Alliance Players DID NOT Save Suramar

[Felfaadaern Darkterror]

I been seeing this over and over and over..... All the allied race threads, BFA lore threads..... Alliance players keep saying "well I saved suramar" talking about the Nightborne or Thalyssra.

SO I thought I'd clear it up: What is reflected in-game does not always portray the cannon story that is the back-bone this 20+ year franchise.
WHEN AN EVENT HAPPENS IN GAME THAT BOTH FACTION PLAYERS PLAY THROUGH IT'S FOR GAMEPLAY SAKE. BOTH Alliance and Horde Player-Characters get an equal game-play experience for a customer based product. SO for GAME-PLAY sake we all get the experience.

A small investigation in to the story and lore will give you context. Sometimes its Horde cannon sometimes its Alliance cannon... In this case.....

According to cannon lore it was a "Horde Champion" that did what our player character did.

So Alliance players you DID NOT save Suramar. Your faction partially helped along side the Horde, while the Horde champion was the one to do the player character action......

That combined with the haughty pride of the Night Elves pushed Suramar to the Horde. Alliance stop acting like you're the pride of suramar now a enemy...

Well if my characters actions didn't really happen, then his feelings don't really matter, and when he kills Thalyssra in "For the Alliance", that won't really happen either, right? But damn it will feel good.

[Deleted]

Of course liadrin is going to be more polite. She wasn't there when Thalyssra and Elisande and the rest of the nightborne turned their back on the night elves and sealed themselves away and left their kin to die. Tyrande had every right to respond the way she did, in fact, personally had i have known that they were going to join the horde ahead of time, as a writer i would have played up that betrayal and that lack of trust and hostility between the two. And actually reflected it in game with the Night elf and high elf armies only being token forces. They could have written it so much better.

It does suck that for a large chunk of the expansion, BOTH factions worked toward something to liberate a city from the legion and then all of a sudden they're just like thanks but you're not welcome here anymore and i'll kill people of your faction. Thanks for securing my future and nourishing my people peace. Throw in on top that, again, the alliance aided in the reclamation of Highmountain/Thunder Totem only to have them ALSO turn on us (that being said it was much more obvious that they would end up siding with the horde over the alliance i suppose - but still... i actually like the tauren as a race haha).

Not even one member of the Alliance set foot on Highmountain, besides Sylvanas and Genn's forces fighting for the towers.

Once and for all, the PC in Legion represented the NEUTRAL Class Orders, picking up after the destruction of the faction on the Broken Shore.

[Soulwind]

Alliance players may have saved Suramar, but.. Tyrande threw a huge monkey wrench in that with her arrogant xenophobic attitude. So even if we DID SAVE them, Tyrande ruined all the good will we earned. I hate that woman.

"Hey, you guys left us to die against the Legion last time this happened, have you learned your lesson about not deserting your allies the minute you feel threatened?"

"Oh my god, you're so mean, I feel threatened, I'm joining your enemies now"

Tyrande is usually poorly written, but Thalyssra's (completely out of character) response to this, if anything, just proved her right. If a few words are enough for them to declare a war against the people who just helped them, the Horde shouldn't expect anything from them.

If they were to be a real part of the Horde, and not some gameplay-first race that won't be featured in any canon story ever again, their next move should be joining Azshara or whoever we're fighting in BfA as soon as the first Nightborn dies in battle.

And while that treachery and cowardice could be part of the flavour of the race, like goblins, it shouldn't be shown through the very person who just fought a guerrilla war against that culture.

I can buy some Nightborne joining the Horde and being childish in their politics while most of the race remains neutral.
I don't buy Thalyssra and the entire city of Suramar joining a foreign war immediately after Legion, and only because of one short conversation.

[Deleted]

"Hey, you guys left us to die against the Legion last time this happened, have you learned your lesson about not deserting your allies the minute you feel threatened?"

"Oh my god, you're so mean, I feel threatened, I'm joining your enemies now"

Tyrande is usually poorly written, but Thalyssra's (completely out of character) response to this, if anything, just proved her right.

If they were to be a real part of the Horde, and not some gameplay-first race that won't be featured in any canon story ever again, their next move should be joining Azshara or whoever we're fighting in BfA as soon as the first Nightborn dies in battle.

And while that treachery and cowardice could be part of the flavour of the race, like goblins, it shouldn't be shown through the very person who just fought a guerrilla war against that culture.

I can buy some Nightborne joining the Horde and being childish in their politics while most of the race remains neutral.
I don't buy Thalyssra and the entire city of Suramar joining a foreign war immediately after Legion, and only because of one short conversation.

You missed the diplomatic attempts during 7.3? It wasn't a overnight decision.

[Felfaadaern Darkterror]

The OP's premise may be correct, but I think it's sort of missing the point too.

Because the core issue isn't really what's canon or who gets the credit. It's pretty obvious the Horde are the ones who canonically did most of the heavy lifting in Suramar. The issue is just that Blizzard decided to make the Suramar campaign a fairly personal storyline and then later made big gameplay decisions that ignored their own storytelling.

The frustration is that right now the alliance player experience in Suramar is basically that you become BFFs with Thalyssra and her crew, literally hand feeding them mana to keep them from going insane at times, only for them to immediately turn around and decide you're kill-on-sight enemies once they've got their city back. You can make similar complaints about the Highmountain Tauren and the Lightforged too.

And that's just dumb. It's also a beast entirely of Blizzard's own making given their decision to have the player character be so directly and intimately involved in the storyline.

This. Every bit of this. Suramar is Blizz's best story telling to date; Thalyssra and Occuleth and their friends are the best new characters Blizz has written in ages, and so many of us were encouraged to become very attached to them only to have them turn on us. And for what? Because Tyrande was slow to trust them? Not a very satisfying ending to the tale.

[Adalwolf]

According to cannon lore it was a "Horde Champion" that did what our player character did.

So we are pulling facts out of our ass now? You couldn't be mor wrong: there is source stating that it was a Horde champion. The adventurer helped Thalyssra. From my PoV, the adventurer is the Shadowblade, an Alliance Rogue.

The thing is: the adventurer does NOT represent its faction. So, even tho, from my PoV, Thalyssra was saved by an Alliance Rogue, it does not mean that the Alliance saved Thalyssra, specially considering the adventurer was acting mostly in behalf of his Order Hall, which is neutral, containing members of both Alliance and the Horde, as well as several NPC factions.

There was no Horde nor Alliance when the Ar'candor was found. There was no Horde nor Alliance during the events that led to the wretched Nightfallen being restored to their Nightborne form. Both the Alliance and the Horde only came to help during the retake of Suramar, after Thalyssra and the rest of the Nightfallen were already saved by the adventurer... alone. And when they came, Tyrande was a bitch to Thalyssra, while Lady Lyandrin was very receptive to Silgryn. When the adventurer went to Argus, the Blood Knights accompanied the Nightborne, while the Night Elves chose to stay in Azeroth. It's only obvious they would choose to join the Horde.

[Felfaadaern Darkterror]

You missed the diplomatic attempts during 7.3? It wasn't a overnight decision.

Except it was. The dumbest part was Thalysra visiting Silvermoon and deciding since the Blood Elves were nice to her why not swear obedience to an undead queen she's never met before? Yeah... that makes sense.

[Deleted]

Except it was. The dumbest part was Thalysra visiting Silvermoon and deciding since the Blood Elves were nice to her why not swear obedience to an undead queen she's never met before? Yeah... that makes sense.

Then you also missed the 7.3 diplomatic talks between Liadrin and Silgryn. Thalyssra going to Silvermoon was result of the diplomatic talks, not of "lets join the Horde". The events on Silvermoon were what led Thalyssra picking the Horde.

[Soulwind]

You missed the diplomatic attempts during 7.3? It wasn't a overnight decision.

"We're both junkies, we have so much in common"
"Absolutely, you and your faction of swamp-dwellers are the perfect home for us"

"We've been the same race for millenia, you abandoned us once and we're fighting to save you now, I hope you remember this"
"How dare you, we're nothing alike, and that happened a long time ago, we were all there already, but a long time ago"

[Felfaadaern Darkterror]

Then you also missed the 7.3 diplomatic talks between Liadrin and Silgryn. Thalyssra going to Silvermoon was result of the diplomatic talks, not of "lets join the Horde". The events on Silvermoon were what led Thalyssra picking the Horde.

I heard the talk between Liadrin and Sylgryn. I would have been fine with Thalyssra opening diplomatic ties with Silvermoon. Doesn't explain Thalyssra vowing to obey Sylvanas.

[Deleted]

"We've been the same race for millenia, you abandoned us once and we're fighting to save you now, I hope you remember this"
"How dare you, we're nothing alike, and that happened a long time ago, we were all there already, but a long time ago"

It's funny because it's the exact same reason as the Night Elven/Highborne rift. So what's the surprise? The Nightborne are Highborne, just like the Blood Elves.

- - - Updated - - -

I heard the talk between Liadrin and Sylgryn. I would have been fine with Thalyssra opening diplomatic ties with Silvermoon. Doesn't explain Thalyssra vowing to obey Sylvanas.

But that's the problem with BfA asspulls. Alleria bootlicking Anduin is another example.

[Soulwind]

It's funny because it's the exact same reason as the Night Elven/Highborne rift. So what's the surprise? The Nightborne are Highborne, just like the Blood Elves.

And they've been in the Alliance since Cataclysm.

Maybe not full members, but comparable to Wildhammer. And enough to allow players to create night elf mages.

[Deleted]

And they've been in the Alliance since Cataclysm.

And yet Nightborne decided to send diplomats to the Highborne that contacted them.

It's very simple, the Blood Elves opened their doors and made diplomatic attempts, the Night Elves did not. It's how alliances are built in our world many times.

[gnomemonster]

The Horde slaughtered the Furbolgs, so where are my alliance playable Furbolgs?

[Eggroll]

Oh do we know that already?

Maybe not her personally, but her as member of the Horde.

[AmazonDruid]

A small investigation in to the story and lore will give you context. Sometimes its Horde cannon sometimes its Alliance cannon... In this case.....

SOOOOOO, It was the Alliance that saved Azeroth from Legion With the help of the Alliance Heros, using as Spaceship crafted by an Alliance Race...

Horde did nothing, was just looking at the sky scratchin their butts.

[Eggroll]

SOOOOOO, It was the Alliance that saved Azeroth from Legion With the help of the Alliance Heros, using as Spaceship crafted by an Alliance Race...

Horde did nothing, was just looking at the sky scratchin their butts.

Apparently it was both. They were both at the gates of Suramar City, Tyrande AND Lady Liadrin. I don't even know why we are discussing it.

[Demeia]

Honestly, it probably should have been handled as a pandaren-style situation, with characters being free to choose which faction to side with.

After Elisande forced their people to side with the Legion, I can't see why Thalyssra would want to do the same.

I think this is just the right point. I have no idea why they didn't just add one sub-race for alliance, one for horde, and then the one neutral one. More could have been added later. Forcing a fit was just a bad idea. They just wanted to save themselves resources and it came at the expense of a quest line we spent half of the expansion doing.

I can only digress further and shake my head at the absolutely nonsensical "war" going on between the horde and alliance while their world faces an existential crisis every 9 months.

[Servasus]

The entire premise of this OP is just laughably false.