Night Elves could become highborne, and have more high-elf toned skin.

Draenei could... hrm... turn eredar red? It's no worse than having blackrock orcs in thrall's horde, I guess.

And humans... humans... hrm... the goth skin is probably a good bet. Either that or "azotha tribal designs".

I'd disagree with that. There are plenty of reasons why a Blackrock Orc might want to leave the Dark Horde behind and it would be easy to roleplay one as a person who wanted a better life than what Blackrock Mountain and subservience to the Black Dragonflight offered. Eitrigg might not have been the only one to become disillusioned, after all. Also, as far as I know, their skin color doesn't seem to be the result of any corrrupting magic.

Eredar red, however, is caused by fel magic and transformation into demon status. If Blizzard wants to support roleplaying as repentant Eredar...well, that kind of throws out what we've been told about Eredar and demons.

I can kind of see Highborne Night Elves, though. Perhaps not all of the survivors who met up with Malfurion and Tyrande decided to follow Dath'Remar across the sea.

Any Blackrock orc captured and interned during the second war would have the same opportunity to be in Thrall’s Horde as any other orc.


Is it though? Archimonde was the most demony demon and he was still blue. Turning red as part of demon-hood is an inference based upon no red skin options for normal Draenei. There could just be some naturally red Draenei, as there are still blue Eredar.


We’ve seen Highborne in game though, and they just look like Night Elves. The difference lorewise would have come when they started turning after they left, but with the turn they also lost their immortality. There would be no midway Night-High elves left alive lorewise.

Indeed. All the Elves of Eldre'Thalas are normal-looking Night Elves (though of course they are Quel'Dorei.)

They could always retcon them into being a subspecies halfway between night and high elves.


Here I go, robloring it up.

It seems rather ironic to me that Archimonde physically looks like the noblest, least twisted of all the Man'ari Eredar, and Kil'Jaeden's been mutated to the point of having jagged horns and facial ridges, razor-sharp teeth, black claws and wings...

...Yet according to Rise of the Horde, since living back on Argus Kil'Jaeden's the one who's always been vain and proud of his looks. :raisedbro

Of course, that would undo the very reason why they exist at all. The only reason the Shen'dralar endured and remained physically unchanged was because unlike the High Elves, who spent centuries without any massive sources of arcane magic before settling Quel'thalas and creating the Sunwell, the Shen'dralar summoned up Immolthar and basically used him as a battery to power their immortality.

Otherwise, they probably would have eventually begun to change like the High Elves did.

I'm pretty sure Kil'Jaeden consciously chose to have wings and such. After all, he is pretty adept at shapeshifting, and he must've figured bitches dig wings.

I wouldn't be so sure. There are some surviving highborne not affiliated with the Shen'dralar, such as Athrikus Narassin and Tarsis Kir-Moldir.

The transformation of the High Elves may have been unique to their situation or new methodology.

Yet those two examples both pursued their own paths of arcane power between the Sundering and the present.

The High Elves probably didn't have the means to keeping their entire population magically "juiced" until they settled down and created the Sunwell.

Of course, it's also possible that proximity to Nordrassil was a factor. Athrikus remained in Kalimdor and Tarsis may have as well for most of the 10,000 year span, while the High Elves all traveled a lot farther away.

Then again, there's also the possibility that whatever resides under Tirisfal Glades and caused the High elves to abandon that region was in some way responsible for their physical changes. Perhaps an example of some sort of affliction meant to strip away their immortality? After all, mortality was one of the numerous results of the Curse of Flesh when it changed the Earthen.

Nah, I'm probably reading too much into it...:evil:

I still don't get the logic of going from a DARK SKINNED NOCTURNAL species to a LIGHT SKINNED DIURNAL one. You'd think it'd be the other way around.

Well, admittedly the first part wasn't a choice while the second was. High elves' skin can probably still tan since they run around during the day, they just aren't specifically purple and blue any more.

Yes... but... but, the night elves had to have evolved blue/purple pigment (as far as I know, they bleed red- unlike draenei, whose blue coloring is a result of their cobalt based blood... which is even sillier, because real blue blooded animals have copper in their blood) for SOME reason, then, and then the high elves had to have lost it.

In a world where people shoot fireballs out of their hands due to magic, I can see magic giving purple skin. (wasnt NE blood purple in WC3?)

Don't forget that quite a few Trolls have bluish skin as well. Blue/Purple could have been the tribal colors of the ancestral trolls who became the Kaldorei at the Well.

Well, jungle trolls have blue/grey fur, so that's not their skin color.

I am pretty sure proximity was always the biggest factor. The High Elves moved off Kalimdor, and thus out of the radius of Nordrassil. They probably would have remained immortal had they built a settlement in Northern Kalimdor instead.

Evolution is fcked up beyond recognition in WarCraft. Don't try to apply it.

About Draenei, we could probably get some deathly pale/green skin, that would fit someone like Auchenai. For Humans, more than the "goth" look I'd prefer Kvaldir-like one.

Broken.

It's not a skin. It would be a model.

Exceptions could be made. :P Besides it really wouldnt work unless they create a female broken model.

Playable subraces: a step further on customization
 

There are a lot of cool races that won't ever become playable for a simple reason: they are too similar to the already playable ones, or they can't build themselves a proper home.

What if, instead of "new races", we got "new subraces"?. First of all, what's a playable subrace? It's basically a new race that, instead of getting its own capital and storyline, sticks to an already playable one's. This would make them mainly aesthetic, and would let Blizzard introduce new races without having to design all their background. Just create the model and drop it in-game.

Of course, the new subraces should have something in common with the already existing ones. You can't go an drop, I don't know, Furbolgs in Stormwind. It doesn't make sense without a story, and subraces aren't supposed to need one.

Let's give some examples:

New models:
-Draenei -> Broken
-Undead human/Blood elf -> Undead elf
-Night elf -> Furbolg
-? -> Ogre

New skins:
-Mountain dwarf -> Wildhammer dwarf
-Orc -> Mag'Har
-Jungle troll -> Forest troll
-Gnome -> Leper gnome

Most of them aren't viable, but we have some that would fit fine, like the broken and the undead elf. For example:

-Broken would start in Exodar, with the same classes as the draenei, removing the holy ones and adding rogues.
-Undead elves would start in Undercity or Silvermoon, and have the same classes as the undead humans/blood elves without paladin.

Other subraces are different only for the skin, like the Mag'har. They'd just have to allow it to be selected by players.

Opinions?

This seems like a good idea with the exception of the Furbolgs. I wouldn't really call them a subrace, they aren't biologically related to the Night Elves or a part of their society.

Nah, they were just an example. I put them there because a lot of people wants them and ogres. If we consider them tied enough to one of the playable races, they could be attached to them.

I would mostly focus on the more logic decisions: there are already broken npcs at the Exodar, and the forsaken have a good pack of dark rangers.

Glad you like the idea ;).

Instead of Heroic Classes, I think these would work great as Heroic Races.

Once you reach the point in the game where you've been sufficiently exposed to the race (like lvl 67 or so for the Broken and Mag'har) you get the choice of rolling a new toon using those skins. Or it could be quest-related or rep-related, like achieving exalted with the mag'har, telaar, timbermaw, tranquillien, so on gives you the playable mag'har, broken, furbolg, and undead elf.

Something to make the new skins special, but requiring enough commitment on the part of the main that by the time they unlock the skins, they'll be sufficiently committed to their original toon that we wouldn't be flooded by wildhammers and furbolg and ogres.

Nah, requirements of that type aren't fair for the players. If they add something special to them, it should be their starting level and/or a limit of characters of the race.

Also, skins /= models. Broken and undead elves (undead elves should) have different models from their partner races'. Mag'Har and Wildhammer dwarves don't, it's just a skin.