Since it’s conception the Alliance has mostly been portrayed as the heroes in the Warcraft universe as they combated the vile demon blood drinking Orcish Horde.While far from perfect and have occasionally committed a rare act of wrong doing primarily due to the actions of certain individuals or groups like Garithos or the dwarves of Bael Modan, the Alliance has morally remained on the side of good.I’ve noticed that Blizzard does occasionally try to spin the narrative in a way that depicts the Alliance as imperialistic but I haven’t really noticed it and feel that’s more of a stretch.While I do enjoy the Alliance as much as the Horde I do feel that they can be a tad boring because of this.Like we’re just the generic good guy faction.Though I do get the impression that the Alliance is about to be subjected to some major changes that could certainly shake things up a bit and give the Alliance some time to be in the “Evil Faction” spotlight.Whether that’s a good thing or not depends on how Blizzard handles it.
My question remains however, Could you ever see the Alliance becoming evil?How would you feel if it got a Garrosh-like faction change?What could serve as a catalyst for such a change?
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Just let the Alliance return to it’s WC3 roots where prejudice divided it and the wealthy and privileged ruled through political manipulations while the peasants suffered it to the point they were ready to revolt.
There ya go. Evil Alliance.
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By the virtues of characters like Garrosh, I highly doubt the Alliance could be made convincingly evil. What is a Garrosh style faction change? Anduin’s acting evil, because he looks MCed to me. Someone could just MC any ol’ Alliance character, that’s the amount of convincing I see most people requiring.
I wouldn’t want the Alliance to be evil. I want both faction to be complicated.
I know we joke a lot about morally gray, but ideally, it’s what would probably be most interesting.
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Is the story set up for it? Sure. I mean the only difference between the great Alliance noble hero and the ex-Horde villian was how successful they were at committing mass murder.
But Blizzard will never do it.
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It would be easy enough to do it. The Alliance could easily go into a Light based Warhammer 40K Imperium of Man. “Burn the Xeno! Purge the Heretic!”
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I also imagined some fanatical religion playing a role in it.I can see the Alliance going full on Holy Crusade mode which could cause a stir among some of the races that don’t typically worship the light or perhaps outlaw and punish those who practice unholy magics or any magic in general that isn’t Light based.All the while spreading “order and civilization” on the “lesser races” of Azeroth.
At this moment? Impossible.
The alliance’s issues were mainly because of Garrosh and Sylvanas.
https://i.redd.it/9way35ihk0e11.png
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While Blizzard has talked about wanting to add more internal tensions, I don’t ever see them having a full blown Alliance civil war/rebellion throughout an entire expansion as done with the Horde in Mists and BfA.
For example I can see an expansion start with the Lightbound coming in and influencing some kind of Alliance aggression but then by end of the launch campaign Velen has stepped up and revealed that the Lightbound are trying to manipulate them into being slaves of the light.
Thus the Lightbound retreat and are pushed out of the Alliance, but they’ve successfully captured important figures from the Alliance in order to convert them. Further establishing that the Lightbound are enemies to be beaten, in the mission to rescue the likes of say Turalyon.
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Turalyon is currently the leader and Anduin will probably step aside for a bit after Shadowlands. Yrel is bound to come back with an overjuiced version of the Alliance’s central religion. If the Alliance doesn’t become evil, then it will certainly splinter and feature certain evil elements.
Turalyon is already jockeying to reclaim Alliance land. He’s also originally from Lordaeron and might not like the idea of the Forsaken building it back up and fortifiying it again.
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No, I do not see it happening.
There were two moments of time when I could have seen it happening. Back in Wrath of the Lich King, where Varian was just Blue Garrosh. And during BfA, when Jaina took to heart her father’s point of view.
And then Varian turned into Mists of Pandaria Varian, and Jaina rekindled her friendship with Baine and Thrall in BfA to the point of saving them during our first trip into the Maw in Shadowlands.
I currently do not see any set up that would likely move the Alliance down an evil path that doesn’t require a dip into headcanon.
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Following the death of Wyll Benton, Turalyon was asked to participate in a meeting with King Anduin and his advisors. Turalyon disagreed with Anduin’s idea of having a Gathering between humans and their Forsaken relatives, and even went so far as to say Anduin misunderstood what the Light intended. As a tactician, Turalyon believed the Gathering was not worth the risk of an escalated altercation that can lead to political catastrophe and war. When Anduin brought him and Genn Greymane to the Cathedral of Light to meet Turalyon’s old friend and mentor Alonsus Faol, who was now a Forsaken himself, Turalyon’s first reaction was cold loathing. When the furious Genn transformed into a worgen to attack Faol, Turalyon stopped him to prevent bloodshed in the cathedral. After Genn left the cathedral in rage, Turalyon told Faol that he blasphemed what was once a good man and had stolen his form, and if there was anything left of his old friend Turalyon would kill him in mercy. But when Faol told Turalyon to look for the Light within him, Turalyon did not strike; when he did indeed find it, with tearful joy he knelt in front of the archbishop who gave him a blessing. Overjoyed Turalyon changed his mind about the Gathering and immediately admitting his views had been wrong, offered his help to Anduin.
https://wow.gamepedia.com/Turalyon
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I don’t think the Horde or the Alliance should be good or evil.
We just need to equally play our parts so the whole Horde vs Alliance game makes sense.
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BfA was the time for a more aggressive Alliance and they didn’t have the stones to give it to us. Even if the next trite war has the Alliance strike first and produce the villains, the Horde is so utterly blackened after Garrosh and Sylvanas that evening the scales now is a moot point, and probably impossible.
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I doubt a faction war is in the cards. At least not for 2 or 3 more expansions from now. That mean another faction war where the Alliance ends up being evil is probably almost a decade away.
But who know Blizzard might jump the gun and we get BfA 2.0 sooner rather then later.
If Turalyon is still in charge after SL, sure I can see it happening. But I’m not looking forward to any faction war anytime soon anymore. BfA ruined the Horde/Alliance story for me.
Honestly, with the writers and direction we’re at now…
No.
Allow me to explain somewhat.
Much of the creative decisions put into the Alliance has been based around the Alliance being formed by races that all reflect humanity in a way. Much of the Alliance has races that look and behave like real humans. Stormwind being the epicenter of majority of the lore and militant force for the Alliance. They have the final say in nearly every segment of current Alliance storylines.
Any type of morally questionable or reckless behavior is immediately outed and condemned by the Alliance. Even when war is in place; the Alliance will flog itself for trying to win a war. (Example: Rastakhan’s death and the siege on Dazar’alor finale.) The Alliance refuses to embrace “Ends justify the means” which many antagonists or “evil” characters will pursue to see their goals realized.
The Alliance is never going to be evil because its being constantly given justification for its actions. Sieging Dazar’alor and gunning down the Horde forces on Pandaria’s shores are justified to the dishonorable and savage acts committed on Teldrassil and Theramore. Every death by the Alliance’s hands is done with a justified act for the gruesome and blatantly worse actions committed by the Horde.
In the end; the Alliance needs to break apart and begin unhinging at the seams. Races like the Void Elves, Night Elves, Worgen, Kul Tirans, and Dark Iron Dwarves need to bare viscious fangs and reject the moral grand-standing the Alliance tries to take. Whether in the desire to claim land, resources, or gain a permanent upper hand against their foe.
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Sure, yeah. I could see it. I don’t highly expect it.
I’d be fine depending on the depiction.
I really don’t believe Blizzard will do anything with this. We had dialogue from Varian post Siege of Orgrimmar where he said the same thing for Gilneas, Ruins of Theramore, and more. But here we are… still empty handed.
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On one hand the writers seem to be saying that the faction war is done, but the Yrel/Turalyon stuff points in the other direction. Maybe they’ll do it both ways by having the Alliance reject the Light Crusade very early on? It’s hard to say. That being said, though…
I would argue that there were multiple big moments in WoW where Blizzard emphatically, explicitly made the Alliance out to be wrong, but despite their obvious attempts, much of the Alliance playerbase to this day refuses to acknowledge that they were evil aggressors in those specific acts. So, the answer is: Blizzard has already tried this, but half the players rejected the reality of the situation. Maybe some Alliance players want to be darker while some don’t, or perhaps a more cynical person would say that some Alliance players don’t really want to be evil, but like to signal that they would be okay with it to appear more neutral.
I leave out which acts in particular so as not to derail the thread into a few certain topics that have already been debated to death for years on this very forum. To be sure, they are topics that are famous for their longevity, if that is any hint as to which ones.
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