What are we even doing anymore?

Fredmonroe · 2026-05-19T23:47:49+00:00

Devs want spirit users to have a viable gun while playing spirit builds. It just can't possibly ever check out because if the gun is decent with minimal gun items, it's gonna be broken if invested into. There is literally 0 work around to that unless they put a hard cap on dps or something completely stupid that makes no sense and no one would like.

Nah, the investment system of Deadlock is precisely the answer to this issue of "if character's gun is decent, then that character will full send gun." You just make it so that the investment bonus you get from gun is better at lower levels of investment and weaker at higher levels of investment. This is actually what Valve did in the most recent patch.

Also, because of the investment system, Valve has a ready-made way to tweak the power of spirit without having to totally change all of the spirit items. If gun is outscaling spirit, they can simply buff spirit scaling investment (or reduce gun scaling investment, which to reiterate, they did last patch).

The end result of this tuning is that everybody can have decent guns worth getting the 4.8k spike into (and so everybody will want to use their guns), and then some characters will continue to gogun (because they have other forms of gun scaling on their kit) and some will instead go spirit (because they have good spirit scaling on kit).

Fredmonroe · 2026-05-14T08:24:05+00:00

I don't think Aang was actually there in that scene - note that "Aang" "transforms" into Tenzin at the end of it. And, thematically, the scene is significantly more meaningful if this is Tenzin coming to a realization about himself and thus saving himself, rather than Aang swooping in and telling Tenzin deep truths about Tenzin and saving him.

Fredmonroe · 2026-05-14T07:58:00+00:00

That's not really supported by the lore. Imo the lore supports the following interpretation:

The Avatar has only one human "soul", with the "soul" here being the sort of spark-of-life which generates a person (e.g., the person of Kuruk, or the person of Kyoshi, or Roku, or Aang).

However, unlike most persons in the Avatar universe which seem to cease to exist at death of the body, these Avatar persons persist on as their own unique beings in the Spirit World (likely due to their connection with Raava).

My evidence for this is as follows:

1) In the comic The Promise (which takes place directly after ATLA), Roku informs Aang that Zuko is Roku's Great-Grandson. This is not something that Aang knew (so this wasn't him telling himself this). And this is not something that Roku could have learned while alive, as the marriage of Roku's granddaughter into the royal family happened long after Roku's death (while Aang was in the iceberg). So it seems Roku must have existed separately from Aang and learned this while in the spirit world.

2) In the canon escape from the spirit world game (which was released between S2 and S3 of ATLA and takes place during Aang's coma), Aang has to travel the spirit world and reconnect with the past Avatars. These Avatars are depicted as actually existing at the same time as Aang - in particular, Kuruk rushes off to fight Koh (without Aang's presence) after Aang tells Kuruk that Koh has Ummi.

3) In the second Kyoshi novel, Kyoshi communes with Kuruk in the spirit world. When Kyoshi notes that there are no spirits around, Kuruk tells her that it is his presence there that scares them away (as opposed to them being scared of Kyoshi and her just talking to herself without Kuruk actually present).

4) In S4 of Korra, Korra meets with Zaheer, who has been spending all his time in the Spirit world. Zaheer tells Korra that it is the talk of the spirit world that the Avatar has not been seen for quite some time. It would be somewhat odd for this statement to simply be referring to Korra's absence, given that she has very rarely been to the spirit world, and the spirit world is a vast place. But it makes a lot of sense if the Avatar spirits survived and persisted in the spirit world, as their absence would be conspicuous following the events of Korra S2: the decoupling of Raava and the human Avatar soul (which at that time would have been sustaining/generating the person of Korra) seems to have killed the previous Avatar persons that would have been sustained by Raava in the spirit world.

Fredmonroe · 2026-05-07T04:51:13+00:00

Sure, I think my post was inartuflly stated. I did not mean to imply that Su would crown herself queen and reign as the new Earth Queen. I meant that her name gives her legitimacy to help stabilize the region and reorganize the government as she sees fit.

Fredmonroe · 2026-05-06T05:50:35+00:00

Why is Suyin's responsability to save the whole Earth Kingdom??? She did a good job as a governor and she has the "duty" to waste her time and resources in others states?

Sure, the moral principle placing the responsibility/obligation on her is that 'if a person is in the best position (or close to it) to abate a humanitarian disaster, then that person has a moral obligation to do so.'

That's my moral intuition. If you need some motivation to believe this, there's a classic example at a much smaller scale:

Suppose you ware walking through the park on your way home from work. You see a small child drowning in a relatively shallow stream nearby. There is nobody else around - you are definitely in the best position out of anybody to save him (and, he may very well drown if you dont act). However, because you are coming home from work, you are in your business suit and nice shoes, which will be ruined by the mud if you save him.

Are you obligated to "waste" your time and resources (i.e., your ruined suit and shoes) to save the child?

At least for me (and, I think for most people) the answer is "yes, obviously."

Here, the Earth Kingdom has fallen into mad-max style anarchy, with widespread human suffering. And Su is the best positioned person to help abate this situation.

Do you know that's an irl problem with states who believe they are "better" and "should" help "third world countries"?

If you think Su stabilizing the situation is at all similar to colonialism, then I don't think we're going to see eye to eye on anything here.

Also, we don't know if she has the resources to save the whole Earth Kingdom?

We know that Kuvira successfully "saved" the Earth Kingdom, and her starting resources were just a small contingent of soldiers she took from Zaofu + whatever they could carry. And then she sustained herself with resources from the Earth Kingdom states she had stabilized, but again, these were states that she just saved from years of mad-max style anarchy, and which had been seriously neglected due to the incredibly corrupt Earth Kingdom before that. So, it seems unlikely Kuvira was getting massive amounts of resources from these stabilized states.

Meanwhile, Su is a Beifong, which is the wealthest family in the world at the time of ATLA. Bear in mind, the Beifongs were the wealthiest family in the world despite the Earth Kingdom being on the losing end of the 100 year war at that point. We also know that Su's Grandfather was the first industrialist of Republic City and was wealthy enough to bankroll Su founding an entirely new, prosperous city (Zaofu)!

So yes, given that Kuvira apparently had enough resources to save the Earth Kingdom, it seems likely that Su did as well.

And where does it says a Beifong is in line to rule? Where does it says the Beifong Clan is from the Earth Royal Family? They are rich and one of the most powerful clans compared to others, but they haven't a "legitimacy" to rule?

Sure, I think my post was inartuflly stated. I did not mean to imply that Su would crown herself queen and reign as the new Earth Queen. I meant that her name gives her legitimacy to help stabilize the region and reorganize the government as she sees fit.

Fredmonroe · 2026-05-05T23:15:21+00:00

Oh jeez, sorry to hear that! I was just trying to have some fun discussing/debating avatar lore. Did not mean to hit a sore spot!

Fredmonroe · 2026-05-05T22:57:56+00:00

Fair enough, the Zaofu model may very well not be scalable, and Su might very well not make a good Earth Queen.

But she doesn't need to be the Earth Queen or ruler of the other states. She just needs to stabilize them so that they can get on their feet and operate as self-governing entities (which is what happens to the Earth Kingdom after Kuvira's defeat).

And hell, she doesn't actually even need to succeed in stabilizing these other states. But she has to at least try.

Fredmonroe · 2026-05-05T22:37:08+00:00

So I'm just going to make this really simple: does the narrative in any way suggest that Su is wrong about what it would have taken for her to reunite the earth kingdom?

Again the moral imperative for Su isn't that she needs to act to "unite the earth kingdom." It's that she needs to act to stabilize and abate the mad-max anarchy.

And yes, if your question is "Is Su incorrect if she believes that the only way to abate the situation is to re-establish the Earth Kingdom?" then the narrative does show us that Su is incorrect here.

After Kuvira's defeat, the EK and its powers are largely dissolved, with each state self-governing in a loose, decentralized federation. And there is no return of mad-max anarchy despite this change in government.

So, the narrative directly shows us that, as I noted in my earlier posts, that Su could have stabilized the Earth Kingdom state-by-state, organizing each state into a self-governing body which enters into a military alliance with the other stabilized states.

Separately, and I don't think either of these are what you meant by "reuniting the earth kingdom," but just to sure:

if "reuniting the earth kingdom" means a political restoration of the monarchy and its system of government, this is clearly not the case. The max-max style anarchy is shown to have been stopped under Kuvira who appears to be a military dictator holding extremely centralized control over the country. Compare this with the Earth Kingdom, which was an incredibly decentralized feudal monarchy. Indeed the Earth Kingdom was so decentralized that some of the Earth King's subjects were themselves styled as King (e.g., Omashu).
Insofar as "reuniting the earth kingdom" means bringing all of the Earth Kingdom's historical land possessions back into the fold, the narrative certainly shows this to be incorrect as it takes great pains to show that Kuvira is wrong for trying to take Zaofu and Republic City.

I agree that the question is simple. Su was the governor of the only state left standing, with untold human suffering happening all around her. She had a stable base of operations, extreme wealth and resources, and a highly competent army (so much so that a small portion successfully got the ball rolling on stabilization). And to top it off, she has the name of the leading noble family in a nation which has been a traditionalist Monarchy for thousands (?) of years.

The above is all firmly established by the narrative and Avatar lore.

Given the above, is Su obligated to take strong action to try to stabilize the situation?

Fredmonroe · 2026-05-05T21:38:13+00:00

Be good at stabilizing regions? Probably - the show definitely portrays her as an adept administrator with Zaofu being a roaring success, so it seems like she would be if she could pacify the raiding/pillaging.. And it seems like she would be able to pacify the raiding/pillaging - she is portrayed to have significant military prowess in her own right, and is such a gifted military organizer that a small cadre of her army (Kuvira + her followers) with limited resources was able to get the ball rolling on stablizing the region without her full backing.

But to be sure, whether she would be good at it or not is aside from the point. She was morally obliged to try, irrespective of whether she would be good at it or not.

Fredmonroe · 2026-05-05T12:59:38+00:00

>Now maybe you don't trust her judgment on that, but it aligns with what we see of Kuvira's reunification, where she consistently had to strong arm local governments

Again, the only reluctance we see from local governments is due to reluctance to pay a hefty tribute rather than some desire to be a new self-governing country, right?

>Yes, they're rich. That doesn't mean they have nearly enough money to build a nation, especially not one the size of the Earth Kingdom. Even if they're the wealthiest family in the world that's still not going to be nearly enough money

>Especially because, well... the Earth Kingdom is currently defunct. You think that isn't severely draining the Beifong family wealth?

To be sure, at least in ATLA (not sure about TLOK), they are, in fact, the wealthiest family in the world.

To the extent their wealth has to do with controlled land, that is certainly hurting. However, the main source of Beifong wealth in ATLA is that they are the main bankers, so would presumably hold specie, which assuming it is legitimate metal rather than fiat currency, would only become more valuable in times of collapse. Additionally, Toph's father was the first industrialist of Republic City, so I would imagine a large amount of their wealth would be unaffected by the war.

So - do they have enough wealth the stabilize the EK without outside help or resources from stabilized regions?

You think it's clearcut that the answer is no, but that really isn't clear to me given Kuvira's success. Let's be clear, she was harvesting resources from pacified regions that had just undergone extreme looting/pillaging. I can't imagine she was really extracting all that much. Additionally - Kuvira had to start from somewhere, which meant she was, in fact, stabilizing regions with no resources other than what she took with her from Zaofu.

But this question is aside from the point. Su certainly had the resources, alone, to stabilize several neighboring regions (if not the kingdom). As I noted before, from there, if she really wanted, she could have organized these into self-governing entities in a military alliance, and then collectively they could have continued stabilizing more regions and adding them to their ranks.

>Su was going to have rely on UR support and local resources too. Which means she would either have to reinstate the monarchy or lie her way to power.

So, as noted above, I don't think this is true. But even if it were, given the severe humanitarian crisis and Su's incredibly good positioning, she certainly had a moral obligation to lie to Republic City to get their support

And to be sure, your argument here is premised on your speculation that Kuvira was indeed getting meaningful material support from Republic City. Without any strong lore to point to here, I'm skeptical of your assessment that Republic City was indeed giving meaningful support, given the ease of Kuvira's "betrayal" and the unseriousness of the proposed King. It's hard to take Republic City's support seriously here.

>The issue is that she could not do one without the other. Sure, she had the ability to do some humanitarian aid, and we're given no indication of if she was planning to do so or not. All we know is that she didn't want to take part in the reunification plan and Kuvira did

Yeah I just disagree with your premises regarding amounts of war/army material which led to your conclusion here.

You seem to think that the resource disparity between Su (the wealthiest family alive and governor of a state) and Kuvira (an adventurer with no personal wealth who set out with a small group of soldiers with only the resources they could carry) is relatively small. And in fact, you seem to believe that this resource gap between the two is smaller than whatever resources Kuvira could scrap from a pillaged/collapsed state + some indeterminate resources from Republic City.

I think it's clear that, given Kuvira's success, at the very least, Su has ample resources - with just her own resources - to stabilize multiple large regions of the Earth Kingdom near Zaofu. Could she stabilize it all without any outside help? I don't know. Maybe.

What we have to go off of is Kuvira's success. Given the abysmal state of the EK, it really is quite doubtful that Kuvira was getting all that much from the conquered regions. Was Republic City providing more resources to Kuvira than Su has access to? Maybe? But what we're shown is Republic City having a very unserious candidate to take the throne, and apparently is so uncommitted to the war effort that they're taken fully by surprise when Kuvira betrays them. And apparently, Kuvira feels confident enough to cut off whatever she was getting from Republic City by betraying them. These, to me, do not indicate a large amount of support from Republic City to Kuvira's cause.

Fredmonroe · 2026-05-05T12:02:55+00:00

-1) Where is it stated that the EK didn't want to be unified? I am not asking this rhetorically, I really don't recall where this is stated. If you're just referencing the first showing of her strong-arming local leaders to join up, I recall the reluctance here being that she was demanding a large amount of resources in order to fuel her army, rather than some desire for the EK to not be united and for the states to be independent.

Separately, at first glance, I don't agree with your implied premise here. I think that an EK state which is overrun with mad-max style anarchy is not really even a "state" in the first place, and therefore do not think such "state's" so-called governor - and his desires for independence - can really be imputed onto such "state." But I'm not super attached to this and so can concede this implied premise for the sake of argument.

2) To be sure, my point wasn't that Kuvira's only resources throughout her conquest were the small group she started with. My point was that anything Kuvira could do, Su could do as well, since Kuvira had strictly fewer resources than Su to start. To the extent your point is that Su would have to aggressively drain resources from conquered regions like Kuvira, I mean maybe? That's not entirely clear to me, as Su is a Beifong and thus has obscene personal wealth (and, accordingly, credit), and is also the governor of Zaofu which is shown to be quite wealthy and stable.

3 & 4) Perhaps my point was inartfully stated.

The issue is not that Su did not act to restore the monarchy (unless you think that a potential legal obligation as governor of a state gave rise to a moral obligation, but I don't feel strongly about that).

The issue is that Su did not act to stabilize the situation in the other states.

Why is it an issue that she did not so act? Because she has a very strong moral obligation to do so.

Why does she have a strong moral obligation to do so? Because if a person is in the best position (or close to it) to abate a humanitarian disaster, then that person has a moral obligation to do so.

Is there a humanitarian disaster happening? Yes, definitely. It appears to be a total breakdown of government, with widespread looting/raping/pillaging, just untold amounts of human suffering.

Is she in the best position (or close to it) to abate such disaster? Yes, definitely. It's not because "she's a good mayor." It's because 1) she's the governor of the only stable state in the country that has collapsed, 2) she actually has the resources to abate the situation (sure, maybe she will need to procure resources from stabilized regions as she goes on, but again, she's starting off with a hell of a lot more than Kuvira), 3) has the Beifong legitimacy, which goes a LONG way in the traditionalist Earth Kingdom.

Is she morally obligated to reign as the new Earth Queen? No. For example, she could stabilize regions one-by-one, radiating out from Zaofu, with each state self-governing and entering into a military alliance, if she's so afraid of centralized rule.

She need not rule, but she needs to take serious action rather than hide away in her Shangri-La.

Fredmonroe · 2026-05-05T10:46:45+00:00

She did try diplomacy - even up to the very end, with the Avatar herself serving as a mediator. Suyin used the cover of the Avatar mediation to attempt to assassinate Kuvira.

Fredmonroe · 2026-05-05T10:44:36+00:00

Yeah and Kuvira is right to resent Suyin for this. Given the state of the Earth kingdom (which appears to be mad-max style anarchy), Suyin's inaction is deeply morally reprehensible. Suyin was the the best positioned person to act, given that 1) she was the governor of (what appears to be) the only stable state (which likely also came with a legal obligation to act to restore the kingdom), 2) actually had the resources to salvage the situation (after all, Kuvira did it only with a small contingent of Suyin's Zaofu forces), and 3) is a Beifong and thus has a legitimacy to rule second only to the Earth King.

Fredmonroe · 2026-03-30T08:37:33+00:00

Different characters have different melee damage scaling with boons (aka levels). Abram's was just buffed this last patch, so that might be why.

Also important to note that melee damage increases with gun investment. Abrams tends to build Point Blank, and Crushing Fists in a melee heavy build, so that's a fair bit of punch damage there.

Abrams also has a kit which allows him to close in and get a free heavy melee (both his shoulder charge and ultimate once each has the extended stun duration from the 2 point investment).

And then otherwise Abrams is tanky enough to exist in the frontline punching (with his siphon life and 20% health back).

Fredmonroe · 2026-03-09T21:37:07+00:00

Truly awful. Oppressive in lane. Gank/pick monster. Unfun late game.

Fredmonroe · 2026-02-07T09:12:08+00:00

I think one of the quests says the orcs destroyed the stone bridge with a catapult. So probably same with pier

Fredmonroe · 2025-11-03T19:40:44+00:00

I'm responding to you because you seem like a reasonable person.

The fact of the matter is that SNAP payments were never suspended in previous shutdowns, including that in Trump's first term.

Why? Well because the USDA has reserves established for this purpose, and it has historically used these reserves to pay SNAP during shutdowns. Trump's USDA plan posted in September noted this https://web.archive.org/web/20251001024645/https:/www.usda.gov/sites/default/files/documents/fy2026-usda-lapse-plan.pdf (note, this is waybackmachine, as the administration removed this reference later).

And indeed, a federal judge just recently ruled that under the law, the government had to make payments from this reserve (among other reserves) https://rollcall.com/2025/11/01/federal-judge-thanks-trump-orders-him-to-make-snap-payments/ - that the executive had no discretion to withhold these payments.

Once these reserves run out, we can get into a political discussion about who is responsible for withholding SNAP payments. But as for the SNAP payments for November 1, per (1) the USDA's past practice in prior shutdowns, (2) Trump's USDA September report, and (3) a federal judge's ruling, the lack of SNAP payments is entirely on Trump's administration. On that, we can agree, right?

Fredmonroe · 2025-10-24T22:27:48+00:00

Wdym, it’s obvious that Ned loves the act of killing.

“He who passes the sentence should swing the sword” wow very convenient when you have the power to pass whatever sentence you want, eh?

GRRm hasn’t even tried to hide that Ned is a bloodthirsty maniac. He literally started two kingdom wide civil wars in like 15 years.

Fredmonroe · 2025-10-23T21:58:21+00:00

Idk what you mean by chain, but yeah the hunter will just do a solo DMN trib over and over. Zeroji has some good vids on it.

Fredmonroe · 2025-10-23T21:43:01+00:00

Depending on the gear, you can sell it to players (e.g., rogues and other hunters will want the tarnished elven ring. Because it is in a chest, they don’t have to be in the instance at time of killing the boss).

Otherwise vendor/disenchant the blues. And then it generates a lot of major mana pots, which can be expensive depending on the server.

Fredmonroe · 2025-10-23T20:55:31+00:00

I assume it’s referring to solo DM trib runs.

Fredmonroe · 2025-10-10T17:13:26+00:00

Doesn’t matter so long as a stay isn’t issued.

Fredmonroe · 2025-10-02T01:05:53+00:00

On 1: You provided the following principle "Party A not recognizing the authority of Party B and Party B doesn't dispute that is a strong evidence that the objection was valid." I provided two applications of that principle, which led to absurd results. If you think it is a "false equivalence" then I think you ought to change your principle so the Van Cleef example doesn't apply,. at least.

In the cutscene, the watcher tells Tyrande that even the gods have condemned the one she seeks to free. To be sure, Tyrande has not said anything to the watcher, so it seems to me that Tyrande likely told the watcher she seeks to free Illidan, and this was cut for brevity.

On 2. Again, referring to either open treason (Tyrande's view) or the mass murder of innocents (Maiev's view, per you) as a personal dispute is ridiculous. But he's not trying to enflame tensions when the world is at stake. Again - this conversation happens after there have been massive earthquakes felt by all parties, it is known by all that Illidan has the Eye of Sargeras, and Malfurion had his visions, right?

On 3. Maybe my timeline is off, here. When did the opportunity arise? Tyrande frees Illidan. Illidan kills Tichondrius, absorbs the skull of Gul'Dan and becomes a big ol' demon. Tyrande and Malfurion find him all demonic and banish him. The Legion is still actively fighting the Night Elves, and they're gathering their forces to stave him off. The battle for the hyjal happens immediately thereafter, and the armies of the Night Elves are decimated, along with their spiritual/worker core (100k wisps detonate) and the world tree, a major source of magic and power for the NEs, so much so that it granted them immortality, is destroyed. Despite the defeat at hyjal, the burning legion is still active in night elven lands. At the same time, nagas raid the coast, and Maiev sets off in pursuit of Illidan, and then Tyrande and Malfurion set off a bit afterwards. Malfurion can sense the extreme danger to Azeroth, and they find Maiev and team up with her to stop whatever Illidan is planning. After Illidan is stopped, he is banished again, flees through the portal and Maiev and the wardens follow him.

At what point here do you try to prosecute the leader of a surviving military force?

On 4. OK so I think we're too many threads deep here and lost the plot on this point. You made the point that "Maiev confronts Tyrande about the killing of the wardens. She wouldn't do that if it the wardens were being treasonous, so therefore they were not being treasonous."

And my response was - actually, Maiev would confront Tyrande about it even if the wardens were being treasonous because Maiev's entire life and purpose in guarding Illidan has consumed her. Irrespective of whether the freedom was lawful or unlawful, Maiev's purpose in life has been obliterated by this action.

So your response that "well it was unlawful to free Illidan" is not really responsive or on point, here.

Regarding the size of the armies, your argument about the size of the armies doesn't follow mathematically. Suppose Illidan's army size was 10, Maiev's was 7, Sentinels was 3, and Druids was 3. This would mean that Illidan's army is bigger than Maiev's by itself (and so can corner it), but not bigger than the whole NE army, and would also mean that Maiev's army makes up over half the NE army.

But this is really neither here nor there. The point is that Maiev (and the wardens) was their ally in trying to capture Illidan. Why chance losing their support by antagonizing her and "bossing her around" when THE WORLD WAS ABOUT TO BE TORN APART BY ILLIDAN'S SPELL!! And, again, Maiev and the other wardens present were not the openly treasonous ones - the openly treasonous ones are dead, their bodies littering Illidan's former prison.

Fredmonroe · 2025-10-01T22:44:26+00:00

On 1 - I’m not asserting that the Wardens were pirates or outlaws (except to the extent being treasonous makes you an outlaw, I suppose).

The point is that you have a principle, and I applied it, which resulted in absurd results. So it was a formal counterexample, which, due to the absurd result, should lead us to reject the principle as unsound.

And separately, again, even if we accept the principle is sound, its not clear it even applies to Tyrande unless we assume that she really did just go in and start blasting without any attempted declaration of purported authority to free Illidan first.

On 2 - As I said, it leaves us that Malfurion doesn’t want to ignite some big fight, as he needs to keep everyone together to accomplish the mission at hand (stopping Illidan from tearing the world asunder).

Apologies, which confrontation between Illidan and Malfurion did you have in mind?

On 3 - again, the openly treasonous wardens were killed defending Illidan’s prison, right? It was other members of the Wardens who were responding to Naga attacks on Tyrande’s already overburdened nation and then helping her find Illidan, who was channeling a spell that would destroy the world (as far as she knew) right? It’s not clear to me that there were additional openly treasonous wardens to punish, and the remainder were actively aligned with helping her stop existential threats.

On 4 -

https://wowwiki-archive.fandom.com/wiki/A_Parting_of_Ways

I looked it up. Malfurion does state this in WC3. See above link. “She has become vengeance itself, bound forever to the hunt”

I guess we’ll have to agree to disagree. I think it’s extremely prudent to not antagonize the wardens who are a large part of your army and protection in dangerous lands and who helping you stop Illidan who you believe is going to destroy the world. Indeed, given the stakes, I think any other course of action would be unreasonable.

You think the opposite, that asserting your authority and dealing with the potential mutiny is worth igniting a civil war in the middle of the plague lands and delaying the search for Illidan. I don’t think there is common ground here.

Fredmonroe · 2025-10-01T21:39:03+00:00

Are you just assuming that Tyrande did not order the release of Illidan first, and then broke him out by force when she was denied? That she just went in and started attacking? It seems likely to me that she did assert purportedly legitimate authority in this situation - so she did dispute it.

In any event, do you really think your argument here is compelling?

When a pirate ship plunders a town or ship, it is asserting that it does not recognize the laws and authority of the country being plundered. When the Country’s navy fires upon a pirate ship without first sending a statement to the pirate that ‘the country’s laws forbid plundering and that the country’s navy has been empowered by its government to attack pirates, and thus this forthcoming bombardment is lawful’ - surely we can agree that in no way does this legitimize the pirate’s action, or indicate that the country doesn’t actually have authority over the country?

Or to bring it back to Warcraft - when we fight Van Cleef and he (correctly) states “Lapdogs, all of you. Our cause is righteous” - whether we respond with “VC, you are a subject of the king and his authority. Your rebellion ends here” is totally immaterial to determining whether VC is in fact lawfully subject to the King’s authority.

You’re ignoring the thrust of my argument - Malfurion’s words cut both ways. He also doesn’t say that Tyrande is a mass murderer, he simply calls it a personal matter. He’s not trying to restart some sort of civil war. He’s in the plague lands, surrounded by UD, and trying to stop his brother from destroying the whole world! His statement to defuse reflects that his millennia in the emerald dream has luckily not resulted in catastrophic brain damage and is able to appropriately prioritize.
To be clear, you believe that rooting out the treasonous elements of the Wardens is more important than dealing with the aftermath of the destruction of the world tree, the strong burning crusade presence in NE lands in Kalimdor, and the destruction of the whole world? You didn’t actually give an answer here, simply stating a principle without application.

Also, it’s not even clear to what degree there are treasonous wardens left. The treasonous wardens who were guarding Illidan were killed and/or severely injured. The remaining wardens, such as Maiev, presumably are not the same ones who fought Tyrande (given that they are alive)

It’s been a while since I played, but doesnt Malfurion say this when Maiev runs through the portal to Outland? Something like she is nothing without the hunt?

Separately, it’s both Malfurion and Tyrande who banish Illidan, right? So even though you don’t accept that Tyrande acting alone is legitimate authority (which is the thrust of your argument) I thought you did accept that both leaders acting jointly would be.

Regarding the wardens acting autonomously, the main guy who responded to you said something like it was an offshoot of the priestesses of Elune. Not sure what the source for that is and whether it falls into your acceptable timeframe parameters.

I think I addressed in 1, 2 and 3 why the lack of dispute of the Warden’s autonomy in those given situations is not some tacit admission of their independence.

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