Monday, August 5, 2013

Another Strategy for Fixing Alliance Lore

I'm going to try to keep these faction-specific posts limited (unless I can do two in a row that focus on either side,) but as we've all discussed (perhaps too much, which is why this caveat is here in the first place,) the Alliance has a bit of a Lore Problem.

Basically, playing as Alliance feels kind of thing. If you look at 5.3 content, beyond the introductory quests with Amber and Sully (and only them) there's basically no Alliance presence beyond the player him or herself. The whole Darkspear Revolution is totally a Horde story, and while theoretically the Alliance is taking a Cold War approach and backing the enemy of an enemy, shouldn't we be seeing SI:7 agents providing training and logistical support to the Darkspear? I'd love to see, in addition to the stole Kor'kron supplies, big shipments of blue-and-gold weapons and armor flowing into the Darkspear Rebellion's arsenal (like we did with the Grimtotem!)

So here's a problem: Taking down the Warchief of the Horde surely looks like a big lore moment for the Alliance. After all, doesn't this mean that team blue is officially the victor when the dust is settled? The problem, of course, is that in order to do this storyline, tons of resources have had to be poured into giving the Horde a reason to kill their own Warchief. And that means that the Alliance side of things basically has to take a backseat to a giant Horde story.

So can Blizzard not really win? Is the Alliance unpleaseable?

Well, no. Obviously not.

Right now, yes, the story revolves around the Warchief of the Horde. The problem, of course, with having every faction-pride-enhancing moment revolve around beating the other side is that one side's moment of awesome is the other side's moment of sucking. And if both sides are ultimately doing the same thing, it kind of dilutes the excitement of the victory.

Siege of Orgrimmar isn't even out yet, but already the victory on the Alliance side feels a bit hollow, given the fact that they aren't really proving their superiority over the Horde, because Garrosh (despite his "True Horde" rhetoric) doesn't actually represent the Horde anymore. We aren't removing the entire Horde threat - in fact, we're pretty much resolving their civil war in the vain hope that A. The Horde will dismantle the dangerous war apparatus Garrosh built up and B. The Horde will have enough good will for the Alliance's help to not strike again.

Still, it wouldn't be fair to the Horde players to just say "hey guys, you got your ass kicked. Your raid consists of just constantly wiping until some Alliance NPCs show up and lock you in cages."

So here's the way to look at it:

The Horde's story (unless you were hoping for Garrosh to grow and actually become a good Warchief, which seemed to be how it was going in Cataclysm) has been good: It's compelling, and it stands on its own. The entire civil war could be happening without the Alliance (pointing Garrosh's extremist attitude toward some NPC faction.) There's enough happening within the Horde itself that outside factors aren't really that important (If he hadn't found the Sha, Garrosh might have turned to some other dark source of power.)

So, finally, to get to my point: What the Alliance really needs is some story that doesn't involve the Horde at all. There's lots of stuff to deal with: the resurgence of the Defias (though admittedly that was kind of dealt with in Heroic Deadmines) and strengthening the Kingdom of Stormwind (perhaps really uniting Elwynn, Westfall, Duskwood and Redridge,) the threat that Azshara poses to the remaining Night Elf population, the integration of the Dark Irons into Dwarven society (preferably with greater depth than "they fought those trolls. Guess we're all best friends now!") The Gnomes need to either take back Gnomeregan for real, or they need to build a new home for themselves - maybe looking into their titanic origins for inspiration. The Draenei - and I can't stress this enough - the Draenei have fixed the Exodar. They could move on if they wanted to. I'd love to see that debate, and perhaps see how some Draenei wish to stay thanks to the bonds of fellowship they've formed with the Alliance.

The Worgen story, admittedly, most likely requires us to kick the ass of the Forsaken out of Gilneas, but given that the Forsaken are almost an independent thing, and the fact that they creep most members of the Horde out anyway, means that we could get away with a victory in Gilneas that doesn't demoralize Horde players.

Though even the Worgen have potential for story that doesn't involve the Horde. They don't seem to touch at all on how the Worgen are integrating into the Alliance. Let's see some real socio-political shake-ups, and not just a bunch of druidic nonsense (no offense, druids.) If all of this could end with the Worgen rebuilding the Park in Stormwind to make it look like Gilneas City, THAT would be a fist-pumping moment for the Alliance.

Likewise, inner conflict does not need to utterly negate unity. We don't necessarily need Alliance leaders plotting to kill one another. Instead, we might see vast disparities in opinion when it comes to strategy. Remember how Velen suggested evacuating the planet before Cataclysm? Likewise, while Tyrande seems to be warming up to Varian as a leader, Malfurion might regard him as nothing more than a passing minor player.

The real key to all of this, though, is that such a plot needs to be a serious, major plotline. Arranging the marriage of some dwarves or even clearing the Zandalari influence out of Dun Morogh is not nearly enough. This needs to be a serious, long-term narrative that develops over the course of multiple patches, or even multiple expansions.

Anyway, to make a long story short: If you're worried that one player faction is suffering from a lack of good lore, then give them something to accomplish that doesn't involve the other one. It worked for the Horde. It should work for the Alliance.

No comments:

Post a Comment