Official High Elf Discussion Megathread

[Sorrior]

They don't have HE plans, if by high elves you mean Alliance high elves becoming playable.

They bluntly told you they have no HE plans.

Saying 'I think they have HE plans' after they bluntly tell you they don't isn't even grasping at straws. There is no straw to grasp.



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I suspect this thread is kept open for one reason only, to contain this never ending discussion. Prior to it's existence there were multiple pro High Elf threads as everyone and their mother came up with some new angle they felt justified another new thread, yet it always rapidly devolved back into the same topic and arguments.

By keeping this megathread open, the moderators probably think they are sparing the rest of the forums from being overwhelmed by countless High Elf threads. The moderators on the official forums took a similar stance as well recently and they now actively lock or delete High Elf topics outside of one main one.

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Source please, because I have never heard that said.

Fact you cannot even pay attention to context yet again proven.

No i meant story wise thus why turning them down

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And then this...



Genuine curiosity, what makes you suspect it?

Their constabtly turning HE down implies to me they plan to do something storywise or SOMETHING we as players don't know prevents it. If so they really should have hinted at it.

Buut i am also in the suspecting this is the last faction war camp and maybe the divide between races will go away soon in favor of old god, void lord and light war. We have MUCH bigger fights coming up and much bigger wars. The petty faction wars mean nothing compared to what we have and will fight.

[Sigxy]

High Elves won't happen in BFA, but I think they will eventually, provided the allied race system doesn't slow/stop. When they are available, I'll have one for sure.

At this rate, I'm expecting them to do what Ion said during the interview.

Giving Blood Elves blue contact lenses. >_>

[Sorrior]

Here is my obligatory "get my opinion in before it's lost to the flaming/arguing" of this thread:

People who want playable high elves for the Alliance only want to play a white skinned elf character with non-green eye customization(ie: blood elf model) on the Alliance side. It has nothing to do with lore reasoning for these people.

The utter refusal to play Horde as an elf proves it. They want the exact same kind of elf that the Horde gets, but waving the blue and gold flag instead. So you get your blood elf model race on the Alliance finally... only the skin is not white and the hair isn't your typical brown, blonde and/or dark.

At the end of the day it's all ABOUT THE SKIN COLOR!

Msny of us also do have BE buut would love to have HE as an option as well.

[Sigxy]

Msny of us also do have BE buut would love to have HE as an option as well.

Then wouldn't you say it's a better idea to just ask Blizzard to make blue eyes a thing for blood elves? Golden eyes are a thing, so it's likely they can add blue later on. That way, both pro-high elves and anti-high elves can come to some agreement, for sure. You get to play 'high elves'.

[Sorrior]

I was here during the great Draenei retcon. I remember visiting the village of the lost ones in the Swamp of Sorrows before the revelation of the new Alliance race but when it was heavily suspected to be Draenei and wondering if they would really be it.

That entire plot has seen been completely rewritten. No longer did Sargeras fall to evil because of his interactions with Demons, instead it was driven by his fear of the Void and the Old Gods. But the key thing about that retcon is that it didn't require them to make an in game change, it merely altered the background information in a way that was fully consistent with the way the game world is portrayed now.

Any retcons used on Blood/High Elves to produce a set of different skin tones would be noticed. They would stand out. They would be immersion breaking.

As for your concern regarding Blood Elves losing their uniqueness due to the introduction of concepts such as the tattoos or hairstyles, having a thematically and biologically identical race join the Alliance would be much, much worse in regards to their uniqueness. You cannot use Blood Elves losing their uniqueness as an argument in favour of playable High Elves, that is a complete contradiction.

High Elves cannot be portrayed differently from Blood Elves because both groups are the same and divided only by a political opinion. Void Elves are what Blizzard ended up with when they tried to differentiate a group of Blood/High Elves meaningfully from the rest of the group. They are the answer.

Yet they have done many in game changes see BE AND HE models being changed from the prior NE version in most cases or Sylvanas.

Your argument about in game changes is already proven to be false

[Deleted]

There are multiple sources for this.

Which we seem to interpret totally different.

incorrect.

I don't think there is such thing like "correct" or "incorrect" when it comes to story interpretations... And even If it would be - it applies only as long, as they don't change mind on that matter, like on many things before.

My views are just my views. I knowledge disagreement, however I am kind of person who would still rather speak loud, even if having disagreement with Judeo-Christian god. Unfortunately for You, these are views shared by thousands of people, who do not recognize Blood Elves, as High Elves.

If political differences resulted in biological differences, you might have a point.

First - not all differences mentioned here were political, and some - like more frequent crossbreeding, mentioned even in game - have far more reaching outcome, than just political. Secondly - saying, that political differences can't have biological consequences would be untrue even in real world (division of Korea example), and in fantasy world is just silly, and was disproved few months ago, by that unfortunate accident, called Void Elves.

If you cannot stomach the Horde

Who told You I ever played Alliance?

I loved Blood Elves once. When hey were introduced. Cause there was no similar elf in any other fantasy world. And calling them - then - " traditional tolkien style " would probably make audience laugh. However I can not stand devs destroying them, by making identical with High Elves anymore, without any objection. It is people who speak for reading them as identical, are those who actually harm them.

All the rest of the post is just repeating the same opinion in different ways as kind of spell, in case the summoning of the lord and the saviors name was not enough in this time to banish evil spirits. Well... I disagree as much times, as You repeat.

And last, but not least - I absolutely have no feeling that this thread "failed".
It rather showed already many possibilities of highlighting differences, and huge field for compromises

Giving Blood Elves blue contact lenses. >_>

Well, for me the case would be effective solved, cause lost. But I would still disagree, that such solution was the best one.

[KrakHed]

Yet they have done many in game changes see BE AND HE models being changed from the prior NE version in most cases or Sylvanas.

Your argument about in game changes is already proven to be false

I think you misunderstood his argument. Yes, they do change models. But BE and HE models were always consistent with one another for the most part. Adding something new would probably require explaining, and not just lazy retconning.

[Deleted]

Not exactly. Blood Elves used redskined Night Elf model before they got their own. What other explanation do we need, that High Elves use Blood Elf model now, cause there is no model created especially for them, yet?

And this one is the closest, however not perfect fit.

If if it turns out to be true, that vampires will be using straight back undead model remake, not Blood Elf model reskin, neither Blood Prince NPC model as they do now, would you been waiting for explanations, too?

They just do new model, if further differentiation is needed, and go.

[Sigxy]

Not exactly. Blood Elves used redskined Night Elf model before they got their own. What other explanation do we need, that High Elves use Blood Elf model now, cause there is no model created especially for them, yet?

There was no lore that showed the Blood Elves & Night Elves having the same body types.

There is, however, lore that shows Blood Elves & High Elves having the same body types.

[Deleted]

There was no lore that showed the Blood Elves & Night Elves having the same body types.

Yes. But there were also differences in presenting High Elf and Blood Elf behavior in WC3, that are not reproduced by model showing them all in aggressive and challenging poses, fitting mostly Blood Elves. I personally hold this opinion since their introduction, so it's little bit older, than this thread, and I rather could not be accused of wanting just "thalasian model with blue eyes".

And so - model similar to Nightborne could be in fact better. If we also give similar explanations as for Tirasians - slightly different heritage (crossbreeding), slightly different lifestyle (more turned in favor of nature was proposed here before, as for answer for finding their way of elven nature-magic balance - cause of being the most consistent with favored by many fans earliest WC2 ranger concepts) then in fact problem is solved.

Understanding, that for High Elf fans their classical elf theme is much more crucial, than "thalasian model with blue eyes" is best way to avoid mistakes similar to Void Elves. And shut down the case. Benefit comes mostly for Night Elves, and Blood Elves, who can not be portrayed anymore as "generic", and have to be pushed further back in roles consistent with their core concepts. This is actually thing that many players wanted.

[Friendlyimmolation]

Yes. But there were also differences in presenting High Elf and Blood Elf behavior in WC3, that are not reproduced by model showing them all in aggressive and challenging poses, fitting mostly Blood Elves. I personally hold this opinion since their introduction, so it's little bit older, than this thread, and I rather could not be accused of wanting just "thalasian model with blue eyes".

And so - model similar to Nightborne could be in fact better. If we also give similar explanations as for Tirasians - slightly different heritage (crossbreeding), slightly different lifestyle (more turned in favor of nature was proposed here before, as for answer for finding their way of elven nature-magic balance - cause of being the most consistent with favored by many fans earliest WC2 ranger concepts) then in fact problem is solved.

Understanding, that for High Elf fans their classical elf theme is much more crucial, than "thalasian model with blue eyes" is best way to avoid mistakes similar to Void Elves. And shut down the case. Benefit comes mostly for Night Elves, and Blood Elves, who can not be portrayed anymore as "generic", and have to be pushed further back in roles consistent with their core concepts. This is actually thing that many players wanted.

In which case, don't call them high elves, because at that point they aren't, just call them half elves and be done with it. People are obviously lenient when it comes to appearance and lore with this as long as they get their pretty fair skinned "Elf" on the Alliance.

But the actual culture, the purest High elves? Those are still Horde.

[KrakHed]

If if it turns out to be true, that vampires will be using straight back undead model remake, not Blood Elf model reskin, neither Blood Prince NPC model as they do now, would you been waiting for explanations, too?

The explanation would be that certain kinds of undead are mutated. The artists decided to elaborate on that mutation. We were only able to see a small portion of the Blood Prince faces, and we know that different levels of San'layn mutation exist. So it'd work, because a difference had already been set up.

With High Elves and Blood Elves, we know there's no actual physical difference besides the eyes. We've been told this, and we can see it.

[Byleth]

A group of Elves previously presented as identical to the Blood Elves suddenly changing to the degree described would definitely be immersion breaking and to deny that is just minimizing the consequences of your suggestions.

To be fair, you just described Void Elves.

If I recall, Alliance hate them and regularly refer to them as "ass-pulls".

Hmmm... It's almost like you are right about skin tone suddenly changing

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How would playable High Elves break immersion? That is really not making any sense. If it does break immersion, how did Void Elves apparently avoid this fate?

They didn't - See above.

[Deleted]

Love how people conclude "Alliance hate Void elves" when it's by far the most popular allied race atm.

[Fyersing]

High Elves cannot be portrayed differently from Blood Elves because both groups are the same and divided only by a political opinion. Void Elves are what Blizzard ended up with when they tried to differentiate a group of Blood/High Elves meaningfully from the rest of the group. They are the answer.

This.

As somebody who has advocated for playable High Elves for nearly a decade, it's always been quite clear that for them to be implemented they would have to become physically distinct from Blood Elves (in more ways than just eye color, or poise); and while Void Elves aren't likely to resonate with everybody, at least they've very clearly distinct from BE's (both visually and narratively).

The giant question mark that looms above the head of each and every Void Elf is that if the intent was to create something as visually and culturally distinct from Blood Elves as possible, why was it decided that the narrative background of the Void Elves should be a hitherto unheard of splinter group of BE's instead of the historically well-known and well-received (among the Alliance playerbase) High Elves?

If VE's were "the answer" to people wanting playable HE's, why are they 100% unrelated to HE's? This isn't a question aimed at you, just a rhetorical musing.

In which case, don't call them high elves, because at that point they aren't, just call them half elves and be done with it. People are obviously lenient when it comes to appearance and lore with this as long as they get their pretty fair skinned "Elf" on the Alliance.

But the actual culture, the purest High elves? Those are still Horde.

I took "Blood Elves are basically High Elves" to mean that BE's are the closest of the three iterations to what their society was pre-Third War. Not sure why this wouldn't be the case, or why anybody who wants High Elves would believe otherwise.

Love how people conclude "Alliance hate Void elves" when it's by far the most popular allied race atm.

Where are you finding this information? Genuinely curious, because I looked earlier and couldn't figure it out. >.<

[Deleted]

Where are you finding this information? Genuinely curious, because I looked earlier and couldn't figure it out. >.<

http://www.warcraftrealms.com/census.php

[Fyersing]

http://www.warcraftrealms.com/census.php

Has anybody verified this website is accurate or not? Because it's got the total count (for US and EU) as being 1,408,547 characters.

Whereas https://realmpop.com/us.html has the count (with the same filters, but only counting the US) as being 39,412,728 characters.

Edit: Oh, I see, WarcraftRealms is purging inactive characters from the list. Interesting.

[DeicideUH]

Has anybody verified this website is accurate or not? Because it's got the total count (for US and EU) as being 1,408,547 characters.

Whereas https://realmpop.com/us.html has the count (with the same filters, but only counting the US) as being 39,412,728 characters.

Edit: Oh, I see, WarcraftRealms is purging inactive characters from the list. Interesting.

AFAIK, Realmpop uses public info from guild lists and auction houses to count population.
It will be more accurate when BfA is available and people are leveling to 120, as alts/inactive characters will stay lower level.

WarcraftRealms require you to use an addon in order to gather data. As such, it's way more limited.

[Fyersing]

AFAIK, Realmpop uses public info from guild lists and auction houses to count population.
It will be more accurate when BfA is available and people are leveling to 120, as alts/inactive characters will stay lower level.

WarcraftRealms require you to use an addon in order to gather data. As such, it's way more limited.

I figured it was more accurate overall, but it currently doesn't seem to even show Allied Races. Shame.

[Deleted]

Set it to 110 - 110 to get the true number, setting it at 20-110 obviously gives a higher number because people tried them but then stopped, Void Elves aint as popular as you're making them out to be. Take into account it's been 5 months since their inception into game so people who are sticking with the race even the most casual ones are lvl 110 by now easily, and even on that website you use it shows there are less Void elves than Worgan.