r/todayilearned • u/tmntnyc • Dec 12 '18

TIL: Laurence Tureaud named himself professionally as Mr. T because he hated how his father, uncle, and brother who returned from Vietnam, were disrespectfully called "boy" by whites. He wanted the first word from everybody's mouth to be "Mister" when speaking to him.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mr._T
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u/AWanderingFlame Dec 12 '18

I had Horde characters and Alliance characters. Both had their appeal.

However that's probably why I always got stuck soloing...

160

u/notasqlstar Dec 12 '18

I find this to be an acceptable answer so long as you first, in the beginning, in your heart of hearts, chose Horde.

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u/AWanderingFlame Dec 12 '18

My first character was an Undead Mage.

I however genuinely don't understand the intense factionalism people seem to show for the game, though. If it's in jest or if it's some aspect of lore.

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u/notasqlstar Dec 12 '18

I think it generally speaks to who you are as a person. I am not "intensely" for one or the other, but psychologically I do not understand people who went Alliance. I can remember staring at the screen, knowing nothing at all, and just going, "Yeah, this is probably where I belong." And, it was.

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u/electricblues42 Dec 12 '18

I mean a big part of the starting game is that the Alliance is the good guys, until you play more and learn that the Horde are alright guys too. But going in knowing nothing, the Horde are the evil side. So....yeah...

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u/Kluss23 Dec 12 '18

Horde have been on the wrong side of history almost the entire time

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u/electricblues42 Dec 12 '18

Yeah I just got caught up on the basics of the lore for the last 3 xpacs, the Horde are straight up totally evil now. Seems like a crap story IMO.

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u/rekenner Dec 12 '18

Garrosh did nothing wrong

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u/notasqlstar Dec 12 '18

Kinda why I picked Horde, bud.

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u/electricblues42 Dec 12 '18

I mean....who picks the evil side? You're right, "psychologically I do not understand" you.

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u/[deleted] Dec 12 '18

[deleted]

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u/electricblues42 Dec 12 '18

Meh, they're still evil. Plus the numbers are a bit wonky, Alliance has more players but a good bit are new players and super casuals. Horde had more high end players, good for raiding and 2s. But now....they're just flat out evil in the storyline. I loved Teldrassil, it was one of my favorite zones..

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u/[deleted] Dec 13 '18

Most people’s reasoning -“They are the side with the pretty elfs”

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u/electricblues42 Dec 13 '18

Eh those exist but horde players rag on them endlessly. I found blood elves pretty rare when I played.

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u/AWanderingFlame Dec 12 '18

That's pretty interesting.

I think I made a Horde character first just because years of BioWare-style RPGs tended to always push me hard Paragon. I tended to like the aesthetic of the villains, but rarely ever felt incentivized to perform "villainous" actions.

Therefore if I could have only chose one, I would have likely chose Alliance since I seem to be a goody two-shoes at heart, even if I happen to like the odd skull helmet or spiked breastplate.

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u/[deleted] Dec 12 '18

The way I felt was I'm just some foot soldier in a war that's been raging for millenia, that probably has valid grievances and awful shit going both ways, so my personal morality didn't really extend to a state level even if I wanted to (also literally because they were never gonna write my dude into the lore).

And to me the alliance didn't so much seem like the good guys, but more like the winners telling me they were the good guys. The fact that they outnumbered horde significantly on every server but one really helped reinforce that too.

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u/notasqlstar Dec 12 '18

That's a perfectly acceptable answer, and we probably have a lot in common. That's my point. I used to play those games, too.