Starting to wish this were actually true. If it were then we wouldn’t get redundant Draenei and Tauren offshoot that add nothing new, we wouldn’t have Worgen watered down to just being generic Night Elf sidekicks, and we wouldn’t have fat humans that will never be as popular or well received as tall muscular Chad Trolls that stand up straight.
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Sounds like personal preferences, really. I’m sure many Draenei and Tauren players enjoyed the ARs that gave them extra options, even if they weren’t as comprehensive as the latter races, or at the least were interested in the Heritage Armor.
Worgen are about to get their long awaited model updates, which look great. Kul’Tiran I really don’t have a problem with, even if Zandalari are strictly cooler.
There was always going to be a “winner” for Allied Races, and that’s Void Elves for Alliance and Zandalari for Horde, it seems.
The feedback I mostly read is that they should have been customization options.
That doesn’t address the lore problems with them, which is that Blizzard failed to deliver on what their niche should have been, and you barely see Worgen out in the world as well, whereas their Cataclysm counterpart race, the Goblins, are everywhere.
I was honestly floored the Goblins get a base they setup in one of the Kul Tiran continents but in Zandalar? Not a single Worgen base, because Blizzard loves putting Goblins everywhere but seem to have no idea what to do with Worgen. They can’t even call the Gilneas architecture their own anymore, because it’s hardly ever used by them when they setup bases, you can count more times when Gilneas architecture has been used for neutral purposes.
Yes, pretty much. But in terms of lore, customization, and overall popularity, the Zandalari are beating the Void Elves quite easily. It’s quite amazing how many are playing them in such a short span of time, whereas Void Elves have been around for more than a year.
There are problems I have with Void Elves that are similar to Worgen, that is to say that their treatment pales in comparison to the much richer developed Nightborne and Goblins who both get ample use as part of the Horde and have actually well-established strong cultures that are constantly emphasized at the forefront when they’re called upon to service a role in the Horde.
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The problem is relative. A winner don’t need to be good, only better than the competition.
Also, in the case of void elves, they did draw people from the high elf crowd. How many would race change to high elf instead if given the choice? We can’t know until it happens.
(And there’s the good racials as well. How many people avoid nightborne or lightforged because of underpowered racials?)
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I think it also boils down to the slim/athletic body type just being the most preferred out of all the body types in the game by the general playerbase.
Although in Void Elves’ case I definitely do wish lore had any factor in it, but I don’t think that’s really the case yet. I think it’s entirely centered on racials and body shape/model animations because the Blood Elf model is just so good. I’ve seen a lot of “race pride” polls before, and usually it seems Blood Elves tend to rank the highest because Blood Elf players have a lot of racial pride. For Void Elves, I know personally I play them because I wanted a shadow race in the Alliance, and Blizzard will never give that niche to other races, no matter whether I would want it to be Worgen or have it more strongly emphasized with Dark Irons.
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Yeah, people are generally shallow. It’s fantasy, so most people prefer to represent themselves as a conventionally attractive race when given the choice, hence why the most popular races all fit this.
I don’t believe lore is a big factor in people choosing a character race, even to those who are fans of the lore or profess to be important. Void Elves are pretty much “the” prime example of this.
aye. I personally would love dryad/keeper but I know they are not that likely (though they could work easily if given a 2 forms ability with the 4 legged form being toggleable at any time with the 2 legged form forced for things such as mounts.)
Though a close second to them are furbolgs.
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Dryad/Keepers having a 2 legged humanoid form out of nowhere would be a pretty arbitrary and excessive lore break just to force-fit them as playable, to me.
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it isn’t like they have much lore to begin with. and it doesn’t have to be a retcon. It can easily be some kind of new blessing.
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Furbolgs would also be just as good of a mirror to Vulpera as Mechagnomes would be, especially if they had the same skeleton as Worgen. They could be another animal race for Alliance like how Vulpera will be another animal race for Horde, they would also mirror in the same way Worgen and Goblins do, being based off Cataclysm races in skeleton and animations.
Them being foils would work too. A big brutish race of barbarians for Alliance and a slippery cunning race of thieves for Horde.
In some cases, I could even say I’d want Furbolg more than Vrykul because I just think their motivation is far stronger (though making one up for Vrykul would be easy too) and they could do plenty of things people want Vrykul to do.
But I do also get why Vrykul are perhaps more popular. They’re more human-like and they give a body shape that’s more suited to a masculine ideal (broad shoulders, barrel chest) that’s lacking in Kul Tirans due to their oversized belly. Although I see that ideal in Furbolg as well if Blizzard did them right.
On Kul Tirans, I’ve seen some fan edits of them and this one is my favorite in regards to the males.
https://www.deviantart.com/woofers-art/art/Kavan-Windblast-789924534
https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/446901463621566464/558557872359997440/Screenshot_4.png
I feel like they’d have been better received if they had looked more like this.
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I’d prefer them to stay as is, just give them no visible pant/shoe armor, like an extended version of what trolls/tauren/draenei deal with.
Druids run around and fight on four legs all the time, so I think it’d be an easier pill to swallow to fit armor and whatnot around the current forms than do drastic weird stuff like warping them.
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that is the dream. The main concern is mounts is all.
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Some people do make choices based on lore. However, when your choice is not supported, what can you do? You go for the best next thing.
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I was more speaking to the fact that, despite possessing weak and very young lore, Void Elves are being adopted in droves, and less about High Elf fans rolling Void Elves as “High Elf placebos”.
Ironically, if I was someone who was a High Elf fan (which I’m actually starting to become at this point tbqh) and I was still waiting on them, I’d be playing a Human character as a substitute. Not to RP them as elves since that’s silly, but just because them and High Elves are quite culturally similar at this point.
Other than that yeah, it’s why I want them to happen as well because I want people who genuinely like Void Elves to be playing the race and not just because they’re settling.
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Yeah, but I do think a large portion of void elf players would go high elf if given the choice.
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And that’s perhaps largely because High Elves would end up being arguably more relatable, since the Void Elves have a “thing” going on with their curse and that’s only appealing to a certain group of people that like darker stories and want to play that out. (Like me.)
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Undoubtedly, but in the same respect, I doubt that if, hypothetically, they say tomorrow that High Elves are never becoming playable, or they fold their ranks into Blood Elves/Void Elves, that Void Elf players will drop them for something else.
My point is they have higher adoption than any Allied Race, while simuntaneously having the weakest lore of any. They’re a testament to most players just playing a race for aesthetics or cool factor (racials are also a factor, but aren’t absurdly gamebreaking or excessively strong).
That’s where I disagree. Until we have high elves, it’s impossible to know how many void elf players chose the race because it’s the best replacement for a lore-based race.
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The fact that being infused with Void magic is all it takes to make Blood Elves British makes me wonder if High Elves could have developed Irish/Scottish accents from the Wildhammer Dwarves after living with them in the Hinterlands for quite some time.
Although I have it in my mind that Celtic/Irish motifs would fit Furbolg quite well, because their name is derived from Irish myth, and it’d also fit solidly well with my idea of them being more barbarian-like. It would remind me of how the Ogres became more Roman inspired in WoD to give them more cool factor.
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