The big bad of the expansion: N'Zoth VS The Horde

[Kithelle]

Literally said the genocide was evil and a mark against the Horde on the list of naming them as villains(including teledrasil in with that).

Ruins of Lordeaon was a brilliant retreating manoeuvre which if not for the intervention by Jania would have been even more devastating to the Allaince. Hardly evil.

Scorched earth is also vaild and had been used in war since forever. Hardly evil.

I haven't leveled a alliance character so dont know alot about the burning of that village. But Kul Tirans were aiding the allaince in the island expedition so maybe they arent neutral at that point? Regardless not great.

Death Knights use undead all the time. So that also counts against the allaince.

Not really
She was killing her own people as well because she didn't care...most civilized states would end a General who did that
It's a barbaric tactic that in the last 100 years was banned by the Geneva Convention
Not really...they were very neutral as the Alliance had barely even begun to help the Kul Tiran with the problems among the various houses
Even Death Knights don't kill their own to raise them as Undead...

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She killed them, her own people to use them as a diversion...if they were already dead that would be one thing, but they weren't even dead.

In case you didn't notice in the last cinematic she basically told everyone to piss off, even left her most loyal high and dry...you think she cares about a few Forsaken Night Elves? They were left in their own confusion and literally had nowhere to go but to Calia.

[Lolites]

In case you didn't notice in the last cinematic she basically told everyone to piss off, even left her most loyal high and dry...you think she cares about a few Forsaken Night Elves? They were left in their own confusion and literally had nowhere to go but to Calia.

well if they were brainwashed they would go with her even after telling them they are nothing... and before that they would help her defend orgrimmar? yet none was there...

[Sondrelk]

Sylvanas' Horde is definitely what hsould have been teh final villain. Explaining the plot of BfA is almost exactly like if Legion took place at the end of MoP instead of having SoO. Or Cataclysm being the final patch of ICC instead of actually fighting Arthas.
You can talk as much as you want about how N'zoth was the true overarching villain, but until i see someone definitively link Sylvanas burning down Teldrassil in a supposed war for Azerite with N'zoth i will continue to call bullshit. N'zoth has nothing in common with the Faction war themes present in all parts of BfA up until 8.3.

Even making Shadowlands the final patch of BfA would have made more sense and tied in better thematically considering sylvanas' obsession with death and how many people died during the War.

[Aucald]

To be fair, I am pretty sure that as a member of the alliance I have a much bigger chance of survival in a world ruled by N'zoth as one of his servants than I have in a world ruled by the horde.
Sure, most likely I would die in both worlds, but if I had to chose, I know which one I would take.

You have almost zero chance of survival in a world ruled by N'Zoth. Either you'd be killed by the legions of Faceless and K'thir, or you'd be driven insane and warped into K'thir yourself in which you could say you "survived" but you would no longer be you, so it would be a rather pointless form of survival. If I were a member of the Alliance in the fantasy context of WoW, I'd probably prefer to die cleanly at the hands of an otherwise normal enemy as opposed to torture, death, and/or possible eternal corruption at the hands of the Black Empire and N'Zoth. YMMV, of course.

[Varodoc]

Remember when expansions had one big bad you would work up to in an epic showdown? Good times.

These bait and switch ones just aren't doing it for me.

So like TBC and Cataclysm?

The only expansion that really fits that criteria is WotLK, where the main villain was both established from the beginning and led to an amazing final showdown.

[alt-ithist]

These are all the same point. You tried to make it 3, but it's only a singular point.
.

It may have been done in a single campaign but we killed the people, burn down their capital city and plagued south shore after we rampaged through ashenvale. Can definitely count as more then one point.

[Kyphael]

So like TBC and Cataclysm?

The only expansion that really fits that criteria is WotLK, where the main villain was both established from the beginning and led to an amazing final showdown.

Cataclysm too. Deathwing was the main villain both established from beginning and final showdown.

Please don't mention Ruby Sanctum, people don't even remember the name of the dragon there. I'd consider that more a preview or pre-patch for Cataclysm than a final Wrath boss after Arthas. Wrath's story ended in ICC.

[omeomorfismo]

So like TBC and Cataclysm?

The only expansion that really fits that criteria is WotLK, where the main villain was both established from the beginning and led to an amazing final showdown.

"WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH WITH THE POWER OF ASSPULLED DEUS EX MACHINAS ILL SLAY YOU!"
i mean, from a velf fan its strange read praises about something that only a holy light fan could find acceptable

[Varodoc]

Cataclysm too. Deathwing was the main villain both established from beginning and final showdown.

Please don't mention Ruby Sanctum, people don't even remember the name of the dragon there. I'd consider that more a preview or pre-patch for Cataclysm than a final Wrath boss after Arthas. Wrath's story ended in ICC.

You omitted an important key word, "amazing". The showdown with Deathwing was not amazing.

[Kyphael]

You omitted an important key word, "amazing". The showdown with Deathwing was not amazing.

Oh, yeah that. True.

[allawyn]

That is actually an interesting factor, because also as alliance you do not feel faction pride, since you are a bully victim that can not stand up for itself and gets pushed around all the time. Nothing to be proud of here.

I understand that they didn't like the BfA plot either. But if I come back for Shadowlands, I will play Alliance. The problems with Horde are now fundamental and permanent and go beyond BfA.

The problem in the Alliance plot was, IMO, also a result of the "villain bat". A typical plot for Blizzard is to have villain strike a great blow that sends the Heroes reeling. The plucky heroes then pull themselves up the be bootstraps and overcome. I don't think they realized how much Alliance would hate Teldrasil and how they couldn't have total defeat of the villains when they are a playable faction, as is usual for their plots.

The bottom line is that now the Horde will always be the bad guys (Saurfang literally equated the current Horde with the one under the Legion.) and the Alliance will always be the protagonist. Neutral content will continue to be centered on Alliance lore. At some point the Alliance will get their defeat over Sylvanas and the Horde will still be to blame for everything. For players that care about lore, playing Horde will suck for a long time now.

[LemonDemonGirl]

Rip Rastakhan btw

Yeah, that was done by the Alliance. Jaina should've died too imho

[Zyky]

It may have been done in a single campaign but we killed the people, burn down their capital city and plagued south shore after we rampaged through ashenvale. Can definitely count as more then one point.

It doesn't though, it's all the same event. Also everyone acting like this is such a huge controversy, this is how war works, how do you think the middle east is? There are literally bombs blowing up civilians and militia at the same time. It's war, it's an unfortunate truth, but still the truth.

[lockybalboa]

And at the end of it all the fucking Hordies and Sylvanas didn't even get their proper comeuppance. All Tyrande did was kill a few minions and yell "WE ARE AVENGED" Fuck this Horde bias bullshit. OH I forgot Ion plays Horde and so do Metzen and most of the devs. It is a company culture to shit on Alliance.

[alt-ithist]

And at the end of it all the fucking Hordies and Sylvanas didn't even get their proper comeuppance. All Tyrande did was kill a few minions and yell "WE ARE AVENGED" Fuck this Horde bias bullshit. OH I forgot Ion plays Horde and so do Metzen and most of the devs. It is a company culture to shit on Alliance.

Tyrande gave herself black eyes before the Horde could... she denied us the satisfaction of beating her down and giving her a couple shiners. There’s her revenge.

/I Kidd, don’t hurt me.

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Yeah, that was done by the Alliance. Jaina should've died too imho

Proper trade off for Rastakhan would’ve been Jaina’s mom, not Jaina herself.

[Swnem]

So like TBC and Cataclysm?

The only expansion that really fits that criteria is WotLK, where the main villain was both established from the beginning and led to an amazing final showdown.

Tbc, wrath, cata.

[SinR]

The REAL bad guy was the writers that dropped the ball on 10+ years of setup in the name of shoving Faction War down my throat like its Prom Night all over again

[Darkeon]

Story was too poorly written to even consider N'Zoth the threat it should have been.

[Varodoc]

Tbc, wrath, cata.

TBC ---> No. Illidan was established as the final encounter of the expansion originally, but in the end it was Kil'jaeden because they had to make the expansion longer to keep people busy until Wrath.

Cataclysm ---> No. The showdown with Deathwing was not amazing, it was underwhelming given the amount of effort that went into developing this villain.

[chiddie]

Exactly as designed by Kil'Jaeden and demanded by the fans. Witness the outrage over losing the Warchief position.

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Do you mean reshaping the classic world ala Cata? I'd suggest instead they copy paste the classic world to another continent server like any expansion, and then do the editing. Have the players able to portal between "the past" (classic world) and Azeroth Goth Edition. Later on, in WoW: The Search for More Money, players could visit that dark and terrible time when the Black Empire arose again but was defeated by the ragtag resistance.

I don’t mean only the Classic zones, I mean ALL the zones, excluding maybe the Draenor of Burning Crusade and WoD. Would be quite the task.

But I agree that an expansion in which both factions “lose” to something would be a nice and interesting variation.