Horde lost in the Battle for the Undercity

[ArguesWithStrangers]

How about we just let the story play out instead of doing mental gymnastics to create a story more to our liking. I main Ally, but thus far Sylvanas has outmaneuvered everyone. That’s fine. You have setbacks and defeats in war. It makes her s a more compelling antagonist than say, Hellscream in WoD, who we just steamrolled. It will make defeating her more satisfying and make it feel more earned. Just play people. We’re literally in the prologue of this story.

[Deleted]

So the Horde lost, again?

right? I cannot understand this thinking 'but jaina saved alliance twice,what if she wasn't there'
are we really going to think with 'buts' and 'what ifs' ?

because if we do, then the horde managed to retreat and escape only because of using the blight three times. what If they didn't have the blight? what if saurfang didn't showed up to save sylvana's ass?
see what I did there?

[Verdugo]

What?

"Sylvanas tried trapping the Alliance and her plan failed horribly, so she won!"

That's not how this works. The Horde lost. Not only did they lose one of their capitals, they lost it for nothing in the end because their "trap" failed.

Obviously it failed, since Golden Boy has massive plot armor so nothing can happen to him.

[ArguesWithStrangers]

What?

"Sylvanas tried trapping the Alliance and her plan failed horribly, so she won!"

That's not how this works. The Horde lost. Not only did they lose one of their capitals, they lost it for nothing in the end because their "trap" failed.

Only because of Jaina ex machina, which is cool, because it sets her up for a really significant role, but Anduin was completely outclassed by Sylvanas.

[Jester Joe]

Obviously it failed, since Golden Boy has massive plot armor so nothing can happen to him.

That's not quite how this works.

If it was just a matter of Anduin surviving, Jaina, Genn, and Alleria could have all died right there.

Point is, not only did Sylvanas now blow up her own capital, she did it for nothing.

Only because of Jaina ex machina, which is cool, because it sets her up for a really significant role, but Anduin was completely outclassed by Sylvanas.

That's not how deus ex machinas work.

Tirion in ICC was a deus ex machina.

Jaina teleporting people has been a thing since Hyjal.

[cparle87]

Both sides lost, Alliance only survived because of Jaina and they didn't secure the city. Nobody really came away from that as a winner, though Blizzard for sure have set up Sylvanas as a villian and she will be killed so Saurfang can be made warchief... Hooray for the merry go round of warchiefs.

Feels to me just the opposite. That Saurfang's honorable but not practical ways will fall to the wayside while Sylvanas seems more in control than ever. I mean, her biggest detractor is now locked up, and only Baine had a problem with it. And Baine has already done the "cooperate with a warchief he doesn't like so long as they don't cross the line" thing before.

[Verdugo]

That's not quite how this works.

Its exactly how it works. Writers dont care about making a living universe that works on logic, they just write in random bullshit and hope it sticks.

[Pantupino]

I dont know much about losing, we got full control over Kalimdor and denied the alliance a historical city almost killing their leader. Sounds like a big win for me.

[Jester Joe]

Its exactly how it works. Writers dont care about making a living universe that works on logic, they just write in random bullshit and hope it sticks.

Considering you had to cut out the actual point of my post just to continue to respond this way, I think it's safe to say there's really no point in trying to discuss this.

[Deleted]

I dont know much about losing, we got full control over Kalimdor and denied the alliance a historical city almost killing their leader. Sounds like a big win for me.

the horde does not have full control in kalimdor yet (I don't doubt that they will in the future), and lordaeron keep is not destroyed, just blighted. it will be cleansed and restored with the return of calia, as alliance. that's why blizzard didn't completely destroy it. the upper part, at least. undercity is ruined 100%.

[Jester Joe]

We don't know that yet.

If anything all the events leading up to it show that Sylvanas is a very cunning plotter and that everything that happened was something she planned all along. This might also include Saurfang getting captured and whatever (bad) consequences that might cause to the Alliance.

We already know what happens with the Saurfang situation, and if that's what she considered part of "grand plan", then she is awful at making plans when it comes to Saurfang, since it leads to basically nothing relevant to Saurfang himself.

I mean, if she's such a great schemer, why did she have to call upon Saurfang's help to come up with a plan to attack the Night Elves?

[Disciple81]

It was planned from the beginning to lose the City, Sylvanas orchestrated it all just to kill the Alliance leaders. And it would have worked had Jaina not showed up to bail them out. I am all for taking Sylvanas out but her strategies made the entire alliance look like helpless children. The Alliance had what is called a pyrrhic victory. The plan was to sacrifice the city the whole time, that is why Saufang was so outraged and why Sylvanas says in the books that such a victory will require sacrifice. It is Horde 2 Alliance 0 and it looks like it is going to continue because the Alliance leaders have already demonstrated they can't handle her. The Alliance should be concerned if things continue as they are they will all be members of the Horde in the coming months.

[Skulltaker]

No, the implication is more that the Alliance ended up blindly walking into a huge trap, not once, but twice. (Most of their superior army destroyed and nearly their entire leadership death).

Everything seemed to be part of some grand plan Sylvanas had made. So in that sense Sylvanas was the clear winner.

Jaina too for being the one that prevented the Alliance from falling apart twice that day...

I also strongly believe that Saurfang getting captured is part of Sylvanas' plans too.

I still assume that Sylvanas does this all for her own sake. She knew perfectly well that rather sooner than later the Forsaken would start to be more and more depending on the Hordes good graces. Then Forsaken considered turning away, which she violently prohibited. I think she's rather afraid for herself. Because she sure is one thing: Unique. She is the only one of her kind. If the Forsaken were to be kicked out of the Horde, she's 'dead' - along with them. Noone else will take them, outside foreces would just keep challanging them again and again, and seeing how their numbers are numbered, they'd eventually lose, and she'd go down, hard. Noone will want her.

If the Forsaken leave towards the Alliance, she's doomed aswell. No chance the Alliance takes her. At best they will just allow her to leve, but where would she go?

So, she does the only feasible thing, from her point of view: She forces the Horde to stand behind her by tricking the Horde leadershiop into 'A good War', which she then turns foul, by commiting g... burning Teldrassil. And all the Horde stood there and watched.

There is no way now the Alliance will see this as only her doing. There is no way they will let them get off easy. The entire Horde just burned down Teldrassil. And noone will believe that wasn't their intention.

Now, Saurfang is a problem. The rest of the Horde leaders have little pull over the other races. Baine is respected, but to young. Lor'Themar is... just that. Gallywix is a Goblin. I don't know who leads the trolls, but he doesn't have the job that long, yet.

But Saurfang is a true hero. He's respected by both Horde AND Alliance. He is the only one who can actully challange her position. He'd have huge support. Probably way more than she'd have.

I actually think it possible that Sylvanas somewhat influenced Vol'Jin to make her Warchief. Be it some form of pact with Loa to whisper to him, promising lives, or if she whispered in his ear herself. She needed to become Warchief. She has always been the odd one out.

[Beloren]

There are so many wrong people here claiming that Horde won the battle for the Undercity it's seriously started to bothering me. I know that someone can play as a Horde, or be Sylvanas fanboy/whatever...

But saying that Horde won that battle is just foolish.

In b4 "You won nothing" bla bla, yeah, Alliance won nothing(other than dominance on the big part of Lordaeron lol), but the Horde lost their city.

Yes, the Horde is now the dominant faction because they destroyed the whole Alliance city with plenty of Night Elves(and other races) there and they evacuated Forsaken etc.

But they still lost the city and the battle.

Just because they used Blight it doesn't mean they won.
First blight(plan B) was used to make Alliance retreat, then Jaina appeared with her magical boat and fixed the ground with her magic.
Second blight(plan C) was used just to prevent the Alliance from entering to their city and they tried to kill their main characters, but they didn't.

...but the Horde still retreated. They ran away. They knew they don't have any chances with that force, so they decided that losing that city is better than giving it for the Alliance from the strategically point of view. But that isn't winning, that's losing.
(sometimes losing battles can make you win war, but still - they lost that exactly battle)

In b4 "OmG YoU PlAy AlLiAnCe!11one", I play both factions and I like them both. Just stating the truth.

Don't argue with trolls, some people are so stubborn and thick, though the situation stares them in the face, they would not admit it. Others are just trying to rile others up, either way, you saw what happened, you know what happened, you have a mind of your own.

If someone says otherwise, you can lok at what they say, if it's nonsense, don't believe them, don't even bother to respond.

[Deleted]

There are so many wrong people here claiming that Horde won the battle for the Undercity it's seriously started to bothering me. I know that someone can play as a Horde, or be Sylvanas fanboy/whatever...

But saying that Horde won that battle is just foolish.

In b4 "You won nothing" bla bla, yeah, Alliance won nothing(other than dominance on the big part of Lordaeron lol), but the Horde lost their city.

Yes, the Horde is now the dominant faction because they destroyed the whole Alliance city with plenty of Night Elves(and other races) there and they evacuated Forsaken etc.

But they still lost the city and the battle.

Just because they used Blight it doesn't mean they won.
First blight(plan B) was used to make Alliance retreat, then Jaina appeared with her magical boat and fixed the ground with her magic.
Second blight(plan C) was used just to prevent the Alliance from entering to their city and they tried to kill their main characters, but they didn't.

...but the Horde still retreated. They ran away. They knew they don't have any chances with that force, so they decided that losing that city is better than giving it for the Alliance from the strategically point of view. But that isn't winning, that's losing.
(sometimes losing battles can make you win war, but still - they lost that exactly battle)

In b4 "OmG YoU PlAy AlLiAnCe!11one", I play both factions and I like them both. Just stating the truth.

In other words you're an anti-Sylvanas hater and you're salty that your faction leaders fell for her plan and got nothing out of it, even though both sides of the battle and cinematic prove it unequivocally. Gotcha...

[Raeph]

Looking at the two battles, War of Thorns and Battle for Undercity, you have to say that Horde one, simply on body count.

I didn't do the alliance side quests but what I saw on the horde side:

Astranar - Horde Won with minimal casualties, and completely eliminated the garrison.
Dark Shore - Horde Won with moderate casualties and routed all defenses though a portion of the garrison survived.
Teldrasil - Horde won with no casualties due to ranged bombardment, garrison destroyed, significant loss of civilian life and complete destruction of infrastructure. Darnassus as a capital city is now defunct.
Assault on Undercity, Approach - Alliance won with civilians evacuated from population centers, garrisons routed in Brill though orderly retreat to the capital city.
Assault on Undercity, City - Horde won with all horde civilians evacuated though Horde Garrison looked like under 20% at the end of the scenario when we left Undercity Courtyard, in a fairly orderly retreat. Near total elimination of Alliance assault forces in the two blight attacks. After full horde evacuation the town was then flooded with blight and it and the surrounding area is useless for the foreseeable future as an Alliance staging area.

Horde destroyed Ashenvale Garrison, Darkshore Garrison, Teldrassil Garrison, Darnassis is no longer a functional Capital City, has dumped two regions of war refugees on the Alliance and eliminated almost the entirety of the Alliance retaliatory strike force, all at the cost of about 50-80% of the Undercity Garrison and Undercity Capital City.

Horde won, period end of story.

Even as a Horde only player I don't agree with everything that went down, I healed all the people I could during the blight attack rather than use blight myself during the scenario, but trying to argue with the results of the battles is pointless. Alliance was routed completely in four separate engagements and lost maybe 4-1, maybe 5-1 against the Horde forces, in terms of just soldiery.

[ZazuuPriest]

There are so many wrong people here claiming that Horde won the battle for the Undercity it's seriously started to bothering me. I know that someone can play as a Horde, or be Sylvanas fanboy/whatever...

But saying that Horde won that battle is just foolish.

In b4 "You won nothing" bla bla, yeah, Alliance won nothing(other than dominance on the big part of Lordaeron lol), but the Horde lost their city.

Yes, the Horde is now the dominant faction because they destroyed the whole Alliance city with plenty of Night Elves(and other races) there and they evacuated Forsaken etc.

But they still lost the city and the battle.

Just because they used Blight it doesn't mean they won.
First blight(plan B) was used to make Alliance retreat, then Jaina appeared with her magical boat and fixed the ground with her magic.
Second blight(plan C) was used just to prevent the Alliance from entering to their city and they tried to kill their main characters, but they didn't.

...but the Horde still retreated. They ran away. They knew they don't have any chances with that force, so they decided that losing that city is better than giving it for the Alliance from the strategically point of view. But that isn't winning, that's losing.
(sometimes losing battles can make you win war, but still - they lost that exactly battle)

In b4 "OmG YoU PlAy AlLiAnCe!11one", I play both factions and I like them both. Just stating the truth.

you say it yourself, just because you lose a battle doesnt mean you lose the war. So all your rambling is pretty much meaningless the horde controls the contenent with most of the azerite on it and instead of attacking our main capital they attacked lordaeron which doesnt have much strategic value. So take the "win" i guess alliance.

[Jester Joe]

Do we? If so explain? Last I know is that him and Anduin ended up talking.

The way I see it the Alliance is going to end up in-fighting because of Saurfang. Some of them are pissed off and out for blood, others among them want to find a more peaceful approach. It's entirely possible she planned for this all along, or might have planned for whatever Baine might be trying to do next.

There are very strong implications in all the events leading up to BfA that everything is exactly part of Sylvanas' plans.

She ends up sending a small crew to break into Stormwind to break out Saurfang, and end up freeing the Zandalari Princess or whatever while they're there too.

The major thing that comes out of this is that now they have a way to connect with the Zandalari to recruit more allies, which had absolutely nothing to do with Saurfang being imprisoned. It's not like he talked to her about how cool the Horde was or something, and if Sylvanas knew that she was there already, then Saurfang had no need to be there either.

She already tried causing in-fighting among the Alliance, and failed. That's what the attack on the Night Elves was suppose to be, she thought Genn and the Worgen would flip out that Anduin would try to save the Night Elves first, but Genn just got mad that Anduin would even think that he would be against that.

I mean, so far she's had failed plan after plan.

She tried to take out Malfurion to break the Night Elves, but she almost died herself to him until Saurfang strikes Malfurion in the back.
She left Malfurion to be killed by Saurfang, which he refused to (really, she should have saw that coming since he was already saying it was a dishonorable blow)
She then decides "Welp, plan A failed, lets burn the tree down to break their spirit!".

Ends up, burning the tree down didn't break their spirits either, just enraged them more.

So of course Undercity was attacked like she did know. There's one thing so far.

She kept throwing her plague out, which would have normally prevented the Alliance from advancing even (Seriously, if her plan was to try to lure them in, she did a bad job at it considering she had no way of knowing Jaina would show up).

And then, when she finally gets everyone to where she wants them, they escape anyway.

[Willhouse]

Ofcourse Horde won battle for Undercity everyone knows that just look at questline not to mention awesome cinematics where alliance showed nothing but retreat and defeat.Well theres that part where jaina showed up but she was needed just for progression of story,some ppl were baffled by her entrance but its a joke compared how Horde spread blight all over ally ass not to mention Sylvanas speech at the end and almost killing whats left of alliance leadership.Alliance was pathetic in battle for Undercity and they won....NOTHING! gg

[Nerovar]

losing isn't a "loss" as it was according to plan.

Had to chuckle a bit.