Were allied races justified? Have they a major revenue source from WoW for Blizz?

[Mirishka]

I'm not sure where you get your data from other than you notice some Void Elves hanging out in Boralus. According to World of Wargraphs, the Void Elf population at 120 is 4.5% ... which is easily the highest of all the allied races, but still the 9th most played race overall. Zandalari Troll is the second most high of the allied races with 3.3%.

A race that has barely been in the game 2 years has been the 4th highest alliance race at points, overtaking everything but humans/night elves/Draenei - that's a success, regardless of how you or anyone else feels about allied races.

[Autoriot]

Allied races should have been customization options for existing races, kind of like what they're doing in Shadowlands to the races customization. For example, after doing Argus stuff Draenei could do a quest line to transform into Lightforged.

Obviously Blizzard picked to do it as a race instead of customization, for the $$. That being said, there are some benefits for the players in Blizzard doing it the Allied race way instead. It allows Alliance to have a BE-like race and horde to have a NE-like race. Blizz unfortunately decided to not give Alliance the Highmountain and Horde the Dark Iron Dwarves, that would have been a good opportunity for some more diversity and a simple story could have supported it. Kul Tiran and Zandalari going to the opposite faction, not so much however.

[Kyphael]

Why should it be the Alliance to get an AR with Undead rig in the first place? Your problem rests on a weird assertion.

Because the most interesting allied races that are simple re-skins (Lightforged, Mag'har, Highmountain) are those that swap the rig for the factions? Dud you want the Alliance to have Nightborne and Horde to get Void Elves? What would be the point in Horde just getting more undead that couldn't be simple customization options for the already existing undead playable to them?

[MyWholeLifeIsThunder]

I think they were a huge source of revenue; like anecdotally, I spent more on race changes when AR came out than ever before, and so did a lot of people I know. But there's no way of knowing, and besides player generated surveys -which would have arbitrary player samplings- there's no way to know.

[agentsi]

What are statistics should you look for? The only thing I can think of is

1. People who brought BFA and played the expansion because of Allied Races primarily
2. Everyone who paid for a character race or faction change to or because of an allied race.

Any other things that might contribute to this?

In your opinion how much additional revenue do you feel they have generated?

It's their company, their game, their content. They(allied races) could be a total failure money wise and if they want to do more of them, they're allowed to. You aren't entitled to only get content from them that makes them money or that you specifically want.

Why folks try to play this, I'll never understand. Unless you're in charge of the company ( you aren't ) they don't need to justify anything to you.

[therealstegblob]

Woah.. 4th? Are you sure? I didn't realise they were THAT popular so soon.

You're serious? I'm actually shocked it's taking them this long. They'll almost certainly be 2nd most popular Alliance race before too long, right behind Human. And then we'll see if they'll surpass even that.

It'll literally be World of BloodElfCraft.

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It's their company, their game, their content. They(allied races) could be a total failure money wise and if they want to do more of them, they're allowed to. You aren't entitled to only get content from them that makes them money or that you specifically want.

Why folks try to play this, I'll never understand. Unless you're in charge of the company ( you aren't ) they don't need to justify anything to you.

Stop overreacting, lol.

[agentsi]

You're serious? I'm actually shocked it's taking them this long. They'll almost certainly be 2nd most popular Alliance race before too long, right behind Human. And then we'll see if they'll surpass even that.

It'll literally be World of BloodElfCraft.

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Stop overreacting, lol.

Hit title for this is literally, Were allied races justified?

Half of the threads he creates are asking questions begging for clarifiation on why blizzard did what they wanted to do. What does X have this, this should be for Y. Blizzard why you do this. etc etc

[Doffen]

Why not both ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ San'layn aren't all that different from Dark Rangers. They are both undead Thalassians after all. Throw in some customization of fangs vs no fangs and maybe claws vs no claws on top of the necessary eye and skin color range to cover both and you're set.

Yeah, San'layn is also cool. San'layn with different skin-tones would be nice. Throw in teeth customization too for the real vampire deal.

[Maxilian]

You're serious? I'm actually shocked it's taking them this long. They'll almost certainly be 2nd most popular Alliance race before too long, right behind Human. And then we'll see if they'll surpass even that.

It'll literally be World of BloodElfCraft.

The charts that i have seen, show that the Velves are the most played AR of the Alliance, but they are still less played than the Pandaren, but i'm pretty sure that the only reason for that is because of the requirements to get the race.

And i also think that they will slowly but surely sour in popularity and will become one of the most played races, but i doubt it will ever reach the Human, Night Elf and Draneai popularity

[therealbowser]

Allied races have been 90% of the reason I've played at all during BFA. Had they not existed, I probably would have skipped this expansion or played so little I might as well have skipped it.

Was the revenue gain worth it? Well, probably. I would like to assume there are a lot of people like me who are playing because of allied races and have little interest in BFA's current endgame. But I don't have Blizzard's money statistics and I doubt you can really narrow it down anyways, so I am not sure how someone is supposed to answer this unless they are just pulling statistics out of their ass and pretending it's accurate.

All I can say is that I like them, and wouldn't be playing otherwise. I can't truly speak for anyone else.

PS: Don't forget, though, that the allied races have probably been a huge source of revenue for race and even faction changes, so don't forget that money is coming from character services, too.

[Mehrunes]

Because the most interesting allied races that are simple re-skins (Lightforged, Mag'har, Highmountain) are those that swap the rig for the factions? Dud you want the Alliance to have Nightborne and Horde to get Void Elves? What would be the point in Horde just getting more undead that couldn't be simple customization options for the already existing undead playable to them?

Why should they be the simple re-skins kind and why should the Alliance get yet another Horde model?

[Ielenia]

Woah.. 4th? Are you sure? I didn't realise they were THAT popular so soon.

By a very small margin, but yes, they do. Humans and night elves, combined, make for almost 60% of the Alliance population. At least according to WoW Census. RIP RealmPop.

[therealstegblob]

Hit title for this is literally, Were allied races justified?

Half of the threads he creates are asking questions begging for clarifiation on why blizzard did what they wanted to do. What does X have this, this should be for Y. Blizzard why you do this. etc etc

Just stop it, arright?

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The charts that i have seen, show that the Velves are the most played AR of the Alliance, but they are still less played than the Pandaren, but i'm pretty sure that the only reason for that is because of the requirements to get the race.

And i also think that they will slowly but surely sour in popularity and will become one of the most played races, but i doubt it will ever reach the Human, Night Elf and Draneai popularity

Void Elves have a grind locking them, they can't be Druids and they're very new. As it is, they're currently around 2% of the Alliance's max-level population where as Draenei are only around 5%. It's likely that sometime in the future Blizzard may even lift the grind-gate for Void Elves (and other older Allied Races), which would certainly cause the current population to explode.

Give it time. They're only going to grow. As it is, they're only somewhat matched in Allied Race popularity by freaking Nightborne. The rest don't even break 1%, with some (like Highmountain Tauren) pulling hilariously low percentages.

[Black Goat]

A race that has barely been in the game 2 years has been the 4th highest alliance race at points, overtaking everything but humans/night elves/Draenei - that's a success, regardless of how you or anyone else feels about allied races.

But that's not what you said. You said, and I quote:

Void elves are hugely popular, and have overtaken most of the original playable races on Alliance side. By that measure alone, you're wrong.

So, now is it about that they have only been available for 2 years and that they're the 4th highest Alliance race? Because in your first statement, they had "overtaken" most of the original races. Which races? Gnomes? Dwarves? Night Elves? But they don't appear to have overtaken any of the popular original Alliance races. I'm not going to dive into "Void Elves are more popular than Gnomes!"

Where are you sourcing your data?

[schwank05]

What are statistics should you look for? The only thing I can think of is

1. People who brought BFA and played the expansion because of Allied Races primarily
2. Everyone who paid for a character race or faction change to or because of an allied race.

Any other things that might contribute to this?

In your opinion how much additional revenue do you feel they have generated?

This is the major issue with thinking it was for monetization reasons, I have not unlocked a single allied race. They are all tied to rep grinds. IMO they should sell them in the cash shop if they wanted to truly monetize it.

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I realize people on this forum have a penchant for talking out of their asses, but how on earth are we supposed to know how much revenue allied races have generated? We don't work in Blizzard's financial department.

This is the kind of thing you can't even ballpark really, there's just too many variables and unknowns.

To answer your other, less-impossible question, yes they were justified - the game suffers from a terrible lack of customization and they've been impossibly stingy with new races/customizations. We haven't gotten new hairstyles for the original races since Wrath for crying out loud.

Whatever you think of their implementation, As of 8.3 Allied races will have nearly doubled the options we have when creating characters. That in and of itself justifies their existence.

I don't think Ive seen my characters faces since Vanilla or the corresponding xpac I created them in. all my characters wear armor and I never change it because I have them all in tier sets from previous xpacs when tier sets looked amazing.

[Hellobolis]

This is the major issue with thinking it was for monetization reasons, I have not unlocked a single allied race. They are all tied to rep grinds. IMO they should sell them in the cash shop if they wanted to truly monetize it.

all they have to do for blizz to turn a profit is be cheaper to make than actual new races.

[therealstegblob]

This is the major issue with thinking it was for monetization reasons, I have not unlocked a single allied race. They are all tied to rep grinds. IMO they should sell them in the cash shop if they wanted to truly monetize it.

Of course it's for monetization reasons. Even if it's not directly selling the product (Allied Races) to you, it causes people to buy a new subscription or prolong their current one in order to spend the time doing the reputation grind. It's effectively just another thing to do to keep you playing. Everything they add to the game is in the interest of monetization.

[mickybrighteyes]

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Woah.. 4th? Are you sure? I didn't realise they were THAT popular so soon.

It's not that surprising when you realize the 3rd and beyond listings are all 5% or less. Void Elves are a bit over 4%?

[therealbowser]

Saberon would be my guess for worgen, and Lightforged undead, on opposing factions like the elves.

Except Lightforged undead just sounds terrible to me...how can u dead be Lightforged? Does this universe intend on breaking ALL its rules?

At this point I really doubt we will see another allied race. I'm expecting Vulpera/mechagnomes to be the last ones. But hey, we'll see I guess.

[nyc81991]

I think the idea of Allied Races was cool and it definitely was one of the better "features" of BFA. However, many of them seem very "cheap" to me and I lost interest in them for the most part.