Sylvanas has always existed in a "just one toe over the line back in the hero part of anti hero" space since she became undead. The fact that she continued development of the Blight after being released from the Lich King's grasp was always very shady, but there was a slight angle on it where one could justify it as a weapon to use against the Scourge and maybe the Scarlet Crusade.
When I started playing WoW in Vanilla, my Undead Rogue was actually a later character I rolled - in fact, I was initially going to play an Undead Mage, though vanilla casters were a super pain in the ass to solo (actually, everything was kind of terrible to solo on, but casters, who could see spells extended to four times their cast time if they were getting hit in melee were particularly painful.) My initial impressions of the Undead were that they seemed to be for "edgy" players, though this was very early in my WoW playing and was a time when I thought Gnomes were redundant with Dwarves.
Once I got to know the Undead story, I found it pretty compelling. Here were a group of people who were, essentially, humans. But they were being hunted down by the Scarlet Crusade, a group of fanatical zealots who didn't seem to understand that there was a difference between the Forsaken and the Scourge. And then, of course, there was also the Scourge to deal with.
The Scourge are my favorite villains we've ever had in WoW. I was running Naxxramas for transmog gear on an alt the other day and was just reflecting on how perfectly menacing, perfectly wicked the Scourge felt. They're an enemy I love fighting, and the idea of being an Undead person fighting against the Undead felt really cool - that he was getting revenge for the horrible thing done to him.
My take on the Forsaken story (and I'll confess that with eight years having passed since Cataclysm revamped the world, I don't perfectly recall all the old quests and could very well be looking at this with rose-colored glasses) was always this idea that things would be fine if the living could just recognize the Forsaken as people. That the Forsaken were not aggressive, and fundamentally just wanted peace. That if the refugees of Lordaeron agreed to share the ruined countryside, that the Forsaken would happily live side-by-side with their countrymen.
Of course that wasn't totally accurate - I personally assassinated the leadership of the town of Hillsbrad (which is now the Sludge Fen,) and that wasn't exactly a "let's just get along" move. But there was this sense that the Forsaken were really desperate and clinging to their lands in the early days, and that all they wanted was some respect and dignity.
My Rogue, being a Rogue, is of course fine with doing some morally questionable acts if it means getting paid. And given that the Alliance isn't willing to bankroll him, he's willing to take the Horde's gold. He's not too different than how he was in life, though given that the pleasures of the flesh are kind of inaccessible to him these days, he's focused more on the acquisition of wealth and fancy luxuries (he's incredibly happy that Suramar, with its decadent culture, is now a Horde city, and would retire there if that was an option.)
But the characterization of the Forsaken has pushed more and more over WoW's lifespan into a cult of personality. The Forsaken all seem totally dedicated to Sylvanas as a quasi-religious figure. Whenever the Horde needs the most morally questionable characters, they go with Forsaken.
And I get that the bitterness of undeath has a dulling effect on positive emotions, and that that's part of what they want to talk about with the Forsaken, but they're pushing them in a direction of being the "token evil team member," and I think that robs the Forsaken of what makes them interesting.
We do get a handful of good undead, like Archbishop Faol, Leonid Bartholomew, and that one guy in the tower near Stratholme who explicitly calls out Sylvanas as having gone too far. But these guys have all rejected the Horde as a whole and are part of neutral factions.
I'd love, for example, to see some Forsaken characters who are still working with the Tauren to actually reverse the plague and become living humans again. Maybe they've spent enough time with the gentle giants of Mulgore that they've learned to really appreciate Tauren culture. Maybe they've spent time with their shamans learning about balance and sought out some new methods to give themselves peace.
Sylvanas turned the Undercity into a trap for the Alliance. There was nowhere near the loss of life at Teldrassil - knowing the fight would destroy the city, Sylvanas had her people evacuated ahead of time. But if you're a Forsaken character, this means you've lost your home. Not just the home that you carved out after being freed from the Scourge, but a home that you inhabited before you died in the first place.
That home would still be there if Sylvanas hadn't attacked Teldrassil, or even if she just stuck to the plan and held the world-tree and its people as a deterrent. Just as in the real world, the threat of force is generally a more useful tool than actual force. Sylvanas went nuclear, and now the Forsaken are suffering that mutually assured destruction.
It's not an element that ever seems to come up, but Sylvanas is not from the same people as most of the Forsaken. The shared experience of dying and then re-emerging years later as Forsaken could very well be enough for the vast majority of people to see past racial divides. And the Quel'thalas and Lordaeron were old allies, so again, that divide might not be so strong. But still, might some of the Forsaken resent that Sylvanas allowed Lordaeron City to be effectively destroyed while she can go back and wander the streets of Silvermoon any time she damn pleases? Her home is remarkably intact.
She led them against the Scourge, but on some level, isn't Sylvanas a carpet-bagger?
The Blight was very useful as a deterrent, but Sylvanas seems to only act in ways to provoke. Her invasion of Gilneas, to be fair, was ordered by Garrosh, but her methods were literally atrocious. And while you might argue that they're nasty, but they get the job done, in fact they don't. Gilneas has been a quagmire for the Forsaken. Burning Teldrassil undercut the entire war strategy Saurfang had devised. So far, what does Sylvanas have to show for all her cruel tactics? She has lost the Horde foothold in the Eastern Kingdoms and splintered her own faction.
As one of the Forsaken, my character would be incredibly pissed off that he's forced to stay in a hot desert, and that Sylvanas has just proved everyone who ever said the Forsaken were not to be trusted, that they were bloodthirsty monsters who deserved to be wiped off the face of the planet, basically right.
There's ruthless pragmatism, which is something he can respect. But provocation on the bet that the Alliance can't fight back is just reckless. So he'll be polite, and salute the Warchief, and he'll certainly bloody his blades with Alliance blood when he has to. But he's now going through every possible scenario in which the Dark Lady might be quickly and carefully eliminated. In the name of the Forsaken, the Banshee Queen has to go.
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