Void Elves come directly from Blood Elves just with Void Corruption yet they’re playable. Mag’hars are the same as regular Orcs just with some different skin colors/hair/markings etc. Highmountain Tauren are the same as Kalimdor Tauren with some markings and antlers. Lightforged Draenei are Draenei with extra light and tattoos/gold eyes.
This is what most allied races are. If High Elves were to be playable they can simply give them a different model with different customizations. Kul Tirans are technically the same race as the mainlander humans but they use a different model for player characters. High Elves can do the same thing or there could be a lore explanation for them gaining a different appearance. Evolution/Adaptation can happen at anytime ingame if the story demands it.
I think the confusion over “Who are High Elves?” is a nonissue. If need be they could take up a different name for themselves should they become playable but I don’t think that’s even necessary.
They changed in a boat ride travelling from Kalimdor to Eastern Kingdoms.
There was no evolution into High Elves. It was a rapid change when deprived of the Well of Eternity.
It could happen to modern Night Elves if we blew up all their Moonwells.
And that was only around 4k years ago. They allied with humans at around 3k.
And that changes nothing about what I said.
When you say “Blood Elves” it only refers to Blood Elves.
When you say “High Elves” it only refers to High Elves.
It’s not semantic. It’s what both groups are called.
High Elves does not work when referring to Blood Elves because they are not called High Elves.
So if you try to refer to High Elves when meaning Blood Elves you have to add extra clarification because it makes no sense given they are referred to as Blood Elves.
Just use the term “Thalassian Elves” because that just means Elves from Quel’Thalas. Easy.
Or we can just keep using the shorter, easier to spell, and still correct high elves to refer to the fact that they’re still the same damn elves and not worry about quibbles that seem designed to make it harder to argue a point in the simplest most direct method.
I don’t believe this was ever stated.
All it says is that they changed, and we do not know how long it took.
We know the boat ride took many years.
In anycase, they are different from their night elf kin. So I am not sure what point you’re trying to prove Drede.
I mean, by your logic, you have a high elf.
The simplest way is to refer to High Elves as High Elves and Blood Elves as Blood Elves.
Because that’s how it’s already set up.
That it was not thousands of years of evolution. That was the point.
And it was in a graphic novel. I want to say Blood of the Highborne but I might be wrong.
There where pictures and it was a short part at the start of the book.
No it doesn’t.
If anyone’s says “High Elves” then they aren’t talking about Blood Elves and vice versa.
It doesn’t matter what one group used to be called. It’s not their name and it does not refer to them. Nor is it used to refer to them at any point outside of past references.
Right, but the point is they’re still the same race. The thing is, you guys see these two names and think, “oh, they must be different races, so it’s okay for high elves to be on the alliance”, no, they’re the same race, lol. Down to the atom.
Actually, that is one of the most debated pieces of this whole thing.
Actually people outside the playable Alliance high elf community use it to generally refer to elves of that shape and size. The problem exists because the writers never thought the terminology out all that much, and there is no remaining political group called High Elves anyway. There was a High Elf nation, now it is called the Blood Elf nation. These other high elves are part of other groups.
Except that Blood Elves are high elves, they are the legacy of the high elves before Arthas. They call themselves something new now, but they haven’t changed their past. In WoW they are also the playable version of the high elf archetype too.
It just feels like a way to try and semantic past a point. Like if I were to say that since they were called high elves before the split, it’s wrong to refer to the non-blood ones as high elves as that confuses them with the full race, so really they need to be referred to as “Thalassian elves non-aligned with Silvermoon” it doesn’t really do anything but make the other side jump through a hoop by trying to force them into a longer name.
Which is exactly what they are doing. The writers messing up capitalization isn’t great ground to be standing on. It’s the difference between ‘High Elves’ and ‘high elves’.
Though at least he’s not trying the whole “But, they ate fel!” bit.
Nope. They bleed purple, have no connection to the sunwell, and stated they were changed.
Not a high elf anymore.
Let alone, again, based on that logic, it means you received high elves.
