They Wasted A Perfectly Good Character / World of Warcraft

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• For many, Zul'jin. Given that he was often spoken of as a heroic, or anti-heroic, forest troll who made the forest trolls (and trolls as a whole) seem less evil, many, many players felt he deserved better than being retconned into a Generic Doomsday Villain fought and killed in a 10-man raid instance that has since removed him replacing him with a Suspiciously Similar Substitute.
• Kael'thas Sunstrider, the leader of the Blood Elves introduced in Warcraft III and initial leader of the Blood Elves in Burning Crusade. He had much potential for redemption but was killed after betraying his people to the Burning Legion. It got to the point that even Blizzard themselves have gone on record to say they regretted how they ended his story. This is being addressed in Shadowlands where Kael'thas was noted to be one of the main lore characters players will meet.
• Lady Vashj had it even worse after playing a major role in Warcraft III as Illidan's second-in-command, and was a comrade of war with Kael. Her return in World of Warcraft basically just had her shoved into the role of a one-off raid boss during Burning Crusade, and is completely forgotten about. This is also being addressed in Shadowlands with Vashj being an ally within the Necrolord Campaign.
• Anub'arak had a lot of potential due to Warcraft III building him up as one of Arthas' most valuable undead allies alongside Kel'Thuzad. However, as a result of Blizzard's failure to turn Azjol-Nerub into a Northerend zone to explore during the Wrath of the Lich King era, which obviously would have provided some much needed focus to the Crypt Fiend race, Anub'arak ended up not getting to do all that much.
• Garrosh Hellscream, son of Grom Hellscream and second Warchief of the new Horde, was originally planned to have a longer character arc with him gradually maturing as a leader. However fan backlash over his initial hotheaded behavior and low-key racism led to Blizzard scrapping those plans. Instead his negative attributes were cranked up even further, turning him into a borderline Nazi executing pogroms on his own people to justify ousting and then killing him.
• Zaela, the first female orcish clan chieftain since Greatmother Geyah, was a brash, take-charge warrior who seemed well-suited to lead an ambiguously heroic clan like the Dragonmaw, not to mention a female orc hero with no marital or romantic entanglements aside from some slight Ship Tease with Garrosh (which made her singular among Horde characters) and an Interspecies Friendship with Lady Cozwynn. Since then, Blizzard handed her a Face–Heel Turn that was every bit as sudden and poorly implemented as that of Garrosh such as turning her into a bigot, when as mentioned earlier, she was close friends with a Forsaken and a half-orc.
• Lady Cozwynn was an active Forsaken outside of Sylvanas's cult of personality with genuine friendships with members of the Kalimdor Horde, most notably being close friends with Zaela. After Zaela's very sloppily handled Face–Heel Turn, Cozwynn stopped existing, leaving Sylvanas and later Nathanos as the sole active Forsaken.
• Prophet Velen prior to Legion, or at least his Draenor counterpart. Velen, who is memetically known to be sitting in the Exodar out of the spotlight that the Wrynn family and Jaina have practically glued onto them appears and is built up to be playing a major role to Alliance players. Finally, players won't have to delve very deep into the expanded universe to find relevancy held by him! Except he kicks the bucket in Shadowmoon Valley — the first zone in Warlords of Draenor for Alliance players, and Yrel, a new character entirely, takes the role of the leader. Some feel Velen was kicked in the face and that Yrel was an Ass Pull, while others like that Yrel is a good character on her own. The silver lining is that this is an alternate Prophet Velen, in a realm where most Draenei survived. The main timeline Velen, who came from a Draenor where nearly every Draenei, possibly including the main timeline's Yrel, have been turned to bones forming the Hellfire Peninsula, is still alive, so this is not the end for Velen.
• Ysera, who unlike the other Dragon Aspects never quite managed to independently hold a plotline on her own and instead is usually relegated to a Satellite Character whose action and characterization revolves around the other Aspects and/or the Night Elves, the latter of which spent several expansions Out of Focus. Her death in Legion doesn't help either as Ysera didn't even receive a Death in the Limelight and is separated from the other Aspects. Like with Kael and Vashj, this is being addressed in Shadowlands with the rebirth of Ysera being the main quest chain of the Ardenweald leveling experience and Ysera herself being heavily involved in the Night Fae campaign. In Dragonflight, the emotional impact of her death is partially addressed, with her daughter Merithra stepped up as the new Aspect of her flight, but there is no reaction or interaction between Ysera and the remaining Aspects Alexstrasza and Nozdormu.
• Imperator Mar'gok got this reaction after Code of Rule, a short story largely told from the perspective of the ogre emperor, showing a very different outlook on things, but also both a strength and a cleverness that had traditionally been beyond the ogres. There was only one problem. This story came out after his canonical death. Further, the second Chronicle established that the main timeline Mar'gok died long ago, because Cho'gall was after him regardless of player intervention, so there's no hope of seeing that characterization matter.
• The alternate universe Ner'zhul represented an opportunity to learn more about a character whose actions defined much of Warcraft history. All of that nuance was lost when the Shadowmoon Valley storyline depicted him as a generic villain obsessed with a dark power. While the Shadowmoon Exiles explain he was driven to the magic in order to prove his worth to the Iron Horde, none of that carries through to the portrayal of either Ner'zhul or his clan.
• Vol'jin got hit by this hard. The troll racial leader since Warcraft III, he hadn't done a lot, but he was a moderately popular character. During Mists of Pandaria, they started to really build up his character, centering the rebellion against Garrosh around him and even giving him his own novel. He quickly became a fan favorite to the point that, when Garrosh was deposed, Blizzard chose Vol'jin to replace him due to his popularity. After an expansion he barely makes a cameo in because we were on another world, we return to Azeroth only for him to be immediately killed by a demon Mook. His time as a Warchief was so completely wasted that there's been backlash from those who assume he canonically wasted that time since we never saw any of it. Blizzard eventually brought him back in Battle for Azeroth as a spirit and he is looking to have an important role in the Shadowlands expansion.
• The Prime Naaru, Xe'ra. Despite being a Base-Breaking Character, her nature, dialogue and role hold huge implications for the lore. She gives insight into how the universe was made... in-universe, she helps bring back Illidan and she is the founder and leader of the Army of the Light. Then she randomly gets forceful with Illidan and tries to imbue him with the Light, which he refuses and kills her for. Not to mention how being the Warcraft universe's equivalent of an archangel, she could've been a powerful fighter against the Burning Legion (assuming her power surpassed A'dal, who single-handedly protected Shattrath from the Burning Legion's forces. Despite this, she rarely does anything in the game (almost nothing that doesn't relate to Illidan), is not given any connections to other Naaru, few characters reference her and she doesn't even survive the expansion.
• Sargeras finally makes an appearance in-game, in the flesh after almost 23 years at the end of Legion... for about one minute before he's imprisoned by the Pantheon, with Illidan as his new warden. However, regardless of his short on-screen appearance, he's left a massive impact on Azeroth, driving his sword into Silithus and ravaging the entire zone.
• Gunther Arcanus was a powerful mage and necromancer of the Kirin Tor who was turned into an undead by the Scourge. He broke free of the Lich King's control out of his own mental strength and survived on his own, having become even stronger in death and thinking he was the only free undead in the world. The Forsaken are so impressed by his powers that they call him a lich and try to recruit him. He's also a former friend of Thule Ravenclaw, an enemy in the next zone. Despite all this, Gunther Arcanus is never mentioned again and his questline was removed in Cataclysm.
• Prophet Zul, whose machinations stretch back to Cataclysm, was introduced as a major player in Battle for Azeroth. Sinister and charismatic, players were quite taken with him and enjoyed what he brought to the story, some feeling that he had the potential to be a Gul'dan-esque recurring antagonist. Villain Decay sets in shortly after his public Face–Heel Turn: the mystique surrounding him is stripped away — his unique foretelling amounts to nothing — and he's reduced to just another of G'huun's pathetic cultists in the Uldir raid, in which he's put out of his misery.
• N'Zoth. While supposed to be the ultimate Big Bad of Battle for Azeroth, his presence was built up throughout the expansion and then he was anti-climatically defeated in a cinematic that's less than 30 seconds long as a messy way of bringing closure to the story of the Old Gods as a whole. Said cinematic was posted to the game's YouTube channel, and its like/dislike ratio should give you an idea of how well his implementation was received.
• Zovaal the Jailer had potential in concept - a god of death who rebelled against his purpose because in his eyes the universe would be destroyed if the disparate forces were not united. His efforts to gain allies from the other Covenants also show signs of potential for an interesting enemy, such as laying bare the problems with Bastion's indoctrination and Maldraxxus being obsessed with any war. For all that he was constantly hyped as a master planner and schemer, in his actual in-game appearances the Jailer was a one-note Generic Doomsday Villain regarded as the worst expansion villain in the game's history.
• Arguably one of the biggest criticisms against Shadowlands is their mishandling of Arthas Menethil; When the players were informed he'd be making an appearance in Shadowlands, with many wondering and hoping he'd play a significant role in the plotline for the Maw and even potentially redeem themselves in spite of being thrown in. However, all that was seen of him was a remnant, and his soul being used to make Kingsmourne was seen as nothing but a copout to get rid of Arthas and not have any sort of writing for him in favor of propping up Sylvanas Windrunner.

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