I have played the wildhammer options as a female dwarf love them to bits. And dark iron is like my favorite alliance race next to dranei. So I am excited for horde dwarves, but I will have to see the customization.
Earthen should have lightning eyes would be so cool and that would make them more distinct besides the earthen gems and rock skin. At least I hope they consider adding that.
Lightning effects in their hair would be cool too. Love lightning magic; I play a shaman after all : )
It would be a cool time for them to show up.
They are definitely going to show up in The Last Titan in some fashion since it takes place in Northrend.
They could be involved in the leadups to that Xpac as it makes since to use San’layn to jump from the “Elf” Xpac to the Northrend Xpac.
Yeah, I think it should be changed.
I think they are treating San’layn as THE wow vampire which is odd since we’ve seen none San’layn vampires/vampirates.
A side benefit of reuniting the elves is that they represent every cosmic power.
Light-Blood Elves
Fel- Fel Blood
Death- San’layn
Void- Void Elves
Arcane- Nightborne
Life- Night Elves
This is what gives me the tiniest of hope.
Just wanted to say that there ain’t no way that some fancy looking text in a Times New Dwarven font is going to deter me from supporting my Elvish Vampires for my preferred faction. -harumph-
Making some big posts in other megathreads on some aspects of the recent announcements, but I’ll get to here as soon as I can. 
–Still dreaming of playable Horde San’layn as a full race! 
Imagine if there was a whole San’layn/Vampire faction/dungeon/raid in the Northrend Revisit.
Like Ultigrad got took over or something and was goth-ed up.
Not really in context to the thread, but a cool idea I had.
I know I had my disagreements in the past, but can I come to support for the San’layn for the Horde AR?
Well, Blizzcon has come and gone, and surprisingly, there is a bit of renewed hope for San’layn, albeit with tempered expectations of course. I thought I would go over a few things of interest from the announcements.
First off, we got three expansion announcements, which is an odd thing to type out. They are as follows:
This is the next expansion, which doesn’t seem like much of San’layn interest since we’re going to mostly be underground. Also has the Earthen as a neutral Allied Race, which I grumble grumbled about a few posts up if you want to read what I think of them. The only new thing on them to say is that they can be all classes except Druids, Demon Hunters, and Evokers currently.
This one is raising some eyebrows since there is a mention of uniting “elf tribes.” I’m hoping that it will be existing groups of Elves that we unite, which should include San’layn of course since they were former Blood Elves.
And as mentioned before, they do have resistance to the Void as an undead race, so they could very much be of help. However, it’ll be awhile before we get any details, but I’ll help to report on it whenever more info gets revealed.
And another big one to raise eye brows, since this expansion is going to involve a return back to Northrend in some fashion. I have no idea if it is a brief return and then going to another area of Blizzard is just going to revamp the whole continent for an expansion, with Bronze Dragons offering their services as a time surfing uber ride between time periods. Hard to know, since this expansion is even further than the other two from coming out.
Another thing to point out is that we have some missing Blood Princes (Atherann and Theraldis) that could play a role, and while Blood-Princess Thal’ena is killable in that Violet Hold dungeon in Dalaran, I don’t know officially in lore if she is dead or still in that jail cell, so maybe she could also play a role as well.
There is quite a lot of potential if we can work with the San’layn again in any of the upcoming expansions. I’m hoping that would be the case as opposed to them just being villain batted again with all the depth and tact of a glob of spit on the floor.
With that said about the expansions, a couple of points I wanted to talk about are below:
-Death Knights-
Earthen are the first playable race since Shadowlands that can be Death Knights, and since we’ll be meeting them for the first time next expansion, it means that it is still very possible for Death Knights to raise more of their kind. Makes me wonder if they’ll change the Shadowlands starting area to bring it up to speed with what happened with Bolvar and add Earthen and other playable races to the area.
What this means is that we should be able to expect almost any new playable race (assuming we don’t get a “Dracthyr can only be Evokers” type of race again) in the future to be Death Knights! And since San’layn were around when Death Knights were made, it would be rather silly to not let them be that class if they’re able to be their own race.
I’ll be sure to report on what all is done with Earthen Death Knights whenever they are available to create. Will be very interesting to see what is done…
-Allied Race System-
Yep. The Allied Race system from BfA wasn’t a BfA exclusive feature at all, which I’m honestly happy for as it does open the door for some races to become playable that isn’t the nightmare that is having them becoming Customization Races, which I assume will continue to be a thing for worse or worse, if you know my opinions on the treatment of Customization Races.
Now, despite Darkfallen being a Customization Race, I do still feel that San’layn would be unique enough to be their own race since they are vampiric as opposed to looking like Blood/Void/Night Elves who wandered into the local Hot Topic for a zombie makeover. Not to mention all the racial potential, personality, and also a potential importance if they play a role in Midnight or The Last Titan, and even both if a playable faction made their debut in Midnight.
They could function easily as an Allied Race that you need to butter up to before they get an offer to join the Horde. And as people have mentioned, given we have races like Lightforged Draenei, High Mountain Tauren, and now Earthen that don’t have a lot of differences from their parent races, I don’t see why San’layn would even be an exception because of it.
Of course, San’layn could still wind up as a Customization Race, which is better than nothing I guess, but I’m still rooting for them as a full race still, and I feel like the chances of that happening have risen. Still going to temper expectations of course, but I do feel a sense of renewed determination now than I did before.
-Neutral Races-
Speculation is that neutral races will be favored going forward, since it would mean less development costs. And with the Horde getting a variant of Dwarves (what a weird thing to type out), it’s possible that faction won’t be much of a consideration.
Now, I’m not against neutral races. In fact, several NPC races I think would work best as neutral races for various reasons, Ethereals, Sethrak, and Tuskarr being a few notable ones. However, I would hope that neutral races wouldn’t be the focus going forward.
In my own personal opinion, I feel like having a whole bunch of neutral races kinda destroys the whole faction identity thing and dilutes that feeling of Warcraft as a whole. I still view faction identity as a pretty important thing to the game, and having a whole lot of races as neutral races just makes the waters muddy to me. Moreso if you start having new races created that can be things like Alliance Tauren and Horde Gnomes, which I hope races like the Earthen would be used sparingly going forward. And even with unique races, having like 20+ neutral races just dilutes the faction identity even more.
So to be clear: neutral races are perfectly fine as long as it isn’t overused with every race and makes sense.
As for San’layn, while I still stand by my opinion that they are a Horde race, given that we have Darkfallen on the Alliance (that is still unexplained how that was accepted) and that we have Horde Dwarves (hard to really believe it as I type it), I could sorta see Neutral San’layn. Maybe some were former High Elves who want to reconnect with their people on that side or something. Who knows?
Honestly, while I still view and support them as a Horde race, if it means we get Horde San’layn in some fashion, I’d take neutral San’layn. Even if it would be weird and make the feel of factions feel very muddy.
If it were up to me, I’d give San’layn tothe Horde and Broken to the Alliance. A bit of a throwback to Blood Elves and Draenei in BC, both are afflicted with a curse ailment thing, and both could easily be Allied Races that you have to work to unlock. Just how I would personally do it, of course.
Anyway, that is all I can think of to type up for this post. Since we have some chances to see San’layn again, I do think it’s important to continue discussions, brainstorming, and so on, albeit with tempered expectations since we don’t know what exactly is being planned.
It was said that the three expansions are planned to be released before 2030 and that 20 years of planning in general for WoW was done and…man, am I really going to be spending 20 years running my megathreads and supporting others? Well, when you want something badly I guess…
Anyway, I’m planning to start continuing supporting playable Horde San’layn again. Bring up ideas, looking at stuff, writing scenarios again, and so on. I’ll also help to report on news of the upcoming expansions when we actually get announcements and so on as well.
Gotta admit, it feels good to be back in a way, and even if nothing comes from it for some reason, I’m still going to continue onward with my march in support of playable Horde San’layn. I always viewed it as a marathon than a sprint, and I fully intend to stand by the San’layn and support them to the bitter end.
The skies seem open to me, so let’s hope the San’layn fly once more! For the Horde!
–Still dreaming of playable Horde San’layn as a full race!
I saw that too…perhaps Dks will get red eyes? I still hope the Blood elves get a chance to get San’ Layn as an option, at least.
I can’t wait to roll my brand new Horde Earthen San’layn Blood Death Knight.
*cackles maniacally at all the elf lore *
Yeah this would be really cool. I really think the chokepoint in Borean Tundra, the Temple City of En’kilah, would be a cool place for that. I mean, we first met Valanar there! I dunno, I may be some huge nerd, but I just… I love that place and it’s of huge interest to me. I really hope we see it more.
I also think some San’layn having a necropolis would be really neat.
Of course! I really appreciate that too. I know I was snarky in the past and could be downright rude sometimes, so I’m definitely not free of any fault. It’s no worries. San’layn on the Horde would be really awesome (but I am bias in that)
Oh yeah, can’t believe I forgot about those too briefly. I still really, really think they should play a huge role in finding the San’layn their homes. It is an EXCELLENT plot point and it’s been lying there the entire time. I still think the ones who were searching for a home in BfA were sent from them.
I really hope they are not just relegated to the ‘evil villain’ role either like they have been.
This still baffles me to no end. And why night elves but not Nightborne were given it. I’m less annoyed about it being a thing the alliance got and more annoyed that not enough care was put into the story, and why nightborne weren’t included. Why Alliance got two races to get it, and Horde got only one…when it’s been a Horde thing 
Not to mention any who may have been turned since Wrath, which could also explain it, and why a void elf may also be San’layn. They wouldn’t be among the originals though for sure.
That would make sense. Granted, I can see either broken or high elves being made a full race and going to the Alliance. It wouldn’t make much sense to me, but I know the high elf community wants that. how they would make them distinct from Blood/void elves, I really do not know. It’s not my cup of tea nor do I have a horse in the race. Their whole shtick is that they are ‘uncorrupted’ which is basically blood elves now (I mean, blood elves have access to blue eyes, so). And that they are Alliance Thalassians (covered by void elves).
Unless they make them ‘lightning elves’ which would be admittedly neat but I don’t think that’s what the community wants and therefore, again, no ‘corruption’ or ‘magical morph’ angle.
I hope we finally get red eyes because it’s utterly crazy we don’t. I still can’t take this hero stuff seriously and it feels like yet another glyph or talent, but I could be wrong if customization proves to be extensive + they have a lot of story.
See that’s exactly why I think it should be changed 
Unless a San’layn is teaching your character that.
But it is very amusing to imagine a dwarf walking into a bar toward a bunch of elves like ‘hey thar fellow elves! HIC!’
Wow so I’ve been very out of touch (sorry for the double post but wanted to follow up on this).
Lore page:
“Following the war against the Jailer, the brothers Bronzebeard reported that the temple is still crawling with Scourge, but at least they don’t have a unified purpose to drive them out into the tundra. The necropolis Naxxanar still floats over En’kilah, but there doesn’t seem to be much going on there anymore.[1] They also reported that Taunka’le Village, a ruined taunka village near the temple, is overrun with leaderless Scourge from En’kilah.[3]”
That’s a crazy plot point right there, so much can be done with it. It’s very open, and … yeah.
Naxx(anar) as the San’layn main hub? 
This bat is cranky that San’layn aren’t playable yet and is off to find the Ruby Dream in order to see them on the Horde side of that character creation screen. It’s just a dream right now, but you can help make it a reality!
With the beginning of each month, I make in-game suggestions for each race I want to see playable along with a mention of their respective megathreads on these forums. While it is far from a guarantee of seeing our dreams come true, I do think every little bit helps, and doing it monthly I feel is reasonable and not that intrusive or annoying.
If you’re interested in doing the same for races you want to see playable, I made a little guide on how to do so in-game here:
Blizzard mentioned having 20 years of planning for WoW. Let us hope Horde San’layn are part of those plans!
–Still dreaming of playable Horde San’layn as a full race!
I need Horde San’layn 
If Northrend gets revamped to be that expansion’s area, I could see San’layn having a base like that as a place for us to go to and a quest hub.
I don’t know what the big bad would be during that expansion, but if something is going on, we likely will need all the help we can get. Maybe with Midnight, San’layn could utilize the Scourge some to help us again the void baddies and then help us on Northrend or if there is another area we go to for that expansion. Someone has to keep them in check after all, and Bolvar sure ain’t doing that again anytime soon. They can also still have some San’layn reside in the Ghostlands for the many reasons we’ve discussed in here before.
Though I do worry about San’layn getting villain batted again. It’d be fine if there were some that were going into business for themselves, but we’d also have some that wouldn’t be evil we would work with to go with it. I don’t want them all to just be made as villains just because we need something to beat up and they just happened to be right there.
I know I have a lot more to think about and discuss, but I’ll save them for future posts. Otherwise, I’d have many pages of stuff in one post to type about. 
–Still dreaming of playable Horde San’layn as a full race!
What I’m more surprised by and interested in is the info from John Hight that Quel’thalas and Northrend won’t be revamps. Sounds like they’re going to be a whole lot more in that they’ll be entire remakes of the zones at a likely larger scale. That’s pretty awesome.
" With the announcement of the second and third expansions of the Worldsoul Saga, Midnight , and The Last Titan respectively, we are going back to old zones like Quel’Thalas and Northrend as they serve new modern story purposes. Hight gave a little more details on how these new zones are being implemented while also preserving their past usage in the game, “We’re giving our world builders some free rein to expand. Those areas may be geographically larger than they were. That’ll give them more opportunities to introduce some of the smaller points of interest where you’ll have a culture or a local tribe and give them the ability to have storylines that center on that. We don’t want people to feel like, oh, wait a minute, it’s that same place I know. It’s gonna feel like the same place; it’s just that it is literally going to be a little bit larger than what you’ve experienced. Flight being much more accessible, we need to have a larger landmass for people to be able to explore.”"
So the Q&A video went up. Nothing about any requested playable races, which I expected. I tried my best to think of some questions for some of the race request megathreads, though a lot of them were far from perfect. At least there is some exposure to the concept of the race request megathreads, so hopefully that will help bring attention to our feedback at least a little bit.
However, there was something of interest I wanted to put in here:
"Clearing up any misconceptions - there’s no time travel in Midnight/The Last Titan. We recently healed the timeways in Dawn of the Infinite and have no reason to revisit that anytime soon. When Metzen said returning to the Old World, he meant seeing how familiar lands have changed and telling new stories within them. They want to ensure that future WoW storytelling keeps iconic settings relevant - we told the story of Northrend and the Lich King 15 years ago, keeping it stale and unchanging doesn’t really benefit the Warcraft universe.
So yes, we will be returning to the lands of Silvermoon, Quel’Thalas, and later Northrend - we’ll see how they’ve changed over time, expand, and reimagine them, but there’s no time travel, only moving forward. Those older spaces will also be updated to allow dynamic flying, with a seamless transition from EPL to the Ghostlands, etc."
So it does sound like we’ll see an updated Silvermoon, Eversong, and Ghostlands in the future.
I’m various curious about Ghostlands in particular, since we’ve discussed before how it would be a great place for Deatholme being a San’layn racial hub. Then with Northrend getting potentially overhauled and the whole uniting Elf Tribes thing, it’ll be interesting to see what happens.
Of course, I say all this with an open mind, as who knows what will actually happen when we get to the expansions that cover it. A lot of things are lining up for potential with San’layn getting fleshed out, but I don’t want to say it’s a surefire thing. My expectations are tempered, though my hopes are rising and shining as always.
Regardless of what does or doesn’t happen, I’m dedicated and insane enough to keep at it for now and through the next three expansions. I’ve also got a number of topics to discuss and go over, but I’ll spread them across multiple posts so I don’t have a huge wall of text for people to scroll past.
I’m sure it’ll be a bumpy road, but I’m willing to walk it and then some to help support playable Horde San’layn!
–Still dreaming of playable Horde San’layn as a full race!
I was a bit surprised at the bit about a seamless transition with EPL. If they are entirely remaking the zones I figured it’d be a separate map from the areas to the south until those are remade as well. But who knows, maybe EPL is one of the zones being remade. The watery divide south of Arathi would make a good spot. Maybe everything north of that, the whole continent section will be what is remade. Looking at it on the in-game map, it’s roughly a similar size to things like the Dragon Isles.
Ion did say it’ll have a definite 4 zones, I’d expect more like 6 when you consider there’s a couple additional zones usually added in an expansion.
I was kinda stoked to learn the zones aren’t just being updated with phasing but are getting entire remakes making them at a larger scale and bringing them up to the present. So yeah, lots can be done.
I kinda fully expect Northrend to have an underground zone in Azjol-Nerub. I wonder if some of the older zone borders will change and maybe something like Howling Fjord and Grizzly Hills would be a combined larger zone to count as one of the 4 or so.
It’ll be interesting to see how it goes.
I hope not. Cavern zones are my least favorite and the team is already making a Nerubian zone in TWW. I get fatigued with the same stuff quickly, which is why I actually disliked legion quite a bit because of fel fatigue. The same thing happened in Dragonflight. Two lava and cavernous raids in a row…. But I digress
I wouldn’t mind, I like the underground stuff.
I know back during the wrath expansion, it was said they’d have liked to have done a full zone for Azjol, so wouldn’t surprise me if they actually did it…but yeah you never know with the zones in War Within, but we’ll have an entire other expansion before we go back to Northrend and I don’t really expect any underground zones in the remake of Quel’thalas.