I am a cynical person that conciously goes for lawful and non-destructive option, while I love a good corruption arc in my entertainment (Breaking Bad is the best series ever camp here), I cannot understand this trend of empathetic individuals trying to argue not guilty for absolute monsters when presented with humanly relateable story of descent into madness. Guys, stop whitewashing Snapes and Arthases and whoever. Actions matter, and when we talk about many deaths, malicious or not, intent is only relevant for the harsher sentence. These characters are villains. Good, compelling, relatable ones, but that's it. PS: I may start a war in comment section, but this is something that bothers me greatly personally as a trend. I am Russian citizen (not for long) and I know very well of scopes and twisted nature of this affliction irl. I keep hearing misplaced compassion from our gentle souled liberals that fled the cuntry first, how they are so so teary-sorry for Ukrainians but whine 'our booooys thooo are victims tooo, let's fund them so that in the frontlines they have comfy socks'. In the frontlines where they loot and pillage and raze to the ground property of citizens of a sovereign country. And when I tell these inviduals 'our boys' are criminals the moment they step across the border or load an artillery round, they look at me as if I am demon from hell that came to torment them with international legalese and Nuremberg trials and cases of Yugoslavian militias being prosecutad from all sides (though Serbs the most because of disproportionate amount of crimes against civilians and their sheer brutality, ofc). Misplaced empathy for abusers and psychos for me comes third place only to manipulation from a victim stance practiced by vulnerable narcissists, and then simple self-righteous and/or sadistic predation and bullying being the top of the top of human shit I can absolutely not take in real life but love observing in good entertainment.

Totally disagree with Stratholm. 1) He took the city and burned bodies 2) he killed all undead So pretty much no one was turned into undead and Malganis wasn't able to gather huge army

Arthas's final sendoff in Shadowlands did the character a huge injustice.

Things to note about Arthas caracter : - As demonstreted , Arthas starts off Human Campaing good alingned , but , for each mission that you complete , he starts to become more and more angry and desperate for a solution to the plague mystery - During the defence of Hearthglen , Arthas is the only person who *knows* that the plague turns the infected into undead instead of just being deadly (He also saw how a normal ass peasent that turns into a Ghoul/Zombie can go toe to toe with a trained and armed footman as seen in the introduction of the mission where some troops are training and some of them just die to the newly turned peasants , even tho they were well prepared for it) and he almost gets overwhelmed by the undead army , if it wasen´t for Uther saving him , Arthas would be dead. - Arthas was wrong/right about the culling - right because it was the fastest way to reduce the number of potencial numbers for the undead , saving commoners from an ill fate (Would you rather get slowly eaten by a ghoul or get a fast death by a giant hammer ?) and also Mal´Ganis was in the city so the situation just went from bad to worse. - Wrong because the culling itself goes against everything about being a paladin from the holy church , it´s immoral , killing his own people leaves the survivors (if any) scarred for life and Arthas also fired uther Final note : There wasen´t much solution to the Stratholme problem - Not enough time to plan something - Not a way to identify infected from non infected (Since there wasen´t any mage there , and Jaina wasen´t trained on that regard) - Trying to ´´Quarentine´´ the city would be a disaster , the number of commoners on stratholme alone outnumbers artha´s army (wowpedia.fandom.com/wiki/Stratholme#:~:text=In%20its%20glory%20days%2C%20Stratholme%20housed%20nearly%2025%2C000%20people.) source - No way to ´´heal´´ the disease since even today on wow lore , there wasen´t been invented a cure to the plague , not even super powerfull beings can save you from it , as seen in wotlk where a crusader gets infected and not even a Naaru/Aspect/Druid can stop the Plague

He did nothing wrong in Stratholme, it's better to kill a person while they are still human, instead of letting them become undead (which would have happened). It slows down the spread of the disease, and since the souls exists in this universe - people are suffering when they are undead, so killing them is an act of mercy.

I believe that Artas did only one thing wrong, the thing that weren't even mentioned in the video - when King Therenas called back his troops he hired mercenaries to burn his peoples ships and then lied to his men that the mercenaries burned the ships on their own, not on his behalf. Muradin mentiones that before talking up the frostmourne Arthas lied to his men and betrayed his mercenaries. It was a narrative highlight for Arthas descent. Everything before that was perfectly justified, everything after was Arthas under the effect of frostmourne and as such he was deprived of his free will. I always found the narrative around Arthas during these 2 campaigns (Human and Undead) very weird and muddled. For exemple it is apparent to me that in second mission when Arthas is angered by the orcs it is supposed to foreshadow his later descent because Uther warns him that if bloodlust would take hold of them they would be as bad as the orcs. It's a weird remark given that the orcs got to be killed and they kidnapped and sacrificed people but it always seemed to me like a clumsy writing. As for the matter of Death Knight Arthas being himself or not - I am aware that narratively considering Undead Arthas as a separate character that was possessed by Frostmorune is very boring, bland and there is no chance that it was authorial intent in this case. However by Arthas own admission he no longer felt any remorse or grief after picking up Frostmourne and we do know that Lich king managed to mind control his minions which also would include Arthas, which practically does absolve human Arthas of Undead Arthas deeds. Everybody has their shadow, however we do generally manage to control it, Arthas on the other hand was apparently magically deprived of that ability. We get to learn more about him though his undead shadow but everybody has urges, the key moral element - our will and ability to control these urges, was absent in Death Knight Arthas. As for the matter of Stratholme, to me it always looked like a form of trolley problem. If a train would run over 5 people should you redirect it to run over only one person? Except that in Arthas case it seems like that one person would have died anyways so it seemed even clearer that Arthas was in the right. The arguments that Arthas made a bad call were always weird. Like it weren't really communicated well that culling was futile in the goal of stopping the scourge. The narrative was focus at how horrible was Arthas decision to kill citizens of Stratholme without really explaining why. Explanation that the dead would be risen anyways doesn't vibe with me that much because then Scourge wouldn't need any plague, they could just storm all th graveyards, also it was never even implied that infested people upon being killed would rise from the plague anyways. The interlude after culling showed people burning the dead which as a child always seemed to me like a dramatic way of performing burial but now I can see it as a very effective measure against the corpses being risen. Medive comments about Arthas work being futile seemed more like him just wanting to convince Jaina to go to Kalimdor. People like to say that there were no good choice for Arthas during Stratholme situation. That no matter what he would do he would be a monster which is the tragic element. Still I don't think that this is a good argument for culling being immoral. I remember that I heard once somebody doing some talk with a philosopher and saying that Ethics are difficult matter - to do evil or good and the philosopher replied that this is a very easy choice - do good, the problem is when you have to choose between two evils. In real life we frequently struggle to fight our dark urges and do good rather than evil despite the difficult situations that we face. However, frequently we face a different moral difficulty, our own personal cullings of Stratholme in which we have to choose between evil and lesser evil and we have to judge which one is the lesser one. Voting for candidate we deem improper for the office being the most mundane example that comes to mind. So we need to ask ourselves - if a person would face trolley problem - would they really be immoral no matter what they do? Is being evil a matter of mere circumstance, does the fact alone that we face morally difficult situations makes us evil because no matter what we do something horrible will happen? How can you be considered immoral just because you had no choice but to do something horrible?

I think the biggest example I have of this is Kerrigan. She is an absolutely terrible monster. Killed billions, got cleansed, killed billions again. Women, children, puppies and kittens, ripped apart and eaten alive by horrible creatures that most would view as demonic. Creatures she sent to the task with full knowledge of what she was doing, again and again. Yet I've met people who think she's a relatable 'good guy'. Quite a few, actually, and weirdly they've all been women. It's so disturbing. That said though, where Kerrigan and Arthas differ *is* intent. Arthas wasn't a good guy by any means, but intent matters so much in reality that it is hard coded into law when dispensing with sentencing. What he hoped to accomplish, what repercussions he caused willingly, how much control he had, the duress, all of it matters to such a degree that culture has come to accept them as mitigating factors that can even have somebody found innocent. Legally, he might have had most of his 'evil acts' barely punished. I'll say you're being disingenuous about the plagued grain. Those people were absolutely screwed. Trying to then claim that dead bodies can be made into abominations is also ridiculous as that involves surgery and work, additional energies, and can be done even if they let the people turn to zombies. There is also the peace of death argument where it is considered immoral to allow somebody to survive only to suffer. Timmy dying right before becoming undead was certainly a more compassionate fate than having him turn, for example.

Bringing up the level designer is problematic, because the guy made a video where he compares the Scourge to real-life diseases, and how we don't wipe entire cities because of a virus. This is already kind of suspicious. Just how can he compare an irl disease to a fantasy undead curse? The way he backs up his sentence is questionable at the least, I don't think anyone would disagree. On the Stratholme mission, some people may disagree with Arthas about his decision, but then they would do no better than Uther and Jaina. Arthas was reckless, but it won't change the fact that Uther wasn't really interested to hear his reasoning either. As his elder and teacher, Uther shouldn't have abandoned Arthas because of his hot-headed behaviour, and should have tried to understand what made his pupil come to this conclusion. The problem is, Uther and Jaina really just abandon him for no other reason than "there must be another way", they didn't really wish to cooperate as far as we can tell from their lines. Its like if Uther just got offended by the way Arthas talked to him, which might fit another character, but not an old and wise mentor. While Arthas is quite overzealous, he really makes the only good decision regarding the city, based on his own knowledge (which is also right). The campaign before the Culling of Stratholme isn't long either, so its not like we missed a great detail. We only see these undead being relentless, large in numbers, and extremely dangerous. Even if there was a way to heal the sick, there was no way for them to find out. When people try to defy that cleansing Stratholme was the bad decision, they don't want to look at it from both perspectives. And I also think they forget how Uther and Jaina just backed up from Arthas the moment he needed them the most. Shouldn't friends and mentors help you when you are about to make a reckless decision, when you aren't in a clear state of mind? Just a question. While he is an adult person, and completely responsible of his own actions, Arthas's downfall is not just his mistake alone :D Then he becomes obsessed with Mal'Ganis, and this is when Arthas truly begins to make wrong decisions. Like disobeying his father's order, and burning down the ships. And after that, ordering his men to kill the "monsters" we hire as mercenaries, in order to avoid losing their loyalty. Then when Muradin confronts him about this, he just dismisses him. When they find the Frostmourne, Arthas just surrenders himself to revenge and takes up the Frostmourne. These are his only evil decisions, and no one could possibly prove that they weren't a cause of Arthas's weakness. After this, we clearly know that Death Knight Arthas is a different person. In the cutscene after the last mission of the human campaign, the following is written: "Tormented by Frostmourne's maddening voice, Arthas lost the last vestiges of his sanity" and "Now, driven by the sword's dark will, Arthas plans to return home to Lordaeron and claim his just reward..." Even the story tells us that he went insane, and his original self is not in control anymore. There is no questioning this, as its stated in the game. Overall, I think saying that Arthas did nothing wrong isn't right, but many of the points both Hirumaredx and you bring up, don't cover the full picture. I wonder if either of you at least replayed or watched the campaign in Warcraft 3 to back up your points. Which would be important since, you know, its the original source :D

I feel like the whole "killing the people of Stratholme would have done nothing, the Devs themselves said so" is a bad argument, because how would Arthas know that? As far as he could tell, killing someone and burning their corpse would ensure that they would not feed the Scourge more strength. I'm not saying this to justify Arthas' actions, he still did terrible things, but the only truly morally evil thing I can think off the top of my head was burning the ships at Northrend and blaming it on the mercenaries he himself hired. I'm probably missing a lot of stuff, it's been ages since I last played WC3.

20:36 Also, that's a gross simplification of what's the motives of Lich King (or at least, Ner'zhul part of him) was. Planet can go fuck itself, the fight against the Legion was never about the survival. It was about Roaring Rampage of Revenge. Because when someone skins your soul alive (as well as the pathetic amount of people you've managed to walk with you through haphazard dimensional gate) and traps you into shadowfrost crystal, it becomes kinda personal.

5:22 "To think that Arthas could take on Malganis is insane." But he... literally won. Sure, Malganis might have been holding back to give him a chance, for some reason, but if he hadn't done anything, all of Stratholm would have died that night.

The culling broke Uther tbh, not Arthas, more as a character than as a person (he just show he hypocrisy incarnated, pretty good representation of a church man) The culling was necessary, Uther knew it and this is why he didnt even try to stop it, he was OK with the killing of innocents as long as he wasnt the one with blood on his hand Obv this also broke Arthas but imo if Uther wouldnt have ""betrayed"" him, arthas would have not fall

I would say Arthas did nothing wrong...until Northrend. At which point he did pretty much everything wrong. The Culling of Stratholme was MORALLY wrong at first glance... but when you think about it, would you rather turn into a zombie, or be killed before it happen? Assuming it was 100% going to happen (which it was). It was also strategically the right call. The whole "corpses become abominations so killing the people means nothing" thing is absolutely ridiculous. 1- If you kill them before they become undead, it's a mercy in addition to reducing the risks of death for your soldiers. 2- If you destroy the corpses, they can't be turned into anything. At all. What do you think would have been a better alternative to the Culling? Also, the whole horse thing? That was in the novel, which was written AFTER Warcraft 3 and therefore neither players nor mission designers had any inklings of that "foreshadowing", making it not foreshadowing at all, really. You can't foreshadow in a prequel. Medivh said Lordaeron was lost, not the whole Eastern Kingdom. The reason for going to Kalimdor was to fight the Burning Legion. I agree with the rest of your video.

"Then your choice is already made. Just remember, the harder you strive to slay your enemies, the faster you'll deliver your people right into their hands." -Medivh, the last guardian

I'm curious what would've happened if Uther and Jaina went to Northrend with him instead of just abandoning him. Could they have talked him out of taking frostmourne?

I present a line from Dr. Allen Grant, in Jurassic Park 3: "some of the worst things IMAGINABLE we're done with the best intentions". ZUKO is someone who truly was a character worth defending, even regardless of the bad things he did. Part of the reason is because he HIMSELF eventually saw that he was doing bad things in service to a bad person, and he actively chose to not give in to becoming the person who tried to force him to be that kind of person. Arthas, regardless of his intentions, lost sight of what was right in his anger and hatred of Mal'Ganis. Acts based in hatred are inherently hateful and wrong, as evidenced by the light abandoning him. That was the whole reason his desire to find Frostmourne was even solidified. He could no longer call upon the lights power, and without it he didn't believe he was strong enough to kill Mal'Ganis

8:52 - yeah Uther and Muradin tried to reason with him, especially Muradin. But not only because of his anger he didn't listen to them but also because of his arrogance and pride

Just one thing. That totally sort of ruins the argument in this case. Yes, they could’ve been raised into abominations and other foul beings. But, how about we just burn the bodies? Which isn’t that what he did anyway? then the necromancer’s wouldn’t have anything to work with except ashes.

Just a note, not to detract from the video itself but the video "Arthas Did Nothing Wrong" was an April Fools Joke. To take the premise and try to portray it in a way people would agree with despite the contrary being the case. Similar to how he made a "Garrosh Did Nothing Wrong" for an April Fools Joke several years prior.

The Timmy ghoul is an easter egg so I don't think it can be used as an argument.

the arthas did nothing wrong video was an april fools joke from hiru lol, but great vid too

i wish i could only be judged for my intentions and not the shitty outcomes throughout my life 😂

I've had quite a discussion with Dave on this topic. Despite my respect for the man, I can't say I loved that. I still consider that the different interpretations should be allowed, because the game is really scarce on details. The dialogues and cutscenes omit a lot of what would really be said and done in reality. Take Arthas' dialogue with Uther just before Stratholme: he didn't give Uther any arguments, and the whole discussion considering Culling is just 3 sentences or so. Dave confirms that it's meant to be a characterization of Arthas. But every dialogue in the game is like that, they are always extremely brief, and people just understand everything from very brief explanations. How can we possibly know where it's characterization and where it's omission? We can't. And when events happen in the game, it's impossible to know which part of what's shown on the screen is canon and which is just game mechanics. For example, during the culling we see that people are basically turning into zombies before Arthas' very eyes. Moreover, we never see him killing any uninfected person. I know that is not canon, because I spoke to Dave. But that's what happens in the game, and if those actions are to be judged immoral, then every protagonist of a zombie apocalypse story is a terrible person. Moreover, we see surviving villagers burning zombie corpses in the following cutscene, which might mean either him doing a bad job culling, or sparing the uninfected people. Again, the canon is that Arthas did a bad job culling, and the plague didn't activate because Mal'Ganis wasn't there. But it's never stated in the game. It might as well mean he evacuated all the people who weren't infected. Did Arthas commit evil actions? Sure. The mercenary episode is very clear about that. Not the Culling, though.

I haven't done ICC, so I don't know if Arthas bad guy monologues about how the crusade to Northrend was part of his master plan or something, but this idea that Arthas was "holding back" seems ridiculous to me. The Pre-Patch event in WOW was a Scourge invasion of Azeroth using plagued grain again, as well as a formal invasion of parts of the world. Sending Naxxrammas to Northrend was a retreat of sorts from the EPL and it's crazy to think that Arthas would sacrifice Kel'Thuzad to test people. In fact in Naxx he outright calls for the PC's to be destroyed. Heck outside of Ice Crown and arguably Zul'Drek, you get the feeling like the Scourge are on the defensive, at best mounting counter-attacks. By WOTLK, Arthas' power is waning, largely because the Alliance and Horde recovered, built up and had a new generation of champions take the place of old ones like Uther. His outposts in the Plaguelands were under constant assault by them as well as the Scarlet Crusade, and the Pre-Patch event was him attempting to regain some of that power.

1:40 - like Obi wan said to Anakin you've become the very thing you swore to destroy

Sometimes, the only good choice is evil. That's life. Stratholme was the correct choice. An entire town worth of undead is another ARMY of undead. Removing that from the playing field is a strategic necessity to win the war. The incorrect choice was not taking the five minutes on horseback to explain the issue to Uther and Jaina. You can ride and talk at the same time. Speaking from experience here.

I disagree with Designer Dave. What is the point of showing us the humans who have eaten the infected grain transforming into undead in a prior mission if the exact same thing wasn’t going to happen? After you eat the grain, you are on a ticking clock, soon you will die and then revive. A whole city doing that at once would be disastrous. Would it not? (Also, arn’t Abominations corpses sewn together? They need to be created. They don’t just form).

"Some may question your right to destroy ten billion people (read Stratholme). Those who understand know that you have no right to let them live." - Exterminatus Extremis

"He was never trying to do the wrong thing" Just because he wan't trying to, (Which he absolutely was at certain points in the story, you know, the whole hiring a bunch of mercenaries to defy his father's orders to go back to Lorderon, only to then betray and kill them once their job was done.) doesn't mean HE DIDN'T do anything wrong. Because he did, and we see him doing things wrong even BEFORE he so much as touches Frostmourne.

Despite my love for WotLK, it retcon-ed some things that's related to Arthas and Lich King merge into one being and everything that comes afterwards. But the subsequent literature retcon-ed everything into oblivion, making Arthas the only personality of Lich-King, playing into that questline about LK carving out his heart and throwing it away. Why i say "recon-ed into oblivion"? There's multiple clear indications that the Lich King is a merge between two entities. Arthas' personality plays into want to remove everything that reminds him of his own human beginning, such as all living things and his heart - something that actually hurt him after the heart was destroyed by Fordring. Something that Ner'zhul would never do. While Ner'zhul's part of the deal clearly shows by torturing Bolvar and placing him at the top of Frozen Throne - not just for the hell of it, but to keep a *replacement* close to the source in case things went south. And there was enough reasons to assume that since Arthas' side already cost both of them - being hit by Forsaken's plague, loosing Knights of Ebon Blade, getting weakened by destruction of his heart to Ashbringer. Another example, from his dialogues it's clear that he's both Ner'zhul and Arthas at the same time. "I was the shaman once" is the direct quote - something that Arthas would never said. Unfortunately, whatever the plans were for this storyline, it died after the Legion, where absolute morons took to the writing of this.

i completely disagree on he was "tricked" into picking up frostmorne narrative both in-game warcraft 3 Muradin and The Guardian actually warned him that blade was cursed and evil. Arthas completely ignored their warnings and took the blade anyway because of his desire for revenge on Mal'ganis and damn all the consequences. nobody forced him or gave him misdirected info on picking the blade. Ner'zhul has ability to foresee the future events and told Mal'gains Arthas would in fact chooses to take frostmorne and sacrifice Muradin.

The biggest issue with Arthas was: Damned if you do, damned if you don't. There were no good choices for him to make. All roads went to tragedy. One must also remember, Arthas was the first soul Frostmourne claimed. He was the first victim. The Arthas, wielder of the blade, was NOT the same Arthas prior. But even as the Lich King, Arthas did show the restraint of his former self. Had he not, the second Scourge invasion would NOT have been stopped. It HAS to remembered that Arthas became corrupted by the darkness of Death itself. There really was no coming back from that. It's like Sylvanas, she became something different. With the power Arthas, as the Lich King, possessed, he could have easily regained dominance of the Forsaken as well. How could he not, is the true question. Arthas unquestionably and easily defeated (and would've killed the cowardly) Illidan even as Arthas' powerful was drastically waning as a DeathKnight. I will not absolve Arthas of his foolishness but he wasn't a completely bad guy. He was misguided and inexperienced. He made terrible decisions but he wasn't purely evil. He had a heart. Even a counter-part of himself aids you in trying to defeat him. Even Uther (before shit retcon) forgave him and chose to remember him as the hero he was once. Let us also not forget. Arthas won the Raid battle. We, the champions, lost. If it weren't for the Holy Light itself surging through a great Paladin, the Lich King would have won it all. The only time in the entire game of WoW where the End-Game Raid Boss was actually too powerful to defeat. The strongest entity to ever grace our worlds. Arthas did indeed do some things wrong; I can't deny. One also must remember that the 'road to Hell is paved with good intentions'. One must act with reason and logic, not emotion. You can blame Arthas for his decisions pre-Frostmourne. After Frostmourne, Arthas became something else and it's a LOT harder say one way or another on anything. Lastly, another thing to not be forgotten, is that the Dreadlords are able to do some nasty things when it comes to mind/heart manipulation. If we take into account what a Dreadlord is capable of doing to a human, it may be harder to blame Arthas for his pre-Frostmourne decisions. Mal'Ganis could've done a lot. Arthas is probably a good example of the rare occasion of a 'good' person doing bad things. Usually it's just bad people doing bad things, or that's at least how I've come to see life. There's a bit more nuance to what I'm trying to say there but I don't know a better way to say it. Kind of like when socialists murder dissidents, deep down, they know they're the bad guys. All in all... I don't care, I love Arthas and I'm team Scourge! Kill the living, raise the dead!

5:10 That's actually an interesting way of looking at it. Since we have cutscene in the end of that mission, where surviving humans burn their dead, i thought it actually made the difference, while Dave states that in the end those corpses too, will fuel the Scourge. I'm not sure how these two points correlate.

LMAO, did you happen to notice the release date for the video you keep referencing? Hiru does a video like this every year, same date. 🤔

Another thing about Arthas having autonomy as death knight is violation and torturing of Sylvanas. Ner'zhul didn't care about personal grievances so long as his goals are achieved, whereas defiling and borderline r@pe imagery of Sylvanas' torture in the comics which he was carrying out himself for near a year according to the story, felt and were painted as sadist, cruel and personal. Even in the Sealed Chest where he kept his most priced keepsakes, amongst all the heartwarming items, he kept vial of the Blood of Sylvanas from days of him torturing her. Say what you want about how Alex "Women abuser" Afrasiabi, who was writting Sylvanas as a cold heart, villainess "Bitch"(Garrosh was his favorite character) and made Sylvanas go completely off the walls by the time of 9.2.5 due to Danuser crafting Jailer and that BS story arc. But before Afrasiabi kept dripping small hints (like raising blood elves in SoO which went against her personal beliefs and trauma that was inflicted on her by Arthas) and Danuser finishing both Sylvanas and Arthas off in terms of lore consistency, Sylvanas was well written, most interesting character WC IP had, Arthas was simply more iconic.

Timmy undead having free will ?Just because he was made a neutral creep. Maybe designers felt is unfit to change kids into raging monsters at that point ? Or maybe he just needed "guidance" from KT or a Dread Lord, they are created via domination magic, so they need a dominating mind. I think it is a huge difference between undead ghouls lets say and risen skeletons. If it wasn't any, why bother create the plague to turn them into undead in the first place ? you just needed them dead to raise, right ? Seeking for possible explanation while disregarding more obvious one is not building a strong case. Lack of reasoning. Again, same simple yet wrong explaining. Why not judge all other characters at same time for doing nothing at all. Even Arthas's father takes the plague as a joke, a rumor. It is clearly shown in the cinematic at the start of the game. Since his father gives the direct orders, first to Uther, then when he recalls Northrend troops, yes, Arthas is indeed alone fighting in something nobody takes interest or understanding. Was he played ? Yes. Was the "mastermind" Mal'Ganis also played ? Yes, he was. Was he responsible for choosing as he did ? Yes. Yet, as the story was build, he had all circumstances from both side, from Mal'Ganis actions and from humans inaction. Having self-control as death knight and how much of it is an assumption. Another bad bad story reading before making the video. The sword and the helm are NOT Legion artifacts. It is clearly revealed in Shadowlands, from what we know The Jailor might have been using LK for his own interest, using the Legion when he wanted, keeping it away when he didn't. You don't have to be sure of anything, again, even Uther's story is detailed in Shadowlands. Arthas' soul was first to be probably split. How exactly is not clearly stated. Also you can see with Bolvar, the new LK, that he clearly states that a huge effort was necessary to keep Jailor's influence on him apart. Regarding why he didn't turn all world into undead, that is also explained in ICC storyline. Risen undead are just mindless, skill-less bodies. In order to fight the legion he needed the most powerful heroes turned into undead, to retain their power and augment it. If you can't follow the story properly, please don't do videos on it, is.....useless effort....that could be better invested elsewhere.

"Well done, Arthas. You did what the plague could not - purged the entire city. Do you feel like a hero yet?"

I could chalk Stratholme up as one of those tough decision leaders have to make. However, it is clear that Arthas has gone off the rails by the time he reaches Northrend. Arthas had good intentions, but that doesn't mean you are good person. Once he was willing to compromise all his principles to accomplish his goals, he had no principles. It is a classic case of the road to hell is paved with good intentions.

I'm an Rp'er on World of Warcraft... and I once considered creating a character that was apart of the Culling proper. Part of that process was coming up with justifications for why someone would go along with this, despite how morally wrong slaughtering innocent people normally is. It helps if you consider the wider problems that the Scourge outbreak had inflicted on the Kingdom, even before one gets to Stratholme. Lordaeron was not in a good position going forward. The Cult of the Damned was largely made up of serfs and farmers from the 'Breadbasket' of the kingdom and the Scourge largely built up its numbers for the original army that Arthas and Co defeated before they reached Stratholme by wiping out those same farming communities, alongside using Andorhal (which was at the center of the food production and distribution) to infect larger settlements that might have been able to endure actual attacks. The Scourge also blighted a great deal of these farmlands in the process; Maybe not to the extent that the Plaguelands would become known by, but still pretty bad. On top of this, existing grain stockpiles are going to have to be inspected and chunks destroyed because of it being a primary method of spreading the plague. No matter what happened, famine and (more mundane) plagues were going to ran rampant across Lorderan in the aftermath of this. Both of which bring additional death. If Stratholme was allowed to become a Scourge bastion with a brand new army of undead in the midst of this, marching fresh forces across ravaged and blighted parts of the kingdom later is going to be a logistical nightmare at best, provided that what few settlements that have survived up to this point continue to do so. This is a problem, because with Lordaeron about to enter a weakened state due to the aforementioned famine (and all the nasty stuff that comes with famine), with the Scourge actively putting continued pressure from a stronghold that can't be easily assaulted by the living due to its defenses and the blight against the land itself that makes resupply or living off the land next to impossible... It would be a war of attrition that favored the Scourge heavily. Purging Stratholme and preventing that bastion and army from forming was pretty much the only real chance Lordaeron had of surviving long enough to recover. Yes, the remaining pockets of Scourge and Cult of the Damned necromancers would need to be hunted down, but by comparison that's just hunting down stragglers. As tragic as it was, there wasn't a lot in the way of alternative options to dealing with the situation in Stratholme before the plague and the Scourge made even assaulting the place more of a horrific nightmare then it turned out to be. Despite Arthas' personal flaws, this was simply a shitty situation were doing nothing wasn't an option.

Arthas is trained mostly to be an effective warrior (and he had the warrior mindset of wreck things first then ask later), so much he forgot that there are other ways to deal the undead problem in Lordaeron. For example, abandoning Lordaeron altogether. Might not be a good thing, but as Medivh predicted, the land was already lost even in the Scourge's earlier stages. Another option might be to ask Kirin Tor to mass-produce an antidote, or to ask the High Elves to do the same (or even have both the Kirin Tor and the High Elves do it together). Arthas forgets that as a prince, his number one job is to be skilled at asking people for help, and that war isn't the only thing that has to be in his mind.

How have we not compared the queen of blades to arthus I think they have tons of parallels.

Sorry, I think you and even the creator are wrong about the culling. Arthas purges stratholme and *prevents it from becoming an undead stronghold*. "The culling of stratholme does nothing!" Yes it did! What on earth are you talking about? Stratholme doesn't fall to the scourge until after the return of Arthas as a Death Knight and with him the reactivation of the scourge and the cult of the damned...

Imagine you wake up, you couldnt take breakfast from that new sweet grain that shipped into the town, and arthas comes and kill you with out really knowing what is going on.

So as someone deep into the topic - i argued with Blizzard here too cause the culling DID accomplish a LOT. Its a common military strategy called scorched earth. The inhabitants of Stratholme were already infected, they already turned when Arthas showed up and became servants of the scourge but yet in a weak state. So by killing the civilians that havent turned yet he 1) reduced enemy forces and their power 2) gave the people peace in death saving their souls as they would have been lost after turning 3) it was mercykilling. The people were doomed to become bloodthirsty cannibals devouring their loved ones. Ask yourself, if you were in that position would you rather be killed swiftly with a hammer to the head or go through the incredible pain of turning undead, loosing your soul and then attacking the people you loved and held dear? Yeah id rather die quick thx. The culling was the best strategic descission that could be made at that point in time - there is no way around it and every military thinking person would have done the exact same and we even have historical examples of real life where similiar methods were used to stop the plague from spreading and killing even more people where infected towns were burned down to save cities. For Arthas did nothing wrong - he did BUT...1) most evil stuff he did, he did AFTER being corrupted by frostmourne or after merging with nerzuhl so he wasnt himself anymore. Similarily he did show arrogance before that but all chars in warcraft have flaws. That said the tragedy of Arthas story IS that he tried to do everything wrong, acting for a greater good and willing to do anything to achieve it. Its a cautionary tale of fanatism - the greater good might not be worth the price to pay for it. That said we also know for a fact that without Arthas holding the scourge back it would have conquered the entire world of Azeroth so he in the end did acutally prevent the destruction of "his people". I also like to compare however as it is said Arthas is irredeemable despite having the excuse of having been mindcontrolled. Ok, but what about Jaina Proudmoore then? Her actions were outright genocidal, breaking the peace, warmongering causing another war with the Horde, she was so bad people believed she was replaced with a Dreadlord. But this bloodthirsty monster got a redemption story? What about Sylvannas, she caused more death and destruction than Arthas did with her new plague, the rekinling of the alliance-horde war, burning down Teldrassil, enslaving the valkyr...that arguably most evil of all warcraft characters - cause she doesnt even do it for a greater good just out of hatred for the living - that one got a redemption story. So if those 2 women get exhonorated than so should Arthas who wasnt nearly as bad as these 2. Also the culling isnt something unique in Warcraft just the scale is. The nightelves had no issue culling furbolgs that were about to be corrupted, same for moonkin and corrupted animals and they cold have afforded to look for a cure instead but didnt. The bloodelfs had no issue culling the wretched and those about to loose control, and dont even get me started on the forsaken. The red dragons did kill their own allies at wrathgate and so on yet i dont hear complaints about these events and tactics that by the way, the Lightforged also use. A lot actually

5:11 purging the city changes a lot. After malganis ran away, the soldiers of lorderon collected the corpses and burned them so the acolytes couldnt retrive them and make them into abominations.

"Yeah, so just because you could end the world and decide not to doesn't exactly make you a good person" I was gonna rebut this but then I thought of the politicians with their nukes and I wouldn't describe them as good people just because they're not launching them either

If you forget about morality (a subjective concept fabricated by us that changes as times goes), and think about the practical side of things. Had he succeeded in the culling of Stratholme, doesn't matter whatever judgment fell upon him, by men or divine, the end result would be that the Scourge wouldn't have continued to kill hundreds of thousands more people. And these people that were killed later, if you ask them, "would you kill some folks at Stratholme now to save your life later?", I'm sure most would say yes, like all those moral paradoxes scenarios we put together. So much for morality 😄

arthas should have been redeemed if shadowlands needs to be rewritten and fixed.

3:40 I actually think you got it wrong here. Before I continue, just to clarify, I THINK ARTHAS DID THE WRONG THING. But in his head, this was his reasoning: Because Arthas killed his horse, the lesson is that, when the time comes next, that a sacrifice must be made, that HE (meaning Arthas) would step in that place. Arthas viewed killing the people in Stratholme as a great sin. A sin which would make him hated for the rest of his life (or unlife as it turned out). BUT, he did this, because in his mind, it was not about him. He viewed destroying his own reputation and having everyone hate him as OK, if it meant saving his people. He viewed taking Frostmourne exactly the same way. "I accept that Frostmourne will destroy my soul, because I owe it to my people. I was responsible for Invincible's death, and if my death/destruction of my soul saves Lordaeron, so be it."

The Timmy thing messed me up as a kid!

I often make a habit of poking Dave with "Arthas Did Nothing Wrong" to the point that it's a running gag in his streams. The thing is, I don't agree with Dave on the matter for a very simple reason. 5:49 This is it. You nailed it. This is the thing that deflates both yours and Dave's argument about Arthas. On your first playthrough, the players and Arthas both lack for information and are doing what they think is right based on that limited amount of information. You know what Arthas doesn't get though? A second playthrough. People who played the campaign go back to The Scourge of Lordaeron and then proceed to dunk on Arthas with information he could not possibly know. Nor is he the guy who built the map. Stratholme wasn't even built to Dave's tastes. In one of his streams, he said that he didn't want all of the civilians to turn and force you to destroy potentially innocent people, but that's not what made it into the final game. Likewise, if the mission is failed, the zombies turn _immediately_ and overrun the Alliance base. So it's understood within the game that failure means a tide of the dead will overrun the Northlands. Per Medivh's statements after the culling, Arthas did successfully manage to buy time. Given that both culling and not culling result in the undead appearing in force anyway, the culling is the strategically superior option because it allows for recovery and more time to act. 6:31 Dude, do you think Arthas can see the floating text that positively identifies who an individual ghoul is? You also can't say for certain that this isn't in fact an Easter Egg because Lil' Timmy can also be found in Theramore when Rexxar shows up. The the UI and easter eggs do not constitute an argument because they are not visible to Arthas. They're utterly irrelevant for argumentation about the character's motivations because something like ghoul Timmy is not knowable to Arthas and it's not clear that it isn't just a joke. Beyond this, I would like to point out two things: Tichondrius admitting that Arthas' soul was stolen by Frostmourne and Kel'thuzad stating that Arthas was deliberately chosen by the Lich King to be his champion. Given Arthas was facing off against ages old demonic forces and a demigod that could infiltrate minds, how was a 23 year old supposed to deal with that? I actually got Dave to pause and think about this in one of his streams when I pointed out that Arthas was like, 23 when this happened and Americans are wrong to trust 18 year olds with student loans they can't pay back. Likewise, the much older Uther failed completely in his duties to be an older man and mentor and instead got into a pissing match with a frat aged hothead. Uther should know better. He was 64 when he died and he was a paladin who very specifically was a source of wisdom and refuge for Arthas. Amazingly, there was even a bit of good writing in Shadowlands where Uther takes responsibility for failing Arthas. Cuz he did.

I would love to hear your thoughts on how Kael'thas was handled in WoW compared to WC3:TFT. :D

At the end of Shadowlands I think the perfect ending would have been Anduin dropping a small soulstone quest item and it leads up to a area in the Shadowlands. When we get there the pure part of Arthas manifests and Invincible appears, he pets him and mounts him walking off into the distance and their remaining anima dissipates and they fade away.

If Arthas went back to his dad (pre-Frostmourne) and talked about how to deal with the Undead, the latter would just side with Uther (whatever that guy's gonna say), since Uther is more tempered than the prince. It's useless to negotiate.

I thought him doing everything wrong was the point.

Those were difficult times. There was a war going on. You would have done the same in his shoes.

The hirumaredx video is a long tradition of april fools on his channel where he spins the narrative so much to the point where he makes nonsensical about controversial topics like BfA/WoD were good or Garrosh did nothing wrong. He is making fun of the Arthas did nothing wrong crowd. This is a showcase of what propaganda can do

Arthas did nothing wrong until the burning of the ships and the betrayal of the mercenaries.

"Arthas did nothing wrong" Mf literally picked up Frostmourne wym

At 12:12 Hirumaredx does not make it clear, but it is not just about ending the World, but essentially gaining total or more control over it. And yes denying more power to preserve the life of others does sound like a moral decision and while it does not necessarily make you a good person, it tells a lot and means there must be morals working inside of him. Think how many dictators with Arthas' power at that point would infact use that power to gain control over the World, even if it means killing others. Arthas by no means is flawless, or sinless, but under normal conditions he would not have become the Lich King... and this is what makes it a tragedy. In a same fashion another fictional figure Anakin Skywalker became evil, because many of the conditions he was under in often forced his hand. Neither had some megalomaniac goal or were after some riches, one wanted to defend his homeland and the other wanted to protect his love. And it is a shame what both became (morally speaking). However with Arthas, it is a strong point, that he was the first to have his soul/will be consumed by Frostmourne, which slowly twisted him into the Deathknight, and this is why I believe, that inspite of his flaws and sins is at the very least a decent man. He was not in control. Whereas Darth Vader was, yet decided to embrace his new life and renounced it later. Arthas never had the option to renounce his state, as the video put it he fell into a trap and there was simply no way out. Many others however do have a way out, but stay in their evil ways... His friends and mentors weren't tricked, but then again they never offered a viable alternate solution. Uther never showed his other way, the King was not having the situation under control and Muradin at the end essentially advised Arthas to concede. If Arthas was presented with a choice just maybe one tactically and strategically less sound, then we could say he picked badly. But he was not, he could choose between doing nothing and letting everything play out (will not end well), he could choose to listen to Medivh (a total stranger, ontop of this the guy who lead the orcs into Azeroth) or continuing on and eliminating those who orchestrated the plague (the move which seems in his position for obvious reasons the most logical).

Arthas did do nothing wrong, the only choise he can be judge on was the culling, when he was in his 20s. In a mediaval fantasy world where science barely exists the cures of illnesses comes down to the light, healers from all realms use it to heal people, arthas tried to heal people with the plague in a village where he killed kelthuzad, and he failed he saw that the light could not cure the plague ( in wow we players find out that there is no cure for the plague its unstopable) So arthas upon reaching strathholme makes a choise, kill everyone inside, there is no way to see whos infected or not, and yes inocent people died. But what choise did he have, okey seal the city and let everyone there be transformed and die and then only after kill them?? or let people out and 100% the plague would spread, he did the only option he really had. And then comes nothrend where yes THERE he makes a bad choise he takes the blade even after muradin tells him no. Thats the only wrong choise he made, and as soon as he touched the blade he died....YES many people skip the cutscene in warcraft 3 where the dreadlord tells arthas " that balde takes the soul of everything it touchs, your soul was the first one it consumed" Arthas died when he grabbed the blade thats why when he kills his father and land he feels nothing, not happyness nor sadness nothing at all. So thats the only wrong choise that ARTHAS the prince the young man does. The culling was not even a choise, because if you read the novels and comics taht are canon arthas asks the light for help in the culling and the light leavs him, she does not help him, the light in wow only helps you if you believe in what you are doing, example the scarlet crusade can use the light to kill everyone. The light makes no choises of good and evil it has no morals, if you believe 100% in soemthign it helps you, arthas didnt think it was the right choise, he didnt want to do it but he "had to" there was no option. Lets take real life as an example, altho its a game we can do a comparison. The plague the black plague, if someone was infected you killed the person and burned the body, lets say you are a knight trying with doctors etc to control the plague that destroyed europe and killed millions, you enter a home and see a family of 6, 4 infected coughting blood and 2 next to them that seem fine, would you really take the risk and put them i nquarantine with other people that might be okey or you do the only choise you have. My point in this mega text that i hope people read until the end is that arthas didnt do anything wrong , but also he didnt do somethign right, he did the only option he had, the world is not black or white, theres alot of grey in it. the bread analogy works perfectly, but lets say theres another person, me and a man see a fish we both want it to feed our familys, if we dont grab it and feed our children they will die, if i kill the man and save my family im "killing" by default that mans children. So am i doing somethign wrong well no and also yes, im dooming a family to death but saving mine, and if the man kills me his on the same boat, its not about right or wrong its the only choise we have. So arthas did WHAT HE HAD TOO should be the better phrase to be used imo Sorry for long text, loved the video and love the lore. If you read this far love you all have a incredible rest of a year :)

I love your Videos and your takes on one of my favorite videogames of all time (probably my favorite one) and i am missing one final take here and eveywhere else people talk about Arthas. Let me explain: The story of Arthas is a grand one but the relatability of this moment comes from the fact that we are all angry sometimes and we are all drawn to giving into this anger. Its most easily observed in romantic relationships. How often do loving parties behave in quite ridiculous ways due to intense emotions? Whenever i was in such situations, i always had at least a glimmer of consciousness telling me "yo dude, this is not the path of good, of love. This is not what you would want if you were in your right mind right now" BUT I didnt always listen to this voice. I sometimes treated people around me with less love than they deserved because i gave into my anger. The tale of Arthas is a reminder that every single day in your life you have the choice to turn around and do the right thing. But Arthas didnt, at any point. And just like a normal human he was consumed by grief and self hatred and suffered because of it. Just like we do when we do the wrong thing. And i believe (almost) everyone who beats his wife or children or mistreats his loved ones feels a similar way as Arthas. People do horrible things because they give into their anger or other emotions and we often forget how EASY it is to do so. We are only a sliver of sanity away from doing the same thing. Thats why its so important to always feed that voice of consciousness that reminds us of our true intentions and lets us act accordingly. THAT is NOT always easy, but it is always possible. Arthas didnt do it and he lost everything because of it. Dont be like Arthas the next time you are angry. THAT is the true lesson from this story.

I think the other people could've stopped Arthas like Uther, Jaina and his father like stand in front of him but they didn't do anything they just left him and that was wrong from them plus I know he could have done the right thing

Arthas was good before becoming litch king...

The road to hell is paved with good intentions.....

Reason is because most people can't face the facts that Arthas was evil for the sake for be evil. Ever before he took Frostmune, Arthas was already a bitter, prideful, and vindictive person. His fall was for his own humorous, and no for unse force. He did everything wrong out of pride. The same Anakin Skywalke fall for his own humorous, and no because a unsee forces.

I don't know Warcraft lore but i know thismuch, as a Necromancer, killing everyone and turning them to your undead army is ALWAYS a bad idea, the obvios reason would be that you need a healthy LIVING population to be able to keep your army growing. the less obvios reason is that you'd be just bored the hell out of your mind for a while untill you encounter something you won't be able to overcome by yourself, be it by lack of forces or creativity due to lack of perspective.

Also remember that’s Atheroth, a dark place to live where war is something normal and we got a twisted morality there as a something normal . Strathholme was a point of grey moral peak where we got a lesser evil to win over bigger . Arthas is a prince who must decided the fate of his own people . If there was medieval problem with even a black plague , people didn’t saw something really evil in idea of saving a millions on a cost of thousands I’m not trying to justifying genoside but we can understand all this better and not play a white knight from our point of view

Arthas did nothing wrong. What happens after he loses his mind due to Frostmourne has no relevance here. At the culling of Stratholme he did what only a king thinking about his country could've done while Jaina and Uther could only condemn him when they themselves were of no use in this situation.

Something that both you and the original video missed that I honestly think is important to the whole paladin arthas/death knight arthas is that the first soul frostmourne ever claimed was his. It's not ever explicitly stated what losing his soul actually did to him, but it's demonstrated pretty heavily through dialogue in the undead campaign. Especially his conversations with uther in mission 2 and tichondrius in mission 1 where he talks about how he just doesn't feel anything anymore aside from a desire to do what the blade tells him. So while he absolutely has self control and is capable of making his own decisions, he's a stronger servant and general that way, I think it's a more complex situation than just being his shadow because his core motivations are being influenced by outside factors and he doesn't truly have free will. When frostmourne was shattered every soul it ever stole was released, and that includes Arthas's soul. The reason Arthas was finally able to feel remorse and had those final words was because his soul had been returned to him and only in his final moments, with his soul returned and freed, was he able to look back and feel horror at everything he had done while undead because he previously lacked those emotions entirely.

The road to Hell is paved with...

10:17 - I think it's strange because they should have some experience, they should be trained how to deal with emotions by Jedi and Paladins

He only does the most reasonable things giving his knowledge, running out of time and his small recourses. If he would succeed he would be praised like a hero. Even if he hadn't touch the sword and just died at the north he still would've win, because cult is already reviled and crushed by him while plague is not spreading anymore. So he did absolutely nothing morally wrong, he just make a mistake that costed him everything in the end. His actions before that was 100% justified, his actions after that are on completely different being, not on him since "Arthas" has already lost his soul and as good as dead.

Let's face the facts: (fictitious facts in the game) 1. Frostmourne has overwhelming mind control power. This is repeatedly mentioned throughout Warcraft 3 The Frozen Throne expansion. Even when the Lich King was weakened due to Illidan's magic, Arthas remained loyal when Sylvanas and ghouls went rogue. This is due to the sword's powers as explained by Kelthuzad. 2. In Warcraft 3, Medivh told Arthas: "This land is lost! The shadow has already fallen and nothing you can do will deter it. If you truly wish to save your people, lead them across the sea, to the west." Which meant that culling of Stratholme or not, Lordaeron will fall to the scourge. Later events proved this statement to be correct. Which meant if Arthas did sail to Kalimdor with his people, we may never see the Lich King as he was in WOW. Maybe he would take another paladin or someone else but that's irrelevant to the point. This might be Arthas' biggest mistake in his life. From the scourge's point of view, the culling of Stratholme is irrelevant to their goal. This meant that even if Arthas stayed in Lordaeron during the entire campaign of Warcraft 3 and combated the plague with non violent means (quarantine, holy magic, medicine, snake oil, etc.). The scourge would still take Lordaeron and Arthas regardless. It's like Medivh said, the only way is to the west. The only human who saw truth in these words was Jaina. 3. Medivh told Jaina: Medivh: "The dead in this land might lie still for the time being, but don't be fooled. Your young prince will find only death in the cold north." Jaina: "You! Arthas is only doing what he believes is right!" Medivh: "Commendable as that may be, his passions will be his undoing. It falls to you now, young sorceress. You must lead your people west to the ancient lands of Kalimdor. Only there can you combat the shadow and save this world from the flame." Both of them are factually correct. 4. At the end of Warcraft 3 The Frozen Throne expansion, Arthas broke the ice block encasing the Lich King and took his helm/crown. Then the Lich King said: "Now, we are one." This meant either their souls merged to become one or that Nerzhul posessed Arthas' body. Either way, Arthas was powerless to the Lich Kings actions from this point on if he wasn't affectively already under mind control. 5. Arthas has made many mistakes that lead him to become the death knight and consequently the Lich King. People can judge him however they want but most, including the narrator of this video, agrees that his intentions were good. As the video have mentioned repetitively. 6. Arthas did kill Malganis. 7. Varian Wrynn, a childhood play mate of Arthas took the role as King of Stormwind, the next human capital after the fall of Lordaeron. Facts in the real world: For the most parts of the free world, when a criminal is on trial. His intentions absolutely matter and will affect his sentence more or less depending on the scenario and crime committed. For example, if I was performing CPR and accidently crushed his ribs and killed him. I am an idiot and should be ashamed. I killed a person. It is my fault that he is dead. However, it's unlikely that I will get a death sentence. Regardless of where this took place. It is even less likely that I will get a death sentence if there were people around me telling me to push harder or holding my hands. Crimes should and will, if caught, be punished. The intentions of the criminal will also almost always affect their sentence.

Arthas killing everyone in Stratholme is simply a mercy i would appreciate a lot. It would be a weight off my mind to know my corpse wouldn't wander around, hurting and infecting other innocent people. If i was a citizen of Stratholme, i would seek Arthas and make sure he killed me.

Depends on your viewpoint. If you have a more utilitarian mindset (way more common than you think) then Arthas didn’t really do anything wrong until be picked up frostmourne. As soon as he picked up frostmourne his actions are evil no matter what your viewpoint is. When it comes to the demonetization of that town. Well.. there was no cure, better to stop the problem at its source than turn into zombies. Thinking there will ever be a cure is too unrealistic and idealistic. There’s one hole in this though: culling them just makes them undead anyway. If that weren’t the case I would back him up here.

I think purging the city was warranted, although it likely should have been possible to save some people. But having them turn into aggressive zombies that then attack and possibly infect others....that would lead to a lot more death. Its more pragmatic good rather than morally good. The clip from the developer just shows you should burn them after killing them, which, Arthas probably should have known. After Frostmourne though? Its really hard to say how much of Arthas' will remained, especially since the writers at Blizzard went completely of the fucking rails. Although, using Bolvar as an Example, Arthas had some issues in comparison, mainly his recklessness.

So. Arthas bad because Arthas burn city only to later turn bad and come back and undead the city. How the hell is he supposed to know that? Oh, yeah, he also murdered an entire city. Well, you can either murder an entire city and burn it's inhabitants' corpses or you can fuel the Scourge so it goes on with a new avalanche of zombies, killing and plaguing more people as they go, by the way, zombies suffer much more as zombies than when their bodies are burnt, Arthas ain't burning them alive or skinning people to boil them later

It's all Muradin fault. If he never mentioned about Frostmourne, Arthas will not hunt for it. Besides, Muradin and Arthas can tank Malganis!

Arthas had little choice in the matter that's what people typically fail to see and of the few choices he had he arguably makes the most reasonable ones with the info/time he is given even going against his own morality while everyone acts emotional and provides 0 solutions to the monumental problems ahead. Those who say Arthas made the wrong choices typically cant offer a better one and Im not only talking about the culling. Arthas was a doomed man in the long run and so were his people, what makes him the hero is how immediately after he realizes that he becomes willing to sacrifice all he is to prevent the inevitable regardless of whether he fails or not. In the warcraft lore nowadays there are few stories and are this grey. It is typically all black and white, right and wrong. All choices Arthas was given were plainly horrible in the long run and in order to do good he had to act bad. That does not make him a villain it makes him a victim of a scheme that was made long before he was born

The Culling damaged Arthas mind and soul, but no; It was NOT his first act of evil, and it was NOT a wrong decision. When he got into the city, those people were already damned to become undead, and with Mal'ganis in the vicinity (and his necromancers), those undead would be controlled and would become a huge problem to the entire continent, and the undead plague would've overrun the continent. "Ahh but Timmy!" - Ok, first, Timmy might either be a joke, and even if he is lore serious, Timmy is found without no necromancer around, dreadlord or any other greater undead controller, hence why he is friendly (more like neutral, since you cant use him). And we have FACTUAL PROOF that the events of The Culling are different, since any citizen that mal'ganis get to it first, becomes an ENEMY undead. "But even killing them, they would have become undead either!" - Yeah, WEAKER undead, far far weaker. A ghoul can shred a normal soldier with ease while a skeleton can be dealt with less casualties. ...the nuremberg trials, really? Moving on! The real first TRUE EVIL act of Arthas was when he burned his ships and killed the mercenaries. That was evil, and that was unnecessary. What do you think would it happen if The Culling had not happened?!! You don't need to go out of Warcraft to find comparisons to Arthas path, as one thing most people forget about W3, is that it's a triple protagonists story, where each race (orcs, men and elves) have one "Arthas" and one "Uther". And although in the case of the orcs, the story lacks nuance (that eventually got overloaded with it in WoW), if you look at the elves you gonna see a perfect mirror of Arthas in the character of Illidan. And they are mirrored on purpose, to show that "in extreme situations, you may need to do extreme things" and at the same time that "extremism is always the worst option" Both Arthas and Illidan sacrificed a small fraction of their people to save their entire world, and got chastised by it, both sacrificed a part of themselves in what they thought it was the way to save themselves, both were lied to, both were manipulated by a higher being that twisted their mind. Not only that, both are brazen, somewhat reckless warrior princes that, for different reasons, got to the same "only I am in a position to do what must be done" mentality. But even though their paths were the same, step by step, whenever Arthas pushed to do greater acts in the name of good, he FAILED, he was wrong, where, whenever Illidan did the same thing, he succeeded. And even though Illidan got his second chance and became an universe level saviour, I would argue that he was far evil in his journey than Arthas (pre-Frostmourne). Up to the point where Arthas picked the cursed blade, he never did anything with the thought of glory he would gain by being his people's saviour, where Illidan was doing this at least 50% for the glory (and maybe a chance to impress Tyrande). So in conclusion, I AGREE with the part that Arthas did A LOT of wrong things, BUT not everything he did was wrong. And I also DISAGREE with the idea that his entire W3 journey was of an evil psychopathic man. Arthas WAS a good man, that did horrible things, THEN did EVIL things along the way, picked the top5 most cursed items in the universe and became completely deranged because of it (there's a small retcon on WoW that points to the idea that from the moment he picked the sword he had no control over his actions anymore, but this is not here or there, we all can agree that DEATHKNIGHT ARTHAS is evil, regardless of how much, by a little or entirely, the sword is controlling him).

Arthas did nothing wrong! He saved the world from destruction by bringing Archimonde the most dangerous creature to walk the lands of azeroth in the entire game, previous games, and possibly even WoW, I don't play WoW though so im unaware if there's ever been a villain that strong in the game.

I'd have probably a lot to say but all i should say is that you should learn more about the warcraft lore and history in general and try to set yourself into the mindset of a human in that world instead of trying to put our world's mindset into an imaginary one, their world is feudal, ours is not, their world has dragons and magic and a freaking continent size old god under northrend corrupting the world, i doubt antarctica has one of those. Comparing Anakin Skywalker to Arthas Menethil is rather bad since Anakin was fated to become the one to bring balance to the force, which was not understood correctly by the master jedi, it meant to bring balance, not destroy the "evil", Arthas was never fated to be other than a King one day, what i'd say is more accurate is that Arthas is more like Richard the Lionheart who focused on crusades and fighting the muslims rather than being king for his own country, he never became a good king because of this because he was more like a gloryhound rather than a leader for people, Arthas meanwhile instead of being a gloryhound, saw killing of the Dreadlord as the way to rid the world of evil, that was their goal, but while aiming for it they became corrupt by a cursed blade which fractured his soul and in fact, in the cinematic where you see Arthas saying his last words, he does not even have his heart in his chest, so it's fair to say that this man is not alive in the sense what we mean with that word.

Arthas is pure evil idc he might still love Jena but killing your own father is unforgivable

The thing is he did not even try to save the people of the city during the cull. He treated every single person as already infected and that is not the actions of a paladin.

I think the main bad thing Arthus didn't do was obviously not spam training griffins to beat malganis' base.

Everything Arthas did is objectively good, as we later learn that his actions are largely fixed points in time and crucial for reality to continue. Not only was he a young man being mislead by actual demonic forces, but time itself had fated him to do it. So he really can't be guilty of anything, other than playing his role like everyone else does. There is no free will in Azeroth.

I feel like a lot of people miss a critical fact about Arthas' decision to initiate the purge. The previous mission lasted 3 days and 3 nights, where Arthas got no sleep and was constantly under attack. It's implied they go straight from that mission to Stratholme, without delay. 3 days with no sleep will make you delirious, and even hallucinate. 3 days of constant fighting will lead to you being incredibly stressed. Of course Arthas made really REALLY dumb fucking decisions at Stratholme, he wasn't in any mental state to make good decisions. Which was planned for. You think those three days were an accident? No, it was all part of the plan to fuck with Arthas and get him where the Lich King wanted him to be.

10:12 The thing is, Anakin as a Jedi has been trained to control his emotion. We see other Jedi not giving into their anger. It was Anakin's failing for not living up to his lessions, and ultimately this made him voulnareable to Palpatines manipulation. Also he was blinded by greed, manifesting as his SELFISH love for Padmé, and other thing Palpatine could exploit. He wanted to save her not for Padmé's sake, but only for himself. On the other hand Luke's SELFLESS love managed to save his father and destroy the Sith because he was willing to sacrifice himself. Luke, opposed to Anakin learned to let go. Edit: I accidentally said Luke was selfish, which he isn't by the time he saves his father.

you really gathered him ijbol

you guys know the true villain behind lich king is the yailer

Arthas from the start was always the villain. He sought power not for the sake of justice but for himself. He with little thought tossed away his hammer for frostmourne even thinking he killed his mentor muradin didn’t bother him. He was always a selfish, petulant brat who enjoyed power for its ability to bully others. He was never a tragic hero it was an inevitability of those who seek power for its own sake will become evil

I do not consider the Culling of Stratholme to be unforgiveable, as the logic suggests the option Arthas took was the best of a bad situation. Letting Malganis kill the entire population makes no difference with Arthas killing the population. But Malganis will allow the infected civilians to become zombies and join the legions of undead, which would quickly grow into an unstoppable force. So having Arthas ensure the citizens do not rise as zombies at least deprives the Legion of troops that they'd use to inflict even greater harm. And lacking in forces, Malganis does retreat. To set a trap, yes. And if Arthas had been smart enough to anticipate this from a dreadlord who practically told him he was luring him there, he might have been wiser than to follow. At least without trying to reconnect with Jaina and Uther. But with regards to Stratholme, Arthas' actions were the only ones that prevented greater harm. Beyond that point however, there is no excusing Arthas' failures. He was impetuous to begin with, and it only get worse in Northrend. While I fully believe that until the very moment he took up Frostmourne, he was motivated by the virtues of protection his future subjects from evil, his failure to communicate the need for the Culling of Stratholme, or the Northrend expedition, only put himself into increasingly desperate positions where doing the wrong thing was the only way forward if he wanted to stop Malganis, who had counted on exactly that. Had he been more thoughtful, or open with his intentions, he could have saved himself and his friends a lot of trouble. I'm not sure how much one can hold Arthas accountable for his actions as a death knight. He no longer has free will by that point, being just a more powerful undead entity for Ner'zul to control. How infectious the will of the Lich King is, isn't quite clear. I would think the petty barbs at Uther, and the cruel fate he forced upon Sylvanas are beyond the concerns of an entity so vastly alien to human emotion, suggesting that when you strip Arthas of his good nature, he suddenly shows a very petty and mean-spirited personality left over. On the other hand, Ner'zul was already a ruthless person as an orc, and being tortured by Kil'jaeden would have done him no favours, so if there's malice to spare, and this bleeds into the thoughts of all undead under the Lich King's control, then we cannot blame Arthas for that. Only for being foolish enough to take up that cursed blade when Muradin told him how bad an idea it was.

Dude, the Arthas did nothing wrong video from Hiru was literally an April's fools video. He has also done a Garosh did nothing wrong in the same vein.

the road to hell is paved with good intentions

It actually worked btw, Arthas defeated the plague of undead in Lordearon, Medivh was wrong. If he had not gone to Northrend that would've been it, just prepare for the next ploy from the Dreadlords.

Arthas made the wrong decision because he took away the lives, humanity and agency of his people who he promised to protect, and so he betrayed them, and in the act lost his own sanity and humanity, which is exactly what his enemies wanted, and so it was strategically the wrong choice too. What he should have done is defend his people from Malganis for as long as possible, which shouldn't have taken any thought because this is what he pledged to do when he became a Paladin and his men became soldiers. In fact, Jaina could have left to warn the capital and Uther could have fought Malganis since he was stronger while Arthas evacuated the non-infected. Then, when everybody has turned, Arthas and Uther can leave. The city would still be lost, but Arthas would have retained his integrity, humanity and sanity, putting him in the right mind to realize that following Malganis to Northrend was a trap, and so he wouldn't have gone, and the Lich Kings plan would have been frustrated, preventing the burning legion from being summoned and destroying Lordearon. Of course, this didn't happen and so some have acused Uther of making the wrong choice. First, Uther would have done the above plan had Arthas not betrayed him. I base this on the fact that he protected the ashes of King Terranes until his dying breath. Uther saw that Arthas had gone mad and that he couldn't be reasoned with. The above plan would not make sense to Arthas in his insane state of mind. He could not be reasoned with. If Uther stays to fight Malganis, then he only makes it easier for Arthas to kill his people, thus aiding him in his evil act. If he stays to fight Arthas, then he forces Arthas to kill his own troops, which the Lich King would have been happy with because it too would have aided in Arthas losing his humanity. I don't think it would be possible for Uther to evacuate people without running into Arthas or Malganis. I think his best move was to leave and for the non-infected to hide. However, I think Blizzards intentions were that there was no non-infected. Yet, Arthas couldn't have known that, and so he still should have searched the city.

There is an unfortunate part. How many people would have made the same decisions as Arthas in the Culling, how people responded to Mengsk in Starcraft thinking he would be decent until he was exposed, and other such scenarios? If given the option to kill these people quickly before they turn and hurt others.... or not.... which would you choose? How many times do these decisions that look like "the ends justify the means" are actually.... evil? Renagon Shepard . Paragade Shepard or Full Paragon or Full Renegade?

WHOA WHOA WHOA DUDE your COMPLETELY wrong about the culling. it IS needed because if Arthas did not purge the city your looking at an instant army of literally HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS OF PEOPLE at minimum according to the lore its the LARGEST CITY in their Kingdom. The size in game? miniturized beyond all belief. Even in WoW its pathetically tiny compared to the properly sized version and its still two complete dungeons. PLUS they leave out large chunks of it including the Harbor. There is a reason why the Scarlet Crusade was never able to clear it out despite multiple attempts. If Arthas had not slaughtered EVERY LIVING BEING in the city Lordaeron the kingdom would have been wiped out within the month. It was a win win scenario for the demons that took MONTHS of planning. Either Arthas wipes out the city or the newly turned undead wipe out the kingdom. Plus BEFORE you go into 'oh but necros can still just raise them from the corpses' THAT TAKES A TON OF TIME. Like for actually durable and useful undead that last more than a few minutes it takes an EXPERIENCED necromancer at least several seconds to animate them PER CORPSE. Thats at MINIMUM for a 200k pop city which is the lowest it could be with stated pop numbers is .6 DAYS of constant continues work on the part of 20 EXPERIENCED necromancers and thats if they work uninterrupted and the bodies are not burnt in fires like they did in cannon. PLUS those experienced Necromancers are at an EXTREME premium after Arthas and Uthers knights just SLAUGHTERED Kel'thuzad and most of his cult at least their higher up members in the previous missions. So no dude Arthas made the only correct choice that he had availible with the information he had on him. Also you not knowing if the undead have free will? Thats tells me you NEVER played the Frozen throne and know NOTHING about its campaign. Also based on your previous video and your hatred of 'evil' campaigns you likely also never played the undead campaign or the other campaigns for that matter. If so then you never learned that the undead had 0 free will up until the Lich King started getting attacked by Illidean allowing some undead to go free creating the Forsaken. Yes he became evil later on but right up until he took up Frostmourne he was STILL more good than evil and would have been horrified if he knew of his future actions that his path would lead him to. Ultimatelly He was a good man that constantly was forced to choose between the lesser of two evils unable to turn from his path or realize that this was a game that he cant win by playing it and the best decision he had availible was not to play. He was in his early twenties too and taught his SOLE purpose for being alive was to defend and protect his people his entire life. Like that is his primairy duty as both a prince and a paladin. So ya he lacked the wisdom to see that the path offered to him by Medhiv was the only path where he COULD save at least some of his people but given how he was raised and his youth there was 0 chance of him accepting such as an option especially from a seemingly crazy person. Maybe if he had a bit more experience sure but your talking about someone who was HAND SELECTED for this by every demon AND Nerzul for being the perfect choice to corrupt given his youth idealism and relative inexperience combining into the whole the path to hell is paved with good intentions and Arthas had the best of intentions and even made the correct choices the entire way through. the ONLY way he could have maybe been turned aside is if one of his friends stayed loyal and put up the option to cross the sea after Stratholme like say Jaina who actually does it later on. Part of why killing the city hurt him so much is that both his mentor and the woman he loved turned their backs on him completely WHILE he was making the correct choice.

Blizzard wright that’s if dreadlord could win over a number of zombie army, there are will be no way to end the Scorge, and yes Ashbringer didn’t exist at this period of time so Medivh was right, this land is doomed