If the Alliance accepted the Forsaken

[Aucald]

I have listed sources throughout this argument, as has Nerovar. You on the other hand have done nothing but engage in endless semantic arguments while bringing in no new information from other extant sources that'd rebuff these points. We have explained at length why the view was widespread then and now, with sources as old as Vanilla and as new as Chronicle and BTS and reasoning why the arguments you have brought up - i.e claiming that it's the result of fanaticism or not actually widespread are baseless. You on the other hand have been relegated to compositional fallacies where the existence of some humans not of Stormwind who tolerated undead then or now applies to the majority of Stormwindian humans. I bring up these other examples not because of their pertinence to this specific topic being discussed, but as an observation of the way you debate in general. It is a serial issue where you misconstrue the existence of separate minority viewpoints as meaning that what the majority view and the far more expansive evidence suggests is not the case. To whit in this case you have yet to present a single contradicting opinion from anyone in Stormwind in Vanilla or now when it comes to this, instead you argue that they could hypothetically exist and in turn that Benedictus' position and the widespread and extremely similar views held later are the outlier on the basis of this hypothetical demos that you haven't produced any evidence exists.

Then I'd say you've pointedly failed to follow the discussion, and in so doing have constructively abandoned the field and ceded the argument. Again, making a bunch of unproven claims (either about me or the specific argument) doesn't make them true, so I think it best to sit back and let the audience come to their own conclusions as concerns the matter. You have thus far brought up a single example proving your case, and I have countered it. You redoubled with a second argument from an entirely different timeframe and entirely different context, whose lack of relevance I also pointed out. I've not misconstrued anything here, nor have I presented anything fallacious or incorrectly reasoned. That you need to make this exchange unnecessarily personal indicates to me that your position is tenuous, as is usually the case when someone feels the need to go ad hominem as opposed to arguing reasonably and cordially.

[Eurhetemec]

The Adherents of Rukhmar believed it was their divine duty to throw people who disagreed with them off a tall building and then use their space laser to fry the inferior surface dwellers and could still use the Light.

Yeah it's pretty clear that have access to the Light isn't about being a good person. WoW's writers are clearly aware of this, esp. having hinted that the Light might not be that great a number of times.

Compassion and respect do not mean compassion and respect in the eyes of the predominantly 21st century western liberal audience, they mean church precepts that have an in-setting definition and even then are solely a construct of the Church of the Holy Light. Those aforementioned by the majority either do not practice them or do not view the same way and yet are still able to use the Light.

This is a weaker argument. Anyone in-game is essentially a 21st century western liberal (in the broad sense which encompasses pretty much everyone except extremists on the left and right), because they're both written by such, and consistently the good guys roll with such a morality (or the 20th century version thereof, which is extremely similar). Freedom of choice and person, some kind of right to safety/survival for people, not murdering people for no reason - these are all valued by pretty much any WoW character who is a "good guy".

So if they say "compassion and respect", they mean it as we mean it. There's no good evidence to the contrary.

HOWEVER, that doesn't mean the Light gives a shit about those things, even if the Light gives a shit about those things, even if people claiming to speak for it say it does. People who lose access to Light powers when they stop behaving in a "good" way are probably judging THEMSELVES, rather than having their powers "cancelled" externally by the Light. They probably no longer, on some level, consider it "right" to wield those powers, so cannot.

[Super Dickmann]

Then I'd say you've pointedly failed to follow the discussion, and in so doing have constructively abandoned the field and ceded the argument. Again, making a bunch of unproven claims (either about me or the specific argument) doesn't make them true, so I think it best to sit back and let the audience come to their own conclusions as concerns the matter. You have thus far brought up a single example proving your case, and I have countered it. You redoubled with a second argument from an entirely different timeframe and entirely different context, whose lack of relevance I also pointed out. I've not misconstrued anything here, nor have I presented anything fallacious or incorrectly reasoned. That you need to make this exchange unnecessarily personal indicates to me that your position is tenuous, as is usually the case when someone feels the need to go ad hominem as opposed to arguing reasonably and cordially.

You have failed to counter this claim across the entire flow of this conversation, and I've argued with both Chronicle, the Benedictus quest in AV, the acceptance of the Scarlet Crusade and, with Nerovar's added source - that even the guy disavowing the Scarlet Crusade doesn't disagree with their platform. Throughout it I have acknowledged your points regarding separate human organisations and explained why that doesn't alter the point about Stormwind, whereas on your part you have not even acknowledged the point regarding the continuity of undead-human conflict between the Alliance (and Stormwind in particular) and the Forsaken because to do so would make this entire topic drift regarding Benedictus' views being fringe, itself unproven, a waste of time. I do agree that it's best to drop this, if only because the three of us have been going for several pages now and there's still not been a single contrary source brought up on your part and we're clearly not getting anywhere.

@Eurhetemec

I'm not sure if I disagree on the latter point or if we're saying the same thing, but in different ways. When the writers talk about compassion and respect, they mean 21st century western liberal views, because the writers are 21st century western liberals. But when the characters and organisations in the setting do so, they don't necessarily mean the same way. In the same way that when say, Blackhand says that it's honorable to chuck children off a cliff, we infer that this is what he considers to be honor and not what honor is to be in general. In this case, it is compassionate in the view of the church to free the spirit of an undead being by torching his chest, because his existence is an unnatural torment and this frees his soul to move onto heaven. We, the audience, might disagree, characters are seen to disagree with this and the setting was iffy on this point even then and has now ditched it given the lore on undeath and the afterlife. But that does not mean that the character is contradicting his own view of compassion by espousing this, because what he means by compassion and what other characters and the audience does are different things, same as with Blackhand and honor.

The added part to this you've already mentioned, namely that the Light doesn't really care about whether you hold 'real' compassion in the eyes of the writers or audience, but only that you belief in some kind of structuring doctrine, which all those people did, hence why they could use their powers. Benedictus in particular was so convinced that he was later able to use both light and shadow despite believing that the only moral course of action was to let a dragon controlled by tentacle monsters destroy the world.

[Mace]

I often think how the world of Warcraft would have been had only the Alliance accepted the Forsaken as victims as opposed to monsters after their freedom. Would Sylvanas have being so bitter? Would the Blight have happened? Would Gilneas have fallen?

This would have happened if the forsaken went alliance, they needed to reject them for them to be horde - it's that simple... the devs control the narrative and the narrative is sometimes determined by decisions like who goes where.. it's that simple


Alliance do accept undead, what do you think the Ebon blade DKs are? It doesn't meant everyone likes it or is pleased about it, nor does it mean it isn't controversial, it's like how people view LGBT - some are okay, some are not happy about it etc.

[Eurhetemec]

@Eurhetemec

I'm not sure if I disagree on the latter point or if we're saying the same thing, but in different ways. When the writers talk about compassion and respect, they mean 21st century western liberal views, because the writers are 21st century western liberals. But when the characters and organisations in the setting do so, they don't necessarily mean the same way. In the same way that when say, Blackhand says that it's honorable to chuck children off a cliff, we infer that this is what he considers to be honor and not what honor is to be in general. In this case, it is compassionate in the view of the church to free the spirit of an undead being by torching his chest, because his existence is an unnatural torment and this frees his soul to move onto heaven. We, the audience, might disagree, characters are seen to disagree with this and the setting was iffy on this point even then and has now ditched it given the lore on undeath and the afterlife. But that does not mean that the character is contradicting his own view of compassion by espousing this, because what he means by compassion and what other characters and the audience does are different things, same as with Blackhand and honor.

The added part to this you've already mentioned, namely that the Light doesn't really care about whether you hold 'real' compassion in the eyes of the writers or audience, but only that you belief in some kind of structuring doctrine, which all those people did, hence why they could use their powers. Benedictus in particular was so convinced that he was later able to use both light and shadow despite believing that the only moral course of action was to let a dragon controlled by tentacle monsters destroy the world.

I think honor muddies the waters, because "honour" isn't really a solid virtue in the later 20th or early 21st centuries, just like valour isn't. Being honorable an individual still is. Honoring your duties still is (notice the verbs), but "honour" itself is suspect, because it's been used, in the 20th and 21st centuries, to justify countless atrocities and cover-ups of atrocities, both individual and societal, and it's more obvious than ever in the last 100 or so years, that one man's honour is another man's pure evil.

That's why you can have badguys talk about honour, because in 20th-century morality/fiction, badguys often fucking love honour, it's an excuse for all sorts of wacky and monstrous behaviour.

Whereas with compassion that's still a solid virtue with a specific meaning that's hard to twist. So it's more like you're meant to understand people using it are probably misguided, confused or insane, rather than just straight-up badguys. Like that they genuinely believe what they're selling. And you totally get people like this in the 20th/21st centuries, who think that some wild and wacky bit of nuttiness is "compassion".

[NorthernDragon]

This would have happened if the forsaken went alliance, they needed to reject them for them to be horde - it's that simple... the devs control the narrative and the narrative is sometimes determined by decisions like who goes where.. it's that simple


Alliance do accept undead, what do you think the Ebon blade DKs are? It doesn't meant everyone likes it or is pleased about it, nor does it mean it isn't controversial, it's like how people view LGBT - some are okay, some are not happy about it etc.

The point is it's hypocritical to accept DKs but not Forsaken

- - - Updated - - -

This would have happened if the forsaken went alliance, they needed to reject them for them to be horde - it's that simple... the devs control the narrative and the narrative is sometimes determined by decisions like who goes where.. it's that simple


Alliance do accept undead, what do you think the Ebon blade DKs are? It doesn't meant everyone likes it or is pleased about it, nor does it mean it isn't controversial, it's like how people view LGBT - some are okay, some are not happy about it etc.

The point is it's hypocritical to accept DKs but not Forsaken

[Super Dickmann]

I think honor muddies the waters, because "honour" isn't really a solid virtue in the later 20th or early 21st centuries, just like valour isn't. Being honorable an individual still is. Honoring your duties still is (notice the verbs), but "honour" itself is suspect, because it's been used, in the 20th and 21st centuries, to justify countless atrocities and cover-ups of atrocities, both individual and societal, and it's more obvious than ever in the last 100 or so years, that one man's honour is another man's pure evil.

That's why you can have badguys talk about honour, because in 20th-century morality/fiction, badguys often fucking love honour, it's an excuse for all sorts of wacky and monstrous behaviour.

Whereas with compassion that's still a solid virtue with a specific meaning that's hard to twist. So it's more like you're meant to understand people using it are probably misguided, confused or insane, rather than just straight-up badguys. Like that they genuinely believe what they're selling. And you totally get people like this in the 20th/21st centuries, who think that some wild and wacky bit of nuttiness is "compassion".

I agree with your point, but it's what I'm getting at - the fact that an in-story entity believes in compassion and imposes upon it a set definition doesn't mean it's compassionate in the eyes of the audience. Aucald is debating that Benedictus's view contradicts that of the Church, when that's not the case, what it contradicts is the morality of the audience. Him contradicting the audience or what the writer considers compassion doesn't mean he contradicts what his Church understands with it because both he and the church could be considered misguided by the narrative without being in disagreement with one another.

[Aucald]

I agree with your point, but it's what I'm getting at - the fact that an in-story entity believes in compassion and imposes upon it a set definition doesn't mean it's compassionate in the eyes of the audience. Aucald is debating that Benedictus's view contradicts that of the Church, when that's not the case, what it contradicts is the morality of the audience. Him contradicting the audience or what the writer considers compassion doesn't mean he contradicts what his Church understands with it because both he and the church could be considered misguided by the narrative without being in disagreement with one another.

That's a misrepresentation of what I've claimed - I said his view as presented is more zealous and/or fanatical than that of the mainstream views (not outright contradictory), as presented by the likes of Tirion, Uther, and others who showed compassion and respect even towards what they felt were implacable foes, and who didn't foster or espouse hatred.

[Nerovar]

I understand the rationale for them wanting to kill both demons (historically evil, and also responsible for mass loss of life) as well as the undead (the Scourge, the Third War, etc. etc.), but that's neither really here nor there when discussing the varying degrees of zealotry or fanaticism when it comes to this fact. Paladins like Uther destroyed the demon-worshipping Orcs like the Blackrocks near Strahnbrad because it was necessary, but neither vengeance nor hatred factored into it - and, in point of fact, Uther admonishes the then-Paladin Arthas for embracing anger or hatred in the task of safeguarding Strahnbrad from the Orcs. As for my previous quote you sort of excised it from it's original context, which was about selling the notion of the faction conflict to non-Human races such as the Draenei, not intrinsically about what the Draenei may or may not believe (and we know, for example, Velen is not himself opposed to the existence of the Forsaken).

Again, killing Forsaken/Undead or demonic Orcs i.e. smiting evil in the name of the Light doesn't have anything to with hatred in and of itself. For the lawful good Paladin, freeing an Undead from the Curse of Undeath by killing them would be seen as a mercy to the person who once occupied that body and as a service to the Light because as you correctly stated, they're the "living" examples of the antithesis to the Light. It is important to remember that while Forsaken possess free will and are capable of feeling human emotions to some degree, they're not a "race" in the same way that Orcs or Humans are. They are merely a political organization formed by a ragtag group of cursed beings, held together by a very anti-life ideology that was fostered by their leader. Now, considering that pretty much all other Undead on Azeroth are either A) scourge or B) maddened by their curse and will attack you on sight (like Stalvan Mistmantle) why would anyone grant a random Undead the benefit of the doubt?

Tirion's excommunication is shown to be itself in error, when the ritual that was supposed to sever him from the Light was proven to have failed in Blood and Honor, as Tirion was actually upholding the values of the Light in contrast to those who excommunicated him for purely political reasons. It is true that in the early days of WoW there wasn't a fine distinction between the Forsaken and Scourge among the Alliance, but it was already starting to be distinguished by then and by the time of WotLK was a given. The example of the Death Knights is entirely something else, as Death Knights were the generals of the Scourge and were previously the direct servants of the Lich King - that's going to be hard to get past even when you know they're now free of the Lich King's thrall. What I'm saying is that knowledge that the Forsaken weren't Scourge, and weren't universally monsters in their entirety, was beginning to be understood even back in Classic. It's not in evidence that a fanatical "kill 'em all" attitude was the order of the day in Stormwind, even back then. I mean some people did think that, and it seems more likely some people didn't - they were afraid of them, but they also held out hope that their former friends and loved ones might also be reachable.

It seems that you completely misunderstood my point about Tirion fordring's excommunication. It wasn't meant to showcase that he was wrong or that his actions were not in line with the "will" of the Light itself but moreso that his views were so radical that they lead him to support his enemy which lead to his excommunication severing him from the Church of the Holy Light. It served to showcase that the Argent Crusade and its acceptance towards Forsaken should not be viewed as the mainstream as it is lead by a literal heretic who was branded as such because of his overboarding acceptance/leniency/compassion leading him astray. This was explored more in-depth in the now de-canonized corebooks which described Compassion as the most dangerous virtue. The fact that he was still able to wield the Light proficiently also doesn't matter as literally anyone with enough faith (Scarlet Crusade, Zeliek) or force of will (corrupted Benedictus) can seemingly do so.

I disagree with the notion that the example of Death Knights is entirely disanalogous to the Forsaken. Both are Undead creatures who were enthralled by the Lich King to commit heinous acts. The only real difference is that Death Knights were obviously more powerful and "life-like" than the mindless zombies who would later become the Forsaken due to greater potency of the necromantic spell that raised them (they were still cannon fodder to the LK). However, I don't see how any of this would constitute a meaningful difference in the eyes of an average worshipper of the Light.

That's a misrepresentation of what I've claimed - I said his view as presented is more zealous and/or fanatical than that of the mainstream views (not outright contradictory), as presented by the likes of Tirion, Uther, and others who showed compassion and respect even towards what they felt were implacable foes, and who didn't foster or espouse hatred.

This is a very flawed point. You're constructing a mainstream consisting of people who had very big disagreements to a point where one yeeted the other out of the church and somehow juxtapose this "mainstream" with Benedictus' supposedly fanatical views even though your only evidence of him not being part of this "mainstream" (despite being the leader of the Church) is that he later turned bad.

[Eurhetemec]

I agree with your point, but it's what I'm getting at - the fact that an in-story entity believes in compassion and imposes upon it a set definition doesn't mean it's compassionate in the eyes of the audience. Aucald is debating that Benedictus's view contradicts that of the Church, when that's not the case, what it contradicts is the morality of the audience. Him contradicting the audience or what the writer considers compassion doesn't mean he contradicts what his Church understands with it because both he and the church could be considered misguided by the narrative without being in disagreement with one another.

Fair enough - though it might also contradict the view of the Church in the sense that his belief that some dubious activity is "compassionate" may not be one widely shared by others in the faith. I don't think it's been established that Archbishop is the equivalent of "Pope" in that their word is the word of god (or the Light in this case), and they can just making rulings from the top down.

[Ersula]

If that happened forsaken would instantly become bland and boring (just like calia). They would all just be like those sobbing forsaken refugees in orgrimmar.

I'm curious where the Forsaken will go from here. Lordaeron/Undercity seems to work like Dalaran now, with Night elf, Human & High Elf forsaken. Some loyal to the horde, some loyal to the alliance. Seems like that was set up for undead elves for each faction as allied races.

Calia is boning & people who like the Forsaken don't like her. But I forsee her as being interesting if her character trajectory is her to be conflicted if the faction war flares up again, or if they really do a "Tyranny of the Light" storyline she might be conflicted between the side of the players or the light

[Super Dickmann]

Fair enough - though it might also contradict the view of the Church in the sense that his belief that some dubious activity is "compassionate" may not be one widely shared by others in the faith. I don't think it's been established that Archbishop is the equivalent of "Pope" in that their word is the word of god (or the Light in this case), and they can just making rulings from the top down.

The Archbishop is the highest Church authority. We don't know if there's papal infallibility, but we know he's the highest authority and we've spent the last few pages going on about the extent to which this view is widespread.

@Aucald

If I misrepresented your take, I'll withdraw it, but in the way you phrase it I do think you're attributing to hatred what really isn't. We have no reason to believe Benedictus was sadistic or purposefully hateful of the undead, rather, given how widespread necromancy was in being condemned and the idea of a paradise in the Light after death, he most likely did genuinely believe it was better off they were put to rest and went to a better place. Hell, Philips directly says that it's extremely compassionate of Benedictus to think this way and we can contrast this more distanced approach to say, the Crusade wishing to torture undead. I'd remind that Uther excommunicated Tirion over the kindness he showed an orc and Turalyon's aforementioned orc purging religious revelation. As I addressed in the post you snipped the past bit out of, there's a difference between the teachings of the Holy Light, the concepts they preach as we'd view them in real life vs. how the characters view them and the actual will of the Light, which we've only seen manifest a handful times, like when it saved Liadrin and Tirion.

[Aucald]

Again, killing Forsaken/Undead or demonic Orcs i.e. smiting evil in the name of the Light doesn't have anything to with hatred in and of itself. For the lawful good Paladin, freeing an Undead from the Curse of Undeath by killing them would be seen as a mercy to the person who once occupied that body and as a service to the Light because as you correctly stated, they're the "living" examples of the antithesis to the Light. It is important to remember that while Forsaken possess free will and are capable of feeling human emotions to some degree, they're not a "race" in the same way that Orcs or Humans are. They are merely a political organization formed by a ragtag group of cursed beings, held together by a very anti-life ideology that was fostered by their leader. Now, considering that pretty much all other Undead on Azeroth are either A) scourge or B) maddened by their curse and will attack you on sight (like Stalvan Mistmantle) why would anyone grant a random Undead the benefit of the doubt?

It certainly *can* have to do with hatred in and of itself, though; that's the entire point of Uther's admonition of Arthas in WC3: "“Vengeance cannot be a part of what we must do. If we allow our passions to turn to bloodlust, then we will become as vile as the orcs.” That's a pretty hefty condemnation of "smiting evil in the name of the Light" if one's passions are borne aloft by hatred and/or the need for vengeance (e.g. vengeance for the Third War). Someone devout in the Light may well smite evil in the name of protecting the innocent, and that's to the good; but they also need to know that what they're smiting is irredeemably evil. The Forsaken have shown through their own actions and personalities that they're not universally evil or "anti-life," and so smiting them sight unseen would indeed fall into the category of an action motivated by either hatred or ignorance (neither of those being good things when it comes to slaying intelligent beings). By all means defend yourself if you're attacked, but attacking someone simply because they're different than you isn't good on its face.

It seems that you completely misunderstood my point about Tirion fordring's excommunication. It wasn't meant to showcase that he was wrong or that his actions were not in line with the "will" of the Light itself but moreso that his views were so radical that they lead him to support his enemy which lead to his excommunication severing him from the Church of the Holy Light. It served to showcase that the Argent Crusade and its acceptance towards Forsaken should not be viewed as the mainstream as it is lead by a literal heretic who was branded as such because of his overboarding acceptance/leniency/compassion leading him astray. This was explored more in-depth in the now de-canonized corebooks which described Compassion as the most dangerous virtue. The fact that he was still able to wield the Light proficiently also doesn't matter as literally anyone with enough faith (Scarlet Crusade, Zeliek) or force of will (corrupted Benedictus) can seemingly do so.

I disagree with the notion that the example of Death Knights is entirely disanalogous to the Forsaken. Both are Undead creatures who were enthralled by the Lich King to commit heinous acts. The only real difference is that Death Knights were obviously more powerful and "life-like" than the mindless zombies who would later become the Forsaken due to greater potency of the necromantic spell that raised them (they were still cannon fodder to the LK). However, I don't see how any of this would constitute a meaningful difference in the eyes of an average worshipper of the Light.

There was nothing radical about his views, and he made clear his case and showed that Eitrigg was not a creature lost to evil - it was simply that the political reality in that time couldn't account for "good" Orcs, and his excommunication was thus completely political in nature. It didn't have anything to do with the Light or even the teachings of the Church of the Light, it had only to do with the policies of its leaders at that time (policies that we now know were bigoted and wrongheaded). Just like in real life, the laity of a given religion can have any number of issues with the politics of the leaders in that community, and I would assume the Church of the Light is no different in that regard. Indeed, the positions of some of its most illustrious members also bear that out, such as with Uther and later Tirion (despite his excommunication he went on to become an exemplar of true faith and tenacity in the Light). The same is true of the Argent Dawn and later the Argent Crusade, despite the nature of their beginnings, they've gone on to show what the truer aspect of the Light in contrast to the earlier Church of the Light - which also speaks to my original claim about how their politics aren't necessarily representative of the mainstream.

The Death Knights bear little to no resemblance to the rank and file of the Scourge (as the Forsaken do), and are consequently made even more monstrous as many of them are *willing* servants of the Lich King who forsook their humanity for power in undeath. They represent the worst aspects of the Scourge, whereas ghouls and zombies (and formerly the Forsaken) are unwilling slaves of the Lich King's thrall, and also victims of the Plague of Undeath that ravaged Lordaeron. The majority of Death Knights aren't victims, but rather victimizers, although the latter generation don't share in this distinction (which was unknown to most in the Horde and Alliance). So yes, I would say the Death Knights are extremely disanalogous to the Forsaken in that sense. Your argument would be akin to saying a soldier would underscore no difference between an enemy grunt and an enemy captain or general - the Death Knights exemplify the horrors of the Scourge in a way that a simple ghoul cannot, and I think any average worshipper of the Light would easily see that distinction and difference.

[Mace]

The point is it's hypocritical to accept DKs but not Forsaken

No argument on me from that one, but bear in mind, Anduin tried to reconcile the Forsaken and Sylvanas sabotaged it, and despite that he still continued with Calia, so we know the alliance want reconciliation.

Ofc they won't have it because blizzard needs the forsaken to be horde, however they could surprise us by making a large chunk alliance friendly ....

At some point they'd reslise the game only needs the players involved to be in the faction, not the whole races... just like we had for darkspears where only a small tribe went horde.

They'll do whatever they wanna do, we can only ope it's actually compelling and makes us feel excited to play wow.. problem about recent events and story telling, especially on the alliance side, in particular for races like night elves, is while there's been great drama, it's acutally not been enjoyable for the fans at all, constant kickdowns for drama just actually reverse the brownie points you get.

You should write it in such a way, that you get the drama, but the plyaable race at least comes out even more awesome than before - because players are invested in them.

In this case, if you were to make some sort of cool thing happen between alliance and forsaken, you'd need to have something awesome packed for the horde fans

[Soon-TM]

To me, it seems like you're hardcore injecting your own beliefs into the Warcraft setting and then force together conflicting parts of the lore from different time periods to fit that belief.

Well, in that regard he's no different to Danuser & co. Although admittedly, @Aucald does a noticeably better job than the hacks in charge of writing.

The basic issue with Stormwind's "kill on sight" policy vis-à-vis the undead, is that it was simply swept under the carpet, exactly like any other instances where the Alliance, and more specifically someone from SW, does something... less than heroic. You might think that the head of the CotHL going off the deep end would have had pretty big consequences - moreso when the crown prince is a priest, and as such had presumably some sort of ties to Benedictus. But no, it is never mentioned in Cataclysm (other than in the dungeon itself), or in Pandaria, where we already see the Golden Boi using shadow magic (not to mention the strong Old Gods subplot). Even in the Legion class campaign, which brought back even old coots like Alonsus Faol was brought back, Benedictus is never spoken of.

[Nerovar]

The basic issue with Stormwind's "kill on sight" policy vis-à-vis the undead, is that it was simply swept under the carpet, exactly like any other instances where the Alliance, and more specifically someone from SW, does something... less than heroic.

The problem is that this shouldn't even be considered bad/evil from a human PoV and it can only be constructed as such within the context of Warcraft lore if you introduce a major shift in morality to Warcraft humans and their church. If you think about the inspirations behind the Church of the Holy Light, the first thing that comes to mind is obviously Christianity and this is reflected not only in the aesthetics but also in the kind of morality that is presented to us in earlier Warcraft stories. In Christian thought the elimination of evil is the only way to respond to it. There is no parley in the battle between Heaven and Hell.
At one point in time, this was also represented in the metaphysics of the Warcraft universe with Undead being harmed by otherwise healing Light spells.

Consider this for a moment: Daelin Proudmoore held the Orcs to be irredeemable even though they purged themselves of their demonic corruption and showed a desire for peace with the humans. Undead on the other hand can only exist through their corruption and procreate through the spread of their darkness. In this respect they're actually more similar to the original (Tolkien) Orcs which are also presented as irredeemable from the PoV of Humans, Elves and Dwarves. Additionally, Forsaken as a group have for the longest time done pretty much nothing that would give anyone a reason to consider them as redeemable despite their instrinsically evil nature.

[Feanoro]

Well, in that regard he's no different to Danuser & co. Although admittedly, @Aucald does a noticeably better job than the hacks in charge of writing.

The basic issue with Stormwind's "kill on sight" policy vis-à-vis the undead, is that it was simply swept under the carpet, exactly like any other instances where the Alliance, and more specifically someone from SW, does something... less than heroic. You might think that the head of the CotHL going off the deep end would have had pretty big consequences - moreso when the crown prince is a priest, and as such had presumably some sort of ties to Benedictus. But no, it is never mentioned in Cataclysm (other than in the dungeon itself), or in Pandaria, where we already see the Golden Boi using shadow magic (not to mention the strong Old Gods subplot). Even in the Legion class campaign, which brought back even old coots like Alonsus Faol was brought back, Benedictus is never spoken of.

It's not so much that these things are swept under the carpet as the writers simply don't give enough of a damn to write Alliance stories. The focus is almost entirely on the Horde.

[Sondrelk]

I'm curious where the Forsaken will go from here. Lordaeron/Undercity seems to work like Dalaran now, with Night elf, Human & High Elf forsaken. Some loyal to the horde, some loyal to the alliance. Seems like that was set up for undead elves for each faction as allied races.

Calia is boning & people who like the Forsaken don't like her. But I forsee her as being interesting if her character trajectory is her to be conflicted if the faction war flares up again, or if they really do a "Tyranny of the Light" storyline she might be conflicted between the side of the players or the light

Optimistically in a relly interesting direction as they have to contend with the specter of not just being the Lich King's shock troops, but now also the more recent matter of Sylvanas being the villain per excellence in the world of Azeroth.
I could see them striking up a tentative peace with the Alliance specifically to recolonize former Lordaeron without opposition, especially the Plaguelands now that we can assume they are close to being cleansed given the timeframe.
We might see some questions being raised from within the Forsaken community, and stirred by those who knew them in life on whether they are still humans, albeit cursed, or whether they are something else entirely. Should they strive for reconciliation with the rest of the humans, or should they carve out an entirely new path. Not to mention the question of whether they should attempt to propagate their existence, which again leads back to the rest of the humans, and whether it might become accepted to make the choice the tidepriest did.


Though then again, more likely they will be pretty much exactly the same as they were before BfA except with a new banner.

[Val the Moofia Boss]

I often think how the world of Warcraft would have been had only the Alliance accepted the Forsaken as victims as opposed to monsters after their freedom. Would Sylvanas have being so bitter? Would the Blight have happened? Would Gilneas have fallen?

"Forsaken as victims as opposed to monsters"

laughs

I'm pretty sure that the Alliance never engaged in live experimentation on their captives. Or milled plague to use to commit genocide.
I'm pretty sure that the Alliance never raised people from the dead, and then forced them to help kill their family and fellow countrymen or be killed again.
I'm pretty sure that the Alliance never launched an unprovoked invasion of a country and then wiped out the majority of its inhabitants, and then blighted the land in a "if I can't have this land, no one can" temper tantrum.
I'm pretty sure that the Alliance never tried to completely genocide an entire race just to spite a dying elf.

Guess what? You can be undead... and still decide to NOT join the evil Forsaken who commits mass crimes against humanity on a daily basis! Any undead who stuck with Sylvanas' Forsaken has zero right to any claim of victimhood whatsoever. If you are an undead, there is a far, far less evil faction of undead ready and waiting for you: they're called the Knights of the Ebon Blade and you don't need to be a Death Knight to join them.

[Treeskee]

"Forsaken as victims as opposed to monsters"

laughs

I'm pretty sure that the Alliance never engaged in live experimentation on their captives. Or milled plague to use to commit genocide.
I'm pretty sure that the Alliance never raised people from the dead, and then forced them to help kill their family and fellow countrymen or be killed again.
I'm pretty sure that the Alliance never launched an unprovoked invasion of a country and then wiped out the majority of its inhabitants, and then blighted the land in a "if I can't have this land, no one can" temper tantrum.
I'm pretty sure that the Alliance never tried to completely genocide an entire race just to spite a dying elf.

Guess what? You can be undead... and still decide to NOT join the evil Forsaken who commits mass crimes against humanity on a daily basis! Any undead who stuck with Sylvanas' Forsaken has zero right to any claim of victimhood whatsoever. If you are an undead, there is a far, far less evil faction of undead ready and waiting for you: they're called the Knights of the Ebon Blade and you don't need to be a Death Knight to join them.

They're obviously talking about how things were before the Ebon Blade were around. A long time passed with the Forsaken being shunned and looked at with disgust before that and after being treated like monsters, living abnormally long and unnatural lives, you would probably just stop caring about those who viewed you as such even if you were once connected to them in some way.