Danielfboone wrote:Come on people, the Horde IS basically evil. The Orcs, who are the leaders, are a race of conquerers, destroyers and invaders. The Trolls are just plain vicious and probably cannibalistic. The Blood Elves are selfish to the extreme. Only the Tauren and the Undead can inspire any empathy. Neither one wants to be in the position they are but have had it forced on them in order to survive. Lady Sylvanas certainly never envisioned winding up allied with Orcs and Trolls but there she is. Orcs may be "Honorable" within their own race, but very rarely outside of it. In all the fantasy worlds where Orcs, Trolls, and Living Dead have been present, they have always been the bad guys. As awesome as a character like Thrall is, in the end analysis, you would still have to class him as one of the "black hats" in the Warcraft universe.
The Horde are not evil. Simple as that. The Alliance and Horde are simply different collectives of peoples and cultures. I tend to compare the two to the conflict between the Roman Empire and the "barbarian" civilizations, with the Alliance as the Romans and the Horde as the barbarians. Both have their good and bad within their ranks, neither is particularly good nor particularly evil as a whole. Plus, you are painting the Warcraft universe with the generic fantasy brush, assuming all the traditional tropes must apply, and this is quite wrong.
Interestingly, when I started playing WoW I did start as Alliance and I found the Alliance to be corrupt, dishonest, underhanded, backstabbing and monumentally hypocritical. They really are a two-faced collective, portraying themselves as all that is good and pure while speaking and acting in the opposite manner. When I switched to Horde it was a relief, for the Horde is a faction of honour and the courage of their convictions, and honest about who they are.
To address your points however:
The Orcs as invaders and destroyers - The Orcs had been delivered into demonic servitude and were used as an invasion force much out of line with their true natures, which are that of a tribal shamanistic warrior society. Any one who pays attention knows the Orcs are honourable, steeped in tradition and true to themselves, but they are now burdened by guilt over the Mannoroth incident. You say they are not honourable outside their own race, and I say you are very, very wrong. Thrall himself continually takes the high road in diplomatic matters and rarely will you see an Orc act in a dishonourable way.
Trolls as vicious and cannibalistic - "If cannibalism be wrong, I don't wanna be right!". Yes, the Trolls were cannibals, but as part of the deal for their inclusion in Thrall's Horde, they promised to give up this tradition. Certainly some Trolls still practice it but in what way is it evil? No harm is done to anyone else, and it is their own ritual connection to their ancestors. As for vicious, this is debatable. Remember, the Trolls once ruled two massive empires that spread over Azeroth, no culture of vicious savages could have managed that. These two empires warred frequently and for generations, and eventually warred with the Silithids and Nerubians as a common foe. Warfare is in their blood, but it's also quite clear by observing their settlements that they are also a very laid back people.
If any element of the Horde can be considered evil it would be for Forsaken. However, the story of the Forsaken is that of a people destroyed, enslaved, freed and violently turned on by their own people. I've written on this elsewhere on these boards. Essentially, the Forsaken are a people with nothing to lose and as they continually lose sight of their old humanity, they succumb to the dark side of every Human's id, because really, why not? The Forsaken are the other side of the Human coin, they are what the Humans are capable of becoming or are in their own secret way.
The Blood Elves aren't evil but a people fallen from grace so to speak. Like the Forsaken they are exiles. The Night Elves did some pretty terrible things back in the day but they were not turned away, but the Blood Elves received no such compassion.
And the Tauren are anything but evil, and they in fact consider the Dwarves evil for their wanton destruction of the earth. And interestingly the Alliance call the Orcs evil for the forestry projects in Ashenvale. I do suspect the Tauren would prefer ultimately to be left alone and not caught up in the faction politics, but they do share a common bond with the shamanistic ways and honour of the orcs.
Bottom line is that the only way the Horde are evil is via the propaganda of the Alliance which seeks to, like real governments of the world, paint the enemy as evil, corrupt, devilish and beast-like when the facts and truths are considerably the opposite.
Danielfboone wrote:
The facts when boiled down into the simplest terms are that the Alliance are the good guys, the Horde , the bad. That's just the way the Warcraft universe was set up.
No, this is just not correct. The Warcraft universe was not set up that way at all, it never has been and as it progresses it's even LESS that way. The Warcraft universe tells the stories of many people, cultures, triumphs and tragedies and how individuals can change the course of history, of a people, of an empire. It is a very human story (and I mean human as us, not in game terms), and the human story is not black and white with good and evil.
The Warcraft universe take the typical fantasy material and infuses it with real-world shades of gray, real personalities, motives, agendas, desires, prejudices and conflict. There is good and evil and it exists within BOTH factions. To not see this is to be turning a blind eye to a particularly great facet of storytelling.
There's nothing wrong with playing either one, they're both fun, but the uneasy cooperation between the factions will flare up again into open hostility after the Scourge threat is eliminated. Especially when Garrosh takes over. Just like in real life, the only thing that ever really brings people together is to have a common enemy. You can't sugar coat the lore of the races to suit yourself, you have to accept them for what they are. What happened with the Blood elves they brought on themselves.
The only real hope for peace seems to lie with Thrall, who as I said is a very compelling character. We'll just have to see how things pan out in the future but I don't see the enmity betwen the factions ever going away.
You're right, you can't sugar coat the lore of the races, but you seem to be doing that for the Alliance. Yes, the Blood Elves did bring upon their downfall but every race has it's faults, disasters, shames and troubles. That's what makes WoW more involved than the stereotypical fantasy mush you are insistent on applying to the Warcraft story.
I do agree though that the next stage of WoW will return to more open Horde-Alliance conflict, and here again we see how the actions of an individual can change the fates of nations. Thrall needs to trust Garrosh, if he does not it means he does not trust his own ancestors. If he cannot trust a Hellscream, what does that mean? He no doubt sees Garrosh's faults, but Thrall is extremely altruistic and no doubt hopes that great responsibility will bring new perspective to Garrosh.
However, Varian knows how to push Garrosh's buttons and does so with great relish. There will be war and the uneasy truce that has bound the Alliance and Horde since The Burning Crusade will erode substantially even in the face of the threat of Deathwing.
TL;DR - Alliance are not Good. Horde are not Evil.
