I just don't see them making a race that can't use mounts. Ever. They use mounts as rewards, there are hundreds in the game, it would be ridicuously prohibitive to prevent a whole race from using mounts. They removed Plainswalking from Tauren for a reason after all.

There are Ogre lovers and Drakonid haters? I took the Drakonid comment more to mean that we'd be getting some race we'd fought in the past, not specifically Drakonids. Drakonids make no sense.

I think what he's trying to say is; they'd look to races that already have a presence within Warcraft; and in the event that they choose a race which is again new, then they would need to integrate them before the expansion somehow.

At this point, one would have to assume that any new races would have the propensity to actually be able to use mounts; unless they chose to go the route of having mounts be a second form of "pets" to the race; yet still having them count as mounts etc etc. That being said, the problem still extends beyond land and flying mounts; even if you give them flight form/plains running, flight paths still exist.

Agreed. The big thing to consider about Flight Form, as well, is that it's an option. It's not that druids CAN'T use flying mounts, they just get an advantage by being able to POOF into one in mid-fall. Creating a race that flat out can't use mounts because they are then given an alternate method (that must also involve training the riding skills appropriately) of speed increases just sounds like hamstringing the designers on balance issues.

The fact that they're willing to own up for shoe-horning the Draenei into the game is nice, though it leaves a lot of questions for future races.

Well, the major NPC race introduced in WotLK is of course the Vrykul. If I'm not mistaken, they even have a fully "armorable" model, that is, they can wear different kinds of armor, like player models and a select few NPC races (Goblins, Naga, Scourge skeletons, from the top of my head).

From the full interview with Chilton, I get the sense that a new class seems unlikely for the next expansion, but that new race(s) seem entirely possible. Seeing as he gives Drakonids as an example, I think we can be quite sure that we will not see Drakonids (or else it would be a strange early reveal).

I think this list by WoWWiki has a lot of the favorite races, with a lot of the typical arguments for or against them: Race ideas - WoWWiki - Your guide to the World of Warcraft

Alliance Furbolg and Horde Ogres.. maybe a bit boring, but both combinations seem quite logical. Ogres were already typical Horde units in Warcraft 2, and Furbolg allied with Tyrande in Warcraft 3, and again with the Draenei in TBC.

I strongly believe that Worgen will be one of the classes for the next expansion. They're a race, like the Draenei, that have this background that can be easily explored/created to fit into either the Horde or the Alliance, they've shown their faces to both factions, they're not necessarily evil or good, and the player masses at large find them to be a cool race all-around.

I don't believe Gilneas will get an Isle of Quel'Danas treatment this expansion, or the next for that matter. Gilneas works much better as a 1-20 starting area, as soon as you're done you're right next to the old world, and you can finish leveling. We know for a fact via the hint dropping Community Managers and Metzen himself that they're working on some very "interesting things" there.

Tom Chilton's interview pretty much confirms that they won't be spitting out hero classes every expansion, so yes, 2 new races for an expansion with their own starting areas fits quite nicely.

As for the 2nd race, I could see Goblins allying themselves with either faction, they're another race that could fit a South Sea expansion, and they're a popular race with the playerbase. You know the Goblins are numerous, they have the Princes of Trade that each faction of Goblins answer to(One leads the Venture Company and is disliked by the other Princes for example), what if one of those Princes were to say ally themselves with the Horde, or the Alliance. Maybe the Alliance and Horde go into open war and one of the princes sees an opportunity to make a large profit swearing allegiance to one side like in the first and second wars. If Blizzard can split the High Elves and Blood Elves down the middle and only make the Blood Elves playable, it's entirely possible that they give Goblins a similar treatment and ally them to one faction and keep the rest neutral.

One of the reasons I wouldn't consider something like the Naga or Drakonids is because they're races that are quite literally monsters. It would be a stretch to consider Naga, and then you have other Naga, that aren't as Nagay as the originals, and have feet and walk around outside and hang in buildings, at that point they wouldn't even be Naga anymore, they'd be something entirely different. Same with Drakonids, downsizing them to a player-friendly race would take a lot of work, at which point you might not even end up with the race you were trying to incorporate into the factions to begin with.

Furbolgs make sense though I always saw them more relating to Horde than Alliance, as their roots are shamanistic and Alliance Shaman's roots are pretty dodgy to begin with. But it seems Alliance team up with them several times more than Horde so who knows. There is also the Alliance racism which would be tough to lore in a full on monster/beast looking race I think.

Vyrkul are interesting but I don't believe there's ever been any reference that they are anything other than bloodthirsty savages, the Lich King enslaved them but they were already brutal warmongers before that. It would be a pretty radical move to have a friendly version discovered, though I suppose they could add some shit like "As the Lich King's control subsided after his death, the Vyrkul took another look at the world and decided to become tree-hugging vegetarians fighting for the Alliance/Horde".

I mentioned it a few months back but they could easily just do something simple like Frostborn/Taunka as the "new" races, or new skin options for Dwarves/Tauren.

Pandaren would probably fit a South Seas expansion quite well but we know we aren't getting them thanks to China.

What was the hoax alliance race as well from before TBC when people had pretty much dismissed Dranei? Was something like a race of Panther humanoids that lived on a secret mountain plateau near Ironforge.


E: I can't see Goblins to be honest, they are pretty happy staying neutral and exploiting the war between Alliance and Horde.

Worgen are possible I guess but it would take some EPIC retcon on scales never before seen I think, even more than Dranei. Pretty much every in game source paints Worgen as evil and there are some quests that speak of the dimension they come from where they live only to kill other life. The source books for the RPG specifically state a few times that they are pure evil with no redeeming qualities. There is the possibility that the Lords of the Emerald Flame refers to a race other than the Legion in which case I guess it is possible they could be an expansion race as they are sworn enemies of the Worgen but given the comments about fitting in the Dranei earlier that seems unlikely.

It certainly would provide a way of removing Garrosh from the equation if he survives Northrend. Imagine it -- Drakonids or another drake-y species enslaved in the Spire by Garrosh and his most loyal troops, Garrosh having gone over to the Dark Side. He's got the idea of breeding troops by playing with Fel magic, corrupting Leeroy's infamous whelps to alter their forms to better suit his Horde's purpose.

A rebellion forms, war breaks out, and the enslaved species fights their way toward the surface (Effectively going *backwards* through LBRS/UBRS, possibly). They break through into Rend's arena, whereupon they witness Saurfang cleaving Garrosh apart with no small amount of pleasure.

"Just like your father."
"You flatter me."
"Don't be. Just like him, you are only useful to the Horde in death."

Simple reasoning against Drakonid: same reason they won't implement Ogres. Blizzard once commented that they would never implement over-sized PCs because of scale issues. Fitting in doorways, etc. They specifically used Ogres as an example of something never to be implemented due to size as EQ (or EQ2) had shortly before made Ogres a playable race.

Tiny player-sized Drakonids and Ogres would be silly. Full-scale ones won't fit in every pre-existing door in the game. QED: no Drakonids or Ogres.

Drakonid in that interview were, like Communism, just a red herring.

I also want to make a point against Naga (and another non-bipedal race): Boots It doesn't make much sense to have a race that can't wear boots or possibly require multiple sets of boots, such as the Drakonid/Dragonkins that aren't bipedal.

I'll not deny that horde have much more (and older) history of shamanism. Blizzard didn't need to shoehorn alliance Draenei shaman into the game by mysterious stuff that happened on Draenor before it shattered into Outland though.

Dwarves aren't one unified clan. The Bronzebeard clan is based in Ironforge; it is the playable dwarf race as well as the core of a major Northrend plot line. The Wildhammer clan is based in the Hinterlands and has an uneasy truce with the Alliance. The Blackrock clan is based in their eponymous mountain and is hostile to both factions. In Northrend we meet the Frostborn, Earthen, and Iron dwarves. Of these 3 old world and 3 expansion dwarf clans, half (the Wildhammer, Blackrock, and Earthen) have shamanism capability. Some dragonkin are bipedal. The guards outside the Obsidian Sanctum are a good example. Further, the full dragons can take on humanoid form, and wear clothing when they do so. Kalecgos and Alextrasza are familiar examples.

Boots frankly, isn't a large enough reason to exclude a race from the running. Trolls, Draenei, and tauren don't wear boots properly more of ankle warmers. There is no reason for them not to have non-traditional appendage ends to follow similar patterns and just map elsewhere on their body. And there's no reason to exclude non-bipeds too since we already accept that the same pair of boots fits an orc male and a female blood elf.

Didn't need to, but it was a convenient way to eliminate the faction-specific class issue. It also helped to square the Draenei more effectively against the blood elves in a very straight-forward "Orcs vs. Humans" or "Red vs. blue" style that hadn't really been used since before WC3. Was it kinda ham-fisted? Sure, I take Blizzard to task for baiting us on the race, but I somehow find the end result of Alliance shamans perfectly acceptable.

Yes, admittedly, there are some non-four-legged dragons. If we assume that any new race must be bipedal and roughly humanoid in shape, then yes, only the bipedal Broodlord Lashlayer-shaped dragonkin are eligible. This doesn't change the oversize issue. And while full-fledged dragons have shown an affinity for changing shape into mortal-looking forms, the other dragonkin have never expressed such an ability. I don't think we are going to have playable dragons who spend the whole game in mortal-mode.

I realize that all of this debate about potential races is pretty exciting, but even with Chilton's statement that a new race will get seeded properly in the world first, we can't base the presence of race entirely on past information alone. The real justification for a race's addition to the game will be rooted in the expansion, just as the connection that both the Blood Elves and the Draenei had to Outland was their reason for inclusion in the expansion where we went to Outland.

Given the conjecture of a South Seas/Maelstrom expansion, we could get burly human-sized Murlocs (hereafter Burlocs) joining the Alliance and Dark Irons joining the Horde for new races, and we'd buy it because the justifications would make sense.

While I do agree we will not get them, Drakanoids are fun to talk about. We have seen tiny ones before, the entire Nef fight had tons of them, with the black ones being the only really large ones in that encounter, and even then they were tiny compared to the other ones in BWL.

If we did get them as playable, I would expect a whole new set of models anyway they could use all gear, and have distinct genders. The Blood Elves got that treatment, something which was much needed as the original models were extremely ugly.

As for Worgen, well they are popular, that's for sure. Back before BC, someone wrote up a full fan treatment of they could be integrated, and it looked a lot better thought out then the majority of the other race ideas flying about at that time. That treatment may also prevent Blizzard from going that route, as it was a fan made one originally.

If anything, I would expect playable Naga, but a lot of work would be needed to be done to make them viable. There is that whole tail issue, and the females have at least two set of arms on top of that.

Well in the end it's software. They can do whatever they like. Any restriction is artificial and subject to limits they chose to observe or break.

Nobody said they couldn't make dragons a playable race. Dragons, not drakonids. Since every race has a racial ability, this one would be shapeshifting. So either you are a dragon, which works kind of like a druid in animal form or you shape out to humanoid form via your racial ability and then you can play with the class skills ("caster form").

You can replace dragon with any other form/creature in this example. It could be done, nothing prevents them from doing something like that, especially now when they start to mess with racials again (or allow faction switches). Worgen that are in the game do a bit of shapeshifting as do dragons already, at least the big ones. The latter who are shifting are all lore characters though, so I'd not really expect them to give something like that to players. But then again we have lots of mini-Arthases' runnig around now as well, so who knows?

Of course, if they want to implement any race that cannot sensibly use an item that is normaly worn, or those already in the game just don't fit (no legs, no feet, more than 2 arms, etc.) then the amount of work needed for implementing that is probably too high and it's most likely not done. Still it's software, if they want to do something, they can.

I was going to object to this idea based solely on the fact that hunters recently found a way to tame one for a pet, but it looks like that was unintentional and will be patched.

Tiny is relative. I still remember the Nef-fight Drakonids at twice player height (human/troll/undead/etc - not Tauren, who seem around 20-40% taller). Not as bad as the 4-6 times height of the huge ones earlier in the instance. Reference the height of the Drakonid guarding portals in the Chamber of Aspects.

I suppose that could always be leveraged as part of the point (it's not a bug, it's a feature!). "Dwarf" Drakonid - abnormally small for their kind, could feel ostracized by their culture/flight and decide to join a faction.

Much as I loathe them, I'm starting to suspect Murloc PCs will emerge this time around (they were photoshopped into character login screen before BC as a hoax). The quests in NW Borean Tundra are a big factor in that opinion. Showing sentient and communicating Murlocs. They have the requisite number of limbs and could model gear without issue (Trolls slouch, too). Just give them to the other faction, please.

Yeah, I think kobolds and murlocs would be great racial additions to the game. Think about it... kobolds are definitely shamanistic and both sides would be equally unhappy with their new races.

You could put in typically epic backstories for both races too:

-Murlocs, rebelling against the grip of the elder gods that created them and aspiring to the light.

-Kobolds, rebelling against the despotic goblin masters who currently enslave them in the Venture Co. mines.

Really, I want murlocs just so I can see a murloc paladin in full plate summoning a charger.

IT's just too bad that the expansion is likely to be released before April first of next year, isn't it?

I agree with this post. We may very well see a new class, new race, both or neither. Until blizzcon, when I expect that they'll announce the new expansion, we can't be for sure. I'm positive they'll implement some "new" amazing feature to the game that will be exciting and innovative.

A few things that they could potentially do to add a new exciting feature to the game with out adding a new class or race is introduce mounted combat, flying in the old world, and simililar features that we expect to see in game anyways.

This could be avoidable with a new class of armor (dragonkin/naga scales?) that would be the only thing the new race could wear.

This thread is filled with guesses about the upcoming expansion/races (not unlike this one), but what did tickle me there were the comments on Wryxian's signature. I found that to be a rather entertaining line of thought and am curious to see if anything more will be coming up shortly.

I don't see how this would work in any way. Armor is a class based restriction, not race. If you had a race that could only wear one type of armor you would need to create items for every class that race is capable of being and no other race would be able to wear them.

I honestly don't see Blizzard coming out with a new class or new playable races for the simple fact that their content creation seems to be heading towards recycling/reusing rather then creating. Doing DK's was much easier then doing two whole new sides in TBC, and I'd expect that for the next expac they'll go even further and avoid new entry level content creation as often as possible.

If anything, I'd guess:

-Expanded vehicle system (boats/ships maybe?)
-more engine additions to accommodate the above
-Expanded player customization and even more pay-as-you-customize microtransaction stuff
-Reintrodution of Azeroth raid content in heroic form (I'd really bank a lot on them reusing at least one instance from vanilla again)
-Possible redesign of azeroth for flight
-Minor cosmetic updates
-Quests, quests and more quests.
-Target release for next spring

I'm basing this on on the fact that 3.2 is probably slated for late summer and 3.3 for December/January.