With almost any other race, hearing the rumors and seeing hints would be a cause of excitement, since for the majority of them, you’d know in general what you’d be getting.
With Darkfallen, however, there are a lot of things about them that causes more worry about what Blizzard would do with them. This is a big reason why I’m trying to temper expectations and not get excited until I see what we are or aren’t getting.
The first part with them is assuming that the rumor is true. That we’d be getting at least one new race of some fashion. Despite that rumor getting everything right about the Dragonflight reveal, it still isn’t a guarantee we’ll be getting anything.
There were also four allied race IDs of some kind datamined near the beginning of Shadowlands, so who knows if we’re getting more than one or just one, the latter of which makes me wonder if the Horde and Alliance variants would be separate ID’s.
The second part is that the new playable race or one of the new playable races is Darkfallen. A lot of hints seem to be pointing to something involving Tirisfal Glades, with official mentions involving the Forsaken and events, along with various things getting slowly datamined that seem very suspect. Not to mention that Calia is involved somehow and there are some encrypted files involving her and Tyrande, both of which could very well involve Darkfallen.
Seeing as the rumor is that the playable race or races would have a role as a Dragonflight preorder incentive (and was stated to specifically not be Dracthyr), I can’t imagine any other type of undead being part of it, and Darkfallen just make the most sense in multiple ways. Light based Undead have been an off and on rumor since BfA, which doesn’t make a lot of sense in this context (or any context really).
It’s also a fairly asinine idea in general:
"Ok Mr. Leetzombiedood, we’ve received your application for the Alliance, and despite Anduin’s efforts to paint the Forsaken in a better light and show them as actual people and also how you’ve retained your humanity and presented all your contributions to the Alliance while alive, we have no choice but to turn you down like the rotting filth you are and kill you on sight without question.
However, if you would go and get infused with the light through some convoluted method and come back as such, with bonus points for looking more like a human, then you’d be welcomed back into the ranks of the Alliance and have the upmost respect from all other members who won’t question your presence at all! We’ll even leave a fruit basket gift for you at the Stormwind embassy!"
Kinda doesn’t paint the Alliance in a good light, does it? Pun not intended, but I’ll roll with it.
I also can’t see Turalyon being all: “You know, the undead are being raised by some dark magic, which makes them evil monsters to be slaughtered, but what if we just take the light and raise them that way? It’s totally not evil guys!”
As you can see, there are several problems with the whole concept of Light based Undead. Light Forged/Redeemed/Bound/Themed Undead would cause more issues in various ways and doesn’t strike me as something that would cause people to hit that preorder button. If anything, I could see it causing people to hit the cancel button faster than the Road Runner after binging on pixie sticks and red bull. I wouldn’t rule them out completely, but I really don’t see them ever becoming a thing, nor should they in my own personal opinion. I personally see undead elves (specifically vampiric elves) being popular and more well received.
With regards to Covenant races, if the rumor specified four races, it would be suspect, but it only mentions one. I can’t imagine them stuffing four different Covenant races into one, and I also don’t see them just picking one in general. The whole allegedly Kyrian with Anduin in Stormwind and Forsworn in Orgrimmar thing was speculated to just be testing for something unrelated, so I don’t see much coming from it at present.
Not to mention that Anduin went into the Maw to meet with Sylvanas, so he is a bit busy. Maybe Kyrians will take him back in the future and check out Stormwind in the meantime, but it’s hard for me to imagine them being playable through that. I don’t know how Forsworn, who are suppose to rejoin with the Kyrian, would suddenly show up in Orgrimmar afterwards either, unless they’re dragging Sylvanas there for her lunch break or something. Not to mention all the hints have been relating to Blood and Night Elves in general. I can’t rule out Covenant races in the future, but for 9.2.5 specifically, I don’t quite see it.
The third part is if we do get Darkfallen, how will they be represented with regards to Dark Rangers and San’layn?
This is of course the biggest worry I have. We saw a recent classification of San’layn as a part of the Darkfallen, which Dark Rangers are also a part of. I’m worried that there may not be any San’layn representation of any sort, PC or NPC, and that San’layn would just continue to be villain batted mooks without any cause or explanation why they would act that way when they really shouldn’t, especially when compared to other undead like lichs and geists that are part of the Death Knight faction and work with them.
As I said, I don’t want to have anything at the expense of Dark Rangers, but with that new classification, it does worry me that San’layn wouldn’t be shown as part of the playable Darkfallen faction, as silly as that would be since they were the original Darkfallen. Moreso if Night Elf Darkfallen are going to be an option, in which I’d be fine with Night Elf San’layn being a thing if it meant Blood Elf San’layn would be a thing too. I don’t know if Night Elf Darkfallen would affect chances or not, however.
The uncertainty of all this is why I get more frustrated at the lack of info and all the piece-meal hints going on. We also don’t know when anything from 9.2.5 will get announced, so it causes more worry than excitement, and the longer we go, the worse it gets.
In fact, this is how I feel internally when dealing with rumors involving races I want playable that start to appear plausible:
Effectively how trying to temper my expectations are going inside my head. I really don’t want to get too excited and potentially be let down in some fashion, especially since the root of all this excitement seems to come from a rumor, albeit a potentially plausible one.
I think I covered the important parts of the whole thing. If I remember anything else, I’ll be sure to post them. I’m just hoping for the best for Dark Ranger and San’layn fans. The fact that one of my most wanted races could actually become playable is a big reason for my excitement, but it’s also a big reason for my worry of lack of San’layn representation.
I’ll continue to monitor for any other hints, datamines, and such to share here and in the Dark Ranger megathread. Let’s hope that 9.2.5’s announcement is sooner than later. 
