There is No Redemption for Sylvanas Windrunner and the Horde has No Honor

Well, I'll admit that I held out some foolish hope that we might see some trickery afoot - that the fire in Teldrassil might have some mysterious cause, framing Sylvanas for a more brutal attack than she had planned, pushing the war into overdrive.

But as her Warbringers short shows, it's all on her.

This plays in-game at the Burning of Teldrassil.

We see Sylvanas talking to Daeleryn Summermoon - an Alliance questgiver who has been aiding in the defense of Darkshore. Sylvanas explains how she saw hope dry up in the defense of Quel'thalas when she was killed by Arthas. But when Summermoon claims to grieve not for her people but for the hero Sylvanas once was, the Warchief orders her people to set Teldrassil ablaze.

Alliance players are given an impossible quest to save the people of Darnassus - I managed to get about 28 out of 982 to safety before becoming overcome with smoke inhalation, at which point Mia Greymane has you pulled out to safety.

Teldrassil is a massacre, no doubt about it, and there's really no getting around Sylvanas' total responsibility.

And to be frank, as a player (on both sides) I am not happy about this. Sylvanas is a straight-up villain. Morally grey means a mix of light and dark, that there's something redeemable about a person even if their methods are brutal. Sylvanas just doesn't have that. There's nothing defensible here. It's a preemptive war (note: preemptive war just means war. There's literally no difference except that you're trying to use a euphemism to distract from the fact that you're the aggressor.) It's an intentional slaughter of civilians.

There's one tiny kernel of honor among the Horde leaders in the attack, and Saurfang does nothing to try to prevent the burning.

So here's what I find frustrating:

Sylvanas is not conflicted, nor does she have defensible motivations. She's just evil.

The Horde is once again the aggressor - yes, you could point to Genn's attack on her in Stormheim, but remember how her mission there was to ENSLAVE a val'kyr?

My Horde main is an undead Rogue, and after the Desolate Council and now this, I think he's thinking very carefully about the opportune time to stick a dagger in Sylvanas' back.

It doesn't even make sense strategically - the plan was to turn Darnassus into one big group of hostages to ensure the Alliance didn't attack. Now the Alliance has no reason whatsoever to hold back. Sure, Sylvanas is luring the Alliance into a fight, but she's totally failing to learn the lessons Garrosh failed to learn - that you can't go 100% aggression without dividing the Horde.

Sylvanas has to be overthrown. And that's why I'm worried we're going down the Garrosh 2.0 path. This is worse than Theramore. We've either got to ask Horde players to continue playing the villain for the foreseeable future or we're going to just run through the same plot points as we did in Mists of Pandaria.

Surprise me, Blizzard. But don't confuse Sylvanas' actions with a cool, morally grey story. This isn't grey. It's just straight up evil.