Warcraft: Lord of the Clans is a novel by Christie Golden based in Blizzard Entertainment's Warcraft Universe. It was published by Pocket Books. The story of the novel was originally going to be used in the adventure game Warcraft Adventures: Lord of the Clans until it was canceled. It is the second book released in the Warcraft Universe after Warcraft: Day of the Dragon. It is part of the Warcraft Expanded Universe.
The book tells the tale of Thrall, a young orc orphaned by assassins who kill both his parents. After being found by a human named Blackmoore, Thrall is taken to his castle, where he is raised to fight in gladiatorial games to earn the alcoholic Blackmoore money. After escaping the castle with the help of a human girl, Taretha, Thrall travels to reunite the orcs.
The book has an unofficial, relatively faithful, adaptation as a Warcraft III Custom Campaign, created by OutsiderXE
, voiced mostly by AI and played as an Action RPG. An official playthrough can be watched here.
This book contains the following tropes:
- Adaptational Self-Defense: While the novel's depiction of humans is bad, the novel is set after two wars the orcs started first, and the orcs were still responsible for mass murder and enslavement of intelligent beings (the dragons). Even the current retcon paints the orcs as invading Azeroth because they very nearly destroyed their own world, which could have been avoided by refusing to cooperate with the Legion.
- Adaptation Distillation: The original source for the plot was a Full Throttle-like game starring Thrall, which was then cancelled due to it not meeting Blizzard's quality standards. It was leaked in 2016. The original game had a lot more continuity nods to Warcraft II, and some of the major plot points were greatly revised in the book. There is no sign of sympathetic human characters such as Sergeant or Taretha in the game either. Thrall's personality (and Orcish culture in general) is also much closer to what the series would use from that point onwards than what's portrayed in the game.
- The Alcoholic: Blackmoore.
- Always Chaotic Evil: Subversion is the whole point. This is the beginning of the the end for the Orcs' long-standing reputation as the embodiments of nastiness.
- Aristocrats Are Evil: Blackmoore comes from a shamed noble house. He is willing to reclaim the family's position by any means necessary, including raising Thrall to use as a puppet general, thereby gaining command of an army of orcs to use against Lordaeron.
- Artistic License – Linguistics: The words in the Orcish phrase "Kagh! Bin mog g'thazag cha!" seem to match the English words, "Run! I will protect you!" one-to-one. Although this is not definitive proof that all Orcish phrases would work like that, it certainly suggests so, and that would be impossible with any real foreign language.
- Asshole Victim: Blackmoore, BIG TIME.
- The Atoner: Grom Hellscream may have once been a Blood Knight who has killed many of his foes and completely given in to demonic bloodlust, but now he orders that his orcs not kill an abducted child, and instead return him to his family.
- Beware the Nice Ones: Blackmoore has been incredibly abusive to Thrall and Taretha for a good chunk of their lives, but both have also turned out to be good, compassionate people despite their awful circumstances. However, executing Taretha and throwing her head at Thrall's feet to try and break his spirit proves to be a horrible, horrible mistake on Blackmoore's part.
- Big Brother Mentor: Grom Hellscream becomes this for Thrall.
- Big Sister Instinct: After Thrall was savagely beaten for losing in the arena, Taretha helped him escape Durnholde at great risk to herself. She also continued to slip him notes in military books throughout his slave years in the arena, giving Thrall his only consistent point of human love and kindness.
- Black-and-White Morality: Despite the fact that this book is about subverting the idea that the orcs are Always Chaotic Evil, there are very few shades of gray in this book. There are good characters and evil characters (on both sides of the conflict), but hardly anything in-between.
- Captain Ersatz: A lot of Thrall's backstory owes itself to Ben Hur and Spartacus. Thrall, of course, ends up better than Spartacus.
- The Clan: The Frostwolves are all a bunch of uniform good guys. They're JERKS to Thrall in the beginning, but they're good guys.
- Droit du Seigneur: Blackmoore forces Taretha to be his mistress.
- Early-Installment Weirdness: This being the first time a true shaman appeared in a Warcraft story, Thralls powers are more similar to a druid's than a shaman, talking to birds and controlling tree branches.
- Everyone Calls Him "Barkeep": Sergeant.
- Fantastic Racism: Thrall is frequently subject to this.
- Genius Bruiser: Thrall is a lot more intellectual than most Orcs, but is also a very capable hand-to-hand fighter.
- Get into Jail Free: Thrall lets himself get captured in the first phase of his and Orgrim Doomhammer's campaign against the internment camps.
- Inverted with the Orcs who simply break out of jail and Meta-wise this novel is part of the card Orcs are dealt as they too go from always chaotic evil to noble savages in Warcraft.
- Gladiator Games/Gladiator Revolt: Thrall's backstory, explaining his martial skills.
- Hate Sink: Suffice it to say, Blackmoore exists as a portrait of everything wrong with humans in the Warcraft universe.
- Heroic Sacrifice: While Thrall is being used as a training subjects with other human trainees, an orc manages to break free of his chains and moves over to him, yelling at him which Thrall only interprets as an aggressive statement before the other humans subdue and kill the orc. As young Thrall didn't speak Orcish, he only learns much later from Grom by telling him what the Orc yelled that the orc was yelling at him to run and he would protect him, causing the orc to have been tragically killed by the other humans entirely pointlessly, likely assuming that the other humans were going to gang up on Thrall to hurt or kill him.
- Language Barrier: An orc tries to tell Thrall to run while he protects him, but this fails because Thrall doesn't know Orcish, and costs him his life.
- Hoist by His Own Petard: Blackmoore raised Thrall to be the perfect warrior who could lead the orc armies against the rest of the human Alliance. Thrall did eventually become the Warchief of the Horde... and then led his army against Blackmoore.
- The Horde: Thrall makes The Horde 3.0. It's not yet an Alliance, consisting of just orcs.
- Humans Are the Real Monsters: Completely subverted. The main villains of the story are all human, and by the end of it, you're cheering Thrall on as he and the Horde storm Durnholde. At the same time, however, Thrall is well aware of humanity's capacity for good as demonstrated by Taretha and Sergeant, and when he sees the collective spirit of the human race during his shaman training, he finds that it's closer to his human friends than Blackmoore.
- Idiot Ball:
- Durotan, why did you think taking your wife and child with you on that perilous journey to Doomhammer was a good idea? Needless to say, this act leads to his son being enslaved by humans.
- His wife, Draka, insisted that she accompany him and that she would not be left behind. And they brought their son because he was a newborn and needed to be with his mother.
- Ineffectual Sympathetic Villain: Langston to a certain extent. Blackmoore is actually just a gigantic bully, but does too much evil to be considered sympathetic.
- Jerkass: Blackmoore, at his best.
- Kick the Dog: Blackmoore has dozens of moments like this in his treatment of Thrall and Taretha Foxton. However, the standout example has to be executing Taretha and throwing her head at Thrall's feet to cruelly taunt and hurt him. Thanks to this, it is immensely cathartic when Thrall finally corners Blackmoore and puts an end to him.
- A more literal example occurs when Blackmoore mercilessly beats up a heavily wounded Thrall because his loss against an ogre in a gladiatorial match cost Blackmoore a lot of gold. To twist the knife further, Blackmoore then invites all the angry spectators who lost their bet on Thrall and have each of them savagely beat the helpless orc, who passed out long before the beatings finally stopped.
- Language Barrier: An orc tries to tell Thrall to run while he protects him, but this fails because Thrall doesn't know Orcish.
- Lethal Chef: Blackmoore hired an old comrade from the war as a chef, whose fish has made Taretha ill more than once.
- Magic Knight: Thrall is proficient in both melee combat and spellcasting (as a Shaman).
- Meaningful Name: Thrall keeps the name, which means "slave", so that neither he nor Blackmoore will forget what the latter has done when the former comes back with a vengeance.
- Messianic Archetype: Thrall is basically a cross between Moses and Spartacus, plus some green paint.
- My Master, Right or Wrong: During the siege, Sergeant sees that Blackmoore's gone mad and that Langston is completely useless, but takes up the responsibility of defending the keep because they all think (correctly) that Thrall won't stop until Blackmoore's dead.
- No Dead Body Poops: Averted. A reference to the "stench of urine and feces" is made a couple of times when describing battles.
- No Name Given: Sergeant. Lampshaded a couple times.
- Not Afraid of You Anymore: Thrall has this moment just before his final battle with Blackmoore.
- Oh, Crap!: Sergeant and Langston's reaction when Blackmoore pushes Thrall too far, triggering his Roaring Rampage of Revenge.
- Old Master: Sergeant is the only decent high-ranking man in Durnholde.
- Our Orcs Are Different: A bit of
Fridge Brilliance when you realize that the previous two books chronologically had treated them as total monsters. - Passing the Torch: Doomhammer grooming Thrall to lead his people to renewed strength, unity and redemption. After his death, Thrall starts using his weapon, the Doomhammer, and wearing his plate armour.
- Proud Warrior Race Guy: Thrall, though an intellectual among his people, still feels pride for their martial heritage.
- Red Right Hand: Amongst the orcs, Thrall's blue eyes mark him as untainted (relatively, as The Burning Crusade and Rise of the Horde later reveal that green skin already indicates some level of exposure to fel magic).
- Roaring Rampage of Revenge: The big finale. Thrall is a tremendously mellow guy, for an orc, and even compared to a lot of humans. The measures necessary to get him up to this are damn near ridiculous. And horrifying. And if you do push him into this... well, he's a shaman, was trained as a gladiator for a good deal of his life, and he's Warchief of the Horde.
- Secret Test of Character: Drek'thar demands respect from Thrall after meeting him, but is impressed when he refuses to accept being treated like a slave, noting that he proved that he was humble, but not an Extreme Doormat.
- The Siege: Completely subverted. The bad guys are the few defenders manning the great fortress, while the hero is leading the massive horde trying to rip the place down. They even succeed, too.
- Small Role, Big Impact: Without Taretha, Thrall would've never escaped Durnholde and ensured the future of the Horde by becoming their new Warchief. Her sisterly relationship with Thrall also proved that friendship and trust could exist between humans and orcs, something that stayed with Thrall for the rest of his life.
- Smug Snake: Blackmoore.
- Surprisingly Realistic Outcome: Thrall, after fighting through over dozen battles against increasing dangerous opponents in Gladiator Games, is pitted against an ogre while only using an Epic Flail. The narration notes is poor choice of weapon against an ogre. Exhausted, his attacks only make his much larger, stronger opponent angry and is nearly killed until the humans running the game intervene.
- Blackmoore tries fighting Thrall himself when confronted by him. Blackmoore is a nobleman who relies on others to fight for him and hasn't engaged in combat himself for years (not to mention he's had more than a few drinks). Thrall was raised to fight in Gladiator Games and his only loss was against the above mentioned ogre. Blackmoore dies.
- Token Good Teammate: Sergeant, for Durnholde.
- Tragic Keepsake: Taretha's crescent moon necklace.
- Wham Line:
- When Thrall defeats an orc who insulted the Frostwolves.
"My name, son of Durotan, is Orgrim Doomhammer."- Thrall gets a very unpleasant surprise in the final assault on Durnholde.
"Taretha's blue eyes stared sightlessly up at him from her severed head." - What the Hell, Hero?: Thrall gives this to some of his men when he finds out they killed unarmed humans.
- Who's Laughing Now?: Thrall does this to Langston, reducing him to a crying baby.
- Your Approval Fills Me with Shame: Thrall feels this way after being complimented by Blackmoore as the latter is mortally wounded and tells him "You are... what I made of you... I am so proud..."
