Indeed. Players might not know what is “best” for them mechanically at all times, but aesthetically and narratively? Listen to the people on those fronts.
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Yeah… thats what I don’t ever understand. It wouldn’t cost them very much to have expanded AR’s to at least the races/sub races that have already joined each faction and would have given no need for any explanations for why they did. Its aesthetics for the most part and its things that would make players happy allowing us to actually play the races we want to. Its… so frustrating.
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Getting that “High Elf” tag (or Wildhammer, Dragonmaw, or whatever else) would go so far in cementing additions that seem to be half-measures that satisfy no one.
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It has been some time since the whole Earthen announcement, and after thinking on it, the biggest problem I have with them is that Wildhammer Dwarves and Frostborn were either given the short end of the stick or completely forgotten.
Wildhammer Dwarves in particular are a pretty important race to the Alliance, being part of it since the old RTS games, to the point where one of their heroes has a statue right outside Stormwind.If there was going to be a third Dwarf race, it should have been Wildhammer Dwarves on Alliance, especially given that their culture is completely different from the Bronzebeard Dwarves. Instead, they get relegated to being the poster child of several of the issues that come with Customization Races while Bronzebeard Dwarves get to skip around cosplaying and LARPing as them.
Frostborn are also part of the Alliance now, but have since been ignored and forgotten about. I don’t know if they’ll play a role in the Last Titan, but they deserve better than that.
If Wildhammer Dwarves were already a full Alliance race, something was done with Frostborn Dwarves to be playable somehow, and likely if we worked with the Earthen some before their Allied Race status was announced, I feel like things would go a bit better. I’d be a bit more receptive to them in that case to be honest.
As it stands, Wildhammer Dwarves get the lame Customization Race treatment, Frostborn get ignored, and we have a little over a year of looking at what amounts to staring at edited Dark Iron Dwarf models with gems stabbed into them that disappear when wearing almost any piece of armor while trying to imagine Dwarves on the Horde. It’s frustrating all around.
I don’t want to give Blizzard the wrong idea about our complaints. A lot of us do want to see variants of existing races, which have their own identity and culture much different from other races, as their own race. I’m a huge supporter of San’layn, Taunka, and Kelfin as full playable races, for example. And certainly, I’m not against brand new races to Warcraft becoming playable, as many races were new at one point to the game.
But Earthen just have a number of issues I mentioned before here and elsewhere that just fall flat as the sole new race announcement. And I hope that new playable races going forward are focused on ones people have been asking for in general for years and such as opposed to having new variants of existing ones taking priority over them for the sake of it.
I’m sure I could go on in yet another thesis paper, but I don’t think I have the energy to keep going all grumble grumble over it. Earthen are a thing and I know there are a few people looking forward to them, which is perfectly fine. I still hope Wildhammer Dwarves get better treatment and Frostborn Dwarves also get treated better than being forgotten about, even if those chances seem to dwindle more and more as time goes on.
All the above is in my own personal opinion of course.
5 Likes
More of the same.
The sour taste for me chiefly stems from a disregard for continuity. Not that these new races contradict continuity - they simply demonstrate how little value is placed upon it. It is difficult to get invested in the cultures of, well, anything now when we know they’re going to be forgotten as soon as we require the next reputation bar.
We constantly encounter races that fill the exact same niche as one that came before. Instead of revisiting and actually progressing these stories, we are subjected to a retelling that we already know won’t matter as soon as the next patch drops.
I think the Maruuk Centaur were a victim of this trend. Their entire narrative was simply world-building, spending an entire zone’s worth of narrative potential fleshing out a culture that ceased to matter when we entered the Azure Span. It’s not that I didn’t like that race or culture - I simply can’t get invested in that depth of world-building when I know there will never be a payoff for that investment.
This. I find myself unable to enjoy the idea of the Earthen, whom on their own are a great race and I don’t want to devalue, who have the exact same story as our Dwarves already have but in shorter timeframe and I assume Blizzard will have it show something to our own dwarves… but then they’re neutral randomly… which makes fine sense, given they’re NOT our dwarves, but like…
If you were going to do the same exact story over again… Why not finally just give players the Wildhammer as an AR? If you were doing a different story then I’d get it. Earthen different thing different story neutral. Great. But its the same exact War of Three Hammers storyline done in short form.
With the same exact clan setups. Its really frustrating that Blizzard would choose that rather than fullfill a fan request for ages.
Imagine they’d instead had us meet these Earthen, left them for a later expansion AR slot for both sides and started the Expansion with Wildhammer for the Alliance and Ogres for the Horde or Dragonmaw for the Horde to keep with another “copy past” race for both sides.
We’d have the attachment to the new races the lore to push them forwards… and we could have the Earthen be their own thing with their own story that isn’t a literal repeat…
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I fully expected them to just throw us some skins and call it good like they have been doing…least effort and such, so I was a bit surprised when they announced them as a full allied race, which is what people have been wanting of all of the skin additions lately. Wish they’d just stick to one, do proper allied races with all the expected effort and customizations.
Wildhammer definitely deserved it, as well as Man’ari and Dark Fallen.
3 Likes
Just give me a wildhammer drooid dorf and I’ll be happy.
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(Shamanism of the Dragonmaw - by wawtman)
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Wildhammer and the Dragonmaw should have been Allied Races long ago… not to mention that the Wildhammer should have been used as a player race option if Blizzard wanted to add another dwarf…
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I have a name picked out for my Wildhammer druid, whenever everyone get druids. Since I don’t have open character slots, I’ll probably use that name for my earthen so I can unlock the heritage set for them.
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I’m still waiting to finally get Dragonmaw Orc skins for regular Orcs 
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Really surprised they haven’t yet honestly.
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I also wanted to see Mok’nathal Orcs too as well.
I thought it was established that Blizzard wouldn’t give a Wildhammer dwarf race based on simply giving Customizations to the standard ones. Much like High elf customization to Void elves.
Not to sound mean but we gotta make do with what we are given.
You know, as much as I prefer full races over customization races, given the treatment they’ve gotten, I’d be fine with Dragonmaw Orcs as a customization race for regular Orcs provided they and other Customization Races get better treatment. Examples are a presence in-game and storylines and you can get referred to as being from the Dragonmaw Clan when applicable, among other things I’ve harped on many times in other threads.
In fact, I recently rerolled that Orc Mage I linked many posts ago to a Tauren Mage recently, but I managed to restore an old Orc Warrior with a new name and went through the Orc heritage armor questline representing the Dragonmaw Clan again. I think I’d change him to a Dragonmaw Clan Orc if that was a customization race option.
Guess we’ll see if the Dragonmaw Clan ever gets a bigger role in the future someday.
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Sure but that was before they decided to make an exact replica of the entire story of the three clans of Dwarves with a new group of Earthen.
There are no rules to what they make an AR or customization or not or when. So we ask for what we actually want in the hopes that they’ll one day actually give what players are requesting rather than randomness.
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Not to throw wet towels on the idea, but both of these races already are in game. Orcs can pledge to the Dragonmaw, and Wildhammer are regular Dwarves with Tattoos. I’d just broaden the customizations and give them the Tattooes and colorations you ask for.
As for Races…?
Ogres for both sides would work best. I could see some Alliance NPCs making ties to surviving Gorian Ogres, who are very civilized and while the Horde brings in the Stonemaul Clan as the counter. This solves the whole “One race for one, another for another” thing Blizzard seems to be avoiding now.
As for Earthen… Same deal as Dark Iron. Not really a fan of a third group of Dwarves, but hey… They aren’t Elves?
Dwarves with tattoos is not what a Wildhammer is.
They’re supposed to be taller and leaner than their cousins and have more tan and darker earthy colored hair for one. For another their racials should be very different, and their culture is far more different than even the differences between Ironforge and Shadowforge dwarves.
Sillyness to claim they’re just dwarves with tattoos.
The Dragonmaw (and blackrock by extension) are still not available. Their skin tones and eye colors are still locked from players let alone the differences in the cultures. Honestly if the Mag’har are enough or the Earthen then neither of these races are out of play.
Ogres are Horde and have been since before WoW launched. They should remain so.
4 Likes