Back in 2012 Daniel was asked a question in a Q&A:

CelCawdro: What are your long-term plans for implementing playable species? Are Cathar merely the first of semi-regular species additions?

He responded with:

Daniel: Like all of our ongoing content updates, we’ll release Cathar into the wild and see how they perform. If new species are clearly popular we’ll keep them coming!

I am wondering how they performed. Can we hope for new species in the foreseeable future?

Did they do really poorly since it has been over three years since we got Togrutas?

Yeah, I'd love to see a Voss character to play!

So would I, but Voss is problematic in various showstopping ways:

* They are significantly taller than the existing playable species.

* Their build is significantly skinnier than the existing playable species.

* Voss voices are post-processed already, and I suspect the consequences of wearing a modulating helmet would be ... strange.

* From a lore standpoint, they are definitely NPCs.

The last one requires a bit of explanation. All eight classes get sent to Voss as if it is some exotic place that (in some cases) even requires special permission for the player to be allowed to visit, and in any case it's a mysterious place that nobody knows about. How does that sound if the player is a Voss? ("This newly discovered world where I'll have to get you special permission to be allowed to land." "What? I was born there. Why will I need special permission to go there?")

What about all those Voss on-planet who obstruct you because "you are not Voss" or because "outsiders are not allowed here"?

I'd love to be able to play a Nautolan.

I second this. They even have a few different body-types for nautolans ingame already, part of the work is already done

Though, I would personally super much like the more alien races, but since BWs stance was pretty much "if their face cant do animations with human face rig they're not gonna be playable", I have a feeling I wont ever be able to play Mon Cala or Rodian, my two fave species

Hey guys! We have heard your pleas so I’m here to announce official word of new player character races! And the word is... we will no longer be putting in new races. It creates to many problems with regards to cinematics. So take what you got and deal with it. There were no such thing as Wookiee Sith. We also need to maintain lore here.

The dev team.

So would I, but Voss is problematic in various showstopping ways:

* They are significantly taller than the existing playable species.

* Their build is significantly skinnier than the existing playable species.

* Voss voices are post-processed already, and I suspect the consequences of wearing a modulating helmet would be ... strange.

* From a lore standpoint, they are definitely NPCs.

 

The last one requires a bit of explanation. All eight classes get sent to Voss as if it is some exotic place that (in some cases) even requires special permission for the player to be allowed to visit, and in any case it's a mysterious place that nobody knows about. How does that sound if the player is a Voss? ("This newly discovered world where I'll have to get you special permission to be allowed to land." "What? I was born there. Why will I need special permission to go there?")

 

What about all those Voss on-planet who obstruct you because "you are not Voss" or because "outsiders are not allowed here"?

You do raise a good point, despite the technical limitations the biggest limitations in implementing a species such as the Voss would be the lore. It's already ridiculous how Sith Pureblood SI can say they don't have any ounce of Sith Blood and how Cathar Troopers/Smugglers can ask how a Cathar looks in one of Ord Mantell's side-quests. The only reasonable explanation that I could think of in that scenario is that your parents were exiled from Voss and you were born outside of Voss society and customs, so while you're biologically Voss culturally you're an outsider raised on the customs of the wider galaxy. But that creates another issue since player's headcanons would have to conform to that, really I'm not seeing any way here either other than forcing a mild backstory onto the player.

Honestly love to see them make Wookies and Trandoshans playable races in game. Variations off the main NPC templates would seem easy enough to implement. A lot could be taken off other toons already IE: Wookie Yell would be the Cathar Intimidating Roar, just renamed/repurposed.

For that matter could do a hell of an expansion with it. Wookies being captured on Khasshyk (I know sp!) by Trandoshan hunting parties. You have to stop them LS. DS you help the Trandoshans capture wookies and keep them as they make great slaves for the Empire.

I think it's too late for that. They only released two: Cathar and Togruta and well there is some work involved in the character models and making of customization options and all that. I have to wonder if considering how small the player base is now, if that's even worth the investment anymore. It may be but I'm just not so sure anymore.

In any case they have to speak basic and have human bodies aside from the head. That way the same armor skins can fit the same way instead of having to redo all the armor sets for the sake of differently shaped bodies, which I also don't think will happen.

So maybe Nautolan could work but I'm just not sure if it's worth the investment for them anymore. And it may come at the cost of something else if they do.

I think it's too late for that. They only released two: Cathar and Togruta and well there is some work involved in the character models and making of customization options and all that. I have to wonder if considering how small the player base is now, if that's even worth the investment anymore. It may be but I'm just not so sure anymore.

 

In any case they have to speak basic and have human bodies aside from the head. That way the same armor skins can fit the same way instead of having to redo all the armor sets for the sake of differently shaped bodies, which I also don't think will happen.

 

So maybe Nautolan could work but I'm just not sure if it's worth the investment for them anymore. And it may come at the cost of something else if they do.

^^ I agree with this assessment.

Besides.... other then it providing a new "skin" for a character... it provides no additional differentiation in terms of game play, story, etc.... so the ROI here is pretty slim ... even for players. As stated above... they have to be humoids or normal stature that fit within the armor profiles in game, and that pretty well rules out a lot of races unless they make armor completely hidden (like they did with the Ewok Treek).

I am by no means averse to them adding new races, it's just that the two they added previously are a bit underwhelming (though I like them both), and I don't see this particular want/need getting "above the line" on resources and effort committed to the game.

The last one requires a bit of explanation. All eight classes get sent to Voss as if it is some exotic place that (in some cases) even requires special permission for the player to be allowed to visit, and in any case it's a mysterious place that nobody knows about. How does that sound if the player is a Voss? ("This newly discovered world where I'll have to get you special permission to be allowed to land." "What? I was born there. Why will I need special permission to go there?")

 

What about all those Voss on-planet who obstruct you because "you are not Voss" or because "outsiders are not allowed here"?

Because this part of the story was written in vanilla FFXIV, years before the Stormblood expansion where Au Ra became playable, the Au Ra refugees don't recognize you as one of their own, and treat you exactly the same as all the other foreigners in Eorzea. They even tell you about Doma as if you've never been there, even though your Au Ra toon was born there.

I really don't think players realize how annoying and utterly immersion breaking this is.

Gormak would be great, but they don't speak Basic. I think Ithorian are the same. Mon Calamari might be nice-- that's Guss Tuno's species. Or Bothans (Bey'wan Aygo).

But, even though I just posted a message asking for a couple of QOL modifications, I don't think EA gives Bioware permission to do a single thing other than "Keep on buying more and more CARTEL PACKS so we at EA can stroke our (rhymes with "sticks") ever more briskly."

I don't believe the ROI for players is low.

I am fairly sure most veteran players have played at least one class story more than once. For me both the cathar and togruta gave me an excuse to make yet another character (twice for Togruta) and play a class story again.

And not only that, with a new character, I spend more on the cash shop to get the character outfitted. Not to mention buying subscription again.

How come no one likes Rodians, I always enjoyed that race ever since seeing Greedo as a kid in his final scene with Han Solo. His death left an indelible mark on me, as you can see. If they are making a new race, let it be Rodian.

I love Rodians. We love Rodians. But because they cant make human facial expressions and their face structure is too far away from humans, kissy bits would look stupid and BW has stated nothing that cant align with human animations will ever be made playable, sadly.

I love Rodians. We love Rodians. But because they cant make human facial expressions and their face structure is too far away from humans, kissy bits would look stupid and BW has stated nothing that cant align with human animations will ever be made playable, sadly.

Damn kissy bits and stuff. Well... Honestly I don't know of any other races from the lore that can do kissy faces and stuff. Can you list some kissy faced aliens that are possible to add then? I will google them if you give some names.

So would I, but Voss is problematic in various showstopping ways:

* They are significantly taller than the existing playable species.

* Their build is significantly skinnier than the existing playable species.

* Voss voices are post-processed already, and I suspect the consequences of wearing a modulating helmet would be ... strange.

* From a lore standpoint, they are definitely NPCs.

 

The last one requires a bit of explanation. All eight classes get sent to Voss as if it is some exotic place that (in some cases) even requires special permission for the player to be allowed to visit, and in any case it's a mysterious place that nobody knows about. How does that sound if the player is a Voss? ("This newly discovered world where I'll have to get you special permission to be allowed to land." "What? I was born there. Why will I need special permission to go there?")

 

What about all those Voss on-planet who obstruct you because "you are not Voss" or because "outsiders are not allowed here"?

Make them a post-vanilla class, like how Death Knights were done in WoW. Lore matters very little when it comes to specific aliens. In fact, most of the lines where you would expect your race to come into play in a conversation, it's a generalization of "aliens", even Cyborg. Make it so that there's a half reason as to why you don't get any reception about your race in Voss-heavy content in vanilla content (much like Cathar receive no mentions despite being one in a conversation ABOUT them) but moving forward, at least TRY to tag them.

Just give me Nautolans and long montrails for male Togruta and call it a day!

Just give me Nautolans and long montrails for male Togruta and call it a day!

Amen!

Man when Togrutas came I was waving my pitchfork around about the stumpy dude lekku

How come no one likes Rodians, I always enjoyed that race ever since seeing Greedo as a kid in his final scene with Han Solo. His death left an indelible mark on me, as you can see. If they are making a new race, let it be Rodian.

Emm, there is too many to list. Here is a list of near-humans though, most of them would work.

Just give me Nautolans and long montrails for male Togruta and call it a day!

Give me Nautolans and I will be happy.

Give me Nautolans and I will be happy.

I went and viewed them, I don't have any interest in Nautolans being playable.

I think it would be far easier if they made Lorrdians playable, or Hapans. Humans with different colored skin tones basically.

Sure, not the most ambitious route to take, but for RPers it would add some deeper layers to the swtor lore tapestry and seeing how popular Chiss are I am sure Lorrdians or Hapans would have a following too.

At this point in time the question becomes what do "we" want more: playable content or playable species? Limited resources (specifically man power and money) necessitates these sorts of choices. I don't like it anymore than anyone else, but it is a fact. No amount of pleading, complaining, whining, ************, etc is going to change it. EA is not going to invest in this game any more than it has to.

That said...

Honestly love to see them make Wookies and Trandoshans playable races in game. Variations off the main NPC templates would seem easy enough to implement. A lot could be taken off other toons already IE: Wookie Yell would be the Cathar Intimidating Roar, just renamed/repurposed.

 

For that matter could do a hell of an expansion with it. Wookies being captured on Khasshyk (I know sp!) by Trandoshan hunting parties. You have to stop them LS. DS you help the Trandoshans capture wookies and keep them as they make great slaves for the Empire.

Three rules:

MUST speak basic

MUST be human size

MUST have roughly human facial features

Wookies and Trandoshans definitely break two of those rules and trandoshans break the third. Sorry not gonna happen.

And the facial features rule is not just about the "kissy parts"; the face of a playable species has to fit on the "skeleton" so that the lips move "properly" when dialogue is happening. A Rodians snout would just sit there; chin and cheeks would be moving and dialogue would come out, but the snout would not move. Heck there might even be significant clipping problems; the snout floating in space.

The height requirement is for cut scenes as well. NPCs would be talking into a wookie's/trandoshan's chest and over the heads of species like jawas, ewoks, and "yoda species". Furthermore, in some scenes a taller species' head would be above the frame and a smaller species would be below the frame.

The speak basic requirement is also about dialogue and using the existing VA and wireframe to portray the player character. It is NOT as simple as replacing that dialogue with different speech; that is unless you are OK with the "foreign language" not being in sync with the mouth movements of your character. It would be like watching a dubbed movie.

While I would like to see them introduce more playable species (I have no personal favorite), I have accepted the fact that the chances of getting any new species is slim to none.