What are the best ways to make the Alliance more popular and interesting?

[Terrorthatflapsinthenight]

Some wish for Turalyon to go mad, or for Alleria, something I deeply disagree with since turning characters into villains just for the sake of having antagonists and without valid explanation or good storyline to go with is one of WOW's oldest, most recurrent and worst story tools and that it didn't make the story of the Burning Crusade better with Illidan and Kael'thas, nor with the Horde during MOP and BFA with Garrosh and Sylvanas.
It would just make the story again worse that it already is.

[Feanoro]

Some wish for Turalyon to go mad, or for Alleria, something I deeply disagree with since turning characters into villains just for the sake of having antagonists and without valid explanation or good storyline to go with is one of WOW's oldest, most recurrent and worst story tools and that it didn't make the story of the Burning Crusade better with Illidan and Kael'thas, nor with the Horde during MOP and BFA with Garrosh and Sylvanas.
It would just make the story again worse that it already is.

Largely, that's people still butthurt about Garrosh and wanting revenge on the Alliance, rather than realizing it was the writers/devs and their petty bickering.

The only way the Alliance will be more interesting is if they have writers and devs who like it. Considering you literally have writers complaining about Alliance somehow equating to slave owners and other woke boogeymen, don't expect anything good soon.

[Terrorthatflapsinthenight]

Largely, that's people still butthurt about Garrosh and wanting revenge on the Alliance, rather than realizing it was the writers/devs and their petty bickering.

The only way the Alliance will be more interesting is if they have writers and devs who like it. Considering you literally have writers complaining about Alliance somehow equating to slave owners and other woke boogeymen, don't expect anything good soon.

When you see how cruelly underdevelopped and underused dwarves, gnomes and draenei are, and how cruelly abused the Night Elves have been so many times by the writers it's clear that most don't even pretend to like the Alliance and will never produce a story with quality about the Alliance anytime soon.

[Alanar]

Three words: Mad King Turalyon.

It just fits honestly.

[Loreth88]

When you see how cruelly underdevelopped and underused dwarves, gnomes and draenei are, and how cruelly abused the Night Elves have been so many times by the writers it's clear that most don't even pretend to like the Alliance and will never produce a story with quality about the Alliance anytime soon.

Worgenst tilo, sadly they not use them, just see them as humans..

[Terrorthatflapsinthenight]

Three words: Mad King Turalyon.

Already done and overused in WOW, and I trust the devs to handle this as much as I trusted Dumb & Doofus with handling Mad Queen Daenerys in Game of Thrones.

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Worgenst tilo, sadly they not use them, just see them as humans..

It would have been far more interesting and realistic to see the Worgens to be distrusted and feared by many of their allies, after all you can't expect most humans or even dwarves, gnomes and elves in a medieval setting to be accepting and trustful of werewolves who could easily shred them to pieces.

Also it pains me to see how Gilneas story is still at the same level after more than a decade, just the same as Gnomeregan.

[Varodoc]

Some wish for Turalyon to go mad, or for Alleria, something I deeply disagree with since turning characters into villains just for the sake of having antagonists and without valid explanation or good storyline to go with is one of WOW's oldest, most recurrent and worst story tools and that it didn't make the story of the Burning Crusade better with Illidan and Kael'thas, nor with the Horde during MOP and BFA with Garrosh and Sylvanas.
It would just make the story again worse that it already is.

The problem is that people here don't understand the characters.

Alleria is not evil, she just wants to fight the Void Lords using their own power and protect Azeroth from them.

Turalyon is not evil, he simply believes that the Army of the Light should act as keepers of Azeroth, just as they were once keepers of the entire Cosmos against the Legion.

Illidan was like Alleria. He wanted to use dark powers to do good. Unlike Alleria, he mass-enslaved an entire species of draenei. Yet people cheered for him when he returned in Legion. Alleria hasn't done anything evil and has the same good intentions but people here want her to die.

Conclusion: this community here is biased for Illidan, and against Alleria.

[Eggroll]

Stop letting them shit on by the Horde?

The Alliance always supposedly "wins" the conflict, but never gains anything from it...

Devs Horde favoritism ruins them.
And of course devs still have a hate boner for the night elves. That certainly doesn't do anything to endear them.

Also, devs can't write intricate lore or create intricate characters, it's all very black and white.

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The Alliance lacks kick-ass moments.

It's sucked playing Horde during the past two faction conflicts. Again forced into the bad guy by an asshole. But I'm guessing in many ways, it was even worse for the Alliance.

I mean, losing a city is crap. But if some enemy does it, such as when Deathwing destroyed part of Stormwind, it can at least show off the power of the bad guy. But who does the destruction of Theramore and Darnassus hype up? The Horde. The other faction of players. That's not a healthy thing.

And what revenge has been had? Garrosh escaped and was then killed by a Horde leader, not Jaina. The Undercity was blown up by the Horde themselves. The Alliance failed to take or destroy Zandalar; they killed a king that wouldn't submit, and were chased off. Sylvanas escaped Tyrande and the coolest strike against her came by a Horde general built up in a series of great Horde cinematics. Ultimately Sylvanas gets judged, but only after being turned good. It's not an awesome moment.

So yeah, personal journeys where the Alliance gets some cool moments that show what makes the Alliance a great faction. (Also, just boost the racials). The Alliance has many things in their favor. They attract more new players. Their aesthetics are better than the Horde's by far. And their leaders are on average a ton more powerful than the Horde leaders.

Alliance also have the better faction music, if you care to turn on the ingame music.

[Evolixe]

I really don't think the whole faction imbalance can be attributed to lore or aesthetics like.. at all. People just want to win, and mid to late LK in most battlegroups horde always won everything PvP related. So people started moving horde because they wanted to win more. Some of that effect bled into PvE, people want to play on the winning side are and before you know it the whole situation snowballs.

The one solution.. and in my opinion, the only solution, is cross faction play on all levels of gameplay so it doesnt matter what you play in that sense.
The imbalance will fix itself to a reasonable degree over time that way.

[MyWholeLifeIsThunder]

They made Alliance both weak, military incompetent and dumb at the same time on several occasions to hype the Horde up.

They wont lose their gonads if they do the same once for Alliance.

Not the point. I'm saying that it would just fail to show *why* the alliance has merit on "its own" if we just frame it in contrast to the Horde. It's not about about making the Horde look bad or weak, that's irrelevant to the point. The point is that they have to show the strengths and worth of the alliance by itself in order to first cement them. Otherwise is just sort of empty.

[Eggroll]

I really don't think the whole faction imbalance can be attributed to lore or aesthetics like.. at all. People just want to win, and mid to late LK in most battlegroups horde always won everything PvP related. So people started moving horde because they wanted to win more. Some of that effect bled into PvE, people want to play on the winning side are and before you know it the whole situation snowballs.

The one solution.. and in my opinion, the only solution, is cross faction play on all levels of gameplay so it doesnt matter what you play in that sense.
The imbalance will fix itself to a reasonable degree over time that way.

True. I don't know why they haven't implemented cross faction pvp, dungeonfinder and raidfinder already.
Works perfectly on private servers. Nobody takes issue. People just want to play the game.

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Not the point. I'm saying that it would just fail to show *why* the alliance has merit on "its own" if we just frame it in contrast to the Horde. It's not about about making the Horde look bad or weak, that's irrelevant to the point. The point is that they have to show the strengths and worth of the alliance by itself in order to first cement them. Otherwise is just sort of empty.

This is how newcomers are introduced to the factions.
So Alliance is "for girls" with bedroom eyes...

Wonder what the average adolescent male player will pick...



Not to mention that this picture is a gross misrepresentation of the playerbase.
Most characters on Horde are female bloodelves, while on Alliance its probably male humans.

Also, taken from https://www.icy-veins.com/forums/top...n-infographic/

[Tiwack]

For a fantasy game the ally certainly lack some magic and hijinks in general in their presentation. They've got the feral horde pegged pretty well but ally just comes off bland as hell - without mentioning the lack of balance in racials from a pure numbers perspective.

[Ardenaso]

Wonder what the average adolescent male player will pick...

the type to main Samurai and Knight in For Honor would choose Alliance while the type to main Viking would choose Horde

[VladlTutushkin]

True. I don't know why they haven't implemented cross faction pvp, dungeonfinder and raidfinder already.
Works perfectly on private servers. Nobody takes issue. People just want to play the game.

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This is how newcomers are introduced to the factions.
So Alliance is "for girls" with bedroom eyes...

Wonder what the average adolescent male player will pick...



Not to mention that this picture is a gross misrepresentation of the playerbase.
Most characters on Horde are female bloodelves, while on Alliance its probably male humans.

Also, taken from https://www.icy-veins.com/forums/top...n-infographic/

Thats too true. Whenever horde is advertised they use orcs and etc, but faction is 70% blood elves by now.

[Feanoro]

Thats too true. Whenever horde is advertised they use orcs and etc, but faction is 70% blood elves by now.

They sure are doing well for being wiped out by the Scourge!

You know, it makes me wonder if the shit they pour on Night Elf heads is due to frustration that the bulk of the "mighty" Horde looks like they'd die if too far from a beauty salon.

[MyWholeLifeIsThunder]

This is how newcomers are introduced to the factions.
So Alliance is "for girls" with bedroom eyes...

Wonder what the average adolescent male player will pick...



Not to mention that this picture is a gross misrepresentation of the playerbase.
Most characters on Horde are female bloodelves, while on Alliance its probably male humans.

Also, taken from https://www.icy-veins.com/forums/top...n-infographic/

That's a very interesting point, but again, it's not really about what I am talking, which is what should be the narrative focus of the alliance in terms of the story itself.

[Eosia]

It just fits honestly.

Because it's been done already. Twice.

"Garrosh/Sylvanas... but Alliance this time!"

[Sorrowseer]

The Alliance fanbase didn't want Void elves in the first place. The only lore bits left for them is when the inevitable Light/Void expac comes out and Alleria and the rest of her Void morons turn into the ticking time bombs they are. I guess the Alliance can use that mess as a plot hook.

I play a void elf *shrugs*

[Mardux]

It's funny how people here want Alleria to become a villain when she is literally not evil and doesn't even have evil intentions. All she wants to do is to defeat the Void Lords, no matter the price. Illidan was cheered and praised for this philosophy yet Alleria deserves to die for it? Literally every single action she has done since her reintroduction in Legion was to better understand and manipulate the Void, so that she can turn the weapon of the enemy against them (the Void Lords).

As for her dealings with Quel'Thalas, she doesn't seek to wage war on her own people. She simply believes that Quel'Thalas would be better off under the Alliance. Which is, you know, the same idea Theron had in MoP. People here make fun of Alleria for joining the Alliance but they forget that Theron also believed in the Alliance more than the Horde in MoP (until the Purge of Dalaran ofc).

So it's just funny how people here want Alleria to become a villain and a boss when she is literally not an evil person. She is a good person who, like Illidan and the Death Knights (people who are beloved and cheered), wants to use her dark powers to protect Azeroth from those who would destroy it.

And I'm going to add that, EVEN IF ALLERIA SUCCUMBED TO THE WHISPERS, she still wouldn't be a villain. Because, as the Vision of Stormwind shows us, she still believes that what she is doing is right. She believes that the whispers have told her a truth and that she should have listened. She still came from the angle of trying to do good.

And perhaps we should mention how N'Zoth himself believed that he was protecting Azeroth from more malevolent forces (referring to the Janitor). We see the Old Gods as these big evil monsters, but in the end even N'Zoth thought he was protecting the mortals of Azeroth from Death.

Sounds like a standard Windrunner. The only difference is Alleria has always been friendly to the alliance so players choose to give her special consideration.

[VladlTutushkin]

They sure are doing well for being wiped out by the Scourge!

You know, it makes me wonder if the shit they pour on Night Elf heads is due to frustration that the bulk of the "mighty" Horde looks like they'd die if too far from a beauty salon.

Might as well be! Its basically hatred on both ends - “zug zugers” and old timey, ageing and balding devs who want to remember their “rocking” youth (and raping women cuz its “rad”) want to humiliate “pansy forest elves” because living in the forest and surviving in such conditions without turning nature inti wasteland is not “badass” enough for them.

And on the other hand - blood elf fans hate how night elves are manlier… or in women’s case just tougher type that dosent look like a live sized barbie doll or silicone filled bimbo.

Basically night elves landed in a zone that makes both masculinity obsessed creeps and soy-fed waifs hate them since they are balanced and in general very “on their own wave” race.

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Sounds like a standard Windrunner. The only difference is Alleria has always been friendly to the alliance so players choose to give her special consideration.

Phone me when she commits warcrimes for 4 expacks, genocides horde races twice and gets away with it on a civil services.

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Because it's been done already. Twice.

"Garrosh/Sylvanas... but Alliance this time!"

If its a genuine Garrosh/Sylvanas situation 1 to 1 then i would fucken love Alliance to have it.