Over the last few expansions Blizzard’s MMORPG World of Warcraft received a plethora of new races of all colors, sizes, shapes, and fur or cog types. Some of them were almost entirely the same as their OG prototypes – just look at the Highmountain Tauren or the Lightforged Draenei – while others provided new models and animations to the factions, such as the Vulpera for the Horde and the Kul Tirans for the Alliance.
But the most interesting addition arrived with the latest expansion, World of Warcraft: Dragonflight. Dracthyr are a race of humanoid dragonkin that have joined both the Horde and the Alliance Pandaren-style, while remaining friendly among themselves. There are a lot of things they bring to the game, including the new Mail-using Class: Evoker, the use of limited transmog options in their true form and the ability to shapeshift to make up for it.
The two latter points are not particularly new to the game: Worgen, the werewolf Alliance race added in Cataclysm, are able to shapeshift between the lupine and the human appearances. Although, unlike the Dracthyr that can choose different transmogs for each form, the Worgen’s outfits remain the same between the two visages. Additionally, the Mechagnomes, the Allied Race that joined the Alliance in Battle for Azeroth, can have highly limited transmog options depending on your chosen customization.
With Dracthyr we now have a race that has both and it begs the question: what other races can become playable if given the same treatment?
Of course, there are still a million choices that could easily serve as an option for Allied Races or even simply extended character customization should Blizzard decide so: Furbolgs, Yaungol, Taunka, Forest Trolls (with their hulking Berserkers!) to name a few. There is also another bunch that safely land in the “humanoids that use almost full transmog and mounts” camp: Vrykul, Gnoll, Broken, Tuskarr and much more. Some more exotic options like the BfA’s Settrak and WoD’s Arakkoa could be safely added into the second section as well.
But this is not about them. For a while now players had their eyes set on races, many of them present in the game from the beginning or TBC, that would run into great limitations when it comes to one of the features of the game, in particular transmog and mounts. However, the Dracthyr approach would allow them to overcome this hurdle.
Number one on our list are the Ethereals.
For those who have stayed away from TBC for far too long, Ethereals are a race we run into in the Outland. They hail from the planet of K’aresh that was destroyed by Dimensius the All-Devouring. Their homeworld was bathed in the energies of the Void and the Arcane and, despite their best efforts to shield themselves from that influence, it destroyed their corporeal forms. However, the would-be-Ethereals were not about to give up. Their forms were infused with enough energy to have a chance to exist without a physical body – but barely. Now they bind themselves with enchanted strips of cloth to provide that much needed extra structure to survive.
Between TBC and BfA we have run into a number of Ethereals and their organizations, from the Consortium in the Outland to the Void-corrupted Shadowguard to the renegades like Locus-Walker and Shadreen that have since joined the Void Elves in the Telogrus Rift. More importantly, it is the Ethereals that provide players with the options for Void Storage and Transmogrification!
These wannabe Protoss have the absolute best animation in the game when it comes to movement! They also seem to be just humanoid-looking enough when it comes to the usage of mounts and would offer a unique perspective when it comes to the inevitable Light vs Void conflict.
So where’s the catch? Well, there is only so much customization a vaguely-humanoid shaped bunch of bindings can offer to players, not to mention the limited transmog options. Even if you look at the more-late game fancier Ethereals like Alleria’s mentor the Locus-Walker or Hearthstone cards featuring such characters as Nexus-Champion Saraad, it is obvious that Ethereal players will not be able to enjoy the full scope of WoW’s transmog prowess.
However, looking between the Mechagnomes and the Dracthyr in their Draconic visage… Would that really constitute a problem in modern WoW? Let us know your thoughts down below – would you play as an Ethereal, even if it meant you can only mog, say, helmet, shoulders, gloves and belt?
The runner up are the Naga.
The Naga are one of the original antagonists of the game and a threat that has persisted from before the Vanilla WoW rolled out. Originally Highborne Night Elves and the followers of Queen Azshara, the Naga got transformed into their current serpentine forms by N’Zoth during the Sundering and have since then served the Old God’s plans. These creatures come in a variety of forms and shapes, from the hulking Brutes to many-legged Abyssal monstrosities like Sivara to more “usual” slim serpentine humanoids like the Myrmidons and the Sirens: Queen Azshara herself, Lady Vash’j, Lady S’theno and many others.
Speaking of Lady S’theno: while about 99% of the Naga we meet act as enemies, there are a few who act neutral or even friendly towards the Horde and the Alliance. Among them, the Coilscar Tribe loyal to Illidan that takes part in the Demon Hunter Class Order Campaign in Legion and Skar’this the Heretic in Slave Pens (TBC dungeon).
In the Ny’alotha, The Waking City, raid from Battle for Azeroth it became known that Azshara intended to betray the Old God N’zoth which she was tortured for. The Queen then assisted players by providing them with Xal’atath, a means to take on the Old God, and disappeared to pursue her own mysterious goals. Is that shaky neutrality enough to make the Naga playable? Maybe not, but weirder things have happened in World of Warcraft, like the planet getting stabbed by the space Satan.
However, there is one notable obstacle when it comes to the playable Naga, namely the tail. While the upper body of these creatures seems to follow the general transmog rules and early-game Naga are seen using the normal player gear, the tail provides a certain hurdle on the way to comfortable usage of mounts.
It is not entirely impossible: there is quite a number of mounts that amount to being discs or having a platform for your character to crouch on: Pandaren Kite, Mages’ flying Disc, various mecha-suits and gyrocopters, flying carpets, various Elemntal mounts, even the Soaring Spelltome. Additionally, the Naga could have their own racial mounts that would account for the tail and allow them to stay as-is.
Or they could go the Dracthyr route and employ the humanoid visages, allowing them to repeat the feat of the Little Mermaid and swap tails for legs – hopefully keeping their delightfully screechy voices in the process.
Now I know there are people sick of the World of Elfcraft but ultimately the most logical humanoid visages for the Naga would be Night Elves and their Horde cousins Nightborne. There is a delightful thread on MMO-Champion that shows what their possible customization options could look like to properly differentiate them from the normie Kaldorei and Shaldorei.
However, WoW is also 18 years old and maybe it is time to wonder when enough is enough and where to draw the line with the new races. Out of the currently available playable options, both the mainstream and the Allied additions, there are always outliers that receive next to no attention to their stories. For example, Gnomeregan still sits irradiated in-game while Gilneas has been ignored since Cataclysm – meanwhile Undercity got both Blighted AND cleared of it later in the timeline.
Introducing new shiny options will likely shelf those story beats for another unspecified amount of time. Would you rather have new races like the Dracthyr or have Blizzard focus on the already existing ones? Let us know in the comments below.
