By the way, to contribute to that observation I made earlier, across all US servers and at level 120, Night Elves make up for 27% of the population, being in second place (after Humans, which are at 28.4%).

Their most played races are Druid (31.5%) and Demon Hunter (29.4%).

Across both factions, Night Elves represent, at level 120, 12.5% of the population, being the third most played race after Blood Elves (19.6%) and Humans (13.2%).

Source: realmpop.com

As a sidenote, Night Elf Demon Hunters represent 43.3% of the total Demon Hunter population, which is the fifth most played class at 8.5%.

With this data in mind, Kyalin, I ask: do you agree that in RP realms Night Elves are apparently more popular than in general (being in not just a few cases even the most played race at max-level)?

If so, how do you correlate the alleged decline in storytelling, lore and portrayal with:

• Decline of the World of Warcraft Trend (Google) coupled with the constant interest in Night Elves (Google), possibly meaning that it's actually an increasing trend in the net sum
• Night Elves being more popular in storytelling-focused realms in present day

Because to me, if I align my above affirmations with the numbers for Classic, it tells that the Night Elf players are actually way happier with their current state in BFA than their previous state in Vanilla WoW.

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Darkshore and Ashenvale definitely changed with the Cata revamp. From what I have gathered, you see the Cata revamp as a/the point that shifted the player reception of night elves in a manner that is substantial enough that it reflects in the WoW Classic population choices of race. Here I am not as convinced. I offered my personal anecdotal evidence that nostalgia for old pre-Cata zones could explain some of that. Here is where I would again point out that yes Darkshore and Ashenvale changed in Cata BUT I don't think that I have heard much clamoring about the Pre-Cata version of these zones. In contrst, I have heard a lot of people talking about Elwynn Forest, Westfall, and Redridge. A lot of Alliance nostalgia seemed rooted in having one of the most epic quest lines of the entire game, which started from Elwynn Forest and ended at Onyxia. A lot of the night elf nostalgia of WoW Classic usually involves the Cross-Continental Marathon. Why? From my own experiences, many Vanilla WoW night elves skipped Darkshore and Ashenvale in favor of Westfall and Redridge. You could only get so far in these zones before you were directed elsewhere.

IMHO, there is more than those options and more to these options.

People also have the choice to play other things which they may find more interesting than night elves not because the lore of the night elves. It seems a bit simplistic to point to a decreasingly negative portrayal of night elves. When Cata came around (Dec. 2010), me ditching my night elf druid was not because of any sense of the negative lore portrayal of night elves that people expressed fears about in Cata beta. I just wanted to play a Gilnean worgen druid. I didn't stop playing an orc shaman because of Garrosh's Horde. I stopped because I wanted to play a dwarf shaman more. If I could have played either of these in WoW Classic, I probably would have.

I played the Old Skool hybrids in the olden days of WoW Vanilla. Do I want to play a druid in WoW Classic though? Nope. (That was a pretty big reason why I played a nelf druid back in the day.) I was happy to move on from those Healing Touch spam days. Do I want to play a paladin in WoW Classic? Nope. Auto-attacking cleanse bot. Plus, I like having Blood Elf Paladins.

I don't think that it is exactly a coincidence that the spike and sudden decline of night elves starting in 2011-01 on your chart was around the time that race-class options expanded. Dwarves could now become mages, shamans, and warlocks. Human and gnome hunters! Blood elves finally got something as basic as WARRIOR! I don't think that one should underestimate how radical and long-awaited these changes were.

Should we then expect a replication or return of the Vanilla numbers in Classic? I don't think so because there are different, albeit overlapping, populations of people playing these games. Some who played WoW back in those days have quit the game entirely. Some are interesting in reliving particular experiences. Some have made new friends and want to play with them, which may involve a faction switch.

I don't think that any answer regarding 1 can be reduced to how the race has been subsequently portrayed in the narrative of the subsequent games.

On one poll I found the WoW Classic Subreddit, Barrens Chat was coincidentally listed as an option for "what are you looking forward to most." It was not the winner by any stretch. But it was apparently significant enough to be listed as a polling option to the question. And there are even a fair number of threads on WoW Classic about Barrens Chat. Yes, the Horde leveling experience sucked. But I would love to relive the snark and confusion of Barrens chat from people asking about Mankrik's wife. It was a community-defining experience on Horde-side. It is almost legendary to this day. To be clear here, I am NOT claiming that Barrens Chat explains everything. But "nostalgic elements" should not be underestimated when it comes to people who are choosing to play WoW Classic over Retail.

You are using quantitative analysis regarding the population changes, but I am finding your qualitative explanation lacking. That is one of my main issues. I think that it is a confluence of issues and factors and that wanting to identify #1 (in your above list) as the underlying culprit is an overly reductionistic explanation that looks for causation in correlation.

@ Krainz

Regarding the points where you referenced more snapshot-in-time data, I have to refer to the fundamental issues I raised in my previous post.

Regarding bullet 1, I did that already. See post 226. The Night Elf trend through Legion and BFA is declining, and when the effects of WoW are removed, it is flat.

Regarding bullet 2 - more popular than "what" is the question I'm trying to answer here. I don't like comparing retail numbers to previous expansions because it's difficult to parse the effects of racials, race and class changes from aspects like lore, and the fact alone that Night Elves are more popular on RP realms doesn't tell me enough about the effects of lore over time. Hence why I'm pointing to the classic-to-classic comparison - because it controls for gameplay factors.

@ Genesis

I recall something similar, but that takes a lot of the wind out of your sails when you're referencing changes in Human and Dwarven zones because Night Elves can still access them. Regardless of that fact of course, they decline in relative terms between 44 and 55% depending on the server type (again, with RP servers taking the largest hits) while each of the Alliance races see relative increases.

This is again why I chose not to opine on changes taking place in Cataclysm when I considered relative interest after controlling for the effects of WoW. The specific reason I mentioned the numbers that I did was to demonstrate that interest for Night Elves was not impaired by the release of Blood Elves.

In a sense I agree, but we disagree on why certain communities would have walked away. The answer that I'm giving that maps to why Night Elves specifically are in steep decline, and why that decline is at its steepest when we consider RP realms.

That's the survey data I've been referencing, and it looks like Barrens chat was added as a box-check item alongside Battlegrounds, Dungeons, Questing, Community Interactions, Roleplaying, etc. I took a pivot table of that data and grouped every response that included Barrens chat as a reason, finding that it was represented in 6.2% of the replies.

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This might be interesting to you. https://classic.wowhead.com/news=295...munity?webhook

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Thank you Krainz, and sorry for not being able to look at this sooner.

I went ahead and continued to the source and... because these people don't believe in presenting the race data by realm type, I pulled the raw numbers server by server.

The results are as follows:

This first visualization compares the actual data to the Reddit Survey:

Actual to Survey by Kyalin Raintree, on Flickr

A few highlights in regards to the accuracy:
Fewer people rolled Dwarves than Reddit said they would.
More people rolled Night Elves in PVE and RP servers than Reddit said they would, but the PVP data was mostly accurate.
Fewer people rolled orcs than Reddit said they would.
More people rolled trolls than Reddit said they would.

The Night Elf actual numbers in RP-PVE realms will become important shortly, but the normal PVE realms are also notable.

But there's still a large decrease as demonstrated in the comparison of the 2019 data to the 2005 and 2006 data:

2005
2019 vs 2005 by Kyalin Raintree, on Flickr

2006
2019 vs 2006 by Kyalin Raintree, on Flickr

The red bars still exist for the most part, but in the PVE and the RP-PVE surveys we climb down from the 40s and 50s in terms of percentage drops and get down to a 28-32% decline for PVE realms and 20%-24% decline for RP-PVE realms.

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Interestingly, though, Humans also saw a small dip despite their continuous portrayals of racial "excellence" within the Alliance over the years.

Orcs are on the rise, not only in PvP servers too, despite Garrosh, Green Jesus and Orc Fatigue.

Other races on the rise are Troll and Undead. Interestingly enough, Dwarves only saw a "significant" increase in RP realms.

EDIT: Something that caught my attention is that apparently Orcs and Undead had an increase which was higher (percentage-wise) than the Night Elves' loss, suggesting that Night Elf players might have migrated to those two races.

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Dwarves did see an increase in RP realms, but don't count out Gnomes and Humans either. In the 2005 data, Gnomes saw a 25% increase, and 9% in the 2006 data on RP realms. For humans, that was around 14%, which isn't 16% but is still significant as well.

Trolls, undead, and orcs are up generally yes - which I think is a reflection of increased popularity of the Horde, combined with the Night Elves falling image. As for whether Night Elves have migrated, it could be that. It could also be that they've just left and not come back, and that those who remain are being represented in the data - or a combination of the two.

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The Horde raising in popularity is quite confusing to me, considering the recent lore developments (Garrosh, Thrall).

Even trolls have been pretty much shafted ever since Siege of Orgrimmar (Vol'jin did absolutely nothing as Warchief, then died in Legion).

I don't think it's the lore perception of the Horde that weighs in its favor, but rather the community perception of the Horde (all raiding guilds are Horde, PvP is easier to win on Horde side, etc).

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You've got to look at the PVP numbers in particular. 69% of the characters surveyed come from PVP servers, and on those servers, 56% of the characters are Horde.

Before I move forward with that point, in 2005, leaving RP-PVP servers out, 46% of PVP server characters were horde. In 2006, that figure was unchanged - so we have a ten point swing.

That makes sense though. Consider the Jugulator:

https://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl...M:&vet=1&w=800

(Sorry for just dumping a link - but the image wrapper isn't working and I don't have time to figure it out)

I'm going to assume that you wouldn't have afternoon tea with the Jugulator. You probably wouldn't trust him with your kids. You wouldn't call the Jugulator moral. Would you listen to his songs? Well, probably not because Ripper Owens could never replace Rob Halford and because that entire album was weird (don't @ me). But if you were on a PVP server and you were asked to embody the Jugulator, a lot of people would take that deal in a second.

Sure, as a Horde player you're condemned to endure a groundhog day like story about the faction's identity where you're blamed for things that you had no control over. I know that's chased a few people away from the franchise and I don't blame them - but there's no mistaking that they appear to be fearsome and competent and the Alliance just isn't. It's at this point where I expect people to begin to dig into the lore and say "yes, but they lost here, here and here" to which I reply that it doesn't actually matter. What matters is the presentation and framing - and when Orgrimmar was besieged, you didn't get a cinematic where Varian spoke menacingly to a crying, almost-dead Orc character whose entire reason for existence was to die tragically by his hands and cry for the camera. You got this:


Just look at the title card image. Is it any wonder why this guy has a cult following? Now look again at the race that bore the brunt of most of this rebalancing. Could you ever mistake them for being competent based on what cinematics and framing they normally get?

Like ever?

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I initially thought that the community's perception of the Horde's portrayal (and most importantly, Orcs and Trolls) wasn't that great. Maybe it's an entirely subjective matter. Like, remember when I found out about Night Elf fans who thought it was great to have those coffins and NPCs in Stormwind, something you regarded as negative?

Some other factors don't carry such a load of subjectivity, though.

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You will probably be interested in this from the War Campaign. While there are a sizeable night elf army as part of the siege of Orgrimmar, they're lead by Shandris rather than Tyrande, with these comments about it:









Some datamined ones that haven't been screenshot-ed in game yet (the Alliance quotes seem to be bugged and weren't working for most of the day to begin with):

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I am now a writer for Blizzplanet!

Sorry for the delays in getting back - again.

@ Krainz

Aside from new models for sentinels, I've run into very few Night Elf fans who were terribly happy with the refugee situation in Stormwind, and it's no coincidence that "pumpkin farming" and worse is offered as a mean-spirited joke in various circles. As for the Horde's portrayal - there's no doubt it's negative, but they do appear competent, which is critical in a faction-based rivalry.

@ IGoD

Thank you for sharing those. I had seen several of them before, but not all of them.

Anduin's comments are clearly the most disturbing foreshadowing I've seen in a while, and I know that I am not alone in thinking that. The experiences of Leyara and Maiev (pre-redemption) loom rather heavily as I'm reading that, and given writer biases concerning Anduin, I'm afraid that 8.3 will conclude BfA with a message that peace should be won at any cost - even if it means tolerating the continuation of a regime built on militarism. It stuns me to think that such a thing could come from the mind of someone who studied World War II, and especially the Nuremberg trials, but here we probably are.

In the meantime, I've been quoting FDR and passing stuff like this around. Obviously I am not pleased, but what else is new?

FDR Disarm the Axis by Kyalin Raintree, on Flickr

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So, some folks on a Discord got mad at one of my FDR quotes. This post is for them.

I've thrown up the FDR quotes to juxtapose the belief that in order to deal with a fascist regime, you have to defeat it utterly, disarm it, and rid it of the toxic ideology that set it on the path to destructive war in the first place with the troubling foreshadowing of Anduin saying that Tyrande has been "consumed by vengeance".

From this, I've been confronted with the following claims:

- Historical parallels are always invalid.

I left out "Hitler ate sugar", because most of the quotes I grabbed from FDR were in '42 and '43 - well before we knew about the concentration camps. This point then usually takes its place. I find this lazy and invalid a) because all historical parallels, in any kind of fiction, or even in the real world will always, without exception, concern situations that are not completely the same, but share abstract characteristics - and this doesn't stop us from using them in a variety of contexts - and b) because I expect people to, when they encounter an inappropriately applied historical reference to at least articulate where they find the discrepancies that cause a threat to the abstract elements being compared.

- The Horde is not a fascist regime.

This is more of a pre-emptive point I'm raising, but I've addressed this already: https://forums.scrollsoflore.com/sho...&postcount=138

- The Horde is not Nazi Germany

Also pre-emptive on my part, and this is true, but again, the quotes I raised were done before anyone knew about the Holocaust, and while the world was aware of the commission of war crimes, such as the bombing of civilian locations, there was still a pretense on both sides that they were hitting industrial targets. That pretense doesn't exist with Teldrassil, neither side truly recognizes it, and so it's fair to say that we're dealing with a situation that would have been worse than the one that Roosevelt was able to recognize. He still said what he did.

- The Alliance isn't able to impose disarmament on the Horde.

Most of these points are based around Anduin's assertion that he only had enough forces for one final assault - which is a statement made with the knowledge that this would be against a heavily fortified enemy where you need to have many times the number as the defenders. Once the fortifications are removed from play, that no longer becomes a consideration. The other point that this claim ignores is that Anduin could not be counting the army of the black moon - because Tyrande was failing to reply to his missives. It may be of course that Tyrande had been wiped out in Darkshore - but Anduin doesn't seem to consider that as a possibility.

- It's unreasonable to push for disarmament when there's a larger threat to be considered.

It's true that in World War II, the Allies did not go as far as they said they would go for just this reason. The Bundeswehr, while operating under heavy restrictions, was established in Germany. Italy was largely allowed to self-govern (although they came over to the Allied side before the end of the War in Europe), and Japan was allowed to keep its Emperor - all because of the greater threat imposed by the Soviet Union. That all being said, the Bundeswehr was established in 1955, and before that, Germany was disarmed. Japan remains disarmed to this day (even through the Korean war and with the concern of Communist China that came with it). Italy mostly got away, but it's notable that the Italian Republic's first real government was supported by the Allies and by the Italian Resistance.

- How does FDR's point demonstrate that Anduin's foreshadowing about Tyrande is bad writing/why is this bad writing?

This is the core of the question, and there are three answers to it.

a. Suspension of disbelief, even in a fantasy, trades on an understandable core understanding of the systems and psychology at play. Unless the writers have gone out of their way to outline an alien psychology, or to lay out the contours of a magical system, we can assume that gravity applies, that physics apply, that typical human behaviors apply, that markets apply, etc. When you want to deviate from that understanding, you need to give that proper attention. Did they do that with Anduin? Maybe on the point of sheer pacifism, but it doesn't explain Jaina, Genn, or other Alliance leaders, or why Anduin would be so cavalier with saying that Tyrande is consumed with vengeance. Although admittedly, the latter point is a more believable thing to hear from him.

b. In terms of what was presented to the audience, Teldrassil was intended to be and was indeed shocking - even to many of the Horde playerbase that previously was celebrating the War of the Thorns (no, I didn't forget about you). For that to happen without real consequences to the Horde is denying resolution, and for the segment of the playerbase that was forced to suffer the most from this event: a denial of any kind of catharsis. These aren't good things to do to your audience.

c. They're even worse things to do to your video game audience. Horde players have rightly railed against being turned into the villains - it robs them of that sense of autonomy and relatedness. Alliance players have rightly railed against being turned into victims - it robs them of that sense of autonomy and competence. Foreshadowing that Tyrande is going to become the next patch villain is singling out Night Elves as being both victims AND villains - which is a great way to get even more of this substantially diminished, but still significant portion of WoW's audience to walk away from the franchise. If you're writing a story to sell a video game, your writing must garner sales - not drive people away - and if it's doing the opposite, then yes it is failing, and yes, it is bad writing.

---

I say all of this knowing that there probably will be an 8.3, and we don't yet know what the future holds - not with Tyrande, Sylvanas, N'zoth or anyone, but there is a definite cynicism I have noticed from other Night Elf posters, and I share it, about what this line means for their future. I have the signature picture that I do for this reason - Blizzard has not earned the ability for Night Elf fans in particular to trust them with this kind of content. It's reasonable to assume the worst - naïve to assume that Blizzard will act in a way that a large segment of customers and people who want to again be customers would expect to be treated - and before you disagree and delve into your litany of counterexamples - I would ask you why you believe there is as much smoke as there is on this.

Personally - I think it's because there's a fire - and because for nine years, those responsible for it have been trying to put it out with gasoline.

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What would be your stance on the possibility of a second 8.1 Darkshore kind of patch for Night Elves?

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I'll assume that when you're referring to Darkshore, we can omit the host of issues that caused it to fall below the standard of what I would consider good presentation - things like the encounter with Nathanos, the inconclusive nature of who actually won, and things like Night Elf Dark Rangers. Let's set the scenario as something that provides an onscreen demonstration of the Night Elves securing Ashenvale - an intentionally constructed an duly delivered "fist pump" moment for the Night Elves - something to provide closure and catharsis for the last nine years, and especially the last two.

Well, certainly anything's possible, and if it was realized, that's the sort of thing that would make me satisfied and would make me seriously consider returning. Again, I don't feel that I'm speaking just for myself on this either.

As for the actual likelihood of it happening - I'm very pessimistic. Blizzard has made it abundantly clear that they have no interest in keeping or regaining people who like or liked Night Elves as customers. I think it's more likely that Tyrande is going to be put down along with the Army of the Black Moon in a style similar to Leyara and the Druids of the Flame. Anduin's foreshadowing seems to be going that way - and it would line up with requests on the forums for Tyrande to go evil so that the Alliance could have its requisite level of grey - requests that I most often saw being advanced by red-backgrounded mains or human paladin types (i.e. people who don't have an investment in what they want to destroy - but don't mind destroying what other people are invested in).

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MyMindWontQuiet on the discord explained how writing for WoW and what the different types of "writers" at Blizzard work on better than I could put it, and it incidentally sheds potential light on stuff like Anduin's comment about Tyrande vs "that such a thing could come from the mind of someone who studied World War II, and especially the Nuremberg trials":

This mirrors a conversation Christie Golden had on twitter last week where she cautioned people that she doesn't work on WoW's in-game story content nor have any authority or control over it, only its cinematics and out of game stuff and even that is split between her doing the same for all of Blizzard's other franchises.

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I am now a writer for Blizzplanet!

Fair enough - this comment spurred me to look a bit further into her exact position in the company, and yes, "Senior Writer" doesn't imply the authority that I previously assumed was there.

Good catch - to you and MyMindWontQuiet - thank you both for that.

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Interesting update from the 8.3 PTR:

Calia Menethil has joined the Horde and is the new leader of the Forsaken, she's working with Delaryn Summermoon and the other undead night elves, Lillian Voss, and Derek Proudmoore to change Forsaken society for the better.



Tyrande stuff:

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I am now a writer for Blizzplanet!

Sigh. I had hopes until 8.1 started hitting the PTR; at which point I argued against the many failures of it, and then unsubbed.

IMO 8.1 Battle of Darkshore was the point at which Blizz had to get the NE story right. The point at which they had to prove that they understood how they had screwed NE fans, and then fix it by finally giving us an outstanding NE story. NE fans should have been written so that 8.1 left them thoroughly thrilled and satisfied.

Instead, we got pretty much the exact opposite.

...

At this point following the WoW story has reached an MST3K level of appeal. It's just a level of curiosity to see exactly what type of garbage they're going to serve up.

Blizzard treats the NEs like the front bumper of a car. There to take the brunt of the beatdown, so that damage to the rest of Alliance isn't quite so bad.

...

Sorry that was all a bit OT. Facts would be more useful on this thread, and 8.3 info dump from Blizzard provides a lot, but they're all confirmatory of basic/expected conclusion. Doesn't really change the overall impact of the conclusion, just the details.
* Horde not held accountable, no payback, no insurance that they won't do this again.
* More than that, the clear indication that it's bad for any Alliance/NE to still be want to achieve that. (The few token complaints about the Horde are only raised to be dropped, or shown to be wrong in the face of the need for "Hope".)
* NE shown as even lacking the will to fight ("tired of war").
* NE undead forsaken *maybe* were mind controlled after all. (This after, Blizz, in response to 'free will' complaints made changes on the PTR to make it clear that they were willingly raised.) Looks like they'll be joining the Forsaken.
* Tyrande is being destroyed as character. She's the archetype of being chastised for heroically defending her people. It's like casting the Statue of Liberty as evil. ... Hmm.

Given the quotes IGOD posted - I've certainly seen a lot of pessimism over 8.3 coming from our community. Wreave, I sympathize with your points, and you're not alone in feeling this way.

However, I am going to present another view.

Tyrande was the character that in episodes like "A Little Patience" was explicitly wheeled out to be wrong - but Blizzard has a typical fashion to this. Usually you can tell by having a character trot out a knowingly defective argument, or otherwise signpost that they've simply gone crazy. I'm not seeing that so much here. Tyrande presents sound arguments that reasonable people can get behind, she doesn't sign the peace treaty, and Genn backs her up.


Ok, but she can't hope to carry on a war with the Horde, right? Well, she just might be able to. I mentioned why the civilian situation is probably much better than portrayed, and that the bulk of the Night Elf army was spared from the War of the Thorns. The mission tables establish that fighting was taking place in Ashenvale, as well as places like Azshara and the Barrens (although in the latter case, that could be referring to humans).

This isn't to say that I don't sympathize with or understand the pessimism. I share it - I just wanted to throw up another way of looking at it.

…

I have no nice things to say about undead Night Elves though. Blizzard needs to drop them - no one asked for them, no one wants them - except for someone in Blizzard's writing department and the handful of contrarians whose names I can predict who will soon be here to represent themselves as wanting them.

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The current developments with Calia, Delaryn and Tyrande have made me feel very disappointed regarding WoW in general.

The sole reason I'll play 8.3 is because raiding is one of the best things I have to do.

I have a feeling the story of 9.0 will jump-start without even touching those matters and thus leaving them to 10.0 or even beyond.

Unless, of course, we do end up having a Sylvanas expansion, as teased by the Blizzcon in-game rewards and the main theme of it becomes everyone hunting down Sylvanas with Tyrande taking the main stage again. However, as everybody knows Sylvanas has in-game and OOC loyalists, so how could you make that work?

And if so, this starts feeling like they're purposefully making fans anxious and upset just to hype a new expansion (again).

EDIT:

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Yes, and in regard to your last paragraph - this is one of the reasons why I say that people shouldn't pre-order and should resist hype, not just for this company but for any company. With this one specifically, it takes very little for me to conclude that it's best to walk away, and that edit provides me with an example. That they hinted at retcons at Night Elf Dark Rangers was more than enough to get me to stop paying attention to Reforged spoilers. I'm not giving it a chance - not unless and until this company does something meaningful to regain lost trust.

As for what I wanted to post about, there's been an argument going on about the Horde losing characters, and how it's only fair therefore that they should be able to get Tyrande's scalp. Given that, here's your hot take:

Dead characters are easier to replace than a playable race's uniqueness, ability to be respected, and ability to be proudly represented. They are easier still to replace than all of that plus a dead character whose death serves only to amplify the earlier problems and to develop other characters.

Further, if your argument is that the Horde needs more characters: propose characters to be added, stop clamoring to destroy what little of what Blizzard, in an attempt to fill your interests, already has mostly destroyed. There are people who are and were actually invested in that, and their interests should not be consistently wiped out just for you.

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Night Warrior Tyrande is the kind of thing that could make several spheres of the Warcraft universe more interesting, not just the Night Elves.

Just like Illidan, in a way.

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I think that could be true in the sense that a blank canvas could one day host a beautiful piece of art. That same canvas of course could also host something awful. We don't really know with any of this except that when you're interpreting and predicting Warcraft's story, death of the author isn't an available option to you. These writers can, have, and will throw any semblance of consistency, grounding, and prior lore out the window for whatever they want to pursue that day, which leaves you only with their biases as a predictive tool.

…. and given that? You don't need to hear much from me to work out what my predictions are. As always, I hope that I'm wrong and I think there might be reasons for that. But again, I haven't really been given reasons to expect whatever ends up on that canvas to be anything but awful.

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I have recently encountered an argument that holds the following:

Not a single person wanted Teldrassil. It is therefore ridiculous to claim that even a subset of Horde players for wanted, received, or basked in the War of the Thorns.

Call this low hanging fruit, call this reactionary - but my reply to this challenge is to come up with fifty unique people who demonstrate behavior contrary to that assertion.

Here we go:

1. Sistask https://us.battle.net/forums/en/wow/...6907099#post-9
2. Thorek https://us.battle.net/forums/en/wow/topic/20766826981
3. Zarinadora https://us.battle.net/forums/en/wow/topic/20767687179
4. Selfie person https://images.app.goo.gl/yaxdJjPLcmH1qmvT8
5. Frodo meme https://images.app.goo.gl/7mjgpqte3fhdtV6M6
6. Faraxios https://us.battle.net/forums/en/wow/...7726702?page=1
7. Bodyparts https://us.battle.net/forums/en/wow/...726702#post-15
8. Finalchaotic https://us.battle.net/forums/en/wow/...page=2#post-37
9. Tovi https://us.battle.net/forums/en/wow/...page=3#post-55
10. Lewdpaw (above url)
11. Ksamil https://us.battle.net/forums/en/wow/...page=4#post-74
12. Spencer Tordoff https://www.siliconsasquatch.com/blo...rned-heres-why
13. Thrloka https://us.forums.blizzard.com/en/wo...zard/315485/11
14. Malgorok https://us.forums.blizzard.com/en/wo...zard/315485/22
15. Gelato https://us.forums.blizzard.com/en/wo...elves/119541/5
16. Artanu https://us.forums.blizzard.com/en/wo...-you/175486/35
17. Atheinia https://us.battle.net/forums/en/wow/...6777107#post-1
18. Inviscerate https://us.battle.net/forums/en/wow/...page=1#post-20
19. Xirmak https://us.battle.net/forums/en/wow/...777107#post-17
20. Vynlordros https://us.battle.net/forums/en/wow/...5616392#post-4
21. Jinx https://us.battle.net/forums/en/wow/...616392#post-18
22. Ythisens https://us.battle.net/forums/en/wow/...page=1#post-20
23. Bodywrecker https://us.battle.net/forums/en/wow/...page=2#post-21
24. Shadina https://us.battle.net/forums/en/wow/...page=2#post-37
25. Orhato https://us.battle.net/forums/en/wow/...page=4#post-61
26. "Heritage armor" https://images.app.goo.gl/cSVpZrb7kLWgXsGw7
27. Vaylo https://us.battle.net/forums/en/wow/...577847#post-12
28. Chaysara https://us.battle.net/forums/en/wow/...1857429#post-3
29. Finnoldoran https://us.battle.net/forums/en/wow/...1857429#post-4
30. Xoroth https://us.battle.net/forums/en/wow/...page=2#post-31
31. Semedree https://us.battle.net/forums/en/wow/...2166915?page=1
32. Anelaan https://us.battle.net/forums/en/wow/...page=2#post-27
33. Braennuo https://us.battle.net/forums/en/wow/...1937875#post-9
34. "Get in loser" https://images.app.goo.gl/f3Q936uNMGC8K8PT8
35. Nezmith https://us.forums.blizzard.com/en/wo...rkshore/326644
36. Treng https://us.battle.net/forums/en/wow/...5966566#post-1
37. Bloodspitter https://us.battle.net/forums/en/wow/...page=2#post-24
38. Bravado https://us.battle.net/forums/en/wow/...9757438#post-1
39. Tyierin https://us.battle.net/forums/en/wow/...9757438#post-3
40. Dusk https://us.battle.net/forums/en/wow/...757438#post-17
41. Alphawolff https://us.forums.blizzard.com/en/wo...ldrassil/56638
42. "All out of Teldrassil" https://images.app.goo.gl/HGUvU8wY7H2yecL38
43. Felsavior https://us.forums.blizzard.com/en/wo...o-burn/54498/2
44. Favi https://us.battle.net/forums/en/wow/...626776#post-13
45. Kalgromash https://us.battle.net/forums/en/wow/...9707439?page=1
46. Arjuna https://us.battle.net/forums/en/wow/topic/20761816393
47. Saurfang (not that one) https://us.battle.net/forums/en/wow/...6857048?page=1
48. Aymer https://us.battle.net/forums/en/wow/...6857048#post-6
49. Drudkh https://us.battle.net/forums/en/wow/...page=4#post-67
50. Thalyssra dab meme https://images.app.goo.gl/g9BtQJ7QkXBJHWQ49

This was all just based on google searches.

There are a couple of things I want to point out before I go further - first, the above is consistent of those who appeared to seriously defend or cheer on the Burning of Teldrassil itself, knowing that Sylvanas had done it - and this is an extreme position. I didn't attempt to seek out or parse out the less extreme positions - such as liking the idea of the Horde conquering the Night Elves before it was revealed that Sylvanas was responsible for Teldrassil.

That reaction I feel is well represented here, and I certainly remember seeing a lot of it before Warbringers: Sylvanas came out:

The other thing I do feel the need to point out, and you can see this by looking at the threads, is that these people ARE a minority among the Horde playerbase. Most of the reactions going back to 2017 and 2018 are dread and disappointment - not celebration. People have accused me of ignoring this fact in the past, and perhaps because I then and now have rejected that characterization, I do want to point both that out, and how clearly the posts around the examples I raised make that clear.

That being said however, it's inaccurate to say that this faction of players simply does not exist - and this is before we get into the "I want war in Warcraft" crowd - or the "Teldrassil would have been fixed if it just came after the Undercity" crowd - or the "if it's red, it's dead" crowd among the Horde. They're different ways of expressing the same desire among certain Horde fans - the demand for a power fantasy, and the joy over having that demand fulfilled.

Edit: #19 replaced as the result of feedback.

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