Death to Thrall? Say it isnt so!

[Jatbirkkal]

Yeah, but I meant the theory of "Garrosh kills corrupted Thrall" thing

[Lisaara]

Yeah, but I meant the theory of "Garrosh kills corrupted Thrall" thing

It's the players that do that....minus the corrupted part. We have to smack around the aspects of him that make him who he is.

[Litlemouse]

This is so weird...

[Yaone]

There is one way Garona could still be alive, she is supposed to be half orc/draenei, and draenei tend to live VERY long lives.

All and all it would be an interesting ordeal if Thrall was made an aspect, but I am leaning towards the hatchling from the Badlands quest chain.
And yes, I am glad they won't be killing off Thrall completely, he is also one of my faves in regard to lore chars~

[Lisaara]

There is one way Garona could still be alive, she is supposed to be half orc/draenei, and draenei tend to live VERY long lives.

All and all it would be an interesting ordeal if Thrall was made an aspect, but I am leaning towards the hatchling from the Badlands quest chain.
And yes, I am glad they won't be killing off Thrall completely, he is also one of my faves in regard to lore chars~

Naw. I highly doubt they'll ever do that. Thrall is the man, according to Blizzard.

[Cerah]

Garona's still alive in the Twilight Highlands. See? She and Cerah even have matching hairstyles. I'm kind of disappointed that they just gave her a standard Orc model though -- she looks cooler in the comics.



Comic Garona. Her half-Draenei heritage is much more apparent:



Lorewise, she doesn't seem to give a crap about Thrall one way or the other, so I seriously doubt that she'll have anything to do with him. Besides, Blizzard seems intent on shoving Thrall/Aggra down our throats with an eagerness unmatched since Square's Squall/Rinoa forced romance plot in FF8.

Seriously, that's what bugs me most about Aggra. The fact she just appears out of nowhere, and Thrall declares her "the One" with little to no story to it whatsoever. That may be the "Orcish" way -- no drama, just getting to business, but Blizzard's audience are real-life humans, and this kind of storytelling just irks readers/gamers. I would have preferred Thrall just stay single. Seriously, Aggra seems like some designer's Mary Sue fan character that for some reason was allowed to become a real lore character. If anything, she's evidence that Blizzard needs to hire some story editors.

Seriously, if we absolutely must have romance in a video game, something more along the lines of FF10 is a much better way to do it, with the two participating characters learning about each other, developing their feelings naturally, along the course of the story, and with that romance just being a part, not the be all and end all of the story. Tidas' determination for Yuna to not have to die to bring about the Calm was a lot more important than whether or not he ended up with her romantically. The fact he genuinely was putting her well-being above any teenage-style melodrama made their relationship so much more satifying and realistic to players, IMO.

Anyway, back on topic: I hope Thrall doesn't die, but I also hope he'll stop this hippy shaman bullshit and get some real character development, without Mary Sue along for the ride.

[Saturo]

Personally, I think Aggra is their way to get Thrall close to someone, and then have [INSERT ANTAGONIST HERE] kill her off. That way, he'll hate [INSERT ANTAGONIST HERE], and they won't have killed off some important lore character.

If it isn't, though... Still, I don't like her. I'm prefer Thrall+Jaina, like everyone else. ^^

But yes, Garona is apparently alive and well. Huh. (The comic of her doesn't have the draenei fangs, just the orc ones. Disappointing.)

[cowmuflage]

It's funny every one goes Thrall+Jaina when in the lore they are just mates and theres no love between them. Thrall likes Jaina as a mate as she reminds him of that other girl Fox something.

[Lisaara]

To reiterate to Aggra - Read The Shattering. Her story with him is there. So she did come with one. They always say the love you find is one you least expect to find. Orcs dont date humans. Never have. Never will. Blizzard's been firm that Jaina and Thrall dont like each other that way and never will.

But lets save that for a different topic, shall we?

I still highly doubt Thrall will die for good.

[Cerah]

To reiterate to Aggra - Read The Shattering. Her story with him is there. So she did come with one. They always say the love you find is one you least expect to find. Orcs dont date humans. Never have. Never will. Blizzard's been firm that Jaina and Thrall dont like each other that way and never will.

But lets save that for a different topic, shall we?

I still highly doubt Thrall will die for good.

I have 2 copies of the Shattering, but with all my readings for school, I haven't had a chance to sit down and read it yet. Sorry Golden, but Shakespeare's a tad bit more important than you.

As for Orcs never dating humans, I refer you to WoWpedia's page on half-Orcs, particularly the line "Not all half-orcs are born to abused or victimized parents; some are the children of clandestine love."

Apparently Blizzard operates by what I'd like to call "Star Trek biology", in that any sentient race can/will have sexual relations with any other, and those relations are often fertile. Whether those children themselves are fertile, or, like mules in RL, are biologically sterile remains to be seen. The most biologically unlikely lore character, Garona's quarter-Orc, quarter-Draenei, half-human kid, is explained literally by "A Wizard Did It" (said wizard being his father, Medivh)

I don't think it's limited to Orcs/Humans or Orcs/Draenei either. In Sholozar Basin at River's Heart in game, there's a male Gnome and a female human that a share Gnomish-sounding last name, which implies that those two NPCs could be married. Human/High Elf pairings are apparently common enough that Kalegos took a "half-elf" persona for his humanoid form. Considering how close Darkspear Trolls and Orcs were during Thrall's reign, I'm surprised that no half-Orc/half-Troll kids have popped up.

Although this is not official, I've expanded upon this Blizzard-supported theme in my own RP gameplay, with 2 hybrid children of some of my characters. The first, Taysha, is the half-Orc, half-Darkspear Troll daughter of Cerah and her troll husband Seabaston. The second is Fateflare, the half-Blood Elf, half-Amani Troll son of my paladin alt, Lighthope.

The point of this is that voluntary interracial relationships in the Warcraft universe do happen and are biologically feasible, as far as Blizzard's storytelling goes. However, I was not arguing for or against Thrall/Jaina in my post.

Rather, I'm more upset by the lousy quality of storytelling behind Aggra's lore role, how she was literally just shoved in our faces. It's unprofessional. I'm not exactly thrilled by Blizzard's policies of introducing most actual lore in sources outside of the game world, where a large percentage of gamers probably won't see it, and characters like Aggra are especially irksome examples, especially when it has been proven that video games are a viable storytelling medium. Blizzard's own stragedy games -- the Starcraft series and the original Warcraft RTS series, are proof enough of that.

Saturo has a point, however. Aggra could be little more than a plot device in order to affect Thrall's life, without killing off an established lore character, though in that case, she's little more than Taretha v 2.0. It still sounds Sue-ish, but a more palatable reason for her existance than solely to screw Thrall. Though the text released so far for Thrall's questline in 4.2 seems to make this line of reasoning unlikely.

[Lisaara]

Okay, I believe I made a mistake in my wordings. I forgot about the half-orcs but again....orcs going with anything other than other orcs are very few and far between.

I think some of you forget.....Thrall and Aggra HATED each other when they first met. They didn't get along at all. Throughout the story, she developed(Granted could've been better but some are saying she has NO story when infact she does) and fell in love with our complex former warchief. Not all romance stories gotta be as big as Harry Potter. I highly doubt thats 100% Blizzard's fault. The author has some tug in it too. He/She could've extended the story a few chapters. I think 4.2 will prove Aggra's love for Thrall and explain a little more. Love is a fickle thing. I too used to not like Aggra til I read a bit of the Shattering. I then gave her a chance and now I really like her. We need strong females like her in WoW...ones that dont go batshit crazy with Plagues or every man on WoW has wanted to screw you.

[Saturo]

So what, she has a few paragraphs of text? That doesn't really change much. :/ She popped out of nowhere because they wanted Thrall to have someone special, that much is obvious. I just think it could have been done MUCH better, such as having her actually included in a game/novel before the one where she all of a sudden becomes a main character and starts dating one of the most powerful men on both Draenor and Azeroth.

Heck, just having her included as one of the captains during ICC or TotC would have sufficed, to make us know that she exists, but no, she just randomly appears. :/

[Lisaara]

So what, she has a few paragraphs of text? That doesn't really change much. :/ She popped out of nowhere because they wanted Thrall to have someone special, that much is obvious. I just think it could have been done MUCH better, such as having her actually included in a game/novel before the one where she all of a sudden becomes a main character and starts dating one of the most powerful men on both Draenor and Azeroth.

Heck, just having her included as one of the captains during ICC or TotC would have sufficed, to make us know that she exists, but no, she just randomly appears. :/

I did say I agreed that they could've done better with it.

[Saturo]

Yeah, I wasn't pointing that at your post directly, but rather at the overall bit of "She's not random! She's in a book!".

[Lisaara]

Yeah, I wasn't pointing that at your post directly, but rather at the overall bit of "She's not random! She's in a book!".

Ah right. Probably not my best words.

[Saturo]

Which wasn't directly aimed at your post either, actually. :D It's been brought up before too. ^^

[Lisaara]

Oh. Haha. XD

[Setanta]

Eh, nothing wrong with the way they introduced Aggra. Was it perfect? no. For all we know, Blizz could always rewrite Nagrand that has Aggra as one of the younger Mag'har orcs since there were plenty underfoot. Without introducing her during TBC, there really wasn't any clean way to introduce her other than in the run up to the Shattering which is how they did it.

And fwiw, Half-Orcs like Garona (Orc/Draenai) were relatively rare, and you were more likely to find the Orc/Ogre hybrid like Rexxar on Draenor. Not saying that the Orc/Human hybrid isn't possible, but I would think they'd be even more rare especially considering the heat turned up on the 'hatred' between the two species.

And the most amusing comment I've ever seen in regards to Thrall is that there is no way that Metzen would ever completely kill off 'his baby'.

[Cerah]

So what, she has a few paragraphs of text? That doesn't really change much. :/ She popped out of nowhere because they wanted Thrall to have someone special, that much is obvious. I just think it could have been done MUCH better, such as having her actually included in a game/novel before the one where she all of a sudden becomes a main character and starts dating one of the most powerful men on both Draenor and Azeroth.

Heck, just having her included as one of the captains during ICC or TotC would have sufficed, to make us know that she exists, but no, she just randomly appears. :/

I did say I agreed that they could've done better with it.

Let's agree to agree on this one

And yeah, it seems they introduced Aggra in such a way just so she'd be a Mag'har. Why couldn't one of the captains in WotLK have taken the role instead? Just because they're not hippies/shamans? Hell, if Thrall *had* to get with anyone, why not the one Orc sister that ultimately wins in the Grizzly Hills base? She seemed to be a character that had her head on straignt, and had a position of power in her own right, with no male needed to prop her up.

[Lisaara]

So what, she has a few paragraphs of text? That doesn't really change much. :/ She popped out of nowhere because they wanted Thrall to have someone special, that much is obvious. I just think it could have been done MUCH better, such as having her actually included in a game/novel before the one where she all of a sudden becomes a main character and starts dating one of the most powerful men on both Draenor and Azeroth.

Heck, just having her included as one of the captains during ICC or TotC would have sufficed, to make us know that she exists, but no, she just randomly appears. :/

I did say I agreed that they could've done better with it.

Let's agree to agree on this one

And yeah, it seems they introduced Aggra in such a way just so she'd be a Mag'har. Why couldn't one of the captains in WotLK have taken the role instead? Just because they're not hippies/shamans? Hell, if Thrall *had* to get with anyone, why not the one Orc sister that ultimately wins in the Grizzly Hills base? She seemed to be a character that had her head on straignt, and had a position of power in her own right, with no male needed to prop her up.

Probably wanted her to be from his home.