I disagree, strongly. The Silverpine quest line is a big lore push. It sets up the fate of Gilneas and shows Crowley turning his back on his country for the sake of his daughter. It introduces new players to the Val'kyr, which play a major role in the Forsaken story now. You see several high ranking Forsaken do heroic things which most people would never expect from them, several of them sacrifice themselves for the player or go out with their guns blazing. The sacrifice the Val'kyr make at the end to bring back Sylvanas doesn't give the impression that it's easy to bring her back. All three of them had to die to do it, and without Arthas around anymore, the Val'kyr are finite beings. Both sides of the conflict are shown as competent (except the drunken orc sea dogs) and willing to do what they must to win.

Silverpine may be a low level zone but the quest is incredibly well done and, dare I say, epic. Blizzard has done a magnificent job with the new quest lines.

The 7th Legion forces in Pyrewood had gnomes and dwarves among them.

YouTube - Cataclysm Beta - Silverpine Quest Line pt 9 "A dish best served cold"

Go to about 7:20.

I wonder what Sylvannas means by "The Val'kyr are our future" - her last line in this quest, if memory serves. It means they're essential to the Forsaken's survival, yes, but I wonder if she's thinking of some production line of sorts. Like turning female Forsaken into Val'kyr. I'm probably reading too much into it, though.

On Ye Old Death Knights: 1. (Dead) human knights surely had a greater effect on the morale of the Alliance armies.
2. Doomhammer was responsible for the death of the Shadow Council members. I'll assume he left little to be raised. And that is if he didn't just burn the bodies.

A) It's wasteful to lose Val'kyr to resurrect Sylvanus. Val'kyr are important resources and not worth wasting.
B) Sylvanus planned poorly and/or didn't understand a subordinate's motivations (Godfrey isn't loyal).

Neither sounds like Sylvanus. She doesn't waste resources and she doesn't turn her back on suspect agencies.

To me it just needs one thing to make sense. A line from Sylvanus about not expecting the Val'kyr to be lost in the resurrection process. I.e. she knew what was going to happen, expected and embraced it. Planning and carrying out a "Look, I was killed in front of everyone and it didn't stick. No one bother to try again, your efforts are wasted" scenario is entirely believable. Publicly highlighting her effective immortality.

Unfortunately the text linked by Halibell denies this possibility. She neither expected the death/betrayal, nor that the Val'kyr could bring her back (much less at their own cost).

The way I understand the difference between vargul and yrmjar as it was presented in WotLK is that the former are just reanimated rotting corpses, while the latter 'ascend' to a state of undeath without actually dying first. Perhaps they required the power of the Lich King to create not-formerly-dead-undead like the yrmjar, or they just haven't found any volunteers yet.

We also have Meryl Felstorm who became a free willed undead long before the Scourge existed. Force of will combined with powerful magic work too.

The Ymirjar aren't undead. They serve Arthas as living beings, much like the Cult of the Damned.

They only become undead if they are made Death Knights or are defeated in combat and raised as Vargul (which is a great shame to them and basically a punishment, as it's a constant reminder that they are unworthy in the eyes of their god).

Why they become sort of frosty I'm not sure, but it's not specific to working for Arthas since the Brunnhildar are similarly frosty and elite and whatnot.

Necromancy aren't exactly forgotten art. There is also ghosts, victims of curses etc. But we are talking about creating intelligent and freewill undead.

Thank's for clarification on Ymirjar. It means that Val'kyr can only raise one type of undead, or "resurrect" undead.

Balnazzar is the one who created The Risen.

The Legion (or rather Kil'jaeden) created the Lich King and his original line-up of liches, and the original death knights originated from demonic magics. The Scourge have sort of taken over the undead business, but necromancers, warlocks, and demons employed them before Ner'zhul was sent to Azeroth as the Lich King.

*snaps fingers*

You know it just occurred to me, that the whole, "I see only Darkness" only applied to Sylvanas/Arthas, which makes me assume at least that Undead don't have the comfort of the light, or the elements, or nature, or any such thing when they pass.

It's a far cry from say Crusader Bridenbrad, who is wrapped in the Light upon death, or the Shaman in Warcraft Legends, who is given a vision of his daughter growing up to be a great Shaman upon his death.

Also makes me think about what Garrosh says to Sylvanas earlier in the zone, "Remember, Sylvanas, eventually we all have to stand before our maker and face judgment. Your day may come sooner than others..."

Forsaken beliefs were described pretty good in Warcraft RPG.
Cult of Forgotten Shadow - WoWWiki - Your guide to the World of Warcraft

So they see only shadow by choice mostly. As for Val'kyr among the Forsaken, it's also consistent with Forgotten Shadow beliefs.


Now obviously many thing from RPG books were changed or retconned since then, still looks solid to me.