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Stormwind City Guards and Civilians Receive Updated Diverse Appearances in Shadowlands

posted 2020/09/10 at 12:38 AM by perculia

ShadowlandsShadowlandsNaomiLarimaine PurdueSuzanneStormwind FishermanAllison PottsShadowlandsIthurian WhitespireSarana DamirInitial Announcement on Diverse AppearancesRedShirtGuy for BlizzplanetQ: One of the things I’m really excited about in the new customization features is how its sort of allowed sub-races of a sort to get in, like Sandfury trolls and Wildhammer dwarves. And then those purple trolls who may be dark trolls or Shatterspear trolls; it’s not clear. But I wondered: it reminded me, in the pre-patch to Cataclysm they added little questlines explaining some of the new race/class combinations. Would there possibly be something similar about, like, Sandfury trolls or high elves in the Shadowlands pre-patch?

A: There are no specific plans along those lines in Shadowlands. Though I think we are planning on just broadly incorporating the range of character customization options for NPCs as well as players just across the world.

I think, in some ways we’re frankly viewing this as a bit of a retcon. Like, we’re not going to change existing named, established characters and make them look different. But, walking around Stormwind, walking around other parts of the world, you will see guards and random civilians that have these looks as if they’ve been there all along. Because frankly I think we see this as correcting an oversight on our part over the years, as well as just trying to improve representation more broadly. We are custodians of a fantasy universe and a world that we built, and we don’t want to not do the right thing because we feel shackled to a decision that was made creatively in a different era that was fifteen-plus years ago.

Now, as for details of troll clans and dwarven clans and the rest, I think as we have opportunities to do things like racial heritage lines or other race focused questlines, that’s a fun opportunity to explore those areas. But we don’t have any specific thoughts for Shadowlands right now.interview with Art Director Ely Cannon
With all the diversity now possible in player customization options, we’re curious if the new customization options will also be reflected on Shadowlands NPC appearances? And will existing NPCs around Azeroth (like Stormwind NPCs from Cataclysm) receive new appearances reflecting the new diverse customization options?

As with any tool we have available with us, designers will make use of it for current or future content. That may include going back to the old world, when new vendors are added, and customizing and updating some of the old NPCs in the world. But it depends on the time involved and what our bandwidth is. Our focus is always on the next expansion and the content coming up to provide the best possible game, but certainly having those available gives our designers a lot more to work with, and I would expect to see more of that diversity and customization represented in the world going forward for sure.

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Comment by PyorrhoeaWe will not be tolerating any racist or bigoted commentary here. Your account will be banned.

Please be respectful to one another and the community at large.Comment by RevenorSas148 said:
Unnecessary references.

No they are necessary refrences because in 16 years this hasnt been a thing and now with all this US issues its suddenly a thing that takes priority..Comment by don1010220Sas148 said:
Unnecessary references.

No they are necessary refrences because in 16 years this hasnt been a thing and now with all this US issues its suddenly a thing that takes priority..Comment by wardenmThis was honestly the best case scenario for Blizzard. If they had changed no named characters at all, they would have gotten complaints because the only important people/ones worth noticing were white. Had they spent the added time and resources sprinkling in a few new named ones here and there, they'd get yelled at for tokenism. Doing nothing would lead to complaints about lack of representation, especially given that rebuilt Stormwind was made with the significant help of immigrants to the area, after the land was retaken by the Alliance in WC2. It was a no win situation. By randomizing some of the named NPCs with no quests or lore attached to them, they can show representation while not upsetting anything established, even if it does cause some kickback from the community initially.

That said, I *do* think we should see more of the Vanilla races as guards at least, particularly in Orgrimmar where the city is so diverse. And, it's not like they haven't done so in the past. Garrisons used trolls/dwarves for ranged units with orcs/humans for melee ones.Comment by basementcat13RemovedComment by ZkajavierUhmm well... I mean, it's not bad in my book, but there's a side of the game where we are remembering old characters (the people that died in teldrassil) while there is other where we are changing the existing ones... I guess their names is their only ID ....Comment by FrostymournThey could, but that would be too much work. Now they can say they did something when they really didn’t do anything.Comment by HellfieldCool. I like the idea of changing current NPC!Comment by Alechs777Did they also increase the diversity of Human voices, too? If not, giving them the generic white person voice feels like a half measure.

For that matter, why don't we have different types of voices we can choose for our characters?

I'd imagine a Warlock and Paladin Human would sound very different.Comment by MEMERMAIDAdd new diverse characters, maybe with some new flavor lines to truly implement diverse cultures and ancestry? Naaaaaah, lets just randomly change appearance of the existing ones, just because.Comment by FrostymournI can honestly see why people are upset by this they’ve opted for the laziest route and instead of giving people of color their own NPCs, they’ve taken random vendors from a decade ago and changed their skin tone to meet some diversity quota. Honestly it might be more racist to actually agree with what Blizzard is doing here, they’ve essentially waited 16 years to give POC representation and it’s barely done properly at all... 2020 Body textures with Vanilla armors looks terrible on any NPC. Atleast make *some* new characters instead of expecting everyone to grovel over how you clicked the randomize button on a few guards and vendors.Comment by Alechs777I mean, isn't *this* kinda offenssive to minorities - that instead of creating new characters that represent them Blizzard changes the existing, established ones?Comment by MightylorddkRemovedComment by DenzzilRemovedComment by KhalzulI'm curious as to why there's such a large variation in human appearances. I understand the real-world representation reason, but from an in-game lore perspective, it's unexplained.

Do humans just have a random skin tone when they are born, or are there certain groups of different-looking humans that have yet to be mentioned in lore? In the real world, different appearances occur because of a lack of interracial mixing. Does the same thing happen in Azeroth? I just want an answer, Blizzard.Comment by EmeraldBlueAmazing how many people suddenly care that Tommy, the barber in the furthest corner of Stormwind has suddenly dark skin.
I bet in the years people have been playing, they didn't give once a flying **** about what eye color some random NPCs had.Comment by skairipaI really love these changes, these might be small changes for some people but it makes the city even more alive to me.Comment by BananabrainThe change is emblematic of WoW moving further and further away from its stated self-proclaimed MMORPG status.

Diversity is great in a fantasy world such as WoW. But this move feels clumsy and a blunt tool to shoehorn in a veneer of diversity.

I was looking forward to new NPCs, perhaps vendors or otherwise, populating the city and even having a small backstory, interactions etc. This move just comes off as lazy and a dishonest attempt to fill some kind of quota.

I remember back in the day, during TBC, I asked a GM if I could change my name because it was incredibly cringe. The reply was, paraphrasing, "Names and appearances of your character are integral in who you are in the world of warcraft and how other players recognise you for who you are." Obviously that philosophy is long gone. We can change our characters gender, name, server transfer etc overnight. In a way, an NPC who has existed as a certain way for 15+ years and suddenly waking up and being fairly different is in line with current Blizzard policy in regards to the RP section of the game. Why should there be any continuity in one's character?Comment by BloodmythRemovedComment by amoederI play on an Asian server and there are no black NPC's in Stormwind, but there are asian one's. Why isn't Blizzard adding black NPC's to our servers?

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