I say they’re about as much of a character as Link is from the Zelda series. Practically the blankest of slates but still have some loose definition based on the quests the game expects you to do. I think WoW just has to play an incredibly loose game of “I’m not touching you” about it due to trying to go both ways about people wanting to be “just an adventurer” or “chosen one hero.”
Maybe I should start posting on human characters in order to emphasize that I’m going to reject people trying to tell me what my human identity “should” be.
Behold, humans having no identity tied to Lordaeron in WoW:
I liked the part where Bolvar yelled “Arthas, the blood of your father, of your people, demands justice!” while the camera cut over to the Alliance’s ranks. Arthas wasn’t a Wrynn! What a plot hole!
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Mate your human identity can be whatever you want it to be. My Forsaken identity is also going to revolve around Lordaeron though. It’s a place that has a rough past and a contentious present and I hope we see it further developed in the coming years
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I’m just really annoyed that faction and/or racial identity is treated as such a legitimate and genuine factor in how the story should be directed on these forums but human players are apparently the one group whose identity is fair game for marginalization, made all the more obnoxious by the fact that there are relatively few regular posters on these forums who are dedicated human players and any attempts that we make to advocate for ourselves are shouted down by a bunch of elves.
To be fair we don’t necessarily know what people play. Who they post on doesn’t necessarily indicate who their favourite race is - I mean you yourself seem more passionate about the legacy of Lordaeron than that of Khaz Modan (though I may just be making assumptions there - the discussion here has not really needed to related to Khaz Modan)
Me for instance: I post on a Forsaken and currently main Horde (long story short I’m an RPer from Australia and there’s very few people active on my realm on the blueside at my weird oceanic hours) but I was an Alliance main from Cataclysm to WoD and still play and enjoy both factions. My favourite “race” in the lore would be the humans of Lordaeron, both living and dead, as I really resonated with the story of the fall of Lordaeron in Warcraft 3 - my first exposure to the Warcraft Universe. I followed WoW’s story closely ever since, though as I was an unemployed teenager for most of WoW’s history, I couldn’t actually afford a sub until Cata haha. In any case I’ve closely followed the ongoing tragedy of Lordaeron, and my interest in WoW has revolved around it.
It’s something that’s tricky though. I’ve always been a regular poster on the Wyrmrest Accord forums and you do find a lot of people who see your red or blue background and assume that’s where all your bias lies. But somehow I don’t think that’s true of everyone, or even a majority of the community. Most people I play with enjoy both factions and a variety of races, and have stakes in a lot of arguments surrounding them.
I guess my point is, we don’t know that the “bunch of elves” are purely and solely elf players. They might also have a lot of fascination with Lordaeron. I don’t know - I can’t read minds - but we are a bunch of real people with varied interests in this fantasy world. Lots of folks have a stake in these arguments.
In any case, as I’ve said above, the logical compromise to me is to have Humans and Forsaken “share” Lordaeron, though I think the best and most fascinating conflict would arise if this were a tense and uneasy division. I don’t even really mind which side gets which (though I can understand it would be hard for Forsaken players who built an attachment to Tiristfal to relinquish that) and I even think it could arguably make more geopolitical sense for the Forsaken to establish themselves in the Plaguelands, supported by Quel’thalas, whereas the humans could establish themselves around Lordamere Lake, supported by Gilneas and Stromgarde (and by extension, receiving supplies from Khaz Modan, across the Thandol Span). Alternatively though, the same could be true in reverse with the Alliance receiving Argent blessing to set up in the Plaguelands and the Forsaken reclaiming Tiristfal and Silverpine.
Point is, at the end of the day, we need to acknowledge that in the lore of Warcraft, the Forsaken AND the Humans have a strong claim to Lordaeron and it’ll be interesting to see how (if at all) this is resolved by the narrative. I feel a real sense of foreshadowing in Turalyon’s words about reclaiming lost Alliance territory… It’ll be interesting to see what happens!
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It also needs it be acknowledged the Forsaken have the majority claim. Some humans of the whole are from Lordaeron, and the rest don’t deserve the place more than it’s undead citizens just because it represents the Alliance to them. We need to develop the other human kingdoms, not have them keep living in the shadow of a mostly (un)dead one.
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I would like to see them developed more for sure.
But at the same time I don’t think it’s an entirely bad idea to address the Lordaeron matter. It IS true that Lordaeron founded the Alliance and has been presented as a major facet of the Alliance narrative for a very long time.
Ainhin isn’t wrong to suggest that presenting this Kingdom as central to the narrative for so long and then basically asking it to be ignored by the faction it created is deeply unsatisfying for its long term fans.
And I say that as someone who genuinely and truly believes that in terms of sheer population, the Forsaken are the successors of Lordaeron.
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There is no evidence to support this, especially post BfA where the Forsaken as a population have been decimated. I did the Battle of Lordaeron. The entire Forsaken garrison at Lordaeron was wiped out with no survivors.
And it doesn’t take into account how many of the Forsaken are people that the Forsaken themselves raised in Cataclysm. It should not need to be explained why the act of forcibly converting a population via magical domination makes claims on the basis of that population dubious at best.
This is one of the reasons I want the Alliance to start Lightforging undead because I am 100% certain that if the shoe were on the other foot you’d do a complete 180 in terms of what constitutes a valid demographic claim.
If they ever were, they no longer are after BfA.
And the claim that they ever were is in itself worth scrutinizing, since one of the fundamental aspects of the Forsaken conceptually was that they were what amounted to a small insurgency. The Scarlet Crusade alone was an existential threat to them in Vanilla and attrition had gotten to the point in Cataclysm that Sylvanas needed to resort to necromancy to boost their numbers.
Given their losses at the Battle of the Undercity and in Northrend it could even be argued that by the time of their invasion of Gilneas, most original Forsaken were already long dead.
The entire purpose of the New Plague was to act as a means of asymmetric warfare against both the Scourge and the Humans, because the Forsaken were much smaller and weaker than either adversary.
Heck, that was the foundation of their pact with the Horde. They needed Horde support because they were so few in number that without it, their defeat was inevitable.
In terms of sheer demographics, the “true successors of Lordaeron” was the Scourge. Heck, it might still be. And the “but the Scourge are mindless” defense isn’t even as applicable as it once was as of Shadowlands where we’re learning that undeath’s affect on the mind raises the question of whether free willed undeath is even truly possible.
Certainly there are posters on this very forum who have taken the position that the Forsaken didn’t have sufficient agency to be responsible for their actions.
I’m glad that you understand how much it sucks for human fans to have been denied any kind of catharsis or resolution to the Lordaeron narrative for this long though when it formed the core of human identity basically from WC2 onward.
Also if you want me to start posting as a human to make things less confusing you’ll need to be more specific, because my Mage, Priest, Warlock, Monk, Death Knight, Paladin, and Warrior are all humans. (My Rogue is a Void Elf, my Druid is a Worgen, and my Hunter and Shaman are both Dwarves.)
I just have
…too many…
Characters who go by the name
Sarestha 
A hella long time ago, I made most of my alts look identical to my mage, because I didn’t want to feel like I was playing a different character, but changing classes instead. I always regretted that, but deleting alts just to relevel them in a different race is Effort that I no longer feel like spending. Doubly so now, since I unlocked the mage tower skins and those are semi-tied to the specific characters you used to earn them; if I were to delete them, I’d be unable to earn their recolors on their replacements if I ever got around to doing it, even under the same class.
I’d be a tauren if they could be mages, but they can’t, so RIP.
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Mood. Mentioned this before but I picked Belf cuz Arabesque themes + magical motifs and at the time I was heavy into the occult, it was this or Trolls because Latin American/Afroindigenous, cuz I am more often assumed Arab/North African IRL
When Zandalari were announced, given Chronicles portrays Zuldazar as Machu Pichu But Trolls, I was going to switch all my characters to Zandalari
But then during development, they removed warlocks from Zandalari 
worst WoW betrayals of my life, even on top of the WoD Gutting Of Demonology For Demon Hunters
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You’re right. Repeating it doesn’t make it true.
The narrator stating the human player character is from Stormwind makes it true.
I liked how the Wrathgate cinematic can’t be accessed in game anymore.
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I realize I’m a week late, but there’s no way to access Orgrimmar’s western gate from Demon Fall Canyon. It’s enclosed on all sides by mountains except for the single entrance pass from Ashenvale.
Honestly the gates shouldn’t even matter, both factions have long established air forces. I want more lore on those please, or something.
Unfortunately, air power and even artillery sways by what the devs feel like is cool in the moment. For example, those big siege towers in the Battle for Lordaeron, even though the Alliance has had dwarven siege engines since forever. Siege engines are superior to siege towers in almost every way, but Blizz went with the latter because they thought they looked cooler.
For the gates, I just thought it was weird that multiple people had an extended argument over something that’s not even true.
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