Do you think everyone who completes the questline will get an “_______ of Gilneas” title?
I mean, I kill Scarlets for free any day that ends in y. But if Genn hands out a title, well then who am I to refuse? Heck, I’ll help him recover all of southern Silverpine if that’s his aim.
Looking at your list, I see how much the Horde’s gotten a raw deal. As far as I can remember, the only equivalents for Alliance are;
Vanilla: Delfias Brotherhood, Scarlet Crusade, Dark Iron Dwarves, Leper Gnomes
TBC: Scarlet Crusade, Delfias Brotherhood
WotLK: Scarlet Crusade, Scarlet Onslaught
Cata: Druids of the Flame, Dark Iron Dwarves, Scarlet Crusade, Delfias Brotherhood, the Wolfcult (added here because Worgen joined the Alliance in Cata)
MoP: Alliance’s initial strike force in Pandaria (with forced labor camps), Scarlet Crusade (added because you can run their dungeons here despite Scarlets having no involvement in the story)
WoD: Draenei who turned to serve the Void or the Burning Legion
Legion: Scarlet Crusade (purged to make Whitemane a Death Knight) and Scarlet Onslaught (rescuing defectors).
BfA: Kul’tirans serving Ashvane or the Drust, Mechagnomes loyal to King Mechagon
SL: N/A (Anduin was mind-controlled so that doesn’t count)
DF: Druids of the Flame
Take out anything related to the Scarlet Crusade and the list shrinks by almost half. Looks like the problem is overuse of the Scarlet Crusade. The writers should introduce some new groups (not yet more Scarlet offshoots though) to give greater depth to the story, other races and create new villains to fight.
While you’re not wrong about the Scarlet Crusade’s issue, there was a brief time where casus belli for the Forsaken against the living was “they’re alive”, which is just as prejudiced as the Scarlet Crusade.
I’m not saying the setting can’t have a ““fake alliance”-looking villain group that targets the horde with an unjustifiable reason”, I’m saying the Scarlet Crusade are overused in that role, stale and should be replaced with another group that does that.
The irony of you saying all that with a Forsaken avatar is staggering.
I’m confused by your TBC point. As far as I can remember, nothing happened with either the Scarlet Crusade or Defias Brotherhood during that expansion since the only Azeroth zones were the draenei / blood elf areas, and those two groups don’t feature on Outland at all.
I might’ve misremembered that one, what about the other points?
I guess I can’t think of any objections.
The reason why I’m leery about the idea of Blizzard introducing alliance-flaked villain groups is whether or not it’d feel both relevant and good to fight them. Something like the Defias Brotherhood wouldn’t work because their ire’s aimed at Stormwind. Druids of the Flame are right out because you’re just killing your victims.
In a way, ironically so is the Wolfcult because originally they were allied with Sylvanas before she betrayed them. But worgen themselves were meant to be an inversion of what you’d expect out of a typical alliance race so the whole thing feels like a miss to me because you’re just pitting monsters against monsters, while the horde player’s on the worse side of the two.
I know you don’t like them being around but I just genuinely feel the Scarlet Crusade remains the best workable villain group that actually plays into what I felt was appealing about playing horde. Even if they feel overused.
I haven’t been Christian in years, and I’m mad that the Death lord didn’t bury them for good tbh.
Not that I’m particularly mad that the forsaken and gilneans are using them as villains. It just feels less fulfilling to me, personally.
While I understand where you’re coming from about why they’re used, I genuinely think and feel that the Scarlet Crusade are neither relevant nor good to fight anymore, especially here.
As I and others have stated, they’re not the main enemies of the worgen. The Forsaken helping the Worgen reclaim Gilneas is cleaning up their own mess so they don’t deserve any credit for it.
And the Scarlet Crusade have become so one-dimensional it takes me out of the story. I don’t see racist fanatic enemies, I only see the writers’ lazy agenda.
Over time, more and more people will get bored of them, to the point where Blizzard will lose subscribers because they’re sick of seeing the same foe over and over and over… and Blizzard will need to come up with something else as they should have years ago.
When everything is edgy, nothing is. The “bad is good and good is bad” fetish has gone so far, it’s going full circle, and the new subversive thing would be a return to the pattern of “beautiful heroes, monstrous villains”.
Use the Brotherhood of the Light for actual spicy Eastern Kingdom’s light fanatics who are more than just bad guys and move on from retreading the same ground with scarlets for another 20 years.
They would be a fair compromise, though the Brotherhood are not Light fanatics. To quote Wowpedia; " The Brotherhood of the Light is a compromise between the Argent Dawn’s more scholarly approach to fighting the Scourge and the Scarlet Crusade’s fanaticism. Talking to several members of this group reveals that they have a clearly different code of ethics and morals than their brethren of the Argent Dawn — while maintaining an objective view which the Scarlet Crusade loses with their zealotry." And it makes even less sense for them to be there than the Scarlet Crusade.
Why does it have to be Light fanatics or even Light worshippers?
It was undead who caused the Gilneas diaspora. Genn himself says in “Before the Storm” that Gilneas is now overrun with criminals, ogres, and trolls, so those three make more sense as enemies to beat to reclaim Gilneas (plus Ogres also scratch the itch of “enemy not tied to the Alliance or the Horde” while not being overused).
That’d be typical of Blizzard;
“The ruins of Gilneas have been taken over by Ogres trolls and criminals. Who should be the enemy to defeat in the quest to reclaim Gilneas? The Scarlet Crusade!”
It basically started with the Forsaken heritage questline. They wanted to utilize nostalgia and have it be about the Forsaken’s old enemy, the Scarlet Crusade (even though they really shouldn’t be around in large numbers or at all). Though I’m not sure why they chose Silverpine when the Scarlets have never ventured there.
So when the Gilneas Reclaimation comes about, it’s basically a continuation. The Scarlets being there makes for a safe but boring enemy. Having it be rogue Forsaken/loyalists is too close to faction conflict which Blizzard wants to move away from (although I read you kill Nelven Druids of the Flame in the new Dream zone as a possible Nelf; haven’t played it yet). The Scarlets are racists so nobody is going to care.
Edit: I agree it’s lame but Blizzard is playing everything safe
Edit; While I do get aggro, I’m criticizing Blizzard’s seeming decision, not you.
The people calling them overused and saying their presence makes no sense care.
I just gave a group not tied to a faction that can be used as enemies - ogres, and Genn himself said ogres had overrun the ruins.
I agree with you it makes no sense, especially with the neat idea of one of the BfA pamphlets talking about a temporary truce between Gilneas and the Scarlets, which would’ve been much more interesting, albeit not exactly relevant to Gilneas’ reclamation.
That could’ve worked but maybe it being Scarlets is again Blizzard trying their hand at nostalgia or just looking at the general vicinity of Gilneas/Lordaeron for a villain. I guess killing Scarlets, in Blizzard’s eyes, is more …satisfying? than some ogres.
Edit: OH but do we know if the Scarlets are going to be THE enemy of the questline? All we’ve seen are corpses. Maybe something killed them.
Wonder why it’d satisfying rather than stale at this point.
That temporary truce with the Scarlet Brotherhood would’ve actually added some nuance and breathed new life into the cliche that is the Scarlet Crusade (though, as you said, it’d be irrelevant to Gilneas’ reclamation, and it also raises too many questions, like why the Worgen would trust something or someone Scarlet-affiliated).
Blizzard needs to up their game, there’s a fine line between nostalgia and cliche.
Maybe Genn would’ve been willing to overlook their past history if it means retaking his kingdom and/or just generally dealing a blow to the Forsaken. He is known to be impulsive and make rash decisions (or he has). It would’ve likely been done under wraps outside of the eyes of the Alliance I imagine. Though, Genn’s flaws, which would’ve facilitated this, are not only things players I think have gotten tired of or maybe he just straight got character development after all. I don’t remember. So maybe not likely still, lol.
That would make sense, but what do you think of the idea a few have raised of Worgen and Forsaken teaming up against the Scarlets? I… do not care for that idea (to put it lightly).
I’m not a huge fan of it myself honestly but whatever.
I like faction conflict but I know others don’t and that’s okay.
I think we should get a scarlet crusade expansion.
The Brotherhood of the Light are underrated; honestly my favorite part about the Argents. Korfax, Champion of the Light and Eligor Dawnbringer are so based. Though, as Thadeus said, they’re not light fanatics.
Oh yeah in the context of Gilneas, I think Scarlets and light worshippers are a weird target. A forsaken breakaway would’ve made way more sense tbh even with the prior description of it, cause even the Scarlets wouldn’t wanna live in what BfA described imo compared to Alterac or something like that.
Funny enough, I agree, the Alliance needs more shades of grey and having to defend the Scarlet Crusade is actually a good thing. Especially if some of them become worgen. I’d love to see Worgen Paladins donning the tabard of the Scarlet Crusade!