Official High Elf Discussion Megathread

[FlubberPuddy]

They only started fixing it in legion so thats not very long ago.. and like every blizzcon before that had people asking about illidan. Its about time i would say.

I mentioned it exactly for those reasons.

They started it internally much earlier, just us public got to see the fixes finally during legion. But they came out years earlier essentially saying that they know their TBC lore of the major characters was trash (thus would try to fix it later which we saw during Legion). I recall even Metzen saying at the 2010 Blizzcon that they were having a book done on Kael'thas.

Looks like potentially it got cancelled, and we're just seeing what they were gonna do with Kael within Shadowlands instead.

[delus]

Gameplay doesn’t make this impossible at all.

Quel’thalas could still go neutral, remember that they don’t need the entire nation to be in the horde to be playable.

All you need is for some of those elves to declare they are still loyal to the horde and insist the player blood elf is one such.

His kingdom can be neutral with some individuals choosing the alliance as high elves or void elves and others choosing the horde as blood elves while the nation itself is neutral.

Exactly the same with Suramar. Most of the Nightborne could become neutral including state. Hell the Arcan’dor could even return most to their night elf appearance healing the distortion of the nightwell and a few who remain Nightborne in appearance choose to be horde loyal. One such is the player character.

Gameplay is unaffected by this. Gameplay only needs horde players to continue to be able to play as blood elves or Nightborne, truth is it doesn’t require all blood elves and all Nightborne to be aligned to the horde or alliance.

This should happen so that the rift between blood elves and void elves widens.

[Beloren]

This should happen so that the rift between blood elves and void elves widens.

Don’t get me wrong. I would personally prefer Silvermoon and Suramar to stay horde.

I’m just merely stating the other options are not implausible at all, nor are they far fetched and could even make for great story telling.

But I’d rather it not happen, and would rather they stay as is. If alliance need to get better elves blizzard should create new places for them, Night elves, even with Highborne have moved on long from Suramar, should build a new capital. The descriptions of Zin’Azshari fit both the colour scheme, aesthetic and combine city scape with nature well enough to suffice and match the alliance very well as seen in the Warbringers.

They should just leave the Nightborne alone and develop them as a night elf sub race apart from the Kaldorei and on the horde.

Same with Silvermoon, it should continue with the blood elves and be updated. Void elves and high elves should get a new home npersonally I feel Dalaran should be the defacto high elf home and the void elves should get an appropriate visually themed city.

If blizzard are smart it could have two versions, one in the normal realm that is high elf looking and one in the void realm that has alterations to both colour and minor features to look voidy.

Give them a plot or area somewhere and bingo new home.

[Traveler Voltin]

Certain posters in here are why some of the horde players want to just crush the alliance into dust.

[Edward Wu]

Certain posters in here are why some of the horde players want to just crush the alliance into dust.

I think you may need to step away from the computer for a bit and take a break.

[Traveler Voltin]

I think you may need to step away from the computer for a bit and take a break.

i am not the one here demanding blizzard give horde things to the alliance.

[Edward Wu]

i am not the one here demanding blizzard give horde things to the alliance.

High Elves aren't Horde. They've been Alliance since the IP's inception lol.

[Traveler Voltin]

High Elves aren't Horde. They've been Alliance since the IP's inception lol.

i wasnt talking about high elves. try again

[ravenmoon]

@Rhlor I've felt many things over the years, but I've come to the conclusion that in the end, the blood elves on the horde and the Nightborne on the horde are bad ideas, and have not helped.

I never thought they were the best way, but I also realised that they could have some advantage for the two factions that could be interesting and different... but in time, I feel the damage has been a lot worse for allowing this, and the product could have been a lot better with elves on the alliance only.

It's not the only problem, i think in their effort to raise the profile of the horde, they completely overshot, they didn't write a good and balanced story in ways that didn't make the alliance look naff, and continued it for too long, like they forgot what they were about.

I think the elves on the horde did that, and they grew to love their own creation and couldn't see how it messed it up, but they will see this. as long as they insist on two factions of the horde and alliance only, and as long as they want to preserve strong faction identities true to the original, elves prominent or glorified on the horde will undermine and destroy those effort.

- - - Updated - - -

That said, I do realise it cannot be undone, but the next best thing would be to discontinue progressing, promoting and glorifying the elves on the horde, and instead do that on the alliance mainly and chiefly. Alliance elves should be a lot more attractive and powerful/complete/wholesome on the alliance, in a way the horde ones only get a small part of that pie.

Horde focus should be predominantly focused on the horde core races, and the things that are greatest on the horde should not be pretty elven cities and kingdoms, but Troll and Orc ones, Tauren and Goblin ones.

The elves can have parts to play on the horde (they remian playable afterall), but they should small and specialised ones, they can be pivotal, but they shouldn't be grand, and should be more inconspicuous, behind the scenes, more implied than shown etc, pretty much how they've been conducting the alliance elves. And for horde elf fans like you horrified by the prospect, well, alliance fans have had to endure this for most of warcraft, you won't get pity from them, and you won't get pity from the core horde fans either.

This ish ow I currently feel.

[Traveler Voltin]

high elves left the alliance after WC2.
Suramar is was never alliance and they left the night elves when they shielded themselves away.

[OwenBurton]

But do not the ren'dorei have quel'dorei traits anyway? According to the latest patch expansion? So what differences does it make? The void elves' racials are probably superior to high elven ones anyway, even if they were introduced eventually.

[elbleuet]

high elves left the alliance after WC2..

So according to you when Stromgarde left the Alliance, humans left the Alliance? I don't think so.

Silvermoon left the Alliance and... That's it. High elves never left it.

[Traveler Voltin]

So according to you when Stromgarde left the Alliance, humans left the Alliance? I don't think so.

Silvermoon left the Alliance and... That's it. High elves never left it.

what you even talking about? i dont know much about stormgarde, only that kingdom got destroyed and now its rebuild(and alliance again.)
,
Silvermoon and most of the high elves left the alliance after WC2. the only a small few high elves stayed with the alliance after WC2.

[Imperator4321]

@Rhlor I've felt many things over the years, but I've come to the conclusion that in the end, the blood elves on the horde and the Nightborne on the horde are bad ideas, and have not helped.

I never thought they were the best way, but I also realised that they could have some advantage for the two factions that could be interesting and different... but in time, I feel the damage has been a lot worse for allowing this, and the product could have been a lot better with elves on the alliance only.

It's not the only problem, i think in their effort to raise the profile of the horde, they completely overshot, they didn't write a good and balanced story in ways that didn't make the alliance look naff, and continued it for too long, like they forgot what they were about.

I think the elves on the horde did that, and they grew to love their own creation and couldn't see how it messed it up, but they will see this. as long as they insist on two factions of the horde and alliance only, and as long as they want to preserve strong faction identities true to the original, elves prominent or glorified on the horde will undermine and destroy those effort.

- - - Updated - - -

That said, I do realise it cannot be undone, but the next best thing would be to discontinue progressing, promoting and glorifying the elves on the horde, and instead do that on the alliance mainly and chiefly. Alliance elves should be a lot more attractive and powerful/complete/wholesome on the alliance, in a way the horde ones only get a small part of that pie.

Horde focus should be predominantly focused on the horde core races, and the things that are greatest on the horde should not be pretty elven cities and kingdoms, but Troll and Orc ones, Tauren and Goblin ones.

The elves can have parts to play on the horde (they remian playable afterall), but they should small and specialised ones, they can be pivotal, but they shouldn't be grand, and should be more inconspicuous, behind the scenes, more implied than shown etc, pretty much how they've been conducting the alliance elves. And for horde elf fans like you horrified by the prospect, well, alliance fans have had to endure this for most of warcraft, you won't get pity from them, and you won't get pity from the core horde fans either.

This ish ow I currently feel.

Once again you only seem to care about the visual and aesthetic elements of the races and not their story or characterization, what about the Alliance makes them the "Elf faction" beyond elves = pretty/nice looking which you associate with the Alliance. Blood Elves as written in TBC were a desperate and fallen people who wanted to survive at any costs that fit the Horde much more than the Alliance, along with the previous characterization as fair-weather allies to the alliance also didn't give them any special connection or bond to the Alliance the opposite in-fact since they didn't care about the alliance and thought the alliance didn't care about them either.

This imaginary imbalance between horde and alliance elves doesn't exist both factions have the same amount of elves, both core elf races are among the most popular races, void elves are the most popular allied race. The only place where a horde/alliance imbalance exists is in Mythic Rading and Mythic+ Dungeons which is due to better racials on the horde side not because "horde elves are better".

This conception of yours that Horde = Ugly and brutal and Alliance = Pretty and nice has never been one of Blizzard prioties when it came to designing races for factions. They gave the horde Blood Elves because they felt the horde needed a non monstrous race, they gave the Alliance Worgen because they felt the Alliance could use a monstrous race, they gave the alliance Draenei because they thought the alliance could use a powerful race and they gave the Horde Goblins because they could use a small comic relief race.

[ravenmoon]

Once again you only seem to care about the visual and aesthetic elements of the races and not their story or characterization, what about the Alliance makes them the "Elf faction" beyond elves = pretty/nice looking which you associate with the Alliance. Blood Elves as written in TBC were a desperate and fallen people who wanted to survive at any costs that fit the Horde much more than the Alliance, along with the previous characterization as fair-weather allies to the alliance also didn't give them any special connection or bond to the Alliance the opposite in-fact since they didn't care about the alliance and thought the alliance didn't care about them either.

This imaginary imbalance between horde and alliance elves doesn't exist both factions have the same amount of elves, both core elf races are among the most popular races, void elves are the most popular allied race. The only place where a horde/alliance imbalance exists is in Mythic Rading and Mythic+ Dungeons which is due to better racials on the horde side not because "horde elves are better".

This conception of yours that Horde = Ugly and brutal and Alliance = Pretty and nice has never been one of Blizzard prioties when it came to designing races for factions. They gave the horde Blood Elves because they felt the horde needed a non monstrous race, they gave the Alliance Worgen because they felt the Alliance could use a monstrous race, they gave the alliance Draenei because they thought the alliance could use a powerful race and they gave the Horde Goblins because they could use a small comic relief race.

It's really funny that you think I think this.

No, I am not basing this compatibility on aesthetics. It is the last thing on my mind. I'm thinking theme, character, history, ideologies, philosophies - before other commonalities like the type of civilization, character of said civilization, the elves taught the humans, their morality and foundation goes all the way back to the kaldorei civilization,

Blizzard intrinsically wrote elves (night and high) joined tightly with humans in all the alliance is based on and stands for, and how it thinks and operates. There is no way kaldorei civilization elves like Highborne or Nightborne fit on the horde, not Thalassian elves whether high elves or blood elves like blizzard has developed them, they dont fit.

While you can take the elves to the horde, in that format as they are right now? Like they are in the game right now?, you are turning the horde into the alliance or diluting it severely, they dont fit the very different theme and character crafted for the horde.

All this without even touching aesthetics.

- - - Updated - - -

You dont get more alliance tha human and elves, all night and Thalassians.

Blood elves and Nightborne are basically, humans on the horde, they arent even changed in character and ideology they kept both the original Thalassian and original kaldorei intact in the blood elves and nightborne. The blood elves that changed, they killed off as villains, and the playable ones effectively remained high elves with a different name and faction.

The Nightborne that could have fit, they also killed off, and chose the most kaldorei, noble, goody goody two shoes Nightborne to be the horde race, they are basically arcane themed night elves, I.e. hihborne with a different look, using arcane themes instead of nature - they have the same good conscience, wisdom and morality as the Darnassians, or did you not notice how similar Thalyssra's morality is to Tyrandes.

These are just a more civilised, advanced type of human and alliance slapped on the horde - its diluting the horde, they may have felt this was needed to make the horde more popular, but it has long since no longer been needed. People just need the models, they dont need the cities, large numbers and character of the elves on the horde.

So remove it I say, remove all of it, and leave a remnant group of nightborne and blood elves dedicated to the horde for player access but dont actually figure largely or are loud or big on the horde, it's just not the character of the Nightborne, Highborne or any Kaldorei, nor the high elves, void elves or blood elves as blizzard has written them so far.

- - - Updated - - -

Finally, and not least either, the current state is not good for the alliance, and changing as I suggested would be very good for the alliance. it is quite clear alliance fans are far more interested in night elves and High elves than they are in even humans. but truth is human and elves go hand in hand. After that comes interest in Dwarves, Draenei, Worgen and Gnomes (likely in that order).

Look at the threads on elves created by alliance players, and what they ask for, what they care about the most, and what interests them. And it's not just that. The poor writing of the alliance and taking it's core other half to the horde ahs left it unappealing and dull by comparison. Why do you think the only noise alliance fans make concerning horde races for themselves is the elves? it's because the elves are woven fully into the fabric of the alliance, it's creation, foundation - even without playing a large role with the humans, the elves are basically better humans.. this is how they are written, and this is all alliance, they are together.. so to then halfway through the project, take one of the biggest elf groups and instead build them on the horde relatively unchanged, was basically putting humans and the alliance on the horde. Which meant reducing and diminishing the actual alliance itself, and at the same time diluting the horde.

So much so the factions are a lot more blurred, not because of aesthetics 9they ensured, aesthetics there would be distinction even though the elven aesthetics are obviously alliance), but it's actually the identity and theme of the factions that got blurred, it's like the horde is 1.5 times the alliance, because it's got half the alliance on it by the elves largely based on them.

Alliance numbers are way down and still falling, ofc they would the best parts of the alliance, the better humans have their best features and aspects on the horde. It's great for bragging rights and feel good factor for horde ELF fans, but it's terrible both for game balance, terrible for the alliance, and bad for the core theme of the horde. And at this point I see no reason for this to continue on the horde and very good reasons for the alliance to once more take the major lead and drive of the elves.

[Imperator4321]

It's really funny that you think I think this.

No, I am not basing this compatibility on aesthetics. It is the last thing on my mind. I'm thinking theme, character, history, ideologies, philosophies - before other commonalities like the type of civilization, character of said civilization, the elves taught the humans, their morality and foundation goes all the way back to the kaldorei civilization,

Blizzard intrinsically wrote elves (night and high) joined tightly with humans in all the alliance is based on and stands for, and how it thinks and operates. There is no way kaldorei civilization elves like Highborne or Nightborne fit on the horde, not Thalassian elves whether high elves or blood elves like blizzard has developed them, they dont fit.

While you can take the elves to the horde, in that format as they are right now? Like they are in the game right now?, you are turning the horde into the alliance or diluting it severely, they dont fit the very different theme and character crafted for the horde.

All this without even touching aesthetics.

- - - Updated - - -

You dont get more alliance tha human and elves, all night and Thalassians.

Blood elves and Nightborne are basically, humans on the horde, they arent even changed in character and ideology they kept both the original Thalassian and original kaldorei intact in the blood elves and nightborne. The blood elves that changed, they killed off as villains, and the playable ones effectively remained high elves with a different name and faction.

The Nightborne that could have fit, they also killed off, and chose the most kaldorei, noble, goody goody two shoes Nightborne to be the horde race, they are basically arcane themed night elves, I.e. hihborne with a different look, using arcane themes instead of nature - they have the same good conscience, wisdom and morality as the Darnassians, or did you not notice how similar Thalyssra's morality is to Tyrandes.

These are just a more civilised, advanced type of human and alliance slapped on the horde - its diluting the horde, they may have felt this was needed to make the horde more popular, but it has long since no longer been needed. People just need the models, they dont need the cities, large numbers and character of the elves on the horde.

So remove it I say, remove all of it, and leave a remnant group of nightborne and blood elves dedicated to the horde for player access but dont actually figure largely or are loud or big on the horde, it's just not the character of the Nightborne, Highborne or any Kaldorei, nor the high elves, void elves or blood elves as blizzard has written them so far.

Your ignoring the motivations why the High Elves taught humanity magic, it wasn't out of the kindness or a desire to help them, it was because they needed allies to fight the Amani Trolls and the Empire of Arathor were also enemies of the Amani, it was an alliance of convienience that stopped existing once the Amani were stopped, the High Elves only started supporting the Alliance of Lordaeron in earnest once the Horde threatened Quel'Thalas itself, they left the Alliance after the second war and didn't renew any support for it until Kael'thas supported the remnants of the alliance under Garithos after the scourge ravaged Quel'thalas which they also left. Where in this history of Human/High Elf diplomatic relations did you come to the conclusion that Elves and Humans share any kind of deep bond? and where in this history of alliances of convienence get you get the idea that High Elves would be opposed to aligning with the Horde which is defined as Blizzard as being made up of alliances of convienence over shared ideals or traditions like the Alliance is defined by Blizzard as being about.

the Kal'dorei and Humans also don't share any deep bond historically, Night Elves didn't even know humans existed until the Third War since Humanity didn't even exist until after the Sundering split Kalimdor and the Eastern Kingdom, they joined the Alliance because they weren't the ones encroaching on their terrority or chopping down their sacred groves like the Horde was and they weren't able to fight the Horde on their own.

The Shal'dorei joined the Horde because despite their kinship the Kal'dorei, Tyande distrusted them and didn't care for their plight while the Sin'dorei were open and understanding due to their shared struggle with addiction to the arcane.

[Rhlor]

@Rhlor I've felt many things over the years, but I've come to the conclusion that in the end, the blood elves on the horde and the Nightborne on the horde are bad ideas, and have not helped.

I never thought they were the best way, but I also realised that they could have some advantage for the two factions that could be interesting and different... but in time, I feel the damage has been a lot worse for allowing this, and the product could have been a lot better with elves on the alliance only.

It's not the only problem, i think in their effort to raise the profile of the horde, they completely overshot, they didn't write a good and balanced story in ways that didn't make the alliance look naff, and continued it for too long, like they forgot what they were about.

I think the elves on the horde did that, and they grew to love their own creation and couldn't see how it messed it up, but they will see this. as long as they insist on two factions of the horde and alliance only, and as long as they want to preserve strong faction identities true to the original, elves prominent or glorified on the horde will undermine and destroy those effort.

- - - Updated - - -

That said, I do realise it cannot be undone, but the next best thing would be to discontinue progressing, promoting and glorifying the elves on the horde, and instead do that on the alliance mainly and chiefly. Alliance elves should be a lot more attractive and powerful/complete/wholesome on the alliance, in a way the horde ones only get a small part of that pie.

Horde focus should be predominantly focused on the horde core races, and the things that are greatest on the horde should not be pretty elven cities and kingdoms, but Troll and Orc ones, Tauren and Goblin ones.

The elves can have parts to play on the horde (they remian playable afterall), but they should small and specialised ones, they can be pivotal, but they shouldn't be grand, and should be more inconspicuous, behind the scenes, more implied than shown etc, pretty much how they've been conducting the alliance elves. And for horde elf fans like you horrified by the prospect, well, alliance fans have had to endure this for most of warcraft, you won't get pity from them, and you won't get pity from the core horde fans either.

This ish ow I currently feel.

at last you let see what your true feelings are!

You don't want to do something to increase the alliance numbers in mythics because to do that it has much more logic to improve the alliance racials! nor do you just want the story of the alliance elves in the lore and narrative better. what you want is to destroy the lore, the narrative and the content of the horde elves because you are envious! It bothers you that the elves in the horde have beautiful cities and that they have pleasant stories for those who play them! You're angry because you want the alliance to have what the horde elves have purely out of jealousy.

my only character in the alliance is a night elf druid and i want the night elves to have better stories i want them to have a beautiful new capital in nordrassil and i also want the void elves to be able to build a city in telogrus. It doesn't bother me that the alliance has nice things. I think Stormwind is prettier than Orgrimmar as a faction capital.

what blizzard has to do is tell better stories and create beautiful new cities for the races of both the horde and the alliance! the worgen deserve to have gilneas back, the gnomes deserve gnomeregan, the night elves must have a beautiful new capital in nordrassil, now we have sandfurry in the horde and we should have zulfarrak and the maghar deserve to have a city of their own!

ask for better things for all races that should be the goal of all players not wanting to steal their content from other players!

and I suggest you play BFA with a horde character because the ending of expa tells us that the horde will not be what it was, it is a new era for the horde where all races are important and where everyone will have the same importance and never again we'll have a warchief, that's the horde narrative now.

[Imperator4321]

at last you let see what your true feelings are!

You don't want to do something to increase the alliance numbers in mythics because to do that it has much more logic to improve the alliance racials! nor do you just want the story of the alliance elves in the lore and narrative better. what you want is to destroy the lore, the narrative and the content of the horde elves because you are envious! It bothers you that the elves in the horde have beautiful cities and that they have pleasant stories for those who play them! You're angry because you want the alliance to have what the horde elves have purely out of jealousy.

my only character in the alliance is a night elf druid and i want the night elves to have better stories i want them to have a beautiful new capital in nordrassil and i also want the void elves to be able to build a city in telogrus. It doesn't bother me that the alliance has nice things. I think Stormwind is prettier than Orgrimmar as a faction capital.

what blizzard has to do is tell better stories and create beautiful new cities for the races of both the horde and the alliance! the worgen deserve to have gilneas back, the gnomes deserve gnomeregan, the night elves must have a beautiful new capital in nordrassil, now we have sandfurry in the horde and we should have zulfarrak and the maghar deserve to have a city of their own!

ask for better things for all races that should be the goal of all players not wanting to steal their content from other players!

and I suggest you play BFA with a horde character because the ending of expa tells us that the horde will not be what it was, it is a new era for the horde where all races are important and where everyone will have the same importance and never again we'll have a warchief, that's the horde narrative now.

It's an unfortunate trend with these types of discussions, instead of wanting good things to happen to what they like, people think that to improve what they like they need to also bring other things down that they don't like or think are somehow obstacles to improving what they like.

I can understand and sympathize with Night Elf and High Elf fans, Blizzard treated the Night Elves as the go-to punching bags of the Horde since Cataclysm and treated the High Elves/Silver Covenant as set dressing/foils to the sunreavers and have basically forgotten they exist now that the void elves have essentially taken their place in the Alliance but wanting to bring bring down/ruin the Blood Elves/Nightborne/Void Elves to improve the Night Elves/High Elves doesn't help anything and only makes fans of those things hate you back.

[Rhlor]

It's an unfortunate trend with these types of discussions, instead of wanting good things to happen to what they like, people think that to improve what they like they need to also bring other things down that they don't like or think are somehow obstacles to improving what they like.

I can understand and sympathize with Night Elf and High Elf fans, Blizzard treated the Night Elves as the go-to punching bags of the Horde since Cataclysm and treated the High Elves/Silver Covenant as set dressing/foils to the sunreavers and have basically forgotten they exist now that the void elves have essentially taken their place in the Alliance but wanting to bring bring down/ruin the Blood Elves/Nightborne/Void Elves to improve the Night Elves/High Elves doesn't help anything and only makes fans of those things hate you back.

best things for everyone! I like the new customizations of the night elves they look great and I am sorry that the blood elves have so few. but that I ask for more customization for blood elves does not mean that I want the night elves to have less! We must all ask for things to improve all races not wanting to take things away from others.

[Traveler Voltin]

it would be so much easier to build up Alliance stuff without taking cities from the Horde.
Night elves seemed to have moved to Hyjial(so its probably not a neutral area). so they can easily start build that up. they still have the base in Feralas they can build up. the SC seems to have disappeared, idk maybe have them make an outpost in westfall or some place in alliance territory to gather all the high elves.

Void elves got a good chunk of high elf customization. they of course want the natural hair colors but that would take too much away from the blood elves. so maybe give Blood elves tattoos to compensate?