Shadowlands allied race speculation

[Yarathir]

Say that to the neutral Suramar, High Moutain, Army of Light, and Argussian Reach factions...

Most of which had ties to one faction or another through being related to existing Alliance and Horde races.

[IAmJakub]

I know nothing about lore and this and that but would it make sense for a being of what is effectively a death realm make it back into the life realm. Our hero is special or some such allowing it to cross over into Shadowlands but does that also not mean the races/beings inside realm not leave the realm?

[Muajin76]

I know nothing about lore and this and that but would it make sense for a being of what is effectively a death realm make it back into the life realm. Our hero is special or some such allowing it to cross over into Shadowlands but does that also not mean the races/beings inside realm not leave the realm?

My guess is that said race is most likely bound or trapped in the shadowlands with no viable means of escaping.

[PrinceOfThaWest]

As a huge fan of the allied race system, I fear we've seen the last of them with Vulpera and mechanical Gnomes. I can only hope I am wrong about this.

[DefinitelyNotTriHard]

IF they make the Covenant races into Allied races, they would all have to be neutral.

Yes, this is exactly what I'm thinking, they would definitely be neutral.
That way they only have to do one at a time.
From the looks of it, there's no particular race associated with the Scourge covenant though so that's three races for three .5 patches

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As a huge fan of the allied race system, I fear we've seen the last of them with Vulpera and mechanical Gnomes. I can only hope I am wrong about this.

They didn't want allied races to be a BFA system last I heard in one of the streams that Ion did a long time back, they wanted that to be something they could iterate upon over time. Seems like it's here to stay tbh

[Xath]

*Look at the Draeneï, Worgens and Mechagnomes*

Okay.

But, seriously.

Alliance

Draeneï - Needed a lore-breaking change to even exist
Worgen - needed a lore-breaking change to even exist and aren't even a real race, just cursed humans
Void Elves - needed a lore-breaking change to even exist and are probably not a real race, just cursed elves; nobody wanted them and they had zero prior development at all
Lightforged - What's the difference with normal Draeneï ? Light harder ?
Kul Tirans - Somehow, they are bigger than normal humans, but at elast they feel really distinct, far more than Worgens do
Dark Irons - the one Allied Race for the Alliance which made sense and was actually requested as far back as Cataclysm adding in lore to the Alliance
Mechagnomes - needed a lore-breaking change to even exist, bring nothing that the core race gave to the Alliance and are fucking ugly

Horde

Blood Elves - already established and had compelling reasons to join the Horde
Goblins - already established and had compelling reasons to join the Horde
Highmountains - don't bring much, if anything, compared to normal Taurens but at least they were well established beforehand
Nightborne - mostly like the Highmountains but for blood Elves, and even then, Blizzard managed to gave them a distinct taste of arrogant and powerful magical society ingame
Mag'har - those needed to have the lore broken to exist sure, but they did bring so many clans requested by the Horde players that even I will give them a pass
Zandalari - they are to Darkspears what the kaldorei of old would be to the wretched things Blizzard has reduced the current ones; I don't care what faction you main, if you don't like Zandalari, I think you have poor taste
Vulpera - well-flesh, unique, distincts from the goblins but indeed working as an allied race

And none of this can be blamed on developers but those working on the Alliance side of things. They are the ones who green-lighted the retcons of Draeneï and Worgens after having green-lighted them to become the new Alliance races. As for the Allied races, the Horde developers actually understood how awesome it is as an addition to WoW and managed to cram two potential ones in one zone when the Alliance ones couldn't even be bothered to see one in the BFA original patch, and we add to wait to see them introduce those abominations called mechagnomes!

You are delusional if you think blood elves joining the horde made sense lol.

[PrinceOfThaWest]

They didn't want allied races to be a BFA system last I heard in one of the streams that Ion did a long time back, they wanted that to be something they could iterate upon over time. Seems like it's here to stay tbh

I really hope this is true. Allied races are a neat feature and in all honesty bring variation to the game, something which is always welcome and I personally can never get enough of.

[Slowpoke is a Gamer]

I have to imagine they'll give us the four Covenant Races, as neutral Allied Races, in like 9.2 or 9.3.

[Nomads]

Most of which had ties to one faction or another through being related to existing Alliance and Horde races.

Even if that mattered, the one jarring exception is the Nightbourne who had connections to the night Elves above all else. So it literally doesn't matter.

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I know nothing about lore and this and that but would it make sense for a being of what is effectively a death realm make it back into the life realm. Our hero is special or some such allowing it to cross over into Shadowlands but does that also not mean the races/beings inside realm not leave the realm?

There seems no reason to believe races from one realm cannot exist in another. We've seen multiple instances of races going from one realm to another... whether it's the Emerald Dream, the various elemental realms, or Shadowlands. It would make no sense for our characters to go to the Shadowlands but the denizens therein to not be able to come to our realm.

The only thing that would argue against them leaving is that they all seem to have a purpose and function to fulfill in the Shadowlands. And abandoning that seems... odd.

[Management]

Just give me Vrykul that I've been asking for since wotlk. They are already established in the lore and would fit in perfectly. I don't want any more asspull allied races. Just give me the good stuff.

[Manariel]

You are delusional if you think blood elves joining the horde made sense lol.

I can't stand their zones, but I did try them, back in TBC, and as much as I hated the whole trip, Blizzard went out of its way to explain why the Blood Elves joined the Horde and not the Alliance. GArithos sparked their distrust, then the dwarven ambassador and the Kaldorei confirmed it anew while Sylvanas (a former hero of their people) and her Forsaken where ther to help them deal with the Ghostlands when no one else did. As a matter of survival, joining the Horde in such a situation made sense.

Just give me Vrykul that I've been asking for since wotlk. They are already established in the lore and would fit in perfectly. I don't want any more asspull allied races. Just give me the good stuff.

Only if you play Horde. If you're Alliance, asspull and crappy AR which brings nothing to the table but reinforce the stale and emprisoning "theme" of the Faction is all we'll get.

[tyrlaan]

As a huge fan of the allied race system, I fear we've seen the last of them with Vulpera and mechanical Gnomes. I can only hope I am wrong about this.

Fret not, you are wrong

In the Q&A section at Blizzcon they answered a question about allied races with more than 2 or less than 2 legs and their answer demonstrates quite clearly that we have not seen the last of allied races.

[Faerillis]

The fact that the only interesting two are already billed to go Horde would bother me, if it wasn't the case already since TBC

The only interesting ones?

Dude the Alliance would be getting Fae Satyrs! The Horde would get overused gothic aesthetic #8. I don't dislike them per se but man they could have come up with a lot cooler than Gothic Vampires.

Also only thing I know for sure about the Venthyr? Blizzard WILL use English accents. Again. For what feels like the 80th time... for some reason Yanks really are fascinated by English accents and I don't understand it

[Nnyco]

Since we are at peace maybe make em all neutral?

[Amnaught]

Hard to imagine any of these races choosing Alliance or Horde other than Kryrians obviously being closer to Alliance aesthetic and Necrolords being closer to Horde...

Huh? The vampires are obviously more fitting for the Horde, and the Night Fae are more fitting for the Alliance. That’s all of them.

Just as easy to put a white banner between Red and Blue on the Allied Race screen for them though.

[Holdodlig]

I hardly see the covenant races become faction specific races because you can see in the beta a kyrian who claims to be a tauren (or at least he was when he was a living creature).

But I easily see them become neutral allied race. The venthyr already have more customization than kultirassian male and are based on the Nightborne skeleton.
Necrolords don't seems to have gender, and from what I saw they have the zandalari skeletons (no joke because they're actual skeletons) so this might simply be the first genderless / genderlock race (and if this brings playable skeleton I'm in)
The satyr race are based on female draenei.
Kyrian seems to be based on vrykul skeleton, which has shown the potential to be a playable race. And most of the female vrykul animations are based on the female orcs one.

[Maxilian]

Owlboys. Please.

To be fair, i at least want them as a Boomkin skin for Druids that side with the Kerilian, and i don't play druid

[telygroar]

Forgot about the bat-people ; The armors would be too much of an hassle to adapt.

Also, don't forget they can't adpat to sunlight. It hurt them.

Ha, and one thing !

THEY ARE ENTITY OF THE OTHER SIDE, THEY CANNOT GO ANYWHERE BUT THE SHADOWLAND SINCE THEY'RE DEAD ENTITIES §§

[Nerovar]

Venthyr with "Gargoyle" form as travel form would be neat but also kinda edgy. Dunno about this yet.

[Moggie]

Just make them neutral during the intro zone like Pandas, then once you leave you need to choose Horde or Alliance. Gets rid of of the whole "X race should be Y faction." Would look weird at first but would make more sense in the Shadowlands.