Mmmm cotton candy
2 Likes
What I was meaning, is that each “core” race has a lvl. 1 - 10 starting zone and experience that is not Exiles reach. We know that Evoker as a class will start around 8 - 10 come the War Within Now.
But if they had say Druid, I imagine they’d have to make the Forbidden reach or something accessible at lvl.1 for the new Dracthyr Druids in this scenario.
Since only Allied races all start at lvl.10 regarldess of class.
Here is to hoping Alliance side can get these as well. 
5 Likes
So the Q&A didn’t reveal anything in the way of customizations or major plot points.
So it’s time to theorise.
We see that Xal’atath and Alleria are being presented as opposite ends of a spectrum. One being more controlled and focused and the other chaotic and overflowing.
Alleria is in white armor with silver trims and light blue accent features (With some dark purple things) wile Xal’atath has Black armor with gold trim and dark purple accent features. Alleria has tidy hair and nails and Xal’atath is almost unkempt.
So I think these two could show us somewhat what extremes Void Elves can go in, depending on their control or how deep they delve. Which kinda helps unify the two themes they got going on currently.
Alleria’s new look is interesting.
She doesn’t doesn’t have it in the trailer, so she could start out as normal then change partway or there might be some sort of transformation. I could be overthinking it. They probably don’t have a model ready.
If it is a transformation, it would confirm her markings are some kind of Void marking in this continuity. (Which is based of her current ones being on the arm with destroyed armor) Or she got some crushed rhinestones in her body paint… And her hair turning dark blue/purple on the ends is interesting. Could be a “That’s just how she looked” or something happens. We will see.
But given that the markings seem to go under her armor, it falls in line with the tattoos Night Elves where just given so it could lead to a customization. And they are more Void inspired than before so there’s that.
Also her left arm, the one with the current markings is now totally covered… VOID HAND?!
As for Alleria’s armor, at first glance it looks like something a Silver Covenant NPC would wear, being White and Silver. But it has abstracted bits that look like Void Elf jewelry. And her entire bow looks to be of the same make as Void Elf jewelry as well. Which is interesting since she doesn’t wear any iside from some ear loops. (Unless you count that Armband?)
But given that she just went to Dalaran, it is possible there is some heavy Silver Covenant involvement with her look or Void Elves as a whole. She could just live there as that is were her son, sister, and nephews live. Or she needs a macguffin of some kind. Or she needed her sister to braid her hair…? (Maybe her son becomes a Void Paladin? DUN DUN DUN!)
Her powers seem to be more in line with her Ranger skills now too if we can judge by that materializing Void Arrow. Need to wait on that one.
As for Xal’atath’s appearance, she looks exactly how a corpse being puppeted by an eldritch horror of unknown type and origin would look, so good work to the artist on that.
We can see she has Voidier Eyes then Void Elves can get. So that might be something we could get somehow. Hopefully for free.
She has Void Orbs… Glyph for Entropic Embrace? Probably a unique feature.
She doesn’t have any tentacles but seems to just be oozing Void. She might not be an old god or directly related to them as first thought. Perhaps she is a Void Lord? A more cosmic being? Lots of theories. No proof.
Her outfit looks very Indo-Arabic inspired to me. It could be similar for any Void Elf trinkets and doodads added for customization.
Her markings creep me out since they look like they where carved into her flesh in the video. Not sure players would get them but who knows. Keep an eye out for similar markings/writing.
So in summery.
For potential Customization Hints.
Posible Markings/Body Paint.
A aesthetic ranging from controlled and defined to chaotic and wild.
Posible Void Eyes and Void Tipped Hair.
Maybe Arbands/Feathers.
Maybe Indo-Arabic austetics.
For potential lore points. (Assuming Alleria isn’t the only Void Elf in the Xpac and she actually doesn’t forget she has a bunch of followers for the second time…)
Possibly a much more refined look and direction for Void Elves. (Militarized?)
Possible heavy involvement for Silver Covenant/Vereesa other Alliance Elf groups.
Void Elves likely being hit with similar whispers with potentially good or bad lore developments involving that.
And that was me overthinking over tiny details and potentially being very, very, wrong.
11 Likes
It will make a nice cosmetic, it should be void elf only. 
We should do this with all threats to the world to make our jobs easier saving the world.
1 Like
Really loved this write up! In a way, I feel Xal’atath follows the same aesthetic vibe (mostly colors) that we’ve seen for Void Elves, but with a far more obvious “Black Empire” aesthetic rather than the more ethereal coded ren’dorei armor.
But Alleria’s new armor truly opens a whole new side to VE aesthetics by contrastring the established palette of darks and golds with white and silvers. We keep black and dark blue accents to unify the void theme, with Alleria retaining some of those ethereal elements, but also with a more noticeable thalassian inspiration in the silver filigree. And we keep the feathers, warpaint and braid aspects of her Farstrider origins, but with an obvious Void lean; the presence of shiny little stars in the markings, the darkening of the ends of her hair, the motives of the markings themselves.
Truly this is what I most wanted of “Farstrider inspired VE markings” and I truly hope we get this as player customization for Midnight at the latest. Alleria’s new look truly shows all the potential VE aesthetics have and I am so excited for what we might see for VE overall in the future.
7 Likes
one of the problems ive noticed with wow is they have historically embraced high fantasy races as caricatures, with goofy body parts and exaggerated features. the one time they didnt do this (blood elves) became the most successful player race addition since game launch. but with the current political climate that keeps leaking over into this fantasy game, the devs are resisting concepts like beauty and femininity, with females being more like men and the men being more masculine also. femininity has all but disappeared in the last two races. tough rocky women with beards, doesnt lend itself to the concept of femininity, neither does a race with no discernible feminine features unless examined close up to see eyelashes
doh this was supposed to be addressed to fenelon
1 Like
Right, women with pcos aren’t women (amongst other jibbajab). And on ignore you go
No.
People are people are people. They come in a great deal of shapes, sizes, existences and expressions. Keeping to one singular binary is an unrealistic caricature of the human race and condition.
Though I agree WoW has consistently shown its amab and afab aspects of races as immensely dimorphic with every single race. Though Blood Elves are very much included in this so I don’t know why you think they’re not.
Its not political, its existence.
I don’t understand why you felt the need to push this into the conversation, as it wasn’t really something brought up at all before but my stance is that people deserve to be represented in all their forms and given its a fantasy game with all the potential in the world to give us those options, Blizzard is woefully lacking in customizations both in a general regard and for actual expressions of humanity as a whole.
6 Likes
same question i asked with dracthyr, because without some evidence of a female, its just a male looking race. with the stone dwarves the evidence is there but its masculine looking because women tend not to grow beards, its like someone doesnt like females, in the customizations department. it isnt a case of either/or, its a case of erasing femininity as if its a bad thing. they have 2 chances every time they make a race and if all we get is masculinity, thats just 2 males. nothing wrong with males. nothing wrong with females either.
Chin hair is very common. It just gets plucked or removed usually.
5 Likes
i’m menopausal so i get little whiskers cause estrogen waning and testosterone increasing. i use to tell people i must be part dwarf. but this is the issue - my femininity is going away but i dont gotta like it.
Your femininity is not going away. We are mammals. We just get extra mammalistic as we age. Or if we have hormone disorders. Which is unfortunately many of us.
6 Likes
well, sprouting chin hair because i’m no longer capable of reproducing is evidence my feminine genetic expression has packed its bags and gone to tahiti
It’s just estrogen levels going down, but that isn’t what makes you a woman. All women go through this eventually. I’ll be going through it when I have my hysterectomy.
3 Likes
ah mine was from a masectomy. early menopause.
well it is what makes me feminine. if you give someone estrogen, they take on feminine characteristics. thats what i mean, our last 2 races have been lacking in feminine characteristics.
Even through our changes though we don’t become masculine. We do lose a girlish figure but hell, I don’t want that back. I use to be a twig and use to pass out when I had to give blood, lol.
1 Like
once you get thru the hotflashes, the rest is smooth sailing to early onset bone loss. lol
1 Like
It’s so rough! I’m having hot flashes already. But that is the meds I’m on for endo and being peri-menopausal.
i cant take any estrogen replacement therapy because the breast cancer was from having too much estrogen, like overdosing on estrogen. so we drove right past normal feminine genetic expression to commune with i’m an emotional disaster area - this, i do not miss. i’m actually rational again.
anyway, remember how people said blood elves had no males because they had some feminine features. we havent had any feminine males or females, in a good while
1 Like