The whinging started with people wanting to get a physical reward for an easy to get achievement back in vanilla. Congratz! you did ZG a lot or had gold. I got to revered and then didn't bother anymore, since my guild really didn't care about the place.
What's next? "Look! I have the unarmed skill FoS! I want a pet/mount/tabard now as well!"
Best thing they can do is just do a "Get X legacy achievements, unlock Y" would work better
If you asked Blizzard about this, they would proberly clarify, that the Zandalari helping you in ZG were mearly a small detachment of the overall Zandalari Tribe and that you still have to impress the rest of the tribe to get their favor. They will proberly remove the old reputation or simply name the new reputation as "Zandalari Empire".
May the lore be great and the stories interesting. A game without a story, is a game without a soul. Value the lore and it will reward you with fun!
Don't let yourself be satisfied with what you expect and what you seem as obvious. Ask for something good, surprising and better. Your own standards ends up being other peoples standard.
Yes. Exalted with the Zandalari Tribe is required to unlock playable Zandalari Trolls. People that did not get that reputation back in Classic will be unable to make Zandalari Trolls.
They could just give a Title for a Meta Achievement.
Like in Wrath if you were already exalted with the Argent Dawn from Classic and then got exalted with the Argent Crusade you got a Title called "The Argent Champion"
Chances are the Zandalari will have a new Faction name in BFA probably something like "Hand of Rastakhan" or something. If so, make it people that get it exalted that also had the original Zandalari faction at exalted get a Title for it?
Should stop the whinging.
Seriously, though, I don't know why people need an extra reward for some reputation or thing they grinded out years ago that they don't even really think about anymore today.
Not everything you do in the past has to give you something extra later.
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"Ah yes, I see you're a Nightborne from a future where the Legion is defeated and we are freed from our addiction. NO SIR, I DON'T LIKE IT. DIE!!!"
The sole reason for me to level to 120 is to unlock a Zandalari Troll and do it again and enjoy the expansion for real, also to make it my main. If I have to get exalted with some punk ass faction which will take weeks of my time on a character I'm not even going to play afterwards, I highly recommend Blizzard to change their course of action with these allied races.
I am Exalted with the Wildhammer of Twilight Highlands, so I want a Wildhammer skin instead of Dark Iron.