So while i’m pretty sure we discussed why a large portion of us dislike BfA at this point, i still think we should dig into how this happened. I honeslty think that the change in leadership from Kosak to Afriasaiba caused a lot more problems. This is gonna be a lot of Inferance based Guessing on what happened from limited evidence, because i don’t actually have insight inside the company.
Blizzard constantly says they plan expansions years in advance, and while it’s probable they plan for the next expansion, they likely only have outlines for ones after that. This brings us to Legion, an expansion where we actually know a lot was changed in the story from the early alpha to the final release. Some changes made sense, like rewriting Highmountain because of a plothole, while others seem… odd. Vol’jin for example was origenally MIA after broken Shoe, not Killed, and Sylvanas took over not by his dying words but because she was then the second highest ranked military commander, having been appointed by Vol’jin to lead the hordes combined forces in the Broken Shore offensive.
Now we run into the Trailer for BfA and some comments from Metzen, and we learn that Sylvanas likely wasn’t supposed to be the main villain in BfA. The Trailer infamously has Sylvanas and Saurfang working together, and Metzen thought the Hordes story would be about unifying the broken parts of it. He also stated, that the big Moral Event Horizen Sylvanas preformed at the start of the Expansion, the Burning of Teldrassil, wasn’t even planned to happen. The war would start in a different way. Combined with the fact Darkshore wasn’t one of the datamined warfronts over some alliance offensives makes me think the War of the Thorns might have been a last minute change. The book in legion that seems to exist simply to give Genn justification in attacking Sylvanas during Stormhiem is another odd case. Where despite being this big major event, his in universe whitewashing was in a minor questline in another zone entirely that could be played afterwards.
All this combined makes me think Kosak’s plan was to have the Horde be temporarily under Sylvanas’ leadership, were they finally unify into a greater whole. After which Vol’jin would be found (Possibly on Zandalar) and retake his position as Warchief while Sylvanas returns to simply being the banshee queen. Genn’s attack in Stormhiem would simply be motivated by his vendetta and be the actual start of hostilities again.
Why would they do all these things? Because Afriasaibi has vastly different opinions on Sylvanas then Kosak did. We joke about Danusaur waifuing her, but before him we did it with Kosask. Afriasaiba (and to a lesser extent novelist Christie Golden who often worked with him) wanted her to be a villain, over Garrosh Hellscream. He likely felt like now that he was given the reigns, he could rewrite Sylvanas’ story as the main antagonist. It also serves to highlight how Disconnected Nzoth is from the main plotline. It wouldn’t be an issue if there wasn’t a main villain, but with Sylvanas taking that role it becomes harder to justify.
As for how it effected Shadowlands, well i expect Shadowlands was, at best, in the super early conceptual stages, and it would be easy to change it so Sylvie was the cause over whatever they had planned.
I still since you guys pointed out what happened and Its still able to get my intent across, im fine.