This seems less like its an issue with it being character driven, and more it just being objective driven. Specifically in the case of BfA, they clearly started with an end destination … and then worked their way back to fill in the pieces. With Teld being essentially just an excuse to lock both factions into a War of Extermination, to press this bizarre tail.
In a similar vein, its reflective to how you’ll see many people start at the conclusion of an argument, then work their way back to find support for it. Since the conclusion came first, it can “never be wrong”; just the “facts” used to support it can be. Which essentially renders any supporting facts irrelevant, since all that really matters is the end destination.
In BfA, with the Meta-Narrative, the only thing that mattered was that end destination of Sylvanas betraying the Horde and setting up SLs. Everything before that was just Blizz sliding in those optional Story Points to shallowly justify reaching that end. Which … hoo-boy is a much bigger issue when it comes to writing philosophy to deal with than just finding that balance between character driven and exploration driven storytelling.
The Alliance lost Nethergarde at the same time the Horde lost their Blasted Lands town.
Southshore deserved everything it got and more. My only regret is I couldn’t personally Blight it. It was a level 30 Alliance quest hub in a level 20 Horde questing area. It’s responsible for turning the area into a bloodbath. It deserved it. It so, so, so deserved it.
And yeah Theramore was weird I guess. Insofar as the Horde still has easy access to southern EK whereas the Alliance has to rely on BB which puts them smack dab in Horde territory.
They had a whole video about how Azshara was a Warbringer, but she was very much not part of the war until Sylvanas decided to drop the fleets into her home.
Good thing we turned Brill into rubble then. Abit of sweet vengeance for Southshore.
It is precisely because of that reason many Alliance were saddened to lose it. It is the very reason it was turned into a battleground! People had fond memories of the place.
We didnt even get the satifaction of leveling Stonard! Which was Theramore’s “equivalent”. Hell, the worgens are now two time refugees, if you want some semblance of balance I say the Alliance gets to nuke Bildgewater Harbor and see how the Horde like their cities destroyed.
Bildgewater Harbor. I’m sure turning Azshara back into a contested zone might make some night elf fans happy.
Hell, I doubt most Alliance would have care if suddenly the Horde got Northrend but every last of our towns was spared destruction. I’d also point out we have phasing to balance out any level discrepancies and could have been used by Blizzard if they want. Heck they could have gotten portions of Blackrock, more of Desolance and gotten new bases in Ferelas/Tanaris.
If the Alliance inflicts as much damage as the Horde has on it, sure why not. But until then I am hoping our heroes off limits.
Why shouldn’t we have more female characters? A good chunk of their players are female afterall! I’d also point out even with all these new female characters we are probably barely at 50-50 representation. That is how few cool female characters there were at the start of Warcraft as a series.
Or course it would. Them getting to hold the zone literally smack dab in the main Horde capital’s backyard reinforces some of their player’s bizarre belief that the NEs alone should be more powerful than the entire Horde combined. For increasingly arbitrary reasons. Also, go ahead, blow up Bilgewater Harbor. We’ll rebuild it in a day, and repopulate not long after.
Whoa whoa how did you jump from “warbringers is forcing an agenda” to, “we shouldnt have more female characters”, its obvious thats not what finninbas is talking about, also your answer is weird, specially when the warbringers were about already established female characters.
Well good thing it was vengance for Southshore because it was pretty pathetic vengance for Teldrassil.
Frankly I have no idea why the Kaldorei are part of the Alliance. Andy’s response to an attack on Teldrassil was to invade Lordaeron. Then commit resources to securing Stromgarde. While the Nelves stood alone in Darkshore and were used as fodder in Nazmir.
Say what you want about the Horde but they punched the Nelves. The Alliance back stabbed them.
That assume it doesnt get arcane irradiate or something, hell maybe we can have that gnome who perfect the plague make a batch to use. Also, maybe the goblins could repopulation but that doesnt change the fact such an attack would probably lead to alot of Cata era goblins dead. Maybe have Boss Mida, Hobbart, Sassy Hardwrench end up corpses lining the beach.
Even assuming Warbringer was forcing an agenda(it wasnt) why assume there was an agenda at all! Why isn’t he complaining that the WoD shorts were all men? And suddenly thinks it is an agenda when we have a group of shorts with female leads.
Of course its not an agenda they are just using the “look we care about women being important and all” for extra goody two shoes points in the eyes of the consumers. Idk why you think blizzard would care about women or any other consumer group other than making money. Its the same reason that bethesda in middle east or blizzard china dont have stuff about LGBT stuff. The company as a whole cant care about it and dont give me that “they have to do tht because else they cant share the wow experience in dictatorland” if they would care in the first place about the real world issues they would have taken a stand.
Women are a minority, it’s obvious having women be the focus has been on purpose. Blizzcon had a panel specifically about woman voice actresses. I personally think Azuka Bladefury was created due to all the other warlords being men. There’s also the matter of Danuser being a big simp. I think Blizzard has handled this well though so I don’t think it’s been a problem.
It’s very telling that those are the characters you have to go with for this jab - a bunch of memes and ascended memes . ‘Oh no, our Goblins with cool names!’ I say, in a sarcastic voice. That’s what happens when you want to threaten these ‘equivalent’ retributions, you end up uncomfortably realizing how little narrative breadth the Horde has, in terms of developing them as a wider worldbuilding entity.
It’s the same disconnect that makes Camp T a weird thing to discuss, because if you played Alliance (especially growing up with the game), the idea of losing a tiny town seems odd to get worked up over - but when it’s one of very few you have, and a frustrating quest hub where you invested a lot of time as Horde…
The Horde is in an oddly liberated position, in a sense. With so little to lose, they have everything to gain - MMO mechanics mean that equilibrium is king, and starting out impoverished as the Horde did makes for a fun ‘claw your way up’ narrative and dooms the Alliance to a slow decline from those initial heights. That’s partly why BFA/Cata are perceived as such ‘Horde Bias’ events, because any equalizing act ends up favoring the Horde.
So go ahead, blow up Bilgewater. Kill off Mida, Sassy, and even Hobbart. We love those characters despite their total lack of investment, the Gobs they replace them with will have pretty much the same damn depth and we’ll probably love them just the same. You can’t take away what we never had, Zerde. And that means that promised ‘retribution’ is gonna tease the hell out of the Alliance until the end of goddarn time.
EDIT: Don’t kill the Gob Squad, though. We do have them, at least, and they rule. They might be plot armored due to the VA factor, though.