No its more like 45%.
She could mean by both void and blood elves.
There was a psuedo-census done by someone who devoted a whole lot of time and effort in 2020 that was full of math I donât understand because I havenât used advanced math since I was in high school in 1990, but it broke down the player population across races and Blood Elves were 20% of all played races with Night Elves coming in a tick over 19% and then Void Elves were just about 6%. Human was the 3rd most popular race at just over 18%. Orc, Undead, Vulpera (of all races!) Troll, Dwarf and Goblin were all very closely distributed. The Allied races as a whole were pretty low on representation. Least popular race was Highmountain beating (or losing to as it was) the Mechagnomes!
You know how weâre going to get Shado Pan mogs in Pandamonium, maybe Blizz can do some cosmetics for Silver Covenant to help those players extend and expand for what they want. A Silver Covenant ground and updated flying mount included, since Shado Pan has both ground and flying mounts.
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I acknowledge you are a miraculous
exception among helfers.
Iâve said this before, and Iâll say it againâŚ
Many of them still are.
It is stated in-game that many Sinâdorei do not trust the new Sunwell, and/or refuse to give up their arcane heritage free of the holy light, despite the addiction inherent to it. Their near-predatory magical feeding practices, and fel-taint remains very much part of the nature of such groups.
We see evidence of this apparently as recently as BfA with belfs seen feeding on blood/blood magic energy for their hunger.
So while the original reason for their renaming was indeed simply to honor the blood shed and lives lost by the High Elves during the Scourge invasion, more characteristics clearly and quickly became a widespread part of their identity. It has been canon as early as wc3 tft that cultural changes had already taken hold amongst the blood elves as early as when Kael joined Garithosâ forces. From more emphasis on certain colors in their clothing and architecture, to changes in their magic practices that resembled the demonic, even before they started widely practicing energy vampirism.
After that, even their living habits changed to a degree, with a sizeable number starting to prefer slightly darker living spaces, which can be seen in many indoor sections of Silvermoon, with this characteristic probably having some overlap in their changing preference in architecture, most likely. On top of that, itâs suggested by at least one belf npc that attitudes regarding foreign affairs and the Sinâdoreiâs place in the world were different from than they had before the name shift. Itâs also shown how the denizens of Quelâthalas were being forced to treat nature and wildlife were changing based on quests and npc dialogue in Quelâthalas, with most taking an increasingly aggressive, almost destructive approach, and a few moving in, and advocating for the exact opposite direction toward a more harmonious and conscientious philosophy, with the exception of the farstriders who seemed to remain about the same as before. This, in addition to other things seemed to indicate a change in culture that embraced ruthlessness, and hunger for power more, especially amongst non-playable belfs we encounter in vanilla who had independently aligned themselves with more unsavory organizations or formed their own groups to deal with their addictions like in Azshara.
Obviously, like you said, with Kaelâs betrayal and defeat, and the creation of the new well some of that has receded amongst some or many of the Sinâdorei of Silvermoon. However, as I stated, among how many compared to not is very much up in the air, with Blizz still probably testing the waters on how to depict the sinâdorei more concretely.
Many, including myself, are in the camp that the Blood elves should mostly remain as they were before the Sunwellâs reformation, partly because we do not want the blood elves to simply be renamed high elves with more paladins on the Horde. Aside from it just being our personal preference that would also, at a fundamental level, be an objectively less unique, more bland option. Lacking in character, personality, or depth, it would be little more than a pathetic copout, devaluing the very concept of blood elves to do little more than try to satisfy certain helfers masquerading as belfers rather than actual belfers. Belfers, who actually like belves as their own meaningfully distinct thing with more distinguishing them from basically every other franchiseâs established high elf trope than flavor lore sequestered to their history, making them and Warcraftâs lore in general more immersive and thus more broadly interesting.
If you want to rp as a more helfy belf, be our guest. You want to focus on their watered down blood knights and other Holy Light worshippers? Cool. But the majority of canon Blood Elves should remain pretty much how they were characterized since the end of TFT, and different from the vast majority of, if not all High Elves.
Do we actually know that the dark spears are significantly fewer than the blood elves? I am unaware of it even being strongly impliedâŚ
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Theyâre a singular tribe that was always smaller than their counterparts back in Stranglethorn. Thats why they left to their Island where Thrall ended up finding them.
Theyâre a small group overall.
Numbers however were never actually brought up.
Ah. So they might be as numerous as blood elves areâŚ
Aye, the Darkspear were also being killed by murlocs and their Sea witch leader when Thrall found em.
So theyâd suffered pretty recently.
That said, 4 years after the third war is when WoW begins and so they could have grown relatively well given trolls supposedly reproduce kinda fast.
Elves dabbling with the Fel holds no significance to why theyâre named âBlood Elvesâ
Blizzard themselves said -
- Blood elves are, biologically and physiologically, high elves.
Source: The Warcraft Encyclopedia/Blood Elves - an official article by Blizzard Entertainment.
It presented information about a variety of things in the Warcraft universe. The original article, formerly located at -
http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/encyclopedia/index.xml
â although, such did not survive the overhaul of the World of Warcraft Official Website.
Blood Elves being named such due to honouring the blood spilled, but also to honour their blood lines â
- Question Asked: âWhat does it mean by âwe will take the name of our royal lineageâ to âSinâdoreiâ as the new representation of BEâs royal lineage?â
- Answer Provided: âThe term âBlood elfâ - blood as in those who died, blood also as in lineage, bloodline.â
Source: MICKY NEILSON, the Publishing Lead at Blizzard Entertainment, veteran of the company for over 22 years.
Tweet answer response found at -
https://web.archive.org/web/20210222183216/https://twitter.com/MickyNeilson/status/451896294433230848
But High Elves donât have mana-withdrawal!
Thought Iâd address this, since itâs always mentioned. 
ALL elves of QuelâThalas, whether they chose to embrace the name âBlood Elfâ or not â succumbed to a huge magnitude of magical addiction & withdrawal ⌠The High Elves are NOT an exception.
They may have had different methods of their vamparism & sating their immense addiction, but they were both present and both practiced ways to control it; lest they became Wretched â either from over-indulging & having the magic burn them away, or not indulging enough and withering away.
Example Source: QuelâLithien Lodge
- QuelâLithien Lodge is a high elven hunting lodge near the entrance to QuelâThalas. It was one of two major concentrations of high elves in Lordaeron.
- All the elves at the lodge became wretched after Ranger Lord Hawkspear found an item of seductive energy.
So as stated -
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Not as Alliance. We donât get what we want. They will give us alternatives that are supposed to be âgood enoughâ.
And horse mountsâŚLOTS of horse mounts.
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Your head canon is not canon.
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As a horde player you have no idea how excited I was to get several horse (and donkey!) mounts in BFA. The gryphon mount from DF is cool too.
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I really wish more recolors were available for all the mounts and more often available across faction lines.
I was happy to get a horsey mount for Horde, I hope we can get more.
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Except the lore numbers and the fact the paragons of their race are represented by the horde.
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Canonicaly? Maybe. Iâd say itâs a pretty blatant that it became a cultural characteristic both canonically, and how fans originally most commonly viewed and portrayed them that fel magic became far more tolerable no matter what you say. Even if not, there are plenty of other things that make them different culturally from helfs.
Not only have I read the Warcraft Encyclopedia, with it never explicitly saying Belfs are biologically and physiologically the same as Helves, it also would be entirely irrelevant if it did as I am simply debunking your claim that the Belf and Helf cultures are practically the same. Even the WC Encyclopedia itself contradicts that claimâŚ
On top of thatâŚ
The canonicity of the Warcraft Encyclopedia was always dubious, even before it ceased to exist in any official capacity. Some of the information in it conflicts with what we see with our own eyes in game both during, after, and before TBC. Itâs not entirely reliableâŚ
Nielson is also hardly reliable. His job has little to do with WoWâs lore directly. However, it is worth noting that that the wording of the question Nielson was answering was asking specifically how the belfâs moniker pertained to their âRoyal lineageâ which hardly disqualifies the idea that other things could have ended up associated with it to the Sinâdorei, and other people on Azeroth.
No need. Anyone who is familiar at all with this subject knows all the Highborne and their descendents are addicted and suffer withdrawal, which I already stated comes with their heritage of arcane magic.
Nope. By definition itâs more than that, especially given itâs a fact that for many, possibly even most belfs, there is nothing former about their addiction and withdrawal. Itâs still very much a present reality. By definition, their feeding habits are part of their culture.
culture
2. the customs, arts, social institutions, and achievements of a particular nation, people, or other social group.
⢠the attitudes and behavior characteristic
of a particular social group.
By definition Blood Elves have a distinct culture from the High Elves. They are a very different people. Itâs a fact.
Fact is equating them serves only to enable the insane individuals looking to make Belfs an entirely neutral race mechanically⌠and I will suffer you enabling no such thing.
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I do hope they clarify if that still effects the Void elves.
My Velf is light skinned, blue eyed, has golden hair, and has no tentacles. Oh look, itâs a Helf!
You got Helfs already, itâs why they gave them those skin, hair, and eye colors and let you turn off the tentacles. Velfs and Belfs ARE Helfs.
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JustâŚIDK maybe cosplay as one when playing a Void Elf of a Blood Elf? Yâall already got the customization to make it happen.
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One of the male void elvesâ gag lines seems to insinuate that not only do they probably still hunger for magic energy⌠they hunger for everything now. They are now filled with a hunger to devour the universe itself. Magic⌠physical matter⌠souls⌠anything in front of them.