Why do people want to change the game so much ? (elves, wow, and the community)

[Syrah-the-Old-One]

Yeah, I know, that title wasn't very inspired.

First let me give you a bit of insight : I personally HATE elves. Always did, no matter what fictional universe. That's precisely why, back around 1995, I fell instantly in love with Warcraft 2 : Tides of Darkness. Finally I had found a game where the story wouldn't revolve around long-eared demigods. It felt rough. It felt dirty. It felt bloody. And my young mind loved it.
I grew older as a Blizzard fan, but mostly playing the Warcraft franchise. Starcraft was cool and all, but it never really clicked. A matter of taste probably. And Diablo was weird in my opinion. Didn't click either.

Long story short : I always loved Warcraft because it was centered around Orcs and Humans, with little to no elf significant presence, except for the human archer unit. The elves did exist in this universe, but weren't the central point around which everything revolved.

Then came Warcraft 3, and the elven lore was a bit expanded. I accepted it. After all, how would you build a world in fantasy settings without at least referencing this race or something similar. Those were almost copypasted upon classic DnD concepts, so I could feel familiar about them.
WoW finally released, and I was at first relieved to see that only Nelves were playable. It felt logical, and relevant to the Warcraft universe I fell in love with. Elves were a rare race, and even if they once ruled the world, they were now on the brink of extinction after the events of Warcraft 3...

And then came BC, a first punch to the gut for me. High elves, (not so) cleverly renamed as Blood Elves, probably to fit the theme of the faction they ended up in : the Horde..
Wait... weren't those supposed to have been OBLITERATED by the scourge ? and weren't the few survivors fleeing to outland ?
I decided to swallow back my anger, and to try to see things on a more pragmatic level : some people wanted to play those, and it would add some different flavor to the Horde.. I ended up accepting it (after quite a long time to be honest)..

Now, the more WoW's story unfolded, the more the two "original" protagonist races of the game were progressively forced to share the focus with those filthy elves I couldn't stand. Nelves, Belves, Nightborne, Void Elves, Sea Elves (naga, duh), and so on...

I still could kinda understand it. After all, not everyone shared my opinion, and lots of people do love elves in their fantasy games.
But then... Why did they play WoW in the first place ?

To me, it feels like someone playing Super Mario Bros, and complaining about the fact that they can't play as Sonic the Hedgehog... or someone playing TESO and wanting to see the orcs take a bigger place in the story.

The whole High Elf fandom made me ask myself this question. They are clearly passionnate about it, but I find it weird that they don't accept Blizzard's negative responses to their requests of playable High Elves in the Alliance.

The Lore, the Devs, the games.. everything and everyone told them that the Blood Elves were actually the remains of what once were High Elves, but they weren't satisfied. And to appease them we got Void Elves.. which were too much different from their fantasy. I particulary find those to be an insult to what the Warcraft universe once was.





TL;DR : Why do people want to change the very DNA of the original Warcraft Universe so badly ?

[Fawkess]

Oh this thread I'm sure will turn out nice and constructive

[Syrah-the-Old-One]

I do intend it to be, and I really want to understand.

But I can also understand your apprehensions, sadly.

[Averrix]

Yeah, because nothing ever evolves and everything should always stay the same.

[Merryck]

based thread

[Th3Scourge]

TL;DR : Why do people want to change the very DNA of the original Warcraft Universe so badly ?

You mean why are the current WoW narrative designers so hellbent on shitting on the OG warcraft lore?

[Niroshi]

It's not as though people have been quiet about their reasons. You're baiting, not seeking understanding. If you wanted understanding wouldn't you just read their words directly??

[Syrah-the-Old-One]

based thread

Totally. Not insulting tho.

Yeah, because nothing ever evolves and everything should always stay the same.

Things do evolve, you're absolutely right. But it needs to feel natural, and some of those elven races' introductions sure didn't feel natural in warcraft's original story.

You mean why are the current WoW narrative designers so hellbent on shitting on the OG warcraft lore?

They do have their fair share of culpability, but my original question was about people choosing to play a game with a clearly defined universe only to change it drastically.

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It's not as though people have been quiet about their reasons. You're baiting, not seeking understanding. If you wanted understanding wouldn't you just read their words directly??

I did, and truely didn't understand their reaction. Mainly because, as I said, elves never felt like a central point of the warcraft universe prior to BC, basically.
Also I confess that I didn't exhaustively go through the whole 400+ pages of the High Elves fanthread, but I'm a regular lurker nonetheless.

[LostSinclair]

If nothing ever changes, your're just playing the same game over and over again with a slightly different coat of paint applied here and there. To keep interest and stay fun or challenging changes happen, some of them are good and stay, others are bad and don't.

[Niroshi]

I did, and truely didn't understand their reaction. Mainly because, as I said, elves never felt like a central point of the warcraft universe prior to BC, basically.
Also I confess that I didn't exhaustively go through the whole 400+ pages of the High Elves fanthread, but I'm a regular lurker nonetheless.

Outside of the First War the Elves have been linked to nearly every major story in some way. I'm not sure why you didn't see them as important until The Burning Crusade. They weren't important back in the 90s as much because the game's universe was tiny in scope. WC1 focused entirely on "The Kingdom of Azeroth" (Stormwind) and nothing else. Warcraft 2 was a bit bigger, but still focused primarily on Human kingdoms. As the game's universe grows naturally it will grow to encompass more than Humans and Orcs.

Anyhow the answer to why people want High Elves is easy. They've been part of the Alliance racial group since Warcraft 2 when they were introduced through the Alliance campaign. They're iconic to the Alliance and so Alliance players naturally want to play as them. Until BFA Blizzard has consistently dangled them in front of Alliance players to the frustration of many. They also went and made Void Elves, which were supposedly only a few in number, when the classic reason the High Elves couldn't be playable was that they were too few in number. There's a general sense of "we're getting fucked over" in that debate from the Alliance and it's not unfounded.

Also people just like Elves and that's kind of obvious, what with the Horde being like 40% Elves and the Alliance being around the same.

[Kyphael]

If you want things to stay the same, Classic is there for you.

[Mirishka]

Yeah, I know, that title wasn't very inspired.

First let me give you a bit of insight : I personally HATE elves. Always did, no matter what fictional universe. That's precisely why, back around 1995, I fell instantly in love with Warcraft 2 : Tides of Darkness. Finally I had found a game where the story wouldn't revolve around long-eared demigods. It felt rough. It felt dirty. It felt bloody. And my young mind loved it.
I grew older as a Blizzard fan, but mostly playing the Warcraft franchise. Starcraft was cool and all, but it never really clicked. A matter of taste probably. And Diablo was weird in my opinion. Didn't click either.

Long story short : *snip*

There is a topic all about high elves, this should have been posted there.

And furthermore being a WC fan, being the biggest fan ever, doesn't mean the games or their lore are beholden to you. Your wall of rant was full of I, me, I, me, as if the game set out to spite you, specifically, with the increased presence of elves. And its ridiculous that you felt the need to sit down and hammer out this massive wall of nonsense that basically boils down to 'stop liking what I hate why can't you all be more like me'.

So I'm going to tell you what it seems I have to tell a lot of people in this community: not everything is going to be, or has to be, for you - and that's okay. The sooner you realize that, the better.

[Marrilaife]

You're around 12 years too late.

Blood Elves are the most popular WOW race. Don't blame High Elf fans when you can see similar stuff everywhere. Sylvanas fanboys? She's an elf. Albeit undead one. Horde playerbase? Blood Elves and endless complains how Nightborne deserve better models so they aren't "wide eyed" like Night Elves. Oh, and people who want Dark Rangers, Sanlayn, Forsaken Night Elves and other Elf off-shoots.

I'm pretty sure there are more fans of World of Elven-craft than "Orcs vs Humans" by now. I'm pretty sure majority of them weren't even born when Warcraft 1 was released so throw backs to the past of the franchise are pointless, most people haven't played the RTS games and probably haven't even played WOW since the beginning but probably started a couple of expansions ago.

Tbh when you go on Classic it seems Undead are the most popular horde race, so I'm not sure how much people love "savage" horde anyway. Majority of people gravitate towards whatever is closest to Human looks, and pointy ear elf is much closer to human than green hunchback orc.

And I don't know how wanting High Elves (a race associated with Alliance) is worse than people asking for Sethrak, Jinyu, Lightforged Undead or other races that were created much later and have much less basis in lore / history to be put as a new race / allied race.

But don't worry, since we already had a wave of elf-related Allied Races I don't expect more until we get all the other races their round. What's left is Pandas, Worgen and Forsaken, so basically expect 2 furry races and probably, sadly, the Lightforged Undead on one side or the other (they created it in BFA prequel novel for a reason...)

[LostSinclair]

You're around 12 years too late.

Blood Elves are the most popular WOW race. Don't blame High Elf fans when you can see similar stuff everywhere. Sylvanas fanboys? She's an elf. Albeit undead one. Horde playerbase? Blood Elves and endless complains how Nightborne deserve better models so they aren't "wide eyed" like Night Elves. Oh, and people who want Dark Rangers, Sanlayn, Forsaken Night Elves and other Elf off-shoots.

I'm pretty sure there are more fans of World of Elven-craft than "Orcs vs Humans" by now. I'm pretty sure majority of them weren't even born when Warcraft 1 was released so throw backs to the past of the franchise are pointless, most people haven't played the RTS games and probably haven't even played WOW since the beginning but probably started a couple of expansions ago.

Tbh when you go on Classic it seems Undead are the most popular horde race, so I'm not sure how much people love "savage" horde anyway. Majority of people gravitate towards whatever is closest to Human looks, and pointy ear elf is much closer to human than green hunchback orc.

And I don't know how wanting High Elves (a race associated with Alliance) is worse than people asking for Sethrak, Jinyu, Lightforged Undead or other races that were created much later and have much less basis in lore / history to be put as a new race / allied race.

But don't worry, since we already had a wave of elf-related Allied Races I don't expect more until we get all the other races their round. What's left is Pandas, Worgen and Forsaken, so basically expect 2 furry races and probably, sadly, the Lightforged Undead on one side or the other (they created it in BFA prequel novel for a reason...)

I don't think we're getting a pandaren skeleton allied race.(what would they even use for that)

[MrSaggins]

From your word choice it seems as though you’re less concerned with fair pointy eared humanoids and more with power checks that tame the high fantasy extremes down to a Conan and the medieval knights vibe. This problem was probably offset a bit by Night Elves losing their immortality (and then undermined by Elune shielding Tyrande from Sargeras, Night Warrior stuff, and Knaak making Malfurion basically a god.) Arthas’ corruption of the Sunwell and their magical addiction was a wonderful foil for blood elven power... until patch 2.4 soiled that entire plot dynamic (honestly my least favorite progression in all of the lore.) The Void Elves are at least held somewhat in check by their susceptibility to maddening whispers, and the numbers of high Elves being infinitesimally small (allegedly) should have been a plus but numbers are rarely accounted for in game. I’ve got nothing to neuter the nightborne though; Elisande was terribly powerful.

This is all possibly dwarfed by the series of magical inflation of the power of other races catching up to the Elves, but then that doesn’t necessarily help the problem of reducing the series back to martial knights fighting barbarians.

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Also, an increased presence and utility of of Thalassian spellbreakers, magic breakers like Ko’ragh or others seen in Highmaul, and certain death knight powers could go long way toward tempering magic.

[zlygork]

"Ever evolving world" was my favorite part of warcraft, since as far back as wc3. I don't get what there would be to love from a wow that does not change tbh.

[Syrah-the-Old-One]

Ok, so..

I do understand the uproar and the feelings of Helves fans concerning Blizzard's decision not to make Helves playable for the Alliance. It completely resonates with the universe that was set up in the days of the RTS, to be honest, you're right, Niroshi. But they separated from this story in BC, when they gave Belves to the Horde, and this is something they can't go back on even if they tease the fanbase about it. It's a bit cruel of them tbh

I think that the question I'm asking is actually coming a bit too late as Marrilaife stated. The story has already evolved to include more and more elven lore. The thing is that I regret Blizz's decision when they decided to expand the story in that way, while I do understand that it's a classic trope that's almost unavoidable. But once again, that's about 15 years too late almost.

I do regret the "magical inflation" that MrSaggins talks about, but I see it more like a symptom, rather than a cause. And I agree, they did go from an almost Conan-like universe in the 90es to a more classic High Fantasy kind of writing afterwards.

There is a topic all about high elves, this should have been posted there.

That would have been seen as provocation, and understandably. I don't want this discussion to be seen as mere trolling.

And furthermore being a WC fan, being the biggest fan ever, doesn't mean the games or their lore are beholden to you. Your wall of rant was full of I, me, I, me, as if the game set out to spite you, specifically, with the increased presence of elves. And its ridiculous that you felt the need to sit down and hammer out this massive wall of nonsense that basically boils down to 'stop liking what I hate why can't you all be more like me'.

First, I'm sorry you understood it this way. The thing is... I'm basically the only point of reference I can trust 100%, and I think the thread is clear about how it is opinion-based. Hence the uneasy number of "I" and "me" 's.. But I don't get how it's different, or less worthy than threads who are similar but on the other side of the spectrum (elf appreciation thread, random threads about how the story is turning up, etc for instance.)

So I'm going to tell you what it seems I have to tell a lot of people in this community: not everything is going to be, or has to be, for you - and that's okay. The sooner you realize that, the better.

It's a good message to spread, and I did realize it all the way back in BC. I just wondered when things began to change in Warcraft's story and how the community responded to it or even influenced it sometimes. Probably natural evolution as you guys said, although it didn't feel natural to me, it's only my opinion after all.

Thanks for your interest anyways, people !

[Merryck]

I don't think we're getting a pandaren skeleton allied race.(what would they even use for that)

Tuskarr or Tortollan could work.

[Tiwack]

A combination of investment and wonder about what'll be next.

[Merryck]

-snip-

They should just make magic as dangerous, corrupting and volatile as it was described in the lore.