History YMMV / WorldofWarcraft

** For OlderThanTheyThink reasons, do not call the ''Mists of Pandaria'' expansion a rip-off of ''WesternAnimation/KungFuPanda''. The Pandaren race debuted in the ''The Frozen Throne'' expansion for ''VideoGame/{{Warcraft}} III'', five years before the first ''Kung Fu Panda'' movie.

** The Pandaren have existed since 2002, but were not brought in the forefront (i.e., becoming a playable race) until around 2012, after which a franchise came out featuring a, for lack of a better term... WesternAnimation/KungFuPanda.

** With the ''Mists of Pandaria'' leak, some of the playerbase had accused the Pandaren concept of (among other things) ripping off ''WesternAnimation/KungFuPanda''. The Pandaren started out as an April Fool's joke by artist Samwise Didier that proved so popular that it led to their debut as neutral heroes in ''Warcraft III: The Frozen Throne'', years before ''Kung Fu Panda'' even came out.
*** To quote one person on the forum, "How can you tell the people who've been playing since ''Frozen Throne''? They're the ones who aren't saying the Pandaren are ''WesternAnimation/KungFuPanda'' ripoffs."

** ''Mists of Pandaria'' was a top contender for TheUnfavourite among [=WoW=]'s expansions, with only ''Cataclysm'' rivaling it for the spot. This stemmed from over-reliance on daily quests in the raid-gearing curve, some users not liking the Pandaren and calling them a rip-off of ''WesternAnimation/KungFuPanda''. However, as ''Warlords of Draenor'' went on, many have started to feel nostalgic about Pandaria instead. While it certainly had its flaws, as listed above, people admitted that it brought plenty of content ([=WoD=]'s problem was that it had barely any). The faction war storyline is still disliked however.

** Dracthyr are androgynous (their gendered tells are only in their mortal disguises) anthropomorphic dragon people with a much lither and athletic build than most of the game's other races. They flat out ''avert'' the ReptilesAreAbhorrent nature of most reptilian races in Science Fiction & Fantasy. Being what they are, it's perhaps inevitable that a great deal of scalies had [=WoW=] put on the map (or retired furries intending to return to the game taking notice) because of the option to play as dragon people that aren't LittleBitBeastly (history repeating, the only other race that gets close is ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyXIV'''s Au Ra, and it's more of an AmbiguousSituation even then despite debuting in an expansion with dragons as a vocal point). While there's a bit of a divison over just how lithe Dracthyr are when compared to Drakonids - the other anthropomorphic dragon people - there's no question it drew eyes from dragon fans towards the game, especially when the full breadth of their customization showed they have more customization options than a majority of the game's other races ''combined'', ensuring it's extremely unlikely any Dracthyr looks identical to another.

* WinBackTheCrowd: While ''Warlords of Draenor'' is almost unanimously regarded as the single most-botched expansion in [=WoW=]'s history, with its focus on private garrisons, severe lack of endgame content, and only one major content patch, ''Legion'' went in a completely opposite direction, showering the players with content and lore for its entire duration. And the quality of the writing has improved too -- just see Suramar.

* [[MagnificentBastard/Warcraft Magnificent Bastard]]

** Dracthyr are androgynous (their gendered tells are only in their mortal disguises) anthropomorphic dragon people with a much lither and athletic build than most of the game's other races. They flat out ''avert'' the ReptilesAreAbhorrent nature of most reptilian races in Science Fiction & Fantasy. Being what they are, it's perhaps inevitable that a great deal of scalies had [=WoW=] put on the map (or retired furries intending to return to the game taking notice) because of the option to play as dragon people that aren't LittleBitBeastly (history repeating, the only other race that gets close is ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyXIV'''s Au Ra). While there's a bit of a divison over just how lithe Dracthyr are when compared to Drakonids - the other anthropomorphic dragon people - there's no question it drew eyes from dragon fans towards the game, especially when the full breadth of their customization showed they have more customization options than a majority of the game's other races ''combined'', ensuring it's extremely unlikely any Dracthyr looks identical to another.

** ''Dragonflight'' attempted to do this after the universally reviled ''Shadowlands'' and the controversy from the Activision Blizzard workplace harassment lawsuit. It removed borrowed power, invested in evergreen systems that don't get obsolete the next expansion, went back to Azeroth and adventurer fantasy after a whole expansion of cosmic lore, gave players the huge and long-awaited Dragon Isles to explore, and instead of locking flying mounts behind a reputation grind, gave everyone an improved flight system from the very start. Unfortinately, [[AcclaimedFlop despite being much better critically received]] than ''Battle for Azeroth'' or ''Shadowlands'', it sold fewer copies than either of them, which may have contributed to ''Dragonflight'' not getting a 10.3 content patch.

* AuthorsSavingThrow:
** The ''Literature/WorldOfWarcraftChronicle''. After years of the constant retcons being the butt of many Warcraft jokes, Blizzard stepped back and made books retelling the history of the Warcraft universe from the beginning of time. These books have provided a definitive version of many events that were left in an ambiguous state, and smoothed over retcons large and small. The best part is that while it technically provides its own retcons, most of these manage to keep the story as close as possible to the original lore while staying consistent with newer lore. It remains to be seen if this will continue going forward, however (the relation between Odyn, Helya, and the creation of the val'kyr has seemingly been contradicted already).
** The dragons got an appreciated throw: there was originally a feat of strength achievement for Death Knights during the 7.2 quest chain for their mount where they [[spoiler:drive the Red Dragonflight to extinction]] purely out of spite and bloodlust. A week after the mount chains came out, Blizzard hotfixed out the achievement and stated that outcome was non-canon, citing that it was unfair to fans of the dragons (especially with all the [[WoobieSpecies misfortune they've recently suffered]]), a moment like that would be too important to only be covered in a single class if it ''were'' canon, and was unfair to give only Death Knights an achievement (that could be lost as the quest only happens once) related to getting their class mount, and also that they never intended the feat of strength to actually go live. WordOfGod also said that the Deaths of Chromie is leading into the dragons being put back into the forefront most likely in the next expansion, after being OutOfFocus with only heartbreak (the above mentioned, the Azsuna blues, and [[spoiler:Ysera's death]]) when they are brought into the plot.
** Flight has apparently been somewhat of a regret for Blizzard, as every expansion since it was introduced, they have found some way to either limit it if not flat out take it away and make them earn it later[[labelnote:*]]Requiring players to purchase training/a license until almost max level, not being allowed to unlock it until max level, taking it away ''entirely'' and requiring an achievement to get it, to timegating it[[/labelnote]]. However, a few steps have been made to combat this:
*** In zones where flight had to be earned through achievement, players would eventually get it automatically via an update since many of these achievements were not considered worth doing after the next expansion made them irrelevant.
*** ''Shadowlands'' did away with needing to grind for multiple reputations for flight and just flat out gave it to players as part of the main story
*** ''Dragonflight'' will give players a new form of flight, Dragonriding, at launch as part of the initial quest line in the Dragon Isles, which differs from regular flight in that actively controlling the mount's heading and altitude is necessary in order to stay airborne, and glyphs can be collected in order to improve flying abilities. Additionally there is nothing stopping a player from simply flying around the Dragon Isles and hunting down all the glyphs as soon as they learn Dragonriding - and as an added bonus, [[AntiFrustrationFeatures glyphs only need to be found once per account]].
** Many people criticized Shadowlands for going too out of its way to be 'different' and cosmic in concept, with a bland and forgettable villain who was unnecessarily hyped up as the BigBad of the Warcraft franchise; the stakes got effectively so high that most people just stopped caring. In reply, ''Dragonflight'' goes out of its way to be more 'mundane', returning to Azeroth on the Dragon Isles, being more focused on the local populations and their problems; while the Primalist villains are a world-threatening presence, they're just really powerful dragons as opposed to, say, an ancient death God created by an even more ancient race of mysterious SufficientlyAdvancedAliens that created the entirety of reality.

** Garrosh Hellscream, upon his introduction in ''The Burning Crusade'', subsequent rise to prominence in ''Wrath of the Lich King'', and rise to power as Horde Warchief in ''Cataclysm'', was hated by players for his {{Jerkass}} attitude, warmongering stances, and extreme anti-human and anti-Alliance attitudes that escalated to outright racism. Many players cheered at the opportunity to take him down when it was revealed that he would become the BigBad in ''Mists of Pandaria''. Over time, however, Garrosh would be much less hated. This is in part due to the perception that he tried his best to overcome the responsibilities Thrall left him when he was appointed as Warchief, which was something he himself claimed ([[VillainHasAPoint not without reason]]) to be doing in his final moments, along with the fact that his actions in ''Cataclysm'' were a justifiable reaction to the moves of the night elves against the Horde. The [[VindicatedByHistory positive reevaluation of]] ''[[VindicatedByHistory Mists]]'' [[VindicatedByHistory as an expansion pack]] and Blizzard doing another faction war storyline for ''Battle for Azeroth'' that was a word-for-word repeat of how the faction war went in ''Mists'', except seen as even more convoluted and nonsensical by the playerbase, both ended up making many nostalgic for the time of Garrosh as Warchief. As a result, many players have expressed the idea that [[DracoInLeatherPants "Garrosh did nothing wrong"]], or even believed Blizzard should have developed on Garrosh's more sympathetic traits in ''Cataclysm'' alluded to in a few quest lines[[note]]albeit quest lines done by a developer completely unaware of the plan for Garrosh to develop into a villain[[/note]] rather than throwing them away.

** The Lich King, the BigBad of ''Wrath of the Lich King''. At the time of Icecrown Citadel's release, many disliked how the entire plot of the expansion, in which Arthas lets the heroes live in hopes of killing them to make them the new generals of the Scourge, was a contrived XanatosGambit. However, in the years that followed, fans viewed Arthas more kindly, in comparison to Zovaal, The Jailer, from ''Shadowlands.'' Unlike Zovaal, who was clumsily revealed to have been a WellIntentionedExtremist after his defeat, Arthas was portrayed as [[ProtagonistJourneyToVillain a hero who gradually became evil]] and remained consistently evil after his fall, but had [[AlasPoorVillain a memorable and tragic death scene]].

** Devos telling Uther to cast Arthas into the Maw is meant to come across as them crossing a line into extremism, but a vocal chunk of fans, especially Sylvanas loyalists, didn't see anything wrong with it. To them Arthas did so much evil that him being tossed into the Maw was justice, and the rest of Bastion had blatantly ignored Uther and Lysonia's warnings that Maw magic was at work. If anything, this action, at least, was fixing the natural order. (To say nothing of how blase most of the Ascended Paragons and the First One herself are once they find out that with the Arbirter disabled, [[spoiler:every soul they ferry, regardless of who it is and what they've done, is immediately an without recourse chucked into the Maw.]])

* SoloCharacterRun: Acknowledging that high-level characters can [[CurbStompBattle curb-stomp]] old content, Blizzard has tweaked the old raids to allow this. These tweaks are not {{nerf}}s, they merely remove restrictions that require more than one person.

** As of Battle for Azeroth, Tyrande and the Night Elves have been repeatedly suffering from countless atrocities such as the burning of Teldrassil and a genocide committed by Sylvanas Windrunner, [[DramaticIrony not all that different Arthas' genocide against the HighElves]], and were denied justice and a proper passage into the afterlife by their god, [[UnintentionallyUnsympathetic Elune]], [[StupidSacrifice who allowed her people to get massacred by the Banshee Queen]] under the idea that they were flowing into Ardenweald. In Dragonflight, Tyrande ends up losing Malfurion to bring Ysera back from Ardenweald, even pointing out that she's tired which many of the players frequently cite as what they see as pointless abuse against the Night Elves as a race.

* WarShip: Jaina is a member of the Alliance and Sylvanas is a member of the Horde, two armies that are at war with each other, but that doesn't stop them from being one of the most popular ships in the fandom, due to many feeling like they would understand each other due to their similarities.

** Head writer Steve Danuser is often held up as the main reason for the story's DorkAge starting in ''Battle For Azeroth'' and ''Shadowlands'', but the inciting incident of the Burning of Teldrassil actually wasn't his idea, but was something that former lead writer Alex Afrasiabi envisioned and put the team to work on, shortly before bailing on Blizzard. According to Blizzard devs at the time, Afrasiabi told the team to write the Burning and Sylvanas being the perpetrator as a moment of pure [[WhamEpisode shock value]] without any consideration for what came after, then left the company, leaving the newly-promoted Danuser and the writing team scrambling to figure out where to take the story from there, a blend of confusion and changed plans that resulted in what's considered the two worst-written expansion. Though some of his story decisions are still controversial, when given the chance to breathe in ''Dragonflight'' without the shadow of Afrasiabi's last choice hanging over him, Danuser proved that he can be a perfectly fine writer.

*** To put it into perspective, some people like Wowcrendor mentioned that mechanics from ''Classic'''s Naxxramas of repositioning, by ''Wrath'', became ''five-man'' mechanics. By ''Battle for Azeroth'' (ten years later), a simple quest boss [[GetBackHereBoss requires the player to chase them around the arena]], while repositioning around environmental hazards -- mechanics almost completely unheard of in classic.

** The developers seem aware of this to an extent. In many cases, if you've been to a dungeon before, it's possible to talk to an NPC to get an abridged version of a dialogue scene, such as asking to skip the pageantry before Trial of the Champion's first battles. It's also become increasingly common for bosses to give a relatively long speech as you're approaching them, and a simple one-liner as you pull them.

*** Some argue that this discontinuity is important to the game itself, as by revealing the Shadowlands and exploring them the game has rendered death as ultimately having no meaning to the conquests of what happens in life. Why should the players care if they succeed or fail to stop world or even universe destroying cosmos stories when there is literally a heaven that all characters go to and rather than being mysterious its all explicitly laid out? This is most explicitly seen in the actions of Elune where killing someone in life has no meaning as they will be going to somewhere better in their opinion. A variant of this is that as Shaodwlands is heavily Azeroth and Draenor-centric, and thus meakes the entire universe looks like it resolves around just characters from just those two planets makes the universe seem very small, with one of the few exceptions being the real identities of Inquisitors in Revendreath who are named as galactic conquerors... that now are just vampires. Therefore the best thing is to outright render Shadowlands as a possibility of life after death rather than set in stone or to ignore it entirely just so theres motivation to keep fighting in the living world.

** A number of characters feel the Arbiter was unfair in how it decided what afterlife a soul goes to because it "Used cold logic and didn't account for what the soul wanted". Along with that, a couple characters explicitly state they expected to go to a different afterlife than the one they were assigned. However, the Arbiter makes it's decision by experiencing the entirety of each soul's life before choosing where it will go and is never once shown to actually be wrong. Alexandros Mograine thought he should be in Bastion rather than Maldraxxus but learning the details of each made him realize the latter actually did suit him better. Likewise, Vashj admitted her envisioned afterlife of being pampered by servants for eternity would get boring very quickly and she prefers the intrigue of Maldraxxus. The only souls that ever go somewhere that isn't ideal for them are the ones where outside forces interfered, usually someone working for Zovaal sending said soul to the Maw.

** Similarly, Tranquility, a very powerful channeled Druid heal with a whistling sound. While using it properly is key, it's fairly reassuring to hear that your Resto Druid is giving everything they've got to counter the enemies' damaging abilities.

* SpecialEffectFailure: In the ''Warlords of Draenor'' expansion, key characters and Garrison buildings are given a 3D-like text. You can see the text being clipped through Khadgar's blade hand. With the Garrison, careful inspection reveals it's not really 3D, either.

** In general, Alliance characters that espouse open hatred for The Horde are at best presented as [[TragicBigot tragic figures whose trauma prevents them from seeing the bigger picture]] or at worst [[FantasticRacism fanatical bigots]] who represent the very worst of the faction. However, the narrative in these scenarios often overlook how The Horde have legitimately committed many atrocities in it’s name (most notably The Bombing of Theramore in ''MOP'' and The Burning of Teldrassil in ''BFA''.) and faced few long lasting repercussions for them. As such it becomes understandable why some of these characters would still be holding a grudge against the faction and those within it.

** ''Wrath of the Lich King'' is not only considered by many to be the game's best expansion, but the moment where it met the peak of it's history.[[note]]As evident by the fact that the expansion's run had the highest number of subscribed players at 12 Million.[[/note]] Thanks to its improvements to the game design, coherent zone and art design, Introducing a well received (if then overpowered) class in the form of the 'Death Knight', acclaimed raids and dungeons, and an engaging plot that manages to satisfyingly wrap up one of the series most popular [[VideoGame/WarcraftIII storylines.]] Its popularity was a likely factor in why the game's next expansion ''Cataclysm'' in comparison was met with a great amount of criticism, especially when it came to the [[TheyChangedItNowItSucks changes to the world design]] and a generally weaker received story [[note]] Some common criticisms, Thrall being replaced by the then ill-received [[ReplacementScrappy Garrosh]] as Horde Warchief (as well as Thrall himself taking center stage to [[SpotlightStealingSquad most characters),]] The BigBad Deathwing, for most players felt like He came [[GiantSpaceFleaFromNowhere from nowhere,]] and a greater sense of attention being given to The Horde over The Alliance.[[/note]] Even the expansion's main villain Deathwing, while liked well enough on his own, is considered to be a weaker character than the titular Lich King, Arthas. The same arguably extents to the later expansions as well, since even before their individual releases, A common question is or was "How does it compare to ''Wrath''."

** The male Blood Elf /silly, "Don't you wish your girlfriend was hot like me?" was added because of the song by the Pussy Cat Dolls was popular at the time of ''The Burning Crusade'''s release.

** As of Battle for Azeroth, Tyrande and the Night Elves have been repeatedly suffering from countless atrocities such as the burning of Teldrassil and a genocide committed by Sylvannas Windrunner, [[DramaticIrony not all that different Arthas' genocide against the HighElves]], and were denied justice and a proper passage into the afterlife by their god, [[UnintentionallyUnsympathetic Elune]], [[StupidSacrifice who allowed her people to get massacred by the Banshee Queen]] under the idea that they were flowing into Ardenweald. In Dragonflight, Tyrande ends up losing Malfurion to bring Ysera back from Ardenweald, even pointing out that she's tired which many of the players frequently cite as what they see as pointless abuse against the Night Elves as a race.

* {{Woolseyism}}: In the Chinese version, [[https://warcraft.wiki.gg/wiki/File:Lord_Marrowgar.jpg Lord Marrowgar]] gets a [[https://warcraft.wiki.gg/wiki/File:Chinagar.jpg different look]] because bones aren't allowed to be shown in video games there.

** ''Shadowlands'', as in the entire expansion, is treated as if it never happened by a large portion of the player base. The amount of retcon the expansion required, that all events from the very beginning of WarCraft were to lead to it, already had the players belief stretched thin. That [[TheScrappy The Jailers]] master plan, ultimately ending in [[VaguenessisComing claiming his universal genocide plan was to stop something even worse]] was attached to the worst villain in franchise history, the treatment of the established deities rather than being disparate pantheons all being just part of the Shadowlands with Elune notably getting hit the hardest as under Shadowlands lore [[spoiler:[[UnintentionallyUnsympathetic/WorldofWarcraft she willingly let all the Night Elves at the Burning of Teldrassil die rather than intervene just to send their souls to Ardenweald because her sister The Winter Queen asked for help and she thought allowing genocide was a good idea]]]] making her seen as uselessly insanely stupid, the Sylvanas storyline being pushed down the audience throats ending with an [[UnintentionallyUnsympathetic undeserved redemption]] along with an asinine "I will never serve" declaration, that the feeling of none of it being either foreshadowed in any real way meant the changes to decades of lore - such as Shadowlands being the origin place of the Dreadlords whose sole purpose was to lead to this expansion - and its reception being retrospectively the worst expansion ever has most people viewing the whole thing as [[AllJustaDream it was all a dream]].

** ''Shadowlands'', as in the entire expansion, is treated as if it never happened by a large portion of the player base. The amount of retcon the expansion required, that all events from the very beginning of WarCraft were to lead to it, already had the players belief stretched thin. That [[TheScrappy The Jailers]] master plan, ultimately ending in [[VaguenessisComing claiming his universal genocide plan was to stop something even worse]] was attached to the worst villain in franchise history, that Sylvanas storyline being pushed down the audience throats ending with an [[UnintentionallyUnsympathetic undeserved redemption]] along with an asinine "I will never serve" declaration, that the feeling of none of it being either foreshadowed in any real way meant the changes to decades of lore - such as Shadowlands being the origin place of the Dreadlords whose sole purpose was to lead to this expansion - and its reception being retrospectively the worst expansion ever has most people viewing the whole thing as [[AllJustaDream it was all a dream]].

* WeWantOurJerkBack:
** Varian and Garrosh brought on intense feelings of this among both their own fans and much of the rest of the fandom after ''Mists of Pandaria''. [[spoiler:The fact both of them are dead now haven't really stopped this, though calls for this happening to Varian has since died down ever since his HeroicSacrifice in ''Legion'']].
** Varian's [=WotLK=] persona was the source of much contention, especially seeing as it was him who reignited the Horde-Alliance War and MisBlamed the entire Horde for the actions of a renegade group of Forsaken. In the final patch (3.3) he showed a softer and more reasonable side by letting Saurfang reclaim his son's body on the Alliance side, to Jaina's tearful admiration. Between then and ''Cataclysm'', he [[TookALevelInKindness took a few more levels in kindness]] in the supplementary materials, which charted his attempts to come to terms with his split-personality and his strained relationship with his son. Cataclysm gave him little focus, but he seemed like a JerkWithAHeartOfGold compared to his bellicose and aggressive personality in [=WotLK=]. [=MoP=], however, took Blizzard's newfound appreciation for him way too far. His budding status as TheGoodKing was made to sprout at an unnatural rate. His CharacterDevelopment was hyper-accelerated, CharacterShilling abounded ([[ThatOneLevel A Little Patience]], anyone?) and a few forumites quickly noticed that his development came to the detriment of other characters, such as Jaina and Tyrande. All in all, the general reaction was just as much disgust as there was to the {{demonization}} of the orcs. [[spoiler:Still, there were few complaining by ''Legion'' when he [[DyingMomentOfAwesome selflessly sacrifices himself to give the Alliance time to get away]] from the Burning Legion, so [[AlasPoorScrappy in death he]] [[RescuedFromTheScrappyHeap found true admiration]]]].
** Garrosh was never exactly a picnic -- at best, an AntiHero, especially in ''Cataclysm'' -- but ''[=MoP=]'' would take everything the fans hated about him and {{flanderiz|ation}}e [[{{Jerkass}} those]] [[HotBlooded questionable]] [[StubbornMule traits]] to incredible heights. Blizzard brushed the honour, integrity, and standards that made him an interesting, redeemable character under the rug and began injecting ever-growing levels of selfishness, ruthlessness and fanatical hatred of all things not orcish. It was all very hard to take seriously, considering he had been showing signs of improvement before becoming ''Warcraft's'' new villainous punching-bag; in particular, the irony of Garrosh mana-bombing Theramore after Stonetalon Mountains was not lost on the forums. As happy as many people were to finally turn their weapons against him, many more were unhappy that his character's arc turned downhill so quickly. [[spoiler:His death in ''[=WoD=]'', unlike with Varian's later, wasn't able to redeem him either, as while some [[AlasPoorScrappy felt sympathy]], others thought he vetted any due to how much his personality went down the tubes -- to say nothing of him kicking the character's ass and requiring them to be rescued by... ''Thrall'', who would go on to defeat Garrosh in a duel]].
** With Jaina's development, some people started wanting the jackass racist Garithos or at least people like him back, since they can't stand seeing their legacy characters turned into racist war hawks, so a disposable HateSink is wanted to take the flak of being racists so legacy characters will not be harmed with sudden villainy or sudden jerkassery. Even Jaina's sudden snap back to being reasonable in the latter part of Battle For Azeroth feels like an unsatisfying conclusion to her

** ''Shadowlands'', as in the entire expansion, is treated as if it never happened by a large portion of the player base. The amount of [[Retcon]] the expansion required, that all events from the very beginning of WarCraft were to lead to it, already had the players belief stretched thin. That [[TheScrappy The Jailers]] master plan, ultimately ending in [[VaguenessisComing claiming his universal genocide plan was to stop something even worse]] was attached to the worst villain in franchise history, that Sylvanas storyline being pushed down the audience throats ending with an [[UnintentionallyUnsympathetic undeserved redemption]] along with an asinine "I will never serve" declaration, that the feeling of none of it being either foreshadowed in any real way meant the changes to decades of lore - such as Shadowlands being the origin place of the Dreadlords whose sole purpose was to lead to this expansion - and its reception being retrospectively the worst expansion ever has most people viewing the whole thing as [[AllJustaDream it was all a dream]].

** ''Battle for Azeroth'' was hit by this in the eyes of quite a few. A good number of players feel that the faction conflict has run its course after the poorly received Horde/Alliance war storyline in ''Mists'', so basing an entire expansion around it was seen by many as both a misstep and [[RecycledScript retreading old ground]], especially right as it seems to be repeating the same issues players of both factions disliked such as the Alliance being a passive punching bag that never does anything wrong, and the Horde's cast being entirely vilified.