Official High Elf Discussion Megathread

[Eleann]

Hypothetically, let's say Blizzard adds High Elves to the Alliance. Now let's say this High Elf race uses the same popular Thalassian model and the blue and arcane eye options we are all familiar with, but other assets like hairstyles, tattoos, scars, jewelry etc. are unique and these High Elves have a unique idle stance, voices and emotes. They also have the full range of human spectrum hair colors and a few more fantasy colors like silver and blue, and all Alliance High Elf NPC's are updated to use the new assets so they are more distinct from Blood Elves. The High Elves even get a spectacular new capital city!

Now, tell me how does any of that incentivize an endgame progression minded Horde guild to switch to Alliance? The answer is... it doesn't.

While I think the following is probably something Blizzard is unlikely to implement, they could add a "veneer" option for races. The veneers would allow players select their displayed racial tag from a preset list based on their selected race (so the race says High Elf instead of Void Elf), and it would also change the names, icons and visual effects of the racials while maintaining their functions. For example, if I select the "High Elf" veneer for my Void Elf, my race would display as High Elf instead, and the "veneer" would change my racials thus:
Entropic Embrace becomes Arcane Legacy: The visual effect, icon and name change but otherwise it mechanically works exactly the same.
Spatial Rift becomes Arcane Jaunt: The visual effect, icon and name change but otherwise it mechanically works exactly the same.
Preternatural Calm becomes Focused Mind: The icon and name change but otherwise it mechanically works exactly the same.
Ethereal Connection becomes Friend of a Friend: The icon and name change but otherwise it mechanically works exactly the same.
Chill of Night becomes Against the Darkness: The icon and name change but otherwise it mechanically works exactly the same.

Basically the "veneer" could allow subraces within a given race. The same concept could be applied to other races, such as Wildhammer for Dwarves, Farraki (sand trolls) for Trolls, Grimtotem for Tauren, Dragonmaw for Orcs, etc.

I know that hardcore end-game Horde progression guilds would probably not be incentivized enough to do a mass transfer to Alliance (due to costs), but I think many casual and semi-hardcore players could get incentivized enough to convince some of their friends to swap to the Alliance if Void elves were given proper High elf customizations, and both them and Night elves got great new capital cities. Like I mentioned in a previous post, once core races are looked into again Night elves could get runic tattoos and glowing limbs, and Blood elves could get Dark ranger and San'layn customizations. So far I can also tell that Blizzard has been trying to promote the Alliance in the last 2 expansions or so with great cinematics and ofc the addition of Void elves. To summarize, I do think that aesthetics, and good cinematics, can become a strong motivator for casuals and semi-hardcore. You are right on the hardcore part, but at least this way we have more possibilities of boosting the Alliance with regards to LFG, LFR queues and even some heroic and mythic raiding. At least it is worth trying.

I like the idea of ''veneer'' skins. That could be a great compromise for granting High elves to High elf fans in a more formal manner, and Dark ranger and San'Layn to Blood elves for that ''bad guy'' theme if players so wish to choose.

[delus]

I know that hardcore end-game Horde progression guilds would probably not be incentivized enough to do a mass transfer to Alliance (due to costs), but I think many casual and semi-hardcore players could get incentivized enough to convince some of their friends to swap to the Alliance if Void elves were given proper High elf customizations, and both them and Night elves got great new capital cities. Like I mentioned in a previous post, once core races are looked into again Night elves could get runic tattoos and glowing limbs, and Blood elves could get Dark ranger and San'layn customizations. So far I can also tell that Blizzard has been trying to promote the Alliance in the last 2 expansions or so with great cinematics and ofc the addition of Void elves. To summarize, I do think that aesthetics, and good cinematics, can become a strong motivator for casuals and semi-hardcore. You are right on the hardcore part, but at least this way we have more possibilities of boosting the Alliance with regards to LFG, LFR queues and even some heroic and mythic raiding. At least it is worth trying.

I like the idea of ''veneer'' skins. That could be a great compromise for granting High elves to High elf fans in a more formal manner, and Dark ranger and San'Layn to Blood elves for that ''bad guy'' theme if players so wish to choose.

That's not going to happen unless belf facials are nuked from orbit.

[ravenmoon]

Blood Elves and Nightborne aren't going anywhere. Rather than spouting off your headcanon, how about you engage with the discussion.
Eleann and many others aren't interested and don't want Horde things...Horde assets. It's only you because you can't get over Nightborne going Horde and only wanting them to have lore moments with the Night Elves.

Tanaria, this has nothign to do with headcanon, I''m not quoting lore here, nor am I saying blood elves and Nightborne are going to have those changes. I'm saying they should, and explaining why I feel so and that I'd like that to happen too.

And I'm quite within my rights to engage on my point of view, and as you can clearly see by the amount of replies I have afforded yourself, eleann, and many others that Ido respond to their ideas, and give my views, even if I do return to what I have proposed.. you can't arrest me for having my own convictions or silence me for sharing them when I want to or feel they are warranted. That's not for you to decide.

And what your purposing, as you've not tackled her main point, is that you actively want Horde guilds to be split. People who play Blood Elves and Nightborne, against their own will, are going to have their character pushed on the Alliance and then if we want to go back, we have to pay...PAY, for a faction transfer.

You are lying about me, stop saying this, I have in almost every response persistently iterated that the horde won't lose blood elves as playable nor Nightborne, that's not what I have suggested or proposed. I've made this clear time and time again, this is why people like Eleann and Kyrianni have come on thinking thinking that I'm requesting blood elves should no longer be a horde playable race - sigh, you've been challenging this from the start, you have no excuse, you are either deliberately trying to mislead others who read these responses or you're being ridiculously careless and have basically never read waht i've written all the way through because it has been mentioned almost every time that the horde will still have blood leves and Nightborne playbale adnhave access to the omdels as they are now, in every suggestion I have proposed. My proposals are not necessarily the same as what I want. But they are what I feel can realistically be done.

What does she do, considering you want belf paladins on the Alliance and her main is a blood elf paladin on the Horde side? Oh well, she just has to look for another guild on the Alliance side. This change was necessary and it has put a hell of a lot of people out as well as guilds, but it's tough. You're going to have to get over it...if that is the message, then I'm glad you've quit because that is sheer arrogance and a total "f you" to Blood Elf players, Nightborne players and to the Horde in general.

What are you smoking? You guys really are not reading what I'm saying, but I'm the jackass that keeps responding to you. She isn't losing the ability to play Blood elf paladin - for crying out loud. Did you forget the part where I said the horde still has blood elves? Playable blood elves and Nightborne? They aren't losing classes or anything like that.

It's the narrative that is changing not the player selection. It is NPC population in Quel'thalas that becomes High elves - not every single blood elf... some remain horde allowing hte player to continue to play, the player character is one of htose that ermain horde and Nightborne, iti s he NPCs that change. The Nightborne NPCs inSuramar all get changed to Night elves via the Aracn'dor - but some stop the process magically because theydon't want to be like that. The blood elf NPCs living in Quel'thalas are the ones that decide they've had enough and the horde isn't representative of them, and their values and decide they're high elves.

The horde will still have blood elves, it just won't have the NPC population of Quel'thlaas, this goes to the alliance, with the return of the High Elves that become a big shiny event properly show cased. The idea is that if you love pretty elven cities and high elf type lifestyle and living, then the alliance is the place for you. If you prefer more bad boy, delinquent, tough guy, mean guy vraiation, then the blood elf is for you. He can look the same as the high elf, but his character is generally very diferent, he also has some cool perks like darkfallen and fel elf skin tones, san'layn cusotmisaions and a few other ocol things that aren't high elven traditionally that he can choose from. Or the plyaer can roleplay a bloo d elf that remains blood elven but still keeps those high elven values - that sort of model would be rare amognst the blood elves beucse it is alliance themed, that willb emuch bigger with the high elves, but you will have that available on the blood elves.. the idea is that hte horde won't have alliance higih elf or kaldorei themes running srong in its blood elf and Nightborne, but there willbe allowance for that in a few. However mosto fhte blood leves would have distinct characters that make them different enough from the high elves, and htis would be much more apparent without Silvermoon and Quel'thlalas, and when they build new things with a new architecutre that isn't high elven based or a recolouring of it,


Your friend will still have access to her blood elf paladins.

And we've seen all those races have their improvements. Hell, Forsaken were the leading race of the Horde for the past two expansions. Trolls got a lot of stuff in BFA. Orcs commanded the whole of MoP and WoD. Pandaren are not a "Horde race." I mean, who cares about Pandaren when their fanbase is small? And don't insult us by throwing Tauren at our faces...those guys are more Alliance than Horde and have been since MoP. Goblins are just a background race, like Dwarves and Gnomes.
Again, your not actually offering the Horde anything new and you know it...your just looking at a way of manipulating your headcanon in a way that is wrote as "fair" but it truly isn't, because it sees guilds and the Horde ripped apart and Horde players left for scraps and having to pay Blizzard for faction transfers back to the Horde and if we don't want to pay, we're oppressed into having to stay alliance. What you want - you know it's isn't good because you wouldn't play it but expect Horde players to accept that they have lost two, maybe three, big horde locations and be ok with that because -different colour trolls are cool- said ravenmoon, even though they aren't and we can already create different colour trolls and had an expansion that saw us stay in Zandalari Troll land.

There are new things, but that's not the point of what's happening here, the suggestion I made is to gather the alliance themes and put them back on the alliance, and do it iinsytle so the alliance becomes attractive - you compensate the horde with horde core things to its core races, the new thing would be the new direction the horde blood elves and Nightborne go - it is not an exhaustive list of all the new things ththe horde and alliance will get.

Don't expect me to paint a roadmap of all the new things the horde should get.. I'm just giving an example of things that could happen should blizzard make the alliance the only place you can experience high elf culture, Quel'thalas, Silvermoon etc and the full breadth of kaldorei culture (i.e. both pre-sundering Highborne/Moonguard arcane types such as Suramar and long vigil forest druid/sentinel huntress types like you see in Val'sharah) - all that stuff is high elf and night elf stuff alliance based and themed, so the point is you remove the theme from the horde's elf - you are not removing hte horde's elves, you are developing them into something different.

Different doesn't have to be worse, it's blizzard, they will make it cool. The immediate task though is to make the alliance attractive.. which is why the blood elf horde developments should be delayed an expansion or two, to give the alliance type to gain equilibrium, by the time the blood elf new stuff comes, the alliance will also be having tings as well. cool but different.

[Kyriani]

I like the idea of ''veneer'' skins. That could be a great compromise for granting High elves to High elf fans in a more formal manner, and Dark ranger and San'Layn to Blood elves for that ''bad guy'' theme if players so wish to choose.

I'd love to see the veneer idea gain some traction to be honest. I like the idea of everyone being able to make their character exactly what they want them to be. There's a lot of non-elf players that would appreciate it I think. People who want to play Wildhammer Dwarves or Farakki Trolls are in the same boat as those who want to play High Elves in that they must do so through customization yet their racial tag and racial abilities still denote their actual race. The veneer idea basically takes features of certain RP addons and makes them better and a formal part of the game, and it does so without having to clutter the race selection with yet more derivatives.

[Tanaria]

I'd love to see the veneer idea gain some traction to be honest. I like the idea of everyone being able to make their character exactly what they want them to be. There's a lot of non-elf players that would appreciate it I think. People who want to play Wildhammer Dwarves or Farakki Trolls are in the same boat as those who want to play High Elves in that they must do so through customization yet their racial tag and racial abilities still denote their actual race. The veneer idea basically takes features of certain RP addons and makes them better and a formal part of the game, and it does so without having to clutter the race selection with yet more derivatives.

I like the idea as well, and I've seen ideas on how this can be done, in terms of breaking down what each race can access. An example for Blood Elves, that I have seen are:
Blood Elf
Illidari
Dark Ranger
Farstrider

Now this is on the right lines, but I'd remove the "Illidari" and "Farstrider" because the "class" based veneers are not exactly diverse. I'd suggest that Blood Elves have access to Dark Ranger as a solid thing. (I'd personally not include the San'layn in this, as it's a shared piece of the same cloth and "Dark Ranger" is far more closely related to the Blood Elves than the San'layn.)

But with the Dark Ranger veneer, you can still play a Warlock or Mage and play an Undead Thalassian Elf which isn't a DK. Plus, this introduces red eyes anyway, which most blood elf/dark ranger fans have wanted. I think the Dark Ranger concept offers more and still provides the "San'layn" feel, without needing to include a separate "San'layn" veneer altogether.

Other examples for Void Elves could be, as suggested:
High Elves

For Night Elves:
Highborne

It's a very good idea and allows for many people to truly play what they want. Again though, I'd make the choice between San'layn or Dark Ranger, as I think both make the whole aspect of "Undead Elf" quite redundant and you can essentially play one or the other, with just the one option and as a Blood Elf Horde fan, I wouldn't want the "death" thing to overwhelm the Blood Elf lore. We've still got the Magisters and Blood Knights.

SNIP

It doesn't matter. Kyriani has already laid out the idea as to why what you suggest will not make any difference to the game's playerbase and will only do more harm than good.
At the end of the day, Blizzard won't do anything which involves losing money. WoD was a wake-up call in that regard. They won't risk the large percentage of Blood Elf and Horde players unsubbing from the game and them losing money - especially if it's a case of alliance gets and robs horde assets and horde gets nothing in return. To avoid this, the Horde has to take Kalimdor and the Night Elves simply have to surrender it to the might of Lor'themar and Thalyssra.

Money > Your feelings, as a former WoW player.

[Kyriani]

I like the idea as well, and I've seen ideas on how this can be done, in terms of breaking down what each race can access. An example for Blood Elves, that I have seen are:
Blood Elf
Illidari
Dark Ranger
Farstrider

Now this is on the right lines, but I'd remove the "Illidari" and "Farstrider" because the "class" based veneers are not exactly diverse. I'd suggest that Blood Elves have access to Dark Ranger as a solid thing. (I'd personally not include the San'layn in this, as it's a shared piece of the same cloth and "Dark Ranger" is far more closely related to the Blood Elves than the San'layn.)

But with the Dark Ranger veneer, you can still play a Warlock or Mage and play an Undead Thalassian Elf which isn't a DK.

Other examples for Void Elves could be, as suggested:
High Elves

For Night Elves:
Highborne

It's a very good idea and allows for many people to truly play what they want. Again though, I'd make the choice between San'layn or Dark Ranger, as I think both make the whole aspect of "Undead Elf" quite redundant and you can essentially play one or the other, with just the one option and as a Blood Elf Horde fan, I wouldn't want the "death" thing to overwhelm the Blood Elf lore. We've still got the Magisters and Blood Knights.



It doesn't matter. Kyriani has already laid out the idea as to why what you suggest will not make any difference to the game's playerbase and will only do more harm than good.
At the end of the day, Blizzard won't do anything which involves losing money. WoD was a wake-up call in that regard. They won't risk the large percentage of Blood Elf players unsubbing from the game and them losing money. Money > Your feelings, as a former WoW player.

I'm glad I am not the only one who likes the idea and sees the potential. What I really like about the idea is that it has no affect on mechanical balance and it's a relatively "easy" thing to implement since it's purely visual distinctions. It also allows Blizzard to focus on truly new races for the future and they can add any new derivatives to their base races as a new veneer.

[ravenmoon]

Raven, I honestly don't believe what happened in TBC with Blood Elves going Horde can be replicated today.

First and foremost, Alliance already has what I feel most would consider traditionally aesthetically appealing races (general speaking)... the Horde didn't really have that until TBC. Secondly, it wasn't only Blood Elves that the Horde got which incentivized Alliance players to swap to Horde, but it was also the Paladin class. This was a big deal as Paladins were superior to Shamans for endgame raiding. Then of course there was Arcane Torrent which remained an incredible racial for many many years.

The Alliance can't be bolstered by shitting on the Horde. The Blood Elves and Nightborne, as they are right now, with all their lore and cities intact, are Horde and Blizzard isn't going to take those things away from them. If by making the Alliance "look better than the Horde" you mean aesthetics, that's not going to help the Alliance's endgame progression engagement. The Alliance already look good. It's one of the reasons they were top of the hill in Vanilla. If anything the Alliance look even better today (aesthetically) than they ever have thanks to Shadowlands. Aesthetics may get people to play Alliance, but they won't fix endgame engagement motivation.

Tbf, only horde elf fans consider that "shitting" on the horde, but I hear your point. I don't think what happened in TBC needs to be replicated on the scale that it did, I think the alliance is still well loved, it's just rusty, it will take a little fire to light it and it can run..

The blood elves were a catalyst back in TBC, but it was much more than them, every narrative decision put the horde at the centre, to raise its profile, every cool development favoured the horde and if it was alliance centric, it was shared with the horde, the horde either had to have the same or better every single time, the net result was the shifting perception of the horde from the lame, evil faction to the cool faction. Cultural shifts also influenced that. Off the back of the 80s/90s your noble virtuous hero was the most popular, as the 00s progressed your edgy emo , anti-hero part monster dude became quite the in thing.


With the horde's reputation much better, it is much popular , it doesn't need high elven assets in the blood elves to maintain that. This is why I know it can afford to lose those assets even though the race is still playable on the horde. The alliance on the other hand would HUGELY benefit from high elves making a big re-entry splash to the playable spectrum and the kaldorei actually truly shining in all the aspects of their lore on the alliance this time.


The reason why the horde needs to lose Silvermoon/Quel'thalas and Suramar is to widen the dichotomy of the two factions , distinguish them better, and heal the identity crisis on the horde, which exists precisely because the blood elves are far too high elven an d have a too high elven and thus alliance type of civilization /set of assets etc, same with the Nightborne. That's why you're removing them, the alliance popularity doesn't need the blood elves to lose the Silvermoon or the Nightborne to lose Suramar - the horde needs this more. however the alliance gaining it will make the alliance shine brighter - still alternatives could be simply building an even better pair of cities for the night elves and high elves - so the blood elves and Nightborne don't lose anything.

The problem is if the blood levs and Nightborne don't loose those high elf things and night elf civilization things, the horde still feels too alliancey, too much alliance on it, because those things are too alliance themed. this is why they have to go.


If you have followed my posts throughout the years I have suggested many things, never this, I've always bene in favour of not nerfing anyone and instead just buffing where needs to be, but sometimes, a little pain and loss can go a long way and open the door for something much better, and shouldn't be avoided - when mistakes need to be corrected.

Hypothetically, let's say Blizzard adds High Elves to the Alliance. Now let's say this High Elf race uses the same popular Thalassian model and the blue and arcane eye options we are all familiar with, but other assets like hairstyles, tattoos, scars, jewelry etc. are unique and these High Elves have a unique idle stance, voices and emotes. They also have the full range of human spectrum hair colors and a few more fantasy colors like silver and blue, and all Alliance High Elf NPC's are updated to use the new assets so they are more distinct from Blood Elves. The High Elves even get a spectacular new capital city!

Now, tell me how does any of that incentivize an endgame progression minded Horde guild to switch to Alliance? The answer is... it doesn't.

Let's delve a little further into our hypothetical High Elf race. Let's say they have amazing racials that are practical and useful in every area of the game. For example, let's say the racials are a single passive that provides both a 5% bonus to reputation gains and a 5% discount from all vendors, an active racial that's basically Blink on a 2 min cooldown, and they have a passive +5% damage/healing proc identical to Entropic Embrace in function but with an arcane themed visual aura instead of changing their skin color. Oh and these High Elves can be every class in the game!

Now the Horde progression guilds are going to be incentivized to at least consider swapping because... well... any class could hop the fence and the racials are pretty impressive and useful in endgame. That the High Elves are aesthetically appealing in every way, is just icing on an already rich and delicious cake. They'd still have to consider the loss of the robust Horde endgame scene, but the lure could be enough to make them bite that bullet and hope others swap as well.

The problem here is that Blizzard doesn't want there to be a massive shift of people from Horde to Alliance. According to the last interview I saw mentioning population numbers, the populations are fairly close. It's the endgame engagement that's lacking on the Alliance. There's also the fact that the above racials would never happen because they are just too good and unless Blizz opened up every class to every race, they'd never let a single race have access to every class.. Half of human's diplomacy? The Void Elf damage proc? Having a 2 min cooldown Blink on any class? Being able to have that on any class? It would swing things drastically, and a drastic swing isn't the desired outcome.

Blizzard doesn't see Blood Elf and Nightborne aesthetics on the Horde as an issue. The Horde are doing just fine and Blizzard don't want to rock that boat beyond maybe making Alliance just alluring enough to tempt some endgame players to swap. That's as far as they want to go. They aren't going to remove any stuff that Blood Elves and Nightborne already have. They also aren't likely to ever add High Elves as their own race at this point. With the new customization options, I'm fairly certain Blizzard considers the request for Alliance High Elves fulfilled, even if some players do not. At best, more aesthetic options (and possibly class options) can be added to Void Elves to flesh out the High Elf fantasy further, and the lore (both in-game and out) can be expanded to show that the remnants of the Quel'dorei have joined the Ren'dorei.

I cover this extensively in my earlier discussion, I thoroughly recommend reading it. The key to solving the problem with the alliance numbers in understanding why it is like it is.

Many people think it's things like racials, or the blood elf model , or horde guilds. It isn't. It's popularity and perception - it was the lore/narrative and presentation changes that made the horde very cool, that changed it's perception.

You need to make a cool shiny big song and dance over the alliance for a little while, and favour it for cool and nice things - this will do the trick. you don't even need new stuff, because the alliance races actually have a lot of cool things about them totally underutilised , ignored and siphoned off to the horde. Quel'thalas, Silvermoon and the kaldorei civilization are examples of things siphoned off, lame dwarves, lame night elves that have little magic, no well of eternity use, no fancy world tree magic use etc, going from a great multi-spectrum race to effectively a niche forest elf only expression - boring dwarves, Draenei who are just always agreeable - it lacks fire and imagination and grossly under utilised. Night elves have fascinating things in their lore, Suramar is evidence of it, and that's not even all, the Illidari are under utilised, the whole mystic of the stars - they call themselves children of the stars, had astrology towers in their civilization and so much mystery to the order of Elune that was intertwined with the mages and the people and the druids - so much non used, only the same one dimension druid take for most of it..

Want to see dwarves interesting/ you watched the hobbit? you played Warhammer? Dwarves can be so much cooler than they are making them in Warcraft.. it's all perception hun.


Do the horde need the blood elves? Well look at classic relaunch, there are no blood elves in the 2018 relaunch, but the overall population is 50/50 now why is that? Because the horde is no longer perceived as the lame faction. it didn't even need eye candy models, those were just the incentive back in the TBC days to lure players over and establish a trend...once the trend is established it is no longer need, emphasis should have switched to the orcs and trolls, they should have done majestic troll and orc places like Daza'ralor/Zuldazar rather than sling more alliance elven stuff (like Suramar) over tot he horde. Void elves should have been darker and a direction tied into blood elves while high elves the vanilla version gone to the alliance. But that didn't happen.

So what do we do now to change alliance perception.. make the elves incredible like they can really be, for being alliance type elves, in their native way - don't shunt that to the horde, the horde is not the faction of high elves traditionally, just because blood elves have sat on the horde since TBC, they've never become more horde like, they've remained very high elven which is an alliance template - if the alliance popularity is low, because it's unattractive and uninteresting, make it exciting. Find out what makes the alliance exiting and the players excited about it and make the shine bright and glorious like the sun.

And if you have any sense, you'd quickly see it is high elves and Night elves that do more for the alliance than any other factions. Even not playable, alliance players wish for and make more posts about high elves than they do dwarves, Draenei, worgen, gnomes, pandas COMBIND... it is alliance fans that talk more about Nightborne lore than horde fans do .. horde fans only talk about blood elves (Nightborne talks are just moans about the models), Night elves are the other massive alliance topic - there is such a desire for them to be cool, powerful, fierce, badass, magical etc - it shows you the things the alliance players like and want are not been given them, if you want all those players who've transferred to the horde to go back.. make their alliance cool again, change the perception.

This is why I feel it needs a big splash again.

[Tanaria]

SNIP

What you feel and what Blizzard are content with are two different things.

As mentioned, Blizzard are seemingly very happy with the Horde. Each race gets it's time in the sun. Hell, Blood Elves hadn't been seen probably, on their own, until Legion in 7.1. They only had cameo appearances between TBC and Legion.
Blizzard wanted to give the Forsaken race a leading part and this is where they developed the character of Nathanos, but also the character of Velonara, who was always a bit shaky on Sylvanas' leadership.

The writers for the Horde are seemingly just more, in-the-know, about each race and that is why they all get equal development. Nightborne only had 8.2 of BFA, since joining the Horde. Everything else was Orc, Tauren, Forsaken, Troll and Goblin.
I don't think you truly understand the Horde narrative and the way the Horde writers have always been. Unlike the Alliance that forces Humans at the front, the Horde writers actually look at each race and use them appropriately. 8.2 gave story to the Blood Elves and Nightborne as they were the races that made sense for the story. Typically, Alliance writers pushed Jaina to the forefront - that's not a Horde problem, that's the Alliance writers' problem. Shandris was involved and heavily used in the Eternal Palace raid, but that's about it.

During the faction assaults, they had the Orcs be the Warriors, the Blood Elves and Nightborne serve as the Mages, the Trolls serve as Hunters and the Forsaken serve as Rogues and Warlocks and these are just a few examples. Blizzard know what they're doing and despite the horrible story of BFA, it has worked in 90% of the cases.

Horde don't need to lose Silvermoon or Suramar. They are Horde assets, no matter how much you try and headcanon it.

EDIT: In fact, it wasn't until the Shadowlands pre-patch did we see any living elf direct and take leadership of the Horde. Lor'themar, not being the Warchief, was the very first time we'd actually seen a living elf be the de-facto leader of the Horde faction.
Sylvanas, being undead and leader of the Forsaken, doesn't really count as she primarily led the undead humans.

Shadowlands pre-patch was the first time an elf, who led elves, was leading the Horde. Not as "Warchief" but as the main commander. Blood Elf fans, myself included, have never really imagined Lor'themar being the Warchief, especially now considering how Garrosh, Vol'jin and Sylvanas were handled, but I think the majority of blood elf fans were happy to see Lor'themar be the main commander of the Horde forces. It could create an interesting dynamic between him and Turaylon and we could see the first antagonistic alliance, attack the horde.

At this stage, we have a more peaceful Horde commander in Lor'themar and a more zealous Alliance commander in Turaylon.

[Kyriani]

Can Blizzard focus the narrative on the Alliance and have them be more proactive rather than always reactive to whatever the Horde is doing? Sure! That'd be great! I think the Horde would also like not being beat in the head with the villain bat for a while too. But that doesn't have to come at the cost of anything Horde has currently. Blizzard simply has to want to devote the narrative and spotlight to the Alliance in a big and consistent way for a significant amount of time. Unfortunately, even ignoring the fact that, as a two faction game Blizzard cant simply ignore one faction or the other, the culture surrounding WoW for the bulk of it's life makes that difficult.

The Horde are "cool". The Alliance are "boring". And don't forget "Horde bias!". It's a matter of perception, and the perception of the Alliance would need to change in a big way to attract the types of players who engage heavily in endgame progression. Blizzard gave literal Blood Elves (painted blue) to the Alliance and it made no difference. Now those literal Blood Elves no longer have to be blue and I'm betting in the near future they'll get a bunch of new hair color and hairstyle options allowing them to appear virtually indistinguishable from Blood Elves. And even if they tossed Paladin and Demon Hunter access to Void Elves on top of that, I still don't think it's would make much difference. The "idea" that the Horde are the "cool" faction is so ingrained in the culture of both Blizzard (there's an orc statue on their front lawn), and the playerbase, that I am hard-pressed to think of what could change that perception.

I think giving the Alliance more majestic elves and magical cities is just going to make the people already playing Alliance happier, but I don't believe it will make the Alliance seem "cool", encourage existing Alliance players to engage in endgame progression more, or draw endgame progression minded Horde players to switch.

[Tanaria]

Can Blizzard focus the narrative on the Alliance and have them be more proactive rather than always reactive to whatever the Horde is doing? Sure! That'd be great! I think the Horde would also like not being beat in the head with the villain bat for a while too. But that doesn't have to come at the cost of anything Horde has currently. Blizzard simply has to want to devote the narrative and spotlight to the Alliance in a big and consistent way for a significant amount of time. Unfortunately, even ignoring the fact that as a two faction game Blizzard cant simply ignore one faction or the other, the culture surrounding WoW for the bulk of it's life makes that difficult.

In an ironic twist of fate, Blizzard could pull off a proactive Alliance with Turaylon as leader. He is far more zealous than Anduin and with Lor'themar seemingly being the defacto Horde commander, who is more reasonable and more for nation security, it could spice things up.

With Lor'themar and Turaylon as the commanders of their respective factions, we could see the tables turn. Plus, if Tyrande hasn't been calmed by the end of Shadowlands, then we do have more bite in the Alliance.

I think giving the Alliance more majestic elves and magical cities is just going to make the people already playing Alliance happier, but I don't believe it will make the Alliance seem "cool", encourage existing Alliance players to engage in endgame progression more, or draw endgame progression minded Horde players to switch.

It won't solve any purpose, other than making a few alliance elf fans happy.
Nightborne and Blood Elves are Horde races with Horde assets. Nothing of their's should be lost, unless Alliance is prepared to say goodbye to Kalimdor, to compensate for the Horde losing the Eastern Kingdoms and Broken Isles.

Yes, that does also mean the Night Elves will have to face another defeat. It's not what Night Elf fans will likely want, but it's tough, I'm afraid.

[MyWholeLifeIsThunder]

SNIP.

I think this is it for me; you simply continue to not address any of the issues we keep presenting and just repeating your views again. You are not interested on a discussion, you don't care about how it doesn't work, you simply say "well it's my opinion" without any attempt to understand why your opinion and premise would negatively impact the experience of huge swaths of the playerbase.

And that's what's really unconscionable about your premise, you care only for your vision regardless of how it would affect others very real enjoyment of the game -cause again, to be clear, you literally want to remove an elven identity that has been part of the Horde for 15 years- and I am done humoring it.

- - - Updated - - -

Can Blizzard focus the narrative on the Alliance and have them be more proactive rather than always reactive to whatever the Horde is doing? Sure! That'd be great! I think the Horde would also like not being beat in the head with the villain bat for a while too. But that doesn't have to come at the cost of anything Horde has currently. Blizzard simply has to want to devote the narrative and spotlight to the Alliance in a big and consistent way for a significant amount of time. Unfortunately, even ignoring the fact that, as a two faction game Blizzard cant simply ignore one faction or the other, the culture surrounding WoW for the bulk of it's life makes that difficult.

That's the huge problem with Ravenmoon's proposals, he cares not for literally taking away 15 years of Horde identity. I am obviously alliance leaning, but I can't help but see such a view as utterly uncaring as to how others enjoy the game. And all for the sake of a simplistic dichotomy.

Also the sheer idea that what the alliance needs to be popular is elves is just... silly. It's far from the only option and it's just weird to present it as the only/best choice.

Humans are always the most popular race; if they gave humans the options to have leaner bodies like elves... yeah.

- - - Updated - - -

In an ironic twist of fate, Blizzard could pull off a proactive Alliance with Turaylon as leader. He is far more zealous than Anduin and with Lor'themar seemingly being the defacto Horde commander, who is more reasonable and more for nation security, it could spice things up.

With Lor'themar and Turaylon as the commanders of their respective factions, we could see the tables turn. Plus, if Tyrande hasn't been calmed by the end of Shadowlands, then we do have more bite in the Alliance.



It won't solve any purpose, other than making a few alliance elf fans happy.
Nightborne and Blood Elves are Horde races with Horde assets. Nothing of their's should be lost, unless Alliance is prepared to say goodbye to Kalimdor, to compensate for the Horde losing the Eastern Kingdoms and Broken Isles.

Yes, that does also mean the Night Elves will have to face another defeat. It's not what Night Elf fans will likely want, but it's tough, I'm afraid.

At the end of the day, Ravenmoon's proposal is just the laziest way to force a faction dichotomy, by making the setting more simplistic and dumbing down in universe choice. The premise that the alliance need elves t be cool is just silly, when the alliance has existed without that "magical and aracne" aspect of elves since... ever. Alliance has always had "forest elves" to pretend the imperial arcane themes belong to the alliance is disingenous.

There are so many other ways to give the alliance a stronger identity, and I am really bummed that this thread has become about engaging with what is downright a bad idea.

[Kyriani]

Humans are always the most popular race; if they gave humans the options to have leaner bodies like elves... yeah.

I must admit... if Human males had a "lean body" option... I would actually make one.

[Tanaria]

At the end of the day, Ravenmoon's proposal is just the laziest way to force a faction dichotomy, by making the setting more simplistic and dumbing down in universe choice. The premise that the alliance need elves t be cool is just silly, when the alliance has existed without that "magical and aracne" aspect of elves since... ever. Alliance has always had "forest elves" to pretend the imperial arcane themes belong to the alliance is disingenous.

There are so many other ways to give the alliance a stronger identity, and I am really bummed that this thread has become about engaging with what is downright a bad idea.

The first time Blizzard brought the "Arcane Elf" thing to the Alliance in any real format, where players could play it, was with Night Elf Mages in 2011 and even then, they didn't really explore it, aside from in Feralas, Azshara and Felwood, with a few scattered quest NPC's.

Before that, it was the Horde Blood Elves that truly commanded the "Arcane Elf" scene, that players could also pick. Hell, my main alt in WoTLK was a Blood Elf Arcane Mage and it felt really good to play...using the Sunreaver Tabard (although, I didn't have the Sunreaver Mounts, I did use the Swift Red Hawkstrider and the Magnificent Flying Carpet.)
Despite it's flaws, TBC Eversong Woods does an excellent job of showcasing the Sin'dorei's mastery of the Arcane. That has been shown to be improving every single step with most of Silvermoon's Magister involved with Blood and Fire Magics.

[ravenmoon]

What you feel and what Blizzard are content with are two different things.

And because you are not blizzard, you have no idea or authority over what that is, nor do I. So let's just call it what it is.

This is not an official evaluation or presentation of ideas to the blizzard board, it's vanity for us to "make compromises" and chop and change or barter for who should get what - because we do not determine those things, nor do we get a say in the meetings where these things are discussed.

So why get angry? Keep on suggesting and imagining, it doesn't matter whether someone disagrees with me or doesn't like what i have to say, I'm not trying to convince blizzard, and I'm not trying to convince you, you really need to remember that.

i am sharing my observations and what I think about the situation, what I've noticed. You show me 0 courtesy because you don't seem to actually consider or read it. At least Kyrianni, MyWholeLifeIsThunder and Eleann have demonstrated that they have understood, so to Beloren and Alanar - at least to a certain extent because they 've hit at the real issue behind all of this.


Beloren and Thunder visit the tradition versus change angle - why the need to go back to the original alliance and horde dichotomies anyway - that is a legitimate question I find anyway, because we are dealing with the heart of the problem with the alliance and why I have concluded High elves are not only desirable but necessary and why the horde's blood elves need to change.

Thunder is all about change to avoid the original tradition, but he balks at the idea of blood elves changing to fit a non-alliance theme, he also challenges the legitimacy of calling the blood elves alliance themed, which is just a shallow excuse, everyone knows the blood elves are essentially alliance on the horde, , we all know they fit more with the alliance than the horde, thunder himself recognises this as did Brigante on the official forums in pointing out that the horde needs that diversity the blood elves bring.. to which I disagree..it doesn't. I concur it needs diversity and new things, but it needs different things, those things don't need to be alliance things, and it shouldn't have alliance things as this imbalances the factions, you can't have the horde have such powerful alliance themes, more attractive than the alliance, in addition to what it has, while the alliance is dead in the water.. it totally undermines the alliance and dilutes the horde, I and he has no suitable answer for this.

So if you don't return to the original heart, where do you go? Beloren's future really, no factions, multiple factions, or players choosing wherever they want to go or a compromise of that, this isn't a bad idea, it's just not the original Warcraft, not Warcraft as we know it. And you can argue that everything changes, it's true things can change, but at what point do they stop being what they were and you might as well change the name? it comes down to blizzard deciding whether they want to leave that warcraft foundation behind or not. I have many times argued for leaving it behind and going Thunder & Beloren's direction, that is stiil my first choice. Whether you believe me or not, however, I have made these recent posts on the premise that the aim is to recapture the heart of warcraft, with the two factions doing what they do best

Kiryanni makes another valid point, she questions whether the inclusion of the high elves would sufficiently turn the tide as I claim, and makes an observation that merits consideration, she reckons it won't, and that taking things from the blood elves would make it worse, using the TBC example isn't that valid because it's a new era and things have changed. however I disagree, I have a gut feeling it would work very well, and the past does give precedence. it's not a sure thing ofc, we don't know, but given the mentality of the players, what excites the alliance, and the fact the horde can stand on its two feet without needing Silvermoon and Suramar in their face makes me confidence it would be enough to boost the alliance, without destroying the horde.

The horde will lose some popularity, this is expected when the other faction becomes popular - you need a net flow to the alliance, you will have no other solutions but to let the alliance appear cooler and better than the horde for a little while.. it doesn't mean the horde has to look terrible, far from it, but if the alliance is to shine brightly and attract others, it needs to have the limelight and the resurgence, and the elves are the key. If managed with the same initiative and tenacity as the opposite was in TBC, it would fix the problem quickly.

now this is where the crux of the debate should lie, not in mis-interpreting that I am proposing horde blood elves are no longer playable, that just shows you either didn't read a thing or barely touched on the details and had already set yourself to oppose it regardless what was said so felt you didn't need to read it. Or you read it, and hated it and set out to manipulate and deceive others claiming that blood elves no longer on the horde is a ridiculous idea framing it to mean I was saying blood elves would no longer be a horde race - which is not what I said, and which I find a bit too far stretched. Possible but very very unlikely.

- - - Updated - - -

And I am willing to bet you didn't read the majority of what I wrote, you skimmed it, saw a few points you could argue - and penned a response. trust me, it shows in your responses.

[Tanaria]

SNIP

Or...Horde keeps Horde things, as in - Silvermoon and Suramar and you get over it, since you no longer play?
Alliance Elves have to wait until, maybe 10.0.

Have Hyjal and Allerian Stronghold.
Core bases for Night Elves, High Elves and Void Elves.

Oh and maybe, if you lose your arrogance and discuss other people's ideas, rather than forcing your ideas down their throats, I will treat you with more respect. All your saying is "my ideas are the best ideas. Yours are alright, but mine are simply better and they must happen." No, I don't do that - if you want respect, you earn it and you discuss other ideas that people have, openly with them, rather than pushing your personal agenda, which is just you being a salty boy for 3 years, because Blizzard gave the Alliance, Void Elves, LF Draenei, Alleria and Turaylon, and the Horde got Suramar.

[Kyriani]

It's fine to have an opinion, or to speculate about things that could be done to bring about a desired result, but I prefer to put my efforts towards things that actually have a realistic chance of happening. Taking Silvermoon and/or Suramar away from the Horde just isn't realistic. So to affect actual change, I focus on things that are within the realm of possibility.

The devs aren't going to change Blood Elves and/or Nightborne just to make the Alliance look better. This is a path that leads nowhere and any efforts made towards pushing for this are essentially a dead end.

The devs might add more customization options, class options, and lore, to reinforce that Void Elves are the Alliance High Elves by showing in-game questlines and NPC dialogues/interactions detailing the why's of this decision by the former Quel'dorei. This is the path I support now. It would take the Alliance High Elves out of their "stasis chamber" and allow them to move forward in story development. I do understand that those seeking High Elves would have preferred a different path than the Ren'dorei, I would have too, but it's what we have to work with now and it's unlikely that Blizzard will add another Thalassian race to the Alliance.

The devs might add more customization options and lore to reinforce the fact that the Shen'dralar (Highborne) did return to Night Elf society. I support this path as well. More options are always welcome and it's a fact, though oft overlooked, that some Highborne were accepted back into Night Elf society, which is why they have mages now. The Night Elf story could see the Night Elf people looking to the arcane once again as they desperately try to rebuild their society after the devastation of Teldrassil. I believe that's well within the realm of things the devs might be willing to explore. It wouldn't mean a forsaking of the Night Elf focus on nature themes, but the arcane themes could see a bit more prominence alongside them.

The devs have previously seemed reluctant to outright remove the faction barrier, but I have a feeling it's inevitable to some degree. Just like mercenary mode for pvp, I believe it's possible that some sort of pve version of that could come about, if only due to the fact that WoW is an old game and there are only so many people who will play the game now. New players are few and far between, and old players sometimes don't return. Assuming the devs can't figure out a way to incentivize endgame progression on the Alliance, then only recourse I can see for them is to allow cross-faction grouping in some way. The two factions are integral to the foundation of wow, but that doesn't mean there isn't room for flexibility.

[Tanaria]

The devs might add more customization options and lore to reinforce the fact that the Shen'dralar (Highborne) did return to Night Elf society. I support this path as well. More options are always welcome and it's a fact, though oft overlooked, that some Highborne were accepted back into Night Elf society, which is why they have mages now. The Night Elf story could see the Night Elf people looking to the arcane once again as they desperately try to rebuild their society after the devastation of Teldrassil. I believe that's well within the realm of things the devs might be willing to explore. It wouldn't mean a forsaking of the Night Elf focus on nature themes, but the arcane themes could see a bit more prominence alongside them.

It's very possible, that the Arcane Highborne could take up a more active role - the last time the Night Elves as a whole, truly prospered was under leadership of an Arcane wielder (although said arcane wielder also brought about their own ruin as well.)
Highborne towers and buildings in and around Darkshore could be a way of a force-field being conjured by the Shen'dralar which protects the Night Elves' new capital which could be Mathystra.

I think, if the Highborne play an active role, Hyjal isn't the best location for them, due to it being very Druidic - it's possible that the Highborne conjure and rebuild the ancient city of Mathystra and this is where the Night Elf civillians choose to live. This also follows on from the Battle for Darkshore, which I think, needs to have some sort of in-game conclusion. A 40 seconds cinematic isn't cutting it for me and the fact that it swaps between being controlled by the Forsaken, then the Night Elves...nah, if you want that, you've got the Bronze Dragons and Chromie Time.

Or - due to Maiev and the Wardens returning, could this be a return to the Night Elven Wardens holding more of a presence? Maiev is relentless when angered...I mean, Tyrande + Night Warrior isn't a pretty thing, but Maiev + Night Warrior...I reckon Sylvanas would be doing her utmost to stay well clear of Maiev, if she was the Night Warrior.

[ravenmoon]

I must admit... if Human males had a "lean body" option... I would actually make one.

They do, they're called high elves (or blood elves or void elves )

[BaumanKing]

In an ironic twist of fate, Blizzard could pull off a proactive Alliance with Turaylon as leader. He is far more zealous than Anduin

Lol, a zealot who sleeps with a void elf, condemns Xe'ra after her death, supports Anduin's peaceful policy, and is friendly towards the forsaken and mages.

The devs might add more customization options, class options, and lore, to reinforce that Void Elves are the Alliance High Elves by showing in-game questlines and NPC dialogues/interactions detailing the why's of this decision by the former Quel'dorei. This is the path I support now. It would take the Alliance High Elves out of their "stasis chamber" and allow them to move forward in story development. I do understand that those seeking High Elves would have preferred a different path than the Ren'dorei, I would have too, but it's what we have to work with now and it's unlikely that Blizzard will add another Thalassian race to the Alliance.

It would be cool for Silver Covenant to start inviting void elves into their ranks.

[Tanaria]

Lol, a zealot who sleeps with a void elf, condemns Xe'ra after her death, supports Anduin's peaceful policy, and is friendly towards the forsaken and mages.

He's a zealot in his utter devotion to the Light. He is lightforged and Blizzard have been hinting that the Light isn't this "purely good" force for some time. It might be time to put that to the test. With this in mind, it makes sense for the Alliance to be the ones who represent this "zealous" view of the Light. Makes the faction actually interesting, by enhancing the story of "hang on, the Light isn't so good after all."

And in comparison to the other Horde commander, he is certainly a zealot. That's good. We need more of that within the Alliance, to stop this "holy white knight" thing which is another factor to the Alliance being quite the bland faction.
We've got Void Elves, Dark Irons, Worgen...use them to their fullest.