The Blackhand Clan - custom lore concept.

[Shatterfury]

The main point is to have a second orcish based faction as a noteworthy force in the world of Azeroth.
I kind of felt that one faction war too little on one hand, but, on the other hand, having multiple clans would dilute the uniqueness of the factions too much.

So the First and Second Wars happen almost the same.

My custom, second orcish force is based around the Black Tooth Grin Clan that transforms into the Blackhand Clan.
The Black Tooth Grin Clan has a fuzzy history depending on what source you read, for me they are a new clan created prior to the crossing of the Horde into Azeroth around a core of Blackrock orcs and countless micro clans and clanless orcs that wanted to join the invasion.
They, like in official lore, were a clan specialized in skirmishes, fast maneuvers, scouting and the like.
They weren`t a big clan by any means, but they gather a lot of survivors after the Battles Blackrock Spire and Grim Batol.
After gathering quite of lot of orcs from those two battles the brothers would name the clan Blackhand, to honour their father.

Why Blackhand Clan and not Blackrock Clan? Quite clear for me. The Blackrocks were the backbone of the Horde and, more importantly, loyal to Ogrim Doomhammer. All those Blackrocks that were loyal to Blackhand would have joined the Black Tooth Grin Clan anyway.
The Blackrock Clan is far more associated with Ogrim than with Blackhand by the end of the of the Second War. Adopting the Blackrock identity for those loyal to Blackhand is strange, they would need to make a point their point that they are NOT loyal to Ogrim, or what he stands for.
To further cement my point I would like to point out that the vast majority of the Blackrocks were in interment camps, the same camps that got liberated by Orgim and Thrall. The Blackrocks are already the backbone of the Horde, Thrall`s Horde.
Thus a new name for this Clan is in order, and let`s be honest, Blackhand Clan is far better sounding than Black Tooth Grin.

I do have two different points that I keep alternating:

a) The Blackhand Clan, after gathering orcs from the two battles ( I know that the battle of Grim Batol happens after the Portal is closed from Draenor, but not in this timeline) , go back through the Portal during the raids of the Horde of Draenor but don`t get involved at all.

Dal`Rend and Kargath remain the two most important important senior orcs, Maim will die sometime in the story.

Dal`Rend would help Jorin Deadeye to get in charge of the Bleeding Hollow Clan, the part that remained on Outland anyway. Almost half broke through the Alliance lines and reached Azeroth and were locked up in the camps.

The Shadowmoon Clan, who would normally still be the biggest clan, would be torn between the Shadow wielding part and it`s Fel wilding part.
Dal`rend would back the Shadow users, Kargath the Fel users.

Thus Dal`Rends faction would be consist of his Blackhand Clan, the backbone of this faction, Jorin`s Bleeding Hollow Clan and the Shadow using Shadowmoon Clan in addition to the Firetree and Smolderthorn Troll tribes who remined with Dal`Rend. Ogres would be intimidated to join.

b) The Blackhand Clan, after gathering orcs from the Blackrock Mountain and the Grim Batol remain on Azeroth, in the western parts of Redridge Mountains, Badlands and Twilight Highlands.

The Shadow using Shadowmoon Clan splinter would be discovered in the Swamp of Sorrows, their story would be that they slipped through using shadow magic during the closing of the Portal.

So, were is my dilemma ?
I was thinking at the roster of such a faction.
You see, there needs to be flavor and each group needs to have two or tree iconic units.
I like the Bleeding Hollow because of their Blood Magic aspect. The two most iconic units for them, in my mind, would be: a melee or ranged berserker unit with a berserk ability that trades damage for health.
But those two kind of step on the toes of the Blackhand and the trolls.

Let me elaborate on my idea of a rooster:

Spoiler: Rooster

Barracks:
T1 melee (Great Hall) - Outrunner - Strong, versatile warrior (Swordstaff armed grunt with the ability to use nets, maybe) - 3 food
T2 melee (Stronghold) - Berserker - Agressive warrior infused with power by it's Blood Magic infused tattoos.
Ability: Blood fury - after engaging in melee the unit has a X% chance of going berserk increasing speed but also damage taken.
(Bare chest covered with red tattoos, wields two one handed axes) 4 food
T2 melee (Stronghold) - Shadowblade - A warrior shrouded in dark mists that is augmented by it's Shadow Magic infused tattoos.
Ability: Shadow shroud - after engaging in melee gives the unit a x% chance of evading attacks.
(Bare chest covered in dark tattoos and wielding a two handed sword) 4 food
T3 melee (Fortress) - Ogre Warrior - good all around. 5 food

Now comes the good part, to train a T2 unit you would need to have one or two T1 units trained so that you don`t mass T3 units only.
T3 units would require either T2 units trained.
This mechanic would force you to have a diversified army.

Ranged Barracks:
T1 ranged (Great Hall & lumber mill) - Skirmisher - Basic female orc archer with good range. 2 food
T2 ranged (Stronghold & lumber mill) -Headhunter - Troll axe/spear thrower with medium range. 3 food unit.
The same mechanic would apply, a Headhunter unit would require a Skirmisher unit already trained.
T2 siege (Stronghold & lumber mill) - Catapult. 3 food

Spirit Lounge:
T1 caster (Stronghold) - Shadow magus - I haven't thought of of the exact spells. 2 food
T1 caster (Stronghold) - Witch Doctor/Loa Priest - Troll healer. 2 food
T2 caster (Fortress) - Shadowmancer - Hybrid caster/medium ranged unit. It should have a spell that makes other units invisible, maybe a teleport of sorts? 3 food.

Beastry:
T1 flyer (Stronghold & beastry) Bat Rider - The troll bat rider. 2 food
T2 special melee unit (Stronghold & beastry) - Wolf Rider. Armed with a spear, does piercing damage.
Can switch to flask throwing that does extra damage to buildings. 4 food.
T2 flyer (Fortress & beastry) Drake Rider - An orc riding a black drake that spits fire.
Good, all around. 5 food.
T3 flyer (Fortress & beastry) Dragon Rider - An orc riding a motherf***ing dragon.
Very good, all around unit with devour.
Limited to 1, given their size even Blood Magic can keep the majority of those beasts in check. 8 food

You see in the b) scenario I can have the Berserker be Blackhand, the Black Tooth Grin could have been joined by Tanaan Orcs thus have access to Blood Magic and Berserkers.
In b) scenario trolls would also have a slot for a battle units in the ranged category.


In the b) scenario the iconic Blackhand units given to the faction would be the Outrunner, the Berserker, the Wolf Rider, the Drake Rider (legacy of the Dragonmaw part of the Blackhand Clan, now they use Blood Magic to torment the beasts into obedience) and the Dragon Rider.

In the b) scenario the Blood Magic of the Blackhand and the Shadow magic of the Shadowmoon Clan would further differentiate this orc faction from Thrall`s Shamanism focused faction in addition to the Ogrim/Doomhammer dispute.

In a) scenario I can`t think how to differentiate the Blackhand and the Bleeding Hollow.
Maybe gray shamanism? Bully the elements into obedience? I would like to continue the "bad magic" theme of this faction.
But it would raise questions on how the Blackhand tame the drakes.
I want the Blackhand to feel like they are the bedrock of this faction.

Spoiler: Population of the main factions prior to the 3rd War.

Blizzard is very lazy, but I think I figured a good way of approximating the population.
I use the cities as a base and than multiply the population by 10 for humans.
And I approximate the rest of factions around the human population.

Kingdom of Lordaeron
Lordaeron City - 30.000
Stratholme - 25.000
Tyr's Hand - 10.000
Andorhal - 10.000
75.000 x 10 = 750.000 population for Lordaeron

Kingdom of Stormwind (prior to the first war, for context)
Stormwind City 25.000
Great Hamlet 10.000
350.000 total population

Kingdom of Stormwind
Stormwind City 15.000
150.000 total population.
Stormwind is crippled, able to defend itself but
unable to project power far away due to the large area is trying to hold onto.
If left alone it can recover.

Kingdom of Gilneas
Gilneas City 18.000
180.000 total population

Kingdom of Stromgarde
Stromgarde City 15.000
150.000 total population

Kingdom of Kul'Tiras
Boralus 12.000
120.000 total population

Kingdom of Alterac - prior to the Second War, for context only.
Alterac City - 8.000
80.000 total population

City-State of Dalaran 20.000, relied on Lordaeron for food.

Kingdom of Quel'Thalas
Silvermoon City 25.000
250.000 total population

Kingdom of Khaz Modan
Ironforge 20.000
200.000 total population

Wildhammer Clan
Arie Peak City 9.000
90.000 total population

The various hill dwarves clans in Twilight Highlands 40.000 total population.


The Horde
Blackrock Clan, the most powerful clan by far - 60.000, at it's peak it could have had well over 100.000
Thunderlord Clan - 30.000, passed through the Portal with Grommash
Bleeding Hollow Clan* - 20.000, passed through the Portal with Grommash
*Further 30.000 remained on Outland.
Shattered Hand Clan** - 15.000 passed through the Portal with Grommash.
**20.000 remained with Kargath on Outland.
Burning Blade Clan - 25.000
Warsong Clan 35.000, not captured
Frostwolf Clan 25.000, hidden in Alterac Valley.
Various micro clans and clanless orcs 20.000.
Total orc population of the Horde 230.000


Dal'Rend's faction
Black Tooth Grin 30.000
+ 10.000 picked after the huge Battle of Blackrock Spire
+ 10.000 Dragonmaws picked after the Battle of Grim Batol. The Dragonmaw Clan was stated to be quite small.
Reforms into the Blackhand Clan 50.000.

Shadowmoon Clan (Shadow users) 20.000

The Shadowmoon passed with other various other orcs.
Those are put into interment camps by Stormwind and used as slave labour.
Will be liberated by Dal'Rend.
The Blackhand Clan will have 70.000 orcs, the Shadowmoon Clan 30.000 for a total of 100.000 at the start of the 3rd war.

So, any thoughts?

 

[ShadowGamerXXX]

(It's time to be a necromancer...)

I think it's a very good idea to make the balance of power in Azeroth more complex, I also love that you have differentiated this clan from any other very well (Even giving it more history than the "created" clans in WoW), however I need to know what their intentions are, Are they still loyal to the Legion?, Are they looking to destroy the Alliance? , Or just establish yourself while maintaining the Status Quo?.

It would be a good idea to have "bad" shamans (The elements are indifferent to the concept of good or evil), it would be great if they learned to use thorny brambles as barriers (Like the Razormane).

Moving on to the playable, it would be nice to have several towers that represent the faction more, I'll give you an example

Tower of Shadows: A pillar infused by dark powers, with moderate magic damage and medium range
Ability: Has an XX% cause curse by 10S.

 

[Shatterfury]

I`m glad that at least some answered.
While this faction certainly doesn`t like the Alliance at all, they are way too small to have a realistic shot of defeating them. They just want to carve their own place that would be relatively secure while making use of dubious magics.

I have given way to thought to this little alternate storyline and I think that this new Blackhand Clan should be the Blood Magic faction and the smaller remnant, the Shadowmoon Clan should be the Shadow magic users.
The lack of basic respect of the former Chieftain of the Bleeding Hollow for the Blackhand boys was well known, thus the Bleeding Hollow gets captured by the Alliance and are sent to the interment camps. This also bypasses the problem, in my mind at least with splitting the Bleeding Hollow Clan between the Horde and this new faction and the fact that the Bleeding Hollow Clan is quite big number wise and would actually overshadow the Blackhand Clan in a theorycraft thread about the custom Blackhand Clan.


You may ask how do I justify Blood Magic for the Black Tooth Grin clan turned Blackhand Clan, very simple, the Black Tooth Grin Clan was a vanguard clan formed from small elements of all clans and clanless orcs. The best scouts come, without a doubt from the Tanaan Jungle, thus the bio of the Black Tooth Grin Clan would justify the Blood Magic theme of the Blackhand Clan.

The actual campaign would fit into a modified 3rd War that would overall lead to the same overall, broad ending as the cannon ending, but with three different takes.
1. The remains of Lordaeron merge with Stromgarde to form the Kingdom of Arathor via a marriage of between Calia Menethil and Liam Trollbane (he is not a idiot in my timeline). Thoras Trollbane steps down from his position of King of Stromgarde to facilitate the reappearance of Arathor. Thoras would be a Grand Marshall of Arathor. What remains of Dalaran would also be absorbed by this new kingdom and would benefit from a lot of autonomy.
Arathor would consist of Hillsbread Foothills, Alterac Mountains and Arathi Highlands.

You might ask, why? Pretty simple, if we go by Blizzard`s route, with almost no piece of Lordaeron surviving and Stromgarde falling due to a number of factors, it would be the Kingdom of Khaz Modan who would be the most powerful kingdom, NOT the Kingdom of Stormwind. 20 years there is not enough time for the population of Stormwind to rebound.

2. The reemergence of the Zandalari as an active faction due to a war of extermination waged by the Goblins on the Jungle Trolls of Stranglethorn Vale.
Their campaign would revolve around pushing the Goblins out of Stranglethorn Vale and helping the Horde whom they meet in the Barrens who also are skirmishing with the Goblins among others.
This new Zandalari faction, consisting of the Zandalari and the Jungle Trolls are the 3rd faction helping in the Battle of Hyjal. (Jaina doesn`t sail to Kalimdor)
The Exarchate of Zandalar (I kind of like the name) would consist of Zandalar Isle (the one from the first editon in size, not the huge one retcooned into the lore), Tel`Abin and Stranglethorn Vale after the goblins are beaten back.

3.The new Blackhand Clan would take advantage of the chaos created by Thrall breaking the Horde free and the appearance of the Scourge to strike at the Wildhammer Dwarves in what we know now as the Twilight Highlands, a land this new faction shares in an uneasy peace with the dwarves.
It would start with the missions of mobilizing the small remnantof the Shadowmoon Clan located in Swamps of Sorrow, and various small Forest Troll tribes, that the time to strike is now and claim the Twilight Highlands as theirs.
This is realized in the first half if the campaign, but the second half revolves around joining the Arathorians, and the Alliance overall, in the fight against a Pit Lord besieging Stromgarde Keep itself. They realize that if the Alliance loses Stromgarde City, they are next.
The final battle could be in Hillsbread or Alterac, it would take place almost at the same time as the Battle of Hyjal.


For context: The Horde reaches Kalimdor via a portal maintained by Mediv himself,(the entire Alliance doesn`t have enough ships to transport hundreds of thousands in one go, that was quite the poor story telling)
The Horde stumbles upon goblins stripping the Barrens of resources to fuel their conquest in Stranglethorn Vale, yet they come to realize a lot of Goblins are forced into labour.
The splinter goblin faction, led by Glazgow, wants to end the exploitation of his fellow Goblins and asks for fair pay for their work. This faction joins the Horde, along with the Tauren who are helped by the Horde in claiming Mulgore.
Grom dies gloriously at the Battle of Hyjal, no silly Fel/Chaos crap.

 

[ShadowGamerXXX]

The story is very well positioned according to me, it is very interesting how you want to guide the third war, I will give my point of view of what can help your story.
Basically this new clan is the same thing that Trall did but without leaving the eastern kingdoms and without exterminating the "evil" magic, I see it feasible that the different trolls of the forest (When the idea of their clans was not so clear) join voluntarily, since according to tradition, these are close to annihilation by the Alliance. I see quite feasible a support of the rebels Defias (If you are going to put some of the lore of WoW), they would maintain a very rough relationship, but both favor that Stormwind is falling apart, it could be a temporary alliance until the Defias take the city and form an "Anti Alliance" league together with the Syndicate , which would create another power in the eastern kingdoms.
The resurgence of Arathor would be the best option for humans at that time, Stormwind would only have less than 50,000 inhabitants and is already full of rebels with what would be a burden to try to unite him to the coalition, but obviously Kultiras would fiercely oppose that option, in fact I think daelin Proudmore would be so offended that he would cut off all diplomatic relations with that new League of Arathor , Kultiras by completely disassociating himself from the alliance would decide to seize strength otherwise... It would begin to colonize the sea, remember that the plague did not hit this maritime city very hard, which would become a great power on that side of the world, the relationship with the Zandalari trolls would be rough, but is hostile in itself.
The last remaining end to tie would be Gilneas, let's make it a bit simple, the archmage Arugal together with a group of people from Dalaran who do not want to be part of the New League of Arathor, decide to convince Genn Greymane to use the curse of the worgen to survive the plague (as soon as a breach opens in their wall) and together with the new "druids" help keep the plague away from their home, collaborating with the New League of Arathor, but as a temporary alliance.

 

[Shatterfury]

I am glad that you enjoy the story.

Yes, there are two main features that draw the wedge between Thrall`s Horde and the small Dal`Rend faction: the Horde honouring Ogrim and thinking Blackhand the Destroyer was a lacky of the deamons. The Horde and trying to be honourable and somehow pay out for the deeds of the First and Second Wars in their own way, but they will not admit it. Still, the Horde will bash the heads in of anyone even hinting of taking them for fools.

Dal`Rend`s faction honours Blackhand as a true hero, who won the First War and despise Ogrim as a backstabbing traitor who lost the Second War. They remain blisfully ignorant, or chose to ignore, Blackhand`s servilism towards the demons.
They did purge themselves of Fel users, while Blood Magic is barbaric and cruel only a fool will not make the differance between Fel and Blood Magic.

The small remanent of the Shadowmoon Clan will also purge the shadow users that get consumed by the Shadow (being lost in madness and summoning literal Shadow manifestations). The Shadowmoon Clan makes use of Shadow magic in moderate doses and emphasise control.
During the campaign they realise they can transfer two souls of shadow users in the body of a two headed ogre thus creating a very powerful shadow user that doesn`t lose himself/herself into madness.

Thus the dihotomy between the Horde and Dal`Rend`s faction is one of who to choose to honour: Doomhammer vs Blackhand but also the attitude towards certain schools of magic.
The Horde, guided by the Tauren and to a lesser extent the Zandalari, reembrace Shamanism and refine his uses achieving an unheard level of connection to the elements.
The Blackhand Clan makes use of Shamanism, Blood Magic and through the Shadowmoon Clan of moderate Shadow magic all in the name of survival.

Thus the two Orc factions couldn`t be more different.

Proudmore maybe can be a bit more level headed and not a complete retard in this timeline.
All in all Kul`Tiras would be on the edge but I like them to remain in the Alliance.

The dickhhead Human faction would be Gilneas. I envisioned a mission for the Alliance in which combined forces are about to take Lordaeron City, but Graymane`s oportunism leads to him trying t take the city for Gilneas and ending up with it in the hands of the Scourge or Forsaken again.
This sours the relationship between the reforged Kingdom of Arathor and the Kingdom of Gilneas thus extingushing any shread of hope for Gilneas joning the Alliance.
The theme of Gilneas would be Naturalists (combining nature magic with arcane) as opposed to the Light wielding Arathorians, Stormwindins and to a lesser extent the Kul`Tiraneans.

The Alteracians could very well join the cult of the Damn en-masse.

I would like Stormwind to remain there and defeat the Defias to be honest.

I enjoy your feedback.

 

[ShadowGamerXXX]

Both Hordes are simply siblings separated at birth, obviously their relationships will be rough at best.
I love that they are moderate with this magic thing, anyone who fences too far and fails to prove that they can control it must be a dead orc. I had come up with a strong thought, Would the orcs try to learn more schools of magic?, as they use it as a survival resource, I would see it feasible that they were not closed to new schools of magic, quiet ... No paladin orcs, I'm just saying they'll be able to dabble a little bit into any magic they have the resources to learn it.
Stormwind is a somewhat difficult case to make it survive, knowing that its population is considerably reduced, it has a big problem with the rebels and the plague, but I think we can simplify its problems a little, making King Varian agree to agree a peace with the defias, paying what was promised, give royal forgiveness to all those who leave the brotherhood and refound the guild of stonemasons , that would be enough to disarm the rebels, you can also try that Jaina decides to go to Stormwind (Since Medivh did not call her to go to Kalimdor) and she would be able to help defend against the plague, since she spent time studying it.
If we get a little crazy with Gilneas, maybe we can arrange a real marriage with the Syndicate, it would be a move to prevent Arathor from grasping so much power, we must remember that almost no human kingdom agrees to re-form Arathor, only as a last option in the worst possible case (This ... is the worst possible case), with which Gilneas does not want to be alone again and on top of that Arathor shares a border with him (As for Dalaran), he would try to find allies where before he saw disinterest (Gilneas never cared about rebels from other people's kingdoms, being honest). I see that perhaps in a couple of decades it will be the most populated kingdom of all, right? Let's remember that worgen humans have "litters" of between 2 to 8 children, at first it would hurt, but then when they grow up they would form an army of good size.
Now let's go a bit to Kalimdor, let's face it, the night elves would not join a faction, they would be a faction, I dare to say without fear of being wrong that they are the ones with the largest population in all of Azeroth, we are also going to do a little simple things. First of all, they will ask before shooting, they are not stupid and less if they see that they share enemies in common, thanks to the fact that Cenarius is still alive, bringing Furion would not be any problem as with the rest of the men (As I could see in Wc3 all non-druid troops are women, and all druids are men, so it makes sense), that would give more free time to save the Furbolts and even for Cenarius to try to get his bastard children back ... the centaurs would support the night elves being honest.
Tell me what you want to do with Illidan, will you let him rot for another 10,000 years? Or will you use him for something?.

 

[Shatterfury]

We are not forced to go the WoW route to justify classes. The Orcs, just like the Trolls and the Tauren are more primal and utilitarian thus for them Shamanism comes far more natural. The Holy Light is far more of a philosophical school of magic, not something your average Orc would do.

Only Thrall`s faction is the Horde, I estimate around 230.000 orcs alone in my first post, while Dal`Rend`s faction only 50.000 orcs.
The intention was to create a noteworthy Orc faction that is NOT the Horde but aren`t the idiots from WoW who are farmable mobs.

Considering that Lordaeron would have like 750.000 prior to the Scourge attack, and like 500.000 - 550.000 get consumed by the Scourge, the new Kingdom of Arathor at best has only half the strength of Lordaeron.
The new Kingdom would have around 300.000, easily the biggest Alliance faction, but if we are to keep some semblance of realism in our minds, they could mobilize at most 1 in 10. Thus we end up with 30.000 able soldiers, but even those can`t be held indefinitely under arms.
On the other hand the Scourge doesn`t need peasants to feed it`s army, they would have 500.000 troops, they are an existential enemy.
Gilneas and Arathor don`t need to weaken themselves with such a huge power at their doorstep.

Oh, and for the two main Alliance factions: the Kingdom or Arathor and Kingdom of Ironforge, I would like them to be separate factions that are part of the Alliance, at the end of the day we are talking about two kingdoms with all the things that entails, armies included. It was stupid in Wc3 that the Alliance, which was stated to be dominated by humans, only had 3 human units.

The Kingdom of Stormwind, with all that insurgency. doesn`t have a major force attacking them. The plague didn`t hit them in the cannon story, I don`t see why it would hit them here.

As for Worgens in Gilneas, I haven`t given a thought if it should happen or not. Gilneas could very well remain a dickhead Human kingdom who focuses of on a mix of Nature and Arcane magics. But the Worgen route is pretty interesting.

As for the numbers of the Night Elves, it is hard to grasp. They have a huge territory, but it is lightly populated jugging by the lack of large settlements.
I figure they have like 400.000 - 500.000 prior to the Legion invasion. But after the invasion they would be like 150.000. Let`s remember that the Legion targeted them. At the end of the 3rd War they would get knocked down to the second place place in the power rank after the Horde in Kalimdor.
Yes, the Night Elves are definitely their own faction and not allied to no one, at most non aggression understandings.

I haven`t thought about Illidan, but I guess we can figure out something for him between ourselves.

Ohhhh....Quel`Thalas: they get wrecked pretty hard but not to a degree of only 1 in 100 surviving. The Scourge was beelining for the Sunwell to revive Kel`Thuzard, thus from an initial population of 250.000 they remain with like 70.000 - 80.000. They reclaim their realm slowly and become even more isolationist.
No, they don`t do the stupid name change, the Quel`Dorei remain the Quel`Dorei but with a thing for Fire based spells, for obvious reasons and with a huge grudge for the Alliance for allowing this to happen.

 

[ShadowGamerXXX]

As for magic of the orcs of the eastern kingdoms, I do not necessarily speak of entering fully into some school, but being more situational, adapting it to their needs, for example some orcs in the swamp could be interested in some concepts of hydromancy since it would serve them in that place, another example would be the necroliths , they would take concepts of the plague to strengthen their skeletons and magic of death, but not so much as to fall under the yoke of king Lich, the same could happen with the "priest" trolls who could try to adopt some concepts of light to strengthen their healings (Remember that before WoW light was not such a philosophical concept , but a religion with its own God), that's what I mean, that they do not close themselves to "experimenting" with magic, combining techniques or schools until they obtain the spells that are most useful to them.
I do not say make an anti-Arathor league, but that each kingdom would take care of its own backs, they could collaborate against a common enemy (The plague), but that does not mean that they will let the other become stronger than them, it would be logical that both try to be the one that rebuilds the broken Alliance, but without trying to sabotage directly , just look at it like this: Arathor (the refugees of Lordaeron, the refugees of Dalaran and Stormgarde) and The Crown Gilnea-Alterac (Royal marriage between Gilnea and Alterac) being rivals for control of the alliance, Kultiras would be distant and would concentrate on marine colonization, but supports both to some extent as he considers them part of "Alliance".
Now the question would be if the dwarf clans are together or separated as in WoW, knowing this you could talk more about them, but it is certain that they help Stormwind in its defense, if we follow the logic of Wc3, then we can say that Garitos was right with what humanity is in danger , which means that the plague is really strong enough to get to Stormwind, although I think you're taking into account some of the coherences that WoW has and combine them with wc3's history with logic.
The thing about the night elves is a bit confusing, since remember that before the legion came almost half of its population was in the emerald dream, perhaps that is the reason why they have few important settlements, but then Teldrassil is created where you can see that they have a high population even when they were the ones who suffered the most with the legion, with which I think they would have between 200,000 - 500,000 before the legion, then they added between 100,000 - 200,000 when waking up the druids, with which that would leave them with between 150,000 - 300,000 after the third war, but like I said everything is confusing.
Oh Queltalas, your population would not really be that important, I think it would be around 50,000 in population (Recall that most of the high elves lived in Silvermoon), Kael would ascend to the throne but he could not do anything with the ruins of his ancient capital (The aura of corruption drove the elves who tried to retake it after Keltuzad), they would start living in the south of Queltalas and Lor'themar Theron would be their advisor, but I don't know what they could do to quench the magical thirst of these addicts, too I am voting in favor of isolationism.
It is good to find someone creative in this thread that seems to be abandoned, it is always good to receive feedback on one's ideas, I wish there were more people like that in the community, so maybe they would help me with my recently published story, but whatever, you are great partner.

 

[Shatterfury]

Well, the EK Orcs do delve into Blood Magic and into moderate Shadow Magic which are questionable schools of magic, but necromancy and fel are out of the question.
What I mean by moderate Shadow magic is like invisibility, damage over time smells and the like, no necromancy.

The Blackhand Clan and the Shadowmoon Clan are anti-heroes that make use of dubious magics to make up for the small numbers, but aren`t meant to give a hint of being evil and a direct continuation of the old Horde. If they would use necromancy and fel that would make them a prime target for the Alliance. The land they will claim Twilight Highlands is between the Kingdom of Khaz Modan and the Kingdom of Arathor, both powerful enough to destroy them if given enough reasons to fully mobilize.
So the EK orcs not using necromancy and fel is both for not getting wiped out by the Alliance and for getting rid of being tools of the Burning Legion.

We could think of a 3rd Orc faction that makes use of necromancy, maybe the remains of the Stormweaver and Twilight Hammer Clan got away and somehow survived, but this is another topic.

Alterac is well within Lordaron, and Dalaran is blocking any direct link between Alterac and Silverpine Forest. Plus Alterac was abolished as kingdom for like 20 years. There is no Kingdom of Alterac to speak of by the 3rd war.
Gilneas and Alterac don`t have any shred of evidence of collaboration in the lore, the first ones helped a bit but then left, the latter were traitorous bastards.
On the other hand Lordaeron and Stromguarde were best allies in the second war, and both Kingdoms lost countless sons for one another.

Plus, if you check up the population I estimated for Gilneas, 180.000 makes them the second most powerful kingdom after Lordaeron 750.000 and above Stromguarde 150.000.
So the new Kingdom of Arathor with 300.000 would be way smaller in strength than Lordaeron, Gilneas by preserving their population becomes even more important and powerful, they don`t need to unify with Alterac.

For Alterac I have thought about of 3 ways to somehow use that population:
a) Cult of the Damned
b) Mercenaries for the goblin cartels and piracy against the human kingdoms.
c) Forming a small kingdom in exile in Northrend

The Light being a religion with a god is WC2 lore, I quite like the adaptation of the Light in WC3 with it being a philosophy that let`s one tap the primal force based in feelings of the heart, with Shadow being it`s countepart with tapping the primal force based on the cold logic of the mind - hence the potential of falling into madness if tapping into Shadow too much.

For the Night Elves, we can be sure that NOT all men were into the Emerald Dream but as you said, it is hard to grasp their population.

High Elves.
The Scourge, when it attacked Quel`Thalas they went straight for the Sunwell, so that why I would like to given them a population of 70.000 - 80.000. The Scourge had to summon Archemonde so quite a lot of Elves managed to slip into the forest because the Scourge when in, summoned Kel`Thuzard and than left with the majority of their forces.
As you said, they would be very limited in their ability to wage war because they had to maintain mental discipline to not get consumed by the thirst.
A small localized campaign in Quel`Thalas could be set up to follow the High Elves making small wins against the Scourge garrison and the Amani and culminating with the recapture of Silvermoon, the fouled Sunwell and it`s subsequent renewal.
After they reestablish control of their own kingdom they vow to keep to their business but secretly use the Ranger Corps to keep their eyes on the Scourge and with their lone Lodge in the Hinterlands, because of the good relations with the Wildhammer Clan, a tap on overall events in the world.

Dwarves.
We have 3 powerful Dwarf Clans who become Kingdoms in their own right, the Ironforce Clan who founded the mighty Kingdom of Khaz Modan, the Wildhammer Clan who founded the Kingdom of Arie Peak and the Dark Iron Clan who founded the Kingdom of Grim Batol
They split many hundreads of years prior due to the Ironforce dwarves choosing to focus on digging deep into the mountain while the Wildhammer embracing the nature on he surface. The Dark Irons have become fascinated with the immaterium after settling Grim Batol many hundreds of years ago. It is a mystery what caused this obsession but the clan developed the ability to use decent shadow magic.
The Dark Irons were a bit more than weird with their use of moderate Shadow magic and prone to illogical moves even by Dwarf standards.
So the Ironforge Clan are the technological, deep digging clan who makes use of moderate Light magic due to human contact in the last hundred years. The Ironforge Clan was weary of magic because of the Dark Irons but the Light is a school of magic based on feelings of the heart so the worm feelings and it`s healing properties convinced some dwarves that at least the Light could be followed a bit in order to heal all manner diseases and harm done by other schools of magic.

The Wildhammer Clan are the least advanced clan by dwarf standards but still good smiths and stonemasons by the standards of everyone else.The Wildhammer Clan were always good geomancers but their constant wars with the Trolls in the Hinterlands made the stubborn Dwarves realize the superiority of the Trolls in magics and slowly they unlocked the ability to commune directly to the elements, especially earth and wind elements thus the Wildhammers become a more magical clan than even the Dark Irons.

The Dark Irons are good with technology but not at the level of the Ironforge clan and have good grasp on moderate Shadow magic, much like the Shadowmoon Clan. They have almost always had sour relations with the Ironforce Clan and the Wildhammer Clan and with the humans overall because the other dwarves clans had decent relations with the humans.

I guess the Dark Irons in my timeline would be set up in Grim Batol rather than Blackrock Mountain. It makes no sense for the Dark Irons to share Blackrock Mountain.
In the Second War the Horde, with the help of the Dragonmaw mounted on dragons quickly chased the Dark Iron out of Grim Batol and didn`t bother to chase them in the Twilight Highlands as well.
After the end of the Second War they reoccupy Grim Batol and keep control of a big part of Twilight Highlands with the help of the Alliance.
They keep the favour of the Alliance for a few good years but after 10 or so years the relations start to sour again thus opening the chance for Dal`Rend`s Orcs to strike at the Dark Irons without the fear of Alliance retribution, especially given the fact that Lordaeron was consumed by the Plague.

EDIT. Gnomes don`t exist.
And yes, Kul`Tiras are the maritime force of the Alliance. Arathor, Ironforge and Stormwind have few ships and have bigger problems on land, thus they concentrate on that.
The Horde doesn`t have much of a navy but the they are building a few ships given the fact that they have Goblins part of the Horde from the get-go.
The Exarchate of Zandalar is a big naval power given the fact that they occupy two big isles: Zandalar and Tel`Abin and the fact that Stranglethorn Vale is far.


I enjoy our talk very much.
Yeah, I have seen your timeline but you went straight into cosmic forces which I try to make without, only using WC3 and bits of WoW lore who are ok and workable.
I would like to do away with all the Dragon Ball crap in my timeline.

 

[ShadowGamerXXX]

It makes sense that they want to kill the necroliths, if it were other times maybe they would support that kind of magic, but currently they cannot trust anyone with death magic, as they could be an undercover plague agent. Speaking of more magic that they can try to handle, perhaps they can learn some geomancy or pyromancy since in the end they will face the Dark Iron clan, they can see it useful after the war (Besides, it would be easier to master it thanks to shamanism).
In the end the Syndicate would end up growing ironically, the plague would transform part of the survivors into bandits and in the end they would unite as part of the Syndicate. I thought of running a "Clumsy Alliance", sometimes you make bad decisions in the middle of a bad streak of tragedies and that I thought would combine with Gilneas' idiocy, but maybe the Syndicate would have a greater value as mercenaries in the eastern kingdoms. . He could make Gilneas hire them for the reconquest of Lordaeron, but by not paying what was promised they rebel, refuse to surrender the city and expel the rest of the alliance from it, then it would be conquered by the Renegades (Maybe by the mind control of their leader?).
Is the Wildhammer Clan still within the alliance? Or has it split up like in WoW?, apparently they would be the only friends of the elves, they would even teach some elves magic of nature to control their magical thirst (It should be noted that it did not work in most, but at least they would give them more time before going crazy), it also seems to be the only strong air force in the continent (The gryphon riders support that idea).
I would not like Ragnaros with the Dark Iron at all, it would only complicate things by trying to explain it coherently, the end the Dark Iron will be on the verge of leaving the alliance, but if they carry pyromancy it would be interesting things like flamethrowers, golems steam and other fire-related machinery.
The gnomes are not so important as to really alter something in the story by their absence.
I already saw a strong rivalry coming between Boralus and Zandalar for the rest of the islands in the sea of Azeroth that are not colonized.
Making a parenthesis. I like some of the WoW cosmology, but I always see a lot of inconsistencies in it. In my story I only take what I think is important to Azeroth and I don't talk about other things that may be happening but doesn't really matter for my story (See Forged by the Titans), I also make changes to the cosmology (Nothing from Shadowlands , the Titans of order are the only Titans, Elune is a goddess, a new demigod, the Loa exist but I do not name them, ect), I will only say that Agrammar trapped will be important later for the war of the ancestors.

 

[Shatterfury]

I do like your points, very good ones.
You gave me an idea.
Gilneas, in it`s drive to conquer more land, to swallow all of Silverpine Forest and eventually Lordaeron City, they would make use of Alteracians as bandits to harass Arathor in establishing control in Hillsbrad and Alterac to give time to conquer Silverpine and Lordaeron City.
With time Arathor finds out and even come to blows with Gilneas and the bandits (I guess this can be shown be having a mission in which both clash and in which Aliden Perenolde dies ). Gilneas proceeds by giving Isiden Perenolde the rank of Duke of Northern Silverpine, a Duke that swears an oath of allegiance to the King of Gilneas thus making it possible for the kingdomless Alteracians to join Gilneas.

High Elves.
Nice idea with nature magic helping with the addiction.

Wildhammer Clan.
No, the aren`t split and they are allies of the Alliance, not full members.
But it might change in the future or during the campaign.

What do you think of getting rid of Outland altogether? Let`s be honest we are talking a planet who has been cracked open. There isn`t a blade of grass left on that rock and we are sure there isn`t any oxigen left as well. Outland, in both WC3 and especially TBC is pure fantasy.

How about you help me construct an actual time line, I see you enjoy talking about it and come up with good feedback.

 

[ShadowGamerXXX]

First of all, if I would like to do a story with you, you also have very good points and respect the logic of the same world.
Basically you thought the same as I did about the Gilnea-Alterac relationship, I also see it possible that at first they wanted to unite the whole Syndicate, but they didn't get the overwhelming support they thought, because although the Alterians hate Stormgarde's quite a bit for what happened in the past, they've already gotten used to a life of anarchy. , so almost half of the Syndicate decides not to join Gilneas, but Isiden Perenolde still has contacts in the Syndicate, so they could function as mercenaries, not when Gilneas needs it, but when Isiden Perenolde sees fit, remember that the House of the Perenolde are known for being very ambitious and for "playing dirty", so one could speak of a certain alliance of the Syndicate with Isiden Perenolde, it would be somewhat risky for the stability of Gilneas, but at the same time they are very useful to protect the northern border from whatever is in Lordaeron (Cult of the damned or Renegades).
The high elves could slowly recover Queltalas thanks to the new shamans and naturalists, Kael will not make the trip to Dalaran, first he is stupidly far away, second he does not want to meet Garitos and third the elves of Dalaran will decide to stay on Arathor's side, Kael's trip will be to try to restore the Fountain of the Sun, which would lead him to recover the libraries of his own kingdom (Weren't the elves the most magically advanced?), at the end he can find stories about "elves purple "and that could help empower both Druidic magic (Night Elves) and arcane magic (Highborne), enough to purify the solar source, if you want Lor'themar Theron as leader of the high elves, Kael He could sacrifice himself to purify the Fountain of the Sun and be remembered as a hero, I did not like at all that in Wow Kael he gave himself to the Legion.
Wildhammer Clan is possibly in the best position, geographically speaking, they are in a large mountainous area, with the only coast that it has, it is after a huge cliff, although it is south of the plague lands, it is well positioned in that place. . I think that some orc clan would manage to establish a garrison with a shipyard on that coast, it is literally perfectly isolated from both the alliance and the plague, would there be problems with the dwarves? really this is not like WoW, they will not go to war in this situation, the only thing the orcs could do to annoy these dwarves is to hunt griffins, which is stupid if you realize that they are as strong as lions and can fly (Logic that does not have WoW), What would the orcs hunt then? They could fish on the coast and hunt the packs of wolves, even the few trolls that are found could join the orc clan. Most likely Falstad Wildhammer ignores them unless they expand aggressively, as he would see that these help him keep the wolf population at bay and end the sabotage of the trolls, they would maintain a peace based on mutual indifference, none want war, the Wildhammer dwarves since you have better issues to deal with and the orcs who would not try to attack someone too strong for them.
The only thing worth it about Outland, is the story of Illidan and the Draeneis (Nothing related to the Eredar... what did Blizzard smoke to turn them into space goats?). The nagas would not survive due to the absence of water and the high elves would not join Illidan, which the only good thing left is Akama with his draeneis, the only possible story would be that Illidan joined Akama to eradicate the demons of Outland and thus be away from the power of Kil'jaeden, in the end the precedent of the destruction of the Ice Crown happens , but here the story would change, Illidan would try to convince his brother Furion to destroy what little of the legion remains, destroy the Lich King, but for the Alliance or the Horde to join this I find it difficult, maybe the night elves are less stupid, do not wait... That Furion was less spiteful. But that would be the only thing that could save Outland in the story (And I only invent this because I love canon and Akama draeneis).
I would like to add that we must first think about the precedents of history, but I see that these are very clear and perfectly coherent, we just need to polish the alliance's precedents a little.

PS: Nothing from the Scarle Crusade, that would be to get too many humans out of nowhere (although I would like to, but you have to be consistent).

 

[Shatterfury]

Spoiler: Map

Let`s start with Dal`Rend`s and Maim`s Clan: The Black Tooth Grim.

What did they do in the aftermath of the Second War and where they settled.

Just like in the original timeline, the brothers don`t reach Blackrock Mountain in time, but the manage to evade the Alliance in the area and pick up the survivors.

The Bleeding Hollow Clan shows no interest in joining Rend and they go through the Dark Portal when Ner`Zul`s Horde come though.

The Black Tooth Grim Clan hides in the eastern edges of Redridge Mountain.

The rest plays out like it it in the original timeline in regards to major events. The noticeable feature is that far more orcs escape through the Portal since Outland is actually destroyed. The vast majority of orcs are imprisoned in Lordaeron and Stromguarde like in our timeline, the exceptions are the Bonechewer Clan and the Shadowmoon Clan who were imprisoned in Stormwind because those evaded capture successfully for one year. The humans used the orcs for forced labour: to mine and harvest crops mostly but also for gladiatorial fights.

The divergence occurs when the Black Tooth Grin Clan moves into Dark Iron Highlands (if you open the spoiler you will see a fan made presundering Twilight Highlands map named Wildhammer Highlands - in my timeline the Grim Batol is the capital of the Dark Iron Clan and the Dark Iron Highlands is the land that feeds the capital of the Dark Irons. ) and saves the remains of the Dragonmaw Clan from extermination when the Red Dragonflight was freed.

Shortly the Orcs manage to get control of Bloodgulch, Dragonmaw Port, Firebrand`s Patrol and Dunwald (we will change some of the names but I want you to understand what area the orcs have). The Orcs and the Dark Irons start to battle for the Dark Iron Highlands, both are evenly matched but in a feat of rage Maim pushes too deep into enemy lines and he is cut down.
Both armies regroup and the fight dies down, the Dark Irons spread the news that they slain a mighty Orc Warlord, this demobilizes and drive from the Alliance to actually join the fight on the side of the Dark Irons whom they don`t like and they figured the Dark Irons will defeat the Orcs eventually.

Rend falls into a big depression and a few years he is very lethargic while contemplating the cost of everything and questioning everything he was doing and what he went through.
After almost a decade he recovers, no longer dreaming of the title of Warchief or lamenting the loss of his brother but with one goal in mind: the preservation of the Orc race. He banishes the few remaing necromancers and warlocks and issues a kill on signt order for everyone who sees one of them.
He witnessed first hand the raw power of those schools of magic, but the gargantuan price one pays as well, this will also make the Alliance less likely to attack him and his clan.

At one point an old hermit orc comes to visit him but it turn out it is no other than Ogrim Doomhammer, the old orc figured that a reinvigorated Rend that banned the necromancers and and the warlocks can help him in freeing the rest of the Horde.
Rend quickly rebuffed the old orc and reminded him that he lost the Second War while his father, that Blackhand won the First War.
After the old orc departed Rend, following a consultation with his fellow veterans declared the Blackhand Clan born out of the Black Tooth Grin, the remains of the Dragonmaw Clan and the orcs from the Battle of Blackrock Mountain.
After all, the small corner of the Dark Iron Highlands was theirs, and given the strained relationship the Dark Irons had with the rest of the Alliance they were safe if they didn`t start a major battle.
The new clan numbered around 40.000 orcs, together with the 8.000 trolls of Smolderthorn and Firetree tribes and the 5.000 ogres of the Firegut and Spirestone tribes, he had few but poweful allies to count on.

The second decade up to the start of the Third War he fortified his position and used the trolls of scouts and get as much information as he could for any opportunity to secure a brighter future for his people.

This is the presentation of the Blackhand Clan and how it came to be, I hope you like it.

But I need your help in figuring out a flyer unit for this orc faction, and I am afraid dragons are out of the question for two main reasons: both the Alliance and all the Dragon flights will go all berserk on the Blackhand Clan. Remember, this is an anti-hero faction, making use of Blood Magic and Shadow Magic, but not Necromancy or enslaving a powerful dragon flight.

 

[ShadowGamerXXX]

I think it is very good how you explain the precedents of all the history that is forming and how you are telling the important bellicose events, I will try to explain how they can survive in these new lands and more or less how they could be carried diplomatically with their neighbors.
We will start talking about the bellico force available immediately, I have already mentioned the population of the clan, the logical thing is that it is possible to mobilize immediately only 10% of the population giving a total of 5300 troops (4000 orcs, 800 trolls and 500 ogres), but we must remember that they are warrior races, that is to say that they can mobilize many more effective immediately , I am sure that they can be able to mobilize up to 20%, in short, 8000 orcs, 1600 trolls and 1000 ogres, but they would be able to mobilize up to 40% of their entire population in the middle of a war, but this would only be possible in very long wars that seriously threaten the clan.
We go directly to the economy and its ability to self-sustain, their first way of getting food would be mainly fishing and hunting, I do not know that you could hunt in that area, but suppose that if possible, we can also count the breeding of pigs / boars but it is noticeable in the culture that hunting has always been their main source of food, we can not really count agriculture, since there are no real indications that know it, but I am almost certain that the trolls taught them something of herbalism and a small agriculture of medicinal / poisonous plants, also the land that they cover I think is not too good to do an intensive agriculture , maybe just small family plots.
As for the manufacture of weapons and tools, they are good blacksmiths but they have the problem that they do not have enough iron mines in their territories, so I see that they have to use the same weapons and tools quite a few times, so they need to loot or expand quickly to avoid being disarmed. As for siege machinery, I think they have between 50 to 100 catapults, remember that siege machinery is really very scarce in the army, but it's very destructive.
The strongest industry they would have would be the timber industry, since it is noticeable that they have good density of forests, outside of that they do not have much.
Raising wolves have the problem of needing a lot of meat for their maintenance,
that would be a problem with which the wolf riders would fall into disuse... at least as regular soldiers, I think owning wolves of war would be a sign of status in the clan, but most families with plots would own dogs/wolves not suitable for saddled use as a mount.
Flying mount... The griffins are out, because or else it would attract much attention from the dwarf clans and that would cause serious problems and could even cause greater unity in these; Orcs aren't smart or resourceful enough to make any flying machines, so this option is also out of the way; The only thing that could work, would be that it maintained a very small air force of dragons ... Let me explain, let's say that the Dragonmaw clan seeing the advance of the Alliance, decided to save some eggs from the queen of the red dragons Alexstrasza, to have a plan for later and start trying to continue breeding dragons, which would be a very long-term plan, but that's why the little air force they possessed will be a couple of dozen red dragons , the only form possessed by "Draco Riders" would be almost at the end of the third war, and for the upbringing not even to say how much would have to wait.

 

[Shatterfury]

Daaamn, I like it a lot.
I like to think about things like food, resources and population.
We will enjoy building this timeline with all the details, we will make Blizzard jealous.

Let`s start with the Humans, since they are the base around we balance the other factions.
Usually Humans can mobilize 10% of their entire population, but only for limited periods of time due to their fields requiring intensive care.
The Dwarves can mobilize 10% of their population for war, it can go up to 15% but only in times of great need.
The females don`t fight not because of any discrimination but because the enemies of the humans and dwarves are usually more muscular and even fit humans and dwarves have to rely on numbers, good quality weapons and armour to stand a chance.
But the females are engaged in agriculture and housekeeping since human, dwarf and high elf societies are more stratified.
There is worth mentioning that there are female mages or priests, but those are a very small part of the overall human and dwarf armies.

The High Elves usually can mobilize between 10% of the population. The constant skirmishing highlighted the skill of high elf females in stalking and getting the first shot in the forests of Quel''Thalas, thus females make an important and sizable part of the Ranger Corps.
In times of great need, like the Second War, the total population mobilized can rise to 15% due to the fact that females are active combatants and because a bigger percent of the High Elf population has seen some fighting due to the presence of the Forest Trolls.

Orcs can usually mobilize a total of 20% of their entire population. Just like in High Elf armies the orc females are taking over the ranged department in the Third War because of all the losses suffered by the Orcs in the last two wars.
The female orcs that go to war are usually the more muscular ones, that can rival human and dwarf males.
Female orc archers use heavier bows than the high elf ones, thus their shots are more powerful but they can`t shot as fast as them.

Trolls and Ogres are quite primitive and they don`t have a stratified society at all, not even compared to Orcs, thus their ability to mobilize for war is even greater than that of the orcs. 40% of tribe going to war is not unheard of for trolls and ogres.

Bear in mind that the Bonechewer Clan and the Shadowmoon Clan, who are used for slave labour by the Stormwindians will be freed by Rend and will join him, thus giving him access to Blood Magic and Shadow Magic. Those clans would add 15.000 each to Rend's faction.
Additional trolls and ogres joining after the start of the Third War isn`t out of the question.
So Rend will have like 14.000 of warriors to command out of 70.000 population, orcs only.

One thing to bear in mind is that even if the orcs, trolls and ogres can mobilize a lot of troops, they can`t sustain the same losses as the rest, their low population makes redounding those numbers far more harder.
A second thing to consider is that the Humans, Dwarves and High Elves, given their population size, can raise new armies from their population at the cost of causing a famine.

I like to highlight that this is just a general frame we have established here. You can bet that the humans that make it out of Northern Lordaeron to the south are mainly the warriors and their families. The civilians are the ones killed and raised into undeath.
For Lordaeron it is the literal apocalypse, so for the duration of the Third War Arathor, because of the influx of Lordaeronians, could very well have like 20% of it`s overall population under arms, but this is mainly because the Scourge is consuming Lordaeron. They will have to demobilise after the front stabilizes.
The Scourge is way worse than the old Horde, the old Horde didn`t have that many Necromancers to raise the entire population into undeath, and they still used slaves.The old Horde would at least grant a quick death, the Scourge doesn`t offer such a gift.
The fact that the old Horde used slaves can be used to explain why there are still Stormwindians around.
So if the story is in a point that makes mobilizing more troops plausible, we will make use of it. For example for the Battle of Hyjal, both the Night Elves and the Horde can go, and will go, over their limits, it is literally a battle for the very existence of Azeroth.
Oh, the Night Elves, they can mobilize like 20% of their population as well, female and males in equal measure. Not all males are druids, there are plenty to go around, and it makes no sense to have the more muscular males not fight at all.

As for the economy I couldn`t agree more.
The Orcs in general would combine all forms : rudimentary agriculture, husbandry (raising animals - they like pigs), hunting and fishing to a lesser extent.
Meat is the main course but there are plenty of vegetables as well included. This also explains the heavy build of the orcs.
The trolls and ogres usually forage and hunt. Only the trolls do some small scale husbandry and agriculture is extremely rare between trolls. Agriculture is seen by trolls as degrading and praise their warriors for being providers. Trolls are expert fishers.
The orcs are no fans of agriculture either, but they practiced it in Draenor, however they started to understand just how many mouths a large, well tented field can feed. They realized that the huge numbers of humans was possible because of it`s large scale agriculture.
As honourless and boring as it was, Rend cynically remarked that agriculture might have very well won the war for the humans allowing them to field so many troops.
Ironforge Dwarves, much like the orcs do it all, small scale agriculture due to the lack of large fields but a notice feature are the mushrooms they grow in some of their caverns, husbandry (especially goats for milk and meat), hunting and fishing, but they also rely on humans for food trading their goods food.
The Wildhammer and Dark Irons don`t trade that much and like to be self sufficient, this is one of the reasons they have a smaller population compared to their Ironforge cousins.
The High Elves have small scale agriculture, husbandry and fishing. The Ranger Corps double as hunters in the vast forests of Quel'Thalas.

This whole debate about the economy highlights the stupidity of Blizzard with setting up Rend in the original time line in Blackrock Mountain with no access to a blade of grass, animals to hunt or fish to catch.


I still think the Dragonflights will go nuts if orcs started breeding dragons to serve as war beasts. But I have figued it out, and you will like it.
What if after Rend snaps out of his depression he stumbles upon a few Bonechewer and Shadowmoon orcs that escaped captivity and they, in exchange for helping them escape from the Swamp of Sorrows, gift him Rylak eggs. The Bonechewers use Blood Magic to sap the life out of a few Human captives and transfer it into the eggs that effectively bring them back to life.
This happens like 10 years before the start of the Third War, thus in 10 years the the Orcs have time to raise almost a few hundreds, especially with the help of Blood Magic that would be used to forcefully grow the beasts to maturity in a fraction of the time.
Unfortunately those Rylaks would consume a lot of meat to the point the Blackhand Clan would stop breeding Dire Wolves for war, so no Wolf Riders for the Blackhand Clan, the Horde would continue to use them, the lands in Kalimdor are vast.
I would like for Rend to still have a wolf to ride but also have the option of riding a Rylak, if this ever becomes a campaign.
Bear in mind that those Rylaks are comparable to Drakes, if not a bit more, so we are talking of something bigger than a Griffon, a Hippogryph or a Wyvern.
This is a neat explanation that ties in with the Bonechewers, the Shadowmoons and giving the Blackhand Clan a powerful flying beast without infuriating the Dragonflights.

So at the start of the Third War, Rend will have Orcs, Trolls, Ogres and Rylaks to command. A faction with Second War vibes but not an evil one.

EDIT. I have added an updated rooster for the Blackhand Clan. Check it out!

Spoiler: Blackhand Clan & allies rooster rooster

Warrior`s Hall:
T1 melee (Great Hall) - Outrunner - Strong, versatile warrior (Swordstaff armed grunt with the ability to use nets) - 3 food
T2 melee (Stronghold & Warmill) - Berserker - Agressive warrior infused with power by it's Blood Magic infused tattoos.
Ability: Blood fury - after engaging in melee the unit has a X% chance of going berserk increasing speed but also damage taken.
(Bare chest covered with red tattoos, wields two one handed axes) 4 food
T3 melee (Fortress & Warmill) - Mauler - good all around. 5 food
Now comes the good part, to train a T2 unit you would need to have one or two T1 units trained so that you don`t mass T3 units only.
T3 units would require either T2 units trained.
So, training a Berserker would require an Outrunner, and training an Ogre mauler would require a Berserker to be already trained.

Ranged Barracks:
T1 ranged (Great Hall & Warmill) - Skirmisher - Basic female orc archer with good range. 2 food
T2 ranged (Stronghold & Warmill) - Axe Thrower - Troll axe thrower with medium range. 3 food unit.
The same mechanic would apply, a Headhunter unit would require a Skirmisher unit already trained.
T2 siege (Stronghold & Warmill) - Catapult. 3 food
Training an Axe Thrower would require a Skirmisher. Catapults aren`t affected by this mechanic.

Spirit Lounge:
T1 caster (Stronghold) - Mystics - Shadow based spells. 2 food
T1 caster (Stronghold) - Blood Magus - Blood based spells. 2 food
T1 caster (Stronghold) - Loa Priest - Troll healer. 2 food
T2 caster (Fortress) - Shadowmancer - An two headed Ogre infused with the souls of two Mystics. Can consume the soul of an unit that is under 20%.
This will unlock two powerful spells that can be used but in the process consume the soul. - 4 food
Training a Shadowmancer requires 2 T1 casters to be already trained.

Aviary:
T1 flyer (Stronghold) Bat Rider - The troll bat rider. 3 food
T2 flyer (Fortress & Warmill) Rylak Rider - An orc riding a Rylak. Good, all around. 6 food.
Training a Rylak Requires a Bat Rider.

 

[ShadowGamerXXX]

First of all, I think you found a very good flying mount, I agree that the wolf riders are going to almost disappear completely in the eastern kingdoms, on the one hand it is a perfect acquisition to avoid being destroyed by the gryphon riders, but for the other would make the looting more difficult, since they would lack light shock units, with which they would need to start developing their production methods since looting is no longer so viable, that Rend strongly supports agriculture is already a very good first Step, they only need to improve in the wood manufacturing, since according to what I saw, the orcs are not that good at handling wood, they are very basic since they simply only need handles for their weapons, catapults and some logs for their homes, Did you ever copy the bows to the elves? If they are slavers, I think that Rend can take the opportunity to learn a little about making better tools and weapons for war.
Now I will review which tools / weapons this specific clan possesses.
First of all, the great majority of the military forces will wield battle axes (Orcs and trolls), the great majority of the ogres would use rudimentary maces, although a few may have their own giant axe, other weapons that could be seen, but being a minority They are swords for the orcs and spears for the trolls of the forest.
As ranged weapons, we have that the orcs would prefer above all weapons at close range, so they use javelins in most of the support orcs, in a minority it would be bows and arrows, especially the minority weapons would be much more used by the female orcs, for the trolls of the forest small axes would be their favorite ranged weapon, but they can also use javelins to a lesser extent, very few ogres would use something other than a mace, but they could carry large slings that allow them to throw stones with great force at strong enemies.
The siege machinery par excellence is the catapult, but even so I think they can use a pair of rams against fortresses or castles, I think that eventually when fighting against the Dark Iron clan these to see the pyromancy and flamethrowers they use, they will try to copy its flammable oil to use it in the charge of its catapults, increasing its destructive power and its usefulness in open field battles.
The way to fight of this clan is to make a frontal collision strong enough to disarm the formations of the Alliance armies, but of course they are not stupid, they would first look for a favorable terrain for this and have the surprise factor on their side, Either attacking when they have their guard down or using a decoy army to surprise them on different fronts at the same time, in the end it is the best they can do since the Alliance depends a lot on formations, so even if the attack fails the alliance will still have heavy lost to the orcs.
Now we go for one of the last points, but where is its main problem, the recovery of casualties.
By having a low population that means fewer births, so the casualties can seriously affect their internal economy, but this applies to a lesser extent to trolls, since they are not guided by monogamy in most cases, That is why they are capable of having higher birth rates, but yes, not too high, on the other hand a very rudimentary medical knowledge is seen, even when compared with other races, I dare say that troll priests are a bit better trained, since at least they know that plants can be healing, while the orcs would only know those of Draenor, which have become extinct (unless they have taken a handful with them), in short, their ability to recover to the wounded orcs is low ... As for medicine, another point is natural regeneration, the inability to recover without the need for medical attention, here they far surpass humans, orcs have better recovery from open wounds, most of these are transformed into scars but not they become a problem, on the other hand the breaking of bones would be quite rare, since according to the orcs themselves, they have a much stronger skeleton than that of humans, the trolls here leave them all behind, most of them Wounds end up recovering at high speed, even the most serious ones, and regenerating limbs is an advantage that is too useful for war, because whatever happens, if they do not die they will never end up crippled, so they can participate in many more battles in their lives than Almost any race, as for ogres, I think they have the advantage that it is very difficult to hurt them, either because of their skeleton, skin and muscles, but I do not know if they have an unusual regeneration.

 

[Shatterfury]

Thanks for imput. I have added in my previous post an idea for a Rooster for the Blackhand Clan.
The Trolls will take care of the healing, which they are quite good at it.


Let`s talk about the various powers in the Eastern Kingdoms.

I have approximated the population of the various factions by multiplying their urban population by 10.

Kingdom of Lordaeron
Lordaeron City - 30.000
Stratholme - 25.000
Tyr's Hand - 10.000
Andorhal - 10.000
75.000 x 10 = 750.000 population for Lordaeron

Kingdom of Stromgarde
Stromgarde City 15.000
150.000 total population

Kingdom of Arathor (after it`s proclamation during the Third War, it is the union of the Crowns of Stromgarde and Lordaeron, and the
absorption of Dalarn and pardoned Alteracians)
300.000 population made out of Lordaeronians, Stromgardians, Dalaranians and some of the Alteracians who have been pardoned.
Southshore has grown into a 10.000 city but is unwalled.

Kingdom of Stormwind (prior to the first war, for context)
Stormwind City 25.000
Great Hamlet 10.000
350.000 total population

Kingdom of Stormwind (at the start of the Third War)
Stormwind City 15.000
150.000 total population.
Stormwind is crippled, able to defend itself but
unable to project power far away due to the large area is trying to hold onto.
A lot of the population is made out of young people who can`t be drafted just
yet.

Kingdom of Gilneas
Gilneas City 18.000
180.000 total population

Kingdom of Kul'Tiras
Boralus 10.000
100.000 total population

Kingdom of Alterac - prior to the Second War, for context only.
Alterac City - 8.000
80.000 total population

City-State of Dalaran 20.000, relied on Lordaeron for food.

Kingdom of Quel'Thalas
Silvermoon City 20.000
200.000 total population

Kingdom of Khaz Modan
Ironforge 20.000
200.000 total population

Realm of Arie Preak
Arie Peak City 9.000
90.000 total population

Kingdom of Iron (Dark Ion Clan) - prior to the Second War, for context.
Grim Batol - 14.000
140.000 total population

Kingdom of Iron (Dark Ion Clan) - prior to the Third War.
Grim Batol - 7.000
70.000 total population

The Alliance at the very start of the Third War is made up by Lordaeron, Dalaran, Kul'Tiras, Ironforge and Stormwind.
During the war Stromgarde rejoins the Alliance by merging with what is left of Loarderon and Dalaran.
At the end of the Third War the Alliance will be made up by Arathor, Kul'Tiras, Stormwind, Ironforge and Arie Peak who officially joins the Alliance.

Seeing how Ironforge has such a large population, they will have their own separate roster.

 

[ShadowGamerXXX]

I'll start trying to explain a little bit about the military organization of the alliance.
First we will take lordaeron's percentages before the third war as an example for all human kingdoms.
As we stand, 10% of the population of Lordaeron can be mobilized immediately in the event of conflict, which at first glance is 75,000 soldiers, which seems like a lot, but we really have to consider that standing armies are very expensive to maintain, so the armed forces will not always be fully trained troops, which I think will be used to a stratified militia system supported by a small standing army. , well I will start explaining so that you understand it.

Permanent army

1% Elite soldiers (Veterans of the two wars and noble cavalry)
7,500 troops.

2% Common soldiers (Permanent soldiers and light cavalry)
15,000 troops

Militia for war.

3% Militia (Guards of cities and citizens with military training)
22,500 troops.

4% Recruits (Citizens who recently joined the militia)
30,000 troops.

Unlike the orcs, not all humans are militarily active, thanks ironically to their social development, urban life and the displaced hunting by agriculture are the cause of the reduced militancy of human citizens (Applicable to a greater or lesser extent in the rest of the Alliance, but I will get to that). Of course, with the great advantage of obtaining a much greater wealth and weapons development, apart from surviving much better the war of attrition, but also with the disadvantage of being more vulnerable to the war of fear.

I'll break down each of these groups a bit.

Elite soldiers.

2,000 Knights of Lordaeron (Nobles from low to high rank, that's why they are few and also would not participate in all battles, at least in their entirety, here are also the generals and strategists of the kingdom).

3,500 Second War Champions (Armed with broad swords and a great shield and sturdy heavy armor).

2,000 Second War Champion Crossbowmen (Armed with a high-quality steel crossbow and medium armor, perfect balance between endurance and agility).

Common soldiers.

7,500 Private Soldiers (They have medium armor, medium shields and steel swords, central members of the formations).

5,000 Light Cavalry (They have very long spears, heavy leather armor, providing great speed and experts in hitting and running or in chasing / harassing enemies).

2,500 Crossbowmen (They possess crossbows, short swords and light mail armor).

Lordaeron militia.

12,500 Trained militia (They possess medium spears or swords and medium wooden shield, and medium leather armor, follow the formations of foot soldiers, using their spears behind army shields, also function as builders of basic structures such as tents, warehouses and observation towers).

5,000 Archers (It has medium bows and basic arrows, they also have a small dagger and light leather armor).

5,000 Engineers of war (They are in charge of the construction of the bases and war camps, they also manage the siege machinery of the army, they are also in charge of organizing repairs of the structures after the battles, they are also an important asset when organizing a defense in a castle or in a fortress, since they are in charge of making cheap but very useful towers).

Volunteers from Lordaeron.

20,000 Militia (They possess spears or long farm tools, they can also come with medium axes and small wooden shields, they possess light leather armor, they would normally be used for the collection of resources or to secure supply lines, they seek to overwhelm their enemies in battles or swell the current formations).

10,000 Support Militia (They have short bows, javelins or slingshots, they tend not to possess armor of any kind, they are simply only support at medium or short distance).

Final notes:

• This would basically be the formations of all human realms, since they all have too similar an organization.
• Do not worry about seeing that humans have a very small support force, for something they are allied with the dwarves and elves, or not?.
• Also don't worry that not everyone is in steel armor like foot soldiers, realistically, most before the Orcs wars were militias trained to fight with minor but annoying threats (Gnoll and forest trolls), even in the middle of those wars there was high voluntary recruitment, but as you know, ordinary citizens can't compare even to the already trained militia.

EDIT: In the middle of the third war an improvised army is formed by heavy casualties by the undead and by the adventure of Prince Arthas in Northrend, this new army of militiamen can reach up to 35% of the additional population, but under the command of the paladins, helping the recruitment and training thanks to the morale given off by the priests and silver hand paladins.

It would be divided as follows.

5% Paladins
37,500 Members

10% Armed Priests
75,000 Members

20% New militia
150,000 Members

Basically they are responsible for the fact that the dead did not manage to eradicate absolutely all the humans in Lordaeron, they would take care of the evacuation and resist as much as possible, despite the fact that all the paladins gave their best effort, the new militia would never have arrived. To be a true army, the closest they came was a well-armed militia, but it was too late to do decisive damage to the Scourge.

 

[Shatterfury]

Thanks for the comprehensive reply.
I like the details you put up! We can make a Total War army with the information you provided.

Let`s go back to overall presentation of the factions.

The Horde, at the start of the 3rd War.

Orc population
Blackrock Clan - 50.000, the most powerful and numerous clan clan by far. The entire clan passed through the portal during the first and second War and it amassed a lot of forces before passing through the portal. Even if they lost the most, many orc reinforcements joined and replenished the clan`s ranks throughout the war.
Warsong Clan - 30.000, still functions as it`s own separate clan.
Frostwolf Clan - 25.000, still functions as it`s own separate clan.
Thunderlord Clan - 25.000,
Bleeding Hollow Clan - 25.000
Burning Blade Clan - 15.000
Bladewind Clan - 15.000
Lightning`s Blade Clan - 15.000
Shattered Hand Clan - 10.000
Various micro clans and clanless orcs 20.000.
Total orc population of the Horde 230.000

Tauren population - 15.000 between all the various small tribes.
The Tauren are nomadic and on the run, thus their population is very small.
Still, an enraged Tauren can take on two orcs at once.

Goblins - 20.000, a small faction that will join the Horde once events unfold in Kalimdor.
Weak combatants but invaluable in providing support to the orcish warmachine.

Raventusk Tribe (Forest Trolls) - 5000, allies of the Warsong Clan. It was this small tribe of trolls that aided Hellscream in not getting captured.
The Raventusk also reintroduced the Warsong to shamanism and helped them keep their bloodlust in check.
The Warsong clan with it`s Raventusk allies can be a nice subfaction for the Horde.

Total Horde population - 260.000 during the 3rd war.


Exarchate of Zandalar
A proud, rigid and caste based society that has access to very adept magic users in the form of Arcanials (arcane users who mix a touch of shadow magic) and Prelates (who use Light magic). They have left Shamanism and Voodoo magic behind thousands of years ago considering them backwards.

A recent, and elaborate plan sprung by all Goblin cartels will shock this ancient society into action and make it shed it`s role as spiritual leaders of the trolls.

Zandalari Trolls - 180.000 (including Dire Trolls who make around 5% of the Zandalari population)
Jungle Trolls, all tribes - 60.000, the unfolding events will make the Zandalari act and intervene and the two troll
people join forces to stem the tide that has arisen against them under the overall leadership of Exarch Rastakhan

The Zandalari are a powerful naval force and hold undisputed domain over Zandalar, Tel`Abim and various other small isles.
The Jungle Trolls are organized into tribes that still have some societal hierarchy compared to all other trolls bar the Zandalari. The tribes are united into a lose Gurubashi Confederation that dominates much of Stranglethorn Vale but infighting happens from time to time.

Combined Zandalari and Jungle Trolls - 240.000 prior to the 3rd war.


The Night Elves
It is almost impossible to determinate their population.
So we know that they lived in communion with nature, so they relied on hunting very much, but we can be sure they did some small scale farming and beast herding.
Lordaeron has 700.000 at the start of the 3rd war, with noticeable smaller land mass, yet are a fully agricultural society unlike the Night Elves.
400.000 for the Night Elves seems of fair number at the start of the 3rd war. They will take the brunt of the Burning Legion and they will lose half of their population with ease.


The Scourge
At first it will be only a bunch of necromancers, but at the end of the 3rd War they would have well over 500.000 from Lordaeronians, High Elves and Night Elves alone.
The numbers of the Scourge would be even higher, but we have to remember that abominations are made from several bodies.

I hope those numbers give more light and make more sense and alow us to progress the story further while not forgetting about demographics.

 

[Shatterfury]

Geography and noteworthy species of Kalimdor


WoW map will do, with a few major notes.

1)Durotar is not like Mars, it`s very much like the Barrens.

2)Winterspring is not frozen Barrens, it a very hilly and forested area that is covered by snow almost permanently. There are no Goblins there, the Night Elves have a strong presence there. The only noteworthy foe the Night Elves have in Winterspring are the Ice Trolls.

3)Tanaris, it is still a desert but there is a great river flowing from the mountains bordering Un`Goro Crater, south of Zul`Farak that cuts Tararis in two. But from the middle of Tanaris it forks, a part towards the north-east, towards Steamweldeelde Port and another one towards the southern mountains.
But this wasn`t always the case, the river only flowed half a year and it stopped in the middle of Tanaris. A few hundreds of years ago Goblins, ever the explorers, found the source of the river and realized that half the water flowed towards Un`Goro Crater. They dammed the side that flowed towards Un`Goro Crater increasing the amount of water flowing towards Tanaris, than the river got it`s current shape. The river used to flow straight into the Great Sea, but because of the heat waves sometimes the rivers`s influx was too low, thus, sometimes salty sea water entered the river course affecting the vegetation. The Goblins cut the river off from the sea in the south of Steamweldeelde Port and even damned it in the south when it meets the mountain.
This actions made Tanaris major food producers despite it being a desert.
Tanaris is a Goblin stronghold housing hundreds of thousands of Goblins.
The only major treats are the Sand Trolls, who ironically have been partially saved due to the actions of the Goblins, and the Silithid.
No stupid Uldum or retard time traveling garbage in my Tanaris.

4)Feralas is dominated Feral Wargen who are contested by Satyrs mainly and Centaurs, Quillboars, Night Elves and Tauren to a lessser extent.
No Ogres and Gnolls, those are not native to Kalimdor.

 

[ShadowGamerXXX]

Very good organization for the horde at that time, I love that it adds coherence to the globins, How is it possible that they do not find created an artificial river in the canon with its cutting-edge technology?.
Here I will seek to explain more in depth the context where the factions are in this story, I will explain a little each extra race that finds in this world (Simplifying it enough, there really are an absurd amount of races, you just have to eliminate the redundant ones)
Here I will divide them into minor races and mini factions, the first are background races that will be a constant annoyance but without becoming a huge problem, and the second are well-constituted races that would eventually unite with some relevant factions or sub-factions ... Let me explain.

Minor races (Eastern kingdoms)​

Gnoll: There is no need to explain this race, they are small tribes distributed by the south and in some cases by the center, here they would not be stupid, anger does not blind them, they would be more organized.
Population: Between 10,000 and 20,000 in total, distributed in ten clans, but would live in semi-permanent camps in groups of 20 to 100 members, covering a huge area, but without having a real influence in that area.
Military data: They handle stone axes or weapons with a very rudimentary foundry, on the other hand they have crossbows with poisonous arrows, the most remarkable are their shamans with rudimentary magic.

News: They are organizing from time to time in groups of up to a maximum of 1000 warriors, to loot military positions, currently several tribes are organizing to take advantage of the precarious situation of Stormwind and thus claim territories in Redridge Mountains, managing to settle in the south-east of the region and pushing more towards the center. On the other hand they are also managing to get another group of clans to settle in the same Elwynn forest.

Dangerousness: The great majority of the alliance is safe since the plague ended with the race in the north and in the center they have almost no presence, but Stormwind does have a big problem with these gnoll, especially because they are beginning to make more organized camps, even with garrisons, according to the SI:7, it allows the gnoll to live up to 500 at a time in these garrisons, being a challenge for the reduced army of the city.
The dwarves will most likely help Stormwind eradicate these gnolls from the Elwynn forest, but it can be very costly to finish them in the Redridge Mountains as they are mostly found here.

Lifestyle: Nomad or semi permanent, although they recently managed to develop small plots of wheat in Redridge Mountains, if
neglected they will manage to settle permanently.

Murlocs: This race is explained alone, I can not say how many they are, but the sure thing is that they are many, they live wherever it paves moderately clean water, end of the matter

News: Nothing relevant, they only threaten the coasts and rivers, so if they are not constantly eliminated it will greatly affect fishing and increase the cost of maintaining boats

Dangerousness: It's very low, they don't have any desire to keep moving forward overland, but a problem is a problem, no matter how small it is it needs to be addressed.

Lifestyle: Semi permanent, they live mainly from fishing, but also their diet is made up of algae and meat from anyone who comes very close to one of their camps.

Mini factions (Eastern Kingdoms):​

Different minor clans of trolls, ogres and orcs: I group them all in the same place since they are practically the same, the only thing that would change their location would be.

Related factions: The Blackhand clan is really the only place where they could be accepted; in the case of trolls they could also join the Gurubashi Confederation.

Dangerousness: They would mainly be a problem of the Alliance, although I do not reject the idea of forming groups of looters to attack the remnants of the horde.
In Queltalas the Kaldoreis would have problems with the trolls of the forest, the plague ended up balancing the scales, so both are at the same level in military terms, with which I think there will be a guerrilla war here, to claim what is left of Silvermoon and its surroundings.
The ogres would be a major problem for their resistance, which could end in a costly war for their complete elimination from the alliance lands.

The Rebels Defias:
The old guild of Freemasons of Stormwind has managed to organize itself into a real force to take into account, at least for Stormwind, playing a little with the numbers I think they could have 5,000 members in their ranks as soldiers and up to 10,000 as support members (Farmers, blacksmiths, lumberjacks ...), capable of becoming a militia in case they are needed,

Organization (Soldiers):
500 Instructors/Defias Strategists
2000 Veterans Defias
1500 Long Arches Defias
500 Spies/Assassins Defias
500 War Engineers Defias

Organization (Militia):
5000 Constricts Defias
3500 Light Horsemen Defias
1500 Defias Trappers.

Distribution: They have more than half of Westfall completely conquered, apart from having 65% of their troops, having their own ''Capital'' being this The Deadmines.
The rest of his forces are in Elwynn Forest, attempting to sabotage StormWind and form outposts and then attempting to take the city.

Relationships: They currently have a mutual non-aggression pledge with the gnolls, but still neither is allowed to set foot on each other's lands.
They are in a constant war with Storwind and are not willing to give up.

Danger: It is one of the factors that has in danger the poor stability that still possesses the Alliance, they are not a too big military danger for the allies of Stormwind, but if the revolution is given it can finish opening enough wounds in the Alliance and can propitiate its dissolution by demoralization and for demonstrating that it returned to be ineffective. It is necessary to act before they achieve their objectives.

Future of the faction: Currently Varian Wrynn is doing what he can with his army, while waiting for support from Ironforge and with that he will seek to recover the lost areas in the Elwynn Forest, even so he notes that the campaign would be quite long to recover all of Westfall, and he must still deal with the gnolls in Redridge Mountains, he is looking at trying to parley with the rebels, although his fighting spirit is enormous, he understands that his people are suffering enough for all this and it is necessary to put an end to this civil war, if the campaign takes too long, he would be willing to do some negotiations with the rebels, maybe forcing the nobility to pay the debt contracted and reforming the Masons Guild could placate the rebels or make them abandon their leaders. Either way, he needs to stop this as he must rejoin the Alliance and stop being a dead weight, so Stormwind can recover from so many wars.

 

[Shatterfury]

I agree and I like your take. We see eye to eye and both put value on plausibility.

The Gnolls don`t use crossbows, those kind of weapons are too complicated for them to manufacture, they use bows or throwing spears.
The Gnolls are extremely adaptable so they have retaken over the lands they used to inhabit prior to the First and Second Wars: Blackrock, Searing Gorge, Badlands, Redridge Mountains (who is heavily contested with Stormwind) and Eastern Badlands.

They are represented by the brown stripes on the map.

On the uploaded map you can see the positions of the new factions that differ from established lore.

Black - The Blackhand Clan
Gray - The Kingdom of Iron (Dark Iron Dwarves)
Green - The Gurubashi Confederation
Orange - Steamwheelde Cartel
Yellow - Venture Co Cartel - in Eastern Redridge Mountain - the area used to be Gnoll territory but the Horde drove many of the Gnolls away in the First war. Once the Horde was defeated in the Second War, the Venture Co established itself in the area before the Gnolls resurfaced.

All other factions inhabit the land they have in lore.
And I underline that this is BOFORE the start of the Thrid War.

This is my map of the Eastern Kingdoms, I hope you like it!

 

[ShadowGamerXXX]

It's great the map you managed to make before the third war, I'm trying to make maps AFTER the third war, that's why Stormwind has problems with the Defias, we can say that the rebels took the opportunity to advance more aggressively after Stormwind sent a good part of his army to support Lordaeron (or what was left of it), in the future I plan to have Varian Wrynn appease the rebels, In the end the Defias rejoined Stormwind but now as a militia regiment combined with the old Masons Guild, in theory they would have more autonomy and the southern part of Westfall would be their headquarters, to watch over The Gurubashi Confederation, their spies would form a new team within the S I: 7 and would help to rebuild, arm and train the vulnerable areas in guerrilla tactics, but they will probably last a long time in civil war until they decide to make a pact.

With the gnolls we know that they are scavengers in all rule, their best weapons are those that they managed to steal from the battlefields, I believe that if they can carry crossbows, since at first they would be the ones they found in the corpses of the army of Stormwind, then over time they could decipher their manufacture by disassembling them and studying their parts, which is very likely since they have been living near Stormwind since long before the first war, so why do not know almost nothing of smelting following that logic? in theory they know how to make swords, axes and spears, but what they don't know is how to melt metals, they know that forges are necessary for that and most probably they are just trying different soils from different places until they find the ones they can use, obviously they would be very full of impurities and that's why their weapons would be of very low quality, maybe later they could figure out how to obtain pure metals, but for now the only thing they can completely figure out is the manufacture of crossbow, which takes time, but at the end of the day it would be their best weapon (based on observations of Warcraft materials, especially the Warcraft 3 canon). This may change in the gnolls that manage to move to an agrarian life form, but that would take a long time before they can get real steel and threaten another realm.

Now we have to talk about a precedent too important for the Alliance in this universe... Lord Garithos... let's be honest, without that bastard Calia Menethil would probably be another corpse in the Plague, he couldn't really recover Lordaeron but at least he could pave the way for Arathor, most probably he would allow the royal marriage between Stormgarde and Lordaeron, becoming a recognized general of the New Arathor and he will keep pushing to recover Lordaeron and exterminate the plague, no mind control or death by Silvanas, he would be in the front away from the dwarves to avoid internal problems in the army.

Thinking of some ideas to make the Plaguelands more interesting, I thought about leaving the Scarlet Crusade, quiet, it would not be another stupidly large faction, it would only be a small remnant of the militia created by the paladins, even having the Chapel of the Divine Light and they can probably make headway in the Plaguelands, their population would reach 35,000 members.

Arranged as follows:
2,500 paladins
7,500 armed priests
10,000 Scarlet Hunters
15,000 Scarlet Zealots.

(Most of the area is empty, it is not claimed by the plague or by the crusade, but if we canon the death knights, then those would be their lands, along with part of the lands of the crusade).

 

[Shatterfury]

Yeah, I also thought about having another minor Human nation in Tyr`s Hand and the enclave.
How about City-State of Tyr`s Hand ? Tyr`s Hand is already the city of churches.
They can have the whole Light fanaticism vibe. The Scarlet Crusade sounds like an organization on the move with a very specific goal in mind.

As for Garithos, if you want to make him part of the story, sure, but we need to tone down his racism a bit. Ironforge and Wildhammer Dwarves will provide significant support.



Well, enough backround details! Let`s start the timeline. Bear in mind I have building this timeline with WC3 style campaign in mind.


The Horde, Freedom`s Call
Ogrim Doomhammer, Grommash Hellscream and Thrall lead the Frostwolf and Warsong Clans in liberating the rest of the Orcs from the interment camps.
Unfortunately Ogrim dies during the last and the biggest battle, the Battle for Durnholde Keep. But before he could draw his last breath Ogrim proclaims the young Thrall Warchief of the Horde.
During this battle Thrall confronts and kills Aedelas Blackmoore.

Lordaeron and Stromgarde begin marshaling their forces but Thrall is visited by a mysterious figure that informs the young Warchief that the Burning Legion will consume this world if action isn`t taken and the Horde doesn`t go to Kalimdor, the place where the climatic battle for the Azeroth will take place.
Thrall`s eyes see a human, but the spirits inform the Warchief that he has in from of him a being of great power.
The next day he informs the powerful being that he will heed his call, but can`t get there.
The mysterious figure tells him to gather the next day with all the shaman the Horde can muster. As promised, he appears with a strange book in hand and starts a conjuration. After a hour of doing the strange incantation a portal opens, the mysterious figure asks for the magical assistance of all the gathered shaman and asks Thrall to begin the hasty evacuation.

During this time Lordaeron and Stromguarde gathered a sizeable force and are clashing with the Horde forces but they aren`t aware of what happens and don`t want to risk a major engagement until even more troops are gathered. This plays in the hands of the Horde who, with very minimal losses, manage to hold the Alliance at bay while the evacuation is underway.

With the evacuation completed the mysterious figure concludes that if Thrall leads the Horde well, it will make up for the crimes it committed ten fold, even if they, themselves, will not comprehend it. He than takes the book he used for the incantation back to Dalaran.

In a WC3 campaign format, this will be a lengthier tutorial campaign. If Thrall`s escape from Drunholde, him finding the Frostwolves and becoming a Shaman are included, we can have a full blown campaign. Both the Battle of Durnholde and the Great Escape can be epic battles, one offensive, the other one defensive.


Alliance, Scourge of Lordaeron (Lordaeron)
This campaign is almost like the original one, the only exceptions are at the start when the first two missions are against Horde forces who are foraging for food, not gathering people for sacrifices. The campaign follows it`s course with Arthas leading forces from the mighty Kingdom of Lordaeron and consuming himself with vengeance and finally falling to damnation.
As noted in our previous talks the majority of the units are human, from the Footman, who now has a chinmail tunic, not full plated armour, to the Crossbowman, to the Halberdier, to the Human Priest and even a giant ballista. The Ironforge Dwarves units recruited from the Workshop, in the form of Gyrocopter and Steamtank, the Wildhammer Gryphon Raider from their Aviary and come later in the campaign.

 

[ShadowGamerXXX]

Alliance, Scourge of Lordaeron (Lordaeron)

- A change I would make in the lore would be in the scourge troops, they should start as weak skeletons, zombies and some beginner necromancers, but as the campaign develops each time better units come out, for example, by the middle of the campaign the weak skeletons become armed skeletons, the zombies in a stronger variant of these, and the beginner necromancers in master necromancers, at the end of the campaign they would be necrophages, abominations and Archnecromancers.
It would make a lot of sense that at the beginning the plague is weak and only based on numbers, since even the necromancers are learning how to make soldiers and as time goes by they discover better ways to make the corpses stronger.

- We could also experiment a little with the human tech tree, at the beginning we would have experienced militiamen, militia archers and light cavalry, then with an improvement these would be upgraded, for example the experienced militiamen to foot soldiers, they would have an improvement in their stats and the ability to defend, it would be like foot soldiers, crossbowman and mounted spearman, at the end if we would have war veterans, veteran crossbowman and knight.

- The army would be divided in the barracks, the chapel, the aviary and the workshop, in the barracks would be the standard troops, in the chapel would be the priest, the wizard (Warcraft 1 and 2 style, but only as a wizard not final troop) and the apprentice paladin, in the aviary would be the griffin rider but we would need to fill it with something else, maybe two additional upgrades for the griffin? (Like the "Strong" troops of Warcraft 1 and 2), or another troop, the workshop would be the troops we know, demolition equipment, Gyrocopter and Steamtank, I also thought about maybe putting the rifleman here, it would be a strong ranged troop but more expensive than the crossbowman.

- The elves have nothing to do here, aren't they supposed to be separating from the alliance?, so it makes sense that no elven troops are to be found here.

- It would be a nice wink that in the purge mission, one could not make a chapel, as it makes no sense for the priests to help in such "dark" (according to themselves) work.

 

[Shatterfury]

Hey! I have been busy with personal stuff, now I should be a bit more free.

I don't know if the WC3 engine is suited for complex trees in the case of Human technology trees.

Yes, there are no Elves in the Human or Dwarf trees.

The Scourge will surely have skeletons, the models are in the game.

Another thing that I realized is that the Nerubian war cannot happen before the Scourge of Lordaeron, the Scourge doesn't have the numbers to fight such a powerful, numerous and well entranced foe.


Scourge, Path of the Damned

The campaign is very similar in structure and the narrative is the same.
Notable exceptions are the presence of skeletons in the first missions.
The Scourge needs to ravage Lordaeron and Quel'Thalas before they gather more bodies.

Notable units will be the skeleton archers who are a 1 food unit that will be replaced with Damned Archers - dead High Elf Archers - 2 food, after the first mission in Quel'Thalas.


Blackhand Clan, The Blackhand rises.

This campaign follows Dal'Rend and his rantag band orcs, trolls and ogres.

The action in this campaign takes place at the same time as the Scourge campaign.

Following the ensuring chaos caused the the rampage of the Scourge through Lordaeron, Dal'Rend feels that the time to act is now.
His first move will be to go to the Swamp of Sorrow to convince the Shadowmoon Clan to join his clan and take the Highlands for themselves. The Blckhands have had constant with the Shadowmoons and the remaints of the Bonechewers for some time. Their constant help with food, weapons and the occasional war party would bear fruit when the Shadowmoons gifted them some Ryalek eggs who were brought back to life with Blood Magic by the Bonechewers, thus giving the Blackhands a powerful air unit.
Upon arriving Dal'Rend helps the Shadowmoons in hunting down some Mystics who have delved too deeply into Shadow magic and are now being consumed by it.
The Shadowmoons explains the subtitle yet important difference between making moderate use of Shadow magic(moderate use of Void magic) and giving in to the All Consuming Nothingness (in actuality Void magic).
Dal'Rend makes an analogy with Fel Magic and understands why the Shadowmoons wanted those Mystics dead for giving in to the All Consuming Nothingness.

The next mission will be about freeing a part of the Shadowmoon Clan that is imprisoned along with the majority of the Bonechewer Clan by the Kingdom of Stormwind.

After freeing up the orcs, and beating back a force of Stormwindian troops sent after them in the Swamp of Sorrow, Dal'Rend is questioned by the elderly Chieftain of the Bonechewers, how he become so calculating.

With preparations underway to move the two small clans to the Highlands, Dal'Rend begins to recall what happened immediately after the conclusion of the Second War and what changed him.

After gathering the orcs that escaped interment following the Battle of Blackrock Mountain, he fled to the Highlands, east of Grim Batol.
There, after setting up, a big battle erupts between the Dark Irons who are trying to recover their lands.
This mission can be a spawn mission, in which the two bases spawn units and you, with the heroes have to help your troops push.
While Dal'Rend and Maim manage to destroy the Dark Iron base, Maim, in a cutscene at the end, pushes further and is killed in an ambush.
Dal'Rend, after killing the ambushers falls into a depression.

The next mission takes place right when the Battle for Grim Batol starts, Ronin frees the Red Dragonflight which proceeds to exterminate the Dragonmaw Clan.
In the ensuring chaos, thousands of Dragonmaws try to reach the Black Tooth Grin bases.
Dal'Rend is awakened from his lethargy by the sheer urgency of the situation, he realizes what has transpired, how the orcish race was used, and how it's survival is now at stake.
And for him to realize this, his brother had to die. Dal'Rend rallies some warriors and pushes into Dark Iron territory and helps the fleeing Dragonmaw reach his base.
After making sure a lot of the Dragonmaws reach the Black Tooth Grin base, Dal'Rend confronts the handful of Warlocks still residing with his clan, he fully understands that there can be no future as long as those that follow the all corrupting fel still reside with his people.

After this mission is over we go back to present day, the orcs have arrived in the Highlands. We see tens of ships unloading Shadowmoon and Bonechewer orcs. Dal'Rend is questioned about the situation in the Highlands, he speaks about the major settlements and how.
He also underlines that 4 years after the Battle of Grim Batol, after all the toil of building up the defenses and stabilizing the food supply, the orcs under his command came together like a clan, thus the Black Tooth Grin Clan, together with all the other remains from the Battle of Blackrock Mountain and the Battle of Grim Batol, became the Blackhand Clan, in remembrance of the first Warchief of the Horde.

The next two or three missions revolves around beating the Dark Irons and conquering the Highlands and sealing off the entrance from Grim Batol to the Highlands.

An interlude than presents a large force of Ironforge Dwarves laying siege to Grim Batol, but it`s rear is being attacked by demons of all things. Dal'Rend meets king Magni in person, the dwarf in charge of the grand army. While they are assessing the situation with the Dark Irons and the demons. While they are conversing a lone Stromgardian Knights appears and pleads for help, Stromgarde City itself is under siege. The actions that need to be takes were a forgone conclusion. The Blackhands are in full agreement with their Chieftain: the demons must be stopped, the tragedy that happened on Draenor must not happen again, the orcs WILL not be slaves again. The Dwarven army lifts the siege and together with a Blackhand host sets for Stromgarde City.

The next mission will have Dal'Rend, Tagar Spinebreaker, Chieftain of the Bonechewer Clan, and Magni with a handful elite units clear their way for the combined forces that will follow them towards Arathi.

The Battle for Stromgarde City sees the Dwarves and the Orcs arrive and beginning to build up their bases and joining the battle alongside the Stromgardians. In this mission Dal'Rend and Tagar spearhead the Blackhand forces in pushing the demons and the undead back. After their bases are destroyed, Dal'Rend and Tagar enter a duel with the Pit Lord that lead the forces, the player will have to win the duel with clever positioning and the creates that contain potions and wards of all kinds. When the Pit Lord is brought to 1% a cinematic triggers in which Tagar is slain but Dal'Rend kills the Pit Lord.

With the conclusion of the battle and the duel a lone Ryalek Rider appears and informs the battered yet victorious forces that the Dark Irons have resurfaced from Grim Batol and are assaulting the entrance to the Highlands. Dal'Rend nods towards Dwarves and the Humans as a salute and orders a speedy march towards the Highlands to his forces.

 

[ShadowGamerXXX]

The campaign looks very good, in the end it makes sense this sort of "truce" as obviously neither side is in a position to wipe out the other side without dooming itself.
Thinking more deeply about it, I think I can include the refugees of Lordaeron and Dalaran perfectly, even the times would fit, since many things happen at the same time.

Campaign: Lordaeron's refugees

I would start with a prologue showing the Lordaeron militia formed by the paladins, everything really begins with a discussion of two sides, the first side want to try to reach the Hand of Tyr, as their scouts have noticed that the plague does not seem to be well organized (Since here would begin the civil war between the lords of terror and the cult of the damned, even Silvanas could already appear in the story), they really believe they can manage to entrench in that area. The second side wants to fight to the last man in the south of Lordaeron, in order to protect the refugees who try to flee to the other human kingdoms (This happens after Arthas' attempt to kill all the refugees fleeing in the first chapter of the campaign of the undead in The Frozen Throne). The ending is clear, both groups are divided, but most of them decide to stay and fight, while the refugees never knew anything about this.
The first mission would be to survive with a high level base of the Lordaeron militia, being attacked by the undead and demons, after 20 minutes the mission ends, with the refugees "safe" and these believing that all the paladins were eradicated that day (which is not so thanks to the other group is still alive). Then the other mission could be caravan style (Like the mission where Maive and Tyrande help Kael to reach the other side of the river), the heroine would be a hooded girl who would lead the survivors until they manage to find a human military camp, discovering that they are the troops of Garithos, formed by the little of the real army of Lordaeron that survived and mercenaries who try to survive, it is revealed that the girl was Calia Menethil who managed to survive all this and Garithos mentions the plan to capture Dalaran (explained in an interlude), where he mentions that the Kirin tor has not been completely exterminated and that they are now under the command of Jaina Proudmore (Ronhin will arrive soon after saving the red dragons), and now they will seek to conquer Dalaran, since the presence of the undead and demons have fallen considerably (by the same civil war), so it would go to the next chapter.
Then the next mission is to secure the rear by repairing the observatories on the way to Dalaran (The first mission of the blood elves but in reverse, starting with the last observatory and ending with the first), the only thing to note is that they would notice that the undead are divided into two factions, which would facilitate the mission, after repairing the observatories they notice the base of the Kirin tor and Garithos finds a perfect area to set up camp with Calia.
The next mission would be to defeat the Legion camps with the help of the Kirin tor and Jaina, there would be one or another line that would mention that Garithos doesn't like to work with the elves, but he can't be too demanding in these moments of need, there would also be an optional mission where one would "help" a base of the cult of the damned (Aggressives of course), to defeat the enemies that prevent them from advancing against the legion camp (then it is explained that as all undead were exterminated after the battle), at the end Dalaran passes into the hands of the Kirin tor and begin with their repairs, but Garithos wants to continue looking for more humans and above all he is curious to know if the other kingdoms are also in trouble, so Jaina sends a regiment of mages along with him. The next mission is to cross a pass to Tarren Mill, but on the way they are bothered by bandits and Syndicate troops (they go along the coast, they never enter the city), after clearing the road Calia suggests him to protect this road as it would be useful to connect by land with the other human kingdoms, so Garithos sets up some lookouts and sends a message to Jaina to also help with some lookouts to protect the road (Jaina takes it seriously and plans to build some towers to protect the road from the Syndicate).
After arriving to Tarren Mill, Garithos notices that he arrived at the right time to prevent the settlement from being exterminated, so he starts to investigate the area to look for survivors, in the end he even manages to enter through the south of the Silverpine Forest and... Here it's up to you, find the wall of Gilneas still standing or find the wall destroyed (Which would scare him a lot, since not even the largest defensive construction made by a human survived the plague), even hear very strange howls in the forest, then decide to return to Tarren Mill before the undead kill him (An interlude all this).
It is explained that after a couple of days of rest for the troops, they notice that a large force of the undead is passing in the distance, the only thing they can do is try not to attract attention, after hiding for a couple of days more, they try to explore further south to see what happened ... Southshore was completely wiped out... But Calia notices something strange, she sees as if this area has been bombarded by... Although they try, they can't find any sign of a ship of that magnitude, but all the soldiers keep hoping that there are still other human kingdoms that are still fighting.
The penultimate mission would be that Garithos notices a large force of undead, but as if they were a rearguard, he realizes that they may be besieging Stromgarde, so he makes a risky move to fight against these undead, he wins against this enemy force, but suffers heavy casualties, but still grab the survivors and begin to march to Stromgarde.
The last mission is also the siege of Stromgarde, but we only control the heroes (Jaina returns and we start with a small army composed of human troops and Dalaran magic troops), we earn money by defeating the enemies and then use it to recruit troops (showing that they are low on army), we have to help the AI to destroy bases, here it would also be good to have lines to explain some interactions with the characters, as well as to explain to Garithos, Calia and Jaina that the orcs are not enemies in this battle.
Then it would be good to make two epilogues, the first one to close the story of Garithos and explain the formation of New Arathor. In general terms, the marriage of Calia Menethil with Galen Trollbane is planned, the contact with the dwarves is reestablished, New Arathor is founded and Garithos receives the title of "High General of New Arathor", for his bravery to protect and guide the refugees of Lordaeron with Calia Menethil, here ends the complete relevance of Garithos, since before he was the only one who made the decisions, now in spite of having an important position, the new kings of New Arathor are the ones who make the decisions and that is why now they will be the most relevant here, in the end Garithos will be in charge of creating a garrison at the entrance of the Silverpine Forest and protect the area from the advance of the plague, so that the reconstruction missions can be done more easily, although of course, he will begin to pressure his kings to make the reconquest of Lordaeron. It is also worth mentioning that no one will know anything about the settlement of the Hand of Tyr, since everyone thinks that absolutely all the Lordaeron militia and the paladins sacrificed themselves so that the refugees could survive.
The other interlude would deal with the rebuilding of Southshore, where the Kultiras flag starts to be noticed in the distance and then a group of battleships stop at the destroyed settlement, here would be Daelin Proudmore, where he would explain that he previously sank a plague fleet, but that he had arrived late and then he only saw Southshore completely invaded by the undead, so in a fit of anger, he unloaded all the arsenal of the battleships he had at that moment on the infected settlement looking to finish with every undead of the place. Then he would meet with the kings of New Arathor, a discussion would be formed, on one side they wanted Kultiras to unify with New Arathor, but Daelin would not be interested in that, because in the end Boralus is completely fine although almost all the eastern kingdoms were destroyed, but in the end Daelin noticing that the kings think that he does not want to help them against the undead, he mentions them not to be confused, that although he is not interested, he is not interested in the undead. he mentions that they should not be confused, that although he is not interested in being part of New Arathor, if he is willing to rebuild the alliance and become a member of it again, that equally, no matter what happens, he would always help New Arathor with what he can, to honor the memory of his greatest friends (Terenas and Thoras). Although Daelin Proudmore is much calmer thanks to the fact that he now knows that his daughter Jaina is not only still alive, but is now the leader of the Kirin tor, this being the heiress of Antonidas. But deep down Daelin has the project of dominating the seas and that is why he is doing a colonization program (which would eventually end up colliding with Zandalar, since both have the same ideal).

 

[Shatterfury]

Wait, wait, wait! Patience, that campaign, with New Arathor, will come after we run though what is the Reign of Chaos. Besides, we already have a human campaign - the Scourge of Lordaeron.


Kingdom of Khaz Modan/Thanedom of Arie Peak - Stubborn like a Dwarf

This campaign focuses on the Ironforge Dwarves, and Wildhammer Dwarves partially, as their own faction with access to Human units to complement their sturdy units. The Wildhammer Dwarves will not have a full rooster but enough units to complete their missions.
The campaign will feature Magni, Muradin and Bran Bronzebreard in Ironforge missions and Falstad Wildhammer in the Wildhammer missions.

The Ironforge Dwarves will feature: Dwarf Warriors (reskinned Footman) - 2 food, Shieldbreakers - 3 food, Ram Riders - 4 food, Rifleman - 3 food, Priests (Ironforge version) - 2 food, Mortar Team - 3 food, Siege Tank - 5 food (far better than the Steamtank) and the Gyrocopter.
The Humans will grant access to Horse Guards - 5 food - a mercenary Knight in the service of Ironforge, and a caster to augment the magical front of the Dwarves. The Wildhammer will provide their Gryphon Riders.

The Wildhammer Dwarves will feature: Dwarf Warriors (reskinned Footman) - 2 food, Huskarl - 2 handed axe unit - 3 food, Hunter - Wildhammer dwarf with a powerful crossbow - 3 food, a Dwarven Ballista - 3 food, a Healer unit - 2 food and easier access to Gryphon Riders.

The first mission takes place in Anvilmar in which you have to take on Troggs attacking the town with Brann. It is a simple mission in which you just control a bunch of units and you find more while help Anvilmar defend itself.

The second mission will have Brann join Muradin who is drilling the town guard of Kharanos. Upon arriving Bran informs Muradin about the attacks, he says there was a few attacks on Kharanos as well, but before they can finish their conversation the Frostmane also attack the town from the west. This is a standard build the base and attack and wipe the base as well. You have to destroy the small Troll encampment in the west but also seal the caves that spawn constant Trogg attacks from the east. Upon finishing the mission a cutscene will show what looks like a Dwarf rifleman going west into de woods,

The third mission will have the brothers join their King in Ironforge. The great city is under siege from within. Magni, Brann and Muradin join forces and methodically push back all the Troggs and seal all the holes. This is a mission in which you control only units and gain control of more by eliminating the city.
Upon completing their task the borthers speak in a cutscene. They conclude that it was all too well coordinated to be random. A Rifleman informs them all that a Dark Iron force have been seen skulking in the south of Ironforge heading west.
Magni concludes that one or both of the garrisons guarding the entrance from Loch Modan have fallen. Time is of paramount importance thus he dispatches Muradin east, to seal the entrance to Dun Morogh while he and Brann confront the Dark Iron force.

The forth mission will feature Magni and Brann in a standard build and destroy enemy base. The Dark Irons are joined by the Frostmane, the combined force fight well but it is no match for the Dwarven host led by their king. Upon completing their task, Brann is tasked in joining Muradin with the forces at hand. Muradin takes upon himself to raise another force and join them later.

The fifth mission takes place almost at the same time as the forth one. Muradin arrives and eliberates the South Gate Garrison from the Troggs and gets control of the base.Than he proceeds to reconquer the North Gate Garrison from the Dark Iron forces occupying it. In the aftermath of compleeting the mission Bran and the rest of his the forces join Muradin. They make preparations of moving into Loch Modan and see what awaits them there.

The sixth mission takes us to the Hinterlands, in the lands of the Thanedom of Arie Peak. Falstad Wildhammer takes upon himself to quell the resurfaced Forest Troll threat in the middle of the Hinterlands, east of Arie Peak. This map is big, it will feature two Dwarf settlements that are under constant attacks from Shadra`Alor and Altar of Zul. The settlements will have their own forces who, in general, will be able to defend themselves but will need your help in from time to time. You will need to keep the town halls from falling while you gather soldiers and enough funds to buy your own units. If the settlements are well defended they gather forces and attack the Troll settlements themselves. You will also have secondary missions regarding Gnolls. You control only Falstad Wildhammer and the units he finds and buys with the gold he acquires, you don`t build anything in this mission. A Gryphon Raider arrives after the mission is completed with grave news, the Undead are sieging Arie Peak.

The seventh mission will have Falstad Wildhammer make his way through the Undead blockade and taking control of the entire city. You than precede to build a huge armed force and defeat all Undead forces sieging Arie Peak.

An interlude than moves us back to the Bronzebreards. Brann and Muradin have chased the Dark Irons from Loch Modan and from the south part of Wetlands, but the Dark Irons didn`t make any stand, only skirmishing with the Bronzebreards. After a month of this taking place Magni appears with a new army. With the Dark Irons largely driven away, and with such huge forces gathered, the time for bold moves is at hand. Magni plans to march on Grim Batol itself to bar any troops from leaving the Dark Iron capital, Brann and Muradin are tasked with retaking the important port of Menethil Harbour.
This ties with the Blackhand campaign when Dal`Rend meets Magni at the gates of Grim Batol.

The eighth mission will feature Muradin and Brann taking on the task of reconquering Menethil Harbour from the well entranced Dark Irons. This will be a long and hard battle.

An interlude starts and concludes reconquering of Menethil Harbour and the informes us about the Battle of Stromguarde City. Brann and Muradin prepare themselves for pacifying Wetlands and managing the streams of of Human refugees coming via boats from Southshore to the north of Wetlands. in the background Dwarf forces stream towards Arathi Highlands to join their king.

The nineth mission, the Battle for Hillsbread, will feature Falstad and Magni leading the Dwarf forces, Thoras leading the forces of Stromguarde and Jaina leading the Lordaeron forces from Southshore. The battle will will feature lots of undeads and demons and will culminate with closing demon gates. We need a minor great daemon lord to lead the forces, that, in the end, will be slain.

The cutscene sees the Alliance standing victorious but badly mauled. At least Southshore and everything east of the river is safe.