LFD & VE were a huge mistake

Community General Discussion
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Blizzard have gone too far down this path now that not much can be done to rectify, but I believe Void Elves and Lightforged Draenei were a massive misstep.

To introduce races who focus so heavily on a theme has a huge impact on your class choice. These two races in particular blur the lines between race and class in my opinion.

LFD cannot be warlocks because of their affinity to the light and yet, because they are given the priest option they are allowed to be a shadow priest which completely contradicts their way of life.

Likewise a VE has dedicated their life to the all consuming void and yet they can choose to weild the light to heal their allies…

Not to mention these two races existing within the same faction. Surely they would despise one another. Given how opposing these two forces are they would not agree with one another’s beliefs in the slightest.

In light of the new customisation options on the Alpha, which are fantastic but should really have have been done years ago. it makes you realise that the vast majority of these ‘Allied Races’ should have just been customisation options in the first place.

What should have happened -

Lightforged skins and tattoos should have been a customisation option added to the existing Draenei, and the alliance should have been given something more unique, such as the Krokuul perhaps? The LFD racials are lackluster as is and the original Draenei racials fit thematically if you decide to choose a Lightforged skin option.

Void Elves were added as a band aid to the ongoing request for High Elves. Why Blizzard will not give in fully is beyond me. They should have just chosen to implement the Silver Covenant instead of these Void Elves.
All they had to do was suggest that Alleria and Vareesa rounded them up to join the Alliance for BFA. Instead they completely made up a race out of nowhere…

This way the high elves could play Paladins or Shadow Priests without much contradiction, and the Draenei could also play Shadow Priests or Death Knights without feeling quite so awkward.

TL;DR
There’s an argument to say most of the Allied Races should just exist as customisation options but I think the two biggest offenders are the LFD & VE’s.
Thier racial themes are too similar to that of a specific class. Existing Draenei and High Elves are more ‘neutral’.

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This.

I originally rolled a white draenei because it fit my fantasy of a character devoted to the Naaru and the light, considering the tale and the racial skill.

When LFD were introduced I was pleased, but then…

I decided I already had one of my own, and I liked the original racial skill better anyway, so I simply kept it that way and did not feel the need to roll any LFD alt.

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I like LFD active ability more, thus my main is LFD.
Though I would prefer if they would give us Man’ari.

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If VE and LD aren’t able to play nice, then that ship sailed long ago. It sailed away when paladins and warlocks were a thing. Or anyone and warlocks. Which is since the game launched.

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They have given races bcoz players wanted it. Lore has nothing to do with it.

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Seriously… many allied races do not make much sense as a separated choice on the character creation screen.

Blizzard could easily tie specific/different racial traits to the choice of certain visual options, the same way they make certain visual options available to only certain classes.

Or, even better, an alternate racial skill (and/or racial demonym) could be picked as an option when having selected certain specific visuals.

Then, you’d have less clutter:

  • Lightforged Draenei could be a Draenei template/customization.
  • Iron Dwarves could be a Dwarf template/customization.
  • Highmountain Tauren could be a Tauren template/customization.
  • Mechagnomes could be a Gnome template/customization.
    etc…

At the same time, if they added the sub-race templates within the racial customization screen, the fans of new sub-races being added as visual options would no longer feel treated any worse than those who got the Allied Races.

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meanwhile the horde got normal races that dont contradict themselves and each other.

goes to say alliance got the short end of the stick

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There has been like 1 new race out of them all for alliance and that was a void elf. rest could have been just a skin/bodybuild or whatnot option on loadscreen.

Horde got brand new race and actual improvement over old ones where only failure was a HM tauren, which I cannot make much difference between the normal and HM ones.

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meanwhile the horde got more trolls and moosemen.

goes to say horde got the short end of the stick

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This is even more prevalent now they’re adding a whole slew of customisation options in Shadowlands.

I’ll find it odd that Dark Iron are a completely separate race yet the Wildhammer will just be a skin option.

Makes you wonder why they didn’t just go with Sub-races as requested by the community instead of pursuing this Allied Race idea.

Edit: Just read through your thread, I think this would be a fantastic idea. Might be too little too late but we can hope!

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I’d say while alliance got just horde race - blood elves, then Horde got vulpera that is actually unique looking.

Void elf and their SL customisation is only thing Alliance players are actually happy with.

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Kultiran also unique, their bodies atleast.

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They are unique because no one plays them.

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Saw some play it, but probably not so popular.

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So what about Undead holy priest been in game a long time ?

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True - I saw their hair and horns when I first went to the daily area and knew I needed them.

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Try the undead priests then, they’re hurt by the light.

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A Void elf skinny dipped into a void pool one day and turned purplish in color. Then he went to holy magic school and learned to heal people.

A Lightforged Draenei was forged in a lightforge, but then he went to shadow magic school and learned to kill people.

Hope that fixed the confusion. It’s a shame it comes down to the players to fill in the plotholes but that’s what modern Blizzard is, they don’t care and they’re lazy.

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Your explanation doesn’t fly. I find it hard to believe that no lightforged has gone to demon school if it’s this simple!

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And if you removed Lightforged, what would you replace them with?

As the Horde would sit with one more race than the Alliance, if you replaced VE with HE but removed LFD without adding anything.