I would be pretty stoked if the Sunwell is torched by sinister voidy magics. It could make belves cool again. And less… like Naaru-loving, moral-highground seeking, peacebloom toking knifeears.
I want elves that are cruel and savage. I want elves that backstab others because they want to, not because they feel they need to rescue a tub of spineless Baine-flavoured jell-o.
Thankfully we know that Jaina’s most powerful magic isn’t teleportation, it’s inconsistent character.
(also she totally abandoned Dalaran because they let the Horde back into the city during Legion so it wouldn’t even be that out of character).
It would be pretty out of character, sorry. I hope for the sake of the story that this will never be the case.
I’d rather have boring predictable scenario of N’zoth being the manipulator than have Jaina’s character butchered even more.
Jaina, who apparently invented the mass teleport spell within this generation as a mage prodigy.
She did? That’s… Stupid.
I mean really stupid.
Sounds just like Blizzard’s writing.
Incorrect.
Lady Jaina Proudmoore is a skilled practitioner of transmutation magic. She has developed a powerful variation of the popular mass-teleport spell that is capable of moving a significant percentage of her army with minimal effort. This spell helps make her extremely unpredictable on the battlefield.
https://wow.gamepedia.com/The_Schools_of_Arcane_Magic_-_Transmutation
Not quite.
‘‘Portals are suitable for moving a handful of individuals easily, but not usually stable enough for moving whole armies. However, Jaina Proudmoore is a skilled transmuter, and has developed a powerful variation of the mass-teleport spell capable of moving a significant portion of an army with minimal effort.’’
The stupid elf above me beat me to it.
Yeah, I’m not wrong. Her own variation is uniquely powerful, moving chunks of armies at a time.
Not in Warcraft 3, and not from the above. The unique aspect is that she can do so without as much mana cost, so she can do it more often. That’s why she’s unpredictable.
And that’s not uniquely powerful? Her ability to teleport into Orgrimmar isn’t out of character.
It is, but she didn’t invent mass-teleportation.
My point was that Jaina is exceptional with teleportation and that this feat isn’t so shocking and strange…
It not being out of character is a problem because if she can do that with apparently minimal effort then you start asking why she’s not doing it more often
like
just teleport a bunch of azerite bombs into grommash hold and then port back out again and watch it explode?
Or just teleport an army past all the defenses?
Or just teleport in and then force teleport the horde armies 1500 feet into the air and watch them fall?
Funnily enough they DID address this sort of thing in a novel - the Shattering - where teleporting was impacted in ironforge due to the wards that Moira activated, and Anduin’s hearthstone allowed him to slip past. But apparently Orgrimmar, the central capital of the Horde, doesn’t have those because…
writing!
Because Horde doesn’t have access to powerful mages. Haha.
The Horde has similar means to level Stormwind into a crater but don’t because…?
It’s a crag filled with huts? Maybe they’ll point out how the new mage portal room is a heavily warded hub to protect it these days in the next WoW novel?
YES! That is my point! I even mentioned this in my initial complaint post!
It’s a capital city, filled with buildings made of stone and wood - just like Stormwind, you ethnocentric ruder.
Wasn’t much made of the significant advantage of telemancy in the big “Bilgewater cannon vs Vindicaar” faction ending WMD debates in days of yore? Oculeth could put a blood elf mana bomb in the driver’s seat and the spaceship goes down.
Clever, tactical solutions are held back for dramatic storytelling effect and objectively stupid military moves are applied instead so that we get big, epic, dramatic battles rather than quick, war ending moves that would make sense within the established scope of avaliable means and character power.
The Horde evidently have intercontinental catapults capable of burning an entire zone and can make it even stronger with the right magics. Telemancy places a handful in the heart of Westfall and lets loose in the general direction of Stormwind keep. Alliance gonezo.
But this isn’t done. The exceptionally able Jaina uses a power she is known to possess and already used recently in the Undercity siege isn’t strange either. The oddity lies in such not being a more common occurance.
A treasury better warded than a canyon filled with huts, clearly.
Yes. She is uniquely able and Oculeth has been geographically and informationally isolated for millennia.
Probably, when the plot calls for it, utterly crapping on its defences as a capital city like breaking someone out of the stockaaahwaitaminute!
Cue azerite boosted blight nuke telemanced’ into Stormwind keep. If we applied logic and avaliable means.
I think we’re basically in agreement here.
Free teleporting=bad for story coherency. At some point you just get into tippyverse territory.
Don’t forget a city of stone burning because Zul wills it.
In fairness, if anyone knows how to set Stormwind on fire it’s probably the guy who can predict the future with pretty good accuracy.
It’s a city of stone and wood, and if Notre Dame proved anything it’s that wood and stone buildings can burn pretty well if you find the right spot.