Azshara is not a terrible person

[Quaade]

I mean, it would be childish to assume someone needs to be unequivocally evil to be a bad person; or to assume that no bad person cannot also have some good qualities.

Azshara sold out an entire planet for personal gain. She willingly and/or negligently caused the direct death of tens of thousands, and the indirect deaths of what likely amounted to millions. She forced a substantial part of her subjects into a mutated new existence without giving them a choice.

It doesn't really matter that she was a patron of the arts, she was (and is) also a narcissistic megalomaniac psychopath.

It's literally childish. In the developmental phase, children are supposed from growing out of having an absolute view to having a more ambiguous one. Examples of absolute views are "mom is the person best in the world," and "mom is the worst person in the world." In this case, trolling or firmly having an absolute view that Azshara was good.

It's the same sort of behaviour you see from people unironically calling Sylvanas competent when in reality she's as dumb as wet cardboard and only seems competent because everyone else is dumber. https://www.mmo-champion.com/threads...sed-brilliance

[Dellis0991]

Azshara may not be a terrible person but neither is Donald Trump. My wife is currently at home with my two sons, one of whom is autistic, and that's why I propose a Freedom Dividend of $1,000 a month to every American citizen - if we took a slice out of every Amazon sale, digital transaction and introduced a VAT ontop of actually taxing the trillion dollar businesses that currently pay 0$ in tax, and that might solve our issues.

Andrew go home your drunk.

[Rampant Rabbit]

If Azshara is irredeemable then so are Garrosh and Garithos, both of whom are regarded as having done nothing wrong.

By whom????

[Nathanyel]

The Kaldorei Queen Azshara was Lawful Evil, but still Evil. Knowingly risking her people's future for the promise of power.
The Naga Queen Azshara retains most of her wits, but the Void influence surely must bring out some Chaotic Evil traits, but that's besides the point. Evil is Evil.

She tolerated the Kaldorei belief in the Wild Gods because opposing it would've threatened her otherwise uncontested rule over the mortal affairs of her people.
Progressive... forced gender disparity is only scratched in the Warcraft universe, sure, a little more in the early works which were forgivably heteronormative, male-dominated without calling it out, as other works of the past, so much so that the supposedly female-dominated Night Elf society (as portrayed in WC3 and WC3 only) stood out. But that's forgotten in WoW and could be explained as a general tendency (natural, not enforced by society) that men were more likely to choose or more adept in Druidism, while women excelled as Priests and Rangers/Warriors. Either way, it most likely wasn't Azshara who introduced that, there were Kaldorei kings and queens before her. Like with religion, she could've simply tolerated this, too.

[Fetus Rex]

Azshara was and is still a good leader. She's vain, arrogant, delusionally sure of herself. Probably the best written female character in WoW.

[Eazy]

This post tho... this could even work with a damn toy commercial.

Bad try dude.. my god /palm.

Why bad try? It's all truth.

[StillMcfuu]

Azshara wasn't a bad person; she is a squid.

[Jastall]

I mean, so long as we're using Azshara as a jump off point to criticize other characters we don't like, she certainly makes for a much more entertaining antagonist than Sylvanas. While Azshara is definitely powerful and cunning, she's not nearly as powerful and cunning as she thinks she is, and such delusional narcissism (backed up be genuine ability) makes the outcome of any sort of encounter with her less certain, and thus potentially much more interesting.

That, as opposed to the Villain Sue that Syvlvanas has become, who is such an unstoppable mastermind that even before any sort of conflict, we all already know she's won. And even if she does suffer any sort of setback, it will turn out to have been apart of her plan all along.

Indeed, in this expansion Azshara was Sylvanas except without the writer's pet protection and with more overt motive that didn't turn on a dime. Which was enough to make her entertaining. I'm happy to see her survive and be up to no good once more in the future. Please, please no redemption arc for her, at best she should benefit from a "better the devil you know" situation.

As for her not being a terrible person, LOL is all I have to say to that. Some people will truly try to whitewash any character they can. Why not enjoy them for their villainous nature instead? My favorite character in Warhammer Fantasy is Malekith and I don't try to hide the fact that he's a treasonous, egoistical, genocidal mother-fucking douchebag. That's part of his appeal. Azshara's vanity, condescension and supreme egotism is part of hers.

[Trassk]

There seems to be this bizarre, twisted logic people in these kind of fandoms have (although maybe it's just a twisted mentality people have in real life just in general) of those who want to pardon and excuse bad people, those who are corrupt and selfish and cruel and without any empathy, almost as if they want to take these twisted and apathetic characters and make them into a project.

And this isn't because of the excuse of 'i just like bad guys', liking a good villain is fine, they can give the story a lot of depth like how joker does in batman stories, liking a good, well written villain for the entertainment is one thing, but this obsession people have to drowning over obvious bad guys like azshara or sylvanas or garrosh, and twisting everyone around so that they are somehow the heroes when their not. It's a disturbing trend I see all to often.

It's as bad as Stockholm syndrome, people who honestly believe they can change someone their bound to or accepting of abuse.

[Xosimos]

Would you prefer to be consumed by tentacle gods?

Yes, yes I would. All hail the tentatles!

[Nathanyel]

Yeah, had a similar train of thought shortly after my previous post, people like interesting villain characters that start/progress the story, and that by itself is ok, but some seem to think "if I like the character, then this is a good, a protagonist character". Seen with most major villains lately.

[matrix123mko]

As for her not being a terrible person, LOL is all I have to say to that. Some people will truly try to whitewash any character they can. Why not enjoy them for their villainous nature instead? My favorite character in Warhammer Fantasy is Malekith and I don't try to hide the fact that he's a treasonous, egoistical, genocidal mother-fucking douchebag. That's part of his appeal. Azshara's vanity, condescension and supreme egotism is part of hers.

There are two reasons:

1. Our "good" characters tend to be no better than raid bosses. Just look at Jaina and compare her to Malygos.

2. In Warcraft not being lawful good makes you easy target for raid designers. Basically every villain dies a moment after his appearance.

[Mehrunes]

It's literally childish. In the developmental phase, children are supposed from growing out of having an absolute view to having a more ambiguous one. Examples of absolute views are "mom is the person best in the world," and "mom is the worst person in the world." In this case, trolling or firmly having an absolute view that Azshara was good.

It's the same sort of behaviour you see from people unironically calling Sylvanas competent when in reality she's as dumb as wet cardboard and only seems competent because everyone else is dumber. https://www.mmo-champion.com/threads...sed-brilliance

This is a fun post. First of all, at best it's a blatant misrepresentation of what the OP said. At worst your entire bit about absolutist thinking is based on you using words that you don't exactly understand. The OP said that Azshara is "not terrible" and "not as bad as Gul'dan and some other characters". Going from there to "Azshara was good" takes something special. As such, the whole part about absolutist thought is rendered wrong when applied to the OP by default. Your conflation of "not terrible" with "good" would be the absolutist position here.

Finally, Sylvanas. Calling Sylvanas competent is not the same as calling Azshara good to begin with (let alone what the OP actually said). And why would you even refer to your thread when that thread is build upon blatant misrepresentations, special pleading and flat out wrong information? Case in point being the Jailer point, because Blizzard outright said Sylvanas does not serve him. Especially since all of that has already been pointed out to you in that thread.

[matrix123mko]

Yeah, had a similar train of thought shortly after my previous post, people like interesting villain characters that start/progress the story, and that by itself is ok, but some seem to think "if I like the character, then this is a good, a protagonist character". Seen with most major villains lately.

Appearance of characters like Jaina or Alleria doesn't help.

[Mehrunes]

And this isn't because of the excuse of 'i just like bad guys', liking a good villain is fine, they can give the story a lot of depth like how joker does in batman stories, liking a good, well written villain for the entertainment is one thing, but this obsession people have to drowning over obvious bad guys like azshara or sylvanas or garrosh, and twisting everyone around so that they are somehow the heroes when their not. It's a disturbing trend I see all to often.

Do point out the people who said Azshara is a hero in this thread.

[Mayia]

Let's get one thing straight - while Azshara may have done some unsavory things, as far as Warcraft characters go she is nowhere near Gul'dan, Sylvanas or Archimonde levels of evil. Here are some of Azshara's virtuous qualities:

1. Azshara pursued knowledge. She turned her palace into a massive research facility and had the Highborne study the Well of Eternity instead of engaging in their usual decadence. During her reign the Night Elves made remarkable breakthroughs in the understanding of leylines, the arcane and teleportation technologies.

What did Tyrande do during her reign? That's right, she lived in a treehouse until Sylvanas set it on fire and dedicated the Night Elves to the worship of a sky fairy that didn't answer their pleas for help when it mattered the most.

2. Azshara understood diplomacy. She forged a peace treaty with the Zandalari to stop their incursions into the Night Elven Empire and the peace actually lasted for years.

What did Tyrande's diplomacy accomplish? She couldn't even get her formal allies to help the Night Elves retake their lands.

3. Azshara tolerated other beliefs. While she may not have liked the Wild Gods, she tolerated them and let them live in peace on Mount Hyjal. And she built Temples of Elune even thought she thought the arcane was the greater power.

Tyrande, on the other hand, insulted Velen when he DARED suggest that Elune might be a Naaru even though she herself knows jackshit about Elune. And Velen is actually a lot older, more experienced and most importantly a better leader than her. Malfurion was right. Tyrande really should keep her mouth shut.

4. Azshara was progressive. Her inner circle consisted of both men and women. Even after her subjects were transformed into the Naga with men having a monstrous appearance and being more suited to melee combat, she still had equal representation in her court.

Tyrande, on the other hand, took an egalitarian society and turned it sexist with sharply divided gender roles. What the fuck, Tyrande?

5. But most important of all, Azshara cared for her subjects. Not in a benevolent way, but she saw them more as her toys and she didn't want other people hurting them. When push came to shove, she tried to save her empire with her own hands.

Tyrande doesn't care for anyone other than Malfurion. When Teldrassil was about to be occupied she convenient left the battlefield. Can you imagine Azshara abandoning her subjects and her capital to the enemy? I sure as hell can't.

I look forward to Azshara's redemption story. She should come back as the true queen of the Night Elves and restore them to their former glory. No more Elune worship, no more treehouses, no more hillbilly sexism. The Night Elves will rebuild their empire under Azshara's guidance and become a force to be reckoned with once more.

Bonus round: Azshara was classy and elegant. For all her ornaments and gems, Tyrande still looks gaudy rather than queenly.

is this gonna be one of those find good in bad guys things? ugh.. sometimes you don't really need to explore the evil fish princess.. sure she isn't all bad but nor is hitler and we don't really indepth why he became such a twat.. infact its mostly ignored the way evil people become infixed on doing evil.

[Jastall]

There are two reasons:

1. Our "good" characters tend to be no better than raid bosses. Just look at Jaina and compare her to Malygos.

2. In Warcraft not being lawful good makes you easy target for raid designers. Basically every villain dies a moment after his appearance.

1. How are they comparable? Jaina's worst actions were to kill/imprison an undetermined number of BEs, and then threaten to flood a city in a moment of extreme duress, which she was talked out of. Malygos decided that mortals can't use magic (while having mortal servants) and would have destroyed the planet had he not been stopped, and there was no reasoning with him. Plus, Jaina is a particularly poor example as she was a raid boss.

2. Azshara herself is a counterpoint, given that she survived. KJ survived being a raid boss, so did Garrosh and a few others like Kel'thuzad, Illidank or Helya.

Anyway, neither of these address my point, that I don't see why characters very clearly written as villains can't be enjoyed as villains, rather than going through endless amounts of hoops to make them sound like good people. Azshara is a bitch, but she's a fun bitch, and there's nothing wrong with that. No amount of gymnastics will make her Lawful Good, and there's a fair few evil characters (like ms Villain Sue) that have survived being assholes for a long time.

[Jetpistol]

Queen Azshara will do what Tyrande couldn't do. Rebuild the destroyed burned tree and bring the night elf civilization back to its full glory!

[stomination]

Posts like these is why people want propaganda, fake news & stuff banned from the internet.

These post are lucrative for this website for all the ppl that see ads.

[Life-Binder]

she literally helped summoned Sargeras onto Azeroth



P.S if Sylvanas was "evil" she would have killed Bolvar