Horde Demon Hunters don't make a lick of sense in BfA

Community General Discussion
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I would argue that the bulk of the class halls have absolutely no reason to turn on themselves in BfA, but Demon Hunters take this to a new level.

Why are the class hall leaders taking part in the faction war and agreeing to slaughter their own? Well, the most common explanation I’ve seen the defenders of this story bring forth is loyalty to their faction. As in, our characters are loyal to the Horde / Alliance and therefore agree to fight for it.

Now, for many classes this is already a rather flimsy justification, because characters like Druids, Shaman, Paladins, Priests and Monks have devoted their lives to the pursuit of their class’ ideals. I’m not buying that a character who embodies these ideals to the point of being chosen to be the de-facto leaders of their class would agree to toss everything in the bin for what amounts to a nationality.

But what of Demon Hunters? What “faction loyalty” do they even have? The whole point of those elves deciding to become DHs is that they had lost everything they had to the Legion and wanted vengeance, so why would they suddenly become loyal to a faction later on?

Yet here we are in BfA. The Slayer, leader of the Illidari, gets orders from the Lich Queen to dissolve his order and butcher those among his brethren who happen to be born as Nightelves… and the Slayer complies. Why?

The same problem exists on the Alliance side as well, but there you could argue that the Slayer sees the Horde, and Sylvanas in particular, as an evil that needs to be destroyed, much like the Legion.

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Quite a subtle anti Sylvanas post You got there going buddy, for a moment I thought it was actually meant for why they fight.

And jeez I don’t know, it could be maybe because demon hunters are still proud of their race and PC demon Hunter does not see Sylvanas as you see her, but maybe more as the hero who sacrificed herself so that at least some Quel’dorei could be evacuated?

And where were you complaining when Night elven demon Hunter was helping Greymane attack Sylvanas’ fleet even when he was told not to?
Hmm?

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Quite a subtle anti Sylvanas post

And how dare they make an anti Sylvanas post!!

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Well what do you want to do about it ? Remove Demon Hunters from the game because they only made sense in Legion? Create a seperate Expansion for Demon Hunters because they don’t fit into BFA ? It is what it is and i’m not sure what Blizzard could do to so “solve” this

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Well it starts good but the last two paragraphs kill it.

Why do they fight for her?
Because writers wills it, because gameplay, it is not that deep.
Or would you be happier if they would be Legion exclusive?
Oh no that would be worse.
Well then, settle with “They are still proud of their race and the Ranger general who died so they could live.”

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Point made with the whole “Sylvanas sacrificed herself to save her people”. If you play through the Blood Elf heritage armor questline you get to learn a bit more about Sylvanas and Blood Elves’ connection/loyalty to her. Lor’themar(current blood elf leader) has a lot of respect for Sylvanas because she sacrificed herself to save her people when Arthas marched into Eversong Woods and massacred everyone.

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By the way OP, there are no Demon Hunter NPCs in Kul Tiras, Zandalar or the Warfronts, so I would say that it is clear that the Demon Hunters don’t care about the faction war. Your character is an exception for gameplay reasons.

Not that we need them, by the way. Sure they are a great weapon against the Legion, but I doubt that they would be of use against the Horde.

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Not writing the story to cause so many conflicts would be a start.
As I said, DHs are merely the most glaring of the classes in this regard. The Highlord, High Priest, Archdruid, Farseer or Grandmaster choosing Sylvanas over their own order doesn’t make much sense, either.

The point about Sylvanas sacrificing herself for the High Elves is decent, but doesn’t negate the fact that the Illidari spent years suffering and training together, nor the obvious fact that Sylvanas now is a completely different person.

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I know, but the story made sense to them so i doubt they really care about Demon Hunters making sense or not. We knew since the start of Legion that it’d be weird once this Expansion is over bc the Legion was defeated and that was pretty much our only purpose

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DHs choosing to continue fighting for Azeroth’s protection even after the Legion’s downfall would make perfect sense. The same happened with with the DKs. It’s only really a problem when you expect brotherhoods like the DHs (and DKs) to turn on themselves like this

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Again, what do you want them to do ? Create seperate storylines for classes where it would make sense ?

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Sylvanas hate posts come in all shapes and forms :laughing:

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As I said 2 posts ago, simply don’t write a story that raises conflicts like this.
A faction war story just doesn’t bloody work for a number of reasons, these class conflicts being only one of several.

Even putting aside that Sylvanas is the villain of this expansion, the story wouldn’t work if we had Voljin or Thrall as the Warchief either.
Sylvanas’ actions are the icing on the cake, but completely regardless of either faction’s leadership, having the order halls break up with no proper explanation just doesn’t work.

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I agree…

The faction war don’t make sense at this point in time anyway, and especially for Blood Elf Demon Hunters…

They abandoned everything to dedicate themselves to fighting the Legion. As they are so fond of reminding you of they sacrificed everything.

These elves fought shoulder to shoulder with Night Elves against horrors that would be too much to handle for most people.
They’ve lost friends, Blood Elven and Night Elven alike to torturous deaths.

The only thing they had, was the kinship between them. The fact that they did not stand alone.

Literally going through hell with someone, fighting back to back would forge a bond that’s not easily broken.
Just look at the soldiers who fought during World War 2. They forged tight bonds with their brothers in arms. The only other people on this world who went through what they did, with them.

It doesn’t make any sense that these Blood Elves would suddenly stab their friends in the back and start attacking their homes.

For the Night Elves you could make an argument for them joining the war against Sylvanas.

They became Demon Hunters in the first place to protect their home and their people.
Then Sylvanas commits a genocide against them, killing innocents and even children.
She could represent the same thing that the Legion did. A threat to the existence of their people.

The cooperation between races that the class halls saw, makes any faction war ridiculous in my opinion. At least for player characters.

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Fetch me my Fel Hammer and i’ll end this war quick and easy!

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gameplay =/= lore

For example like the Kul’Tirans would even DARE to put the Highlord into their prison (this is literally asking for a war). Same goes for the Netherlord (who could turn Tol’Dagor into a demon stronghold by himself from within). The Druids wouldnt be happy with it either etc etc etc.

Also imprisoning the Player in itself was already stupid considering our power in the world and ranking within the alliance (last time we were Generals before becoming class leaders. You dont put a General who acts as an emissary into a prison unless you beg for a war).

Just dont think too much into it, it simply wont make sense.

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In absolute fairness, blood elves demon hunters were Sunfury. The folks who dropped everything to follow their Prince on another damn world, ally themselves with monsters like Nagas or Illidan as long as it was for the good of their homeland. (Kael’thas did betray Quel’thalas, ultimately, but it would be after the blood elves joined the Illidaris.)
I don’t know for you, but I could see such people being still Ride or Die in the protection of their nation. Must blood elves are, to protect Quel’thalas.

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Sylvanus sucks no doubt about it. Selfish and anything but a real horde leader.

As for the Illidari fighting each others, well it’s the same issue with Horde vs Alliance as we allied to face bigger foes so many times it just feels forced to fight each other at this point. I consider it as a plot hole as even if a DH did all he did for his race/lost ones you would create bonds with your fellow Illidaris. This just doesn’t make sense. Not once in DH class hall characters were discriminated by their races.

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One could, if he for some reason wants to get any kind of logic into this, say the illidari that are your allies are the ones that follow you and the other ones that follow the one DH you kick during the campaign (which in my case would have been kayne)

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Demon hunter and DK have no reason beyond their expansion but due to game mechanics they have to stay.