New races; Do we really need them?

[Teriz]

until one of you can come up with something other than races or classes that can offer a major thematic addition to the game that cant be achieved through something like transmog theres no reason to assume we wont be getting new races as long as the game lives.

As long as the class distribution holds the way it is now, Blizzard could add more classes to the game. The main obstacle on that side of things is that there isn't much left in Warcraft to be made into a class. Everything is pretty much covered.

Which by the way is sort of where we are with races. Everything is pretty much covered on that side of things as well. Like someone said above, when you start considering Murlocs or racial retreads like High Elves, its probably time to stop.

sub races? i assume will get them eventually but thats a heavy undertaking, every race would require one otherwise it would be unfair, and all the races that would be added would require remodels to be as good as the normal race models and not to mention some races would require new lore and even new beings to be created to even have a sub race, this undertaking would be similar to the model revamp were nearly confirmed to be getting next expansion.

a model revamp could be a good substitute but thats a one off thing, atleast for a long time.

were getting new races whether you like it or not

I think we'll be getting a model revamp next expansion. There's already evidence in the game that Trolls, Orcs, and Dwarven models are pretty far along, because we have NPCs utilizing those models. I'd also love to see sub-races. Like Humans could become Vrykul, Draenei could become the Broken, or the Forsaken could become undead High elves like Sylvanis. That would be very cool, and add a lot to the existing races.

[Zaelsino]

Brand new races are an expansion package deal that we've come to expect though. Sure, not EVERY expansion, but them saying "no more new races, ever" would feel like a closed book to a lot of people, even if it would be for the best.

I wouldn't care. At most, I think the game would benefit from some more neutral races; that way they only need to spend half the time on it.

[LordHidious]

Theoretically, 100% of alliance players are human.
Strangely enough, the same applies to horde, though I suspect there's a small percent of them that are trolls

[Deleted]

I voted Yes, beacuse I want to see more classes in the game, for the next expansion.

And ofc Humans are topping the Alliance side, there is alot of PvP'ers who just love to not have to buy that trinket. (Me aswell)
Blood Elfs on the Horde side aint surprising me either, since people want their characters to be 'Clean'.

When I played horde I had all my chars being Blood Elfs (Only my druid being Tauren) I went with the best looking race.

We need more races each expansion, or atleast new classes.

[Felarion]

Lorewise imo only 2 more races need to be added as a playable. High elves and Ogres/Mok'Nathals, but from the other side i never expect they add Pandas or Worgen in to game (goblins was sure bet since classic)

[Deleted]

so what you're saying is horde should get all the new races?

What I'm saying is that the alliance isn't about 'getting new races'; they are the guardians- the old guard protectors of the established powers and peoples of Azeroth. Random new races like Worgen and Draenei undermine that if implemented to excess.

please stop, the ONLY reason blood elves arent alliance is because of population issues

Oh please, Belves are as 'horde' a horde race can be. The once mighty and proud, post catacysmic survivors who have shaken of a corrupt addiction to stand tall once again in an attempt to remake and redeem themselves in the embrace of a hopeful new kind of magic. That's the tale of the Orcs and the Elves both.

You can't honestly think that Belves belong in the Alliance? For sure the High Elves would have fit, if they still existed, which they don't. The events of Warcraft III forever changed Quel'thalas and it's inhabitants such that High Elves such as they existed before then are impossible, the high elf ethic demands the context of unrivalled peace, prosperity, and advancement that they commanded in the EK.

[willtron]

Ethereal is the only race I could see being added - but then again, i'm slightly biased and have loved Ethereal ever since I first saw them.

[Goremonger]

I would much rather they add new races every expansion than new classes. It isn't very hard to balance things when there is a new race that brings racials which aren't game breaking. Compared to DKs who were the ultimate class when wrath came out.

[Teriz]

I really don't believe that Ethereals would be a popular class choice if introduced. I think Ogres would be semi-popular depending on their PvP racials. Horde players are much more into PvP than Alliance players, so racials matter more, not their closeness to humanity. The top Alliance races are Humans, NEs, and Worgens. Frankly, I believe Worgens are #3 because they're just humans in Werewolf form.

I don't see High Elves getting implemented. Blizzard isn't going to bring out a new elf model before they redesign NEs and BEs. Could you imagine the QQ from Blood Elf players when the super cool new High Elf model drops and BEs are still using the model from 2004? Imagine the mass exodus from the Horde.

[sir-connor]

I think instead of new race options they could spend the resources creating more customization options for current races - more hair/facial options and maybe that dance studio?

Subraces for each race might be an easy way to get around making the game feel bloated too, subraces would look slightly different to the main race, have slightly different racials and maybe different animations.

E.g; Forsaken, currently they all look human, could have dwarf or elf forsaken. Trolls - muscular "forest" trolls. Orcs - slimmer, more "WCIII Blademaster" style of orc.

[willtron]

I think instead of new race options they could spend the resources creating more customization options for current races - more hair/facial options and maybe that dance studio?

Subraces for each race might be an easy way to get around making the game feel bloated too, subraces would look slightly different to the main race, have slightly different racials and maybe different animations.

E.g; Forsaken, currently they all look human, could have dwarf or elf forsaken. Trolls - muscular "forest" trolls. Orcs - slimmer, more "WCIII Blademaster" style of orc.

they'd have to be careful with that one - big forest trolls arent part of the darkspear for example.

[Planetarism]

I think instead of new race options they could spend the resources creating more customization options for current races - more hair/facial options and maybe that dance studio?

Subraces for each race might be an easy way to get around making the game feel bloated too, subraces would look slightly different to the main race, have slightly different racials and maybe different animations.

E.g; Forsaken, currently they all look human, could have dwarf or elf forsaken. Trolls - muscular "forest" trolls. Orcs - slimmer, more "WCIII Blademaster" style of orc.

I like it.

+1 vote!

[Deleted]

It is nonsense answering messages like this... but anyway... let's honor the Quel'dorei, the most demanded race of the Alliance for years.

They are indeed the most demanded race. It's because people want to play classical high fantasy, high elves. They don't exist in the Warcraft setting; not anymore. Metzen did that thing he likes to do where he overturns a stereotyped and cliched fantasy trope by recasting it in a different light. Asking for the high elves you want would be like asking for Orcs which were more classically violent and 'always chaotic evil'; like asking for Dark Elves which were less about nocturnal moon worship and nature, and more about subterranean demon worship; like asking for goblins that were less steampunk capitalists, and more classically like smaller weaker faster orc runts.

The High Elves exist (spite of some) and are more numerous than the Darkspear Trolls or the Goblins who survived the escape from Kezan and their shipwreck. Moreover, the number of the High Elves has not done anything but to increase recently.

Numbers have nothing to do with it. There are probably more fel orcs than Horde Orcs. There are more members of the scourge than the Alliance or the Horde.

Old school High elves don't exist- the number of people who identify as High Elves is immaterial, anyhow. That they identify as high elves does not change the fact that they *aren't* the High Elves we once knew. WoW 'high elves' are to WCII High Elves as uni-student socialists are to Bolsheviks. The cultural and political context has marched on, the High Elf civilisation was wiped out. All that remains are the greatly diminished Blood Elf survivors, and some among their number that live in treason, denial, and nostalgia for how things used to be.

The High Elves are a key member of the Alliance since long before the creation of the Alliance itself, as human-elf relations date back to the empire of Arathor, thousands of years ago. The High Elves and humans are natural allies, and have always fought side by side, helping each other. It's a perfect relationship, even to this day (as you can see ingame).

Confusions upon confusions upon confusions. High Elves were never in the Alliance we know in WoW; the Alliance of Stormwind. The last time Stormwind was attacked (and razed, in the 1st war), they did sweet fuck all. They were nominal allies to Lordaeron in WCII and WCIII, but their commitment really only matched the threat posed to Quel'thalas- they were hardly close. Anyhow that alliance != the current alliance in the game (someof the members of the old alliance joined the new one, some didn't, some new people have joined the new one that were never in the old).

I totally disagree with your assessment of the historical relationship between the Human kingdoms and Quel'thalas- they were not 'natural allies'; Quel'thalas was arrogant and isolationist, rightly believing themselves to be in a different league to the primitive squabbling human feudal states (who couldn't even cast magic until they taught them how, in return for meatshields against the Trolls). When humans in the south were getting attacked by the old horde in the 1st war, they did nothing. When their own neighbours in Lordaeron were getting beaten into the dirt, they sent a token force of farstriders, thinking (correctly) they were not at risk themselves. It wasn't until Quel'thalas itself fell under dire threat (and ultimate annihilation) in the 3rd war that they really joined in alliance with the Humans proper, and by then it was too little, too late.

Altogether the Elven attitude to the comparatively primitive human kingdoms alternated between "Who cares what the mud farming humans are up to" and "Uh oh, you know we could use a few extra sword hands."

The real honorable people here are the High Elves. The Blood Elves betrayed their beliefs and their lineage through the contamination with fel magic. Also they caused the revoking of all their customs and actually drove the High Elves of their own homes because they refused to partake of that betrayal.

Don't you see how the destruction of the Sunwell makes these objections irrelevant? Elves are addicted to arcane magic, the sunwell used to be a limitless source, then it got contaminated and shut down. Notwithstanding the fact that the overwhelming majority of their population just got slaughtered by the Scourge, that their capital and homeland was literally cleft in two, that their infrastructure was utterly shattered, that scourge still roved their shattered homeland, that what survivors existed were displaced, starving and lacking leadership after their Prince betrayed them- notwithstanding all of that; they were also going mad with magic withdrawal and devolving into wretched.

The Blood Elves were looking down the barrel of extinction. Try to grasp that. Successive betrayals and catastrophes struck all at once, and all the entire race was about to go extinct. Feeding on fel wasn't an 'honourable' choice, it was a necessary one. It was acall Lor'themar and his military junta government made, and enforced, to intercept the extinction of elves altogether.

Like an old person who won't leave their ancestral home in the path of a flood, these 'high elf' dissidents clung to the contextually irrelevant old ways, they wanted things to go back to how they were- but that just wasn't an option. Many of these high elves who refused to take sustenance fro fel magic did in fact turn wretched after all. The need for magical sustenance is inescapable, however, and until the blood elves graciously admitted them access to the sunwell (that the blood elves as a people painstakingly pulled themselves together to fight to restore without any help from these high elf traitors) they either went wretched, starved, or fed of auxiliary sources not available to the entire population of Quel'thalas.

How easy it is to be honourable when you benefit and depend upon those you scorn as dishonorable.

Furthermore, the Blood Elves betrayed, besides to their own people and to themselves, to the Alliance, which had been always their allies for generations. The Sin'dorei sided with the enemy, the Horde, nest of corruption and decay, formed by orcs, trolls and undead, the natural enemies of the elven race.

What do you even mean 'natural enemies', what makes them natural enemies? The Elves never fought in the 1st war (against Blackhand's Horde), nor did the entire country fight in the 2nd war (against Orgrim Doomhammer's Horde) save for some ships and farstriders given at lordaeron's request for aid. Then *that horde* was destroyed. It stayed destroyed. Decades later an Orc named Thrall would form a New Horde, separate from the old Burning Legion controlled horde, and consisting of mostly new members.

But that aside, do you think the Blood Elves joined the Horde for fun? Place yourself in Lor'themar's shoes for a second. You are the defacto leader of a military regime overseeing the ruins of your homeland. People are starving, undead roam the forests, wretchedness is rife, Silvermoon is in ruins, the King took an entire house of blood elves to Outland then defected to Kil'jaeden. Quel'thalas can't really collapse, it has collapsed. On your southern border is the Dar'Khan's fortress Scourgeholme, and beyond that, the Eastern and Western plaguelands. A single serious push could mean the creation of what would probably become know as the 'Northern Plaguelands'. But that's not all, Sylvannas Windrunner fields an impressive army and navy to the immediate southwest. She sends military 'aid' courting your 'allegiance' hoping to sponsor you into a Horde in which she has more enemies than friends. You do need help, and joining the Horde will probably save your homeland and people. But really, what happens if you refuse?

The Silver Covenant has been only the beginning of the resurgence of the Quel'dorei, very soon the rest of the High Elves scattered throughout Azeroth, Outland and other worlds will gather around Alleria Windrunner for fight for their future, the future that was snatched from themselves by those of their own kind.

The silver unicorn flag will wave again! First in Greenwood and then in the rest of Azeroth and the other worlds. The Quel'dorei, proud of what they are, soon will prove to the world that they are still there, fighting alongside their comrades of the Alliance.

Ashal'anore! Ashal Thalas'din belore!

Long live Alleria Windrunner, the hope of the high elves!

For the Alliance!

This would actually be kind of cool. A renaissance movement of sorts. For the first tiem in a long time, a serious case could be made to return to the old ways. I could live with hypocrite Alliance High elves who are empowered to to exist by the sacrifices Blood elves made such that there is even an argument to be had- and it is by these sacrifices that the High Elves draw their distinction from them, and think of them as somehow better despite benefitting from them nonetheless.

I would like to see Alleria return. I started in WCII and I shed a tear every time one of those good ol' NPCs dies or disappears.

On a complete side note, the unicorn banner, was it ever historically used by the old High Elf kingdom? I thought the Phoenix was the symbol of House Sunstrider. If you look on the Silver covenant tents at the Argent Tournament, they've got the same phoenix logo as the belves, just blue not red.

[Deleted]

No, WoW doesn't need more races. What it needs, in my opinion, is the embellishment of lore and story development for the already playable faction races that have been gathering dust on the forgotten shelf of obscurity for years now. Draenei. Gnomes. Goblins (whose leader doesn't actually exist in the contemporary game world!). I'm lookin' at you!

Saying, "Lol, the Blizzard writers are all human, so don't criticise us for making humans the almost exclusive centre race of Alliance story-telling!", is not a valid excuse for uninteresting writing and side-lining the lore of a number of races they chose to make playable in the game and, as such, get many of their fans and customers interested and emotionally invested in. It's lazy.

But, yeah, that plus an overhaul of the Vanilla player-character models...

[MAXCAVALERA]

New races , new combinations , more customization/ personalization which is a good thing.

[Immitis]

What I'm saying is that the alliance isn't about 'getting new races'; they are the guardians- the old guard protectors of the established powers and peoples of Azeroth. Random new races like Worgen and Draenei undermine that if implemented to excess.

Oh please, Belves are as 'horde' a horde race can be. The once mighty and proud, post catacysmic survivors who have shaken of a corrupt addiction to stand tall once again in an attempt to remake and redeem themselves in the embrace of a hopeful new kind of magic. That's the tale of the Orcs and the Elves both.

You can't honestly think that Belves belong in the Alliance? For sure the High Elves would have fit, if they still existed, which they don't. The events of Warcraft III forever changed Quel'thalas and it's inhabitants such that High Elves such as they existed before then are impossible, the high elf ethic demands the context of unrivalled peace, prosperity, and advancement that they commanded in the EK.

thne how do you explain the magisters having to brain wash the citizens of silvermoon in order to get them to join the horde? or the fact that blood/high elves were going to be an alliance race in vanilla? or the fact that one of their greatest heroes is nicknamed ORC SLAYER.

the one and ONLY reason blood elves are horde is because at the time alliance vastly outnumbered horde and blood elves were one of the most requested races to be added to wow.

[Lord Pebbleton]

We don't really need them.

[Deleted]

Personally, I'm happy with the playable races we had in vanilla. But clearly a lot of people do find some entertainment in playing 'something' new. Even if that something is the exact same class with a new skin.

[Northem]

On a complete side note, the unicorn banner, was it ever historically used by the old High Elf kingdom? I thought the Phoenix was the symbol of House Sunstrider. If you look on the Silver covenant tents at the Argent Tournament, they've got the same phoenix logo as the belves, just blue not red.

Ignoring all the pro-blood elf and anti-high elf propaganda, I have only to say a few things:

The Silver Unicorn is the ancient symbol of the High Elves since they came to Quel'Thalas, as can be seen in the elven destroyers of the Second War. Also the fundamental colors of the High Elves are the silver, the aquamarine and the turquoise (that's why their capital is still called Silvermoon).

The Phoenix is a symbol chosen by the Blood Elves that represents their alleged rebirth from the ashes of the Third War. Like the crimson and golden colors, the phoenix is a symbol unique to the Sin'dorei, and any authentic Quel'dorei would reject them, for everything these symbols represents.

All there is in WoW in relation to the High Elves are mere placeholders, ie, they have no real value. So for example the High Elves models in the game are merely Blood Elves models with blue lenses and the voices of the Night Elves, or their symbols are the symbols of the Blood Elves recolored in blue, nothing serious.

We hope the day comes soon when the High Elves have their own cities, their own colors, their own models, their own symbols and even their own voices ... yet it seems that Blizzard hates the Quel'dorei ... like many others around here ...

[Deleted]

thne how do you explain the magisters having to brain wash the citizens of silvermoon in order to get them to join the horde?

I guess you didn't read my (admittedly hefty) post. The Belves joined the Horde under a certain kind of Duress. It was the best thing for them to do, but perhaps not the ideal.

or the fact that blood/high elves were going to be an alliance race in vanilla?

I was going to make mash potatoes, but then realised I could make potato rostis with dill.

or the fact that one of their greatest heroes is nicknamed ORC SLAYER.

Slaying Orcs? One elf an entire race does not make.

the one and ONLY reason blood elves are horde is because at the time alliance vastly outnumbered horde and blood elves were one of the most requested races to be added to wow.

No, thematically and in terms of narrative it actuall fits beautifully. It's a classic strange bedfellows plotline. The Horde is a place for the crestfallen and corrupted to redeem themselves and fight for a place in a world that often justly doesn't want them. The Belf story trajectory better fits them being in the Horde. Belves in the Alliance would run against the grain of what the alliance is about, belves in the Horde fits perfectly- unexpectedly at the time, because people though Horde meant savage and alliance meant civilised.