I actually agree, the Jinyu would have been real neat to see turned into an AR. If nothing else, since they do have fairly good Alliance themes but would be a non Mammalian race. So, it would have been neat to see how Blizz’s art team differentiated between the two genders. Maybe bring in different types of fish aesthetics and traits, like Koi for the females.
EDIT: Also would have love to see a bit more Vrykul in the Kul Tiran Designs (I like the Kul Tirans as a concept, but there could have been a nice in between the two body types for both genders). Also, Broken over the Lightforged, just as Taunka over the Highmountain would have been the preferred choices. Could you imagine Akama officially joining the Alliance?
Honestly? I like the Mechagnomes in concept … a lot actually. Do I think their execution was spot-on? No, there is room for improvement … but I do think they are interesting on a story level.
This is a group of gnomes isolated from the world long-enough to fall prey to their more sociopathic racial tendencies. Which manifested in a cultural practice of self-mutilation. Like, that is WILD, and could really provide some interesting (and dark) stories for the Alliance. Hell, they should have had Paladins as an optional class; without how Titan fanatic they are. As such, since every race more or less was getting a corresponding AR, the Mechagnomes were fine.
If I were to pick my “ideal” Alliance AR set (and this is coming from a Hordie), I guess I wouldn’t change that much. With a more refined execution with all of them, something like:
Humans of SW: Jinyu (SW Humans have the most direct contact with them, and Anduin had a pretty big personal arc on Pandaria. Plus, Kul Tirans got the Human AR covered).
Dwarves: DarkIronDwarves (Cuz WOW!)
Gnomes: Mechagnomes (Embrace the weird+Paladin of the Titans class)
NightElves: Void Elves (with a twinform like Alleria, to give that clear Highelf look, but not being as truly redundant as Highelves conceptually are).
Draenei: Broken (I mean, this would have been so cool).
Gilneans/Worgen: Kul Tirans (With a bit more Vrykul mixed into the design, however its hard to ignore the shared Gilnean/Kul Tiran lineage so the KTs go them).
After seeing Alliance on GD complain about everything possible for the entirety of BfA, I’m going to have to agree. We get bonus rewards for playing in War Mode, an exclusive mount, a new race using the blood elf model with potential for new lore, other allied races with amazing racials, we canonically won both warfronts, and we don’t regularly lose our leaders, but it’s still been endless bellyaching about races and War Mode most of the time.
Requests for high elves, blood elves being made neutral, or void elves being gutted and turned into essentially high elves (natural skin, natural hair, paladins, and part of or even all of Quel’Thalas; we only got the first one)
Requests for Alliance versions of other Horde races
Requests for pie-in-the-sky races that don’t fit the allied race mold
Crying over Kul Tirans and mechagnomes based on their looks, including endless threads asking for the former to get access to a whole different model or two, and begging for the latter to have been demoted to barber options just to throw gnome fans under the bus
The ongoing belief that the Alliance deserves either of the two groups of sethrak despite the mounting evidence saying otherwise
The most I see from Horde posters is threads asking for ogres, undead paladins, and blue eyes for blood elves, the last of which they finally got, but before they did it was always met with the pro-high elf crowd going ballistic over the idea. Probably why I plan to play mostly or entirely Horde in SL.
If you wanted to split hairs about it, Mechagnomes swap out the mushy bits for fully Mechanical appendages the higher up they go in society. So in theory, you could play a Mechagnomer starting out with a fully Mechanical arm or whatever backstory you got.
That one is hands down the most complicated model edit I’ve done before. Its rigged and ready for animation too, but it has all kinds of errors I need to address before I can properly load it. But yea. That was one of my primary sources of inspiration for it.
They look great! And I will be honest, after actually meeting them I found the Kelfin and the Unshackled more interesting conceptually than the Vulpera. I do understand why Blizz chose the Fur Goblin Rigs over the Water Goblins (Goblins are the lowest played core race in the game, and the asset investment in the Vulpera was already there) … but c’mon, Sea Giants and Deepwater Markura in the Horde would have been so cool. Plus, I did get attached to Neri.
That being said, i would have liked to see Vulpera get Druids of the Desert, just as I would have liked to see MechaGnomes get Paladins of the Titans. I mean, could you imagine a Paladin Mount MechaSpider? That would be amazing!
Can I just say on this one: Mechagnomes are presently the least rolled race in the game. That isn’t just people complaining, that’s “Most people do not want to roll this race full stop”. Compare to Vulperra who are, stupidly high in numbers
I know its not possible to be barbershop stuff for them, but hell knows I’d much prefer the ability to have a single mechanical arm or something over, well, what mechagnomes became. And when the Horde gets a full new race and the Alliance gets a clear variation on its least-rolled vanilla race that isn’t even that different from the standard…
As a gnome fan even I can see we got the raw end of it with Mechagnomes
So here is what I think happened. I think gilgoblins were originally meant to be the goblin AR. However vulpera were basically ready to go from the moment they were discovered in prepatch. However I think that at some point during the development stage(long before bfa). One of the devs watched ratchet and clank and then thought. Heh why don’t we make the goblin/gnome ARs ratchet and clank based? I think this because the gilgoblins have showed up in Orgrimmar in 8.3 without any explicitly defined reason. They also have all the lore setup, more then enough motivation to join us and check all the boxes for what an allied race should be except for their models. No other primary race we helped in BFA has showed up at a capital city except for vulpera.
Honestly, I think they were planning on Mechagnomes for a while. “Junkergnome” files were in since the BfA beta, its just people had no idea what Junkergnomes were
I think Vulpera were the late choice given the original tail-less Vulpera model they had at Blizzcon, and sometime during Beta they got upgraded to playable
I would wager that they both were fairly early in conception of BfA ARs. Mechagnomes culturally do seem to have a lot of thought put into their culture and civilization, and for those that care enough to look are pretty distinctive in comparison to their Gnomish Core race. They also do thread that problematic needle of TRUE Mechagnomes not being an actual civilization, culture, or even race that one could “Ally” with. While I certainly wish there was a bit more flavor put into their prosthetics, they are pretty functional as an AR. Within the guidelines of what an AR is.
Vulpera on the other hand do break the mold a bit in terms of ARs, in that they are a new species that just so happen to be altered Goblin rigs. That being said, its clear they were at least toyed with as a playable race early on … and they do deal with the “Gallywix Problem”. Frankly, I love Wix as a character but there was no way the Bilgewater could entice an AR into the Horde with how he operates. And sadly Gazlowe didn’t take over till ARs were sort of over.
Vulpera are perfect for the Horde. They don’t really care about anyone else if they can’t profit from them/gain power from them, and they act all sanctimonious and holier than thou, commenting about how “bad everyone else is who is not us!” giving lip service to being those who “help the downtrodden” while actually trying to conquer and rule over everyone else. I mean, Vulpera themselves are basically furry Goblins at heart.
The idea that they’re staunch survivalists, rather materialistic, and fairly savage and selfish when pushed is pretty generic Horde race. That being said, its not surprising that two ex-slave races have common personality traits like that.
If you’re trying to say they are at their core a SUPER generic Horde race one you look past their fluffy exteriors. You’d be right. Its part of why I kind of found them conceptually boring. I like their characters. I like that Blizz found a functional nitch for them within the Horde. I do genuinely like them as part of the Horde. However, they are pretty lacking on a writing level.
