San’layn/vampyr Elf ALLIED RACE Coagulated Megathread of Ideas{Re-VAMPed} (Part 1)

I want a vampire Mechagnome! It only drinks diesel fuel.

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It would be nice to have that as an option.

I miss the old wc2 Death Knights. Can do without the scepters.

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Honestly I’d love it if we just got staves as an option too.

Plenty of good ones for that. Personally not my thing for a scepter though. That said I don’t think my personal preference should keep anyone from using such a thing. Especially if we’re trying for a WC2 experience.

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Also, I do wish we could get some proper cloaks about our shoulders, even if it looks horrible when animated. The bathroom towel capes have never looked good.

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So it has been awhile since I last posted in here. I opted to take some time to digest over the whole Darkfallen as a customization race unlock thing and wanted to get my feelings put together.

The implementation of Darkfallen as a customization race for Blood Elves isn’t a bad idea in of itself. The idea of customization races can work and even give some different tribes or clans of races a chance to become playable that they wouldn’t before, even with the allied race system.

However, the way Darkfallen were implemented is…less than stellar in my own personal opinion. Being tied to one skin with one set of eyes attached is one of the main problems, but there is also the idea of identity. Darkfallen at present just get treated as LARPing Blood/Night/Void Elves, with no changes in voice, racials, and the like. There isn’t so much any reaction that you’re an undead elf as a result. It ultimately feels hollow when playing my Darkfallen, as if something is not quite right (no illusions involved).

In a way, being referred to as a Blood/Night/Void Elf isn’t incorrect, but it’s like referring to Forsaken as Human. What makes a Forsaken a Forsaken goes away if they were 100% treated as Humans and referred to as such. Not to mention that Forsaken don’t need to breathe underwater, but the Darkfallen Elves still can drown. Of which is a treatment I worry about happening to Kelfin, should they ever become a customization option for Goblins.

Something I will say that I did like was during the questline to unlock Darkfallen skins, there was something that felt like the Darkfallen would have a presence in the future. Something that Wildhammer Dwarves, another casualty in the lackluster treatment of Customization races, didn’t get. Instead, they got plastered on a PowerPoint slide and then quietly shoved in-game without much fanfare.

Of course with the Darkfallen, there is unfortunately no San’layn present and standing with the Darkfallen. A big disappointment since San’layn are now classified as a sub section of Darkfallen, with their own vampiric features. Sure, I could dress my Blood Elf as a San’layn, but it ultimately just feels empty when it really just feels like I’m playing as a Blood Elf. Especially since it wasn’t shown that any San’layn were part of the Horde.

Furthermore, as a customization race, any vampiric features aren’t really there. No bat form, no blood-related racials, no vampire specific customization options. Instead, it just feels a bit like getting some goth looking toy from the dollar store and trying to pretend it was a vampire.

While I feel that it could still be possible to see San’layn as their own race, complete with their own spot on the character creation screen, it feels like the chances of that have gone down dramatically with the Darkfallen skin. At best, maybe we could see some more customization options with maybe some San’layn shown to be part of the Horde now, but that remains to be seen whether or not the Darkfallen skin is a “one and done” thing that may or may not see updates in the future. Hard to know what direction things could go.

While I still think it’s good to continue to give feedback and overall general support for San’layn, even if it is for customization options, I will admit that it has gotten harder for me to do so given how Darkfallen have been treated as a skin. As I’ve said before, if somehow I ever got on the Community Council, an issue I would bring up would be Customization Races and how they could be better treated and implemented. After all, characters are one of the biggest important features of a MMORPG, and no race that becomes playable should feel hollow and like a parent race cosplaying instead.

My posts in this megathread may slow down a bit until I think of something more to contribute. I still hope to see San’layn as their own race somehow, but if their destiny is just that of a customization race, then I still hope they’ll have a presence within the Horde at least with being part of the Darkfallen faction within. Should we see San’layn as their own race, I’ll happily reroll the one I made into a real one.

I hope people continue to give feedback on Darkfallen and playable Horde San’layn in general. They and other customization races deserve better. :wine_glass::bat:

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Fallynn, you still alive?

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She is, she just doesn’t use the forums anymore, she’s also not playing WoW at all currently and hasn’t for quite a few months now.

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It would be nice if they could further develop more customizations for darkfallen. Such as… undead voices, more customization, jokes/dances.

The way bodytypes got renames made me wonder if we can just add undead bodytypes for all the elves that got darkfallen and nightborne. At this point. Each body type in dragonflight already has its own unique customization.

I do not see why this could not apply to stuff like kul tirans with adding the stormwind human body types for example and keeping the racials and voicelines.

Adding bodytypes in this way could also give access to forsaken having stuff like the undead night elf model and still being forsaken. But new voicelines would be nice if we were to add new bodytypes to existing races. For blood elves that could mean getting a whole darkfallen bodytype which I would like and have unique voice lines/dances/ and undead customizations.

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Creating a dk on classic has reminded me on what a missed opportunity it was not to recruit San’layn into the Horde.

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This is really something that needs to be done across the board for everything.
I keep saying there should be a small dev team dedicated to just customization, that being adding races, character customizations, maybe even working out new classes (there’s a few that should have been added by now), maybe even some of the class skin ideas for all classes for all races.
Maybe an overhaul of the character creator to work in multiple subraces/allied races. Fix the problem of some not being races instead of customizations by adding voices and such.

Voice sets could be used to choose your in-game label.
Pick a human, but a voice set with a gilnean voice set, you’re now a “gilnean human”.
dwarf with a wildhammer voice set, then pick proper talents, “wildhammer dwarf”

So much more could be done.

Darkfallen could easily have been an allied race that covered both san’layn and dark rangers.

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Bumping this thread because I came back from a long hiatus. Glad to have my meager dark ranger customizations but quite angry the alliance got it. Oh well.

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Happy October everyone! One of my favorite months for somewhat obvious reasons. :jack_o_lantern:

As you can see above, I have something of a San’layn transmog going for my San’layn character. It isn’t perfect, as his hair seems to go through different parts of the helm. I may have to experiment with hair styles sometime to see if I can minimize that.

I may also try to share some stuff to celebrate Halloween throughout the month like I normally do. Maybe some screenshots with my San’layn character as well. As disappointed as I am that they’re not a full race, I’m still hoping to see them officially part of the Horde by being part of the Darkfallen, even if it seems more likely to just see them as customization options.

Whatever everyone’s plans are this month, I hope you have a fun, happy, and safe October! :wine_glass::bat:

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Happy October my friend!

I love this mog. Thats so awesome!

Still waiting for Blizzard too…

Separate the eyes from the skintone!
Give more dead skin tone options for other skin colors!
Allow the eyes on death knights!
Give more San’layn options like claws, fangs, ears and scars!

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I’ve mentioned before that I feel that it’s still important to give feedback when it comes to playable San’layn, and I figured with a new month, I’d share the little guide I made on how to do in-game suggestions.

At the beginning of each month, I usually send in-game feedback for each of the races I want to see and refer to their megathreads on here for more information. I figure it can only help to gain some interest in our requests of what we’d like to see, though no guarantees it’ll lead to that ever becoming a reality.

If you’re interested in doing something similar, I made a guide in the following post that explains how to do it in steps:

With San’layn, it’s a bit tricky since Darkfallen are a customization race, but it’s worth a try to send in some in-game suggestions for them. Even if it would be for customization options.

I’m still hopeful that customization races in general would get better treatment, and that San’layn would officially be inducted into the Horde also. Preferably as their own race, even if the chances of that seem to have dwindled sadly.

Regardless, I continue to support playable Horde San’layn as best as I can. :wine_glass::bat:

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I was conflicted with this. But I do have a bunch of void elves. They tend to do bettter with stuff like hairstyles.

It is a shame though they did not let the san’layn join the horde. And the dark ranger only working on a pale white skin tone and not the others.

On the other hand my void elf monk is rocking a nice mogs with the red monk sets from legion.

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Very nice!

I personally don’t feel like they’ve given us the San’layn yet. Their interest was to give Dark Rangers to both sides as a treat it seems. Not even really all that well. Locking the eye color to one skin and such.

Theres so much more they could do.

Like such!

Give us more San’layn options Blizzard! (or give us an AR finally) :wine_glass: :bat:

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Bat ears, bigger fangs, abilities to shapeshift into spiders and bats. Those are all things that still need implemented for sure. Dark Ranger doesn’t cover it.

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I honestly wonder why they even did that. Like, surely it was more effort to tie the colors to each other, because I’m pretty sure that they were already their own separate colors before this [when they were just NPC options]. Like what was even the point of that? It’s like they put in more time to just give us less options, or something.
It doesn’t even make sense ‘lore-wise’ because you can still have a normal, lively looking skin color as a DK while having the blue glowing eyes. Plus, they didn’t even give the DR options to DKs, which also… doesn’t make sense. >.>

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The cynical part of me says they did it that way so later when they untie the eyes from the skin tone they’ll be applauded for the low effort that they should have done to begin with.

Like the jewelry for example that shouldn’t be locked to only the female model for Blood Elves, if they unlock it later they can act like they did something and be applauded for the low effort.

But that’s me side eyeing blizzard at this point.

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Honestly I can’t blame anyone for side eyeing Blizzard like that these days.

Most everyone has some reason to feel a little miffed at em. Between the unequal treatments of customizations to poking fun at long requested additions to even simple things like making the game more friendly towards the players time.

Couple things like that with the lack of communication and yeah… Its worth keeping a cautious eye on what Blizzard is up to.

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