What will it take to forgive an entire faction?

Blizzard is in an interesting position when it comes to World of Warcraft — they’ve pushed the bar beyond anything we were expecting. Not in terms of quests and leveling, but in terms of the story itself. Both Horde and Alliance have committed errors over the years, some worse than others, but we have never had anything on the scale of what went down in Teldrassil and Lordaeron. Theramore, heartbreaking as it was, wasn’t a capital city for an entire race of people. The Horde burned Teldrassil, the Alliance responded by hitting back at the Undercity, and now we’re down two faction capitals.

Where exactly do we go from here? That’s the big question I’ve been asking myself, and I don’t know if I have an answer for it. Yes, the faction war has been an underlying part of WoW’s story since day one. But for the most part, it’s usually taken a back seat to bigger and far more dire threats. By leaving it in the background, both factions have been free to move onward through whatever threats the universe feels free to throw at Azeroth. But now it’s front-and-center, which means…we’re going to have to deal with it.

The narrative can’t just sit at a standstill like this forever. That’s where stories grow stale, old, and unappealing — they go from being engaging to just another round of same-old, and that’s when players lose interest. With that in mind, putting together a big moment like Teldrassil, like Lordaeron, means that an equally big payoff is almost expected at this point. But what is that payoff? Does one side beat the other, and change the face of the game forever? Are the Alliance and Horde about to come to some kind of mutual understanding, and actually forge some kind of path towards a tentative peace?

What the Horde did to Teldrassil is nigh-unforgivable. Yes, it was Sylvanas who called for the burning of the tree, but she’s the leader of the Horde. Her actions reflect on the Horde as a whole, whether your Horde character believed in it or not. Coming back from something like that…it’s going to take something major to earn any degree of forgiveness. Can that forgiveness actually be earned? I don’t know. Part of the reason Battle for Azeroth is so fascinating right now is that question of what happens next and the fact is that I can’t reasonably answer it. All I can do is wait for the story to play out, and see where it goes.

So I’m going to turn the question over to you guys because this is a topic that’s been debated back and forth since the War of the Thorns started. Is there any way for the factions to forgive each other? What do you think needs to happen to move that story forward? Do you think it’s possible for peace to be found between the two factions, or are we stuck with a state of endless war? What would you consider a satisfying resolution? And let’s keep the comments respectful, guys — I’m sure we can have a reasonable discussion about a video game without attacking each other.