Who would you say is the main faction of the story?

[TheramoreIsTheBomb]

Alliance
or
Horde?
I'd say the Horde is the main faction of the story with the Alliance as their side kicks.

[Wyrt]

The Alliance is the main, lawful retarded protagonist.

Horde is the main chaotic retarded villain.

[Danare]

From my standpoint I think both of them is the "main protagonist". But in most recent expansions, it is clear that Alliance is getting lot of favouritism from writers.
Burning Crusade: - Alliance and Horde fought against each other and together against Illidan. No clear winner in this.
Wrath of Lich King - Both of Alliance and Horde fought together (and against each other) and killed him. No clear winner in this.
Cataclysm: They fought against Deathwing and against each other and did not have clear winner.
Mists of Pandaria: They fought against Sha, but primarily against each other and in this one, Alliance came out top in Siege of Orgrimmar where they had chance to annihilate Horde leadership right there then.
Warlords of Draenor: They fought against each other and against the Iron Horde and Legion. There is no clear winner but they defeated Legion and Iron Horde.
Legion: The primary focus on this expansion was against the Legion, although the Alliance won against Slyvanas in foiling her plans. So I think in Legion, Alliance came out slightly top but not much.
Battle for Azeroth: Alliance. It is undeninable that in BFA expansion Alliance is the main protagonist. Horde suffered setback at every turn. They lost lot of War Campaign as Alliance was able to successfully conquer and kill Zuldalari's king before escaping. This was huge victory for Alliance as the Alliance did not have any grievous loss aside from gnome's king (and even then, the gnome's king didn't really die.) Then in later campaigns, Alliance was pretty much ahead of Horde and Horde was suffering from interfaction conflict (Saurfang vs Slyvanas) and that weakened Horde and Alliance managed to siege Orgrimmar *again* although it wasn't full-blown war but they successfully deposed a Warchief (again) and now Horde need to recover more than Alliance after loss of leadership and overall loss of war in BFA.

Who knows what will happens in Shadowlands. For most of expansion I consider Alliance and Horde as protagonists but in BFA... It is the Alliance.

[Soon-TM]

During the early days of WoW, there was no "main faction", things were actually pretty even story-wise. But since Cata onwards, it's like writers don't know anything other than have the Horde behave like a schizophrenic patient who's invariably cut down to size by Dr. Alliance.

Which also means that if someone in the Alliance has to take a beating to make it happen, it's ok - as long as it isn't Stormwind, aka Our Treasure.

[Arrashi]

Humans. Everything else is background noise.

[Wyrt]

Which also means that if someone in the Alliance has to take a beating to make it happen, it's ok - as long as it isn't Stormwind, aka Our Treasure.

It's almost always night elves who are beaten. And then their human masters deny them any form of justice by shoving a shitty peace deal down their throats which absolves the Horde of any wrong doing.

[Evaddon]

All the people of Azeroth, as they've been constantly telling us

[Irian]

Anyone who doesn't say Horde hasn't played BfA. Or MoP. Or WoD. Or cata. Or honestly any expansion in recent memory besides Legion.

The Horde is the poster child of WoW at this point and any story involving either of the factions usually revolves around what the Horde is doing, and the Alliance might react to it a bit.

Never forget the robot cat in MoP. I wasn't even playing Alliance and I was still pissed about that.

[Florena]

From my standpoint I think both of them is the "main protagonist". But in most recent expansions, it is clear that Alliance is getting lot of favouritism from writers.
Burning Crusade: - Alliance and Horde fought against each other and together against Illidan. No clear winner in this.
Wrath of Lich King - Both of Alliance and Horde fought together (and against each other) and killed him. No clear winner in this.
Cataclysm: They fought against Deathwing and against each other and did not have clear winner.
Mists of Pandaria: They fought against Sha, but primarily against each other and in this one, Alliance came out top in Siege of Orgrimmar where they had chance to annihilate Horde leadership right there then.
Warlords of Draenor: They fought against each other and against the Iron Horde and Legion. There is no clear winner but they defeated Legion and Iron Horde.
Legion: The primary focus on this expansion was against the Legion, although the Alliance won against Slyvanas in foiling her plans. So I think in Legion, Alliance came out slightly top but not much.
Battle for Azeroth: Alliance. It is undeninable that in BFA expansion Alliance is the main protagonist. Horde suffered setback at every turn. They lost lot of War Campaign as Alliance was able to successfully conquer and kill Zuldalari's king before escaping. This was huge victory for Alliance as the Alliance did not have any grievous loss aside from gnome's king (and even then, the gnome's king didn't really die.) Then in later campaigns, Alliance was pretty much ahead of Horde and Horde was suffering from interfaction conflict (Saurfang vs Slyvanas) and that weakened Horde and Alliance managed to siege Orgrimmar *again* although it wasn't full-blown war but they successfully deposed a Warchief (again) and now Horde need to recover more than Alliance after loss of leadership and overall loss of war in BFA.

Who knows what will happens in Shadowlands. For most of expansion I consider Alliance and Horde as protagonists but in BFA... It is the Alliance.

I would say:

BC: Pretty even, but with a slight bias toward the Horde in the Sunwell ending. Velen plays a part but it's much more important for the blood elf story (horde) than alliance.

Wrath: Pretty even actually because the alliance and horde kind of stop being important after the wrathgate and undercity battle. The argent crusade, neutral goody goodies, and the ebon blade, vengeful undead with vendetta against lich king, take the place of what could have been alliance and forsaken roles, rendering the factions to background players mostly. In theory, this could have easily been a horde expansion because the forsaken and blood elves were most impacted by the Scourge invasion in WC 3. But instead neutral figures take up the lead after the expansion's first 'act. '

Cataclysm kind of depends on if you can divorce Thrall from the Horde or not. It definitely felt like in terms of quest content though, the alliance kind of got the short end in some places due to running out of time. Datamined info suggests there was intially going to be a boat intro scenario mirroring the zepelin ride for horde, and the alliance base in Twilight Highlands never gets 'finished' like the horde one, and some issues in other zones. Thrall is technically neutral here, but he was also 'the' central horde character sine WC 3 so it's a bit hard to separate him from that past here. And he steals away some confrontations (Benedictus, Fandral) that could have been better spent with alliance characters with actual ties to these charactesr. Once again, datamining showed that Benedictus' betrayal was supposed to play out with Varian but got scrapped for time and his audio reused with Thrall in the hour of twilight dungeon. I'd say Cata ends up leaning horde to a degree but largely due to that being where the chips fell during crunch rather than design.

MOP: Oh boy. This was a messy one. The alliance 'wins' but it's ultimate a hollow and meaningless victory in the long run. And the Alliance got jipped in the barrens patch compared to the horde. I think very few people on either side came out of this satisfied. Alliance fans generally wanted to do more than wag our fingers at the horde and march out, rebels generally didn't want alliance help dealing with Garrosh, and garrosh fans, well, wanted to side with Garrosh. I call this an all around flop.

WOD: I see arguements going both ways. You overall get a lot more orc lore fleshed out than draenei, who are limited to one zone and part of another, but on the other hand, you spend a lot of the expansion killing horde characters from WC 2. I'm going to tip this toward the alliance though because Khadgar and kirin tor are technically alliance here.

Legion: I think the involvement of the Draenei in the latter patch tip this toward alliance where you didn't really have major horde characters involved past the nightborne stuff, and the NB themselves didn't join the horde until the end of the expansion. Plus a lot of night elf history here. I'd say alliance leaning easy.

BFA: A copy of mop but with Sylvanas poofing before siege of org 2. Honestly feels like it's more about setting up Sylvanas for Shadowlands than in actually telling a story about the factions.

[Dellis0991]

The Alliance.

[Maxilian]

From my standpoint I think both of them is the "main protagonist". But in most recent expansions, it is clear that Alliance is getting lot of favouritism from writers.
Burning Crusade: - Alliance and Horde fought against each other and together against Illidan. No clear winner in this.
Wrath of Lich King - Both of Alliance and Horde fought together (and against each other) and killed him. No clear winner in this.
Cataclysm: They fought against Deathwing and against each other and did not have clear winner.
Mists of Pandaria: They fought against Sha, but primarily against each other and in this one, Alliance came out top in Siege of Orgrimmar where they had chance to annihilate Horde leadership right there then.
Warlords of Draenor: They fought against each other and against the Iron Horde and Legion. There is no clear winner but they defeated Legion and Iron Horde.
Legion: The primary focus on this expansion was against the Legion, although the Alliance won against Slyvanas in foiling her plans. So I think in Legion, Alliance came out slightly top but not much.
Battle for Azeroth: Alliance. It is undeninable that in BFA expansion Alliance is the main protagonist. Horde suffered setback at every turn. They lost lot of War Campaign as Alliance was able to successfully conquer and kill Zuldalari's king before escaping. This was huge victory for Alliance as the Alliance did not have any grievous loss aside from gnome's king (and even then, the gnome's king didn't really die.) Then in later campaigns, Alliance was pretty much ahead of Horde and Horde was suffering from interfaction conflict (Saurfang vs Slyvanas) and that weakened Horde and Alliance managed to siege Orgrimmar *again* although it wasn't full-blown war but they successfully deposed a Warchief (again) and now Horde need to recover more than Alliance after loss of leadership and overall loss of war in BFA.

Who knows what will happens in Shadowlands. For most of expansion I consider Alliance and Horde as protagonists but in BFA... It is the Alliance.

I wouldn't say the the Alliance its getting favoritism, i think that they find the Horde more interesting to write, so they write a lot of stuff about it, but they still have in mind that "The Alliance are the good guys and they win in the end"

Though i do agree that the Alliance loss the less but it is never done much with what they win (IMHO the main problem with the Alliance)

[Razion]

So far, the Alliance wins all the wars. But I'd be lying if I didn't say it felt like the Horde's story a lot of the time.
It feels kind of appropriate that an underdog story would be more epic, and the Alliance hasn't been outgunned to the extent of the opening of the Dark Portal in a long time.

If there's a cheat answer, I think the game ends with Sargeras, and probably the hand-holding kind.
I don't think we're heading towards a one faction kills him for the glory and the win sort of end.

[McNeil]

Horde has had the most development by far ever since they passed trough the Dark Portal. Most of the good human lore has been set in Lordaeron who were never really part of the Alliance of Stormwind, and their nation didn't even do anything in WC3. You also see Horde leaders do a lot more compared to Alliance, which comes with a lot of fuck ups to the point that we had to siege their own capital nearly twice. The Forsaken has also played a huge part with how much screentime Sylvanas has been given.

[Seylene]

It's clearly the Hordes story, which is the annoying part. Alliance seems to exist as the backdrop of the world that the Horde interact with/assault. Its like watching a Conan style story no one wants to talk about the kings and people that he wanders through its only whatever he interacts with and brings down and how these affect him(Horde).

[gaymer77]

Contrary to what the Alliance fanbois think, the game for the most part is Alliance favored. @Danare got it right in his breakdown of each expansion but I'll go one step further. Each time the Horde & Alliance team up, the leaders are some how tied to the Alliance (be it currently, previously, or in later expansions). Hell in MOP the Alliance not only put on a full scale attack of the Horde capital city but before doing so teamed up with one of the Horde leaders to help organize the coup. Then in BFA you have the Alliance invading a Horde-friendly faction and killing their leader. Not once but TWICE has the Alliance invaded "Horde cities" and sought to kill their leader. Yes the Alliance fanbois say how the writing is Horde-centric but take a look at the reality here. The game is written from a perspective that the Alliance are good and the Horde are bad. I live for the day that Blizzard makes the Alliance do something bad (or "morally gray" as they like to say) and the "good guys" are the Horde who have to invade an Alliance city and kill/dethrone one of its leaders. I'm calling it now, it will be the best expansion in WoW's history if/when this happens.

[Arrashi]

Horde has had the most development by far ever since they passed trough the Dark Portal. Most of the good human lore has been set in Lordaeron who were never really part of the Alliance of Stormwind, and their nation didn't even do anything in WC3. You also see Horde leaders do a lot more compared to Alliance, which comes with a lot of fuck ups to the point that we had to siege their own capital nearly twice. The Forsaken has also played a huge part with how much screentime Sylvanas has been given.

Especially when it comes to dying.

[Kyphael]

Alliance, obviously. The only time Horde even got close to being the hero faction was Cataclysm, and Blizzard made sure Thrall went out of his way to give up the mantle of Warchief to become "a WORLD shaman." Meaning he was representing all of Azeroth, not The Horde.

When Tirion Fordring defeated Arthas, he was still pretty much an Alliance character, even if he was collaborating with The Horde.

In Mists of Pandaria, The Alliance had to come in and curb stomp Garrosh for The Horde. The Alliance were the clear heroes who took down an evil Horde Warchief.

In Legion, Turalyon, Alleria, and Khadgar were all clearly Alliance in the campaign against The Legion, they never forsake their ties. Only Illidan was neutral. The Horde was nowhere to be found in the story after Varian died.

BfA? Sylvanas and the Horde were portrayed as antagonists and aggressors all expansion long until the other Horde leaders but Gallywix all left Sylvanas one by one. Saurfang was arguably the hero, but he represented a Horde splintered by two ideals. Hardly anything to be proud of if not the whole Horde was celebrating, only half, while the other sulked not because they thought they were wrong, but because their Warchief abandoned them.

So The Horde has never been the hero faction in WoW, ever. Last time they were was in Warcraft III when Grom planted his ax in Mannoroth's face.

[Nathasil]

Horde has had the most development by far ever since they passed trough the Dark Portal. Most of the good human lore has been set in Lordaeron who were never really part of the Alliance of Stormwind, and their nation didn't even do anything in WC3. You also see Horde leaders do a lot more compared to Alliance, which comes with a lot of fuck ups to the point that we had to siege their own capital nearly twice. The Forsaken has also played a huge part with how much screentime Sylvanas has been given.

Exactly. And the Horde was not only handed the Lordaeron lore, they were also given the Quel'thalas lore as well. So basically everything Alliance was shoved into the Horde. Remember, Stormwind did not exist in WC2, which was the last game before WoW to feature factions (WC3 did not have them at all). So what makes the Alliance today is the short races of WC2 that nobody ever liked, the WC1 Humans that nobody ever gave a fuck about and the Night Elves, who never belonged into the Alliance to begin with. And even with the Night Elves, everything that happened before the WotA is now lore that also Horde races will claim for them.

If you give everything of your franchise that players have any remote interest in to one of your two factions while using the other as your NPC-Background and trash-can for ideas that you (the developers) did not like yourself and don't want to bother with in the future....you get exactly where WoW is today.

I would not say that "The Horde" faired a lot better though, and by Horde i meant he faction that actually earned that name and stood for something....what is called "The Horde" in WoW today is a strange conglomeration of pacifist Tauren, funny Fox people, Undead Humans and lots and lots of Sissy Elves afraid to get dirty. That is not "The Horde"...it's not even a faction, It's just a strage something that stands for nothing and will (obviously!) follow an undead warlord that hates life and hope into a genocidal war without any questions.

Blizzard has managed to destroy both factions. The Horde simply has not realised it yet, because they get showered with goodies a lot.

As for the question in the OP: WoW is not a game about the factions. It's a game about the world. About Azeroth. The factions are completely meaningless to her....and also to our own characters if you care to read quest-texts. The main protagonist of WoW is Azeroth herself. The factions are just there for the sake of making the game worse for everybody.

[tromage2]

Horde, Alliance are just the basic fantasy goodie goodie guys to fit that role when the story needs it.
That is why the Horde storyline is interesting and something new, and why Alliance comes out flat and a cluster of races you can pull out of any other fantasy book.

[ravenmoon]

From my standpoint I think both of them is the "main protagonist". But in most recent expansions, it is clear that Alliance is getting lot of favouritism from writers.
Burning Crusade: - Alliance and Horde fought against each other and together against Illidan. No clear winner in this.
Wrath of Lich King - Both of Alliance and Horde fought together (and against each other) and killed him. No clear winner in this.
Cataclysm: They fought against Deathwing and against each other and did not have clear winner.
Mists of Pandaria: They fought against Sha, but primarily against each other and in this one, Alliance came out top in Siege of Orgrimmar where they had chance to annihilate Horde leadership right there then.
Warlords of Draenor: They fought against each other and against the Iron Horde and Legion. There is no clear winner but they defeated Legion and Iron Horde.
Legion: The primary focus on this expansion was against the Legion, although the Alliance won against Slyvanas in foiling her plans. So I think in Legion, Alliance came out slightly top but not much.
Battle for Azeroth: Alliance. It is undeninable that in BFA expansion Alliance is the main protagonist. Horde suffered setback at every turn. They lost lot of War Campaign as Alliance was able to successfully conquer and kill Zuldalari's king before escaping. This was huge victory for Alliance as the Alliance did not have any grievous loss aside from gnome's king (and even then, the gnome's king didn't really die.) Then in later campaigns, Alliance was pretty much ahead of Horde and Horde was suffering from interfaction conflict (Saurfang vs Slyvanas) and that weakened Horde and Alliance managed to siege Orgrimmar *again* although it wasn't full-blown war but they successfully deposed a Warchief (again) and now Horde need to recover more than Alliance after loss of leadership and overall loss of war in BFA.

Who knows what will happens in Shadowlands. For most of expansion I consider Alliance and Horde as protagonists but in BFA... It is the Alliance.

The horde having a villainous sterak doesn't mean alliance favouritsm, or if you haven't noticed, "bad boy" is quite popular, and edgy is how most people want it.

You judge by who the centre and focus of the story is whether it's as a good guy or bad guy, and the alliance and it's races are not the centre nor foocus of the majority of major events or the actions of the factions whether they win or lose or whether they are being good or bad.

Tbh, most people who think the alliance is been shown favouritsm is simply because they judge that based on whether you do good or bad. Warchiefs going evil and being killed is considered favoritsm, to the alliance, which is silly becuase the allinace is rather inconsequential in most of these, target practice for the horde, or the set up for which the horde's problems and challenges are brought out more. It's about the horde really.

THat's just my opinion though, take it or leave it.