The Alliance lost nothing. Stop complaining

Lore Story Forum
62

Not gonna lie, I’d be okay with it. The Horde could get a story for once that didn’t center around a civil war where they are their own worst enemy. And they, at least on paper, would have a character that could go toe to toe with the Alliance demi-gods. Plus destroying Silvermoon means that whole region can get phased out and I wouldn’t have to get a loading screen when trying to go there.

Canonically the blood elves lost 90% of their population and still do just fine. Wipe out their capitol city and that still won’t change, because Blizzard has repeatedly stated that population numbers don’t matter. There will always be enough. Always.

Bring it on imo.

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63

To balance it out though, the Horde would have to take out the Exodar.

64

Let’s not destroy any more capitol cities, thanks.
Seriously, after the raging backfire that Blizzard got from fans over Teldrassil and UC, would taking away more cities be that smart of a plan?

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If they did something more in line with what happened to Lion’s Arch in GW2 I think it could work, because it was a big bad, it happened in a large event that you got to participate in and be a hero, and then, in the end, you win and rebuild and triumph.

EDIT: Would anyone disagree that the War of Thorns/Burning of Teldrassil has proven more unpopular and hated than the Battle for Undercity? Because it seems to me that this is true, and I think the largest reason for it has been the presentation. The Burning of Teldrassil was the culmination of the Horde throwing back the Alliance and then destroying their city. Rather starkly, the Alliance loses, and the Horde wins. To contrast, in the Battle for Undercity, the Alliance manages to fight to the walls, destroy the Azerite War Machine (though this is laid at Anduin’s feet) only to then be forced back by the Horde, until Jaina arrives to save the Alliance from certain destruction. Rallying, the Alliance pushes into the Undercity, defeating the Horde defenders…until Sylvanas blows the city up in their faces to spite them, with unknown casualties for the Alliance.

In a very real way, you can say the Horde came out ahead on this exchange. Yes, both factions lost a capital city. But the manner and presentation was by no means as equitable as that appears.

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66

Literally everyone who was involved in this war came out of it worse than before it started. There is nothing from this expansion that can be considered a victory for either side. It’s a dumpster fire that needs to be forgotten as quickly as possible.

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67

If city was destroyed by a Big Bad and then the players had the option to help in rebuilding it afterward, that would be acceptable.

I’d like to say it would make things better if Blizzard provided a “rebuild Teldrassil/Clean up UC” chain of quests or events but… This was all done on a faction war basis, so even if people got Teldrassil back exactly like it was, there would still be threads and posts raging about how evil the Horde is and how unhappy players are that they can’t have retribution.

68

As much as I don’t like to be antagonistic, Arkturas is right on the note that the presentation differed. Losing the Undercity rocked, it was everything the Forsaken player loves (this one, at least, and I know of others who feel the same). Fatalistic, relentless, spiteful, and wilful - the Forsaken got to bleed the Alliance for every inch of soil and then flip them the bird while denying them their prize - while evacuating all of their people ahead of time. It’s got ‘Forsaken Racial Identity’ all over it, and very much had the implicit ‘…and we’ll be back’ tacked onto the end. Saurfang spoiled the mood at the end, but the event was amazing, even if it wasn’t anywhere near as good as the expac cinematic promised.

Unfortunately, for the Night Elves there was never a theme they could latch onto to frame the loss in a positive way. Forsaken have been grinning through bloody teeth and rolling with the punches from day 1, but the Night Elf themes of tragically falling from the heights of their former glory are… played out, at this point. What is this, the fourth time? And the added knife twist of being made to watch the civilians die in questing was a cruelty blizzard could have done without.

Yes, BFA sucked. The few points of cool and satisfying stuff were far too few in comparison to the confusion and disappointment that surrounded them, but people who say the Horde had the Battle for Lordaeron on their own terms are right. You could scarcely have written a more Forsaken thing to do than to shatter the enemy on your walls and then run away cackling, leaving behind no consolation.

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69

You’re entitled to your own opinion. But for those who enjoyed the Battle for Lordaeron, there are just as many who found it dumb that Sylvanas started killing and raising her own troops and literally no one horde side bats an eye.

I just personally find BfA to be a genuine terrible expansion. We lost far more than we gained from it. All it did was split the fanbase even further.

70

That’s how war is scored.
Everyone always thinks that war is about scoring victories over your opponent, that the one who “wins” is the one who comes out ahead.

That’s not true. War is all about who loses most and after a certain point, after both sides have lost so much that it’s no longer important to “keep score,” the one who “wins” is that one who’ve decided they’ve lost too much.

71

I agree it was terrible, no argument on that we lost more than we gained and lost cohesion as a result. 100% agree.

I just think that Lordaeron was a great moment specifically for the Forsaken. Sylvanas blighting the battlefield was one of those weird ‘different for either side’ moments. The cinematic shows everyone dying, but the Horde get to tend to their wounded troops and they say stuff like ‘we advanced too far’ and ‘we shouldn’t have been there’ to muddy the waters on how much Sylvanas was deliberately targeting her own troops versus accepting that some out-of-position friendly fire was going to happen. After the fact, of course, we know she was 100% doing that, but at the time there was a lot of argument about this - and given the rest of story maybe even the writers at the time weren’t sure.

And frankly, the move to use the blight won the battle. Without Jaina, that was it - the battle was over, and the Alliance hadn’t even reached the walls. It cost her some of the vanguard, but without the Flying Dutchman that move almost single-handedly won Sylvanas the battle, and maybe the whole Fourth War. Again, many Forsaken players love that stuff. Doing the questionable thing to crush your enemy? 10/10.

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72

This is such a good analogy for the Night Elf player experience in BfA. Ta.

Though, as a personal aside, the thought of the Belves being invaded like that a second time (first by the Scourge) makes my heart hurt :frowning: Ah, I suppose you were trying to get through to Erevien. But damn, lol. Still. Good analogy.

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73

They already pretty much ruined what made blood elves interesting at the end of BC so I don’t really see any issues with this. Better than another horde civil war at the very least.

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74

I know I know I shouldnt add more (world) trees to the fire, but we barely know how big of a % of the total night elf population that lived on teldrassil, especially given that the Night elves are both ancient, and basically had all of Azeroth under their control (as in all of kalimdor in WOTA this coupled with the MANY survivors of teldrassil and the fact that they literally have their men and other druids sleep for Centuries, etc (did i mention they are most likely spread out all over the world 10k years ago? Also shadowmeld, and tree stuff etc etc, and spreading to other planets etc etc. I would say teldrassil was probably asr big a loss as theramore was for Garithoskind.

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75

I have often posted about a destructive High Elf War in Quelthalas that culminates in the Void Elves accidentally consuming the whole of Quelthalas in the Void. Taking the whole area off the map and sending it to the void.

It would make the Alliance the aggressors and the bad guys - even if they wanted Quelthalas for “good reasons” and only accidentally released the Void, they would still come off as warmongering land grabbing jerks who messed with powers they could not control.

It would be neat if the Telogrus Rift was actually Quelthalas in the future - and it was moved into some corner of space and time after the Void Elves destroyed it. There would be a certain irony to it. That their initial base is the homeland they were exiled from - after they destroyed it and lost it to space and time.

I don’t mind losing the homeland of a race I play if the story is interesting and it goes somewhere. I think the idea that we can lose cities and whole zones sort of makes the place more alive.

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76

This, but I am also not hung up on some racial superiority need.

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77

Hey that’s not true, they lost stuff.

Thanks to BfA Night Elves can no longer tell themselves that they can singlehandedly defeat the entire Horde. That’s a pretty big blow to certain Night Elf egos.

Umm, they lost the opportunity to play Nightborne. Oh man, do I remember all the multitude of threads and arguments about how the Nightborne should join the Alliance because of that one neutral druid doing them a solid. BfA is credited with the Allied Race mechanic that threw cold water on that idea.

Similarly, they lost alot of hope of ever seeing playable High Elves. I mean sure, there are still people who want them, still people who demand them, but with Void Elves they’re less common and their odds of ever seeing them are much smaller.

The Alliance used to talk about Bolvar joining the Alliance in battle against the Forsaken and their evil Lich Queen. With the evil Lich Queen leaving the faction and kicking Bolvar around on her way out, they seem to have lost any hope of that happening.

Night Elves used to argue that Elune was the one true creator deity who was more powerful than all ancient gods, naru, titans and old gods. They sorta can’t with a straight face now, that’s bound to be a blow.

They can’t walk around Teldrassil for their RP without knowing they’re anachronistic.

Alot of Night Elves died in that attack too! I mean, I can’t name any. Like, not a single one, but they did! And it’s not like Blizzard just adds in nameless representatives of a race and kills them every expansion, this was special!

And they’ve just about all but given up hope that the Lightforged would single-handedly defeat the Horde using space ships.

The Alliance lost ALOT.

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78

Big same. As long as the place I have to mainly be doesn’t look really ugly, it is whatever. My only gripe with Stormwind with so long was the Cataclysm hole that was only just fixed before. Part of why I dislike playing Horde is the look of Orgrimmar.

Otherwise, I like tragedy and loss as part of a story.

79

Arathi was not Alliance territory.

There was a Forsaken camp there and the human refugee camp, but there was also a full settlement of Orcs living in the zone at Hammerfall.

The kingdom of Arathor was long destroyed, and those who remained were in a long struggle with ogres and bandits for control.

Eventually they managed to retake (though really, only after the Ebon Blade interfered for their own purposes) and rebuild the castle, and the Forsaken and refugee camps were disbanded, but the orcs were and still are settled on those lands at Hammerfall.

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80

I think it’s fine to be sad that a nostalgic zone got vaporized. But my sympathy ends there.

81

Of course it was.

Stormwind was also destroyed and rebuilt and is Alliance territory.
The Kingdom of Arathi joined the Alliance and never left it.

Gameplay wise Arathi was an Alliance zone while Hillsbrad was given to the Horde.
So stop your nonsense.

Even BLIZZARD SAID SO in its interview that the Alliance won both warfronts because they were “alliance territory to begin with”.

So with 3 official sources stating that, by what mean has your rediculous claim any substence rather than your personal head canon?