This is a very hot topic since the Draeni was revealed to be the new Alliance Race of the Burning Crusade expansion.
So now the Eredar were good kids, and it was Sargeras already gone mad and evil who offered Archimonde and Kil’jaeden to join him in his already established Burning Legion.
The Official site lore and Warcraft III Manual said the other way around: Sargeras was sent by the Titans as champion to destroy the evil Eredar. He defeated them and imprisoned them. And their evil and attack caused him to hesitate and go into a depression.
By the time he fought the Nathrezim, his depression was amok and he resigned his beliefs as a Titan and decided to create the Burning Legion.
That was a big retcon.
To those who missed it, Chris Metzen admitted to have forgotten that Sargeras had met the Eredar first and that it was the Eredar who caused him to blah-blah.
https://www.blizzplanet.com/?action=news&id=754
I can’t believe he could forget something like that, and he might have made that excuse up, but whatever. So now we have a retcon and it will stay. That’s what matters now beyond any eternal rants about it.
So all we are left to do is to speculate, theorize and be creative about this new retcon and adjust to its changes.
First Theory
I have read this from other people in the community. The retcon or the lore blunder since Metzen confessed to have forgotten—could be somewhat fixed up. Everything is based on timeline and timeframes.
The Titans arrived to Azeroth 147,000 years ago according to the timeline provided by White Wolf in Warcraft RPG: Lands of Conflict. I think the Wow RPG Corebook also says it.
The Well of Eternity was created 65,000 years ago. And the Titans departed Azeroth 64,001 years ago.
However, the new retcon says that 25,000 years ago, Sargeras arrived to Argus—the Eredar homeworld.
It is strange how the Eredars are now evil and part of the Burning Legion for such a short time—considering the date the Titans arrived to Azeroth (-147,000).
Back to topic, what I have heard which sounds at this point credible in a sense—heck we have to believe the retcon, so why not? hehe—is that Sargeras the Champion had defeated the evil Eredar many thousands of years ago and imprisoned them in Argus – his mind already becoming affected.
Then Sargeras the Champion fights other evil races until he finds thousands of years later the Nathrezim. He became evil and starts releasing demons he have already imprisoned long ago. Starts creating the Burning Legion.
Milenias later, he arrives to Argus. Its been thousands of years since the Eredar were imprisoned here. Their evil had been subsided as new generations of Eredar went back to pacifist ways—after all imprisoned for so long.
Sargeras arrives to free them from their prison, and convinces them to join. Kil’Jaeden and Archimonde accept right away, and Velen and a few leave the place with help of the Naaru.
Although that theory I have heard sounds neat and dandy to fix up the retcon and still maintain a sanity on the old lore—it might have a few holes. Like how an evil Eredar would eventually go good. Unless Sargeras had mindwiped the evil races and through milenias they had forgotten their evil past.
It is both digestable and yet amusing. I will leave you to dissect that one.
Second Theory
Ok—unwrap the previous theory from your brain. Let’s start blank without any influence of the previous theory.
I think the only one I have told this theory of mine is Baggins, maybe Kenzuki. Not sure.
Starting fresh, although the lore does not say that Sargeras was ever in Azeroth with the other Titans before he exiled himself and resigned the Pantheon—we do not have a timeframe date of when he did resign or when he began his Champion duties nor when he built the Burning Legion.
So let’s have that in mind for the following.
Maybe Metzen has left already some breadcrumbs in Patch 1.9 leading to the Draenei playable race and Eredar retcon.
Some will go whoa?
Here is a possibility, and it has more holes than a Swiss cheese. But here we go nevertheless.
We know in this retcon that Sargeras had created the Burning Legion already by the time he reached Argus to assimilate the Eredar into the Burning Legion in his Burning Crusade.
Which is a chicken and the egg plothole.
Having that in mind now we are left with the interrogative. What then caused Sargeras to become depressed by the time he met the Nathrezim?
That answer could be—twistingly-answered if Sargeras had been among the Titans when they arrived to Azeroth. Let’s say he was still not sent by the Titans as a champion to purge the universe of evil, so he was part of the Pantheon creating worlds still.
Let’s say that what caused the Titans to send off Sargeras as a Champion to purge the universe of evil was their encounter with the Old gods ……
After the Old gods were chained and defeated, the Pantheon became aware of the presence of evil in the Universe. After concensus, they decide they should take care of this menace to their Ordering of the Universe. Aman’Thul the Highfather proposes to choose his brother and confident.
Aman?Thul and his brother Sargeras
oversaw the creation of innumerable worlds across the Twisting Nether and gently guided countless races to greatness. Sargeras was Aman?Thul?s closest advisor and supporter until he turned to evil. Now Aman?Thul looks to his consort Eonar for council.—Warcraft RPG: Shadow and Light—page 113.So … now we have something interesting here. Sargeras was in the Pantheon when they created worlds, guiding these races to greatness. Hmm …
He was Aman’Thul’s brother and his closest advisor and supporter … Hmm.
So with this new retcon, let’s say Sargeras came with the Titans to Azeroth. Once the Titans defeated the Old gods, the Titans became worried of such an evil race. And decided this menace throughout the universe should be contained and dealt with. Who else but his brother and closest advisor to deal with this menace?
The Pantheon sends Sargeras out of Azeroth to start his duties as the Titans’ Champion to put an end to the evil races of the universe until Sargeras found the Nathrezim, and from there on he resigned the Pantheon and transformed into Galactus the Devourer of Worlds—ooops, I mean Sargeras the Destroyer.
Hmmm … but in Metzen’s retcon there was a catalyst—the Eredar—that caused Sargeras to resign the Titans’ way before he encountered the Nathrezim. What was that catalyst now that the Eredar is not it?
Hoo-haa !!! Back to Azeroth.
Here is your catalyst:
Geologist Larksbane: “In the time before time, when the world was still in its infancy, a battle between a Titan and a being of unimaginable evil and power raged on this very soil. The prophecy is unclear about whether or not the Titan was vanquished in this battle but it illustrates that a Titan fell. An Old God had also fallen – or so it was thought.”
https://www.blizzplanet.com/content/184/
This story is read by Geologist Laksbane once you defeat Roman’Khan the Emissary of the Qiraji and bring his Crystal Unlocking Mechanism to Geologist Larksbane at Cenarion Hold (Silithus).
The quest that triggers Geologist Larksbane to read the Crystal Unlocking Mechanism is named The Calling:
https://wow.allakhazam.com/db/quest.html?wquest=8315
So here we have the catalyst. If Sargeras came to Azeroth with the Titans, and fought the Old gods and the Elemental Lords—it is possible, somehow, that Sargeras fell in combat against C’Thun.
What if somehow, when C’Thun became desperate knowing he would die, slashed out to Sargeras in a unexpected way … injuring Sargeras badly and tainting him somehow. Maybe a seed in his metallic bronze body?
This scene reminds me of Wolverine# 104 when the origin of Onslaught was revealed. Some evil within Magneto reached out to Xavier’s chest as a last desperate attempt when Xavier mindwiped Magneto. Impregnating Xavier with some taint that grew and fed off Psionic energy becoming later into Onslaught.—well let’s get out of Xmen before Kenzuki goes nuts and mad lol.
Anyway, what if Sargeras was that Titan that fell in Silithus. Wouldn’t that be the catalyst Metzen is planning for this new Sargeras-Eredar retcon?
If so, Patch 1.9 was the breadcromb to initiate that long storyline to explain the new retcon later on.
This brings up many other questions for this retcon.
What if somehow the Old gods, seeing how the Night Elves wtfpwned the Qiraji and the trolls, somehow they saw an opportunity by whispering into the highborne to dare them to delve more into the corrupting magics of the Well of Eternity?
What if C’thun tainting Sargeras when they both fell in Silithus paid off—scheming until now the proper time to lure Sargeras back to Azeroth?
Ain’t that strange how they lured Neltharion the Earthwarder to create the Demon Soul? As if it was already part of a long-term plan?
The Demon Soul was a golden disc made out of Neltharion’s blood. The Goblins shaped and forged this blood in their anvils beneath a mountain until it became a simple golden disc.
The Old gods whispered to Neltharion to capture one of the demons that entered through the portal of the highborne.
Neltharion placed the Demon Soul onto the demon’s forehead and it sucked in its lifeforce into the Demon Soul. Of course, it also had some of the Old gods’ taint—which Knaak hasn’t explained. However, Knaak slipped some nice details about the Demon Soul artifact and a hint to a possible continuation of Rhonin and Krasus’ adventures in a new book after the War of the Ancients Trilogy:
https://www.blizzplanet.com/content/434/
So the keyword here is the Demon Soul.
If you read the trilogy books, basically what we are told is that Neltharion was simply a muppet of the Old gods. A tool for a means.
The Old gods wanted Neltharion to create the Demon Soul to lure Sargeras. They somehow knew that Sargeras needed a magic amplifier so that the Highborne could open the portal wide enough for Sargeras to enter Azeroth.
And that is how Sargeras commands Mannoroth to search for the Demon Soul after Neltharion transformed into Deathwing and used the Demon soul to kill many of the Burning Legion and even Elves along the way of its destructive wave when he wielded it.
This became the breaking point when Sargeras found out of this item that caused so much destruction. Sargeras immediately asked Mannoroth to find the Demon Soul at all costs to serve as an amplifier for the Highborne’s spellcasting so that the portal for Sargeras became wide enough for his arrival to Azeroth.
Now doesn’t this sound far-fetched? How could the Old gods have known all along that the Demon Soul would draw Sargeras to use it as an amplfier?
How did the Old gods knew that once Sargeras set foot in Azeroth, the Old gods could automatically escape their prison?
Can they somehow manipulate time? Did they get a message from the future from the Qiraji and the Twilight Hammer? Did the bones of Grakkarond in Silithus had anything to do with this?
Or was it when the Old gods captured Nozdormu briefly?
All we know is that for some reason there was a time-anomaly. Krasus, Rhonin and Brox were sucked in by some strange time-vortex—I assume located in Winterspring. Orgrimmar was already built when Rhonin and Krasus went back in time by accident.
It is not clear if that time-anomaly was caused by Nozdormu in an attempt to seek help, or if it was something else. Could it be the Emissaries of the Qiraji (Roman’Khan and others) somehow used the energies of the Bones of Grakkarond to communicate with the Old gods in the past? Far-stretched. :: shakes head::
Anyway. The question stands. How did the Old gods knew the demon soul would draw Sargeras to Azeroth and that once he did arrive it would cause the Old gods to be freed from their Prison?
That makes no sense.
But what if this was all a long planned thing? What if C’Thun battled Sargeras, and tainted him as a last option out of desperation? Then feigned death.
What if knowing Sargeras—the titan that fell in Silithus – would be so affected, he counted on Sargeras to eventually turn depressed and evil?
Hmmm ….
Knowing that one day he would be drawn to Azeroth (War of the Ancients) becoming their very tool to freedom from the Old gods’ prison.
Hmmm …
Share your thoughts. Don’t kill the messenger.
