It is Valentine’s Day weekend and as tradition instead of spending the three days alone, locked in my room eating chocolates in my sweatpants. I head down to Boston in my political clothes and participate in Harvard National Model United Nations (HNMUN) conference.
HNMUN is a huge four-day event that invites Model United Nations clubs from colleges all over the world to professionally dress up and peacefully address the current world problems on the behalf of the country that they were assigned.
This year I get to represent the nation of Dominica and I am in the committee to find a solution to the issue of aging population in Third World Nations.
As I see people from different parts of the world, coming together to discuss their opinions and concerns of their nation while trying to find a solution that everyone can agree on. I tend to think about the age-old question that everyone has thought about at least one point in their life.
“Can there ever be world peace…on Azeroth?” Yes this question has been pondered -I assume- by most of the player’s while playing and now that we have an expansion all about the conflict I think now is the appropriate time to talk about it.
I am going to discuss at World of Warcraft’s world peace because this is a World of Warcraft blog and Azerothian politics is much easier to talk about since it only has two factions and both sides admit that they are at war with each other.
Before I begin I would like to say that the short answer is of course, No. This is a videogame that Blizzard wants to people to continue playing and because of that there must always be conflict for the players to be apart of.
I have written before about Warcraft and politics and I also asked what type of war the Horde and Alliance are in, which you can read here in Be MOP #87. In that post I proposed that the current Warcraft conflict can best be compared to our first World War, with the two sides fighting each other for pride and to prevent the other from gathering and resources to gain to upper hand.
There are two common ways to end a war and try to find World Peace after the last cannon was fired. The first solution to end the war and finding world peace is the utter destruction and humiliation of the enemy. I wouldn’t be surprising anyone if I said that this is the option that I see the Horde is trying to achieve.
This was how the Allies of World War I (Britain, France, United States) acted after defeating Germany in the first World War. In the post-war treaties the Allies forced Germany to admit that they were defeated, that they were the bad guys in the war, and forced them to pay for the entire cost of the war for both sides. The treaty completely destroyed Germany’ sending the entire nation into an economical and emotional depression.
The Horde would most likely to use this method after winning the war (with Garrosh’s current outlook on life and the Alliance) They could achieve this type of victory by having Garrosh completely disreguard any bit of conscience he has and utilize another controversial method of getting the upper hand, like finding another Destiny Bell.
Garrosh won’t be happy until he as Stromwind as his personal summer castle.
The other, more civil, option that Warcraft’s war could end is to have one side win the war and immediately try to work about a military and economical deal for the future.
The Allies used this method after WWI with invading Berlin, nullifying the threat, and then went straight to work to get Germany back on its feet and have a propose a trade deal with France. That Coal and Steel trade agreement eventually evolved into the famous, Noble Peace prize-winning, European Union that has successfully prevented any wars to erupt on European soil.
The question of how this would work in Warcraft is by having the Alliance initiate this deal. The best possible time for an economic trade deal to form between the two factions would be right after we invade the Horde capital. Ideally, once the Alliance/raiders defeat Garrosh just like the Earth’s Allies, the Alliance will need to replace the current leader for someone who is more forgiving more open-minded to the Alliance, that isn’t Thrall.
or at least serve Garrosh a huge slice of Humble Pie.
Now that the Alliance have knocked down the Horde member’s ego down a peg the important thing to do is to offer a hand to help them back up again. If Blizzard wanted to go down this road they would need to introduce an other greater, absolute, evil that both sides will have to work together to overcome. like another demon based expansion.
Just like how the Allies reluctantly worked with West Germany to fight against the invading Communist threat during the Cold War.
Will Blizzard’s game developers go with this option? I doubt it, as stated before that taking the WAR out of World of Warcraft would be a terrible option, shooting their cash cow with a critical hit
And Blizzard has stressed that fact that they want to get the game’s focus back on the Human and Orc conflict that the first three Warcraft games. Blizzard also seem to have heard the complaints of the past expansions where the last content patch constantly asked both sides to put their differences aside and join together to defeat Illidan, Arthus or DeathWing.
I don’t think that Blizzard will go back to the big baddie expansion model just after one expansion of forging a new path for the game. But if the Alliance and Horde War ends and peace does emerge you will know that I will be writing about the political importance of the event and drawing more parallel to Earth’s history.
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Be MOP focuses on the Mists of Pandaria expansion of World of Warcraft with my own reflections about the current news and developments that happens throughout the game’s life cycle. Updates Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays
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