[Spoilers]Arellia and Turalyon... what the hell?!

[rasako]

With the holy nathrezim model I have a feeling that maybe some of them switched sides like in chronicle, since chronicle states the nathrezim originally served the void lords.

[TyrannicalPuppy]

Yes, but why Night Elf? And Night Elf clothes? They gave Turalyon fancy schmancy draenei paladin gear, but they didn't make him a draenei model.

Blizzard hasn't needed Night Elves as placeholder models for High Elves for ten years. It's not like Alleria's some crazy new race of elf. Then again, maybe she is, in which case, ugh.

It's just dumb of them to do for no reason. Normally, a placeholder model should be at least somewhat similar to what the thing will eventually be, if possible. Like using normal Burning Crusade Gronn models for WoD Gronn before finishing those models.

The Wardens, a group of night elves, use blood elf models. It's a reasonable assumption, then, that Alleria's model will be similar to, but not the same as, the typical night elven model we have at present. Despite the lacking variety in playable looks for characters, not all elves look the same. A high elf could, very reasonably I might add, have floppy ears rather than the "normal" rigid ears of a high elf.

Also, a lot of high elf models are still based on the night elf model, just not all of them. The ones in the Blasted Lands, for example, despite looking like something straight out of 2003.

EDIT: For some reason it double posted. Oops.

[Koryn123]

Well now I'm curious as to what it's a reference to, because I'm an un-pop-cultured swine.

People are saying something Game of Thrones-ie, Superman-ie, all sorts of stuff. Frankly, they should have used something else, and I bet Alleria and Turalyon are going to end up being fel-corrupted Legion commanders that we'll be killing for lewts.

Because nothing says good writing like the good ol' fashioned Blizzard standby of

"uh...corruption...?" *pretends they're going to explain how said person got "corrupted" by writing an 80-page novella, which is so lazily done that 10 years later, it's only halfway done, only to put it on hold, then the author quits Blizzard, so RiP Kael'thas fans who expected Blizzard to treat one of their most popular characters with an ounce of respect.*

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The Wardens, a group of night elves, use blood elf models. It's a reasonable assumption, then, that Alleria's model will be similar to, but not the same as, the typical night elven model we have at present. Despite the lacking variety in playable looks for characters, not all elves look the same. A high elf could, very reasonably I might add, have floppy ears rather than the "normal" rigid ears of a high elf.

Also, a lot of high elf models are still based on the night elf model, just not all of them. The ones in the Blasted Lands, for example, despite looking like something straight out of 2003.

EDIT: For some reason it double posted. Oops.

The wardens use the same skeleton animations as the Blood Elves, not their models, but when they don't have their gear on for story reasons, they're normal Night Elf models, like Maiev in Val'sharah.

Only if Alleria were severely deformed would her ears be horizontal, extending 10 ft. behind her head, rather than a few inches vertically.

Night Elves are incredibly tall, taller than humans, like 9 feet, while High/Blood Elves are roughly the same height range as humans, shrinking when they were transformed by the energies of the Sunwell.

Alleria has never been mentioned as a giant towering over her friends in the Sons of Lothar, so I really see no reason why they'd make it a Night Elf model, unless they're going to do something dumb where it's like "oh, she met Elune during her travels, and was turned back into a Night Elf! Isn't that cool, everybody??? Please re-sub??? Hello???"

[Enthralled]

About Alleria using a night elf model: it reminds me a little of that odd garrison inn visitor with the night elf ranger model who comes looking for Alleria. It never made sense.

[Katie45]

Maybe, she turned back into a nelf cause of no sunwell

[Deleted]

What I'm wondering is how this quest relates to the MM Hunter quest. In the MM quest it shows that the Inquisition captured Alleria at some point and took her bow, but by the time the player gets there Alleria is nowhere to be found and Vereesa thinks that she managed to escape. Right now I'm thinking the order of events is

- Alleria and Turalyon's army suffers its final defeat
- They send the message to Arator
- They are captured by the Legion and imprisoned on Niskara
- Alleria manages to escape (possibly Turalyon escapes with her, or he stays back to give her a chance to escape)

So then perhaps in Suramar or a later patch we come across Alleria (and Turalyon? Or perhaps she asks us to help rescue him).

[Terongor]

"Alliance blood spills, this pleases me"

[Colonel Sandor]

I assume we'll rescue them in a later patch or expansion.

[Biske]

Yes, but why Night Elf?

Sylvanas used to have a Night Elf model


Placeholders don't mean anything. Unless it's Captain Placeholder. He means a lot to me.

[Katie45]

Sylvanas used to have a Night Elf model


Placeholders don't mean anything. Unless it's Captain Placeholder. He means a lot to me.

back then they didn't even have a blood elf model, the belf model could have easily been the placeholder

[Biske]

back then they didn't even have a blood elf model, the belf model could have easily been the placeholder

Never quested in Blasted Lands?

[Katie45]

Heh, at launch those models didn't exist those came in a patch

[Biske]

Heh, at launch those models didn't exist those came in a patch

Pretty sure those models have been in the game since before release since these same elves (recolored) were seen at Scholomance and several other areas. And by "pretty sure" I mean I'm 100% sure but finding screenshots is a pain in the ass. Here's the best quality I could find.



That's Instructor Malicia from Scholomance with her old-ass blue-robed model which is the same as the one above (except her robe is red)

Oh, and before you tell me "lol, Scholo was added later in a patch", no. http://wowwiki.wikia.com/wiki/Patch_0.12 Scholo was added in patch 0.12 pre-release.

[Aucald]

Sylvanas originally got a Night Elf model because the High Elf models in Classic before TBC had a very limited animation rig, very low texture quality, and were prone to glitching up. Since she was going to get a lot more player interaction than any quest NPC or instance boss they opted to go with a fully-functional model. Then she got changed into a red-eyed placeholder Blood Elf model, and finally got her own unique model.

[Koryn123]

The re-textured Night Elf models used for pre-BC Blood/High Elves were changed when BC came along, with the exception of those in Scholomance, until it got revamped in MoP.

So, there's no reason for them to have given Alleria a Night Elf placeholder model, unless they're about to do something incredibly stupid right out of an awful RPer's story by having her mutate back into a Night Elf for some reason.

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Maybe, she turned back into a nelf cause of no sunwell

The Night Elves have been connected to the Well of Eternity for 10,000 years since Illidan created the new one, and for however long they'd been living around the original Well of Eternity before that, so they should be addicted to magic.

When the High Elves quit their magic cold turkey, they had some rough times, but eventually the pangs of their addiction got easier to manage (much easier for the Silver Covenant safe behind their human friends in Dalaran than for the High Elves Lor'themar had to banish to Quel'lithien) so Alleria being without the Sunwell shouldn't turn her back into a Night Elf. She should just be left as a normal High Elf.

Honestly, I half-expected her to become a Blood Elf if they were going to do something as drastic as change her appearance. She's been fighting the Legion a long time, and was held in Legion custody for a good long while, so I would have guessed at some point she'd get a little dose of fel energy being without the Sunwell for so long and unable to resist. Might have been neat. Certainly better than whatever dumb idea they have now, unless it's just a cruel joke to cause nerdrage.

If she were somehow turned into a Night Elf, I imagine it must have been because she and Turalyon hung out with some Draenei, who had a naaru with them, and the naaru is Elune, who somehow influenced the Dark Troll's mutation into Night Elves, and does the same thing to Alleria. Because Blizzard sees people arguing over whether Alleria would come back and want to maintain relations with her people, or become a Vereesa clone and devote her entire existence to murdering Blood Elves for imagined slights, and they say "Rather than have some balls and make a decision, we're just gonna completely change her into something entirely different, justify any character changes people object to with 'a lot can happen in a thousand years,' and cross our fingers that subscription numbers go up when people can see an NPC named Alleria, despite it really not being Alleria."

[Biske]

So, there's no reason for them to have given Alleria a Night Elf placeholder model

Since the whole purpose of placeholders is to be deleted once the model is done, placeholders can be literally anything. It could be a checkered cube as far as they're concerned. It doesn't have any meaning, it doesn't have to make sense, it doesn't have to meet any requirements for anything. You're concerned over literally nothing. It would be like when boats weren't working and they had Captain Placeholder transport you during betas, you were worried that he wasn't lore-friendly and "omg boats aren't people who magically teleport you". They could have made her an orc if they wanted. Unless she makes it to live as a Night Elf, there's literally nothing to worry about. The most likely scenario is that if she's getting a unique model, she's going to use Night Elf animations, so they rigged up a regular NE for testing purposes, which has precedent in WoW like with http://media.mmo-champion.com/images...grondFS047.jpg that.

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http://www.mmo-champion.com/threads/...!-In-uldum-x-D placeholders are not representative of the final product (those are tol'vir)

[Koryn123]

Since the whole purpose of placeholders is to be deleted once the model is done, placeholders can be literally anything. It could be a checkered cube as far as they're concerned. It doesn't have any meaning, it doesn't have to make sense, it doesn't have to meet any requirements for anything. You're concerned over literally nothing. It would be like when boats weren't working and they had Captain Placeholder transport you during betas, you were worried that he wasn't lore-friendly and "omg boats aren't people who magically teleport you". They could have made her an orc if they wanted. Unless she makes it to live as a Night Elf, there's literally nothing to worry about. The most likely scenario is that if she's getting a unique model, she's going to use Night Elf animations, so they rigged up a regular NE for testing purposes, which has precedent in WoW like with http://media.mmo-champion.com/images...grondFS047.jpg that.

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http://www.mmo-champion.com/threads/...!-In-uldum-x-D placeholders are not representative of the final product (those are tol'vir)

I suppose you're right. I assume they'd at least make some small effort to make a placeholder similar to something already there, though. No tol'vir, so they used the funny tol'vir disguise thing they did in Uldum. And that great big plant magnataur is most similar to a magnataur, so they used that.

I suppose that if she's getting a Night Elf skeleton for her custom model, it's fine. I just really really really hope they're not going to make her a Night Elf. Because that would be really dumb.

[Biske]

I suppose you're right. I assume they'd at least make some small effort to make a placeholder similar to something already there, though. No tol'vir, so they used the funny tol'vir disguise thing they did in Uldum. And that great big plant magnataur is most similar to a magnataur, so they used that.

I suppose that if she's getting a Night Elf skeleton for her custom model, it's fine. I just really really really hope they're not going to make her a Night Elf. Because that would be really dumb.

IF they do keep that night elf model for release, I still think it would be a similar case to old Sylvanas where they just went "meh, this will work for now. No additional work required" until Alleria appears at the forefront and they go "ok, guys, we REALLY need an actual model for her". Like, even if she uses the whole Night Elf model, lore-wise they won't change her into a Night Elf... is basically what I'm trying to get at. Other than giving a really long-winded "don't worry about it".

[Katie45]

Elune being a narru doesn't make sense with the new lore from legion and the book

[Koryn123]

Elune being a narru doesn't make sense with the new lore from legion and the book

I know, I was just saying if they decided to make Alleria a Night Elf, it wouldn't be far-fetched for them to break lore and say "oh wait, sry guys, she is a naaru after all" and stuff.

Since they can't make up their minds whether they want the Silver Covenant to be racist dicks whose entire existence is for the sole purpose of killing Blood Elves for things only one of them did, and not even to them personally, or if they want them to be cheery happy go-lucky guys perfectly willing to work alongside Blood Elves.

Same with Modera, who they wrote taking a sadistic pleasure in the knowledge that the Saurok on the Isle of Thunder were attacking the Blood Elves too. Then they had her working with a High Elf and Blood Elf in WoD with no explanation or follow-up. Now in Legion having her be an advocate for bringing Aethas back.