A Cause to Gladly Die for
The aura of the Orcs had changed, there is was no denying it. Before their army had felt something akin to a well mixed broth, each part was seperate in texture but united as a single entity. There was savagey, orderly disipline, and individualism all in there own respective parts unified in will to form an army for Hans to experience as he battled against them. The sensations in his blood letting him feel out where each of these foes was moving while his experience and talent told him what to expect and a good guess on how to respond.
But now with the most recent change they were nothing like that broth they were before. Now the Horde army was something more like a frozen wind, combined the nervous anticipation one feels just before some venomous beast lashes out. Even with a change of command an army doesn't change that quickly, unless...
"Eitrigg." Hans breathed out as he remembered what had been said by the elder Orc noting how Eitrigg had revealed he wasn't the leader but the younger female beside him was the one Hans would have been facing.
"What was that?" Lorna Crowley asked from atop her Palomino Bridle, a lighter warhorse that seemed ready to go into a full gallop at any moment.
Hans considered the question and his own thoughts for a moment before answering while Aethalas stayed silent at his side a knowing frown on her face. "Just a thought. The Horde's going to try something different this time, We're going to have to be ready to react rather than have something prepared." The Grand Master answered simply looking out to the Horde army while moving to try and lay eyes on as much of their force as possible.
Then Hans felt it, the slight vibration running up the legs of his steed and striking him. The rumble of over a thousand feet moving as one. "They're coming." The Grand Master and serving general of the Imperial Expedition force stated.
And just as he spoke the sounds, drums and warcries of the Orcs came rumbling across the land while dust clouds rose from their movement. Moments later the northern cannons began to fire unloading explosive shells into the Orcs. Hans only could see a small portion of it, but Eitrigg's opening move of his new command was obvious, daring, and far too close to what Hans was used to facing from greenskins.
En masse the Mag'har Orcs charged for the Northwest outpost entirely abandoning the half encriclement. They rushed forward at a full run, or at a full gallop for their mounts, and full steam from their Siegemaker tanks, and even ignored the cannon fire pouring into them from the few Alliance cannons. Desperately the Alliance weapons fired while Alliance riflemen and Crossbowmen all massed to the fort's wesr and rushed forward to unleash bolts and bullets into the rushing hoard. Many Orcs shrugged off the damage, their armor either stopping the long ranged blows, or their endurance allowing them to press forward against all but truly leathal blows.
Whatever bold move Eitrigg was making with the swift cold force of his would find itself lacking. Hans was well versed in fighting against such massed forces."Order the Knights of Morr to hammer the rear of the enemy as they move! I want the Knights of the Blazing Sun, Knights of Sigmar's Blood, and Knights Panther to strike any openings and to pull back to strike again before the enemy can react! The Knights of the Everlasting Light will take place of my honor guard. Have the line infantry break down into units of fourty men and stagger their lines with openings for our handguns and crossbows and be ready to receive the enemy's charge! The moment they finish with the outpost they'll turn to us."
Hans orders were being immediately relayed to the arrayed forces and troops still waiting in the fort. "Lorna, I want your Gilneans and Worgen ready, the mechanical tanks of our enemies are bound to take to the front, we'll need your people to destroy them for us."
The Commander of the Gilneas Liberation Front raised her blade, "it'll be done!" And with her own gestures and shouts in the Alliance's common language, which Hans still hadn't learned the name of, she soon sent her troops to disperse among the Empire's troops to wait for the coming Siegemakers.
While the Empire's troops still prepared for their battle, the Horde shells from their cannons pockmarked the land and laid waste to the barricades and trenches openings ways for Orc warriors mainly ones accompanied by wolves rushed into outpost and clashed with the surviving shell shook troops. Still the Tower fell swiftly and just as the last of Hans troops moved into their starting positions the Mag'har banner was being raised over the tower while the mass of the Horde's forces began to turn south not even bothering to reorganize.
Hans thanked Sigmar that the Mag'har were still disorderly, with their strength, technology, and numbers if they came at his army in a organized fashion then his men would suffer dearly to even hold the line barely. But Hans knew something was wrong, wasn't that Eitrigg figure a veteran, experienced in war? Such a disorganized mob would hardly serve to break his line in a swift manner and Hans might now be able to slip past and retake the Northeastern Outpost. Where was the cold chill Hans felt when he first knew in his blood that Eitrigg had taken over? Where was the sting of the lightning strike or waiting trap he had anticipated? Where had the sensation of looming dread disappeared to?
Hans sat back scanning the coming Orc mobs. No this gave him the same blood boiling burning passion as any other greenskin invasion that he had faced before. So Hans steed slowly stepped back as he prepared to assess the value of retaking the Northeastern Outpost. And the Grand Master's blood stung, nothing was wrong, there were no enemies not even the typical scouts as far as his eyes could see, not that avoiding his notice would have been too hard. No Hans could feel it his blood chilled and the venom running through, there was no evidence, the flags in both the Southern Outposts and showed that everything was fine, yet everything told him another story.
Hans had to grin, it was painful, but he now knew what was happening why his blood felt nothing when the Orcs entered their mad rush northwest. They were a cold sacrifice and distraction, but of this Hans had no evidence, and the Orcs were for all their disorder still operating, all turning as one, all moving as a single force, under clear direction as sloppy as it was. "There you are you bastard." The General muttered as he followed his senses feeling a strong sense in his blood vaguely from the southeast.
"Rally on me Knights of the Everlasting Light! Aethalas I have need of your escorts! We ride!" Hans shouted raising his sword into the air.
To his flank Lorna looked to Hans incredulously. "You plan to charge them now?!" The Gilnean commander asked with worry.
"No stay here and take command! Pick them apart piece by piece! This is the final stretch, whoever wins what is next to come wins the battle! They've gone all in on this, if we crush them here they will have to bring in their reserves, making any attack on Elspeth and Shandris futile!" And with a strong turn Hans began his headlong gallop to the Southeasten Outpost, the sixty Knights of Everlasting Light behind him and Aethalas and her Sentinels slowly gaining from behind.
"ဖြန့်ကျက်ပါ၊ မှောင်မိုက်ကိုသုံးပြီးသူတို့ကိုဖုံးအုပ်ထားမည်! (Spread out, we'll use the darkness to envelop them!)" With an shouted order, Aethalas' Sentinels spread out and pushed their Saber Cats harder pulling just ahead of the Knights and in the darkness of the night despite the bright stars and moon they disappeared from sight, though by now Hans could at least keep track of their movements.
He'd look the fool if he ended up changing headlong into his own men at the Outpost, but somehow Hans knew that was not the case. And as they neared the Outpost Hans saw it a single State Trooper falling to his death from the tower a crossbow bolt carrying him off the ledge. And then it began, shouts and warcries and in a single instant as if rising from beneath the ground itself, maybe so in some cases, the Horde's fighters all assaulted the Outpost as one force over one hundred predominantly Orcs, with a good mixture of Trolls, Goblins, and Tauren attacked the Outpost from far too close and from every side at once.
The speed of the attack was astounding, these were the Champions that Aethalas likely had warned Hans of as magic bolts and small explosions lit up the outpost. But Now Hans and his Knights and Aethalas Sentinels were here. The Sentinels opened up unleashing a wave of arrows that struck and wounded or struck and killed many of the attacking Horde while their mounts continued forward intent on sincing fang and claw into the enemy. At Hans side a knight blew the warhorn of the Knights of the Everlasting Light signaling their charge. And after a long moment Hans and the Knights leapt over the barricades his pistol drawn Hans sighted a brown skinned Orc and fired just before the leaping horses landed and the Knights charge crashed into the Horde's forces.
The clash was devastating Orc axes beheaded horses, removed noble steed's legs, carved men's armor and flesh apart while spears, darts, arrows of strange designs, and lesser magics felled men. Simultaneously Lances punched through armor, beheaded, peirced hearts, and hit with such force that sent the enemies flying even as the lances broke. Hans steed was saved from the savagery only as he lept from his mount falling atop a blue skinned troll pushing his blade into the creature's face breaking the large ugly tusk off the gangly beast.
Using his pistol as a club Hans beat the face of his foe the troll flailing its spear locked with Hans' sword as both warriors fought to moved their weapons into a position where they could stab the other, the wooden shaft and the sword's blade scraping randomly in the dirt. Then Hans reared back, his sword ready while the Troll's longer spear couldn't be properly positioned and the Knight thrust his blade forward, up through the chin of his foe whose eyes went wide in pain and terror. still with Hans blade through his mouth the Troll fought for its life fists pounding Hans armored torso and a punch drawing a bloody stream from the Grand Master's now broken nose.
The Troll tried to mutter something in its native tongue, "Shrakzag ushhuth ashpiritakun athlease, athleasuth ishon'akum. (By the Spirits please, please don't.)" The creature gurgled out past Hans blade and the blood filling its mouth. But Han's paid the gibberish no heed as he pulled back, drawing the sword back only slightly and with his full body weight thurst forward again until the tip of his blade peirced through the top of his opponent's skull. Slowly standing Hans assessed his latest kill, if Hans had to guess a young man just old enough to go to war, likely deluded that fighting would bring him glory. Hans wondered if the man had truly understood that he could have well likely died going to war, no no one understood until they finally stood on the battlefield and felt death's grip.
And Hans was back into the battle drawing a second pistol from his bandolier and firing at a Orc whose shoulder snapped to the side under the impact but was relatively unharmed, right until the Elf before him let loose two arrows into the Orc's throat. The Elf glared back to Hans, "သင့်အမ္မဏီကိုသင့်အတွက်သိမ်းဆည်းပါ! (Save your Ammunition for yourself!)" Hans just shrugged in partial incomprehension as he with blade drawn spotted a Goblin who weilding some strange electrified hammer downed one of the Knights of the Everlasting Light.
As Hans closed with the Goblin he considered the bloodbath about him. He always thought the curse upon the Knight Order beside him was just an excuse, yet here he could see it plain as day. Misfortune abound for the Knights and yet their skill and courage was more than a match for their foes, yet that only meant that both sides dies in equally horrible manners. As Hans backstepped away from the Goblin's hammer strike which seemed to send a wave of thunder out pulverizing the dirt it struck, a Knight beheaded a Tauren in a expert stroke none other could easily replicate, yet as the Tauren fell its crossbow on it back fired putting a bolt through the knight's crotch, which exploded a moment later. Hans dodged a sideswipe of the hammer and linged in severing the Goblin's unarmed fingers off its hand.
As the Goblin's hammer fell to its feet Hans stabbed his blade into the Goblin's chest just as the hammer struck the Goblin's foot. A blast of lightning severed the foot throwing the Goblin up into the air, making Hans' blade carve open the Goblin's chest. Then the Goblin landed on the helm of a nearby Knight its corpse locking the man's damaged helm in place blinding him with its guts and filling the helmet with blood. The man gurgled and struggled trying to get a opening to drain the blood or at least breath as a Axe weilding Troll descended upon him. Struggling for air and mostly blind the man fought his attacker, strength vs strength and speed verses speed, and with a blind flailing attempt to stop yet another a axe stroke in a long series of punishing blows the Knigbt severed the Troll's hand off forcing it to run with a yelp. Then with a final gurgle, the knight dropped, drowned in the blood of Hans' last kill.
And then Hans had a moment to breathe and reload his pistols, the battle lulling immediately around him as he watched the fighting all about him. Then a break in the fighting opened as a axe carved on of the Knights in half revealing Eitrigg who pushed past his latest kill the Commander's eyes now locked on Hans who raised his blade in a duelist's salute. "I almost thought you wouldn't come." The Orc stated, making his own salute with his axe before taking a ready stance.
And then the two started closing at a jogging pace. Hans arm snapping up aiming a shot to Eitrigg's leg and firing. The Orc dove to the side with the bullet burrowing into the ground. Now Eitrigg was on his knee, and Hans stepped in thrusting his blade. Eitrigg in turn thrust his shoulder forward, a stab that would have certainly gone into his chest now scraping across his pauldron and thanks to Hans' skill sliding into the gap between his shoulder and his neck. But Eitrigg in turn struck Hans in the side with his axe the blow throwing the human back who as he fell back several feet dropped his sword.
Eitrigg rushed Hans, but the Grand Master wasn't unaccustomed to losing a sword mid fight and while he scrambled for his blade drew another pistol and fired. Eitrigg blocked the shot with his axe but that slight movement, that axe being out of place, that slightest bit Eitrigg moved slower allowed Hans to grab his dropped sword and roll under Eitrigg's axe. The Grand Master while sprinting to his feet covered in blood soaked mud, thrusting his blade into Eitrigg's back.
With a roar the Orc moved his arm thrusting back slightly and Hans could feel the impact against his stomach a sharp point stabbing into his flesh. A quick glance down telling him that Eitrigg had grabbed his axe by the head and thrust back stabbing through Hans' armor with the metal tip of the axe's knob. Hans staggered back pulling his blade from Eitrigg's back, and quick as a viper the Orc span in place lunging past Hans' outstretched blade and grabbing his wrist and then twisting. With a shout of pain the bones cracked and the sword fell to the ground, but Hans still had his Bandolier and brandished his final pistol, swinging it to club the Orc in the eye, a move that with a tilt of the head became a blow to Eitrigg's dome that the Orc answered with a headbutt. Which caused Hans to stumble back before the old Orc swept Hans legs out from beneath him.
Hans fell landing on his back in such a way he hand to tilt his head back to see the Orc looming over his blade hoving just above Hans' head. The Grand Master struggled to breathe each of the blows he had taken and the blood in his nostrils making it more difficult and his vision blurred. There would be no recovering before he lost his head.
And then Eitrigg stumbled forward a arrow petruding from just beneath his shoulder pauldron. The Orc roared and turned and soon Hans heard the sound of blades clashing and metal scraping against metal. Taking the moment the General breathed while wiping blood off his face and clearing his nostrils. Then with a grunt of effort he rolled onto his hands and knees hand still clutching his last loaded pistol. In a second he'd stand up and put a bullet into that damned Orc before retrieving his sword.
Hans brought his leg up ready to stand and rush forth, just as the sound of heavy metal impacting then pulling away from wet flesh met Hans' ear and the corpse fell next to him. Her face was split down the middle, the force of the blow knocking a eye out of its socket. And before Hans could react Eitrigg's boot found where his axe had pierced him earlier, sending Hans onto his side.
Above Hans huffing and with several new cuts and arrows in his body Eitrigg leveled his axe. Once the Orc went to swing Hans would fire and at least die with dignity. But then horns sounded in the distance as the huffing Orc smirked slightly, head gesturing to the Southwest. Hans had to roll slightly to be able to look, and even then over the corpses, through the confused combat and horses and Kaldorei the Horde's flag flew over the tower of the Southwestern Outpost.
"I was worried you'd not come face me here, if you retook the Northeastern Outpost or chose to reinforce the Southwestern Outpost my gamble would have failed. But I had faith in that instinct of yours. Now do you yeild?" The grey haired Orc asked, while taking a moment to savor the agreed upon victory.
"Damn it, I should have shot you in the face." Hans laughed out slowly falling back onto his back.
"I was trying to spare you too, so why didn't you shoot me when you had that chance?" Eitrigg asked standing as the battle still persisted but the fighting started to slowly die out as one by one the last of the Knights of the Everlasting Light, the Sentinels and the last desperate survivors of the Outpost realized the battle was over and they had lost.
"For a moment, I thought of you as a countryman and thought it would be a waste. Should have fucking shot." The man's eyes teared up even as he let out wheezing laughter.
He then turned his head, eyes meeting the empty gaze of Aethalas, the blood and gore of her dying expression staring deeply at him. "By Sigmar this fucking hurts. But that's why I can't ever quit. This is the only time I know I'm alive."
Eitrigg burst into laughter, while his eyes expressed his own sympathy as he also looked about, even with druids and priests far too many of his own would not be returning almost as many as the knights and Sentinels they had slain. "Are you sure there's nothing else you can do?" The Orc then asked.
"I'm not suicidal enough for Elector politics. Besides if I'm not out here then it'd just be someone else." The statement wasn't particularly funny, but both chuckled, and then started to laugh. Two warriors sat among the dead laughing their pain away.
They fought shoulder to shoulder as brothers pikes, spears and Halberds held forward to stave off the incoming horde of Orcs. Many of the Orcs would clash with their defensive lines crashing in and through to strike before a press of steel finally would finish them off. But men dropped frequently, magic and crossbows killing as easily as the brutish savages. But walls of lead, rain of crossbows and suddened charges from Knights who kept a brutal cycle going against the Orcs made the battle into a savage meatgrinder.
Blocks of men would hold resolute despite the ontush of Orcs until monstrous engines of death firing cannon or spewing flames would break apart their position making the soldiers easy pickings for the Orcs following behind.
For the Mag'har they now faced a foe more alien than they were to this world. Where others would surround a beast or proudly push forward in strength these men branced in bunches and focused the Orcs down one after another. Cousins, brothers and friends died, but for the sake of their allies, their temporal kin, and their new home they pressed on fighting trusting their fate to the savior Eitrigg's plan.
Where wolves and Siegemakers broke these invaders lines Worgen and Gilnean elites would rush forward eager to destroy and thus deny the Mag'har vital assets. While the Mag'har pounded their foes, cleaving them apart the enemy stabbed at them taking eyes, hands, and lives. Neither side relented, for the Mag'har their new lives depended on victory and with the healers among them they many could keep fighting even through relatively minor wounds. For the Empire their earlier victory by Hans leadership, and knowledge that they had nowhere to flee they became resolute to win or die, only breaking when their formations did then looking to regroup.
With Lorna's leadership the Empire chipped away at the Mag'har advance forces. Already they were nearly down to half their number and much more and they'd be left with the choice to bring forward their reserves or to abandon their push into Mulgore as a fruitless endeavor. But the Imperial lines were thinning and despite destroying nearly all the Siegemakers Lorna's own troops were heavily bloodied and increasingly incapable of responding to the Mag'har's breakthroughs.
When Adventurers snuck about claiming the southern two outposts the sound of the trumpets announcing the Horde's victory weant almost unnoticed by both sides. Orcs and State Troopers fought for just shy of a half hour past the trumpeting that announced the defeat of the Empire and Alliance, and the victory of the Horde. And at one moment Lorna was tempted to keep fighting, but she could see the spirits of the men flagging, the knowledge of their loss spreading and so she started working to bring the fighting to a stop. A bitter taste in filled the Gilnean's mouth, yet she had to admit the number of soldiers still alive, and that she was not to be a captive of the Horde was reassuring.
Still both sides had devestated one another. Little more than half the Alliance and Empire forces were either dead or wounded, and little less than half of the Mag'har were dead or wounded and destined to recover, though enough to ever fight again or not was of severe question for some of the Mag'har as their Empire counterparts had tires their hardest to kill and maim them and when they had failed to kill, maiming had worked sufficiently.
Raindrops split, cut in half by the arrow soaring for Baine's heart. But the High Chieftain despite the exhausting weeks siege had his senses as sharp as ever and his mace batted away the arrow while a second and third painfully but ultimately uselessly embedded themselves in his arm and thigh. Now close Baine's mace swept forward passing just over Shandris' head as she flipped back under and away from the attack.
However Baine was still too close and too fast, she wouldn't be able to get another arrow off without his mace breaking her bow or her arm. So instead a single curved blade was drawn and held in her right hand as the General swept her blade aiming for Baine's hand. But the Tauren was experienced and knew his opponent was both efficient and a veteran who had likely spent as much as half his lifespan if not more fighting on the front. With a pull back of his weapon he narrowly avoided losing his fingers and instead his fist collided with Shandris jaw sprawling her on the ground near the base of the crashed zepplin.
"Look at yourself, at all of this? Do you think this is peace? That this will make anyone be willing to talk? A crime against all life in exchange for a crime against the Kaldorei? If you stop now we can still bring the people to talk, we can prevent hate and spite from taking root and we can guarantee the future of Azeroth against whatever threats were presented to you on Mallus." Baine tried to reason with Shandris, he prayed to the Earthmother that she could see what he did. Thunder Bluff, Mulgore ablaze nature and the spirits screaming in agony, men fighting to their deaths in battle crazed states with no intent on sparing the lives of the other side.
Shandris wiped a trickle of blood running from her newly split lip and then spat out a trickle of the blood. "Just shut up and fight me already you deluded idiot." The Kaldorei General growled barring her fangs at Baine.
With a sigh the Tauren marched forward unwilling but ready to clash with his belligerent foe. Shandris rolled in her swords sweeping and drawing shallow cuts on Baine's legs as she rolled between them. In rage and pain he stomped sending a shockwave through the earth spoiling her recovery from the roll and forcing Shandris to take a knee or risk falling over allowing Baine to strike with his mace. The blow crunched and he could sense he harmed Shandris but she firmly braced against the blow before lashing out drawing her sword against the length of Baine's arm leaving a long cut along the length of the Tauren's arm.
Baine roared in pain pulling the limb back and stumbled away. But Shandris kept on her attack lunging for Baine's throat, but the High Chieftain would not let her. His left hand found her sword plunging through right until he could close his grip around her blade's hilt and her hand. Then with a mighty pull he lifted her of the ground slamming the Kaldorei into the dirt over and over again before tossing her again into the wreckage of the zepplin.
"Look at you. Dripping in Bloodlust and hate. I'm offering a peaceful solution and your blinded by conquest and a need for victory. Peace through threats and abuse will not last, it's what's done after the fighting that secures peace, but you won't give up your fight. You refuse to let us move on, losing the point you wanted to make with unending bloodshed and have instead moved on to trying to use a bomb." Baine lectured, feeling pity as Shandris unsteadily used the Zepplin to rise back to her feet. Her body was battered and bruised, and now a eye was starting to swell.
Both combatants drank small vials of healing potion. Shandris finished her first but while her bruses and swelling faded stayed where she stood glaring ar Baine dripping with sweat and rain water. "Listen to yourself, you self-righteous idiot. Where where you, where were the Bloodhoof when Azshara invited the Legion to our world, took my parents from me and threatened to end our world? Where were you, the Bloodhoof when the world was sundered and we all had to pick up what remained? The War of the Shifting Sands? It has always been Kaldorei sacrifice and Kaldorei strength that has kept this world alive. While it is the rest of the world and heartless traitors who invite disaster and conflict! I've had enough of you hypocrites who judge from the side while reaping the benefits of my sacrifice! Kaldorei can forget plenty in our lives, more than you will ever even know, but I haven't forgotten my duties, and what we've sacrificed. I'd rather die than let others lead us all to our deaths!"
Baine sighed, his heart aching. He could only guess the depths of Shandris' pain. "Then all we have left is to end this with violence, forgive me." Shandris drew her bow out and Baine charged intent to strike her before she could load and fire another arrow. Lightning struck illuminating the battlefield and revealing the glow of light in Shandris' hand, General of the Sentinel Army of Darnassus had once been a priestess of Elune, and she could still call upon her goddess' starfire from time to time. She threw the burning flames of creation into Baine the bolt striking him by suprise and in the face.
Yet for all it burned and the pain it induced, Baine was endurant and pressed forward sweeping his mace in a wide swing. However he struck nothing as Shandris ducked under launching a arrow directly into Baine's chest with such force it almost went through the High Chieftain entirely. Still partially blind Baine struck again, and this time his mace connected as he swung with all his might. Shandris hit by the full entirety of Baine's might found herself lifted from the ground and thrown back.
As vision returned Baine searched for his foe, had she used Elune's gift to evade? Was she lurking to strike from the shadows? Baine cautiously looked about for his opponent, only to freeze as he saw her.
With a arm broken and useless she clung to the rain slackened earth of Thunder Bluff slowly sliding and slipping with the flow of water and slowly dragged off the cliff. Her eyes were wide, panicked and full of fear. Seeing Baine she scowled, "Damn you." She muttered arm desperately trying to pull herself up to safety.
Baine leapt arm outstretched... and Shandris gave way, the wet soil no longer able to hold the catastrophe loosened rock crumbling beneath her. Baine could only watch, half off the edge himself as Shandris fell, her legs hitting the side of the cliff sending her tumbling head over heel away from the cliffs and into the smoke and mist down below beyond the High Chieftain's sight.
Reviews:
Guest 1: The canon change to the council was a mix of the writers being lazy, and trying to get out of their rut of "evil warchief" which could have been real easy if they had competent writers...instead their best writers think a brilliant strategy is to swim across a river in full plate armor while under arrow and lightning fire by an enemy who even had a numerical and additional terrain advantage.
And even then that change required the removal of Sylvanas and the guy who won the position of warchief dying in the act.
Guest 2: well 2 on 1 just isn't fair, Tyrande needs some allies.
Guest 3: Similar curses and blessings exist on Mallus, the Werecreatures of Mallus don't get any tabletop love besides the Skinwolves who are ironically fundamentally diffrent beings more akin to a weird possession that tears itself out from inside you Alien Style and vice versa. But the Worgen curse in general on Azeroth seems to be contained/controlled (and their lead lapdog is so proud of his leash) and Mallus has their own methods of treating or at least preventing the spread of similar curses, not the "cure" narrative BS that Blizzard likes to fall back on before then backpeddling away from the cure almost immediately (que "the Old Gods are all gone for good and forever and will never ever ever be back." two expansions later "so the Old Gods are totally a major power and not even close to defeated") but still effective enough to stop the spread enough to purge by fire.
To me there weres, but a were still isn't fundamentally the same as a human. Just like how Vampires, no matter how much glitter fangirls protest, are not "just like us" Vampires are fundamentally inhuman or human adjacent, but not human. While there's protest and back and forth weres are fundamentally the beast within, the creature is their true self or the thing that dictates the flow of their life. Blizzard just happens to be bad at writing, particularly in a manner that makes things similar to humans but are not humans behave in any manner that isn't just straight indistinguishable from a human...hell even cows and fish act just like average every day Californians...early 2000s Californians to be specific.
Onix121: here comes the sun, ~doo doo doo doo, here comes the sun, and i say it's all right.
Dragon King of the West: Well the whole plan never had the Empire holding land permanently.
Understanding her plans is harsh trial. She may have the best outcome in mind, but she'll use her own allies as ammo for her ambitions and plans.
As for the two, there's a detail that's being missed, and that's unfortunately skewed everything.
BloodRedRoses11: Sadly I don't think he''d be so lucky as the world hates black iron dwarves, but now if it was Kane well "rule of thumb hussad, you can't kill the Messaih". but zepplins can not soar down cliffs to rescue bob bomb for their license in Mulgore has been revoked.
Hakuryuu: No worries my coment more had to do that there are background mercs who at best have their name mentioned once and then some just played off as swordsman units or generic units.
For the gnomecorder sorry but I don't put stock in the Gnome comms equipment, if you need a device strong enough to send signals into space or for miles and miles, just to detonate bombs that are not only in LoS but on ships that are less than a mile away, you have some weak transmitters. A pocket radio could have detonated those bombs if they had closed a quarter of the distance more. And considering the Azerothean tendency to not see something right in front of them, I'm pretty sure the Gnomecorders used in game are tied to some fuck huge radio tower with a banner on it daying "Allince Gnome's radio station for region wide Alliance communications do not steal" complete with a Orc standing immediately in front of it after stepping out of the Horde regional HQ going "hmmm I wonder how the Alliance has such good comms? I was tasked with shutting them down but I just can't find any." All as said tower keeps scrapping the bottom of the Vindicaar as it completes its planetary orbit.
Code Geass Season 2 IMHO wasn't as strong as season 1. Incredibly good, but fell back into Gundam tropes a little too much.
Bringing back Mag'har equipment and junk would typically require a victory to get anything significant. of course Azerotheans/Dreanorians have awful material, logistical, and intelligence security, but I highly doubt the Empire would get much or anything of use.
Yeah holding back Teclis from ruining everything is a chore...timeline wise we'd be lucky to have another month before he starts fucking with the portals.
ScruffinMcguffin: That she is, but for the skulls i doubt they'd be able to...seeing as how the one's Baine fought are now dust.
Ravenguard0009: I'm excited since Ind will basically be the Order alt to Chaos, with Indian culture. I wonder which of the ancient kingdoms they'll base everything around, since India has had so many warring Empires who were straight brutalizing eachother essentially over racism right up until the Europeans showed up on boats wanting to sell drugs and buy "spices". But we have the Devas, the tigermen, and so many Indian cultures to chose from. So basically "not daemons", "not beastmen" and then either a medium weight infantry force of elite finesse fighters who still have a strong mainline, or like the fan made codex has with cheap garbage chaff troops and a few lighter unique skill troops.
On Azeroth it's total war, nukes are not necessary for total war to happen, the concept of total war is entire state vs entire state with no limitations in terms of what can be targeted, as in factories, cities, etcetera and the nations bring their full production capacity and full population into the war. For example the Punic Wars were total wars, but generally the concept was seen as inferior and borderline idiotic until the modern and pre-modern era as a new monetary system with centralized state banks meant that nations could shift the expenses and downsides of funding such wars away from the political elites or the king's treasury, or rich allies, and instead trick the people into shouldering the expenses of the war. Sadly to the detriment of the writing Blizzard never even under the best writers had the mental capacity or just the exposure to comprehend or even independently imagine what limited warfare looks like.
Which for the VAST majority of their plotlines a limited war would have served them immensely better than their all or nothing stories complete with Godzilla escalations and DBZ power scaling. While Wrath of the Lich King's story is ok...minus the fact Arthas was obviously helping you kill him for contrived BS that would have never paid off. Limited War escalating into a united all out against Arthas would have done the story better as he made limited goals and objectives, individual cities that would have allowed him to checkmate the entire world. Likewise for Cataclysm and Mists of Pandaria we're somehow to believe the Horde and Alliance are going at it total war style... yet really they weren't until after the authors moralized and made Garrosh into Hitler. And so somehow the Horde and Alliance are in a total war...yet the Adventurers are uninvolved comparatively and neutral parties somehow possess or can just demand and take the highest end military hardware... both those stories would have been better if the Horde and Alliance were engaged in limited warfare, some characters are obviously off fighting the war, but huge reserves of troops, equipment and ships are still not in use and can react to the threats of Old Gods and so these reserves spearhead the fight while the neutrals then fill in the gaps with their despicable grey neutralness.
Archmage of Necromancy: Sadly thats more my failure as a author, iIcouldn't write a proper response without either going into their fight, or using cliche lines/logic that I absolutely despise. Half of Shonen at one point or another use the lines I ended up writing a varient of and I just "fuck no" and decided to save the rest of their exhange for while their killing eachother.
JiggyliFAP: So skipping straight to the Gnome hate, did you know one of them shot Bambi's mother and blamed a nearby human for the crime, he even hired Walter Dizknees to make a movie putting the blame straight on the poor innocent human.
And Voland's Venators are you trying to make Anduin a Sissy ;)?
As for Venture company...either somehow zoning laws exist, orrr the whole setting favors inefficientcy to a extreme. "This gun can penetrate fourty feet of mythril and fires with atom splitting precision per the claims, so the two of us we are going to run at it with half a inch of steel on our chests while wielding a sharpened hunk of steel. We're totally going to win this!" I refuse to think anything other than a Ork is that stupid let alone another human whose supposedly a long time war vet...so likely the Venture Company have some shady reason for having to do it the way they are.
For the Forsaken Blizzard in their mind numbing attempts to simultaneously moralize everything, put national leaders as the ultimate badasses who don't need armies, advisors, or friends, and to "spare" us of any character deaths miss one ultimately badass and sort of evil thing the Forsaken could have been doing. Cue the Nightmare Empire of Cryx, the Kingdom that sure they were never ahead of the curb, but they always get their hands on advanced national secret level sciences sooner or later, because everyone even brilliant scientists dies eventually and if they have to help that process along then so be it.
I don't trust that 1% unless were putting the pre-WC3 High Elves at 300 million or more the total void elf population NPC or otherwise is larger than the entirety of the void elves, and thr High Elves wouldn't have population enough to do a quarter of the stuff Blizzard claims they've done...and still then the Blood Elves considering the events of Burning Crucade...yeah the fact they even participate in anything is a miracle.
As for Spellbreakers, considering the mechanics of how they operate they can probably dispell fairly well but they won't be able to shut down a Winds based magic user like they could a Mana based mage of Azeroth.
Frostwolves "aren't" neutral because the Alliance attacked them forcing them to seek Horde support. but it looks like they were going to flat out be full neutral. "With enemies you know where they stand, but with neutrals, who knows... it sickens me."
Bretonnia farming...*wavy flashback* "Get back to work!" "~Look down, look down, don't look him in the eye! look down, look down, you're here until you die~" *flashback ends* NEVER AGAIN!
Still were operating on a less than 20 year timescale for WoW...if everything was, well what its hyped to be, by Warlords they simply would have lacked the manpower to resist even with the occasional Tauren twin being born.
Everything else...*smug anime grin*
But for your back and forth with Hakuryuu, Dark Elves are very good at imitating High Elves and have their own people as spies in Ulthuan, i very much doubt any of them openly announce themselves as heartless slavers but instead just pretend to be high elves, though to those who actually know the High Elves well their nature might still give them away, but look at the Bleakswords and Dreadspears and corsairs their armor is very similar to the High Elf gear they likely use a mix of ignorance and basic disguise work to just trick people who don't know better.
micelzod: Indeed, will she be the next edgelord blindfold man? Will she go around saying "you are not prepared" while doing everything possible to conquer or destroy Azeroth? Will she actually have a well written path?