Why would the Nightborn join the Alliance?

[Worgster]

i really need that image of thalyssra dabbing infront of the burning teldrassil. all these buttraged alliance being nonsensical.

like it couldn't have been set up better for them to go to horde.

Dabbing is so 2017 just stop it.

[derpkitteh]

That is the point, it was set up for them...very poorly. Just like Void Elves story is rather poor...so many things are done so poorly about this expansion just to get the war going again.

it's not poorly explained. you just have to pay attention to the wording of all of the wq's you do on top of the wording in the main story. tyrande is hostile to them constantly.

Well the arcan'dor that saved them from the nightwell and becoming wretched was created by night elves and carefully tended to by one. Without him they would all be wretched by now.

Personally think the most sensical lore choice would have been to make them neutral and add mag'har or mok'nathal for the horde

a night elf that has zero connection to greater night elf society in anyway. he's been pissing around in the woods of suramar for over 10k years, he might possibly be the oldest night elf. same goes for the moonguard, they have zero connection to the rest of night elf society and have been separate from it for 10k years at least.

[vertigo12]

Simple as:
- game play balance. Nigh Elves Darnassian Kaldorei goes to the Alliance. Suramar Kaldorei Nightborne goes to the Horde.
- Blood Elves -Sin'dorei allies with the Horde, Ren'dorei or Void Elves which are pretty much the same High Elves who then became Blood Elves faction changes back to the Alliance.

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I mean 1 and 2 didn't stop the blood elves. It's almost certainly the blood elves themselves who were all "Naw man, these are cool undead and trolls. They helped us after we were almost wiped out by the Scourge."

+ It is logical that Blood Elves goes to the Horde. Kaldorei civilization and High Elves sub species are - mutated Trolls.
- Undead Faction leader= former High Elf Ranger General.

[Battlebeard]

So much discussions about these guys.

I hate Suramar and everything related to it with all my heart. Never died anywhere in game as much as in Suramar City in early Legion.

As an alliance player, I can't wait to kill Nightborde horde players and I'm happy this disgusting race won't be in the alliance

[Verdugo]

So much discussions about these guys.

I hate Suramar and everything related to it with all my heart. Never died anywhere in game as much as in Suramar City in early Legion.

As an alliance player, I can't wait to kill Nightborde horde players and I'm happy this disgusting race won't be in the alliance

Since you admit that you are bad in this post, there is a bigger chance they will be killing you.

[Battlebeard]

Since you admit that you are bad in this post, there is a bigger chance they will be killing you.

Well, wouldn't say bad. Rather too lazy and inpatient to play carefully. If you accidently pull something, you pull everything. This place is kinda poorly balanced. When you had like 800ilvl you can't survive 15mobs attacking you.

[Super Kami Dende]

I honestly think the Nightborne should've been Pandaren type faction choices. As in making a new one gives you questlines where you can choose to be either Faction. Since both factions literally saved them from the Withered Addiction.

[Baroclinic]

Better question: Why would the Alliance want a bunch of legion sellout elves?

Alliance has had a good track record with their racial leaders not being raid bosses. Dark Iron is cutting it close as is.

[Serenais]

They don't really have a reason to join anyone.
In the Alliance, they'd be sidelined, mostly by the human dominance of the faction, which is something they'd have very hard time to stomach. Hence, not really a reason to join it.
In joining the Horde, however, they effectively traded Elisande for Sylvanas, which I'm not sure is really an upgrade. And given Horde's tendency to bring a genocidal maniac into power every now and then, they've also show quite a bit of historical myopia. Also, quite a bit of an argument against joining.
For both factions, I really don't see a reason that would speak for joining. The Nightborne do not really have a real kinship with either of the races - after all, besides night elves (and Thalyssra pointed out that she doesn't trust night elves, the reason being silly, but, it is there), they really don't know any, having been hidden under the shield and effectively cut off from the rest of the world.

In fact, joining the war at either side puts them at risk - the Nightborne have no naval force to speak of, yet their only significant settlement is a port city. Considering the size of navy that the Alliance or the Horde (with the inclusion of the Zandalari), Suramar is prime to become a very easy and very valuable target. Horde was the worse choice in this case. The Zandalari may have the largest navy of all the factions, but their navy is (per Blizzcon) just a slightly bit larger or on par with that of Kul Tiras - and pre-BfA, the Horde pretty much little navy to speak of. Thus, the Alliance could easily assault Suramar from the sea (as long as it doesn't attempt a landfall, that would be incredibly stupid in Suramar). In fact, the Alliance will likely end up forced to neutralise the Suramar harbor, as it can easily become largest ship building spot for the Horde, quite close to both main theatre of war (a lot closer then Stormwind, where the largest ship constructing docks of the Alliance are) and a signficant source of lumber (Val'Sharah) to build those ships. As long as Kul Tiras keeps the Zandalari in check (and they will, given Alliance's larger naval experience), Sylvanas will desperatelly need to build secondary navy somewhere, which the Alliance is bound to realise. As long as any semblance of logic is implemented, a naval assault at Suramar is inevitable.
(obviously, Blizzard can just "meh" it and not mention Suramar ever again, as they seem to give far more importance to rule of cool and usage of new content than actual military sense, but, well, I wanted to put forth my 0.02€)

[Cassidin]

There is only really one reason why they join the horde. It's also the same reason why the other three sub-factions joined the two sides. Blizzard wanted to get something from this expansion into BfA to try and give something of BfA that people could get early - ie at the end of Legion. I have no problem with the idea of the Allied Races but personally I have every problem doing this with factions we ALL helped along the way. On my Alliance characters I am exalted with both Nightfallen and Highmountain - it doesn't make sense for me for them to suddenly say "sorry we're going with the other dudes". The converse is true on my Horde characters.

To me (and yes this is my personal opinion only) it only makes sense to keep these factions neutral. I think its the wrong decision to make them pick either side as they accepted help from both and have no reason to be against one. They should have started with the Allied Races with factions that you only gain rep with as ONE faction. At the least they should have been OPTIONAL factions. Maybe both factions can gain rep with them - but apart from cosmetic/achievement there is no point in doing so for one faction. I would have no problem with that.

It just feels "off" to get all that rep with a faction to then later know they have supported the other side. I know Blizzard have all kinds of "lore" reasons why this may be the case but its all just an excuse to do something the easy way.

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I honestly think the Nightborne should've been Pandaren type faction choices. As in making a new one gives you questlines where you can choose to be either Faction. Since both factions literally saved them from the Withered Addiction.

Same could be said of Highmountain - both helped them get the tribes in line.

[Super Kami Dende]

Same could be said of Highmountain - both helped them get the tribes in line.

Wouldn't be hard to do, since they were literally Allies with the Night Elves during the WotA. Ruln and Jarod Shadowsong were friends.

[Molvonos]

I think...

Maybe...

It's because...

Tyrande was a piece of trash during the entire Nightwell story arc, while the Blood Elf leadership actually showed compassion. As a NE player since beta, i've never been more inclined to switch to Horde than I have now, if I did have a justifiable reason to switch factions based on In Character lore reasons.

I actually enjoyed the Nightwell Arc and Suramar as a whole, though.

The way they painted Malf and Tyrande this expansion has me itching in a bad way.

[Caerule]

Tyrande was not polite, yes. And that characterization suits the Night Elves well. She has the perspective any Night Elf should have, that doesn't feel their path the last 10.000 years was a mistake.

The Night Elves are a people of Forests and Faith, with a distrust of arcane magic. The Nightborn are 100% arcane city folk. The two groups were never going to get along.
The Night Elves distrust and abhor the Blood Elves. And blood elves at least have rangers and religion. Nightborne are Blood Elf Extreme.

If Jaina had remained in charge of Dalaran, keeping Dalaran in the Alliance, rather than neutral, perhaps there would have been a good alternative ally to the Blood Elves, among the Alliance. But no, the contact to the Alliance is the Night Elves. The race most incompatible with Suramar of all of the races on the Alliance.

For the Nightborne to end up favoring the Alliance would have been insanity.

[Kithelle]

it's not poorly explained. you just have to pay attention to the wording of all of the wq's you do on top of the wording in the main story. tyrande is hostile to them constantly.



a night elf that has zero connection to greater night elf society in anyway. he's been pissing around in the woods of suramar for over 10k years, he might possibly be the oldest night elf. same goes for the moonguard, they have zero connection to the rest of night elf society and have been separate from it for 10k years at least.

I didn't say it was poorly explained, I just think it's poor in general and forced...basically just a quick and easy excuse to align them to factions for BFA.

[Martymark]

1) Undead are culturally verboten in most societies

The streets of SW teem with the walking dead. Death Knights, ghosts, Draenei golems and soul priests.

Horde are even more open to them with Tauren, Trolls, and Orcs chatting and revering their dead ancestors.

[Deleted]

The Nightborne joining anybody is like the dumbest idea in BfA. They already had developed friendly relations with both sides. They could have remained completely neutral and still have gained protection and help from the Horde and Alliance. Their knowledge and their city would have been a big draw to both sets of elves, craftsmen and magic users from both sides.

Now they get to have the fun time of being enemies with people who could have helped them. Instead of gaining resources and time to rebuild, they now have to face the idea of losing even more people in a war they had no reason to join.

You can say the same thing about LF Draenei. While there are not many prominent Horde NPCs on Argus, the Horde is equally presented via the Order Halls and the player characters. Horde races helped fight the Legion just like Alliance races. Yet, the LF Draenei decide to join Alliance.

The whole discussion is totally pointless. And from my PoV, there is no reason for the Nightborne to join the Alliance. Though I am not happy about how Blizzard has presented Tyrande in Legion (I was never a big fan of her, but now she surely has reached a total low, especially with the whole Val'sharah mess), it's what we have.

[Techno-Druid]

The streets of SW teem with the walking dead. Death Knights, ghosts, Draenei golems and soul priests.

Horde are even more open to them with Tauren, Trolls, and Orcs chatting and revering their dead ancestors.

Actually trolls, orcs and tauren have a strong dislike for undeath. The only reason why Thrall accepted them into the Horde was because Hamuul Runetotem thought that they could be led away from Sylvanas's leadership and convinced him that they could potentially be cured.

Also, death knights are tolerated because of King/Warchief decree.

[Lorgar Aurelian]

It would have made a lot more sense to have the night bourn slip and a faction of them joining the horde but not all of them. There are probably or should probably be nightbourn who have still living relatives with in the alliance who they would want to find. I find it hard to believe that no one in the night bourn wants to look up old friends or family who are in the alliance.

[Saverem]

It's as weak as having VELFs join the Alliance. The Horde helped Light's Army and Argus Reach or w/e they're called as much as the Alliance, yet they went with them.

They're just looking for reasons to add new sub races to the game.

This is just Blizzard choosing game play over lore, which is fine.

[MyWholeLifeIsThunder]

If you are not willing to accept the premise of "the nightborne HAD to pick aside because the world has gone to war and they need protection if they are to endure" then you are not even addressing the conversation on the minimum of good faith.

We all know wow's storytelling isn't the best, but if we are not trying to contextualize what we have into making sense, what's even the point of even discussing the lore? Like if you feel this is un-salvageable bad writing fine, but that means this is not the conversation for you.

OP already outlined the reasons why the nightborne have reasons why joining the horde is their best choice. As for joining the alliance, there simply aren't as many.

And no "proving themselves to the night elves" is not a reason to join the alliance. Why would they do that? We are talking about elves here, arrogant elves. If the nightborne were a completely altruistic society, sure, that would be a reason, but they arent; they are prideful and haughty, and if anything "proving themselves" to the night elves, make amends for betrayals they might not consider their own or see as a necessity of survival, would feel as a slight.