The Unofficial High Elf Discussion Megathread

Community General Discussion
14755

I’ve suggested having the High Elves become Dragonsworn in the past as an idea on how to make them more visually distinct from Blood Elves, but it wasn’t a particularly popular idea. Personally I find it more tolerable than Void Elves, since for one thing these would be High Elves, the Alliance’s loyal High Elves, and for another, Elves and Dragons have friendly enough relations that I don’t think it’s a stretch.

7 Likes
14758

Nah, man. You in particular have a very palpable ego problem. You also follow a very specific pattern when interacting with anyone you feel is talking beneath what you have contrived as “your level”.

First you take a counter position.
Then, if you feel you haven’t gotten your point across, you fall back on this idea that “The Lore”, some immutable god script, is only interpreted corrcetly by you.
Then, especially if they are making valid points, you devolve into calling them trolls, accusing them of having a headcanon (rich for a thread pretty much operating on this), and dismissing them. I’m honestly surprised you didn’t call him a Lydon alt.

I know the pattern because it was one of the first things I noticed about pretty much every interaction I had with you as Volunder and later as Nyshant (why you continue to swap faces is beyond me).

Back to the actual points of your guys’ little spat:
Evolution definitely exists within WoW. Being magically induced, cursed, or influenced by outside forces doesn’t make it strictly not evolution. Many races have been transformed in WoW, and I agree these are not evolutions:

  • Void Elf (Obviously)
  • Naga
  • Satyr

But there are plenty of examples of evolution in WoW’s races:

  • Broken/Lost Ones (devolved via influence from demonic energies
  • Dark Trolls to Night Elves (thousands of years of subtle influence from the Well of Eternity)
  • Night Elves to High Elves (Thousands of years of subtle influence from the Sunwell)
  • Night Elves to Nightborne (Thousands of years of subtle influence from the Nightwell)
  • Proto-Drakes into Dragons (pretty big one here)
  • Aqir evolving into what we know as Nerubians in the north, and Qiraji in the south.
  • Pretty much every non-elf Troll offshoot, including: Jungle Trolls, Ice Trolls, Forest Trolls, Sand Trolls and Dark Trolls (all evolving gradually to suit their enviornments)

What influence was impacting said evolution is really not at all relevant, and in fact those are factors real world biologists look for when trying to find how a species evolved. It just so happens that “magic wells, curses, and Old gods” don’t exist in the real world. Within Warcraft however, these are absolutely valid forces to spur evolution. If you want to get semantic about the word go right ahead.

To his other main point that High Elves and Blood Elves are the same race, well they literally are. They definitely aren’t that different physically (I can make Humans or Tauren or Orcs with a greater difference in skin and eye color than Blood/High Elves), and culturally, at their core, they are still majorly attuned, affected by, and proficient in magic. Who they call friends remain their main “cultural” difference, with very minor offshoots of other High Elves adopting a few ideas of how to cope outside Quel’thalas.

Baldarun is very much correct when he points out these differences, while obviously existing, are horrendously expanded and extrapolated to suit the narrative of the thread (not counting the extra speculation or theorizing about how to further differentiate them), and that in reality, nothing measurable in game has been shown to be driving these groups further apart aside from politics, (with Blood Elves even considering rejoining their High Elven kin in the past).

I also agree with him that High Elves are less and less likely as we move away from the tired “conflict” High Elves and Blood elves had (the tapping of creatures for mana, the prices they’d pay for power), seeing as of TBC’s end the initial reason for that conflict is gone, and we move forwad with a much more recent threat against the Blood Elves and the Sunwell by these Void Elf traitors.

All the signs from threads laid in Legion and BFA thus far point to next expansion being a Shadow/Void or Void vs. Light expansion. Illidan and Xera. AU Lightbound. Star Augur’s warning about the Void. Alleria’s maddening whispers in her head. Blood Elves being Light cleansed while Void Elves fall to shadows. Illygnoth’s whispers and Ogmot’s journal entries.

We’re headed pretty obviously in a direction of Void vs. Light, one way or another, in a conflict that will not be wrapped up in BFA but instead started here and flung into 9.0 much like Garrosh started WoD’s events in MoP, and Gul’dan started Legion’s events in WoD.

So when I hear the developers say things about Allied Races like “We want to add them where it makes sense with our story direction”, unless the High Elves take a side or more relevant position in this coming threat, I see them continuing a backseat supporting role whilst Void Elves are expanded upon.

3 Likes
14760

23 of March, 2019, 431 days since patch 7.3.5 release, and we have 0 Void/Shadow stories and plotlines with the Void Elves involved.
Honestly, this is disappointing and alarming, i wouldn’t be bothered if i didn’t cared about the Void Elves at all.

14 Likes
14761

well said. i was hesitant about void elves over high elves at first but after working with Alleria and Umbric so much in BFA im much more excited about their stories and where void elves go from here. especially with all this void activity being teased

also just spent my entire spring break playing and completing KH 3 24/7. it was worth it. im back to playing casual wow now tho :hugs:

1 Like
14762

Blizzard had no idea of what to do with void elves. They were made at the last minute, there was no time to make any storyline for them. They were shoehorned into the war campaign, and that’s it.

Maybe, maybe, it has been enough time for Blizzard to have used them for something. We will see in 8.2… but don’t hold your breath. I’m expecting the night elves and nightborne to have roles in the story, but I doubt the void elves will have anything to do with the patch.

7 Likes
14763

“We want to add them where it makes sense with our story direction”, yeah yeah… sure…

Looks at Void Elves, Dark Irons and Ma’ghar

You know what Allied Race would make sense with the story direction back in Legion? Yeah, High Elves, they used them in stories where other races could be used, it’s possible they wanted to flesh them out and smooth the storyline to their implementation.

16 Likes
14764

Let’s be honest, I don’t think there really was a good time to add Dark Irons and Mag’har. Dark Irons would’ve been added in Cata, and Mag’har in WoD. So, they made sense enough to be added in the second round of Allied Races, since the first round was all about Legion races, with the exception of Void Elves.

6 Likes
14765

looks at Umbric and Alleria

:thinking:
:woman_shrugging:

i didnt see vereesa helping my alliance toons in KT or Zandalar. and theres clearly a void heavy expansion focus being developed. void elves will probably get even more development and attention

1 Like
14766

Lol.

Pulling Mag’har from AU would require some forceful storytelling in any way.
But dark irons are easy.

I don’t think you need the “right” moment to add a race, only to make them revelant to the story.

It’s Blizzard’s excuse that is the problem.

Tell me anything they did that couldn’t be done by other characters. Or anything they did that fleshed out or moved forward the void elf storyline.

They could be replaced by Vereesa and Magus Solgaze and the story would pretty much be the same, except with less purple special effects.

12 Likes
14767

Correcly, this is why their statement is false, Allied Races aren’t slaves of the plot.

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14768

even ion and his dev team couldnt figure out how to make them distinct from blood elves

i even took a couple SS to compare physical differences. there were none

https://imgur.com/a/T3tHLZ0

https://imgur.com/a/Mkupwnu

14769

At least Dark Irons played a role in the Battle for Dazar’alor with the mole machines.

2 Likes
14770

that isnt a fair equivalency. you could also replace them with junker gnomes if we are going down that road

:woman_shrugging:

14771

My point exactly.

4 Likes
14772

Void Elves remind me of Finral on Black Clover:

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14773

The only races we ever see “evolving” in WoW are the Zandalari Trolls (no indication of magic involved in them becoming the other kinds of trolls) and the Aqir. Every other “race” that came from another one was transformed by magic. No natural selection involved there.

All we have from Void Elves in this expansion so far is Umbric teleporting us (which any other spellcaster class can do, apparently), and the “psychological warfare” in Zandalar which will never pay off because faction assaults have no impact on the story.

8 Likes
14774

Indeed, but that’s the thing, it just shows how untrue the statement actually is in the first place. Like it’s good if AR are relevant to current content, but do they have to be? Eh? Mag’har and DI and VE’s kinda aren’t, and that’s not an issue.

We could get so many more AR that don’t actually need a large impact on story direction (Forest Trolls, Wildhammer Dwarves, Hozen, Jinyu, Taunka, Broken, and yeah, High Elves -even when we’d like if they got more lore) because they are an already established part of the lore.

11 Likes
14775

I think there’s merit in just accepting Allied Races as a minor role in the story and being primarily about player character customisation as well. I mean, as it stands, there are core races that barely get any screentime as is, let alone adding another four races so far per side. I think that signs Blizzard up to a commitment that they probably shouldn’t be making. Allied Races should, ideally, have smaller roles, like quest chains, or a scenario once in a while, or something like that.

The way the Silver Covenant just kind of pops up every now and then for a quest chain is a good example of how Allied Races should appear in the story, but also more importantly, how they should be expected to be used in the story - yes, they’ll appear from time to time, but don’t expect them to be this huge deal.

12 Likes
14776

The problem is introducing a new race and not properly fleshing it out.

When the Silver Covenant appears, it needs no introduction, we know it already. We get happy to see old faces again.

But you can’t introduce a whole new race without making some effort to build up that familiarity.

And that’s exactly what Blizzard failed to do with void elves (and, to a lesser extent, lightforged draenei). They were just pushed into the spotlight, without proper introduction, without building up familiarity. It’s shameful to compare them to other new additions like nightborne or highmountain.

We know way more about NPC races like arakkoa, ogres, hozen, ginyu, vulpera or sethrak than about void elves.

13 Likes
14777

Well this is an obvious side effect of there being: 1) More and more races, and 2) Only so much in the “narrative budget” for any particular one from a design perspective.

I think it’s disingenuous to write off Void Elves and their actions so far. I’ve noticed them far more than I have our own Allied Races in equivilent spaces.

Their lore is brand new. You’re being harsh critics of a race for the start of their story not having some momumental consequence or impact out the starting gate. Just because they couldn’t give it proper setup due to being a late design choice (or as Blizzard claims “Not wanting to just have every new race be something you’re familiar with”) doesn’t mean they’ll forever have a marred state in the story. They have to start somewhere. :man_shrugging:

I wonder what spin you’ll put when they become increasingly relevant as we approach the conflict with N’zoth as Steve Danuser has directly implied, or what becomes of Alleria, and likely into 9.0 as it’s extremely likely to be a Void-centric expansion.