I wonder where does the whole "rebellion thing" put players. I mean, you can have an orc character - are you a soldier of Warchief or a rebel? You are Troll, your leader was nearly killed by an ambush organised by the leader of orcs - I guess you aren;t still with Garrosh then, so you are against him? Are players siding with Garrosh, like orcs or goblins (i presume) considered enemies by trolls/blood elves now?
Quite a mess, i'd say.
Even orcs can be against Garrosh. The novel was pretty good in showing that, that the Blackrock Brown Shirts kidnapped and beaten those orcs that were friends of Eitrigg or that didn't like the new regime.
Garrosh turned the Horde into an authoritarian regime, all up to the use of paramilitary secret police and cult of personality.
Alliance wins the war? We help a rebellious faction remove their progressively more insane leader, ooh yeah! Fistbump! we get to... clean up the horde's mess, again...
While agree with everything else you said I do want to make a quick point about this point and the Alliance story in MoP so far . Yes I'm gonna be "that guy" again with this stuff.
The Alliance isn't getting as much attention of Racial Leaders as the Horde is, which isn't in itself the problem but is linked to it, so don't take this as a "bias" thing, more as a point of reference between the two factions.
In 5.1 we're seeing 3 characters receiving some sort of major development for each faction for the Horde they include Garrosh, Vol'jin and Lor'themar while on the Alliance side we have Varian, Anduin and Jaina. While Horde are receiving development for 3 racial leaders with the added benefit that they are all from different races. Whereas the Alliance is only receiving development for 1 racial leader and they are all the same race.
So far while I'm enjoying the story and like the look of 5.1 more,but the lack of diversity in the Alliance story is holding it back from being amazing.
The Horde getting a better leader doesn't mean jack, we're talking about the outcome of the war here. The Alliance win, The Horde got itself in such a state that it crumbled upon itself and split with loyalists and rebels. Since someone else mentioned Nazis let's go full Godwin in this thread. The Nazi regime and Hitler died at the end of WW2. Did Germany win the war because the war removed an authoritarian regime? Lol no, The Alliance get themselves into Orgrimmar and fuck things up and The Horde has to fight itself. How on earth is it not a comprehensive Alliance victory?
Gnomes win the war and let horde and rest of alliance suffer in sweet, sweet pain. Entire Azeroth turns pink and all gnomes owns pink love rocket mounts and pink goggles =)
Not as much as I'd hope. She is there, but she isn't one of the main leaders being developed. For Horde I could also raise you Baine and Thrall .
We've heard Varian mention Velen which is fantastic, but we will have to wait and see.
No matter how you look at it the development for the Horde is a little more diverse atm.
We also know from reddit and Best Buy chats that Sylvannas will play a role before the end and Rexxar as well. I will agree that the Horde is getting far more diverse development of all its leaders and it seems like the entirety of the Horde is being drawn into it while we're rallying entirely behind Varian, but I'm still diggin' the vibe this time around.
I still wish they had die hard Alliance enamored developer on the writing team that took the stage at Blizzcon panels and we'd see Blizz vs Blizz shots and stingers thrown back and forth in good fun!
Last edited by Faroth; 2012-10-27 at 02:59 PM.
In the game, alliance groups will kill Garrosh, but in the lore it wont be the alliance defeating the horde.
Before MoP (or perhaps Cata), the Horde was united behind a Warchief, a strong central power. The Alliance, on the other hand, had no strong central commander. As Wrathion points out, Varian didn't do a lot during Cataclysm. In MoP, we see the Horde central power disintegrating and racial leaders getting more light. In contrast, we see the Alliance building up a strong central leadership, so it is normal that Varian gets more attention, at least in patch 5.1.
---------- Post added 2012-10-27 at 04:23 PM ----------
Let's see where this is going.
The goal of this was, for Garrosh, is the complete annihilation of the Alliance and total control of Kalimdor for the Horde.
For the Alliance, it is to defend and destroy Garrosh.
For what we see now, the Horde won't achieve its goal. It will get divided against itself and they will even need the Alliance to depose Garrosh. They will lose a leader and the new one will have a lot of rebuilding to do. On the other hand, the Alliance will succeed in defending its territories and Garrosh will be killed, deposed, well at least he won't be warchief anymore. The people of the Horde gets rid of a tyrannical leader, but actualy wins nothing against the Alliance. So it seems that the Alliance wins that war.
Well, as far as we know. There's a couple more patches before we lay siege on Orgrimmar.
Last edited by Frontenac; 2012-10-27 at 04:25 PM.
I do not doubt Varian needs lore, in fact I'm very happy that he's receiving the story he's getting - that of a good uniting leader. But there is space for more character development and there is need of non-human development. If he's supposed to be uniting the Alliance then it shouldn't be just limited to Tyrande being told that she made a boo boo about her battle tactics.
No I'd like to see Velen show up with Anduin. I'd like to see Muradin leading a Dwarf Brigade with his brother Brann as they discover further titan artifacts. I'd like to see Mekkatorque show up with a bad ass robot and blow the Horde to bits and show that his people can do more directly in the conflict. I want to see Genn being more involved with Varian as the two people and races clicked with each other at the end of Wolfheart.
Varian getting development is great. But it shouldn't be all about him, especially if his story is meant to directly involve him getting support from the other leaders.
(Sorry if it sounds like I'm bashing the Alliance story, I'm really not. There are just some annoying flaws atm that are preventing a good story from being a great story)
Last edited by Scummer; 2012-10-27 at 06:20 PM.
I've come to the point as an Alliance player where i give up on the lore the lore team writes ^.^