I've been Alliance since day one and have never really played on the Horde side.

For those of you who consistently play both sides, what would you say are the noticeable differences between the two?

I'm not talking about the obvious differences (race, cities, BG's pwn'ing, etc.). I mean general play experience or "atmosphere", if you will.

And do you split it up evenly? Or are you inclined to play one side over the other?

I have played Horde since the day my first toon was born into the world of Crushridge, so i can't really say anything from experience about differences in atmosphere.

I had a conversation with a few hardcore WoW heads a while back that go to the conventions, etc. etc. According to them, playing Alliance tends to be a little easier on PvP servers because Alli outnumber Horde on an average of 3-1 on PvP servers. (I don't have a hard source to back this number up, I'm just relaying information that was given to me). They ended up transferring to a PvE server as an entire guild because they wanted to focus more on endgame content, and not worrying about gankings while they're preparing for a raid, or summoning other raiders.

Personally, I don't mind being outnmbered on a PvP server, although it gets inconvenient when PITA alli are constantly ganking at a summoning stone (but what comes around goes around) :P

My first toon was my Ally druid at release, which I leveled to 60 and raided a ton on. I then lvld a NE priest to 60 (that my gf started then abandoned at lv 5, decked her out in shadow gear, and kept her as my PvP toon.

I started an UD warlock on another server during that time, and got it to mid 30s playing it whenever I felt like questing / playing WoW solo without people bugging me. Around that time there was all sorts of guild drama / gquitting going on (stupid ass 40 man raids and prima donna MT's), and WoW was getting to be more work than fun (as an officer at least trying to coordinate a bunch of dbags that were bored with raiding and just coming along for dkp so they didn't 'fall behind'). Plus I wanted to see the inside of Org / UC / TB and experience the fabeled 'barrens chat' :P

After BC, I leveled my Druid to 70 with the RL friends I had been playing with, and they promptly quit the game. And the guild that I had been in disbanded, people server transfered, etc. At that time I found out a couple new RL friends played horde toons (and had since release), so I leveled my lock to play with them, and have been having TONS of fun raiding up through BT and dominating BG's, and have leveled another 70 horde side.

All in all, IMO horde > ally. The atmosphere in BG's, raiding, questing etc just seems more mature to me. Someone once said "kids and noobs pick the pretty characters..." I can't comment on that as my first toons were 'pretty characters', but there may be some truth to it (i.e. the influx of idiot female BE hunters and rogues...)

I play on Blackrock, which is one of the most competitive PvP servers (barely behind and imo second only to Tichondrius) on BG9, and I don't see a 3:1 disparity (or any really... horde dominate ally in every way on BR). Some of my initial reactions when playing horde over ally were that horde were much more organized, especially in BG's, though also in PvE... ally always tended to go out and hk farm / do their own thing in PvP, whereas horde were more apt to actually defend, communicate and utilize strategy. In PvE, there wasn't as much emo over loot, and people all tended to try to do their best, rather than treat raids / instances as a glorified casual chat room. Not saying that PvE wasn't lighthearted, just that ppl paid more attention.

I guess my opinions are biased, as the original ally server I was on was small and obscure, and I wasn't really in a good guild (family guild at the core), while the horde server I'm now on is one of the original servers, and is FULL of really good players both PvP and PvE. It all depends really on the group of people you associate with on said faction. And more than that, it all depends on what you like looking at most. I grew to despise gnomes =/

I totally agree with Claritondeus.
Still im Ally cause of RL-friends ^^

Both alliance and horde have bratty little kids.

Both alliance and horde are chalk full of people who managed to click their ways to level 70 without a clue of how to play this game, both PvE and PvP.

Both alliance and horde have killed Kil'jaeden, and both alliance and horde have guilds that are still stuck in Karazhan.

Faction-based generalizations are ridiculous.

(BTW: My first 70 was a horde hunter on Staghelm, and now he lives on Area 52. My current main is an alliance druid on Bonechewer.)

I play alliance because 90% of my friends play there. So I'd rather play with them and BS than play alone on Horde. However having played some of the horde, I like the story on the horde side better. After having seen some of it, you get the impression that the horde has their share of bastards, but that they are way better than the alliance people (barring that whole undead faction and BE thing). The Tauren are just noble giants. The Orcs are recovering from their demon infection, but have a very deep shamanistic culture. Trolls are just canables that never knew any better (just ignore that whole ZG and ZA place :))