User:AJF3876/Warcraft IV/Thoughts

Warcraft IV would conceivably pick up several years after the end of WoW, and for the purposes of this writing will operate under the assumption of little happening since the end of the Siege of Orgrimmar. As in established canon, Garrosh was defeated. The Horde is weakened and the Alliance comes out on top due to the internal troubles within' the Horde. The Horde's troubles only continue to worsen as the Alliance begins to slowly suffer conflicts of interest as well. By 40 ADP things seems to have boiled up again, and within' both the Horde and Alliance internal issues threaten to tear both factions asunder. Nevertheless, as war continued to rage on in the peripheral areas of the world, conflicts at home heated up and armies were massed once more. In both Kalimdor and the Eastern Kingdoms, tensions flared between the two factions where interests collided. But the tensions didn't escalate to full-scale war. A cold war like situation settled down, though it was immensely unstable and saw significant changes in the geopolitical situation.

For instance, in 41 ADP, the Forsaken Empire was ejected from the Horde following another high ranked Forsaken betraying his Horde allies; Master Apothecary Lydon, suffering from his constant depression and with the only driving force left in his life being the suffering of the living, made a play for power on Sylvanas. With a substantial backing from the Royal Apothecary Society and a large Dreadguard following, he seized power, killed Sylvanas' Val'kyr, and then put an end to the Dark Lady herself. One of his most initial decrees, even while a civil war had just been ignited within' the Forsaken Empire, was that all living beings within' the Forsaken Empire, no matter their affiliation, were to be subject to loyalty examinations, even if they were simply Horde citizens traveling through the Forsaken Empire. When it became clear just what happened to those who had been taken for loyalty examinations, Vol'jin, already weary of the Forsaken under Sylvanas, and even more so after the coup that placed Lydon in power, finally elected to eject the Forsaken from the Horde.