Poll: Allied Race or Customisations

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  1. #1

    Review: Was Allied Races the right approach? or would customisations have been fine?

    What are your thoughts?
    A)
    Is the whole allied race thing un-necessary and things would have been much easier with just adding them as customisations instead?

    B) Or are you quite pleased to have had the allied races and now look forward to customisations?


    My thoughts? We were always going to get customisations, but allied races (or sub-race) as a race feature offered something unique and compelling which would never have happened if cusotmisations came first. I was willing to bet that if we got allied races we would still get more original race customisations down the line, but the reverse would not be true.

    Imo, the Aallied race packgaing has been a huge success, and been compelling game feature for BFA, I would not have bought BFA if it were not for nightborne or void elves becoming playable - i had no interest in another faction war.


    The question then becomes:
    1. what should have been done as an allied race and what should have been done as a customisation?
    2. There are so many racial options and variations, and frankly some actually require more than being just a skin to an existing race

    I feel a lot of lore and personalisation would have been lost on some of the groups if they were just customisations


    Future of the Groups:

    Going forward, I think somethings should be customisations and some should be Allied races. what criteria should determine which is up for grabs really depends on the lore and what is trying to be achieved. People found Kul'tirans, Nightborne, Zandalari and Vulpera effective enough alterations of Night elves, Trolls and Goblins to qualify as allied races, but didn't find Void elves/Mag'har/Highmountain/Lightforged to be suitable ones, and could fit as customisations.

    Personally I think void elves needed to be its own race to be effective, but maybe it is redesigned that way, faction switching the blood elf model helps that. However Highmountain could definitely have been a customisation, same with Lightforged. Eredar on the other hand could be an allied race, same with Broken.

    Class Extensions:
    I think the allied race concept can be extended to classes in the form of Class Identities or Class Skins, which is essentially a class that is given a different identity/appearance. And like Allied races/customisations can come in 2 forms:

    New Class: Like a Locus Walker can appear in the class slot, but is essentially a redressed mage with the spell names, visuals and animations changed to fit. This can be extended to brand new class. Design a new class, give it 3 identity of skins: Tinker, Locus Walker and Dragon Lancer

    Similarly it can customise existing classes: E.g Moon Priestesses and Rangers can be customisation for Night elf/nightborne and Elven priests/hunters. This is now just a customisation for a class available to members of s elected race to bring the lore flavour.

    This tool has a 3rd application: Making lore appropriate class/combos to fill in missing playstyles without changing the class. E.g. every race can have the Demon hunter playstyle if the Demon hunter is re-skinned as a blademaster. Elves can have the shaman playstyle if re-skinned as a Star Augur or Elemental Augur, whiel the human/forsaken version could be known as Entropists etc.

    It is creative. an dit doesn't exclude brand new class playstyles being given but certainly allows lore appropriate cand attractive versions of existing classes that match the lore.

    Redressing a class is certainly easier to do than a full allied race, it's just a matter of new visuals and names.
    Last edited by ravenmoon; 2019-12-30 at 06:16 PM.

  2. #2
    I am Murloc! Maljinwo's Avatar
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    Allied races are fine when done right (Zandalari, Kul Tiran, Dark Iron)

    But not worth the effort when they look like a skin option as the Highmountain Tauren or the Mechagnomes
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  3. #3
    Pfft, allied races was the only thing that kept me invested in BfA. Without it, I would have unsubbed after 8.1. Sure wasn't Battlefronts and Island Expeditions!

    - - - Updated - - -
    @Maljinwo has a good point, though. I unlocked Lightforged and Highmountain just because I'm a collector, but had they been the template, I wouldn't have stuck around. I mostly did it for Nightborne, Void elves, Kul'tirans, Zanadlari and Vulpera. The other three are trash and lazy.

  4. #4
    @ravenmoon, you gotta learn how to make polls in your threads.

    Personally; there's no right answer to allied races vs. customizations. Although most of the allied races would work as customizations for existing races, it wouldn't always; Void Elves and Nightborne are opposite faction to the race for which they would be customizations. Same thing with Vulpera. Clearly modeled on the goblins and thus "their" allied race, but nonsensical to be a set of customizations for them, as they're an obviously different species.

    I think, moving forward, that the question of allied race vs customization options should be based on:

    1. Does it use the same models? (Not the same thing as using the same skeleton)

    2. Is it the same faction as the original race?

    If you answered yes to both of those, then it should be customization options and not a separate race.
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  5. #5
    Allied races are fine and I can't really imagine how void elves or nightborne as mere customization options would work, since lorewise the core race they are based upon is in the opposite faction. However I want to see new customizations for the allied races too. The void elves should be able to get pink skin tone customizations like Alleria.
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  6. #6
    Quote Originally Posted by Nefarious Tea View Post
    @
    Quote Originally Posted by Nefarious Tea View Post
    ravenmoon
    , you gotta learn how to make polls in your threads.

    Personally; there's no right answer to allied races vs. customizations. Although most of the allied races would work as customizations for existing races, it wouldn't always; Void Elves and Nightborne are opposite faction to the race for which they would be customizations. Same thing with Vulpera. Clearly modeled on the goblins and thus "their" allied race, but nonsensical to be a set of customizations for them, as they're an obviously different species.

    I think, moving forward, that the question of allied race vs customization options should be based on:

    1. Does it use the same models? (
    Not
    the same thing as using the same skeleton)

    2. Is it the same faction as the original race?

    If you answered yes to both of those, then it should be customization options and not a separate race.

    Good point, i'll also add race character. One of the beauties of allied races is you can get a culture of a race that is very differnet to the main race and playable as it's own with its own fantasy. That isn't possible with it jus being a customisable skin. So I would say

    3. Does it have a unique enough culture or character to the main race?


    The initial attraction of sub-races was getting to lay the existing versions of races we had already seen, like wild hammer dwarves, mag'har and others, but the real jewels were the different enough looking ones (Zandalari, Mok'nathal, Broken) - but who was to say all of them needed to be so different?

    Truth i think we got the ideal, both sub-races and customisations comign forwad. customisation do allow many other types like wildhammers, Highborne, black and far east asian looking humans to be available, (who knows what we'll get for Thalassians.. San'layn perhaps?0.. but it's also clear some could be a sub-race as well as a customisation.

    There are also paid options. like a half elf or half orc option.

    - - - Updated - - -


    Quote Originally Posted by Tenebra the War Criminal View Post
    Allied races are fine and I can't really imagine how void elves or nightborne as mere customization options would work, since lorewise the core race they are based upon is in the opposite faction. However I want to see new customizations for the allied races too. The void elves should be able to get pink skin tone customizations like Alleria.

    Yes, agreed, void elves could never have worked as blood elf customiation, but primarily because their story takes them to the other faciton,its in part of their defintion. Nightborne on the hhand don't have that, they coudl easily have been in the alliance story wise because of t he night elves, they qualify because they are the first night elf group to visualise the pre-sundering culture of he night elves which affords them a unique enogh visual look.. not just to the model but to everything. And thus can work as a race, although no one would have been surpirsed if they had night elf models and called highborne - so the name change and altered appearnce is just a caveat, they'd have worked with night elf models - though I'm not sure if they'd have been as popular with them.
    Last edited by ravenmoon; 2019-12-30 at 06:37 PM.

  7. #7
    Quote Originally Posted by ravenmoon View Post
    What are your thoughts?
    A)
    Is the whole allied race thing un-necessary and things would have been much easier with just adding them as customisations instead?

    B) Or are you quite pleased to have had the allied races and now look forward to customisations?


    My thoughts? We were always going to get customisations, but allied races (or sub-race) as a race feature offered something unique and compelling which would never have happened if cusotmisations came first. I was willing to bet that if we got allied races we would still get more original race customisations down the line, but the reverse would not be true.

    Imo, the Aallied race packgaing has been a huge success, and been compelling game feature for BFA, I would not have bought BFA if it were not for nightborne or void elves becoming playable - i had no interest in another faction war.


    The question then becomes:
    1. what should have been done as an allied race and what should have been done as a customisation?
    2. There are so many racial options and variations, and frankly some actually require more than being just a skin to an existing race

    I feel a lot of lore and personalisation would have been lost on some of the groups if they were just customisations


    Future of the Groups:

    Going forward, I think somethings should be customisations and some should be Allied races. what criteria should determine which is up for grabs really depends on the lore and what is trying to be achieved. People found Kul'tirans, Nightborne, Zandalari and Vulpera effective enough alterations of Night elves, Trolls and Goblins to qualify as allied races, but didn't find Void elves/Mag'har/Highmountain/Lightforged to be suitable ones, and could fit as customisations.

    Personally I think void elves needed to be its own race to be effective, but maybe it is redesigned that way, faction switching the blood elf model helps that. However Highmountain could definitely have been a customisation, same with Lightforged. Eredar on the other hand could be an allied race, same with Broken.

    Class Extensions:
    I think the allied race concept can be extended to classes in the form of Class Identities or Class Skins, which is essentially a class that is given a different identity/appearance. And like Allied races/customisations can come in 2 forms:

    New Class: Like a Locus Walker can appear in the class slot, but is essentially a redressed mage with the spell names, visuals and animations changed to fit. This can be extended to brand new class. Design a new class, give it 3 identity of skins: Tinker, Locus Walker and Dragon Lancer

    Similarly it can customise existing classes: E.g Moon Priestesses and Rangers can be customisation for Night elf/nightborne and Elven priests/hunters. This is now just a customisation for a class available to members of s elected race to bring the lore flavour.

    This tool has a 3rd application: Making lore appropriate class/combos to fill in missing playstyles without changing the class. E.g. every race can have the Demon hunter playstyle if the Demon hunter is re-skinned as a blademaster. Elves can have the shaman playstyle if re-skinned as a Star Augur or Elemental Augur, whiel the human/forsaken version could be known as Entropists etc.

    It is creative. an dit doesn't exclude brand new class playstyles being given but certainly allows lore appropriate cand attractive versions of existing classes that match the lore.

    Redressing a class is certainly easier to do than a full allied race, it's just a matter of new visuals and names.
    No they were not done right as all as all they are is really a cheesy skin option.

    What they should've done was introduce long and epic and also challenging questlines that your character could do to "remort" or transform into that specified allied race....

    for example any kind of elf class couldve had the option to change to say void elves by doing some long ass quest chain that involved everything from achievements, professions, pvp and pve (both raid and dungeons) and possibly world exploration and finally jumping into a void corrupted fountain that's maintained by alleria and turalyon and thus your character is permanently that allied race

    it would've made it feel like you actually earned it and it would make you think before actuallly changing it, also since these allied races have racials, you're racials would've changed as well and it would've been awesome because not everyone would just be running around as wahtever race they chose.

    ie dwarves turn to dark iron - gnomes to mechagnomes

    everyone being able to create one feels cheap as hell to be honest....
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  8. #8
    The Insane Aeula's Avatar
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    Should have been racial customisations. The allied race armor work could have gone towards tier sets.

  9. #9
    Banned Timewalker's Avatar
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    I'm not that crazy about allied races. Feels like it has simply cluttered the playerbase. Before I could tell exactly what people were. Now it's all just a blur.

    That said, I'm playing a Kul Tiran and having fun being something else than a 6'0 Hulk that the regular Humans are.

  10. #10
    It's a clumsy implementation whose goal is to promote grinding and leveling.

    It could maybe be forgiven if they actually made good use of it, but then they went and used it to implement junk like mecha gnomes and void elves.

  11. #11
    Some allied races like lightforged should have been customizations. Instead, the allied race for those races should have been something more unique (like broken in this case). Reskins should only be allied races if they're giving that model to the other faction, like void elves.
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  12. #12
    There are some very unnecesary allied races that should've just been skin options, looking at lightforged draenei and Highmountain tauren. Others have had a lot more work put to them like Zandalari and Kul'Tiran which are fine, despite the latter not being a popular one to play. My main gripe is that when leveling an allied race for the heritage armor, you have to go through the slog that is the Cata version of the old world. They really should have updated the old zones to make leveling allied races feel more bearable.

    I'd say they are the best feature in BFA (which isn't saying much), but they could've been better if they had picked the new races more thoughtfully. Like void elves shouldn't have been an option as they are just a blatant attempt to give the blood elf model to Alliance, if you wanted to do so then just give them high elves with very unique customisation options that makes them stand out from blood elves. Some lore reasons of why the Highmountain tauren and Nightborne would help to fight against the Alliance makes no sense either. Also some of the execution has beeen terrible like how they modeled the Nightborne. And as for my last complaint I think mechagnomes and vulpera as the last 2 allied races are a huge waste of resources.

    I'm still loving my Mag'har, Zandalari and Dark Iron to this day.

  13. #13
    Quote Originally Posted by Maljinwo View Post
    Allied races are fine when done right (Zandalari, Kul Tiran, Dark Iron)

    But not worth the effort when they look like a skin option as the Highmountain Tauren or the Mechagnomes
    That's exactly the issue, people look at the ones that are the most polished/took the most effort and expect that for every Allied Race.
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  14. #14
    Herald of the Titans Amaterasu65's Avatar
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    All are decent additions to the game, but some are not worthy of being a seperate race like LF Draenei, HM, Maghar, Mechagnomes. Also Zandalari females. Void elves would also be in that category but since they are not part of their parent race's faction, I let it slip.

    Zandalari males, Kul Tirans and Vulpera are the most unique. But none are my cup of tea, so..

    I guess, yes a good addition but mediocre execution.

  15. #15
    I loved the idea, I like the available choices but do wish more or others were already here that have been waiting(Jinyu, Furbolgs, Arrakoa and Mogu being obvious choices) but the need to have them Exalted BEFORE getting access to the them, just to have to so it AGAIN on that character is lame. Give them a questline that has to be done by a very specific faction/race that ties the new race to the players character. Alliance Night Elf has to recruit the Alliance Void Elf; Horde Taurens have to recruit Horde Highmountain. Humans have to recruit Kul'Tirans. Orcs have to recruit Mag'har Orcs. Not exalted but based on the existing race that the allied races are based off. Lightforged Draenei = Playing a Draenei. Zandalar Troll = Playing a Troll.
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  16. #16
    I am Murloc! Maljinwo's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Nathanyel View Post
    That's exactly the issue, people look at the ones that are the most polished/took the most effort and expect that for every Allied Race.
    Why shouldn't they?
    They are supposed to be new playable races not just look like a customization option.
    Look at Kul Tirans. Classified as an Allied Race yet they are built as a completely fully fledged race, somrthing unique among all other AR
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  17. #17
    Titan Maxilian's Avatar
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    To be fair, i really like the AR at the moment, mostly because they are not their own race but a culture that can be combined with another existing race of the faction, the one that's a little more out there are the Vulpera but at least they were already presented as having a direct connection with the Zandalari culture.

    VE are the other that are more "out there", but i guess they show an evolution of a small faction of the Alliance that we don't see much (the Hight Elves)

  18. #18
    Highmountain, mag'har, dark iron and lightforged should have been unlockable customization options for standard races, not their own races. Just add standard and new customization together. Imagine how much those races would gain in options?? (In the case of dark irons, the fire in the beards/hair could be tied to using a dark iron skin).

    Allied races should be only those that have different models, a very distinct class selection or use cross-faction models.
    Whatever...

  19. #19
    Titan Maxilian's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Amaterasu65 View Post
    All are decent additions to the game, but some are not worthy of being a seperate race like LF Draenei, HM, Maghar, Mechagnomes. Also Zandalari females. Void elves would also be in that category but since they are not part of their parent race's faction, I let it slip.

    Zandalari males, Kul Tirans and Vulpera are the most unique. But none are my cup of tea, so..

    I guess, yes a good addition but mediocre execution.
    To be fair, i really like LF and Mechagnomes, as both bring something that could easily propagate in its faction, for example, i would love for the LF to eventually include other races (mostly Humans), for the Mechagnomes to also share this knowledge to other races (like Dwarves), so they can because a new "form of living" within the faction.

    Note: I do agree that Maghar could have been a costumization option though (even though is the only AR that i play)

  20. #20
    Dreadlord Seiklis's Avatar
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    It's a case by case thing

    Alliance
    Void Elves - Should have been High Elves with Void customization options
    Lightforged - should have been draenei customization
    Dark Iron - Debatable...could go either way
    Kul Tiran - Debatable...lean towards human customization
    Mecha-Gnome - Should have been Gnome customization

    Horde
    Nightborne - allied race
    HM Tauren - Should have been Tauren customization
    Mag'har - Debatable but lean towards orc customizations due to amount of horde allied races
    Zandalari - Allied Race
    Vulpera - Allied Race

    So imo Alliance should have gotten High Elves, Argus Broken and Dark Iron Dwarves
    Horde should have gotten Nightborne, Zandalari and Vulpera

    That said I'd probably just add Draenor Orcs and Kul'tiran cause it feels weird not to have any alliance allied races that are actually from the expansion

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