The Odd One Out -- The Forsaken

As you can probably guess by the title, Neve has left the security blanket of the Ghostlands and has struck out on her own. And in the case of "closer is better", that means Hillsbrad and Tarren Mill.

Along the way, she dropped in to say hello to ex-Queldorei and current leader of the Forsaken, Sylvanas Windrunner. She'd found the locket that belonged to Sylvanas, you see, and the Forsaken leader in the Ghostlands saw an opportunity to butter up Sylvanas as well as introduce the Banshee Queen to the Sindorei Mage who'd been doing a lot of the heavy lifting in the Ghostlands. Because all politics is local, I suppose.

And this exchange is why I felt that Blizz
missed a huge opportunity at the end of Wrath
to take Sylvanas in a different direction.

Poor Ambassador Sunsorrow is left to pick up the pieces from an --in retrospect-- "bad idea".

Still, compared to their Queen, let's say that the Forsaken don't exactly radiate goodness and light.

I used to think that the Forsaken had kind of a bad rap, with the behavior of the Apothecaries taking up most of the 'evil' in the room. Well, I finally got a chance to view Tarren Mill again these many years later, and while the Apothecaries are the worst of the bunch the Forsaken in general are firmly planted in the Evil end of the Good-Evil spectrum. 

Which makes me wonder anew: who the hell thought that throwing the Forsaken in with the rest of the Horde was a good idea? 

Being largely misunderstood is one thing, and there's the occasional quest that stands out in that regard, but my distaste of the Forsaken isn't off the mark at all. The rest of the Horde --in varying ways-- espouse Honor first and foremost. But to the Forsaken, Honor is a weakness to be exploited. Well, everything another race loves is a weakness to be exploited. 

I mean, there's a reason why the iconic Horde Rogue is that of a Forsaken, and it's not a happy-go-lucky character ready to bust a few heads, drink some ale, and charm/bed people along the way.

Errol Flynn and Merry Men they ain't.*
From basementrejects.com.

The Forsaken delight in gloom and doom, killing the living and dancing on their graves. 

So why are Thrall, Cairne, and Vol'jin hanging out with these people?

I could make a better argument for splitting Humans into two separate groups, one for the Horde side (Jaina and Theramore), and one for the Alliance side (Stormwind), than just sticking a "non-human" race predisposed to kill everything alive on the Horde side. And if you want to even out the factions, just make gnomes a neutral party. As far as TBC goes, having the Sindorei join the faction the survivors of Lordaeron (Jaina's faction) were part of, in the Horde, makes more sense. To the Sindorei, Stormwind was "waaay down there", not part of the humans that originally formed an alliance with the Queldorei. In MMO terms, it's just like SWTOR's original factions: Humans, Zabraks, and Twileks could be part of either Republic or Sith Empire.

***

But nevertheless, the Forsaken are here, and I have to deal with them. So I'll hold my nose and survive throughout Hillsbrad, and then at earliest opportunity I'll leave the Forsaken and their Victor Von Frankenstein complexes behind.

Whatever.

*When I was a kid, cable television didn't exist for most of the country. So when I was sick, I was plopped out on the couch in the living room --away from my brother who got the bedroom to himself-- and watched local television. And for some reason, the Errol Flynn version of The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938) was always on. It's my generation's Princess Bride or A Christmas Story. So when I visit the Ohio Renaissance Festival, I'm always struck by the people who also loved that movie and cosplay as Merry Men or others of the Plantagenet era of England.