Xe'ra, why did Illidan kill her?

[Trumpcat]

He gave up his high ranking position in Kaldorei society, the respect and acceptance of his entire race including his brother's and the woman he loves, and got thrown into prison for 10 000 years. He will never been forgiven and will only ever be reviled by everyone. It's literally just the players who think Illidan is cool and our opinions don't count for anything and aren't the norm.

I would have thought these things were on full display, did we skip the 300 times he's complained about being imprisoned, or all the bits with Malfurion and Tyrande complaining about him? Or the end quest after Argus in which, despite being right and finally ending the Legion, STILL cannot get much positivity out of his brother and Tyrande?

He is just a selfish bitch, that got some pseudo retcon to minimize his atrocities. "The Betrayer" thrown into prison for 10000 years isn't just because he wanted to save the world but was misunderstood. Unless Blizz discards their previous books and the War3 story like Disney did with their expanded universe, he's nothing more.

[Thage]

He does do this. You may have interpreted it differently from me, but his entire story was, "You're wrong about us, and I'll show you why so you'll fight for my cause instead." That is literally no different. The only difference is Eorzea is very black and white. You know exactly who the bad guys are at all times so you know not to trust them. Emet-Selch didn't learn anything. He made no internal reflections. He did nothing but work you, trying to make you his buddy so you would be sympathetic to his cause. He was doing nothing but serving his own interests the whole time.

The important part of that sentence was the other half. "and for the plot to treat him as unambiguously in the right when he decides to double down on his schemes."

edit: Also, Emet did learn something by the end. His dying words are, "Remember us. Remember that we once lived." You beat him, fair and square, and instead of screaming about the injustices of destiny or lamenting his loss, all he asks is for you to remember that the Ascians existed and, through hubris or fate, were dealt a shitty hand. That's a far cry from the man who disdainfully denied that the Eorzeans' experiences could ever amount to that of the Ascians, comparing them to how they would consider ants.

Characters are allowed to have development. They are allowed to change. Illidan was killed for his actions. Do you not think that he could have learned from that? How is it hypocritical that he think someone else trying to do exactly what he did (while trying to make him someone's minion again) deserves death? It's literally what happened to him. It actually would have been insanity to go along with it since it would be doing the same thing and expecting different results.

That is the moment the story showed Illidan was redeemed. Regardless of how well it was sold, it was incredibly important in showing he was truly changed. He denied the easy way that would only perpetuate the cycle, instead choosing to look for a new way. One that wasn't, by his reckoning, doomed to failure.

Also, "I am my scars", however memey, is a bland statement. Everyone is the sum total of their experience. Illidan is no different. He's just stating, in a different way, he's learned from his mistakes.

Precisely none of this was shown ingame. Illidan's entire character 'arc' in Legion consisted of other characters telling us why he wasn't all that bad, or him feeling bad after the fact when he fucked someone over, only to proceed to continue fucking over everyone around him for the sake of chasing his personal vendetta. His response to Xe'ra isn't "This is wrong," or any other such statement that suggests he has learned from his experiences.

"I am my scars" is used as a schlocky statement to insist that he is better as he is, than he would be with whatever power boost Xe'ra would have given him, because he has a pathological reflex against destiny (see aforementioned discount high-school nihilism whenever he starts talking). How does this show he's learned from his mistakes? This is like saying Grom's bland lip-service in the 6.3 cinematics are some insinuation that he's 'learned better' despite no corroborating evidence (not even the Mag'har unlock scenario does much to suggest he did fuck-all to prove he was turning over a new leaf except to work with the draenei out of survival, only for him to express shock that the draenei decided to get their pound of flesh once more pressing matters were dealt with).

You can argue until you're blue in the face that some great leap of character progression happened, but all I saw of Illidan was the same ultimately-selfish cretin he'd been since Warcraft 3. Even his 'brave sacrifice' after defeating Argus was more about him fulfilling a vendetta than being heroic or altruistic. He's a wonderful example of how not to write a Byronic hero.

[Shaetha]

People aren't happy when those changes destroy rather than build on existing stories they enjoyed.

They make every possible effort to ignore context. They take everything in the worst way possible. The misinterpret the simple things. They want the story to not hold their hand(evidenced by saying things like "They didn't say that. That's your headcanon" when someone gives anything but the most shallow interpretation) but they complain when something simple does get played. Every single one of those things has happened in this thread. They seem to only want Blizzard to write their own fan fiction.

It feels like they've decided they dislike it before they've even seen it. Is it any surprise when they don't like it? Actually, that's a huge thing with people in general. They're so averse to things being different that they will try to tank every single thing that even points in a direction outside their comfort zone, and it gets wearing. Sometimes I can't stop myself from saying something.

[Lorgar Aurelian]

1. Fuck em, there was a war to be won, and he needed their power to win it, same as Arthas when he took up Frostmourne.
2. What?
3. In the lore, he had gone insane at his point after his fight with Arthas, but then the retcon fucked it up and it makes no sense anymore.
Not that the original lore made any sense, it's not Illidan's style to enslave people, though he does use them.
4. What??
5. Yeah, cause we needed to end that shit once and for all. Too much time had be spent on the defense with the Legion, we needed to surprise them for once.

so pretty much xera was in the right when she was trying to turn illidan, as you say "Fuck em, there was a war to be won"

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Illidan only forced Akama into service, because Akama betrayed him first. And you can't say the Broken were forced into service since they were the ones holding Akama's soul captive, too.

He also kills the mages under his command and takes there power and burns though goat souls even though they were working for him. his crimes aren't limited to enslaving akama.

[Michael Jackson]

so pretty much xera was in the right when she was trying to turn illidan, as you say "Fuck em, there was a war to be won"

Except Illidan has proven results, the Na'aru are fucking windchimes which have never helped us once - with anything. They couldn't even heal a dying PALADIN in Northrend from his illness.

If I have to choose between one overzealous powermonger and another, I'd rather pick the one who kills demons dead.

[Oneirophobia]

He is just a selfish bitch, that got some pseudo retcon to minimize his atrocities. "The Betrayer" thrown into prison for 10000 years isn't just because he wanted to save the world but was misunderstood. Unless Blizz discards their previous books and the War3 story like Disney did with their expanded universe, he's nothing more.

I'm not saying he isn't awful, I'm refuting your point that he sacrificed nothing. That isn't the case.

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Except Illidan has proven results, the Na'aru are fucking windchimes which have never helped us once - with anything. They couldn't even heal a dying PALADIN in Northrend from his illness.

If I have to choose between one overzealous powermonger and another, I'd rather pick the one who kills demons dead.

To be fair the naaru have helped us a few times - however it was usually their body pieces in a machine or thrown into a magical well that did the helping... or they were food for a void elf.

[Lorgar Aurelian]

That's what you call someone who doesn't have the willpower of a wet tissue.

If you're not like that, you're stuck working a minwage job while simultaneously being shit on by anyone or anything with a backbone

that's what you call some one without the willpower to see there convictions though when it actually comes down to it.

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Except Illidan has proven results, the Na'aru are fucking windchimes which have never helped us once - with anything. They couldn't even heal a dying PALADIN in Northrend from his illness.

If I have to choose between one overzealous powermonger and another, I'd rather pick the one who kills demons dead.

So did the burning crusader not happen for you or something? the goats were never saved from argus the blood elf's were never cured from there fel addiction illidan was never resurrected ect ect.

[Shaetha]

The important part of that sentence was the other half. "and for the plot to treat him as unambiguously in the right when he decides to double down on his schemes."

I mean, you must have played a different WoW from me too if you think that. The actual characters in story(not rando NPCs) 100% consistently treat Illidan like shit. Even when he turned out to be right, they treat him like shit. The only people that even tolerate Illidan are outside the story.

Xe'ra tried to rape him with the light. He was 100% justified in fighting back. Nothing you can say or imagine will change my opinion on that. It's that simple.

[Michael Jackson]

that's what you call some one without the willpower to see there convictions though when it actually comes down to it.

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So did the burning crusader not happen for you or something? the goats were never saved from argus the blood elf's were never cured from there fel addiction illidan was never resurrected ect ect.

Burning crusader -> no idea what you're talking about, I know only of the crusader who was left to die in Northrend because even Big Daddy Windchime couldn't help him

Goats saved from Argus -> only to be turned into a private army, once again, how did that help us on Azeroth?

Blood Elves -> no idea what you're talking about

Illidan resurected -> no idea what you're talking about

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I mean, you must have played a different WoW from me too if you think that. The actual characters in story(not rando NPCs) 100% consistently treat Illidan like shit. Even when he turned out to be right, they treat him like shit. The only people that even tolerate Illidan are outside the story.

Xe'ra tried to rape him with the light. He was 100% justified in fighting back. Nothing you can say or imagine will change my opinion on that. It's that simple.

And despite all that he still fights for us.

If I was him I would've grabbed malfurion by his beard and told him "listen here you furry bitch".

[Aucald]

You can argue until you're blue in the face that some great leap of character progression happened, but all I saw of Illidan was the same ultimately-selfish cretin he'd been since Warcraft 3. Even his 'brave sacrifice' after defeating Argus was more about him fulfilling a vendetta than being heroic or altruistic. He's a wonderful example of how not to write a Byronic hero.

Illidan's not really in the Byronic model, though. A Byronic hero is compelled to heroics (or anti-heroics) to atone for a great or terrible wrong they committed earlier in life - Illidan doesn't really have anything in that vein. While his temporary allegiance to the Legion is misunderstand by most, hence his appellation of "The Betrayer," it was never intended as a betrayal and Illidan (as of the "Illidan" novel) was always on the side of good and his allegiance to Sargeras a facade to undermine the Legion's efforts from within.

Illidan is more or less the quintessential antihero - someone who doesn't have the conventional hallmarks of a hero, in Illidan's case a cruel sense of pragmatism, a willingness to do terrible things in the name of victory, and an all-consuming desire for vengeance against the big bad (one that drives him to questionable means). There's very little good in Illidan at the end of the day, despite the fact that he ultimately fights for the same things as the heroes.

[Lorgar Aurelian]

Burning crusader -> no idea what you're talking about, I know only of the crusader who was left to die in Northrend because even Big Daddy Windchime couldn't help him

Goats saved from Argus -> only to be turned into a private army, once again, how did that help us on Azeroth?

Blood Elves -> no idea what you're talking about.

burning crusade as in the expansion... are you really this clueless?

The goats and windchimes made it to azeroth and helped with the pushing back KJ,The lich king,Deathwing, garrosh,gromosh, and everything inbetween.

The wind chimes and velen lead to the sun well being purged endign there fel addiction.

the wind chime is the one who lead us to resurrect illidan.

do you actually play wow?

[Rendark]

The bitch tried to brainwash him into a light slave, that's why.

[Liarparadox]

Because she tried to change Illidan into something he didn't want to be, so the only logical ( and epic ) conclusion was to eye beam the shit out of her.

Epic? I get some people liked it. I guess you really did. I rolled my eyes at the pathetic writing that's been done a million times in rpgs about this whole light/dark balance shit bla bla bla same crap. Illidan used to be one of my fav characters. They destroyed that guy for me in Legion.

[Shaetha]

burning crusade as in the expansion... are you really this clueless?

The goats and windchimes made it to azeroth and helped with the pushing back KJ,The lich king,Deathwing, garrosh,gromosh, and everything inbetween.

The wind chimes and velen lead to the sun well being purged endign there fel addiction.

the wind chime is the one who lead us to resurrect illidan.

do you actually play wow?

They've done a lot of telling people to do things. How many things have they actually done?

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Epic? I get some people liked it. I guess you really did. I rolled my eyes at the pathetic writing that's been done a million times in rpgs about this whole light/dark balance shit bla bla bla same crap. Illidan used to be one of my fav characters. They destroyed that guy for me in Legion.

Balance of forces is real life. It's not some RPG cliche.

Also, we get it, you like to root for villains.

[cuafpr]

what I don't get is why/how the entire army of light was ok with it..like uh.... he just killed your supreme commander wtf

[Lorgar Aurelian]

They've done a lot of telling people to do things. How many things have they actually done?

So you don't think leading or giving divine guidance counts as doing any thing? I guess bringing the goats ships so didn't die also counts as doing nothing.

[Calfredd]

Except, they aren't. They are nothing like computers and you can even see their compassion and ability to reason when one of them travels all the way to the north of Icecrown to ascend one man and help ease his suffering at the hands of the plague. It's not logical or safe to do it but it did out of goodness. I don't like when people make up a head canon like that because Blizz made one Naaru evil to fit the "illidan didn't do nothin wrong!" narrative.

Crusader Bridenbrad was about a Blizzard employee's brother dying of cancer. Did they ever canonize that?

[Sioliar]

For the rule of cool... its the only tool that Blizzard seems to be guided lately when creating lore conflicts

People keep arguing about non-issues when this guy here pointed the problem spot-on. The writing been so bad, they change Naaru's purpose with every expansion.

Oh noes, without Naaru we gonna fall! Oh noes, the Naaru are going extinct! Oh noes, the Naaru are now dead and all turned into... Void, Voider... things... Oh noes the Naaru are now mind controlling people! (never before till MUH SCARS tho) Oh NOES! *again* Naaru were space *azi all along!!

I can't wait to see what they come up with in Shadowlands, no doubt at some point they will remember that Naaru is still a thing and introduce them as main villains in some obscure 9.2.5.1/2 patch as a world boss that patrols an entrance to the next raid or such.

[Stormspellz]

what I don't get is why/how the entire army of light was ok with it..like uh.... he just killed your supreme commander wtf

par for the course of legion, when we started destroying space armada of magical star destroyers with swords- anything went

[Ielenia]

Because he's a hypocrite. He's all for forcing his "destiny" on others but refuses to have a destiny forced on him.

What "destiny" is this you believe Illidan was forcing on others?