Actually what is the perfectly consistent is what Blizzard is telling us about Kul Tirans: they're human (Alex Afrasiaibi in a Lost Codex interview without even being asked about it).
Also if Blizzard intended to give the Alliance something similar to Vry'kul they would have given them different beard and hairstyles like this:
Actually telling people the Big Kul Tirans are related to Drust or Vry'kul would have made them more popular with the playerbase so there is no reason for Blizzard to tell people they are just obese/bulky humans.
That is incorrect. From Burning Crusade till patch 8.1.0 the Silvermoon City Guardians had a unique, modified Night-Elven model, not available to player Blood Elves or High-Elf NPCs.
Also, in Warcraft 3 and Vanilla WoW Night-Elves, High Elves and Blood Elves shared models and every Kul Tiran encountered in Warcraft 2 and WoW prior to BFA used the "normal" human model so it's an irrelevant argument. Blizzard will only make complete new models when it makes sense for them to do so and if it fits in their development cycle.
"I guess only blood elves feel like the odd man out for the Horde. I hope that we've engineered that into it as deftly as we could, but you know, it's the equivalent of a bunch of white chicks hanging out with goblin or tauren. It's weird." -- Chris Metzen
Kul Tirans are Human. There's no reason why SW humans cant share the same appearances, hair style, tattoos, darker skin tones, different weights, as the Kul Tirans because they are the same race. If my SW Human wants to get fat, they should be allowed access to the fat model used exclusively by Kul Tirans. Its only logical.
You mean the one area in the world apart from Tirisfal Glades where Tyr's Guard, a group of Vrykul stayed behind to guard Tyr's Tomb and lived together with Humans.
"At some point in Azeroth's distant past, humanity emerged in Tirisfal Glades. The iron-skinned vrykul who lived there slowly died off. Many of them suffered from the curse of flesh, a strange malady that transformed them into creatures of flesh and blood.
Yet one group of vrykul lasted longer than the others. They formed a secretive group-Tyr's Guard-to protect Keeper Tyr's tomb. The vrykul of this order knew that they would not live forever, and so they inducted some of the fledgling humans into their ranks.
The vrykul taught the human members of Tyr's Guard the history of the fallen keeper, his tenets of self-sacrifice and justice, and the truth of what lay within the tomb."
-- source Legends of the Silver Hand
There seem to be quiet some similarities between the Drust teaching the Kul Tirans druidism and the Vrykul laying the foundation for Tyr's Guard Paladins and the other of the Silver Hand, yet we don't see bulky human NPCs due to Vrykul genes in Lordaeron.
Half-breeds are very rare in the Warcraft universe:
Dave Kosak: "We don't have that many cross-breeds in the universe."
Dave Kosak: Half-races are so rare in Warcraft that we don't really have any established lore. (That I'm aware of).
Therefore it seems extremely unlikely they could have resulted in an entire population, otherwise we should probably have loads of half-elves by now and Kosak ruled them out explicitly in his tweet.
Not only have multiple Blizzard devs stated Kul Tirans are humans, they have also ruled out half-breeds which human-drust hybrids would be.
"I guess only blood elves feel like the odd man out for the Horde. I hope that we've engineered that into it as deftly as we could, but you know, it's the equivalent of a bunch of white chicks hanging out with goblin or tauren. It's weird." -- Chris Metzen
this was a early statement of the kul'tirans, obvious things changed, pretty much like they said zandalari would just get dino travel forms, they were not intendtent to be a different race/sub-race, but then ended becoming one;
when a people join another people hybridization happens, its the normal flux of thingsNothing in that further explanation talks about it's due to a mixture of Kul'Tirans procreating with Drust. "Joining a society" isn't the same as "all our people are fucking together now".
this is just reforce by the kul'tirans characteristics, they look like vrykul and their racials its close related to the seafaring vrykul, unlike other humans
how long you mean like less than ten years? you are stretching too hard, kul'tirans had thousand of years.if that were the case we'd be having a plethora of Half-elves shown in the game due to how long High Elves and Humans have mingled together in Dalaran.
yes prob there is a few half-elves, they could be an allied race, this would make sense
you just have to do 1+1=2This is unconfirmed information you're trying to pass off as fact.
they are an allied race, this already proof they ARE a different race/race, not just the same race, they are not just regular humansDeveloper/aka Word of God is stating they're not a different race and you're pulling unconfirmed theories out to justify something against what a developer has stated. Sound familiar? lmao
- - - Updated - - -"These are Allied Races, these aren't Sub-Races. There's no direct associated Race or "Parent Race" or anything like that"
-Ion Hazzikostas, Blizzcon 2017 Q&A
Same as highmountain tauren are tauren, but not just the regular tauren, make perfect sense to me.
Night Elfs are Elfs.... so are Blood Elfs... The species is Elf, but Night and Blood Elfs are different races of the same species.
Kul Tirans are Human... so are 'Stormwindians'. The species is Human, but they're both a separate race of human (just like Chinese people are a separate race to African people, both being human though).
High Elfs on the otherhand are the both the same species AND race as Blood Elfs. They're one and the same... the only difference being political.
So, sorry, but the "Kul Tiran" argument you high elfers are trying to make is kinda moot.
Blood elves are our high elves - Chris Metzen
The original intent of using Kul'Tiran in this thread is to show that Blizzard can give "the same race" different models on a whim. They're calling Kul'Tirans the same race. Alex Afrasiabi literally saying, "btw they're human" shows this.
He doesn't say anything about Drust ancestry, doesn't say anything about magically being changed.
What you guys are showing me is that you'll only listen to Blizzard when it helps you and when it doesn't then you'll try to find a way say "they're wrong" without having anything outside of head-canon to back that up.
Kul'Tirans aren't another race, they're human. They have different models from the "core human race" all because Blizzard wanted variety. This means other groups of the same race can also have modified models.
The highmountain Tauren example is silly, they have moose horns. Plenty have suggested here having permanent fixtures to High Elves such as tattoos/feathers/highlights etc. This would be on top of the different eyes High Elves have.
If moose horns is enough but Highmountain Tauren are allowed to have same skin tones, then extra accessories but the same model for High Elves is do-able too. Already precedent said by Blizzard.
Horde also already have two heavily modified Night Elf models in the Zandalari and Nightborne. Alliance only has Void Elves, which isn't a modified model. So all things being equal, it's also okay that Alliance gets another model based off the Blood Elf one again.
Which can be modified, just like Zandalari, Nightborne, Highmountain Tauren, and Kul'Tiran.
Just because Kul Tirans are human doesn't make them the same race as SW humans. I'm hispanic, am I the same race as an asian person? High elfs however, are the same race and species as blood elfs. Albeit, I do admit that given WoW is a fantasy world with different species this argument is a bit "grey". However, fact is Kul Tiran's are more different to other human nations (such as SW) than high elfs are to blood elfs. Physically and culturally there is more diversity between KT and SW than high elf and blood elf.
Sounds like nearly every high elfer.
Again, same species different race.
Funnily enough, moose horns are more distinguishable than any of the high elf fan art (that attempt to differentiate them from blood elfs).
HM Tauren don't cross faction boundaries. Likewise LF Draenei don't either. However, High elfs do, as confirmed by Ion (Lead Game Developer).
Additionally, "Blood Elfs are our High Elfs" - Chris Metzen
Void elfs and Nightborne were a trade of both factions elf model.
Zandalari on the other hand have been altered substantially enough that they don't look like Night Elfs (completely different face, hands, feet, hair, added tusks).
For things to be "equal", high elfs would have to be so far altered from blood elfs you would be able to distinguish them from blood elfs instantly. I don't think some new hair color, tattoos and "feathers" do just that. What high elfers have proposed seems to be on par with the HM Tauren or LF Draenei treatment... neither of which cross faction boundaries. Like I said, VE and Nightborne were the equal swap.. so high elfs technically would have to receive the Zandalari treatment (uglier face, three toes and fingers, tusks, etc...lol...you get my drift). So, you can't use the Zandalari argument, cause they're a completely different species and race to their "parent model".
On a side note, high elf fan art seems to focus on a "woodland elf" theme. Given that the majority of Alliance aligned high elfs live in Dalaran (a majestic and magical city) the "woodland" theme isn't really relevant. High elfs of Dalaran resemble more their kin in Silvermoon City. The woodland theme appears to be based on "fan fiction" of the high elfs at Queldanil Lodge, but these elfs are so few in number it would make no sense for any "high elf" theme to be based around this very small group. It would make more sense for "high elf" aesthetics to focus around the Dalarani elfs...who again more closely resemble their kin in Silvermoon City and the Sunreavers, both of whom are Horde. So when Blizzard says high elfs would blur faction lines, one reason for that is because the aesthetic for majority of Alliance aligned high elfs is already demonstrated via blood elfs. Another reason of course is that blood elfs are the main high elven society in WoW, and represent the high elf trope in this universe. No need to double down on this trope when it's already manifested via the Blood Elfs.
Last edited by Strippling; 2019-05-03 at 06:10 AM.
Blood elves are our high elves - Chris Metzen
The word you're looking for is ethnicity. People from China, Africa, and YOU are all apart of the same homo sapien (race) species.
Back to video games. Humans are considered one race. Kul Tirans are not Drust. The Drust are part of the Vrykul race, who are a separate race from Humans. The Kul Tirans are not a freak sub race from drinking contaminated water. They are literally just fat humans. Blizzard made fat a separate "race".
There's no reason why my SW human shouldn't have access to the same customizations as Kul Tirans and vice versa because they are literally the same race.there is no reason Blood Elves shouldn't have access to the same kinds of look. Anything proposed for Alliance High Elves can and should be equally applied to Blood Elves.
Yes, every Allied race has different hair styles and facial options when compared to their parents. Check out Dark Iron Dwarves to ordinary Dwarves, Lightforged Draenei to ordinary Draenei, Mag'har Orcs to ordinary Orcs. But none of those examples use the different hairstyles and facial hair options as justification for a separate allied race, they all have something far more profound going on.
If you are arguing that hairstyles and facial hair is enough, I ask you to consider, what do you think of a Green Orc option with only unique hairstyles and facial hair being proposed as a new Allied race? Do you think the person putting that idea forward would be able to keep a straight face as they did so?
New hairstyles and facial hair options are a customisation flair on the new Allied races, that is all. They are not the true differences between an Allied race and their respect parents.
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As I wrote above, the Kul Tirans having Drust/Vrykul blood is not incompatible with saying they are Human, which they undoubtedly are. As a real world example, some of us carry Neanderthal or Denisovan DNA due to interbreeding. Are those individuals not fully Human?
As for not telling anyone about it, that merely means it is not explicit in game. They didn't make the fact Void Elves can recruit other Elves explicit in game either, if by explicit we mean being flat out told that is the case. It was implicit, with all those Elves hanging out in Tel'rogus messing with the void and with the sheer number of Void Elves in the game world not lining up with the number of Elves present at the initial transformation. But Moorgard confirmed that the Elves can turn other Elves who seek their powers in his Polygon interview.
Now I will of course admit this topic is subjective, I don't have enough evidence to conclusively prove that what I am saying is fact in regards to the Kul Tirans. But I believe there is sufficient doubt that, for now, the question remains open.
Fair enough, I had forgotten about those guys. But they also no longer exist, having been replaced in that patch. I am also familiar with why they were like that, in that during the Burning Crusade development the proposed Blood Elf model was scrapped and begun from scratch. They were simply a testament to that work. They existed, but they prove a point in that their clear difference from other Blood Elves was incongruous from the rest of the game world. Their erasure and replacement with the proper model simply ensures EVERY thalassian elf uses the race appropriate look.
Yet they have no reason to do so for Alliance High Elves, for whom they have time and again told us are the same race as the Blood Elves. There must be a justifiable reason for a new model, and an attempt to pretend that an Alliance High Elf is different from a Blood Elf is not it.
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Perhaps they did. The people of Lordaeron have been on a diet in recent years and are much skinnier than they used to be, so it might not be apparent anymore.
Again, the Kul Tirans are not half breeds, nor is that what I claimed. The Drust theory states that there was some interbreeding centuries ago, but that the Drust died out and 'Vrykul' traits disseminated throughout the Kul Tiran population. Kul Tirans are fully human in the same way someone who carries a few Denisovan or Neanderthal genes in reality is fully Human.
Last edited by Obelisk Kai; 2019-05-03 at 10:35 AM.
and dark iron dwarves are dwarves, highmountain tauren are tauren
just not the same kind o dwarf and tauren, like any other allied race, kul'tiran are "human" in the exact same sense dark iron are dwarves, but not just the regular human.
he don't need to, this is lore coming after his statement.He doesn't say anything about Drust ancestry, doesn't say anything about magically being changed.
they are human in the same sense dark iron are dwarves, highmountain are tauren, lighforged are draeneiKul'Tirans aren't another race, they're human.
but still are different
silly is to think a tattoo is the same thing as a horn, its not nearly enough difference to even be viableThe highmountain Tauren example is silly, they have moose horns. Plenty have suggested here having permanent fixtures to High Elves such as tattoos/feathers/highlights etc. This would be on top of the different eyes High Elves have.
one is a biological difference that you cannot become, you must born with it, a tatoo anyone can put on himself.
kul'tirans do not have just tattoos, they have a whole different model, supported by lore, not just minor things
the good old, if A its true then B should be true is a bad fallacy, horns are biological difference, rom taurens of ten thousand years of distance with the bless of cenarius, making then change, you think putting an earring in a elf they will somehow be different enough or be a different race? nopIf moose horns is enough but Highmountain Tauren are allowed to have same skin tones, then extra accessories but the same model for High Elves is do-able too. Already precedent said by Blizzard.
now you are just grasping at strawsHorde also already have two heavily modified Night Elf models in the Zandalari and Nightborne. Alliance only has Void Elves, which isn't a modified model. So all things being equal, it's also okay that Alliance gets another model based off the Blood Elf one again.
Nah the only ones grasping at straws right now are you guys. The only point of Alex Afrasiabi reiterating that KulTirans “btw they’re humans” is obviously due to people having been discussing the Drust theory. And yes it is a theory hell even Obelisk has to admit it is a theory, that means not backed up by any official material, not backed up by “Word of God” which you guys used to take as gospel.
Now you guys are trying to do all you can to fight against what “Word of God” have said on the KulTiran topic, because it shows that regardless of something being the same race, the model can be changed.
Also yes Strippling, you are in fact still the same race: a human. You’re getting confused with the word “ethnicity” which is what describes people being Asian or Mexican or whatever. But everyone of those guys, including you Strippling, is still part of the human race... that this had to be described plainly is just uh, yikes.
Also Obelisk’s Green Orc comparison but with new hairstyles and stuff is a straw man argument. First, no one is saying only add different hairstyle options for High Elves, and Second there’s no existence of some unplayable Green Orcs that have been fighting with the Horde for years that players get to interact with but can’t play.
Of course no one would make that argument with a straight face, because its premise is already stupidly flawed.
Last edited by Traycor; 2019-05-03 at 01:47 PM.
No, Void Elves have new options in the facial hair and hair departments because that seems to have been a deliberate design choice on the part of Blizzard to add a little more diversification between an Allied race and the parent race.
Void Elves are an Allied race because they got blasted by a ton of void energy and transformed, they are now different from Blood/Alliance High Elves, another flavour of High Elf so to speak. They cleared the threshold required to become an Allied race in the first place.
Alliance High Elves do not meet that criteria, they are biologically, culturally and thematically identical to an already playable Horde race. They miss the profound difference with Blood Elves, which Void Elves possess, to become an Allied race in the first place.
Ok hang on a second there seems to be a lot of misinformation on why kt humans are fat.
It was specially stated that living in Kul Tirans has caused many kt humans to develop those body types. So essentially kul tiran culture and their environment promotes big and burley humans.
So no it would not be normal or common for a stormwind human to appear fat.
In order for helves to have a different body type than belves there would need to be some kind of similar lore reason to justify it which there isn't. Not even culture wise as helf culture still revolves around magic and rangers.
I'd say if people want high elves so badly, it needs to get some development, make them all group up somewhere and try to build their own city or smt, then something bad happens, they have to adjust to something else or whatever whatever, call them i dunno new elves or dont use word elf, call them nomads or something.
Exactly, so you admit that all customization that an Allied Race gets doesn't get to go to its parent when it comes to stuff like hairstyles/beards/accessories etc.
The only difference Void Elves have from Blood Elves is that they were blasted with Void Energy. You keep harping on High Elves being "biologically, culturally, and thematically identical" to Blood Elves but don't realize with how fresh off the boat Void Elves are, they literally still have the same culture as Blood Elves, behave still like Blood Elves do (carry that "i'm superior" personality trait), and thematically are just Void based instead of Light based.
We got seafaring Humans (Kul'tirans), priestly Trolls (Zandalari), even Holier Draenei (LFD), mountain-y Tauren (Highmountain), lava/deep Dwarves (Dark Iron), uncorrupted Orcs (Mag'har).
With what looks like incoming fox people and mech-er gnomes.
You say Alliance High Elves do not meet Allied Race criteria, but what is Allied Race criteria?
"Allied races are, from a design point of view, alternate versions of the main races. They mostly use the skeleton of an existing race, but altered and with a different model. They also have their own racial abilities. Allied races get a full character kit including their own emotes, flirts, funnies, exertions, and so on.[1]"
So from a design PoV they just have to be an alternate version of a main race. Sounds like High Elves to me. What's funny is that Void Elves don't meet this criteria, as they are not an altered model.
Unless for everyone here, a skin color change is enough. By that assertion then though, a Night Elf becomes two separate races if you make a pink one and a blue one and a purple one.
https://wow.gamepedia.com/Allied_race
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Everyone:
-Quotes literal responses from Blizzard stating why KT humans are fat-
-Quotes literal response from Blizzard stating KT are humans-
You: Guys hold on there's lots of misinformation.
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I never said that kt humans aren't just humans.
I see lots of quotes but none that actually explain the fatness as to something other than giving a reason to differentiate sw humans and kt humans.
Easy to cherry pick the quotes that support your wants and omit those that don't
I wonder what was in the water in Hillsbrad Foothills that made some of these humans so bulky and turned them into a different race of humans
They seem to be everywhere like Gerald Green in Farshire, Northrend although Jeremiah Hawning standing next to him is clearly a normal human that just needs to eat more. I'm not sure what race Wendy Darren is though
There is a nice picture of the 3 of them right here
Gerald Green also seems to have a brother or cousin Corpseburner Tim in Eastern Plaguelands and had another family member who was the Mayor of New Avalon
Of course there were also skinny human models like the Defias Watchman in Dead Mines but like Jeremiah Hawning they just had to eat more..or perhaps lack of food is why they don't exist anymore ?
Of course we've also had special dwarf races in the game for a long time like Yarley which makes you wonder why they added Dark Iron as playable race since they are just ordinary dwarves
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mDrvGu-f4yY
around 9:50
"We were thinking Kul Tirans, they're humans. How do we make them distinct. How do give them their own sort of identity. What differentiates them from the other human factions across Azeroth. Lordaeron has it's own look and Stormwind has its own look. "
around 13:22
"Let's make a new human body type."
around 21:25
"They are strong in their own right. They are strong because they existed in place which is not very habitable. It's very harsh, very unforgiving."
There was more interesting background information regarding the Kul Tiran human model design in this video but if you want a written transcript you'll have to do it yourselfThey didn't mention Drust ancestry though
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"I guess only blood elves feel like the odd man out for the Horde. I hope that we've engineered that into it as deftly as we could, but you know, it's the equivalent of a bunch of white chicks hanging out with goblin or tauren. It's weird." -- Chris Metzen