This expansion focuses heavily on red-versus-blue, and doesn't really feature a PvE "big bad evil guy" as such. There's the Sha, but it's almost really a manifestation of war itself as enemy.
Let me sum up the results of 8 years of conflict so far: the Alliance has lost Southshore and Silverwind Refuge, Theramore has been destroyed with a nuclear weapon, as has the forested part of Stonetalon Mountains. The Night Elves' unblemished record of failure as protectors of nature nears completion as the Horde's loggers drive further up Ashenvale; if anything happens to Feralas they will be well and truly out of intact forests to protect and presumably forced to retire as a playable race.
In return, the Alliance got: Camp Taurajo. They kicked over 3 tents and a coleman stove.
Now, this is a Horde toon, and it was my main. I played Ally for most of vanilla and BC, and decided to see how the other side lived for Wrath and Cata though I had little opportunity to play in the last year. But I have always been blue at heart, and this is killing me.
I know the game's authors' Horde spirit is not new; they have a statue of an Orc of a Worg outside their HQ. Last night at release event in Irvine they were shouting "for the horde" and mocking Ally players for the destruction of Theramore. This strikes me as the equivalent of the commissioner of baseball saying he's a huge Yankees fan and hopes they always win. Isn't he supposed to remain an impartial facilitator and ensure everyone has a fair shot, at least while he's on the clock? These Blizz guys aren't even pretending to be fair. I pay my $15 a month, same as the Horde faithful. Either stop treating my faction like it's a foil for the Horde, or stop charging me the same as you charge them. We're not just player-controlled mobs, here. This game's supposed to be fun for everyone.
Some have suggested that this trend is a consequence for Ally players' lackluster attitude towards world PvP over the years. That is a valid concern, and I think the addition of Draenei and Worgen as opposed to Blood Elves and Goblins has been an attempt to rectify that. But if they were going to take that trend as a license to storyline-kill half the faction and render our most popular race's entire raison d'etree a humiliating failure by wrecking one forest after another, I think they ought to have warned us. The alliance's lack of enthusiasm for world PvP has a lot to do with the fact that we don't think it matters! If you'd told us it DID, it would have changed everything! The Horde has, and has always had, superior esprit-du-corps. If this is your way of trying to change that, and if anything we do can possibly change it, say so!
I am retiring this belf toon. It's back to a blue tabard and corpse-camping those knuckle-dragging, child-murdering, devil-worshiping filthy mutants until the people who play them, who find playing evil a more escapist experience than playing good precisely because of how sheltered they are, depart in frustration.
I don't know where the writers get off thinking it is acceptable to take sides in their own video game; this strikes me as conceited as well as unfair. If we need to PvP moar before we can earn any concessions for our faction from the authorities, TELL US. Don't let us wonder why this is being done! Just tell us what we have to do.
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