Official High Elf Discussion Megathread

[Friendlyimmolation]

What we had was 10 years without the allied race system who justifies such thing as HE, get over it.

sure, if you ignore every reason why they aren't playable. Saying get over it doesn't magically remove the reasons why you don't get high elves.

[Syegfryed]

so, after all the bullshit of blood elves being holy elves, instead of arcane, when half of the sunwell is arcane, and their culture is basically oriented for the arcane magic, now it seems we get back to the point people keep saying blood elves are not high elves, even every piece of lore even before ion stance clearly state then as high elves, shocking

i bet the next it will be they saying blood elves sucked fel magic and now are other race

[Aldo Hawk]

And you have trouble hearing what the developers say it seems.



And? So what?

You have High Elves in the Alliance. Doesn't change a damn thing. They are present as a playable race in the Horde.



If the end result is a fair skinned elf that is called a High Elf it is unacceptable because it encroaches on the race and theme, both of which are now part of the Horde's theme. You are trying to reinvent the wheel to justify this desire.

If you are willing to change so much to get an approximation, ask for the Half Elves nobody cares about.



To say Ion's reasons were debunked is to give credit to the weak rationale behind playable High Elves he rejected. You agree with the 'debunking' because it's what you want to hear. I heard what I wanted to hear too of course, but I heard from the lead developer and not an upset pro High Elf poster who thinks he knows more about the game than the man paid to run it.



No, this is already over. All those scenarios are just to satisfy you personally that it's over. Blizzard could leave the High Elves to rot off screen or have them pop up from time to time as they do now like the story prop they obviously are, Blizzard doesn't have to do anything else on this matter than it already has, tell you 'no' and why they said 'no'.

How i have trouble hearing what the developers has to say if i don't have any problem with bringing their words on the table? Jeez try harder please.

The one who has trouble hearing others are people like you who do not understand that play a HE in the horde is not what people want.

And if Ion's words were debunked it is because they were, is not any kind of mistery.

This is not a matter of facts, because we have them and the last move has to come from developers, so what matters is their willing to do that, so we just want the developers to do something about it and not give such responses as: 'There's less BE than HE in the world' or 'They look the same' or "You can play that fantasy in the horde", because those responses are not valid ones when, for example:

The look of HE should not be the same as BE if they got introduced, so there should not be a problem when we are talking about Blizzard's art team, and it is not the work of fans, fans, with their time, skills, and effort, suggest changes for the HE to look different from BE, but is not their work to do so, they do it because they love the idea.

In the matter of numbers... well, there's draenei, lightforged, VE, gnomes, and a plethora of races who a very low numbered in the world.

Is not fair to someone just come and step on it just because they hate it, have a bit of respect and if you don't like it behave like an educated person and give constructive feedback about why you don't like them, do not flame when others point out flaws in your arguments, it is enought, people will insist in this untill they have a definitive response about the matter, not a: 'The future is open'.

You are the one making it a war, just look at you and the others like you after the Q&A, you all were throwing shit and acting like total cunts because you believed you have won, is that a mature behavior?

This is ridiculous, those who come here to flame should feel ashamed of themselves, it's a cancerous behavior, and is just taking the easy way.

- - - Updated - - -

sure, if you ignore every reason why they aren't playable. Saying get over it doesn't magically remove the reasons why you don't get high elves.

What reasons are those? i can come up with the looks reason, but it is something that can be changed.

Or the lore reasons? ohh yea right HE are already alliance and while they are a low population it is enought when compared to other playable races.

The faction wall? yeah, because VE are not clearly recolored blood elves (and the BE part is important, they didn't even came from the alliance itself), and while pandaren weren't what developers want, they exists and i do not have problem with them in pvp.

We already have BE? right, go tell someone that if they want to play something that is in the alliance's lore they have to be horde, and those who want to play a BE and are okay with the horde are already doing it.

Is it a reason of looks? no one allied race added and announced will be introduced without aesthetic changes, what is the problem with looks? WoW have a really great art team, they can come up with nice things, and even the fanbase created examples of HE that look different from BE without having to look at small details such as this two images: https://image.ibb.co/mCTr3c/HE_Male_Skintones.png and https://i.imgur.com/3oET3CJ.jpg this is fanmade, how payed employees that study to do their jobs can't come up with something great?.

[Syegfryed]

What reasons are those?

watch the Q&A

i can come up with the looks reason, but it is something that can be changed.

indeed and it was made it, its void elves

The faction wall? yeah, because VE are not clearly recolored blood elves

and are different enough with both model, theme and fantasie

and stop bring up pandaren, this is becoming embarrassing

We already have BE? right, go tell someone that if they want to play something that is in the alliance's lore they have to be horde

you can play void elf in the alliance pretty fine and pretend

people want play dwarfs, worgens and gnomes in the horde as well, but they need to roll alliance, you guys will not be the special snowflakes to choce what action play the elf

Is it a reason of looks? no one allied race added and announced will be introduced without aesthetic changes, what is the problem with looks? WoW have a really great art team, they can come up with nice things, and even the fanbase created examples of HE that look different from BE without having to look at small details such as this two images: https://image.ibb.co/mCTr3c/HE_Male_Skintones.png and https://i.imgur.com/3oET3CJ.jpg this is fanmade, how payed employees that study to do their jobs can't come up with something great?.

exactly, small details, this is just a blood elf more bulky with better model/texture, this is not enough to make then a different allied race, this change don't even make sense to happen, there is no lore support

and yet they fall to the same theme, generic tolkien elf

people would have more chances with half elves, but the obsession don't let then

[Friendlyimmolation]

What reasons are those? i can come up with the looks reason, but it is something that can be changed.

You're point is already worthless if you have to justiy change for the sake of change just to make something different enough to be playable when outside of the ideas, they are not different. "Blood elves are high elves" is the most boiled down argument because it is the base of the issue, they are not unique, they are not special, they are outcasts of an playable race and unlike void elves, nothing separates them.

Or the lore reasons? ohh yea right HE are already alliance and while they are a low population it is enought when compared to other playable races.

The only playable race you could say they outnumbered was void elves, and even then, they are not unified, nor do they have and universal culture, outside of blood elven culture which is Horde.

The faction wall? yeah, because VE are not clearly recolored blood elves (and the BE part is important, they didn't even came from the alliance itself), and while pandaren weren't what developers want, they exists and i do not have problem with them in pvp.

Then you like many others are either willfully ignoring the issue or still never understood it. The devs don't give a shit if you have no problem with it, they do. They do not want the Horde to mirror the Alliance and Vice Versa, you're not going to get the blood elf model with blue eyes, nor will it be changed for you when there is no reason for it to, because try as you might, none of the suggested changes make sense and deliberately skip over how similar they are, and because of that they will not be playable.

We already have BE? right, go tell someone that if they want to play something that is in the alliance's lore they have to be horde, and those who want to play a BE and are okay with the horde are already doing it.

That's called understanding a two faction game and being mature enough to realize that you don't get everything you want, nor does every single thing in the game need to be offered to one faction. You want to play a pale elf? Play Horde, simple as that.

Is it a reason of looks? no one allied race added and announced will be introduced without aesthetic changes, what is the problem with looks? WoW have a really great art team, they can come up with nice things, and even the fanbase created examples of HE that look different from BE without having to look at small details such as this two images: https://image.ibb.co/mCTr3c/HE_Male_Skintones.png and https://i.imgur.com/3oET3CJ.jpg this is fanmade, how payed employees that study to do their jobs can't come up with something great?.

Yet again the point flies clear over your head, High elves are the exact same race, they look the exact same, no amount of headcanon or jumbled logic justifies them being different in appearance, and Blizzard has made it quite clear they don't want to blend factions.

Ask for something realistic, like half elves if you want a similar model, but to try so hard to beat around the bush is ridiculous. High elves are not some owed gift, high elves are not some different looking people than blood elves, and the pale, majestic blonde haired yada yada isn't going to be shared.

[Aldo Hawk]

watch the Q&A


indeed and it was made it, its void elves




and are different enough with both model, theme and fantasie

and stop bring up pandaren, this is becoming embarrassing


you can play void elf in the alliance pretty fine and pretend

people want play dwarfs, worgens and gnomes in the horde as well, but they need to roll alliance, you guys will not be the special snowflakes to choce what action play the elf




exactly, small details, this is just a blood elf more bulky with better model/texture, this is not enough to make then a different allied race, this change don't even make sense to happen, there is no lore support

and yet they fall to the same theme, generic tolkien elf

people would have more chances with half elves, but the obsession don't let then

The tolkien elf issue is a made one, the problem is HE being the same as BE with different colors, the image i linked shows a HE that can be differentiated from a BE with just one look at it, and if you didn't accept my argument of modify the HE to look different, just look at Nightborne, they are different from what we saw before being playable, and why was that? because they modify races before making them playable.

You are just rolling the roll while calling people names without backup...

[Ithekro]

The tolkien elf issue is a made one, the problem is HE being the same as BE with different colors, the image i linked shows a HE that can be differentiated from a BE with just one look at it, and if you didn't accept my argument of modify the HE to look different, just look at Nightborne, they are different from what we saw before being playable, and why was that? because they modify races before making them playable.

You are just rolling the roll while calling people names without backup...

No I think he just hates elves in general. With the Horde potently getting Undead Vampire Elves at some point in BfA, who knows.

[Syegfryed]

The tolkien elf issue is a made one, the problem is HE being the same as BE with different colors, the image i linked shows a HE that can be differentiated from a BE with just one look at it, and if you didn't accept my argument of modify the HE to look different, just look at Nightborne, they are different from what we saw before being playable, and why was that? because they modify races before making them playable.

You are just rolling the roll while calling people names without backup...

no, you are trying to oversimplify the issue, the problem is not just "look"

It is look but also theme, fantasie, lore and aesthetic, goes further to gameplay reasons like imbalance, exodus and others things

High elf is the tolkien and classic fantasie elf, the same cliche, the mage elf, the ranger elf, and this is already occupied by blood elves, in look, theme ad fantasie

Voidelves simple overcome the theme, fantasie, aesthetic and lore problems in one hit, giving then another theme trough the dark/drow elves, given then another fantasie trough the void powers, and different aesthetic from the blood elves and the lore problem since they gave a reason inlore for the change

High elf more bulky will not change nothing, they still are the same elf, with the same everything, but more bulky, with no reason to be. Sorry, try harder

[Aldo Hawk]

You're point is already worthless if you have to justiy change for the sake of change just to make something different enough to be playable when outside of the ideas, they are not different. "Blood elves are high elves" is the most boiled down argument because it is the base of the issue, they are not unique, they are not special, they are outcasts of an playable race and unlike void elves, nothing separates them.



The only playable race you could say they outnumbered was void elves, and even then, they are not unified, nor do they have and universal culture, outside of blood elven culture which is Horde.



Then you like many others are either willfully ignoring the issue or still never understood it. The devs don't give a shit if you have no problem with it, they do. They do not want the Horde to mirror the Alliance and Vice Versa, you're not going to get the blood elf model with blue eyes, nor will it be changed for you when there is no reason for it to, because try as you might, none of the suggested changes make sense and deliberately skip over how similar they are, and because of that they will not be playable.



That's called understanding a two faction game and being mature enough to realize that you don't get everything you want, nor does every single thing in the game need to be offered to one faction. You want to play a pale elf? Play Horde, simple as that.




Yet again the point flies clear over your head, High elves are the exact same race, they look the exact same, no amount of headcanon or jumbled logic justifies them being different in appearance, and Blizzard has made it quite clear they don't want to blend factions.

Ask for something realistic, like half elves if you want a similar model, but to try so hard to beat around the bush is ridiculous. High elves are not some owed gift, high elves are not some different looking people than blood elves, and the pale, majestic blonde haired yada yada isn't going to be shared.

My point is not worthless because playable characters suffer changes everytime when they are introduced, so my point is just implicit.

Are you saying that HE are less pupolated in Azeroth than horde Goblins? or Mulgore Tauren? or Exodar Draenei? k

And i do not ignore the issues, i'm litterally looking at them and thinking how everything can fit well without distort the whole concept so much, a two faction game is not necesarily two faction with different races, and i understand that, i'm not asking for having the same races in the two factions, that simply destroys the concept of the two factions on wow, but you can't simply say to me that adding HE are going to destroy that, that's delusional, is not copying the entire block into the another, is adding more lore relatable things into the player choices, is simple as that.

[Traveler Voltin]

Everything is an allied race 2018

[Syegfryed]

No I think he just hates elves in general. With the Horde potently getting Undead Vampire Elves at some point in BfA, who knows.

of course i hate elves in general, with exceptions like lorthemar and rommanth, thats obviously since day one im here, i just like a bit blood elves before they theme is just generic tolkien elves back in the frozen throne campaign

the problem is im not biased about the subject, if i was, i would be the first to support HE playable, to more and more elves get out of the horde

[Aldo Hawk]

no, you are trying to oversimplify the issue, the problem is not just "look"

It is look but also theme, fantasie, lore and aesthetic, goes further to gameplay reasons like imbalance, exodus and others things

High elf is the tolkien and classic fantasie elf, the same cliche, the mage elf, the ranger elf, and this is already occupied by blood elves, in look, theme ad fantasie

Voidelves simple overcome the theme, fantasie, aesthetic and lore problems in one hit, giving then another theme trough the dark/drow elves, given then another fantasie trough the void powers, and different aesthetic from the blood elves and the lore problem since they gave a reason inlore for the change

High elf more bulky will not change nothing, they still are the same elf, with the same everything, but more bulky, with no reason to be. Sorry, try harder

Hey, nice try, you just tried to make as i just care about the looks because i just answered something about that.

So there's nothing about HE being a counterpart of BE, with it's own place in the world, it's own storyline, it's own allies and themes, it's own way to overcome things.

No, you just say it is the ranger and mage fantasy with a tolkien elven touch.

[Syegfryed]

So there's nothing about HE being a counterpart of BE, with it's own place in the world, it's own storyline, it's own allies and themes, it's own way to overcome things.

you are not making sense now

No, you just say it is the ranger and mage fantasy with a tolkien elven touch.

what

[Aldo Hawk]

you are not making sense now


what

I'm not going to care about you...

[protip]

I guess at this point I'm just not understanding what the anti-HE crowd are doing? Reminding us that Ion said "no, not anytime soon" (blizzard "soon" btw)? Okay lol

It's not like that suddenly and magically takes away the desire for people to have them playable in game, it just lets us know. "Well don't hold your breath" and I think most understand that?

People are still free to discuss them, their presence, create fan art for them. Don't understand the people trying to make all this stop?

I don't think the people coming in here to stop the discussion understand what happens when you tell someone no, but fortunately there's no need to really respond to them. As for your curiosity about why people are still speaking against high elves here, it's for the same reason that people are still trying to justify them. I think The-Shan gave one good reason here:

the entire issue honestly boils down to "Where do you draw the faction line?" (In terms of racial uniqueness) Which is clearly something divisive (and subjective!) not just on these forums, but at Blizzard, given the mixed responses we've received in their communications. The fact is that their current philosophy for races is against High Elves, that isn't a 'never', though. Being loud and being vocal, and continuing to discuss it is healthy as long as there is interest in discussing it. It will let peoples' opinions be known and show interest.

Maybe a producer will take notice, maybe they'll bring it up at future meetings. Disagreeing with Blizzard is not wrong, it makes you opinionated. Politely disagreeing, and proposing change is fine, being a noisy ape is nasty. There are noisy, toxic apes on both sides.

I agree with a lot of what you say here, barring what you say about mixed responses, but I'd like to add a couple of things. The reason to keep discussing the issue is certainly because Blizzard might take notice. High Elf fans know that, and we do too. If only one side were to leave the discussion, and Blizzard did take notice of it, their views would not be represented.

In terms of just adding high elves as they are now, it does pretty much boil down to how important people consider the faction line. When people suggest things like making races arbitrarily different, retconning the story, going back in time to grab WCII high elves, or any of the other ideas that have been brought up, there are different problems. If no one speaks against those ideas, Blizzard might get the idea that people just don't care about retconning the story, for example.

Being loud and vocal is fine, to a point. The first point is spreading misinformation, or mischaracterizing people who disagree with you. I have seen a lot of people claim that Blizzard is being spiteful for not doing what they want, and that's bad for the game and the community, so I hope we'll see less of that. The other point is being disruptive, for example derailing unrelated threads or hassling Blizzard employees. Other people have other concerns, and that should be respected.

[Deleted]

Should have posted here before. Here's my theory how everyone could be happy:
"High elves are not happening. Best solution is to have distinct half elf allied race where Blizzard could use other than thalassian model. People can get same feeling from light skinned blonde half elves i believe. Lets be honest we all want skinnier humans with pointy ears anyways. And here's how Blizzard could implement them:
Giramar and Galadin are the key (they are Vereesas and Rhonins children, halfbreeds). Lets imagine that Silver covenant wants to serve Alliance and Vereesa with her twins (dunno how old they are but I believe they aged aswell as Anduin and are battle ready) goes to some place to gather Azerite. When they go to the place they meet non other than blood elves with Rommath and Reagent Lord. Vereesa in her style strikes first but is outnumbered and Giramar (he's older and more stoic than his brother I imagine him as ranger-like) with Galadin (mage) gets captured. As her final act she rallies Silver covenant to rescue them but gets killed in the process. However twins escape but before their eyes most of Silver covenant gets killed. They retreat and start to gather all of Azeroths halfbreeds and remaining high elves. Together they want to avenge their mother and forge a new future for their not pure halfbreed (lets say blood elves dont like halfbreeds or something to spice things up). But this is not the end, remaining (very small number) high elves can act as class trainers for half elves, Arator can join in or smt, make some new heroes development, let the old heroes get some rest. Imagine that twins have very different characters. Thats how you can give purpose for half elves to hate horde, get their identity and kill off remaining high elves.
From Hordes POV lets say Rommath has an idea to infuse Sunwell with Azerite so it could become uncorruptable or smt, well I just like to see him do more in game. Blood elves goes to place, meets Silver covenant, gets attacked, kicks ass, profit. But to spice things up lets say undead sent by Desolate Council (not Sylvanas, let them do smt and give her a rest) goes to the same place, recovers high elves bodies and makes them into Dark Rangers squad with brainwashed Vereesa. She could be fierce Alliance killer, crazy and with intention to make more dark rangers. That way we could have some family drama, dark motives and new character developments."

[RangerDaz]

I am sorry logic doesn't seem to make sense to you.

Logic isnt important to some people here when it can favor the thing they are debating against (aka playable races they dont want to come live)

Im sorry everyone, but i really feel this way.

[Aeula]

Is there something wrong with disagreeing with Blizzard?

Disagree all you want but it’s not going to get you anywhere. You’d be better served asking Blizzard for something else.

What we had was 10 years without the allied race system who justifies such thing as HE, get over it.

It doesn’t justify High Elves and it doesn’t change the fact that Blizzard doesn’t want them to become playable.

[ercarp]

It doesn’t justify High Elves and it doesn’t change the fact that Blizzard doesn’t want them to become playable.

Ion* doesn't want them playable.

[Aeula]

Ion* doesn't want them playable.

The game director of WoW. As in the guy at the top of the food chain as far as WoW is concerned. So...