Official High Elf Discussion Megathread

[Aeluron Lightsong]

haha, again with hedcanon, no, they are not

Except there was plenty of High Elves at Dalaran. Hell before the Scourging of Quel'thalas even Kael'thas himself was a student there.

the elves who helped the alliance in war3 are the elves from quel'thalas, who are now blood elves

They were High Elves, which further more showed how much ppl wanted High Elves in the Alliance. Yeah they turned into Blood Elves(Or Kael'thas's survivors) but the point still stands.

again, not all of then, just the ones who were imprisoned in dalaran, and flee to outland, some of then back, justlike Rommath

Kael'thas's Blood Elves got imprisoned yes but the bulk that the player Blood Elves were in Quel'thalas. The ones that followed Kael'thas were considered villainous(See Sunfury elves that we killed a lot in BC)

except, the "silvermoon blood elves" are the quel'thalas elves, also, high elves, so yes they were represented in the past

The ones that were left and well eventually had to feed on fel and other things, High Elves decided "No" and well Lor'themar exiled them. There's already some High Elves in Outland still around but originally the Silvermoon Blood Elves WERE High Elves at one point.

again, prove, cause those could just go back home and be the blood elves now, like Halduron and the other farstriders

The ones that went with the Son's of Lothar and Alleria that ended up stranded when the Dark Portal closed, it's literally right there in BC as I pointed up above.

an even small force who still is in outland

Logistics is literally the last thing Warcraft lore deals with, considering Void Elves are here and well Lightforged Draenei are small in number.

[RangerDaz]

I'll commend you for your optimism in the face of the overwhelming odds that High Elves probably won't happen.

But the reason why there isn't an option for a Sylvanas-esque elf in the game is because what happened to her is fairly unique. It would require a large quantity of people to be killed and then brought back to life in the same way she was. Not like the Forsaken, either. Exactly the same way she was. Death Knights themselves adhere fairly closely to this mechanism of reanimation, but her level of it is even more unique than that. I'm actually quite unsure how Nathanos became the way he is, but wasn't he a Human?

San'layn are literally part of the Scourge. While it's not impossible I highly doubt, even more so than High Elves, that a faction of Elves under the command of the Scourge would join the Horde on a playable level. Let's even consider for a moment that Bolvar would give permission to this. What makes you believe Bolvar would allow Sylvanas, the current Warchief, to take control of a faction of elves under his command? To be frank, did you even think this through?

We've been accused of being "closed minded" and giving simple retorts to counter the High Elf argument. But this is why it's mostly hard to take you guys seriously. You guys just want things for the sake of wanting them, and to most of you, that's justification enough when it is simply not. It's almost as if no thought or credence is given to the way the story has been told and laid out. But posts like this one will likely get ignored because it doesn't fit the agenda of those begging for High Elves.

For us to lose Silvermoon as a capital city would mean the Alliance would have to lose another city. There's no way, in terms of balance, that the Alliance would claim both Lordaeron and Silvermoon while we only burn down Darnassus. Another testament to how little forethought goes into these "we will take this whether you like it or not" claims you guys have become so fond of making.

If you want to convince people, or garner support, this is not the way to go about doing it. In fact, I believe it will have the opposite effect.

Finally got time to answer this Here it goes:

I'll commend you for your optimism in the face of the overwhelming odds that High Elves probably won't happen.

I thank you again for your compliment However i am very curious where you get those "overwhelming" data statistics!

But the reason why there isn't an option for a Sylvanas-esque elf in the game is because what happened to her is fairly unique. It would require a large quantity of people to be killed and then brought back to life in the same way she was. Not like the Forsaken, either. Exactly the same way she was. Death Knights themselves adhere fairly closely to this mechanism of reanimation, but her level of it is even more unique than that. I'm actually quite unsure how Nathanos became the way he is, but wasn't he a Human?

San'layn are literally part of the Scourge. While it's not impossible I highly doubt, even more so than High Elves, that a faction of Elves under the command of the Scourge would join the Horde on a playable level. Let's even consider for a moment that Bolvar would give permission to this. What makes you believe Bolvar would allow Sylvanas, the current Warchief, to take control of a faction of elves under his command? To be frank, did you even think this through?

Here i agree only partially with you (a very small part!). Yes, Sylvanas was raised in a special way by Arthas. However other killed High Elves were raised in undeath by him as well. There are many Dark Ranger NPCs ingame that go with Sylvanas. I also agree that the San'layn are a special case, but if undead elf race would come out, i would mix the sanlayn and dark ranger concepts in the customzation options for gameplay / diversity choices. Also they could make up new lore to justify these changes, as they did to justify the void elves existance or to the nightborne and highmountain changing from neutral to horde faction.

We've been accused of being "closed minded"

Yes! That completely defines all the frevorous anti high elf MMO-champ forum militants

But this is why it's mostly hard to take you guys seriously.

Why? Because we have different opinions?

You guys just want things for the sake of wanting them, and to most of you, that's justification enough when it is simply not. It's almost as if no thought or credence is given to the way the story has been told and laid out.

It's not a question of wanting or not wanting. It's a question of analysing the current allied race model (which has been live ingame since 2 months ago for everyone who pre-purchased BfA) on how new playable races are chosen and created, and seeing how Alliance High Elves qualify the same criteria that made the current allied races playable. Check the video below, if you already haven't:

ut posts like this one will likely get ignored because it doesn't fit the agenda of those begging for High Elves.

Yes, this post was supposed to insert some humor into the 100 pages. I have posted so much in these 100 pages already, that i decided to insert this to lighten up the discussion. Jesus, where is your sense of humor, guys?

For us to lose Silvermoon as a capital city would mean the Alliance would have to lose another city. There's no way, in terms of balance, that the Alliance would claim both Lordaeron and Silvermoon while we only burn down Darnassus. Another testament to how little forethought goes into these "we will take this whether you like it or not" claims you guys have become so fond of making.

I joked as being an Alliance High Elf who wants Silvermoon back. That doesn't mean the war will succeed or not. I didn't like at all having two of my favorite vanilla places being destroyed (Teldrassil Tree and Undercity). Man i loved those to places. So many good memories. But war is war, and things like this can happen all the time.

And it is possible to lose silvermoon as well. Alliance could get Silvermoon and horde could get Exodar as an alternative. There are so many possibilities in WoW storytelling that i don't understand why people keep saying "it's not possible" to happen in a fictional universe, especially one like Warcraft that has had so many retcons since 30 years ago (check Chronicles as an example). Anything is possible, if Blizzard wants it to be. They are the owners of the franchise, and the final decision is theirs, even if it means to create new "ass pulled" allied races, as so many people call Void Elves.

f you want to convince people, or garner support, this is not the way to go about doing it. In fact, I believe it will have the opposite effect.

Thank you for lecturing me on how to make mmo-champion posts
I have made so many posts in this thread already, that I am sure this specific post won't affect anything.

Maybe you should also relax and not take this too seriously as well? This is just a game afterall.

[BTHSE]

all the High Elves we had were the Dalaran High Elves. These are now the Silver Covenant High Elves or the High Elves left at Theramore like Captain Danill and his High Elf troops.

There is just nothing to support that. Heck, there is strong evidence to support the exact opposite. Kael'thas and his group of blood elves were helping the alliance against the scourge in Lordaron, their missions took place in Dalaran. Don't you think that most of the able bodied forces that would volunteer to help Kael'thas and the Alliance retake Lordaron and Dalaran rather than rebuild Silvermoon would be the elves of Dalaran themselves? Those elves were apprehended and sentenced to death in Dalaran by Garithos. Do you really believe that Garithos would have made a distinction between Kael'thas blood elves and whichever High Elves were lingering around Dalaran? Off course not, he would have apprehended and executed them all the same so it is very likely that a good chunk of the elves that joined Kael'thas in outland were themselves Dalaran elves. Heck, Kael'thas himself could be considered a Dalaran elf since he was known to spend more time in Dalaran than in Silvermoon.

Again you cannot say that "All the HE come from here or there", there is no single source for the HE. In the aftermath of the third war the HE renamed themselves blood elves as a way to acknowledge their hardship, however as the BE got desperate to satisfy their addiction most of them started siphoning living beings for their mana. Some of the elves said "wow, I want no part of that, I'm leaving" and they joined the alliance. They did that both individually and in groups, some were initially Silvermoon citizens, some were Dalaran citizens, some were from lodges, some were from the Alliance expedition... It's all a very mixed back. The HE of today come from various sources, just like the blood elves of today weren't only citizens of silvermoon. Some of them were from lodges who decided to go back to silvermoon to rebuild their homeland, some of them were from Dalaran and moved to silvermoon after Dalaran was destroyed, some of them used to be soldiers who fought in the second war and just came home after the Horde had been defeated.

You can't just go "This is where they're all from, they're all just some very distinct groups that have been separate for a long time and stayed that way" they're all the same race, the same culture with minor variation in their backgrounds that ended up separating in the aftermath of the third war.

In WCII (before the xpac) we had the "token force" that later settled in the lodges and Stormwind. These are now the general High Elves.

Again, you have nothing to support that. The lodges have nothing to do with those forces. The lodges were initially some elven forces positioned in various places so the elves could keep tabs on the world, they existed before the second war and after it they mostly stayed on the side of the alliance after the third war but there is just no evidence that the token force from WarII has anything to do with them. The token force was just some loyal soldiers obeying their king's order to pretend that they supported the alliance. There is just no reason to believe they were out there because of their conviction that helping the alliance was right. Nothing to tell us that any of them volunteered and didn't want to go back home afterwards (unlike the forces commanded by Alleria which all decided that they'd rather support the alliance)

[RangerDaz]

WORD OF GOD IS CANON, Ion says that

Man, i can't understand this obssession some people here have for Ion and every single word he says.
He is not president of Blizzard company, and everything he or any other Blizzard employee say doesn't mean it is the final word from Blizzard related to any issue for ALL ETERNITY.

Things evolve, things change through time. It is normal in a game like this. One moment they have certain goals to accomplish, other moments their goals shift to other priorities or they change their minds related to certain issues.

[Syegfryed]

Except there was plenty of High Elves at Dalaran. Hell before the Scourging of Quel'thalas even Kael'thas himself was a student there.

thats totally irrelevant to the subject we are talking about

he said all the elves who appear in warcraft 3 are the elves from dalaran, and its not true, they are from quelthalas

the elves from dalaran after the scourge attack could just go back to their home, or follow kael, you can't prove they are now all alliance

They were High Elves, which further more showed how much ppl wanted High Elves in the Alliance. Yeah they turned into Blood Elves(Or Kael'thas's survivors) but the point still stands.

if they are now blood elves, the point not stand, if people want those high elves they can play then with another name.

not in the right faction? too bad, get over it, things don't always come like we want.

Kael'thas's Blood Elves got imprisoned yes but the bulk that the player Blood Elves were in Quel'thalas. The ones that followed Kael'thas were considered villainous(See Sunfury elves that we killed a lot in BC)

Again not all of then, some of then did back to quel'thalas, and are there until today, like rommanth and the elves who bring the mana/fel crystals

The ones that were left and well eventually had to feed on fel and other things, High Elves decided "No" and well Lor'themar exiled them. There's already some High Elves in Outland still around but originally the Silvermoon Blood Elves WERE High Elves at one point.

now and then this "feed on fel" comes up, thats just boring

those high elves who decide "no" and get exiled, were blood elves at some point, then rename to high elves

yet, i can't see your point here, silvermoon blood elves are high elves.

The ones that went with the Son's of Lothar and Alleria that ended up stranded when the Dark Portal closed, it's literally right there in BC as I pointed up above.

you are talking about the ones who went to outland with alleria, we are talking about the ones who were sent by Anesterian as token force to fight by the alliance, and those could be blood elves now just fine.

Logistics is literally the last thing Warcraft lore deals with, considering Void Elves are here and well Lightforged Draenei are small in number.

you can proof that void elves and LF draenei have small numbers than the HE in outland? cause the logic say its obvious the contrary

[RangerDaz]

Hey looks like you're having a wonderful chat and productive discussion.

Just wanted to remind everyone that it will never happen.

OK Thanks for reminding us of your personal opinion!
I will also remind everyone that my personal opinion is that it will happen sooner or later

[The Stormbringer]

Fine you want HE then ask for Forest Trolls too then we are set

Sure, sounds good! Gotta give those High Elves a proper rival/enemy, after all. Who better than their oldest and most hated one?

[RangerDaz]

If Blizzard does cave in and make (Silver Covenant) high elves an allied race? Does that mean there's still hope for vrykul and ogres?

Fine you want HE then ask for Forest Trolls too then we are set

Sure, sounds good! Gotta give those High Elves a proper rival/enemy, after all. Who better than their oldest and most hated one?

I would make the following pairs (Alliance vs. Horde):

Alliance High Elves vs. Undead High Elves (Dark Rangers, San'layn, etc)
Wildhammer Dwarves vs. Raventusk Trolls (and jungle Trolls)
Saberon vs. Ogres
Sethrak vs. Vulpera
Mechagnomes vs. Mechano-forged Goblins
Vrykul vs. Mogu
Murlocs vs. Naga Shapeshifters: Naga / Highborne forms (more or less like Worgen shapeshifting)
Broken vs. Mok'nathal

[Traycor]

There is just nothing to support that. Heck, there is strong evidence to support the exact opposite. Kael'thas and his group of blood elves were helping the alliance against the scourge in Lordaron, their missions took place in Dalaran.

Great chatting with you Corazona, you're fun to talk to!

That's why I separated out the Blood Elves that followed Kael'Thas. These elves came from all over, including the elves who were away. The ones who followed him became the villainous Blood Elves of WoW (not the playable ones). So they are seperate from the Silver Covenant as well as the playable Silvermoon Blood Elves.

You can't just go "This is where they're all from, they're all just some very distinct groups that have been separate for a long time and stayed that way" they're all the same race, the same culture with minor variation in their backgrounds that ended up separating in the aftermath of the third war.

I can agree with that. I'm talking in generalities about the overall groups. While we've heard of High Elves leaving Silvermoon during the whole Blood Elf thing, we've had no indication that a mass exodus of 10% of the population left. (It's actually greater than 10% of the city's population, since the Silvermoon Blood Elves are only 75% of the remaining Thallasians. That would mean one in every 7.5 left.

Nothing we've seen supports that idea. The High Elves as a whole were already gone. The descriptions of those who left seemed to indicated small bands of non combatants. These would be some of the High Elf NPCs that don't see action and wouldn't be playable even with a High Elf Allied Race.

The lodges have nothing to do with those forces. The lodges were initially some elven forces positioned in various places so the elves could keep tabs on the world, they existed before the second war and after it they mostly stayed on the side of the alliance after the third war but there is just no evidence that the token force from WarII has anything to do with them.

By you're very description, it 100% indicates that the lodges were part of this token force. They were there to get involved in the world. There's no reason to assume they just stayed in the lodge while other elves traveled from far away to go help. The fact that they later stayed and separated from their people further supports this.

The token force was just some loyal soldiers obeying their king's order to pretend that they supported the alliance. There is just no reason to believe they were out there because of their conviction that helping the alliance was right. Nothing to tell us that any of them volunteered and didn't want to go back home afterwards (unlike the forces commanded by Alleria which all decided that they'd rather support the alliance)

I will concede that this point is debatable. However, we have no indication that the elves who went were 'pretending'. In fact, the actions of Alleria and her High Elves strongly indicates just the opposite. I do agree not all of them were being pious or whatever. There was probably a lot of pragmatism involved in their actions.

Every indication is that the Silvermoon Blood Elves didn't want to be involved, and stayed in their own lands.

Thanks for taking the time to respond Corazona!

[DeicideUH]

I need to remember that not all Dalarani high elves remained high elves. The Sunreavers are probably mostly made of former Dalaran citizens as well.

Nothing is absolute, what we can speculate is on general behavior. I'd say:
Elves from the lodges, Dalaran, Alliance Expedition, former 2nd War soldiers that didn't went home mostly remained high elves, but not all of them.
Elves from Silvermoon mostly became blood elves, but not all of them.
Some blood elves went back to being high elves after Kael'thas introduced the new teachings, but these are few.
Some high elves became blood elves after Kael'thas new teachings, but these are also few.

[Traycor]

I need to remember that not all Dalarani high elves remained high elves. The Sunreavers are probably mostly made of former Dalaran citizens as well.

Nothing is absolute, what we can speculate is on general behavior. I'd say:
Elves from the lodges, Dalaran, Alliance Expedition, former 2nd War soldiers that didn't went home mostly remained high elves, but not all of them.
Elves from Silvermoon mostly became blood elves, but not all of them.
Some blood elves went back to being high elves after Kael'thas introduced the new teachings, but these are few.
Some high elves became blood elves after Kael'thas new teachings, but these are also few.

Agreed. Well said.

[Aldo Hawk]

Sure, sounds good! Gotta give those High Elves a proper rival/enemy, after all. Who better than their oldest and most hated one?

The problem here is that i don't know if blood elves would be comfortable with forest trolls in their side, at least Zandalari are explained (and playable pandaren are not the pandaria ones).

But talking as a blood elf player myself, i prefer to fight high elves than void elves btw, blood elves are the proper rival to alliance high elves.

[Enkrypt]

Man, i can't understand this obssession some people here have for Ion and every single word he says.
He is not president of Blizzard company, and everything he or any other Blizzard employee say doesn't mean it is the final word from Blizzard related to any issue for ALL ETERNITY.

Trust me, some of us have an equally hard time understanding the obsession to have the Blood Elf race available on the Alliance side with the simple difference of blue eyes. Especially when what most of you want is already available in game, just on the different faction.

I'm open-minded, trust me, especially within the boundaries of a video game. It is the High Elfers that are not open-minded, in my experience. Why? Because most of you just outright refuse to play the faction that has the race you want. Instead, you pretend your campaign to get High Elves on the Alliance is like some righteous crusade that Blizzard will inevitably have to give in to.

The most recent hilarity is that the statement that was made saying "Feedback has been passed along." is like some MAJOR shift in their stance, when it's easy to see it's just to placate the foaming-at-the-mouth masses who grow increasingly irrational in their desire to have access to a race that is currently available in game. The reason it's only available to the Horde is quite clear. But delusions of grandeur do typically make it hard to see very rational things. Keep saying things like, "Alliance will get Silvermoon, and Horde will get Exodar..." LOL. Sure thing. Maybe one day all your fantasy dreams will come true.

Maybe.

[Aeluron Lightsong]

The problem here is that i don't know if blood elves would be comfortable with forest trolls in their side, at least Zandalari are explained (and playable pandaren are not the pandaria ones).

But talking as a blood elf player myself, i prefer to fight high elves than void elves btw, blood elves are the proper rival to alliance high elves.

I mean it sort of didn't stop being friends with the Darkspear trolls. Yes it's a different tribe but they are still trolls nonetheless, so honestly the animosity is still there or rather should be. I wouldn't mind Forest Trolls on the Horde either. Them going the path of the Zandalar or just the smartest of them would tell the rest of them to suck it up and for the sake of the trolls they must join the Horde.


I don't see Forest Trolls being a race anytime soon though.

Trust me, some of us have an equally hard time understanding the obsession to have the Blood Elf race available on the Alliance side with the simple difference of blue eyes. Especially when what most of you want is already available in game, just on the different faction.

I'm open-minded, trust me, especially within the boundaries of a video game. It is the High Elfers that are not open-minded, in my experience. Why? Because most of you just outright refuse to play the faction that has the race you want. Instead, you pretend your campaign to get High Elves on the Alliance is like some righteous crusade that Blizzard will inevitably have to give in to.

Because obstinate responses like these ignore the very obvious reason. They don't want to be on the faction of the Orcs, Tauren and Trolls. They recognize the old WCII WCIII themes and wanted that but got shat on as early as BC.

[Traycor]

Since you seem kin on in-game references here is a excerpt from an in-game wow book "As part of its northern campaign, the Horde succeeded in burning down the borderlands of Quel'Thalas, thereby ensuring the elves' final commitment to the Alliance's cause." For more details you'll indeed have to read chronicles of the Tides of Darkness novels.

With regards to the WarII game itself that impression is mostly due to the limitations of the time but it was part of the storyline nevertheless. You had to play the Horde campaign to see the details of why the elves decided to join (the burning of Quel'thalas) while in the Alliance campaign I believe you only got a brief "Okay, the elves are joining now" during a naval mission briefing which didn't necessarily detail the circumstances of why the main army elven army joined the fold. I wouldn't fault anyone for thinking "well that must be the same elves that were with us since the start and not reinforcement from silvermoon".

Great stuff!

[Aldo Hawk]

I mean it sort of didn't stop being friends with the Darkspear trolls. Yes it's a different tribe but they are still trolls nonetheless, so honestly the animosity is still there or rather should be. I wouldn't mind Forest Trolls on the Horde either. Them going the path of the Zandalar or just the smartest of them would tell the rest of them to suck it up and for the sake of the trolls they must join the Horde.


I don't see Forest Trolls being a race anytime soon though.



Because obstinate responses like these ignore the very obvious reason. They don't want to be on the faction of the Orcs, Tauren and Trolls. They recognize the old WCII WCIII themes and wanted that but got shat on as early as BC.

In eversong there is a quest to avenge a Darkspear that got caught up by forest trolls, and those two aren't the same by any means, darkspear were horde and blood elves joined the horde, and later Vol'jin refused to join the "troll empire rising again" movement, refusing to join zandalari and forest trolls altogether.

What i want to say is that the relation between blood elves and darkspear aren't remotely comparable with the relation with forest trolls or zandalari, each one of those are different in the lore.

Forest trolls could be a cool race to play? of course! but new lore must be written for that, the troll wars were a huge event.

[Traycor]

The problem here is that i don't know if blood elves would be comfortable with forest trolls in their side,

I wish we had more of this in game. It would make for great storytelling to have groups within the same faction that hate each other. I can see Blood Elves and Forest Trolls staring each other down and bickering at a war meeting, disrupting things. Maybe one group disobeys orders because they despise their "allies".

There could be back-stabbing and betrayal. "We would have won if the Forest Trolls weren't here. They have ruined the once proud Horde!" Pure storytelling gold.

We could have quests that involve stopping relations from breaking down and possibly even forcing the groups to work together through diplomacy, coercion, or blackmail.

We should have more of this on both Alliance and Horde.

[Syegfryed]

Forest trolls could be a cool race to play? of course! but new lore must be written for that, the troll wars were a huge event.

you guys are confusing the amani with the forest trolls as a whole

forest troll is a subrace of trolls, amani is a tribe/empire of forest trolls

the amani would never join, but the revantusk, a tribe of forest trolls is already horde.

regardless this have nothing to do with the HE thing, people are just stretching

[Aeluron Lightsong]

In eversong there is a quest to avenge a Darkspear that got caught up by forest trolls, and those two aren't the same by any means, darkspear were horde and blood elves joined the horde, and later Vol'jin refused to join the "troll empire rising again" movement, refusing to join zandalari and forest trolls altogether.

What i want to say is that the relation between blood elves and darkspear aren't remotely comparable with the relation with forest trolls or zandalari, each one of those are different in the lore.

Forest trolls could be a cool race to play? of course! but new lore must be written for that, the troll wars were a huge event.

It's just they are the same race but...different species I guess? I mean I already would look at High Elf and Blood Elf history being pretty much intertwined, just going different paths.

[Aldo Hawk]

you guys are confusing the amani with the forest trolls as a whole

forest troll is a subrace of trolls, amani is a tribe/empire of forest trolls

the amani would never join, but the revantusk, a tribe of forest trolls is already horde.

regardless this have nothing to do with the HE thing, people are just stretching

I just found this in wowwiki https://wow.gamepedia.com/Amani_tribe and http://wowwiki.wikia.com/wiki/Forest_troll

Forest trolls and the amani tribe are correlated, i don't know that much about it but is the first impression that it gives.

Sorry for deviate the discussion, but it just appeared and seemed interesting to me.