Thrall.
Or no one - a Horde council of some sort.
Sylvanas is our last WC3/Vanilla faction leader. Everyone else is either too young, too new, or both.
The Horde is basically already a council. Every racial leader has had a seat at the table.
It’s very rare that you’re going to have a council of any time without some one figure above the rest. The Council of Three Hammers only manages to work out because A): they’re all the same race so it’s easy to handle a majority of their problems together and B): The plot kind of demands it. We’ll probably see it fall apart eventually.
TBH, I would prefer both? I know that’s asking for a lot, but screw it … we need to change something to this constantly cycling Warchief mess. Let the Warchief remain to serve within an executive function, and make a council to debate decisions (with the Warchief being the tiebreaker when needed). I figure that’s closer to what the Horde was envisioned to be anyway.
But yes, as long as Thrall is finally willing accept his part in the Garrosh mess, he should become Warchief again. Saurfang/Eitrigg should lead the Durotar Orcs; Gazlowe should replace Gallywix as Trade Prince; Voss (or preferably Nathanos if he could gain an identity outside of being Sylvie’s dog) replace Sylvanas. Sylvie will likely no longer be part of the Horde by the end of BfA (one way or another).
Sure, but her original plan was of debatable faultiness, there was no reason to expect the Gilnean population to unanimously fight in favor of taking Darnassus first during the war. Likewise her second plan wasn’t a gamble in the slightest, it was predicated on the already established fact that the Alliance would most likely go after her power base and get annihilated. Which…they did to be frank, it’s immediately obvious it paid off because the Alliance seems to have failed to secure any of the surrounding territories around Lordaeron and was immediately on the back foot in the Arathi highlands, something that the Alliance is struggling to hold come the start of 8.1.
Also like, the Void Elves hadn’t even seen battlefield action before now so expecting an army of Ren’dorei to just pop into the battlefield seemed like a game changer that she couldn’t of reasonably predicted. Nor was the Alliance not walking into said trap very likely considering the fact that it would mean they were operating a battlefield where the Horde controls an entire continent and a half, attacking Kalimdor would get significantly harder without any real foothold.
The first plan wasn’t bad, and the second plan I would argue was straight up good and horribly crippled the Alliance, it just didn’t kill them outright.
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Okay, but why infest the Horde with Alliance filth along the way?
What they’ve done to Sylvanas is a shame, and so is what they’ve made the Horde do under her. But imo nothing would be worse than bending the knee to Anduin and the Alliance through one of his patsies like Baine “I send my horns to Anduin because I love him” Bloodhoof or Varok “Cry in my cell about how meeeaaan Sylvanas is until I have a heart to heart with Anduin because he’s so cool” Saurfang.
I’d happily burn a hundred Teldrassils if it meant that the Alliance would stay out of the Horde. I’d much rather be villains than subservient to them because “muh honor” or nonexistent in the story at all to give them time to shine. There’s more than one way to be a Horde fan, and my way is just as valid as yours.
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The problem is that at the end of the day that council still has the Warchief above them who can really do whatever they want.
Personally, I think the best solution would be for there to be no Warchief during peace time, each faction leader rules their own nation and they remain allied with one another in the Horde. Then when war breaks out, be it with the Alliance or anyone else, the leaders come together and vote in a Warchief, either from their number or a prominent general, who leads the Horde until the war is over.
This would allow for them to pick a Warchief that will be best suited for the confict at hand, and would allow characters like Sylvanas or Gallywix to take the center stage with clear purpose and without permanently tying the entire Horde to their nastier plots and schemes until the inevitably become a full blown villain and/or raid boss even to the Horde.
And frankly, the Alliance should be doing something similar instead of this High King nonsense.
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Same reason why we infested the Horde with scourge rejects, both pervert the Horde in some way, but only one worse than the other.
Well along with Sylvanas bending the knee to Anduin, i can think of many fates worse than those.
However imo, nothing gets worse than just going full on scourge, killing and raising half the planet and then having the Forsaken innevitably betray the rest of the Horde races and kill us too and force a proud Orc or Tauren to go bend knee to the ego queen. Thus making what is generally agreed on to he the best WoW expansion, Wrath of the Lich King, an entirely pointless adventure and relegating the most iconic villain in all of WoW a sloppy second to, ironically, a character who wanted to distance herself from him as much as possible.
And I’d happily NOT burn any civilians if we could just have an expansion in which the Horde can rebuild its’ roster and be restored to its’ former glory without either being subservient to the Alliance OR compromising its’ morals. And honestly, who evem cares if the Alliance is strong, they’re players just like us, they have every right to be powerful, but being evil just to spite them is a idiotic solution to the problem that only leads the Horde to be even MORE subservient, both in morality and from the casualties in the war. It’s self-destructive behavior that makes an already horrible situation even worse and the only way the Horde can recover is to have a period where we can look inward and rebuild ourselves without any outside intervention.
It’s really not complicated. Forsaken fans just don’t seem to want to understand that we need to re-build, not destroy. 100 years of peace would have been more than enough time for the Horde to regain its’ footing, hell, we have a secret weapons factory right underneath our capital city, who’s to say there wouldn’t have been plenty of Azerite popping up down there that we could use to prepare a massive arsenal without the Alliance knowing just in case they decide to attack us again.
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I don’t see how it’s debatable.
Her plan was entirely dependent on the Gilneans and Night Elves causing a rift in the Alliance that would leave poor inexperienced Anduin helpless to act and divide the Alliance’s military into pieces the Horde could manage.
That rift is her original wound that cannot heal.
Sylvanas and Saurfang completely misjudged Genn and the Gilneans. It was predictable that the Gilneans would be attached to the people that rescued them, supported them and gave them a home for years when they had absolutely nothing. At least enough to favor freeing their civilians over regaining lost territory. Teldrassil was their home too.
Which brings me to another point…
Gilneans would be hostages along with the Night Elves.
The original plan didn’t account for that little detail either! ![:expressionless:](https://d38bqls1q93fod.cloudfront.net/en/wow/images/emoji/twitter/expressionless.png?v=6" ":expressionless:")
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“We” can´t change anything, only the writers can… and so far they seem too enamoured with the idea of musical Warchiefs to fix this (I mean, come on!! remember the lore twitch they made a couple of weeks ago? they were too busy patting themselves in the back and gloating over their cinematics to realize they screwed up spectacularly in regards to the actual writting fundation of the expac…)
I don´t give a rat´s behind over how powerful the Alliance is being portrayed, but I DO care over the Horde´s NPCs and themathics being literally erased from the face of the game so we can recreate perma Legion expacs from now onwards (I´m SICK AND TIRED of having to play messenger or babysitter to random Alliance / formerly Alliance / Alliance flavored heroes in narratives that only benefit Alliance themathics. I refuse to pay for another Argus / Val´shara in which those NPCs insult me to my face while I´m saving their sorry selves from their own incompetence. No more, 4 expacs of cattering to this trend is ENOUGH).
What do YOU think is gonna happen if devs decide to elevate Blanduin and his faithful fanclub followers to universal acclaim and “end the faction conflict” with such cartoonish version of peace, hmm? I do think I know… smells like Legion all over again.
No thanks, my money won´t pay for Golden´s humid dreams regarding her pet characters.
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But Gilneans were not a people who attached to others, quite the opposite: The Gilneans were always independent nationalists who often spited and used the people around them in order to benefit themselves in one way or another. In many ways Genns arc in Before the Storm is how he is no longer that selfish idiotic stubborn old man anymore.
Further while yes the Gilneans in Darnassus would be hostages, there would also be the Gilneans including Genn in Stormwind. When forced to choose between Darnassus or Gilneas, with the Gilneans chomping at the bit to retake Gilneas for years, it is not unlikely that the typically selfish Gilneans would go after their own homeland.
Certainly wouldn’t be the first time a Gilnean left another Gilnean to die, that’s for sure.
Genn until now has been selfish and revenge driven, it’s a pattern that he’s utterly fixated on to the ruination of everyone around him, and under him, for multiple decades now. Suddenly, for once in years, Genn actually uses his brain and shows a modicum of compassion rather then being the same dumb old man that he’s been for like…his entire life.
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That’s never going to happen and you know it.
Unlike the Horde all bowing down to Anduin because he’s so great and awesome and has magic bones, because we have “”“writers”"" like Christie Golden who will very easily retcon over a decade’s worth of lore for a core race of the Horde just to make Sylvanas look even more evil so that Anduin can feel sad about the Forsaken.
I don’t care about the Alliance players having a fun time on their side of the fence, they’re welcome to it all day. Just have their Anduinitis and human potential and all of their other sickening Alliance things over there, and keep it there. As far away from my Horde as humanly possible. Forever.
And you don’t really seem to understand just what a lot of Forsaken fans like myself (even tho I used to consider myself more an all around Horde fan before BfA killed off my interest in the rest of the Horde) actually want, and why we take the positions we do, instead just saying whatever you want to paint us as not liking the Horde at all. If I had complete control of the game we’d just have a fun adventure expac with pirates and Trolls reminiscent of Vanilla’s feel of the world, with some Old God and Shadowlands stuff thrown in to set things up, not the faction war. But I don’t have full control. So what am I left to work with?
The Mudhut Honor Horde and Humbo Paladin Alliance aren’t going anywhere. Ever. Anyone who thinks either of those things are seriously in danger from Sylvanas or whatever is severely delusional and should seek professional help right away, because there’s no way Blizzard will ever have anything substantially bad happen to them. But I’ve seen that Blizzard is quite, quite, quite more than willing to trample over everything I’ve loved about the Horde and WoW in general since I got into Warcraft when I was 7 years old as long as it means they get to prop up the mudhuts and humbos as great heroes under the most white bread, plain, bland character in the franchise while utterly destroying anything and everything that I and many others have loved in this franchise.
So what am I supposed to do? Just say nothing while all that made me love this game for years is trampled on just because some dumb Orc cries in a jail cell while waiting for Anduin to come cheer him up? No amount of moralizing about honor or whatever will ever make me care in the slightest about Teldrassil, Blight, or anything else that those two sides oppose. So as long as I have a way to voice my opinions on the subject, it’s always gonna be in opposition to the Alliance and their little pets Saurfang, Baine, and anyone spineless enough to join them, because there’s really just nothing else for me to root for at all.
Also, to answer the question of the thread, Lor’themar easily. Until he has any interaction with any Alliance leader during wartime that isn’t at least telling them to go away or to go stick a sword down their throat. Once that happens, the Horde is well and truly dead, because we’ll all be bowing down to Blizzard’s pet golden boy Anduin, the Bland King of the Blandalliance, soon enough at that point.
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How do you think Alliance players felt during the entirety of Cataclysm and MoP, playing second fiddle to Horde characters?
Who’s Anduin’s faithful fanclub? I’d love to meet people who are as devoted to Anduin as Sylvanas fans are to their Banshee Queen.
It’s not just goldens’ fault, dunno why everyone just keeps pointing fingers at her even though she didn’t even join the team till around the middle of Legion and these expansions were written long in advance according to the devs. In fact, Golden feels like the only one who’s trying, cuz who the heck else on the writing team are you going to blame other than one of the newest and less influential additions.
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… playing second fiddle he says. I suppose Firelands never existed, then?
Cause wait!! even in the “supposedly Horde Bias faction war” expac, we Hordies had to follow Malfurion… AGAIN And guess what is gonna happen in 8.2 regarding Brann “I supported the Alliance invasion on Nazmir” Bronzebeard and we Hordies?
And MoP /rofl… sure, sure, cause they “followed” Garrosh everywhere, right? And they didn´t totally get the chance to insult the future Warchief of the Horde with impunity (I mean the good ol´dialogue controversy? yeah, it was a deliberate choice made by the Alliance players -they sassed Vol´jin first-).
Do yourself a favor and don´t try to emulate Zerde… you´re gonna lose this one.
Let me see: for starters Chistie Golden and Afirasiabi.
In regards to in-game characters: the whole of the Alliance racial leadership sans Tyrande (but only after 8.1.5 patch), Baine, Saurfang, Wrathion…
Her last couple of novels dude -since Tides of War the Blanduin fanwank has steadily become worse and worse on them-
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The Gilneans have never been so reliant on the charity and compassion of others before. Sylvanas should have considered the changes that could create in them. The gratitude they would feel. The bonds that would have developed over the last 7 or so years living side by side. If nothing else, Sylvanas should have considered the great debt they owed and whether or not they were honorable enough to repay it.
The entire plan for defeating the Alliance depended on the Gilneans acting exactly as she expected, if they didn’t her plan would fail, the Alliance wouldn’t be divided and the Horde would have to face the full might of a united Alliance. Which she and Saurfang determined they could not afford to do. Despite that she clearly spent no time trying to figure out how the Gilneans actually thought of their saviours.
When Genn attacked Sylvanas in Stormheim his battlecry wasn’t just for Gilneas and Liam. It was also for Varian. If nothing else, putting Varian next to his beloved son and his kingdom as things he wanted to avenge personally should have been a big clue that his priorities had shifted a bit over the years.
She gambled the fate of the entire Horde on assumptions.
Not on any recent research and observation.
If she had created a battleplan based around a guess at the strength of an enemy army, never even tried to verify it and underestimated so severely that her forces were outnumbered 10-1 no one would be claiming she was a tactical genius.
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As a side note, I think bringing Thrall back is the preferred choice for “enough” Horde to where he would serve “enough” as an olive branch to not be a disaster outright. A large part of me hopes even now that what Saurfang is doing is going to fetch Thrall, rather than planning some dumb rebellion (and that part of me also hopes that journey will take us to Outlands Nagrand; to visit the Outlands Mag’har, wander the Throne of the Elements, and visit Dranosh’s grave).
On other fronts:
- Sylvanas likely wont die twice in this expansion (which means she’ll survive it, but I doubt she’ll be a member of the Horde at BfA’s completion). Have no idea who will replace her as the Forsaken representative (NOT CALIA)!
- As a person who loves playing a Bilgewater, but wants them out of Wix’s shadow … I think Wix will be punished for his participation in this war (give us Gazlowe as Trade Prince BLIZZ!)
- I would prefer Rokhan get a long overdue unique model and finally become the official Darkspear Racial Leader. Loa’jin serves better as a binding agent between the Horde’s two Troll factions.
- I’m unconvinced that Saurfang will survive BfA, so if he doesn’t that duty of Racial Representative will likely fall on Eitrigg’s shoulders. He’s a bit on the old side, but he’s a good egg, and he’s actually got some connection to Geya’rah; so it balances out.
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I know the Forsaken have NEVER given a rats’ aas about the Horde and would ditch them in a heartbeat if it meant their own self-preservation, the reason why they allied with the Horde in the first place.
There’s a HUGE difference between respecting an enemy leader and being subservient to them, and there is nothing wrong with having respect for a strong enemy much like how Sylvanas had respect for Varian at the BS or how Thrall and Jaina respect each other.
Writers like Christie Golden defined half a decades worth of lore, particularly for the Horde. It wasn’t her decision to make Sylvanas Warchief, it wasn’t her decision to make Garrosh evil or go travel back in time to an AU Draenor, she simply puts these stupid ideas on paper and tries to make them work. I’ll say it again, it is not her fault.
#IstandbyGolden
It’s kinda hard to keep them away when we’re the ones starting a war with them.
Now that I think about it, you Forsaken ARE humans, just dead. It’s time to accept your hereditary potential and roll with it.
Because you don’t. You condescend on core Horde values like Honor, Family, and tradition and label them as stupid and nonsensical and then constantly call out for the deaths of characters who strongly represent these values. It’s a self-destructive mindset that doesn’t sound like someone who actually cares about the Horde as much as they do their favorite characters.
Do you think I’m happy about Baine or Saurfang being alliance sympathizers? No! They’ve accomplished absolutely nothing so far this expansion and will continue to do nothing until an unknown point later this expansion, and even then it’s likely to be stupid and unsatisfying.
But do I think they need to killed off or mocked further? No, they’ve already had enough shiddy writing this expac, Baine has been a poorly used characters for over 8years and is doing no better here. But that doesn’t mean I want them to die. That’s just moronic! The last thing the Horde needs right now are 2 more Horde leaders getting killed off with no replacement, while Sylvanas continues to act like an uncompromising aashole, pissing off most of the other leaders and doing no course correction whatsoever.
The solution to the Horde plight isn’t to cut out the impurities, it’s to set them right. This is why the Horde has been failing as a faction for almost a decade, it’s because characters don’t understand the wisdom in mercy. Just kill Garrosh, just kill Zaela, just kill Zul’jin, just kill Kargath, just kill Kael’thas and it doesn’t solve anything, it just makes the problem worse.
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I would not have killed Vol’jin. I would have killed Sylvanas instead, then used the last of the Val’kyr to resurrect her. This would have made the Stormhiem storyline have more importance than Sylvanas just looking to enslave some spare Val’kyr but her looking to enslave them as a means of future survival for herself.
Have Sylvanas and the forsaken ally with Helya and the Helajar while Genn and the Worgen allied with Odyn and the Valajar. I would have stacked the zone with the PVP style world quests.
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Oh, so discussing literally anything related to WoW’s story with you is a waste of time. You could have just told me that to start with.
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Beyond this, I fear what successor he’d choose next.
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Because she’s one of the most interesting characters in WoW Lore and her actions very obviously are driving the entire World toward some kind of end in a way I found interesting.
So do I, but I still dissociate at the end. My Alliance characters and most of my Horde characters do not like Sylvanas. That doesn’t mean I can’t tell it’s a good story and that she’s acting completely in character. I don’t have to like something in a moral sense for it to be good art.
This happens literally all the time lol.
The US obliterated a primarily civilian city - Nagasaki - simply as a show of force to confirm their technological supremacy in an effort to end a war by intimidation because they didn’t want to waste their own troops on an invasion in Japan. (And faced no repercussions, mind you.)
My brother, if you think eliminating the primary military, economic, logistical and cultural center in the otherwise Horde-controlled continent is less reasonable or warranted than that very real event that obliterated 5 centuries of a unique religious Japanese subculture, almost all its adherents and a total of 100,000 people, I don’t know what to tell you. I grant you it might not be reasonable in a moral sense. But that it’s realistic and strategic decision-making no one can rightly deny.
Well it’s not over yet. Also the Raid in Dazar’alor is pretty unwarranted. It’s like the US raiding the capital of Pakistan and blowing up their congress because they harbored Al-Qaida. Sure, heh, we might feel justified, but the people getting bombed sure wouldn’t.
But, as I said, BfA looks like the chapter where they’re beginning to abandon that cartoonish view of war. It’s in development. I don’t think the Alliance will be considered squeaky clean by the end. For now, they need to make you think a certain way.
This…isn’t at all why those people died. Teldrassil had to be successfully occupied or destroyed. How anyone could think it was burnt just to kill hope or something is ridiculous. Even if that’s an emotional response Sylvanas has, she already had ulterior motives. Just like how razing Stormwind to the ground both helps grant Horde supremacy on Azeroth and a pool of corpses to raise as Forsaken. Teldrassil fulfills at least three objectives: 1) “killing hope” whatever that means (we might find out soon), 2) hamstringing Alliance logistical capacity in Kalimdor (as intended), 3) a pool of Elven corpses to grow the dwindling numbers of the Forsaken (unsaid, but implied).
Once more, happens all the time. Not only is this common today, it was common in the past too as a norm of warfare. It was so common that religious authorities in both Islam and Catholicism had to write extensive ethical codes for just war just to stymie its prevalence. (Ethical codes, by the way, that we threw out centuries ago. The US, for instance, doesn’t even abide by Nuremberg, and that was just written last century.)
Ditto. Agree on a moral level, but it works pretty well for governments today.
Again, I’m not arguing Sylvanas wouldn’t be considered a War Criminal under our laws. Or that she doesn’t break even the most lax principles in medieval Just War (which were more strict lol). Yeah she totally is, and she totally does. But she’s an interesting War Criminal, and she’s driving the story in a cool direction. Moreover, she has more “thumos” for the survival of the Horde than anyone else in its leadership, and she’s actually willing to sacrifice everything to make sure the Horde stands on top. (She risked - and lost - her Val’kyr on Darkshore for the sake of building the Forsaken and holding the region for the Horde, effectively risking her own ability to escape damnation, the existential crisis that’s been at the forefront of her character since the end of Wrath.)
Not yet. Obviously I’m talking about a future event. But the ideas are there. The themes are there. It’s gonna happen. We have the Army of Light in the Alliance. One of my characters literally served the Naaru that tried to lightforge Illidan. She’s about it. Hell, this character is about it. I and every Alliance champion fought with Yrel and served the Army of Light. The idea that we aren’t gonna accept her into the Alliance if we get the chance is ridiculous. Stormwind is literally recruiting farmhands to armor up. You think we’d turn down Lightforged Garrosh and Yrel?