OctoWow - Forums

Just throwing this out there: Nagas, Ogres, Pandaren as playable race. In that order

The first two are obvious, have already been implemented in other private servers and are proven to be possible. All three have WC/WC3 roots. Many people are interested in seeing them implemented. I know it might take some time, especially to have them fully fleshed out as the Goblins and High Elves. I can respect the undertaking that adding any one of these would mean.

However, though these have already been done before technically, I think they would really make Octo stand out as the premier T-WoW/WoW Classic+ Server and totally be in their own lane. I already believe y'all to be in your own lane, but this would separate from the few trying to keep up.

And okay okay I know a few people really hate Pandaren, here's my case.
- They came at a bad time in WoW where things had just started changing for the worst and continued to do so IMO, I feel most their hate was undeserved.
- They are definitely Classic friendly lore-wise and have roots in the original games like Warcraft 3 which we should be taking inspiration from for a project like this---storywise could easily have been founded pre-CATA in Classic+
- I don't think anyone has even tried to successfully implement them into a classic client. Would totally put Octo in their own lane.
- They would do nothing to harm any of the other content and are their own thing either way, just like adding any other aforementioned race would be unless it's Classic+ worldbreaking like a Draenei, Dracthyr or some BS

The game files are out there, I have had my eye on many projects which actively are already implementing and working on this.. its not impossible, far from it. Some even have fully fleshed out starting zones. Azeroth at War comes to mind, Wallcraft. There are others, even some ancient probably gone servers which I've played on. They even have things like Murlocs (Idk how I feel, having a hatred for them LOL. But interesting) as playables. Hell, maybe even Worgen, I didn't hate that and now we have Gilneas so it could line up nicely.

I'm not saying the utter variety of new playables should be the hill that's died on for development attention. But the fleshed out and thoughtful implementation is definitely the next step in the evolution as part of what made TWoW so great.

So, something to consider..

A big problem regarding Naga is they don't aesthetically align with either faction. Even if everything else could be solved for they simply do not belong in some tavern somewhere shooting dice with the boys. The Naga are a cold, selfish race of monsters. When they were Elves they were so hubristic they brought the very end of the planet upon themselves and their salvation from death came in the form of a dark bargain with an elder god of the depths.

I want to see more of the Naga as an antagonistic force but they will rapidly start losing their sauce if they are reduced to being your party's healer running Deadmines... and heaven forbid we ever see one wearing a hat.

Pandaren are more workable but with the notable problem that there doesn't exist a classic model for them outside of the single Brewmaster pet model. A playable race's model needs rigging for all equippable items in the game as well as animations for all of the emotes. Voice lines can probably be preserved from the MoP race but the tech alone is quite a hurdle to bring up to T-WoW standards. Lore-wise it's fine enough to make them available as a Horde race provided a lot of the MoP lore is retconned but it's still a task and a half.

Worgen are interesting in so much as their models can be more easily reworked to fit classic era aesthetics. The main problem with them is the Cataclysm lore for them as a race required a complete retcon of their nature. In Classic the Worgen are to Shadow what Demons are to the Nether. Worgen are a species of shadow-monster from another realm who spread a deforming curse to their victims whilst they themselves remain pure. This one is the most plausible of the options thus-far but still comes with a lot of work narratively to establish them. We know there is a cult in T-WoW Gilneas seeking to embody the Worgen's power for themselves and the angle of accursed gothic science gone awry would be a good way to explore them as a race. I would argue the Alliance would only accept the Worgen into their ranks if they were effectively second-class citizens, accepted secretly under the watchful eye of SI-7 in exchange for services rendered, because the idea of any random human in your city being able to transform into a violent ragebeast at a given moment is probably way too much for the people of Stormwind to stomach. In fact I would argue activating one's Worgen form inside city limits ought to lead to the NPCs turning unfriendly to you and perhaps the guards even going hostile (though I could easily see that being abused to make PvP raids on the city easier).

Ogres are an interesting case. They have multiple models which could be retrofitted to suit armour. They don't need to be too huge to work as a playable class though too much height will lead to serious problems with the camera clipping onto ceilings. The big question is that of female Ogres and there are generally two strains of thought I've encountered on this front. The first is that Ogres are all male and the gender option for them is replaced with an option to choose between one-headed or two-headed. The second is that in order to make it so that ANYONE would bother playing a female Ogre they would have to be a really interesting design else they risk falling flat like the female Kul Tiran model.

Of what you've presented I can see Ogres and Worgen being theoretically viable however I believe an updated Draenei (Classic) race would also be worth pursuing for the Alliance as they have much in common. The Draenei share a blood feud with the Orcs (so they have common cause with the humans), they are trying to rebuild their broken civilisation from what little culture remains available and understandable to them (so they could benefit from Dwarven Archeologists), they have a connection to and a respect for the natural world (like the Nelves), they engage in extremely high-level arcane magic such as world-spanning teleportation (which will doubtless be of interest to the High Elves), and they come bearing technologies entirely alien to the world of Azeroth (which I'm sure the Gnomes would enjoy reverse-engineering). The Classic Draenei model is ugly as sin and the Burning Crusade model is far too pretty, but of all things Warcraft III Reforged has the best interpretation of classic Draenei imo and a quick google of Akama's WC3:R model should demonstrate the potential for these Draenei as a cool addition to the Alliance.

There's more potential races to be added to be sure but I'm certain at least Naga (and Murlocs) would do more damage to the tone of the setting and the aesthetic of the race than they would do good.

(Just to clarify, I have discounted any consideration to population because the Darkspear are just a single tribe of island trolls who managed to survive the Naga and the sinking of their islands, all fit onto Thrall's ships which were already full of Orcs, and then survive the entire Kalimdor theatre of the 3rd War, the aggression of Kul Tiras who chased them out of their NEW islands, and the treachery of Zalzane. If the Darkspear can keep pulling new trolls out their bums then population ought not be a concern.)

I support pandaren and any other race that is friendly with the classic lore. The only issue that may arise though is they'd have to make a new model for them most likely or at least textures because I dont know if the original vanilla client can handle the high res model and textures the newer races have.

The mods that added new models all had stretched and blurry textures.

But not only that they'd need to make their own models anyways because they just would not fit in with the older races. So it just comes down to are these devs not only willing to but have the capability to build a practically brand new race.