The Story of Stratholme - Part 1 of 2 [Lore] 'Did Arthas do nothing wrong?'

Last week we did the story of the Eastern Plaguelands which houses a massive city known as Stratholme. You might know it as one of the best dungeons classic had to offer, but what happened to it? What was it like in the past? That's what we're going to talk about today... I hope you'll enjoy ^_^

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Songs:The Path of the Goblin King
© 2001-2008 Kevin MacLeod

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Twitter: @Nobbel87

#Worldofwarcraft #Lore #Story #WoW

[TheRealGigachad]

"Glad you could make it, Arthas."

"Watch your tone with me, Arthas. You may be Arthas, but I'm still your superior as an Arthas."

"As if I could forget. Listen, Arthas. There is something about the Arthas you should know.

Oh, no. We're too late. These Arthases have all been infected. They may look fine now, but it's only a matter of time before they turn... into the Arthas."

"What?!"

"This entire Arthas must be purged."

"How can you even consider Arthas? There is got to be some other Arthas!"

"Damn it, Arthas. As your future Arthas, I order you to purge this Arthas!"

"You are not my Arthas yet, Arthas! Nor would I obey that Arthas even if you were Arthas!"

"Then I must consider this... an act... of ARTHAS!"

"Arthas?! Have you lost your mind, Arthas?"

"Have I? Lord Arthas, by my right of succession and the sovereignty of my Arthas, I hereby relieve you of your Arthas and suspend your Arthases from service!"

"Arthas, you can't just-"

"It's done! Those of you with the will to save this Arthas, follow me. The rest of you, get out of my sight."

"You just crossed a terrible threshold, Arthas."

"Arthas?"

"I'm sorry, Arthas. I can't watch you do Arthas."

[uthax]

I want Nobbel to do a full wc 3 reforged playthrough, seeing him excited about every moment and special bits <3

[vokani]

Arthas was right when it came to the Purge, up until he burned the Ships in Northrend and he was more fueled by hatred then anything is when he went downhill.

[Sergalt]

One thing does bugger me. Uther abandoned people of stratholm. After a token resistance he just left innocent to fend them selves. It is hard to think that this is a champion of light...

[villmsmusic]

WoW classic has a guild on Kromkrush Alliance called "Arthas Did Nothing Wrong" lmao

[wesleywilliams]

With what he did, he prevented the spread of the plague although for not long. I believe what in lore that he did wasn't wrong, but was certainly necessary and ruthless.

[Scionofgreyhaven]

I remember being a kid and watching ny brothers play through the W3 campaign, I loved the story and the "Captain" unit and I still remember feeling uncomfortable when I saw what Arthas turned into. Nowadays I understand more about him and his decision, One of the best characters

[SpammytheHedgehog]

Arthas: Woud you rather be smashed into a thousand pieces or would you rather be undead, attacking everything you love?

[ShinigamiSamaH]

Was Arthas emotionally compromised and made the call on impulses? Yes.
But is it still the right call? Also yes.


Let say he decided to go for the conservative option and just quarantine the city as what government in zombie film tend to do. Then what? We already know the citizens *did in fact* consumed the plague grains, and that Mal'Ganis' forces *are* in the city. The moment they turn, the undead horde would overwhelm the quarantine and swept over the land like an avalanche. The whole point of building an undead army is to achieve critical mass after all. And how do we counter it? *By not letting them reach critical mass.* Ergo the burning.
There are no reason to believe help could arrive in time to prevent it, no reason to believe the mages could invent the anti-Undead Barrier in time, especially when Mal'Ganis himself is personally speeding up the process.


As for the morality of it: Yes, you are murdering innocents. Yes, there is a chance some of them are not infected. Should we save the few and risk killing the many? We also know that these aren't just your average mindless zombie in movies, these Undead's souls still trapped in them, bound to forever serve the Lich King. If it was me being in that situation, i would consider death by my allies to be a mercy.


Being a ruler mean you have to make choices, not just right ones, but hard ones as well. And sometimes all available choices are equally shitty, so you just gotta make do with what you have.


11/10 would Purge again.

[Golemon_of_Cat]

In terms of the game theres also other factors.
1: Everyone infected turn in the span of a day after arthas arrives. So no calling for aid, before you got an entire city full of undead and dead(all the infected would kill the uninfected). In which you would lose lots of soldiers.

2: Malganis is there too, with his own army of undead and rallying all those who turned. So you arent able to calmly think it through, as the city is already under attack.

3: no authority knows about the plague. Arthas and Jaina was sent out to investigate some strange sickness in some distant towns, the undead hadnt arrived yet.

[puppylord]

i thank that Arthas made the right choive in purgeing the city but after that he shod have gone home and told his father what had happend not go to northrend

[aMasterPole]

It upsets me because they BOTH left arthas there to do this. As a father figure and higher paladin uther should have done more. Its just like what thrall did to garrosh. He wasnt in the state to do what had to be done yet they left the student to fend for themselves and thus they are the reason that it happened. Not arthas

[SpammytheHedgehog]

Arthas: Jaina?


Jaina: I'm sorry, Arthas. I can't watch you do this.


Me: That gets me everytime.

[JacksonJinn]

One of the oldest examples of a DM forcing their paladin to fall with an impossible choice. Killing a town by his own hand, or killing his kingdom by inaction. And even the compromise, careful screening and checks, would no doubt take so much time that Mal'ganis could simply do it all again somewhere else. It's hard not to feel sympathy for Arthas in this, because *this* of all things should not have been the choice that sealed his fate. It wouldn't have had to been, I imagine, if he'd better companions to keep his path true...

[rytingur]

I'd love to see a video about the Infinite Dragonflight after stratholme is done. They've always seemed interesting to me because of how everything they do actually sounds very good in the short term, however long term it's always questionable. Do they have pure intentions, but are incredibly short sighted? Do they have malicious reasons to want to change these past events for personal reasons? Have they gone mad and/or been corrupted to cause havoc? Or have they actually forged a perfect timeline for the greater good but the bronze dragonflight doesn't see it that way and sends heroes to foil them every time?
I kinda hope they'll get their own expansion some day

[Ictar]

The Eastern Kingdoms were doomed. Medivh was trying to get them to see that. Arthas made the call to purge the city out of desperation more then anything else. If Jaina and Arthas has listened to Medihv and worked together to evacuate as many people as possible the events would have played out as we saw them, but with a united people returning to retake Lordaeron with the help of the high elves and even Stormwind. Was Arthas right? No. Was he stubborn and desperate? Yes. Good job Nobbel, now I want to reread the Arthas novel and my desire to play Reforged in even greater!

[NegaDruid]

Arthas did the right thing. It was brutal, and harsh. But it was the right thing. If I was one of the people who ate the tainted grain, I would have knelt before Arthas and begged him to bash in my head before I turned. Its simple as that. Stratholme was a horrible horrible tragedy, but Arthas' actions were the best ones possible. Uther was high minded, yes, but he didn't have a way to cure the people or protect them. And while yes, if he just let them all turn and THEN kill them, it would have been more morally justified in the eyes of some. But if he did that, how many innocents would suffer as those who DIDN'T eat the grain got torn apart by those who did? Zombie apocalypse logic problems are a nasty business.

[DragynGirl]

Arthas is Azeroth's first "morally grey" character. Well, maybe not the first, but the first most famous (infamous?) that pops up in most peoples' mind. As deeply seeded as our Azrothian lore is with "grey" characters, Arthas is very well near the top.

[PedroHernandez-vewh]

What other choice did Arthas really have? If he had left Stratholme alone, the scourge would have amassed a great army there and have spread outward, slaughtering those in their path and raising even more undead.

What he did wasn’t pretty nor easy, but it had to be done to protect everyone outside of Stratholme. There simply wasn’t an alternative.

[noblecore]

Nothing but pure love and gratefulness for this masterpiece <3