No DK Allied Races?

[Alz94]

Are us Death Knights ever going to get access to any of the Allied Races?

[Jeina]

Almost definitely not.

[Lochton]

Maybe... in the future.. right now... naw..

[Chonar]

Do you need to have it explained why they're not?

[Ielenia]

Are us Death Knights ever going to get access to any of the Allied Races?

Void elves and lightforged draenei literally did not exist in Azeroth until Legion, meaning they weren't around pre-Wrath for the Lich King to raise their dead.

Nightborne and Highmountain tauren existed in Azeroth since... millennia, but nightborne never left their bubble (literally) until Legion, and the Highmountain tauren never left the Broken Isles (to my knowledge).

And while it's technically correct to say that Lich King could have had his minions procure the bodies of dead highborne/highmountain tauren to raise... it'd be incredibly unfair to the Alliance to give the Horde allied races that could be DK... while the Alliance is left with races that cannot.

Mag'har orcs also cannot be death knights because, again, they literally didn't exist on Azeroth until now. But Zandalari and Dark Iron dwarves totally should have been able to be DKs, since both existed prior to Wrath, and were around the world. To some extent.

[Galathir]

Void elves and lightforged draenei literally did not exist in Azeroth until Legion, meaning they weren't around pre-Wrath for the Lich King to raise their dead.

Nightborne and Highmountain tauren existed in Azeroth since... millennia, but nightborne never left their bubble (literally) until Legion, and the Highmountain tauren never left the Broken Isles (to my knowledge).

And while it's technically correct to say that Lich King could have had his minions procure the bodies of dead highborne/highmountain tauren to raise... it'd be incredibly unfair to the Alliance to give the Horde allied races that could be DK... while the Alliance is left with races that cannot.

Mag'har orcs also cannot be death knights because, again, they literally didn't exist on Azeroth until now. But Zandalari and Dark Iron dwarves totally should have been able to be DKs, since both existed prior to Wrath, and were around the world. To some extent.

I'll be sure to tell that to my Mag'har Orc when he says hi to Garrosh Hellscream during the finale of the Stonetalon Mountains questline (something I always love to play because 1) Stonetalon has a short but interesting questline, 2) there is the additional incentive due to the rank buff and 3) I love seeing Garrosh acting all honorable knowing what he will do later).

Any lore reasons given are bullshit. The only reason is that DKs start at a higher level and Blizzard couldn't be bothered to think about a workaround for that.

[Cosmic Janitor]

Any lore reasons given are bullshit. The only reason is that DKs start at a higher level and Blizzard couldn't be bothered to think about a workaround for that.

This and nothing else.

[shade076]

Since the DKs have their own self contained story starting zone which has to predate wrath the races they choose would have work within that lore. The only possible candidates I've seen are Dark Iron, Zandalari, and Kul Tiran but they didn't bother with any of those.

[Ielenia]

I'll be sure to tell that to my Mag'har Orc when he says hi to Garrosh Hellscream during the finale of the Stonetalon Mountains questline

You do know the game zones are "time-locked" until they're updated, don't you? Surely you can't expect Blizzard to update every single zone in the game when they release a new expansion, or worse, a content patch that progresses the story?

Any lore reasons given are bullshit. The only reason is that DKs start at a higher level and Blizzard couldn't be bothered to think about a workaround for that.

Death knights are the resurrected heroes of both the Horde and Alliance. That's the reason for them to be at higher level. The death knights already have the combat experience of their past lives. The factions had no VE, LD, HB, DI, HT, ZT, KT heroes until after the war against the Lich King.

[Unholyground]

Dark Iron and Zandalari have the best chances if it happens since they both were on the main continents when that whole thing happened.

[Galathir]

Death knights are the resurrected heroes of both the Horde and Alliance. That's the reason for them to be at higher level. The death knights already have the combat experience of their past lives. The factions had no VE, LD, HB, DI, HT, ZT, KT heroes until after the war against the Lich King.

I disagree about some of these races (mostly the ones you mentioned before) but even if you were right about all of them, lore can be made to fit. Blizzard has done so before. The mere existence of VEs in the number that appears now (not just within the playerbase but also within lore, see the Battle for Lordaeron or the numbers of them appearing during assaults, especially in Zuldazar for example) is testament to that.

[Sevarin]

Void elves and lightforged draenei literally did not exist in Azeroth until Legion, meaning they weren't around pre-Wrath for the Lich King to raise their dead.

Nightborne and Highmountain tauren existed in Azeroth since... millennia, but nightborne never left their bubble (literally) until Legion, and the Highmountain tauren never left the Broken Isles (to my knowledge).

And while it's technically correct to say that Lich King could have had his minions procure the bodies of dead highborne/highmountain tauren to raise... it'd be incredibly unfair to the Alliance to give the Horde allied races that could be DK... while the Alliance is left with races that cannot.

Mag'har orcs also cannot be death knights because, again, they literally didn't exist on Azeroth until now. But Zandalari and Dark Iron dwarves totally should have been able to be DKs, since both existed prior to Wrath, and were around the world. To some extent.

while i agree with the literally impossible void elves that didnt exist at the time, death knights are considered to be heroes, which is why they came back as powerful death knights.

to say that a hero wouldnt possibly, under any circumstance, leave their homes to go across azeroth and search out people that are in need of aid or what have you... thats kind of silly. yes, even a lightforged could have defected, or been sent to azeroth on a mission against the legion. the mag'har also existed before/during TBC and some could have easily gone through the giant portal linking our worlds.

just like there is a pandaren dk follower, but pandaren cant be dks because they were on the island. that right there is enough proof that you CAN in fact have people in a faction break off and go explore into the world.


this all said, the lore reasons for race/class restriction is kind of bs. they add things for gameplay reasons, but at the same time say things cant happen because lore. oh look, now humans can be druids! trolls can be paladins! undead can be priests and use spells that arent shadow!

class/race restrictions are essentially only used for rp purposes. leave them for rp realms if thats such a massive issue, but theres really no other reason to have such restrictions in the game at this point, other than the fact they would have to make more druid forms. though honestly, they could just let druids pick and choose between all of the current existing forms. add some extra customization to druids instead of being stuck in forms you may or may not like based on what race you chose.

[Gurahk]

I recall in a past QnA that Ion hinted at allied races being able to play DKs in the future when it makes sense, so we are gonna get DKs for allied races, the question is when.

[Ielenia]

while i agree with the literally impossible void elves that didnt exist at the time, death knights are considered to be heroes, which is why they came back as powerful death knights.

to say that a hero wouldnt possibly, under any circumstance, leave their homes to go across azeroth and search out people that are in need of aid or what have you... thats kind of silly. yes, even a lightforged could have defected, or been sent to azeroth on a mission against the legion. the mag'har also existed before/during TBC and some could have easily gone through the giant portal linking our worlds.

We call them "heroes", but we only say so to differentiate them from the rest of the soldiers. Those weren't all 'heroes', but also powerful generals, cunning commanders, etc, from a military group. Not all of them go around the world help people.

As for the lightforged draenei, there was no way they could have come to help at that time. They were already engaged in war with the Burning Legion for a long time, and at no point we have any indication that they ever got the upper hand enough to be able to spare troops to send specifically to Azeroth and not to other Legion-infested worlds.

just like there is a pandaren dk follower, but pandaren cant be dks because they were on the island. that right there is enough proof that you CAN in fact have people in a faction break off and go explore into the world.

I take it as an indication that despite some pandaren being around Azeroth, pre-Wrath, there weren't enough pandaren to make it available as a playable race option for DKs.

class/race restrictions are essentially only used for rp purposes. leave them for rp realms if thats such a massive issue,

No, it's not "only used for RP purposes". The game has a story, and if you don't like it, well, tough for you. But if we're just going ot throw story and lore right out the window, might as well just completely change WoW and make it a "dungeon simulator" with no story, just randomly generated dungeons with randomly generated monster population and randomly generated loot and hazards.

No customization option as well, since that's just "rp". Everyone looks the same. No lore, no story, pure gameplay.

[Kemsa]

Blizzard needs to introduce them first. Right now there ARE Dk allied races, and yes its from the Island Expedition, we have a Maghar Orc Death Knight and a Dark Iron Dwarf Death Knight.

Now they need to be introduce first or unlocked, and i can said this for sure.... probably next expa.

[Greengrim]

Since the DKs have their own self contained story starting zone which has to predate wrath the races they choose would have work within that lore. The only possible candidates I've seen are Dark Iron, Zandalari, and Kul Tiran but they didn't bother with any of those.

I really don't want to see my class in kul tiran skin... it would seriously damage me both physically and mentally...

[The Stormbringer]

Do you need to have it explained why they're not?

Yes, I do. Why? Because we just did an expansion where we made a whole boatload of new Death Knights, several of which were us doing it ourselves. They should give the option to just make a Death Knight with any race and skip the starting zone at this point.

Or the lore can be that they were freshly raised and thus not very experienced, dropping their level down to 1 or 10 as "neophyte Death Knights" and give them gear they can purchase at Acherus every so often, similar to Monks.

I want a Pandaren DK, dangit!

[McNeil]

I think not making them DK's because of lore reasons is bullshit, considering how often they have completely shoved aside any quality that their stories had left. Like even in in BFA, how does it make sense for me as a Zandalari to be welcomed into Dazar'alor as a stranger, where I had to turn in a quest with Talanji on the throne while Zul and the rest of the Zanchuli council were present, and that after the introduction I get to fight off Jaina in the raid despite being itnroduced afterwards. Also its so fun to quest for Garrosh on my Mag'har orc.

They could at least make Dark Iron and Zandalari death knights if they want to stick to the lore, considering that both of them were present on Eastern Kingdoms. Even pandaren could be made a DK where one of them simply wandered around Lordaeron looking for adventure, who then got unfortunate enough to be struck down by the Scourge.

[Amathricus]

to say that a hero wouldnt possibly, under any circumstance, leave their homes to go across azeroth and search out people that are in need of aid or what have you... thats kind of silly. yes, even a lightforged could have defected, or been sent to azeroth on a mission against the legion. the mag'har also existed before/during TBC and some could have easily gone through the giant portal linking our worlds.

Those Mag'har and the ones the players chose are from different realities. The ones in TBC are the Outland ones that lived through the Draenor history that Garrosh didn't corrupt. The ones the players play are the ones from WoD. SPOILER: They have a different time line and don't step foot on Azeroth until the player goes there, years after the events of WoD to recruit them, and essentially save them from Yrel's zealots.

With few exceptions (Gravewalker Gie, the NPCs from the Island Expeditions), all DKs you see were raised by Arthas, it's the very nature of the entire DK quest chain. So as was said earlier, the only possible ones would be the Zandalari and the Dark Iron Dwarves, possibly the Kul'Tirans. WoD PC Mag'har didn't exist in the same reality as Arthas, Void Elves were created a few expansions after his death, Nightborne were magicked away in their bubble (there could be an argument for them, honestly).

And there are always exceptions to class rules (the two NE Paladins in the Pally Order Hall, the pandaren DK Gie from the Garrison etc, Anduin still being a priest wearing plate armor), but those rarely come into play with available classes for races or what the classes can do.

I would love to see a new faction of DKs, maybe Alliance heroes who are dedicated to their causes who want to keep fighting no matter what and have consented to Bolvar to be raised to fight once more, or (hahah, ruffled feathers time), maybe raised by Sylvanas. Alliance heroes who are mortified about be raised without consent and once again fight for the Alliance. Or Horde heroes who simply wish to continue fighting for their causes by either of them.

[Futhark]

Vrykul would be a perfect DK Allied Race. They were already in Northrend. The biggest obstacle is explaining why they would have joined either faction in the time between then and now.

That said, if the next expansion furthers the Undead theme with Sylvanas, Helya, and necromancers, more new Death Knights could be created from all existing races.