How should Blizz Balance the Horde and Forsaken?

[Maljinwo]

That is why I want to have the Black Bride and Mortuus to have their due since they are a very important part of Forsaken culture as well.

2 characters with 5 minute appearances are important part of forsaken culture?

The Black bride literaly has no dialogue outside of a 'hey, lets pvp on Arathi' and Mortuus is barely a thing that appeared on 2 quests and is based on a youtuber's character

Wow. Such culture. Much important

[tromage2]

Wonder how many of the Forsaken playerbase are left in this game.
Think most stopped playing long ago when they started to destroy the faction.

Next to that with Sylvanas gone and no source of new limbs and flesh the forsaken should rot away in a few years.
So i guess the faction is just here for gameplay reasons but lore-wise this faction will be gone soon.

[Skytotem]

Do we have examples of it doing so?

Burden of proof is on you claiming they can't. Unless you can demonstrate that Arthas raised every single free willed undead by hand then you don't have a leg to stand on bud.

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I fell in love with the maniacs. People like Calia were not a thing until Before the Storm came out. The Forsaken identity was set in stone at that point. And I fight to get that back. That is why I want to have the Black Bride and Mortuus to have their due since they are a very important part of Forsaken culture as well. Being the Grand Executor comes with priviliges.

Mortuus is literally just a reference to the Oxhorn videos, and given Oxhorn went off the deep end... I don't think we're gonna see more of him.

[Cynical Asshole]

The Forsaken are often too evil to really mesh with the more honorable main core of the Horde (Orcs, Tauren, Trolls), while Calia the new head of their council is too 'good' to satisfy most of the Forsaken fanbase.

So how can blizz satisfy the Forsaken playerbase?

Whar do you mean?! The same way they justified Garrosh's True Horde, the Horde massacring that town in BFA, the burning of Teldrassil:

"NOT ALL HORDE ARE BAD...."

Mod Edit: Don't use giant fonts in this fashion.

[Powerogue]

I'm curious that it seems a lot of people seem to regard war with the Alliance as the only way for the Forsaken to have their old vibe

I think what people are really not wanting to accept is that the Forsaken are now a cult without a cult leader, and that is a massive shift in who they are. The justification for Sylvanas dragging more of them into this cursed existence was always the war. The war that is now over.

The question isn't just what they do with their newfound freedom from Sylvanas's lies and manipulation, but what they even are now looking to the future. The "vibe" will not, cannot ever be the same again. I pointed out how this, far from depriving Forsaken RPers of interesting story potential going forward, it opens the gates to new things that wouldn't have been possible before, but will fundamentally change what we see as "The Forsaken identity."

Again, I think the best way moving forward with this is a Forsaken heritage armor questline to really dig into this and help the Forsaken "find themselves" again. Because the war with the Alliance is over, and Sylvanas isn't coming back any time soon.

For me at least on my forsaken DK, the loyalist BFA questline and return to Lordaeron post-SL were some of the best Forsaken story I had seen specifically because we were doing something different.

Morbidly fun as it may be to farm humans in Hillsbrad Foothills. In those stories I always kind of disassociated from the carnage because it's obviously not something I would do. But then taking that questionable Sylvanas loyalty even after rescuing a death knight that I watched her imprison and bringing it into BFA with it being an actual choice it really hit home that my character was a part of something terrible as I wandered the barren streets of Orgrimmar recruiting the last of the civilians to die for Sylvanas and dragged one of the last good orcs left in the city through it in chains.

Going through all that, the character I had made almost as a joke of "I would have to be a forsaken death knight who had their brain caved in three times but kept being rezzed anyway to still be following Sylvanas at this point" wound up being the one I felt the most connected to. It made me want Sylvanas brought to justice more than ever.

To then all the stuff with Calia? I was so baffled with her inclusion into the Forsaken at first I thought it would've been better if Voss straight up killed her. But they made that work too. It's different, but recognizing and appreciating what the Forsaken were is not exclusive with watching their story develop in new directions.

[Alanar]

Sylvanas can't be replaced by B-Tier Characters. Her role on Forsaken society was far too crucial. Just give the job to the nine living members of the old desolate council who got rejected by their relatives and are still full of spite. Or replace Calia with the Black Bride and Mortuus. That way the fanbase can feel properly represented without losing their identity to humanizing and becoming generic.
.

The problem was always that the only role of the forsaken was sylvanas. We later found out she sought out ways to procreate, but even that turned out to be just about her. I do miss the old dark lady and it sucked she didnt care for the forsaken in the end. They failed her story, but thats another topic.

The forsaken literally need their OWN story and the council is helping with that to give all forsaken type they repressent a voice. Isnt that a good thing?

I dont care so much about Calia, she doesnt mean harm and is there to help the forsaken. Sure her lightforged form is a bit off and it sucks this didnt happen IN game, but outside that.. I dont even know what to hate? Is it her hair color?

[Aucald]

I dont care so much about Calia, she doesnt mean harm and is there to help the forsaken. Sure her lightforged form is a bit off and it sucks this didnt happen IN game, but outside that.. I dont even know what to hate? Is it her hair color?

See, for that, you'd need a crash course in the concept of Horde Purism - the doctrine that holds that any Horde NPC that has ever been in a non-violent encounter with any Alliance NPC is completely and ineluctably tainted by them, forever tarnished and incapable of being truly part of the Horde. Calia, having had peaceful relations with Anduin, Jaina, and Derek is for all intents and purposes an Alliance NPC masquerading as a Horde one - no matter what her stated or demonstrated intent is, she is forever marred by her association. The same is true for Baine, Lor'themar, Thrall, Thalyssra, and anyone else who has ever had a conversation, written a letter, spoken a kind word, or even had a non-violent conversation with an Alliance member. This taint is referred to by many names, of course: Blandiunism, the Blue Fever, the Blue Pox, ADS, and so on but it all stems from the ultra-paranoid notion that Alliance sympathy is somehow pathological in its nature - a virus that destroys all is good and true (and Horde). Thus, the only suitable leaders for *any* Horde faction must be someone utterly committed to the cause of war with the Alliance, and the more genocidal they happen to be about it the better.

[Super Dickmann]

I dont care so much about Calia, she doesnt mean harm and is there to help the forsaken. Sure her lightforged form is a bit off and it sucks this didnt happen IN game, but outside that.. I dont even know what to hate? Is it her hair color?

Her lightforged form isn't 'a bit off' it's antithetical to the undead curse, because it's a) Chosen b) has no downsides, it's functional immortality. In addition, it nullifies the Forsaken's relationship with the Light because she's not at odds to it. The entire point of no longer being able to find refuge or associate with the transcendent power you found solace in without massive downsides doesn't exist for her. Nor does being rejected or being unable to cohabit with humans. She lives with them for 99% of her existence as a character, works as their agent in the Gathering, chooses to leave Kul Tiras with an equally accepted Derek out of solidarity and so forth. She fails in every aspect that comprises the core of Forsaken identity.

But even that's not the reason she's so loathed. It's because she's tied to the most damaging set of retcons to ever touch the race from BTS and BFA, where the Forsaken were turned into a comical police state and Lordaeronian nationalism was considered taboo in complete contravention to the entirety of their Cataclysm and Vanilla experience, separating the Forsaken from their ongoing leader and making Anduin better understand them within a one hour conversation. Only to then, within 8.3 have them completely collapse as a state after mustering zero opposition and ability to take over their own state when they were previously the race who most often turned on their leader for not being radical enough and instead have to be saved by Calia who takes up these pitiful sadsacks under her wing and saves them from their own ineptitude. She does this purely out of solidarity as, once again, she wasn't rejected by anyone and lost nothing and is ontologically different from them. The transhumanism and refurbished Lordaeronian nationalism that was shifted to match their undeath was turned into 'tirelessly working to protect the living', turning the race into martyrs for the causes of others who desperately wish they were human. All characters who participated in prior Forsaken stories were all but removed from relevant story roles to be replaced by Calia's fuckbuddy and either disposable sockpuppets who exist to solely to die (Zelling) or characters refurbished to entry into the Forsaken off-screen (Voss).

The reason this has lessened is that the entire second paragraph is basically off. The Sylvanas book effectively binned BTS and the Forsaken societal retcons that destroyed the race and 9.2.5 binned 8.3 and the entire bit about the Forsaken's inaction and Calia being their messiah figure along with any association with the Council. In BTS to Shadows Rising, the race with the most active polity was completely changed and then sacrificed on an altar to this insufferable Anduin clone who then arrived to save them out of pity, in 9.2.5 all of this is removed and Calia is treated as a newcomer who has to prove herself to those same Forsaken who were doing just fine without her. The questline still ends with a Forsaken worse than they were in Cataclysm in all aspects, but it does leave the race in about as good a place as a Calia inclusion could possibly go.

The entire first paragraph however still applies. Calia is still entirely off-base from the race and unlike how Cataclysm treated the Forsaken raison d'etre being removed by acknowledging it and working off of it, the questline busies itself with showing how 'no, really, she's just like them' despite this patently not being the case. Until a story actually works off of the societal reaction to Calia's state, being emulation (Forsaken paladins, flagellants, imitators etc.) or rejection (self-explanatory), she will continue to be a sore on the race, just a less prominent one than she would otherwise have been.

[Skytotem]

See, for that, you'd need a crash course in the concept of Horde Purism - the doctrine that holds that any Horde NPC that has ever been in a non-violent encounter with any Alliance NPC is completely and ineluctably tainted by them, forever tarnished and incapable of being truly part of the Horde. Calia, having had peaceful relations with Anduin, Jaina, and Derek is for all intents and purposes an Alliance NPC masquerading as a Horde one - no matter what her stated or demonstrated intent is, she is forever marred by her association. The same is true for Baine, Lor'themar, Thrall, Thalyssra, and anyone else who has ever had a conversation, written a letter, spoken a kind word, or even had a non-violent conversation with an Alliance member. This taint is referred to by many names, of course: Blandiunism, the Blue Fever, the Blue Pox, ADS, and so on but it all stems from the ultra-paranoid notion that Alliance sympathy is somehow pathological in its nature - a virus that destroys all is good and true (and Horde). Thus, the only suitable leaders for *any* Horde faction must be someone utterly committed to the cause of war with the Alliance, and the more genocidal they happen to be about it the better.

I think this is an incredibly uncharitable take on some very legitimate grievances folks have with Calia, Baine, and the Horde narrative overall.

To answer @Alanar properly folks don't like Calia for a few reasons.

1. She's an Unknown. Her initial appearance was in the Priest campaign of legion, and in the BTS novel. So if you weren't a priest in Legion and didn't buy the novel, she literally came out of nowhere for a lot of folks and people weren't clear why this Light-based person is even in the running, much less the fact that...

2. She's arthas's sister. Even if the Menethil line was well liked before Arthas went crazy, I don't think it's a popular move among the playerbase and would be divisive at best, moreover there are questions on...

3. Her actual qualifications, she would've been pretty young and inexperienced when she went missing.

4. Circling back to Aucald's point she was basically a character that the Alliance had wanted for awhile, very vocally on story forums and other places, to come back as a symbol of reclaiming Lordaeron, and a chunk of Horde/Forsaken players were a fan of this because they were hoping that with Sylv gone (one way or another) that they could get an anti-monarchy or new form of govt to serve as a foil to the Alliance.

Then Blizz killed Calia and made her a Light-dead, and lined her up to try and lead the Forsaken which is... not a popular theme with the Alliance folks who want to retake Lordaeron OR the Forsaken/Horde folks who wanted a broader Forsaken less anchored to Lordaeron and more focus on general undead folks from many places.

5. She's Not Forsaken, Literally Calia was immediately accepted and supported following her dying and being raised, she's never had the Forsaken experience of being rejected by loved ones or not understanding what was happening and being associated with dark magic that affected the soul/emotions of a person until SL kind of soft retconned that, which some people felt diminished their own characters to prop up Calia.

I could go on, but there are a lot of reasons people aren't super juiced for Calia.

[Aucald]

I think this is an incredibly uncharitable take on some very legitimate grievances folks have with Calia, Baine, and the Horde narrative overall.

It was more a humorous aside on the growing frequency of Horde partisan intolerance of anything tangentially related to the Alliance.

1. She's an Unknown. Her initial appearance was in the Priest campaign of legion, and in the BTS novel. So if you weren't a priest in Legion and didn't buy the novel, she literally came out of nowhere for a lot of folks and people weren't clear why this Light-based person is even in the running, much less the fact that...

Calia is actually mentioned multiple times in the Rise of the Lich King novel released in 2009, including the plot where she was nearly forcibly married to Deathwing (in his form as Daval Prestor). So she's not really "out of nowhere" in terms of WoW lore, she was a known issue back then. The marriage plot is mentioned all the way back in Day of the Dragon in 2001 as well, although I don't think Calia is named in this novel, just her existence as a daughter of Terenas Menethil and thus the sister of Arthas.

2. She's arthas's sister. Even if the Menethil line was well liked before Arthas went crazy, I don't think it's a popular move among the playerbase and would be divisive at best, moreover there are questions on...

Terenas Menethil II himself is still viewed positively by the Forsaken themselves, as per the continued existence of the inscription in the throne room of the Undercity.

3. Her actual qualifications, she would've been pretty young and inexperienced when she went missing.

This is part and parcel of why she has no real intention of being the sole ruler of Forsaken Lordaeron.

4. Circling back to Aucald's point she was basically a character that the Alliance had wanted for awhile, very vocally on story forums and other places, to come back as a symbol of reclaiming Lordaeron, and a chunk of Horde/Forsaken players were a fan of this because they were hoping that with Sylv gone (one way or another) that they could get an anti-monarchy or new form of govt to serve as a foil to the Alliance.

Then Blizz killed Calia and made her a Light-dead, and lined her up to try and lead the Forsaken which is... not a popular theme with the Alliance folks who want to retake Lordaeron OR the Forsaken/Horde folks who wanted a broader Forsaken less anchored to Lordaeron and more focus on general undead folks from many places.

5. She's Not Forsaken, Literally Calia was immediately accepted and supported following her dying and being raised, she's never had the Forsaken experience of being rejected by loved ones or not understanding what was happening and being associated with dark magic that affected the soul/emotions of a person until SL kind of soft retconned that, which some people felt diminished their own characters to prop up Calia.

These two points kind of form their own misguided combined point, in that the idea that a given faction gets to "own" a given NPC regardless of their story or choices, and the mistaken notion that the Forsaken are a monolith that Calia could never belong to. The Alliance has its own partisans and extremists who espouse a similar philosophy to the Horde version I glibly defined above. Similarly, the Forsaken isn't just undead created by the Plague or raised by the Val'kyr - they've got all kinds among their number, from leper gnomes to ghosts to (actual) banshees and so on, so there's no real reason that an undead being created by the Light couldn't find their home there. The Forsaken define themselves as being "forsaken," as in cast aside and separate from the living. As Calia feels the same in her new form, by her own desire to be part of that world, I'd say she qualifies as Forsaken just like any other even if her form retains some fairness. Same as Sylvanas, really.

[Powerogue]

I think this is an incredibly uncharitable take on some very legitimate grievances folks have with Calia, Baine, and the Horde narrative overall.

To answer @Alanar properly folks don't like Calia for a few reasons.

1. She's an Unknown. Her initial appearance was in the Priest campaign of legion, and in the BTS novel. So if you weren't a priest in Legion and didn't buy the novel, she literally came out of nowhere for a lot of folks and people weren't clear why this Light-based person is even in the running, much less the fact that...

We only address unknowns by getting to know them. Varian dropped out of the sky gameplay-wise (for non comic readers) in Wrath of the Lich King as a barbarian wielding a fancy magic sword that was both 2h and dual wield at the same time who was suddenly High King of the whole Alliance, but we got to appreciate him eventually.

Heck I didn't care at all about Velen or his whole backstory until Legion, then that bit when he was parting ways with Kil'jaeden almost made me cry.

And I despised Calia, not for being a bad person, but being a bad fit as a member of the Forsaken, from the moment Before The Storm was written. She was oblivious to the darker elements of the Forsaken, which seemed heavily downplayed in the book, and was viewing them as mewling victims who needed a new savior figure. Blech. I thought the only way they could salvage it would be direct conflict between her and Voss; the Forsaken themselves trying to kill her. While they handled it differently than I expected, the initial rejection by the Forsaken and exploration of their dark themes felt like she came out of it with a better understanding of who they actually are, with them likewise begrudgingly tolerating her usefulness rather than fawning over her. Great!

Blizzard are more than capable of taking a story that appears to be going one way with a boring messianic figure and doing something far more interesting instead:

[Shadowferal]

Blizzard are more than capable of taking a story that appears to be going one way with a boring messianic figure and doing something far more interesting instead:

I found that less interesting and more silly. But the writing to me...was just wrong anyway. (and never liked the idea of "demon hunters")

To each his/her own.

[Feanoro]

I think this is an incredibly uncharitable take on some very legitimate grievances folks have with Calia, Baine, and the Horde narrative overall.

It was an attempt at humor, made pitiful due to its source spending years turning this into a Horde only forum. Much like Blizzard, favoring one side when you're supposed to be neutral leads to a state where, the actual declared enemy long since beaten, aggression turns inward and "traitors" are sought out.

[Aucald]

It was an attempt at humor, made pitiful due to its source spending years turning this into a Horde only forum. Much like Blizzard, favoring one side when you're supposed to be neutral leads to a state where, the actual declared enemy long since beaten, aggression turns inward and "traitors" are sought out.

That's a bold statement, Cotton - made pitiful by the twin facts of it making zero sense and having no basis in reality.

[Val the Moofia Boss]

Wonder how many of the Forsaken playerbase are left in this game.

Hard to tell. There are a couple Forsaken themed RP guilds left on Moon Guard. Dunno how much of a percentage drop that is from the RP scene's heyday during 2013/2014. I only remember there being like 2 Forsaken guilds back then, but there could have been many more as I never really frequented Undercity and Silvermoon, I mostly interacted with traditionally Horde themed guilds in Kalimdor. Horde RP isn't concentrated in Orgrimmar like Alliance RP is concentrated in Stormwind so you don't see the whole RP scene. Not sure how happy they are about the latest turn of events or if they disregard it. Certain things in official lore are considered a faux pas by RPers and are disregarded.

[Le Conceptuel]

Hard to tell. There are a couple Forsaken themed RP guilds left on Moon Guard. Dunno how much of a percentage drop that is from the RP scene's heyday during 2013/2014. I only remember there being like 2 Forsaken guilds back then, but there could have been many more as I never really frequented Undercity and Silvermoon. Horde RP isn't concentrated in Orgrimmar like Alliance RP is concentrated in Stormwind so if you don't see the whole RP scene. Not sure how happy they are about the latest turn of events or if they disregard it. Certain things in official lore are considered a faux pas by RPers and disregarded.

I'd argue Moon Guard is a poor starting point—isn't Wyrmrest Accord consistently more popular on the Horde, with the exception of a slight trough after the lawsuits leading to the realm teetering a bit?

[Val the Moofia Boss]

I'd argue Moon Guard is a poor starting point—isn't Wyrmrest Accord consistently more popular on the Horde, with the exception of a slight trough after the lawsuits leading to the realm teetering a bit?

People server transferring over from WRA to MG are telling me that WRA's Horde RP scene is dying and that they view MG as the last bastion of Horde RP. AFAIK Wyrmrest had more casual, unguilded walkup RP happening while MG was more based in guilds.

[Le Conceptuel]

People server transferring over from WRA to MG are telling me that WRA's Horde RP scene is dying and that they view MG as the last bastion of Horde RP. AFAIK Wyrmrest had more casual, unguilded walkup RP happening while MG was more based in guilds.

I recall that was the case for a while following the cubicle-crawling debacle, but I thought it had reversed.

[Aucald]

Hard to tell. There are a couple Forsaken themed RP guilds left on Moon Guard. Dunno how much of a percentage drop that is from the RP scene's heyday during 2013/2014. I only remember there being like 2 Forsaken guilds back then, but there could have been many more as I never really frequented Undercity and Silvermoon, I mostly interacted with traditionally Horde themed guilds in Kalimdor. Horde RP isn't concentrated in Orgrimmar like Alliance RP is concentrated in Stormwind so you don't see the whole RP scene. Not sure how happy they are about the latest turn of events or if they disregard it. Certain things in official lore are considered a faux pas by RPers and are disregarded.

Haven't WoW RP servers basically always discarded "official" lore in favor of their own flavor or subjective lore?

[Val the Moofia Boss]

Haven't WoW RP servers basically always discarded "official" lore in favor of their own flavor or subjective lore?

I'm not sure what you mean by "their own lore". People usually aren't RPing a homebrew setting or Star Trek on a WoW retail RP server, but certain things people aren't going to touch like WoD or Shadowlands.