Finally Some Horde Epicness

I finally had an epic lore experience on the Horde side. I’d been waiting for the Hero of the Mag’har questline for a long time, and it did not fail to deliver.

To pick up the questline you must be level 66, and have completed the Blademaster questline, Altruis the Demon Hunter questline, and the escort quest from the Murkblood village. The pre-requisites are quite enjoyable in themselves, especially the Demon Hunter one, which gives a little nod to the main villain of the Burning Crusade expansion.

Nagrand is full of interesting lore figures for the Horde, such as Garrosh and Saurfang the Younger. Getting a glimpse of their past makes their characters really come alive for me – no longer do they appear as shallow villains.

For those that don’t know, the Mag’har are a faction of orcs that remained uncorrupted by the Burning Legion and banded together. Garrosh is a chieftain, assisted by Jorin Deadeye. What Garrosh believes about his father causes him to fall into a deep depression, and throughout the questline he seems rather apathetic to your successes.

The questline culminates in Thrall’s visit to Outlands. I won’t spoil too much of it, but here’s a few screenshots:

Thrall and Garrosh meet

Thrall and the Greatmother of the Mag'har

I can’t help but love Thrall, despite my Alliance loyalties. He’s a truly heroic and inspiring character, and adds an element of “good” to a faction that seems so evil. This experience only strengthened my admiration for him. I suppose this is why Blizzard had to remove him from Horde leadership for Cataclysm – having a likeable Horde leader weakens their goals of increasing tension between the factions.

Sidenote.. but OMG, Thrall’s new model for Cata is fantastic. Srsly.