Watch from min 3:20. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TAzgZtQazWQ
Before I begin my rant, a little background on Ion:
Before he was hired by Blizzard back in 2008, Ion used to send coding and written strategy tactics to the developers for raid mechanics. He was exceptional in this field and proved very intelligent in that, which lead to his eventual recruitment. He worked in raid boss design and mechanics, class design and balancing, and maintaining the WoW achievement system. This was fine and he did a lot of good work whilst employed in these subjects.
Until he got promoted to Game Director for WoW. And then he began to extend an uninspired, very strict and underwhelming mentality on matters with which he had zero connection in his previous work. Such as LORE. Making unnecessary comments about how simple it is to just play a Blood elf if you wanna be a fair, blue eyed elf⌠which admits a huge disconnect from the community concerning that topic.
Then he interfered in the design of Void elves in Legion, leading to a great amount of gatekeeping with not allowing them to be DHs or Palas, and insisting in keeping them blue. This went on for a few years until they realised the ridiculousness of these restrictions.
Now, weâve gone from him seeming positive to the idea of lifting class /race restrictions, to backtracking 100 steps and saying there are no plans for anymore expansion of these.
And letâs be honest, the Horde benefitted much more from the class/race combos added in DF. Itâs easily seen by having a quick look at char creation. Instead, they are investing even MORE time on the DrakthyrâŚ
They wonât come out and say it, but the obvious truth is that theyâve added all the class/race combos that take no effort and all thatâs left are the ones theyâd actually have to make new art assets for. So theyâre stopping, or at least drastically slowing down.
Itâs not that you canât come up with a concept for a mechagnome druid. Itâs that nobody would play a mechagnome druid, because mechagnomes are stupid, so why bother wasting time making custom forms for them?
I think the most likely scenario is that making the animations for dracthyr to be other classes is time consuming and bothersome for them, and now they just dont want to put in the work for the other races to get new classes as well.
Step 2 - Use those rad robot animals as Druid forms for Mechagnomes.
Step 3 - Reuse those rad robot animals as Mech Pets for Hunters.
Step 4 - Buff Mech Pets and make them the best Pet Family.
Step 5 - Profit
We might see something like that in the Last Titan. If we fight Titan stuff, we may end up fighting lots of robots, which would make a great excuse to make all sorts of robot models, including some animal shaped robots.
Brother, the community is not connected to these sorts of things. Lore is a very niche concern, believe it or not. I know thatâs hard to believe in a place like these forums where the majority are very casual players. But, believe it or not, wow has a huge amount of semi hardcore players. Most people donât watch a single cutscene the entire campaign because they want to get to max level as fast as humanly possible.
He didnât back track, he just said itâs not happening in the immediate future, they never gave us a timeframe. We still donât know what the big features of Midnight or the Last Titan will be, so it could very will be theyâre holding out until then.
He didnât say there are no plans ever though. He just said itâs harder for certain race/class combos to be added that fit with the lore. Doesnât mean it wonât be done. Just means theyâll take steps to make certain concepts feel more normal. I mean just look at the number of negative reactions there were to the presence of a void elf paladin npc recently. But over time it will feel less unfathomable. Or more fathomable? Either one.
When they need a âI winâ button, thatâs when we will see races open up to more classes, worgens get a tail option, and more racial model features like hair styles, etc.
Right now there is no reason to put in the extra legwork, when people will be focusing on the new zones, devles, raids and dungeons. I mean they even are tossing in a new battle ground, lol.
I think if they truly needed a panic button, they would of made Tuskarr a playable race. Itâs a win. Iâve known players that would come back to the game just to okay Tuskarr. But they obviously didnât need it.
Over my years of WoW, Iâve found that thereâs only one thing that makes or breaks a Raceâs popularity:
Physical attraction.
Every popular race is either conventionally attractive to mainstream audiences (like the Elves) or at least extremely attractive to a large enough non-mainstream niche audience (like Orcs and Vulpera).
I donât think thereâs enough of a target audience for the Tuskarr. They may have a dedicated fanbase (every race does), but the question is: Is that fanbase large enough?
There is nothing new to fit, that doesnât already fit with the current game. An entire races cultured doesnât need to be changed to make the class/race combos work.
Well if his statement means anything like âânot for another 2 years at least famââ then thatâs not good enough. Void elf Paladins and DHs shouldâve been released some 7 years ago along with their Legion launch. I still find it incredibly shocking they were not. Imagine not letting a race that shares the exact same model with Blood elves not have access to the same classes as they do. I donât care how lore unfriendly Void elf paladins wouldâve been, itâs even more offensive to gatekeep Void elf players in this way. And had they used their brain and given us some void effects along with Paladins and DHs, people would think itâs super cool. But no. Always the bare minimum and less.
