Simple question, but does anyone think the old Mongrel Horde idea that for better or worse evolved into WoD could be made to work? I’ve been thinking about it because most of the races meant to be a part of it have gotten model and lore updates in the last few expansions, and you could maybe even add others like the remnants of the Vrykul or a Mogu warlord who is ambitious and creative enough to seek outside help. Personally, I think regardless of how it turned out, going with the Iron Horde over them was a good choice, because the Mongrel Horde just isn’t expansion villain material. But where I think they could work is as a secondary recurring threat similar to the Naga or Zandalari. They’re not a global threat like the Legion or an Old God, but they’re enough of a threat that anytime they pop up we need to divert resources to dealing with them since if they get a foothold it might end up being nearly impossible to dislodge them. The main reason why I think these guys could work as a recurring threat is this, WoW doesn’t do deeper themes often, or very well when it tries. But one that is so consistent that it can retroactively be applied to the RTS games is that when people are united that are able to face off against seemingly impossible odds, and when they’re divided, they’ll likely fall to a united threat.
I loved the Mongrel Horde as a concept. The various races the Horde and Alliance roflstomp on our way to whatever new level cap we get, all banding together for common goals has so many fun parallels to the formation of the actual Horde. And some real interesting potential if not played for laughs.
They are obviously not an expansion-level threat, but I’d like them as a B-plot threat. Like, if hypothetically they showed up during the world soul saga, my plan for them would be…
TWW: While questing in questing zones, we see recruiters. Gnolls meeting up with kobolds, murlocs and centaurs making plans, harpies delivering scouting reports. You know the drill. During a later patch, these mysterious become less mysterious; the beastial races are banding together. We obviously get sent to stop them, and we even think we did.
Midnight: We did not, in fact, stop them. We actually motivated them into banding together quicker. Now the beastly races have formed a fully functioning protection network. Probably not actually called the Mongrel Horde because that just labels them as a joke faction, and I want this played serious. But since I cannot think of a good, serious name, I’ll keep going with Mongrel Horde.
Throughout the questing zones, whenever we go near a gnoll encampment of harpy nests, members of all races from the Mongrel Horde are present. Murloc stealth-strikers attacking from rivers and lakes. Centaur hit and run archers. Gnolls and quilboars using simple seige weaponry. Kobold and harpy bombers. Eventually sending individual adventurers just isn’t enough, and we have to send actual troops to handle the issue… And the mongrel horde has left the area. We get a dungeon or two featuring them, but that’s about it.
Last Titan: As soon as we set foot in NewNorthrend, the Mongrel Horde are there. But they aren’t just fighting us; they’re fighting the enemy forces as well. Early days we’re stuck fighting both, but by the .1 or .2 patch, we’re forced to negotiate with them for at least a cease fire. And then we learn the truth.
From their perspective, we’re the bad guys. They have lived on Azeroth all this time too, and we have kept expanding into their areas. When murlocs fled to the shorelines, it was to escape the naga. They didn’t know this was already human or elf or orc land. They were refugees, suddenly dealing with hostile strangers. Kobolds, they live underground. Those mining tunnels were their homes before we went to slaughtering. So on and so forth. Our lower-level adventurings have pushed them to the point they needed to band together to survive. They are just a ragtag group of misfits, trying to make it in a world that constantly treats them as hostile.
Their story is basically the story of Thrall’s Horde.
And so we agree to borders with them. We agree to a cease fire. Moreover, Azeroth is their world too, and they will fight beside us against the Void and the Titans.
Then post-World Soul you can have them show up as a neutral faction. There are still some tribes for each race that are not part of the MH and refuse to any form of peace, so we can still have filler mobs. But the Mongrel Horde highlights how our “smash first, ask questions never” approach has had repurcussions. Nothing too heavy or too gloomy, but it’s still there.
Every bit this. Heck, I wouldn’t even limit it to just the original plans, maybe for example the Kobolds manage to reach out to their Snobold cousins, who in turn manage to bring the Magnataur that have rallied under a single leader since we haven’t been paying much attention to Northrend since the end of Warth, to use just one example. It’s a concept that has so much potential to be a legitimately cool idea for a multi-expansion story that could give Blizzard and excuse to send us on short returns to areas we haven’t seen in years.
Look, I’ll never again say something so heinous and blasphemous again… but I thank the Void for giving us WoD over the dropped Mongrel Horde idea. The second worst idea ever edged out the worst idea ever.
I know some people want “low-key” expansions for breather room, but it’s hard for me to think of anything more vapid than the Mongrel Horde. I’d deactivate my account and return in a few years when it passed, comfortable in the knowledge that I didn’t miss anything relevant to the lore.
Nobody is saying the Mongrel Horde was a good idea for an expansion, I even said so in my original post. But, they make sense as a recurring threat. Also come on man, how can you say WoD is the worst idea ever after BfA, Dragon Riding, and everything done with Illidan in Legion?
I don’t know, because I’m genuinely a little surprised that anyone would say those things are worse than WoD. If I may be so bold to speak on behalf of most, I think that might be a minority position you hold.
Dragon Riding is by far the best feature of this expansion and one of the best features they’ve ever introduced. Seeing it listed in the same list as BfA is mind-boggling.
The hardest part of the Mongrel Horde is that if you frame it as a justified response to the Red/Blue expansion with goals that are ultimately liberatory, you then have to contend with the fact that they’re right and we’re wrong. Which I really don’t think think game’s storytelling framework is any good at.
There was nothing bad about WoD’s concept. It was just that it was such a behind the scenes fluster cluck that it A) had nearly half its content cut and B), Blizzard decided that an entire expansion of fighting orcs after spending nearly half of Pandaria fighting them, including its final raid.
This is a… challenging statement to make, and surely you must realize how unusual it is. WoD is almost universally hated amongst the playerbase. You can like it, more power to you, but it’s just shocking that you seem to think everyone is on the same page or something. You’re pretty alone on this, unfortunately.
Plus, need I even say “Single Legion Paradox”? How does demon-Socrethar exist in multiple universes at once if mortal-Socrethar ascends to demonhood in multiple universes simultaneously? Does he get yanked around the multiverse constantly every time mortal-Socrethar ascends? Why didn’t Kil’jaeden just keep invading other universes until he manages to create the singular demon-Velen in one of them? WoD is a blight on the consistency of the lore, and it led to the “Single Shadowlands” madness as well.
It’s still not as bad as the character assassination of the Horde during BfA, turning Illidan into a glorified edgelord/marry sue, the unneeded gimmick that is Dragon Riding being required to advance the story of a zone in Dragon Flight, or to add to that, nearly everything to do with Garrosh in Pandaria and Cataclysm.
This is the second thread you’ve completely derailed today with this maddeningly bizarre complaint that has nothing to do with anything. In here, as well as in Dracthyr thread, you seem really desperate to rant about this weirdly specific topic, and not a single soul on earth agrees with you. Is this some kind of fixation for you? Would you cut it out?
I’m not derailing the thread. You specifically said the WoD was the worst idea in the game and I gave a few examples for things I consider worse. On a thread that was about trying to determine if an idea that was planned to be an expansion could work as a recurring threat in across multiple expansions. And on the other one, all I did was make a joke about how the faction conflict being settled by a dragon race would be worse than BfA and someone else felt the need to respond to the obvious joke and I responded with an explanation as to why I think that.
Personally, I kinda think the moment for the Mongrel Horde has passed.
I sure do love dragonriding. Best thing they’ve done since weapon artifacts. My compliments to the chefs, and I’m glad they’ve indicated that it’s here to stay as the new flying mechanic. Because all the stats show that everyone loves it, and I’m glad Blizzard is responding to that feedback.
No reason I bring it up, just so glad.
Honestly, I don’t agree that the moment has past. If anything, post-BfA is a better time to use it than post-MoP. And of course, we’ve still got a bunch of minor factions we treat as loot piñata’s that could eventually decide they’re sick of it and join together against us.
isnt this explained by the true timeline thing
With the focus on the races that have been used in Dragonflight, I think the Mongrel Horde can easily be used as a concept now. It’s a matter of figuring out how those races would come together, and gameplay wise how to incorporate them into zones you can travel to in a manner that isn’t disjointed. I’d have preferred the Mongrel Horde idea over WoD, even though I don’t know how that’d have tied into Legion. WoD is the worst expansion so far for ruining lore concepts, and is the start of WoW going into decline. BFA’s concept is atleast good, and Shadowlands atleast created new material that tried to be interesting. Not that WoD wasn’t interesting, but Outland 2 isn’t difficult to think of conceptually whenever most of the lore already existed.
To be fair, Blizzard might’ve not known they were doing Legion when they started the original concept for whatever WoD was originally going to be called. And even if they had kept the original concept, they wouldn’t need to tie it into Legion. After all, Burning Crusade didn’t really tie into Wrath of the Lich King and the only thing that really tied it to Cataclysm was a raid added after the story was completed.
This is interesting. It reminds me a little of what ffxiv did in their last expansion with the beast tribes and the city states finally making peace. I think Azeroth could use a third power block, maybe not as a playable faction, but Azeroth feels like it’s been entirely carved up by the horde and alliance sometimes.
I can believe they might not have conceptualized Legion yet, but they did say long before that they thought of expansions two or three ahead of time. Which might’ve been a lie. But if they kept Legion as is, using Gul’dan to bring the Legion to Azeroth would’ve come out of nowhere. It’d have made Legion worse.