A superpower that suddenly doesn’t have to guard its own land, respect the agreements it made with Allies, respect logistical constraints and geopolitical barriers?
I guess if BFA is your yardstick for reasonability…
4 Likes
Actually she wants to be the bridge between the living and non living Lordearenians. Heck, I am curious if Blizzard will follow though on that if she will end up abandoning the living Lordearenians to their fate.
1 Like
Of course they did, they installed her. Doesn’t stop Calia from batting her eyelashes about Anduin in Shadowlands and palling it up with Jaina.
But if you want to believe that the Alliance dictating the Forsaken’s future is some kind of epic win for the Forsaken I certainly won’t stop you.
Not sure what you’re getting at. Are you implying that the more sensible narrative progression would have been for the Forsaken to continue to rampage across Lordaeron wiping out settlements of the Alliance, which controls a continent that spans half the planet’s landmass and has its center of power right there (Hillsbrad is almost as close to Ironforge as it is to Undercity, especially when you account for Alliance domination of Baradin Bay) and for the Alliance to do nothing about it?
The idea that it is unrealistic for the Alliance to be able to steamroll the Horde in the Eastern Kingdoms when it shifted its entire strategic focus into doing so is one of your most bizarre assertions yet.
1 Like
Look at Tirisfal’s geography.
In the East of Tirasfal Glades, you have a mountain range, with a discernible chokepoint known as the bulwark - which comprises a strong barrier before we go to consider that the Forsaken rule the center of the chessboard with Andorhal, which in turn allows them to check northward advances coming through Hillsbrad, which they also controlled. Their Eastern Flank then is pretty secure.
On the Westward side, the only land route in involves taking an army up a thin mountainous wooded pass that gives the defender all of the advantages, which you have to do again, after you’ve moved the Forsaken out of Hillsbrad - which is tough enough given that the Horde seems to be able to project all the way to Arathi.
Given those factors, plus the force multiplier that is the blight, this is an extremely hard country for the Alliance to attack overland, and after Cataclysm, it was in the best geopolitical situation it could have been in.
Even though Blizzard had the Horde pull an even more ridiculous hat trick, someone probably stopped them here - which is where we get the most absurd amphibious invasion in history. Sure, we can totally launch an unopposed landing sourced from the other end of the continent. That makes total sense - and we’ll throw them into a castle siege and when that fails, Jaina will steal Captain Hook’s pirate ship and use it to hit the iWin button.
This is before we go to consider what parts of the world have to be abandoned to get the forces together to make this work. While we’re here - why were the Draenei able to help here, but not in Ashenvale? What gives?
That aside - we need to stop acting like wars are instances where we throw whole player races onto Final Destination from Super Smash Brothers and watch them duke it out. If portals are ineffective for transporting large armies, then geographical features matter, bottlenecks matter, logistics matter, the defense needs of a global power matter - and they matter to an extent that no, you can’t just march an army north and expect not to run into problems that aren’t easily fixed by “lol, we outnumber them.”
10 Likes
Relatively speaking, I’d find Lordaeron starting to be taken by vindictive Alliance / hunting down Forsaken to be a bit of a revival for the race-identity. The whole ‘Trying to survive in a world that hates us, with a home we can no longer return to’ vibe.
As for the rest, depending how they twerked quests on each faction around it; it could be interesting - but yeah if it’s one sided then probably not.
The Alliance dominates the Eastern Kingdom’s seas, and they dominate the Eastern Kingdom’s skies. It’s not just a matter of outnumbering the Horde, although that does in fact matter a fair bit when one belligerent is outnumbered on what is likely a 1-100 scale. It’s also about the Alliance having air and naval supremacy combined with a fully mechanized land force and a massive industrialized economy.
The Alliance’s logistical position was strong, controlling the only functional port on Baradin Bay allowing relatively unrestricted supply lines to northern Lordaeron, especially with the bulk of the Horde fleet in Kalimdor. Stormwind wasn’t the only place that troops could be sourced from, with Ironforge also relatively close to the front as mentioned before. Stormwind had already demonstrated the ability to launch and sustain protracted military campaigns as far as Northrend. Northern Lordaeron is a comparative walk in the park.
You want to talk about Tirisfal’s geography, the entire zone aside from the eastern and western portions is a giant plain and the Forsaken have little to no capacity to defend against mechanized infantry. You can actually see evidence of this in Brill; the place was literally crushed under Alliance tank treads. The Alliance brought with it such overwhelming firepower that it literally created a path of flame from the coast to the capitol.
The Forsaken’s only strategic asset was the Blight, which not only is of limited effectiveness against mechanized forces but also was something that they had in limited quantity and so they were holding it in reserve. The Forsaken had little to no capacity to defend against this. Even the gunship that they brought they never bothered to use in the battle because the outcome was a foregone conclusion. Neither Saurfang nor Sylvanas actually believed that the Forsaken could hold Undercity under a concerted Alliance attack.
The Alliance could have ejected the Forsaken from the Eastern Kingdoms by force if it had really committed to it basically any time after WotLK, because the chief strategic threat to the Alliance in the region was never the Forsaken, it was the Scourge. The reason the Alliance didn’t do this was because they were concerned about the effects that such a campaign would have on the balance of power in Kalimdor, but Garrosh and Sylvanas made that a non-issue by destroying Theramore and Teldrassil respectively, rendering the Alliance’s strategic interests in the area moot and making a move against the Forsaken the Alliance’s best and strongest strategic option.
3 Likes
The draenei did help:
Anduin winced. “First Theramore, now Darnassus. They’ll have all of Kalimdor, except for Azuremyst. And mark my words, we’ll be evacuating draenei soon.” The draenei were hardly in a position to assist the beleaguered night elves, though some brave souls had traveled to do so. Once Darnassus fell, the hungry Horde would doubtless turn their attention to Azuremyst.-Elegy
Lorewise I assume the draenei didn’t send many of their forces to Lordearon(same with Ashenvale) but they did send them.
Why not? The entire premise of the war was the Fleets of both the Alliance/Horde were not in great shape. And the Horde \ended up having the same problem as the Alliance, in reverse:
The Horde’s fleet had been battered, too. Even if they could overwhelm the Alliance fleet—debatable at best—they would still have the same problem as a land‐based approach: not enough ships to transport a suitable ground force to take and hold the city. Any landing assault in Stormwind would fail. -A Good War
1 Like
Frankly, the successful amphibious invasion backed by air and naval supremacy that the Alliance demonstrated at Tirisfal is several tiers more believable than the Horde’s successful overland invasion of Darkshore by way of the Barrens and Ashenvale.
2 Likes
Perhaps if you ignore that the Tree Queen offered the bulk of her military to a fool’s errand.
1 Like
Once the other boot drops in the story.
Hasn’t happened yet.
I am the only true Horde patriot. All the others are traitors.
Somone is really aiming for a vacation from the forums it seems
1 Like
I fight the good fight for the Horde.
If the Forsaken want their land back, all they have to do is go there. It’s not like Darkshore, where the Horde occupied the territory and had a secure land route straight back to their territory. The Alliance went by ship, attacked, then left. That’s why the warfront was all the way in Arathi. That’s how far the Alliance could push in by land. Like, 95% of the Forsaken’s territory remained under their control. The remaining 5% was either ruined during Anduin’s initial steamroll, or blighted by Sylvanas.
It is not recovered until we got our own unique sceanrio the same way the night elves did with Darkshore. This is all about fairness. Also Alliance occupied Shadowfang keep going by the exploring azeroth book. So no. Not ALL Forsaken land is retaken yet.
You did. It was with Calia and Voss.
We did not. Stop lying.
Re: Naval and Air Superiority:
I’m not sure where you get this point from, especially in the north. My understanding is that both fleets were decimated in Legion for starters. But the Alliance also has no functional ports north of Stormwind City. Menethil Harbor remains unusable. It’s also not a simple matter of just flying up a fleet of gyrocopters from Ironforge. Those and other flyers require fuel or food, depending on which ones we’re talking about. That requires intermediary bases on the way to the Undercity, which just weren’t bothered with. In fact, airpower seems to have not been considered at all, which makes less sense when we consider the Undercity’s indigenous zeppelin tower.
The (Western) Horde’s Navy being in Kalimdor also makes less sense when we consider a) that Sylvanas was already predicting the attack on Lordaeron, and sent reinforcements there, and b) that the Alliance were having to come in from such a distance away as well.
Northrend also showed the difficulties with such an attack, not the strengths. The Lich King had no real navy to oppose the landings, but his army was quick on the uptake in Borean Tundra. Meanwhile in the Howling Fjord, the Forsaken manage to intercept and stop an entire invasion fleet in a manner that I’d expect them to do here.
Re:
1-100 scale
What made you believe that figure was close to reasonable?
Re: Tirisfal is a Plain.
This comment ignores my comment on Tirisfal’s flanks, which I see in this response has gone uncontested.
RE: Blight
A) The Alliance did not primarily attack with mechanized forces.
B) We do not have strong evidence, nor a logical base from which to argue that Alliance machines protect their operators from the blight.
Re:
Tirisfal is several tiers more believable than the Horde’s successful overland invasion of Darkshore by way of the Barrens and Ashenvale.
I agree with this, but that still doesn’t make it ridiculous. It is less ridiculous to me that a bicycle could beat a Formula 1 race car than a pair of roller blades. But neither scenario is reasonable period.
3 Likes
Begins crying in Worgen
I guess we will just be homeless forever, Blizzard hates us and will sooner give the Night Elves and Forsaken their lands back before us.
4 Likes