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  1. #1

    Moments where the bad guys should have won

    I have always found the moments in the story of World of Warcraft and its expansions where the antagonists are the ones to strike a victory on the Alliance and/or the Horde and the adventurers to be far too rare.

    In the great majority of the situations where there is a a theat or start of a threat the adventurers just have to pop up to beat the villains whenever they are Burning Legion, Scourge, Old Gods and their forces, villainous versions of the Horde, hostile races or local criminals.

    What are the instances where the adventurers should have been beaten, and the factions suffered a true defeat or failure in the story, over all of WOW and faced true consequences and casualties because of it ?

  2. #2
    The Lightbringer Highlord Hanibuhl's Avatar
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    - The confrontation with the Lich King (We were beaten... only by a strange twist of fate, we were resurrected and won)
    - Archimonde's defeat at Dreanor (It took a lot more to defeat him at Hyjal, so it's a bit strange we defeated him with a bit more ease. He could've wiped us out)
    - Kil'Jaiden's defeat (We mopped the floor with the Legion, only to find out that Sargeras were closeby all along... it could've ended badly!)
    - Argus' defeat (Argus could've and would've murdered us if it weren't for the deus ex machina)
    - N'zoth's defeat (Supposedly, an Azerothian Kamehameha is all that was needed...)

    We've had too many run ins with death...

    I know it's a game and we're meant to win, but it'd be good to occasionally lose, in a gameplay sense. That way we can work on a story where we're the underdogs again!

  3. #3
    Hogger and Edwin so that Stormwind is back to rubbles
    Last edited by McNeil; 2022-09-01 at 07:06 AM.

  4. #4
    Well Azshara technically won. She did what she meant to do; used the Heart of Azeroth to free N'zoth.

  5. #5
    Algalon. You don't really beat him at all, and you're just lucky he had a change of heart.

  6. #6
    Quote Originally Posted by Highlord Hanibuhl View Post
    - The confrontation with the Lich King (We were beaten... only by a strange twist of fate, we were resurrected and won)
    - Archimonde's defeat at Dreanor (It took a lot more to defeat him at Hyjal, so it's a bit strange we defeated him with a bit more ease. He could've wiped us out)
    - Kil'Jaiden's defeat (We mopped the floor with the Legion, only to find out that Sargeras were closeby all along... it could've ended badly!)
    - Argus' defeat (Argus could've and would've murdered us if it weren't for the deus ex machina)
    - N'zoth's defeat (Supposedly, an Azerothian Kamehameha is all that was needed...)

    We've had too many run ins with death...

    I know it's a game and we're meant to win, but it'd be good to occasionally lose, in a gameplay sense. That way we can work on a story where we're the underdogs again!
    I agree with all of these.

    I would also have added one moment with Lei Shen the Thunder King, with him making the demonstration of his powers by single-handily destroying the Alliance-Horde forces sent against him with his lightnings.

  7. #7
    Warchief Progenitor Aquarius's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Triceron View Post
    Algalon. You don't really beat him at all, and you're just lucky he had a change of heart.
    The thing is, he is not a bad guy. By resetting the planet, he tried to save the universe from corruption. We lost enough in the Shadowlands when we continuously chased the Jailer and ended up killing his minions while he was pushing forward and continuing with his plan. Same with the Dreadlords. These guys barely lose, and they are annoying as hell.

  8. #8
    The Lightbringer Highlord Hanibuhl's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Terrorthatflapsinthenight View Post
    I agree with all of these.

    I would also have added one moment with Lei Shen the Thunder King, with him making the demonstration of his powers by single-handily destroying the Alliance-Horde forces sent against him with his lightnings.
    I also wonder if Lei Shen was just weak enough to be killed or if he held back and was killed because of his own mistake.

    Quote Originally Posted by Cloudmaker View Post
    The thing is, he is not a bad guy. By resetting the planet, he tried to save the universe from corruption. We lost enough in the Shadowlands when we continuously chased the Jailer and ended up killing his minions while he was pushing forward and continuing with his plan. Same with the Dreadlords. These guys barely lose, and they are annoying as hell.
    Yeah.. I sometimes wonder if Algalon 'gave us the win' because he saw the future a bit and knew what was gonna happen anyway.

  9. #9
    Herald of the Titans enigma77's Avatar
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    the Legion should have won

    it makes no sense that Azeroth could defend itself and it makes even less sense that we could launch a counter invasion of their homeworld

    absolutely ridiculous, but then "absolutely ridiculous" describes the story quite nicely overall

  10. #10
    Dragon Soul. The defeat of Deathwing required contrivances on top of deus ex machinas on top of the villains gargling on the idiot ball. One of the most offending examples is how Deathwing at the same time was smart enough to predict that the Aspects would try to use the Focusing Iris to break the seals placed on the Dragon Soul by Deathwing when it was created, even though it was something Kalec came up with on the spot 2 minutes before we got there via a portal. Yet at the same time he acted like a drooling retard and only sent some random Orc mook to spring an ineffective trap there. Given how the success of the Aspects hinged on the unsealing of the Dragon Soul, all he needed to do was to either grab it himself, hide it at the bottom of the sea (especially since Azshara was his ally) or launch it into the Nether through a portal of his own. And then there would have been no stopping him.
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  11. #11
    Quote Originally Posted by Mehrunes View Post
    Dragon Soul. The defeat of Deathwing required contrivances on top of deus ex machinas on top of the villains gargling on the idiot ball. One of the most offending examples is how Deathwing at the same time was smart enough to predict that the Aspects would try to use the Focusing Iris to break the seals placed on the Dragon Soul by Deathwing when it was created, even though it was something Kalec came up with on the spot 2 minutes before we got there via a portal. Yet at the same time he acted like a drooling retard and only sent some random Orc mook to spring an ineffective trap there. Given how the success of the Aspects hinged on the unsealing of the Dragon Soul, all he needed to do was to either grab it himself, hide it at the bottom of the sea (especially since Azshara was his ally) or launch it into the Nether through a portal of his own. And then there would have been no stopping him.
    If my memory is correct he also made his Dragon Soul so it couldn't be used against him, with Nekros Skullcrusher being absolutely unable of doing anything to him with it when he tried to enslave him too.

  12. #12
    Quote Originally Posted by Terrorthatflapsinthenight View Post
    I have always found the moments in the story of World of Warcraft and its expansions where the antagonists are the ones to strike a victory on the Alliance and/or the Horde and the adventurers to be far too rare.

    In the great majority of the situations where there is a a theat or start of a threat the adventurers just have to pop up to beat the villains whenever they are Burning Legion, Scourge, Old Gods and their forces, villainous versions of the Horde, hostile races or local criminals.

    What are the instances where the adventurers should have been beaten, and the factions suffered a true defeat or failure in the story, over all of WOW and faced true consequences and casualties because of it ?
    Well we hadlight-ex-machina where the lich king literally killed us.

    We warped the timeways in exceedingly unlikely ways to beat Deathwing who still almost broke the world, imo in terms of raw powerful he was The most powerful foe we had faced up until Argus at least.
    (though naturally the eldritch monstrosity known as "Murmur" still beats all of them, i love how absurdly powerful they made that creature without a second thought)

    We should not have been able to recover after our defeat at the broken shore either, though i really love the way they handled that.

    But you know that's kinda the thing: By upping their villains so much you can't let them have a real win at all, because it's like Thanos snaps but he kills 100%; no coming back from that if they have a genuine win.


    Personally i am sort of hoping they'll still do a black empire world revamp expansion, where azerite soaked C'thun and Yogg-Saron burst forth, Y'shaarj returns through either time-travel shenanigans or through "the long route" via the great dark and N'zoth's ruse is revealed and the world is rapidly subjugated with our only options lying in time travel by allying with the infinite dragonflight. Would be a nice villain vs. villain moment too.
    Could also try to become resistance fughters against the black empire and crack jokes about imperialism ofc, would fit their woke penchant.
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  13. #13
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    Quote Originally Posted by Terrorthatflapsinthenight View Post
    I have always found the moments in the story of World of Warcraft and its expansions where the antagonists are the ones to strike a victory on the Alliance and/or the Horde and the adventurers to be far too rare.

    In the great majority of the situations where there is a a theat or start of a threat the adventurers just have to pop up to beat the villains whenever they are Burning Legion, Scourge, Old Gods and their forces, villainous versions of the Horde, hostile races or local criminals.

    What are the instances where the adventurers should have been beaten, and the factions suffered a true defeat or failure in the story, over all of WOW and faced true consequences and casualties because of it ?
    Vanessa VanCleef during her revenge (Updated Deadmines). She had the heroes, she could've ended it but instead, it was written as such that the heroes got to be dangling over the furnace of molten metal to then free themselves. Such a James Bond cliché. Then to force her to work for the Uncrowned, later on, just, sour taste, she should've tried to slit our throats while we slept.
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  14. #14
    Quote Originally Posted by Highlord Hanibuhl View Post
    I also wonder if Lei Shen was just weak enough to be killed or if he held back and was killed because of his own mistake.



    Yeah.. I sometimes wonder if Algalon 'gave us the win' because he saw the future a bit and knew what was gonna happen anyway.
    He's supposed to be still weakened after having been dead for so long, and to not have regained his full strength yet.

  15. #15
    I still don't understand why the Legion, under Lord Kazzak, opened the dark portal. They Legion didn't have any position on Outland to fight against Illidan-Vashj-Kael'thas. I also don't understand how Illidan and company got painted as the bad guys for the expansion.

  16. #16
    The Broken Shore - The Alliance and the Horde were both defeated and sent packing. It was then that Heroes rallied their Class Order Halls and beat back the Legion. Once the Alliance and Horde failed they should have been disbanded then... BfA should never had happened... still salty about that.
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    No fucking way. The worst idea since democracy.

  17. #17
    Moderator Aucald's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Linkedblade View Post
    I still don't understand why the Legion, under Lord Kazzak, opened the dark portal. They Legion didn't have any position on Outland to fight against Illidan-Vashj-Kael'thas. I also don't understand how Illidan and company got painted as the bad guys for the expansion.
    Lord Kazzak was apparently charged with collecting the Glaive of the Aspects (a demonic artifact that was made from stolen draconic power) and used another unknown artifact to reopen the Dark Portal so that he and Highlord Kruul could collect the Aspect shards of the Glaive and return them to the Legion via Outland. It's a plot point in WoW that presumably went nowhere after that, but it supplied a rationale for Kazzak to reopen the Dark Portal and return to Outland, where he became Doom Lord Kazzak in charge of the Legion's operations in Outland, commanding them from the Throne of Kil'jaeden in HFP.

    As for Illidan being painted as a bad guy, he and his lieutenants did themselves no favors in that department despite Illidan's staunch opposition to the Legion. IN HFP, where we basically land on Outland, they're harassing the established Alliance and Horde fortifications with Illidan's pet Fel Orcs led by the corrupted Kargath Bladefirst from Hellfire Citadel. They're also brutalizing the Dreghood Broken of Sha'naar via Illidan's Illidari demons, as well as Kael'thas trying to corrupt the colossi of the region and send them against the Azerothian vanguard. When we enter Zangarmarsh, we find Vashj and her minions draining the area dry in an attempt to hoard Outland's dwindling supplies of potable water, presumably to make the Broken tribes in that area more tractable. In Terokkar we find Kael'thas conducting weapon tests, as well as linking up with Voren'thal who gives intel on both Kael and Illidan's brutal excesses. Long story short, the combination of Illidan being busy with his Demon Hunters and letting his lieutenants and their minions run roughshod over Outland gives the strong appearance that Illidan is a tyrant who needs to be put down before he destroys what little is left of Outland.
    "We're more of the love, blood, and rhetoric school. Well, we can do you blood and love without the rhetoric, and we can do you blood and rhetoric without the love, and we can do you all three concurrent or consecutive. But we can't give you love and rhetoric without the blood. Blood is compulsory. They're all blood, you see." ― Tom Stoppard, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead

  18. #18
    Quote Originally Posted by Linkedblade View Post
    I still don't understand why the Legion, under Lord Kazzak, opened the dark portal. They Legion didn't have any position on Outland to fight against Illidan-Vashj-Kael'thas. I also don't understand how Illidan and company got painted as the bad guys for the expansion.
    Demons overestimate themselves, sort of their thing.
    Also Kazzak wanted out if Azeroth as much as he wanted the Legion to come in.
    Plus there were several large legion camps on hellfure peninsula and there was an indeed infinite stream of demons coming towards and initially through the portal.
    Thing is that we all solved this during quests no one paid attention to and removed pre-patch content which is still a retarded concept.

    Kael'thas had switched allegiance to the Legion though did not fully antagonise Illidan, Vashj was sort of doing her own thing while supporting both illidan and Kael, and Illidan had retreated there in fear of Kil'jaeden's wrath (which is what makes their interactions in Legion painful to watch) as Kil'jaeden could easily intimidate the combined forces of Kael, Vashj and Illidan and likely overpower them.

    Basically Vashj was causing ruckus and was in league with Illidan and indirectly the Legion, Kael sort of the same but more Legion, Illidan had gone mad with fear and antagonised everyone trying to consolidate his power and resist Kil'jaeden. (hence Doomwalker permanently assaulting the Black Temple)
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    Furthermore, I consider that Carthage Slam must be destroyed.

  19. #19
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    N’Zoth and we all know why.

  20. #20
    If you consider that in Warcraft 3 we needed all armies of Azeroth to stop Archimonde.
    Meaning basicly all bosses that are considered stronger then him should have beaten us heck maybe alot more since we are like what 20-40 people lore-wise facing these bosses.

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