I would like to hear the communities thoughts.
With so many leaders on both sides seeking peace between the factions. There are also a number on both sides clamoring for war.
I can totally see the ending of this expansion concluding in the creation of a 3rd “neutral” faction. I think it could even be set as a choice (like the choices we’ve seen in BFA) for players to decide.
The biggest argument against it is, what a total pain it would be for Blizzard to implement. Not to mention forcing your player base to decide as a guild which side to choose if they wish to remain together.
I think it could be interesting to have the more war focused members of the factions break off and focus on their war. While those who seek peace between the factions focus on healing the world.
There will not be a third faction. It would be more something like after SoO. Here you can read that there will be no split:
https://blizzardwatch.com/2018/11/05/single-faction-world-warcraft-feels-closer-ever-blizzcon-interview/
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Edit: Steabrus beat me to it.
This is exactly why it won’t happen:
Three factions…or one?
Since Afrasiabi brought up the Saurfang vs. Sylvanas option, Mitch pressed him about the idea of splitting the Horde into separate factions for each camp. While the idea would be “thematically cool and appropriate for this scenario,” Afrasiabi explained that creating a third faction would really mean splitting up friendships and guilds since factions cannot adventure together. His preference would be the other way: that the Alliance and Horde could group together “one of these days.”
“That is the bigger meta lesson of Azeroth,” he concluded, “that these battles that we fought, even when we are separated, are for the same damn purpose. For our home.”
It would never get off the ground. There’d have to be some REALLY strong incentives to get people to play it, and even then you run the risk of worsening things with the current faction balance issues (how much does the third faction taking players from the Alliance hurt the Alliance)?
Really, they need to find a way to add in mercenary mode since they can’t get two factions balanced properly.
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Not a good time if you ask me. Scourge, Night Elves or Illidan’s faction were the best candidates and we can’t implement those now. I think they will keep it Horde and Alliance forever.
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I think it’d be more likely that, rather than create a 3rd faction, the game would allow non-Warmode players to group and communicate cross-faction.
They could still include different storylines for the hawks and the doves on each faction, but it would require a lot less work. Mechanics-wise, the system could use something like the current non-warmode PvP flags or the FFA group combat to deal with opposite-faction party members who flag due to combat or entering the other faction’s zones. (Ranging from being unable to heal/interact with flagged party members to being able to attack them too)
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They can barely balance the two factions we have now, what makes you think they can balance a third?
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I agree in the spirit of these ideas, too. I think that the next expansion should unlock being able to play with all players in the game, like the opposite of the Pandaren. That is to say, leveling from 1 to 120 you would be Horde or Alliance, then at 120+ everyone would get to get to group up and play together.
For War Mode I would propose the opposite: Anarchy Mode, where everyone you aren’t grouped up with is attackable and can attack you, like a lot of the free-for-all enabling PvP areas we already have in the game.
It’s a popular fan theory, but I really don’t think it’s going to happen. I’m not even sure why so many people think it will.
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If you mean everyone being able to play together, probably because of Alex Afrasiabi. On top of him bringing up the one faction idea, he also said that BfA would resolve the faction conflict.
No, I mean the idea of a third faction. I just don’t see it happening.
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While I don’t think a third faction will ever happen (more likely we’d see the alliance and horde dissolve completely but that’s a different conversation) I definitely see Sylvanas breaking off from the Horde and leading her own faction-- making room for a Dark Ranger Hero Class.
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Because that’s what this story needs, another dark and edgy hero class.
We’ll see … though I think with Velonara’s little short story (of all Dark Rangers its the odd ball who volunteered to work in the Horde garrison, rather than go back to Sylvanas) … Blizz will probably start trying to drag Dark Rangers away from Sylvanas. After all, Velonara (for some “convenient” reason) is the last Ranger to fall in the Blood Elf Heritage questline.
Nothing quite like Sylvanas deliberately and willingly starting to do the very thing to the NEs that many of the Dark Rangers only forgave her for because she was forced to by Arthas.
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But…that’s kind of a HUGE argument. This is why I would be shocked if anything like this ever happened.
Taking a shrinking player base and then dividing it again would cripple…well, probably every raiding guild. And would heavily incentivize players to just leave. I can’t imagine Blizzard going this route.
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Is he the one who also said that BfA was about bringing the Forsaken and the rest of the Horde together? Or was that someone else? Can’t seem to find the interview right now.
That was Steve Danuser:
“There has always been some question as to what the Horde stood for,” said Danuser. “And that has changed and evolved over time. Is it this disparate collection of outcasts that nobody will align themselves with? And that’s why they’re together, out of necessity? Or is it this group that’s driven by honor and courage? Players have been able to identify and pull out parts of the storyline that they favor and maybe turn a blind eye to some of the other things, but all of those things have been part of the Horde’s history.
“While we’ve had conflicts like the Siege of Orgrimmar, none of those really resolved what the Horde is. Battle for Azeroth is absolutely an opportunity to look at both sides [honorable and evil] that have made up the Horde storylines throughout the years and pull them together. And maybe give a chance for the Horde to look inward and maybe become something new, something stronger than it ever was before.
“We look at this as an opportunity, and the thing is, to get there, we have to look at those scars that have come along the way. That’s the only way we can grow and move beyond, is taking an honest look at the things you’ve done, and nobody is exemplifying that path to the Horde more than what Sylvanas and Saurfang and those other heroes are doing. They are embodying the other aspects of what the Horde was. So to get to the future of the Horde, we have to face the Horde’s past, and face it in a very real and tangible way.”
Honestly, in the context of BfA that we’ve had, I’ve been reading this now as Blizzard working to do away with the Horde’s villainous elements so that the faction war can end, which would match up with Alex Afrasiabi statements about one unified faction up above, and also him saying that BfA should resolve the faction conflict:
PC Gamer: For a long time the conflict between the Alliance and the Horde has been ignored in favor of dealing with external threats, like the Burning Legion. Why is now the right time to respark the animosity that started it all?
Alex Afrasiabi: We feel the Alliance-Horde divide is foundational and fundamental to World of Warcraft as a franchise and as a story, but we danced around it for a very long time. We’ve had run-ins, we’ve had close calls, but we’ve never been able to finish it—to have that resolution. We’re coming out of this expansion, Legion, and the world is not in a great place—the players and the factions themselves are not in a great place because there is all of this old animosity that hasn’t been resolved. It’s time to resolve it.
I posted a story in the sister forum to this called “The Cleansing of Lordaeron” to show how Blizzard has set up an Alliance undead race under Calia Menethil. You’d really have to read the end of Before the Storm to see the full picture, though. In short, Anduin does a reverse Arthas, bringing light warriors to raise first Uther, Invincible (for Calia), and then on to Andorhal to turn former Scourge into a light undead army that they then use to take Silvermoon for the Alliance.
I honestly don’t see Blizzard doing a Light-themed allied race. Not as a playable faction, anyway. It would undermine their own Forsaken narrative.
Plus…I think it’s lame the way the Alliance keeps getting white bread versions of monstrous races, and this would be the ultimate example of that. Undead without the yucky decomposition, sociopathic attitude, hunger for flesh…what’s next? Sparkly vampires? Do any Alliance players want this?
If there is going to be some sort of Light-infused undead, I think they’ll be antagonists for both sides.
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I will give you one good reason Blizzard will not do a third faction: Battlegrounds are made for 1 v 1. Not going to happen.