Zahir, none of this is reason for the Horde to allow Night Elves to control the territory in front of their gates, or even if closed, their western wall.
This is not a reasonable stance.
You know it isn’t.
It does not make sense for the Night Elves to hold the land in front of the western gate/wall of Orgrimmar.
It is incoherent within the narrative for anyone to want or allow for that on either side of the faction divide.
Nah Durotar wasn’t inhabited by anyone at the time, ergo why is it was chosen in combination for its brutal biome as “penitence”. The Night Elves nor Tauren claimed the land in the narrative, it was just an empty place with zero standing settlements.
And Tauren have an equal claim to the land given the Barrens and “Durotar” being just one continuous plain.
In an ideal world, Blizzard wouldn’t have said the land was “empty” but rather it was Tauren land that the Tauren gifted the Orcs to build a home, and used the canyon structures more to the south away from the border of Night Elf lands, and the canyon that today is Orgrimmar would’ve been the chokepoint
But alas, Blizzard lacked the long-term foresight and it was a bunch of white guys writing a story with many races based on many IRL cultures using many IRL historical beats.
It’s normal when this lore was written in the late 90s by a group of majority white guys who thought naming the Jamaican-speaking (at the time) Troll King “Rasta-khan” was a genius idea.
I agree that Blizzard lacked foresight (or rather, the intentionally wrote what they did in order to stir up conflict) but you’re basically doing a “Strong-willed, independent minded Orcs arrived at the harsh, untamed land and civilized it” thing, complete with “the natives hadn’t claimed it because they didn’t put a flag down”
You can accept this if you like but something tells me that your assessment of the Dwarves at Bael Modan wouldn’t be anywhere near as merciful even though they were doing the same thing that the Orcs did.
Nah, it’s because in-game that is what we are told. Neither Night Elves nor Tauren claimed the land, while precolonial native societies were very clear about what land either belongs to who (in the case of say, the Tawantinsuyu of western South America along the Andes mountains and then some), or what land exists for the joint collaboration of the various local tribes (in the case of the many Anishinnaabe tribes of the northeastern US).
Thrall wanted penitence of his people, and so picked a place that was a barren wasteland with little resources that neither his friends nor frenemies claimed (neither Tauren nor Night Elves).
Dwarves at Bael Modan are a Dwarven settlement in Stonespire Tribe land.
Same way Zoram’gar is an Orcish settlement in Night Elf land
But the Shatterspear Tribe lands in northern Ashenvale is also their indigenous land.
Also, to bring this back around, the Alliance’s settler-colonialism in central Kalimdor that irritated the Horde so much was because they had been chased out of their homeland by the undead and had nowhere else to go, a situation that was perpetuated by the Horde subsequently allying with the undead and denying them the ability to return to their homelands even after the defeat of the Scourge.
Theramore got nuked because the Horde hated the fact that there was a large Alliance presence there even though it was the Horde perpetuating the conditions that kept them in Kalimdor.
Just to add another layer of irony to all the Horde complaints about humans wanting to return to Lordaeron.
People complained about Theramore’s existence? I figured that would have been largely limited to complaints about attacks originating from there. It’s not like the horde even owned Dustwallow Marsh.
They hated the fact that Northwatch Hold existed and that the Alliance was expanding into the Southern Barrens with places like Bael Modan, even though the Alliance frankly had just as much of a right to build colonial outposts as the Horde did, with the aforementioned ironic corollary that the Alliance presence in central Kalimdor probably would have dried up on its own had the Horde not committed itself to blocking human repatriation to Lordaeron.
all of Darkshore, Ashenvale, Felwood, Moonglade, Hyjal, and Winterspring belongs to the Alliance
Demon Fall Canyon pass is a chokepoint because Ogrimmar’s western gate
the canyon dividing Azshara and Ashenvale is a chokepoint
The Talondeep Pass (Stonetalon/Ashenvale pass) is a chokepoint
Mor’shan Rampart turned into just a big fortified wall into Tauren territory and so a Chokepoint
Azshara is a non-issue for Hyjal as there is no pass from Hyjal into Azshara
And then the Alliance holdings of Feralas - Desolace - Eastern Stonetalon
There is a column of Alliance territory from Stonetalon Peak, to Thal’darah Overlook to Farwatcher’s Glen which controls the pass from Stonetalon into Desolace; just say Stonetalon is too mountainous to allow for combat or meaningful gains/losses
Bael’dun Pass is a chokepoint between Mulgore and Desolace
New Thalanaar vs Westreach Summit is a Land-Water chokepoint betweenDesolace and Thousand Needles
Horde Kalimdor is thus:
Azshara
Durotar
Mulgore
Barrens (both) (Except Northwatch Hold, make it a Kul Tiras holding)
Thousand Needles
Tanaris
Un’goro (relocate all Alliance territory trolls to Un’goro, turn it into a new Troll City (Zul’Goro?), except the Frost Trolls in Dwarf territory to Zul’Drak)
Dustwallow Marsh
Neutral Territories where there are joint military efforts:
Uldum/Ahn’qiraj/Silithus to control Old God stuff and protect the Forge of Origination (Alliance directs joint exercises here)
Ulduar, ibid (Watchers direct joint exercises here)
Pandaria, by order of the Golden Lotus (Golden Lotus directs joint exercises here)
Dark Portal because obvious (Horde directs joint exercises here)
But the Western Wall of Orgrimmar cannot reasonably be held by Alliance forces. That does not make sense.