Millions of players romp about in MMORPGs like World of Warcraft. Few of them make a name for themselves and even fewer become legends. One such legend is Angwe, an orc rogue who became a scourge of the Alliance back in Vanilla.
Who is the player? Angwe is an orc villain who was in Vanilla WoW. By that we don’t mean the new WoW Classic, but actually the original WoW, back in 2005.
Unlike the legendary warrior Kungen, however, Angwe has made a name for himself as a particularly mean player. He is considered one of the greatest villains in World of Warcraft, apart from story antagonists like Arthas and Kil’jaeden.
Back then, YouTube wasn’t as big as it is today and Twitch didn’t even exist in this form. Accordingly, there is little evidence of Angwe’s misdeeds.
Nevertheless, conversations about the nasty villain in the community keep coming up, memories of the old days or even praise of his achievements. But who exactly is Angwe?
“I just like being Freddy Krueger”
What is Angwe known for? Angwe was one of the best PvP players at the time. As he explains in an AMA on reddit, he was ranked #1 or #2 in the PvP leaderboard every week on his server Dethecus.
Back then, it was still about honorable kills. Honor was only given when you killed players of the same level in the open world. Stranglethorn Vale was particularly notorious for huge PvP battles and ganks at the time.
However, Angwe has settled in the port of Menethil. There he slaughtered rows of alliance members, those at level 60, but also absolute noobs who just wanted to level there. As he says himself, he spent 8 to 10 hours a day on it.
“I just love being Freddy Krueger […] I loved scaring people, making them look over my shoulder with every step. I love being the butzeman,” Angwe revealed in an interview with PC Gamer 2017.
Interview with a Griefer: “I only feel good when others cry.”
That’s why it was particularly nasty: Menethil Harbor was the only reasonable way for Alliance players to get to Kalimdor from the Eastern Kingdoms back then. There was still Booty Bay, but the ship there led directly to Durotar, a Horde area.
Ships from Menethil headed for Darkshore. So if you wanted to travel back and forth as an Alliance player, you had to go that way. Particularly nasty: the port of Menethil is in an area for level 20-30 players. There was always enough fodder here for Angwe’s blades.
Angwe often waited at the docks and assassinated players who just wanted to board the ship. Sometimes he even drove along a bit, killed the people on the ship and then swam back.
It went so far that Alliance players were afraid to even go on the ships. They waited near the guards and only sprinted when the boat came, hoping not to be Angwe’s target.
Angwe even founded his own guild, the “Servants of Angwe”. Alliance players in this guild came out as cowards, but at least they were protected from the nasty orc and didn’t become his target.
“You live in your mother’s basement”
These were the reactions: Angwe herself created an alliance character on a second account. Back then, you couldn’t play both factions on PvP servers. He uses his character “Angwespy” to watch his victims get upset with him.
The villain saved the best statements as screenshots and uploaded them to a website specially created for this purpose. The original of this no longer exists, but some fan sites still display the chat messages and forum posts today. Highlights include statements such as:
At least one guild even posted an “Anti-Angwe Guide” on their own forum specifically for avoiding the orc. Angwe sneaked into the guild and trolled it out from within.
Back then, WoW had a few more problems. Here are the 5 funniest bugs in WoW history:
See the 5 bugs that made history in WoW in the video
How did it end? It is precisely this anti-Angwe guild that is said to have finally banded together and waited for him. According to PC Gamer, once he logged in, a veritable army was waiting for him. He was said to be able to take some Alliance players to his grave before being defeated. His last battle.
Shortly thereafter, Blizzard introduced Battlegrounds with Patch 1.5. PvP enthusiasts could arrange brawls in instanced areas, and open PvP became less and less important. There was honor on the battlefield.
Since you still had to travel to the battlefields back then and couldn’t just teleport into them, the mass of PvP players shifted towards Ashenvale and Alterac, away from Menethil.
Angwe was no longer the terror of the Alliance. He says he realized he was wasting his life playing the way he did. Menethil and the Alliance were safe again.
Terrorizing entire servers – Not so easy today
The villain explains that his drive still comes from Everquest, an older MMORPG. The tone was much rougher there and what he pulled off in WoW was nothing compared to PvP in Everquest.
In the podcast with the developer of Germany’s largest MMORPG, we talk about what it’s like to be evil as a player. Listen on Spotify or iTunes or tune in directly here:
WoW players were not used to such assassins and are not today. Griefer are more likely to be reported and avoided, it’s more about teamwork than annoying others. Blizzard even wants to promote a good climate with a “social contract” and other ideas.
The war between Horde and Alliance also receded more and more into the background over the years. The factions allied again and again against larger enemies and with patch 9.2.5 Horde and Alliance can even play together properly.
The days of players like Angwe are probably numbered. This is not possible simply because most players today understand a lot more about WoW and Co. If someone were to stand anywhere, they would have someone even better attached to them in no time.
We used to be all noobs and Angwe was just a little bit better. He says himself that today he would be properly poured. We all got a whole lot better today:
In 2008 it took 62 days for the final boss of WoW to die – today he is knocked over in Classic after 52 minutes