Would you support Sylvanas Windrunner if you still had the choice?

[Minikin]

Portraying this as a situation of either extermination or concentration camps is exactly what makes this so atrocious. There WERE more alternatives. Were they easy or convenient? Of course not. Exiling them to somewhere on Azeroth, trying to integrate them into the world, etc. would have been very difficult; but those WERE alternatives. The victors simply didn't consider them, because it was so much easier for them not to.


While there's no doubt about that, we still don't know the ACTUAL endgame. She had some kind of motivation, a goal for which she accepted a very high price. It wasn't just her being sadistic or psychotic - there was an intention behind everything that we are not yet privy to. Maybe it'll turn out it was a very bad reason. Maybe not. For now, I'll give her the benefit of the doubt, because she's neither an idiot nor a maniac.

People said similar things at the start of BfA.

She must have done is cuz of something! But turned out teldrassil happened BEFORE lorderon.

Saurfangs a traitor! She is serving the horde! But turns out "the horde is nothing!"

Nearly three years and a HD Netflix drama later, it is now confirmed that even if she might have other motivations, she's sided with a guy who literally mashes souls into the ground so he can make land for his area.

We have confirmation on:
She started a war not for the horde but herself
She was made warchief not by the horde but muehzala
And is siding with a known evil force.

You still want benefit of doubt. This isn't about the horde vs alliance anymore. But let's say we give her benefit of doubt. Are you really willing to say ppl still won't support her like sheep (ogmot's prophecy sounds very much aimed at her), even if that means they'd get mashed so she can unlock her next talent row?

[Florena]

Nah. Honestly she's never been a character I was all that invested in, even back in early WoW when I still found the Forsaken themselves interesting. And even back in 'a good war' it was hinted that she had a hidden agenda so I'm really not surprised how BFA played out. Even if it turns out in Shadowlands that she gets the illidan treatment from Legion I'm not going to be invested in her.

I'm just done with her. I don't really even look forward to killing her as a raid boss I just look forward to her not being part of the story anymore.

[Biomega]

But let's say we give her benefit of doubt. Are you really willing to say ppl still won't support her like sheep (ogmot's prophecy sounds very much aimed at her), even if that means they'd get mashed so she can unlock her next talent row?

I have no idea about what OTHER people will do. I can only speak to myself. I'll wait with my judgement until I know everything that's behind all this. Only then can I decide if I think whether or not what she's done was justifiable or not.

[Minikin]

I have no idea about what OTHER people will do. I can only speak to myself. I'll wait with my judgement until I know everything that's behind all this. Only then can I decide if I think whether or not what she's done was justifiable or not.

I guess that's fair.

[Vakna]

This isn't an accurate portrayal, though. Sylvanas didn't specifically set out to murder children - she obliterated a settlement, with all the casualties of war that entailed. That's what happens in war. You think the Alliance waited for all the civilians to get out when it attacked Horde cities? It's only a difference in scale, not in action.

Whereas the orc concentration camps were SPECIFICALLY designed to break the spirit of an entire species, including all its members from birth to death, AFTER the war was over and won. Talk about committing genocide.

Again, I'm not arguing over comparisons, I'm arguing over whether Sylvanas' actions can be justified. There is a reason why war crimes exist, some things are too much even in war. Once she crossed that line, it doesn't matter if she was somehow trying to save the entire universe. What she did was a crime against life, a crime against the entire planet. She doesn't even deserve to return home before she dies.

She's also made it very clear that she just wants everyone to die and become soul-slaves under the Jailer (which she somehow considers free will?). She's been twisted beyond recognition, there is nothing about her that is remotely redeemable. Yet somehow there are still loyalists out there who would follow her even though she wants to kill them and turn them into slaves?

- - - Updated - - -

I guess that's fair.

I disagree. I don't think there is any possible explanation that can justify what she's done. Even if her plan was to somehow defeat the Jailer all along, it's still not good enough.

[Minikin]

Again, I'm not arguing over comparisons, I'm arguing over whether Sylvanas' actions can be justified. There is a reason why war crimes exist, some things are too much even in war. Once she crossed that line, it doesn't matter if she was somehow trying to save the entire universe. What she did was a crime against life, a crime against the entire planet. She doesn't even deserve to return home before she dies.

She's also made it very clear that she just wants everyone to die and become soul-slaves under the Jailer (which she somehow considers free will?). She's been twisted beyond recognition, there is nothing about her that is remotely redeemable. Yet somehow there are still loyalists out there who would follow her even though she wants to kill them and turn them into slaves?

- - - Updated - - -



I disagree. I don't think there is any possible explanation that can justify what she's done. Even if her plan was to somehow defeat the Jailer all along, it's still not good enough.

I think he's saying he's gonna wait until the end to make final judgement. Which i can kind of understand. For me, yea sure, throw her off the edge of the maw and be done with it. But I can understand people saying they wanna wait and see.

[Benitora]

I would need to know what I'm supporting before I can say that I would support her or not.
She's been vague all the fucking way about what she wants, so what exactly is there to follow except for a pair of tits?

[Biomega]

Again, I'm not arguing over comparisons, I'm arguing over whether Sylvanas' actions can be justified. There is a reason why war crimes exist, some things are too much even in war. Once she crossed that line, it doesn't matter if she was somehow trying to save the entire universe. What she did was a crime against life, a crime against the entire planet.

That's a false equivalence, though. We're not debating the legality of her actions. It's about whether or not they were justifiable.

Stealing is illegal. Trespassing is illegal. But if there's someone dying in front of a closed pharmacy and I can break the window and steal the life-saving medicine, that's a justifiable action. You can even go further and say that stealing and trespassing are both generally IMMORAL, but that in this case doing so was probably the most moral action you could take.

Of course, the more severe the action the more profound a reason you'd need for justification. Maybe Sylvanas has a good enough reason. What if, say, the entirety of creation was at stake, and her destroying Teldrassil and killing all those children was the only way to save everything that ever existed? Would that not have been a justifiable action? What remains now is to see whether or not there really WAS such a reason, and whether or not it DID demand such action. But we don't know yet.

[loras]

I didn't really support Sylvanas when she was the Queen of the Forsaken or the Warchief of the Horde, and I certainly wouldn't now that she's betrayed the Horde and thrown her lot in with first an Old God and then an inscrutable elder being whose current plans involve the death of Azeroth as a whole.

This, for any reasonable non-death aligned character.

I've a nihilistic warlock that would join the Twilight's hammer or the Legion if he could in example.
But i could also imagine a mournful death knight that might genuinely share her sentiment towards existence, for example, or a brainwashed forsaken that still believes she is ultimately in it to help the forsaken in particular.

And perhaps some more ruthless alliance types might as well, if her redemption is good enough, or if it opens up opportunities to improve their lot sufficiently enough (they might, in example, expect her to fail regardless of her motivations, and thus consider their decision to support her or not as irrelevant, and thus pursue rewards).

- - - Updated - - -

Draenor was destroyed when a bozo Orc said "Dam we can't conquer Azeroth, ohh well lets try finding another by ripping open a bunch of space/time fractures, we can find somewhere else to subjugate.". But like most of the Hordes problems they shoot themselves in the foot then blame the Alliance.

That really does sum up the Horde quite nicely.

[shaqar]

the amount of fanboys on this website who have a hard on for this undead piece of .... is really something..
I for one IM SO DONE WITH THIS HORRIBLE CHARACTER AND WRITING

[GR8GODZILLAGOD]

On topic, yes.
The second they could let us RP as the actual bad guy, I'm in. I would've preferred Arthas back in WotLK, but running around as a hellspawn would be kinda cool. You could consider this from a game of ethics, but I'm sure most people would if it were fun. There is something about being a part of a gothic horror army that appeals to me.

There's a reason the DK starting zone is probably my favorite bit of questing in the game. Playing the bad guy can be pretty damn fun.

[donuthoe]

no, souls are being destroyed so its no different from the Legion

[Triceron]

Problem is Sylvanas is written as a control freak.

So whether you support Sylvanas or not depends on whether you like following orders of an abusive control freak or not.

[Lorgar Aurelian]

Portraying this as a situation of either extermination or concentration camps is exactly what makes this so atrocious. There WERE more alternatives. Were they easy or convenient? Of course not. Exiling them to somewhere on Azeroth, trying to integrate them into the world, etc. would have been very difficult; but those WERE alternatives. The victors simply didn't consider them, because it was so much easier for them not to.

These absolutely weren’t options. You don’t exile a group you already know can make portals to attack you again and you can’t integrate a group which is almost catatonic going through fel withdrawal while still having marauding bands in the wild unless you take every baby and make them a better treated thrall.

The options were hold them or kill them.

[Biomega]

These absolutely weren’t options. You don’t exile a group you already know can make portals to attack you again and you can’t integrate a group which is almost catatonic going through fel withdrawal while still having marauding bands in the wild unless you take every baby and make them a better treated thrall.

The options were hold them or kill them.

Disproven by the fact that the orcs on Azeroth WERE able to recover and integrate into a functioning society - The Horde. The resentment they had towards the Alliance and the NElfs was not borne out of aggression, it was out of history and necessity, respectively.

[LordVargK]

Portraying this as a situation of either extermination or concentration camps is exactly what makes this so atrocious. There WERE more alternatives. Were they easy or convenient? Of course not. Exiling them to somewhere on Azeroth, trying to integrate them into the world, etc. would have been very difficult; but those WERE alternatives. The victors simply didn't consider them, because it was so much easier for them not to.

Exiling them would mean giving up land. And effectively it's the same as imprisonment. Let's say you build a wall around the blasted lands and put all orcs there. The wall is necessary for your own protection. What would happen? The orcs would starve to death.
You simply don't invest ressources into an alien civilization that tried to exterminate you.

And integration? Like how? And why? Again the question, why invest any ressources into aliens that literally tried to kill you all while pillaging, raping and burning everything in their path into the ground?

Keeping them as slaves were the best options for both: workforce as reparations for the Alliance, survival for the orcs. After all the only way to tame an orc was the influence on a human.

While there's no doubt about that, we still don't know the ACTUAL endgame. She had some kind of motivation, a goal for which she accepted a very high price. It wasn't just her being sadistic or psychotic - there was an intention behind everything that we are not yet privy to. Maybe it'll turn out it was a very bad reason. Maybe not. For now, I'll give her the benefit of the doubt, because she's neither an idiot nor a maniac

.

The motivation kinda doesn't matter anymore. It can't possibly justify the means. There is literally nothing that could do that.

- - - Updated - - -

Disproven by the fact that the orcs on Azeroth WERE able to recover and integrate into a functioning society - The Horde. The resentment they had towards the Alliance and the NElfs was not borne out of aggression, it was out of history and necessity, respectively.

Neither history nor necessity. Most orcs were just bloodthirsty enough to be swayed to invade azeroth, which then resulted in draenor breaking apart. They were undoubtedly unjustifiable agressors.

[Biomega]

Neither history nor necessity. Most orcs were just bloodthirsty enough to be swayed to invade azeroth, which then resulted in draenor breaking apart. They were undoubtedly unjustifiable agressors.

That's not what I'm referring to, I'm referring to the post-War times, i.e. effectively the WC3 period.

The motivation kinda doesn't matter anymore. It can't possibly justify the means. There is literally nothing that could do that..

If you're saying you wouldn't kill an innocent to save the entirety of creation, I'm calling hypocrisy right there.

[VladlTutushkin]

That's not what I'm referring to, I'm referring to the post-War times, i.e. effectively the WC3 period.


If you're saying you wouldn't kill an innocent to save the entirety of creation, I'm calling hypocrisy right there.

I put it another way - i would not trust her with making a choice of sauce for celebratory turkey, let alone with saving Creation. Such “saviors” as her only make things worse, in any setting.

[Soon-TM]

she's neither an idiot nor a maniac.

Tbh she's been depicted as either (or both!) of those two things since at least WotLK, when her second in command almost killed her during the coup at the Undercity. As a matter of fact, she was killed (again) shortly thereafter, because she didn't keep a short enough leash on her newly risen/subdued subjects AGAIN.

[Lorgar Aurelian]

Disproven by the fact that the orcs on Azeroth WERE able to recover and integrate into a functioning society - The Horde. The resentment they had towards the Alliance and the NElfs was not borne out of aggression, it was out of history and necessity, respectively.

they didn’t integrate into any other faction they recovered from there fel withdrawal and made there own by finding allys who were ok with there pre fel ways of life.

Making your own society with like minded people =/= integrating with another.