Midnight 12.X Patches & World Soul Saga Speculation Thread

[allegrian]

This kind of talk is just...baffling to me. Red alliance? Really? Half the player base of the Horde is Belves. And I can guarantee you that Alliance players view Belves just as red as orcs or Tauren or whatever. So part of the Horde denouncing it's own is....not very Horde of them. It is very Garrosh coded though...

From a warcraft 1-3 and vanilla wow point of view, belves are not horde at all in theme (so, the original and thrall's horde) even if they are canonically. It's as if they just added humans to the horde and now we're suposed to think that human themes fit the horde because you can play them (same can be said about Earthen).

At this point, the horde has so many different and contradictory themes that they shluld just merge alliance and horde into the same faction and leave each race as their own lore faction.

[milkmustache]

For once, agreed. Something more definitive than "nothing to announce," their non-answer with that is the same as the Void DH spec everyone anticipated.

Exactly! Agreed with @Graeham. I don't think us Ethereal truthers would be putting up such a dauntless crusade if there weren't something there. The Gleeful Glamour is definitely our war banner at this point, but dancing around the question is a major hint.

[Hitei]

Alliance player here, fine with this. Silvermoon as a hub is going to feel weird to Alliance characters canonically as well. It just makes sense.

As an Alliance player my immediate reaction is why am I helping Blood Elf causes then? Fighting to keep the Sunwell (and so Azeroth) safe aside--why am I bothering to defend rural Eversong villages under attack, or help cleanse Windrunner spire, or making sure lynx populations don't get too big if the Blood Elves can't even be assed to give me free run of the city while I help save their entire kingdom?

What a shitty decision, especially when for some reason the Horde have free run of Bel'ameth with only a debuff after they burned the Night Elf capital to the ground, full of citizens a few years ago, and were allowed everywhere but the Alliance specific buildings in Dalaran despite attacking Dalaran in Vanilla.

[Limayria]

Exactly! Agreed with @Graeham. I don't think us Ethereal truthers would be putting up such a dauntless crusade if there weren't something there. The Gleeful Glamour is definitely our war banner at this point, but dancing around the question is a major hint.

I wonder if they're gonna elaborate on that in the panels at all, the glamour is so weird but maybe it's just the "dinar" problem all over again

Where what they gave us was very much not "dinar" but would have been decently well received with a different name

[Ashahalasin]

This kind of talk is just...baffling to me. Red alliance? Really? Half the player base of the Horde is Belves. And I can guarantee you that Alliance players view Belves just as red as orcs or Tauren or whatever. So part of the Horde denouncing it's own is....not very Horde of them. It is very Garrosh coded though...

I'd rethink your guarantees. There is no universe where that is true.
BE feel out of place on horde, always have.

Horde started as the violent demonic invaders, then morphed into "noble savages". Blood Elves have never been at home in this, nor have undead. It started as an alliance of convenience, not a true merge of cultures and ideals.

[Vakir]

And that alliance of convenience was, again, completely invalidated in the same expansion they joined.

It was a bold decision for the time, but I play both sides about evenly and I have always felt they're a bit out of place in the overall Horde aesthetic. It was a really crazy and exciting mic drop to have them be Horde when it was first announced like 20 years ago, during a time the game's interest was it its peak, but I don't think it landed in the long-run.

[Marlamin]

As an Alliance player my immediate reaction is why am I helping Blood Elf causes then? Fighting to keep the Sunwell (and so Azeroth) safe aside--why am I bothering to defend rural Eversong villages under attack, or help cleanse Windrunner spire, or making sure lynx populations don't get too big if the Blood Elves can't even be assed to give me free run of the city while I help save their entire kingdom?

What a shitty decision, especially when for some reason the Horde have free run of Bel'ameth with only a debuff after they burned the Night Elf capital to the ground, full of citizens a few years ago, and were allowed everywhere but the Alliance specific buildings in Dalaran despite attacking Dalaran in Vanilla.

I think that 'aside' is not an aside for me personally, in the grand scheme I don't think it matters which bit of Azeroth you are defending as long as whatever you're defending is holding back the evil from reaching things you do care about.

[Xilurm]

As an Alliance player my immediate reaction is why am I helping Blood Elf causes then? Fighting to keep the Sunwell (and so Azeroth) safe aside--why am I bothering to defend rural Eversong villages under attack, or help cleanse Windrunner spire, or making sure lynx populations don't get too big if the Blood Elves can't even be assed to give me free run of the city while I help save their entire kingdom?

What a shitty decision, especially when for some reason the Horde have free run of Bel'ameth with only a debuff after they burned the Night Elf capital to the ground, full of citizens a few years ago, and were allowed everywhere but the Alliance specific buildings in Dalaran despite attacking Dalaran in Vanilla.

You're looking at it the wrong way. We are the armies coming to Silvermoon's defense. The Hordies already live there, they have citizens. You wouldn't let a neighboring's country army just settle anywhere in yours just because they came to help.

[xskarma]

From a warcraft 1-3 and vanilla wow point of view, belves are not horde at all in theme (so, the original and thrall's horde) even if they are canonically. It's as if they just added humans to the horde and now we're suposed to think that human themes fit the horde because you can play them (same can be said about Earthen).

At this point, the horde has so many different and contradictory themes that they shluld just merge alliance and horde into the same faction and leave each race as their own lore faction.

TBC launched in 2007. We're coming up on 20 YEARS of Belves being a major part of the Horde.

I know people have trouble accepting new ideas, but come on now. That is a part of the Horde player base being willfully and stubbornly obtuse and resisting of things that don't fit their really REALLY narrow view of the world, that has not been accurate for nigh on 20 years.

To have the most popular race in the Horde, FINALLY after many years of begging Blizz, getting their capital fixed, and brought into the modern game, and have the race be celebrated (and with it the Horde) for at least the entire introduction of the expansion and Season 1, and be waved off by a part of the Horde fan base as "meh, red alliance". That is quite frankly not a Blizz problem at all, or anything wrong with anything they have done, but a small, but loud mouth part of the Horde fan base being toxic as hell.

[Limayria]

And that alliance of convenience was, again, completely invalidated in the same expansion they joined.

It was a bold decision for the time, but I play both sides about evenly and I have always felt they're a bit out of place in the overall Horde aesthetic. It was a really crazy and exciting mic drop to have them be Horde when it was first announced like 20 years ago, during a time the game's interest was it its peak, but I don't think it landed in the long-run.

They only gave belfs to the horde so the horde wouldn't have a population death spiral

Also I just wanted to have an official "told ya so" to the haters telling me void dh was impossible even if the spec looks like abominable dogshit, it's still a void dh which I called before 11.2 was announced even

[milkmustache]

I wonder if they're gonna elaborate on that in the panels at all, the glamour is so weird but maybe it's just the "dinar" problem all over again

Where what they gave us was very much not "dinar" but would have been decently well received with a different name

This is a really good point, and I completely agree that just a bit of clarification could be great. If they come out and say "Hey, we really enjoyed the idea of these glamours and want to extend them to races that may not be available to players, but have models we're proud of," then I will fully step back, eat my crow and move on (although with some despair). But until then, it's a really, really weird situation and I will gladly dig my heels into this hill to die on.

[Ashahalasin]

You're looking at it the wrong way. We are the armies coming to Silvermoon's defense. The Hordies already live there, they have citizens. You wouldn't let a neighboring's country army just settle anywhere in yours just because they came to help.

Then why are Red Dawn the bad guys for not wanting an invading army from settling in their lands?

[Xilurm]

Then why are Red Dawn the bad guys for not wanting an invading army from settling in their lands?

Well they settled on some hills, not in Stromgarde itself. The Alliance is still allowed in Silvermoon, just not everywhere.

[Vakir]

They only gave belfs to the horde so the horde wouldn't have a population death spiral

See, I think post-WoD model revamps, and also following the Cataclysm redistricting, things would've been fine even without Blood Elves. Maybe not the population destination it is now, but still present.

The biggest problem with launch Horde is that Kalimdor simply sucked shit. They definitely seemed second banana in terms of zone design comprehension compared to the Alliance, especially Elwynn through Duskwood. The overall quest distribution and layouts were disproportionate.

That's probably the real reason Garrosh ran roughshod in Cata, they were making zones a bit more even and had a narrative excuse to do so. They just didn't make it narratively satisfying (or coherent) which is why we got the Horde bias talks. Alliance got the short-straw in terms of presentation and quality in Cata.

But if you were to give ogres that were, say, cool in the way that Rexxar's presentation is rather than solely a farting gag race, or other Horde-appropriate "monster" races that people have long requested but still haven't come to fruition, I think plenty of people would be interested.

[Limayria]

This is a really good point, and I completely agree that just a bit of clarification could be great. If they come out and say "Hey, we really enjoyed the idea of these glamours and want to extend them to races that may not be available to players, but have models we're proud of," then I will fully step back, eat my crow and move on (although with some despair). But until then, it's a really, really weird situation and I will gladly dig my heels into this hill to die on.

I'll fight with u, I wanna be an etheral so fucking bad

Though I'm more excited for our new bat elf friends than most bcuz finally shaman on a race I don't mind playing and the new druid forms seem awesome

See, I think post-WoD model revamps, and also following the Cataclysm redistricting, things would've been fine even without Blood Elves. Maybe not the population destination it is now, but still present.

The biggest problem with launch Horde is that Kalimdor simply sucked shit. They definitely seemed second banana in terms of zone design comprehension compared to the Alliance, especially Elwynn through Duskwood. The overall quest distribution and layouts were disproportionate.

That's probably the real reason Garrosh ran roughshod in Cata, they were making zones a bit more even and had a narrative excuse to do so. They just didn't make it narratively satisfying (or coherent) which is why we got the Horde bias talks. Alliance got the short-straw in terms of presentation and quality in Cata.

But if you were to give ogres that were, say, cool in the way that Rexxar's presentation is rather than solely a farting gag race, or other Horde-appropriate "monster" races that people have long requested but still haven't come to fruition, I think plenty of people would be interested.

I don't think the horde would have made it to WoD with out blood elves, before cross faction raids and dungeons and pre cross server content death spirals would be much easier to start happening just by people wanting to play with their friends or whatever

I def think it would have been fine eventually especially with the advent of cross realm groups but even with blood elves on the horde we had many servers ending up super dead

Now maybe those servers would have been less dead if the population ended up splitting 70/30 or w/e it would have been but that's getting so far from what we could possibly have known

Just like it seems there was at one point set up or concepts for illidari as a third faction and each faction getting a signature class

Paladins for alliance shaman for horde dh for illidari

With illidari getting broken/naga/belves/fel orcs or arroka or something with belves being demon hunters and paladins and broken shaman, alliance getting a shaman race in TBC (pandas?) and night elf demon hunters

Horde getting troll demon hunters and forsaken paladins

But this is a whole load of nothing on a super long comment already

[milkmustache]

I'll fight with u, I wanna be an etheral so fucking bad

Though I'm more excited for our new bat elf friends than most bcuz finally shaman on a race I don't mind playing and the new druid forms seem awesome

My initial disappointment is simmering and I'm opening up to it a little more. I'll definitely roll a Haranir druid, will probably hold off on saving my Shaman for a hopeful Amani troll!

[Ferlion]

* **The World of Midnight: A Further Look into the Zones, Quests, and Story:** On August 21 at 13:00 CEST with Senior Game Director Ion Hazzikostas and Associate Design Director Maria Hamilton
* **Systems Download: Diving Deeper into the Features of Midnight:** On August 23 at 11:00 CEST with Senior Game Director Ion Hazzikostas and Associate Game Director Paul Kubit.

So the deep dive for the features is on august 23

I really do wonder if we'll get something tomorrow. A wowcast or something, or if the Metzen stuff was just completely scrapped.

[Vakir]

Though I'm more excited for our new bat elf friends than most bcuz finally shaman on a race I don't mind playing and the new druid forms seem awesome

Haranir are similar to me as Kul Tirans where the forms are so much better than the actual originating race that it's downright frustrating.

Like, "give me a spooky Harandar/Drustvar tree or gnarled forest sprite to be for a base form instead of this goofy looking fuck."

KTs are fine for bulkier classes, I am annoyed you can't play a normal human with their voice/racials for something like a druid, tide priest, whatever.

[Viridiel]

Then why are Red Dawn the bad guys for not wanting an invading army from settling in their lands?

Aren't the Red Dawn bad guys because they're human supremacists who attack the Alliance and Horde alike to ignite a war...? They want everyone except humans gone from the Highlands, not just orcs.

[Hitei]

I think that 'aside' is not an aside for me personally, in the grand scheme I don't think it matters which bit of Azeroth you are defending as long as whatever you're defending is holding back the evil from reaching things you do care about.

You're looking at it the wrong way. We are the armies coming to Silvermoon's defense. The Hordies already live there, they have citizens. You wouldn't let a neighboring's country army just settle anywhere in yours just because they came to help.

It's an aside because they are two separate things. I'm not arguing that fighting the Void to defend Azeroth isn't more important. Yeah, of course. The evil has to be stopped.

But that isn't all quests. So when some Blood Elf in rebuilt Goldenmist Village goes "These spiders are getting a bit too close to the town, clear them out." Why? Clear them out yourself. Get a Horde champion to do it. If I'm not welcome enough in your kingdom to walk around your capital city unmolested, you can do your own busywork. I immediately feel like I'm now being forced to assist someone who doesn't even have the decency to extend the same courtesy.

It's also just sort of obnoxious, completely ignoring the above narrative/character motivation aspect.

You know how annoying it is when you're in Dornogal and you accidentally get too close to the weekly table and are auto-dismounted? Now half the playerbase just has entire sections of the city that presumably teleport or dismount and teleport you for flying over them for too long or taking a wrong turn. Because they chose the wrong faction I guess? GG?