He didn't come off as all that selfish in the Undead Campaigns TBH. Instead, he came off as driven to carry out his king's will even while he was weakening.

Arthas sees himself as the only person both willing and able to stop a deadly threat to his kingdom. The degree to which that worldview approaches reality is debatable (especially if you only look at WC3, which I do in this thread), but this is why he is willing to do whatever he sees as necessary to save his kingdom.



As for Hearthglen: Uther and Arthas both seem to be misreading each other. Uther tries to compliment Arthas for holding out as long as he did ("I'm surprised that you kept things together as long as you did, lad."), while Arthas hears that as Uther thinking his defensive efforts were incompetent. Annoyed, Arthas tries to explain that he did the best he could with what he had("Look, I did the best I could, Uther! If I'd had a legion of knights riding at my back, I would've--"), which Uther reads as Arthas thinking he's deserving of even more praise ("Now is not the time to be choking on pride!").

Not helping is that Uther is stuck in mentor role and is condescendingly telling him he can't possibly "defeat a man who commands the dead all by yourself", despite Arthas having already taken down one of the scourge's leaders, as well as feeling the need to explain basic facts about fighting the undead ("The undead ranks are bolstered every time one of our warriors falls in battle") to the guy who's been leading the investigation against them. If anything, it seems to me like Uther is the one who should be watching his pride.


Because his soul had been sucked out of his body, fundamentally altering him as a person?

Well, yes. He's answering the questing "What's happening to you, Arthas?". It's generally considered proper to answer a question about yourself with an answer about yourself.

__________________
This is not a signature.

Arthas was more chipper and/or showed more team spirit in TFT's Undead Campaign than in RoC's. I'm sure whatever spell was cast on Arthas wore off as Ner'zhul weakened.

Well Uther could have had a bit more faith in Arthas I guess. But this was no longer an investigation mission -- Arthas's job was just to escort Jaina to figure out what the plague was all about. This was now a Lordaeron crisis with an epidemic on their hands. Arthas playing at being an experienced paladin who knows exactly what they need to do -- and even worse, playing up his prince title to try and coerce Uther into getting him to do what he wants him to do. (Rather than trying to persuade him) These are Arthas 'choking on pride' far more than Uther is.

Uther is an experienced commander, leader, he has a right to take charge in this matter. Especially when the prince is raving about exterminating an entire city of people. It goes against everything the paladins stand for, and Arthas is just casually tossing out and demanding this obscene order. In the long run it was necessary, but Arthas clearly had no respect for the lives he was about to take at all.

His soul was returning to him, though in tFT. He's much more spirited and even kind at times. He holds back from taunting Kael about Jaina, he's lively and spirited. Respectful and even genuinely humorous.

But it's present in everything he says, even when he picks up Frostmourne. That was just a random example that jumped out in my head, it's not the only one.

__________________
"The Demons did their job well. You creatures are as reckless and bloodthirsty as they ever were."

Arthas missing control of his soul couldn't have been what made him serve Ner'zhul in TFT. Sylvanas and other undead in Lordaeron broke away and it was established in RoC's manual that Ner'zhul's rule of his undead subjects was dependant on him bring able to direct their souls.

Well Arthas had a direct link to the guy with Frostmourne, so Ner'zhul probably had some influence over him still. But I don't think his rule over Arthas was ever absolute.

__________________
"The Demons did their job well. You creatures are as reckless and bloodthirsty as they ever were."

Ner'zhul had influence sure, but he was past the point of being able to just puppet him over to Northrend. He ended up depending on Arthas being a willing tool.

Arthas killing Ner'zul in a dream battle (lol) was the point where I turned very suspicious of Blizzard's writing, the "must always be a Lich King debacle" was the point where I had my first and biggest disappointment in Blizzard... things only went downhill from there.

Going over the Arthas novel again, what really sticks out is how hard it tried to whitewash him. Like when he's all blue after Uther says his famous line about Terenas' ashes. Or how Arthas apparently had second thoughts about smashing Quel'thalas.

I wouldn't call that whitewashing. If anything it makes him look completely culpable for his actions after picking up Frostmourne. Going by the game it looked like he basically lost free will after doing so. The book suggests otherwise.

__________________
"It is the soldier, not the reporter, Who has given us freedom of the press.
It is the soldier, not the poet, Who has given us freedom of speech.
It is the soldier, not the organizer, Who has given us the freedom to demonstrate.
It is the soldier, Who salutes the flag, Who serves beneath the flag,
And whose coffin is draped by the flag, Who allows the protestor to burn the flag."
- Father Dennis Edward O'Brian, USMC

To me desecrating the ashes was his moral horizon point, worse than the actual murder of Terenas. Having Arthas be especially bastard-y about it makes for stronger villainy, methinks.

Arthas never showed any doubt or guilt for canning Uther then having Stratholme torched or stranding his troops. And mind you, Ner'zhul's spell on Arthas was wearing off in TFT's Undead Campaign so it's not like he was only loyal due to brainwashing. He was as zealous as ever, he stopped calling the Light and instead called to the Lich King.

WC3 Arthas wasn't a man who did nothing wrong before he became a victim of the Scourge. He was a brutal man who joined and embraced it like the degenerate he is.

Another version of the Enhanced Campaign by a different author, this time: The Scourge of Lordaeron
http://www.hiveworkshop.com/forums/m...xtension%3Dw3n

Unless you count Arthas commenting on it to Muradin. I think he felt guilt about it but bottled it up like a leader has to in that situation. Stranding his troops was wrong but they're in no way on the same scale. In TFT Arthas still didn't have a soul. Besides that not all of the Undead gained free will. Why exactly some did whilst others didn't was never explained but I don't think it can be definitively stated that he regained his free will.

Also apologies for the delay in replying.

__________________
"It is the soldier, not the reporter, Who has given us freedom of the press.
It is the soldier, not the poet, Who has given us freedom of speech.
It is the soldier, not the organizer, Who has given us the freedom to demonstrate.
It is the soldier, Who salutes the flag, Who serves beneath the flag,
And whose coffin is draped by the flag, Who allows the protestor to burn the flag."
- Father Dennis Edward O'Brian, USMC

RoC's manual established that Ner'zhul's control over his undead subjects was dependent on him directing their souls. Considering what happened in TFT and Arthas' noticeably different personality in its Undead Campaign from RoC's, Ner'zhul's control over Arthas must have weakened. Ner'zhul was lucky that Arthas accepted his status.

Not just noticeably different, but noticeably CHANGING. He starts off as big, cruel, cold-hearted conqueror Arthas, then slowly but surely shifts into an Arthas who... really never existed. Loyal, lighthearted, joyous. Then shifts back to cold-hearted conqueror at the end when Ner'zhul restores his power.

Also no way was Arthas just 'playing the leader' in RoC. He was PISSED that Uther was defying him. And as a leader he failed to appeal Uther to his cause and failed to prove that his methodology was the correct one. Arthas is not that stoic and never has been.

__________________
"The Demons did their job well. You creatures are as reckless and bloodthirsty as they ever were."

Ner'zhul put Arthas in the position to be a great conqueror with undead lackeys to shine his shoes. As far as Arthas knew and cared Ner'zhul let him do as he pleased, unlike Uther, Terenas, Jaina and Muradin who were all questioning him or otherwise opposing him.

Ahem, I'm playing it, and it's really great. A whole overhaul of WC3 military system. Really makes one immersed in the maps. Footmen into Archers with wel fed FTW!

Also, new events and sub-quests.

Let's celebrate our hero of Lordaeron:

Replayed the scenario maps today. Funny Bunny's Egg Hunt was hilarious.

Hm. Would've expected something of a reaction from Arthas if he suddenly regained control of himself. But I think this is something we'll just have to agree to disagree on.
I meant he was (possibly) trying not to let the atrocities that had been happening get to him (at least overtly). Obviously he failed massively but that's what I meant in terms of not expressing guilt for Stratholme. Though I guess his blaming of Mal'ganis could have applied to that too (since it was the Dreadlord's fault).
I love this so very very much. "Never trust an elf"!

__________________
"It is the soldier, not the reporter, Who has given us freedom of the press.
It is the soldier, not the poet, Who has given us freedom of speech.
It is the soldier, not the organizer, Who has given us the freedom to demonstrate.
It is the soldier, Who salutes the flag, Who serves beneath the flag,
And whose coffin is draped by the flag, Who allows the protestor to burn the flag."
- Father Dennis Edward O'Brian, USMC

Also, WC3 established Ner'zhul as picking shady if not ''evil'' characters for his closest henchmen. What with how he recruited a Nerubian king and a necromancer.

Weird technical question about the WCIII campaign editor.

If you create a warcraft III campaign, you carry over data between levels through the use of game caches. However, are these game caches stored per individual campaign? Could you create a game cache in one campaign, and load it during another?

__________________
This is not a signature.

This fills me with joy.

No idea, but I doubt you can. Those kind of things are usually locked to the parent file.

__________________


Metzen: They are one of the ancient races of Northrend that we haven't spoken of before... because we hadn't made them up before. (laughter)

~Main: Expansion theorycrafting, Expansions list, The Age of Nightmare, Empire of the Tides (coming soon)~
~Fan ficton: Anachronos Journey: The Timeless Heir~ ~Geography of continents series: Old Kalimdor (original), Pandaria~
~Locations as zones series: Azjol-Nerub, Barrow Deeps, Zul'Aman, Demon Hunter zone, Caverns of Time~