Blizzard can make a dozen individual class campaigns or four Covenant campaigns. They can make two campaigns; one for Alliance and one for Horde. They gave us a taste of it in BfA with the separate leveling experiences in Zandalar and Kul Tiras. I.E. the best parts of BfA.
That element of chivalric romance that also informs the human aesthetic can exist alongside fractious, violent, and intolerant Humans as experienced in WC3 or early WoW. It existed as an ideal among real humans at the time, even as they did things even worse.
There’s no reason why humans in WoW need to be so narrowly defined and idyllic compared to all the other races and lots of reasons why they shouldn’t be. It’s not just hurting Horde in the narrative, either. Night Elves and Draenei have to vie with humans coming across as wise beyond their years and never leading anyone wrong characterization for other races is extremely few and far between.
I can totally get people enjoy that. But let’s not try to act like it’s something that’s hard to come by and that if Blizzard lost it, that there aren’t a bunch of other games to pick up the slack. And do it better.
I am stating the obvious. That the CURRENT post-Cata Alliance is simply no longer capable of “Arthas” type characters anymore. Nor Garithos types. Nor Daelin types. Nor Blackmoore types. Nor pre-Cata Varian Types, or Old-School Genn types. The current Alliance and its characters aren’t capable of nuance, of darker shades, or of tangible flaws (beyond the occasional stupid-stick beating). Just like the WC3 Horde no longer exists thanks to the Cata shift (that rendered the faction a Plot-Device), the WC3 Alliance no longer exists … when Cata rendered the Faction little more than a Purity Test.
Truly, there are no better representatives for the two Factions (in their current iterations) than Baine and Anduin right now. With Baine being “a worthless plot-device who’s own characterization needs are always thrown aside for the stories needs to use him. And who can only find value as a person in what value an Alliance character can find in him.” Just like the Horde. And Anduin is “a walking, preachy, passive, purity test. Who is more of an idyllic concept than an actual person, and who gains more sue traits by the patch”. Just like the Alliance.
Hypothetically, what if there was a tauren as an expansion’s neutral leading character that walks the player through the plot, in the same way Khadgar or Magni did? But he’s written without the game making a deal out of the fact that it’s a horde character; it just exists as your expansion guide. That’s probably the closest the horde can match to that kind of romantic ideal.
I dunno you ask your average Horde player and they seem perfectly willing to go on a rant about how evil Jaina/Tyrande/Rogers/Alleria/Genn/Turalyon are. Sometimes it feels like there’s a lot of goalpost shifting going on on these forums.
Are we talking Erevian? Because outside of him, none of these characters have been called “evil” by the Horde. They may want to, but Blizz and the story DON’T validate those stances. Under no circumstances will they allow these characters to be portrayed in a grey or less than morally flawless light. And any time they even fringe on grey, Blizz buries them under mountains of justifications or just handwaves/excuses it all away. Blizz will NEVER justify the Horde aggression and antagonism they force the Horde to partake in.
The average Alliance player isn’t really all that concerned with retaking Lordaeron or loses that much sleep over the plight of the Night Elves either. Ask your average WoW player about the story and you’ll find they care way more about the latest class tuning, their gear progression, or when the next patch full of raids is dropping and the last time they got to feel like they could shamelessly kill a bunch of stuff.
Doesn’t mean there don’t exist plenty of people who care about the story. But you’ll probably only get surface explanations because a lot of people only knowingly engage with most media on a surface level.
Oh? When? Where in the story exactly? And are those stances validated by the tone or story itself in any way? Because I’d wager no. Not in a million years. Blizz wouldn’t think of tarnishing that spotless shine.
Talanji does it all the time. And Sylvanas cited Genn as one of her justifications for war. Rexxar talked about his hate of Daelin as well and how it extended to what he perceived as similar actions to his by Jaina.
Did you do warfronts in BfA? In Stromgarde in particular there was plenty of trashtalking by both sides. Rokhan does the “this be troll land” thing and Danath calls Eitrigg a greenskin and Eitrigg refers to the internment camps etc
You mean the Talanji that’s basing her opinion heavily off what we know to be an unreliable narrator (because the Alliance events in the Throne room are the canon ones). Or how Sylvie never once really mentioned Genn beyond him not giving up his grudge against her (and we know now due to her motives, that argument was totally BS; designed to work on Saurfang). And I’m not sure any of the trash talking in either of the Warfronts would tonally portray the Alliance roster there in a negative light. But it sure as hell paints a lot of the Horde reps in negative ones. Like I said … Blizz wouldn’t be caught DEAD portraying darker shades on the current Alliance.
Talanji is basing her opinion on the fact that the Alliance killed he father, which they did, and that Jaina led the strikeforce.
It was designed to work on Saurfang because it appealed to sentiments that were already real. That’s why it worked.
Danath and Turalyon come off as kinda racist and imperious in the Horde version of the warfront and the Horde leaders are talking about it.
You can, as an independent player, say that this feels hollow but it isn’t because Horde characters never talk about their grievances with the Alliance because they do.
Which is why the Horde got experience an “elaborated” version of events for that fight, where Genn comes off as a racist monster who wants Talanji as his prisoner. Or how Genn’s actions aren’t even mentioned once outside of the argument Sylvanas uses to convince Saurfang (and SHE doesn’t even bring him up, its Saurfang who briefly mentions Stormheim). Danath and Turalyon? Sure whatever? Blizz has reinforced Evil Race tropes so much that their racism is more than validated; just like Daelin.
TBH, just about the only time I see Alliance players trying to find “flaws” in their Mary Sue faction is when people point that their artificial flawlessness is a writing “Flaw”. And since the Alliance can’t have those … its time to REALLY stretch to find that grey on the Blue team the writers, story, or tones would never reinforce.
Also, absolute dog-trash writing … and somehow the Jedi Order (in both the prequels AND the non-Canon Old Republic content) have WAY more moral ambiguity and nuance than the current Alliance are allowed. LOL, Mathias Shaw for example. The leader of the Alliance CIA and the Master of Spies/Assassins. Tinky-Winky from the Telletubies has more moral nuance and ambiguity than even that guy these days.
