Riffing on my previous post, I thought it would be interesting to think about the various races who have not gotten an "Allied" equivalent.
So far, we've seen or have confirmed Allied Race variants of Blood Elves (Void Elves,) Tauren (Highmountain Tauren,) Draenei (Lightforged Draenei,) Night Elves (Nightborne,) Orcs (Mag'har Orcs,) Dwarves (Dark Iron Dwarves,) Trolls (Zandalari Trolls,) and Humans (Kul Tiran Humans.)
That leaves Gnomes, Undead, Worgen, Goblins, and Pandaren left to give "sub-races" to.
Personally, I find the cross-faction allied races the most interesting (even if, as a primarily Alliance player, I'll grumble about the fact that the Nightborne ditched us.)
As I wrote about in the previous post, the Forsaken have a bit of an identity crisis - or perhaps I should say that they ought to have one. In truth, the Forsaken have mostly been shown embracing their newer, post-human identity, viewing living humans (though more recently Worgen) as their biggest adversaries.
And yet, there are some scattered NPCs out there who don't feel that way.
The fact is that most of the Forsaken were, in life, members of the human kingdom of Lordaeron. They lived under the benevolent rule of King Terenas, and presumably had assumed that this style of leadership would continue under his son Arthas. While you could make the argument that Arthas had already become a villain by the time Frostmourne stole his soul, the prince that the people knew had not really shown such signs of wickedness - he was charming and being trained by Uther the Lightbringer himself. What could go wrong?
Lordaeron was the most populous and probably the strongest of the human kingdoms (though I'd say Stormwind has now surpassed it at its height.) This was, of course, what made the Scourge so devastating and what splintered the Alliance. But one has to think that some of the Forsaken pine for that earlier era.
Being Forsaken - or to be broader, being a free-willed Undead - means a couple things: the person is still a walking corpse, rotting with bones exposed. But their memories and personalities are restored to them. On the other hand, some things do change about them - positive emotions like joy and love are muted, as if the volume knob was turned down to 1. Negative emotions, on the other hand, are left alone, and while this doesn't necessarily turn them into rage monsters, it does mean that bitterness, anger, and sadness are all felt more strongly. The senses are also affected - sight and hearing seem fine, but smell and taste are, mercifully, also less sensitive.
So what does one do when there's really not much of a possibility of feeling good and happy? Generally, the answer has been to dedicate oneself to a purpose. Many Forsaken have taken the Dark Lady as that purpose - ensuring that her will is served. This puts pressure on Sylvanas to come up with a worthy goal for her people, and the current one is actually a pretty good one: finding a way to perpetuate themselves (there's a Darwinian argument that such a goal would always be the most effective one.)
But that's not the only goal that the Forsaken could work toward.
Many Forsaken fought bravely in the name of the Alliance during the Second War. And some might look to the revulsion and loathing that they receive from the living and understand and even sympathize with it. After all, if you're Forsaken, there's a good chance the reason you died in the first place was because people just like you killed you. Hell, your best friend might have turned into a zombie, killed you, and then you both got your free will back to become best friends again.
I would imagine there's a fair number of Forsaken who wish nothing more than to be able to walk the lands of the Alliance once more - some might actually be from Stormwind, having left as refugees after the First War and then staying in Lordaeron after the Second. Or they might have old friends in Ironforge that they can't visit anymore.
And indeed some of them might be horrified at what has happened to Lordaeron. The Scourge wrecked the country, yes, but Sylvanas has labored tirelessly to re-make it in her image. A statue of a High Elf stands in the center of Brill, a town that was built for and lived in by humans.
For those who remember the name Menethil, not for the betrayer that would become the Lich King, but for the generations of benevolent rulers who go back thousands of years, perhaps there is a sense that this is not the right way.
And while she is reluctant to use that last name, we now know that Calia Menethil, daughter of Terenas and sister to Arthas, rightful heir to the throne of Lordaeron, is alive and well.
So there are the seeds here of a group of Forsaken who, if given the chance, would happily join the Alliance, fighting to restore Lordaeron to its former glory, and see their living kinsmen rebuild what they had lost.
The big question is whether the Alliance is willing to take them. While there's a big hurdle in the instinctive disgust that humans have for the undead, the fact that the Alliance has Death Knights in its ranks kind of makes that point, if not moot, then at least less cut-and-dry.
The only other case of the Alliance taking in former members of the Horde is the Void Elves. But this was a special case - the Blood Elves were also former Alliance members, and there was even a sense, briefly, that they might switch sides again. On top of this, the Void Elves are exiles from the Horde, and would show very little fractured loyalty due to their outcast status.
And actually, these two qualifiers could apply to what I'm calling "New Lordaeron Undead." They're former Alliance (indeed, potentially founding members,) and they're also very likely to be outcasts - if they denounce Sylvanas, who is not only the leader of the Forsaken, but now commands the full force of the Horde, they're probably going to be chased out of Horde territory.
Now there's a bit of a hitch here:
The Alliance is going to attack Undercity at the start of Battle for Azeroth, and while they don't get to quite occupy it, the city is going to be vacated (I guess if the Horde doesn't get to claim the burned-out Teldrassil, the Alliance shouldn't get Undercity.) Thus the "New Lordaeron" forces are unlikely to be kicked out of Tirisfal by the Forsaken, as the Forsaken themselves will have been kicked out by the Alliance.
It's possible that the Alliance might encounter such a faction hanging around Tirisfal, but given the huge defeat the Horde has suffered, I'd bet most would assume that they're not outcasts looking to re-join the Alliance, but rather a really transparent ploy to infiltrate the Alliance.
There's also the practical question of appearance: Allied Races don't get to just be marginally different-looking versions of existing races (sorry High Elves,) and so you'd need something to really draw a distinction.
One possibility is that the New Lordaeron are those who have gone through a ritual similar to Nathanos. But the big problems there are A: those would probably be the most loyal to Sylvanas and B: that would probably count more as a human-variant Allied Race than an Undead one.
The solution for the first issue could be something a bit out of left field: What if they were restored by the Lich King? While Bolvar looks like he's starting down the villain route, I don't think we should fight the Lich King again. To me, a more appropriate premise for a new Scourge expansion would be if there's a rebellion within the Scourge against Bolvar - either killing him or driving him to exile. That "unbound" Scourge we were warned of would be a sufficient raising of the stakes, and we could finally see if it was true that we needed to crown a new Lich King. Bolvar, with his deep ties to Stormwind, would make a natural ally, though this would of course create a conflict with Calia, and might even throw the whole "New Lordaeron" premise out the window.
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