When did we stop putting heads on spikes?

[Onotay-wyrmrest-accord (Onotay)]

You must have gotten so many wedgies from the other Orcs in the Valley of Trials

[Lingxiu-the-forgotten-coast]

@Uggolok-bleeding-hollow

@Lingxiu-the-forgotten-coast

Who’s going to join a faction that offers less of the world than its counterpart? Why join the Alliance to only see that 10% of the world when you could join Horde and play in the 90% of the world and its dungeons and its raids? Not only that, but the wider world means more Horde content and storylines and perspectives can be told, versus the constant claustrophobic atmosphere the Alliance would have?

I don’t think that goes through the mind of players. I couldn’t care less how much of Azeroth the Horde controlled. I’m far more interested in what defines the Horde and what sets it apart from the Alliance.

The contrast is what matters here. Parity is not a useful metric for story telling and so far as I’m aware inconsequential to gameplay.

Can Alliance still LFD into dungeons in ‘Horde territory’? If so, then the losses are a pointless humiliation conga forcing the Alliance into lobby mode. Wow, what a positive impact the war had! Now in order to play the game I have to click on the green eye instead of wandering around and exploring!

Parity isn’t useful for storytelling, but you are flat-out wrong about it being inconsequential to gameplay. There’s a reason balance concerns are a Very Important Thing in gaming.

[Uggolok-bleeding-hollow]

Don’t you travel through Horde controlled territory for dungeons today? Ever take a trip through Kalimdor to do literally anything after the Horde took complete control of it?

I’m saying it’s inconsequential because it observably is. Nobody thinks about how much territory Alliance or Horde control. They login, pew pew and travel where ever they want regardless of how much story territory either side holds.

[Ýen-frostmourne]

That’s just Banter

[Lingxiu-the-forgotten-coast]

Yes, but most ‘Faction-Exclusive’ areas are low-level and don’t contain dungeons or raids. Making 90% of the world Horde Territory suddenly means that 90% of those dungeons and raids are now Horde-Only. Like, let’s say war happened just before DF, and then DF launches and because Horde had control of the seas due to a story victory, only the Horde could access the Dragon Isles? Alliance would have access to all of the expansions systems, sure, but access to the zones would be Horde Territory.

Hell, imagine trying to sell this expansion to players; ‘So, the players on the other team win and get all of your favorite territories, and you have less world to explore. So, that’ll be $40?’ No promise of swinging the pendulum back, because once a power is reduced, powers stay reduced, in reality at least.

[Uggolok-bleeding-hollow]

@Lingxiu-the-forgotten-coast

Making 90% of the world Horde Territory suddenly means that 90% of those dungeons and raids are now Horde-Only. Like, let’s say war happened just before DF, and then DF launches and because Horde had control of the seas due to a story victory, only the Horde could access the Dragon Isles? Alliance would have access to all of the expansions systems, sure, but access to the zones would be Horde Territory.

No that’s never been true. Alliance can go to Razorfen downs today. Or really anywhere outside of the Horde cities. Even if they so desired they can sneak into Ogrimmar to run Ragefire Chasm.

Nothing mechanically stops this from happening.

[Lingxiu-the-forgotten-coast]

So then why would territory be lost in the first place? It doesn’t serve a gameplay purpose aside from marking one side The Loser and one side The Winner through means neither side controlled.

Again, all you’d be doing is consigning the Losers into lobby mode until they either got their territories re-expanded through the narrative or the faction is deleted. Which then begs the question, why have the players in the first place if the NPCs are going to decide everything?

[Uggolok-bleeding-hollow]

Again it’s not lobby mode. You can go anywhere in Horde controlled territory today with little contention.

The point of having a changing world is it’s more plausible. It has consequences in it. It’s not a big stupid blue villain that exists as plot device with no consequence to the world.

I’d much rather Warcraft be the one of Garrosh and Varian competing to build and destroy one another than Zovaal and his contrived existence.

[Lingxiu-the-forgotten-coast]

Yes, but contested zones becoming faction zones means quest NPCs likely change as well, which means quests become permanently lost. Which means content is lost since those quests aren’t functional anymore.

Do you really think the game would be healthy with Alliance able to adventure in Stormwind and Elwynn Forest with Horde having control over literally everything else?

[Kentaurus-turalyon (Kentaurus)]

And we are always at war. Just not always with the opposing faction. The “war” aspect never left the game.

[Uggolok-bleeding-hollow]

No you can still have quests. They would naturally change over time to fulfill whatever plot was necessary.

I’m not sure what you think is lost here. The game we have today shows us that while Theramore was important to the story it had zero consequence on the gameplay. Players can still get back and forth across the continents, do quests and dungeons and PvP.

[Lingxiu-the-forgotten-coast]

BECAUSE THE BARRENS IS STILL CONTESTED.

If there were actual victories and claimed space, those areas would not be contested anymore, they would become Faction-Locked. You do not find Alliance questlines in Mulgore or Durotan, because those are Horde territories.

What you want, or at least what I believe you want, is for Faction dominance over territories. That means they become Alliance or Horde territory, which means questlines have to change or be removed for the ‘losing’ faction while the ‘winning’ faction can explore more storylines afforded by the dominance of that territory. This means there is less and less story available for the faction in decline as their territory continues to shrink. Which, realistically, would continue to happen because of the Snowball Effect.

That is, unless the writers deus-ex-machina a way for the losing faction to turn things around and start winning again. Which then makes the entire ‘war’ the same betting and drinking game that GoT became, with as much player input.

At least when we’re fighting the monster of the week we can say ‘yeah we beat them.’

[Uggolok-bleeding-hollow]

The quests change though.

When Deathwing brought the Cataclysm to the world the quests got revamped. It doesn’t matter if the quest occurs in Horde controlled territory or contested territory. You think the WoW team can’t just put a bunch of new Alliance quests in their hub and then in Horde controlled territory? Sure they can.

There’s nothing stopping them from making Alliance playable while Alliance territory is at an all time low.

[Brakkarion-wyrmrest-accord]

You’re kind of going out on a limb there. I’m sure someone may have been disappointed if they were Alliance in Hillsbrad logging on to find their town was reduced to slime.

But BfA even shown that it is possible to have Horde quest in Alliance zones and vice versa with how they completely split the faction into separate mini-continents. It isn’t even about 100% Domination of a zone or a world map because it’s possible for a faction to win ground on some fronts and lose ground on others and even the ones they win on. If it came down to “Oh no, a level 12 quest from ten years ago is inaccessible!” Then… Time dragons, they are all over the place and they phase entire zones into before and after images.

[Uggolok-bleeding-hollow]

And you just write the quests Alliance would need to enjoy the game from the perspective of the oppressed. They still exist in the game and have all the same story elements as before. They aren’t deprived of gameplay.

[Lingxiu-the-forgotten-coast]

There’s a difference between ‘playable’ and ‘appealing’. Sure, I have no doubt you could cram enough quests and questgivers into Elwynn Forest and Stormwind to get someone to max level, but does that sound at all appealing, as opposed to the Horde being able to safely receive quests throughout the entirety of Kalimdor and the majority of EK along with all expansion zones?

Being able to explore, see new sights, wander around, these are all things that are also important to the player experience. ‘Losing’ the contest for a zone means that zone can no longer be safely entered and experienced for players on the ‘losing’ team. Which means the Alliance player has to endure not only being the designated loser of the story, but also the mechanical impact of losing those questlines as well as being unable to safely enter the zone any longer.

@Brakkarion-wyrmrest-accord

You’re kind of going out on a limb there. I’m sure someone may have been disappointed if they were Alliance in Hillsbrad logging on to find their town was reduced to slime.

But BfA even shown that it is possible to have Horde quest in Alliance zones and vice versa with how they completely split the faction into separate mini-continents. It isn’t even about 100% Domination of a zone or a world map because it’s possible for a faction to win ground on some fronts and lose ground on others and even the ones they win on. If it came down to “Oh no, a level 12 quest from ten years ago is inaccessible!” Then… Time dragons, they are all over the place and they phase entire zones into before and after images.

Again, Vol’dun and Kul Tiras were contested zones. That is not the same as Green-Text Faction Zone. Massive changes happen once the zone is no longer contested after one faction ‘wins’ the contest.

As far as the notion of ‘win some here, lose some here’, that goes back to parity. The Horde and Alliance essentially trade, constantly existing at the same stalemate, thus making the war pointless because ‘oh nothing’s actually going to happen to advance either side. We can’t win or lose.’ Which makes the whole grand war pointless background noise because it doesn’t matter. And if it doesn’t matter, why is it happening?

Finally, ‘Just Add Time Dragons’ are the literal deus-ex-machina that make any ‘stakes’ completely laughable. So much for a living world when one faction has to live in the literal instanced past to quest and level.

@Uggolok-bleeding-hollow

And you just write the quests Alliance would need to enjoy the game from the perspective of the oppressed. They still exist in the game and have all the same story elements as before. They aren’t deprived of gameplay.

And what about when it’s time for the killing blow to the faction?

[Uggolok-bleeding-hollow]

@Lingxiu-the-forgotten-coast

Sure, I have no doubt you could cram enough quests and questgivers into Elwynn Forest and Stormwind to get someone to max level

…

That’s not what we’re talking about. You are thinking that Alliance quests would need to be in controlled territories when the game shows us that contested territories and even opposition-controlled territories suffice.

The story just goes in a direction where one is oppressed and one is the oppressor. They both still have content and gameplay across the entire game world.

@Lingxiu-the-forgotten-coast

And what about when it’s time for the killing blow to the faction?

It’s not required.

[Lingxiu-the-forgotten-coast]

What Horde questlines exist in Elwynn? What Alliance questlines exist in Mulgore? None, as far as I know, at least outside of the holidays, and entering Faction-Locked zones flags you for PvP which means, oh boy, here comes the ganksquad. So now we’d be forcing non-WM questers into PvP which always worked well before.

@Uggolok-bleeding-hollow

@Lingxiu-the-forgotten-coast

And what about when it’s time for the killing blow to the faction?

It’s not required.

Then the war is pointless, as there are no stakes. Horde can’t ‘win’ the war and Alliance can’t ‘lose’ it, there’s just inconvenience forced by the story progression that lucky players will benefit from and unlucky players will suffer from.

[Deadcity-tichondrius]

a quest where you have to go put a guys head on a pike for talking too much about there not being heads on pikes would be pretty good lul

[Uggolok-bleeding-hollow]

@Lingxiu-the-forgotten-coast

Then the war is pointless, as there are no stakes.

Stakes or consequential outcomes are lasting events that form new stories and outcome in the world. Essentially if you cannot remove the event or actor from the world without damaging the existing outcome then it is factually consequential.

So no you’ve got this wrong too.