Being Alyrian doesn't necessarily imply that I'm going to side with them. You can chose faction regardless of your race, correct?
Well, yes and no. On one hand sure, you don't HAVE to play as an Alyrian loyal to his race instead of foreign aggressors. But on the other, a racial background is not just a different skin tone. So an Alyrian would be very different then say, a Vhalurian even if they were allied towards the same goal. For instance Alyrians don't so much respect law so much as an unspoken moral code of what is right and what is not. Back in the day even the bandits and assassin's of Alyria did this, and they were not the sort that let people triffle with them. Nowadays not so much. Even if you weren't loyal to the now dispersed droves of you kin, there'd be some sort of recentment towards a few groups. The most powerful mage in history basically atom bombed your ancestral home. After your people made another one, the ((old)) Church of the Empire called them all heretics for praying to their old gods, and burned it to the ground. Finally after that, the Mhordul ((who'd basically saved your people from exstinction)) finally got tired of honoring an alliance that did not serve to strengthen their people, and that led to the most recent exoddus.
And Mhordul? They pretty much don't blend in anywhere but with other mhords due to their near primal approach to all things. The only sort you'd find abroad NOT in a war party would likely be an outcast turned mercenary. That and people naturally hate Mhordul for their past deeds ((most lump them in with ogres and goblins, rather then people))