Originally Posted by
exochaft
That's where I've been leaning every since they made a point at Blizzcon to mention not all souls are equal, the greater ones yielding more anima that is used in the Shadowlands. It's pretty clear that Malfurion would be a massive anima boon to the Maw, and having lost that a tree full of dead Nightelves may be a good second.
On that same note, that should say something concerning her ultimate motives, of which we still don't know and can only speculate. If the above turns out to be true, there is weight in the choice of killing Malfurion before resorting to burning down Teldrassil. On some level, I think the story is going to lead Sylvannas into still caring on some level about the world, and that her ultimate motivations are to save Azeroth in some capacity. To that end, her initial choice of orchestrating the killing off a few big sources of anima versus just mass killing of people of lesser anima to the same end sort of reflects upon what her actual motivations may be. Doesn't mean she can't be misguided and performing deeds that can be viewed as evil, but her character is portrayed as a lot more calculating than just being a chaotic mass murderer.