There’s lore on it, don’t know why it’s need to be pointed out every other moment these sort of threads pop up because people have a problem with dark skinned elves. Coldshade has already linked it above.
I just came here to say, shut up mainly. They exist.
The argument that they make no sense within the lore is a bit of a strange and ill-thought out one, given the setting, there’s all manner of ways these skin tones could very easily be explained as coming about, plus we do also have Devi as a canon character who has been described as dark-skinned, albeit how dark was meant by “dark-skinned” at the time in that case is anyone’s guess as it’s a character from a novel with no canon visual depiction.
Overall I love the inclusion, look forward to Blizz adding more representation, however I do wish Blizzard had gone further with this, also including more of an idea as to where these new skin tones fit in, just to add that extra flavour to the game world as a whole. Certain playable races already have diversity depending on the clan/tribe they come from, or the region of Azeroth they come from, but for some of the new skin tones added, this is considered bad, despite the ask being basically to give more to these races rather than just slapping them on the side of existing populations and calling it a job well done, or making it out that regional difference is bad, which is a particularly odd counter-claim to make, but with how many of the new skin tones were handled I can understand the reason some people feel like it is the lazy checking of boxes.
In any case though, whether you consider them bad lore, that they make no sense or whatever else, they’re here to stay, and a lot of people are happy about it so let people enjoy the representation. It’s a good addition.
Why would someone be so bothered about simple customization? It’s not like they added antlers or something… it’s just a skin color.
What I would have likes would have been a story with some of the new skin tones.
Example Trolls:
The Farraki skin.
Make a small cinematic, or better add a quest that explains to us why some Farraki (or all of them) now join the Horde. It would have been so easy to do.
Same goes for the Elves. Perhaps a group of Quel’dorei stayed further away from Quelt’hals (could go back to their voyage to the EK) and guarded a magical place or something and rejoined now their people. Boom explained! You can even use magic for the elves. Not saying it has to be this exact way, but it could have given a interesting story and perhaps even new locations for players.
Who knows? Like you said that’s also not a bad thing.
There are different ways to do it. Blizz took a lazy one (as so often) sure. People seem happy enough with it (in general).
classic dogwhistle dismissing companies reacting to natural cultural/demographic shifts as conspiratorial agenda
If you’re really
You maybe gotta ask yourself why are you parroting the oldest alt-right talking point, and then typing out a whole page of “but what about the lore!!!” around it to make it palatable
Maybe that’s a good opportunity for self-reflection
I agree broadly, but I will play devils advocate there, I think it currently suits Blizzard to have ‘Enemy Troll’ races, and the Farakki have only ever much pretty been enemies of both Horde and Alliance. Similar (But not the same as) the Amani, who -were- allies of the Horde during WC2, but not since, and are now firmly enemies of not only the Horde and Alliance, but even other Trolls (Hence them being hostile in their enclave in Dazar’Alor (No, I have no idea why the Zandalari let them in, in the first place, they will happily kick off on Zandalari player characters.)
Some Farraki maybe, but not all. After all, they would be falling under ‘Darkspear’ as their generic ‘race’ in the same way as Wildhammer fall under ‘Dwarf’ (Though not Dark Iron’s).
A Cinematic would imply they were an Allied Race, which they have not done for Wildhammer, or for that matter, for Void Elves looking like High Elves. Thing is, they have no established presence in the Horde, unlike the Wildhammer and High Elves do in the Alliance, which means they very much would be falling under Rok’han as head of the Darkspear, which is…kinda where they are now?
I agree, some lore clarification would be nice, to explain how -some- Farraki found themselves to be under Rok’han’s command in the Horde, as until then their status would be nebulous in the extreme.
Paradoxically, the one Skin that Trolls didn’t get, that actually has an established presence already in game would be the Revantusk. I mean, Sure, the Amani are enemies, but the Revantusk are part of the Horde, have their own settlement, and have their own leaders there. That would have struck me as a no-brainer.
What I really love is the alt-right accusing others of going on political rants in topics, while it is them who start it every time with categorising everyone having an opposing opinion as either woke mob, SJW, communist or antifa.
Dark skin colour ingame can’t just be a new feature to extend the possibilities of playable elf tribes or make players with dark skin feel more represented and included. No, it’s an agenda that tries to erase Western culture. How god damn paranoid and amidst and existential crisis must one be to sense a threat or political conspiracy behind every virtual tree? It’s so annoying, pathetic and at one point also very uncreative.
Well just as a counter point to that the one dark skinned elve we have in lore before now was from a alternative universe (if I dont missremember it) and in the main universe we havent seen any (dosnt mean there arent any but a explanation would have been wonderfull to have). I personaly couldnt care less about what skin colors people can have in the game but I would enjoy if they included those things into the lore somehow becouse that would maybe actually lead to intressting storys.
When you cut of your finger your kids will still be born with 10 fingers
There are no lore reasons that say an elf cannot be dark brown that I am aware of.
With regards to melanin, I’m not sure that applies to elves but if it were true that elves have melanin in the same way that humans can have it, then they do in fact have the capacity to produce the required levels of melanin to have dark brown skin, the way it works for real people is that when they are exposed to sunlight they start to produce melanin to protect them from the sun, this is something that all human beings will do. You may notice that people that spend all of their time inside their homes and never go out, are often paler than those that get out more, the reason for that is because they are not exposed to sunlight as much as other people. So in places where the sun is hottest, the people that live there have dark skin. So if you are going to apply the same logic to elves that you apply to humans, then it makes sense for elves to have dark brown skin, because humans can have dark brown skin.
Having dark skin options in the game to represent dark skinned people is no more a diversity tick box than having gnomes and dwarves in the game to represent those among us who are of short stature. It’s more about fantasy and escapism, it’s about playing a game in a fantasy world. There are many who like to create a character that looks like them or like an idealised version of themselves, and for them being able to pick a skin tone that resembles their own is certainly a selling point of dark skin options, but there are also many others who like to create characters that look nothing like them and are not even of the same gender, the dark skin option is as much for them as anyone else.
From blue-ish Zandalari with scale patches, to the very dark skinned “Dark Troll” Tribe, to the pruple/blue Kaldorei, to the “fair skinned” Quel’dorei?
I think the Elves went thrugh so many color change during their evolution, and in some cases, in one Elf lifetime (the Highborne who sailed from Kalimdor and established Quel’Thalas it took one generation - or sometime less - to lose their colour and bodyshape…), some “new” skin colors popping up left and right, not even in the top twenty strange things 
I agree with you on the basics, simply quoting this part to not make it overly long. I took the Farraki simply as one example. As stated further down with the Sin’dorei I would expect such things for all new skins for every race. This of course includes the Wildhammer skins etc.
It’s not needed, but it would be a nice addition. At the very least a quest.
The Amani are really in a bad position, but even for them you could make it work. However you made the point for the Revantusk and it’s true. It’s so strange to me we did not get their skin.
(Edit because I klicked too early on replay).
Back to the roots, unite under the Zandalari banner/Empire
Would solve the whole “me no Horde” issue; the Zandalari at the moment are not really part of the Horde, Talanji was very clear, they are equals in that alliance, and as far as I know ( I could be wrong) that nor really changed
Every Troll could be/should be under Zandalari juridiction (except the Blood Trolls for obvious resons) and thus allies of the Horde
Would solve basically everything and would be a good excuse to give every skin colour and tribal marking to the players so make whatever Troll tribe is your lil’ heart’s desire
And wouldn’t be so farfetched; even the Farakki (arguably the hardest Trolls to get along with others) played nice and attended on Rastakhan’s funeral, respecting him and were actually neutral state
To be honest, it’s because of people like you that I am always use the darkest skins for all my characters, especially my elves, humans and gnome toons. There is nothing specifically saying that there aren’t any elves with dark skins. And at the end of the day, it was the people whom were making the lore accepting for elves to have dark skin tones, so all is lore friendly. Are you that arrogant that you think of yourself as above the people writing the story now? That is disgusting. Take your racist opinions out of here and cry because more people have the option to imerse themselves more into their characters now. 
. I hope we will get more options like this from now on. If it upsets people like you that much, I fully accept them ^^
What a bunch of garbage.
When people get over this?
“BuT eLfS iN wArCrAFt aRe sUpoSed to be fAiR sKInd aNd wHiT!”
Night Elves, Void Elves and Nightborne would like to have a word with you.
We can have purple, blue, violet, pink and even actual black elves, but make brown-skinned ones and people lose their nerves over it. Something specifically against these skin colors? Seems to me the issue isn’t with lore but something else here.
That makes me want to do Demon Hunter with these skins, and white hair.
Void Elves look great with these skins too :3
THIS! So much! I don’t care if there are black elves running around, just tell me WHY are there black elves running around and where they are from! Also, start doing that in the game itself and not in some bogus books, I’m here to play a game and enjoy the world through it, not to read fanfiction of some random writer you hire to explain this in 400 pages…
That is a bad faith argument. You know full well skin color and hairstyles are not comparable in the slightest.
Not quite false, but also not quite true. There are deserts and such on Azeroth, we could easily say that black humans come from areas that are nearby, or settlments that are inside these deserts. We cannot say the same, however, about elves as their settlments are pretty much set in stone with little wiggle room to add anything new.
The lore isn’t always what is written, but also what’s shown. There were black customization options for humans because, well, there were black humans in WoW. Not the same with elves. Also, Devi was not portrayed as black per se, but rather with dark skin. That could literally mean skin similar to Greek, Latino or even Indian pigments rather than full on black. That is why it needs to be explained to make a modecum of sense: where do these elves come from, how did they get their dark skin, do they have different culture and so on and so forth.
Nobody says anything about them because they are, essentially, a separate race. They are elves, true, but they are quite different in both looks and culture. Also, they are explained in lore and are a vital part of the world that is well written into the story.
That is not the point. The point is… where do elves with these skin colors come from? They are obviously not quite from Silvermoon, given what we have seen over the years. You can’t just add things like these without little care or with the “whatever, just pay it no mind” mentality. It’s a rather touchy subject nowdays, one that should not be covered with bad faith and disregard, but rather with ties to real world and how it works. After all, fantasy does take inspiration from reality and vice-versa.
Also,
Agreed).
To be fair, the Irish were considered a different race. It is actually quite famous how they were considered “white [black people]”. Usually when British/German/American people “brownify” some people it is with the intention of using racism in order to discriminate against and subjugate them. Phrenology was used against the Irish in the same way it was used against black people, to provide the veneer of scientific reason to justify their exploitation. The Irish joined the white race relatively recently. Just like how Arabs left it recently, because white people wanted to bomb them. Race is really a social construct, and this racial fluidity is the main evidence. The modern understanding of what a “race” is was invented by historians, not biologists.