Equality

[OwenBurton]

There's usually no equality of the kind you seek in good storytelling; it goes against an interesting narrative overall because the author is limited by the desired equality of outcome for all the sides involved. Look at Warcraft 3; the Alliance of Lordaeron met its end in that game, whereas the Horde found new footing.

Basically, from what I can observe at least, most Alliance and Horde players nowadays truly dislike the storyline and Blizzard's recent lore development, but their complaints are usually completely neglected or ignored. I did not vote that in that poll regarding Steve Danuer's writing, for I was not sure if he alone was responsible for the negative changes, but the writing really is not that admirable, even from the most open-minded and objective perspective.

[Okacz]

Why are the Horde always written as the "bad guys"?

Never understood that line of thinking. Horde = red, Alliance = blue. This is the very first fucking choice you make in the game. Do you pick the blood-soaked, tribal-tattooed Horde that has its symbol on battle standards? Or do you pick the baby-blue Alliance banner with golden lion painted on shiny shields? What is so confusing about that, why do people join Horde and are then grumpy that they are the bad guys? In the good ole' days even Thrall was standing next to the throne (because sitting animations weren't yet invented) and sending your ass to kill Alliance in various keeps all over Durotar/Barrens, because fuck them.

Story sucks right because the game lore strayed away from this simple dichotomy and considers all players to be crystal clear, but some of the Horde leaders (fighting under the same bloody banner Player chose) must be evil for gameplay sake. Horde never gets to do anything warmongering that isn't then immediately written off as "oh that was just some bad seeds, the rest of the Horde wants peace, prosperity and probably rebranding while we're at it". Blizzard didn't even have the balls to kill off Gelbin in BfD in retaliation.

[Grazrug]

You are conveniently leaving out that Garrosh went into business for himself and became an enemy of both the Alliance and the Horde. Even if it was in the name of the Horde ("True Horde" as he was calling it, his vision of it)... the actual Horde faction rebelled against him. Adding him to the list of "losing important figures" of the Horde is just silly


The Zanadari trolls were not even officially apart of the Horde at the time of Rastakhan's death, so he doesn't really count as an "important figure" in the Horde.

He totally does count as loss.

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There's usually no equality of the kind you seek in good storytelling; it goes against an interesting narrative overall because the author is limited by the desired equality of outcome for all the sides involved. Look at Warcraft 3; the Alliance of Lordaeron met its end in that game, whereas the Horde found new footing.

Alliance bias is the problem. This topic is proof of it. The Alliance needs a massive loss in retaliation forall the Horde has suffered,

[KOUNTERPARTS]

He totally does count as loss.

No.


He really doesn't. But good try though.

[Rhelyo]

No.


He really doesn't. But good try though.

I don't understand why do you say this? It's true Rastakhan died in the same expansion he made the appearance. I am not familiar with Warcraft lore books but was he a part of the zandalari trolls before the expansion or was he added as a leader since the zandalari trolls needed a king in BfA?
For example in MoP when we fought the zandalari on that island did we knew who their king is? Was he part of lore since then? Because if he indeed is an old lore character like Saurfang,Jaina,Khadgar and other big names then i do add him in the list of Horde losses. I mean this would mean the Horde lost a big character only to be replaced by Talanji. I would have rather prefered if the roles were switched and Talanji died in BfA and let Rastakhan alive.

[KOUNTERPARTS]

I don't understand why do you say this? It's true Rastakhan died in the same expansion he made the appearance. I am not familiar with Warcraft lore books but was he a part of the zandalari trolls before the expansion or was he added as a leader since the zandalari trolls needed a king in BfA?
For example in MoP when we fought the zandalari on that island did we knew who their king is? Was he part of lore since then? Because if he indeed is an old lore character like Saurfang,Jaina,Khadgar and other big names then i do add him in the list of Horde losses. I mean this would mean the Horde lost a big character only to be replaced by Talanji. I would have rather prefered if the roles were switched and Talanji died in BfA and let Rastakhan alive.

So... for like, the 3rd time now? I think this is the 3rd time:


The Zandalari trolls were not apart of the Horde while Rastakhan was alive. He offered absolutely nothing to the leadership of the Horde at that time. He offered nothing to the story of the game in a "major Horde leader" because he was not one.


Rastakhan was killed during the Battle of Dazar'alor. Also, at this time, the Zandalari trolls were not apart of the Horde. The Zandalari trolls joined the Horde when Talan'ji was their leader. When the Zandalari trolls finally joined the Horde, Talan'ji had already been the queen of the Zandalari trolls for a decent amount of time.


Talan'ji is the Zandalari troll character you want to put up on a pedestal. Not Rastakhan.


Rastakhan is and was not a Horde character, Horde leader, Horde anything. It's okay to like him as a Zandalari troll leader, even like him based on his personality and like him as a character... but to say he was an "important Horde character" is incorrect.

[Feanoro]

The Alliance needs a massive loss in retaliation forall the Horde has suffered,

Loss of multiple cities, a core race turned into a nearly extinct humiliated punching bag, Alliance leaders rushing to comfort and console the enemy, the entire faction rendered into NPCs only reacting to the Horde, the story has been almost exclusively Horde led since TBC, there's almost no Alliance playerbase for most organized content... And yet, the Alliance somehow needs more of a beating. Just wow.

[VladlTutushkin]

Loss of multiple cities, a core race turned into a nearly extinct humiliated punching bag, Alliance leaders rushing to comfort and console the enemy, the entire faction rendered into NPCs only reacting to the Horde, the story has been almost exclusively Horde led since TBC, there's almost no Alliance playerbase for most organized content... And yet, the Alliance somehow needs more of a beating. Just wow.

Grazrug aka --- snip --- is a german guy, who lives with his parents still, despite being more then 23 years old. He also was medicated for some kind of mental illness before, and it is unclear if he ever got fully cured. He is also a neo nazi supporter and rants about lesser races and islam all the time, wanting Germany to become a nazi state again.

He also receives food from his uncle, who buys him groceries now and then, since he is unemployed.

Well, you can see why he acts like he does based on that.

[Syegfryed]

Loss of multiple cities, a core race turned into a nearly extinct humiliated punching bag, Alliance leaders rushing to comfort and console the enemy, the entire faction rendered into NPCs only reacting to the Horde, the story has been almost exclusively Horde led since TBC, there's almost no Alliance playerbase for most organized content... And yet, the Alliance somehow needs more of a beating. Just wow.

Tht would be true, if it wasn't, actually.

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Never understood that line of thinking. Horde = red, Alliance = blue. This is the very first fucking choice you make in the game.

red and blue don't mean good and evil, this is a bad take in relation of both factions if we go back to warcraft 2 and 3, the whole point is how the factions can be both, good or bad, that being a matter of perspective.

the "dichotomy" is much more nuanced from what you said, and it sucks because game lore forgot those two games.

[Zigrifid]

Im pretty sure that when we return to azeroth Turalyon will have an issue with Anduin being so easily "manipulated" (even though he is under mind control) that he wont leave the throne
The way i see it there might be some internal conflict in the alliance with elfs starting a war against the humans for not helping when Tedrassil burned and turalyon might play a big part in that war, lets not forget that propaganda against anduin occured in BfA ,so there is a stepping stone into making some good alliance lore but i doubt cause you know .......Danuser + sylvanas + Nathanos = only lore now.

[Feanoro]

Tht would be true, if it wasn't, actually.

By all means, prove me wrong on anything in that list. Excuse me while I don't hold my breath.

@VladlTutushkin Oh, one of THOSE Horde fans. Blood Elf RP, by any chance?

[VladlTutushkin]

By all means, prove me wrong on anything in that list. Excuse me while I don't hold my breath.

@VladlTutushkin Oh, one of THOSE Horde fans. Blood Elf RP, by any chance?

--- snip ---

Mod Edit: Naming and shaming is not permitted.

[Magnagarde]

As i seen a lot of people want Sylvanas head on a spike for what she has done in Teldrassil and as a horde i do agree she might deserve it.
But the horde these past expansion lost great names like Garrosh,Voljin and Rasthakan(even though we knew him for one expansion).Now most likely we will lose Sylvanas either by being killed or banished never to be heard of.Thrall left the horde and started agriculture.
The Horde are pretty much weakened.Except Varian i do not recall the Alliance ever losing important figures.

Why are the Horde always written as the "bad guys"?

The Alliance never needed to lose important figures because it keeps losing them to Blizzard's decision to turn them into neutral plot-driving characters. The Alliance keeps losing characters through the simple fact that Blizzard writes them into not caring about the military and political union that the Alliance represents. These characters end up "growing out of fighting for the Alliance" and always end up fighting for something that is "more important". Imagine the Horde, but with 10 small Thrallites instead of 1 Thrall. That's the Alliance.

Think about it; the Alliance came into Wacraft's MMO with absolutely no good leading figure in charge. Jaina was the only relatable Alliance character and she was standing in her tower in Theramore all the time, while the Alliance was ruled by an unknown human soldier from Stormwind. The dwarves' king was first introduced in WoW and the gnomes were a complete enigma, save for a few references in the RTS games. The Horde on the other hand came into the MMO setting with Thrall, Cairne and Sylvanas.

Khadgar, a hero of the Alliance, was turned into a character whose allegiance to the Alliance all but evaporated. Velen is in the same camp from day one of his introduction. Tyrande and Malfurion have never showed to care much about the Alliance and have never done anything for it, unless it directly involved saving the night elves. Magni, the king of the Ironforge dwarves, was turned into a "speaker" for the planet's soul. Calia Menethil, a possible living succesor to the throne of Lordaeron, was turned into an undead. Thoras Trollbane was turned into a death knight that once again serves a "greater goal" and won't be bothered with Alliance business. Bolvar Fordragon, who lead Stormwind in Anduin's stead, was turned into the new Lich King and, with the Shadowlands, into the newest plot-driving ex-Alliance character. Uther the Lightbringer was turned into a Kyrian plot-driving ex-Alliance character. Alleria Windrunner, another hero of Alliance, was turned into a prodigal vessel of the void whose new identity makes the Alliance irrelevant in her overaching character development.

The only character whose allegiance to the Alliance progressively increased is Genn Greymane. The Alliance came out of the Third War as the losing faction, while the Horde came out of it as a resurgent power. The Alliance doesn't lose characters through the charaters' death, but their partial or complete disassociation from the faction. Bolvar and Uther were disassociated from the Alliance through undeath.

[Syegfryed]

By all means, prove me wrong on anything in that list. Excuse me while I don't hold my breath.

There is not need to prove an over dramatic post about how reaching it is, a single glance already do that, cause, rly, night elves are not nearly extinct, that is just fallacious, and "multiple cities" you mean two, unless you are counting any settlement with like two houses.

[Okacz]

red and blue don't mean good and evil, this is a bad take in relation of both factions if we go back to warcraft 2 and 3, the whole point is how the factions can be both, good or bad, that being a matter of perspective.

the "dichotomy" is much more nuanced from what you said, and it sucks because game lore forgot those two games.

Exceptions are only exciting if they exist alongside established norm. Also, when they are rare. This is why WC3 had "subversive" themes of a Human that became evil, and Orc that became Jesus, it would suck ass if both factions were established to be greyish. This is why Icecrown was an effective moment - the conflict between Alliance and Horde in Northrend starts early, with Horde being the aggresor and Alliance defending itself for the most part, but they slowly learn that it's more important to focus on fighting the common enemy. Before we get to once again murder each other.

And the dichotomy works best when there's an actual difference between the things. Right now we have the beautiful dichotomy between "Alliance" and "Other Alliance". And earlier people wanted the dichotomy to be between "Good" and "Sad And Misunderstood", yeah that's some Horde pride right there.

[Syegfryed]

Exceptions are only exciting if they exist alongside established norm. Also, when they are rare. This is why WC3 had "subversive" themes of a Human that became evil, and Orc that became Jesus, it would suck ass if both factions were established to be greyish.
This is why Icecrown was an effective moment - the conflict between Alliance and Horde in Northrend starts early, with Horde being the aggresor and Alliance defending itself for the most part, but they slowly learn that it's more important to focus on fighting the common enemy. Before we get to once again murder each other.

You are probably getting a lot of things wrong here, as for vanilla to wtlk the aggressors were alliance, and in northrend both factions were trading blows(alliance declare war on the horde)

Its the truth hat both factions are grey in a perspective of, there is no right or wrong, factions are fighting each other for a number of reasons that go from vengeance, land and resources

And the dichotomy works best when there's an actual difference between the things. Right now we have the beautiful dichotomy between "Alliance" and "Other Alliance". And earlier people wanted the dichotomy to be between "Good" and "Sad And Misunderstood", yeah that's some Horde pride right there.

there is more ways of doing dichotomy than boring 'good and evil".

For the most part the difference between factions were thematic, religion and aesthetic, of how those races reacted different based on their customs and uprising. This alone are huge differences that they stop focusing, so, the problem is not that one faction isn't evil and the other is good, is negligence in the overall story.

[Feanoro]

There is not need to prove an over dramatic post about how reaching it is, a single glance already do that, cause, rly, night elves are not nearly extinct, that is just fallacious, and "multiple cities" you mean two, unless you are counting any settlement with like two houses.

So basically, you can't back it up. Too bad canon and all the facts and proofs disagree with you, but Lord knows that's pretty normal.

[Synvanas]

So basically, you can't back it up. Too bad canon and all the facts and proofs disagree with you, but Lord knows that's pretty normal.

Until Blizzard gives official percentages about the Kaldorei losses, he is right, the Night Elves are not to be considered "nearly extinct" at all, especially because they are actively attacking the Horde in Ashenvale and Azshara.

And in order to be in the group of the "nearly extinct" races, Blizzard must say that in the burning of Teldrassil the Night Elves lost from 80% to 90% of people, otherwise they aren't. (which is the group of Blood Elves, Gnomes and Draenei first and foremost)

[Feanoro]

Until Blizzard gives official percentages about the Kaldorei losses, he is right, the Night Elves are not to be considered "nearly extinct" at all, especially because they are actively attacking the Horde in Ashenvale and Azshara.

And in order to be in the group of the "nearly extinct" races, Blizzard must say that in the burning of Teldrassil the Night Elves lost from 80% to 90% of people, otherwise they aren't. (which is the group of Blood Elves, Gnomes and Draenei first and foremost)

They haven't settled on a number, but every statement in game and out supports the idea that the majority of the population is gone.

Additionally, I do like the attempts he made to dismiss the entire post while only providing any objection to one specific point in it on a technicality.

Loss of multiple cities - Southshore, Darnassus, Dolanaar, Silverwind Refuge, Theramore off the top of my head

a core race turned into a nearly extinct humiliated punching bag - Night Elves have been the Horde's punching bag since Cata and every official statement makes clear they lost the majority of their people with Teldrassil

Alliance leaders rushing to comfort and console the enemy - Anduin acts as a pallbearer and delivers a eulogy for Saurfang, the general who led the Teldrassil campaign. Not one damn word of comfort to the Night Elves, who are his people's allies

the entire faction rendered into NPCs only reacting to the Horde, the story has been almost exclusively Horde led since TBC - These forums have done to death that the Horde drives the story, with the more level headed Horde posters freely admitting that. We have blue statements that they prefer to write for the Horde. We've seen them reduce the Alliance to humans and pals with statements that they only really know how to write humans.

there's almost no Alliance playerbase for most organized content - Any attempt to contest this cannot be taken seriously. Blizzard's Hall of Fame, WoWprogress, Warcraft Logs... Take your pick, if you want to do any serious PVE or PVP, you're forced to play Horde.

[Darth-Piekus]

there's almost no Alliance playerbase for most organized content - Any attempt to contest this cannot be taken seriously. Blizzard's Hall of Fame, WoWprogress, Warcraft Logs... Take your pick, if you want to do any serious PVE or PVP, you're forced to play Horde.

Despite a small minority on the forum trying to deny that but there is a lot of Horde bias inside Blizzard from the start. The whole game from Warcraft 3 and after was made with the Horde in mind. Elite Tauren Chieftain with the power of the Horde with no Alliance counterpart, the rigged competition regarding the Alliance and the Horde chopper, Racial skills that favor the Horde which leads to the result Feanoro mentioned above regarding PVE and PVP in Horde vs Alliance Ratio, story that favors the Horde survival by bending all the rules, equalizing victims and killers, justifying murder and destruction with no consequences.

It's no wonder this game was left with nothing and Blizzard now being accused with things they clearly support in the game.