How should conflict be introduced within the Alliance?

[RyanEX]

Varians the obvious first choice, also Jaina. Infact more so Jaina, she uses her magic to dispose of Varian and lock him in an arcane prison, and assume the throne, while anduin is absent.
This causes a rift in the alliance between those wanting to destory the horde outright, and those standing against it, causing rifts in the faction.

It will of course end with Jaina either being killed or imprisoned herself like she did Varian, but its Anduin who leads the charge against her alongside Baine, against the Jaina loyalists.

The fallout with cause dalaran to shift back to a neutral state, with one of the remaining council members leading it.


To be frank, Jainas the best the alliance has going for it for some inner faction conflict, because no other leader is really all that, maybe except Genn, but I'd see him siding with Jaina.

Really?

It never ceases to amaze me how people get so into their hate for a character for acting naturally, that they either forget or fail to realise that that character no longer acts on those impulses anymore.

As in the case of Jaina she was effectively neutered by Kalec threatening to dump her if she didn't stop hating on the Horde. So unless something happens to said blue dragon Jaina ain't doing anything.

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How about something like this...

Anduin's ship goes missing after leaving Exodar to return home. Varian Wrynn, out of his mind with worry, orders the Alliance to scour Azeroth to find him. His wrecked ship is located with evidence of Night Elf involvement. King Wrynn, questions Tyrande about it and discovers that Malfurian has sensed something stirring in the Emerald Nightmare and is unavailable. She denies involvement in Anduin's disappearance and is offended that Wrynn would even suspect the Night Elves of involvement. This leads to some tension between the Night Elf leadership and the rest of the Alliance.

Valen arrives in Stormwind and tells Varian that he can feel where Anduin is located, but something is preventing him from going there and Anduin is in great peril. He tells him he can feel him in the mountains of Western Tristfall. He gives the king a crystal that will lead him to his son. Varian assembles some of his greatest heroes (feeling sending a military unit will provoke the Forsaken, choses to send a small unit of trusted and powerful heroes) and heads off to find Anduin. The crystal leads them to the Whispering Forest and they discover a group of Night Elves attempting to sacrifice Anduin. The Night Elves are under the influence of the Emerald Nightmare and while rescuing Anduin, Varian catches a fleeting glimpse of Malfurion steping into a portal to the Emerald Dream. Anduin is rescued and while recovering tells his father and Valen that Malfurion has been corrupted by the Emerald Nightmare and was behind his abduction. Valen senses that something is not quite right with Anduin but Varian ignores him.

Varian demands Malfuion and Tyrande come to Stormwind to explain. When they arrive, they are upset at being summoned but deny any involvement in Anduin's disappearance and the attempted sacrifice. Malfurion says the Emerald Nightmare is stirring and he needs to return to find out what is behind its awakening and to try to keep it contained. He and Tyrande leave and that night, Varian Wyrnn is attacked and slain by Malfurion. Anduin becomes king and demands that the Night Elves turn over Malfurion for trial or there will be war between the Night Elves and the rest of the Alliance. The Council of the Three Hammers, Gelbin Mekkatorque, and Genn Greymane all support Anduin's claim, but Valen councils that something is not right and will not participate in any attack on the Night Elves. Aysa Cloudsinger and the Tushi Pandaren also express their concerns and will not condone any action as well. Valen leaves vowing to find out what has really happened.

Skipping ahead to the resolution, Anduin has been corrupted by N'Zoth and is really his agent to foster chaos in order to attempt to break free of his prision. Malfuion is innocent and did not kill Varian Wyrnn. Once the old god is dealt with, and Anduin's corruption is purged, he is still King of the humans, but won't be the leader of the Alliance. Instead, a council is formed to lead the Alliance consisting of all the leaders of the Alliance and the Dwarves, Gnomes, Worgen, and Draenei take the forefront of the Alliance.

Been done before, always by people that insist that "Varian must die".

[Wyrt]

Been done before, always by people that insist that "Varian must die".

He kind of does need to.

With the current state of alliance writing the other leaders will never force him out of high king and he'll never step down. High King is something that never should have happened in the first place and Blizzard needs to correct that mistake.

[MikeBogina]

playing the Witcher 3 and watching Game of Thrones has really shed some light on how shitty life was back in those days. For some reason, wow can't even come close to the depth of humanity that those 2 have. All the humans are portrayed as just, light worshiping people. it's always Varian and good soldier #251 who do some good chatter. They really do have one person speak and represent the rest of the race. All 3 dwarf races are mirrors of the 3 leaders. Gnomes are all spazy and crazy like Mekatorqe(?) Draenei are all nice and kind hearted like Velen. High Elves are all self absorbed, righteous bastards who think they're better than the blood elves... like their leader.

Really most of the populations are depicted just like their leaders, like there's no personalities.

They should have done more with the nobles, had them be some real backstabbing bastards. Take some power away from the singular leaders and give it to some other people and have them be pains in the ass to the leaders.

Have racism break out in Ironforge, let it be started by members of the Bronzebeard faction.

Have a large group of night elves break away and follow Maiev.

Horde could use the same treatment. Orcs are good under Thrall, bad under Garrosh? All male tauren are mirror images of Bane?

[RyanEX]

He kind of does need to.

With the current state of alliance writing the other leaders will never force him out of high king and he'll never step down. High King is something that never should have happened in the first place and Blizzard needs to correct that mistake.

And what about him just simply stepping down? It would actually be in character since he's written as never wanting that kind of responsibility. When we do eventually have to fight Maiev or Azshara have him bend his knee relinquish the title since he says he'd rather have someone with more experience against that opponent in charge...preferably Tyrande.

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playing the Witcher 3 and watching Game of Thrones has really shed some light on how shitty life was back in those days. For some reason, wow can't even come close to the depth of humanity that those 2 have. All the humans are portrayed as just, light worshiping people. it's always Varian and good soldier #251 who do some good chatter. They really do have one person speak and represent the rest of the race. All 3 dwarf races are mirrors of the 3 leaders. Gnomes are all spazy and crazy like Mekatorqe(?) Draenei are all nice and kind hearted like Velen. High Elves are all self absorbed, righteous bastards who think they're better than the blood elves... like their leader.

Really most of the populations are depicted just like their leaders, like there's no personalities.

They should have done more with the nobles, had them be some real backstabbing bastards. Take some power away from the singular leaders and give it to some other people and have them be pains in the ass to the leaders.

Have racism break out in Ironforge, let it be started by members of the Bronzebeard faction.

Have a large group of night elves break away and follow Maiev.

Horde could use the same treatment. Orcs are good under Thrall, bad under Garrosh? All male tauren are mirror images of Bane?

This is an accurate description...if all you did was play the game. And even then it's not entirely accurate since we've already had Nelves that broke off to follow Fandral (you might know them as the Druids of the Flame) and Tauren that aren't "nice" (they're called Grimtotem) and then the whole Cataclysm where you had orcs talking about how they missed Thrall and others cheering Garrosh on (of course there weren't many of the former until Blizz decided that most orcs wanted Thrall back).

Based on the novels Ironforge is full of tensions with the three clans now living there. The reintroduction of the Highborne into Nelf society has opened many an old wound which is how Maiev was able to reform the watchers so easily. The Nobles are still backstabbing bastards who just don't get screentime. The gnomes already had a split which resulted in Gnomeregan.

[Zulkhan]

Horde could use the same treatment. Orcs are good under Thrall, bad under Garrosh? All male tauren are mirror images of Bane?

The Horde surely had something more in the direction you pointed to, which is why this thread exists, because the Alliance has none of that at all.

For example, in Heart of War we were able to see how not every orc agreed with Thrall and, later, how many of them prefered Garrosh over him, suggesting the amount of general dissent or mere dissapointment many orcs had regarding his leadership. Under Garrosh, it was something like 90% of the orcs faithfully loyal to him, only to lose any faith in him when he crossed the treshold with only an army of relatevely few "zealots" remaining at his side. Now things seem like the first days of Thrall's appointment as Warchief, we'll see how long it'll last.

Yeah, it's not much but is more than the Alliance has seen until now, and the story put such a strong focus on the Horde's internal conflicts and turmoils that, honestly, you don't really feel the necessity to have more of that. It's obvious that right now, the ideal way to push forward the story would be the Horde merely rebuilding and redefining itself, with the Alliance experiencing some internal turmoil shaking its foundations.

On a side note, Tides of War made an attempt to show more of Baine's people besides its leader, the way many kept sending assaults against the Alliance and were banned by Thunder Bluff or when some of Baine's very guards cheered and approved Garrosh's plan of razing Theramore. Sadly, these things are likely destinied to be confined in novels and never reach the game.

[Talen]

He kind of does need to.

With the current state of alliance writing the other leaders will never force him out of high king and he'll never step down. High King is something that never should have happened in the first place and Blizzard needs to correct that mistake.

High King was a bad idea from the start.

The Alliance arguably needs some sort of internal conflict to generate story potential. However - it also neds to be recognised that simply by virtue of who they are, the Alliance members have a long detailed history which in itself provides lots of potential for story, development and growth as does the continuing conflict with the horde, VBurnign legion et al.

It's not that the Alliance doesn't have stories and potential - it's that Blizzard doesn't use them.

Right now - the threat of the Burning Legion is enough to keep the Alliance together. But the Alliance needs some way to dilute and disperse its military strength. And non-human races need much more of a focus.

Varian should step down from the position of High King, the role of Supreme Commander should be resurrected and given to a non-human leader. Jarod would be perfect....more focus of the NElfs.

Time needs to be spent developing the Alliances goals and stories. Recovering their lost kingdoms, restoring Grim Batol and securing Blackrock. Rebuilding Nethergarde and either moving Menethil or building dykes to reclaim the land. Moving into Dire Maul, officially (ingame) retaking Gnomeregan and so on. There needs to be more focus on non human NPCs. It should be emphasised that the Alliance military is growing, that they are more proactive but that much of this strength is tied down guarding borders or securing the territories they have taken.

And so on.

There is lots of potential...internal Alliance conflict is desireable in some ways, but at the same time the nature of the Alliance as it is places a limit on the scope of that internal conflict and reduces the need for it.

EJL

[Octavius]

Don't forget shadowforge. Lorewise, it's alliance yet. They made some confused statement about the dark iron society being "in flux", and that moira will return to shadowforge when the other clans will trust Her enough but We see very little about the status of relations within Ironforge. This could be a good starting point in doing the alliance more interesting.

[Ogren]

Some inner conflict would be cool but I don't see it happening. The Alliance is far too unified and stable. Plus there's the issue that the moment an Alliance character stands up to challenge the status quo, he or she is immediately smacked down with the villain bat for ever daring to show a different point of view about an issue.

Asking for conflict is basically just asking which Alliance character should go on the chopping block.

[Hiricine]

The alliance needs a split agenda. The best I can think of is Varian/the draenei wanting to push the campaign harder in Draenor while "something" threatens Azeroth, and hits closer to the night elves or the Dwarves. The Ne's are PROBABLY the furthest from the interests of the alliance, both practically and geographically.

[Matius]

I think the best choice for conflict in the Alliance are Night Elves.

Night Elves are an ancient and proud nation. Why would they allow younglings like Humans have any authority over them? As I said earlier there should be a bigger role in Alliance leadership of NE or at least a contest of power between Wrynn and Night Elves and other nations.

[Martymark]

Worgen supremacists pour their blood into the SW water supply, infecting many across the city.

[Merlinb]

Could be a perfect opportunity to add an unexpected race for the alliance, Naga for example. Alliance get their backs pushed to the wall in some way, the naga offer their help, which would be hard to deny. Next thing you know that ends up pissing the Night Elves off and then the worgen end up siding with the night elves, humans with naga, etc.

Not a complete faction split by the way, just some serious tension between the tight nit group.

[Stormspellz]

dwarf powerstruggle- everyone picks a different backer.

[Sandrox]

Varian should step down from the position of High King, the role of Supreme Commander should be resurrected and given to a non-human leader. Jarod would be perfect....more focus of the NElfs.

Shandris Feathermoon > Jarod.

[Romano]

Any kind of conflict made in the Alliance, with the current lineup of races, would feel forced. The Alliance has more in common with each race than the Horde does now. The original Thrall's Horde had a lot in common with their tribal themes, shamanism, and overall values. Now, with the addition of Forsaken, Blood Elves, Goblins, and Pandaren, they're a loosely tied group that is held together for their hatred of the Alliance, and the fact that all of them have had to fight to survive.

On the polar opposite is the Alliance. The Dwarves and Gnomes have always supported the humans, and they have similar values. The Draenei work with humans well enough for their reverence of the Light. The Worgen work well with humans because, well, they are humans at their core. Worgen also help bridge the Night Elves further into the Alliance with druidism, and the responsibility the Night Elves have taken with the Worgen curse. Though, while the Night Elves have certainly always had a cordial relationship with the rest of the Alliance, they are the oddest in the Alliance. Though, they respect everyone else well enough, since it's not like the technology of the Alliance is used like the Goblins, where nature suffers constantly in the advancement of technology (though, the Gnomes and such haven't been nature-loving by any means).

If the Alliance had any inner strife, it would most likely come from newer races, subraces, or lore races. Things like High Elves, Dark Irons, any Leper Gnomes allied with them, Highborne, etc. Most of these races have been on the outside of Alliance conflicts and politics until recently. In the case of Dark Irons, they continue to prove that they care about the Alliance, yet everyone still doesn't trust them much. The Highborne and High Elves could have some conflict with the rest of the Kaldorei, since the High Elves' ancestors were banished for being elves that use magic, yet the Highborne were accepted into the Alliance around the time of the Cataclysm.

Things like that would be the biggest sources of conflict within the Alliance without making ti feel forced. Just my two cents, though.

They ahd a chance wit the Gilneans.
Although worgen are essentially humans they were pretty isolationist, or at least Greymane.
That was the reason he left the Alliance and created the Wall.
In the first place.

But in WoW he is just buddies with all the others.