Which is fine. The goal shouldn’t be to do away with that entirely, as its just never going to happen with this franchise. The goal should be to just get Blizz better at using what cast they already have, and using them when its most appropriate. Rather than just using the same 3 or 4 pets they’re obsessed with using. A council of 13 is fine if there is enough variety in those 13 to ensure that certain characters can find relevance somewhere.
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My problem - see the alliance “council” - is that it is always the same actors who act when there is a “council”.
z. For example, BFA: Jaina - Genn - Anduin, that’s it.
Always the same actors, no dwarf, no elf, only these three.
I’m very afraid that the same thing will happen with Horde, only with different actors.
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If we’re lucky lol! At this point, all we have is a bunch of characters who have become accessories to your 4 or 5 Alliance ones. And … uhh … last time the Alliance actually had a gathering of leaders Tyrande and Velen were both present for the most part? You may not like how they’re involved, but they are consistently involved. Its really just the Dwarves and Gnomes that don’t have any presence at all, and the Gilneans/Worgens who (like Baine for the Tauren & the BE reps for their race) don’t have their reps representing them because there are no racial stories for those reps to represent.
I’m not expecting the council to amount to much. Certainly not any political stuff going on (and honestly that sounds hella boring to me, lol). From what I understand, the reason why the alliance was written to have a high king position in the first place was so that narrative attention could be condensed down to a single character with a couple of satellite NPCs to bounce dialogue off of them, since Blizzard found it easier to write that way.
And of the four core horde races, the only nostalgia leader to have survived in the faction is Thrall. Even if he’s not looked at as fondly as he used to be, I’d expect the writers to continue relying on him for now.
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Blizzard can’t even manage to write the Council of Three Hammers as having distinct viewpoints, and they were all previously established characters, too. So I think the size of the Horde council doesn’t really matter in the question of how they’ll be used or written, and it might as well be whatever size makes the most sense within the fiction. Which means I’d lean toward a larger one; might as well give everyone at least theoretical representation.
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They can barely write the two main wildhammer characters distinctly enough to seem like different people so really at that point having expectations is a mirage
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And the sad thing about the Council of Three Hammers is that was an opportunity for them to have conflict within the Alliance. Something I’ve seen a lot of players ask for over the years. Sadly that mini civil war was swept under the rug, much like Magni’s relationship with his daughter, Moira. 
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Sadly so, yes. There can’t be any conflict within the Alliance (and the human has to hold everything together).
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I was gonna answer to your inquiry, but Sarm beat me -beautifully, may I add-, to it.
The intro quests in the Maw made me want to leave Thrall inside Torghast.
If we run away with your idea of putting a character that usually is represented as a counterpoint, then we should inquire first if we want that a character that has a “strong personality / strong character” trait too so to say. Why? cause characters with a “strong personality” trait would more probably than not have the potential to contradict or even become antagonistic to the 1st seat. And while this superficially could be “bad” for the racial seat duo, it would be VERY good to built more interesting political narratives.
As the resident Belf fangirl I will put the Belf example. The strenght in character of the second seat is the difference between picking Rommath or Liadrin for that job, cause whie the first one has the potential to even counter directives from Lor´themar, he too is probably much more versed in the political game and will pick up the stuff Lor´themar doesn´t see. Liadrin would be more inclined to cede to Lor´themar´s ideas and follow him. Rommath? nah. The guy will fight Lor´themar if he feels he must.
I guess this also ties into that “Horde Power Levels” thread.
I don’t really care if the Horde leaders are Demigods. Its nice to have a few, and I do expect all of them to be competent on the field of battle (as this franchise requires), but their direct combat strength isn’t what I look to when it comes to future stories for them and the people they’re supposed to represent. Like, YES it would be nice for Baine, Thrall, and Jin to get personal characters arcs that result in tangible growth (and strength) by the time we leave the Shadowlands. But the point is that character development, with any power boosts they get merely being an easy expression of that growth. Not the reverse.
For example, big stories for me? Gazlowe working to bring in the Kali Steamwheedle branches. Rokhan opening talks to bring in ZF and the Farraki into the Horde. Baine and Jevan working to reunite the scattered Grimtotem and bring them back into the fold. The Forsaken getting to turn the Scourge into a resource for their population and maintenance needs (perhaps claiming ScarletM & Strat as they rebuild Lordaeron). The Blood Elves finally rebuilding their territories & fully accepting their place as a Core race of the Horde (that they are). Finding a more permanent resolution for the FT issues, and bringing them into the Faction.
THIS is the crap I want to see, and NONE of it requires demigods to do. Just good leaders.
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I prefer the long lived races to genuinely not be super-core to either side, as a matter of principle. As far as I’m concerned belves were with the alliance for about 3 non-consecutive weeks and with the horde for a few months.
Not just because it’s easier to avoid the villain bat that way but also because if they’re going to retcon the one reason there’s still elves in the horde, they can also stop pretending there’s belf horde pride; anyone old enough to only have known horde quel’thalas at this point is literally a toddler from an elvish perspective.
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I honestly think the “races” need to be redrawn moving forward somewhat.
Like Thrall & the MU Orcs and Geyarah & the AU Orcs should hash it out between the two how they could operate moving forward, abolishing the Clans as Thrall led or reviving the Clans through the AU survivors.
Likewise I’d honestly rather see all of Trolldom become a unified Troll Parliamentary Conciliar Monarchy again. Talanji as global Troll Queen with the Zanchuli Council revamped to include every single Troll tribe, the representing electing a “Prince” who represents all Trolls collective interests (probably Rokhan).
Likewise unify the Mulgore Tauren and Highmountain Tauren tribes into a Tauren Federation, have Baine and Mayla be a power couple.
I think the 1st and 2nd “seats” you imagined fit nicely inasmuch we will never get more than 2 characters per race 
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Yup.
If only to have some internal (but not civil war-esque) conflict between the tribes.
I would really like the Taunka being involved here if only because they’ve been Horde, technically, since Wrath.
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https://twitter.com/pedrothedagger/status/1418068700779868166?s=19
Explains why they’re avoiding any Horde development for a few years now, they fear writing Horde races with dignity so avoid writing them at all.
Also confirms downthread they added the Italian stuff to Goblins once they realized they were extremely Antisemitic.
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That explains the horde, but why they refuse to write the alliance? is it also about racism?
BFA was all about the Horde though.
Horde identity crisis, new leaders, new government system.
It wasn’t development you liked but the Horde got a revamp in BFA and that counts as development.
New jersey actually and they have a famous italian immigrant population.
Alliance (Humans ie Europeans and USians) are the heroes of the show, congrats
Everyone else though? Also ignored unless they can tie Humans back to it.
So yes
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I mean, yeah. My favorite race got constructively destroyed in a stuffed-in-the-fridge trope for the benefit of Anduin Wrynn.
We now have a pretty good idea about the root cause of that.
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Andiun did not get that much development either though and Jaina’s ended with the end of the zone questing finale. He got more development in Shadowlands than BFA.
As I’ve said, Japanese derivative race got nuked and what did the Alliance gain?
Strom rebuilt and the territory up until Tirisfal. Human gains. Not even Worgen cuz they can’t be bothered to turn south to reclaim the peninsula.
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