User:Haleth/Gul'Dan

Gul'dan (voiced by Paul Eiding in Warcraft III, voiced by Troy Baker in World of Warcraft, and portrayed by Daniel Wu in the film) was an orc warlock, formerly a shaman from the Shadowmoon clan born on Draenor, the homeworld of the orcs. Mentored by the elder shaman Ner'zhul, Gul'dan sought power above all else and when Ner'zhul was contacted by the demon lord Kil'jaeden, Gul'dan helped him make a blood pact with the demons. Ner'zhul sought to undercut their alliance when he learned the pact would make the entire orc people slaves to demons, but before he could, Gul'dan betrayed him and took his place. Gul'dan became the first known warlock and the head of the Shadow Council, a cabal of resourceful orcs who secretly served the Burning Legion from within orc society. Gul'dan's actions would ultimately lead to the corruption of the Horde; he deceived several leaders of the orcish clans into drinking the blood of the pit lord Mannoroth, binding them to the Legion. With a unified orc army at his disposal, Gul'dan launched an unprovoked attack against Shattrath City, and razed the draenei capital. Even though the orcs had followed Kil'jaeden's orders, the demon lord abandoned them, leaving them to fight amongst themselves for years on a world that quickly turned barren from the use of fel magic. Gul'dan was also responsible for raising the gigantic fel volcano known as the Hand of Gul'dan after severing the orcs' ties to the ancestral spirits of Draenor.

Gul'dan saw a new destiny for the Horde after being contacted by the corrupted Guardian Medivh, who was possessed by the fallen titan, Sargeras. The orc warlock was promised endless power in exchange for conquering Azeroth and freeing the body of Sargeras. The Shadow Council built and opened a Dark Portal with Medivh's help, and the orcs plundered their way across the Eastern Kingdoms, eventually laying siege to Stormwind City. With victory in his grasp, Gul'dan decided that he no longer wished to wait for Medivh to voluntarily tell him the location of Sargeras's tomb. The warlock was searching deep within Medivh's mind when the human sorcerer was killed during a daring raid, and Gul'dan fell into a coma. By the time Gul'dan awoke, most of his followers were dead, and the Horde was now firmly under the command of Orgrim Doomhammer. Gul'dan swore allegiance to the new Warchief by assembling an undead army—the dreaded death knights—from the corpses of Stormwind's fallen heroes. However, when Orgrim's Horde needed him the most during the Second War, Gul'dan and some of his clans abandoned Orgim to seek the tomb of Sargeras, where he uncovered the terrible truth behind his efforts: Sargeras never had any intention of granting him power at all. Gul'dan was torn to shreds by the masses of vicious demons inside the tomb, and his very skull became a focus of demonic power.

An alternate version of Gul'dan appears in World of Warcraft: Warlords of Draenor as a secondary antagonist, who later becomes the main antagonist. This Gul'dan was contacted by the Legion directly at a much younger age, differing greatly from his transition through Ner'zhul who planned to use him in their plot to conquer Azeroth. After being exiled from his village when he was young, he journeyed to the Throne of the Elements to seek the help of the elements of Draenor, but they refused him. In his sorrow, a mysterious green essence known as fel magic appeared to him, and Gul'dan learned to harness it, using it to kill everyone in his village who had turned their back on him. After Garrosh Hellscream went back in time to convince the alternate version of his father, Grommash, to reject the demon pact, Gul'dan and his chief lieutenants, Cho'gall and Teron'gor, were imprisoned. Their magic was drained to power the Dark Portal that connected the alternate Draenor to Azeroth in the current timeline, until they were set free by adventurers to seal the portal. Meanwhile, the Shadow Council conducted its own battles against the draenei for the purposes of gaining greater power, while heroes from Azeroth battled the Iron Horde. Khadgar, the archmage who led the Azerothian expedition to the alternate Draenor (just as he had led the expedition to Draenor in the main timeline decades before), considered hunting down and stopping Gul'dan his highest priority.

After the deaths of several Iron Horde warlords, including Garrosh, Gul'dan repeated his offer to Grommash, who again refused. After incapacitating Grommash, Gul'dan made the same offer to anyone who sought greater power. Kilrogg Deadeye was the first to drink from the tainted cup and become warped by the demon's blood. Gul'dan took control of the Iron Horde and used the blood of Mannoroth to warp the landscape of the Tanaan Jungle. When a band of adventurers besieged Hellfire Citadel, Gul'dan opened a gate at the foot of the Dark Portal to summon the demon lord Archimonde from the Twisting Nether. The adventurers managed to defeat Archimonde, but in his final moments he forced Gul'dan through the gate.

Gul'dan returned as a major antagonist in World of Warcraft: Legion. Archimonde sent Gul'dan to the main timeline's Azeroth with the goal of paving the way for the Legion's third and largest invasion. Under the direction of Kil'jaeden, Gul'dan made his way to the Tomb of Sargeras on the Broken Isles. He briefly considered betraying the Legion, after discovering that the original Gul'dan was betrayed and killed by demons within the tomb, but Kil'jaeden offered him a choice: serve the Legion and be given a position of power, or betray them and be destroyed. Gul'dan chose to remain loyal and opened the tomb, allowing countless demons to flood into Azeroth. Gul'dan was then sent to Suramar to negotiate the surrender of the Nightborne elves. In a desperate counteroffensive, Alliance and Horde forces assaulted the Broken Shore in an attempt to stem the endless tide of demons. The battle resulted in a devastating defeat and the deaths of multiple heroes, including Tirion, Varian, and Vol'jin. Gul'dan made his way to the Nighthold in Suramar with the encased corpse of Illidan Stormrage, where he attempted to contact Sargeras and use Illidan's body as his new host, but was defeated by heroes and Khadgar. He was ultimately slain by the revived Illidan Stormrage.

Gul'dan also appears in Hearthstone and Heroes of the Storm.

Gul'dan appears as the main antagonist of the live-action adaptation of Warcraft which was directed by Duncan Jones. In the film itself, he was portrayed and voiced by Daniel Wu. In the film, he appears once again as a powerful orc warlock, and he unites the orc clans and forms the Horde, and creates a portal to the world of Azeroth. The orcs begin to use fel magic to drain the life out of captive draenei to sustain the portal. Once it is operational, Gul'dan leads a small warband to capture prisoners on Azeroth and sacrifice them to bring the rest of the Horde through the portal. Durotan, the chieftain of the Frostwolf Clan, his pregnant mate Draka, and his friend Orgrim Doomhammer join this initial warband. While crossing through the portal, Draka goes into labor. When the orcs arrive on Azeroth, Gul'dan assists Draka with giving birth, but the baby is stillborn. Gul'dan then drains the life out of a nearby deer to revive and infuse fel magic into the baby, which Durotan later names Go'el.

The orcs, led by Gul'dan, raid several settlements throughout Azeroth. Anduin Lothar, the military commander of the human forces in the Stormwind Kingdom, looks over some of the men that were killed, and finds a trespassing mage named Khadgar, who explains that he was investigating the dead bodies because they contained traces of fel magic. He has his Orcs kidnap humans to sacrifice for the portal to get the rest of the orcs in. He kills Durotain when he learns that his fel magic is responsible for destroying the Orc home. His plan is stopped by Lothar and Khadgar who stopped his portal from opening and he loses most of his Orcs' respect and their commandment when Garona becomes the new leader of the Horde.

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