Soon the Horde won't have much left... (Horde Branding Problem)

[Niwes]

Oh c'mon, Metzen wasn't as bad but let's not pretend he was a GREAT writer, Metzen was an idea man, a big picture concept type. Wow's never had GREAT writing, but before it wasn't as big so the inconsistencies weren't as bad over time.

The problem is partly that everything's piling up, so the flip-flops, and changes in characterization are worse.


If Cata-MoP-Wod hadn't ALREADY done this story it'd be much more palatable.

i read all the books and all the lore. and the wow universe (WotA, PrePortal stuff, orcs vs humans, Scourge and Lich King, dragon aspects, etc) and its characters (i.e. thrall, lothar, medivh, orgrim, rhonin, illidan, turalyon, uther, garona, etc) was really not bad at all. broad range of story and deep lore. the early (golden) days of wow was a written universe, that was not bad at all. wow do not have to hide behind shadowrun, star wars, star trek or warhammer. it was good stuff. so there WERE creative ppl and good writing at some point in the past.

that said, lets be real: nothing came after that. endless recycling of all that good, but old, stuff since ~2010. wether good new characters that were used long term and fitted well into the universe, nor good writing and enhancement of that universe. instead they produced half assed characters (that mostly killed a while later anyway), embedded in horrible shit stories. all of that was loose coupled together, presented with horrible bad writing. or in short: it was cheap shit.

so all in all the wow universe per se is great imo, but what they made out of it, is horrible flat and lame cheap shit. and the reason imo is: $$ milk it.

[mysticx]

Are you even reading what I’ve put?

Kill Sylvanas, by all means feel free to. It’s not hard, as Godfrey has shown in the past.

But don’t drag the Alliance into it. Don’t let the Alliance know about it. Don’t do things like setting Derek Proudmoore free for the benefit of the Alliance.

If the Alliance hadn’t got involved then the Sunreavers wouldn’t have shown up.

Yeah great, so one of the main storylines (Sylvanas being on a 1-way trip to crazytown) would be a Horde-only affair? I daresay Sylvanas and her delusions became an Alliance affair when that undead hag had Teldrassil burned down on an apparent whim.

Uldir was very jarring for Alliance, with basically three lines of text “That place is bad, kill everything in it” being all the lead-in we got instead of the whole storyline leading up to it for the Horde, i remember the whole rebellion against Garrosh, and the Alliance’s build-up being... 10 minutes of faffing around with a robotic cat, while the way Alliance NPCs are shoehorned into the whole thing is a bit messy, Blizz can’t just leave half the playerbase out of a major part of the expansion storyline.

[Lochton]

After MoP the Warsong and Kor'kron became pretty 'tainted' lorewise, so we can't use them for much, or rather, Blizz is too lazy to use them and properly address how they're viewed or what's going on in the aftermath.

We're quickly running into similar problems with the Sunreavers and the Forsaken as a whole. I mean hell, the broken mask on the Forsaken symbol is basically Sylvs face, and I'm pretty sure it's only got a bird and arrows because of HER really.


What is Blizz going to do once we lose what's left of these forces? There's not much left of the Horde soon since the AU-Mag'har don't really use the MU or AU clans they just have their aesthetics.

You still have the Warsong clan active. And the Kor'kron is more a unit that is slowly being flushed out of unwanted blood.

[SoundOfGuns]

I kind of enjoy this topic? Because while this argument is going about and everyone is... not without reason up in arms about the fact that the Horde was written against a wall... (also fuck you, GreenJesus, these decisions are still made by Afrasiabi, but i guess it doesn't fit the narrative. Just saying.) ...there are likely 500 other threads opened by alliance-mains, reee-ing from the depths of their lungs on how there is a horde bias? Just felt the urge to point that out, because its hilarious.

- - - Updated - - -

Yeah great, so one of the main storylines (Sylvanas being on a 1-way trip to crazytown) would be a Horde-only affair? I daresay Sylvanas and her delusions became an Alliance affair when that undead hag had Teldrassil burned down on an apparent whim.

Uldir was very jarring for Alliance, with basically three lines of text “That place is bad, kill everything in it” being all the lead-in we got instead of the whole storyline leading up to it for the Horde, i remember the whole rebellion against Garrosh, and the Alliance’s build-up being... 10 minutes of faffing around with a robotic cat, while the way Alliance NPCs are shoehorned into the whole thing is a bit messy, Blizz can’t just leave half the playerbase out of a major part of the expansion storyline.

I get your point that the Alliance should be involved considering they burned down the tree, but... Its kind of... annoying to hear alliance concerns about being involved when the entire game is increasingly bend around your comfort zone? It still is. The horde is the evil party and the poor poor Alliance is the victim of misbehavior. Oh noes. Time for the heroes of the Alliance to rise up to beat the mean, genocidal horde. Yawn-been-there-done-that-yawn. The Alliance has always been 110% involved into everything that ever happened, unless there was a neutral character at the helm. And if you now explain to me how Thrall isn't neutral; Magni, Bran, Arthas, Illidan, Turalyon, the worst Windrunner-Sister and Velen twice + Yarel. Thank you. Blizz CAN leave half the playerbase out of major parts of the expansion to only shoehorn them in, they did it time and time again but it just never hit the alliance... You will survive not being the magnificant, all changing force for once in Uldir. It will be the first and last time for several years.

[Greengrim]

@B-Man

...The Horde has historically been a proactive, aggressive force for the vast majority of its existence...

I'm not entirely sure I understood your comment correctly, as my English is not that good, but in case you are implying that the Horde is overly aggressive I would like to dispute your statement. The Horde was forcefully brought to Azeroth by Gul'dan, and after the end his tyranny the new Horde has only been striving towards peaceful existence. In fact, Thrall nearly succeeded to achieve complete peace between the Horde and Alliance, but his meeting with Varian was sabotaged. They have always had honorable mentality and were never aggressive unless provoked or threatened, of course, with the two exceptions: Garrosh and Sylvanas who have caused some tremors. But as it can be seen, their actions are not approved by other faction leaders, which means the Horde still supports the same mentality, they just need a better Warchief so they can continue to practice their old ways.

[Aeula]

Yeah great, so one of the main storylines (Sylvanas being on a 1-way trip to crazytown) would be a Horde-only affair? I daresay Sylvanas and her delusions became an Alliance affair when that undead hag had Teldrassil burned down on an apparent whim.

Uldir was very jarring for Alliance, with basically three lines of text “That place is bad, kill everything in it” being all the lead-in we got instead of the whole storyline leading up to it for the Horde, i remember the whole rebellion against Garrosh, and the Alliance’s build-up being... 10 minutes of faffing around with a robotic cat, while the way Alliance NPCs are shoehorned into the whole thing is a bit messy, Blizz can’t just leave half the playerbase out of a major part of the expansion storyline.

The entire storyline shouldn’t have happened. But now that it has, involving the Alliance in it (At least willingly, working side by side with them) comes at the detriment of the Horde.

[Super Dickmann]

I'm not entirely sure I understood your comment correctly, as my English is not that good, but in case you are implying that the Horde is overly aggressive I would like to dispute your statement. The Horde was forcefully brought to Azeroth by Gul'dan, and after the end his tyranny the new Horde has only been striving towards peaceful existence. They have always had honorable mentality and were never aggressive unless provoked or threatened, of course, with the two exceptions: Garrosh and Sylvanas who have caused some tremors. But as it can be seen, their actions are not approved by other faction leaders, which means the Horde still supports the same mentality.

No worries about the english, I'll try and explain my point a bit more clearly.

You have to remember that the orcs were brainwashed thing only became a thing in WC3. In WC1 and WC2, so for about six years of the franchise's early existence, the orcs were just evil. This falls into said aggression. Aggression, proactivity and evil aren't the same thing. Proactivity just means wanting something and taking steps to get it. Say, the orcs wanted to take over the world in the first two games, so they did it. Thrall had to be told by Medivh to go do something. His end goal was to found Durotar and then live in peace and after that point the orcs were effectively done. A proactive faction, aggressive or otherwise is better, because it can trigger storylines and not just react to it. Thrall would, if left to his own devices, just sit around and you'd have no story unless a bad guy came in. Garrosh, Orgrim and so on were driven to take land for their people and this created conflict and thus a story.

But the orcs were only like that for two to six years between WC3, TFT and then Burning Crusade. In Wrath of the Lich King, the orcs are against aggressively pursuing a goal - the defeat of the Lich King and beginning to reject Thrall's ideology, as seen in stories like Glory about his decision to put the orcs in a desert and his conciliatory attitude towards the Alliance. At the same time, while the orcs were still passive, the new races introduced like the TBC-era blood elves and especially the Forsaken were also driven towards something, be it their need for mana or revenge and did not mesh with the Kalimdor-era Horde. They were intentional additions to enable variety and conflict because a passive Horde doesn't want anything and so it can't get into conflict. Cataclysm was the culmination of this trend, with the Horde in general being driven into a war to get at something - be it reclaiming Lordaeron for the Forsaken or being able to exist independently for the Horde. This was also teh last time the game didn't flagellate the Horde for being aggressive.

Garrosh and Sylvanas were eventually turned into morality plays and rejected by the Horde, but while I'm largely talking on a meta level, you have to remember that the biggest conflict with Garrosh was because of his racial policy, not because of war, and Garrosh himself often spoke of honor as did his followers - they simply had a very different understanding of it than the likes of Thrall. And when it comes to Sylvanas, her declaration of war is greeted with massive enthusiasm in the A Good War story and it's mentioned in the 8.2 datamined again that she commands the popularity of the people despite the leaders complaining.

[mysticx]

The entire storyline shouldn’t have happened. But now that it has, involving the Alliance in it (At least willingly, working side by side with them) comes at the detriment of the Horde.

While i understand the sentiment, WoW is a two-faction game, Blizz can’t just say “If you want to have any idea what’s going on with regards to half the expansion storyline, play Horde”, the whole “There are two factions, and things need to be broadly equal between them”-thing is becoming increasingly troublesome for the storyline development...

[Greengrim]

No worries about the english, I'll try and explain my point a bit more clearly.

You have to remember that the orcs were brainwashed thing only became a thing in WC3. In WC1 and WC2, so for about six years of the franchise's early existence, the orcs were just evil. This falls into said aggression. Aggression, proactivity and evil aren't the same thing. Proactivity just means wanting something and taking steps to get it. Say, the orcs wanted to take over the world in the first two games, so they did it. Thrall had to be told by Medivh to go do something. His end goal was to found Durotar and then live in peace and after that point the orcs were effectively done. A proactive faction, aggressive or otherwise is better, because it can trigger storylines and not just react to it. Thrall would, if left to his own devices, just sit around and you'd have no story unless a bad guy came in. Garrosh, Orgrim and so on were driven to take land for their people and this created conflict and thus a story.

But the orcs were only like that for two to six years between WC3, TFT and then Burning Crusade. In Wrath of the Lich King, the orcs are against aggressively pursuing a goal - the defeat of the Lich King and beginning to reject Thrall's ideology, as seen in stories like Glory about his decision to put the orcs in a desert and his conciliatory attitude towards the Alliance. At the same time, while the orcs were still passive, the new races introduced like the TBC-era blood elves and especially the Forsaken were also driven towards something, be it their need for mana or revenge and did not mesh with the Kalimdor-era Horde. They were intentional additions to enable variety and conflict because a passive Horde doesn't want anything and so it can't get into conflict. Cataclysm was the culmination of this trend, with the Horde in general being driven into a war to get at something - be it reclaiming Lordaeron for the Forsaken or being able to exist independently for the Horde. This was also teh last time the game didn't flagellate the Horde for being aggressive.

Garrosh and Sylvanas were eventually turned into morality plays and rejected by the Horde, but while I'm largely talking on a meta level, you have to remember that the biggest conflict with Garrosh was because of his racial policy, not because of war, and Garrosh himself often spoke of honor as did his followers - they simply had a very different understanding of it than the likes of Thrall. And when it comes to Sylvanas, her declaration of war is greeted with massive enthusiasm in the A Good War story and it's mentioned in the 8.2 datamined again that she commands the popularity of the people despite the leaders complaining.

Please correct me if I am wrong, but orcs were land-hungry only during Gul'dan's corrupted reign over them. After he and Medivh were dealt with the Horde lived in disorient and misery for a long period of time. That changed when Thrall became their warchief and started practicing the old orcish ways (since before Gul'dan). Taking them into the desert was his best decision, as they were finally left alone. They had their own lands and thus, the long-awaited freedom. They were short on wood, which created some minor conflicts with the night elf race to the north, but other than that, the Horde had nothing else to bother them, different than quillboars and desert scorpions. These were times of prosperity for the orcs. And after Thrall answered the ultimate call - to save the whole damn world by becoming the first mortal aspect - the Horde's honor was shoved into the ground by his most trusted: Garrosh. Thrall had forgiven him for so many things, and entrusted his beloved family to him, and that's how he was repaid.

Anyway, I understand the need for conflicts so that the story may remain interesting for the ones interested in it, but I disagree with the method. Breaking one faction while leaving the other intact is not the proper way, not to mention that it's not even fair. As a Horde supporter I am very much disappointed in this decision. I truly hope the alliance blondeboi is actually corrupted by the old gods and ends up screwing everything up, so that the alliance also becomes a bit tainted. Or at least let Thrall lead us again, so we may have a chance to redeem ourselves through serving him once more.

[cparle87]

Are you even reading what I’ve put?

Kill Sylvanas, by all means feel free to. It’s not hard, as Godfrey has shown in the past.

But don’t drag the Alliance into it. Don’t let the Alliance know about it. Don’t do things like setting Derek Proudmoore free for the benefit of the Alliance.

If the Alliance hadn’t got involved then the Sunreavers wouldn’t have shown up.

Firstly, the "keep the Alliance out of it" angle is completely unreasonable and impossible. SI:7 spies had a piece of azerite in Anduin's hand around the same time that Sylvanas was told about the stuff. They knew the Horde had Derek's body. Why do you think Jaina flipped out when she saw him, because she already had an idea half formed of what they could possibly do with him, and was right.

Yeah, freeing Derek helps the Alliance, but that's not the point. The point was Baine saw Sylvanas about to do something so sick and twisted that it violates the core principle that her own people, the Forsaken, hold dear: free will. Sylvanas saying she was going to do this was what the Culling of Stratholme was to Jaina. It showed them the point where loyalty to their superior reached its limit and they realized they couldn't follow them anymore.

Your whole argument pretty much boils down to "Don't create any lore about Alliance and Horde interacting peacefully, because all that means is Horde submitting to Alliance." And that is stupid.

Also, what do the Sunreavers have to do with any of this.

[Realitytrembles]

1. Wow, just because Golden miss-used the term "toxic masculinity" does not mean the term itself is a useless meme. It's a valid sociological term used to discuss how men can be pressured to engage in overly aggressive, emotionally repressive behavior. What are you people, rabid 4Chan right wingers?

2. WoW's lore itself is pretty messed up beyond repair. (massive retcons are needed imho) But the Horde's problem is not "Becoming a red Alliance" as brainless tribalists moan, it's repeatedly indulging in morally bankrupt instances of evil (Bombing Theramore, Burning Teldrassil) for asinine and contrived reasons and then trying to claw back into its once morally positive status. The question of "Is the Horde evil?" was answered in Warcraft 3, with a resounding "No." Yet Blizz feels compelled to ask this tired question again and again further undermining the original answer and the entire basis of the faction.

3. Warcraft was once pretty unique in its portrayal of usually evil fantasy monsters actually being intelligent and capable of moral complexity. A monstrously evil Horde reduces the quality of the Warcraft IP as a whole, as evil Warcraft Orcs, Trolls, and Minotaurs have nothing going for them compared with say, the Orcs and Goblins of Warhammer Fantasy.

1. "toxic masculinity" is right up there with mansplaining and so forth as bs PC brainwashing terms

agree on 2 & 3

[Aeula]

Also, what do the Sunreavers have to do with any of this.

Have you even looked at the 8.2 PTR datamining?

[Super Dickmann]

Please correct me if I am wrong, but orcs were land-hungry only during Gul'dan's corrupted reign over them. After he and Medivh were dealt with the Horde lived in disorient and misery for a long period of time. That changed when Thrall became their warchief and started practicing the old orcish ways (since before Gul'dan). Taking them into the desert was his best decision, as they were finally left alone. They had their own lands and thus, the long-awaited freedom. They were short on wood, which created some minor conflicts with the night elf race to the north, but other than that, the Horde had nothing else to bother them, different than quillboars and desert scorpions. These were times of prosperity for the orcs. And after Thrall answered the ultimate call - to save the whole damn world by becoming the first mortal aspect - the Horde's honor was shoved into the ground by his most trusted: Garrosh. Thrall had forgiven him for so many things, and entrusted his beloved family to him, and that's how he was repaid.

That is not the case. Thrall chose Durotar as a form of racial penance for the orcs, per the Shattering book. He thought the orcs deserved to suffer and a harsh land would give them the struggle they needed and presumably eventually the chance to go beyond that. At the same time, his people were starving and they were so dependent on night elven handouts for both wood and hunting rights in Ashenvale that without said Alliance support they would collapse. This was a result of his deliberate choice to put them in Durotar despite knowing and stating himself that there were other places. They were most definitely not times of prosperity. Thrall had dragged his people into the ground. Garrosh was the one to recognize this and to act in the orcs' racial interest after Varian declared war in Wrath of the Lich King.

Orcish honor is completely impenetrable once you set aside the Blood Oath of the Horde as Mists had us do. But the orcs were never peaceful. What was honorable in Draenor for instance was to kill weak children so as they did not drag the rest of the clan down, with only the Frostwolf abstaining from this. Or the slavery/sadomasochistic rituals of the Shattered Hand or the blood magic of the Bleeding Hollow. The orcs were a warlike people, but also divided hunter-gatherers. The Legion simply united them and stripped away their moral compunctions. But up until they sacked Shattrath they were not on demon blood and were still killing people willy-nilly. Thrall did not return the orcs to some unified prior culture as no such culture exists. What he did was combine the Frostwolf ethos with his human morality.

Anyway, I understand the need for conflicts so that the story may remain interesting for the ones interested in it, but I disagree with the method. Breaking one faction while leaving the other intact is not the proper way, not to mention that it's not even fair. As a Horde supporter I am very much disappointed in this decision. I truly hope the alliance blondeboi is actually corrupted by the old gods and ends up screwing everything up, so that the alliance also becomes a bit tainted. Or at least let Thrall lead us again, so we may have a chance to redeem ourselves through serving him once more.

I deeply disagree with the very last part. Thrall is part of the problem, not the solution. The very notion that the Horde is such an unsalvagable, wretched organisation that the only ray of hope for it is to be managed by someone with a foreign morality in service fo the other faction for whom a large virtue was racial guilt is untenable. The one good thing about Mists was that it set this aside and Vol'jin, despite being a meh character by himself and despite the immense damage done to the Horde, it at least replaced the overaching noblesavage thing Thrall had going with a wider appeal. Shamanism and tribalism by themselves cannot be the uniting characteristics of the Horde because a good half of it doesn't practice them. Honor as a uniting characteristic is meaningless because orcish honor is impenetrable nonsense that no one follows consistently. Thrall, Garrosh, Nazgrim and Saurfang all claimed honor while doing things completely contradictory from one another.

[Lodreh]

If 8.2 remains unchanged then the Horde is basically dead as far as I'm concerned.

The only hope for the faction at this point is to have all the leaders killed off. They're the ones dragging the Horde down,

The entire Horde cast needs to be rebuilt from the ground up without the baggage and Alliance sympathies present in 90% of the current Horde leadership.

Otherwise what's the point? Why play the fake Alliance when you can go play the real one and be closer to the boy king instead of his distant vassal?

We are suppose to have a definitive resolution to the Alliance vs Horde conflict by the end of BfA. I suspect the resolution with be... kill Sylvanas... nominate Anduin Wyrnn as Warchief. That brings all major races under one banner. Political bickering could become very Game of Thrones while each race tries to improve their perceived standings. Just a thought #AnduinforWarchief

[Greengrim]

That is not the case. Thrall chose Durotar as a form of racial penance for the orcs, per the Shattering book. He thought the orcs deserved to suffer and a harsh land would give them the struggle they needed and presumably eventually the chance to go beyond that. At the same time, his people were starving and they were so dependent on night elven handouts for both wood and hunting rights in Ashenvale that without said Alliance support they would collapse. This was a result of his deliberate choice to put them in Durotar despite knowing and stating himself that there were other places. They were most definitely not times of prosperity. Thrall had dragged his people into the ground. Garrosh was the one to recognize this and to act in the orcs' racial interest after Varian declared war in Wrath of the Lich King.

Orcish honor is completely impenetrable once you set aside the Blood Oath of the Horde as Mists had us do. But the orcs were never peaceful. What was honorable in Draenor for instance was to kill weak children so as they did not drag the rest of the clan down, with only the Frostwolf abstaining from this. Or the slavery/sadomasochistic rituals of the Shattered Hand or the blood magic of the Bleeding Hollow. The orcs were a warlike people, but also divided hunter-gatherers. The Legion simply united them and stripped away their moral compunctions. But up until they sacked Shattrath they were not on demon blood and were still killing people willy-nilly. Thrall did not return the orcs to some unified prior culture as no such culture exists. What he did was combine the Frostwolf ethos with his human morality.



I deeply disagree with the very last part. Thrall is part of the problem, not the solution. The very notion that the Horde is such an unsalvagable, wretched organisation that the only ray of hope for it is to be managed by someone with a foreign morality in service fo the other faction for whom a large virtue was racial guilt is untenable. The one good thing about Mists was that it set this aside and Vol'jin, despite being a meh character by himself and despite the immense damage done to the Horde, it at least replaced the overaching noblesavage thing Thrall had going with a wider appeal. Shamanism and tribalism by themselves cannot be the uniting characteristics of the Horde because a good half of it doesn't practice them. Honor as a uniting characteristic is meaningless because orcish honor is impenetrable nonsense that no one follows consistently. Thrall, Garrosh, Nazgrim and Saurfang all claimed honor while doing things completely contradictory from one another.

Whaaaaaaaaaaat?! Dude, from where do you have this info on Thrall?! None of the books or wiki mention such things, even remotely.

Thrall is a character who has been nurtured with pain and misery, hence him being enslaved as an infant. He grew up in chains and cages, and was constantly forced into ring fights. He knows this kind of suffering very well, and that is why he made the new Horde his family, and began to care for them after he was freed from Blackmoore. He was also the first orc shaman with whom the elements communed and lend their powers. Prior to Thrall the elements did not answer the calls of orcs due to their strong corruption by fel. That was a clear sign of true heart and leadership potential. He did not punish his people by creating Orgrimar in Durotar - he simply found them a place to be free on Azeroth (a world they are not originally from). He has always tried to solve all conflicts with honor and dimplomacy. As I mentioned sooner, he was even one step away from achieving true peace with the alliance at his meeting with Varian. They even discussed different tradables they could exchange, like exotic hides from orc side, and wood materials from human side. So even Varian saw that he was a true leader with whom he could potentially make peace. And as for the tribes you mention he never united, they are Draenor material, which means they date back since before Thrall was even born.

[Martymark]

Not all male behavior, and not all forms of masculinity, thus the "toxic" modifier.

That's not what Gillette told me!

[TheImperios]

That's not what Gillette told me!

Yes, because corporations that use slave labour to produce their goods are the poster boys of left-wing ideas! They are certainly true believers and are definitely not using the drama to get hype!

[Hubbl3]

Whaaaaaaaaaaat?! Dude, from where do you have this info on Thrall?! None of the books or wiki mention such things, even remotely.

It's in "The Shattering", page 45/46.

[TheFirstOnes]

If you're looking for symbols, just swap the blue here for red and you'll end up with the perfect representation of Thrall's, Baine's and Saurfang's Horde:

Except, their Horde was always the regular Horde symbol, so therefore this doesn't make sense.

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What the fuck does the "Horde" even mean or stand for anyways? Nothing logically binds this group of races together other than being Anti-Alliance. They are a flimsy excuse of a faction. A joke. They should rebrand themselves as "Anti- Alliance" cuz that's all they got going for them. Without that they are nothing. The Alliance is their sole motivation in anything. And therefore they will always be used as a foil for the Alliance and nothing else. Because they have nothing else.

"The Horde, a faction led by off-worlders and composed of outsiders has survived these obstacles by bonding together, fighting as family, comrades, or even uneasy allies."

Um...

[Super Dickmann]

Whaaaaaaaaaaat?! Dude, from where do you have this info on Thrall?! None of the books or wiki mention such things, even remotely.

Thrall is a character who has been nurtured with pain and misery, hence him being enslaved as an infant. He grew up in chains and cages, and was constantly forced into ring fights. He knows this kind of suffering very well, and that is why he made the new Horde his family, and began to care for them after he was freed from Blackmoore. He was also the first orc shaman with whom the elements communed and lend their powers. Prior to Thrall the elements did not answer the calls of orcs due to their strong corruption by fel. That was a clear sign of true heart and leadership potential. He did not punish his people by creating Orgrimar in Durotar - he simply found them a place to be free on Azeroth (a world they are not originally from). He has always tried to solve all conflicts with honor and dimplomacy. As I mentioned sooner, he was even one step away from achieving true peace with the alliance at his meeting with Varian. They even discussed different tradables they could exchange, like exotic hides from orc side, and wood materials from human side. So even Varian saw that he was a true leader with whom he could potentially make peace. And as for the tribes you mention he never united, they are Draenor material, which means they date back since before Thrall was even born.

Your view of Thrall is the intended one, but it's not the one we're actually shown in many materials. Blizzard is relying on what you state above even though that's not what they actually wrote in many instances.

The bit about racial guilt and Durotar being chosen deliberately for its inhospitability, that it was pushed to its very limit and reliant on night elven handouts is in the Shattering and admitted by Thrall. The constant famines are alluded to in Heart of War and in Glory, relative to the richness of the lands around them. These Wrath-Cata era stories. In the Shattering, as @Hubbl3 says, Thrall says the above in plain text and other orcs note it as well. Thrall similarly still had slavery as an active thing in the Horde, Varian's whole backstory and reason for disliking the Horde stems not only from the sack of Stormwind but also because he was a gladiatorial slave in Thrall's Horde, with said slaver, Rehgar being one of Thrall's main advisors.

Nor did Thrall successfully impose his view of what the orcs should be either on them or on the Horde at large. While the orcs had a high opinion of Thrall as a person, they were disillusioned with the results of his leadership - Shattering attests to this as does Wrath and it's why Garrosh was chosen - his strong personal popularity. When it comes to the Horde at large, Thrall had the Forsaken and blood elves as a bolt-on. This was the correct way the faction should work - orcs as a focus, the Eastern Horde as its own entity, but it also meant that he had a vastly more amoral group he had no influence on up until the Wrathgate. Varian also declared war on this ground as well, having seen the experiments the Forsaken were doing.

Thrall failed on virtually all levels as an actual statesman, though not as a visionary and the way it went with Varian was no different. Varian was the one to declare war and he'd already attacked the Forsaken fleet immediately prior in Howling Fjord. The peace summit was not going to result in a success and Varian was also the one to nab Honor's Stand in the Barrens well before Garrosh was even Warchief. Garrosh's war was one of survival and necessity because his people were incapable of surviving after the Shattering and not only were they already at war with the Alliance, but the night elves had cut all trade with them, which by Thrall's admission would result in the orcs' starvation.

These all make Thrall a very interesting character, but basing him as the end line of what the Horde should be is a grievous mistake and will only fuck this faction further beyond repair. Blizzard had a chance to avoid all this by having Saurfang pull a Doomhammer and off Sylvanas then be forced to stay in a war with an Alliance that was closer to its Vanilla to Cataclysm-era version, but it didn't. To shove everything the Horde has been for ten years and then six years prior to WC3 before that into the bin, while at the same time shuffling all of Thrall's personal responsibility for all that's happened to be ignored solely so we can pretend that it's 2002 and it's WC3 again despite the orcs and the extended Horde having changed heavily since then is the biggest narrative copout that they can do. Hence why it's virtually guaranteed.