapt to input,such as Illdan’s repeated refusal of her “gift”.
I think that trying to judge whether one was “better” than the other is an exercise in pedantry. Both were monsters in their own way and the world is better off without them.
Illidan however is a lot more fun to read about because he’s more than just a vehicle of prolonged exposition and obsessive control freak. He has other dimensions and a built up body of lore whereas Xe’ra was really just a long cameo. He’a good villain when he is a villain and an interesting nuance when he’s put in the anti-hero role. Illidan unlike Xe’ra had a path of character development, a journey that we walked through with him.
Whether it’s reading his farewell letter to Tyrande, or listening to him howling through Outland those are slices into a character with depth.
Xe’ra doesn’t have that depth, she’s frankly simply just not that interesting a character. Colossus in The Forbin Project shows more personality than she does and that’s saying something.
Yeah but that’s definitely not a retcon, soft or otherwise.
No I don’t think so, Xe’ra did like, literally one vaguely bad thing that people poorly and hamfistedly try to connect to a really really bad IRL thing. Illidan committed numerous atrocities. The stuff with Alleria is pretty justifiable as well.
This might be splitting hairs a little, but that kind of reaction reads to me more like people reacting to the story itself, and that character just being a proxy for the storytelling decisions they didn’t like at the time.
Side note but the “Illidan is the chosen one -PYSCH not really because chosen ones are dumb” was a good example of doing ‘hey wait and see where we are going with this story before casting judgement’ Blizzard earned a bit of credit with that one. And then immediately squandered it with BFA and Shadowlands.
Call it a memory hole or whatever you like, but that’s the way Blizzard usually gets rid of stories they don’t want to follow up on. They don’t make an official statement saying “This never happened”—they just ignore whatever it is and move forward with the new storyline even if it doesn’t fit with what came before. It’s annoying as heck.
I don’t disagree. But Xe’ra was definitely a focus for the hostility, for being the messenger. Especially when people were assuming she was meant to be a reliable narrator.
Just out of curiosity, do you think it would have been better if Illidan HAD actually been the Chosen One, and allowed Xe’ra to convert him into a lightforged being, therefore retroactively justifying all of his past actions as stepping stones on a path to get him to where he needed to be, like Xe’ra said?
Or do you just mean that Illidan never should have been brought back for Legion at all?
I was on the fence about Illidan being a Champion of the Light. My view can be summed up as “It could work, but needs to be done well, cos it’d be easy to mess this up.”
The main problem was the execution. They set up him as a Champion of Light then pulled the rug out from under us. They claimed he had a big part to play… only for him to contribute almost nothing to the story.
Except you don’t see many Space Odyssey fans calling HAL 9000 evil or a monster even as they disagree with his actions. And Xe’ra had more personality than HAL.
The problem is their hatred is usually based on a double standard and/or they’re in denial about it.
No. Illidan wanted to get face-to-face with Sargeras, no one asked him to be at the Seat of the Pantheon and nothing suggests he was needed there.
He didn’t give up Tyrande, she clearly was not interested in him and is happy with Malfurion. While he sent a message to his brother, they’d said their goodbyes already in Frozen Throne already.
