I accept that there’s no turning back time when it comes to the Horde. However, I think that there’s plenty of work that could be done with the current Horde, if Blizzard wanted to give them attention.
What about the Zandalari Empire and Darkspear Tribe mending relations with the hostile troll tribes in order to gain access to more customisation options?
Alternatively, the shamanistic races could devote themselves to healing the devastated landscape of Durotar and the Barrens (which remains one of the biggest messes caused by the Cataclysm) and creating a sustainable source of resources that doesn’t involve cutting down Ashenvale?
Then of course there’s the possibility of actually developing the Forsaken capital city and making it something a little more significant than a stinky little corner of the Ruins of Lordaeron. That would be nice, after seeing what they’ve done with Bel’ameth.
The identity of the Horde doesn’t have to be built on hostility against the Alliance, or soul-searching and struggling with their own bloodlust, or being a really metal army of murderous monsters. There’s room for more positive and constructive storytelling for them, without making them a clone of the Alliance.
I think the story just twists between factions quite naturally. For a long time it was focused on the Horde and its leadership, now it’s focusing on the Alliance reclaiming their destroyed homelands. Don’t forget it wasn’t that long ago the Alliance felt like a sideshow to what the Horde were doing, so it’s only right we spend time focusing on the Night Elves, and seeing the Worgen reclaim Gilneas.
It would be nice to see Ebyssian reflect more on his life with the Highmountain, but there have been moments where he has. (At the Forvidden Reach quests I think?).
At the moment it’s nice to see Baine in DF making peace with the Centaurs, and Thrall returning for TWW. Midnight will also be focused on the Horde if the expansion takes place in Silvermoon, with the Blood Elves and the Nightborne.
Will we see a Horde like the one with Garrosh again? Hopefully not, and no time soon. I much prefer the Horde where Baine returns Jaina’a brother to her, and then her and Thrall save Baine from execution.
I suspect the next warmongering faction will be the Alliance with Turalyon. The Scarlet Crusade at Gilneas are just a reminder that the light can be used for evil. Hopefully a more spiritual and compassionate Horde will be a great contrast to this in the future, but we will see.
Broadly speaking, yeah; I look over the coming content in the forseeable future and I can’t help but see a distinct lack of… anything that the Horde as a roleplay community can actually get anything from. That forseeable future being -at least- two expansions into the future does not bode well for those of us outside of the roleplay circles (Alliance, Elves, etc.) already mentioned.
I know I’m going to sidetrack the topic here, but it is something I am curious about. I’ve met a good few people who seem to think this is going to happen, and I wonder how they come to that conclusion.
Since as far as I have seen, ever since Turalyon came back, he hasn’t done a thing that would make him a zealot. On the contrary, he even came to terms with and spared Alonsus Faol, who is now a Forsaken. Is it just because he’s High Exarch of the Army of the Light and currently sitting on the throne in Stormwind? Or where are people getting these ideas?
I think at least some of it is just wishful thinking. For nearly twenty years Blizzard have had the Horde’s faction leaders be the aggressors and it’s not just Horde players who are tired of that plot. If nothing else, Turalyon being proactive in would give the Alliance the ability to be pretty objectively in the wrong for the first time since… Stormheim, probably.
Is it any worse than fighting Scarlet Crusade in Dragonflight, 9 years after their (last) canon destruction in Legion, over a region they never controlled before?
It’s less about Turalyon hinself, I think, and more the writing trend of “Light maybe Bad, actually?” from the last few expacs.
It’s less about ‘does this make sense’ and more a worrying, gnawing feeling of ‘this feels like the next disastrous foray into Morally Grey Territory based on what came before’
I can’t think of the exact example, but I’m sure I remember Turalyon coming across as questionable quite a few times. Enough to wonder if seeds were being planted.
Also there is a questline in game, the unlocking of the Mag’har Orcs allied race, that has them fleeing AU Draenor because the Army of the Light has gone too extreme, and replaced the Burning Legion. With Turyalon being the leader of the Army of the Light here, there’s always been a thought something similar could happen here.
Going back to OP, I do hope there will be some nice Horde beats - it’s hard to tell from what we know now
Most likely one part him being one of the few not being shown getting buddy buddy with the other faction (if we ignore the wacky elf wedding where randomly everyone marketable showed up), one part Turalyon having been shown a few times as being willing to go extremely far to do what he deems right or necessary (That being, the Light-enslavement interrogation of an orc in Beyond the Dark Portal and him once again dabbling in a little bit of torture in Shadows Rising).
Short-term, this would be immense for troll RP. The social dynamics of the tribes and Zandalari are a wellspring of politicking, spiritualism, strife and lessons learned.
Long-term, the troll fantasy and culture isn’t the same without frequently tackling the “dis is OUAH land” bit of their lore, I.e conflict with the Alliance. Trollkind is splintered and broken because of the current members of the Alliance, and vanquishing those ancient foe is likely the single thing that can unite the tribes.
Unless, you give proper narrative weight to a resurgence of Aqir (8.3, grrr.) Which is likely for Midnight and the Amani joining the Horde, considering K’thix’s buried beneath Zul’Aman.
Yes but no.
BFA was in the works from at least Warlords onwards, probably even conceptually in MoP (ie the highwater of the game as a whole).
No, they keep the two faction variant about because FOR THE HORDE neckbeard blizzcon crowd pay more into the game (or did) and because it appealed to the milkbottle stealing cube crawling dudebros who were evicted from Blizzard.
Weird how as soon as they’re out of the picture the reasonable devs (ie alliance players) are left, ergo you get alliance centric focuses on the big story beats.
Or it’s that Chris Metzen was the only main writer with any joy for the Horde as a faction, and was hands off since Legion and then fully left since BFA until The War Within and that’s why the Horde stopped being as prevalent beyond Danuser’s enthusiasm for Sylvanas and Nathanos and Christie Golden’s for Calia, with her commenting on her Twitter a few years ago that she pushed for this character to be included as a centerpiece in Before the Storm despite her not even being planned to make an appearance to begin with.
Sadly, not every issue with this game’s gameplay or narratology can be painted as a fight between good and bad neckbeards fighting over which color is cooler, or as a group of devs out of which only one person had any say in anything story related who left before BFA was finished. It’s much easier to see it as an eternal fight of us vs them, but sometimes things could’ve simply been done better or by people actually invested on the subject and there’s nothing more to it than that.
I actually wrote an expansion idea that would fix the Horde’s neutering:
Granted my version is about war between the factions because that is what i like about Warcraft, but the basic premise would work even without that.
Kill off characters that have served tgeir purpose for the narrative of WoW (or outlived it).
Bring in old and new characters into the spotlight to create conflict within and between factions and the world. This means vested but different interests, allocation of resources or pholosophical differences.
and even in this example he’s really not into the idea of having to do it until Alleria manages to pass like 5 different speech checks on him to convince him, and even then he still disagrees that it’s “necessary”. Honestly, I think people just want Turalyon to be evil at this point as a gotcha for Garrosh and Sylvanas being hit with the bat, or because he’s a paladin (the light is evil now brooos source: trust me it was revealed in a danuserian dream).
Regarding Turalyon becoming a warmonger or instigating conflict, I think it’s a bit of wishful thinking (from people on both sides of the faction divide). I would gladly put money on it never happening.
The tauren are naturally going to gravitate to helping Team Blue when the Horde keeps getting written as the antagonists. They’re the most morally unambiguous race Horde-side.
Men will literally torture and abduct refugees in front of their family but people will still go to bat for them so long as they’re a human male paladin
We never talk about the potential for the Void-corrupted Alleria Windrunner becoming evil. . .despite being filled with evil juice now that’s slowly making her skin into evil stars and evil-purple.
They always blame the Light-fearing, Tax-paying, King-hailing Human Male Paladin minority. Typical.
and even in this example he’s really not into the idea of having to do it until Alleria manages to pass like 5 different speech checks on him to convince him, and even then he still disagrees that it’s “necessary”. Honestly, I think people just want Turalyon to be evil at this point as a gotcha for Garrosh and Sylvanas being hit with the bat, or because he’s a paladin (the light is evil now brooos source: trust me it was revealed in a danuserian dream).