Arthas did Nothing Wrong

[Krek01]

Well, for starters he could have at least tried to explain the situation to his superior instead of simply demanding his cooperation in what would at that time seem like total lunacy.



No. Arthas failed them by his refusal to explain the situation. Uther had no reason to follow Arthas' plan. Arthas acted irrational and emotional in that scene.

Except he kinda did.

Arthas: Listen, Uther, there's something about the plague you should know.
{Sees that the people of Stratholme ate the tainted grains}
Arthas: Oh, no... we're too late. These people have all been infected! They may look fine now, but it's just a matter of time before they turn into the undead!
{...}
Arthas: This entire city must be purged.

Whether or not he made the right design when it came to purging Stratholme, he was pretty much screwed, either way, and Mal'Ganis gets what he wants.

As for whether or not Arthas should be judged for his crimes when he took up Frostmourne (if he had total control, or was subtly influenced or fully brainwashed by the Jailer), it is tough to say. We'll have to see how it'll play out. Blizzard is free to retcon their story however they please (it doesn't mean they should, though).

I wonder if the characters in-game will even bring up the discussion of culpability on Arthas' part if they discuss Anduin not being in his own mind when he attacked the Archon.

[kaelix1]

No, he doesn't. Uther even states that outright. Uther is Arthas' superior, not the other way around.

He also had plenty of opportunity to explain why his actions were necessary - but he'd rather waste that time on trying to order his friends and superior around.

YES, he is his superior in Silver Hand, whoever Arthas outrank him as Prince of lordaeron, that's why Arthas had the authority to suspend the order, Uther/Jaina should have just wait and see the situation not run like cowards

- - - Updated - - -

So wait, refusing to help him is cowardice but murdering his own people because he was too much of a pussy to face the undead is the height of bravery?

Nothing been a pussy here champ, its all about trying to minimize the damage, an undead army equal to the population of Stratholme would have kill far far far more people than just purge Stratholme, are you 12 or something? they didn't have the time/resources to deal with such an army

Infracted.

Love this forum, corecting people is 'trolling' but someone using words like 'pussy' and dumb logic is ok

[OokOok]

Anduin is being directly mind-controlled. Arthas burned a city, killed allied mercenaries, doomed his soldiers to die, and this is before touching Frostmourne. Afterwards, he was never controlled, only lead. His emoted were sapped but he still had free will. He chose to kill his father and destroy his kingdom.

Evil is a point of view

He burned a city full of the plague, killing a couple thousand to stop the spread of a plague that could of taken over all of azeroth

He doomed soldiers who wanted to abandon their post, desertion is a crime punishable by death.

[Kaver]

Anduin is being directly mind-controlled. Arthas burned a city, killed allied mercenaries, doomed his soldiers to die, and this is before touching Frostmourne. Afterwards, he was never controlled, only lead. His emoted were sapped but he still had free will. He chose to kill his father and destroy his kingdom.

He didn’t have free will. Where are you getting your info from?

[huth]

Except he kinda did.

Except, as your quote shows, he didn't. He starts to, then just tells them they have to kill the civilians without giving any understandable reason.

YES, he is his superior in Silver Hand, whoever Arthas outrank him as Prince of lordaeron, that's why Arthas had the authority to suspend the order

No, he still doesn't. Uther outranks him as a Paladin of the Silver Hand. Jaina is not a citizen of Lordaeron. Being a prince of Lordaeron does not afford him authority other either of them. He also doesn't give them any good reason to consider his request. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.

He doomed soldiers who wanted to abandon their post, desertion is a crime punishable by death.

He doomed soldiers who were ordered by his father to return home.

[OrcsRLame]

Reminder that in WC3 Arthas tells Kel'Thuzad that he hears only the voice of Frostmourne. And Arthas does not change at all personality wise after his connection with the LK weakens.

This implies rather strongly the existence of another consciousness inside Arthas that is neither Arthas nor the LK.

Not saying the Jailer thing isn't a retcon, but it's not a retcon that comes totally out of left field either. If anything it actually lines up fairly well with WC3 but is a pretty big retcon to WOTLK and the books.

As for the actual thread topic, I think it's fair to say Arthas did some wrong but he's not exactly the biggest monster in the Warcraft universe. Stratholme needed to be culled lest the whole continent be overrun. My only criticism there is Arthas could have planned to be more tactful. Instead of running in and just swinging away he could have ran in with the intention of telling the citizens to spend their last moments with their families, which then would have been interrupted by them turning into the Scourge. In practice it wouldn't have been much different, but it would have shown very different intent from Arthas.

Probably the most evil things Arthas did was killing the friendly mercenaries and burning the ships of his men in Northrend.

I would argue at least some amount of culpability there lies with Uther and Jaina. It doesn't help that his mentor and girlfriend abandoned him when he needed them the most, especially since he was in the right about Stratholme. I'm sure that fucked with his moral compass just a bit.

[Lorgar Aurelian]

There was every chance. Anyone alive is shoved into a 1 person room and locked. If they turn smash head in, if not get them out.

You’d need an insane amount of men space and not to have zombies raging through the streets for this to be even some what feasible it wouldn’t have been in even slightly possible at stratholm.

[Thage]

Nice microwaved take, OP.

[EntertainmentNihilist]

Anduin is being directly mind-controlled. Arthas burned a city, killed allied mercenaries, doomed his soldiers to die, and this is before touching Frostmourne. Afterwards, he was never controlled, only lead. His emoted were sapped but he still had free will. He chose to kill his father and destroy his kingdom.

He burned a city to save a kingdom. Justified. It's just the trolley problem.

The mercs and ships are more debatable, but in my opinion (this is admittedly open to interpretation) Arthas believed Mal'Ganis was the "dark lord" behind everything that was happening.

So he was willing to do whatever was necessary to kill him and save his kingdom, even if that meant betraying his father, the mercs, his expedition, his own life, and his own soul. I think that is at least partially justifiable.

This is of course, something people debate. But to me, I believe firmly that morality is not a set of rules governing which actions are "wrong" and which are "right". Morality is about intent and consequences. If someone does something "for the right reasons" and the result of that action is better than the alternative, that action can't possibly be wrong. Even if that action is something "rules morals" would say is bad, like killing or genocide.

TL;DR Actions are just the mechanism by which someone's will / intent because consequences. If the intent is good and the result is good, the action can't be bad. I don't care what your rules say.

[Ardenaso]

once again, if Arthas assessed the situation properly to Uther and Jaina, things would have been much better

keep in mind that Uther and Jaina never saw anyone turn into a zombie

[Thage]

YES, he is his superior in Silver Hand, whoever Arthas outrank him as Prince of lordaeron, that's why Arthas had the authority to suspend the order, Uther/Jaina should have just wait and see the situation not run like cowards

Arthas did not have authority to strip Uther of his rank or suspend the Order of the Silver Hand. He was not the coronated king. He also had no authority over Jaina, who comes from an allied nation and was sent on official business from another allied nation--at best she's a diplomatic attachment to Lordaeron, and even that's a stretch because she wasn't there to deal with King Terenas, only to investigate and report her findings on the Plague. That she got swept up in things is tangential.

How do I know Arthas lacked authority to do what he tried? Because Uther still held his rank and Terenas heeded his advice, leading to the Northrend expedition being recalled. Even after the fall of Lordaeron, the Silver Hand remained active and officially-recognized, although the Lordaeron chapter eventually rechristened itself the Scarlet Crusade (and later, those who still held true to the Silver Hand's ideology broke away from the Scarlets to form the Argent Dawn and its affiliate, the Brotherhood of the Light).

Also, Uther and Jaina had no reason to follow Arthas into what they saw as a mass slaughter of innocent civilians. All they know is Arthas stood on a hill, mumbled to himself, and then ordered them to join him in wiping out an entire city. That Arthas was right in the aftermath is post-facto justification, which has no bearing on their immediate reactions to his order nor to his refusal to actually fucking explain what's going on, instead of throwing a temper tantrum and trying to pull rank on someone who answered to his father, not him.

[Pebrocks The Warlock]

and the result is good

And tell me, what was the result? How did his people benefit?

[Narwhalosh Whalescream]

Arthas didn't go far enough. Anduin will make Arthas look like a prankster.

[Magical Mudcrab]

Arthas did not have authority to strip Uther of his rank or suspend the Order of the Silver Hand. He was not the coronated king.

We don't actually know 100% whether Arthas had the ability to do either of those things in current lore, but the original Warcraft Ultimate Visual Guide explicitly stated that Arthas did disband the order; however, subsequent books, such as the expanded version of the Visual Guide and Chronicle, have only stated he sent them away and considered their actions treason, so it may be considered a soft retcon, though not 100% confirmed to have been so.

How do I know Arthas lacked authority to do what he tried? Because Uther still held his rank and Terenas heeded his advice, leading to the Northrend expedition being recalled. Even after the fall of Lordaeron, the Silver Hand remained active and officially-recognized, although the Lordaeron chapter eventually rechristened itself the Scarlet Crusade (and later, those who still held true to the Silver Hand's ideology broke away from the Scarlets to form the Argent Dawn and its affiliate, the Brotherhood of the Light).

This isn't the concrete evidence that you think it is. Terenas was the king, and had the supreme authority in Lordaeron. It would be trivial for him to reverse a degree made in the field by Arthas, especially given it was an order only heard by the Knights of the Silver Hand and Jaina. That Uther later held rank doesn't actually have bearing on whether Arthas' actions had weight.

[Tarba]

Iam not talking about that and you are missing a few points here.

I am saying that until now in the debate for "was Arthas evil", the answer was a resounding yes. Because on the info we HAD he did everything wrong. There was no concrete evidence if the sword or the helm or both controlled him.

Now however we have something. We can see anduin is under control, because he breaks out of it for a split second to realize what he's done.

Thus we now have some evidence that Arthas MIGHT be under control too. That maybe he wasn't totally to blame for his actions. HOWEVER there are two problems with that if they go that route.

Foremost. Yes he did go out of his way to raise Sylvanas. This is not speculation. We have proof of this from when Sylvanas asks for a clean death and instead he says that no such merch awaits her and he brings her back as a banshee. This was not motivated by strategy, it was motivated by spite. We have concrete proof of this.

If they do go the route of mind control then that part will be affected.

No. Arthas was not evil. He did what was necessary. Killing is evil, but a soldier is not necessary evil. What he did in Stratholme was the only thing he could do. Uther chose to run away to get back his titles. He could have helped the citizen of Stratholme, or tried something. But no... Mr top good of the light and rainbow Uther had better things to do. He was the evil one there or atleast a fucking coward.
Later when Arthas was leading a campain in Northrend to stop the menace on his lands, thanks to Uther basically lying to the other retard who allready did not listen the warnings of the KirinTor about the fucking plague in northlands, he got his war effort saped. A fucking random guy came up, told his men "it's finished" and get out. They could have sent reinforcement to help the prince stop the undead menace. No they chose once again to condemn his land. So he burned their ships so they had no other choice to push forward. And kill a bunch of trolls and ogers, like we killed a shit tone before that "just because".

And once again no. Raising Sylvanas was not out of the way. Why the fuck should he give her a clean death, while his war machine is literraly about killing people and raising them as undead? What tue fuck would it have mean? "Okay you lead the main forces against me, I killed and raise to serve me many of your people, but you I will spare you and just kill you because you asked me nicely?"
She was a strong and valuable asset to his army. Not doing it would have made no sense.

[Kumorii]

From watching Nobble he allowed himself to be influenced. His battle with Ner'zhul inside the helm shows that he himself killed his own innocent part to succumb to the power. Arthas is responsible.

To me that he actually is responsible is what made him interesting as a villain. He was a bad guy from the start, just managed to hide it within the rules of the society he was born into.

[huth]

But to me, I believe firmly that morality is not a set of rules governing which actions are "wrong" and which are "right".

That's pretty much exactly what morals are. A set of rules determined by common consensus on what actions are considered right or wrong and under what circumstances these may have a different appelation. You're mistaken that a set of rules wouldn't consider intent and consequences. Even formal courts and laws can do that.

[baskev]

After seeing the latest patch cinematic, is Anduin responsible of what he did in it? if no, then the same goes for Arthas as he was under the Jailer influence all along.

Yes and no. Depends, if he was under it when he burned the town, or only after sword or armor ( becoming full lich king). But it does question how much after getting frostmourne etc he was still in control.

Hell even keeping the soulds on azeroth must not have been the jailors plan. maybe it was him fighting back?

[huth]

maybe it was him fighting back?

Explicitly so. None of the 3 Lich Kings did what the Jailer wanted them to. Probably the reason he went for a more direct approach with Anduin.

[baskev]

Explicitly so. None of the 3 Lich Kings did what the Jailer wanted them to. Probably the reason he went for a more direct approach with Anduin.

Yup, hope we will see how this all goes.