I’m a horde player but have been playing a few of my low level toons on Silvermoon and well, from a high pop horde server to Silvermoon I dont seem to notice any real difference if anything Silvermoon seems quicker for queues etc. Wow progress shows a far larger amount of Silvermoon guilds over a high pop horde server for 10/10M and general Mythic raid progress.
I am at lower levels so I cant see the end game because its locked behind a level cap to check random dungeons groups which pointless but whatever
Just wondering is the difference really that large other than at the very high end of the game? Or would i see a massive drop at m+? Because cant say its the case for raids as already explained its far outperforming a high pop horde dominated server.
There aren’t as many PUGs for things, granted, but it doesn’t follow that access is “open-season” hordeside, just the opportunity for access is larger.
There’s still gating such as RIO and all that, and in fact the very fact that there are more groups and players hordeside means from my observations generally, horde players tend to have higher requirements on their groups in PUGs (because they can expect such, because there’s more players) so whilst there is more groups, it doesn’t follow there’s necessarily more you can get into, if that makes sense? (I mean on balance there probably is, but I don’t think it’s as simple as “groups for everyone” i’ve spent many hours looking for groups on my warlock to build her mid key experience in M+ and very rarely are there groups at the level I need and where there are, often they set their requirements way higher than I have gearwise and RIOwise despite me outgearing these dungeons technically…).
Alliance players may have the view that because there’s less, they can’t be too picky. I haven’t experienced it enough this expo to know for sure as i’ve recently returned to blueside.
I will sayu though the best balm is guilds and communities. In BFA I was in a m+ community and I wouldn’t have believed people if they told me keys were nearly impossible to get. I was running several keys every single day with a variety of people.
Joining such as ally is definitely worthwhile, i’d say for anyone though, because the mercy of the groupfinder can just be quite the slog.
Just curious what realms are you comparing for your raid comparison?
Just comparing two realms isn’t really an accurate representation. There’s currently almost 19 pages on wowprogress of Horde guilds that are 10/10 mythic compared to 4,5 pages of Alliance guilds.
Anyway, if you’re just raiding heroic for AOTC or doing dungeons for KSM you’re more than fine for Alliance, especially if you find a nice guild to run content with If you’re pugging there will be less options, you’ll have a harder time but it should be doable. The difference will be more noticeable once you get into content above that level however.
I can’t really speak for PvP as it’s not something I do.
Well if you want to play exclusively in a guild or with close friends, then it doesn’t really matter what side you’re playing on, so long as you have that guild or friends.
If you’re going to play with random players, then the selection is inevitably better and bigger on the Horde side than on the Alliance side. So that whole PuG environment goes a bit farther on Horde than on Alliance.
Just the two realms ive played on recently Stormscale - Silvermoon. I dont tend to hop servers much but was bored and thought id just hop over for a bit and see how alliance was doing on some old low toons.
But again i accept it is true at the top end of the game as i said in the OP what im trying to see is it really that different overall or does everyone just jump on the bandwagon cos the top reflects the bias?
The answer is sadly YES. The Horde is just the superior faction of 2. For every Allinace guild, the Horde as 10 times more to offer. As regarding pugs, there are 3 times more Horde keys than there are on the Alliance side.
In all honesty, the Alliance is a good faction if you don’t wanna engage in any kind of high end content.
Mythic raiding is mainly because it requires a large number of players with a similar goal. and you generally need more than one’s raiding team worth for a good pool, because otherwise you can’t have a single person ever quit, or sit out a run etc.
With the other two you need less players generally (5 or 2/3 if talking arena) and you WILL find alliance players who want to get to these heights, there are plenty that do it. I wouldn’t say being ally here is necessarily the worst thing so long as you are up for networking and finding out where you need to look. Unlike horde you won’t find them swelling up in groupfinder as often, but they’re definitely around.
Mythic raiding is the most obviously affected area, the other two to a lesser degree. If someone was going to do got KSM say, or glad, i wouldn’t say them rolling alliance will stop them doing that and they must reroll horde. If they said they wanted to world first mythic raid, or get in the top 100, i would tell them they will probably find it a lot easier if they are horde.
I maintain only for raiding at the top end (and by top end I mean you’re aiming to do it quickly within a patch and aren’t willing to wait).
When it comes to doing top end m+ and rated pvp I wouldn’t say it’s an impediment if you’re prepared to use stuff like guilds and communities to help connect you with the players.
TBH most horde players would tell you the same honestly, using such is superior to outright pugging. That’s the principle difference. An alliance player looking to PUG high content may have issues, whereas a horde one may be able to find groups (whether they’re good enough or not is another question) but when it comes to doing high content with organisation? Only mythic raiding at the competitive level is the area where alliance is down.
In communities and such, though they may be smaller than horde, there is well more than enough alliance doing keys at and above the 15 range and same for ranked pvp.
Fair enough! I think people are definitely jumping on the horde bandwagon (myself included, my guild went Horde after being Alliance since early Vanilla) but the problem is people have been doing it for years and nothing has been done to counter it.
It all started with racials but that problem has long been solved, unfortunately it was done too late. There’s just a vastly bigger playerpool of ‘serious’ pve players on the Horde side which is why people switch and keep switching. This shift has been going on for years and even if Alliance could be better in some situations it isn’t worth switching back to the side that has less players in the hopes that other people will follow as well.
MDI is a good example of this, every team competing in the MDI is Alliance, yet the actual leaderboards in game are Horde dominated. Being Alliance might give you an edge in m+, but that doesn’t matter if there is no one to play with.
Yeah i agree with what youve said, i’d add though from my experience that pugging higher m+ keys on horde doesnt seem too basd, so for sake of this post lets say 15+ is classed as pugging higher m+ keys. Then on the horde it tends to, in my experience, have a fairly high success rate in all honesty.
KSM and high end pvp is harder though, they are just less groups in the group finders so unless you got a solid group of friends doing those with you it’s going to take you a while.
I wouldn’t know. What I meant by that comment is the quality will obviously be variable. I won’t entertain the idea that all high horde pugged keys are smooth sailing because the forums paints a very different picture of that for sure.
But the idea that “nobody serious plays ally” is one that needs to be challenged. We have a fair few forums faces here whom are ally whom were doing the harder end of content even a vast majority of horde wouldn’t have dared touch in the first few weeks because those alliance players play in groups with people they know who want to do that content with them.
Horde is great is you don’t know anyone and want to make “high-end contacts” and just kind of fall into that scene or whatever, because there’s loads of players. As an alliance player unless you actually concentrate on doing stuff and keeping contact with good people you run with to aim for those high keys you won’t be able to “stumble” into it as you could on horde.
Aterlos above echos my point - if you have a group of regulars on ally there is basically no difference whatsoever. This is a strictly PUG issue in all content, with one exception which is mythic raiding (because of the smallness of the scene)
If you’re pugging there will be less options, you’ll have a harder time but it should be doable. The difference will be more noticeable once you get into content above that level however.