An AU Azeroth without the Orcs...

[Feanoro]

You mean those Night Elves that were responsible for the first invasion by summoning the Burning Legion in the first place?

You mean the ones that became today's Blood Elves? The bulk of the Night Elves fought against the Legion and their own corrupt nobles.

It was this invasion that made Sargeras meet the Orcish race in the form of Broxigar and is the reason the Orcs were 'recruited' / corrupted. Two can play this game, the Night Elves are the reason everything is f*cked. Or similarly you can blame the Draenei for leading the Burning Legion to the Orcish homeworld.

Ah, that meme trying desperately to shift blame off the Horde. "The intended victims of serial killers are responsible for anyone the killers kill! They should have just allowed themselves to be killed!" Do better if you want to be taken seriously.

[Aresk]

When is this AU falling alongside the MU? If it were put in place now (similar to how the link to WoD was created after the events of MoP, when Garrosh already had improved tech and knowledge of how things worked), I think everything would be fine; Sargeras is already imprisoned, and the Legion's leaders have been decimated in the MU, so the AU would be safe. If we're talking about retconning the MU so that the orcs never showed up, then Black Morass already answers that question.

[saintminya]

You mean the ones that became today's Blood Elves? The bulk of the Night Elves fought against the Legion and their own corrupt nobles.

Sure, some of them eventually became Blood Elves, but way to omit the High Elves in-between. Not all of them became Blood Elves, or chose to align with the Horde at all. Pretty lame retort anyway, when they were all Night Elves at the time. It is also always amusing how on these forums it is frequently those with clear Alliance-bias who claim to be annoyed with faction conflict yet are eager to always pass the blame. The Horde have done plenty wrong, and the Alliance have done plenty wrong. More importantly in regards to this topic, the Night Elves have done plenty wrong.

To the OP though, I strongly believe that without the presence of the Orcs the Legion would've ultimately won in the first round. Night Elves weren't as weak as they are now back then and surely would've still put up a good fight, but it wouldn't have been enough without the aid of any outside forces like the Trolls or the in-fighting Humans.

[Feanoro]

@saintminya
It's amusing how Horde fans preach "not all X" only when it applies to Horde races. Alliance races though, they screech things like all Night Elves being responsible for Azshara and her corrupt nobles, or humans being responsible for Arthas.

As to it being a "lame retort", sorry you don't know the canon.

[Beloren]

You mean those Night Elves that were responsible for the first invasion by summoning the Burning Legion in the first place?

It was this invasion that made Sargeras meet the Orcish race in the form of Broxigar and is the reason the Orcs were 'recruited' / corrupted. Two can play this game, the Night Elves are the reason everything is f*cked. Or similarly you can blame the Draenei for leading the Burning Legion to the Orcish homeworld.

No, the introduction of Borxigar is not the original story.. it's the time correction story.

Kil'jaedan finds the orcs well before Rhonin and Brox are born, WC1-3 has already happened before these guys go back in time to stop the infinite's flgiht meddling. So the absence of the orcs would not really affect Sargeras discovering them anyway. All it means for the Knaak story is that another person (a non-orc) would likely have accompanied Krasus and Rhonin)

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To the OP though, I strongly believe that without the presence of the Orcs the Legion would've ultimately won in the first round. Night Elves weren't as weak as they are now back then and surely would've still put up a good fight, but it wouldn't have been enough without the aid of any outside forces like the Trolls or the in-fighting Humans.

You mean the second round right? WC3 is the second round, not the first.

Do you think the orcs absence would have been filled with the many more humans and high elves who'd have consequently been alive at the time, not to mention tauren and trolls who'd likely have been called up to? And that it would have been sufficient?

Afterall it is the night elves that defeat the legion again with the important killing blow, they are the indispensable ones in the second round, it's their power that burns Archimonde to death. the horde and alliance provide the necessary cover but play no pivotal role, it probably is safe to assume that an equal force of either all horde or all alliance would have been enough to fulfil their role. All that was required was the numbers to block the legion , it didn't matter if all the forces were alliance or horde or 50 /50.

I don't recall the horde bringing anything specifically unique to the battle that could not have been done by an equal number of humans or high elves, same with the alliance, the alliance could have been replaced by an equal number of horde fighter.

[saintminya]

@saintminya
It's amusing how Horde fans preach "not all X" only when it applies to Horde races. Alliance races though, they screech things like all Night Elves being responsible for Azshara and her corrupt nobles, or humans being responsible for Arthas.

I actually agree with you. It's annoying when anyone does it. This ain't the thread for it, but I've never seen anyone blame humans for Arthas. That's just wild.

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You mean the second round right? WC3 is the second round, not the first.

Do you think the orcs absence would have been filled with the many more humans and high elves who'd have consequently been alive at the time, not to mention tauren and trolls who'd likely have been called up to? And that it would have been sufficient?

No, I used the term "round" to evoke the imagery of a boxing match. I suppose it could have been sufficient if they managed to work together, I just doubt that they would have set their differences aside.

[Lupinemancer]

So, anyone ever thought of what AU Azeroth would be like? the orcs never made it to Azeroth, how do you think things would have turned out?

That would be a peaceful world without war and death, aside from minor native threats which are easily dealt with.
The Legion wouldn't arrive since the defenses would be strong and there wouldn't be any to summon them.

[cparle87]

Ah , so blizzard essentially declared that the destruction oft he orcs was necessary to save Azeroth. Just like how they wrote that the sundering and first legion invasion still had to happen when Ronin and Krasus go back, - but to me that always just sounded like an excuse not to have to re-write their history to allow a time travel gimmick to explain the story, rather than any real relevance. While you could still essentially write a completely different story anyway in an AU, but Blizzard has also given the keys within the current continuum to allow a very different fate for the AU Azeroth

They have only ensured our Azeroth (our MU) would not have survived without the orcs, but AU Azeroth is anyone's guess. The legion get destroyed in ALL realities, so MU Azeroth's victory ends them in all realities.. in the time line, the Legion's defeat happens in AU's timeline around the time the orcs would have started invading Azeroth. Therefore being destroyed in our MU, they wouldn't have been able to finish their attack on Azeroth. AU Azeroth would never have had a WC1, 2 or 3.


Now, I think the main points would be if the night elves discovered the threat was over, it could significantly change things on Kalimdor. EK would probably be unchanged and only have domestic affairs. The biggest thing would be resolving Medivh's power - he would have lost hte Sargeras prseence inside him, what would he do? He or his mother i assume would probably be able to let the kaldorei and aspects know of what happened if Elune doesn't already share.

However the SL plot, the old gods plots too they can still happen.. however the old gods relied on the chaos caused by the legion. That still leaves the jailer's plans - would he used another world to carry out his plot? Or does what happen in SL also transcend all realities, meaning our efforts there woudl affect AU azeroth also. Probably all AU Azeroth would have to deal with is the old gods.

How would Krasus and Brox going back in time stop the WotA when it was already going on before they were sent back?

AU Azeroth would've never had a First thru Third Wars, you are true. But without the orcs' invasions the human kingdoms, dwarves, and high elves would've remains separate and prone to infighting. As I said in my last point they'd fallen to civil war and were already in shambles when the Legion found their way to Azeroth. Who knows how long it would've taken Medivh to get them there without Gul'dan's help, maybe decades. Even if the Legion never gets there in the AU they people of the Eastern Kingdoms are already in a shambles. If Kel'thuzad was able to get the people of Lordaeron turned to the Cult of the Damned so easily because they didn't like the taxes to keep the internment camps how easy do you think it would be for active Old Gods to turn the people to something akin to the Twilight's Hammer in such a world? I'd say AU Azeroth wouldn't stand a chance against either Deathwing or any of the Old Gods.

[Beloren]

No, I used the term "round" to evoke the imagery of a boxing match. I suppose it could have been sufficient if they managed to work together, I just doubt that they would have set their differences aside.

Who, night elves and high elves? Their differences don't cause a problem in the original story.. high elves are with teh alliance in the battle of mount Hyjal, and later in TFT Tyrande has no problems helping Kael'thas, much for the high elf/night elf animosity is stoked up later for TBC when the blood elves go horde. It's almost non-existent before then.

I actually agree with you. It's annoying when anyone does it. This ain't the thread for it, but I've never seen anyone blame humans for Arthas. That's just wild.

Seen it happen many times.. Arthas is the main calling card some use to explain why we join the horde over the alliance.. saying humans destroyed Quel'thalas.

Tbh.. it's grasping. We joined the horde because it was convenient for our purpose of reaching Outland, not for love, not for their cause, not because we wanted to belong to the horde or any b/s like that., not because of Garithos either, though he was the reason kael'thas refused to work with the alliance.

[saintminya]

Afterall it is the night elves that defeat the legion again with the important killing blow, they are the indispensable ones in the second round, it's their power that burns Archimonde to death. the horde and alliance provide the necessary cover but play no pivotal role, it probably is safe to assume that an equal force of either all horde or all alliance would have been enough to fulfil their role. All that was required was the numbers to block the legion , it didn't matter if all the forces were alliance or horde or 50 /50.

I don't recall the horde bringing anything specifically unique to the battle that could not have been done by an equal number of humans or high elves, same with the alliance, the alliance could have been replaced by an equal number of horde fighter.

Why bother making it about Horde or Alliance? Where the troops come from is irrelevant so long as they play their role. Orcs were just the most capable warriors, with their shamans and warlocks being a fine bonus. Trolls could have provided adequate shamans, but no one else could've provided warlocks of any worth.

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Who, night elves and high elves?

Huh? I was referring to any of the forces that could've joined in combatting the Legion. Humans don't get along with themselves, Trolls don't get along with Elves, and Night Elves were notoriously xenophobic. It is possible that the Night Elves wouldn't have played nice with the High Elves though. They'd all probably have needed some Tauren there to preach some peace and keep them all focused only on the fight that mattered lol.

[Beloren]

How would Krasus and Brox going back in time stop the WotA when it was already going on before they were sent back?

they went back to prevent someone else stopping it from happenning. And ended up helping the night elves defeat the Legion - they also greatly accelerated the original timetable - all for the purposes of the narrative.

Not sure why we had to have a human around for it to be relatable to alliance fans and an orc around for horde fans.

AU Azeroth would've never had a First thru Third Wars, you are true. But without the orcs' invasions the human kingdoms, dwarves, and high elves would've remains separate and prone to infighting. As I said in my last point they'd fallen to civil war and were already in shambles when the Legion found their way to Azeroth. Who knows how long it would've taken Medivh to get them there without Gul'dan's help, maybe decades. Even if the Legion never gets there in the AU they people of the Eastern Kingdoms are already in a shambles. If Kel'thuzad was able to get the people of Lordaeron turned to the Cult of the Damned so easily because they didn't like the taxes to keep the internment camps how easy do you think it would be for active Old Gods to turn the people to something akin to the Twilight's Hammer in such a world? I'd say AU Azeroth wouldn't stand a chance against either Deathwing or any of the Old Gods.

Interesting point, fair enough.

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Why bother making it about Horde or Alliance? Where the troops come from is irrelevant so long as they play their role. Orcs were just the most capable warriors, with their shamans and warlocks being a fine bonus. Trolls could have provided adequate shamans, but no one else could've provided warlocks of any worth.

But warlocks werne't intsturmental to the battle either, nice to have had, but mages would have survived or other types of combatants as long as they were capable - tha'ts why I say it could have been all horde or all alliance or 50/50 neither side was indispensable, only the night elves were.
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Huh? I was referring to any of the forces that could've joined in combatting the Legion. Humans don't get along with themselves, Trolls don't get along with Elves, and Night Elves were notoriously xenophobic. It is possible that the Night Elves wouldn't have played nice with the High Elves though. They'd all probably have needed some Tauren there to preach some peace and keep them all focused only on the fight that mattered lol.

I think the threat of the legion would have united any force. - Medivh would have done his persuading to whoever was availble, whether humans, orcs, tauren, trolls, furbolgs or Kobolds.

the night elves back then weren't petty nor small, they were changed later remember? They'd have worked with anybody who was willing to fight and had the power too, why not the very kin who together helped secure the first victory over the legion. All that elf hatred gets recast later.

I think trolls would have put their animosity behind them against the legion. Definitely Darkspears.. not so sure about some of the evil groups though.

i find a bit of problem with wow's portrayal sometimes, the behaviour of some races don't always match their description. Everybody behaves like a squabbling teenager, you'd think all the races were an army of 16-45 year olds, rather htan beings who were thousands of years old or well grounded wise oaks. Perhaps nuance is lost on the developers.

[DatToffer]

Do you think the orcs absence would have been filled with the many more humans and high elves who'd have consequently been alive at the time, not to mention tauren and trolls who'd likely have been called up to? And that it would have been sufficient?

It wouldn't, because there wouldn't be any humans in Kalimdor.

No orc invasion means no Medivh ghost to look for redemption and warn the kingdoms of the Legion's return -> No departure for Kalimdor, no help for the Night Elves. Everyone dies.

Even if he was there to give them warnings, he would be looked as a mad man. No Ner'zhul means no Scourge disaster to bring credit to his warning -> Everyone dies.

Medivh was instrumental to Azeroth's safety in War3, but his path was only set because of his actions leading to the First.

Without the Horde to give the Alliance a reason to exist, you'd have a possessed Medivh and a Deathwing in disguise to fuck the Eastern Kingdoms around.

[Dellis0991]

Even without the orcs Sargeras would've eventually found Azeroth.

[Frontenac]

It was already explained what would have happened.

The human kingdoms would kill each other, because there was not an common enemy like the horde.

Without the orcs, taurens would be exterminated by the quilboar and the centaurs, the darkspear by the murlocs, there would be no horde or alliance to fight in the third war helping the night elves, they would Lose and the legion would conquer everything.

Plus, without Broxxigar the night elves would had lost in the first legion invasion

I don't buy this. I know this is Blizzard's explanation since the Black Morass dungeon. But it's bogus. The orcs were sent by the Legion precisely as proxy for an invasion. A proxy they needed because they wouldn't have been able to attack directly. You're saying that the human kingdoms united against a common enemy. Seems to me that the Legion is one heck of a common enemy. The Dwarves and Elves would have rallied even faster, because they could not brush it off as "these aliens are a Stormwind concern". And humans killing each others in border conflicts could not have been as murderous as ravenous orcs killing, massacring, pillaging and destroying everything. I mean how could a war between, let's say, Gilneas and Lordaeron be more damaging than the wars (plural) we've got throughout the world between the Horde and the Alliance since the Dark Portal opened? Also, no Dark Portal, no Nehr'zul. No Nehr'zul, no Lich King. No Lich King, no second invasion.

Oh yes, the Tauren and Darkspears would have been extinct. Still, I can't help but wonder how could two dying races (one of which being so diminished that they could embark on a few ships) be more important to Azeroth's defense than seven human kingdoms, Quel'Thalas and Khaz Modan at their full might?

Now, I'm not saying that the Horde did nothing to stop the Legion's invasion, but still, the orcs were part of their plans in the first place.

As for Broxigar, his very presence informed Sargeras of the orcs' existence...

[Beloren]

It wouldn't, because there wouldn't be any humans in Kalimdor.

No orc invasion means no Medivh ghost to look for redemption and warn the kingdoms of the Legion's return -> No departure for Kalimdor, no help for the Night Elves. Everyone dies.

Even if he was there to give them warnings, he would be looked as a mad man. No Ner'zhul means no Scourge disaster to bring credit to his warning -> Everyone dies.

Medivh was instrumental to Azeroth's safety in War3, but his path was only set because of his actions leading to the First.

Without the Horde to give the Alliance a reason to exist, you'd have a possessed Medivh and a Deathwing in disguise to fuck the Eastern Kingdoms around.

It would also mean no legion ..at least not in the way it happened for the 3rd war..

you see, as much as the orcs presence did trigger the formation of the alliance and stronger bond, it could just have easily resulted in the legions's victory. it didn't in this case, meaning the absence of the orcs would not necessarily mean certain doom for azeroth.

Let's just say there is another mysterious force working on Azeroth, that regardless of what actually happened, i.e. whether orcs came or not, it would have used what was around to deny the legion, deny deathwing and deny the void too.


If the orcs don't rally the humans to fight the legion threat, the high elves could have, if not them, the night elves could have. Maybe the legions' return wakes Malygos from his deep sulk and he is the rallying cause and also flushes out Deathwing's plan

so that no matter who was around, they'd have reason up, the only thing that differs would be who would have played the role.

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But I stand by first prediction, because of Au Draenor events, that lead to the destruction of the legion in MU which affects all realities, AU Azeroth would never have faced the Legion.

And what that AU Azeroth would look like would be interesting.

[DatToffer]

Reading you, it seems you're not interested in discussing about the consequences of removing the orcs from the timeline, but you'd just like to remove the orcs from the story and write something where all is fine and the Azerothians gets all.

Maybe you should have opened with that, I know fanfics don't always get respect here, but I'm always curious of these.

[Kallisto]

I believe that without the orcs as a common enemy the human nations would have warred with each other

I think this Warcraft 3 custom game captures it well:

https://www.epicwar.com/maps/263440/

https://www.epicwar.com/maps/301794/

It's already been said in lore that without the Orcish invasions Genn was planning to attack Lordaeron to increase Gilnean lands in what is now Silverpine and Hillsbrad foothills.

[Saltysquidoon]

It's a difficult discussion.
Blizzard's official position has to be the orcs indirectly saved Azeroth by uniting the Alliance (as WoW is an mmo and you cannot have one faction be completely narratively unjustified in existing). Which is true, but it's also necessary to understand blizzard wrote the orcs as unironic bad guys in the first two games and agents of the legion. Resultantly Blizzard had to retroactively justify how the og horde were really a good thing, in the long run, all along. (This speaks to a bigger issue of wanting Thrall's horde to be directly connected to the old horde for some asinine reason but that's neither here nor there).

I think that instead of focusing on a position the narrative has to hold because WoW needs a status quo we should look at the other points:
1. Thrall was the only one willing to go to Kalimdor and resultantly kicked the nelves into gear. Admittedly how much people in EK knew about Kalimdor has been royally fucked by thoughtless retcons "expanding the lore" over the years so how necessary that was is up for debate;
2. Thrall united the zandalari and the Tauren (and saved both from extinction) and resultantly galvanised them against the legion. Given the history between the elves humans and trolls and how humans especially think of beast races it's unlikely some theoretical AU alliance would have even bothered to try and recruit them. On the other hand the horde did save them from extinction so it's unknown exactly how much they would have been able to help in an immediate legion scenario;
3. The horde has been pretty much solely responsible for dealing with pretty much every issue that cropped up in eastern, central and southern Kalimdor since WCIII (with the obvious exception being the raid on Ahn'Qiraj).

I will say while it is certainly true that AU Azeroth with no horde would have been highly fractious and almost completely unprepared for an entirely unfettered legion invasion. That doesn't preclude the possibility of writing a story where some theoretical alternate alliance pulls out the W without the Horde, especially if it's a horde-esque limited invasion that specifically was written that way to allow for a response. .

[Syegfryed]

Ddin't the night elves win the first invasion without Rhonin, krasus or Broxigar? Isn't the rise of the infiinte tied to the legion, and orc intereference in the first place meaning there woudl be no need for a disturbed timeline to be repaired there. And without Broxigar, wouldn't someone else have sufficed?

Everything because weird after those books, thats why time travel is a mess if not done right.

But apaprently, no, they would need those 3 guys, for the things to happen.

This amazing feeling, to know that your entire tribe got wiped out by a goddamn murlocs.

tbf , who enver got killed by those water rats when they come in the dozens.

[ohwell]

Legion would have taken over the first time then game over.....

There's only 1 Legion for all time lines according to lore. So there wouldn't have been the same invasions.

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Total Legion victory. Without the Horde present at the battle of Mt. Hyjal Archimonde would have succeeded in draining the World Tree, decimating the mortal resistance and then either succeeding in usurping Sargeras (unlikely) or more likely being forced to summon him only for Sargeras then to corrupt the World Soul, turning Azeroth into Argus 2 and all native life dying off.

There's only 1 Archimonde so he can't be in 2 timelines at once.... Gotta love the dumb lore that they created in WoD. The Archimonde we fight in AU Draenor is the same one we killed in MH.