WoW

[korinacaffeine]

 Mo' World of Warcraft questions, but this one's a little simpler:

Is there a way for people to tell races apart besides just physical appearance/mannerisms/other normal ways? For instance, can an orc differentiate between a blood elf and a night elf simply by a smell undetectable to most others? That sort of thing.

Thanks~

Comments

[accountingwitch]

...is there something specific you're looking for? Like a tauren's hoofprint is going to be different from a blood elf's.

[korinacaffeine]

No, something that can't obviously be seen or sensed by the average human. Like I said, a certain smell, or maybe some sort of aura they give off? can't really effectively articulate what I'm trying to get across, haha.

[accountingwitch]

I pestered my boyfriend, who knows more about this stuff than I do.

The most obvious is the undead: wherever they go and whatever they touch? Dead. Watch a trailer or play the Scourge in WC3: everything turns blighted.

In-game, the draenei have Heroic Presence (+1% chance to hit aura) - I supposed that would translate into people feeling something 'right'. They're also powered by the Naaru, energy-based beings who are born from the Holy Light of Creation.

If one could sense something magical about someone - say trying to figure out who or how an object was enchanted by - hypothetically, the races rely on different types of magic.

Tauren are more spiritual/elemental - the equivalent of a Native American shaman, I guess.

Troll magic is similar, but I'd base it more on South American native tribes, where they're not afraid to get a little blood on their tools.

Blood elf magic would feel more tainted or malevolent, since they're used to stealing drawing their energy from demons.

High elf magic would probably feel more...pure,

[korinacaffeine]

You hit the nail on the head, though. Thanks for the info!

The specific scene was whether a group of Alliance members could sneak into a Horde settlement unnoticed (or vice versa) disguised (with magic or not) as the opposing faction, or if the citizens of the settlement would be able to tell their identities past the disguises.

[accountingwitch]

In-game, there are times when you have to sneak around as the opposing faction: more often than not with just a mask and stolen uniform. This is good enough to fool sentient but very stupid mobs, such as ogres. One quest has you disguised as a Sketti (birdman race), but it's a very poor disguise and only works on a near-blind Sketti.

No problem!

[accountingwitch]

Oh hey, I just did some quests that might be useful for you:

* sneaking into an orc settlement. I picked up a uniform and a guy enchanted me to look like an orc. The disguise was good enough to fool anybody except Hunters.

* sneaking into the Sunreaver (Horde) quarter of Dalaran. I 'borrowed' a Sunreaver tabard and a human mage temporarily enchanted me to look like a blood elf. Easily ran into the quarter, did the quest and ducked out - normally, guards will stop Alliance players from entering and kick them out.

So like I said, it's handwave territory - depends on how close you want to stick to the cold, hard game mechanics vs. the lore and hypotheses.

[korinacaffeine]

Neat! Thank you very much. :)