Maybe. But that depends entirely on what they do with them doing forward.
Speaking personally here, I have a number of disparate issues with the way Void Elves were implemented, the lack of lore basis only being one of them, but a lot of it is rooted to the fact that they have a particularly bad foundation as an AR.
What even is a Void Elf in the terms the game presents to us? What are they like? We’ve got like three entirely different angles to them at this point and none of them feel particularly committed to. Umbric is our only real window into who they even are as a people, and that’s a significant problem.
Can these be remedied with attention over time? Sure. But the void elves just being there and using purple magic during the campaign has done nothing to flesh them out as a race. Umbric’s political musings have done the most leg work, but we need a lot more than flavor text off of one dude to pick up the slack here.
I don’t doubt we’re going to see Void Elves around from here on out. We may even see a lot of them. But being reminded they exist and actually giving them any real basis for that existence are two different things. And sadly Blizzard does not have a good track record of supplying that kind of substantial screen time even to races that do get proper introductions when the expansion isn’t explicitly about them, so forgive me if I’m a bit skeptical.
Good points here. It’s what leaves me to believe that they were just aiming primarily at delivering a huge swath of new race and character options, as quickly as possible, so they trimmed the fat off the process to just get them out.
While I’m sure this has come at some lore/narrative expense, I think it’s still worth noting that as of this next pair of races (assuming Vulpera/Junker Gnomes), we’ll have doubled the races available in the game from Vanilla to Legion in the span of a single expansion.
In terms purely of player options for their character avatar in WoW, Allied Races have been huge.
While I do feel this is a totally legit take away from the system as a whole (I’m always going to fall on the side of more customization = better so I sympathize with this opinion), my issue with it is that it’s not like this is an inherent problem with ARs as a whole - the only other AR that comes even close to sharing Void Elves’ shakey foundation problem is Lightforged, and they at least had a content patch worth of introduction and multiple named NPCs with distinct personalities, although they do share the problem of not being particularly well defined as a culture.
Every other AR that has launched so far has had a proper grounding in place justifying their existence. We got to know them, there’s memorable characters we can point to, it’s a lot easier to look at them and say with confidence “oh yeah, I get what they’re about.”
Assuming the upcoming ARs are what we think they are, they’ll have similar establishment either in place or coming down the pipe (how well the gnomes will be implemented is it’s own question, but we at least know there’s supposed to be a full zone and dungeon establishing them, however any of us may feel about them).
I’m not trying to say “These ARs = good, These ARs = bad”, and there’s valid complaints to be made regarding the ones that were implemented effectively, but my point is that this can be done better, we have clear examples in the game of it happening. Hell, I want to see these problems fixed with Void Elves, they’re in the game and deserve to have solid ground in place underneath them. Barring some major content development allowing them to take center stage, however (which would involve having to come up with a lot of new NPC characters to carry the weight), I worry that ship has sailed.
Much as I hate to admit it I’m skeptical at this point that High Elves will be a thing, but a large part of people’s insistence on seeing them implemented is that this groundwork has already been done for them. When we have examples of existing ARs with such broken implementation standing next to a race that’s had foundations in place in spades, can you really blame people for being frustrated, regardless of whether or not you share that want?
Include the Silver Covenant, Vereesa and the elves of Allerian Stronghold in the search for Umbric in Ghostlands.
When stepping into Telogrus, Alleria is escorted by the allerian elves and a Silver Covenant squad, while Vereesa and a second squad guard the portal on Azeroth
When the ethereals spring their trap, all the high elves with Alleria are transformed as well
In the Telogrus racial hub, put all the named elves with gossip on how they view their condition and how they are getting used to it.
Give a second leader to the void elves, a high elf (I suggested Auric) that clashes with Umbric in how each of them view their condition.
Make high elves work closely with void elves, as sister races.
More customization options
(I’m typing on the phone, so I apologize for any typos).
The problem is that Alliance mostly got variations on things for ARs, while the Horde got the actual thing.
Want High Elf? Here’s Void Elf.
Want Broken? Here’s Lightforged Draenei.
Want Dark Iron? Here’s Dark Iron. (the exception)
Want Vrykul? Here’s Kul Tirans.
Also its quite a shame that set never became available, I’m still holding out hope we see it someday (Trial of Style at least always will be a possibility!)
Even by keeping the origin of being Blood Elven exiles, Umbric’s group could have been introduced far earlier during Legion as members of the conclave.
But the lack of set up was obviously caused because they just came up with the VE too late, with not even 7.3 specifically setting up VE’s. At this point IDK if Alleria as meant to set up any Allied Race, and tbh, I don’t think she was, as her Journey on Argus was clearly just about herself, so it’s hard to believe VE’s were even conceptualized during 7.3 development.
Think is, ANY backstory they would have given them could have worked if they had actually taken the time to introduce them, but I do believe that using the Silver Covenant as basis for the VE would have been better, because it would have simply paid off set up already in place. It would have been a stronger outing for sure.
Indeed, Alamara has been an early proponent of those ideas, when VE’s were announced but not yet implemented and we thought there was still time to change some stuff. Alas, VE’s kept the same course.
For for me still the BIGGEST and EASIEST missed opportunity was the complete unadressing of Alleria’s Rangers in Outland. They could have joined Alleria in her search for Umbric so easily, and ultimately help to explain why VE’s have fighter times rather than just being scholars.
I think I’m more fond of them being Alleria’s followers in Outland than the whole Silver Covenant, mainly because I sympathize with those who don’t want the potential of pure High Elves done away with completely and still have a chance to be playable.
Yeah, we have seen a few NPC’s from the Allerian Stronghold return (notably Captain Auric Sunchaser at the Sunwell, and Ros’eleth at Trueshot Lodge) but it really does seem a shame to see most of them seemingly stay in Outland.
It kind of bugs me, though, in that Allied Races have actually kind of bloated out to be a much bigger thing than originally described in terms of dev resources.
When we go way back to the Allied Race announcement, they were praised by the devs as a way to introduce new races quickly and efficiently, without the bloat of starter zones or Questing 1-20 or anything like that.
Which would have been excellent if that’s what had been delivered, because Blizzard could theoretically pump out new races really quickly.
Fast forward to BFA’s release, and looking at Allied Races now, and in particular how long it took them to finish Zandalari and Kul Tirans, and…there’s a lot of extra fluff that didn’t need to be there.
You know how I would have done Allied Races? I’d start them in the vanilla starting zones, with the same camera flyovers and everything, and given them a voiceover explaining who they are and why they’ve joined the Horde/Alliance.
Mag’har Orcs are a group that returned with the Horde from Draenor to pursue Gul’Dan, and have now pledged themselves to the Warchief.
Some Highmountain Tauren were inspired to adventure by the heroics of the Horde, and now fight alongside their brethren under the Bloodhoof banner.
The hardy seafolk of Kul Tiras, swayed by the words and deeds of Jaina Proudemoore and the Alliance, have now volunteered their might of arms to the Alliance.
A group of exiled occultists, the mysterious Void Elves were banished from Silvermoon and now seek to earn the trust of the Alliance.
…and that’s about it for now. No main characters, no starter zones, no nothing. Make them as bare bones as possible, and then build them up through content and cinematics later on.
(And this may sound hypocritical, considering my grievance with Void Elves is a lack of lore, but I think if each race started off bare bones and was expanded on via questing/cinematics/story, it would be more consistant an approach than where we’re at now, with some races feeling like they have more lore effort than others.)
You could also tie that into the levelling zone experience - for example, finishing each zone on Zuldazar/Kul Tiras unlocks also unlocks a corresponding Embassy mission where Anduin/Sylvanas ask you to learn more about your new allies. This gives you a small insight into the lore surrounding that Allied Race, and an opportunity for them to be in the spotlight, but also reinforces that they aren’t a main race, and aren’t going to have the same kind of narrative focus or even dev resources thrown at them. Which is what the initial idea was supposed to be all about.
@Nindraine
Yeah, that can’t really be helped. The ones worked on first in a set will always suffer. It’s clearly evident the first 3 Allied Races aren’t at the level of Void Elves onward (speaking purely customization, not lore setup).
A similar thing happened with the HD model update in WoD. Night Elves were one of the first done and had, and may still have, issues for months compared to the later races’ updates. BE also took a long time to just get rid of duckface.
As for Zandalari and Kul’tiran dekays, that was all on Kul’tiran. Zandalari were one of the original 6 announced. They were set to go before Mag’har had even been decided. But they decided to pair them with Kul’tiran and give them a fully unique model rig, and that was the reason for the delay. Still think it was far too long, though. They should’ve been immediately available following Uldir, with exalted rep.
@Talendrion
To be fair, we also pulled Mag’har from a completely alternate timeline instead of just getting the Mag’har from our own Outland/Draenor, which is a little wierd.
interestingly there is a case to be made that AU mag’har and outland mag’har have sort of been combined together as a group. We see this the island expedition team that as a mag’har death knight. that isn’t an AU orc.