[00:06] factions place in Azeroth back in 2004, so vanilla. 22 years ago, and funnily enough, nearly as much time has passed in game. And yes, the actual map itself means it's got the scars of the Cataclysm world revamp. But for today's
[00:22] video, we want the map to be as big as possible because there's something that factions. Stormwind, [music] the dwarves, small blotches of blue. We have the orcs taking their first steps into the Barrens. Notice how insignificant
[00:37] they are. Okay, let's now fill the map in with everything else that's going on. The Zandalari, Legion, Dark Iron, Blackrock, centaurs, and of course, the Scourge. Then, huge stretches of unexplored land,
[00:52] Mistshrouded Pandaria, the Lost Dragon Isles, and the recently discovered Khaz Algar. We were pockets of safety in a vast dangerous world. Now, let's zoom that forward. This is the world map during Battle for Azeroth, and the
[01:07] difference is immediate. The world is split between red and blue. Everything else is either undiscovered or destroyed. It's a world dominated by the Alliance and Horde, two of the greatest storytelling forces in the setting. And
[01:20] storytelling forces in the setting. And since then, well, nothing. Worse than nothing, total [music] stagnation. Stormwind's king walked away from his throne. The Undercity is destroyed. A Horde council has lost itself [music] to
[01:33] committee politics. And the night elves, exhausted by constantly sacrificing themselves in the name of the Alliance, are now forging their own destiny. It's been eight years since this map was relevant to Azeroth's future. Eight
[01:46] years of drip-fed factional lore, small stories and minor inclusions that give us a sense that the Alliance and Horde are barely clinging to relevance. After eight years, it's easy to conclude Blizzard have forgotten the factions or
[02:01] don't think of them as an important way to tell stories in the modern setting. we thought we'd remind them. Let's go on a journey together from the factions living in the edge of a dangerous world to a world [music] of politics now
[02:16] living at the edge of Warcraft's lore. Here's the thing I've noticed, a lot of or they have one that doesn't look great. And it's often not because people can't afford it. It's because they just got overwhelmed halfway through building
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[03:22] you a 10% off your first purchase of a site or domain. San Andreas, Halo 2, and so many others including World of Warcraft. We're
[03:35] logging in for the first time and we're welcomed to Azeroth. We're introduced to the races, four for each faction, but no matter what we pick, we find our race can't claim its own borders. Scarlet's assault Tirisfal, quillboar and Kul
[03:48] Tirans march across Durotar, Stormwind is in full-blown revolution and for some reason Teldrassil's forests just got very dangerous. We secure the home very dangerous. We secure the home front, but venturing out, it gets worse.
[04:02] Westfall is in freefall. Werewolves dominate Silverpine. The Barrens [music] are primed for a Centaur invasion. It is a dangerous world, but these are only the first obstacles we find. We come to our faction's borders at level 20. These
[04:16] zones that are essentially the edge of the pocket of safety that we've carved out with our own hands. Outside that, we find a world often totally destroyed. Of course, many of us had spent endless hours destroying it in the previous
[04:31] three RTS titles. Lord aeron was engulfed in a zombie apocalypse and from the Dark Irons to the Grim Totems, traitors were popping up left and right. The still fresh Legion invasion left pockets of demons pretty much everywhere
[04:45] and above it all, elemental lords, black dragons, and old gods were staking their claim to our chaotic world. But our efforts paid off. The wilds of Kalimdor and the wastelands of the Eastern Kingdoms were cut back. Breathing space
[04:58] at last. But then came the next two threats, Illidan and Arthas. They were far away in Outlands and Northrend and once they were dealt with, it was back to our home territories and it was time to expand the borders.
[05:16] around the legacy of two characters. Thrall who had forged the new Horde and carved out a nation in Kalimdor. And then of course, Varian Wrynn. At this point, he was actually living his dream as a mind-wiped enslaved gladiator named
[05:29] Lo'Gosh. A whole Warcraft comic adventure later and he returned to adventure later and he returned to Stormwind. And with that, the era of institutional alliance chaos was over. Varian was back. He was king, but of
[05:42] course, he was still a warrior and he was going to do something about all these threats, and then do something about the Horde. But the next addition to the Alliance came from the most unexpected place, outer space. The
[05:56] Draenei came hurtling through the great dark in a hijacked dimensional ship named the Exodar. They crash-landed in Ashenvale, and through the night elves joined the Alliance. Head south, and the Alliance managed to secure Dustwallow
[06:09] Marsh and push a little into the Barrens. This was a new breed of Alliance aggression with strongholds such as Fort Triumph dominating what should have been core Horde territory. But the real story in Kalimdor is, of
[06:22] course, that of the Horde. From Ashenvale to Tanaris, you see the red expand across the map. Goblins under Gazlowe join the Horde and move into Azshara, carving the land itself into a giant symbol of the Horde. The power to
[06:37] build all this coalesced under one man, Thrall, the Warchief. But, if you know your history, you'll know it wasn't Thrall who drove all of that Horde to war. It was Garrosh Hellscream. As the tides of war rose up in Kalimdor,
[06:51] Fort Triumph was destroyed, Dustwallow was secured, and Theramore would be bombed out of existence. And the Horde's rise was only beginning. What came next was a world-dominating military force. But, of course, we can't
[07:05] count the Alliance out because a lot went down in the Eastern Kingdoms. Quel'Thalas [music] to join the Horde. This was a little
[07:18] weird because the high elves had spent the last [music] decades killing trolls and killing orcs. Yes, after a Scourge apocalypse and the Alliance doing them dirty, the newly named blood elves had no home. What was worse, their prince
[07:32] was half-mad chasing demons across Outland. Without much choice, the blood elves joined the Horde. At first, think of it as a bond with the Forsaken that elves essentially feeling like a bit of a side faction of the Horde, but trusted
[07:48] one day they would become the Horde's backbone. Sylvanas though didn't stop there. She secured Silverpine and pushed into Hillsbrad, her forces so effective that she leveled Southshore with plague bombs. Perhaps her greatest victory
[08:01] though wasn't Gilneas, where she forced a potential alliance kingdom on her borders to fully evacuate. What she left was a feral wasteland in a way useless as a resource, but in doing that she ensured there would be no serious
[08:15] competition. Genn Greymane and his worgen joined the Alliance, but that doesn't change the map much after the Forsaken expansion. There is though the were being systematically cleared of the Scourge and the Forsaken even made it to
[08:31] Andorhal, but that is when Sylvanas met Varian and his immense appetite for war. securing their own regions of the Plaguelands. But as strong as they were, the Forsaken had by now forged one of Azaroth's most brutally effective armies
[08:47] and ultimately they won the day. With this final victory the Alliance were left barely clinging on north of the Thandol Span. In the south though, everything had changed. You see, Magni Bronzebeard had attempted an ancient
[09:01] earthen ritual and was turned into a diamond. That story only concludes in the World Soul Saga, but back in this era it meant the dwarves were without a king and this is where things got messy. The true heir to Ironforge was in fact
[09:15] Magni's grandson through his daughter Moira. You see, his name is Dagran Thaurissan the second and he is second in line after his dad to another throne. That being the shadow throne of Emperor Thaurissan of the Dark Iron Dwarves. Now
[09:31] Moira attempted to assert her son's claim, but bungled the coup forcing Varian to storm Ironforge. You may not have seen it in game, but yeah, that actually happened. It was pretty cool. Yeah, it's before Moira lost her head,
[09:46] and Anduin convinced everyone to sit down and talk things through, leading to the reforging of the Council of the Three Hammers. And through that, as you can see, nearly all the lands of Khaz Modan are now firmly within the
[09:59] Alliance. We got a coup, a siege, and a new government all inside one expansion. Suffice it to say, modern Azeroth hasn't had a move like that in the last 8 years. Stormwind, for its part, did push its borders out of the Swamp of Sorrows
[10:13] and deeper into the Blasted Lands, but Varian's eyes were set on international war. This is when he became High King of the Alliance, a direct counterpart to the Horde's Warchief. Okay, let's zoom out. We now have two men, Garrosh and
[10:28] Varian, and two huge power blocks hovering up the world. It was time to explore, expand, exploit, [music] and exterminate.
[10:41] perfect narrative foil for the rising factional violence. It was a land haunted by the Sha, a remnant of the Old Gods that fed on negative emotions. The factions' logical next step, then, was to dump as much hatred and warfare into
[10:55] Pandaria as possible, accidentally empowering the Sha. It was a brutal conflict that split the continent apart, but we learned a lot of lessons. Garrosh became the unhinged dictator of the Horde, until a Darkspear revolution
[11:09] unseated him. The Horde nearly died that day. Quite literally, the Alliance could have executed the Horde's leadership in Orgrimmar's throne room, but cooler heads prevailed, and Vol'jin became the new Warchief. A dictator, a revolution,
[11:22] and a throne room standoff. The factions, by this stage, were generating Azeroth's largest stories, and they did so just by existing next to each other with characters who are agents in the world and with both sides coming to
[11:37] natural tensions because of expansion, because of resources, because of territorial claims. But of course, after Pandaria, it was off to alternate Draenor where factional violence churned and then we went back to Azeroth and
[11:51] with the events of the Broken Shore got stuck into the third and final Legion invasion. It was during this invasion that Vol'jin took a poisoned blade to the chest and in his final breath made Sylvanas the new Warchief of the Horde.
[12:05] Sylvanas the new Warchief of the Horde. And with this, everything is now primed for all-out war between the factions. The map is dominated by red and blue. Two major holdouts though are Zandalar and Kul Tiras.
[12:18] But they were soon to bring their immense fleets to the fight as well. You see, the emergence of Azerite after Sargeras stabbed the world led to a Sargeras stabbed the world led to a massive, massive problem for Azeroth. A
[12:31] vast new power source was there. It could absolutely be weaponized and for those who weaponized it early, the Horde, the ultimate risk was finding themselves in a use it or lose it situation. This led to much politicking
[12:47] across the setting had joined the factions. We had the city-state of Suramar now in personal union with Silvermoon, the Lightforged and their crazy light-based super weapons, the Mag'har escaping from genocide from
[13:00] across dimensions. All of this strength building, building, and building until it felt like there was no choice but to pull the trigger on the war to end all wars. But here's the thing, even back then, there wasn't a good reason for us
[13:16] to actually go to full-blown war, at least not an obvious one. Yes, there's the Azerite dimension, but I think we all know there is a Jailer-shaped elephant in the room. I'll get to that on Sylvanas in a minute.
[13:30] >> But back then, I think we thought that all of this was just how stuff works. We called it cycles of violence. One death would lead to revenge being taken. That destruction led to another town's burning. Time after time, all the way
[13:46] back to Warcraft 1. But we'd learned our lessons, right? We should have known better. Yet there we were once again, and unlike any previous war, this was truly global. By sheer extent, it was the greatest faction war ever fought.
[14:00] But in fighting it, were we being idiots or was there something else going on? Were we actually being manipulated? Because the new war chief Sylvanas seemed eager for war. Maybe she was brutally pragmatic. Maybe this was the
[14:16] only true way to save the Horde. Like Europe before the First World War, perhaps too much power had concentrated and the factions now felt forced to use [music] it. Better to use it on the Alliance they use it on us. But no, we
[14:29] were actually being manipulated and this [music] is the seed of the factions' death in the modern setting. Put simply, Sylvanas was about to pull off the mother of all gaslighting exercises and totally destroy any credibility the
[14:43] factions had left. Just look at this map. These are the factions at the full extent of their power. They won't expand from here. They will just shrink and drop out of relevance. The reason the Fourth War became inevitable and the
[14:57] reason the factions have dropped out of relevance since is the same one. It is relevance since is the same one. It is Sylvanas' deal with the Jailer.
[15:09] will stand with the greats as being one of Azeroth's bloodiest. It began with the War of Thorns, the burning of Teldrassil, and a planet-wide attack on Alliance forces. The Alliance struck back and emptied its regions of
[15:21] able-bodied men to fight on every front. The undercity was attacked, plagued, and Arathi Highlands. But, even at the height of the conflict, Blizzard were unable to bring it home. We did a handbrake turn into Nazjatar, and then
[15:36] discovered that Battle for Azeroth wasn't a faction war after all. No, it was an Old God expansion, and at the end of that journey lay N'Zoth. But, the final faction showdown did take place, even though it wouldn't be the final
[15:49] boss of the expansion. And that is the Gates of Orgrimmar. Sylvanas' Horde loyalists against another band of revolutionaries out to take down their warchief. This time, wrapped up in the journey of Varok
[16:02] Saurfang, an old orc who had seen a loss of war. He stepped forward at the Gates of Orgrimmar, challenged Sylvanas to Mak'gora, centrally ritualized combat, and though it killed him, it showed everyone present just how pointless the
[16:16] war was. And that's because, in Sylvanas' own words, the Horde meant nothing. She then zipped off into the sky, a bit like Team Rocket. But, it wasn't until we dealt with N'Zoth that we'd understand what any of that meant.
[16:30] Shadowlands. And that's when we realized the whole war was a design to juice up the operations of a villain in the afterlife named [music] the Jailer. And whilst we were discovering that, Anduin was captured, tortured, and made to do
[16:44] terrible things, such that when he returned to Azeroth, he ran from the throne of Stormwind, leaving the crown and the high kingship Alliance in a bit [music] Because of that, the Alliance had little
[16:58] clear leadership, and their leadership didn't have much narrative impetus. Over Sylvanas, they had decided that warchiefs were in fact bad news. So, they started a council. A council that has done very little since. But, we're
[17:13] not sure if that's a consequence of them being ineffective, or a consequence of Blizzard refusing to use the Horde to actually tell stories. Let's revisit the map. Every border held, the stories were just laughed off. Everything just sat
[17:26] stories, yes, like the Alliance reclaiming Gilneas or the very beginnings of un-plaguing the Undercity. Most recently, there was some storytelling with the factions. Suramar and the Kaldorei were shoehorned into
[17:40] elves, leaving us to wonder where the hell the original factions of World of Warcraft are. And what's odd, what stands out, is Xal'atath's attack. With that, the threat she represented and
[17:53] still represents is existential in scale, and she did succeed. She's likely in the world core ready to do whatever's next in her plan. Yet, all this red and blue in the maps, all these years of built-up power and politics led to
[18:09] nothing. The factions did not respond. In fact, the factional response was so silent, people wondered if they still existed. Ultimately, this is a map that we've made because we want to remind Blizzard in a clear way that can't be
[18:24] Blizzard in a clear way that can't be ignored that this is how Azeroth exists in our minds. I don't think it's how Azeroth exists in Blizzard's minds, and that's a problem. One day, they're going to need to deal with this. And that's
[18:38] what brings me to the end of our map exploration. If you want a deep dive in how Blizzard personally murdered the Horde out of the setting, which I think is appropriate after this video, well, I have good news. You can check out this
[18:50] have good news. You can check out this video next.