The Big Decision

We’ve all made the decision. Whether it was on a whim or a well thought out process, we have all chosen a faction in World of Warcraft. Everyone has different reasons as to why they chose to fight for the Horde or the Alliance. For me, my first character was Alliance because all of my college buddies were going Alliance at the time. They did go Alliance when we got the game, but ended up being on a different server (a story for a different time). I actually played through vanilla and some of BC before I leveled a Horde character. For me, there wasn’t really a decision when I first started playing. Since my friends were playing Alliance and I wanted to play with them, it was an easy decision.

As I played more and more and began to learn about the game, I sometimes regretted the decision of rolling Alliance. This was well before the days of faction changes and even transfers, so the only other option was to level another character. That was something that I was not willing to do. Cut to today and faction changes are relatively cheap (or expensive however you feel) and they are easy. This really negates a lot of old arguments as to which faction is better. If you think Blizzard favors a certain faction or if you feel that certain racials are more powerful or even if you just like the look and feel of the other faction, it is painless enough to obtain without needing to level to 80 again.

The Grass is Always Greener

It is a topic that comes up regularly amongst many WoW players and on the WoW forums (who reads those anyway?). It isn’t the debate as to which side has better lore, or which side feels better to fight as, it is the question of whether or not Blizzard favors a faction and balances the game accordingly. If you’ve played WoW, the thought has probably crossed your mind. Even if you keep in mind that most of these posts are by trolls and it probably does not represent the viewpoint of the majority, you still can’t help but notice racial “stereotyping” in guild, trade, or BG chat.

What I have come to find out is that the old adage “The grass is always greener on the other side” applies to this situation. When I played Alliance for the first couple years, I felt as though Horde had a huge advantage in certain situations. Back then it was mainly in AV and geared Shaman could literally 1 shot players. I then met a couple of people who lived in my dorm and they played Horde. It was fun to discuss the topic with them because 95% of the time, they felt the exact opposite. When I thought AV was imbalanced because the Horde base only had one way into it, they felt the same about the Alliance base. Even little things like how difficult Onyxia attunement was for Horde came up at times. Then when I leveled a Horde character, my outlook on the game began to change. I noticed that my thoughts switched and I began to feel like Blizzard favored Alliance (Although I have never felt that they actually favor a faction, I do think there are subconscious and accidental advantages to both factions).

Ultimately it comes down to personal experience. If you ask a player in a strong Alliance battlegroup which faction is better at PvP, they will most likely answer Alliance and visa versa. You have probably met a player who thinks their class is the absolute bane of blizzard. They cry over every nerf and can’t stop talking about how weak they are. Even if they are playing the most faceroll class currently, they genuinely feel that their class needs serious buffs. If you are completely honest, you have probably felt this way at times about your current main.

There isn’t a way to stop these perceptions that we have about the game. The best thing we can do is to know that we hold bias and make opinions based on that. I can guarantee that Blizzard already does this.

Epic Flying Mount

I finally saved up enough money even with buying epic gems and enchants as I geared up to get my epic flying skill. I have had the bronze drake sitting in my bags for a long time waiting to be used. This is my third level 80 and my first drake mount.

Bronze Drake