Given the constant "playable HEs" issue and the corresponding "give the Horde an Alliance race in return" counterpoint I came to realize we never quite discussed what sort of crossfactional trickery people would like.

So, have a poll!

Here is the premise:

If you could pick any race(s) to become available to the other side, be it in their current from or as a suspiciously similar substitute (high elves, forest trolls, eredar), which ones would you pick? You can pick them for any reason, because you think they look cool, because you think them being bifactional could be a good story, because they'd fit better on the other side... whatever.
Don't worry about how hard it would be to pull off, if you picked it, it happened. This is about what you want or think is cool, so vote with that in mind.

The poll is multiple choice, so you can select all the races you'd like to see become bifactional rather than just the absolute favorite.

Give the Horde the humans. Think how much love and lore they would get if they weren't forced to stagnate on the Alliance.

Eredar (draenei), if it was High Elves for the Alliance

Furblogs.

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None I'd say if I'm being honest but if I have to choose then the only ones I'd think would fit are Dark irons who refuses to be lead by Moira and her pup and are free from Raggy. If we assume that there's gonig to be a cold war in the background then the Horde can always offer them aid in fighting their cousins and reclaiming the Badlands, Searing Gorge and Burning steppes.

I ofcourse see High elves on the Alliance as justice as they sohuld have been playable from the start.

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Say no to genocide!
Save the Nightborne!

None...

...Oh, alright.

High Elves IF and only IF they were designated as such, and not "Naruoropth. Blood Elf. Alliance" as well as given the blue eyes. Straight up 'traitor' elves? No.

Syndicate/Alterac Humans I'd begrudgingly permit.

Dwarves because Cool of Rule. We'd need to get Tauren in exchange.

None, really. I wouldn't mind seeing High Elves as a human subrace when the new models come out (I know it sounds odd, but most of the racials would fit fine if you just renamed them, and Stormwind is just as reasonable a homeland for a High Elf as any other place in the world nowadays), but I don't think they need their own playable faction.

I picked the title "Crossfactional Traitor Bastards" for pomp alone.

They need not be traitors, like HEs who are in fact more loyalist than BEs speaking only in terms of factional loyalty, or if Amani joined the Alliance to battle BEs... they wouldn't really be betraying anyone.

EDIT: But if someone wanted a scenario where, for whatever reason, a chunk of a race turned traitor then that is cool as well.

High elves(more as a subrace for humans to be honest), draenei(though I'm thinking more about man'ari or perhaps Auchenai types), and worgen(savage worgen would be likely to finally exist and fit in with their faction).

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Dwarves in the Horde, please.

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Disgruntled Forsaken Stable Master
"Blacker than a moonless night, hotter and more bitter than hell itself... That is coffee."

Humans.. forced to stagnate?

When did that happen?

None. Bifactional races as a concept present huge story problems to me.

Every Alliance race already has plenty of neutral members, so they all fit by default. Having nuance to the storyline would probably take away some possibilities (IE: Gilnean worgen, all dwarves).

Every Horde race could potentially have counterparts in the Alliance if there was a bit more nuance to storytelling. For instance:
- Alliance backing (freethinker-led) forest trolls against Quel'thalas (which, otherwise, has been sitting quite safe, and can reinforce the other Horde factions at its leisure), or perhaps supporting the Zandalari against the Horde;
- orcs who were converted to the Light or otherwise feel humans are superior due to the camps (ala Uncle Ruckus/Durnholde Syndrome) or are members of the Flowerpicker Clan;
- goblins paid off by the Alliance, tauren who don't have battered wife syndrome;
- high elves and Alliance-sympathizing blood elves (who kept their heads down);
- and of course Alliance-sympathizing undead who have kept their mouths shut so they don't get their asses executed by the Forsaken.

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"All right, I'll get that kid to eat. Where's my screw driver and my plumber's helper? I'll open up his mouth and I'll shove it in."


The Alliance's three rules on faction conflict:
1) You can't win.
2) You can't break even.
3) You can't leave the game.

I think they're alright assuming they're originally written that way (like the pandaren, who aren't so much functioning as member states as they are a bunch of unaffiliated adventurers). Ethereals, for instance, would work just fine as a bifactional group.

I'd like to be able to RP a Steamwheedle Goblin without getting killed on sight in Stormwind, so that'd be nice.

The Draenei practically are neutral already, so might as well go all the way.

And I'm not exactly opposed to High Elves even if I don't particularly care for the idea.

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Well, to elaborate on my picks.

High elves playable for the Alliance, I voted that, what? Well, I think the interaction between HEs and BEs actually has potential, it is just the inexplicable good fortune and power of the HEs that is making me dislike it. HEs by all rights should be weak and haggard survivors, whose primary opposition and contrast with the BEs comes from philosophical differences, not the flash of steel. The HEs are not BEs equals, they have no land and by rights should be physically and economically weak, so this dissonance between portrayal and actuality needs to stop.

Alliance trolls, unifying all trolls at once might be too much for Vol'jin as it would effectively kill the drive behind troll lore. Having the Amani join the Alliance (oh sweet, sweet irony) out of desperation or having the last Zandalari remnants go Alliance just to spite Vol'jin could have great story and political ramifications for the trolls.

Alliance orcs, as half-enslaved Azerothian (the continent) Blackrocks. Basically, Alliance rolls in and takes over the region but are still unwilling to commit a wholesale massacre of the orcs. Through coercion (possibly by holding families hostage) they make the orcs obey Alliance laws and fight for their new masters. Very interesting dynamic there, given past and present history.

Alliance undead, pretty simple actually. Some newly risen Forsaken may have rebelled and joined their former faction. Alternatively an isolated group of free willed undead (hypothetical Drisburg undead) never joined up with the Forsaken. Great way to explore the minds of the free undead and the intricacies of the Great Lordaeron Game, being played right now between humans and Forsaken.
But not everything is sunshine and puppies, they are still undead with all the myriad issues that comes with. And while officially and legally welcome to the Alliance, emotionally things are not so clear or pretty, on both sides.

Will do the same for Alliance races later.

I want to play an Alliance Worgen that's savage. Unfortunately those savage Worgen are given to the Horde so I can't be the "token savage race" that I want to play in an otherwise civilized faction, because Blizzard has hereby decreed that you can only be allowed to be savage, dark, gritty, and badass if you play Horde.

That's at least one big problem I have with it. It's another way of diluting aspects that make up the current playable races. The factions should have more racial diversity, but this isn't the way to go about it, imho.

Picked the High Elves for obvious reasons.

I went with the Draenei for the Horde because they already are "'neutral", they might as well go Horde. And if they can bring their pal Anduin with them, it would be great.

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Always funny (and ironic) when people come up with stupid ideas and think of them as awesome when they also criticize Blizzard's idea's which aren't even as weird.


I mean, Horde-Draenei? Really?

So, I vote for 'No cross-faction races'-option (except for Pandaren and Ethereals and stuff). And the Draenei are still an Alliance-race!

By every characterization of the draenei, they would have joined the Horde if they crash-landed in the Barrens. The genocide is no big deal to them, unless it's humans doing something that remind them of it.

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"All right, I'll get that kid to eat. Where's my screw driver and my plumber's helper? I'll open up his mouth and I'll shove it in."


The Alliance's three rules on faction conflict:
1) You can't win.
2) You can't break even.
3) You can't leave the game.

And where have they said that they don't mind the genocide that much? In your own head?

It's because Velen knew that WoD would happen and that all of his race would be saved, in an alternate timeline. For the greater good, he sacrificed their existence in one timeline, to teach the orcs a lesson.

The only mentions the genocide are:
1) In a history book (probably), which is objective;
2) In one quest that sends you to help lay some souls to rest in HFP, Alliance-side. The quest giver doesn't really say anything negative about the current orcs;
3) In the Velen story, in which the draenei smash some human skulls in;
4) TBC manual, which states that draenei are going to try to take revenge on the orcs.

Given that no draenei is actually shown to hold ill-will toward the current Horde for what the previous Horde did... #4 is what is incorrect about the current lore, not #2 and #3.

Of you can show me any evidence that the draenei hold a grudge against the current Horde for the genocide, I can probably change my mind on this.

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"All right, I'll get that kid to eat. Where's my screw driver and my plumber's helper? I'll open up his mouth and I'll shove it in."


The Alliance's three rules on faction conflict:
1) You can't win.
2) You can't break even.
3) You can't leave the game.

Blizzard just didn't explore it, Broken Draenei for one didn't like the Orcs. At all.

Broken are as much the Holier-than-thou Draenei as the forsaken are humans.
The answer is 0.

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Say no to genocide!
Save the Nightborne!