Mists of Pandaria saw the Horde fractured - part of it remained loyal to Garrosh Hellscream, even as he descended further and further into an obsession with finding superweapons capable of destroying his enemies - both the Alliance and those disloyal to him within the Horde - and those who wished to see Thrall's vision of the Horde restored.
Horde players journeyed through Pandaria, first towing Garrosh's line but then siding with Vol'jin as the Darkspear Revolution began to combat Garrosh's frankly fascistic tendencies. It was a pretty exciting development for the game, as we had never before turned on our own faction leaders.
From an Alliance perspective, however, it was easy to feel as if you were on the sidelines.
Especially given how the Siege of Orgrimmar ended, there was a sense that the Alliance had merely assisted one faction within the Horde against another, and given what has happened relatively soon afterwards, it doesn't seem as if this effort really amounted to much. We once again have a Horde that is aggressively trying to destroy the Alliance. And this iteration of the Horde has been more successful. The destruction of Theramore was a big enough event to transform the Alliance's most passionate advocate of cross-factional peace into one of its most die-hard anti-Horde members.
On top of that, the Alliance came off as rather weak when you considered that they were essentially equal partners with a mere fraction of the Horde in fighting Garrosh's forces. If, for example, the Darkspear Revolution was forced to desperately ask for aid from the Alliance or risk being wiped out, that would have been one thing. But Vol'jin hardly even seemed all that thrilled to have the help.
We are seeing echoes of Mists in BFA, with another off-the-rails Warchief and another honorable hero of the Horde set up to become a focus for resistance against this tyranny.
While I do suspect that we're going to get a twist here that gives us a different story than a simple Garrosh 2.0, the same problem persists:
The Horde just has a more interesting story.
But that's where I think that the Darkshore warfront starts to make things a bit more interesting.
When Sylvanas and Saurfang planned the attack on Night Elf lands, (and it was really mostly Saurfang's plan, up until the burning of Teldrassil) the idea was to divide the Alliance politically. The thought was that if the Alliance would not send troops to liberate Teldrassil, the Night Elves might split from them, while if they did, the Gilneans might be angry that their lands were not liberated first.
Burning Teldrassil seemed to hamstring this plan - if the Night Elves had nothing to save there, they'd simply concentrate their efforts on other fronts. The attack meant to divide the Alliance would wind up unifying it instead.
And to a large extent that's the narrative we got in the aftermath of these events - Undercity fell thanks to this effect.
But that story seems to be shifting back toward the way it was originally planned - in 8.1, Malfurion and Tyrande launch a campaign to destroy the Horde forces in Darkshore. While Teldrassil itself is irrevocably lost, the truth is that the tree was a relatively new part of Night Elf society. Many civilians lived there because, until now, it had served as a safe harbor from the aggressive Horde. But the lands of Darkshore, Ashenvale, Winterspring, Felwood, and Hyjal are all very ancient Night Elf territory that they know quite well.
That the Night Elves have the right to fight to win back this territory is, I think, indisputable. Yes, there might be some questions about resource allocation, but I don't think Anduin or anyone else in Alliance leadership would mind gaining that territory back.
So how do you make this an interesting story?
I think you get some of the answer in the Terror of Darkshore.
Druids in WoW really trend quite strongly toward the obvious good-guy archetypes. They tend to be seen as more of the hippie-like, harmonious sort. Malfurion, of all people, has exemplified this sort of Druid. But in the cinematic we get previewing 8.1, we get to see a much scarier version of Malfurion and his Druidism. Horde forces are yanked off the road to what must be a swift and bloody end. One orc is slowly crushed to death by roots that drag him, screaming, into the earth.
Malfurion, benevolent though he usually is, is capable of gruesome violence. While the fact that it's just a bunch of Horde grunts may undercut his power, canonically Malfurion is one of the most powerful beings on Azeroth, and his anger should worry the Horde.
We also see Tyrande undergo a transformation in 8.1, embodying an aspect of Elune known as the Night Warrior.
While this transformation has an easily recognizable visual signifier - the usually glowing Night Elf eyes become black as night - we don't have a great sense of what, exactly, it entails. The Night Warrior aspect of Elune is clearly a fiercer one (it's in the name,) but I'd like to know exactly what kind of sacrifice this requires, and how it might transform those who undergo the change.
I think the problem Blizzard faces in telling this story is explaining what exactly has changed. The Night Elves have always fought to defend their lands. Merely showing that they are using violence to do so does not make the story any more complex - they've always used violence.
The point is that I think they need the Night Elves to be transgressive in some way. After what the Horde did to them, there's not much the Night Elves could do that wouldn't feel morally justified or at least understandable.
I've often remarked that if they want us to buy the Horde's constant antagonization of the Alliance, we need to actually see the Alliance commit crimes and atrocities that are not immediately offset by worse actions in the Horde.
But I also think we need to see the Night Elves committing acts that seriously alienate some of the Alliance from them. The Alliance has been in desperate need of an internal conflict so that their factional stories don't merely see them reacting to the Horde with a vague sense of moral superiority.
No comments:
Post a Comment