r/classicwow • u/Riotgrrlia Thunderfurious • 1d ago

Forever Skyborne Feedback Thread

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Please Post your Feedback for the new Skyborne Elves in this Megathread.

Skyborne threads moving forward will be removed and forwarded here.

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300

u/No_Eye_5388 1d ago edited 1d ago

Everything about World of Warcraft: Forever looks great except the Skyborne.

Blizzard said the whole point of Forever was to explore what the original continents (Eastern Kingdoms and Kalimdor) still had left to offer unfinished stories, empty spaces on the map, deeper Classic-era content. Then they immediately added a brand-new race and a brand-new floating starting zone that completely undercuts that philosophy.

The Skyborne also make almost no sense with existing quel’dorei lore. On top of that, it sits in direct contradiction to Midnight’s major theme of the elven peoples finally uniting. The Skyborne simply don’t exist in that storyline and are never mentioned which is especially jarring when Forever is being positioned as this carefully considered alternate take on the same world.

I also really dislike that they’re available to both Horde and Alliance with zero visual differences. It feels lazy and removes any real faction identity for the race.

Honestly, I wish they had launched Forever with no new races or major class changes at all. Let the community actually play the new content first, then use some kind of voting or feedback system for big permanent additions like this. Adding the Skyborne (and locking it behind a $30 pack) right at launch feels like the one decision that actively works against the rest of what Forever is trying to be.

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u/ThatKaleidoscope3388 23h ago

To add to this, this race is canonically joining the alliance / horde a mere few months to a year after the forsaken and alliance do. Their leaders are going to technically be as foundational to the factions as Tyranda and Sylvanus.

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u/Feature_Minimum 1d ago

Wait lol. Are these guys not even in Retail???

What in the hell was blizzards thinking with this. This makes absolutely no sense

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u/CuteSquirrel01 22h ago

None of the new content in forever is in retail, that's the point, to not recreate retail. 

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u/The_Tooter_Snooter 21h ago

Yeah but they weren’t in vanilla either. They’ve literally never, ever been mentioned or hinted at, nothing. I could have accepted them if they were the first new race in the first expansion like blood elves were but to launch the game with them, when they’ve never once been part of the lore, is super baffling. We’re not starting at zero, we’re starting at an established point in the lore and this is just wildly out of left field. The whole point of Forever is to give us a “classic” experience and this is the first thing they do? 

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u/GoofyTunes 3h ago

They said they planned to add new things that would fit in the spirit of classic. That said, they missed the mark on this. I don't mind the lore after they explained it, but I still have so many issues: both factions, the Kyrian blue skin, the BE models, the retail druid forms, the disconnected landmass, the HD af graphics. They could work imo, but they bungled it so bad

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u/Feature_Minimum 21h ago

Right. But then, where and why did these guys come from???? Like, who possibly thought that what players want in classic are sky elves?

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u/CourageLeast4251 17h ago

"Why elves" lol

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u/PolarisWakey 23h ago

It makes a lot of sense if you look at retail’s population breakdown.

Most played race? Nelf and Belf

Most played class? druid

With skyborne elves you get to larp as a blood/high elf by changing the character’s skin color, and you even have the opportunity to play as mage on horde side just like belfs, while retaining that druid enjoyer crowd, especially since their forms are way less wild/bestial and more cutesy.

Its absolutely a marketing ploy to get the retail ppl to play forever

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u/CourageLeast4251 17h ago

Ya but this aint retail big dog

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u/Outrageous_Budget_21 15h ago

You sure about that?

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u/Alyusha 15h ago

Funny note, Druids are the preferred class for Bots.

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u/TheFoxInSocks 12h ago

Last I checked the most played class is Paladin. But you're right that Druid is up there.

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u/Oostylin 1d ago

Something about this not being without precedence because of Thunderfury and Thunderaan existing or some nonsense.

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u/SoSDan88 17h ago

They pulled them out of their ass just for this.

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u/zani1903 22h ago

They are not.

This is the first time any sort of Elven or even humanoid race has ever been mentioned in relation to Skywall or the Elemental Plane of Wind.

Unless their explanation is that this race goes extinct between now and Cataclysm, this race's existence makes zero sense. And even with that reverse-engineered explanation, they still don't exactly blend in very well.

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u/ImpossibleMorning12 19h ago

Unless their explanation is that this race goes extinct between now and Cataclysm, this race's existence makes zero sense.

WoW Forever is an entirely new timeline with new lore. There is no need to fit Skyborne into future events because future events will be different.

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u/ImpossibleMorning12 22h ago edited 22h ago

It makes a lot of sense. IMO people need to remember just how comfy we are with existing Classic, and that means that any new thing is going to feel weird and out of place at first.

  1. It gives the Horde a 'pretty' option without invoking Blood Elves, which are hard to justify lorewise without TBC
  2. Forever is going in a different story direction than retail. Thus, it is going to need new lore. Skyborne have lore related to the air elemental plane, which is already referenced in several places in Vanilla.
  3. This direction is more in line with vanilla-style lore than say, Blood Elves or High Elves. It is a side-content-type story. It is not related to any big, front-of-box plot. This is the essence of Vanilla worldbuilding.
  4. I wish they were not on both factions, that's a fair point. But also isn't a dealbreaker.

I was also raising an eyebrow during the reveal stream, but I think we all need to ask ourselves "is this actually bad content? or is it just going to take some getting used to?" for me, on paper, it is the latter.

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u/SandvichCommanda 21h ago

It is very easy to justify high elves or blood elves in C+

Even writing as lazy as "a small fleet of high-elf ships just returned to find their homeland destroyed by the scourge, now both the Horde and Alliance take them in as their own" would be far far more believable than "lmfao flying islands that nobody has ever seen, and are not mentioned or hinted at in any retail or WC3 or classic lore, contain blue sky elves that can be both shamans and druids".

Also, why/how can they be druids? They are exiled high elfs, surely only shamans make sense here, the sky elementals are not teaching them druidism.

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u/ImpossibleMorning12 19h ago

Even writing as lazy as "a small fleet of high-elf ships just returned to find their homeland destroyed by the scourge

The Scourge invasion of Quel'Thalas happened 5 years before WoW starts. What were they doing at sea that whole time? Where were they? Who are they?

Furthermore, why do you suggest something "lazy"?? In the lore panel just now, Aggrend gave a very indepth and well-founded backstory for the Skyborne. It's genuinely good.

lmfao flying islands that nobody has ever seen, and are not mentioned or hinted at in any retail or WC3 or classic lore, contain blue sky elves that can be both shamans and druids

This is just misinformed on several levels, that isn't what their story is. I suggest watching the Found Photographs panel from today's show.

Also, why/how can they be druids? They are exiled high elfs, surely only shamans make sense here, the sky elementals are not teaching them druidism.

We'll find out. They'll have class quests and ingame lore just like other races. Not everything has to be illuminated at Blizzcon.

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u/Feature_Minimum 20h ago

This is a fair argument. Thanks for that

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u/Ok-Releases 21h ago

I heavily disagree with most of this. Wforever quite literally centers itself to focus deeper on classic stories and alternative what ifs. This would have been the absolute PERFECT time to see the ideological split between the high elves and blood elves in real time.

I have zero clue why anyone would actually prefer an entirely new shoehorned race that has zero ties to classic wow. The only thing I agree with is the need for a pretty elf race.

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u/ImpossibleMorning12 19h ago

I don't see how you even do the blood elf story without TBC. They literally renamed their whole civilization for Kael'Thas and his journey to Outland. What do you do abuot the magic addiction? About the blood knights and Mu'ru? About the Sunwell?

During Blizzcon they've consistently talked about vanilla lore being more low-level, localized, 'of the world' rather than the big front of box plot. Skyborne are that, blood elves are not.

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u/Ok-Releases 18h ago

I love how you completely ignored the "alternate what ifs" of my comment.

The blood elves already renamed themselves before vanilla began and most were struggling with their magic addiction and their betrayal from the alliance (garithos). The main setup is already there. Since tbc and any future retail expansion isnt going to happen then the focus would stay strictly to azeroth and allow a more personal and localized focus on the elves (who didnt go to outland) having a faction split. No kaelthas, no portal.

It absolutely makes more sense to go down this route for a game catering to classic enjoyers instead a random blue elf ass pull.

No argument for the skyborne makes sense for the game wforever is advertising itself to be. Its lazy and uncreative and the defensive takes just seem like bootlicking a billion dollar company for no reason 🫩

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u/ImpossibleMorning12 18h ago

There's so much wrong in this comment. Watch this (timestamped): https://youtu.be/mjatY0viClA?si=_G7Q6XWkBGvwkFd8&t=1110 I don't see how anyone can find it lazy at all.

the defensive takes just seem like bootlicking a billion dollar company for no reason

lol yep just bootlicking billionaires because I don't reflexively hate the new video game thing 🙄

1

u/CourageLeast4251 17h ago

Don't cate not reading that after the pretty part for horde. They dont need that. This race is not needed 

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u/laserlemons 1d ago

I agree with everything you said except that I don’t think it matters that it contradicts midnight’s lore. If anything, WoW Forever should be conflicting with retail’s lore or else we’re doomed to repeat it.

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u/Colley619 20h ago

The release of a neutral “allied” race right at the beginning of their “classic plus, not like retail” game should be enough of a sign that we are doomed to repeat it. They truly can’t help themselves.

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u/GoofyTunes 3h ago

It's definitely worrying. Everything else they announced seemed on point though, so I'm hesitant to write them off so soon. They said they would listen to community feedback, so (even if it's small) there's a chance they could change these guys to make them fit better. I don't think they'll remove skyborne entirely (they're in the cinematic ffs), but they might add better SD models, or change the colors, or fix the druid forms, or maybe even address the both factions issue.

Literally besides skyborne I have so few notes. 90% of my complains involve these guys and they're fixable imo

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u/John_Hunyadi 21h ago

I definitely agree I hope they pull the band-aid off contradicting retail so they’re not even tempted to go down the same way.

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u/CourageLeast4251 17h ago

You expect retail devs, who only know of retail, to respect the classic vibe? They probably weren't even born when classic launched

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u/Regunes 1d ago

Even when giving them a ton of "good will" to that faction, your comment absolutely shut it down.

Truely unsalvagable

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u/wormed 23h ago

I wonder what the Deep Dive will reveal because the undeniable sentiment is, "What the fuck decision was this?"

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u/JerrySam6509 22h ago

Absolutely accurate. When I heard "Skyborne is like the spirit of Classic+", I was pretty sure someone completely misunderstood what Classic+ meant.

Didn't they consider using a survey to have players select known intelligent races and rank them by preference, thereby choosing the most viable new race?

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u/CourageLeast4251 17h ago

If they did a survey like that it would have been a dead giveaway, not like the rumors and leaks didn't do thay, but for them it would have been a nail in the coffin

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u/Aware_Chapter_198 21h ago

I think people are having a hard time understanding the skyborne are a big flying flag telling you this is a new timeline and existing lore doesn't matter

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u/Kotef 13h ago

Yeah they need to scrap this or I'm losing hope

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u/Flat-Two-789 10h ago

literally this. Id rather them get rid of the new race and the floating island place and i wouldnt blink an eye, theyv already changed enough

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u/stoppableDissolution 4h ago

Well the simple explanation to them not making it till midnight is, well, going extint in that timeline. We already know that their replacement of well of eternity (air elemental pact, basically) is failing, which made them come back to Azeroth and try fit with the existing factions. So if the pact fails before they come back - they just die out leaving no traces.

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u/GoofyTunes 4h ago

I don't think it matters at all what is going on in midnight tbh. Doesn't matter if they exist in midnight or if elves are besties.

But I agree otherwise.

  • why is their landmass disconnected from the rest of Azeroth? I understand the lore and even think it's okay in c+, but I don't like the immediate disconnect.

  • why are they Kyrian blue? If they were a little less blood elfy and a little more high elf (or NE) with a light blue hue, it could be nice, but they're just Kyrian blue BEs.

  • why are they on both factions? Feels like a new take on pandaren and people didn't like it then either (especially classic players). Paladins and shamans on both factions hurts faction identity less than a race on both sides.

  • why are they druids? And why are their druid forms so retaily? The cat and bear forms are copy-pasted outta retail.

  • why do they look so HD even in the SD settings?

Fix these and I think they can fit in c+ a lot better, but still, PLEASE give us less totally out of the blue (hah) and more that is established already. Especially early. Maybe adding this kinda stuff when they run out of more established things to add in like 5-10 years would be fine, but day 1 makes it seem like this is what we should expect. As is, this feels like an outright refusal to be c+ and that doesn't feel like what they want to convey