by JR Cook - 9 years ago     show comments

Along with today’s announcement of Tavern Brawls, we’ve also received preview images of the new Hunter and Mage heroes. Speculation mode… ACTIVATE!

Let’s talk the about the Hunter first:

There’s a few things we can assume about this new hunter:

• Definitely an elf. The pointy ears are a dead giveaway.
• Likely an Alliance character, since Magni implies that getting opposite faction options is part of the motivation for the new heroes.
• The character is like NOT Tyrande Whisperwind, since the silhouette doesn’t match any of her art and she’s a rather cross-class character with both Hunter and Priest properties.

When it comes down to elven archer characters, the first three names that come to mind are the three Windrunner sisters: Alleria, Vereesa, and Sylvanas.

Alleria would be an interesting option, since she’s never personally appeared in WoW itself, but was an important character in Warcraft II: Tides of Darkness and Beyond the Dark Portal, as well as the novelizations for those games.

A pre-Forsaken Sylvanas would be a reasonable option as well, as she shares a lot of the aesthetics that Alleria had. Additionally, the silhouette seems to line up with Sylvanas’ pauldrons; note the accents at the end of the pauldrons that bend upwards, which would make sense if they are feathers.

All that being said, Vereesa seems like a fairly weak option; her name will likely get confused with Valeera too frequently, for one. Throughout the history of the character she’s never had an outfit that looks like it would be consistent with this silhouette. And while a pre-Forsaken Sylvanas would be interesting, she’s definitely become a more prominent character as the Banshee Queen.

Verdict: It’s probably Alleria.

Switching gears to the Mage:

General consensus around the community at this point suggests that Medivh is the top contender, and here’s are the reasons why:

• There’s a real dearth of mages on the Horde side that aren’t blood elves, and this silhouette doesn’t highlight the ears the way you’d expect to see a blood elf displayed.
• The feathers coming off the shoulderpads and the flared collar are a key part of Medivh’s character design since WC3.
• The shape of the end of the staff in the foreground lines up with the shape of Medivh’s staff, Atiesh.

What I find interesting is that Medivh felt like a strong contender for an alternate warlock. Now I have no idea who they’re going to throw for that one.

We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it, though.

What do you think? Any other possibilities for these two heroes that we missed? Sound off in the comments.