Warcraft/Characters/Illidan and Followers

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Illidan Stormrage

"Betrayer. In truth, it was I who was betrayed. Still I am hunted, still I am hated. Now my blind eyes see what others cannot. That sometimes the hand of fate must be forced.."

Illidan is....complicated. Originally the fraternal twin of Malfurion Stormrage, he diverged with his brother, both with his more caustic, arrogant personality and his adept sorcerery. Unfortunately, arcane magic in the Warcraft universe is addictive, and Illidan quickly became dependant upon the powers he wielded. Initially a hero during the invasion of the Burning Legion in Azeroth's ancient past, Illidan spent some time in their service (as a double agent with vainglorious but heroic intentions) and, thanks to a "gift" of Sargeras, had both his eyes seared out and replaced with supernatural vision, gaining a strong understanding of fel magic in the process. When the arcane Well of Eternity was destroyed, Illidan betrayed the night elves by creating a new one with a vial from the old Well, and, in defending himself, killed several of his own people. Since this was seen as endangering the world,[1] Illidan was chained beneath the earth for ten thousand years.

Understandably, this made him a little bitter.

Released to battle the demons during the Third War by his former crush Tyrande Whisperwind, Illidan cleansed the Felwood by absorbing the power of an evil demonic artifact. Now half-demon, he was banished by the night elves and spent much of Warcraft III: The Frozen Throne seeking to destroy the Lich King following Kil'Jaeden's order. He failed and was badly injured by Arthas, and fled to his new realm of Outland to escape Kil'Jaeden's wrath, where over the time between Warcraft III and World of Warcraft, his last well-intentioned hopes were replaced by megalomania and madness.

His forces in-game are referred to as 'the Illidari'.

  • Anti-Hero: Illidan meant well during much of the Frozen Throne, certainly moreso than Arthas. He's not remotely heroic, but his ego and obsession with getting praise often led him to do the right thing for the wrong reasons. Continues into World of Warcraft.
  • Black Magic: Illidan's inability to keep off the fel magic is the source of his damnation.
  • Body Horror: Along the way, he grew horns and wings, and his feet turned to hooves.
  • Cain and Abel: Him and Malfurion. Slightly reversed, Illidan is younger, but is the 'Cain', while Malfurion is older, yet he is the 'Abel'.
  • Disabled Means Helpless: Averted and lampshaded: "I'm blind, not deaf!"
  • Dual-Wielding: Wields two large warglaives.
  • Evil Sounds Deep: His voice gets quite a bit deeper after he absorbs the Skull of Gul'dan and becomes half demon.
  • Eyepatch of Power: An entire Blindfold of Power.
  • Fallen Hero: Was a hero in the war against the Burning Legion, but his desire to prove himself and jealousy of his brother drove him to join the Legion to destroy it from within. Then he was imprisoned and freed, only to be forced to work for the Legion again in what caused him to Jump Off the Slippery Slope. From then on, he shifts between Anti-Hero and Well-Intentioned Extremist in his efforts to fight the Burning Legion with the public at large, even Malfurion and Tyrande, seeing him as a villain.
  • Fate Worse Than Death: Life imprisonment is already pretty bad, but if you're an immortal...
  • Heel Face Revolving Door: Illidan's ultimate allegiance is to himself.
    • And Tyrande.
  • Hypocrite:
    • Illidan mocked Velen for fleeing the Legion after Kil'Jaeden and Archimonde accepted Sargeras' offer and said the deaths of his followers are on his hands. Not only has Illidan's actions in the past resulted in the deaths of many of his own followers, but he spent years hiding from Kil'Jaeden in Outland and doing the Legion's dirty work.
    • He said to Velen and Turalyon that their faith in the Light blinds them, but his faith in himself leaves him unable to see his own mistakes such as re-creating the Well of Eternity, ripping open a rift between Argus and Azeroth and the repercussions of killing Xe'ra, who was a powerful ally against the Burning Legion. Furthermore despite his talk about people being "blind to greater threats' regarding the Burning Legion, Illidan himself seems unaware of, and has made no plans against, the Old Gods and the Void.
    • Furthermore, he makes several derisive comments regarding the Light and its powers... but these prove hollow since Illidan gets to Argus on a Light-powered vessel and the majority of the forces on Argus are made up of the Army of the Light (also see Ungrateful Bastard below). It even comes up that in his final message to Tyrande, he states that he considers her faith in Elune to be one of her best qualities... even though he had spent much of his time among the Army of the Light being distant and dismissive towards the Light and its followers.
    • Illidan killed Xe'ra for trying to replace his fel with the Light against his will (if he was powerful enough to break her bonds, which he did, it's at best doubtful that he needed to kill her), but Illidan himself split and enslaved Akama's soul when Akama disagreed with Illidan's own methods to fight the Legion.
  • Jumping Off the Slippery Slope: Let's just say that he did not take his defeat by Arthas, and the subsequent realization that Kil'jaeden will want to punish him for his failure, very well. At all.
  • Large Ham: When Liam O'Brien is the one voicing him. Besides the memetic "YOU ARE NOT PREPARED!", there's also pretty much every line he says in the Well of Eternity dungeon. Especially "I will be the savior of our PEOPLE! I WILL FULFILL MY DESTINYYY!".
  • Love Triangle: Part of this with Tyrande, although really he never had a chance. But he likes to think he did.
  • Magic Knight: Required to be a demon hunter.
  • Mr. Fanservice: Half-elf, half-demon, blindfolded, muscular, perpetually shirtless, purple-skinned, winged, clawed, horned, tattooed, definitely interpretable as a Woobie.
  • No Good Deed Goes Unpunished: A bit of a stretch, given his apparent madness and lust for recognition, but Illidan's entire life before fleeing to the Outland can be read as this. His repeated (and just relatively successful) attempts at heroism simply doesn't seem heroic enough for anyone to appreciate them, and so he is ignored, shunned, imprisoned and finally banished despite never actually intending to hurt his friends or allies. He goes off the deep end when exiled, but until then, the only unambiguously irredeemable thing he ever does is in a fit of frustration and anger when said allies seemingly prevent him from saving them in the long run.
  • Pet the Dog: His rescue of Tyrande in Warcraft III: The Frozen Throne and his promise to always look out for her, no matter what, shortly before he fled to Outland.
  • Poor Communication Kills: Many examples, though the most obvious is when Malfurion stops him from killing the Lich King because he didn't tell anyone what he was doing: they just felt him performing incredibly destructive magic.
    • On the other hand, it's revealed that the magic he was performing would have destroyed the continent of Northrend, and he was doing it because Kil'Jaeden told him to do so. Neither piece of information would have been well received. And, as Uther revealed in World of Warcraft, the death of the Lich King would have been Bad News, even if Illidan hadn't melted the polar icecaps to do it.
  • Promethean Punishment: Illidan has only grown worse due to his ten-thousand year incarceration, not better as his kindhearted brother naively hoped.
    • Illidan himself realizes this: when Maiev calls him insane in Warcraft III: The Frozen Throne, his immediate response is "Isolation can do that to the mind." If only the other night elves understood that, a lot of tragedy couldd have been averted.
  • This Is Sparta: YOU! ARE NOT! PREPARED!!
  • Unlucky Childhood Friend
  • Villain Protagonist: Illidan was a protagonist for a good portion of Warcraft III: The Frozen Throne.
  • Walking Shirtless Scene: Sure most demon hunters are, but since he got those wings on his back, he can't wear a shirt anymore.
  • Well-Intentioned Extremist: The most charitable reading of his actions.

Prince Kael'thas Sunstrider

"The Alliance has failed my people."

The son of King Anasterian Sunstrider, Prince Kael'thas took over leadership of the High Elves after their defeat at the Sunwell at the hands of Arthas and the Scourge. At this time, the High Elves were just learning the true price of their magic addiction: deprived of the Sunwell's energies, they grew lethargic and desperate. Kael'thas promised to find a way to cure the malady, but in the meantime, he formed an allegiance with Illidan Stormrage as the latter promised to satiate the Elves' hunger by harnessing the energies of demons themselves. Renaming his people Blood Elves, Kael'thas left them and entered Outland in search of the power to finally cure his people once and for all.

His obsession with power led Kael'thas to consort directly with Kil'jaeden the Deceiver, the last undefeated Eredar lord of the Burning Legion. Abandoning Illidan as a lost cause, Kael'thas entered the ancient Draenei citadel of Tempest Keep and began harnessing the magical energy of Outland toward unknown purposes. In the meantime, he sent forces to attack and destroy the rebuilt city of Shattrath, home to the power of the Naaru. These forces betrayed him and formed the Scryers.

Under the leadership of the Naaru, the Scryers and Aldor (remnants of the Draenei) eventually drove Kael'thas out of Tempest Keep. However, his plans were not yet undone. Now wholly insane, Kael'thas returned in secret to Quel'thalas and used the power he had gathered in Outland to rebuild the Sunwell, with the objective of summoning Kil'jaeden into Azeroth. Had he succeeded, Azeroth may well have been destroyed, but Kael'thas never lived to see Kil'jaeden's defeat, as he was finally killed by a group of heroes who hunted him down in his final refuge within the Magister's Terrace.

  • Aristocrats Are Evil: While Evil and a Prince he cared too much for his dad to be an Evil Prince, as referenced in Arthas.
  • Badass Cape
  • Blond Guys Are Evil
  • The Caligula: By the end of The Burning Crusade, Kael'thas had run the name Sunstrider into the ground.
  • Calling Your Attacks: "Anara'nel belore!", "By the power of the sun!", "Vengeance burns!", "Velomin ashal!", "I'll turn your world upside down!"
  • Degraded Boss: From the third most difficult raid boss in The Burning Crusade to a 5-man dungeon boss in the Sunwell patch. His abilities in that dungeon are even a toned down version of his raid boss abilities.
  • The Dragon: To Illidan at first, and then he betrayed him and became Kil'Jaeden's dragon.
  • Dragon with an Agenda: During The Burning Crusade, Kael'thas was preparing a gateway for the Burning Legion to invade Outland and Azeroth while Illidan was completely unaware.
  • Drunk on the Dark Side/The Dark Side Will Make You Forget: Thanks to the corrupting influence of fel energy, he abandoned any pretense of saving his people and started down a path of destruction. In fact, he ultimately signs on with the same guys who GAVE THE ORDER to destroy Quel'thalas (albeit who are now enemies with Arthas, who actually did it to resurrect Kel'Thuzad).
  • Evil Feels Good: Prolonged exposure to Fel magic ultimately does this to anyone, but when you need magic to survive...
  • Evil Is Not a Toy: It's not entirely clear if he's assisting Kil'jaeden because he wants to harness his power or if he's completely nuts and has turned into an Omnicidal Maniac.
  • Fallen Hero: In a manner not so dissimilar from Arthas himself, ironic given his hatred for the man. Like Arthas, for all his personal faults he genuinely wanted what was best for his people and was willing to go to any lengths to save them. The undead Scourge ultimately attacked his kingdom, and in his desperation, he sought darker and more insidious powers until he became the antithesis of everything he once stood for, hated even by his own people.
  • Heel Face Revolving Door
  • He Who Fights Monsters: Again, he's basically the elven version of Arthas, falling deeper into darkness to "save" his people until he ultimately betrayed them for their destruction. Then again Arthas had lost his soul and was partially brainwashed by the Lich King, and when his soul returned he showed remorse, while Kael's last words were screaming that the world would burn.
  • Jumping Off the Slippery Slope: See, this is what Fel Magic does to you, kids.
  • Large Ham: Can he ever stop talking? He even manage a Nothing Can Stop Us Now speech in his dying breath. And he's voiced by Quinton Flynn.

"This is preposterous! Am I to assault the undead with nothing but sticks and harsh language?"


Lady Vashj

"Soon we will reclaim the surface world and take vengeance upon the Night Elves."

Vashj was the handmaiden of Queen Azshara prior to the War of the Ancients. Loyal to the Queen to the point of obsession, she attempted to assassinate Tyrande Whisperwind when she considered making her the new handmaiden. She was, along with the rest of the Highborne, transformed into a naga by the Old Gods when the Sundering caused a great part of Kalimdor to become submerged by the sea.

Ten thousand years later, a period she seems to have spent training her combat skills, she resurfaced as the leader of the naga Illidan summoned as allies. When his plan to destroy Icecrown with a spell failed, she assisted Kael'thas Sunstrider by supporting him with boats and troops, and, when this got him arrested by Garithos, rescued him and recruited him to her cause. The pair then departed to the shattered world of Draenor, where they rescued Illidan from Maiev Shadowsong, who had traced him there, and helped him defeat Magtheridon and gain control over most of the planet. When Kil'Jaeden tracked them down and demanded Illidan to attack the Frozen Throne, she and Kael readily joined him, and, unlike Kael, remained completely loyal after their defeat. She and her troops have since then seemingly focused on draining the waters of Zangarmarsh, storing it some unknown place for some unknown purpose.

  • The Archer
  • Aristocrats Are Evil
  • Batman Gambit: The reason she offered aid to Kael was so that Garithos would arrest him for treason, so that she could recruit him and his people.
  • Demoted to Extra: Compared to Illidan and especially Kael'thas, Vashj receives very minimal attention in The Burning Crusade. It consists of a directionless plot in Zangarmarsh that goes entirely unresolved and then, seven or eight levels later, of returning to the area and killing her.
    • She doesn't even make a cameo appearance in the Arthas novel despite having helped lead the failed Illidari campaign in Northrend.
  • The Dragon: To Illidan, she is deeply loyal to him.
  • Dragon with an Agenda: What is she trying to do in Zangarmarsh exactly?
    • Gain control of Outland's water, but it's never revealed why, exactly.
      • It's explicitly explained that Illidan's goal in Outland is to create a new Well of Eternity. To accomplish this, he's ordered Vashj to drain the water in Zangarmarsh. He'll then combine that with the arcane energy Kael'thas is harvesting from the Netherstorm and mix in the water from the original Well that he kept in vials. The best possible outcome of this plan is an Earthshattering Kaboom on a chunk of land that's already experienced an Earthshattering Kaboom. The worst possible outcome is that it'll work, but the Legion will get their hands on it.
  • Flunky Boss: The second phase of her battle involves dealing with four different types of adds while disabling her shield.
  • Gorgeous Gorgon
  • Green-Eyed Monster: Toward Tyrande, regarding Azshara.
  • An Ice Person/Kill It with Water
  • Last-Name Basis: Originally thought to have Only One Name, but in Cataclysm, it's revealed that her mother's name was Lestharia Vashj. No one has referred to her by or even mentioned her first name.
  • Magic Knight: Well, more of a Magic Archer, but still...
  • Petting Zoo People: Half snake, half elf, and her hair is made up of snakes.
  • Shock and Awe: Has some lightning abilities in World of Warcraft.
  1. ↑ He'd intended it to be a source of power to protect the world should the Legion ever return. Or to feed his addiction. It's not entirely clear and the truth is likely somewhere in the middle.
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