Baine in 10.0 and beyond

[GreenJesus]

Since Baine has been sitting on the ground in Oribos since we rescued him in like week 3 of the expansion, do you think we will have a quest where we help him stand up again, teach him how to walk again? Id imagine there's probably a lot of cow shit piled up behind him as well. Will we have to wipe his ass? Will he need surgery to fix his hemorrhoids?

Can someone sitting on the ground for 2 years lead the Horde?

[Paperfox]

There are guards in cities who have been standing in one spot for years, and they appear fine. Baine is just fine too.

[Val the Moofia Boss]

If the timeskip theory is true then I wonder what is going to happen if he returns to Thunder Bluff and finds out someone else has taken over as chieftain. Then again, Baine has been allowed to show... pretty much almost no initiative whatsoever, so I guess he'll just stand off to the side.

[Aucald]

It's actually a hidden Tauren racial ability, but if a Tauren NPC stands immobile for a certain time they enter a form of stasis and hibernation, able to shrug off the effects of entropy for an unspecified amount of time. Do you know those rock formations in Mulgore? That's actually masses of hibernating Tauren who have been there for so long that geological formations sort of took shape around them.

[Progenitor Aquarius]

Since Baine has been sitting on the ground in Oribos since we rescued him in like week 3 of the expansion, do you think we will have a quest where we help him stand up again, teach him how to walk again? Id imagine there's probably a lot of cow shit piled up behind him as well. Will we have to wipe his ass? Will he need surgery to fix his hemorrhoids?

Can someone sitting on the ground for 2 years lead the Horde?

Hahaha, this is priceless. Hey, but maybe he is tormented just let him rest for a bit. He’s just a cow. They do like relaxation and such.

[Ringthane]

If the timeskip theory is true then I wonder what is going to happen if he returns to Thunder Bluff and finds out someone else has taken over as chieftain. Then again, Baine has been allowed to show... pretty much almost no initiative whatsoever, so I guess he'll just stand off to the side.

Considering how most of the major players in this game have done so little in the past few expansions you could basically replace them with cardboard cutouts, does it really matter?

"Look - there's a new threat to Azeroth! Let's get all the leaders of the Alliance and Horde together to fight off the evil and - OW! I just stubbed my toe! Man, that hurts! I've got to sit the rest of this out to recover. Champion - you go get those guys while we all spend the next two years on our rumps with our thumbs up our noses!"

[Zuben]

I'd like him more if he Magni'd into an inanimate statue for years, tbh. Cairne as a character held some respect, but his ways as a trait of his race is not interesting. Baine is those ways without all the things that made Cairne kind of cool. It doesn't help that he's personal friends with Anduin, up to being a background character in Stormwind's throne room and halls in the cinematic, where Wrathion comes to visit. The crowning moment that cemented my hatred for him was when I, a Loyalist, was forced to kill Sunreavers alongside Jaina to spring his legitimately treasonous ass out of jail.

/rant

Let him become stuck on his ass in Oribos, timeskip the hell out of Azeroth and have a newblood Grimtotem rise to prominence, to show the tauren what it's like to be actually interesting.

[Skirdus]

Let him become stuck on his ass in Oribos, timeskip the hell out of Azeroth and have a newblood Grimtotem rise to prominence, to show the tauren what it's like to be actually interesting.

Honestly I really want to know what the hell Magatha Grimtotem is up to these days. Last we saw, she was basically on probation in the Shaman order hall

[Nraktja]

Man, it's seeing threads like this that as a Night Elf fan I also realize how much the Horde and its characters have been fucked over for a while. Cairne died offscreen, his son did fuck all and he's widely considered as the weakest racial leader, they made Vol'Jin die to a trash mob to make Sylvanas a protagonist for 3 expansions in a row, and hit the Horde with the biggest villain bat in making them complicit in genocide. We're really in need of even a shred of "acceptable" or "OK" storytelling right now that hopefully they saved some of it to this "last chapter" as they put it and are able to wrap it up okay-ish in the end. *Huffs more copium*

They're probably goint to make Tyrande forgive Sylvanas and fight alongside her aren't they... *siiiiiiiiiigh*

[Biomega]

Baine just sitting on his ass but becoming a big pain for the Horde?

What is there to fix, clearly he's doing exactly what he's been doing for the past 5 years.

[Rend Blackhand]

Baine will die of the greatest deep vein thrombosis the world has ever seen from sitting in the same position with his legs at 90 degrees for well over a year.

[Zuben]

They're probably goint to make Tyrande forgive Sylvanas and fight alongside her aren't they... *siiiiiiiiiigh*

I don't think Sylv will do any fighting, as the least Blizz should do is have her be in chains. Portable ones, of course, so that she can act as our tour guide of the Jailer's plans in Zereth Mortis.

But yeah, Tyrande won't get to behead her. Maybe a 'stay-a-while-and-listen' convo, where she taunts Sylv about how she killed Nathanos.

I'd be very surprised if in the aftermath of Zereth Mortis we'll actually get an official execution event of Sylvanas. It would be so cathartic if it happened*, but if there's one thing the current Blizzard knows how to do it's how to disappoint their customer base.

*Yeah yeah, I previously argued there'd be no point as it would just relocate Sylvanas's soul to the custody of one of the covenants. Reneging that I suppose the writing team could write it so that Sylv's affinity to the death realm would make it so her death would be ultimate, the same as what happens to the inhabitants of the Shadowlands when they die (=be removed from existence completely).

[shoc]

Jailer should have killed Baine and ashed his soul in the first act of Shadowlands, that would have made Zovaal seem slightly interesting.

[Zuben]

Why would you still be a loyalist when we now know for a fact Sylvanas didn't care for the Horde and was literally using it

I'd understand if all she did had been for the Horde why people would still be loyal - but why be loyal to someone who straight up used you for their own goals?

You misunderstood, I meant I was a Loyalist in BFA. The route I expected would actually cater to my choice rather than just be a carbon copy of the Rebel-route with a thin framework of "double-agent hue hue". Once Sylv revealed her cards in 8.2.5 it was over, the story was deemed shit and I don't really know what to do with the Horde now.

Even then, it was tone-deaf af to have any Horde go against Sunreavers alongside the one who is responsible for their darkest hour. And even though things worked out for the Revels, and by proxy the Horde, it was just because the writers made it so. The take during the war was that we had gone too far with Teldrassil and the Rebels were actively crippling their own faction in such a situation. That's why freeing Baine was so horrible to me.

[AwkwardSquirtle]

It's actually a hidden Tauren racial ability, but if a Tauren NPC stands immobile for a certain time they enter a form of stasis and hibernation, able to shrug off the effects of entropy for an unspecified amount of time. Do you know those rock formations in Mulgore? That's actually masses of hibernating Tauren who have been there for so long that geological formations sort of took shape around them.

Maybe in 15.0 he'll wake up and have us heal woonz.

[Mungho]

Let him become stuck on his ass in Oribos, timeskip the hell out of Azeroth and have a newblood Grimtotem rise to prominence, to show the tauren what it's like to be actually interesting.

I've heard speculating that in light of the reveal of Zereth Mortis that instead of a timeskip, there's going to be a reset of some sort(like making it that all the people that died in Teldrassil and etc. never died).

But regarding Baine, there were so many things they could do with him. Like, when Cairne was killed, outwardly Baine could've mourned, but inwardly he was glad that the old man finally kicked off so he could be chief. Maybe have him dabble in fel magic. He could be deceptive and engage in realpolitik, for instance instead of exiling Tauren who attacked the Alliance after Taurojo, claim those were exiles and not sanctioned by him.

[rayvio]

If the timeskip theory is true then I wonder what is going to happen if he returns to Thunder Bluff and finds out someone else has taken over as chieftain. Then again, Baine has been allowed to show... pretty much almost no initiative whatsoever, so I guess he'll just stand off to the side.

Baine returns and finds the Grimtotem are running Thunderbluff. and they're doing a better job than he did!
now there's a moral dilemma, you've got an evil but competent ruler like Magatha Grimtotem and a well intentioned screw-like like Baine wanting to take the power back... do you want to side with the bad good or the good bad?

[Zuben]

I've heard speculating that in light of the reveal of Zereth Mortis that instead of a timeskip, there's going to be a reset of some sort(like making it that all the people that died in Teldrassil and etc. never died).

But regarding Baine, there were so many things they could do with him. Like, when Cairne was killed, outwardly Baine could've mourned, but inwardly he was glad that the old man finally kicked off so he could be chief. Maybe have him dabble in fel magic. He could be deceptive and engage in realpolitik, for instance instead of exiling Tauren who attacked the Alliance after Taurojo, claim those were exiles and not sanctioned by him.

Wait, he exiled tauren for attacking Alliance in the aftermath of Taurajo's sacking?? As if I needed more reasons to hate him. What is the source?

[vilememory]

Baine dies in 9.3, when he sees Sylvanas he snaps from the PTSD of all the shit he went through in Torghast and tries to kill her. That is when the other two Windrunner sisters show up, kill him, wound Thrall, and start bitching out the Afterlife and Horde for what they did to their poor innocent sister. This leads to the next faction war in 10.0, vengeance for the Windrunner sisters against the Horde that turned Sylvanas into an undead and a half souled monster. Yes, Arthas and the Scourge were Horde when they killed Sylvanas.

[Val the Moofia Boss]

Wait, he exiled tauren for attacking Alliance in the aftermath of Taurajo's sacking?? As if I needed more reasons to hate him. What is the source?

Tides of War.

The Alliance, expanding from Northwatch Hold under false information that the tauren were planning an attack, had razed Camp Taurajo. The only residents it now had were looters. Many tauren died in the battle; others fled to Vendetta Point, where they sporadically attacked Northwatch Hold scouts, or to Camp Una’fe—the “Camp of Refuge.”

In response to the aggression, Baine did what he felt was best to keep his people safe. The road to Mulgore had once been open; now what had been dubbed the Great Gate shut out any possibility of a massive Alliance incursion. Most tauren were content with the erection of the gate and did not burn for revenge. Others were still aching from the attack. He could not condemn these people. Baine did not rule with a tight grasp; the tauren followed him willingly and with love—perhaps mostly out of respect for his father, but with openness in their hearts nonetheless. Those who disagreed with Baine’s decisions, like many Grimtotem, or the tauren who chose to strike back at the Alliance from Vendetta Point, were expelled from Thunder Bluff but otherwise suffered no repercussions.