Forsaken - not always Scourge?

[Gráinne]

Is there any evidence that has been generated by Blizz to suggest that it's possible for a human to have died and then been re-animated not as Scourge, but as undead with their own will intact? Are all the Forsaken we see in the game former Scourge? What about your own characters - have any of you who play Forsaken developed a story for your character that doesn't involve him or her having been Scourge?

[DjalliDhey]

Not me.. Djalli was a member of the Scourge, but she doesn't remember her time as one of them.

[Niethan]

Actually, there's I think two other types of undead in the lore that are not Scourge. If I remember correctly, there's Revenants (self-raised by sheer force of hate) and the dead in Duskwood, which was a byproduct of Medivh.

[Sulajin]

Isn't there a few quests in Tirisfal, of all places, where you find a few zombies not risen by the Scourge, and in fact unaware of Sylvanas' "Forsaken"?

[Roth'rili]

Well the undead opening and starting opener quest is proof that a undead can awake without being scourage at all. Essentailly in that opener the said forsaken just awoke from the crypt plagued by undeath but as his/her own will. Mostly though I think that if a human died from the old plague the brought the scourage there is a chance for one to become forsaken instead of the scourage.

Mostly me just assuming but I doubt the scourage can have a flow of new recruits unless they raise them themselves for 100% chance they will be scourage. I'm not sure exactly, but I do believe someone could die and not become a scourage when raised.

[Sulajin]

Yeah, the Forsaken never really struck me as having that large of a pool of "recruits" to draw from, and the Lich seems to offer better benefits. No self-doubt for one thing.

"Who am I? Why am I here? What's my purpose?"

"Rend and tear."

"Good deal." *Rends and tears*

[Darkblade]

There hasn't been any evidence of an undead raising and just being free. There is evidence of particularly powerful undead freeing themselves (Gunthar, for one). Each new Forsaken character you get the "we were just about to toss you on the fire" speech, which doesn't necessarily say that you were Scourge and they were about to burn you except you got your identity back, but it could. And since there are no necromancers hanging out trying to bring the dead to unlife, it would seem to reason that your fledgling character was undead, and they were waiting to see if that spark of individuality showed up showing you weren't a mindless scourge. How you got to be undead before "waking up" in Deathknell is probably up to you, but I'd say 99 times out of 100 it was because you were Scourge.

[Sulajin]

Well, Brill is just the starting area. Not all Orcs are born in the Valley of Trials, after all.

What I've allways wanted to try RPing as is one of the Undead from the Rise of the Forsaken mini-plot going on in Frozen Throne. You know, the ones that were banshees that just posessed a Scourge? That'd be neat.

[Xiphus]

Well, some undead can rise up and never be part of the Scourge, I guess, because remember, the Lich King's control over the undead hd pretty much weakened since the events of the Frozen Throne, meaning that those corpses that rises again away from the Plaguelands and also after the Third War will probably rise up with his will pretty intact.

My character for example, is never part of the Scourge (and thus, he doesn't hate the Scourge, because he was never involved in the atrocity and can never understand why the Forsaken in general have a very seething hatred against the Scourge), and he rose back up six years after he contracted the Plague, meaning its power is pretty much waned by the time he got back up.

Why it took he so long....well, I'm figuring that one out myself. Innate resistance maybe?

[Faelen]

I've never gone completely into the details of my own character's backstory regarding Scourge before Forsaken, but my Forsaken warrior Faelen froze to death in the Alterac Mountains after the destruction of the Dalaran capital, and was found years later after an avalanche outside the Undercity, and was risen as Forsaken. I just always assumed that given we were witness to how the Lich King did it, that Sylvanas could do just the same, but alter it to give the undead a free will. That's how I play my character anyway.

[TerokNor]

Korne, my undead warlock, was killed during the fall of Lorderon. He was not raised until the Undercity already existed, and essentially follows the starting lore given in the Undead starter area from there.

[Keraph]

Hey, Keraph was killed when Lordaeron fell too! We can be....died in action buddies! XD

[Ninorra]

Steinburg died in Lordaeron! He was working at the First National Lordaeron Bank when the scourge hit, and that was the end of them..

[Keraph]

Hey, I had funds in that bank! I DEMAND RECOMPENSE!

[Sulajin]

Athius died on the way to mount Hyjal. Due to an altercation with his patrol's Mage, his hair was set ablaze, and in his panic stumbled into a Scourge movement.

Poor guy still doesn't trust Belfs as a general rule.

[Celuna]

Celuna was forced to drink a plague look-alike-potion that has all the ugly physical symptoms but minus the mind-control part. The maker of the potion did get the "activate on death" part right though :)

[Swerto]

I still havn't decided if Swerto was ever part of the scourge or if he just woke up forsaken >.<