You know some Alliance cinematics would be cool

[Rozz]

Sylvanas acts and sets things in motion, even if she doesn't get screentime. Anduin at best reacts to Sylvanas, mostly he just shows up at the denouement of a plot to congratulate us and fades back. They are really not comparable.

Why do you think it's a comparison? I already stated it wasn't. The statement isn't about who is more popular or shows up more, it's about what story they're tied to. Anduin, Jaina, and Genn are the Alliance equivalent to Sylvanas, Nathanos, and Baine. All 6 are the main ones involved with the main faction war storyline, with all the other faction characters being supporting roles to their wishes, intentions, and actions. Saurfang's main role in the story is part of an internalized conflict side plot. The closest we had to that on the Alliance was Tyrande. If you want to compare actions, you could make the same argument for the entirely of the Alliance since almost everything they've done has been reactionary. But since that's not the purpose of my statement, I don't plan on going there.

[Garymorilix]

If that is true, it would have been nice for Alliance to get any of that story. From what i see, onlyHorde gets to interract with Saurfang.

That's a bold statement given what's happening in 8.2.
Or are you upset you don't get to be ordered by Sylvanas to hunt him down?

[Raikh]

Why would Alliance get a full CGI cinematic atm? What for? They dont have a story in BfA and thats probably the best fate they can get. Neither is this a dualistic faction war expansion. The only real war here is the writers vs. the community's sanity. And given the results so far the writers are winning because people start to see faction N'zoth as the most attractive one, as its more palpable than either of the two horde "factions" or the decorative alliance.

Sans the nightelves the alliance gets the better draw here because nothing is still better than that immense garbage fire that is the entire horde story line and characterization. The CG cinematics look insanely good but the story surrounding them isnt even salvageable anymore and is simply a grim rmeinder that the best art team cant save a story from utterly misguided and incomeptent writers.

[Sondrelk]

That's a bold statement given what's happening in 8.2.
Or are you upset you don't get to be ordered by Sylvanas to hunt him down?

Seeing him in a single quest in 8.2 is the ONLY appearance he has had since the very beginning of the expansion when we captured him in Undercity. He has been mentioned to Alliance a single time since then when Shaw offhandedly mentions a prisoner has escaped the Stockades.

If Saurfang is really Alliance like you claim, where is our version of the quest where we find out he escaped and get the choice to help him.

[Garymorilix]

Seeing him in a single quest in 8.2 is the ONLY appearance he has had since the very beginning of the expansion when we captured him in Undercity. He has been mentioned to Alliance a single time since then when Shaw offhandedly mentions a prisoner has escaped the Stockades.

If Saurfang is really Alliance like you claim, where is our version of the quest where we find out he escaped and get the choice to help him.

I didn't claim anything. You did. You said Alliance doesn't interact with Saurfang, proven wrong.

And by the, the Horde doesn't get to interact with Saurfang until 8.2 either, unless you are also a traitor, then you get like 2 lines of Dialogue. But yea, keep crying like Horde players have some 40 min epic Saurfang quest chain going on.

[Sondrelk]

I didn't claim anything. You did. You said Alliance doesn't interact with Saurfang, proven wrong.

And by the, the Horde doesn't get to interact with Saurfang until 8.2 either, unless you are also a traitor, then you get like 2 lines of Dialogue. But yea, keep crying like Horde players have some 40 min epic Saurfang quest chain going on.

We don't interract with him. This is the 3rd Saurfang cinematic, and the second one since he disappeared from Alliance memory.
Noone in the Alliance is given any story to go with the cinematics. The Lost honor cinematic could in theory have been given some Alliance quests to go with it, but it didn't.
The first time it was even acknowledged in Alliance questing was when Shaw mentioned him escaping. The first cinematic shows us a character Alliance has no relationship with whatsoever.

Here is a quick mockup. Second cinematic comes out, we are given a quest to help Saurfang escape, by doing what the Horde player later finds, like dimissing guards, and removing spiders. Suddenly the story has relevance to Alliance.

The fact that Saurfang will eventually show up in 8.2 to sneer at the Alliance that set him free is too little, too late. Blizz could have given the cinematics relevance to the Alliance, but they chose not to.

[Soon-TM]

What about story as Saurfang vs. Sylvannas but in Alliance? Tyrande vs Anduin or something?

Nope. #HumanPotential > all, you silly, you should know already

[Garymorilix]

We don't interract with him. This is the 3rd Saurfang cinematic, and the second one since he disappeared from Alliance memory.
Noone in the Alliance is given any story to go with the cinematics. The Lost honor cinematic could in theory have been given some Alliance quests to go with it, but it didn't.
The first time it was even acknowledged in Alliance questing was when Shaw mentioned him escaping. The first cinematic shows us a character Alliance has no relationship with whatsoever.

Here is a quick mockup. Second cinematic comes out, we are given a quest to help Saurfang escape, by doing what the Horde player later finds, like dimissing guards, and removing spiders. Suddenly the story has relevance to Alliance.

The fact that Saurfang will eventually show up in 8.2 to sneer at the Alliance that set him free is too little, too late. Blizz could have given the cinematics relevance to the Alliance, but they chose not to.

The Lost Honor cinematic tells everything the Alliance needs to know: Saurfang was let out by Anduin and crew.
The escape itself is irrelevant to either faction. Horde only tracks Saurfang to make the choice at the end. The Alliance doesn't have such narrative fork in their story, so them being part of it is just a waste of time, there is nothing to gain plot-vise.

Saurfang is not an Alliance character. You focus on the wrong part of the story. From an Alliance perspective letting out Saurfang should be the major thing. He was responsible for Burning Teldrassil and the War of Thorns, other leaders finding out that Anduin just let him walk out should be your main point. Not whether you get to kill some spiders for Saurfang or not.

Unfortunately, that didn't happen because the narrative they are trying to tell doesn't have time for such sub-plot. The focus is Saurfang, not the factions.

These cinematics are not Horde cinematics, they are Saurfang cinematics. They mean that Saurfang will probably do something that benefits both factions, and he will most likely die doing it. These are meant to make us care about him.

[Gaexion Ramza Beoulve]

Here's an alternative.

Blizzard allocates some resources to announce 2 distinct mini-mini-series.

A handful of shorts to pad out the stroytelling and flesh out the two factions. They don't have to be core characters but something to wet the appetite.

By being a series they won't come out of nowhere and have players thinking Blizz favors one faction over another, but rather would be an olive branch to fans and something to sink their teeth into. Knowing that there would be 3 warbringer shorts was fascinating, anticipating their release was exciting, knowing they would eventually come out and Blizz eventually fulfilling their promise was satisfying.

Lack of palpable content and engagement leads to subscriber loss and speculation which causes fans to start peaking behind the scenes at the chaos involved in running a major studio. Be better than that. Rather than have petty CMs and cruel execs making cold and brash statements-take the initiative and inspire your fans to engage to stake their own claims and help bring the fantasy to life through memes, machinimas, and fanart.

Like we used to do.

[ChampionChains]

Shit, the entirety of Legion was focused on the Alliance.

[KaPe]

Shit, the entirety of Legion was focused on the Alliance.

And look just how many fully cgi Alliance themed cinematics there were. Hint - not many.

[Sondrelk]

As i have said before, the problem with Saurfang getting loads of cinematics is not really taht they are horde-focused. Sometimes an expansions story needs to focus on some aspects of the story that are more important to some races, and by proxy, a singular faction.
Legion is a good example of that. there were 2 races that needed closure for the Legion storyline, and it just so happened that both were Alliance, in that respect i can understand why they made both HM Tauren and Nightborne Horde, they needed to give a connection to Horde to not make the expansion entirely Alliance centric.
Similarly, WoD were mostly about Horde, because the expansion were about orcs, and Horde is the orc faction.

However, the Saurfang cinematics could easily include both Alliance and Horde. someone mentioned how Saurfang is going to be important to both Alliance and Horde in the end, but it really does not feel that way. The first Saurfang cinematic was released with the description of how they wanted to soothe the Hordes bruised ego after they destroyed Teldrassil and looked like the villains.

The second at least showed Anduin in it, but it talked mostly about Horde, and their problems, i suppose Anduin was considered too much Aliance for Blizz though, because for this one Horde got an extra questline in addition to further flesh out the cinematic, a questline the Alliance could easily have gotten a variant on as well.

Now the third one is blatantly all about the Horde, It has Horde characters talking to Horde characters about Horde problems, only being stopped when Horde characters show up to further the Horde agenda.


You would not think that Asking for at least a questline that is a copypaste of the one Horde got is too much, but i guess it is.

Hopefully the expansion is going to be slightly more balanced by the end, though i doubt it. First, as i mentioned, there was Horde getting a cinematic to soothe their ego after they had attacked the opposing faction, while those they attacked got some offhand mentions of how this was the biggest catastrophe in their recorded history.
Then there was the devsd coming out and saying how Tyrande got her revenge by taking back some of her homeland, and that is why they are going to leave her out of a story that is blatantly where her story has been headed for decades.

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To illsutrate my above point with Tyrande, imagine if Velen was not present on Argus in Legion because he had too much exposure in 7.2, and instead it was focused on gnomes and goblins.

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Or, to make a point about how Legion as at least done slightly better in the faction bias, imagine if Alliance did not have quests in Highmountain because it was technically Horde, or if Horde did not have quests in Val'sharah or Azsuna for the same reason. Same plot, just with one faction not getting any of the relevant plot details, and instead just being told on the forums that the Tyrande cinematic in Val'sharah that Horde never got to have any quests for was totally not Alliance-centric because Tyrande was not fighting for the Alliance at the time.

[ChampionChains]

Legion is a good example of that. there were 2 races that needed closure for the Legion storyline, and it just so happened that both were Alliance

You've never felt that the orcs who were enslaved by the Legion, broken off from their roots, turned into murder machines, lost their home world and culture to the Legions corruption, etc needed closure with the Legion? Or the Forsaken who were turned by the puppet of the Legion and had everything taken from them much in the same way the orcs did? Or the Humans who felt the full force of those orcs and undead who were being driven by the Legion? Half the races in the game needed closure with the Legion and only 2 got it, not even two really because it was more or less just the Draenei and the Illidari. Most races that had beef with the Legion were 100% ignored.

[Sondrelk]

You've never felt that the orcs who were enslaved by the Legion, broken off from their roots, turned into murder machines, lost their home world and culture to the Legions corruption, etc needed closure with the Legion? Or the Forsaken who were turned by the puppet of the Legion and had everything taken from them much in the same way the orcs did? Or the Humans who felt the full force of those orcs and undead who were being driven by the Legion? Half the races in the game needed closure with the Legion and only 2 got it, not even two really because it was more or less just the Draenei and the Illidari. Most races that had beef with the Legion were 100% ignored.

Yes, both had importance to the plto. But Orcs had just gotten an expansion centered around their culture, and Forsaken were always more about Scourge, anyways. They also got story in the context of Sylvanas and Varimathras at the end.

Nelves and Draenei were more integral to the Legion invasion at that point. Nelves for the elvish stuff on Broken isles and also references to War of the Ancients, and Draenei specifically for Argus.

[ChampionChains]

Yes, both had importance to the plto. But Orcs had just gotten an expansion centered around their culture, and Forsaken were always more about Scourge, anyways. They also got story in the context of Sylvanas and Varimathras at the end.

Nelves and Draenei were more integral to the Legion invasion at that point. Nelves for the elvish stuff on Broken isles and also references to War of the Ancients, and Draenei specifically for Argus.

I never got the "WoD is a Horde expansion" argument since 90% of the focus was killing orcs, not venerating or siding with them. Killing orcs is an Alliance theme. It was just a shame that decades of build up of orcs needing to face the Legion was shat on so Illidan could be retcon-resurrected for another edgelord hero class and endless moaning about sacrifice. For all the cries there usually are for the factions to work together, Legion was a MASSIVE missed opportunity for Orcs and Draenei to unite against their shared primary antagonist. Especially following WoD.

[vilememory]

You want to know why Horde is getting so many damn cinematics this expansion? Because this is it for the Horde, this is the last expansion you will have two official factions. Horde is going down, Sylvanas is going to fuck up everything. Saurfang is going to die trying to save the players, Thrall is going to end up dying after being black arrowed by Sylvanas. Blightcaller is getting left behind to get cut down when Sylvanas fucks off to the the Shadowlands to become the Hyper Goddess of Death. Lor'themar gets crippled, Baine loses an arm, Gallywix chokes to death on his own spittle when he realizes Sylvanas blighted his private treasure troves, all of them. It is going to end with Anduin trying to help whoever we pick in the moment to be Warchief, Baine snaps screams no. No more, the Banshee has won... Our hope is dead, and with it. The Horde. Get a nice cut cinematic of him picking up a torch that is right next to the dead Thrall and walking to the Horde Banner that is hanging nearby. He thrusts the torch into the banner and it begins to burn. Then he states what the various races can do, go to the various neutral factions to seek help from. The orcs can go to the Earthen Ring, the Forsaken and Blood elves with half a brain go to the Argent Crusade. The tauren will seek Hamuul Runetotem to seek entrance into the Cenarion Circle to help heal Azeroth, and the others can figure it out for themselves.

And just for shit and giggles Baine can turn to Anduin and tell him congratulations, you have done what your Father could not. You have defeated the Horde, camera pans up to reveal a burning Orgimmar filled with Blight citizens and soldiers all fleeing the ruined capitol. Then it is off to the next expansion, with new racial leaders for most of the Horde races. No explanation what happened to the survivors or where they went and a focus on the Alliance with Anduin trying to keep the newly arrived Ethereals and Lightbound from getting the other members of the Alliance to help them purge/convert Azeroth of everything 'they' deem wrong.

[lockybalboa]

Nothing but fucking orcs. The Metzen plague persists

[Sondrelk]

I never got the "WoD is a Horde expansion" argument since 90% of the focus was killing orcs, not venerating or siding with them. Killing orcs is an Alliance theme. It was just a shame that decades of build up of orcs needing to face the Legion was shat on so Illidan could be retcon-resurrected for another edgelord hero class and endless moaning about sacrifice. For all the cries there usually are for the factions to work together, Legion was a MASSIVE missed opportunity for Orcs and Draenei to unite against their shared primary antagonist. Especially following WoD.

Fair point. Illidan was indeed a massive waste of space, and i say that as one of the ones that most staunchy advocated an Illidan redemption arc, guess it would have involved too much Night elf story, and BfA has definitely shown how much Blizz seems to despise Alliance night elves.

Draenei and Orcs could definitely have gotten more of a combined front at the end, suppose it maybe just didnt click for Blizz when they wrote the soty for Argus, it was the Draenei homewolrd afterall, they might just have thought they would prefer to have one race there instead of 2, especially when orcs would feel very bolted on compared to Draenei, what with having no orc leaders suited to be on the same level of hisotry iwth the Legion as Velen.

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You want to know why Horde is getting so many damn cinematics this expansion? Because this is it for the Horde, this is the last expansion you will have two official factions. Horde is going down, Sylvanas is going to fuck up everything. Saurfang is going to die trying to save the players, Thrall is going to end up dying after being black arrowed by Sylvanas. Blightcaller is getting left behind to get cut down when Sylvanas fucks off to the the Shadowlands to become the Hyper Goddess of Death. Lor'themar gets crippled, Baine loses an arm, Gallywix chokes to death on his own spittle when he realizes Sylvanas blighted his private treasure troves, all of them. It is going to end with Anduin trying to help whoever we pick in the moment to be Warchief, Baine snaps screams no. No more, the Banshee has won... Our hope is dead, and with it. The Horde. Get a nice cut cinematic of him picking up a torch that is right next to the dead Thrall and walking to the Horde Banner that is hanging nearby. He thrusts the torch into the banner and it begins to burn. Then he states what the various races can do, go to the various neutral factions to seek help from. The orcs can go to the Earthen Ring, the Forsaken and Blood elves with half a brain go to the Argent Crusade. The tauren will seek Hamuul Runetotem to seek entrance into the Cenarion Circle to help heal Azeroth, and the others can figure it out for themselves.

And just for shit and giggles Baine can turn to Anduin and tell him congratulations, you have done what your Father could not. You have defeated the Horde, camera pans up to reveal a burning Orgimmar filled with Blight citizens and soldiers all fleeing the ruined capitol. Then it is off to the next expansion, with new racial leaders for most of the Horde races. No explanation what happened to the survivors or where they went and a focus on the Alliance with Anduin trying to keep the newly arrived Ethereals and Lightbound from getting the other members of the Alliance to help them purge/convert Azeroth of everything 'they' deem wrong.

I would have accepted this if i believed for a second that Blizz will actually have consequences for the Hordes actions this expansion. Had i believed for even the tiniest moment that Blizz would actually let this story unfold naturally with Alliance getting sick of the Hordes shit and only letting them survive in the end to make their vicotyr all the more humiliating for the Horde, i could stomach Horde clearly being given all the toys this expansion, but i don't, so i wont.

[ChampionChains]

Nothing but fucking orcs. The Metzen plague persists

Blizz just hears the vocal minority (who is still subbed) crying about the story consistently going downhill. So they're doing what the masses have unwittingly demanded Blizz do; return to the heyday of WoW. And the heyday was the Metzen era of orcs with Thrall leading the Horde. Everyone cried until Blizz returned to it, and now they're all crying that they're getting what they asked for. Just like all the crying over the Cata heroics which people begged for.

[Sondrelk]

Blizz just hears the vocal minority (who is still subbed) crying about the story consistently going downhill. So they're doing what the masses have unwittingly demanded Blizz do; return to the heyday of WoW. And the heyday was the Metzen era of orcs with Thrall leading the Horde. Everyone cried until Blizz returned to it, and now they're all crying that they're getting what they asked for. Just like all the crying over the Cata heroics which people begged for.

To continue this tangest briefly, it is actually kind of telling when you look back at the expansion deemd "good" in the eyes of the forums. Most of them seem to be nostalgia trips. It is the ones with new "fresh" ideas that seem to get the boot for being written horribly. It is almost like the forums don't want to admit that they mostly enjoy a story based on how similar the characters is to how they were depicted in a previous Blizz game.

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I suppose i shouldn't call them fresh ideas, per se, more like less developed ideas. Like Deathwing being the big baddie when few people knew about him. Or Pandaria when Pandaren had only shown up in a few Warcrat missions.