Around the time that BfA was announced, I recalled a video interview with a Blizzard employee who, while naming some Allied Races, happened to mention Mogu among them. I recently remembered this interview and managed to find it.
This interview was done in 2018 with Daniel Stahl, a developer. The video is below, with the timestamp of interest being at the 5:28 mark if it doesnât take you there automatically:
With regards to that pesky giant sword stabbed into the planet, the first thing mentioned was âWhat does that mean for the Mogu?â And then followed by a mention of Dark Iron Dwarves and a general Allied Race mention with them having to pick a side.
Thus at the time, there seemed to be some thought that Mogu may have been considered to be an Allied Race during BfA. It wouldâve been a random mention otherwise of us wondering what the evil Mogu clans, remember this was before the Rajani Mogu were a thing, thought about it. Bit of a weird thing to imagine what some enemy faction off another continent wouldâve thought about it, aside from either indifference, panic, or opportunistic thoughts.
Now obviously, we never got a Mogu Allied Race during BfA. We did go back to Pandaria briefly and met with the Rajani Mogu, who at that point remained a neutral NPC faction. But I wanted to think on the idea some and speculate what could have been, especially when it comes to Saurok as an Allied Race.
The important thing to point out with the idea of a Mogu Allied Race was this was stated before the expansion came out. Itâs likely that if they did become an Allied Race, they wouldâve only been on one faction. There was a war abrewinâ in the world (of Warcraft!), and Allied Races at that time had to pick a side. Which leaves the question of what faction Mogu wouldâve joined and what wouldâve been the opposite factionâs counterpart.
Now, the obviously counterpart in this scenario wouldâve been Saurok. Iâm assuming that the return to Pandaria wouldâve been expanded a bit more, and if war between the Horde and Alliance were still going, it wouldâve made some sense to have a tribe of Saurok going at the playable Mogu faction at the time, which I could only assume wouldâve become the Rajani Mogu. It fit the storyline of both sides joining up and fighting each other or, if it occurred at the end as it did in our reality, wouldâve been something that would be around the time that the Horde and Alliance wouldâve learned the true meaning of Winter Veil, saw the pointless fighting between the Saurok and Mogu when a greater threat loomed, and wouldâve gotten everyone to work together to beat up the big bad. Again!
I can only assume with this combo, that Saurok wouldâve been Horde and Mogu Alliance. I strongly believe Saurok fit the Horde well and Mogu, being more regal, would have some more arguments in allying with the Alliance at the time. If you want more of an argument for that, you should take a gander at the Rajani Mogu megathread:
But the thing is, we didnât really get Allied race pairs that were, for the most part, directly tied to the opposite factionâs chosen Allied Race. Kul Tirans and Zandalari partly did at best, and others didnât really have much connection with each other save for some of the Legion races living on the same continent. Unless Iâm forgetting something of course, which is always a possibility.
So I canât say for certain if Saurok were considered as an Allied Race and if they mightâve been considered to be paired up with Mogu. Iâd like to think that maybe they would have been, since Horde Saurok and Alliance Mogu wouldâve been a combination that wouldâve fit the theme and storylines that went on in BfA.
Still, it is interesting to see Mogu specifically mentioned with the talk of Allied Races. Since we didnât see it happen in BfA, Iâm curious if itâs something that could happen in the future. We are dealing with a lot of Titan related stuff the next two expansions.
Granted, Blizzard seems to be leaning more on neutral races these days, but there is a hope that weâd see Horde Saurok paired with Alliance Mogu if that ever became a thing. I still think there are great storyline opportunities with both sides having titan knowledge that needs to be combined and both sides working together in order to have a chance against whatever big bads are in the future.
Otherwise, itâs hard for me to see Saurok wanting to join a faction when Mogu are a part of it. They kinda rightfully have some opinions on the Mogu in general, and while things could be written around it, I think itâd fit better with them on opposite factions.
Anyway, this interview was something I wanted to ramble a bit on. Not sure what changed then, if anything planned got shelved for later, or if Saurok had a chance at Allied Race status during BfA. But itâs still something worth discussing!
20 days until our megathreadâs 5th anniversary! 
-Playable Saurok for the Horde please! 
