Is The Horde Even Worth Salvaging At This Point? Should We Just Give Up?

[Liangni-azshara]

I notice a criticism that is present since Legion/Bfa, about wanting the Horde to not be the agressor, that the Alliance should be the agressors for once etc…

But i am asking myself something, isnt the Horde being the bad guys just part of the essence of Warcraft? What i mean by that is, originally, in war1 and 2 they were the baddies, and only in war3 they started to be different, but…we saw with Cata, MoP and even WoD, that everytime the writiers (and Metzen) want to go back in the roots of the Horde and the franchise, they push forward the “baddies horde”

When you look at Metzen for example announcing WoD, he yell the names of these great warlod GUL’DAN! BLACKHAND!! NER’ZHUL, KILLROGG etc…and you really feel how he is hyped about this, how its for him “the horde” he like to write.

Even in bfa, if you look at the keyarts, at the marketing and how the devs talked about it, they liked the brag about coming back to the war1/2 vibes…but in war1 and 2, the Horde was the baddies.

So, i am asking myself : isnt it simply how the writiers like to write the Horde since the start? isnt it the essence of the franchise?

Can it really be changed when the franchise itself was based on that?

[Alynsa-wyrmrest-accord]

I swear to almighty Pizza God, some seemingly large number of Alliance players have never even heard of Warcraft III and think the MMO began with Cataclysm. But only when it comes to the Horde.

It’s super freaking annoying, and I’m just about done with the lot of 'em.

[Zilidar-emerald-dream]

@Danseis-silver-hand

that can never be undone because of the writing that was imposed on it.

And this is why I think a story reboot is the only path forward.

Again, I value your ideas a lot, but I’m not convinced there’s any other way forward.

[Danseis-silver-hand (Danseis)]

I would say that it is an aspect of the Horde yes. However, the Horde can have more than one aspect to its story. Just as the Alliance can be a faction that exemplifies tradition, nobility and self-sacrifice while at the same being rigid, arrogant, and self-righteous the Horde can exemplify honor, freedom, and spiritualism while at the same time being hyper aggressive, brutal, and gravitating towards strongmen.

Are the Horde the bad guys now, no. Have they been the bad guys, yes. Will they be the bad guys in the future, I certainly hope not. WoW’s story will be better, in my opinion, if the Horde has other aspects highlighted for the foreseeable future.

@Alynsa-wyrmrest-accord

I swear to almighty Pizza God

Which one?

@Zilidar-emerald-dream

And this is why I think a story reboot is the only path forward.

Again, I value your ideas a lot, but I’m not convinced there’s any other way forward.

It’s hard to see the path when its dark. In my opinion, the best way forward for the Horde’s story (and in fact WoW’s story) is to focus more on the spiritualism aspects of it. For example, we could have an expansion where the faiths of every faction become highlighted. For the Horde this would mean exploring shamanism in a more thorough way as well as the beliefs of the Forsaken, the Goblin’s, and all of the others. I think this would be a better way forward.

[Liangni-azshara]

@Alynsa-wyrmrest-accord

I swear to almighty Pizza God, some seemingly large number of Alliance players have never even heard of Warcraft III and think the MMO began with Cataclysm. But only when it comes to the Horde.

Well, even in war3 yes you have Thrall being a good guy, but you have also Grom being corrupted by the Blood and attacking human and then become red and cutting tree!

In Vanilla you have Forsken, Burning Legion in the orcs, you have lots of shady stuff, like sylvanas making her plague.

In tbc you have the Blood Elves that even tbc intro sayd : “their lust for power no matter the cost, place them in the horde!” like “yeah they so power hungry that they are in line with horde” clearly telling you they not good guys.

In Woltk…same stuff with Sylvanas making her plague, you are telling me that “woltk is not about the horde being bad” remember there was a siege in Undercity in woltk? Yes because the Horde had a freaking dreadlord in their ranks…

Compare it to the Alliance, in these 3 expacs Alliance did not have that.

And Thrall is like the only Orcs (with maybe Eitrigg) to be different.

I mean, its just there : siege of undercity in wrath, it was not made up by MoP that the Horde had its capital be sieged.

[Alynsa-wyrmrest-accord]

@Liangni-azshara

but you have also Grom

Tell me you read the wiki and never played WC III without actually saying it.

I’m gonna repost this here for the WC I / II fans who must’ve skipped everything after, and base their Horde takes off WoWWiki articles and Alliance quests.

@Alynsa-wyrmrest-accord

With this post, I’m just done. I’m tired of dealing with people who clearly don’t know the Horde story from WC III to beyond, only see it from an Alliance lens, and want to tell Horde players that they don’t know the Horde story as well as these Alliance-focused people.

Anyone fitting that criteria, y’all can just talk to your own selves now.

@Danseis-silver-hand

Which one?

My personal Pizza God is the gentleman who works at the pizza place a minute walk from my home!!

[Liangni-azshara]

@Alynsa-wyrmrest-accord

Tell me you read the wiki and never played WC III without actually saying it.

Well, yes i did play war3, i know Grom sacrificed himself to kill Mannoroth and that the cineamtic of his death was one of the most cool cineamtic in emotions.

I played war3 in 2002 or so…

That dont change the fact he killed Cenarius, became mad because of the blood and that Thrall had to deal with him.

But well, the Alliance at the end of TFT also had its interesting aggression with Daelin, which was cool…but, in wow? Was it ever done?

The problem is, yes War3 was awesome, but i feel like, people dont like its conclusion, i dont know if you get me there : War3 had clearly made it ending as a “its peace with horde and alliance finally”

then vanilla start : drums of war yell!!! and when i heard that in 2004 i was like…what? But war3 said they were in peace!

And to me, this just feels like…i dont know, why? The writiets felt it was not good for seelings to say its peace?

I am not saying i know the story of the horde better or whatever, i just ask myself, if the devs are just not too lazy to actually do a “war3” thing.

[Danseis-silver-hand (Danseis)]

Seeking power is not necessarily evil any more than seeking peace is not necessarily good. Seeking the strength to defend yourself, your family, and your world is generally a good thing. It’s only when it is taken to far that it can be become an evil thing. Seeking peace is usually a good thing but sometimes peace is another word for surrender. Context matters in those circumstances.

@Alynsa-wyrmrest-accord

My personal Pizza God is the gentleman who works at the pizza place a minute walk from my home!!

A truly sanctified soul whose deeds deserve acclaim and praise.

@Liangni-azshara

I am not saying i know the story of the horde better or whatever, i just ask myself, if the devs are just not too lazy to actually do a “war3” thing.

Don’t forget, only the Alliance forces under Jaina were at peace with the Horde (granted at the time we weren’t sure what other Alliance forces were left). But Ironforge and Stormwind, technically never made peace with the Horde. While they were not at war neither Ironforge or Stormwind had a peace treaty with the Horde and both had every reason to both mistrust and hate the orcs.

[Alynsa-wyrmrest-accord]

This whole business these past couple days/weeks has finally changed my mind. Fluff it all. I’m down with Waygs’s idea.

@Waygs-bleeding-hollow

Honestly I’m gonna buck the trend and say, throw the horde’s sins under the same rug the Alliance one goes into. I do not care at this point.

Retcon Teldrassil. Sylvanas was being possessed by Zovaal when she gave the order to burn the tree, and Zovaal’s influenced forced everyone else to comply. The whole war campaign was Sylvanas’s body as a puppet for the Zo, and him mind-clouding people.

Then in some random patch, the whole of teldrassil is just fully back in the game. Turns out, it was only some mild scorching and the night elves way overreacted to the entire debacle.

All the other crimes the Horde allegedly did in BfA? Mawsworn possessing the corpses of fallen Horde soldiers, with a few shape-shifting Dreadlords mixed in for the lulz.

Theramore? What Jaina didn’t tll anyone is that the Stormwind House of Nobles was storing the Alliance’s own version of the Blight there, a toxic chemical weapon that used old god blood and had it been deployed, it would have deforested all of northern Kalimdor. Garrosh was a hero for stopping it, and the only reason he ended up drinking void juice from the Heart was because he expected voided out Alliance troops because of the actions of the House of Nobles.

Retcon away the Horde’s sins. Clean 'em up nice.

[Akiyass-moon-guard (Akiyass)]

It’s not the Horde’s sins that are the problem, it is the execution of their sins in the greater context of the story.

If you want to feel like you are on the morally justified side, then you are probably just in the wrong franchise.

Speaking as a Nelf player, the issue is not -that- Teldrassil was burned. It is the -When, Why, and HOW- is was burned.

When? After what was basically the entire Nelf storyline of Warcraft, purging Teldrassil of Corruption and bringing it to a point of a serviceable World Tree, it literally goes up in smoke, undoing everything we had done up to that point.

Why? For ANOTHER tired and worn out Faction conflict storyline with some weird and equally lazy tie-in to Handsom Squidward robot Satan.

How? Catapults with the range equivalent to modern Artillery, causing living, magically enchanted wood to combust instantaneously.

Has anyone tried to start a fire with green wood?
It’s hard.

And to me, this is the problem with everything post-Classic WoW.

[Liangni-azshara]

@Danseis-silver-hand

Don’t forget, only the Alliance forces under Jaina were at peace with the Horde (granted at the time we weren’t sure what other Alliance forces were left). But Ironforge and Stormwind, technically never made peace with the Horde.

Thats true, since they were not part of the Battle of Mount Hyjal. It is interesting because, it really shows how, war3 did not really deal with the human kingdom (and even less the dwarves/gnomes) during war3 and mainly focused on Lordaeron.

@Danseis-silver-hand

While they were not at war neither Ironforge or Stormwind had a peace treaty with the Horde and both had every reason to both mistrust and hate the orcs.

Completly fair, they would be exactly feeling like Daelin at that point, and thats understandable.

But yet again, War3 really made it feels like “ok everyone friends!” at the end of it which was a bit too simplistic maybe.

[Elierra-cenarion-circle]

@Liangni-azshara

So, i am asking myself : isnt it simply how the writiers like to write the Horde since the start? isnt it the essence of the franchise?

I don’t believe so. Warcrafts 1 & 2 were fun romps, but minimalist on plot; WC3 set the tone of the MMO with its story-heavy restructuring of the factions. In vanilla, their contrasting flaws and virtues were evident in the Horde’s bloodier past but the Alliance’s shadier present, but at some point - I think when fan reactions to Wrath’s Varian proved unfavorable - they abandoned that in favor of this rather reductive view of the Horde.

@Liangni-azshara

I notice a criticism that is present since Legion/Bfa, about wanting the Horde to not be the agressor, that the Alliance should be the agressors for once etc…

The Alliance needed to strike first in BfA because WoW’s Horde had already tanked its credibility with Garrosh. The Alliance had justifications galore to hit the Undercity long before the tree caught fire. In MoP’s epilogue, the Alliance resolved to “contain” Sylvanas and ensure another mad Warchief could never inexplicably turn the orcs into orks again. It was, and remains, unfathomable that these hacks just recycled the Garrosh plot with Sylvanas.

[Danseis-silver-hand (Danseis)]

@Alynsa-wyrmrest-accord

Retcon away the Horde’s sins. Clean 'em up nice.

Gul’dan wasn’t actually darkness incarnate he was just a visionary who employed out of work souls in road construction. Grom was simply over enthusiastic as a lumber jack and really who among us hasn’t gone a little overboard with an axe. Garrosh merely wanted to start some farms and how was he to know that an old gods heart would be so dangerous. So Sylvanas started working for a guy whose entire ascetic screamed evil, do you know how hard it is find a job in this ecconomy?

[Alynsa-wyrmrest-accord]

@Elierra-cenarion-circle

I don’t believe so. Warcrafts 1 & 2 were fun romps, but minimalist on plot; WC3 set the tone of the MMO with its story-heavy restructuring of the factions. In vanilla, their contrasting flaws and virtues were evident in the Horde’s bloodier past but the Alliance’s shadier present, but at some point - I think when fan reactions to Wrath’s Varian proved unfavorable - they abandoned that in favor of this rather reductive view of the Horde.

Literally the only thing I would change is the last word in this paragraph from “Horde” to “Factions” since both got boiled down to caricatures, but regardless it is a perfect post overall.

Thank you for eloquently putting my feelings to words.

@Danseis-silver-hand

Garrosh merely wanted to start some farms and how was he to know that an old gods heart would be so dangerous.

Honestly, you could wash away all of Garrosh’s sins pretty easy.

Add ambiguity to the start of the nameless Cata/MoP war, which already has enough ambiguity as it stands. It was literally a resource war, and the Horde particularly has always been resource-poor.

Theramore was a legitimate target. No changes. Don’t want a city blown up? Don’t use it as the Alliance army’s port-of-call for their land invasion of Barrens Southside.

Wanting other super-weapons? Wanting isn’t a problem, only deploying. He didn’t deploy any more, so no problem.

The only big issue is the Heart, and this is an easy fix; the Sha of Pride. It’s right there, it influenced him, he wasn’t in his right mind at that point and the situation wasn’t helped by the people he should be able to rely on turning against him.

I’d leave the smaller issue of trying to get Vol’jin murdered as-is. Vol’jin already talked his big game threats.

@Danseis-silver-hand

So Sylvanas started working for a guy whose entire ascetic screamed evil, do you know how hard it is find a job in this ecconomy?

Naw man, what’re you even talking about? You can’t blame any of that on Sylvanas. She’s been under Zovaal’s mental influence since Edge of Night and it only got stronger after Zo’s plan to own a Horde came together during Legion.

It’s all Zovaal’s fault, not her’s.

[Zerde-sargeras (Zerde)]

@Alynsa-wyrmrest-accord

I swear to almighty Pizza God, some seemingly large number of Alliance players have never even heard of Warcraft III and think the MMO began with

Even then Warcraft 3 had Grom go and drink demon blood(even after being warned by troll witch doctors/I guess now they are shaman) its a bad idea and Grom actively antagonized Jaina.

Like it or not. We simply had history repeat itself with MoP and dont get me started with Sylvanas.

Edit:First Erivien said something I actually agreed with and now Akiyass liked my post. We must be living in the end times.

[Alynsa-wyrmrest-accord]

@Zerde-sargeras

Warcraft 3 had Grom

Yes it did have Grom.

[Akiyass-moon-guard (Akiyass)]

@Zerde-sargeras

Even then Warcraft 3 had Grom go and drink demon blood

Rare Zerde W

It has been a pretty consistent thing in Warcraft that orcs have a predisposition for violence.

I can get behind Horde players wanting a bit more nuance in their story telling, but it seems they instead just get butt mad whenever someone with a blue background points out that the Horde has ALWAYS been warlike and violence prone.

[Alynsa-wyrmrest-accord]

@Zerde-sargeras

Edit:First Erivien said something I actually agreed with

I think you and Erevine would agree on quite a lot. Both of you prefer a very black and white morality binary, and both want the same factions on the same side of that binary.

You and Erevine have quite a lot of views in common. You’re just much, much less ick (I wouldn’t even qualify you as ick), and not a fan of racism like he is. And when you’re not discussing the factions, you’re actually delightful.

@Akiyass-moon-guard

It has been a pretty consistent thing in Warcraft that orcs have a predisposition for violence.

I was about 99% certain you played WC III and knew Grom wasn’t the entirety of the orc race presented there, and that his death represented the death of the Old Horde mentality, complete with sacrificing himself so a new, better Horde could be born from his demise.

My mistake. I misjudged things obviously.

@Akiyass-moon-guard

but it seems they instead just get butt mad whenever someone with a blue background points out that the Horde has ALWAYS been warlike and violence prone.

Because y’all usually have to put blinders on to, once again for the media illiterate, WC III’s story, Vanilla’s, TBC’s and even Wrath’s.

Horde did sketchy?

Cool. Stormwind House of Nobles. Onyxia. Gnomes in general. Dwrves digging where they shouldn’t and awakening threats. Night elves had a whole evil cult in their back yard, and not the corrupt tree their secondary leader grew and convinced them all to live in. Daelin.

We’re out here pointing out that WC III started the trend of showing both sides as largely made up of shades of light grey, with some black spots.

Y’all out here pretending the story didn’t happen, only the bad parts, and only the Horde’s.

Cuz y’all got some heavy-duty blinders on.

EDIT: Why am I even wasting my time? None of this is coming from a place of honest discussion. I’m’a let y’all just go talk to each other like I should have stuck by.

[Zilidar-emerald-dream]

I know. Its ridiculous and thats why I ignored that person. Completely brain dead and beneath me.

[Danseis-silver-hand (Danseis)]

@Elierra-cenarion-circle

The Alliance needed to strike first in BfA because WoW’s Horde had already tanked its credibility with Garrosh. The Alliance had justifications galore to hit the Undercity long before the tree caught fire. In MoP’s epilogue, the Alliance resolved to “contain” Sylvanas and ensure another mad Warchief could never inexplicably turn the orcs into orks again. It was, and remains, unfathomable that these hacks just recycled the Garrosh plot with Sylvanas.

ALL OF THIS!!!

It could have been as simple as Danath and Turalyon convincing Anduin it was time to reclaim Lordaeron. Or some more complex motivation like the Alliance and the Horde were tricked conflict by Azshara as a means of empowering N’zoth (or just because she was bored) and so concocted a series of events that lead the Alliance to attack first.

@Zerde-sargeras

Edit:First Erivien said something I actually agreed with and now Akiyass liked my post. We must be living in the end times.

As someone who has to follow political news as part of their job (for the record I don’t recommend that for your own sanity) you might be surprised.