What it really comes down to is the Horde you’re seeing, as someone who mains an Alliance and by your word started focusing on the game in Cata, isn’t the Horde that people who mainly play Horde see, especially if you started playing prior to Cata.
The Horde I fell in love with existed before Garrosh, when the forsaken were sketchy, but showed signs of maybe not being abhorrently evil. Where the trolls and orcs and tauren were banded together as “brothers”. You say Thrall’s the exception, but the Horde I loved followed his example; honor above all else.
Back then, the devs could do shades of grey and moral ambiguity. Warsong Gulch was a thing because orcs needed the lumber for actual survival and couldn’t get it any other way, while the night elves held the woods the warsong clan… lumberized? Lumbered? Whatever. Those forests were sacred. Both sides have real need and motivation for their actions, and both are justified. Arathi Basin was a fight between two forces with a rightful claim to the land; the forsaken were the formerly living inhabitants, while the humans were the still living ones. AV was about two groups too stubborn to not fight. And so on and so forth, and other than the BGs? The Thrall Horde didn’t seem to necessarily hate the Alliance. Neither side was invested in fighting. Which is why the whole Wrathgate episode was so big. Which is why in the Ulduar patch, it was Garrosh who provoked Varian, and Thrall who kept his cool.
Basically, to stop myself before I really go on, the Horde of today, the Horde you see Ally-side and have seen since Cata, isn’t the Horde some of us have seen and hope to see again.
Well of course i know that before cata it was… different. for both sides.
Then blizzard decided that it was a good idea to keep pushing this conflict that destroyed characters,races or the story in general just to encourage their players into hating each other.
The problem comes when is done poorly and only creating toxicity and al already toxic fanbase that is not even fun at this point to have, is miserable, it only brings the worst of people (like myself) and just an irrational hate in general that i cannot even explain.
i too wished that bfa was more gray so maybe both sides could actually have more fun in their story without neccesarily ruining the other, like bfa did.
I think a lot of the problems and arguments going on right now are because so many players are split in their views:
Some feel that this was bad, but Blizzard will surely write the Horde correctly soon.
Some feel that BfA was the final straw, it escalated too far to go back to normal now.
And these views are hard to reconcile because one leans towards downplaying this bad chapter in the story to focus on the next, hopefully better, one, while the other feels that the story cannot progress until it sits down and seriously works out all the bad blood it generated. These often lead to arguments because group A often feels group B is spitefully dragging up stuff they’d rather move on from because they never agreed with it in the first place, while group B often feels that group A is trying to keep their atrocity-won cake and eat it, too.
And the hardliners/trolls on each side make it difficult to reach a middle ground.
I assume I am being labelled as the hardliner here.
Alright. How about you guys with a more moderate attitude think of a way to fix the narrative where both sides are happy.
They did it in bfa, and according to the latest interviews, they are obviously happy with their story and how much players are “invested” in it, so I wouldn’t put it past them to do it again sometime in the future.
What really upsets me is that they managed to create such a poisoned atmosphere that people of one faction now feel they can only ever be satified again when the other will be completely obliterated.
I’m all for healthy faction rivalry but this is taking things too far.
Well, no, it’s a valid question.
I’d say, the Horde, same as the Alliance, is first and foremost an artificial contruct that changes with every change in leadership and stands for whatever suits the story they want to tell. Genocidal warmongers one day, honorable warriors who “band together in times of adversity” the next.
The horde under Sylvanas had little to no resemblence to its original core themes and values anymore, and the sudden reverse course at the end of bfa felt forced and unconvincing.
The factions as they are at the moment, especially the Horde, are nothing but a joke, a sad parody of what they once were. I wouldn’t mind to get rid of them rather sooner than later, but since they are a “pillar of the game” and all, this is sadly not an option I have.
That being said, I understand the frustration of Alliance players because I feel the same. But it’s not the Horde or their players that are to blame for that, it’s the writers, and their inability to give us a story that feels satisfying for even one side, let alone both.
Because he still believes in attempting peace. As for Saurfang, while he himself participated in attrocities he still did the right thing in the end and help end the war just before Sylvanad could complete whatever she wanted to do/in time for us to deal with N’zoth.
And the Horde has ZERO incentive to adhere to the agreement.
Afterall what is the repercussion if they don’t?
Are their people faced with extinction? Nope.
Are they in danger of losing their lands? Nope. Instead they actually gain some.
The Horde has nothing to fear because they face no repercussion.
A war to the Horde is a net positive that they can only gain from.
Is it any wonder they keep doing it?
Just as the horde are doomed to be #savage jerks who change leaders and commit atrocities, the alliance are doomed to be the white knight faction that won’t consider even a morally gray approach to fighting the horde.
Unfortunately, most of the moderate suggestions I’ve seen tend to get ignored in favor of posters arguing with the easy target hardliners.
But, in terms of what I’d like to see to patch things up:
Faction ambassadors at the other faction’s embassies. Have them have scripted conversations, which get updated each patch, to show what the sore spots are in faction negotiations, what they can agree on, and what they can’t. Mostly, they’d serve as a constant update to show that this plot thread hasn’t been forgotten and swept under the rug, even if it won’t be resolved instantly. They could steal common arguments from the forums to bicker about in-game easily enough.
Night elves retake Ashenvale from Sylvanas loyalists in a playable scenario. Show off everything that’s cool about night elves, every neat unit and special effect from the Warfront, plus major Draenei and worgen support, and some appearances from other allies as well. Show them winning and winning big, with no ifs, ands, or buts. (Horde players won’t have to see/play through this scenario, and can get a Horde-focused questline somewhere else instead.) As part of this, reveal that the Horde/ex-Horde slain in the scenario were the ones who were eager to invade and unapologetic about the Burning, so they’re crossed off the revenge list.
Have the Horde ambassadors tell/show the Alliance that the Horde is rounding up Sylvanas loyalists. Have the Horde turn over at least one character who’s confirmed (by SI:7 or so, not just taking the Horde’s word, and also giving some more successes to Alliance spy agencies to counter their Worf effect) to be someone who participated in the Burning. (I’d prefer a point of contention in A/H negotiations to be that the Horde won’t turn over all the perpetrators, however, choosing to deal with Sylvanas loyalists internally rather than submit to the Alliance. But at least one should be turned over.) Show to the Alliance player how the Horde is different rather than saying they’re different but showing no differences.
Show that the Alliance isn’t toothless. The debates over which faction is stronger show what POVs players can have, so I’d like to see something cacnon confirming that each side could still savage the other if the war continued. (I think the Horde player should see this, but presented with the tone of “these guys are no pushovers, this is serious and maybe deadly” rather than “oh noes big bad Jaina can one-shot us all! Ok, moment over, go squish Alliance punies again.”)
Let Rogers be a villain to the Horde. If Blizz wants to keep the faction divide, then the Horde needs an antagonistic Alliance character that they can resent without being prodded to feel guilty, but I think Jaina has too much history to turn into a full villain, and I think turning Tyrande into one would be terrible after Teldrassil - she at least needs to get some big successes for the night elves to build up their pride again before she can be tolerably be made into a villain and bumped off. They can be frosty with the Horde, but shouldn’t be full villains. Rogers, however, would fit the role to a T. (I’m fine with the Alliance having Garithos-style figures for the Horde player to unreservedly loathe, I just don’t think faction leaders should be turned into those kinds of caricatures. On either side.)
Rebuild a capital city for the night elves and Forsaken - as the faction capitals for the expac after Shadowlands, so that they can be a major feature and take up a lot of narrative time and care. Let the player interact with a whole host of named faction NPCs, and quest to help the rebuilding process. Show how these societies are recovering and building themselves anew. (I like Stratholme for the Forsaken, and while I’d love a spot in Ashenvale for the night elves, that’s probably impossible, so maybe Hyjal or Nighthaven or even Auberdine or Lor’danel for another port city.) Additionally, I’d seed in a few minor story quests throughout Shadowlands showing night elf and Forsaken characters searching out and picking the spot to rebuild, maybe a situation where the player can periodically turn in current-expac resources as part of the rebuilding effort, like the Warfront contribution phase - just to keep the topic alive even when it can’t be in focus yet.
Let the Horde visibly participate in neutral world-saving events in a major way. All too often, they get sidelined in neutral events while Alliance-themed groups are made neutral and take center stage, which I think is a big negative for both factions. This makes it seem, especially to Alliance players, that the Horde only participate in stories when it’s about murdering Alliance. Make Argent camps using recolored Orc buildings (instead of just a few orc NPCs in Human buildings), have Argent apothecaries on loan from the Forsaken and who don’t have a malicious ulterior motive, have some plains-themed Cenarion Circle camps with Tauren buildings and doodads, etc. Show that the Horde are an equal half of neutral organizations instead of a few NPCs shoehorned in. (And actually make neutral factions feel neutral, instead of Horde feeling they’re shoved into Alliance groups while Alliance feel like they’ve had major pieces flensed out of the Alliance to give to the Horde.)
I’ll probably think of some more points later, and this doesn’t solve everything, but I think this would salve over the worst of the current story’s festering wounds.
Well, yes, that’s the core issue of Blizzard writing the factions. It’s just that I really don’t think a change of roles would solve the problem. Much less that Alliance players would enjoy it.
It’s also worth noting that back then, the Alliance and Alliance adjacent institutions had their fair share of jerks too. The world was on the brink of war because of Admiral Proudmoore’s single minded drive to destroy Orgrimmar and the new Horde. There was political corruption among the nobles of Stormwind. The Dwarven clans engaged in political intrigues. The Scarlet Crusade was still a thing.
At some point, not only did the Horde get darker, the Alliance got lighter. Nobody in the Alliance can do anything shady anymore, and if they do, the narrative bends over backwards explaining how they’re 100% justified. Dark Irons and Void Elves, formerly considered evil, join and all the bad stuff they’ve done is kind of just dismissed. The Alliance itself is apparently a perfect system, without internal conflict, and any threat to this perfect peaceful order or its very existence can only come if some external force.
So in order to ensure we have an actual story, we require a never ending parade of end of the world scenarios or wars propagated by non-Alliance parties. Because for various reasons, it’s been decided the Alliance can’t drive conflicts anymore.
I am going to wait and see how “moderate Horde” players respond to it. Which honestly you are better off making a thread on its own.
I can’t and won’t comment on your post because I don’t want to derail it.
But I will say seeing Horde humanized and impact my narrative positively in a noticeable way irks me somehow.
It just feels wrong. It doesn’t fit what I have seen and experienced so far.
I can understand that. It does feel like Blizz made the Horde dig themselves down such a deep hole with the Burning that it feels cheap to suddenly pull them out of it with nary a dirtstain… but I don’t think the Horde players, so many of whom didn’t want to go along with that story in the first place, should have it hanging around their individual neck forever.
I think any solution is going to feel bad in some way, but I think almost any solution is better that the current one where everything is swept under the rug for the sake of status quo. I’d prefer something that both the Horde and Alliance player can, if not like, then at least not vehemently hate.