How much has Shadowlands fundamently changed Arthas's story?

[Dellis0991]

It was like adding bread to a bread sandwich.

[Al Gorefiend]

This doesn't really change anything about Arthas or his story. He wasn't depowered or anything either.

[Aresk]

its has fundamentally changed how much agency he had during the course of his downfall.

But we've seen that Bolvar retained his agency, and Zovaal lumped Arthas and Ner'zhul in with Bolvar about agents that refused to serve appropriately. Likewise, we see Sylvanas still has agency, unless Zovaal mentally ordered her to shoot an arrow at him for some reason. I would still hold Arthas solely responsible for everything he committed as a paladin, as a death knight, and as a lich king given what we know currently. While they could come out and say Arthas had no control over himself, I don't feel we're there yet.

[Soon-TM]

We have to consider whether he's responsible for most of what he did. Can a person's soul be held responsible for things their body does while their soul is trapped inside a sword unable to have a say in things? If not then just looking at Arthas' history the worst thing he did would be the Culling. Would that be enough to earn Revendreth?

Well, if Sylvanas is effectively off the hook (we can safely assume that she won't be sent to Vampireland, much less to the Maw) so should Arthas, and vice-versa. After all, Mal'ganis states clearly in WC3 that the first soul to be claimed by Frostmourne was Arthas'... Unless Malgy boi is soft retconned into being wrong/a liar.

[deenman]

Where was Nerzul a cosmic threat ?

And Arthas was such a threat that alliance and horde had time to fight an old god, help in the nexus war , fight each other , have a tournament , help the locals with unreleated problems and than dropped by the lichking and stomped him without any mayor help. No titan relict, no dragons no wildgods, just mortals walking in and killing him.

And later we get to know that deathwing was about to wake up, which basically would have ended arthas world invasion in a heartbeat.

Arthas was a human level threat and nothing more, the moment any mayor lore character would have cared about him he would have been removed from the story.

well putricide did say he perfected a plague that would kill all life on azeroth,so...if we didnt stop em deathwing may have woken up to a barren wasteland lol,also considering our characters are this major cosmic savior,by killing us....arthas would have been very literaly a cosmic threat

[cparle87]

Well, if Sylvanas is effectively off the hook (we can safely assume that she won't be sent to Vampireland, much less to the Maw) so should Arthas, and vice-versa. After all, Mal'ganis states clearly in WC3 that the first soul to be claimed by Frostmourne was Arthas'... Unless Malgy boi is soft retconned into being wrong/a liar.

Yeah, that's the point I'm making. It wasn't Arthas himself doing all the terrible things he did post-retcon so how should his soul be on the hook for it? It looks like him, talks like him, has all his knowledge, but it's not him. It's like the whole Angel/Angelus thing from Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

Sylvanas is a different kind of beast. From what we saw with Uther having that little piece of your soul returned causes something of a multiple personality break until the difference are reconciled. We have a part of Sylvanas' mind whose last memory is being killed by Arthas back during WC3 trying to reconcile with the part of her mind that has been the Sylvanas we have known all this time. Closest thing I can think of is if the Bronze Dragons brought WC3-era Sylvanas to the present and magically showed her all the shit modern Sylvanas has done, then made them become one.

[Ardenaso]

Arthas always was a minor player in the whole sceme of wow. He was always human level threat while in wc3 we already saw cosmic level threats

I'd reckon Arthas was only "local" level threat like Daelin Proudmoore

[Raven]

Changed wouldnt say it changed anything, more like it has added.

[ArenaDk]

well putricide did say he perfected a plague that would kill all life on azeroth,so...if we didnt stop em deathwing may have woken up to a barren wasteland lol,also considering our characters are this major cosmic savior,by killing us....arthas would have been very literaly a cosmic threat

Now the problem comes, is it healable , how does he spread it, how much can he produce, did he really test it on all life or is it again only talking mortal life and so on.

And are our characters from woltk the same as the ones from Legion ? I would say no, because at that point we neither had blessings from various higher beings, no weapons no azerit, nothing.

There is a reason why even though the deathlords weapon was stronger than frostmourne ( source offcial blizzard artefact introduction) , he needed still many many other people and help to even fight the legion

[Mehrunes]

Arthas personally? Not really. The Lich King and the Scourge at large though, very much yes.

[McNeil]

Not much yet. Only that some 5-man dungeon boss grapped his ass around the time that he was speaking with Terenas. As the Lich King all of his deeds are only getting cheapened by Handsome Squidward which is better left forgotten. He's going to play some part in the Anduin encounter and I don't expect much out of it.

[shadowmatrix]

I'd reckon Arthas was only "local" level threat like Daelin Proudmoore

Bigger then local but far below an invasion by the Burning Legion. It took 3 armies, many wisp bombs, and a world tree nuke to stop Archimonde's group while two armies that didn't get along kept the Lich King penned in.

[Houle]

Funny enough, both Arthas and Ner'zhul remain *mostly* unchanged.
They both said "cya noob" to bald boy jailer, they both did their own thing and had their own goals.

What IS fucked beyond repair, however, is basically the entire rest of the Scourge/Legion story in WC3. Especially Kel'thuzad and all of the dreadlords. As it turns out, both KT and the dreadlords served the Jailer all along, yet backstabbed and fcked each other over throughout the entirety of WC3. Half of the campaign is now "Jailer Minion A" fighting "Jailer Minion B" for no reason at all, even tho they have the same fckn goal.

Arthas and Ner'zhul got fucked over far earlier than SL, with the "Arthas: Rise of the Lich King" book. Thats where both their characters got seriously damaged for the first time.

Edit: damn it, @Super Dickmann pretty much beat me to it

[Nerovar]

It only really sullies Arthas' story by association with this garbage expansion. But we have yet to see what they got in store for him.

[Super Dickmann]

Funny enough, both Arthas and Ner'zhul remain *mostly* unchanged.
They both said "cya noob" to bald boy jailer, they both did their own thing and had their own goals.

What IS fucked beyond repair, however, is basically the entire rest of the Scourge/Legion story in WC3. Especially Kel'thuzad and all of the dreadlords. As it turns out, both KT and the dreadlords served the Jailer all along, yet backstabbed and fcked each other over throughout the entirety of WC3. Half of the campaign is now "Jailer Minion A" fighting "Jailer Minion B" for no reason at all, even tho they have the same fckn goal.

The KT retcon, done in the span of a single journal entry and two lines of dialogue, is still one of the most baffling and dumb retcons I've seen from the game in how contradictory and pointless it is and how many plot holes it opens if you think about it for more than five minutes. What makes it stand out is that it also adds absolutely nothing. With other retcons, both in SL and outside, like the dreadlords or the draenei you can at least follow the logic involved as to what it was meant to add but the KT business is completely pointless, even more so since the Lich Kings got away from this scott free. What difference does it make, Steve, that in this new and dumb setup, KT has been working for the Bald Man all along? What did you mean by it? It changes nothing about us fighting him, since all that matters for us to want to kill him at this time is that he's working for the Bald Man at present, it only causes chasms in TFT.

Don't change KT and the WC3 Scourge campaigns still hold together effectively the same way, notwithstanding that the hat also had an extra feature and that the dreadlords trying to hijack the Scourge in TFT and verbally blowing off the Legion now have an extra beat involved. The dreadlords, Sylvanas and Ner'zhul still have contradictory motives so long as KT works for Ner'zhul and is loyal to Arthas. Change KT and the story abruptly ceases to make any sense, since it's KT who tips off Arthas to the LK and the Scourge being enemies. It's based on his advice (and presumably Ner'zhul's) that Arthas arranges for Tichondrius's death. It not only wrecks KT on a character level by ruining his great dynamic with Arthas, it also liquidates the structure of the plot, all for no gain to speak of.

Not to mention what putting him one room away from Sylvanas does to both of their stories and goes completely unaddressed. It's uncanny how much damage you can do with so little effort, amounting to a paragraph of text and model placement in a raid. Or the wasted potential. You have Arthas (in a sword), Mograine and Sylvanas all in the raid with him, you also have Alexandros and Kael outside it and the non-story you choose to tell is that KT gives some bland expository dialogue eviscerating his own story and then keels over in an admittedly okay boss fight to no reaction from any of the above. Instead of KT it could have been a random Maw Man and it would only exponentially improve both his story and that of everyone around him.

[Diatribe]

The way it should've gone for Arthas, was the discovery that he wasn't as free an agent as we thought he was and was more of a puppet than anything. As a result, it should've been one of those outcomes wherein he was born again in the mortal world where he wasn't Arthas, but a clean slate and given a chance to show whether or not he truly deserved to be in the Maw or not.

[Hctaz]

I don't think this changes anything about Arthas. Other then the fact he got screwed out of a chance at redemption in the afterlife by going to Revendreth.

It's not clear that he was targeting by the Jailer. It's not clear at all that the Dreadlords were acting in the Jailer's best interest when they created the helm or pushed Arthas. They worked for the Legion, and did the Legion's bidding. If that happened to benefit the Jailer that was great if not that was too bad because they had to do what the Legion told them to do. Arthas for better or worse still made all the same choices himself.

I think you're going to have to rethink your statements here a bit.

The Jailer does specifically mention the Lich King as being a failed pawn in his schemes. He might be referring specifically to Nerzhul, but Arthas was a part of Nerzhul's plan.

The Dreadlords not working for the Jailer I also don't think is correct. They did their work in the name of the Burning Legion, but the Burning Legion is who created the Lich King. The Lich King is for sure the Jailer's pawn as he himself stated this. They also used a fragment of Argus' soul to kill the Arbiter as part of the Jailer's plan as well, so it seems like the Burning Legion was actually another pawn for the Jailer as well. The Dreadlords are canonically the ones who twisted Sargeras' mind and made him become the leader of the Burning Legion, they're the ones who made the Lich King's armor and sword, they're the ones who came from the Shadowlands.

And this is the problem with a retcon of this magnitude. There are too many things that just don't make sense, and they kinda invalidate the struggles we've gone through in the past. The Lich King? Jailer pawn. Sargeras and the Burning Legion? Jailer pawn. The entire "big bads" of the Warcraft story have been retconned into being nothing more than a step in the Jailer's plans.
It also makes literally zero sense. You're telling me that he planned for Sargeras to corrupt the world soul using Fel Magic turning Argus into some sort of angry death titan so he could use a fragment of his tortured soul to kill the Arbiter? That sounds so fucking stupid.
They tied everything back to the Jailer in this expansion.
The Eredar's home world being targeted by the Legion wasn't because it was a powerful world soul capable of preventing the deaths of the demons, it was actually a part of the Jailer's plan. The first part was just an excuse to get Sargeras to do exactly what the Jailer wanted the whole time. The Eredar coming to Draenor in the first place was a part of the Jailer's plan. Opening the Dark Portal was all a part of his plan. Warcraft 1 and 2 were part of his plan. Creating a Lich King was part of his plan. Warcraft 3 was part of his plan. These events don't seem stupid in their original context, but framing them the way that they are now framed makes them sound stupid.

And I say all of this because, without these exact events happening, we wouldn't be where we are today. I'm not just trying to frame it poorly for the sake of the argument, he literally says that all of this shit was all part of his plan. That's where the 5D chess memes come into play. It was all a part of his plan the entire time.

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The way it should've gone for Arthas, was the discovery that he wasn't as free an agent as we thought he was and was more of a puppet than anything. As a result, it should've been one of those outcomes wherein he was born again in the mortal world where he wasn't Arthas, but a clean slate and given a chance to show whether or not he truly deserved to be in the Maw or not.

Or just don't shit all over the previously established and well written story just because you've got ass all for an idea of where to go next in the game.

[Diatribe]

I think you're going to have to rethink your statements here a bit.

The Jailer does specifically mention the Lich King as being a failed pawn in his schemes. He might be referring specifically to Nerzhul, but Arthas was a part of Nerzhul's plan.

The Dreadlords not working for the Jailer I also don't think is correct. They did their work in the name of the Burning Legion, but the Burning Legion is who created the Lich King. The Lich King is for sure the Jailer's pawn as he himself stated this. They also used a fragment of Argus' soul to kill the Arbiter as part of the Jailer's plan as well, so it seems like the Burning Legion was actually another pawn for the Jailer as well. The Dreadlords are canonically the ones who twisted Sargeras' mind and made him become the leader of the Burning Legion, they're the ones who made the Lich King's armor and sword, they're the ones who came from the Shadowlands.

And this is the problem with a retcon of this magnitude. There are too many things that just don't make sense, and they kinda invalidate the struggles we've gone through in the past. The Lich King? Jailer pawn. Sargeras and the Burning Legion? Jailer pawn. The entire "big bads" of the Warcraft story have been retconned into being nothing more than a step in the Jailer's plans.
It also makes literally zero sense. You're telling me that he planned for Sargeras to corrupt the world soul using Fel Magic turning Argus into some sort of angry death titan so he could use a fragment of his tortured soul to kill the Arbiter? That sounds so fucking stupid.
They tied everything back to the Jailer in this expansion.
The Eredar's home world being targeted by the Legion wasn't because it was a powerful world soul capable of preventing the deaths of the demons, it was actually a part of the Jailer's plan. The first part was just an excuse to get Sargeras to do exactly what the Jailer wanted the whole time. The Eredar coming to Draenor in the first place was a part of the Jailer's plan. Opening the Dark Portal was all a part of his plan. Warcraft 1 and 2 were part of his plan. Creating a Lich King was part of his plan. Warcraft 3 was part of his plan. These events don't seem stupid in their original context, but framing them the way that they are now framed makes them sound stupid.

And I say all of this because, without these exact events happening, we wouldn't be where we are today. I'm not just trying to frame it poorly for the sake of the argument, he literally says that all of this shit was all part of his plan. That's where the 5D chess memes come into play. It was all a part of his plan the entire time.

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Or just don't shit all over the previously established and well written story just because you've got ass all for an idea of where to go next in the game.

well, we'll never know what Blizzard's true story was going to be (in regards to how I'm sure they had it planned out originally over a 9.1, 9.2 and 9.3 patch cycle to tell it) and what we got was a chopped up, cut, blended and frankensteined creation now.

[Zodiark]

At this point if they made an expansion where they basically said everything that happened from Vanilla onward was a dream, and we all woke up to cries and screams to look outside and see the Lich Kings army washing over the land once more, I would be a happy camper.

REVENGE OF THE LICH KING!

[Claymore]

It’s honestly kind of astounding how bad the storytelling these past two expansions have been. Shame, I thought Shadowlands really showed promise early on — the Night Fae in particular I think should’ve been more managing, deadly and perhaps even sexy — but it’s just devolved into “the Jailer’s fucking plans” and still zero known motivations, and they couldn’t even be bothered to incorporate any of the genuinely interesting plot threads, like Ner’zhul as a character, and seemingly not even Arthas.