Official High Elf Discussion Megathread

[Aldo Hawk]

It is simple.

Blood Elves are High Elves, High Elves are playable.

And why wouldn't I like it? The fact you are requesting it means it hasn't happened. The fact they laid they don't want to do it and introduced a variant means they are exceedingly unlikely to grant that request. I am quite content with you petitioning forever and never getting anywhere, not sorry at all.

How can High elves be playable and people still request for them? There's something you forgot about don't you think?

And come on, don't try to cover your anger with a mask. Everyone saw the saltiness of your today's responses.

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Yeah, but they're fairly insignificant in the whole scheme of things. I just wouldn't hold my breath to play a High Elf anytime in the next 7-10 years. By that point, either WoW will be pretty much dead, or we'll have a proper sequel.

Insignificant? Can you please explain to me why did they had more relevance than other actual playable races?

I don't exactly know what are you playing now but I don't need an arbiter who is forced into a supposed middle ground thanks.

[delus]

It is simple.

Blood Elves are High Elves, High Elves are playable.

And why wouldn't I like it? The fact you are requesting it means it hasn't happened. The fact they laid they don't want to do it and introduced a variant means they are exceedingly unlikely to grant that request. I am quite content with you petitioning forever and never getting anywhere, not sorry at all.

But the Alliance High elves are not playable and they're already part of the faction. None of what you are saying counters this. At best you are trying to obfuscate this fact.

[FlubberPuddy]

Here's to the next fifteen years!

This can be said for Ogres, Forest Trolls, and Wildhammer Dwarves as well. Let's throw in Undead Elves too. Basically any race that doesn't get added in BFA will be waiting longer for their inclusion.

Inb4, "but they didn't comment on those races". End result still the same. None of the above mentioned races are also playable and thus are still waiting to be playable.

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I just wouldn't hold my breath to play a High Elf anytime in the next 7-10 years.

No one has to, I personally didn't have to stay subbed to, nor pay attention to, WoW before it added things like Tmog, LFR (yes I wanted a way to queue to see raid stories), and Demonhunters.

Blizzard will add what they want to add when they want to add it based on community feedback. All those things I mentioned were based on community feedback despite the pushback each of those additions had to endure from the players and developers.

And we already know there are some developers in support of having High Elves included. Thus, just because the company atm doesn't want them, doesn't mean every dev doesn't. That's pretty huge in my book, means there's a possibility of it happening later.

[Alixie]

One day we'll get a lead WoW developer who values Warcraft's roots and lore enough to provide the Alliance with one of its core races. If Ion comes around then more power to him. High Elves will happen one day.

The devs have a Horde bias. They cant help themselves from taking potshots at Alliance players. These are just from BFA.

"Can Horde characters ever really be jealous of an Alliance character?" (said after Junker Gnomes were showcased in the Wowhead interview)
"You're welcome, Alliance." (about PVP imbalance)
"If you want X, the Horde is waiting for you."
"The Night Elves already got their revenge." (Nightborne have hijacked Nelf lore, and their genocide was just for shock value)

Ion in particular loves to voice his distain for the Alliance. The lead designer, who makes all of the important decisions, joking about how much the Alliance sucks, when he's the reason they suck. And they continue to crack tone deaf jokes after players called them out on their bad game decisions like:

Stormsong is unfinished, and the story ends abruptly with filler quests to kill Quilboar.
That the Alliance only got horses as rep mounts because they couldn't think of anything creative to make a mount out of on Kul Tiras.
The absurd population imbalance where 90% of the top raiding and pvp guilds are Horde.
Tyrande and Malfurion losing to Nathanos, and will not be facing their old nemesis, Queen Azshara.
Saurfang gets 3 movie cinematics, while the plot device Night Elves get none.

So Im not sure why some people are this scared and obsessed about losing exclusivity on their Aryan Elves. It wont happen as long as Ion is in charge and will drunkenly crap on their own lore to keep them happy.

[Ielenia]

the developers think it's about the skin tones,

Then I'll go ahead and say it: the developers are wrong.

That individual is not a different race from Blood Elves, therefore blue hair for Blood Elves please. Leaving that aside, hair colour is not enough. Eye colour is not enough.

Except no, it would not go to the blood elves. Especially like if an explanation is given, like blue hair only happen if a high elf is not affected by the fel at all, which would prevent all blood elves from having blue hair.

Both can be replicated. Differentiation is accomplished by a some sort of profound difference that cannot be replicated.

"Void elf"-ification can be replicated. Your argument is invalid.

"The analogy fails because it's predicated on a flawed basis, that the developers are wrong and you are right.

The analogy doesn't fail, because on both situations we have the "owners" saying something that does not match what our eyes see.

If the developers made Sylvanas become a blood-thirsty ruler, intentionally killing so many Horde members that would make even Garrosh blush, start attacking and torturing children in heinous experiments, killed Thrall to demoralize the rebels, and then killed Aggra and her children just because "why not", and made a throne for herself in Orgrimmar using the bones of the other leaders of the Horde she killed... but the developers said Sylvanas was a moral, noble leader... would you believe them? Because your words so far heavily imply they do.

You are not right. You are a customer coming into an immaculate restaurant and insisting it's dirty despite all evidence to the contrary.

No, I'm a customer coming into an unclean restaurant, and complaining it's unclean.

This is of course the other half of the issue, the company the Blood Elves keep. Had the Blood Elves stayed with the Alliance, and the Silver Covenant High Elves still stayed separate and glowered at them for being mana junkies, do you honestly expect me to believe you'd be agitating for those pure, uncorrupted Silver Covenant High Elves?

I don't care what you believe, simple as that. My answer, and what I believe, are not predicated on yours. But, in short, yes, I would.

You want to have a Horde race on the faction you prefer.

No, I don't, and I would appreciate if you stopped repeating that falsehood.

Character creator makes sure to mention that Blood Elves used to call themselves High Elves.
Starts your Blood Elf off in Quel'thalas.
Your Blood Elf visits the high elf capital of Silvermoon city.
Your Blood Elf can undertake a heritage armor questline showing you 'the last act of the high elves', right before they redefined themselves as Blood Elves.

You're just proving my point, here. They're no longer high elves. They're blood elves now.

Blood Elves constitute such an overwhelming majority of the race that they ARE defining what a high elf is.

No, they don't. They define only what a blood elf is. High elves still exist, and so they define what a high elf is, not those who rejected the name. You would have a point if no high elves were left alive in the world and they were just a memory.

How is it wrong?

Is it wrong because the silhouettes have been given to the opposite faction, which is the crux of the issue. Skin color is meaningless in that regard. Before nightborne and void elves, if I saw a thalassian elf silhouette around, I'd immediately recognize it as a blood elf, just by batting an eye. I'd instantly recognize a tauren, an orc, a night elf, a human, a troll, etc... and would instantly know which faction they belong to. Now, with nightborne and void elves... the moment I see one of them, I will not know if it's a nightborne or a night elf, or a blood elf or void elf. At the very least, not until I mouse over or target them, and see the color of their outline or name. Almost no one will.

Your point is that because Nightborne and Void Elves use the same basic models as Night Elves and Blood/High Elves respectively, that this means the faction boundaries have been broken. And as a result, they shouldn't resist giving the Alliance High Elves on the grounds of faction diversity.

You are probably the only person pushing this argument with any kind of consistency. It's not hard to understand why your fellow pro High Elfers are reluctant to follow this line of attack. Because IF you are in fact right, and Void Elves violate the faction boundary by being too similar to Blood Elves, then you have already won. The Alliance has it's High Elves and this entire thread is redundant.

You speak of rolling your eyes, yet mine are threatening to roll off their sockets at the dishonesty you're presenting, here. Because you're heavily implying I'm after high elves because of their silhouette. I'm not. And I've told you that numerous times, already. I simply use this argument to counter this silly notion that the "faction lines" are still preserved.

Void Elves to you aren't good enough because they aren't the high elves you wanted. Their lore is too different.

Blood Elves aren't good enough because they are a part of the Horde. Their lore is wrong.

Only Alliance High Elves matter, the right shade of Elf on the right faction.

Yet you, who argues lore is important, are willing to say that lore plays no part in faction diversity. That it's all about the model in fact. That YOU are the only who cares about the story and the background.

Yeah. Funny how this post of mine proves you wrong. My contention is with this claim that says "high elves look too much like a blood elf to be viable", and that's why I make this point about silhouettes.

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Blood Elves are High Elves,

But not all high elves are blood elves.

High Elves are playable.

False. No option in the Alliance banner in the character creation screen.

[FlubberPuddy]

You know I agree with you! Never say never, but let's try to not get too wrapped up in it.

Being completely frank, Blizzard hasn't sold many of us on these Ren'dorei yet, have they? If we felt reason to embrace them as more than just traitors of the Horde, maybe customization options would open up. And maybe, just MAYBE, the void could be their path back to the Quel'dorei they all once were?

We don't know everything about the void yet, but maybe it will prove to be a cleansing ability for those who utilize it correctly. Null and void is the expression, so maybe void will nullify the fel magic and mana addiction, and later on, we end up with a group of elves on Alliance that are titled "Void Elves", but the irony is that they're the most pure in form.

I'm super tired as I'm typing this, so I hope it makes at least a bit of sense!

Oh yeah I'm not trying to be wrapped up in it, which is why lately I haven't been engaging in long bouts of this discussion.

We can wait and see what happens with Void Elves, I don't know if it will be engaging though, and I feel like a lot of people will be taking Void lore to = Void Elf lore.

I want the Void Elves to get more fleshed out, but Blizzard's barely done anything with them other than just continuing to say they're Blood Elves (based off Magister Umbric's words to the Void Elf player) that didn't enjoy the Horde.

[The Silver Covenant]

Ion in particular loves to voice his distain for the Alliance. The lead designer, who makes all of the important decisions, joking about how much the Alliance sucks, when he's the reason they suck.

Oh, I'm aware. A good friend of mine was in Elitist Jerks with Ion and still talks to him. The guy's got a weird teenage mind and his entire life drive is to shit on the Alliance now that he's WoW's lead dev.

[Vasaru]

Oh, I'm aware. A good friend of mine was in Elitist Jerks with Ion and still talks to him. The guy's got a weird teenage mind and his entire life drive is to shit on the Alliance now that he's WoW's lead dev.

Not that surprising, sadly.

[FlubberPuddy]

The interesting thing is that they changed their ways to rejoin their original faction. Like we've both said, however, it would be nice to have a playable group of completely unchanged, untainted Quel'dorei.

In the meantime, I'd level up a Void Elf if I could at least get a light-silver or white/platinum hair color, long, parted in center, like all elves have. The mustache and goatee is cool, so I'd use that. And perhaps a super dark purple skin and then a lighter, almost apricot/plum tinted one to balance things out.

I would actually enjoy a dark purple skin on Void Elves. They have the most ugly sickly looking shades of blue/purple for skin tones.

Reminds me of this old race from Perfect World MMO: the Tideborn.







Void Elves remind me of this lame race from one of those low-grade asian style f2p p2w MMOs

Part of why I can't stand em, and what's sad is they're implemented in a low grade way to WoW as well. I believe DeicideUH even has a thread where people who like Void Elves admit how trash their implementation has been.

[tikcol]

This thread is hilarious but I'll give you something. Void elfs is the most ridiculous race to ever grace Azeroth, even more ridiculous than high elves considering we already have those. Now we have those x2, the idea of releasing high elves now is so utterly stupid that I can't see them ever happening. Even more so than in the past.

[matrix123mko]

I would actually enjoy a dark purple skin on Void Elves. They have the most ugly sickly looking shades of blue/purple for skin tones.

Reminds me of this old race from Perfect World MMO: the Tideborn.







Void Elves remind me of this lame race from one of those low-grade asian style f2p p2w MMOs

Part of why I can't stand em, and what's sad is they're implemented in a low grade way to WoW as well. I believe DeicideUH even has a thread where people who like Void Elves admit how trash their implementation has been.

I like void elves a lot more than high elves but I agree that they need more customisation options. Also, these tideborn are cool.

[matrix123mko]

Void elves are ok, great casters, at this point fuck lore kill off the High elves by absorbing them into VElf society and give void elves slightly more fleshy looking skin tones that'd be fine.

I like this idea.

[Strippling]

That's not an official petition. It's worth nothing and no one cares about it except you.

Blizzard cared enough about the WoW classic petition, because it actually had a significant number of signatures. You're just hand waiving away the official high elf petition because it had a rather lack luster supporting. I'm willing to bet if this petition had some 10000+ signatures you'd gladly use it as evidence of how popular high elves are. But alas, it couldn't even get a measly 700 signatures, so you resort to 'no one cares about it'. Which ironically is fitting.

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Just re-finished it. I still believe that High Elves should be a playable Alliance race, and believe that the lore justifies it.

Is my understanding of lore just that superior to yours? Or are you just super biased toward the Horde?

I suggest you create a blood elf, that will help your not so ''superior' understanding of the lore.

[matrix123mko]

I'm okay with it too, just write a good story to explain what goes down.

During the first hundred of pages Obelisk kai wrote something good about that.

[Gurluas]

I can't believe this thread is still going in circles with the same false arguments.
Yes. Most original High elves (Pre-Wc3 High elves) are Blood elves since most of the original High elves either died and only 10% of the survivors became High elves with the other 90% becoming Blood elves..
Blood elves are closer to the Pre-Wc3 High elves than the current High elves. Being friendly to the Alliance, respecting other races and living with them was scorned upon in High elf society, and it is likewise still scorned upon in Blood elf society.

No, the group calling themselves High elves today are NOT Blood elves, they have minor physical differences and massive ideological and cultural differences that are only widening as time passes. Void elves are Blood elves and in no way follow the High elves ways, in fact, Void elves are Blood elves using even darker magic and being even more corrupt, instead of Fel eyes their entire body is completely void tainted.

No, the majority of High elf fans do not just want pretty blonde majestic elves in the Alliance, we want the High elf group in the Alliance, even if the High elf group needs to be altered.

The High elf group becoming Void elves would utterly destroy their identity, which is about remaining pure, fighting their addiction and avoiding corruptive magics. It would just piss off even more people and satisfy no one.
However, there's other avenues to follow, like elemental magic, nature magic, or even arcane magic.


Here's some Concepts I put forth before in this thread:

1. Elemental Magic: The High elves align closely with the Wildhammers, becoming more primal, dropping Arcane magic for good, taking up shamanism and living more in tune with nature, even more than the Rangers. The Highvale High elves have already dropped magic and have very close ties to the Wildhammers, they're the ideal choice for this.

2. Nature Magic: The majority of the High elves are changed by some event, perhaps a wild god not aligned with Hyjal or some other force, and they're altered deeply. Unlike Night elves whose nature theme focuses on them being closely tied to Elune and living in balance with nature, the nature High elves would BE nature. Their skin is green and plant-like, their hair is replaced with leaves, their eyes are a deep natural green and they may have vines or branches growing out of them. Think something similar to the infested Orcs in Gorgrond.

3. Arcane Magic: This one has a parallel to the Void elf transformation, but it has some very big differences: mainly that this was not the High elves's choice, and that there's no connection to dark magic or void whispers or anything like that. Basically imagine this: The Horde throws a mana bomb on a High elf settlement, possibly Quel'danil if the Silver Covenant is visiting at the time, a newly established one, or perhaps ironically even a reclaimed Theramore the High elves are trying to resettle. The High elven mages of the settlement create a barrier to protect their people as they had no time to escape and teleportation or portals could be disrupted by the mana bomb, the bomb hits and a massive wave of Arcane washes over them, thanks to the barrier they survive, but they find their bodies have changed, no longer of flesh and bones, the High elves now have crystalline bodies, their affinity with the Arcane is strengthened, but so is their addiction. They remain loyal to the Alliance and vows revenge on the Horde. In this case we're looking at a situation similar to Crystalsong Forest, where the residents of the area were turned crystalline and infused with the Arcane. The High elves would have crystalline hair, crystals growing out of their body, a shiny crystalline skin and so on.

As you can see all these concepts sufficiently change the High elves from their base form, differentiating them significantly from Blood elves and Void elves, but it also keeps the core of what makes a High elf a High elf. They're not mentally altered by these experiences, they're the same High elves who have been in the Alliance since Warcraft 2. I believe the best solution to the High elf issue is to significantly alter High elves in this way.

[Ielenia]

Blizzard cared enough about the WoW classic petition, because it actually had a significant number of signatures.

Did they, really? Or did they only "care" about it because an infamous person that used to work for Blizzard decided to hijack the movement to get his 15 minutes of fame and "deliver the petition personally to Blizzard"?

[Obelisk Kai]

That's not exactly the best attitude either! You're better than that. What we need is for Blizzard to expound upon the Ren'dorei. They were introduced, but not much has happened since then. A few added customization options and a valuable story may help quell the desires of some of the folks who so badly think we absolutely NEED to have the Quel'dorei.

The sentiment was crudely expressed and I apologise. The sentiment however is true. Pro High Elfers are essentially going to be petitioning until the game shuts down. In reality I find the effort put into the request sisyphean, but that is their choice to make.

The truth after all is simple. Blizzard gave Blood Elves to the Horde for a variety of reasons, but they still gave Blood Elves to the Horde. They aren't going to add a race they have already added into the game a second time. There are so many reasons not to do it. Leaving aside the impact on faction diversity and racial identity, there are other reasons we normally don't bother with but they can use exploration below.

If Pandaren taught us anything, it wasn't that neutral races are a workable precedent (quite the opposite in fact) it's that forums sometimes aren't the best guide to player desire. Those in favour of something are more motivated to make the case in favour than those who would be opposed. When it came to Pandaren, they were for many years prior to MOP THE most demanded race to be added to the game.
The backlash to Pandaren only began after they were announced, as a previously large and silent group voiced their misgivings about the new race. With the Alliance High Elf suggestion, many pro High Elfers see only virtue in the fact that the debate keeps going, even going so far as to mock those voicing opposition that all they are doing is bumping the thread and keeping the discussion live. Pro High Elfers fail to understand that the continuous bumping of these threads is irrelevant, Blizzard has people actually reading these threads and what they see is a debate characterized by an endless, circular argument and. I will not say the debate has no resolution, a resolution was in fact provided with the addition of Void Elves and the declaration that Blood Elves are High Elves and the Horde is waiting for you. The debate keeps going because the resolution is rejected by the pro High Elf community. Yet that rejection does not mean Blizzard is compelled to go back to the drawing boards to try again. After all, from their perspective, they've resolved the issue, which that recent GM/CM response supported.
The division on the forums on this topic must be seen a taster of the backlash awaiting them from the general wow population by introducing playable Alliance High Elves. There are plenty of Blood Elf players and Horde players who are perfectly happy with the status quo and who don't bother with this discussion because either they feel it is beneath them or (more likely) they just don't visit the forums, most Warcraft players don't visit the forums after all. These are people currently and happily paying to play the game. Why on Earth would Blizzard want to anger them to please a small, hardcore group for whom the only compromise is to get everything they want? This is a group who would be quite content to dismiss the anger from the other side as long as they got what they wanted and yet who are now engaged in a petulant exercise on the forums venting their own frustrations and demanding Blizzard pays attention to what they want because of their anger. In victory their hypocrisy would be galling to witness.

And that isn't the only aspect. Granting the Alliance access to a duplicate of a Horde race demands something to restore balance. I have seen pro High Elfers argue that the Horde doesn't deserve anything in such a transaction, or that they don't care what they get so long as they get Alliance High Elves. On this point, I believe them for once. But the Horde would most definitely get something and Blizzard would be faced with two options.

The first is to give the Horde a duplicate of a core Alliance race. No differences, no alterations, an exact race for an exact race. Plenty of pro High Elfers seem fine with this although I must admit the level of contempt they have for their own faction is jarring if they are so willing to barter away it's identity just to get Alliance High Elves.
The logical choice to give the Horde would be Humans. Blood Elves are the most popular Horde race, so something small like Gnomes or Worgen wouldn't be an equal trade. Night Elves and Draenei are out for reasons of lore, as are Dwarves. Only Humans are equivalent in terms of desirability, only Humans with their many nations could have the lore contrived to support it. That it would ruin the core of the franchise, Orcs vs Humans, is irrelevant because one you start trading races the entire faction edifice collapses.
Suffice to say, giving the Horde an Alliance race of that magnitude might upset the Alliance players who actually LIKE their faction, are proud of their faction and don't feel that anything and everything that can be sacrificed should be sacrificed if it means getting Alliance High Elves. Coupled with the backlash from the Horde, the player base should be lively for a time.

The second option is to give the Horde a brand new race like Ogres while the Alliance gets a duplicate. I will leave it to your imagination as to how well that one will go down. You'd still have pissed off Horde players but I feel the Alliance reaction would not be one of unmitigated joy.

The above are practical issues outside the game Blizzard would have to contend with, beyond questions of racial identity or faction integrity. These are concerns we do not deal with normally in these discussions, but they are there. They are more certainly there. When you add this to everything else I say regarding the possibility of Alliance High Elves, how can anyone conclude they are anything but extremely unlikely? All that effort to sate a tiny group of zealots at the cost of enraging the entire community and damaging the faction foundation of their own game.

Which is why Void Elves were the compromise. A variant of High Elves, but devoid of the theme and aesthetics. They were different. Unique. Apart. They did not undermine the status of Blood Elves as the High Elves of the Warcraft universe, as Blizzard had done with them what the pro High Elf community argues should be done, that high elves should be differentiated from Blood Elves. Personally, I felt the model should have remained Horde unique so I wouldn't have invented Void Elves OR Nightborne, but I found the compromise tolerable. Neither side won completely and the Alliance got something thalassian but that something respected the sensitivities of Horde and Blood Elf players.

I don't believe the Void Elves need more customization, or at least customization that makes them look like high elves. Not only do we have a race that looks like high elves, because they are high elves, but human nature being what it is most Void Elf players would gravitate towards these high elf like looks and thereby diminish the differences between the Void Elves and the Blood/High Elves. It also undermines the Void Elves themselves. They are the compromise, but they are also their own thing.

Void Elves should be allowed to be Void Elves. For further customization I would actually suggest more tentacles. As for their story, complaints about that have never made sense to me. Up until the moment they were transformed their story and lore was Blood Elf story and lore, and Blood Elf story lore IS High Elf story and lore. Now they have their own story and lore, but that cannot be divorced from what came before. Instead, they have diverged from the Blood/high elf story to follow their own road, but they shared most of that road with the Blood/high elves. And that future promises they will have an interesting plot, as we come to tangle with the void who is better placed for the spotlight than the Void Elves?

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How can High elves be playable and people still request for them? There's something you forgot about don't you think?

And come on, don't try to cover your anger with a mask. Everyone saw the saltiness of your today's responses.

Sometimes my emotions do get the better of me. A stubborn refusal to face the facts can bring out more direct responses.

As for how High Elves can be playable and people still request them? That gives a veto to those making the request to define what a high elf is. The people requesting high elves seek to play a Horde race within the Alliance. The easiest way to get around Blizzard's strictures on faction diversity is to ignore them in their arguments and pretend they don't matter.

Hence people still request them because they refuse to face the facts that they are already playable. Blizzard has defined what a High Elf is. A Blood Elf is a High Elf.

High Elves are therefore playable.

[Gurluas]

<Massive Obelisk Kai wall of text>

You're wrong. Please read my post in the last thread.
The only thing playable are Wc3 High elves, the High elf faction people are actually asking for is NOT playable.
And it's that faction and racial fantasy people have been asking for since they were properly fleshed out in TBC.

Before TBC nobody asked for High elves, they asked for Blood elves because back then they were the same. TBC introduced the distinct High elf faction in the Alliance.

[Obelisk Kai]

This can be said for Ogres, Forest Trolls, and Wildhammer Dwarves as well. Let's throw in Undead Elves too. Basically any race that doesn't get added in BFA will be waiting longer for their inclusion.

Inb4, "but they didn't comment on those races". End result still the same. None of the above mentioned races are also playable and thus are still waiting to be playable.

It's interesting you already knew what my response was going to be, almost as if you knew the flaw in your retort as you made it. Just because you call out my response before I make it doesn't invalidate it.

Yes, they didn't comment on those races. They haven't provided a rationale explaining why they aren't going to happen. They haven't publicly ruled them out. Who knows, maybe they'll happen one day. They stand a far greater chance than Alliance High Elves, particularly as none of the variants are likely to go to the opposing faction, which as we know is the reason Alliance High Elves haven't happened.

[Doffen]

High Elves are therefore playable.

That is actually mostly true, since Blood Elves and Void Elves are High Elves and both are playable.

The High Elves that hates Blood Elves and want to attack them on sight are not playable though, and that's what some people want. It's time to actually understand that, and respect that along the way. Same way many of us respect your point of view.