If they made a new class in the future, what would it be?

[Triceron]

Necromancer- based covenants in the place of a Necromancer or Dark Ranger class

What does Shadowlands have to do with Hunters?

[Teriz]

But, either way, your assessment is wrong. Classes are not made with the intention (sole or main reason) to attract new players. It's just as much made for current players as well. If not more so. Because, more importantly than attracting new players, is keeping the players that you have currently have engaged, and one sure-fire way of doing it is with a new class.

We’ll just have to agree to disagree, because there’s no way to prove this one way or another.

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What does Shadowlands have to do with Hunters?

Shadowlands has everything to do with Sylvanas, since she is the one who initiated this expansion’s storyline. She’s also an undead elf Ranger.

[Tenebrius]

Some kind of melee class of course. Probably using plate or leather.

[Syegfryed]

If the class fits the race, thematically and lore-wise, why should they not allow said race to pick said class other than "I'm offended that this race is super popular"? That's like saying "night elves are already super popular, so they shouldn't be demon hunters".

ah yes, i wonder how much would take for you to come to argue for the sake of arguing, when did i say they should not allow a race pick a class?

when did i say elves should not be able to be dark rangers?

im literally saying they should not make dark ranger elf exclusive for the sake of "elf", cause is bullshit to not allow other races to pick a class just because they are not enough popular, try to read things before atempting a gotcha

Again, why should those popular races NOT be allowed to pick those classes?

And again, who said they should, are you tripping?

People aren't saying that dark rangers should be "elf only", that's your interpretaion. And an erroneous one, IMO.

dude literally said it should be elf exclusive because elves are super populous

[Ielenia]

dude literally said it should be elf exclusive because elves are super populous

I went back a few posts to read the posts. He did not say what you claim he did. He said "elf-centric", not "elf-exclusive". Both terms are not synonyms. For context, the monk class is pandaren-centric.

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We’ll just have to agree to disagree, because there’s no way to prove this one way or another.

And yet you felt justified and confident enough to post your opinion as fact, until challenged.

Shadowlands has everything to do with Sylvanas, since she is the one who initiated this expansion’s storyline. She’s also an undead elf Ranger.

So BfA was also a hunter expansion? And MoP was a warrior expansion, because of Garrosh?

[Teriz]

People are also seriously overestimating the popularity of elves. While Blood Elves and Night Elves are very popular, Nightborne are not, mainly because they're not very distinct from the other elves. Allowing Nightborne to be part of a new technology class would help quite a bit IMO.

It should also be mentioned that one of the reasons I think Dark Rangers are a bad idea is that it could make Blizzard give Forsaken an undead elf option to match Sylvanas, thus essentially turning that race into yet another elf race.

So BfA was also a hunter expansion? And MoP was a warrior expansion, because of Garrosh?

Yeah, I don't know how you reached either of those conclusions.

[Kumorii]

Friendly reminder, Dark Ranger is the correct choice!

[Teriz]

Friendly reminder, Dark Ranger is the correct choice!

Why exactly?

[Teriz]

Sorry Teriz but that's just not true. Nightborne are not less popular due to their distinction. They're less popular due to their age.

Looking on statistics, they're 1.5- 2x more popular than highmountain tauren, maghar, zandalari.

They represent ~1.4% of characters, versus ~2.2% for pandaren who have existed far longer, and ~2.8% for goblin.

By that logic you could actually argue they are more popular than goblins, given that goblins were introduced 11 years ago and are only twice as common as a race added 2-3 years ago.

So I'm not sure where you're making your argument tbh.

Yet they're not more popular than Vulpera, and Void Elves, and at one point Zandalari Trolls were more popular than they were. All of those races are newer than the NB. I have no idea what happened to the Zandalari population. Perhaps they migrated over to Vulperas after 8.3?

In any case, the point is that people are basing elf popularity largely on Blood Elves and Night Elves, when races like Nightborne which should be extremely popular are simply not in comparison. Further, I completely disagree with the notion that we should base future classes on current race demographics.

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Im not trying to be toxic here but like, I literally gave Teriz proof/evidence that Mekkatorque was not an iconic wow character, and not nearly as popular as he thinks, but he didn't reply once I posted the evidence which kinda just makes discussing stuff about Tinker completely pointless.

I didn't reply because I have no interest in debating your opinion or your anecdotal experience in the industry.

[Teriz]

I think your best bet Teriz would be something similar to what bellular suggested if you heard him recently. An expansion that is just really low level, no world ending bad guy, just an expansion that focuses on Azeroth and small but dangerous enemies rising here and there, I think that would be a golden opportunity to really pull in some of the less popular races like gnomes and goblins, give them 'their' class and flesh out the more basic WoW stuff, perhaps work on a new ogre race too. I think an Ogre race, and a tinker class, (not sure on what alli race tbh, don't think there's many obvious missing ones) would be a very simple but pleasant addition to the game. But I don't think this expansion you're talking about with some undermine epic tech based expansion is gonna happen soon, might be wrong, just my opinion.

Frankly I think something akin to the Undermine April Fool's Joke post would be the best thing to happen to WoW in years.

[Teriz]

Sorry that argument is silly though. They are approximately in line with other playable races whether you like it or not, they're approx equal to zandalari, much more than maghar, they're now in 2020 approximation more popular than goblins, who have existed 3-4 longer, they're way more popular than highmountain, they are a successful allied race, FACT.

Vulpera are slightly more popular, so what, someone has to be #1. Its not like they are 3x more popular.

You're completely misunderstanding how statistics work lol, its crazy. Most horde elf fans are already playing Blood elves, and a small % of them that prefer nightborne enough to be willing to pay for a change will have. What you're suggesting is that somehow because Blood elves make up like 16% of character, that suddenly overnight nightborne should be 8% and blood elf 8% which is absolute rubbish.

So you're saying that only Blood Elf players would want to race change to a Nightborne? Further, what about new players? Wouldn't someone not playing WoW be possibly interested in the Nightborne?

Nightborne are approximately as popular as you would expect them to be statistically.

Again, only if Blood Elf players were the only ones capable of becoming Nightborne.

I mean I wasn't even bringing my industry experience into it, I literally gave you evidence that you can google and you just went silent as always. I find it hilarious how people on this forum get all salty and angry whenever anybody brings their experience into it. If you don't want to believe that's what I do, that's your choice, but Im not lying so.

I didn't go silent, I simply moved on to a more relevant discussion. Again, circular conversations that involve someone's personal preference or attempting to show off their credentials hold little interest to me.

Teriz - Mekkatorque isn't iconic, get over it.

But Gazlowe is.

I mean sure you would say that, you're literally Blizzards #1 goblin/gnome/tinker/undermine fan though, don't you see how biased you are? Im sure you would like that, and I think it would be cool, but you cant use that in an argument lol.

It's not about bias, it's about the fact that Undermine is part of warcraft lore. It would provide an expansion that both grounds the franchise, is a part of Azeroth, and introduces the concept of an underground continent. Something we've never experienced as a playerbase, and something that the playerbase has expressed a desire towards.

[Teriz]

No I'm not saying only, I'm saying the majority of elf fans will already be Belf, and only a small percentage statistically would have swapped. Im sure new players did pick nightborne, but there arent many new players. Nightborne are statistically where you would expect them, based on race changes, new characters etc.

You're taking a new elf race, and comparing them against by far and away the most popular race in the game, and expecting them to have an extremely large population. How so?

Because if the Elf race is so popular that we should cater any new content towards said races, then a new elf race should be far more popular than any other new race in the game. However, that isn't the case. The most popular new race in the game is a bunch of nomadic desert foxes, and they reached that mark with less availability time than the other allied races. Thus, perhaps the goal shouldn't be to cater to elf fans, but cater to other audiences who might be attracted to other forms of content.

You did go silent again, explain why if you google 'warcraft characters', mekkatorque doesn't even show up in the 52 suggested characters when Googles results are based primarily on popularity/similarity. You're talking about the worlds largest search engine, requesting data from it, and it doesn't consider mekkatorque relevant. How so, explain please.

Funny that, because Gazlowe also doesn't show up. Please Teriz I'm serious like by what measure do you consider these characters iconic I don't get it?

Why would either show up when the current expansion has nothing to do with either of them, and there is no class that represents either one of them currently in the game? I'm sure Mekkatorque popped up quite a bit during BFA, so I'm not seeing how that particular measure is relelvant at all.

It is bias, the lore is extensive and varied, just because YOU want underground content doesn't mean others do dude! We've never experienced it as a playerbase, yes we have, there's tons of dungeons and caves underground in wow

Dungeons and Caves =/= Continent.

what makes you think people even want 'underground content' hahaha. Sorry but do you really think players are like "Ahh yeah damn I just wish we could have some you know, underground content, yeah that would be DOPE" Ive never heard that in my life dude, where are you basing your opinions on?! Observations? educated guesses? Official Blizzard communication? Like what! You think its cool because you're into that.

Please show me where the playerbase has expressed a desire towards having an underground expansion.

Read the general response towards the Undermine Expansion April Fool's joke earlier this month.

[Diaphin]

You don’t create new classes to appeal to the current userbase, you create new classes to appeal to the userbase who currently isn’t playing WoW for whatever reason. Which is why a technology class may be the wisest route to take since it is a popular RPG class, and is nonexistent in WoW’s class lineup.

Also OP racials mean little if the race housing those racials feels out of place and weird.

Where is it a popular rpg class? Like, literally, where? In SWTOR for example, you have two technology based classes per faction but guess what, everyone wants to play the magic classes. In Guild Wars 2, the Engineer is the least popular base class by a margin of 4 percent, with the only less played class being one where you have to buy a full priced expansion to play it. Wildstar, a tech heavy MMORPG, is dead. Do you have any case where the hell tech based class is super popular? Even in FF14, it seems like it falls short compared to most other DPS classes. So have you any statistics or data at your hand were technology classes ever had been popular?

[Teriz]

Where is it a popular rpg class? Like, literally, where? In SWTOR for example, you have two technology based classes per faction but guess what, everyone wants to play the magic classes. In Guild Wars 2, the Engineer is the least popular base class by a margin of 4 percent, with the only less played class being one where you have to buy a full priced expansion to play it. Wildstar, a tech heavy MMORPG, is dead. Do you have any case where the hell tech based class is super popular? Even in FF14, it seems like it falls short compared to most other DPS classes. So have you any statistics or data at your hand were technology classes ever had been popular?

Your post proves my point. The fact that it shows up in pretty much every RPG proves that it is a popular RPG class. The fact that such a class is not in WoW when WoW has a massive amount of technology-themed content is a detriment to the game.

[Diaphin]

Why exactly?

It a mail wearing ranged class which is based on the most popular and iconic warcraft character, after Arthas and Illidan who had their class. Any time when an iconic warcraft character got a class dedicated to them, it garnered lots of hype and was rather successful. Dark Ranger would just follow the success model of Death Knights and Demon Hunters. It is a WC3 hero, it is even in Heroes of the Storm and Sylvanas is the most popular and iconic character remaining in the franchise and currently the face of Warcraft.

What makes no sense about making the class of the most popular and well-known Warcraft character after the big two Arthas and Illidan playable, especially if she is currently the face of the game and obviously a favorite of the devs too. I need to get your logic here, that you think a class designed after a barely known niche character makes more logical sense than a class designed after Sylvanas Windrunner.

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Your post proves my point. The fact that it shows up in pretty much every RPG proves that it is a popular RPG class. The fact that such a class is not in WoW when WoW has a massive amount of technology-themed content is a detriment to the game.

Yeah, the fact that technology based classes tend to be at the bottom of the popularity lists, with a 4% margine in the case of Guild Wars 2. Proves your point. Are you well my dude?

[Teriz]

No. Im sorry, just no, that's not how it works lol. Theres already a ridiculously popular elf race on horde, most elf players will continue to play them. Nighborne are averagely popular as expected.

Theres nothing like Vulpera, and lots of players want to play something like a cute fox in a fantasy world, sadly. I fully expected vulpera to be massively popular, more so than others. Perhaps only Zaldalari to challenge them in popularity by my expectations.

Based on the argument presented here, shouldn't Nightborne be far more popular than the Vulpera?

What makes you think Nighborne should suddenly be equal or above average in popularity when as I said, why wouldn't most horde players who love the elves continue to play Belf?

Again, based on the arguments presented here, Nightborne should be the most popular allied race on the Horde. That isn't the case.

Well, that's a flat no, and that's a fact.

Illidan, Thrall, Guldan, Malfurion, Khadgar, Medivh, Sargeras, 'Goblin', Durotan, Lothar, Saurfang, Doomhammer, Grom, Turalyon, Kiljaeden, Aegwynn, Archimonde, Cairne, Vereesa, Antionidas, Baine, Chen, Voljin, Yrel, Draka, Onyxia, Garona, Magni, Alleria, Blackmoore, Lorthermar, Med'an, Valeera, Mannoroth, Kargath, Taran Zhu.

None of these are primary SL characters, yet they show up when you google Warcraft Characters, by that logic, Mekkatorque wouldn't have popped up. Perhaps during the siege of dazaralor, but yeah. It is relevant, clearly. Its showing 52 characters of which most arent relevant to SL, most of the others are generic characters like the lich king, there's no gazlowe or mekkatorque, so they obviously arent that popular.

Illidan has a popular class designed in his image, and is a hero character in HS. Thrall was a major part of this expansion early on when he was kidnapped, and is a hero character in HS. Gul'dan is a consistent villain in Warcraft and is a hero in HS. Malfurion has a popular class designed in his image and is a hero character in HS.

I could go on, but hopefully you get the point.

I just don't see how he's as popular as you think, I just think you're grossly overestimating how popular these characters are in the community. Look at gnome/goblin, they're not popular at all.

When have these characters had the spotlight shone on them in any major form? We got some spotlight in BFA and people were perfectly fine with it, even welcomed it. That should tell you something.

So your argument is that people are crying out for an entire wow continent underground?

No, my argument is that a dungeon or a cave isn't the same as an underground continent.

Im sure it was popular, as I said, it sounds like a cool piece of content, but that argument has no footing because we have nothing to compare it to, I'm sure any expansion prank based in some popular random lore of a new continent/world would be extremely popular. Whats your point?

If you acknowledge that it's popular and a cool piece of content, what's your point?

Im curious, can you explain to me why you think people are so into goblins/gnome related content when they are so underplayed? Why do you think people actually want that?

Goblins and Gnomes are underplayed because no class fits their racial theme, which is high technology and steampunk. Its rather hard to get interested in playing a race whose prominent members are inside combat robots and firing lasers, when the only thing you can do is swing a sword or cast a spell. For example, if you think Mekkatorque was cool in Battle of Dazalor and you wanted to be something similar, what class could you choose to accomplish that? The answer is none.

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It a mail wearing ranged class which is based on the most popular and iconic warcraft character, after Arthas and Illidan who had their class. Any time when an iconic warcraft character got a class dedicated to them, it garnered lots of hype and was rather successful. Dark Ranger would just follow the success model of Death Knights and Demon Hunters. It is a WC3 hero, it is even in Heroes of the Storm and Sylvanas is the most popular and iconic character remaining in the franchise and currently the face of Warcraft.

So why can't we simply place those Dark Ranger concepts into the Hunter class? Marksmasnship for example could use some interesting abilities, and has housed Dark Ranger concepts before.

What makes no sense about making the class of the most popular and well-known Warcraft character after the big two Arthas and Illidan playable, especially if she is currently the face of the game and obviously a favorite of the devs too. I need to get your logic here, that you think a class designed after a barely known niche character makes more logical sense than a class designed after Sylvanas Windrunner.

Because the Dark Ranger concept offers nothing new to the class lineup.

Yeah, the fact that technology based classes tend to be at the bottom of the popularity lists, with a 4% margine in the case of Guild Wars 2. Proves your point. Are you well my dude?

Machinist is far from the bottom of the list in FFXIV.

As for GW 2, according to this, Engineers are 8%, and lag behind the bottom tier and middle of pack by a few percentage points.

[Ielenia]

Yeah, I don't know how you reached either of those conclusions.

You said that hunters are heavily related to Shadowlands because of Sylvanas, despite the class' lore and theme having zero to do with the setting and story being told.

By that logic, hunters are also heavily related to BfA and warriors are heavily related to Pandaria, because of Sylvanas and Garrosh, respectively.

[Syegfryed]

I mean that's not how it works..

I don't know what the argument Diaphin is making but it doesn't matter. The fact they are overwhelmingly the most popular race in the game is literally the exact reason a company like Blizzard would add more elf centric content. Your 'ideals' do not represent AAA publically owned companies, as much as I agree with you in principle that we don't want that..

right, and elves have being popular since their introduction and yet the game does not revolve around then, only one class is elf exclusive because it actually made sense lore-wise, they didn't need to change it.

This would be actively changing the lore, just to pamper a group that does not even make half of the playerbase.

And they can still revolve lore around the forsaken/elves being rangers and open up the class to other races and everyone would be winning.

[Teriz]

Ummmm no it doesn't haha.

A whole MMO heavy on tech = dead

Engineer = least popular class in GW2

SWTOR Tech class = Unpopular

What makes you think Blizzard as a business would be like, lets do a tinker class that's going to bring us bank!

It was obvious DH/DK was going to blow up the MMO world as it did, Illidan/Arthas/TLK are perhaps the most iconic character in MMO/RTS history. You're seriously comparing that to a tinker?

The Tinker is consistently the most popular future class choice in most polling, so the playerbase has a desire for it. As for why the Engineer is the least popular class in GW2, it probably has to do with its lack of focus and purpose. It's turret system is pretty lackluster, and the developer really has no idea what to do with the class. That's merely my observation. In FFXVI, the Machinist does far better, since it has a rather clear design and purpose. The main issue I've heard from Machinist players is that it is notoriously difficult to play. Again, that's a developer issue, not a thematic issue.

I don't believe that Blizzard would make similar mistakes with their classes. WoW is a superior designed game to both GW2 and FFXVI.

[Syegfryed]

I went back a few posts to read the posts. He did not say what you claim he did. He said "elf-centric", not "elf-exclusive". Both terms are not synonyms. For context, the monk class is pandaren-centric.

the point was making an elf exclusive class like demon hunters yes, precisely because the subject was being coming up from the other user who had a lot of bias on it

i give two shits about being "centric" the problem is being locked to other races for no reasons, besides, if its going to be "ranger centric" it does not need to be elf centric either, or at least heavy elf centric, because again, there is other races who have rangers