Lack of Man'ari Customization

Community General Discussion
21

I couldn’t agree more. They definitely leaned way too hard into this as the expansions rolled out, which disconnected them almost completely from Draenor/Outland. Especially odd when in older Draenei dialog they still consider Draenor to be an ‘ancestral homeland’ to them… and their main motivation for joining the Alliance in the first place was so they’d have allies in retaking and rebuilding their civilization on Draenor.

But hey, I guess it’s kind of a pattern for Blizzard’s portrayal of the Draenei. Written consistently inconsistent, and whatever we are given is usually given in marginal amounts and leaving a lot to be desired.

Feel like Blizzard has always struggled with what they wanted out of the Draenei, never really felt like they had a solid grasp or idea on how they wanted them to play out or even appear aesthetically. Like, as an example look at their accents. In TBC the accents of the Draenei were all over the place, felt like every V.A. had a different idea for what they were trying to do…

2 Likes
22

Give them an inch…

1 Like
23

The fel scar skins are probably being saved for when the demon hunter class gets proliferated is my guess.

24

You play manari guilt Manari, not the actual cool demonic ones.

You play the ones that were ordered at gun point to kill all life on this planet and cry themselves to sleep every night

25

The accents are all over the place, yeah. In MG I chalk it up to regional differences, which is definitely not what Blizzard was going for but…what can you do, I guess. The best thing draenei have going for them is from a community of invested artists and theorycrafters, which is kind of bleak from Blizzard’s side given they came out in TBC.

With Man’ari, I’m pretty worried for the state of our Heritage. The idea of the disparate Eredar factions rejoining to form one big civilization together would be a bit more compelling if not for the lack of a cohesive identity. Since WOD, Lightforged feel like “draenei, but draeneier”, and krokul got passed up entirely despite being more emblematic of the forgotten TBC concept art by Blizz.

2 Likes
26

You just described my life

1 Like
27

“here’s a little something for you guys,”

Players:

2 Likes
28

Lightforged Draenei do so little with the idea that they might as well not exist. They should have a similar level of Light “mutations” as Fel-blooded Man’ari have in demonic corruption.

Wings, of course. Crystal horns. Floating crystal horns. Floating geometric crystal horns! Like they’re so filled with Light they’re they’re taking on Naaru-like properties.

Glowing hands, glowing hooves. Glowing scars! Metalic gold and silver skin-tones.

As it stands right now, a Lightforged draenei has very little going for them. A very limited color pallet. Very few things that the normal draenei can’t imitate or flat-out pull off better.

They have nice hair and crests. That’s about it.

The normal draenei should get customization that reflect that this is a refugee culture. After the fall of Shattrath it was how many years of living in hiding? Then the Exodar crash? These should be a people in technological decline and that should be reflected in their garb.

Scars. Lots of scars. A draenei could be a survivor of several attempted genocides in their life time. War paint and tattoos. Lots of leather/hide/textiles in their armor as well as scuffed and cracked glowing crystals.

Forget Argus. You have a young generation of Draenei that look at the Ruins of Shattrath like “We built THIS? I grew up in a mushroom.”

3 Likes
29

Fell tattoos like DHs would be nice. Also, new horn designs and horn jewelry. Oh, and a forked tip tail.

2 Likes
30

Exactly, it’s baffling to me how Blizzard has stripped away so much of the Draenei’s connection with Draenor when realistically there’d be multiple generations of Draenei that would have no connection to Argus at all.

Initially, it seemed that Blizzard did portray the Draenei as having very little connection to Argus, having a more heavy emphasis on the importance of Draenor to their people. To the point wherein quest text they emphasize how most Draenei don’t even know of Argus’ existence per TBC quest text:
www.wowhead,com/tbc/quest=9693/what-argus-means-to-me

From what we understand, over the course of the expansions Blizzard has consistently lowered the amount of years that the Draenei had lived on Draenor. From 5,000 down to 2,000 to 200, and in some sources merely 20 years before the opening of the Dark Portal (this becomes increasingly ridiculous when you take into consideration that they’ve built an entire civilization in that amount of time).

Also really weird considering Draenor is literally named after them.

But going back to the initial point, there’s a sorefully underutilized aesthetic that they could’ve used within this understanding. Their shamanistic connections being one of the many opportunities Blizzard has had to express something wholly unique with the Draenei.

That, and of course the initial theming of being a race of exiles in hiding whilst in diaspora from their fallen civilization on Draenor. Lots of aesthetic potential there when you consider the idea of them piecing together their former holdings, traditions, and lifestyles whilst in that diaspora.
An example of a customization option that could emphasize this, like you said, could be stuff like scars, war paint, shamanistic or ritual tattoos.

I do hope that they actually go for something like this in their heritage armor (if they ever get one), instead of opting for the LF heritage armor but purple…
Something more along the lines of this:
static.wikia.nocookie,net/wowpedia/images/6/6f/Playable_Draenei.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20200618152517

Another oddity among Draenei customization is that there’s barely any customization surrounding jewelry. No earrings, nor piercings, nothing beyond a head circlet and the minor customization we’ve been given surrounding tendril-rings. Very odd considering Draenei are supposed to have a strong connection with jewelry, to the point where they have an actual racial passive in the game to emphasize this connection.

31

Neither of the skin colors we got are Off-Brand to the Manari.

They just lack Fel Scars.

They did though?

Techncially all Draenei are Eredar. Draenei and Manari are just Offshoot names for the different factions and in a way races of Eredar. So they’d need to include Manari in the Eredar Name or it doesn’t fit.

32

I think he just means the older Man’ari skin textures from Legion, for whatever reason.
The ones with large fel etchings on their skin and cracks on their hooves.
I personally don’t like the look of them at all and way prefer the ones we actually got as customization options, but having the option doesn’t hurt I guess.

Originally there was definite biological differences between the two, but post-WoD and Legion we’ve learned that Draenei are the same as pre-Legion Eredar etc.

Don’t really have an issue with the actual in-game race name still being ‘Draenei’, think this is mostly a non-issue and changing it doesn’t really add anything but confusion within quest text.

I also think it’s completely possible that Eredar biology works similarly to Orcs wherein wielding or being around fel influences skin color. Orcs turn green and some Eredar turn red. But that’s mostly speculative headcanon than anything concrete, just a simple handwavy way to say that there’s no real need to change the race name.

1 Like
33

Imagine, if you will, a game that is made to be fun…

Where, when you’re told that you can make man’ari, you can make man’ari… and not some random off-brand version.

I don’t understand it at all. The skin tones and fel scars EXIST in the game. The winged models EXIST in the game.

We literally have 1.5 races that have wings already (Dracthyr and dps Demon Hunter demon form).

There would be no harm in giving us a cool thing, instead of giving us something terrible.

34

It’s more about the STRONG red color. The single red skin tone we got looks almost orange to me. =/

I essentially wish to re-create Kil’jaeden. And there’s no reason that we shouldn’ tbe able to. We already have one winged race already. Allowing man’ari a winged version (for those who want wings) wouldn’t break the game.

Perhaps it may make some people reroll their human or high elf into something else.

35

I can see why they didn’t add winged options. I feel like Blizzard mostly saves that for cosmetic back/cape options rather than racial customization.

I also think that kind of thing would be taking customization a little too far, but that’s just my personal opinion.

Maybe for Draenei DHs, if that were to ever happen.

Not models that are attached to the actual Draenei model, mind you.
The winged Eredar are either using special unobtainable items or they’re using an entirely different model.

2 Likes
36

The fel scar options don’t have face options, so they’re not player ready, even if a bit closer than most things

The winged models aren’t player ready in the slightest so you’d be even more limited than a dracthyr with that model, because dracthyr can at least wear tabards. The winged eredar can’t.

2 Likes
37

I wasn’t aware that they were that different. So far I only know of the female winged man’ari which to me look like any other female eredari and kil’jaeden.

Kil’jaeden certainly looks different than other male eredari, but I think that a game that is based around RPG and lore and choosing different races for their aesthetics aught to be able to put the work in to make the game the very best it can be.

At this point, I have no desire to make a man’ari due to them not looking like the man’ari that I know.

I mean, it is ridiculous. Do you know that we still cannot make a Dark Iron dwarf with the Dark Iron NPC dwarf skin tone?

Why wasn’t that included?? It is, in my opinion, the best dark iron skin tone, because while it is definitely a coal/obsidian skin tone, it also has some flesh tones to it.

38

The only issue I see with wings is the next want is to be able to fly. And that becomes a whole new issue if suddenly a look for a race gave them a whole new racial ability when you don’t get it if you don’t choose that look.

39

I would have liked it if we had more Man’ari options like Huge Bulk Option, Fel Cracked Skin Tunes, and more. Red Skin and Green Eyes just isn’t really Eredar.

1 Like
40

Something, something mouse. Something, something cookie.

1 Like