I’d like to get more info about Guardians of Ancient Kings… Maybe angels?
For sure if doesn’t lead to some lore butchery, but as someone who loves Paladins, been thinking about it…
Imagine if Tyrael from Diablo universe existed in wow, and all Paladins held him high as their true Lord and Savior, fighting in his name, trying to preserve justice as he did, and hopefully to be the Hero he is/was. Although i mean the immortal Archangel of Justice, not the mortal version. (I don’t know that much about Tyrael, don’t kill me.)
Even though, Titanic keeper Tyr basically has that role (notice the name similarities too, Tyr and Tyrael, basically angel version of that name.)
Interestingly enough, Tyrael and GotAK look quite similar.
But yeah, maybe some angel beings who are not Naaru or Val’kyr, but basically Guardians of Ancient Kings get a bit more lore… And hopefully don’t face a butchery.
With the Void plot becoming more and more relevant, it would make sense for the Ethereal to make more of an appearance as well, given it is indirectly the Void that made them as they are, which gives them a motive to join the fight. We know there was at least one faction of Etheral, the Ethereum, who were ideologically motivated to seek vengeance on the Void, rather than being motivated by wealth. And then there’s the Consortium, who has been making deals with Azeroth before.
Their homeworld K’anesh would also be an excellent concept for a new zone if and when we decide to venture outside Azeroth to fight the Void.
Racial bonuses could have to do with their relationship toward magic as well as their iconic phasing when they move. Something to do with teleporting or blinking in and out of sight maybe? And obviously, some bonuses in regards to their clearly inborn mercantile talent and knack for finding riches and power.
Paladin - As a note, the void-touched ethereal found in Legion prove that the magical form which the Ethereal contain behind their wrappings can be somewhat influenced by the type of magic they wield. Therefore, since paladins call upon the Light from within themselves, a Light-touched ethereal is a perfect candidate, by my own logic anyway.
Monks - because when did monks ever need an explanation?
Warlock? - I haven’t seen any fel-touched ethereal, but I don’t see why they couldn’t wield fel fire and demonic spells as well.
Common aesthetics for fantasy races that haven’t really been explored yet in Warcraft:
Rat people. Kobolds could be considered this, but they’re more of their own thing, rather than being rat-like.
Faeries. Perhaps you could count wisps and some other creatures, but traditional faeries don’t exist in Warcraft.
Halflings. I’m not talking about gnomes, I’m talking about very traditional and rustic hobbit-like halflings.
Common cultures used for fantasy races that haven’t really been explored yet in Warcraft:
Dark Ages or Early Medieval. Late medieval aesthetics with knights in shining plate armour are a thing, but nasal helmets, round shields and hauberks of chain mail aren’t.
Slavic Renaissance. Peculiar headwear and haircuts, excellent facial hair, opulent clothes with huge amounts of fur and embroidery and of course, everything to do with cossacks.
Turkic Renaissance. I know that exploring anything connected to Islam is a dangerous move considering the current zeitgeist, but there’s a hell of a lot of inspiration to be gained from the Ottoman Empire.
Ancient Cambodia. Countless glorious stone temples, lots of Hindu-Buddhist iconography that we’ve yet to see the like of in Warcraft. It could be cool.
Ancient Persia. Specifically, the Achaemenid Empire. Excellent hair and facial hair, a fascinatingly diverse empire with very interesting policies unlike anything we’ve seen in Warcraft thus far.
Feudal Japan. So maybe there’s some vaguely Japanese features present in the races of Pandaria, but for the more part, Pandaria is Chinese and feudal Japanese influence remains shockingly absent from Warcraft.
I honestly can’t think of what any new race in WoW might actually look like. It seems to me like Blizzard’s already done almost every exotic type of creature that exists in mainstream fantasy. However, there are lots of cultures that they have yet to cover, that would be really cool to apply to new races in WoW.
A species of beaver people.
Living in dams around water, their druids bending wood to suit their needs and revealing the inner tree for them to eat.
They have deep ties to nature and the world, but aren’t so easily driven mad by corruption, like the furbolg.
Long lived old friends of the night elves that vanished after the Legion invaded. They went deep into hiding in places they can’t really easily be reached… Or some crud.
Classes:
Druid
Priest
Warrior
Shaman
Monk
Hunter
Rogue
Racials:
Splintered Maw: The chewing of wood often leaves splinters in the race’s mouth. Bite the enemy embedding splinters in the wound causing X bleed damage over Y.
River Folk: Increases standard swim speed by Z%, perhaps also a toggle like aquatic form.
Resist Corruption: The race’s resistance to corruption reduces damage from shadow and fire magic by B%.
Just thought of this one, its something really different from what we’ve had playable before.
The Skitax (Aka the Roach people)
The Skitax are a relatively new species on Azeroth that evolved quickly from roaches left on Kezan after the Goblins made their exodus. The Kajimite evolved them into Roach humanoids who live in Apocalyptic style Warbands and use scrap to build weapons of mass destruction. The Skitax Join the Horde after we defeat their current ruler.
Classes:
Warrior, Hunter, Rogue, Mage, Shaman
Racials:
Hard Shell: Take X% less physical damage.
Without a head: After death, you can continue to fight for a few seconds.
Ultimate immune system: Disease are less potent.
Customization:
Skin colour: Various earthy colours including Light brown, dark brown, black, green, blue and red.
Head: the face option for the race, allows you to choose different faces that come with extras like cracks in the carapace, small spiky knubs or missing mandibles…
Antena: Hair option.
Eye colour:Choose from a black, really dark brown, dark red or Dark green.
Fun fact: they’d be the first race where females are bigger than males.
Southern tuskar which has its social construction written by tommy wiseau, the males are voiced by dany devito and females by nicki minaj.
The lore of the race is based on deviant art mary sue characters.
They live on islands between tanaris and pandaria and run a small fishing empire.
I’d love to see an insect-themed playable race in WoW, but that’s my personal bias talking I always love races in fantasy settings like the Mantid in WoW.
But if I had to design such a race from scratch, I’d probably push for a race of humanoid wasps or similar flying insects (drawing inspiration from the Thri-kreen of D&D or the Vespid of Warhammer 40k) and write a storyline about the Alliance and Horde getting involved in a civil war or rebellion of some kind in their homeland, with the Alliance backing the insect Queen while the Horde backs the rebellion. (And follow that up with themes of the Alliance trying to encourage order and stability at the cost of personal freedoms. While the Horde wants to free an oppressed lower caste of drones at the cost of the order and causing chaos and damage in the process) and that would tie into members of the race joining each faction similar to the Pandaren.
Other details about them (to justify their class options) would be that they view the void as a resource to be used but also greatly feared (all insect races in WoW are old god themed it seems, may as well keep that theme going) and due to living in an underground hive/colony they developed a culture of elementalism/shamanism to help survive by communing with the Earth spirits.
They’d have a fun gimmick of being able to fly or hover by themselves, similar to a Worgens running wild ability.
And as far as customization goes, different head and insect eye shapes and variations in chitin/skin color. And there would also be some Horde/Alliance exclusive customization options, perhaps have the Horde variant suffers wing or skin defects to show they originally came from a disenfranchised or otherwise abused lower caste while the Alliance variant might be able to choose optional jewelry or some similar flare to better represent being a part of the already established order of their home city.
This is really just me saying “I’d love to play as Mantid but here’s something similar that I think would be interesting.” and making ideas up on the spot.
I personally would love some type of Greek Warrior Tribes similiar to Athens, Sparta and so on.
Greek Mythology overall is also great to explore sadly they kinda did bring all the gods down into titan watchers (example egyptian in Uldum or Northrend/Stormheim with Nordic)
As for the Greek Tribes I am not certain about the race per say as it can be any ‘‘race’’ so to say but the culture driving them.
A race akin to the illithids from DnD, but in the Warcraft setting they would be a secretive group of manipulators that haven’t revealed themselves because they were preoccupied with keeping the Old Gods from fully manifesting. They were created by the Titans as the real actual watchers of Azeroth, but their originally idyllic appearance and pure souls got corrupted due to their constant exposure to Old God corruption.
Due to their horrifying looks and a tendency to survive on the souls of the pure to sustain their sanity (think quasi-vampirism or how the Illithid eat brains in DnD) they have been manipulating other factions and notable characters behind the scenes with psychic whispers disguised as divine or otherworldly messages, such as Elune’s whispers, whatever force told Vol’jin to select Sylvanas as Warchief, the whispers Garrosh heard while pumped full with Y’shaarj juice etc.
All of this simply so that they can steer the Horde or Alliance to fight the Big Bad of the Week corrupted by Old Gods. Since N’zoth broke free this race of monstrosities have to reveal themselves because their cabals got bulldozed by the newly risen forces of the Old Gods.
Can join either factions.
Appearance: Squidface similar to the K’thir (can have some weird lore that the K’thir were meant to be supplicants to join the race but have to pose as Old God cultists and survive for x years before they are allowed entry), thin bodies, customization options can include their skulls shaped like brains, different tentacles, rings and additional eyes on the head/body that match the eye colour of the character.
Classes:
Death Knight, Warlock, Priest, Mage, Rogue, Shaman
Racials:
Creature of the Dark: 2% increased Damage or 3% Damage Reduction (when using Tank Specialization) while indoors or during night outdoors
Secret Manipulator: Reputation Gain with all factions increased by 5%
Cabalite Resolve (3 Min CD): Passive: Curse, Magical Effect and Plague effect durations reduced by 15% on Player Character. Use: Removes half of the negative effects, healing the player character by 2% of max health for each effect, but disables the passive for 30 Seconds.
The fact that there are few games where I am able to play a frog is an absolute travesty. Why would I not want to make a chivalrous Frog Knight who uses old timey speech? I don’t care that it’s an obvious Chrono Trigger rip off.
WoW’s kobolds are skaven.
Ratlike creatures that can actually use simple technology such as guns and explosives.
They can wield magic and there is even a rat-druid.
