Fate, Up Against Your Will

Quest Giver: King Varian Wrynn — Stormwind Keep, Stormwind City

Objective: Assist Lady Jaina Proudmoore in a diplomatic mission to Orgrimmar. Speak to the Warchief of the Horde, Thrall, at Grommash Hold.

Quick Facts

• Location: Stormwind City → Orgrimmar (phased instance)
• Chain Position: 2 of 5 in the post-Wrathgate chain (Reborn From The Ashes → Fate, Up Against Your Will → A Royal Coup → The Killing Time → The Battle For The Undercity)
• Horde Equivalent: Herald of War

Walkthrough

Speak to Jaina in Stormwind Keep

• After turning in Reborn From The Ashes to King Varian, pick up this quest from him.
• Lady Jaina Proudmoore is standing near Varian’s throne in Stormwind Keep. Speak to her and select the gossip option to open a portal to Orgrimmar.
• Do not travel to Theramore. The Jaina in Theramore Isle cannot advance this quest. This is a common mistake.

Enter Phased Orgrimmar

• Step through Jaina’s portal. You and Jaina will teleport directly into Grommash Hold.
• On arrival, the Kor’kron Elite guards rush forward aggressively, but Thrall calls them off.
• Lady Sylvanas Windrunner is also present, kneeling before Thrall.

Watch the Dialogue

• A scripted conversation plays between Thrall, Sylvanas, and Jaina. This is one of the pivotal story moments in the expansion, so take it in. Key points:
  • Thrall confirms the Wrathgate attack was a betrayal from within, not sanctioned by the Horde.
  • Sylvanas explains that Varimathras and Grand Apothecary Putress staged a simultaneous coup in the Undercity, slaughtering hundreds of her people. She barely escaped alive.
  • Thrall states the Horde has lost the Undercity and is preparing to siege it.
  • Jaina warns that Bolvar Fordragon was like a brother to Varian, and the king’s rage over Bolvar’s apparent death may override reason.
  • Jaina departs through a portal back to Stormwind, expressing hope they will meet next as allies rather than enemies.
• After the dialogue concludes, speak to Thrall to turn in the quest.

Efficiency Tips

• This is a dialogue-driven quest with no combat. Completion takes only a few minutes.
• You can repeatedly portal between Stormwind and phased Orgrimmar by speaking to Jaina again, as long as you do not turn in the follow-up to King Varian. However, there is no practical reason to do so in WotLK Classic (see WotLK Classic vs. Original WotLK below).
• Proceed immediately to A Royal Coup after turning in to continue the chain. The entire 5-quest sequence can be completed in one sitting.

Lore & Secrets

The Wrathgate Fallout

• This quest bridges the Wrathgate cinematic and the Battle for the Undercity. It establishes that Putress’s plague attack and Varimathras’s coup were coordinated, simultaneous betrayals, not just a rogue apothecary acting alone.
• The scene also sets up the Alliance-Horde rift that drives the rest of the chain. Despite Thrall’s assurances, Varian’s grief over Bolvar pushes him toward war, a theme that carries forward through later expansions.
• Sylvanas’s claim that she “barely managed to escape” foreshadows questions about her true loyalties. The Royal Apothecary Society operated under her authority, raising doubts about how much she truly knew.

Easter Eggs

Echo & the Bunnymen Song References

• The quest name “Fate, Up Against Your Will” is a lyric from “The Killing Moon” by Echo & the Bunnymen, a 1984 post-punk classic. The song’s chorus repeats the phrase “fate, up against your will” as its central hook.
• The pattern continues through the chain: The Killing Time (quest 4) is also a lyric from the same song (“it must be the killing time, unwillingly mine”).
• Frontman Ian McCulloch famously said the lyrics came to him in a dream and he “half-credited them to God.” The song appeared prominently in the film Donnie Darko (2001).

Cross-Expansion Connections

Jaina Proudmoore’s Arc

• The Jaina seen here, still advocating diplomacy and peace between factions, is a far cry from who she becomes. In Mists of Pandaria, Garrosh Hellscream destroys Theramore with a mana bomb, killing nearly everyone she knows and turning her hair white. She nearly retaliates by flooding Orgrimmar with a tidal wave.
• In Battle for Azeroth, she returns to her homeland of Kul Tiras and eventually reconciles with her estranged mother. Her full arc from peacemaker to war hawk and back to cautious hope spans over a decade of storytelling.

Bolvar Fordragon’s Fate

• Jaina’s grief over Bolvar here is premature. Bolvar is not actually dead. The combination of Putress’s plague and the red dragonfire that cleansed the battlefield transformed him. He was captured by the Scourge, tortured by Arthas, and ultimately became the new Lich King at the end of Icecrown Citadel.
• Bolvar’s story continues through Legion (commanding the death knight order hall) and Shadowlands (where Sylvanas shatters the Helm of Domination). He reunites with his daughter Taelia, who had believed him dead for years.

The Undercity’s Fate

• The Undercity that Thrall and Sylvanas prepare to reclaim here will eventually be lost for good. In Battle for Azeroth, Sylvanas floods the entire city with blight rather than let the Alliance claim it after the burning of Teldrassil. It remains uninhabitable.

WotLK Classic vs. Original WotLK

In the original 2008 release (Patch 3.0.2), players discovered they could exploit the phased Orgrimmar to safely complete fishing achievements and enter Ragefire Chasm. Patch 3.1.0 (April 2009) shut this down by making fishing yield only trash and blocking access to Ragefire Chasm. WotLK Classic launched with these fixes already in place, so:

• Fishing Diplomat cannot be completed in phased Orgrimmar. Fishing yields nothing usable.
• Old Crafty cannot be caught here. You will need to sneak into non-phased Orgrimmar the old-fashioned way.
• Ragefire Chasm cannot be entered from phased Orgrimmar.

Additionally, WotLK Classic added Zidormi, a Bronze Dragonflight NPC near the entrance to the Undercity Sewers in Tirisfal Glades. She allows Alliance players to manually toggle the Battle for the Undercity phasing on or off.

This was added as a hotfix to address bugs that could strand players in the wrong phase, preventing them from interacting with NPCs and vendors in Orgrimmar or the Undercity. If you encounter phasing issues at any point during this chain, visit Zidormi to reset.