Aesthetic Glyphs - Great Start Blizzard!

#1 - Nov. 30, 2010, 2:12 p.m.
Blizzard Post
(TL;DR - Blizzard has a few Minor Glyphs in the game that affect a character's appearance. This is a great opportunity to add a lot of customization to one's character if they continue this trend.)
Blizzard has recently added two interesting Glyphs to the game, one being the Shaman Glyph that turns their Ghost Wolf form into an Arctic Wolf, and another that changes the new Druid Tree form into the old treant model. Wouldn't it be awesome, though, if Blizzard took this concept and ran with it?
For example, what if you could make your Death Knight's eyes glow red instead of blue to give it that WCII, Teron Gorefiend vibe instead of being glued to the WCIII, Arthas concept? What if you could Glyph your Warlock to finally have that green fire you've been waiting for? Or maybe you Druids out there could Glyph for a specific bear/cat form instead of messing up your favourite hair colour?
Edit: Due to popular request, I thought I'd mention here that these Glyphs should not take up a Minor slot, but a new catergory of glyph simply for these aesthetic changes.
I'm a really big fan of adding an eye glow to characters and, judging by many helm designs in the game, so is Blizzard. I'd love to see my Shaman's eyes ablaze with lightning without having to wear Ten Storms, however. Likewise, we might even be able to take this concept outside of classes - what if we could Glyph our Orcs to have the Bloodlust haze, akin to Grom, about our eyes now that Garrosh is unwittingly fueling that side of the Orcish heritage again? Maybe you Gnomes, Goblins and/or Engineers out there could add a perma-goggle Glyph to keep that technological edge no matter what you're wearing.
Another big catergory of Glyphs that I envision would be colour changes to spells. As mention above, Warlocks have been dying for the Felfire green. A bit more drastically, perhaps a Fire Mage might like it if his Frost Nova, Ice Block and Cone of Cold gained a more fiery appearance. Maybe a few Druids out there wouldn't mind a Glyph that suspended their morphing into an animal form (travel forms excluded) from changing their appearance - actually being able to look at their character rather than (select bear skin 1-6) for hours on end.
Anyway, enough musing. I thought I'd make a list for a few of the ideas I had, and invite you all to add to the list if you're on board with the idea. I'm having some difficulty with the melee classes, so feel free to suggest anything.
    Death Knight: Red/green eyes; different Ghoul models (geists, undead Murlocs, skeleton, ghosts)
    Druid: Ability to suspend visual transformation when shapeshifting (including Moonkin); glowing yellow eyes (akin Night Elves, but for all Druids); more Moonkin colours (white mentioned); Antlers; other shapeshifting forms (ie. Red Lynx)
    Hunter: Pet effects (ie. smaller/fiery); different colour Hunter marks
    Mage: Ability to change multispec spells to something more thematic of their spec;
    Paladin: Glimmering golden eyes; red/blue effects for some spells dependant on faction; Add libram graphic to character; "Perma-Auras" a la WCIII
    Priest: Ability to switch up the colours of their Holy/Shadow spells (ie. Undead may prefer to have all their Holy abilities give off that purple Shadow colour, while a Tauren may prefer to have their Shadow form make them out to be a luminous being)
    Rogue: Detect Traps "swirly ball"
    Shaman: Lightning eyes; ability to select other races' totems; Water-based heals instead of nature; add totem graphic to character
    Warlock: Felfire!; Shadowflame (purplish fire); More demon models
    Warrior: Grom-inspired Bloodlust haze eyes; Perma size increase; show less armour (for that berserker vibe); Heroic Throw uses Ranged animation; Charge/Intercept fire trail

And for race-related Glyphs:
    Human: WCII Turalyon-inspired golden eyes
    Dwarf: Permanent Stoneform; Wildhammer tattoos; Shaman: keg totems; Dark Iron skin
    Night Elf: Silvery glowing eyes
    Gnome: Perma-goggles
    Draenei: More skin colours (ie. demonic grey, red) to reflect their... diverse... heritage, especially given that some are playing with Magic and ignoring the Light
    Worgen: The ability to enter combat in human form
    Orc: Bloodlusted red eyes; Dragonmaw arm brands/ashen skin; Mag'har skin
    Troll: More troll tribes! Bulky forest trolls would be a definite perk
    Tauren: Taunka graphic
    Goblin: Perma-goggles
    Undead: Add a little flesh to your bones and patch up those exposed knees and elbows; "Freshness" use the Human Death Knight undead model/ specific skins
    Blood Elf: High Elf blue eyes, given that the Sunwell is back up and running

And lastly, a miscellaneous catergory:
    Drops: Allow dungeon/raid bosses to drop these glyphs, and maybe a few unique to that boss (ie. downing Deathwing awards fiery, molten eyes)
    Display Options: Force certain items (ie. cloaks) to display the guild emblem

Anyway, like I said, I love the potential that those two Glyphs add to the game. I know that I'm reading far too much into it, but I'd like to see what kind of support the community has to offer something like this.
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Community Manager
#61 - Nov. 30, 2010, 11:44 p.m.
Blizzard Post
We've enjoyed the few that have been made and really hope to continue on with them. A big issue is always time constraints, but the biggest hurdle is probably that we don't have the capability to alter spell effects directly with a glyph yet. The tech doesn't exist for us. Swapping out models, like the two you mentioned, are somewhat easy as long as we like the actual effect and want it in the game. Changing fire to be colored green though, while awesome, isn't as easy.

Some of the things you mentioned are certainly possible, some are quite like never going to happen, and some we just need the tech to pull it off. :)

We do indeed though hope to keep adding aesthetic minor glyphs.