The real moment where Sylvanas became a "Villain," obligated to 'lose."

[Omedon]

Sylvanas has, over the course of BFA's arc which began with "before the storm," been pointedly, singularly and specifically characterized as the incarnation of current factional hostilities. Genn's hate has been dulled from "all forsaken" to Sylvanas, Anduin's mission statement has gone to a singular note of Sylvanas being the problem, and on the horde side of things, it's all for or against Sylvanas. You can of course RP your character however you want, but the narrative we're being given to work within as far as canon goes is that, yes, Sylvanas alone is ultimately the "problem" perpetuating the faction war.

... And she absolutely must fail in the end, and here's why:

The moment Sylvanas' narrative changed from "what are we but slaves to this torment" to a straight up war on hope, not even just life, but hope, she was doomed.

Warcraft is not a world that allows bleak notes or beats in the story to go unanswered, because despite comparisons being made to its current arc, WoW is not game of thrones or that kind of fantasy. WoW has a rating and an established tone that does allow for some dark moments, but they almost always meet their necessary resolution to stay in its genre's lane as heroic fantasy.

-The Culling of Stratholme: Potentially an objectively evil act, (whether that be in forcing it or enacting it) Dark as all heck, complex and compelling... but also lead to the creation of WoW's archetypical darth vader figure that, yes, was necessarily, ultimately defeated in satisfying fashion. His battlecry was "all life must end," he was the villain, he existed to be defeated and he was. A delayed peak in regards to the valley of darkness that made him, but a necessary, inevitable one.

-The bombing of Theramore: An objectively evil act Perpetrated by a villain who was announced as the final villainous raid boss of MoP, ultimately meeting a villain's end. A dark moment, a necessary, inevitable ending, again compelled by the lane Warcraft must stay in. Again, a peak in the story mandated by the valley that was the bombing itself.

-The Burning of Teldrassil: An objectively evil act, and even though the pressure to not repeat past themes creates many parallels that people will gripe about until its follow-up peak, it is a valley that demands a peak. Unlike Garrosh, Sylvanas has similarities with Arthas in posessing an ephemeral, elemental quality that makes her absolutely evil, only where Arthas declared that all life must end (which, yes, Sylvanas has also mirrored), Sylvanas goes the extra step to extend her warcry to oppose hope.

WoW is not, just not, going to put us in a position where the person crying out against hope in her villainous banter is "right." I don't care if half the playerbase pump their fists for her war cry, her archery, her figure or her awesome voice acting, Sylvanas as an enemy of hope is a capital-V villain and we, as players will be cast against her one way or the other. They are not going to reward loyalty to she who declares war on hope, they are not going to cast your character in canon to go along with that. Again, you can RP however you like, I myself play my characters as vacationing gods from my homebrew D&D world, and while I generally keep that to myself, that's just as canonically wrong as "I'm still With Sylvanas" will turn out to be by the end of this arc. Maaaaybe she'll get Illidan'ed, maybe she'll have some form of twist, but this game, with this rating, in this genre is obligated to have an "Endgame" to follow its "Infinity war." That's the genre we're playing, that's the game we're in.

The moral of the story of this arc is not going to be "go ahead and kill yourself, hope is a lie." That is an obligation that goes above and beyond artistic licence. That's archetypically mandated.

Why make this thread? Honestly, I'm beside msyelf that it seems there are still people thinking that their dollars as players mandate Blizzad to vindicate Sylvanas and, more to the point, maintain a non-optional faction divide. I guess I just really want people to be ready for how this MUST end, to save some heartbreak. Spoiler altert: If you are the type to ragequit the game because I and others like me end up having the option to tank as a bloodelf paladin for human and nightelf playing friends... WoW will make up the difference by eliminating the toxicity of that unreasonable demand that we not have that option. Toxicity costs money. Sylvanas is arguably now an analog for everything wrong and toxic with the playerbase as a result of the faction war. She therefore must be defeated. Maybe that means capital-D death, maybe that means putting on the Lich King's crown and becoming an actual PVEvil entity, maybe that means exile to the shadowlands and becoming the face of the spirit healer forevermore, but it will mean a defeat of some kind, because the battle for Azeroth is likely in part a battle against toxicity: Point out the problems with having us all hate each other, personify those problems, then defeat those personifications.

The villain on the box for BFA is the faction divide. The villain on the box is always defeated. (Except in MoP where there was no villain synonymous with the expansion, but the expansion announcement was immediately followed by "Garrosh is the final boss.")

[Yarathir]

Wonder how long it'll take before the first "But muh Purge of Dalaran" or "But muh Stormheim" post.

[I am disappoint]

Yeah she's gonna die, it was obvious from the beginning. She's evil, always was.

[A Chozo]

Still think it would be cooler if they ressurected her.

What is she witout her curse? Barely a High Elf anymore (culturally speaking), Sylvanas' purpose has been tied to her avoidance of death and the stability of her people. With her undeath lifted, she would lose purpose.

[owbu]

If this story was only written by the writers team, I would be 100% sure that everything you said is correct. Blizzard doesnt really write any unusual stories and wouldnt really plan something risky like "oh yeah...our fantasy game is actually about your hero being the enemy of hope!" So "Sylvanas turns evil and we fight her!" was probably the original plan.

What makes me think that they just might do something narrativly suicidal like "oh..Sylvanas was grey all along!" is that we live in times where the marketing people and twitter shitstorms probably have more influence over what the writers get to write than stuff like consistent plot or narrative arcs or other stuff that goes beyond "woah! that szene was badass!11!".

[Shakana]

I think she can be defeated until something hits her and she changes her narrative. I keep telling people that maybe she is under some Old God's influence but she won't stop being until this Old God stops influencing her or she is cleansed in some way of her banshee-twisted-old god influence way.

Maybe we will fight her, maybe not. Maybe we will fight her but not kill her as it might there be something that can happen and change forsaken's way. Instead of people thinking that the Lightbound forsaken will join Alliance cause they are good, maybe the forsaken will choose a different path and you will have more forsaken like Calia Menethil and not forsaken being all touched by the light but not making a 3rd faction for the forsaken, because they have been part of the horde but they always had their ways and wanted all kind of live purged and the horde's honor day by day, and after what she did with Teldrassil, the horde starts having another meaning.

[GreenJesus]

Yeh Blizzard went the lazy route and just made a controversial figure that was actually grey in cataclysm into black with "war on hope". They chose to turn her from an anti-hero (depending on your view) to a straight up villain in this expansion because the writers are lazy and want to have a story that is "good vs. evil". The writers refuse to give the Horde a satisfying reason for wanting to fight against the alliance and they continually white wash the alliance characters to make the alliance feel like the perfect lawful good knights they are. It is really frustrating how inept the writers are at making a faction story that feels satisfying and makes both sides feel like what they are fighting for worth it. Cataclysm with garrosh did a good job. The Horde was starving and it was the alliance's fault. The alliance raided their lands and cut off trade with them. Garrosh said enough of this bullshit and took what they needed. That is a "grey" that people will fight for. "War on hope" is just cringe.

[Shakana]

Ok so after reading this i just had a huge blast and i commented in one of my threads this:

I just had a huge blast. Reading a thread about Sylvanas made me realize that Calia might do something about Sylvanas and she has seen that the undead can be benevolent and she is one and she might know what brings them another point of view to life and not just death and evil. I think Calia Menethil will be known as something else, not even kidding, i think she will rise this expansion and maybe even lead the forsaken to another path. Since all of them were humans, as Calia was and i think if i remember the lore, that probably she was killed by Sylvanas. Calia is the last of the Menethil family and Sylvanas was touched by Arthas too she is what she is because of Arthas, maybe Calia will know what to do and will probably have something to do with showing Sylvanas what she did to her is the same as Arthas did to Sylvanas. Who knows, i think the forsaken will follow Calia Menethil after Sylvanas is out of the picture, either we kill her or not.

- - - Updated - - -

Oh and Sylvanas always wanted to get revenge on Arthas for what he did to her, and she ended up doing the same with Calia and others. How a monster she has become with revenge and after her revenge...

[Justpassing]

"But they said Sylvanas won't be die / be a raidboss!!"

Yeah they also told us that burning of Teldrassil would be of causes shocking.

[MechaCThun]

You make some valid points, from a narrative-that-has-good/good guys-versus-evil/evil guys-trope stand point.

[dope_danny]

and still watch her get Kerrigan'ed.

[LDancer]

My money is on Azshara having at some point captured the banshee queen and this war is because she is playing the part. Surely simple for someone of Azshara’s power. There is nothing that makes more sense as to explain why the banshee has swapped characters so rapidly. We know that everything during BFA and the associated work we did with the Heart of Azeroth was Nzoth and Azshara puppeteering.

So is it a stretch to assume this war is of her making too?

The last we saw of Ashvane was she was sailing off rescued by Sylvannis to become the penultimate boss of the next raid? Massive hint that my guess could be on the money.

[Soon-TM]

Basically OP has explained why BfA is merely a MoP rehash at this point, with or without Sylvie as a raid boss. We were sold a Morally Grey (TM) story, and instead we got Stupid Good Boiking and the (literal) Army of the Light on one side, and Stupid Evil Witch on the other, with that cringey af "war on hope" to top the cake.

Bonus cringeyness if writers end up Kerrigan-izing Sylvie, as it might well be the case.