Oh, I read comparisons as comprise. My bad 
No worries!
1 Like
Im not being snippy, I just disagree with you.
Night Elves and Forsaken are my favorite races. BFA was a nightmare for me. But the Forsaken have Sylvanas, who has been playing 4D chess for 3 expansions now, and is well on her way to get a redemption arch despite being one of WoW’s greatest war criminals.
Meanwhile, Night Elves lost everything and Tyrande got this big “Power buff” and hasn’t done anything she couldn’t have done without it. Night elves were literally just a scapegoat for a story they had no role to play in.
1 Like
Except when plot demands it.
/sadface
Let me guess, it’s C. [Baine is the heart of the horde] Golden’s book?
But how would otherwise the plot, that is not connected by logic, could happen?
Do you mean with using logic, or random bs go as we have?
I would not call them less significant, but the emotional connection to something not established would definitely be way weaker.
It’s destroyed already iirc.
They don’t get what the alliance is.
Danuser notes that the Alliance aren’t at each other’s throats. “The Alliance is like a family. Brothers and sisters can disagree, and things can get heated, but there’s still a deep and abiding love and trust there.”
© https://www.polygon.com/2019/1/15/18183772/wow-battle-for-azeroth-alliance-tides-of-vengeance
That’s not the alliance theme. “Family-alikeness” is the original horde theme. [if my memory from w3 days serves me well enough]
The alliance was (I mentioned this a few times, but Metzen is charismatic in his presentation, so maybe that is 1 more but not 1 too many times mentioned):
[union based on honour and righteousness, and a deep seeded drive to dispence “indiscriminate justice” upon those who threaten their homeland]
gl hf
2 Likes
Ideally - like Culling of Stratholme. But it does not look like the devs have people currently to pull off another event where there could be enough room to debate “what if” scenarios, possible options, what would be different should different characters stay / get involved, etc.
The problem is, that IMO the story need to have some elements in the story, like, there is no natural feeling of “cause”. But understandable depiction of what is a “cause”, and what is its effect on the story, should be present.
If the pressure is not maintained (in whatever heat involving device), it will usually either drop, or cause an effect when it just blow up whatever it touches.
The alliance was teased and kicked for a while: lands taken in Cata, empty threats of Varian and moralizing during MoP about willing to retaliate is bad bad (does not fit the alliance theme afaia, but that’s what we got), then there was Dalaran given and taken away, then the promise of justice for Teldrassil and central place in marketing only to go into sidelining the story of the elves, while the central is Saurfang-Anduin (lol) contrary to advertisement, and now “all get revenge around, but not you, pointy ears!”
And as the result IMO it will be the same as I would expect in any regular steam-related machine: either people get disappointed and leave, or it will for some time be uncontrollable rage that hits everything that it can get to. Which is wrong objectively, but “what else did you expect” at the same time.
So, because the devs denied the advertised justice, it gets uglier and uglier. Pressure could’ve been released and the players would have debates collecting who did what, and would be fine with factions fighting each other and having legit reason to respect and somewhat afraid each other. Of course there would also be outliers who would think that having equal amount of wins / losses could lead to a good story, but I’m leaving it out just like most possible grudges of the factions to each other, for the sake of simplicity.
So, that’s where we are. Correct answer is not always the best one. Blasting the horde is not the correct answer by irl standards especially. Or intentionally not fixing certain bugs / imbalanced abilities. But sometimes it’s a loss short term for a gain long term. [would’ve been if done with the proper timing and context]
IMO.
gl hf
IMO the main problem for the forsaken is that the devs forgot that there is more than Sylvanas. They pushed a bit story of Nathanos, because Sylvanas… but there are so many characters and possible themes to explore among them which just did not progress…
And that is a really sad state. I’d get if the original forsaken, if Sylvanas would run away in TBC - WotLK would act demoralized. But attempts to sell it now feels off now.
gl hf
1 Like
I agree that the night elf polity, however you want to define it, shouldn’t immediately resume close political relations with the Horde or it’s constituent governments. I disagree that they should never enjoy friendly relations again. It’s geopolitically unsound. Polities, even historic ones outside of what we typically think of as a modern nation-state, didn’t allow emotion, even rooted in legitimate grievance, to stand in the way of advancing their self-interests, even when that self-interest is advanced by working with former perpetrators of ill. Logically, it may take decades for normalized relations to resume between the Horde and the night elves, but saying never again is an irrational expectation and is extreme. That being said, I also agree their grievances shouldn’t just be dropped for the convenience of returning the narrative to the status quo, because it represents the opposite extreme.
I think it’s erroneous to portray any race as a monolith. We know Baine, as the passage you quoted illustrated, didn’t support the invasion. We also know, as you pointed out, he didn’t intervene to stop it either. It makes him complicit, of course, but the realpolitik of the situation would ask: “did he have a real choice?” What would have happened if he refused to comply? Would he be replaced? Would the tauren interested in the war go anyway? Would Baine speaking out have made a concrete difference or would it merely morally absolved him in the abstract? Is the latter without the former even meaningful? I’m not sure I have immediate answers to those questions, but I believe they are worth considering.
Along those lines, we also know that a number of tauren, particularly those in the Cenarion Circle, didn’t participate in the war, and were active elsewhere. Hamuul is the most prominent example; we can infer he was in Silithus aiding the Circle and the Earthen Ring with Magni. Likewise, we can assume, as it is clearly illustrated, a number of tauren elected to abstain from the war, whether out of pacifism or being otherwise occupied with issues they felt were more significant than another mortal war.
In regards to the tauren polity, as I mentioned above, even complicity in genocide doesn’t merit a permanent cessation of political and economic cooperation between the night elves and the tauren. It does merit a hiatus in the interim while that relationship is reevaluated, but they should resume gradually when it benefits both parties to do so in a manner consistent with their self-interest.
1 Like
Before or after the tree™?
Before - who knows what were his connections among the horde to investigate / set up something. We do not know such things. Just like the devs, despite the players being crucial, do not give us info about the details of the current peace.
After - if even half of the horde would bail out, that would be the end of the plans, and would outright make all discussions over IMO, because it would be clear that the horde leaders are not spineless cowards looking for opportune moment, but actually do stand for what they say. And thus could be reasoned with, etc., even from night elf / worgen perspective (arguably draeneie should’ve been somewhere nearby, but the story decided that nah).
Either way, if we stop and think about stuff, we can find many things he could do, even ask via blood elves, to get the audience with A’dal to seek for a way to resolve the thing. And many more options IMO.
gl hf
Why should the alliance give any breakaway horde race any mercy if they only chose to defect after the War of Thorns? By then, they’ve already marched on night elven lands, even if nobody knew the tree was going to go up.
I find it wildly ironic that I made this thread to gain some distance from incessant whining from rabid Night Elf stans, and yet…
3 Likes
The passage Kyalin had quoted earlier, and the scene I was referencing, was before the tree. I think that Baine had greater leeway in his actions after Teldrassil burned, but I believe that, from a metaperspective, he waited too long.
For the same reason anyone works with defectors. Self-interest. “These defectors or former opponents will aid us in advancing our self-interest (in this case, self-defense) in exchange for clemency.” is a pretty common occurrence in world history.
True, that was a stupid question. Sorry. I figured it would be easier to let them hang out to dry as the rest of the horde cannibalized any would-be dissenters instead of wasting manpower trying to defend them, or something like that.
Some night elf fans may want that as a part of the narrative, but I’d prefer things a bit more…realistic. 
Assumption that the operation was not widely known, and other only got the info after the tree™ was on fire.
Nothing escapes the… well, you get it.
They all did, and acted so comically bad, that it devalues the idea the devs tried to promote. The idea was “but look, they helped / were also victims of the system!” I assume.
But in reality in 8.0 content Baine did not mention the tree™ even once even though I met him quite a few times in Zuldazar, and the only comment I got on topic was a nighborne suggesting to make it clear on which side they stand.
It would be tricky to pull IMO even for a good writers. But as usual, there is like a dozen options for every turn of the story, so, possibly? Depending on where to lead the narrative.
gl hf
I don’t see the advancement of self-interest as the same thing as being friendly. In geopolitics, after all, there are no such things as friends - only competing interests. But you do also have to ask if a partnership with an entity that has attempted a genocide on your people I would argue multiple times would ever work. Maybe a hundred years passes and you’re technically on the same side of a war. Do you trust them to not abandon a critical front? Do you worry about what they’ll do with shared resources? Hell, even on trade - do you worry that the resources that you trade with them may one day be turned right back around on you? Do you really feel comfortable with potentially betting your security on these people?
It also doesn’t get better if they argue to you that they had no choice or that they just did what was pragmatic. That’s just a sign that you’re lower on the priority risk - and yes they will come after you if something higher on the priority list demands it.
Finally, I just don’t see us getting through the time horizon that would smooth this over, and I don’t just mean in-universe - these are feelings that are harbored by respective playerbases. You could have a timeskip tomorrow establishing that a thousand years have passed and that much has happened - but I doubt that would be something that general audiences would connect with and find reasonable.
3 Likes
Man do i miss 2013 Blizzard.
Uh, yes? Britain and France are the prime example of that in modern, Western geopolitics.
I agree–somewhat. Written with realism at least partially in mind, it would take years of real time investment to return the narrative to any semblance of a cordial or friendly status quo. That real time investment can be illustrated in the narrative as a passage of exponential time, however, and I believe most of the player base would accept it as consistent. Some players would see it as an opportunity for character development–cultural schism between older and new generations are always interesting interactions to explore, and in the context of this narrative, it wouldn’t be any different. I think those who wouldn’t accept it as plausible or narratively consistent are those who can’t disassociate their own real life self-interest with the fictional interests of the race they align with.
I think that even by the Cata time the amount of resources allocated to WoW was limited. Vivendy had its own track of acting like modern big publishers with internal studios.
There is info that only about 5% of the quest development time was spent on the story in Cata, and Metzen was not a part of the quest team.
So, concepts were there, but how many opportunities were avalable to actually keep things coherent and “as intended” - this I do not know.
Source for 5% and no Chris in the team:
gl hf
When it comes to night elves, I find that topic especially peculiar. Elegy metioned a very specific scene with mother and child being in the burning tree. So, it makes it plausible to assume, that for one reason or the other a bunch of children died in that event. So, why is it relevant?
Before the W3 events a bunch of druids were asleep and overall situation can be illistrated in a rather off at the first glance text, but it add some important meaning IMO.
“Diabolical Plans”
p.s. - Stop using up all of the blood ink on love letters to my lashers! Night elf virgins are in short supply these days.
Which by itself could be considered a joke, and maybe not the most appropriate theme to bring, but it is likely that most children there were, were born after the year 21, when Archimonde was defeated, and night elves lost immortality. BfA is year 33. Which to me means, that the horde practically killed a chunk of generation born out of cooperation of night elves and the horde, so to say.
Those who could grow up and know the story about their parents fighting side by side with orcs, etc., are gone. Because of the orcs too. And those who will be born after will know the price for trusting the horde.
IMO the devs did not bother thinking about how deep would the problem go, before doing stuff. But honestly, the story of BfA is not as bad as people claim. It’s way worse.
gl hf
Britain and France also most of the time share geopolitical interests. I think a better comparison would be Japan and China, Greece and Turkey, or Germany and Russia - nations with traditionally conflicting geopolitical interests, which the Night Elves and the Orcs especially certainly are.