Varian, if he existed, would be rolling over in his grave…if he hadn’t been obliterated, that is…at what his son has done by ignoring the warning Varian gave the Horde. As I recall it included the line “…we will end you!” and instead all we get is:
Anduin skipping through Orgrimmar singing “Why can’t we be friends, why can’t we be friends?” while Orc children follow him, in a Conga Line of Kumbaya, singing “It’s a small world afffffter all!”.
Disgusting.
Baine and Saurfang are holding hands with the Alliance now.
Saurfang was killed because of it.
Our morally grey Warchief™ said she never gave a damn about the Horde and just left the people she wanted to seek a better future for.
They were very quick to dispose of Rastakhan.
Horde lost both Warfronts.
The whole Horde cast is acting sorry for all of it.
But we got the allied races we wanted, what were the allied races we wanted? Who knows but we got what we wanted apparently.
It would be cool if we go to Shadowlands and meet Varian and he says something along these lines…but that won’t happen because then that warm bond between father and son just wouldn’t be so cozy and nice anymore.
Anduin continuously pushes aside Genn’s advice to go the “peaceful” route…even in the face of Saurfang himself pointing out just how bad the Horde has been all these years (Anduin still tries to make it out like his side does baddie things too).
Another thing i think would be cool to see in Shadowlands is Anduin going there and all of the souls that he is responsible for that died due to his poor (peace loving) decisions came to haunt him. Might make him think twice about cozying up to his buddies in Org. again, but i doubt it.
To be fair here…he was never a Horde leader.
And he never will be
Sure.
And Malfurion can spend the entire expansion skinning Tauren while Tyrande burns Nightborne civilizans from the inside with Elune’s Wrath. And after it’s revealed that Elune was really secretly an Old God all along, Velen gets insta-gibbed by a tree sprite in the final raid preview cinematic and Lor’themar and Thalyssra lead a joint Horde-Alliance force through Stormwind to put an end to it all, ending with the Horde taking their leave with “We’re even now; just don’t let it happen again… or else!!11”
To say in a lot of words that the only thing the Alliance received during BfA is a pat on the back is about what I expected out of this thread
This would be so incredibly unsatisfying and a waste it is hard to imagine.
While i do think it would be nice to finally have a leader…LEAD the Alliance in some retribution, especially since for Tyrande/Malfurion the war is not over and she makes that quite clear in the face of Anduins “peace at all cost” approach, i do fear a bit of how Blizzard will go about it as their writing for the Alliance has been showed so many times to be really bad in so many ways.
Honestly, i think it would be cool if Tyrande actually used the Night Warrior aspect on the Horde and perhaps even killed Anduin along the way by mistake or even on purpose being lost in her need for vengeance for her people and all that wronged them in BfA.
You don’t need to imagine it… just play Horde. 
That’s the type of crap that’s happened in “our” story.
The sense of impunity and emptiness would have been nullified if the Alliance had been responsible for the final destruction of Lordaeron’s ruins, and the site was uninhabitable not by the blight but by a final act of ally, but I think that would be very difficult with our leaders falling into traps one after another.
Then, in an act of pity, Syl destroyed everything to spare us the shame.
Because clearly, we can’t even destroy a ruin without the horde’s help.
At least the Alliance is a superior canonical force. 
This didn’t happen. Certainly isn’t reflected at all in the game and won’t be. They are ruled by a council now.
This didn’t happen. Certainly isn’t reflected at all in the game and won’t be. Another “win” in lore that isn’t reflected in the game, not to mention Ashenvale is still not back in Night Elf hands, only Darkshore and our “revenge” of killing ONE WHOLE Valkyr.
This isn’t even a thing. It’s like saying the Horde killed Umbric…but Alleria filled in. Except there are thousands if not 10’s of thousands of Zandalari and only about 20 Void Elves. You still inked the deal with his Daughter.
Which isn’t reflected in the game…and at least we took a step at doing something after giving up UC/Hillbrad/Gilneas/South Shore/EP/WP etc. etc. etc., hey guys rejoice we finally won something in EK after15 years WOOHOOO! Seriously are you joking?
Not reflected in the game at all. But hey i guess you can point to it in some way in “lore”.
Way to minimize genocide to try to make a point. Won’t count all of the military deaths in Ashenvale/Darkshore/Feralas i know you want to just gloss over in your rush to make it out like the Alliance just rolled to victory.
And it is what you should expect from what the reality of the game is.
That’s not what happened at all, it’s not even close.
The whole thing reminds me of the battle of Hoth in Star Wars Impire Strike Back, where Vader destroyed the rebel base, the rebel fleet fleeing the galaxy, but all this is worthless, because he can’t capture Luke.
Canonically, an empire victory over the rebels.
See how happy Lord Vader is. 
…what? Did the War Campaigns not happen? Did Saurfang fight Sylvanas with some common grey sword? Did the guards of Saurfang in the Stockades just forget to lock his door in an Epstein-like fashion?
https://twitter.com/wowhead/status/1190746578052452352?lang=en
It’s right here plain as day that this is exactly what happened by the people that dictate the story. How you personally feel it was presented in your head canon has no bearing in this conversation.
Not even remotely close. Why even reach for this comparison? Our first introduction to Zuldazar and the lay of the land at a macro level is via Rastakhan. The entire plot of the Zuldazar questline centers around the ongoing conflicts in Zandalar and Rastakhan’s place in it as well as his personal struggles with his Loas and the challenging decisions he was forced to make. Needless to say, some extremely solid character development took place–Umbric is a leader of a faction of traitorous Elves who threatened the livelihood of his people when they were on the brink of extinction, understood and accepted why he was exiled, and betrayed those people anyways by joining the enemy superpower the moment it was convenient for him to do so. Again, you’re reaching for the moon comparing these two characters in any fashion but like I said… I expected this yet I hoped for better.
Which is a legitimate complaint but to challenge this, how would they present this in-game when gameplay mechanics dictate that the Warfronts remain available as a feature of the expansion? It’s like people refuse to acknowledge that MMO’s require some corners to be cut for the sake of gameplay.
Same point as above.
Most of the NE army was in Silithus during the Burning of Teldrassil which is why they had the bodies to contest the Horde post-Burning. The military arm of the NEs is fine. From a lore perspective, yeah they lost their homeland and countless civilians that drive their economy likely fracturing them permanently… This is an odd point to stand on as everywhere else in your argument you only consider things from a gameplay perspective. Regardless, guess what? You have kin in the Forsaken! Keeping your other victories over the course of BfA in mind the Alliance needs to collectively get over Teldrassil.
Again I ask, are we considering things from a story perspective, a gameplay perspective, or both? You seem to be firmly pro-gameplay and anti-story in the majority of your post but you used the story rather than the gameplay to present an argument… How are we examining this topic?
the faction numbers certainly don’t match up lol alts don’t count btw
Naah… we like it here. We gonna stay . Ok ?
Yeah, since Cataclysm happened 10 years ago, Alliance actions are nothing but a joke.
That’s the point, Saurfang and the Horde did everything…the Alliance just showed up to support him, they didn’t actually do anything.
It’s not how i see it in my head canon, it’s how it’s NOT REPRESENTED IN THE GAME.
And i know this might be too hard for you to understand but THAT IS WHY THE F’N QUESTION HAD TO BE ASKED IN THE FIRST PLACE. BECAUSE NO ONE EVEN KNEW WHO WON IN LORE. Good game try again.
Because you are trying to reach for some “Alliance win” from something that didn’t mean a squirt of piss. The Zandalari STILL joined the Horde and nothing changed.
You got to do a WHOLE TON OF content around Rastakan including a whole quest line involving the LK and Vol’jin and what is going on that LEADS DIRECTLY TO THE EVENTS IN THE SHADOWLANDS…that just by coincidence of all the great writing the Alliance gets THE ALLIANCE HAS NO F’N IDEA ABOUT.
The comparison/analogy had nothing to do with the lack of story the Alliance got for their pulled from THIN AIR AR, vs. the Zandalari, it had to do with nothing changing because Rastakan died…absolutely nothing, like you tried to allude too in your post.
Or to use your words…you still inked the deal with the next one in line.
Well idk, your making it out like sharding of zones isn’t a thing or instancing isn’t a thing.
The fact of the matter is that ALLIANCE IS NEVER ALLOWED TO HAVE A WIN IN THE GAME REFLECTED IN THE ACTUAL GAME. There is ALWAYS a reason Alliance “wins” are never allowed to be showed or reflected in the game and then people have to ASK QUESTIONS AT BLIZZCON BECAUSE THERE IS NOTHING TO REFLECT ANYTHING IN THE GAME.
Seriously? No it isn’t, especially after the events of Darkshore, that is part of WHY Tyrande did what she did. There were military units in Ashenvale and Darskhore that got wiped out.
Both but the problem is that while we can consider things from both perspectives, the ONLY thing that ever gets showed in game, is the Horde perspective. That is why 8 years later Theramore is still a pile of garbage while Orgrimaar was never even touched at the and of SoO. Blizzard tries to give the Alliance “wins” but it is ALL smoke and mirrors. Off screen, in “lore” or anywhere but in the game.
So i ask you WHAT can the Alliance point to over the entire history of the game that they can have pride in? What story is the Alliance supposed to look at and say yup that was a solid win?
I don’t think you can take one without the other. The problem is the game is where the players are. So while i can point to the first 4 years of the game where Varian wasn’t even put in the game because it was content they “never got around too” and then they put it in a comic and voila he was there in lore and suddenly in the game…THERE WAS NO PLAYER AGENCY with the very leader of their faction, he just poofed out of thin air. So Alliance has a huge issue attaching to anything in the game because everything that happens is in lore/books/off screen. Their leaders are written as uber powerful morons that is then reflected in cinematics (when they even manage to show up in them) and in the story.
Hey! I love Milk-toast! Don’t you dare!
As opposed to the developer spoon fed faction?