So you’d rather just have him do nothing and be irrelevant? Since you don’t think that any of your suggestion will come to pass.
But, if he uses a T-pose he would completely assert dominance over everyone in the entire room, which wouldn’t work either. So I propose an A-pose as a compromise.
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If I were to chose between doing nothing, or accentuating the issues he already has, I rather he did nothing and left whatever lore the race is to have to other secondary characters.
Said sort of approach did wonders with the likes of Lorthemar, and with Dwarves in general.
There are middle grounds in between this, and absolute inaction. Baine doesn’t need to have a more proactive role in order to crawl out of the hole certain people put him in.
Not doing certain stuff would be enough in certain occasions.
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And I say that they’d might do that in 9.0. Hold your complaining until then. It’s over now and there’s nothing we can do, whether we like it or not. And we’ve presented most of the points and how we feel about this anyway.
Secondary characters…all irrelevant anyway. Hamuul is neutral, Magatha is a villain and 99% of people don’t have a clue who Jevan Grimtotem is.
We’re stuck with Baine. For good or for worse.
Wait a minute. We see a Screenshot of Baine being in Stormwind presumably on a mission of diplomacy, and people go mad, like he is a permanent fixture there. That might be for one scene. I mean in our real world, yes, an Ambassador to another nation tends to spend most of their time in that host nation, but that is not the case here. This is more similar to Nato and the Warsaw Pact in the latter half of the twentieth century. Why? Because it is not individual nations having Ambassadors to other individual nations, it is The two Superpowers talking.
You send a heavy hitter, and the Horde is running out of choices,
Rok’han? We don’t know enough about Rok’han’s stance on the Alliance as to whether he would be a good choice. I mean in ‘Shadows of the Horde’ we see that even Vol’jin, who was a fairly level headed dude, -hated- the Alliance, hence the whole begrudging (at first) friendship with Tyrathan Khort. So He’s pretty out of the picture until we get more of a feeling for what he is about, which is probably the Horde’s IC view also…
Talanji? Err, the Alliance just invaded her city in a lightning raid and killed her dad. You would have to be a Lunatic to think she would be a good choice.
Geyarah? Yeah, sending her to negotiate with a bunch of people that include Draenei is -bound- to end well. I’m sure she has no preconceived prejudices…
Thalyssra? I think that the Horde, IC, as much as people love to make jokes about them being stupid, would be self aware enough to realise that sending someone who looks like a Night Elf, when the Alliance’s Night Elf leader has went completely Bat-guano, would probably not be the most politic move ever.
In fact lets cut that, Mayla Highmountain seems reasonable, but she just doesn’t know the history outside of the Broken Isles enough to be a credible Diplomat.
Eitrigg? Same as Rokhan, we don’t know enough about his character as to whether he would even be suited as a diplomat, or would just flip a table, roar “You people disgust me!” and storm out of a meeting.
Thrall? A credible choice, possibly the only one that would fit easily. He’s not been behind the Horde’s most dastardly deeds, and was for a time, neutral. He has contacts in the Cross-Faction Earthern Ring, and there is his connection with Jaina. He was born in an internment camp for goodness sake (Well, not quite, but you know what I mean) Thrall would be a good choice as Envoy….
But…
He does have a tendency to just…walk away. Not from direct threats, he was foremost in working against Deathwing, but when -he- thinks things are all sorted, he just wanders off. I mean fair play to the dude, its not like he has not done anything with his life, but twice now he has just bimbled off, and things have gone horribly, horribly wrong. You can’t do that with World Geopolitics. Plus, he probably doesn’t want to, he was farming, He was Superman in ‘Kingdom Come’ (Kudos for having read one of the best graphic novels if you got that reference…).
Jastor Gallywix? For Real? Seriously! This is a guy whose own people don’t really like him, a guy who’s idea of a vanity project, is to set explosives, carve his own face on a mountain, and blow part of a continent into the Horde symbol. Even the Horde don’t trust him, so why should the Alliance? I mean heck, even the only person in the world who he does have a shred of emotion for, Maldy, sends him Pipe bombs in the mail each year to show how much she hates him!
Lor’themar Theron (and anyone who still goes ‘Bob?’ needs to play the game from TBC onwards again) . Now you’re cooking with gas. He -has- shown himself able to try and rectify misunderstandings, he has been able to set aside faction conflict for the greater good, he was even in negotiations with Varian Wrynn, who lets face it, was not the calmest of chaps. He also has that major quality you look for in a politician.
He doesn’t -want- the job, he just does it to serve his people. He’s high profile enough, being one of the only heavy hitters the Horde has left, it would be coming fresh from the Pan-Elven army cooperation in Suramar, and the cooperation in Naz’jatar, (although I swear he and Jaina just need to book a room somewhere, Liadrin can put some ear plugs in and read a book, and they can just get their hatef**k out of the way and go back to normal).
Major problem with him? Kinda the major problem with Elves in general. They will do what is best for -them- at that time. If what is best for them is what is best for the Alliance too, then you’re golden, if your interests do not coincide, all dice are off. It’s not that he is malevolent, it is just that in in everything, in his eyes, well, uh, eye, the needs of Quel’thalas come first.
It had to be Baine. It always had to be Baine. No one else has the right set of qualities that would make a successful Ambassador.
Alliance envoy to the Horde? It would have to have been Gelbin Mekkatorque. He has no personal issues or grudges to work out, is a ‘man’ who can think with pure logic, and like LTT, as we see in ‘Cut Short’, he really- really- cares and worries for his people.
Velen would have been a possibility, especially if he was sent to Silvermoon. Rommath would grumble, but lets face it, he did Silvermoon an absolute Solid. No one can deny that, plus, he is able to put aside Faction hatreds.
Falstad Wildhammer would not have been a bad choice either.
Really however, we are all missing the point, there would have been two ideal people, whose races cross the species divide between Horde and Alliance, who are ‘Neutral’ yet know enough history to have done the job…
I give you, Ambassador’s Khadgar and Gazlowe…. Heh, what, a man can dream.
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He forgets to mention that Baine warned Jaina of the attack and allowed civilians to evacuate. Baine is not a heartless monster as sees civilian casualties as just a part of war.
See? This is what working together can bring.
You’re not up to date on your 8.3 lore, Jastor is getting replaced.
Wait wait! Clearly I am not! This is honestly news to me, I must have missed that, Please tell me it is by Boss Mida…
No, Gazlowe is the new leader of geblins.
Yah he’s getting replaced by Gazlowe.
Nope. Sorry, it’s Gazlowe, explainig that Cartels don’t really matter anyway and the Horde is just a new employer.
Oh that’s fair, I didn’t suggest you made that point but I mentioned it just in case, since people did raise it in the past when discussing Baine.
To each their own, I don’t mind it at all and I can see why Baine is a good candidate. Yes, there might be better candidates possibly, but I wouldn’t say this is a narrative issue. The idea that Baine is a leader who prefers the Alliance over the Horde isn’t shared with all Horde players, a much more commonly shared opinion is that Baine doesn’t act well in times of crisis and has a flawed judgement (e.g. Taurajo being a “valid military target”), and whether Baine is a diplomat or not is irrelevant for that.
You’re really not messing with me here, for serious? Gazlowe! This is AWESOME!
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Yeah it’s been discussed for a while now. Take a look:
Baine is no ‘heavy hitter’.
And given his past actions, he is the last person I’d like to see in that kind of position and with that kind of power.
Diplomats are supposed to be capable of balancing the interests of the faction they represent with those of the one they are dealing with.
Baines background has had close to zero of the former and lots of the later.
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The dude is the High Chieftain, Chieftain of Chieftain of all Tauren tribes on Kalimdor, and one of the leaders of the Horde. That’s pretty much what I mean by a ‘Heavy Hitter’.
Simply not true. Baine balances his conscience and his loyalty and acts accordingly. He’s not hiding in the background going “oh no, we can’t attack the Alliance, that’s Eee-vil” at Theramore, he is quite happily kicking bums and taking names, however when he finds out about the Mana Bomb, he’s “Naw, that’s not War…” He is actually much more in keeping with Old Horde mentality at that point, than Garrosh is. Even after he leaks the information, his loyalty is still to his Faction and he fights… I mean it is all there in ‘Tides of War’, He is happy to stomp down Alliance, just on his terms that he regards as honourable. if that seems weird, then heck, Human history in our own world must really bake your bagel…
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Are you ignoring the fact that Baine had always talked about the Horde unity and interests and had brought the Highmountain into the Horde?
I know he’s been portrayed badly during most of his existence, but come on. This is some seriously biased statement with little to no substance to it, and was likely made out of frustration with the character.
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Alleria was sent in Silvermoon by Anduin as a sort of diplomat in order to convince the Blood Elves to rejoin the Alliance, even if her diplomatic skills are pretty much close to zero, as far as I know judging by her history with the Orcs anyway…and indeed she failed and almost corrupted the Sunwell in the process.
So it’s not the first time Blizzard pick a faction leader as a diplomat for the other faction, although the fact that they picked Baine is indeed hilarious, it’s like they want to reinforce the fact -or the meme- that he is indeed an Alliance spy/shill inside the Horde after all.
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Baine has always been a plant for the alliance. He helped them winning the war with Derek after all. Nobody should be surprised by this.
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