How the hell will the orcs redeem themselves when all this is done?

[Flaks]

It's simple.

We uh....kill. The Badman.

I do think that's redemption enough. Everyone and Varian's mother knows Garrosh and the Kork'ron were responsible for the atrocities. Saying that all Orcs should be held responsible is kinda silly.

[Florena]

Neither Alliance or Horde where ever pure black and white, both are grey imo. However, Alliance is a slightly lighter shade of grey then Horde. Not so much wrong with that imo.
Looking at wow though, the pure white and pure black character where mostly (I daren't say always ) outside either faction. Old jaina is pretty damn white but was never 100% alliance imo. Thrall was always pretty white but got a complete bleach -after- he left the his Horde leadership position. The big bads where always outside the Horde or the Alliance, either from the start (deathwing) or was kicked out before he went completely black (Arthas). I think that now we finally see a change in that. Finally someone within the playable factions is turning black and we have to find a way to deal with that. The Horde because it threatens to tear apart said Horde. The alliance because it's far to dangerous to have a big bad in charge of a superpower.

One of the two factions had to be the first. It ended up being the Horde. I really hope to see that they continue this trend and that hopefully the Alliance will get their share of black soon. Varian going evil would be lame though. I'm rooting for either the dark dwarves taking over the council or greymane going bananas :P

The Alliance has some shades of gray, but at the moment it's overshadowed by two things: Garrosh and the Forsaken. One is an isolated race within the horde, the other is the big bad of the expansion that we'll be raiding against in a few months. And one of the worst things the horde has done, the invasion of Gilneas, was a combination of these two factors. Garrosh ordering said invasion and Sylvannas resorting to weapons she was forbidden from using to ensure victory.

But while the horde may be darker at the moment, let's not overlook the fact the Alliance doesn't have a clean slate these last couple of expansions.

1. Taurajo.
2. Preemptive, unprovoked attack on Stonard.
3. Kidnapping Thrall and sinking an neutral goblin ship.
4. Putting Pandaren, even children, into forced labor. (Though this was partly due to sha influence.)
5. Gunning down surrendering orcs. (Partly justified, we don't KNOW they were going to surrender, they could have gotten out of the water and shouted 'lok tar ogar!' and fought to the death unlike their warchief.)
6. The purge of Dalaran.

[Hughes]

But then why am I surprised, this clearly being blizzards reaction to the insipid whiners that complained about Thralls development in cata, they decided to back away from giving him any real development into fatherhood.

Because the entire xpac was centered around him? Well..just about. And I wouldn't call them insipid whiners, just people who called Metzen on having a stiff over his creation and giving it too much face time. I understand your a fan, but not everyone feels that way or cares about his 'trials in fatherhood.' If I wanted to see that, I'd watch a chick flick or get my wife pregnant.

[Crookids]

I'm still confused as to what the Horde's place will be for the final tier and the raid against Garrosh.

[Dreknar20]

Garrosh ordering said invasion .

why would that be considred the worst of the worst?

[Faroth]

4. Putting Pandaren, even children, into forced labor. (Though this was partly due to sha influence.)

Where the hell did the Alliance do this?

[Deleted]

so Garrosh does some bad things like bomb theremore, kill some ally and then kills some trolls (maybe i mean besides that dude in org who says Vol'jins alive has any other troll actually died?) and you blame ALL ORCS? so how did humans get Redeemed after Arthas? funny how you Alliance forget you had Arthas all these years killing EVERYONE, but the moment 1 orc goes mad and starts a cult ALL orcs are to be blamed. . .lol. . .

1. I don't play alliance

2. I am not blaming all the orcs, I am stating that there are likely to be trust issues after the kor'kron are taken down, it's just the nature of this type of thing, ofcourse there are going to be many who may look at orcs, remember their families that were killed by garrosh and then irrationaly blame the remaining orcs, it happens in real life, so it could just as easily happen in warcraft.

[Deleted]

Euhm you are making it look like the entire Orc race is following Garrosh, which is not the case. The only Orcs that need to redeem themselves are the ones siding with Garrosh that we don't actually kill in the seige of Orgrimmar.

[Hughes]

[QUOTE=Florena;21228029]
But while the horde may be darker at the moment, let's not overlook the fact the Alliance doesn't have a clean slate these last couple of expansions.

1. Taurajo.

-Theramore. Also, read into who died and it will answer point 6 of your post.

2. Preemptive, unprovoked attack on Stonard.

-Horde constant attacks on the borders, etc. etc. Two gorrillas pounding their chest at each other.

3. Kidnapping Thrall and sinking an neutral goblin ship.

-Thrall being kidnapped was by one opportune Alliance captain, the rest following orders. Also, he was the leader of the HORDE, the enemy faction to Alliance.

4. Putting Pandaren, even children, into forced labor. (Though this was partly due to sha influence.)

Did you play the Ally side? Horde did the exact same thing.

5. Gunning down surrendering orcs. (Partly justified, we don't KNOW they were going to surrender, they could have gotten out of the water and shouted 'lok tar ogar!' and fought to the death unlike their warchief.)

-Better to not take risks. War.

6. The purge of Dalaran.

Garrosh's actions caused the death of Rhonin, and an entire town they were trying to protect. I don't blame them, especially considering Dalaran was an Alliance city to begin with.

---------- Post added 2013-05-24 at 04:07 PM ----------

Where the hell did the Alliance do this?

About the same time Alliance discovered Horde was doing it. Trust me, I didn't understand it either.

[Florena]

[QUOTE=Hughes;21228143]

But while the horde may be darker at the moment, let's not overlook the fact the Alliance doesn't have a clean slate these last couple of expansions.


-Theramore. Also, read into who died and it will answer point 6 of your post.

-Horde constant attacks on the borders, etc. etc. Two gorrillas pounding their chest at each other.

-Thrall being kidnapped was by one opportune Alliance captain, the rest following orders. Also, he was the leader of the HORDE, the enemy faction to Alliance.

Did you play the Ally side? Horde did the exact same thing.

-Better to not take risks. War.

Garrosh's actions caused the death of Rhonin, and an entire town they were trying to protect. I don't blame them, especially considering Dalaran was an Alliance city to begin with.

---------- Post added 2013-05-24 at 04:07 PM ----------



About the same time Alliance discovered Horde was doing it. Trust me, I didn't understand it either.

I'm not trying to say that the Alliance is evil, or that the horde didn't do shady things too. I'm not saying the Alliance is worse than the Horde, the Horde is definitely the darker shaded faction right now. I'm just pointing out that not everyone in the Alliance shares Varian and Anduin's attitude or restraint.

[Faroth]

Euhm you are making it look like the entire Orc race is following Garrosh, which is not the case. The only Orcs that need to redeem themselves are the ones siding with Garrosh that we don't actually kill in the seige of Orgrimmar.

It's not quite as white washed as that either, though.

Orcs are the majority of the Horde. They supported Garrosh through Cataclysm and into Pandaria things started to shift and you get the split. And if the orcs largely opposed Garrosh, then you're saying the vast majority of the Horde stood complacent while a minority did everything.

The orcs do have something to answer for here; not just to the Horde/Alliance but largely to themselves. How did they allow it to come to this? How did they not see this sooner, and why did they not do anything to stop it? Questions I would expect Thrall weighs on himself as well, whether deserved or not.

---------- Post added 2013-05-24 at 04:11 PM ----------

About the same time Alliance discovered Horde was doing it. Trust me, I didn't understand it either.

It's part of the Horde intro to Pandaria in Jade Forest, I take it?
My Horde alts are still Hordelings.

[Destinas]

The Alliance has some shades of gray, but at the moment it's overshadowed by two things: Garrosh and the Forsaken. One is an isolated race within the horde, the other is the big bad of the expansion that we'll be raiding against in a few months. And one of the worst things the horde has done, the invasion of Gilneas, was a combination of these two factors. Garrosh ordering said invasion and Sylvannas resorting to weapons she was forbidden from using to ensure victory.

But while the horde may be darker at the moment, let's not overlook the fact the Alliance doesn't have a clean slate these last couple of expansions.

1. Taurajo.
2. Preemptive, unprovoked attack on Stonard.
3. Kidnapping Thrall and sinking an neutral goblin ship.
4. Putting Pandaren, even children, into forced labor. (Though this was partly due to sha influence.)
5. Gunning down surrendering orcs. (Partly justified, we don't KNOW they were going to surrender, they could have gotten out of the water and shouted 'lok tar ogar!' and fought to the death unlike their warchief.)
6. The purge of Dalaran.

With the Forsaken, it's much more than the invasion of Gilneas. When it comes down to it, it's the fact that almost all of Lordaeron is under Forsaken control now. All of Hillsbrad is Forsaken territory, and much of the quests there are in favor of the Forsaken winning each battle. The prince of Stromgarde becomes a Forsaken, though he isn't given much lore other than his Forsaken model in-game. The events in Andorhal speak much of Sylvanas and her leader ship (in both bad and good ways). The list goes on as far as the storylines up there.

However, while the Alliance has done some morally wrong things, the biggest reason they aren't always thought of as "bad guys" is because of the way they're portrayed in the first place. Who would you trust, a pink-haired gnome, or an Undead? The Forsaken are depicted as evil, and for all intents and purposes are more toward the evil side of the scale. The Orcs, generally, have always been depicted as bad guys since the first Warcraft game (and most other forms of fantasy). They've been pushed into the role of "simple, shamanistic folk" because of Thrall and Metzen's attention to detail to him, which is fine, but now many of them are pulling a complete 360. It's much easier to make someone out as a bad guy when they look intimidating, no matter how their culture really is.

That said, the Alliance doesn't have many entire races that can be labeled as "bad" compared to the Horde in terms of actions or appearance. The ones who have acted the worst are the Dark Irons (pre-council of three hammers, that is) and the humans in most of those listed cases. The Dark Irons now, however, are simply shady and not explicitly "evil" - they are up to something, though. The humans can't ever be depicted as bad guys as a whole since they're a staple of fantasy games, books, movies, and tv.

Is it fair? No. I feel bad that the Horde has Garrosh as a main bad guy, and people suspect Sylvanas will be as well in the future. I couldn't truly name anyone in the Alliance who could truly betray everyone, except Moira. But I doubt that they'll go with "faction leader bad guy" for a while after MoP.

[Malkhor]

---------- Post added 2013-05-22 at 10:42 PM ----------

[/COLOR]

No I cant agree with you. Once everything is done and calmed, Trolls and Tauren will start hating every Orc in Orgrimmar or New Kor'kron. It always happens like that.

To pull this in to real life to emphasize, there's still people that hate all Germans, and the period after WW 2 wasn't pretty either.

[Faroth]

That said, the Alliance doesn't have many entire races that can be labeled as "bad" compared to the Horde in terms of actions or appearance. The ones who have acted the worst are the Dark Irons (pre-council of three hammers, that is) and the humans in most of those listed cases. The Dark Irons now, however, are simply shady and not explicitly "evil" - they are up to something, though. The humans can't ever be depicted as bad guys as a whole since they're a staple of fantasy games, books, movies, and tv.

Is it fair? No. I feel bad that the Horde has Garrosh as a main bad guy, and people suspect Sylvanas will be as well in the future. I couldn't truly name anyone in the Alliance who could truly betray everyone, except Moira. But I doubt that they'll go with "faction leader bad guy" for a while after MoP.

The night elves should have been the counter to the Forsaken for the Alliance. Where the Forsaken spread death through the plague, NEs should have defended life with ferocity the rest of the Alliance may have even disapproved of. Xenophobic, brutal in combat, relentless, and willing to employ every method necessary to achieve their goal on the battlefield. Their original artwork had more feral looks and Samwise's art definitely portrayed them more brutal than what we've seen in WoW.

The night elves could have been the ones to do questionable things, to provide the "walking the edge of being bad guys" because they're doing what they PERCEIVE as right and nobody is going to tell them otherwise. The xenophobia would even allow you to keep them untrusting and not entirely in line with the rest of the Alliance, must like the Forsaken were for the Horde.

Instead Blizz decided they'd be purple skinned hippies.

I don't think they'll go with a faction leader as the villain for a while either. Sylvanas is certainly questionable, but I think we'll see that story put on a slow simmer for a while.

[Deleted]

quite easily ? there are a lot of Orcs with nothing to do with whats happening.

[Faroth]

quite easily ? there are a lot of Orcs with nothing to do with whats happening.

"Oh, we didn't have anything to do with that" doesn't just resolve things. I mean, it does in WoW storylines far too much, but logically it shouldn't. There's going to be distrust and unrest as the Horde recover from civil war. The fact is, the orcs who didn't support Garrosh should still be viewed with distrust from a logical story standpoint. It's kind of the point that it's not right or fair, but it's the challenge they should be facing and overcome.

If there's a Legion based expansion up next, it may even set the stage for a heavy surge for the orcs to want to prove themselves trustworthy and honorable in battle against the ones who started all their problems.

[Dreknar20]

To pull this in to real life to emphasize, there's still people that hate all Germans, and the period after WW 2 wasn't pretty either.

also the hate between Japanses and Chinese even though WW2 was many decades ago
Old Hatrds dont die easily

[Zulkhan]

wouldnt say most or all. The Lich King originated from an Orc. Kael could be considered part of the Horde in a way.

The Lich King was nothing more than a shadow of Ner'zhul. The true iconic villain of WC3 was the fallen prince of Lordaeron, 2 of the 4 campaigns were about him, and the Frozen Throne had the final and most important campaign again about him. When he became the Lich King, in Woltk he erased the personality of Ner'zhul (RotLK) and became the dominant persona of the Lich King, so all that we saw of the LK in Wotlk was Arthas, emotionless and inhuman, but still the personality of the prince dominated the Lich King.

In the bonus campaign the orcs are under attack by the humans of Daelin Proudmoore, blind to reasoning that died like morons. Not technically villains, still humans that died in a very bad light.
Kael'thas cannot be considered a part of a Horde, since he never had contacts with Horde characters, maybe he didn't even was aware of which alligiance his people chose and at some point he simply didn't care. Kael'thas coudn't be considered Alliance or Horde, much a "neutral" villain (like Illidan).

In Wow the only bad orcs are in the Burning Blade, a demon-lovers organization with both humans and orcs inside it. The Alliance on the other hand had the last remnants of the Silver Hard becoming the crazy zealots of the Scarlet Crusade. In Wotlk we have the first true questionable Horde activities, like the Garrosh violent attitude in war and the betrayal of the Forsaken, still, the main villain is Arthas the Lich King, we also have the completely mad crusaders becoming warlocks under the influence of Mal'ganis. In Cata we have Garrosh doing nasty things, still in the "gray" area and nothing truly evil, while the Alliance have two relevant figures like Benedictus, Fandral and a good number of night elf druids (becoming Druids of the Flame) becoming the servants of the entities that want to bring the end of the world (Deathwing and Ragnaros); all of this while Thrall became essentially the hero of the expansion.

So, no, i think that the Alliance plagued us with a lot of villains.

Which is because of the nature of those factions.

Arthas was an Alliance prince. True. But when he went bad, the Alliance didn't go bad with him. The Alliance never supported his goals. Never helped him achieve his goals. They stood up and fought him and denounced him because what he was doing went against everything the Alliance stands for. Plus, there's really only so much you can bend a factions character before breaking it.

Garrosh, however, is different. He's seen as a bad guy. But, unlike Arthas, he has the full support of his people. He isn't coercing them, he isn't tricking them, he isn't driving them into battle with whips or threats. The Horde, by and large, support him, support his goals, take joy in the battles they fight and relish the thought of what the Alliance is suffering, no matter how barbaric the actions are. And, as a result, the Horde is tainted by Garroshes actions in a manner the Alliance wasn't wrt Arthas.

And just as the Alliance is constrained by their characterisation of 'good', the Horde is constrained by their characterisation as 'bad'; the player base will accept from the Horde what they won't from the Alliance.

EJL

You are comparing the uncomparable, and for this your argument is flawed. First, Arthas has never been condemned or "fought", simply Uther and Jaina avoided any responsibility for the mess in Stratholme, leaving all the shit to Arthas, they just said "nuh nuh nuh this is not the right thing to do" without proposing nothing else, especially Uther did the morale-keeper with no ideas at all. Arthas took an extreme and creepy decision, indeed, still, no matter how terrible and murderous could it be, there were no other choices or alternatives, while the two "good guys" FLED (excatly, not "stood up") and turned their back to the mess, hoping that things turned good by their own. Cute.

Arthas was not the rotten apple of the Alliance, this is what the Alliance in their bigotry loves to belive, with their "hand-wave" attitude, but while Arthas was indeed a flawed character, he became so single-minded in what was right to do in Stratholme because of his traumatic experience in Hearthglen, in which he saw his own people and soldiers becoming Scourge under his eyes, an experience that nor Jaina or Uther had. But a lot of other humans had the potential for taking evil decisions for the supposed good, in the right circumstances; and the birth of the Scarlet Crusade is the absurdly obvious prove of it. They were what remained of the Silver Hand, the same order of Arthas, that went through the same horrible and traumatic experiences, becoming consumed by hatred and obsession excatly like him; but what makes the Scarlet Crusade much more worse than Arthas is that they NEVER questioned themselves, for this they are capable of using the Light, while Arthas was losing his tie with it. The Scarlet Crusade considered themselves Alliance, while the Alliance on the other side of Khaz Modan just hande-waved them like they were not their businesses, "we have nothing to do with crazy zealots", despite the fact that those crazy zealots were the respected members of the Silver Hand, before the Scourge apocalypse.

This is the reason for which humans, instead of the orcs, don't have decent gray zones. They have their Church of "goodness", having a faith in it that touch fanatism sometimes, and for this some of them become bigoted and easy to prejudice or obsession, and these guys just fall from the complete "good" to the complete evil, because fanatism when twisted and corrupted become madness. This happened with Arthas, with the Scarlet Crusade and with Benedictus, and everytime the Alliance just dismiss them as "rotten apples", because they are against their ideals. But those guys followed those ideals too. But it's simply too easy talk of goodness and happy things when things are all quite and good. It's much more harder do it so when things completely screw up, and only the strongest and greatest, like Tirion (just an example), are able to remain steady in their convinctions through all the shit brutally threw in their face.

But the others ? Many of them just fill their mouth with the great ideals of goodness, ready to throw out them from the window when the situation is too dire for have the balls to honour them. And compared to these, Arthas looks like the best one in comparison.

So no, the Alliance doesn't have the characterisation of "good", they just have a more hidden and insidious evil, that show itself in the weaker minds and souls of their kind when things screw up, and is called bigotry, for bigotry the Alliance have only great heroes and mad villains with little place for true gray areas (with few exceptions), with the last ones promptly discarded as "traitors" of their way of life, and of course the lack of it in the Horde is the reason for which the Horde never really do real good or real evil by their own, they used to care for survival, not follow higher ideals.

What changed with Garrosh before Theramore was that Garrosh put the "survival way of life" to an aggressive and prideful state, completely different by the constant and quite struggle for survival of Thrall, and for this the orcs follow him, because they don't belive he do it for bad reasons, but for the sake of his people. Problem is that Garrosh is becoming obsessive and prideful to absurd highs, involving vengeance and bitterness in his original goals (like after his defeat in Wolfheart), and after every patch he's a step closer to do something absolutely Evil, and the only reason for which the Alliance looks so good in their whole is because of Garrosh and his lackies looking so bad.

[Dreknar20]

oh Zulkhan...your always so insightful

[Maximus Testiculos]

It will turn out that it was all garrosh'S fault even when it is not.