Ok, this entry isn't about gold making, today it's lore time. I absolutely love good stories and Warcraft universe is filled with them. To be honest, there are also a lot of bad storytelling, but hey, Azeroth is big enough to have many kind of things.
Ineterst in Warcraft lore isn't just a thing for roleplayers. If you raid, you are always in the middle of the important lore events. I'm sincerely shocked that so many people don't care about the storylines and don't even want to understand what is happening in the game around them. And then there are of course the quest texts, personally I just love the immersion that happens when I involve myself to the events of Azeroth. These days quite a few people just sit in Stormwind or Orgrimmar and spam dungeon finder or battlegrounds to level. Oh they miss so much of the game world. There have been and are some absolutely brilliant quest chains that have brilliant stories written in them. Many have played the worgen and goblin starting zones, they offer a good feel to the whole race, what they really are about. Then if you haven't already, spend some time and level a forsaken character through Tirsfal glades and Silverpine Forest, that is some nice storytelling! For me there are some truly memorable quest experiences: Wrathgate in WotLK, the missing diplomat -quest chain in the old days, Hyjal quest chain, Horde Dragonmaw quest chain in Twilight Highlands and the Shady Rest inn quests in Dustwallow.
But enough of memorizing, what I want to talk about today is the status of Alliance in current state of events. Cataclysm has been very much about Thrall and quite a lot about Horde or neutral factions. Malfurion has been more a neutral npc than an Alliance leader. One of my favourite WoW fansites,
WoW insider, had recently
couple of
podcasts where they discussed the Alliance status. What's the problem then? The truth is, Alliance seems to be pretty boring at the moment. Many people dislike the fact that Alliance seems to be losing all the time to the Garrosh's Horde, but I don't really care about that. The problem is, Alliance doesn't seem to do much about it. I now present a few ideas that I think would improve the overall story developement from where we are at the moment:
1. Tension. We need it. And I don't mean just war between Alliance and Horde that has been in a focus in Cata and will be likely even more in MoP. I mean tension within factions. The Horde has it, it remains to be seen what happens between Forsaken and the rest of the Horde. But Alliance is just lamely united and their only leader seems to be Varian Wrynn, who in my opinion is quite a shallow character. We need different point of views. There are many possibilities, like hot headed Varian vs. other Alliance leaders or maybe even tension building within night elves which takes us to the second point.
2. Malfurion and Tyrande. Oh boy, there's a huge wave of complaints that Tyrande is too passive and acts now just to be arm-candy for Malfurion. She just doesn't seem to do anything. We need something more alike to Warcraft III where she had strong opinions and would say them openly also when that'd mean disagreeing with Malfurion. Malfurion is too much out of this world to be interesting all by himself. We need something to happen to him, some sort of character developoment.
3. Jaina Proudmoore. We haven't heard anything of Jaina since the end of WotLK. And we know Theramore will be destroyed by the Horde. This offers a good chance to develope Jaina. Will she feel betrayed? What will she do? Some proper drama would be in order.
4. Draenei. We need something from draenei. They also have been too passive. What are their plans within the Alliance?
5. Difficult moral dilemmas. This is really the point that makes the story interesting. Alliance vs. Horde isn't a battle between good and evil. Both factions do good things and both fanctions do terrible things. And war is never nice. I'd like to see that in story developement as well. I want stories to make us think about our choices, and we need situations where there are only bad alternatives. That forces characters to think about their actions. Warcraft universe have many stories about corruption and redemtion. Let's have more of that.
6. Less comedy. Ok. Occasional comedy is good, but not when whole zones are built over pop-culture referrences. I'd like to see slitghtly more serious themes.
What do you think? What in your opinion would improve the Alliance from the story point of view?
They had their own expansion, you could say. Burning Crusade storyline is awesome, the whole story of addiction, solutions, dissapointments, betrayals and the ultimate redemtion, that was really nice. The problem is similar to what the Alliance is experiencing with Draenei: nothing is happening. What's the problem? Blood elves have much potential. Personally I would like to see something happening within their hierarchical structures. Prince Kael'thas is no more and Lor'themar is only a regent lord. Blood elves need to sort out their leadership. In other words: They need a king. 
Baine doesn't like Garrosh. That's understandable. Garrosh killed his father, Cairne, in ritual duel. The death was really an accident that was caused by secretly poisoned blade. The one responsible is actually Magatha Grimtotem, leader of the Tauren Grimtotem tribe. In the Thousand Needles questline Horde players need to do the nasty thing and help Magatha since there no better alternative at that stage. The story culminates in Magatha getting artifact of enormous power. Things are unsettled, Grimtotem are a real threat. The stage is set, but then......nothing happens. That's the problem. That story needs to continue. We are left in the air. We have the Grimtotem threat with what we can't really do anything and we have Baine, leader without proper personality. His character needs to develope. Grimtotem tribe attacking Thunder Bluff? Something, anything!
