Loyalists are loyal to whom?

[Drakefriend]

It seems to me as if the factions usually represent the normal armies of the Great Continent-the Loyalist represent the Wesnoth military, Northerners orcs and their allies, Undead undead and Drakes drakes allied with saurians. The Rebels are the normal elven military with the support of human magi and mermen hunters, so the name makes no sense- and Konrad had all mermen lines avaible and can recruit thieves and horsemen, but no woses, later he even has access to dwarves. The strangest faction is Knalgan Alliance, as it consist of two factions usually seperated in campaigns: Dwarves and Outlaws. The only place where this kind of alliance happened was in the beginning of Northern Rebirth, but the Northern Alliance was soon joined by other races. Except for that the Knalgan Alliance has no further historical evidence other then the race description of the dwarves mentioning that the only non-dwarves dwarves cooperate with where outlaws in the north of wesnoth.

[thespaceinvader]

Whilst the factions are supposed to vaguely reflect the state of affairs as of HttT, they're not exact - balance, above anything, reigns supreme. And let's be honest, the Drakes and Saurians don't feature at all in HttT. They aren't allied in any meaningful way outside of MP.

[Aziroshin]

As I have understood it, the loyalists are loyal to the former king and his rightful successors. I am using "rightful" here in contrast to "lawful", in a moral way. They perceive the Ashievere "camp" as what they are - people that forcefully attained power in ways that, judged from a good-faithed monarchic perspective, are wrong. Asheviere might be part of the royal family, but that's it. In they eye of the loyalist faction she is much more an usurper than anything else.

However, I have to admit that the explanation of some that they simply are loyal to the throne of Wesnoth sounds pretty convincing as well. My perception stems much from the introduction to HttT, where it says that Delfador rose an army of loyalists in Weldyn. However, it might at least as well be that this just denotes that he raised that army (out) of (the pool of) loyalists; an explanation that actually seems to make erven more sense.