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Wednesday, September 29, 2010

Arthas Menethil – Hero, or Villain? (Part Two)

In my last post I talked about Arthas’ beginnings, his early life, and the culling of Stratholme, an event that majorly impacted Azeroth.  Sure, he killed all of those infected townsfolk.  But what would you have done?  Let the plague spread?  Is Arthas a hero for what he did?  Or is he a monster?  Maybe hearing the rest of the story will help you decide.


  • Arthas followed Mal’Ganis, the demon responsible for Stratholme, to Northrend.
  • Arthas and his men ran into Muradin Bronzebeard, the Dwarf that trained Arthas in swordfighting as a boy.  He was with his group of Dwarves exploring.
  • Arthas received word from Uther and his father to return home with his men.
  • Arthas wouldn’t leave until he killed Mal’Ganis.  While his men were heading back to the boats, he hired a group of mercenaries to set fire to the ships.
  • When Arthas’ men arrived, he betrayed the mercenaries, accused them of burning the boats, and had them killed.
  • Muradin told Arthas of Frostmourne, a fabled runeblade hidden in Northrend.  
  • Arthas, Muradin, and a small group of men pressed on to Mal’Ganis’ base. 
  • Using an ancient waygate, they made their way to Frostmourne, inside an icy cavern.
  • Arthas was confronted by a Revenant Guardian, who told Arthas that Frostmourne was a cursed blade, and that he would not allow him to have it.  Arthas struck him down.
  • As the Revenant was dying, he said, “Turn away… before it’s… too late.”  Arthas replied saying, “Still trying to protect the sword, are you?”  “No…” the Revenant said, “Trying to protect you… from it.
  • Muradin read an inscription on the ice, and told Arthas that the blade was indeed cursed.  He told him to forget about the blade and lead his men home.
  • Arthas refused, he stood before the blade, and shouted out to the spirits of the cavern to release Frostmourne, that he would give anything to protect his people.
  • As the weapon broke from its icy prism, Muradin, Arthas’ long friend was struck by a shard of ice.  Arthas no longer cared about his friend.
  • Arthas dropped his holy warhammer, wielded Frostmourne, and made his way past Muradin to defeat Mal’Ganis.
  • Mal’Ganis told Arthas about how his thoughts were now controlled by the Lich King.  Arthas replied telling him that the voice said to kill him.  Slaying the dreadlord, Arthas ran farther north, leaving his troops to fend for themselves.
  • Arthas soon lost the last remnants of his sanity.

98 comments:

  1. Who are you going to discuss next time?
    These are some pretty fun facts.

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  2. great find, but not really into this. :)

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  3. Reading this backstory makes me feel pity for him.

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  4. I personally love the backstory of WoW, infact the whole Warcraft series. Keep up the posts, i'm looking forward to the next one.

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  5. WoW is a pretty fun game. Personally I think when LK came out it got a lot worse :(, BC was badass though

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  6. awesome blog dude.

    following you.

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  7. I really like the bullet style posting story

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  8. bleh, i used to be hooked on WoW...

    and then i failed my first semester of college! not good! ;~;

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  9. I dunno...I guess I feel a little bad for the guy but he just left his men and friend. I never got into the games but they've always interested me. Cool post, bro.

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  10. very nice blog
    i like your post!
    supportin & follow you ;)

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  11. Thanks for posting his story it is an awesome read. Keep them up. I will keep reading that is for sure.

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  12. Niiiiiiiice. I like your blog. I'm going to start following you. Keep up the good work.

    Thanks!

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  13. He still looks ugly! :(

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  14. his backstory is very interesting.

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  15. damn you time to play some ft again lol

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  16. It's always tragic, for me at least, to look at a monster and not see the hero he is. It's even harder for me to not look at a hero, and sympathize with his situation. He's going to kill thousands, and become hated by all the people he wants to help, to save their lives.

    It's something that really gets to me, and something I feel we all know in some way. Che, Hitler, Stalin, etc... Anybody else see the light in popular monters?

    Amazing post mate, in it's own way. Really made me think.
    -JKane

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  17. like thes facts very cool keep it up

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  18. Power hungry villain.

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  19. only a bad arthas is a good arthas
    oh i love this wordplay :)

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  20. Arthas set out with the best intentions. Even if his actions in Stratholme were questionable, they were logical.

    He was tricked into being corrupted, before that he was just a leader who didn't want to see his people suffer.

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  21. Incredibly difficult decisions to make, but when you have to decide between a population and an individual, it's not hard to choose the population and believe that you've maintained your conscience...

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  22. I read the book. I think he seriously just went nuts after his horse died. seriously, he mentions how much he misses his horse every 3 pages.

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  23. Hey look, it's the Master Sword.

    But in all seriousness, I don't even play WoW and I'm kinda liking these stories a lot.

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  24. Hm, I'm surprised that Blizzard decided to delve this far into the story.

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  25. Loved the WC3 story line... but I never really paid attention to WOW story line...

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  26. wow. pretty neat story. Thanks for making it short and easy to understand.

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  27. The poor fellow.

    This is very interesting. Thanks for sharing. :)

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  28. I want one of those swords, but in real life, i'd carry it around and do everything with it, scratch my back, open doors, save cats from trees.

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  29. Arthas is chaotic good, turned chaotic evil

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  30. Loving the backstory on this guy

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  31. awesome read!!
    showing some love!

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  32. is that the sword they talked about in south park, what was it, sword of 1000 something?

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  33. You should make a proper website for WoW history!

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  34. That is a very thorough story, interesting character!

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  35. ahhh man wish i had a frostmourne

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  36. I love WoW and Warcraft 3. I admittedly never played Warcraft 1 or 2, so to me killing Arthas was beating the game.

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  37. It really does make you think how much depth Arthas really had and how tragic he really is.

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  38. Your post reminded me of the good old days when Blizzard used to make good games.

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  39. quiero quiero that sword
    quiero quiero that sword
    quiero quiero quiero quiero
    quiero quiero quiero quiero
    quiero quiero that sword

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  40. Arthas is a hero in his own right, but not anymore. by the way, what happened after his defeat in ICC?

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  41. thanks for the read, it's some nice thing to review a every so and so

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  42. Not big on WOW lore, but nice post. :D

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  43. looks great!
    i like it .

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  44. interesting post, and i have to agree with several others, his sanity was slipping, so i don't think he was a villain or hero, just mad

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  45. will more of the story be revealed after cataclysm?

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  46. Nice!
    Keep up the good work!
    May The FORCE Be With You!

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  47. good work summarizing the story around arthas

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  48. huh, my WoW chops aren't as good as I thought they were

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  49. I love Arthas. My favorite thing in the whole Warcraft shit. Besides Thrall maybe c:

    Also get back to HoN stuff

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  50. Very interesting read! Great research!

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  51. How did you get your blog to be so awesome? :)

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  52. Why is your blog so fun to read? :)

    http://tornadojackson.blogspot.com/

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  53. Even at my most in depth I was barely a casual player, so this stuff is really interesting!

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  54. I slay thee arthas with thy sword of 1000 truths

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