New update for Stormwinds guards: Black and asian skins to the NPCs. Positive or Lore-breaking?

Lore Story
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Honestly? Even something as minor as some shared single quest would’ve sufficed.
I understand that it would be a ton of work to analyse every custom option and come up with a custom experience or questline. Trolls alone would have like 6 different new questlines, dwarves would have at least one, tauren 2, and then we’d have stuff like Void/Blood elves, being able to be High Elves or viceversa.

In all, i agree that it’s simply to much work to realistically expect it to happen. But yes, the least they should’ve done, is facilitated some shared quest that encompassed the inclusion of most of these changes.

Something along the lines of:
“Now that the Zandalari have pledged themselves to the Horde, various tribes have decided to follow and mend their past grudges in order to have a place in this new world. Experience this historic moment by attending Talanji’s speech in the Terrace of Speakers”.
Or something like “With the renewal of the Dark Iron vows to the Alliance, Kudran has decided to formally do the same for his clan. Attend the Three Hammer council in Aerie Peak to witness this historic moment”.

The rest would have something similar. And honestly, that would suffice for me.

EDIT: Oh, that and tweaking quests in order to introduce parameters in their code to acknowledge distinct racial features. Just as they are able to address you as a “He” or a “she” depending on whether you are a male of a female PC, i think that a single swipe in their code could easily introduce the word “Wildhammer” or “Grimtotem” in those few quests that address you racially.
This would definitely take some time, but it would still be less work than coming up with an entire questline.

PS:

I’m seriously worried about the fact that people can be so easily triggered when someone points out that these distinct features should have been tied to the same sort of natural evolution/adaptation and cultural development, that writers gave the rest of races when they attempted to make everything more coherent or “realistic” in the setting.
And how certain people apparently can bear having an explanation regarding how some troll has developed distinct racial features due to its habitat, but cannot accept having a space robot having the same treatment simply because it looks more humanoid and its offensive for them to have it pointed out. Even if that sort of explanation is the one that rules the natural evolution of our RL human species.

I’ll just add, that i’m not exactly impressed if that’s indeed some quest designer take on it. Wouldn’t expect an employee to call out on the corporate message, especially regarding a subject that certain people turn into something so delicate.
Having some Blizzard employee defending some bad way of addressing the story is hardly new.

(And from now on, i’ll try to refrain from tackling this argument for as long as people go about turning this into some social debate)

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182

Yeah…would be some work indeed…but it does present a perfect opportunity to add some more background for the different races.
And they wouldn’t have to do it for every bit of customization, just some of the more out of the ordinary ones - ones that are linked to other ‘subraces’, tribes or clans.
And like you said, for the Trolls they could just cover several under one questline and maybe have an extra separate one for the Forest Trolls.

While I wouldn’t be opposed to that, I think it would be interresting for only those same race npcs to aknowledge you as a particulair tribe or clan. An outsider referring to a Grimtotem as just Tauren for example, would be fine for me, because what do they know. And it adds a little more character to npcs…sadly I’m sure that will also be allot of / to much effort.

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183

We’ve had the black and asian option for humans from Classic to WoD, so this isn’t a big deal imo.

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184

For as long as it concerns the representation of a marginalised group, it will always be a social debate. I’m sorry that you don’t enjoy the mixing of fantasy universes and social ramifications, but as you can see in the quote above, Blizzard is dedicating resources to diversifying their humans because they want humans to be a reflection of the humans that play them.

It is impossible to discuss the lore side of things without acknowledging the meta reasons behind their inclusion and the importance of such. Blizzard, as the quest designer stated, treat humans as the same regardless of skin tone. I’m sorry that upsets you, but that is their philosophy moving forward, and in the year 2020 I do not see that changing. You can’t simultaneously be wanting a serious discussion but also refusing to discuss anything relating to the meta-narratives surrounding their inclusion; it doesn’t work that way. You can’t pick and choose what you view as important to the conversation, especially on an open forum.

For the record, we agree on practically everything besides giving human skintones a “backstory”. I’ve never once disagree with the notion that dwarves should have a subrace questline, or that Blizzard didn’t implement this in the best way, or that Warcraft has historically been white dominated. The only way we disagree is on the fact that I, and Blizzard themselves (see above), do not wish to make their established human race be from jungles or tropical islands.

You have been given a plethora of examples of how humans in this setting have always been diverse, and that humans have always been portrayed as being the same race/species despite having physical variations that mimic real world races. You have selectively chosen to blatantly ignore every point made against you, and the last legs you’re standing on are “You’re an SJW so shut up” and “but trolls and dwarves have it!!!”. If you want to discuss the lore and lore alone, then the lore surrounding humans (not dwarves, tauren, or trolls) directly backs up what we are arguing against you. You are within your right to call that lore dumb or misguided, but you can’t deny its existence.

I think it’s very much time to agree to disagree. There are plenty of different universes, such as Redguards from The Elder Scrolls and Ocean Folk from Pillars of Eternity, that follow your guidelines. Blizzard is under zero obligation to follow suite, because their humans, as said, “are all the same regardless of real-world racial characteristics”. That makes them an exception to trolls and dwarves, but because of the meta-narratives surrounding real world races in a fantasy setting, it is entirely justified.

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185

I was skeptical myself but then someone explained to me quite simply how humans may have evolved differently from different Vykrul tribes with specific genetic features. I’m going to be using it as my own headcanon. :ok_hand:

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186

Ruins the world building a bit. If Black and Asian humans have been part of the kingdom for as long as white humans, wouldn’t the three ethnicities have mixed to the point of being unrecognisable by now?

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187

Subordinating story quality to political/social messaging kills narratives.
Specially in fantasy stories.

Creative processes work the other way around.

That’s the reason this attempt comes out in such a half-assed way.
And why you need to have your own headcanon in order to fill in the blanks for features that have their own explanation in other races.
Or accept at face value Blizzards “deal with it”, even if it creates a whole lot of inconsistencies that clash against basic RL logic, as well as ingame one (like Aeula pointed out).

Given this is the Story section of the forums, by story standards, this feature was handled badly.

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188

We’ve always known that NPCs don’t look exactly like their in-game models, otherwise every NPC without a custom model would look almost exactly like everyone else around them. They’re limited to what’s available in-game but in the lore of this world they probably have different body types, skin colours, hair, etc.

Nothing in the lore specifies all humans (or belfs) are specifically white/fair skinned. Nothing specifies that they’re all the same height and weight either. What you see in the game is a more limited representation that over time is being improved upon with more details. I don’t see any official lore telling us only white people can become Stormwind guards. Human in this universe are racist towards other “races” (as in the fantasy understanding of “species”) rather than “ethnicities”.

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189

At no point have I suggested a single headcanon. Black humans come from black vrykul; as shown, this is canon. It is you that is suggesting black humans are from either jungles, secret islands, or deserts (all of which do not have actual black people irl in any vast capacity).

This existence of people of colour in your fantasy safe space is not political. The Warcraft setting will not be dealing with emancipation, with oppression, with anything remotely politically driven. Their inclusion is merely representing how Blizzard views their game should have always been. If you believe a black/Asian person existing is political, then that’s your own issue you need to evaluate.

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190

That conflicts with real life logic as well. Colonial countries such as Brazil, the Caribbean, the USA, practically all of South America in fact - all countries that have had immense racial diversity for centuries, yet still have certain distinct racial groups (especially throughout South America).

But that’s a bit of a Weird point because I don’t agree human eugenics belongs in a whimsical fantasy setting, and I’ll eat my hat if Blizzard includes that in their 2020 MMO intended for wide audiences. Humans can be very dark, and also not as dark; it’s obvious some of the skin tones are intended to be “mixed race”, if that’s enough for you.

191

Yeah but we’re presuming here that Azerothians Humans have had no history of racial segregation and have in fact been coexisting from the very start of their cultural existence since there is no source for there being any difference in origins.

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Never said it did.

Never implied it was.
What you said on the other hand, did sort of lean said predicament.

Here:

And specially, here:

You are subordinating story quality to attempted messaging. Disregarding the fact that it was done poorly, for the sake of acknowledging and praising the attempt.

Good intentions do not create good storytelling. And again, forceful/lazy attempts with these sort of things, often come in detriment of quality.

I can sidestep your attempts at turning my argument into “You are just arguing for a story of whities” every time you throw them at me.
And i’m not the one that gets offended when someone points out the obvious contingencies that are indispensable to allow multiculturalism. Contingencies that are lacking for the human race of Stormwind (even if they do not for most of the rest of races).

193

Then the answer could be as simple as human biology doesn’t work in the same way as real life human biology. They are after all not a naturally evolved race, but created via curses on metalwork. It could be as simple as certain humans keeping a tight hold of their particular vrykul’s ancestry, which reflects in their children and their children’s children. In terms of IRL examples, I think looking into the various Creole people would be a helpful thought experiment, in terms of various racial groups intermixing yet remaining distinct.

I think it’s worth asking; why do you have an issue with this now? We have had black humans from 2004, and Asian humans too. Had you complained at any point up til now?

194

The answer wouldn’t be “as simple as”, because we have precedents that show how Titanforged races became about as tied to natural adaptation as any other race. With Dwarves, and orcs, it even marked the apparition of distinct cultures.

If you want to argue humans, you have Kul Tirans being also affected by it. To the point they developed physical differences.

195

Not really mate since we’ve had black/Asian humans longer than blood elves, nightborne, taunka, yaungol, even vrykul - they’ve been included in the lore long enough now that you’d figure people would have accepted they belong in the setting. The fact they can now have better customisation options isn’t a retcon, it’s merely expanding human options. Where’s your thread complaining about night elves getting a very dark purple skin tone, or orcs and goblins getting a yellow one? It really isn’t Blizzard that is making this political. There is no inherent “message” here; only that Blizzard is rectifying the fact that WoD blatantly whitewashed the entire human race by removing the two Asian face options and lightening all black skin colours to a tan brown.

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Kul Tirans can be blacker than the humans we have now lmao. They have also developed their larger sizes due to more recent vrykul ancestry (Drust integration), but yeah. Bit of a moot point if you consider Kul Tirans can be very dark skinned.

197

I’ve always had an issue with the lack of background origins for the other ethnicities, it came off as lazy. Before I could dismiss it as them being a mix of all three but now there are significant differences which shows it’s not so.

198

Your example includes dwarves and orcs. Ignoring the very obvious fact you keep ignoring that dwarves have always been able to be black, since 2004, that’s two races. Gnomes (a race that was also able to be black) aren’t shown to have any inherent intense racial differences based on location; the Eastern Kingdom gnomes and the Mechagon gnomes are physically identical (ignoring of course the mechanical limbs). That’s two Titan races that have immense racial diversity based on location (dwarves and orcs), and two that don’t. That holds a precedent that adaptability is not something inherent to something being made by the Titans.

EDIT: Again my discord is still open if you want to see the rest of the conversation I had with someone actively involved with the creation of the WoW universe. It’s tophatsaur#5881, and includes a lot of examples that contradict your assertions. The invite’s still open to anyone else who wants to see.

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Seniority doesn’t make the feature itself any better. We’ve had lore blanks across several fields for years now.

Notable differences need of an explanation. Grasping at “they never had one”, doesn’t make the human ones any more acceptable.

You can take it at stride if you want.
But it remains a bad story no matter how positive you think the intentions behind it are.
Specially if you are to highlight it more from now on. And specially given how much effort you’ve put into explaining how the rest came to be.

For someone that says to represent a PoC, you sure seem quite narrowed regarding what black features include. Skin colour is but one of the traits.
Are asian-themed humans some Vrykul that somehow took a hit to the face that slanted their eyes?

https://wow.gamepedia.com/Dark_Iron_dwarf

And again, grasping at unexplained bits of the story doesn’t validate them in a way that turns them acceptable. As they remain, you know…unexplained.

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200

It but one of the traits indeed, and up until SL was the only trait we had in-game to differentiate the human races (besides the pre-WoD Asian face type) in a game with incredibly limited customisation. Again, turning this into a “aha actually you’re the racist” ain’t gonna work when you continue to say things like

:grimacing:. No comment besides yikes.

Not referring to Dark Irons here friend. Open up your game client and cycle through the dwarf skin colour options, and then the gnome ones. There are two distinctly darker and browner than the others, similar to the human skin tones.

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