Spoilers, preview of Before the Storm

[Rhlor]

I hope we can see the desolate council in the game

[Resheph]

Didn't Blizzard mention lots of times that there is no "evil" in factions?

Tell that to the widows and orphans of the Horde genocide in Theramore. Blizzard employees do their best to not lose the edgelord subscriber base as that's 45% of players, but it's clear there's a good and bad faction.

[Shibito]

I know someone threw out the idea that Sylvanas isn't attacking Stormwind to destroy it, but for something more specific. Maybe to get the bodies of people in the graveyard, but what if she's going after the body of Arthas. We never did learn where it went and there is this tombstone that no one knows what it's for and it has the crest of Lordaeron on it.

Why would they bury arthas in sw? Of all people the single human that almost destroyed everything AND drove your beloved high elves away from the alliance.

[Arrashi]

Like I said above, I don't think they would really be cured - but instead of embracing their cursed state they might begin to move away from it thematically, moving more into the mold of Leonid Barthalomew or Meryl Felstorm as opposed to their current themes.

Which makes them into boring, generic good guys, but with evil visuals. Yay.

[Shibito]

I feel the same way about horde fanboys. Thankfully this new Desolate Council turns the Forsaken into something interesting rather then having them be defined by Slyvanus(rotten tits). The Forsaken should not be 100% completely tied to Slyvanus just like the Orcs are not 100% completely tied to Thrall. Despite both characters being the literal "messiah" of their respective people. I might actually role a Forsaken if the Desolate Council becomes the new Forsaken racial leader and Slyvanus becomes the final boss in "Siege of Stormwind". Sue me.

Well you are just a alliance fanboy no need to spend time on you , you are at the same level as ravenmoon

- - - Updated - - -

Time for Gnomes to shine, get that radiation bomb ready!
And if alliance is to keep on its king's words, they must end the Horde after this attack.

https://youtu.be/IXIGKT_gp4g?t=150

Former king, he is enchanting dust now replaced by a plaything for wrathion.

[Mehrunes]

Utterly meaningless as long in a two faction MMO. Absolutely nothing will come of it. This seems to be literally MoP all over again, if at all, since most Horde leaders won't follow her long on that route.

Screw the leaders, just look at the races. Even most of the Orcs didn't follow Garrosh. And Sylvanas doesn't exactly have the same Orc supremacy card to play here. And thanks to the development from 4 pages earlier, not even all Forsaken would follow her. Which makes it an idiotic plan against her characterization so far.

Who will lead the rebelion ? That is the question. And will pandaren suffer the most this time as well ?

I mean, they're Pandaren. Their very existence is suffering in and on itself. They always suffer the most.

Lol she lost Undercity again.

And this time, there ain't no Vol'jin to help you

The only help Vol'jin offered in Undercity was causing demons to laugh themselves to death.

I think the whole Stormwind invasion plot being intimated at the very beginning of the book is an indication it may go off-the-rails quite quickly, especially if the war-weary rank and file of the Horde catch hint of the plot before it is under way. There will be proverbial blood in the water if the Alliance hears of it, though; even if nothing actually does come of it. Just the idea that Sylvanas could plan such would be enough to re-ignite the conflict.

Even if she drops it on the next page with nothing coming out of it, the very existence of this plot is just an unholy abomination and the grand proof that Warcraft's writing would be upgraded if it was written by fucking meerkats. After Draenei pulled Vindicaar out of their ass, the Horde is in losing position unless Sylvanas got her hands on Sargeras' jizz and upgraded the Blight with it. And starting a losing war is not something Sylvanas would have ever done. She didn't even help the Horde out other than sending Garrosh scraps to shut him up when the Horde was winning the war.

And what is she supposed to gain from this war? Thousands of Forsaken dead without a way to bring them back? I mean, it'd be one way to get rid of a small bunch of malcontents, but it's rather overkill even for Sylvanas. I guess she could get a supply of bodies to make the surviving Forsaken undergo the process Nathanos went through, but Nathanos isn't fucking invincible, so unless they finish the Alliance off quickly, those non-rotting Forsaken aren't going to be of much use. That is if she can pull even that off, given how creating even one Nathanos drained the shit out of her Val'kyr.

It really doesn't matter, it's a "been there, done that", again painting the Warchief of the Horde as the bad guy for plot purpose.

In Blizzard's mind it's probably fresh and exciting anyway because most people expected some kind of Void-related plot.

All she has to do is pay of the house of nobles and stormwind descends into civil war. She doesn't even need to invade. I don't even know why she wants to push for Stormwind, it doesn't really make any sense.

Why not? Forsaken totally need resources having the same needs as the living. And they totally ran out of space for expansion, having only four kingdom's worth of free space they have yet to do anything with right at their doorstep.

Is it too much to ask to have the alliance the bad guy for once? The last time anything similar like that happened was in Wc3 with garithos, we really could use some trigger happy humans, preferably assassinating Sylvanas starting a war and then we could finally get a human themed raid.

They did start the previous war though. Then again Blizzard completely handwaved it away because Garrosh was their Hitler.

They pulled of WoD, ever since then I really don't have much trust in their storytelling. At this point I hope this snippet is fake.

Damn, it took you all the way to WoD? That's some admirable resilience.

Horde have been so cartoonishly evil for no provocation for a long enough time for the Alliance to have a laundry list of legitimate Greivances that they have yet to collect on. Horde's one legitimate beef was Taurajo-and it was wrapped up rather nicely and even on the "agressor" end it was seen as a failure. It was a good conflcict-but short lived.

Purge of Dalaran. Rogers in MoP. Genn attacking Forsaken in Legion. Besides, Alliance started the previous faction war and it lasted for ~4 years in-lore. Not particularly short lived. And even in that war Alliance was on the offensive more often than the other way around, since for most of the war Garrosh fucked around Ashenvale over and over again without much success, while the Alliance offensive saw Alliance invading multiple Horde zones, including Durotar.

Think about it-the Horde has been pulling stupendously stupid shit as far back as Wrath, where some Orcs thought that Team Killing was a good and honourable sport before getting trampled by skeletons.

After Varian declared a war over actions of Horde rebels and after he learned that the Horde suffered at their hands even more than the Alliance.

This is the sort of level the Alliance would need to sink to-sabotaging co-op efforts for jollies, testing experimental Chemical weapons on Captured Horde Civillians, putting Trolls on chains and making them fight to the death to get their children back...and they'd have to do this consistantly over a long period of time.

And Varian declaring that war was supposed to increase cross-faction cohesion? And when did the Horde test experimental chemical weapons on captured Alliance civilians? Let alone when did Alliance have an opportunity to learn about it for it to affect their judgement? And the chains and forced fighting thing was on Garrosh, after the stark majority of the Horde rebelled against him, with even Varian realizing the difference between the two Hordes.

Another faction war started by a bad new Warchief because the Horde is running low on supplies and needs the Alliance's shit?

Jesus Christ Blizzard.

Obviously Alliance is swimming in resources, because reasons.

Is it still Horde bias if the Horde players hate it too?

"Still" implies it was ever a thing to begin with. The closest Blizz ever got was giving some previously contested zones to Horde in Cata, but that was only to fix an imbalance that favored the Alliance before it. So the main example of HORDE BIAS Alliance players whine about was Blizzard fixing actually countable Alliance bias from earlier expansions.

She even liked him

Oh, right. Already forgot that bit. Thanks for reminding me of the worst plot development in Warcraft's history.

Orgrimmar? Nope the orcs will jump ship so will the rest of the horde. Undercity will burn and Calia might even join that forsaken council and living humans return to Lordaeron and coexist with the moderates, calling it now

No. Just no.

[Shibito]

Kill off all the leaders make one go against his character and start age of sigmar now we got wow 2

[Deleted]

Stormwind gets destroyed, and becomes the new undead city. The alliance takes back Lordaeron and restores it to its former glory?

[Graden]

Stormwind gets destroyed, and becomes the new undead city. The alliance takes back Lordaeron and restores it to its former glory?

Never in a million years, something like that would require a huge amount of time. Just think all the quests etc that are linked with SW and UC.

[Friendlyimmolation]

Stormwind gets destroyed, and becomes the new undead city. The alliance takes back Lordaeron and restores it to its former glory?

Then they shout for stormwind for the next 10 years until the undead invade lordaeron and take it back, and the Alliance invade Stormwind and take it back. Then the humans start shouting "for Lordaeron" again.

[Hubbl3]

Can't wait for another Horde Warchief Raidboss.

[Deleted]

Never in a million years, something like that would require a huge amount of time. Just think all the quests etc that are linked with SW and UC.

They did it with cataclysm, so there is nothing that stops them from making Stormwind and nearby zones into a city of the dead, and Undercity into what it once was. You also solve the issue with borders and will have most if not all human kingdoms in close proximity to each other. And the Deeprun tram could be converted into some sort of dungeon like that Warlords train instance, the tunnel is infested with undead that crawls their way to ironforge

[Mehrunes]

Stormwind to her is like a massive hatchery of dead humans just waiting to be rezzed i mean surely the graves in Lordaeron have been picked clean so she needs war with humans to replinish her stock of soldiers. At least this is the only reasoning i can see behind this?

Siege of Stormwind here i come and the title 'Conquerer of Stormwind' is along time coming for us hordies!!

If Sylvanas managed to ress all graves in Lordaeron, she'd have such an insane army she wouldn't exactly need Stormwind.

I bet that story line is dropped

I mean, the Helya raid wrapped up Stormheim storyline according to Blizzard. So nothing to see here.

It all makes sense know she is jealous of Varians great statue and wants her own down there.

She had one in Brill since Cata though.

Which is weird, she said she won't be taking orders from him at the end of SoO.

Maybe she grew to respect him over the duration of WoD, when he did... nothing of worth.

Sounds plausible. She's got plenty of that extra thick plot armor. Everyone knows this.

You still don't understand what plot armor is.

Sylvanas did die, in Warcraft 3.

Why off yet another Warchief?

Blizzard is apparently interested in ripping of Harry Potter now, so they decided they'll turn the position of Warchief into defense against the dark arts teacher from HP.

If Slyvanus starts in all out war over what happened in Stormheim, the bitch is dumber than i thought. Hopefully Anduin lets Genn go wild on her ass.

That attack was already an act of war. That nothing came out of it, let alone the part where Blizzard wants to make Sylvanas the aggressor, is simply more of their illogical writing.

Wars have been started over less than the attempted killing of a leader, but I was making no comment on whether or not Sylvanas is justified or not. I would have to read more of the book.

Two Italian cities waged a war over a bucket once. Compared to that, everything is pretty much fair game as far as justifications go.

Typical. Humans start a war with the Horde, then the Horde gets blamed for it.

I mean, that's the Wrath-MoP war in a nutshell. So fresh and exciting concept!

The Cata-Mop war started with Sylvanas invading Gilneas cause Garrosh wanted bigger port in Lordaeron.

Invasion of Gilneas started after the Alliance-Horde war. It started even after the invasion of Ashenvale, which was the biggest cause of the war being resumed after post-Wrath ceasefire. Besides, Gilneas wasn't even an Alliance member at the time.

Also, saurfang threatening her like he did Garrosh, I hope he acts on it this time.

Being all talk and no action seems to be his thing though. Then again Sylvanas seems to have dropped her brain somewhere in Stormheim, so maybe Saurfang misplaced his code of conduct as well.

The first world war was started by Russia helping Serbia as it came under attack by Austria-Hungary like the Nightelves helping Gilneas as it was invaded by the Forsaken.

Given how there were existing defensive treaties between the Russian Empire and Serbia, it's in no way comparable. The invasion of Gilneas is also still something that happened a year after Varian started the war.

what did you guys expected? Sylanas is not good, everyone know this, dont try to deny

Good? No. What Sylvanas is, is pragmatic. Attacking Stormwind is in no way pragmatic, especially after Alliance got their hands on a spaceship.

It's more about Horde once again being painted as aggressors than Sylvanas.

Horde should be rebuilding itself, not starting wars, since they're weaker faction ever since Soo.

They could have Alliance start it for once.

Alliance did start the previous one though. It's just that Blizzard sucks at writing, so that fact was completely brushed under the carpet as insignificant, because Garrosh ended up being the big bad. Because of that, any actions against Garrosh's Horde, even those that happened before he turned lol-evil (or before he became the fucking Warchief) were justified. It doesn't even apply just to the Alliance. Darkspears being a bunch of traitorous shits led by someone who threatened his sovereign, in a medieval-esque society, with death, yet receiving no repercussions until a year later, after Garrosh turned lol-evil, is also caused by it.

1.The Attack on the Wrathgate didn't cause a War between Horde and Alliance. Varian was teleported away by Jaina and later spoke with Thrall and let Saurfang take his son back in the Alliance version of Icecrown citadel.

His words are an outright declaration of war. Which is why wowpedia lists that as the start of the war. And why the factions needed to sign a ceasefire and then negotiate peace after WotLK.

I made a comparison between both situations because initially the Horde didn't declare war against the Alliance but the Alliance came to help Gilneas and the Night elves had an expedition crops with warships and siege weapons. You even destroy an airship of the horde with their help.

Which is still not comparable. Because even if you handwave Varian's declaration away, as if signing ceasefires when you're not a war was actually a thing, the invasion of Gilneas happenes after the Cataclysm hit. Alliance's attack on the Barrens happened before.

3. The Horde invaded Gilneas how didn't they cause the conclict?

Because it's entirely different conflict with Alliance and Gilneas having no relationship whatsoever for your WWI comparison to work and because the actual Alliance-Horde conflict was already ongoing. You can't start a war against someone that you're already at war with, can you now?

The conflict didn't end with Gilneas being annexed by the Forsaken there was still resistance that allied itself to the Alliance and like Serbia Gilneas was freed afterwards and still is.

Except you even got the end part of your comparison wrong. First the majority of Gilneans, including the ruling class, escaped, turning Gilneas into terra nullius. Then the stragglers that waged guerrilla warfare were forced to surrender. The latest official information on Gilneas stated it to be an abandoned ruin that was blockaded by then Forsaken for five years.

[huth]

I feel reminded of the whole "Anduin is going to die!" debacle from MoP...

[Sigxy]

Well I kept saying multiple times that instead of a world threatening expansion, we should have a Horde vs Alliance expansion -IF- they make it work good in the story. Unlike what we've had the last expansions.

[Serenais]

@Mehrunes : While I agree with a lot that you say, I personaly believe Blizzard will conveniently forget a lot of pretty much everything. Alliance suddenly stopped having WMDs in Cataclysm (remember the bomb in Skybreaker's hold in WotLK?), despite being targetted by one (Thaldarah grove says hello) and losing on many sides in general. MoP had Alliance face zero reprecussions from having effectively lost its major breadbasket (I mean, without Westfall, Stormwind is bound for a famine, yet... nothing happens?). They are not going to factor in anything that would get in the way of the story they want to tell (for starters, I completely stopped believing their ability to weigh in actual combat tactics when the Horde managed to push as far as Maestra's post in Cataclysm - the Night Elves should've caused the Horde a Vietnam on steroids, yet they barely held onto Astranaar - and still, for some funny reason, the Forest Song was never even touched for... reasons?), so I wouldn't be surprised by 8.2 having a raid in either Stormwind or Undercity. Mind you, neither would really make sense, but "someone" has to fight for survival, right...
#NotHavingAHighOpinionOfBlizzard'sWriting

[Graden]

Then they shout for stormwind for the next 10 years until the undead invade lordaeron and take it back, and the Alliance invade Stormwind and take it back. Then the humans start shouting "for Lordaeron" again.

Along with Lordaeron the Alliance takes Gilneas back and Genn decides that Gilneas can not and will not pay for the wars of the Alliance anymore and withdraws from it. The undead come from Stormwind and invade Lordaeron, refugees gather outside of the Greymane wall and cry for help, but the gates remain closed. In the meantime, despite his age and thanks to the boost from the curse of the Worgen, Genn manages to have another son.
Lordaeron is gone again and Gilneas is next. The undead invade Gilneas and kill his son while Genn and some Gilneans escape. Genn is accepted back into Alliance and shouts ''Gilneas will rise again''.

[AcidicSyn]

Can we confirm that the Vindicar even survives the events at Antorus though? Or that the Draenei don't simply give it to the Army of the Light after we lock up Sargeras?

The Army of the Lights ship went down as we saw, so they would need a new ship.

I think it's probable that either the Vindicar does go down during the final events of the war with the legion; or more probable that Velen simply gifts it to Lothraxion, who takes over as High General for the Army of the Light while Turalyon/Alleria return with us to Azeroth. The Vindicar then remains on Argus and acts as watchers for the prison containing Sargeras and Illidan, removing it from the Alliance vs. Horde equation.

Would it be a smart move? No. Of course not. Realistically Velen should just be like "Yeah you can have it, but just one sec let me go zap these Horde cities real quick, cool?" But, he's Velen, and just giving away the Alliances biggest deterrent immediately after Argus is free because "I'm sure we'll all be nice to each other from now on" seems exactly like the kind of thing he would do.

[Dagoth Ur]

Alliance did start the previous one though. It's just that Blizzard sucks at writing, so that fact was completely brushed under the carpet as insignificant, because Garrosh ended up being the big bad. Because of that, any actions against Garrosh's Horde, even those that happened before he turned lol-evil (or before he became the fucking Warchief) were justified. It doesn't even apply just to the Alliance. Darkspears being a bunch of traitorous shits led by someone who threatened his sovereign, in a medieval-esque society, with death, yet receiving no repercussions until a year later, after Garrosh turned lol-evil, is also caused by it.

That's true I forgot about Rodgers and Skyfire.

But still like you said even though Alliance started it, Horde still took all the blame and got aggressor slapped on its forehead because of Garrosh.

I just think this whole war Sylvanas is potentially starting could as easily be started by Alliance.
It would maybe make even more sense since they're the stronger faction lorewise and if they're ever gonna do that now would be right time.
Lordaeron nostalgia is slowly reigniting with return of Calia and Turaylon + Genn also has a beef with Forsaken.
Also if Kul'tiras is gonna be included in next expac, they could take part in it too since Horde killed Admiral Proudmoore.

But surprise surprise writers decided it's Horde being naughty time again.
I know I am assuming too much here since we don't have all the context yet, but like I said I am being cautiously pessimistic!

[jimboa24]

My thoughts immediately after reading the preview?

"Oh, FUCK YOU, SYLVANAS!"

Can we finally have this bitch die? I am so sick of the blatant Sylvanas fanboi-ism both in Blizzard and among players. Sylvanas is an irredeemably evil, stone-cold bitch who doesn't care about anyone but herself at the end of the day. She's never going to fucking change - that is her character. Period. Can we finally kill her now in some useful way that advances the plot or someone else's character arc? Please?