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

Lore Story
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Lol.
So this is the problem isn’t it? The argument isn’t about debating how well they implemented the feature, it has to do with some weird fixation about turning it into a “human rights” debate.
Go back to Wowhead or general discussion, if you want to sate your blue balls for stuff like that.

This forum section is about debating story issues, and how writers handle these sort of new features.

And yeah, throwing about distinct ethnic groups without an elaborate explanation, in a setting that has consistently highlighted the fact that it cares for stuff like natural adaptation, is on itself, some of the laziest writing on this game.
Regardless of how positive the intentions were.

Honestly? It sounds rather racist to discard any chance for black or asian features to have the same expanded background as the rest of races on the planet.
It also signals how ignorant and obtuse the person in question in for apparently not knowing something as basic as how distinct physical features are naturally created/originated. But i’ll get to that in a bit.

Also, and regarding this bit:

I’m not the one that argued that in this setting black or asian features came because of something called the “Curse of Flesh”.
I’m not the one holding onto it to explain why Black or asian features came to be.

And in fact, i seem to be in the minority here when i argue that these features deserve to have something more than that.

Who said they had to? I get that there is little left for you other than creating some strawman about anyone here advocating for having Blacks shown in loincloths, but you’ll still be missing the point by several miles.

The whole point of giving humans a background isn’t about turning said collective into mere “jungle people”. It’s about giving them the same sort of expanded background that ingame and RL races have.

Are you really that ignorant regarding human evolution and biology, that you really do not understand how disparate physical features come to be?
Or is it just a pose?
Ingame, most races follow on the same template as RL in terms of natural adaptation/evolution. Why shouldn’t humans have such? Why can’t they?

And i can’t help but laugh at the sort of negationism you are displaying here.

I guess it’s all part of your virtue signalling, but it really gets weird to read how apparently we are to discard stuff like natural adaptation (which we have ample proof regarding it coming into play even on Azeroth), and RL human history, in order to not “offend” in a setting that already leans on all sorts of primitive-themed races, and whose human equivalents are based around European-medieval societies (with a fantasy twist to them).

Yeah, “Poof, Magic” remains some lazy way of storytelling in a setting that cared to create actual/plausible reasons for racial iterations with every other species of this setting.

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Honestly man you do you. You’ve been given story examples in this thread, biological examples, the PR + common sense reasons your jungle human headcanon will never come to be, and a very valid explanation as to the humans’ origins. The fact you’ve resorted to “ha ha actually YOU are the racist” just shows how little of a leg you have to stand on. The fact you choose to believe the very valid explanations you’ve been given are either “poof magic” or “virtue signalling” proves you have zero intent here of having an actual discussion; your only interest is discussing with people you agree with, and will claim anyone giving a lore reason to the contrary “doesn’t care about the lore and should get lost”.

Expand your worldview.
https://books.google.co.uk/books/about/Why_the_Humans_are_White.html?id=QAIrngAACAAJ&redir_esc=y

https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/HumansAreWhite

https://www.historyworkshop.org.uk/white-supremacy-and-medievalism-in-online-dungeons-and-dragons-communities/

https://writingcooperative.com/rethinking-race-in-fantasy-an-evidence-based-approach-8341c98ab05?gi=470a8eea7b4f

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Nope.

I’ve seen quite a lot of virtue signalling, and some weird fixation to turn this into some political debate about minorities and representation even if the topic itself was angled in a way that judged how well it mashed from a story perspective.

Even considering that, had to deal with people like you discarding:

  1. Precendents ingame: Dwarf example. Which hasn’t been countered and has been conveniently ignored by you.
  2. Basic biological reasons and natural adaptation: Trolls, orcs, Tauren, Elf,…examples. Which again, has been as sidelined as the above.

All i’ve seen, is some flailing that attempted to nitpick stuff out of context, and trying to discredit the any disagreement as “racism”. Which, given the nature of the arguments exposed, point at either illiteracy regarding the meaning of the word, or not bothering actually addressing the case being made.

In all, it all seemed as some cheap and flawed white knighting that still required of guys like you to build their own windmills in order to have anything to charge against.

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So, did you defer to a ‘PoC’ before you started playing and posting on that Pandaren character? You know, those deemed inapropriate by Chinese law?
Or do Chinese not fall under the ‘PoC’ cover? Does that mean they fall under the ‘Whitey’ color, then?
Just asking you, since you’re so keen and heavily engaged on these matters.

Also those links…
The first one is about an obscure book with zero ratings and no preview to explain what it’s about other than some title which could entail a whole slew of everything or nothing.
And about the second one, I got a simple reply for you, just like you prefer it ; Check out Bollywood movies, most people in those movies, practically 95% of it will be ‘PoC’, now, I’m thinking it’s because those movies are shot in Asia with Asian actors.
As opposed to Hollywood(which tbh, sucks a** these days) which is shot in a predominantly white country with a predominantly white majority…sooo strange!

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I’m not engaging in a discussion with someone who says “Hollywood is for us whites! You can have Bollywood!”, which I think is the most hilariously stupid thing someone’s said in this thread so far.

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Ooh Did I say that?
Did I say ; "Hollywood is for us whites!’? Did I write that down in black and white and your read that?
I think the most hilarious thing here is you turning this way and that to label people ‘racists’ and get away with a mighty fine case of racism yourself.
Besides, engaging in a discussion is not pointing your fingers and missapropriating what other people are saying.

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I loose interest in discussing with people that do not even bother giving any kind of explanation beyond some “Deal with it or you are racist”, that nitpick stuff out of context in order to try and discredit an argument that goes along different lines, or that seem more concerned about forceful representation for some social agenda, than in story quality…while posting in a place that discusses about the story quality.

As of now, you might get the impression that i think you are not worth debating seriously with.
Well, given your arguments, you sure are onto something. Because i do think that someone that for example distorts arguments made (such as turning “Blizzard should work on plausible background for blacks” into “You just want jungle people”), is in fact, not worth debating seriously with.

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168

At the end of it all, if you read my posts you’ll find I don’t disagree with the fundamentals of what you’re arguing. It was frustrating that for over ten years I couldn’t play a character that looked like me, and that the default human race was entirely white with zero significant black characters. It was absolutely harrowing.

I’m not defending Blizzard here; this inclusion is obviously lazy, it is blatant that it’s being done as “rectifying the past” rather than attempting to properly represent marginalised peoples in their fantasy settings. I’m not going to claim an almost wholly white-led company with a history of very problematic tendencies is somehow now a champion of civil rights; that would be dumb.

The reason you believe this is turning into a racism debate is because a lot of the things you say come across as incredibly tone deaf and ignorant. I haven’t argued against your topic on dwarves/trolls because I don’t disagree; I’ve argued against your examples of how you’d “fix” this situation by making all the black humans be descended from jungles of all things. It’s obvious you never intended that to come off as racist, and I’m not suggesting you as a person are, but you need to understand that saying someone like that is going to be incredibly offensive to some people and very worthy of scrutiny/being called out.

If your topic had stuck to just “Blizzard implemented this lazily” and not “Black humans should be from Stranglethorn or some tropical island” then you and I would have been agreeing with each other. It very much isn’t the thread itself I take most issue with. You can’t just try to shut down people calling you out by saying “these SJW’s aren’t worth it” when if you look at my post history, you’d see I’m on a roleplay realm of all things; I care very deeply about the lore or else I wouldn’t be here.

The reason I don’t want a story/narrative about how black people came to be in the WoW universe is because I don’t trust Blizzard to write that story with the sensitivity and nuance they should. Their head writing team has zero black people involved with it, and any attempt to push “why there are black people” would very much come across as at best misguided and at worst deeply ignorant. It’s no longer just a sub race when you’re dealing with a genuine group of marginalised people; whether it’s a fantasy setting or not, it’s now anthropology, and I don’t believe Blizzard’s writers know enough about that to write this narrative believably. Having humans be black because of black vrykul ancestors is the best (and currently canon) solution, because it treats them as normal. The suggestions you’re giving would treat black peoples as “The Other”, and that isn’t what we want. We want to share an equal space as the same fantasy race.

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Why do we have to discuss skin options that are totally normal for any humans in real life? This doesn’t need any extra explainations. It’s just the way some humans look. End of story.

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The reason i believe this is turning into a racism debate is because certain people seem to be reaching for anything that could be interpreted in any racist way.
And because it seems as if people had a script, that applied to anyone that dared say anything against it, be them actual na**is or people acknowledging some missed nuance regarding the feature itself.

This is signalled through people taking issue in the fact that i typed “exotic”, regardless of quotation marks or further clarification regarding what i meant by that.
Or how I implied that the most logical place these black features would come from would be Stranglethorn because of a series of logical ingame reasons such as it being the only place with a sizeable human population that should’ve developed notable distinct features.
Yeah, no sh!t, i know Africa has something more than jungles, but unfortunately, The Barrens do not have any kind of notable human settlement, nor do they count with a figurehead such as Makasa that could usher or facilitate the inclusion of certain human collectives.

Denying the roots of these visually distinct features, is going against the very foundation of our history as a human species.
And there is enough backing in order to point at some of its parallels with how it works in the ingame setting.

Why should that be any more concerning than how white people came to be? As of now, i don’t see anyone taking issue in how Blizzard is trashing all over the Nordic cultures in order to facilitate their own view of how humans came to be in Warcraft.

Lets take a look at the other races that had an expanded reasoning for their existance.

Do you take issue in the way Blizzard explained how Wildhammers came to be? Do you think that the way they handled troll tribes, is in any way offensive had it been applied to a human race?

And most importantly of all: Given their background, how about we consider ingame humans about as “fantastical” as the rest of humanoid species that currently populate the setting? Their background certainly makes their humanoid features purely circumstantial.
I see no need to have them treated any different than the other races.

If we are to take “umbrage” on Blizzard parodying some minority, there are already several races that would probably fit the bill.
And honestly, i see no issue in that given the way its being handled. Even for the segments that would probably affect me.

We already have several human segments being treated as the “Other”.
Kul Tiran and Gilnean for example.

Do you think anyone should be offended by it?

And this wouldn’t be about creating ghettos for the “others”. It would be about giving actual reasons for the circumstance that allowed said multiculturalism to happen.
Regardless of whether people like it or not, i can track back in human history why i have darker skin than say, most Norwegian or german people.
I know why my features resemble more those of an arab, rather than that of the rest of Europeans.

And because of it, i fail to see what harm would it make for distinct human features to have something as simple as: “They are black because they used to live in X, or came from Y”.
Regardless of how offended people get when pointing out the above, that’s the logical reason behind most of both ingame and RL racial features.

If you are black in Britain, you can probably track your history back to either the New Commonwealth, or those african black slaves that stayed loyal to the crown during the American Revolutionary War.

If you are black in France, that’s probably because you are a descendant of french colonies of either African or Melanesian ancestry.

And if you have browner skin, and something resembling arabic features in Spain, that probably means that your family had some kind of ancestry of north african influence from that time Muslims invaded the peninsula and formed what they called Al-andalus.

Would i personally take offence if anyone pointed out the above? Not at all.
Would i consider myself any less british, french, or spaniard, because of it? Lol, why should I?
Is there any actual country that wasn’t founded on interracial mixings?

Assuming that multiculturalism happens because of “reasons” or “Magic” is one of the worst ways to go about it.
Specially in a setting that cared to elaborate why the rest of the species had their own distinct features.

Being extra delicate simply because they would be touching on the race that mirrors RL the most, is absurd from my point of view.
Personally, I do not identify myself with a space robot that got squid chickenpox. Regardless of how “human” said race looks.

I think that overall, Blizzard managed to portrayed rather fine how the different races came to be. Even if i tend to see the “american point of view” seeping here and there (specially regarding certain moralisms)

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171

Blizz close this thread please. It’s just going round in circles and has become pointless now.

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Black and asian people exist. That’s a fact. Not an opinion. Asking for extra lore just to explain different skin colors when it is normal not to be white too is just hidden racism brought in here by the OP. Stop your racist antics now.

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Even in Skyrim I think it was actually possible (without any mod) to create a Nord character with dark skin despite Nords are clearly based on scandinavian people…so…

“Skyrim belongs to the Nords !” …

…“Yes, even dark-skinned ones” :slight_smile:

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Okay, so instead of acting like bungholes, let’s throw this on another side abit.
Because the OP’s questions/ criticisms and some latest interview got me thinking;
Our Mutual Blizzdaddy Ion, said somewhere that there are more customization options on the further horizon, after Shadowlands goes life.
Now, ofcourse I won’t be getting excited anytime soon, because I don’t want to set myself up for a crushing weight of disappointment, However;

What if they added Customization options through questlines?
As in you complete a questline specific to those customization options, to give them more depth instead of the ‘ere catch these new biiiiiits’ of just adding it to the barber(if I can still call it ‘the barber’).

Examples(yes, you saw this one coming a mile off);

  • Grimtotem customization ; Although I’d love it anyway, I’d apreciate it allot more if it was complimented by underlying lore bits, to explain a bit more about the current civil situation of the Tauren tribes and as to why those options are now available to you, as the player character.

  • Forest Troll, I picked up on this being a fan favorite, and I also got the impression, from checking for myself(obviously), that these options were still missing, so they could also add them through a questline, explaining the Forest troll culture a bit, it’s ties to the Horde, perhaps, it’s view on the Blood Elves a bit, to explain why this choice is now available, and perhaps they could add an option for Troll players, similar to how Orcs have Posture options, to Bulk or not the Bulk, mon.

What do you guys think? I mean, I’ve read more than enough now of the boring a** humans, which are clearly going to be boring anyway no matter what their skintone is going to be.
Any other suggestions? Disagreements?(Yes, you can disagree on Humans being boring, you can also add a suggestion for a Human questline for additional customization, is you’re still missig something, or have some cool idea(Obviously))

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175

This already does happen with the Night Elf black eyes. I like to imagine Blizzard is toying with this idea for Shadowlands…

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Yes, so I read, I actually haven’t played the questline, I don’t have any Alliance characters of high level.
And I hope you’re right, this is all subjective obviously, but I think it could add allot more to the playable races and they could use these questlines to flesh them out more, maybe introduce some new characters or cultural sides of the races.

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I know right?! We already do that in a way with the Allied Races, we work for their rapport and assist them - which then makes their people accessible to the player.

It’s not unheard of. Would be a fun content route to unlock everything.

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I think that this should’ve been the go-to alternative to introduce significant racial features for players. That’s why i was extremely disappointed when Danuser shot down the hype by claiming none of the features to be introduced, were to be acknowledged by the game itself.

I understand that Blizzard’s laziness knows no bounds, but i feel it would’ve been easy to have some throwaway line introduced somewhere, and the optics would’ve improved soooooo much.

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Yes, agreed, like for instance, now the Dwarf customisation options for Wildhammer dwarves will just be added, now allot of people will be happy with that ofcourse, but it could have been more significant if it was done through a questline, so you had more updates on how things are now for the Wildhammer clan and some more of their background.
And well, I think it would actually add that feeling to actually playing a Wildhammer, instead of just a Bronzebeard that visited the barber shop and got some tattoos(which is an option now or then, anyway).

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After contacting someone involved with the quest design (they wished to not be named directly since this is in no way ‘official’) over twitter, I have confirmation of Blizzard’s views on this subject, as well as the personal take of a quest designer who has been with the team for several expansions now. Response below.

https://i.imgur.com/5jmUkpS.png

To note:

“There will be Black guards and Asian-looking guards, because in Warcraft humans are humans and they’re all the same regardless of real-world racial characteristics. There is not a history of different human tribes of different skin tones coming from ‘exotic’ places (gag!) to justify their existence. It’s a fantasy universe and they just exist.”

My discord is tophatsaur#5881 if anyone needs further proof that this isn’t just a photoshop job. The case is closed. I’m so incredibly happy that we now have 100% proof that, on Azeroth, humans are just humans. Shadowlands is gonna be amazing.

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