Reviews:

Guest 1: Slight Detail, Thanqual doesn't lead the Grey Seers Ironically comparing him with Ikit he's lower on the Grey Seer totem pole than Ikit is on the Skryr totem pole. But as for the Alliances yeah it'll probably be a lot more complex than the Alliance's relationship with most the playable and non-playable races in Azeroth and Outland.

Guest 2: Yeah the kingdom of Stormwind, the Gnomes and Dwarves out of everyone on Azeroth are basically hard countered by Skaven. Maybe Trolls, Tauren and IDK Blood Elves seem the next most likely could be said who gets hard countered by Skaven on the Horde side, but Night Elves are ironically THE race I'd say are best suited to counter the Skaven with everyone else more middling out vs the Skaven.

Guest 3: *Runs through the stargate finds Teal'c and brings him back from the Jaffa homeworld, then points to guest* "Indeed"

Guest 4: Likely but following Mediaval warfare logic Likely skirmish forces are engaged with most the smaller ones, or they, on paper, wont get recognized and only the significant forces will get any credit no matter how small of numbers those are compared to the lesser forces that joined in.

I'm honestly whenever I think of him because of this imagining him either capturing a ORK and putting him in a dress, or somehow kidnapping a Orc woman and trying to go all taming of the shrew using very convoluted logic to apply any successes there to all Orcs.

Guest 5: All good observations and mostly the logic I applied, though in this instance having numerous bodies between you and the gun also helps.

Guest 6: On Azeroth, unlikely the Winds only just started to seap through. On Mallus there aren't any besides some Warrior priests and Sisters of Sigmar immediately present so probably not in the immediate. But still remember, most State Troops operate off the logical assumption that they're going into a fight without one of the big healers present and so they buy cheap potions and operate thinking they'll have to patch themselves up later because typically Battle Wizards etc save themselves for larger deployments rather than the day to day patrols.

Guest 7: Some of those numbers are including Skaven Slaves or the Skaven of a full region meaning multiple warrens. but idk why fans seem to take Skaven Warrens under human cities to somehow be Skaven cities, Altdorf was the exception not the rule not the example. Most Skaven Settlements under human cities are basically outposts/towns and then the Skaven just draft 100% of the local population which ignoring Skaven malnutrition leading to inferior soldiers, humans only recruit between 1% to 10% of our population for some very clear reasons, even with the "smarter and better" humans of today if we drafted 100% of our population and armed them all with swords and placed them into army blocks we'd have 40% casualties, a woman trying to usurp the patriarchy by murdering random men and make herself queen of all and peace on earth because men are bla bla bla, some other woman sparking a rumor and laughing at her success of getting dozens of people burned at the stake, and communist revolution and a counter revolution and a third faction fighting to left TF alone by these authoriarians, all before ever seeing a enemy.

While there is is a whole Quantity over quality thing as even a child with a pistol is lethal, but higher recruitment rates at lowet quality of troops is typically terrible long term planning...but it's the Skaven their birth rates and time till adulthood almost make up for it. Where humanity we can't sustain such high numbers because after our society will inevitably collapse partially since everything we needed we didn't have anyone working on it.

Guest 8: If Chaos shows it's face before it's too late maybe. I mean how many looming threats, Loom over Azeroth only for the Horde and Alliance to keep skirmishing and keep shooting at eachother even while "united" to face that threat...hell how many vague "looming threats" have the people of Azeroth just chosen to ignore until "too late". Even if a Azerothean army were to go to Mallus, get killed to a man save one horrified survivor who witnessed everything, I'm more than certain most the leaders would write chaos off as a non-threat...unless Blizzard sees a Expansion opportunity, then magically Khorne would chose to send the smallest possible portion of his army to face certain failure "because they just wanted to unite everyone against a bigger threat" and then get counter invaded hard.

I'm sorry Blizzard fans, but the repeating villain plot point really sucks, especially when Arthas could have easily won if he was half as smart as everyone pretends he is, Sargeras should have won, pornstar bald man shouldn't have even existed, only Illidan had that theme work for him and we knew what threat he wanted to unite us against. At least Garrosh and the Old Gods had unique motivations despite all the times I hear people claim their stories sucked.

Guest 9: One was a early life Thanqual who was the Council's self angrandizing Errandboy getting involved in a local affair, the other was a commitment of forces following one of the largest Skaven population explosions one so great they could have solo provided the entire end times chaos threat...but competitive writers given both ego and financial incentive from GW executives who never read a WHFB book ensured the whole thing would be a convoluted mess filled to the brim with nonsense (which then AoS attempts to honor that nonsense just reflects badly for lore nerds I mean it took till 2020 where peopleare held hoatage in their homes for a Elf fanboy to go "well maybe they aren't so bad")

Jak23: We shall see where everything goes, perhaps the Skaven won't even be given the chance. And indeed Blizzard's lazy writers did her and everyone a dirty, like they have well writen scenes maybe, but some good scenes don't equate to a good story, which is sadly something modern writers don't seem to understand. That's part of why i try to consider everything set rules for myself and then see if i can navigate the maze to the end result i want, or something close enough.

As for the potrayal its also just a case of humanoid body type physics and the multitude of strategies that work for the humanoid body. Such are the basic rules for charging and recieving a charge. Stormwind has typically had to face Orcish Honor which more or less demands individuals fight semi-solo, which given their super strength allowing them to hit as if they were ten dudes makes sense, but Stormwind as a consequence hasn't really had many instances where their mooks have to default to line tactics rather than Squad vs 1 orc...followed by another orc...followed by another orc followed by lighting bolt. Much like how your basic US military Soldier modernly is trained in tactics that were useful for and devised in Vietnam, yet go most their career never having to use them.

But on the whole humanoid body type bit...I really would love to see a fantasy or scifi properly explore biology in combat. like 40k's tau i fucking hate their soldiers because everything about their Biology is actually a detriment to the style of warfare GW gave them. The mecha no problem, but the Tau's legs are made for forward acceleration, not for dodging side to side, their vision lacks depth perception but would be good at spotting close range targets, making shielded SMG/shotgun wielders the natural best option for them, where as their lack of depth perception and this thing called planetary curvature makes long range fighting far more difficult for them which would mean really the Tau firing the rifle at long range is just a biological component pulling the trigger when a computer tells him to, or is inaccurate as all hell.

Hakuryuu: the "story finally advancing" part with AoS and 40k is where i always roll my eyes. 40k was advancing and already moving but GW executives were blocking the advancement and then jumped it ahead with whats the most insulting time skip that was purely profit driven and profit off the competetive netlisters rather than the collectors. I mean if you were around for gathering storm, you know how the fall of Cadia was a worse disappointment than Shadowlands was for WoW fans by a decent margin, the only people who were in the slightest satisfied were ultra-fans who thought boys in blue can never have a bad story associated with them and praise the Ultramarine movie. Instead every chaos fan was up in arms for how they got blue balled and their grand victory cheapened and their followup stolen away for what felt like ego stroking for the two writers most guilty of the absurd acceleration of meta creep and grimderp in 40k.

The Guard fans now cry daily over the loss of cadia and felt that their greatest pride was slighted and instead fell back into a denial by remembering Vraks and Armageddon. And then half these advancing storylines are met with GW forcing things back into the SAME status quo with the most superficial of changes, again making a cheap knock off cadia and centering entire campaigns about it then gaslighting fans who called it Cadia 2.o.

At least for most the AoS stuff it doesn't retcon WHFB, except for the parts that do. Now 40K the new stuff is great, but I'm not some blind "all i care about is paint jobs" fanboy like Chapter master Valarak who on his Vigilus lore review treats the greatest feat of psychic might from a space marine ever written as if it was unimportant to praise what was a obvious marketing excuse and reused paint schemes. Good writing needs to always be priased and bad writing punished, Vigilus defiant Targarius summoning Calgar was alone almost worth the years of bullshit...if your a imperium fan and you weren't expecting that level of writing for cadia just a year before. I also wish that level of writing could get me invested in AoS but i have yet to see something at that level.

And maybe I'm spoild for advancing plotlines, but again War Machine, GW could have taken a page from their book. I mean GW steals from fans and other companies all the time anyways.

On to the story GW word of god Skaven slaves aren't counted as Skaven don't think the slaves are worth counting just making more clanrats into slaves if they feel there are too few. But your average Warren ranges from 1k to 10k Skaven and each and every skaven in that warren is capable of being fielded as a soldier, due to how lowly the Skaven value eachother. But think about that 1k to 10k number, and then think of the population of a Medieval town which averages 2k expanded to 3K average for sustainable population in warhammer, because a Warren fills the same role as a town and can be located in far more locations and larger quantities than the Empire's towns. Like one map of Sylvania I've seen showed roughly 30 human towns that were named and featured in WHFB books, there would be a Skaven Warren, not necessarily under it, but exiating for each plus a Warren or Nest for each castle, and a few Warrens at various mines and other locations. So on average where there would be maybe 90k to 100k living humans in those towns, not counting any cities or villages and not counting the unnamed towns in Sylvania.

For the same unit of measure there would typically be 30K to 300k Skaven combatants still not counting slaves in Sylvania and thats still also not assuming that due to strong winds of magic/horned rat's will there isn't a sudden population explosion from several months ago where that 30k to 300k would swell by a factor of 4 to 10 and thats again just using the human towns that are named in Sylvania, not the Skaven cities, not Warrens in random locations, mines, forts, in Dwarven underway locations, etc. And each of those rats can be counted as a combatant where humans our average percentages for soldiers range from 1% to 10% of the population ( lowest skaven vs highest human from just the towns and their related warrens there would be 30k Skaven vs 10k humans still not counting slaves), AND all those are just "local" combatants, an army marching from outside the region would be arriving 1/2 to 5 thousand more combatants (using the vs Nagash attrition value which from Skavenblight to Nagashizzar is further than Sylvania) per Warren they recruit from.

The thing with Teclis is that he doesn't play that constant of a role in the Empire. And then High Elf court is such a convoluted mess that it would take a chapter just to explain why he hasn't shown up already...after many hours of listening to a high elf fanboy explain the High Elves politics complete with the codexes, multiple books, and a chart...lets just say I'm amazed that TWW2 thought that somehow they could turn that into a positive feature of the High Elves, rather than the one annoyance of the High Elf tabletop players which always had me laughing at their smug superior asses when the worthless sacrifice character ended up being their army General because dice rolls, and all dice rolls ever did for me was kill the clear traitor-vermin in my ranks and reveal that I was right and my own men wanted me Dead-gone but i got them all first.

Ironwall: Isabella Von Carstein was raised from the dead and Daemon possessed as a Vampire by Chaos. And the Ulrika book made it extremely clear that while in Praag she was even more attune to the city's magical corruption due to her vampire nature, and she very much was effected by the Slaaneshi mcguffins in that book. And those are Warhammer Vampires, the effectual Daemon Prince equivalents of Undeath. Now the Forsaken, they don't have a lack of a soul to corrupt, a magical wellspring of power within themselves washing away all but the power of Death, the ability to effectively cleanse themselves by consuming untainted blood etc. The Forsaken instead have a better ability to cleanse Daemon weapons taking the Demon Sword of expanding dildo and turning it back into a regular cucumber. and at that point if all they can do is turn a Chaos sword to a hunk of iron then why bother with the Chaos wargear to start with?

OscuroSignore-51: Oh there's a role yet for them to play. But there's a LOT to have play out, and then once what WoW fans will recognize initially as The War of Thorns is going to blow up into something that made their "Battle For Azeroth" look small...which really BFA I'd argue for a world war was as small scale if not smaller than the seven years war, aka World War Zero where the French, Austrians, and Russians fought the British and Prussians for world dominance. For WHFB fans who don't follow or lost track of WoW. The War of the Thorns was "the story we wanted to tell" event, where leaders were made into retards because the writers are cooperate idiots who wouldn't recognize good tactics, if one bit them in the ass. and the leaders not turned into retards were turned into vegetables and thus unable to anything but sit around even as their homeland/extremely close best friends they could have at any time helped are all turned to cinders. so obviously besides adding WHFB to the mix, I'm scaling up the Horde and Alliance leadership from the IQ 60 of Blizzard's current writing staff to the IQ 170s they claim every minor character on Azeroth to be no matter how many boards they nail to their head while helping SpongeBob rebuild his pineapple.

kingbean777205: Well we may or may not see what's become of them. But like i said a Omake with them ruining a IRL player's whole WoW experience would be much better.

Ruins of Astranaar

Günther pulled back to observe the battle taking place before him the Men-at-Arms and knights of Stormwind had now entirely abandoned the battle, even Volkmar seemed to pull away from the fighting. Over a thousand of the Skaven must lay dead, yet there seemed to be plenty more, enough that many of their reinforcements were instead diverting into a massive tunnel the rats had dug next to the portal.

Now though the Ratmen had gotten themselves into a conflict with what looked like tree people, Female Centigors, the Night Elves and Minotaurs, as well as a whole lot of scaley green creatures and even what looked like chubby dragonlings...or he assumed chubby having never seen one before. There were legions of the Ratmen but the Tree's, dragons and green-scaled lizardmen held their advance while the odd female Centigors thinned the Ratmen ranks sapping the strength from the Skaven assaults.

Then there were the Minotaurs, Night Elf Druids, and various wild beasts that assaulted the Skaven's positions attempting to push to vital assets or to cap the portal. Each of their assaults had been costly to both sides but unsuccessful. That was though with one exception, as Anduin and many others cheered one they called Malfurion made an assault on the Skaven Mortars which saw many of their poison spheres prematurely detonated and contaminating the area such that the Skaven still haven't tried to retake the post.

"Your majesty the report you requested." One of the Lion's Guard shouted delivering multiple scrolls to the table that now Anduin and many of his current staff were at. Anduin never tore his eyes from the battle playing out before him, giving suggestions and observations to have runners deliver to the leaders of the Defenders of Mount Hyjal.

"Summerize the reports." Anduin requested while watching a new clash between the Ratman and the tremen where the rats began using green fire against their foes.

"R-right your majesty." The Guard stuttered, earning a eye roll from the Empire Captain. "Right, there are currently no more significant reinforcements headed for Hyjal, the Moonglade has already sent their forces or are engaged on other fronts, meanwhile the Winterspring Sentinels are sieging Everlook due to a suspiciously large presence of Horde adventurers and holding back an invasion force from Azshara.

In Ashenvale the Horde has breached Falfarren river, and the tunnel the Skaven have here emerges in Ashenvale and the enemies that aren't joining the battle here are instead joining the Horde assault in Ashenvale. Currently Ashenvale forest is ablaze, Horde forces are capturing anyone they can and killing anyone who resists, but Undead from Mallus and the Skaven are causing widespread destruction at the rate their forces are advancing the Horde will reach and hold Darkshore long before the Darnassus fleet can arrive, Sky Admiral Rogers and Admiral Taylor as the directives given them have elected to launch the Stormwind fleets however Sky Admiral Rogers will not arrive for another three days even while traveling at full speed. We also fear the Horde's naval fleet will attempt to intercept the Admirals."

Anduin paused. "What about the Horde's Skyfleet?"

Günther froze. "Sky-what?" The captain stated, absolutely in shock.

Anduin still didn't look to to the Imperial. "Skyfleet, we don't have many ships compared to more conventional fleets, the naval ships Avenah states she saw docked at Altdorf outnumbers our Skyfleet drastically. The materials for such vessels are rare and typically wanted for other projects."

Günther just frowned. The Alliance's High King was trying to downplay, and by the reports, it was crossing some great distance. A fourty plus cannon broadside from the sky would be unatoppable. Even four ships with ten cannon broadsides would be deveststing against inland fortress, or a horde caught in the open.

"Umm, Sir the Horde's Skyfleet is currently divided. Most of it is still defending Underblight, but a large contingent seems to be on standby in Ogrimar." The Lion's Guard informed.

"What about Exodar?"

"The Draenei still haven't taken action yet, however the Vindicaar is already making preparations to descend on Felwood. Velen is still bedridden the poisoning he recieved from the Naga attack seems to have had a worse effect then we thought." The Guard explained.

"Wait. Shouldn't your guys Light have been able to heal him instantly?" Günther asked, the obvious observation and the implications of the question immediately making Anduin curse his shortsightedness.

"Not if it was made specifically to try and kill him. I doubt the enemy thought they would actually kill Velen, but knocking him down like this would slow down the Draenei as he always prevented any internal debate from preventing the Draenei from taking decisve action when needed." Anduin stated knowing that the attack must have been meant to buy Sylvanas the time needed for her plots, and blinding the Alliance by denying them the warning of Velen's visions.

Anduin's mind returned to the Horde skyfleet over Ogrimar. If Sylvanas wanted to hurry this invasion and risk emptying all of Ogrimar's forces why leave behind any elements of the Skyfleet... unless she was trying to save them for something. And if she was still holding elements of her plan in reserve, that meant there was still a way for Anduin to hurt her plans, maybe even buy the Night Elves the time they needed.

"Abandon any stealth, activate every asset we have in Ogrimar. Disrupt the Horde's forces in any way they can, prioritize attempting to steal the Horde's skyfleet, if not taking all of Ogrimar for the Alliance. They want to take Darnassus for the Horde, lets meet them at the Negotiations table with Ogrimar." The High King ordered.

"But my King, Shaw had ordered SI:7 to stay low and avoid any conflict." The Guard protested.

"They are already standing in the middle of a conflict!" Anduin retorted, which recieved a chuckle which reigned over the cloppingof hooves as Volkmar and his borrowed steed approached.

"Stealing an enemy city from behind them? decicive. How many days ride is this Ogrimar?" The Grand Theologist asked with a vicious grin.

"A day and a half for a force as small as we have currently thanks to the resources we have now." Anduin replied, which earned only some slight confusion from the Imperials among them.

"Then let us set out. And if these spies of yours refuse to act then they will be responsible for our defeat." The Theologist ordered, a grim grin on his face.

Saurfang and the Horde were closing on Astranaar, his new damned allies were setting the forest ablaze as they went and dark spirits stirred as a dark presence seemed to loom behind the Horde's battlelines. And Maiev had to deal with Delaryn Summermoon and Broll both showing the lack of conviction necessary to stop to Horde's advance. Let these Barabarians burn every tree and village in their path, anything to slow their advance.

Right now the Druids should be visiting Thunder Peak and motivating Lord Magmathar to flood the plains below with lava burning the passing Horde and stopping their advance. Or perhaps Broll, if he really was as powerful as Malfurion could visit Cragspool lake and carve a new path for the Blackwolf River, draining Cragpool lake and flooding the forest just before Astranaar. Instead Broll is trying to rescue every animal and spirit he could.

And Delaryn was more focused on the civilians than her duties. It was like she couldn't possibly comprehend that if the Horde wasn't stopped now at any cost that far more wisps would be made than the ones currently passing through Astranaar. At least Summermoon was willing to use tactics that would harm the Horde rather than entirely obsessing over preserving lives.

"The Horde's advance is being made easier by rogues and scouting forces. Though due to their pace and lack of communication, I suspect that we might be able to use that to our advantage." The Captain explained as they swiftly moved toward a smoking Astranaar.

The town was already filled with corpses, wisps floating around aimlessly floated in their hundreds in and about the town. Poison and knife wounds to the back had taken the lives of all the guards while many of the dead civilians had died much more brutally, Axe and sword wounds covered some, while shuriken were embedded in the corpses of others and most of the civilian bodies.

Captain Summermoon seemed melancholy looking over the dead. "We need to honor the dead allow their wisps release, and drive out any rogues remaining in the city." The Captain stated many of the nearby adventurers and Sentinels immediately moving to obey, while Maiev and her Wardens stood by actually glaring at the Kaldorei Sentinels.

"You want to signal that we've retaken the town by making it obvious that Kaldorei have tended to our lost?" Maiev demanded, her scowl deepening.

"No, we'll honor and release every Wisp we can. But once the Rogues and witnesses are gone, we're rearranging everything to make it look like a second battle took place here and the Horde forces had pressed on to pursue our forces into a trap. Truth will be however when the Horde stops here they'll be in our trap, allowing us to hold them longer." The Captain answered staring at the battles starting as Skaven and Horde Rogues fought for their lives and died furtively against the Kaldorei forces.

"And do you have any Idea where Broll is?" Maiev demanded.

"No, but I'm certain that we can do this, all we need is a spy to lure Saurfang himself into the trap. Without him I'm sure we can stop the Horde." The captain stated confidently.

"I would still prepare a sabotage of the bridges maybe we can trap the Horde's warmachines in Astranaar." The Warden concluded.

The Skaven charged and again Malfurion struck them down, roots grasping their numbers and pulling down the Ratmen and tearing into their flesh. Elsewhere wild beasts and insects lashed out against the Skaven ripping into their flesh. Even as bolts of energy lashed out from the Arch-druid striking down a rat with each. Even with a army of powerful druids and the chosen of Gods, Malfurion alone was able to forge ahead against the relentless waves of Skaven.

Malfurion wasn't sure how many there were, nor if the forces of the defenders of Mount Hyjal could both drive back the Skaven into the portal and intercept the Horde armies. But the Skaven will be driven back, and Hyjal defended, of that Malfurion was certain. He wouldn't let some plot by Sylvanas succeed.

Even while surrounded by massive heavily armored rats, Malfurion proceeded pushing towards the portal. He would clog the portal and cut off the Skaven entirely and once that was done, pushing through the tunnel to cut off the Horde from behind would be Malfurion's next priority.

But even as he pressed forward the Arch-Druid spotted her. Sylvanas appeared among the Skaven, smirking at him, her bow at her side.

"Ssylvanass!" Malfurion roared preseing forward his staff caving in Skaven skulls and sending vines to strike out against Sylvanas.

The Banshee Queen lept back dodging the vines and launching arrow after arrow at the vines and Malfurion as she retreated. Even with armored Skaven rushing him with polearms Malfurion was not slowed pressing towards Sylvanas.

"Malfurion, we meet again. I had decided to hunt an animal and look what I happen to find, just the set of antlers I think would look best on my throne. Wouldn't you agree?" The Forsaken Queen taunted launching more arrows Malfurion's way.

"You shall see no restraint this time, Undead queen." Malfurion growled closing on his foe.

The Arch-druid forced his way towards Sylvanas, killing nearly thirty of the armored Skaven who dares tried and bar his way. Still Malfurion closed on Sylvanas shifting into Bear form ready to tear into the Banshee with his claws. However as he loomed over Sylvanas the Queen of the Forsaken smirked, and then three gunshots rang over the battlefield.

Three green streeks flashed, one missing Malfurion and one blocked swiftly by the summoning of a Treant. but the third peirced Malfurion, forcing him to roar in agony. Malfurion reverted to his Night Elf form stumbling back in agony, hand clutching his chest as his blood poured out from his wound with every pump of the Arch-druid's heart.

"As I said, I decided to hunt an animal. Time to skin it." Sylvanas preparing her bow.

Malfurion charged blocking the first arrows Sylvanas launched punching her with a clawed hand. The Queen drawing a blade to defend herself as Malfurion unleashed his rage against her. At first the Queen could barely keep the Arch-druid from landing a crippling blow against her, many painful and damaging attacks landing and harming her.

But Malfurion started to slow as blood ran down his chest, and began to run down past his feet to join the pools of blood on the ground. And as he slowed, Sylvanas took the upper hand of the battle drawing blood and even carving flesh from her opponent. And then with a kick Sylvanas had Malfurion on his back, and was drawing her bow with a Black Arrow focused on Malfurion.

Sylvanas released her arrow, the tip lightly stabbing into Malfurion's throat just as Sylvanas was blown back. Three Green Dragons landing in the battle, the one at the center Merithra of the Dream who loomed over Malfurion protectively before picking up the Arch-druid and taking flight, her companions close behind. The development earned Sylvanas curse as her quarry escsped the Dark lady unable to confirm his death meaning she would have to resort to far more drastic measures, and fulfilling promises that before she had no intention to ever honor.

Ikit followed the maps and guidance of the Horde officers to the town referred to as Astranaar. As the Skaven army followed Ikit they dragged along multiple weapons from Ratling guns, and Warpfire throwers to Lightning Cannons and weapons looted from this world and the frames of two rockets yet to be completed.

The Azeroth was exceeding Ikit's expectations, making him eager to use every weapon in his arsenal, to create newer weapons, and prove his absolute superiority over these lesser creatures whose greatest feats thus far had already been exceeded by far inferior Engineers to Ikit's own illustrius power. Though while Azeroth was proving a worthy conquest, these Horde-fools were so far beneath Ikit it was truly a sad day that they had been chosen as the Council of thirteen's puppets.

Even as he closed on the town which served as the Ashenvale regional capital Ikit was already assessing which weapons would best destroy it. But just as Ikit decided that Warpfire and Poison wind would work best, despite the fact that the oddly wallless town though the moat about it was thick enough to serve to annoy a lesser army.

Of course, the Horde had already taken this capital town and no matter how much he was tempred Ikit knee better than to open fire on the town...yet. But even with the tempation, beyond the knowledge of the reasonable consequences of a early betrayal of the Horde before the great Horned Rat allowed, Ikit still couldn't have tried to test his weapons against the town, first was the multitude of magical sources his newest eye-lenses detected about the Town, but also the mass of magical energy arriving to the side of his army in the form of the spirit hosts of the Blue-skinned Dead-thing.

The one called Tarei had set out on her own, her host of spirits and corpse-things growing as she roamed the villages and attacked stragglers. The Horde tried to explain the Wisp things but those just sounded like weak ghosts. Either way the Vampire had a small army at its disposal already and a loyalty to the Horde which Ikit couldn't understand. But Vampires seldom if ever tried to advance weapons and were thus inferior and unworthy of anything but the Skaven's contempt.

Still the Skaven's sensibilities were being triggered, something about the situation was wrong. Thus the tool known as humility was in order. "Ah, Yes-Yes the Vampire is here, it would be faster for you-you to cross thr bridge first-before me. I have many weapons to inspect-check before meeting with Horde Chief-leaders."

The Vampire just scoffed, scowling down at the armored Skaven before marching past, with a horde of shambling Elf-thing corpses behind her. As Ikit suspected something was wrong, as Tarei was crossing the bridge the structure collapsed under her and her zombie horde. A commotion also errupted in the town as massive vines started to rise up, particularly around the largest building, and then the Elf-things appeared out of the shadows, their arrows and large throwing blades lashing out into diffrent Horde warriors.

"An attack Quick Kill-Kill fire Mortars and Ratling guns! Now-Now!" Ikit ordered, estatic for the chance to level the town with weapon fire. Even as he spoke, Tarei who lept to avoid falling into the water landed on the other shore, the spirits about her joining the Vampire in the battle.

The Imperial Great Cannon was heavier than Shandris had anticipated, she had planned for two Hippogryphs to carry the cannons to the rally point, instead it took five, a whole squadron to lift the cannon through the air to the rally point. But once there the forces gathered did seem rather impressive. The Empire's impromptu commander Lady Emmanuelle Nacht and the 'Shadowmancer', whatever that meant, Luitgard Reichen both had taken command of several small detachment of Imperial Scouting forces as well as a couple of formations of Swordsmen and hamdgunners to the rally point. There Shandris gathered a force of Sentinels and her remaining Druids.

The battle thusfar while the Kaldorei had caused massive casualties among the enemies, the Undead forces had seemingly never lost from their numbers while those Skaven, based off the breifing from Irma, numbered as many as many as the Mantid if not more. Meanwhile the Kaldorei had been slowly dying off, against the Undead Shandris had to call off all her forces making the Empire troops endure fighting the main bulk of the Undead on their own, and the Skaven had shown a willingness to kill more than dozens of their own to kill a single Sentinel. But the Skaven would at least break and territory could be gained, where Undead wolves, and Swarms of Bats both man sized and smaller, and other deathless monsters would descend on the Kaldorei killing all they could before the Kaldorei could escape, or before retreating themselves.

With the attrition in mind Shandris had to improvise, and while it might have been still somewhat straightforward for this world the General of the Sentinels knew she could pull it off. Now that Night was falling the Sentinels borded a number of captured barges, bringing one of the Empire's Cannons and their troops. She would sail to the Sister's of Sigmar's temple and push to take the portal from there.

The Mallus barges once boarded with the forces, and the Hippogryphs hidden onboard the boats, sailed slowly up the river. As Shandris' plan the Kaldorei made a push drawing each Skaven's attention towards the wall they possibly could. As the barges sailed they passed into Mordheim and Shandris and her Sentinels went into alert carefully watching the city shoreline.

Occasionally Sentinels would launch a arrow, at first each arrow dropped some Skaven who noticed the barges, however soon the Sentinels were firing arrows non-stop. And then clanging as an Alarm raised. Then Sling Bullets and stones started to dent the barges as Skaven, mostly the ones identified as slaves, began to mass at the shoreline at all the places where the Barges would most likely dock. But soon the whole situation turned into a slow parody of a mobile battle as the Sentinals kept up their fire on the Skaven Slingers, and some oddly more difficult to hit Skaven appeared on the shore throwing shuriken or also using slings.

Swiftly these something or another runners were becoming Shandris' priority. Already far more Sentinels than Shandris cared to lose even when skirmishing with the Horde, though she had been forced to leave many of her best healers behind. Still Empire State Troops began to help finding and helping use boards to shield the Kaldorei as the exchanges became more intense. Then the barges closed with and began to dock on the island of the Sisters of Sigmar, the Rock.

Scaling onto the Rock would already be a arduous task as it was, but the Island was under the most intense weapons fire from the Skaven, with the Skaven's own Blight being fired onto the Island as well as sustained gunfire, and at least one of their Lightning Cannons firing on the Island as well. And to make the ascent worse the Sisters of Sigmar were on the alert, warding off each of the Skaven's attacks with fanaticism and powers which Shandris could only attribute to being as if they were this world's own Paladins.

Even as the General was reaching the top of the wall Shandris was thankful that Emmanuelle had come and gone up first. "Look I'll keep this matter clear and straight forward. As I told your Sister Superior before she brought you up here, I am prepared to negotiate on your behalf to the Grand Theologist who commanded the Imperial Army of Reikland in this city until a couple days ago om your Temple's behalf, he will help you all regain redemption with Sigmar and indeed you may earn it anyways, if you allow my forces and these Elves to use the Rock as a staging point to retake the city. We plan to sally forth from here. Cross the bridge, and then attack the portal and clear these tainted beasts as we go. The entire matter is rather straightforward."

Shandris remained silent as the wrinkled woman spoke. "You expect us to ally with invaders who brought even greater taint to this city?" The old woman asked, idiot obviously never getting the memo that the Alliance never controlled where the portal opened to.

"They didn't bring the Skaven, and were in negotiations which would have inevitably aided in your temple and mission by bringing more focus from the Cult of Sigmar and merchants from the Empire to this city." The Imperial Ambassador reasoned.

"And yet half our order is dead thanks to battles they brought to this city." The woman countered holding her warhammer ready.

Shandris watched, only barely comprehending the conversation and noting that she needed to gain a real grasp of the Reikspiel language, or else she'd be left in the dark of too many complicated and potentially dangerous situations.

"Umm, me army go, fight rats?" It was crude, possibly unintelligible attempt at Reikspiel but with the pointing outside hopefully the women would get the message.

Emmanuelle looked to the Kaldorei general, smiling as five Hippogryphs crested the wall. "We also brought a cannon, my gift to you."

Another message Rat rushed to the great Grey Seer and delivered his report shortly before getting crushed to death by Boneripper. The message warrented the Messenger's death, because it made Thanquol angry, and marked the messenger and everyone associated with it as failures.

"I Said-ordered to trap them and burn-burn them in the tunnel, how-why did they escape!" The Grey Seer Thanquol demanded of his incompetent servants. Each and every one of them sniveling and bowing, the actual commanders they represented far away from the Grey Seer, undoubtedly trying to undermine him much like Ikit is, making absurd resource demands from the other side of the portal. Likely asking for weapons he never even needed.

"Oh-oh great one I have a u-urg..."

"Well where are they!?" The Grey Seer demanded looming over the gathered rats angrily.

"They-they escaped into the tunnels beneath the city-streets. They will die-die in the Warrens yes!" One of the gathered Skaven offered.

"Eeeeeuugh! Not-not good enough! Collpase-destroy Warrens on top of them, now-now!" Thanquol ordered nearly screeching down to his subordinates who trembled as Boneripper behind the Grey Seer began to flex its muscles.

"But-but we need tunnels for-for reinforcements, Lord Seer!" One complained.

"M-my greatness the-the River-waters..."

"Then dig-build new ones! Better ones! See-see my brilliance makes everything better while you idiots waste-abuse my time!" The Greatest Grey Seer ever, in his own mind, proclaimed to the assembly of sniveling cowards gathered before him.

"Great One they-they close on..."

"THE ONES YOU SEEK KILLED FANGLEADER KRUKIT! THEY ESCAPED INTO DEEPER TUNNELS AS WARREN COLLAPSED-FELL! OH WISE ONE WHO FORESAW SAW THIS OUTCOME WITH THEIR SUPPERIOR POWERS!" Another Rat reported running into the chamber.

"RRRRRRRRAAAAAAAGH" Sudden green lightning errupted from Thanquol striking down many of the assembled messenger rats.

"M-my Great-wise Lord, the-the Elf-things will..."

"Find-kill Felix and Gotrek now! I don't care-care what it takes, do it now-now!" Thanquol's rage sent many more rats running from the chambers.

"I-if we don't act now-now the Elf-things will take..."

"THE MIDDLE BRIDGE HAS FALLEN ELF-THINGS MARCH OUR WAY NOW-NOW!" A panicking, musk of fear covered rat screamed running into the chamber.

Swiftly Thanquol leapt across the room geabbing the new messenger. "What-WHAT?"

"T-The-The Elf-things took the central bridge, they-they turn for us now-now." The trembling rat recited.

"HOW." Thanquol demanded with a low growl.

"They-they took man-breeders fort and invaded from there-there. They used a cannon to-to break openings." The Skaven was releasing fresh waves of the musk of fear but Thanquol ignored that, his rage boiling.

Then the Grey Seer looked around him. All about Skaven of various clans looked to him, expecting some spell or his signiture brilliance to save them all, cowards wishing to hide behind Thanquol instead of going out to fight themselves. Thanquol resigned himself and with a gesture sent Boneripper to smash the last remaining messengers.

Oh Thanquol would take to the battlefield alright. He will show all those who clearly havs betrayed him, intentionally allowed Gotrek and Felix to undermine his plans, and even hid a invasion of his city from him...he'll show them all.

Maiev Shadowsong at first doubted the ambush would be nearly as successful as it had been. the Ambush had almost been exposed after a Kaldorei spy had been found and killed and Saurfang raised an alarm through the camp, but Brolls unexpected attack on Saurfang had opened up the Horde forces, and Maiev and Delaryn took the opportunity. Emerging from shadows Sentinels and Watchers, Druids and Wardens fell upon the Horde forces from every angle, arrows lodging in Orcish throats, Forsaken cut in half by glaives, and the Bridge into Astranaar collapsing.

The first seconds of the Ambush saw more casualties on the Horde's side than there were ambushers. Maiev herself killed a Orc Grunt and a Duskwatch soldier before pushing deeper into the Horde forces, pushing towards the Inn hall where Broll was attacking the Horde's command staff. However before she could reach the Inn, the Warden was waylayed, dodging to the side as a bolt of lightning lashed towards her. Next Maiev dropped as Purple magic energies flaires around the arms and maces of her newest opponent who attempted to shatter her skull with the strike.

The Warden instead moved thrusting her Umbra Crescent into the torso of her attacker who leapt back and away from the lead Warden. A Ghost charged Maiev who slashed cutting the Ghost in half and prepared as her opponent a pale-blue Draenei of all people hissed at her and lunged forward. The power of the Maces of the Draenei forced Maiev back and as she fell back she uses her cloak to block a fireball before going back to combat the Draenei.

Even as the two clashed multiple ghosts and Horde met the Kaldorei ambush head on and several fell, granting Maiev renewed determination and a growing disdain for their enemy. "So even the Draenei stand against us, or whatever you are. Doesn't matter I'll drag the truth from your survivors!" Maiev called upon the Avatar of Vengence its power envolping Maiev and multiple spirits of Vengence rising up to lash out against the invaders.

But even as the Warden blinked away from her attacker and the spirits unleashed their wrath against the Horde the battle still began to turn against the Ambushers. Spheres of Blight began to fall among the buildings of the town, landing among clumped Kaldorei swiftly killing them. Likewise green bullets began to spray even striking down the spirits of Vengence.

Even as Maiev threw knives at her foe, backing away from the Draenei, she witnessed that the Kaldorei forces were now slowly being pushed back while the bodies began pile up. Poisoned gasses, streams of bullets, and ghosts pressured the Kaldorei Ambushers. Maiev still held the Draenei and was actually pushing the hissing fool back, staying ahead of her strongest strikes, and easily dealing with the Ghosts that moved in her support. But as she fought the battle about her got worse, the Ratmen suddenly surged into Astranaar at their lead an armored Rat who the moment it was close to Broll lifted its arm shooting a torrent of flame into Broll forcing him back.

Maiev then frowned as she watched Broll Bearmantle as the flames touched him retreated. Maiev almost called the Druid out, nearly ready to threaten him. But a Horn followed by sight of Sylvanas banner on the other side of the collapsed bridge forced Maiev to submit to the reality and flee. As the last of the Sentinels that Maiev could allow to cross the last bridge crossed she collapsed it, taking some Sentinels and a multitude of the ratmen and some unexpected Night Elf zombies with the bridge sinking them to the bottom of Astranaar's waters.

"You killed our Sentinels..." Delaryn muttered as she watched Sentinels swim for the shore, many shot by Horde and Ratman weapons before they could make it, and many more pulled beneath by the ruins of the bridge or frantic drowning ratmen still fighting to survive.

"It's what we have to do to win." Maiev responded grimly, watching the Kaldorei and rats drown knowing that if Broll had been faster, if Delaryn's spy had been better, if she had been better they would have just won the war rather than simply delaying the Horde at a horrific cost.

Tyrande Whisperwind emerged from one of the few portals focused on bringing people onto Teldrassil rather than evacuating out the civilians. But as Tyrande spent a few seconds to watch the evacuation the pace was horribly slow, each hour only hundreds could escape by portal while tens of thousands needed to escape.

Tyrande then marched to the command of the Darnassus city guard, the area they had been set with a multitude of maps and near countless wooden modles marking the various forces of the war indicating where on Kalimdor the Night Elves suspected or knew each of the Horde's forces to be as well as where their command understood their own forces and allies to be.

As she approached many of the Sentinels bowed to the High Priestess, who walked over to the table, found the painted wooden model of the Vindicaar and dramatically placed it on the table over Darkshore. Then still wordlessly she began to place down multiple models each representing a unit of Lightforged or simply of the Draenei and began adding them to the map.

"The Lightforged and Draenei have agreed to join the war, the Vindicaar should be in firing range within the hour. Inform Maiev immediately that I will be joining her in the field soon. Also inform Malfurion to not worry, I will keep our people safe and all he needs to do is focus on protecting Nordrassil." As Tyrande spoke much of the Sentinels command looked to her with renewed hope, but then with pity moments after.

They all worked but silently, something that disturbed the Priestess of Elune. Swiftly the Priestess looked across the board and each of the maps, checking each detail she could with a glance. "What is happening on Hyjal?" A straight question but one that seemed to be at the center of the low spirits and dread she felt in the room.

"Lady Tyrande, Lord Malfurion has..." The Sentinel reporting choked back a sob. "...has fallen in battle against Sylvanas. Currently the Green Dragonflight is tending to his wounds, but our Hyjal forces are wavering. We do not know if Hyjal will be able to hold much longer, and we do not know if Malfurion will survive."

Tyrande froze for a moment, fighting down her own surge of emotions trying to prevent a outburst and to remain the leader the Kaldorei needed. "I-I won't be joining Maiev and Broll on the Darkshore front. Hyjal needs me now more. Send a messenger to Turalyon, beg him to leave the Vindicaar and assume command of the Darkshore front...NOW!" The Kaldorei Sentinels burt into activity each scrambling to obey Tyrande. For her part the Priestess stepped out of the command area, and collpased. She did not cry, but prayed begging Elune for strength and guidance.

Tarei gathered her spirits and Night Elf zombies and marched into Zoram'gar outpost. Inside the Horde's main force and the warmachines of the Skaven detachment under Ikit Claw all sat waiting for her arrival. Already Sylvanas had gathered Nathanos Blightcaller and Saurfang to her side along with the armor covered rat.

She had considered raising the dead of the Horde to her side damn their reactions and any who had any qualms with her actions could die too...but that Damn rat and his guns was always too close by, and if she tried anything certainly he'd see it as a opportunity to gun her down gaining even more of Sylvanas favor.

Still she joined the meeting of leaders who just months ago she had been foolish enough to think beyond her. As she walked up she could hear Nathanos speaking, proving himself a idiot.

"If we close with the Night Elves the Vindicaar would never consider firing on their own forces." The Undead reasoned, not entirely a bad plan but one Tarei didn't care for.

"No, we can't allow ourselves to misjudge the Alliance at this stage. Besides we want to deal a deathblow to the Alliance, one which would see the Eastern Kingdoms retreat to care for themselves rather than take up a hopeless cause." The Banshee Queen reasoned, and though Tarei knew she was a being above Sylvanas she still felt Sylvanas power and wisdom in thay moment and certainly deferred to the Forsaken ruler.

"Hmmm, Blue-thing cannon-flying ship is a problem for Horde yes-yes?" The rat spoke up and Tarei could feel herself holding in a hiss of irritation. The creature reaked of selfish ambition, contempt, and false civility, how these Horde fools didn't see it was beyond her.

Nathanos sighed, "Yes that's exactly what we're discussing right now rat."

Ikit just chuckled in response. "I-I have two Doomeockets at my disposal yesss-YES! All I with my superior engineering would need is some of your special blasting-Black powder, the Azerite one I already hear soo much of and my rockets could hit-kill the Alliance sky-boat. Give me-me another mana-bomb to research and I can really Kill-kill everything up there."

Sylvanas put out a calming hand. "I can not give you another mana-bomb if we use one the escalation would cause too much damage...your own people's interests would all be destroyed Skaven. But as for the Azerite that we can manage."

Saurfang then spoke up. "I'll see to it Horde champions collect as much as Ikit needs."

Tarei could hear the rat gag in disgust realizing he'd have to cooperate with Horde soldiers even more. Not that she cared for any of this. "We've reach Darkshore Sylvanas, where is the Skyfleet? Aleksandr certainly can be denied any longer." Tarei challenged, the subtle threat hanging between her and the Forsaken leader.

"The fleet waits with my Queensguard in Ogrimar, they'll take off and collect your forces when I order. And I will give the order when I think the Vindicaar isn't a threat to my fleet." Sylvanas countered.

"I am still sending summons for Aleksandr now, you owe us Sylvanas." Tarei insisted though her words carried less venom.

"Well in the mean time there are plenty of your kin appearing along Darkshore and in Felwood feel free to acquire prisoners from among them." Sylvanas tone was offensive, obviously she meant to demean Tarei, but the offer still was tantalizing.

Then a Orc rushed to Saurfang's side, breaking Tarei from her brooding and Ikit from whatever machinations the damned rat was thinking of.

"Lord Saurfang, Ogrimar is under attack, the SI:7 attack from within, and a small army of Knights travels south through Azshara!" The Orc reported.

"What!" Tarei was the most shocked of all present, Ikit seeming not to care in the slightest while Saurfang went into contemplation.

"Nathanos, take what Champions and Rangers we can spare cleanse Ogrimar of the SI:7 blight once and for all." The Warchief of the Horde ordered.

"I will not tolerate this! I am coming too, they will not deny me Azuremyst Isle!" The Vampress hissed, and within minutes Nathanos and Tarei were racing back to Ogrimar all while Sylvanas looked over the tactical maps, both of Azeroth and Kalimdor considering her next move.

"I think if this all works out the Alliance might not last for much longer."