What IN GAME changes are we going to see?

[McNeil]

Hopefully they return Kael's original voice

[Kwaizar]

hopefully they cover up a lot of the sexualized females like alextrasza, calia's chest, reduce jaina's chest size and remove perverted NPCs

I hope you are joking and not a real snowflake

[Darthias]

Already happening. It's just minor, unimportant characters you don't notice. Like the innkeeper in the dwarven district in SW (Thaegra Tillstone). Was changed in SL prepatch from

to
.
It's the only NPC I've noticed so far, but I also did not watch out for it. I've just had one character bound to that inn, so I've noticed when SL launched.

Actually what happened here was that they didn't change this NPC specifically.

What Blizzard did was make NPCs in cities have more versatility by applying essentially a randomising the appearance to NPCs so as to have them fall in line with the SL pre-patch player character customisation options. So while it looks like they changed the NPC specifically, it just so happened this NPC became a darker-skinned dwarf than before.

(You can see this if you look at different guards in the main cities, some of them use the 'round' face structures, while some of them use the older 'tight' face structures as well as various skin tones and customisations.)

[BrintoSFJ]

It's their IP and they can do with it as they want, regardless of anything.

They are a public company who can choose to not associate with a person wihtout any reason given.
They have not incarcerated him or fined him in any way. He doesn't even work for Blizzard anymore since last year. Ever wondered why?

There is no guilty beofre prooven guilty as they are not the once who decide anything regarding him only theri company.
Public figures and high level employees represent the company and can seriously harm the everything regarding said company. They have no other choice but to cut ties.
But again: There is no action against Afrisiabi here. Nothing. At all. In any way. This only concernes the game and ActiBlizz.

And we wonder why game companies and developers never hold themselves accountable or responsible for anything and blame others for their failure, including their paid customers. With people like you, there will always be victims of sexual harassment and rape and subsequent corporate hush up. Because you have given them the power to do so, because you don't hold them accountable to a higher sense of morality.

You, a 30 year old man, had to ask what to do when a 16 year old was hitting on you, gonna hazard a guess and say this sort of thing is beyond your current understanding

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Cum brain strikes again

So you believe that women showing skin is bad? What next? Women are responsible for rape because they show skin? Women are sluts if they reveal parts of their skin and thus deserve to be raped? Is that it? Are we living in the dark ages? The fact that you have so much problem with female revealing clothing is extremely disturbing. Don't try to assosciate it with male gaze, the problem is you.

[Doffen]

In order to make sure that nobody gets offended by the different appearances: all races will be replaced with that old beta troll model, as it has a bit of everything.

I would do that, so that wouldnt work as I would be sorely offended by such sexism.

Field Marshal Afrasiabi has been removed from retail....

(replaced with a FEMALE field marshal)

They couldnt just remove it or rename the male npc, no no.

Doubling down is the way to go amirite.

[BrintoSFJ]

I hope you are joking and not a real snowflake

Or he believes that women are responsible for rape and women who wear revealing clothes deserve to be raped. He will just try to cover it up with bullshit like "Male gazing" or "Sex sale".

[Pakheth]

they've already done that. Highly doubt Kael'thas's OG voice actor will want to come back after the way he was treated

They have? I truly hope so. Original voice actor was so much better and his voice is iconic.

[LordVargK]

Why does this matter though?

I did not voice an opinion, just stating that "diversifictaion" is already happening.

But if you want my opinion:
Replacing one character's model with a totally different designed one is ridiculous. If you want a black character that badly, then at least make a new one. After BfA you had the perfect opportunity: Dark Iron Dwarfs joined the Alliance, so Thaegra could have just sold her inn to a new, black Dark Iron Dwarf character (that obviously has a different name) and went to explore the once forbbidden cities of the outcast clans, that are now opened up to the rest. Having a little explanation is not much work (you literally give the new NPC a textbox, where she explains where Thaegra went and why there is a new ownership of the inn, we've seen that plenty of times in the game).

But only changing the skin color of an existant character is frankly insulting. It shows that you absolutely don't care. You don't care enough about diversity to make a new character for it (which literally is as easy as changing the name and model of the already existing one and giving it a textbox explaining what happened to the character this one is replacing). You don't care enough about your game world that you would do a tiny effort to keep it consistent or reflect changes made in one expansion.

The way I see it, whoever thought this was a good idea gives zero fucks about the whole issue. I've probably given it more thought in this post alone, than the one responsible for this change. And that really shows how much Blizzard actually cares about diversity. Those changes alienate more people than they please, because their excecution is soo bad.

Actually what happened here was that they didn't change this NPC specifically.

What Blizzard did was make NPCs in cities have more versatility by applying essentially a randomising the appearance to NPCs so as to have them fall in line with the SL pre-patch player character customisation options. So while it looks like they changed the NPC specifically, it just so happened this NPC became a darker-skinned dwarf than before.

(You can see this if you look at different guards in the main cities, some of them use the 'round' face structures, while some of them use the older 'tight' face structures as well as various skin tones and customisations.)

Thanks for the explanation. But I think my point still stands. This is okay for unnamed NPCs like "Stormwind guard", but terrible for named ones. You don't just change existing characters, that's bad style.

[BrintoSFJ]

What else do I think?

I have a problem with straight men creepily drooling over women, even ranking games based on how nude they can get their characters.

Women can wear whatever they want and people shouldn't behave like cumbrained freaks because a woman has visible skin

Yeah I don't belive that. Because people like that woul not question revealing female costumes in game. Because people like that would know that all over the world women are harassed and raped based on their clothes and at least in game, they can let loose with these costumes. The fact that countries like Iran, Saudi Arabia and several other muslim countries ban games like LoL, SMITE, BnS, BDO on account of revealing female clothes but don't ban WoW should tell you enough.

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Wow man, dont overwhelm us with your good faith arguments.

Then don't write bullshit, simple as that.

[Kathranis]

How do you know this?

You're telling me he is in Waikiki Beach right now drinking Mai Tai's?

Scott Johnson talked about it on his podcast the other day. He's close with a bunch of people in the company, particularly the PR and community outreach side, since he's hosted panels and done exclusive interviews over the years. He also got private confirmation of the abuse from one of the victims, someone he said is now high up in the company, who he respects and trusts.

[Venziir]

Well, the incelhood is strong within this thread....

[Nalam the Venom]

Cum brain strikes again

You can keep story NPC's as A-B cup and cover them up all you want, or even add options to disable character creations options from view.

But i'd still appriciate if WoW had an option for big size.

BDO size for reference https://i.imgur.com/sG9DKHh.jpg <-- slight NSFW warning if any one is offended by big badonkers

[Grim32]

I did not voice an opinion, just stating that "diversifictaion" is already happening.

But if you want my opinion:
Replacing one character's model with a totally different designed one is ridiculous. If you want a black character that badly, then at least make a new one. After BfA you had the perfect opportunity: Dark Iron Dwarfs joined the Alliance, so Thaegra could have just sold her inn to a new, black Dark Iron Dwarf character (that obviously has a different name) and went to explore the once forbbidden cities of the outcast clans, that are now opened up to the rest. Having a little explanation is not much work (you literally give the new NPC a textbox, where she explains where Thaegra went and why there is a new ownership of the inn, we've seen that plenty of times in the game).

But only changing the skin color of an existant character is frankly insulting. It shows that you absolutely don't care. You don't care enough about diversity to make a new character for it (which literally is as easy as changing the name and model of the already existing one and giving it a textbox explaining what happened to the character this one is replacing). You don't care enough about your game world that you would do a tiny effort to keep it consistent or reflect changes made in one expansion.

The way I see it, whoever thought this was a good idea gives zero fucks about the whole issue. I've probably given it more thought in this post alone, than the one responsible for this change. And that really shows how much Blizzard actually cares about diversity. Those changes alienate more people than they please, because their excecution is soo bad.



Thanks for the explanation. But I think my point still stands. This is okay for unnamed NPCs like "Stormwind guard", but terrible for named ones. You don't just change existing characters, that's bad style.

The problem even with anonymous guards being changed is lore wise some of these race changes make no sense (see Blood Elves for example). Now Blizzard could of easily explained these new different skin colour variations - and why we never saw them before. But nope, that would require a couple of days work. All of these diversity changes, be they race, sexuality, gender - it comes more across as washing, rather than adding lore or retconning it ingame. It's a fantasy world where even some of the retconned stuff is never explained in game. It's absurd.

[Raetary]

why do the change if it doesn't matter?

Why not?
If you add brand new customization options to player models, why not utilize those options in the game world?

[Muxtar]

Amazon are doing black hobbits n dwarves for their Lotr show.

No way! Any proofs? I was so much looking forward to this show...

[Grim32]

Why not?
If you add brand new customization options to player models, why not utilize those options in the game world?

Maybe because when it comes to race or gender that ends up coming across as "washing"?

[Gorsameth]

I find it amusing that they are already removing all references of him before anything has even been decided in court. Normally that would be setting a dangerous precedent of guilty until proven innocent, with the accused already having their lives ruined before anything even makes it to court, which sadly happens far more often than it should. But in this case it at least makes some sense, the developers would be the ones who know if he actually is guilty since they would have witnessed it.

To keep this within WoW I point you to the situation of Method and Josh. Not doing anything because the court did not almost killed the organisation.
That is why companies don't wait on the courts.

[Ihavewaffles]

No way! Any proofs? I was so much looking forward to this show...

theonering says so, but it may be a rumour n not confirmed, but wouldn't surprise me if it's true.

[LordVargK]

The problem even with anonymous guards being changed is lore wise some of these race changes make no sense (see Blood Elves for example). Now Blizzard could of easily explained these new different skin colour variations - and why we never saw them before. But nope, that would require a couple of days work. All of these diversity changes, be they race, sexuality, gender - it comes more across as washing, rather than adding lore or retconning it ingame. It's a fantasy world where even some of the retconned stuff is never explained in game. It's absurd.

At least it's easier to create a headcanon for those anonymous NPCs. You don't have to treat them as changed, just new recruits after the third (fourth?) war. Many of the original guard were drafted and are now replaced, but since the war (and the cataclysm) had a heavy toll on the population of Stormwind and its surroundings, those humans were recruited from further south.

An explanation would be nice, but is not strictly necessary.
But you just can't headcanon a new skin color on a named NPC...

[Nalam the Venom]

I'd say get a girlfriend but that wouldn't really be fair on them

Your real life situation does not have any thing to do with your preference in games & Media.