Why is Theramore seen as unjustified?

[Combatbutler]

Not every civilian is able to just become a warrior and the Legion is simply not an army you can beat with conventional means. You want to make the Draenei look bad, but every normal person in their situation would have done the same. Not everyone wants to just run into a meat grinder for the Light. If anything their running away is the most reasonable response.

Every last draenei should have been trained to fight if called upon, anything else is just pure stupidity, I don't have to make the draenei look stupid, they are doing a splendid job on their own.

Yrel ruled over a Draenor that had already pretty much been freed of demons by us, she only mopped up the straglers. Again your fantasy that the Draenei could have beaten back or even held off a full assault of the Legion is ludicrous. Just look at those Legion Star Destroyers, If the Legion had gone all out Draenor would have been vaporized in days and nothing would have been won by that.

They had centuries and if they played their cards right, could have easily gotten the orcs on their side, the orcs did worship a naaru for centuries as their ancestors were drawn to it.

You said "forcing them into submission" that is quite different from what you say here. I don't see how that would have changed that the Orcs could easily be turned against them. They had a peaceful cooperation, almost friendly and still the Orcs jumped at the chance to massacre them, civilians, children and all, because that is just what Orcs do. They did after all not even need Kil'jaeden to go for the genocide on AU Draenor.

It isn't forcing someone into submission can be done through very different means, you don't have to use extreme violence, coaxing the vast majority of the orcs while silently weeding out those who are not down with it over the years is very much possible. The orcs had no peaceful relations with the Draenei, they pretty much knew nothing about them, which is one of the main reasons it was so easy to paint them as targets.

He realized it was his son literally a second before and the situation just overwhelmed him. So you are not only blaming the victims for the deeds of their attackers, but also a father for trying to save the life of a son and maybe not thinking clearly for a few seconds?

He literally attacks you, once he realizes it is his son, who had butchered his people left and right and still Velen had the gall to try to stop you, he pretty much spat on any sacrifice done to get his people to survive at this point, because this time he was personally affected.

Geezus... you got the empathic range of a sludge elemental.

I reserve empathy for those who deserve it and Velen most definitely does not, he is one of the worst leaders out there.

The Orcs literally turned on each other for being in different clans and you want to tell me that they would not have turned on the alien Draenei? Please.

And draenei tend to go power crazy and turn on each other too, so what it is still very much possible to create an overarching stable force, with some small dissenters here and there.

There was trade between the race and again the Draenei saved some of their kids. They are probably morons for even going that far, true.

There was almost no trade, it was quite limited, they kept their distance.

They should have know that Orcs are intrinsically untrustworthy and not engaged with them at all.

They are as trustworthy as the Draenei, who know space satan is cleansing the universe and never bother to tell the natives on the worlds they land upon, they just use the natives resources for themselves, then leave those worlds in the dust to die, when the demon army shows up, depriving those natives any chance to prepare for said demons or plan an escape for themselves, because Draenei just don't feel like sharing.

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About Jaina... back in MoP, when Lei Shen was resurrected, she tasked the alliance with empowering the Staff of Antonidas with the strength of Lei Shen after killing him, and canonically it actually happened... guess what, Lei Shen power was a piece of Aman'Thul soul so just do the math...

Wrathion got that, Jaina got some left over power from the ceiling.

[Eto Demerzel]

Wrathion got that, Jaina got some left over power from the ceiling.

As far as i remember... Wrathion consumed Lei Shen heart, which contained memories and stuff... and Jaina asked us to absorb what remained of Lei Shen power after killing him:

https://wow.gamepedia.com/Securing_A_Future

She even mentions the staff now wields the thunder king's power and (at least) she thinks its enough to destroy Orgrimmar walls over Garrosh's head.

[Mehrunes]

This thread is a fascinating tour in what Alliance posters are deliberately ignoring. On one hand they want to ignore the game material showing things like Theramore's involvement in the war or earlier things like Northwatch aggression on the Barrens predating Garrosh's invasion on Ashenvale or, even earlier, Varian being the one to declare the war back in wrath.

So one could think that it's just what @Skytotem said in the very first reply, i.e. how the book doesn't address Theramore's behavior in Cata. As in, one could think that Alliance posters are simply going by the book alone while ignoring the game. Except... at the same time there's the story of innocents and children being killed by the mana bomb pushed as the main reason why Theramore is bad.

You know, the innocents and children that left Theramore via ship because Garrosh deliberately sat at Theramore's gates for a week doing nothing, giving them ample time to leave. Which they did, leaving only those wanting to fight behind. Which made them no longer mere civilians but a militia. And militia members are combatants and as such valid targets of war. And all of that is covered in the book.

So Alliance fanfiction peddlers aren't just ignoring the game material and focusing on the book alone, which is already wrong since game material is still canon. No, they are doing something even worse. They are cherry-picking the most convenient aspects of both the book and the game. Though credits where credits are due, it is nice of them to expose themselves this hard.

[WaltherLeopold]

Convenient retcon.

I guess? I don't actually care, it's canon.

The lore is a mess cobbled together by retcons anyway, nothing makes sense anymore, you can't have causality or consequences.

[Raisei]

You shouldn't really be upset with Ally fans trying to hide their !@#$ under the rug whenever they are called out for it. After all, they are just following in the writers' steps. Someone in these boards (think it was @Super Dickmann? Not sure though) said that the ultimate difference between Horde and the Alliance is that, while both do resort to some pretty !@#$ed up stuff from time to time, only the former has to answer for it.

Suuuuuure, except... when did the Horde answer for ANYTHING? Theramore, Teldrassil, Brennadan. The only people feeling consequences are Garrosh and Sylvanas, who at that point had already betrayed their own factions anyway, everyone else is scot free again and again and again.
The Alliance keeps loosing cities but when the time to answer for that comes it is always "Well, we aren't sorry we murdered your civilians and will not do anything to change but it was only the Warchief doing it really.... again."

I am not even talking about reparations or being destroyed completely, but just political consequences. The Alliance has Tyrande openly questioning Anduin with one foot out of the door of the Alliance, meanwhile the Horde is in such good mood that they forgive everyone that was a Loyalist and none of the newer races even thinks about leaving them after being dragged into that horrible war.

As much as I like that the story focus shifts with Talryssa making a move on Lorthemar, the Talryssa I met in Suramar would be in negotiations to join the Alliance or go completely neutral after being betrayed by yet another leader and the Highmountain tribes would be back on their totempole and never return.
But none of that happens. The Horde will just pretend that all the atrocities were commited by Sylvanas and had nothing to do with them. That is how much it "answers" for it.

[Mehrunes]

As far as i remember... Wrathion consumed Lei Shen heart, which contained memories and stuff... and Jaina asked us to absorb what remained of Lei Shen power after killing him:

https://wow.gamepedia.com/Securing_A_Future

She even mentions the staff now wields the thunder king's power and (at least) she thinks its enough to destroy Orgrimmar walls over Garrosh's head.

And as that very quest text shows, that's not what Jaina asked the player to do. Jaina asked them to absorb the room because she thought that was Lei Shen's source of power. She thought wrong. Lei Shen's source of power was within Lei Shen himself and he was the one who powered the palace rather than the other way around. What Jaina captured in her staff is the power of wishful thinking and false rumors.

[Combatbutler]

As far as i remember... Wrathion consumed Lei Shen heart, which contained memories and stuff... and Jaina asked us to absorb what remained of Lei Shen power after killing him:

https://wow.gamepedia.com/Securing_A_Future

She even mentions the staff now wields the thunder king's power and (at least) she thinks its enough to destroy Orgrimmar walls over Garrosh's head.

I did the quest, the staff drains the powersource on the ceiling, but that was not the source of Leishen's power, it was the heart, Jaina got essentially a charged battery, which is still quite potent, but not the main thing.

[Mehrunes]

This is the official stance from Blizzard on when the war started and by who:

Q:
The Alliance army who invaded the Barrens wore the tabard of Theramore. Were they under Jaina Proudmoore's command? And their invasion happened way before the time of the incoming destruction of Theramore incident, so what's the reason behind their attack on Orgrimmar's territory? It seems the Alliance and the Horde were already in total war in Cataclysm.

A:
Because Garrosh wants to defeat the night elves and conquer the whole of Kalimdor under the banner of the Horde. So the humans of Theramore sent their army and tried to establish a military line between the night elf territory and Theramore. But it seems the result is not what they expected.

This doesn't even remotely say what you want it to say. First of all, nothing here even attempts to deny the fact that the war in Cataclysm was not a new war but a continuation of the war declared by Varian in Wrath (as per what @Derpleton linked, later confirmed by Chronicle v3), because the Shattering made it clear that between WotLK and Cata all the factions got was a ceasefire, not a peace treaty. Secondly, not only does the question asked there refer to Alliance troops we could actually see (i.e. the Nothwatch Expeditionary Force) as per the very wording of the question, which doesn't include the Northwatch forces that attacked Crossroads and captured Honor's Stand earlier on (as those were not seen by the player and only mentioned in quest text), but even the answer only talks about Garrosh's territorial ambitions, without mentioning him actually invading Ahenvale yet.

[Eto Demerzel]

And as that very quest text shows, that's not what Jaina asked the player to do. Jaina asked them to absorb the room because she thought that was Lei Shen's source of power. She thought wrong. Lei Shen's source of power was within Lei Shen himself and he was the one who powered the palace rather than the other way around. What Jaina captured in her staff is the power of wishful thinking and false rumors.

She literally mentions feeling the power and honestly i hardly doubt the leader of the most powerful society of mages cannot discern between "wishful thinking and false rumors" and actual magic power... and on the other hand, Wrathion just got some memories, no power, no strength... so... ockham's razor...? (I admit this might be some speculation, since bliz can come any day and just say "no, Aman'thul resurrected so his power flew back to him" or some bullshit like that).

[Akka]

I kinda get it I guess but im tired of the horde getting blamed for everything all the time

I feel you, mate.
The faction who simply came in from another world and genocided everything in their way, was shown leniency through imprisonment instead of annihilation and went to another genocidal war, then was again forgiven only to start yet another genocidal war, is always maligned for no good reason. That's really insensitive :'(

[Combatbutler]

She literally mentions feeling the power and honestly i hardly doubt the leader of the most powerful society of mages cannot discern between "wishful thinking and false rumors" and actual magic power... and on the other hand, Wrathion just got some memories, no power, no strength... so... ockham's razor...? (I admit this might be some speculation, since bliz can come any day and just say "no, Aman'thul resurrected so his power flew back to him" or some bullshit like that).

On the same Island Lor'themar, a ranger, recognized a potent magical artifact faster than her, just saying.

https://wow.gamepedia.com/Raiding_the_Vault_(Horde)

Ah, I know a powerful artifact when I see one. You were wise to bring this here. I will see that Aethas examines it right away + perhaps we can put it to work in our favor.

In the meantime, take this in trade.

https://wow.gamepedia.com/Raiding_the_Vault

What's this? A necklace? What are you trying to- aah, I see... A relic from the Thunder King's vault! Fascinating... Powerful, too.

The Kirin Tor will keep it save. In return, please accept this.

[Mehrunes]

Pretty sure the alliance actions in the southern barrens were in response to horde aggression in Ashenvale. You know...the reason Cairne stood up to Garrosh and died.

Garrosh wanted to conquer Kalimdor for "The Horde", at the expense of nature and all the other peoples. All the War in Cata and MoP was a result of his warmongering BS. Theramore was unjustified because of his intent.

Not only does Northatch's attack on Crossroads and Honor' Stand predate Garrosh's invasion of Ashenvale, but the invasion isn't even what Cairne stood up to Garrosh over either.

Honestly, I feel Jaina would have been justified in destroying Orgimmar. That would have ended the threat once and for all and prevented more bloodshed in the long run.

The timeline in which Jaina succeeded in her mater plan of flooding Orgimmar ended in the Alliance being utterly obliterated.

[Eto Demerzel]

On the same Island Lor'themar, a ranger, recognized a potent magical artifact faster than her, just saying.

https://wow.gamepedia.com/Raiding_the_Vault_(Horde)

Ah, I know a powerful artifact when I see one. You were wise to bring this here. I will see that Aethas examines it right away + perhaps we can put it to work in our favor.

In the meantime, take this in trade.

https://wow.gamepedia.com/Raiding_the_Vault

What's this? A necklace? What are you trying to- aah, I see... A relic from the Thunder King's vault! Fascinating... Powerful, too.

The Kirin Tor will keep it save. In return, please accept this.

That does not mean she cannot discern between a normal staff and an empowered one... and she even got an epic proportion power up after that, before MoP Jaina was just an archmage, she could conjure elementals, she could make ice fall, etc... after MoP Jaina power-levels go nuts and she raised a huge several tonns battleship on her own, made it fly and even powered all the cannons to fire dozens of arcane blasts on her own. Hell she was even able to clean Sylvanna's Blight with just ice, has any other mage in Azeroth ever done anything like that?

The only logical explanation for her power up (aside from blizzards poor writting) is that she actually got a lot of power from Lei Shen.

[Combatbutler]

The only logical explanation for her power up (aside from blizzards poor writting) is that she actually got a lot of power from Lei Shen.

I never disputed that, she got a fully charged battery of the stuff, just not the source. Since she basically had no idea a titan fragment and keeper juice was powering the guy, she assumed his power came from his battery.

[Mehrunes]

She literally mentions feeling the power and honestly i hardly doubt the leader of the most powerful society of mages cannot discern between "wishful thinking and false rumors" and actual magic power... and on the other hand, Wrathion just got some memories, no power, no strength... so... ockham's razor...? (I admit this might be some speculation, since bliz can come any day and just say "no, Aman'thul resurrected so his power flew back to him" or some bullshit like that).

You do realize she didn't become a leader of Dalaran because of her merit but because Vereesa found Krassus' dusty prophecy that Khadgar and Kalec thought kinda described her post-Theramore self, right? Then there's what Combat said. And the bit in Tides of War where Jaina's attack with lethal intent on Thalen into which she poured all of her might (as per the omniscient narrator) didn't even give him a nosebleed, which showcases how weak she really was outside of teleportation until BfA bullshit.

Besides, whatever Jaina felt doesn't change the fact that, as Chronicle thoroughly described in the bit about Lei Shen's rise to power, Jaina's theory about his source of power being hidden in his throne room couldn't be more baseless even if she tried. Lei Shen's power came from what he stole from Ra, including the spark of Aman'thul's soul and it was inside him, not in his throne room. And, like I said and as Blizzard already described back in MoP, Lei Shen was actually the one powering the entire palace system.

And speaking of Aman'thul, when asked how Sargeras could have Titan's souls to twist them into the Dark Pantheon if they were chilling within the Keepers ever since he struck them down at Nihilam, Blizzard already mentioned how he got them only after he invaded Azeroth, so you accidentally stumbled onto the right track in that regard.

That does not mean she cannot discern between a normal staff and an empowered one... and she even got an epic proportion power up after that, before MoP Jaina was just an archmage, she could conjure elementals, she could make ice fall, etc... after MoP Jaina power-levels go nuts and she raised a huge several tonns battleship on her own, made it fly and even powered all the cannons to fire dozens of arcane blasts on her own. Hell she was even able to clean Sylvanna's Blight with just ice, has any other mage in Azeroth ever done anything like that?

The only logical explanation for her power up (aside from blizzards poor writting) is that she actually got a lot of power from Lei Shen.

You answered your own concern there. The Blight you brought up is the perfect example of that. Because screw Jaina freezing the vapor for some time. At the end of the siege she conjures a bubble protecting Anduin and his squad from point blank Blight barrage. Even though as per lore established since Wrath, the only magic that protects from Blight is Dreadlord magic. You couldn't do it even with the Light. And unless Blizzard wanted to sneakily confirm the meme about Jaina being a Dreadlord, they simply pulled that moment out of their assess because of how kewl it looked, with no regard to the lore.

[matrix123mko]

She literally mentions feeling the power and honestly i hardly doubt the leader of the most powerful society of mages cannot discern between "wishful thinking and false rumors" and actual magic power... and on the other hand, Wrathion just got some memories, no power, no strength... so... ockham's razor...? (I admit this might be some speculation, since bliz can come any day and just say "no, Aman'thul resurrected so his power flew back to him" or some bullshit like that).

Jaina is a human. She cannot sense magic as well as an elf or a dragon.

- - - Updated - - -

brought up is the perfect example of that. Because screw Jaina freezing the vapor for some time. At the end of the siege she conjures a bubble protecting Anduin and his squad from point blank Blight barrage. Even though as per lore established since Wrath, the only magic that protects from Blight is Dreadlord magic. You couldn't do it even with the Light. And unless Blizzard wanted to sneakily confirm the meme about Jaina being a Dreadlord, they simply pulled that moment out of their assess because of how kewl it looked, with no regard to the lore.

To be honest, magic should be able to block blight. Whomever didn't think about shamans using wind to make blight change direction should have gone to bed instead of writing lore at 3AM.

[Eto Demerzel]

You do realize she didn't become a leader of Dalaran because of her merit but because Vereesa found Krassus' dusty prophecy that Khadgar and Kalec thought kinda described her post-Theramore self, right? Then there's what Combat said. And the bit in Tides of War where Jaina's attack with lethal intent on Thalen into which she poured all of her might (as per the omniscient narrator) didn't even give him a nosebleed, which showcases how weak she really was outside of teleportation until BfA bullshit.

So... being the apprendite of the predecessor of the last Kirin Tor Archmage, a member of the Council of Six and (by Antonidas words) having the potential to become the greatest sorcerer in the history is not enough merit right? Aside from Khadgar and probably Azshara, there is no stronger mage in the world than her. And your fragment about Tides of War just gives more power to my speculation that she actually got a part of Lei Shen strength, since Tides of War happens BEFORE her staff absorbed strength.

Besides, whatever Jaina felt doesn't change the fact that, as Chronicle thoroughly described in the bit about Lei Shen's rise to power, Jaina's theory about his source of power being hidden in his throne room couldn't be more baseless even if she tried. Lei Shen's power came from what he stole from Ra, including the spark of Aman'thul's soul and it was inside him, not in his throne room. And, like I said and as Blizzard already described back in MoP, Lei Shen was actually the one powering the entire palace system.

She used her staff to absorb power from the room he just had died, who cares if she though the power was on the room or on the dead body? She instructed you to drain power from the room and the body was in it...

And speaking of Aman'thul, when asked how Sargeras could have Titan's souls to twist them into the Dark Pantheon if they were chilling within the Keepers ever since he struck them down at Nihilam, Blizzard already mentioned how he got them only after he invaded Azeroth, so you accidentally stumbled onto the right track in that regard.

Actually, i found the source of this and its not deeply explained nor confirmed, the answer is a question from a dev:



There is no confirmation about it, just some sort of "posibility", and even with that, lets pretend, for the sake of this argument that this dev is actually confirming that Legion Invasions targeted the Titan pieces... how could they possess the Aman'thul one if literally NOBODY KNEW where Wrathion was? Nobody was chasing him, he never mentioned the legion abducting him, so if your theory that actually Wrathion got the piece of Aman'Thul soul is right, we are missing quite a bit of lore related to this that Wrathion does not remember (or not care) which is extremelly doubtful or rather, like Ion said on an interview in Gamescon, what Sargeras has are PIECES OF SOULS, not the entire titans. As he says, if Aggrammar was complete, he could just stomp us, how could mere Shivarras contain a full Titan let alone the whole pantheon?

[Combatbutler]

She used her staff to absorb power from the room he just had died, who cares if she though the power was on the room or on the dead body? She instructed you to drain power from the room and the body was in it...

It is clear you didn't do the quest, the room is not drained, just the battery on the ceiling.

https://youtu.be/UEj_fLBEjyg?t=296

I advise to mute the sound

[Saltysquidoon]

You know it's funny I look at this nightmare fuel patchwork of conflicting lore and REEEing about dev comments contradicting the game and think back to all those people who unironically defend blizzard's BFA retcons because 'they don't matter anyway'.

[Eto Demerzel]

It is clear you didn't do the quest, the room is not drained, just the battery on the ceiling.

Im not talking about the quest representation, im talking about what she asks, she tells you to place the staff on the room and it would drain the power from Lei Shen. Do you think draining magic is a surgical precise movement where you specify "NO, DONT ABSORB MAGIC FROM THIS AREA, JUST ABSORB THIS OTHER PRECISE AREA!".

Although im not going to agree on this, lets move forward because we are moving far away from the topic... my point regarding Jaina's strength is that she is actually able to topple cities (no matter where her power comes from, if from bad writting or from bad lore) and she does not do it.