Making Alliance interesting

[namelessone]

So, after reading countless threads about lack of alliance faction pride, blizzard favoring horde, all stories made about horde, I thought about why this is REALLY happening and what can be done about it.

I was always a horde player, but I'm not hating alliance, and I agree that wow storytelling as it is has a problem. The problem, however, isn't something petty like "oh, Metzen just likes horde better".

First, the problem is that alliance is not conceptually interesting. It's place in the story of Warcraft, since Orcs and Humans pretty much, was to be foil to the horde. Alliance started to counteract the horde invasion, and ever since it's role was purely reactionary. Think about it. Most interesting alliance characters in the lore were always the few rare individuals who actually took action and stepped "outside" the Alliance.

Second, it's filled with too many fantasy cliches, it's too "safe" and familiar. While Horde can play with cool ideas and styles, alliance always had a theme of "generic knights in shining armor". Built of fantasy cliches. The worst part is that instead of bringing cool ideas with different races added to the alliance later, writers instead basically imposed Alliance on those races. Night Elves were awesome and original in WC3, but as soon as they started developing them as part of the alliance, Night Elves lost backbone and became bland tree-hugging pacifists. I mean, even Night Elf zones start out cool, but get blander and blander the closer it gets to alliance overall story arch.

Third, too much focus on Humans. Horde can get away with focusing on Orcs, because it is basically orcs from draenor leading smaller-numbered races of Azeroth. Alliance needs to differentiate from that. It should be emphasized that it's a union of different races, none of the "high king" BS. It would also not hurt to develop the other races of the alliance a bit. Humans are bland and generic, but let's say we need at least one such option in fantasy. Humans are okay. What about other races? Gnomes are supposed to be engineers, tinkers and inventors - but that's not emphasized in any way! Any character can be engineer, even a troll. Dwarves are almost as bland as humans, and they don't have half as much development. Night Elves have something going for them, but Blizzard seems to insist on reducing them to pacifist hippies. Draenei and Worgen could be cool, but they had pretty much ZERO development past the starting zones.

So here's my take on what has to be done to make Alliance more interesting:
- Develop alliance story OUTSIDE of Alliance vs Horde conflict. Make them achieve something important and cool that doesn't involve horde in any way whatsoever.
- Quit making "alliance" settlements. Make dwarf settlements, night elf settlements, even worgen camps. Quests have to reflect diversity of alliance races. Horde actually has that already. Remember in Northrend? Borean tundra had distinctly orc-themed base, howling fjord had distinctly forsaken-themed villages. On alliance though, both places had generic fortresses.
- Stop trying to create "alliance style". It always ends up feeling "human" and generic.

That would be a good start.

No TL/DR, because I have no idea what I just wrote.

[Sylvannah]

twohundredandseventyfourpointnine times yes!

[namelessone]

Moon Blade I know what you're saying. Night Elves used to be my favorite faction in WC3, I absolutely loved NE zones in Vanilla because they were so far removed from generic alliance, they felt unique and mysterious and cool. And it's been going down since then, to the point where Night Elves act as generic archers for alliance armies.

[Arrashi]

I think that what would really make alliance more interesting is alliance lore figures randomly going insane and becoming villains we have to kill. It would put much needed focus on alliance making them both antagonists and protagonists. + everyone would be interested in how completely insane jaina, or cannibal-rapist varian would turn out.

[slime]

I think that what would really make alliance more interesting is alliance lore figures randomly going insane and becoming villains we have to kill. It would put much needed focus on alliance making them both antagonists and protagonists. + everyone would be interested in how completely insane jaina, or cannibal-rapist varian would turn out.

Arthas, no?

[Arrashi]

Arthas, no?

That was...how many years ago ? And arthas never had any alliance feel to him. We need massive insanity in alliance right now. Not some beltway pansies.

[blackblade]

Alliance has Night Elves, Worgen, Gnomes and Draenei which do not fit in with the medieval knight theme of humans and dwarves. As far as night elves being tree-huggers, that's Druids, and their overbearing smothering of the Night Elf story with their holier-than-thou bullshit came to a head in Cataclysm, with night elf fans and in the story itself with Druids of the Flame. The Sentinels weren't mad that the Horde was using lumber; they used to sell it to them. They are mad that the Horde has the nerve to invade their land to try and take it.

I wouldn't put gnomes on that list, but yes.

The problem is that they don't really zero in on the more exotic aspects of the alliance, because your so called high king is human, and your "faction capital" is basically stormwind.

[Deleted]

Well for me Alliance is uninteresting because it's based on race well known from any other fantasy game/book/movie. Alliance lore and characters are based on same well-known characteristics, religion, honor, law over all. Even "savage" Worgen are just humans that can turn into warewolf or Pandas are just fat and furry humans(i mean very civilizated) with asian like culture.

and about your ideas:

Horde-Alliance conflict would be cool if most of races would have reason to take part in.
because now 90% of Horde-Alliance conflicts looks like Humans vs. Orcs or Humans vs. Forsaken. Night Elves are very strong but are presented like stupid tree huggers that sucks at war.

+1 for race only settlements. All races should have much more race identity maybe with a little bit of racism. Not like now "we all love each other, we are all brothers of the alliance". Now it's strange sub-races doesn't trust each other(Dark Iron and other dwarfs or NE and Highborn) while in Alliance all races are brothers.


Alliance should be a military pact not federation...

[StationaryHawk]

I already find the Alliance interesting. I've never really had a reason to complain about a lack of faction pride, generic fantasy concepts, or disinteresting characters.

Aside from that, some of your complaints are a bit of a stretch. Gnomes are emphasised as being the engineers in several areas, but to expect them to be the only engineers is silly. Northrend had almost specifically Orc and Forsaken quest hubs, where as Alliance had Human and Night Elf quest hubs (there were the camps you wanted). And for many, that Alliance style is probably as indicative of the Alliance as the red and black with spikes style is of the Horde.

[Deleted]

I agree with this.

[Thetruth1400]

In the end, it does all come down to poor writing though. Blizzard, for whatever reason, can't write an interesting story for Alliance, let alone one that isn't Human centric. As soon as they realize that the Alliance is composed of 6 races, 7 if you count Pandaren, the better the story will become.

Additionally, when they stop with the Alliance is only there as a reaction to Horde actions and have the Alliance start taking the front and center action roll, things will change for the better for the Alliance.

As it stands right now, it seems like WOD is shaping up to be another Horde attacks / Alliance reacts expansion. The Orcs are attacking and the Draenei are reacting by defending themselves. That's pretty much all we know as of right now. Blizzard has been so tight lipped on story that that's pretty much the only thing we can draw so far from the expansion. The Alliance is going to sit back in Karabor and wait for the Iron Horde to come knocking on their doorsteps. The Horde is going to join the Frostwolf clan right off the bat though and taking it to Ogres to claim some land for themselves.

I have almost no faith that Blizzard can actually write a story for Alliance in which someone takes initiative and doesn't lose themselves to power, go crazy, and we have to end up killing them. Arthas, Kael'thas, and Illidan are three great examples of that. They all diverged from the Alliance reactionary ways and in the end went crazy and had to be killed. Hell, even Jaina, who was always the center of neutrality, ended up becoming jaded and cynical towards the Horde. Justified? Sure. Becoming vengeful and almost lustful for her wanting revenge? Just plain bad story telling.

[RetRumm]

Alliance need to be the assholes for once for a good story. If Thrall was the one to stop Varian trying to kill Garrosh at the end of SoO only for Varian to attack and wound or even kill Thrall, step over the crumpled heap of Thrall kill Garrosh then give Vol'jin the finger before having Jaina port them all out of there to safety it could set up a good next expac. I have a horrible feeling horde and alliance will be too chummy in WoD.

[namelessone]

That was...how many years ago ? And arthas never had any alliance feel to him. We need massive insanity in alliance right now. Not some beltway pansies.

Arthas was a main hero of WC3 Alliance campaign, I'd say that's pretty alliance. Sure, it was hard to connect to him if you started with WoW. But yeah, more alliance-specific villains would be great. Doesn't need to be alliance character turning corrupt, just needs to be some threat that only affects alliance. Even something like Defias. Alliance needs more stories that don't involve Horde.

[Highlord Hanibuhl]

What irritates me is that it's an ALLIANCE. So far it has only been 'THE HUMANS & pals'

The might of the dwarves, the strength of the worgen, the skills of the gnomes, the knowledge of the draenei and the excellence of the night elves .. COMBINED!

[Friendlyimmolation]

What irritates me is that it's an ALLIANCE. So far it has only been 'THE HUMANS & pals'

The might of the dwarves, the strength of the worgen, the skills of the gnomes, the knowledge of the draenei and the excellence of the night elves .. COMBINED!

Don't forget the Night elf in MoP screaming "The kings Mercy" or something. But yea I agree with Op, even as a horde the blandness of the Alliance story hurts me, if must be worse for you guys and those ideas would help.

[Baronthefirst]

Oh boy..... Most of the playerbase is Horde. They want Horde story and progression. There is nothing to be made if Blizzard supports Alliance story progression. The majority of the playerbase being Horde could care less. Blizzard knows this. If you want to have a good interesting story I recommend you do what I and many before me have done. Faction change and go Horde.

Maybe when the playerbase is 90% Horde Blizzard will realize how bad they screwed up. Right now they do not care. They are backing the Horde!

[Florena]

I think that what would really make alliance more interesting is alliance lore figures randomly going insane and becoming villains we have to kill. It would put much needed focus on alliance making them both antagonists and protagonists. + everyone would be interested in how completely insane jaina, or cannibal-rapist varian would turn out.

You mean like Bennedictus and Staghelm? That worked out SO well for developing alliance story.


What they need to do is give some non humans focus for a bit and don't be afraid to show some actual conflict between its races. The resolution to the three hammers story was too abrupt and uninteresting and had no bearing on anything else outside of MoP. What they need to do is write the story with alliance in mind as a part of it, not find a way to tag the alliance along. While I still have 'some' hope for WoD my fear is that it'll be about the horde rediscovering itself (which is a shame even for them because it's really only the orcs that have an identity crisis right now) and the alliance are just tagging along to fight the old horde again. Give us some villains interesting for the alliance to fight lore wise, rather than this 'wc 2 meets BC' thing.

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Oh boy..... Most of the playerbase is Horde. They want Horde story and progression. There is nothing to be made if Blizzard supports Alliance story progression. The majority of the playerbase being Horde could care less. Blizzard knows this. If you want to have a good interesting story I recommend you do what I and many before me have done. Faction change and go Horde.

Maybe when the playerbase is 90% Horde Blizzard will realize how bad they screwed up. Right now they do not care. They are backing the Horde!

Actually the horde/alliance playerbase is about even, the horde is just more vocal when it comes to faction pride stuff.

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I already find the Alliance interesting. I've never really had a reason to complain about a lack of faction pride, generic fantasy concepts, or disinteresting characters.

Aside from that, some of your complaints are a bit of a stretch. Gnomes are emphasised as being the engineers in several areas, but to expect them to be the only engineers is silly. Northrend had almost specifically Orc and Forsaken quest hubs, where as Alliance had Human and Night Elf quest hubs (there were the camps you wanted). And for many, that Alliance style is probably as indicative of the Alliance as the red and black with spikes style is of the Horde.

I know the elves had one camp in dragonblight, where else were they? The dwarves did have a presence though.

[Mihalik]

It's amazingly easy to make Alliance more interesting. You build faction pride via perceptions. More PvP wins, more world first raids by Alliance guilds, and plot where the faction is winning left and right.

Step 1. Racials. Make Alliance racials intentionally and actively superior to Horde ones, both for PvP and PvE. If enough of the "hardcore" min-max folks flock over to one faction they end up significantly boosting that faction. World first raids, Alliance streamers etc, create a consciousness that Alliance=good.

Step 2. Major lore victories. Like really nasty ones. Not like the SoO one where you faceroll a capital, then go home. But stuff like Theramore. Create a crater in the ground, change entire zones to one faction over the other. This can be done incredibly easy for the Alliance if Blizzard is willing. Gilneas. A massive empty zone, with Alliance lore, involving Nelfs, Worgen vs. Forsaken. And Stromgarde. Have the Humans retake Stromgarde with the aid of a major Dwarven military intervention. It's all there. And you don't even need to upset any of the Horde zones much.

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I know the elves had one camp in dragonblight, where else were they? The dwarves did have a presence though.

Stars Rest was basically the Nelf presence in WotLK besides the Nelfs that were part of the Alliance or Argent Crusade armies. The Dwarfs were basically totally embedded into the overall Alliance military.

[Florena]

In the end, it does all come down to poor writing though. Blizzard, for whatever reason, can't write an interesting story for Alliance, let alone one that isn't Human centric. As soon as they realize that the Alliance is composed of 6 races, 7 if you count Pandaren, the better the story will become.

Additionally, when they stop with the Alliance is only there as a reaction to Horde actions and have the Alliance start taking the front and center action roll, things will change for the better for the Alliance.

As it stands right now, it seems like WOD is shaping up to be another Horde attacks / Alliance reacts expansion. The Orcs are attacking and the Draenei are reacting by defending themselves. That's pretty much all we know as of right now. Blizzard has been so tight lipped on story that that's pretty much the only thing we can draw so far from the expansion. The Alliance is going to sit back in Karabor and wait for the Iron Horde to come knocking on their doorsteps. The Horde is going to join the Frostwolf clan right off the bat though and taking it to Ogres to claim some land for themselves.

I have almost no faith that Blizzard can actually write a story for Alliance in which someone takes initiative and doesn't lose themselves to power, go crazy, and we have to end up killing them. Arthas, Kael'thas, and Illidan are three great examples of that. They all diverged from the Alliance reactionary ways and in the end went crazy and had to be killed. Hell, even Jaina, who was always the center of neutrality, ended up becoming jaded and cynical towards the Horde. Justified? Sure. Becoming vengeful and almost lustful for her wanting revenge? Just plain bad story telling.

I understand where you're coming from, but at least this time around it's not the player horde the Alliance is reacting to, it's the enemy of the expansion, which the player horde is ALSO reacting to. What will be annoying though is if the story turns out to be thematically about the orcs coming to terms with their past and rediscovering themselves while the alliance is just kind of there.

From what I've read, though it's possible this will change in their updates to SMV, the Draenei DO actually go on the offensive against the Iron Horde once you help defend Karabor, ending with an assault on the name of their city there. I think that Velen's death and Maraad rising up to lead them will be a big part of this, as he's much more action oriented than the prophet.

[mysticx]

You mean like Bennedictus and Staghelm? That worked out SO well for developing alliance story.

I know the elves had one camp in dragonblight, where else were they? The dwarves did have a presence though.

Maybe Blizz should use characters that players have actually heard of, Staghelm gave two obscure quests that only night elf players saw.

The Night elves also had a camp and questline in Krasarang, but nothing that influenced the main storyline of the expansion, but at least they weren't lapdogs to Varian, so that's something...