Mordor - a part of the story I just dont get

[Oelle]

obviously, spoilers following...

So, in Dor Amarth, we meet some dwarfs. All fine. They tell us, they work for a woman that was the only one that wanted those dwarfs to work for her, when all others would just have banned or killed the dwarfs after they lost their leader to sauron (nice attitude, merciful, right?).
What we find out about said woman is, that she is interested in information and has the power to control ghosts and control people with those ghosts. Her goal seems to be finding information, mainly concerning the dwarfs ring of power.
As I see it, the only "evil" thing we know about her is, that she uses some type of necromancy. But we are not opposed to work with ghosts, as we do so several times in Mordor (at least we work together with two ghosty-statues and allow a third to get into our mind). Soo... after some time, we free the dwarf king and he is totally into getting his ring back... then we follow him to the nice lady and kill her. Just because Mr crazy dwarf king is silly.
Why would we do that? Shouldnt we and Gimli tell him to stop and take that woman as hostage and seek for the knowledge she has? She could be a good source of information and doesnt really seem evil enough to need her dead. When I first played that part, I stood there and thought "what the #### is happening here?" "why am I supposed to attack her?" "Why cant I attack the dwarf king instead?"
Its like all she sais is true and he is just a silly idiot and she even predicts he will destroy his folk with his search for that ring...

Can someone tell me why it is as it is? I just dont get it. With the other parts in Mordor, I had no issues with the story... Have no problem to work for one side and then the other to create some havoc... no issues either with working together with some goblins for information or just profit... but that part really confused me...

[ThePinion]

ALSO SPOILERS:

Zôreth was well aware of how dire a situation the Stout-axes were in after Sauron devastated their halls, but if the Stout-axes had no use to her, she would have fallen in line with the rest of her kin. While it seems merciful from the perspectives of some of the Stout-axes, it was a self-serving act by Zôreth to gain power by leveraging the Stout-axes' desperation to aid in her own pursuit of power. In fact, her desire for power of her own was so overwhelming that even the Order of the Eye found her methods unscrupulous, selfish, and to some degree: blasphemous against Sauron himself. Zôreth is/was a pariah, even among her own people.

As for King Greytooth, he had a lot of things to reconcile with his newfound freedom. He had to at once transition from forgotten prisoner to a beacon of hope among his people, while at the same time battling the hold the Dwarf-ring had on him from years of torture by Sauron. Learning that he'd essentially been tricked out of his family heirloom by both Zôreth and Sauron at the same moment, he snapped in a fit of anger and despair and the Ring reasserted its lingering hold on him. Zôreth was evil, and held his people as slaves - alive, but a far shot from the glory of their past. King Greytooth wanted to break that cycle, and Gimli's better sense failed him in that moment as he was still caught between his duty and his personal interest in seeing the Stout-axes become an ally of his people.

In the end, Zôreth does predict King Greytooth's downfall in seeking the Ring, but she wanted that same power for herself and would not have hesitated to wield it were the roles reversed. If she got what she wanted, she would have cast the Stout-axes aside immediately.

I hope that helps clear it up!

[Oelle]

Well... obviously every leader in Mordor is evil and selfish... all granted... I just feel that it would still have made more sense to treat her like Ayorzén (who was a Pariah, too) and totally felt no need to kill her. I even tried to go up to her before, kind of look if one can talk to her, get some information, see what kind of woman she is... so as the story is presented, I didnt see her as the big evil we need to kill on sight. And King Greytooth was obviously insane at that point, so I didnt get why I take orders from him at all. Not that my guard needed his "mercy" to get away, could have fought my way out through those 20 dwarfs there easily...

I get why Gimli acts as he does there now, though.

[LagunaD2]

Talk about over-thinking things!

The simple message of this quest chain can be summed up in a few short sentences:

Dorfs are not people.

Fat, stinky dorfs are sneaky, greedy and evil.

NEVER TRUST A DORF!

The End.

As for the weird old lady, she willingly kept fat, stinky dorfs in her house. That makes her either a dorf-hugger, or a depraved lunatic. Or both. She got what she deserved.

[SungXe]

I don't doubt the vivid evil character deepth of Zoreth, but what you represent in the game failed utterly to reflect that. We have been forced to follow through with a cold murder initiated by the stoud soon to be firehorns.

Granted middleearth is a black / white moral place, where races like orcs and goblins can be slaughtered by the free peoples without moral perils. Doing so with corrupted humans isn't.

Countless times you forced the moral high ground UNNEEDED on the players character to let clearly evil people and beings pass, even when they just did murder someone in your presence, even Aragon was forced to stand and talk against Mordirith instead of fighting him and not sseeing another friend ranger die.

Gun Ain?
Azgash? Or whatever his name was in moria mirkwood
Isengard Mountain witch,
Raven wizzard......and so on.

Obviously trying to kill you, or actually killing and hurting other right in front of you warranted some uncalled mercy with those evil beings.
And then there is poor old Zoreth, slaving some dwarfs, might killing some colleteral, but not attacking us, not trying to kill us. SURRENDERING and yet we have to kill her in cold blood.

That goes against anything we done before. But pshhh it's okay eh. What happens in Mordor stays in Mordor.

Tl.Dr: Make her scream, "Evil dwarfs i kill you" / attack player and it would exactly be like always in the game. For now, we just eagerly ir unwillingly helped dwarfs to kill a prisoner with no need at all.

If you really inteded her to feign surrender out of cowardice, please still let just the dwarfs do it.
As for now the representation is really lacking, and disturbing logic.

[Gwinthilnel]

I don't doubt the vivid evil character deepth of Zoreth, but what you represent in the game failed utterly to reflect that. We have been forced to follow through with a cold murder initiated by the stoud soon to be firehorns.

Granted middleearth is a black / white moral place, where races like orcs and goblins can be slaughtered by the free peoples without moral perils. Doing so with corrupted humans isn't.

Countless times you forced the moral high ground UNNEEDED on the players character to let clearly evil people and beings pass, even when they just did murder someone in your presence, even Aragon was forced to stand and talk against Mordirith instead of fighting him and not sseeing another friend ranger die.

Gun Ain?
Azgash? Or whatever his name was in moria mirkwood
Isengard Mountain witch,
Raven wizzard......and so on.

Obviously trying to kill you, or actually killing and hurting other right in front of you warranted some uncalled mercy with those evil beings.
And then there is poor old Zoreth, slaving some dwarfs, might killing some colleteral, but not attacking us, not trying to kill us. SURRENDERING and yet we have to kill her in cold blood.

That goes against anything we done before. But pshhh it's okay eh. What happens in Mordor stays in Mordor.

Tl.Dr: Make her scream, "Evil dwarfs i kill you" / attack player and it would exactly be like always in the game. For now, we just eagerly ir unwillingly helped dwarfs to kill a prisoner with no need at all.

If you really inteded her to feign surrender out of cowardice, please still let just the dwarfs do it.
As for now the representation is really lacking, and disturbing logic.

Agreed, sorry Pinion, the storyline just doesn't work without making us seem like cold-blooded killers.

[middlediscworld]

I can't remember exactly what happens at the end of the instance. Is standing aside and letting Zoreth get killed, but without actively doing so an option or not?

[Oelle]

I can't remember exactly what happens at the end of the instance. Is standing aside and letting Zoreth get killed, but without actively doing so an option or not?

Yes, you can just stand there and let the three dwarfs do the dirty job.
Still, not stopping them, when you should and could imo is nearly the same as doing the kill yourself.

[LagunaD2]

Yes, you can just stand there and let the three dwarfs do the dirty job.
Still, not stopping them, when you should and could imo is nearly the same as doing the kill yourself.

If I could have exterminated every fat, stinky Mordorf in the building then and there, I would have. The beauty of this quest chain is that you DO eventually get that opportunity.

(As an aside, the quest involving Zoreth herself is terribly designed. A couple of my squishy, under-geared alts pulled aggro on her and were dead to her crit ranged attacks within seconds. If you die to Zoreth, not only do you have to ride all the way back from Dingarth, you also have to repeat the 10+ minutes of brain-dead RP, listening to fat, stinky dorfs stroke each others' egos, before getting to Zoreth again. Absolutely horrible.)

[elianidd2]

Well... obviously every leader in Mordor is evil and selfish... all granted... I just feel that it would still have made more sense to treat her like Ayorzén (who was a Pariah, too) and totally felt no need to kill her. I even tried to go up to her before, kind of look if one can talk to her, get some information, see what kind of woman she is... so as the story is presented, I didnt see her as the big evil we need to kill on sight. And King Greytooth was obviously insane at that point, so I didnt get why I take orders from him at all. Not that my guard needed his "mercy" to get away, could have fought my way out through those 20 dwarfs there easily...

I get why Gimli acts as he does there now, though.

I thought this storyline was a bit silly too, and a big missed opportunity in terms of a redemption arc. I mean seriously, Gimli and the Lonely Mountain gain some new workers? Is that all the dwarves who say "Sauron took everything from us. And then he took more." deserve? To be shipped off to another master? I was really hoping Legolas was wrong and Gimli's open-handed warm embrace of his kin was not turned on its head, but even after that great scene where the dwarves learn of everything that has been going on and seem really happy to connect with the outside world they had to be turned evil. Silly.
As for Zoreth, I get that her being essentially a black Numenorean or woman of Mordor was going to make redemption for her hard, but they could have tried. It seems to me that with Sauron's power gone, many of those long-suffering under his black fist could be redeemed.

[LagunaD2]

even after that great scene where the dwarves learn of everything that has been going on and seem really happy to connect with the outside world they had to be turned evil. Silly.

It is impossible for a dorf abomination to "be turned evil". The entire race of dorf abominations was created in an act of sacrilege, and was intended to steal Middle-earth from its rightful occupants. They are more irredeemably evil than orcs (who at least started out as people).

As for Zoreth, I get that her being essentially a black Numenorean or woman of Mordor was going to make redemption for her hard, but they could have tried. It seems to me that with Sauron's power gone, many of those long-suffering under his black fist could be redeemed.

She was in league with the depraved, fat, stinky, sneaky, greedy, cowardly, lazy, fat, stinky Mordorfs who armed Sauron's armies. 'Nuff said.

[elianidd2]

dorf dorf dorf, dorf dorf.
dorf dorf dorf dorf!


dorf.

Looks like you need some chillax time with the meister.