How to make Mechagnomes more appealing, by Gearbox Jenkins

Community General Discussion
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I, Gearbox Jenkins, would like to share some ideas I have to make Mechagnomes more appealing and fun to more players.

Gnome Hair Styles and Colors
Give Mechagnomes all the hair styles and colors available to regular Gnomes, and vice versa.

Full Metal Option
Give Mechagnomes a few mechanical “skin” tone options (possibly three to match the three upgrade limb color options, rusty, silver, and iron). So the “skin” would look metal, with stuff like rivets and seams and corrugation lines around the neck drawn on, that sort of thing. Some players would like to play a Mechagnome that looks fully robotic on the outside, without having to wear the heritage armor.

Mechanical Eye Colors
Different colors for the mechanical eyes. Blue is nice, of course, but it would be nice to have more options. Options including heterochromic and blind options. I would love to see as many mechanical eye colors as actual eye colors.

Full Metal Hair
Add either a few solid metal, rivetted "hair"dos or, if it’s possible, add metallic hair colors. Maybe both?

Metal Facial Hair
Who wouldn’t want to sport a shiny metal handlebar mustache, for example? Heck, let the ladies use them too. The Mechagnomes are pretty into messing around with their bodies after all. I, Gearbox Jenkins, wouldn’t be wearing a metal mustache but the option would be silly and fun, and Mechagnomes should really lean into being silly and fun.

Mix and Match Arm Upgrades
Let Mechagnomes pick the look of their mechanical arms per side if they’d like. If someone wants a clamp on one side and a metal hand on the other, let them.

Mogging Options for Limb Upgrades
Allow Mechagnomes to choose if mogging covers their limbs or not. Legs would just be an On or Off checkbox, but arms would have checkboxes for Right, Left, or Both. Imagine, you could make your own mini Winter Soldier by choosing to have mogging only cover one arm. Feet and hands would always be mechaincal though.

Mad Scientist Laugh
This one is probably not possible since it would require bringing the voice actors back, but the Mechagomes have a great mad scientist laugh animation, but the voice, at least for the female Mechagnome, doesn’t really match as well as it could. We could really use a real MWAHAHAHAHAHAHA! laugh.

23 Likes
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I think all of the races (especially those with the fewest options) could use a lot of love in terms of character customization.

Unfortunately, all of those efforts have been funneled into Dracthyr for this expansion.

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They need all of normal gnomes options.
This is the biggest thing to me

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Gnomes in general need some serious lovin, from lore to customization.

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Surprised they haven’t given the leper skin tone to mechagnomes yet.

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I kinda wish they’d just fully embrace the ‘mech’ aspect of Mechagnomes and make them full-on proper machines instead of the hybrid ‘prosthetics’ they went with. Being a full on robot with proper ‘hair’ and stuff would be really neat!

I’d try it out, at least…

I don’t know why Mechagnomes don’t have regular Gnome options. That’s a bit of a silly thing to me…

It’s been about 10 years since we ‘liberated’ Gnomeregan. By ‘liberate’ I mean ‘set up the Cata version of the dungeon’. That was the last bit of lore I think Gnomes received.

I wouldn’t hold your breath for that to change…

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I have another one for your list: they need the other tints of their heritage armor (which are already in the base files) to be available, just like the Mag’har get theirs. Mechagnomes have three distinct cosmetic themes and their currently available heritage armor only matches one of them.

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I support all of this, but the cynical part of me says they will never change Mechagnomes, and just used them as an excuse to create precedent for so much armor not showing up on a race, since Dracthyr are basically going to launch with the exact same problems.

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Just curious, why would you expect leper gnome skin to be a mechagnome customization when it’s not a regular gnome customization.

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Technically you can make a Leper Gnome Death Knight already, they have the green skin option.

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Technically that’s a death knight skin, not a leper gnome.

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I fully support you getting more customizations.

However, there is no amount of customizations that would entice me to play a gnome.

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What? Gnome’s just got new lore in BFA with the heritage armor quest.

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If an Ironforge Dwarf with tattoos is a Wildhammer Dwarf, then a green skinned Gnome is a Leper Gnome.

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Lepers eventually completely decay, without some sort of enhancement they’d be stuck with an unrealistic shelf life.

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Like the ones hanging out in front of Gnomeregan that have been there for a VERY long time?

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Interesting. However playable mechagnomes hail specifically from Mechagon. They’re not just any gnome that has mechanical bits. And I’m not aware of any leper gnomes in Mechagon. Correct me if I’m wrong.

With that said, Blizzard did incorporate Wildhammer customization options for Ironforge dwarves, as someone else pointed out, so maybe nothing matters anymore.

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The toxic sludge in the airfield are them in a few days/weeks/months, unspecified ingame.

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Nice to see another passionate member of the Mechagnome crowd.

I have a thread for our customizations myself.

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ou would a saronite mechagnome hear old god whispers?

1 Like