[Spoilers] I'm Still Not Convinced About the Current Plot (Elegy and A Good War Discussion) [/r/wow X-Post]

TL;DR:

The current plot indicates Sylvanas may have ulterior motives and the like, and that's cool. What isn't cool is how things are portrayed right now. Black vs. White is not particularly interesting, especially when it continues to drag the Horde's supposed values through the mud.

In A Good War, it seems Saurfang ends up agreeing at least in part with the practicality (but of course not the honour) of the Burning of Teldrassil. This is indicative of an ongoing problem in Warcraft storytelling, ignoring details here or there to rationalise a perspective. In Saurfang's case, the Burning of Teldrassil is not justified by "Maybe we've tilted the Alliance?" when you already should have attained an edge through military dominance on Kalimdor -- thus the Azerite it holds -- and the ability to make a hostage situation out of the hundreds, if not thousands of night elves still on the World Tree.

Justifying the burning of the World Tree in Saurfang's eyes after he originally perceived it as madness is really, really nonsensical. It was madness, and you should not be capable of convincing a brilliant, honourbound orc that there was anything practical about it. Seriously.

^(Despite the length of this TL;DR, it's still only 5% of the text as a whole at 196/4105 words, so no complaining!)

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Hello,

I just finished reading Elegy, and then A Good War in one good solid sitting (minor breaks as necessary), and I've gotta say... I'm happy ish knowing what I did about the two short stories, but ended up being a bit flabbergasted by the end of A Good War with one particular point being made.^(Disclaimer: this will mostly focus on A Good War.)

With that said, let me set up what I think is a fair opinion on the current writing direction/standard/whatever you wanna call it. The plot, for Battle for Azeroth. I will also preface this by saying that I generally like or even love a lot of decisions Blizzard makes with the lore, including many retcons. This is actually one of the few times I've been genuinely concerned with where things are headed.

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Standing Concerns for Current Writing/Plot Development:

• The current plot direction seems a bit naughty. As in, it looks like the way they're portraying the Horde is unfortunate, because they're shifting them down the route of war once again as if they're irredeemable savages.

Yes, this is Warcraft and Sylvanas is a Warchief and whatever. That doesn't really justify bad writing. I still hate that in the Warbringers short for Sylvanas she just decided to down the World Tree. Why? Because Sylvanas being evil is expected -- her being stupid is not. That's inconsistent.

• The current storytelling seems a bit naughty. In this thread, and as plenty of others on r/wow have pointed out, there clearly seems to be other things at play. Old Gods, Sylvanas' ulterior motives, you name it. And I'm sure we'll get more on that as Battle for Azeroth progresses.

But,

I feel very little for the whole Alliance vs. Horde conflict following Sylvanas' short if only because it has since painted the conflict in an extremely Black and White fashion. I know who I'm "rooting for," I know who's in the wrong, and I'm not really feeling much for characters because there is no real internal struggle. The only outlier on this is Saurfang, who currently resides in a prison cell doing jack shit.

Of course his story will be elaborated upon, but the point is that even if we are given lore that retroactively changes my view on who and what is happening, the way things are presented now make me feel bored, and disinterested. Unlike my first point, this is a problem that could very well just be be resolved in time, but I think it will be forever a valid criticism because if they end up showing us things that influence how we look at the lore retrospectively, I'd still be asking "Why couldn't you have alluded this to us sooner?"

I know a lot of Horde players especially are not appreciative of asking "Are we the baddies?" once again. The recent Old Soldier cinematic was truly fantastic, and a great way of helping raise Horde pride... but doesn't actually address these concerns, except indicating to us that Blizzard is definitely taking into account the side of honour and other New Horde ideals.

So, the short stories.

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Elegy:

Elegy was all in all well written and appreciated, especially the gruelling detail it went into with the conflict between Alliance and Horde. It was great to see both sides in their short stories, even to the basic concept of silly mistakes being made by combatants of either side; it strikes as real.

As much as it's cool to think every elf fights like Legolas or whatever, it was great to see how one mistake here or there was also construed as a combatant taking advantage of a weakness.

With that said, there's one particular thing about Elegy I could appreciate:

Through blurred vision, he saw Genn Greymane’s face as his wife clung to him, and he realized that not even Genn, who hated Sylvanas with his whole heart, could believe it. No one had thought she would put her cruelty before her cleverness. There was no strategic purpose, no possible reason to destroy the tree. Far from it—with this unfathomable decision, Sylvanas had united the Alliance in a way nothing else could.

Huzzah! They acknowledged the decision as madness. That's fantastic, I can appreciate that, because such a brazen action from a supposedly cold and calculating leader cannot be left unexplained. And of course, it's not been explained -- at least not adequately (see the point about "Evil Stupid" above). This is just another hint suggesting that we'll be revealed something later on that shows an event such as this in a new light.

I will note finally that the whole assault was made possible by three things:

1. Spies and the ability to feed misinformation. Saurfang capitalised brilliantly on this, as shown by what Renzik got to see.

2. Azerite. The existence of Azerite. Had armies been suggested to be moving south through misinformation in point 1, there would be no matter of believability or even major concern on the Alliance's part had not a substance the strength of Azerite been presented to them. Azerite in Before the Storm's description is stated to "threaten to reignite the bitter enmity between the two factions."

3. Severely depleted navies on both sides. Staging an assault on Teldrassil would take years, and in the meantime, the people are held hostage so retaliation is not a good option at all for the Alliance.

There is a fourth reason why the assault was initiated, and that was to attempt to sow discord among the Alliance, and Anduin catches wind of this. Despite what people say about the guy, he is far more intelligent and level headed than people seem to want to let on.

I will say though that sowing discord among the Alliance is a God awful idea. Tactically, it wouldn't work. And there are a couple reasons I say this, and both of them are quite obvious and are bases for concerns with current plot writing:

Reason 1: The Alliance just beat back the Burning Legion and did so through unity and mutual assistance. If the Burning Legion's greatest invasion of Azeroth yet and the death of the Alliance's High King wasn't enough, how do you fathom breaking their spirit by giving them yet another enemy to rally against? This is Sylvanas and Saurfang's severe and frankly baseless underestimation of the Alliance.

Reason 2: In Before the Storm, Sylvanas mentions that the Alliance no longer has any human leaders to rally behind. "No Varian or Llane Wrynn, and no Anduin Lothar." But she is missing out one person who is extremely relevant here. She remembered both Kings of Stormwind, but not both Supreme Commanders. She forgot Turalyon. She forgot her own sister's lover who had been part of a Thousand Years' War against the Burning Legion.

You could suggest she didn't know he'd returned or anything, except in the Windrunners comic which we know happens prior to Before the Storm, her reunion with Alleria should be indicative enough of something to do with Turalyon. Indeed, Vereesa says outright to Alleria upon Windrunner Spire with Sylvanas present, "I envy you your time with Turalyon, Alleria."

Yes, he has returned after twenty years of absence, and yet, something tells me that wouldn't be such an issue when we see Illidan taking the reins as well as he did after having been regarded an enemy of Azeroth. Turalyon is one of the Alliance's most revered heroes.

So I'm glad that Anduin saw through it, and I'm glad that Greymane confirmed the insanity of it by calling Anduin a fool if he'd ever thought he'd put the reclamation of Gilneas before the retaking of Teldrassil and freeing of its inhabitants from the Horde occupation.

Because it truly is ridiculous to suspect that the Alliance leadership could fracture because they don't have a human, or when they've faced the Burning Legion straight-on.

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A Good War:

A Good War is where most of the rationale and many questions arise, in my opinion. Elegy is about the losing battle, and the tragedy of the burning of Teldrassil. About the incomprehensible nature of such an act.

A Good War is about... a little bit more than that.

As a small, positive aside: I love the almost banterous nature between Varok Saurfang and Nathanos Blightcaller when Saurfang leads him onto the trickery he is trying to play the Alliance under. Great interaction there.

Now, in order the short story gives this things in:

First, a hint towards Sylvanas not being simply insane.

The warchief had done very well in giving the reins of this plan to the orc, Nathanos had to admit. Saurfang had learned warfare before he had learned to walk, and it showed. His reputation and legacy were well earned. He had sacrificed much for his people, and the Horde trusted him to make the right decisions, even in dark days.

Although, Sylvanas has earned that reputation a thousand times over, yet she is still mistrusted. Too many in the Horde were short-sighted and weak-willed. Sylvanas had seen what lay beyond this life. She knew what waited on the other side. What else could she do but act on that knowledge? If her actions sometimes seemed cruel, well, life was cruel. Existence was fleeting. Her plans soared over the horizon of mortality, and that frightened many.

It did not frighten Nathanos. It delighted him.

Saurfang twisted in his seat, looking at Nathanos.

Oh look, ulterior motives and plans. Now, we have been alluded stuff like this in, say, the Windrunner comic. She clearly is not just all for the Horde and whatever.

But, the way it is phrased here is far better than "Eventually, they will all serve me.

They will all serve... death."

Because seriously that just sounds unambiguously evil and voodoo baddie-like. This sounds like Nathanos is at least a little bit in on her machinations and, equally importantly, he doesn't necessarily perceive what they do as strictly evil. It's not explicit, however this here strikes me as "We do what we must," very much an ends justify the means kind of thing.

And let's make no mistake; it seems abundantly clear from various sources that Sylvanas acknowledges herself as a monster. She isn't morally ignorant, she is morally deficient -- she knows much of what she does is wrong, but in the name of pragmatism she often does it anyway. That doesn't mean it isn't evil, but at least then it isn't Evil Stupid.

Secondly, Sylvanas is willing to put her unlife on the line:

Sylvanas stepped closer to the wisps, regarding them calmly. Saurfang ground his teeth but said nothing. She faced down the wall of swarming lights as though it were Malfurion himself. And perhaps, that was not inaccurate.

Sylvanas spun around. “I am prepared to duel Malfurion alone.”

Saurfang wasn’t sure he had ever heard a worse idea, not with circumstances this dire. “Warchief—”

She cut him off. “I know. I would be facing him, his remaining army, and the spirits of his ancestors by myself. That will be … difficult to overcome,” she said dryly. “But we almost have them. I will not retreat.”

The night elven ships fired again. Shots landed close by, explosions sending geysers of sand leaping into the air. A few of Saurfang’s guards flinched. Sylvanas didn’t. Neither did Saurfang. They’re just testing their range, he knew.

“Wisps are dangerous only in large numbers,” Saurfang said. “Can you … kill them, Warchief? Enough of them?”

Sylvanas eyed the wisps for a few moments, then shook her head. “Not enough to matter. But we can disperse them. Take anyone you need, Saurfang, and go into Felwood. Find a path over the mountains into Darkshore, and sweep into this forest from the rear. When I hear the attack begin, I will lead the remainder of the Horde through the front. We will squeeze Malfurion from both sides. He will fall today.”

When we already know from Edge of Night (and supplemented further by this quote later on) that Sylvanas cherishes her own self-preservation if only to avert oblivion/Hell, we can appreciate some complexity and arguably even a degree of selflessness in her actions and plannings here. She has repeatedly risked her life in Battle for Azeroth as we know, and while we could understand her being bold in an attempt to secure the best future she can for herself (and even the Horde), it is heartening to see her willing to put herself to the test and take grand risks to achieve these goals.

Now, we go later on to after Malfurion has been spared by Varok Saurfang.

This battle was not about a piece of land. Even Saurfang knew that. Taking the World Tree was a way to inflict a wound that could never heal. Losing their homes and their leaders would have ended the kaldorei as a nation, if not a people. Even the loss of one leader would have been enough to create a tide of despair. The wounds of this battle would have bled, festered, decayed, and rotted the Alliance from the inside out. Anduin Wrynn would have lashed out in a final, desperate war, looking for a miracle, because only a miracle would save them.

But a miracle already had. A miracle granted by the honorable hand of a foolish old orc.

And an overconfident warchief. Best to lay blame where it belonged. This was her mistake as much as Saurfang’s.

This conquest of Darnassus would rattle the kaldorei people. They would grieve for their lost, fear for their imprisoned, and tremble at the thought of the Horde ransacking their homes. But they would not fall to despair. Not anymore. Malfurion’s impossible survival would give them hope. Their wound would heal. Even in this dark hour, they would say, Elune still watches over us.

And that was almost certainly true, wasn’t it? Elune had intervened. Perhaps she had even stayed Saurfang’s killing blow. And she wouldn’t be the only force beyond the Alliance to oppose Sylvanas’s true objective.

So the first thing is, this gives pretty damning evidence that Sylvanas' idiocy in letting Malfurion live was indeed her own idiocy. She blames her own overconfidence, so it's really hard to say that her inner-monologue criticising herself is going to be wrong.

That, honestly, sucks a bit, but I guess that's the best we can get from a situation where she lets one of her two primary objectives get away. It's a shit excuse, I'd still say it's a bad plot, but it's written as best as it could be.

The second thing however is of course the "true objective" bit. Blizzard has been really, really good given us sod-all in regards to what Sylvanas is doing and what her true motives are besides self-preservation. This is just another wink to the notion that she has more going on than we're led to believe. This is good, because I prefer her not being 2-dimensionally evil, even if this quote still shows she's being at least a little Evil Stupid.

Again, bad plot but the best writing they can achieve for it I guess.

I will also say that this seems to ignore what I'd have thought would have been one of the biggest cruxes about capturing Teldrassil as was identified earlier: hostages. Retaliation is not so easy when you have something you can very easily, very quickly lose as a result of that. Hostages would be the best hope the Horde would ever have of spreading discord within the Alliance, between those who want to act and those who would hesitate. You would never get the Alliance split over how to act, only whether they could because thousands of lives are at risk otherwise. More on that, later.

Here, we once again see an acknowledgement of madness.

“Why …? Why …?” Saurfang breathed. He looked again at Nathanos. The Forsaken’s eyes were wider than the orc had ever seen.

Sylvanas had her back to Saurfang, watching the fire spread. Saurfang tried—desperately tried—to rationalize her order.

Did that dying elf tell her something? Were they planning to resist? Is the Alliance about to arrive with reinforcements?

A dozen different explanations rushed through his mind. They all died quickly. There were no sails on the horizon. A couple of kaldorei ships were frantically moving away from the World Tree as burning branches rained down upon them. Even the captured ships were awkwardly steering out of the way. They had not expected this.

Nobody had.

What about Sylvanas?

That thought struck Saurfang cold.

Was this her plan all along?

No. It couldn’t have been. She’d had a strategy in mind. Conquering the World Tree—taking it intact—would have been a brilliant move. Destroying it was …

… madness.

The entire tree was now engulfed in flames. Shimmers of blue and white grew and faded as the fire burned hotter and hotter. The edge of the fire circled around the tree. And then, the city of Darnassus began to burn.

I don't have much to say about this, for one simple reason.

They basically take it all back and say "Screw logic" in the next bit.

“They will come for us now. All of them!” he said.

“I know.” She was calm, as though nothing were wrong. “They will attack the Undercity in retaliation. You will need to plan our defenses. Begin evacuating my people.”

He struggled to form words. Finally, pure hatred made him spit out a condemnation. “You have damned the Horde for a thousand generations. All of us. And for what? For what?”

Her expression didn’t waver. “This was your battle. Your strategy. And your failure. Darnassus was never the prize. It was a wedge that would split the Alliance apart. It was the weapon that would destroy hope. And you, my master strategist, gave that up to spare an enemy you defeated. I have taken it back. When they come for us, they will do so in pain, not in glory. That may be our only chance at victory now.”

He wanted to kill her. He wanted to declare mak’gora and spill her blood in front of Horde and Alliance alike.

But she was right.

A wound that can never heal. That had always been the plan. And Saurfang had failed to inflict it. The story of Malfurion’s miraculous survival would have spread among the armies of the Alliance as proof that they were blessed in their cause.

War would still have come. That had been certain the moment Saurfang had led the Horde into Ashenvale. And it would have been what he had feared most: the meat grinder, spending so many lives to achieve so little, ending with a whimper, and thus dooming future generations to a war nobody could win. Once again, Sylvanas had seen it before he had.

I have to say, what on earth is the logic behind this? No no, I can see that it is well explained within the quote above, but...

This has been a recurring theme of characters apparently just, forgetting details. Important details, when they're meant to be brilliant tacticians. And here, they have forgotten two incredibly huge details that have already been mentioned:

1. Prisoners. A hostage situation. This is again what I thought would have been the best thing to hold against the Alliance, and Sylvanas threw away this bargaining chip in a massacre. Evil Stupid.

2. "Our only hope is to provoke them so much their vein pops out"? I'm sorry, did we forget about how you just secured a continent and its Azerite?!

Point 1 is ludicrous to me because those prisoners could have been extremely valuable, as was thought from the outset of this grand undertaking. Sylvanas threw it away for no real reason and while her being Evil Stupid is bad enough, why the Hell is Varok Saurfang being won over by her atrocious logic?

He full on acknowledges that taking the Tree would have been a brilliant move. How does that suddenly go out the window by Sylvanas saying "My grand strategy is to tilt the Alliance into losing a war."

Look, if she was reaching for some shit all justification and she has ulterior motives or whatever, fine.

But the fact that Saurfang fell for this when he had not only the prisoners to consider, but the Azerite that they would have had greater access to regardless, is flabbergasting. Flabbergasting. I have no idea how a commander of his experience, so capable as to make the burning or occupation of Teldrassil so possible, overlooks these two overbearing advantages that the Horde would have possessed should they occupy Teldrassil.

Couple that with Sylvanas seemingly forgetting about Turalyon's existence, and both of them underestimating the Alliance and their unity despite them having just stuck together through the Burning Legion's invasion, and... I guess it's just extremely unfortunate how reasonable I find it to be concerned with the plot at this point.

At least Varok feels shame and dishonour at this point, but there's no real justification for what seems to be his agreement with the practicality of the Burning of Teldrassil, truly.

Overall, the current plot the way we understand it makes me very concerned for the story of Battle for Azeroth. The Burning of Teldrassil is the cornerstone of the expansion, the catalyst to war, and it seems to have been founded on some very, very bad decisions and misunderstandings.

Even if some or most of these details are addressed, like Sylvanas not being as ignorant or emotional or simply stupid as she appears, it still makes me question why the story had to be told in this way, with very little hint of moral greyness or interest between the Alliance Horde conflict.

Oh look, your plan was to piss to the Alliance off.

I guess you succeeded -- I'm not sure what you're hoping from that, but now you've just ignited war, because, war.

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Closing Thoughts:

Overall, it's just very disappointing to have had Sylvanas' Warbringers short be so disappointing with an anticlimactic answer to the "Who dunnit?" of Teldrassil. The problems associated with the plot from such a video appear to be glaring. It was easily forgiveable in just Before the Storm for Sylvanas to ignore Turalyon's existence. That one thing by itself is hardly merit for big complaint.

But continuing that theme of unusual ignorance from not just Sylvanas', but Saurfang's perspective indicates to me one very simple decision of bad writing: we wanted a Horde-Alliance conflict to reignite, so we will actively ignore certain story elements to achieve that. Even, it seems, Saurfang's sensibilities as a tactician or Sylvanas' intelligence.

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If anyone ended up reading all of this, good on you. In any case, thanks for giving this the light of day and I appreciate knowing your thoughts about this as well. I know there's a lot of criticisms here or there on the storytelling or the lore, or even criticisms of criticisms, so hopefully this provides a fairly comprehensive basis for people to understand why I am discontent with the lore (and hopefully an appreciation for why that's reasonable).