Oh yes, I heard, both excited and nervous, the book was so well written, and the characters so nicely balanced. It has the air of something extraordinary and which that will definitely need to be tackled thoroughly. I hope they dont mess it up.
Jordan describes things so well, when I first came to wow, and read of the kaldorei empire that spammed the globe with its advanced civilization and highly developed magic, the Age of Legends was exactly what I thought off.
The Wheel of Time’s narrative helped me properly picture what living in a world after a great cataclysm that destroys the existing civilization completely is like, and then the survivors having scraps from their former lives to carry on. Framing how you can go for thousands of years and not even come close to recapturing what you once had. Made it easy to understand how the high elves hadn’t reached the former heights of their cousins, as the lore states the kaldorei civilization was the greatest ever on Azeroth, ahead ofakk the cultures today, which also meant the high elves.
There were differences from the wheel of Time’s story ofc, but you get to understand what and how this can be the situatiin. I often noticed on forums people use to think the night elves as primitive, especially the kaldorei empire because it was in the past, they were imagining it more like an Athens or Rome, with the modern world or today world more up to date and pushing the frontiers of knowledge, this is how they imagine Quel’thalas and Dalaran etc…but that was never what the lore said. And i was surprised they couldnt visualise how a post sundering world s civilizations were less advanced than an ancient one, especially since this is not unheard of in fantasy or science fiction.
Use to reading books, I am use to forming my opinion based on what I read. So if the lore said the kaldorei pre sundering civilization was the greatest Azeroth had seen and that even 10k years later no civilization compared to it, this I remembered,
So when I thought of the high elves,the humans and every other race on Azeroth, I remembered the kaldorei had gone further.
When I saw Silvermoon in TBC, I loved it, and I knew that wow, even with something like this, the night elves had done more. I couldn’t wait to see a pristine pre sundering city. All the Kalimdor ruins teased, then Vash’jir was a big tease too in cataclysm. Had to wait till Legion and Suramar, and it did not disappoint.
But I also noticed that some of the fans weren’t even associating Suramar with the kaldorei. I was like shocked, I had to keep pointing out to many the cinematic with Thalyssra showing an unchanged Suramar quite spectacular and fitting the adjectives of grandeur the narratives had given, the lore accounts that state the night elves were ahead of everyone today, and they should think of the Darnassians in a post apocalypse world where they have had to ditch the power they needed to rebuild their great cities and forests. I think they had trouble associating Suramar with the night elves because they had always imagined kaldorei civilization as ancient and interpreted ancient as backwards, not paying attention to the actual lore that stated it was the most advanced civilization.
This is why Zin’azshari in Warbringers and Suramar do not surprise me, but a lot of people are so surprised, they think the kaldorei some different species to these elves, and start referring to the highborne as if they are a different race…and I’m like…,Sheesh, you were not paying attention to kaldorei lore were you. Kaldorei, the whole lot of them, not just highborne
Some don’t even realise, Suramar is lifted off the pages in War of the Ancients trilogy, night elf children, not just highborne, but all night elf children were taught spellwork alongside reading and writing.
They think the current kaldorei devoid of magical knowledge, desire or talent, and ignore they are described as being made from the arcane and eyes, glowing from their biological connection to the well, it’s a power they have inside them, an arcane one. Banning the use of sorcery, did not remove arcane talent , love or aptitude, what it thoroughly eradicated woukd be addiction and dependency. And helped ensure the Legion never found Azeroth for a very very long time until humans meddle.
If the accounts were to be taken at face value too, the pre sundering kaldorei used both nature and arcane sorcery to build cities and enhance cultivate forests, which means without the sorcery wing, the long vigil kaldorei were also impaired in repairing the damage to the forests, they had to do it purely on nature magic, but at least had the nature boosting arcane energies of the well and moonwells to aid.
This reinforces that sorcery was never bad, it was forbidden because it’s use would bring back the Legion , and that was catastrophic, not because the people hated it or the arcane, protecting the world was vital. Also until addiction was understood, they couldn’t be free with it. The high elves are described as being very cautious and careful with magic, the idea is because they don’t want to repeat the reckless abandon of the highborne around the 1st invasion. But this is what the blood elves return to between TFT and TBC and is why the night elves warn the alliance if the past of that particular group, elves have been known to go crazy and lose all sense because of magical recklessness, it must have been very concerning to them, because with their knowledge they could let the Legion in again, which some tried to do in SWP raid.
I noticed many people weren’t connecting with this. I can only assume some of the fans never paid attention to what the lore actually said, so struggled to imagine the kaldorei building Suramar and Zin’azshari, and as such they adopted a warped view that it was the high elves/blood elves who did. You actually see this said by posters once in a while, and I have to point out to them it was night elves, not high elves - the high elves would not exist for up to 3,000 years after the sundering, and these former night elven palace highborne would decide to build a new civilization superior to the old, better attitude, better mindset, freer, more embracing of all, rather than the highly stringent and structured pre sundering culture, or the arcane banning long vigil culture they had left behind.
I argue with people who think because the blood elves are of highborne stock, their culture is highborne, it isn’t. The shen’dralar culture is highborne, the Nightborne’s culture is pre sundering kaldorei, the blood elves created a new culture. Not completely new, but it was different, it had a nobility and fairness that the kaldorei pre sundering culture had lost, and that was more reminiscent of the long vigil culture, except the arcane was also free to be practiced and I keep reminding people, so was every other type of magic.
Pre sundering kaldorei culture around the 1st invasion (not the earlier stages like when the cities were been built for example and there were still kaldorei students of nature as well as Elune and the arcane). Around the first invasion, kaldorei society was nearly 100% arcane like you see in Suramar. The arcane did everything, making the people more addicted where they should have been using their bodies or other natural means, the arcane came to substitute everything. There was the priesthood, still respected and intertwined, but at this stage, fee numbers, all female, sort of like buddhist monks in modern society, very few, still cukturalky intwined in far eas culture, but most people are into tech and the wonders of science.
This was not the case with the high elves, the high elves did not reject nature magic, or divine magic, while they turned from the Moon Goddess, rejecting the culture of the kaldorei both past and present, they adopted the Light, and their new culture explored all magic.
People also don’t realise they had lost a lot of arcane knowledge, the high elves ancestors were long vigil night elven former highborne, they weren’t shen’dralar or Suramar night elves in a post city, intact and carrying on in kaldorei pre sundering ways.
They like the druid and priest group had lost everything, all their cities (as far as they knew) had been lost to the demons, and finished off by the sundering.
They were like the Aes Sedai after the Age of Legends, except they had far fewer tomes and artifacts, and had had a 3k year gap of practicing no magic.
As such they were open to learning and developing all sorts. Nature wasn’t banned at all, even though I reckon all experienced druids stayed behind honouring the pact and in agreement with the ban, high elves would have pursued that magic in conjunction with the arcane and others.
Fel ofc would be anathema, and they would be much more careful with magic. They didn’t want the Legion back either and their entire schism with the rest of the night elves was that arcane could be used safely in large quantities via a power source like the Well of Eternity without exposing Azeroth.
Now we know where the Well comes from, we can understand how using it made Azeroth light up, because it is her blood, pure arcane energy using that source lights her up, the sunwelll would not have had the same effect unless it was connected to the ley lines of power (her arteries and veins), but it didn’t matter, the device they used to mask their energy signature was the ban’dinoriel, and it must have worked as the kaldorei on Kalimdor didn’t sense the arcane use their.
It is from their we deduce, the shen’dralar must have done similar straight off the bat in Eldre’thalas, which indicates how clever they are, they not only trap a demon successfully without pulling the Legion to Azeroth, they are the first to shield the use of magic from anyone, twisting nether or druid alike. People quick to dismiss them forget they are described as Queen Azshara’s most revered arcanists, this is extraordinary to begin with, how can they be backwards when we are told their knowledge was intact in their city and they have spent the last 10k years furiously researching the arcane and in addition decrying the world too obsessed with any knowledge, they would easily have every civilizations new magical advancements and all their own. Add to that they only fell to ruin 200 years ago, it shows you they must be incredible even though the game isn’t updated to reflect this. People just assume without factoring the lore.
If you thought they were great, so are the Farondis of Azsuna, Nar’thalas is the foremost centre for magical research in the world in pre sundering kaldorei civilization. Before the hubris of the highborne alienates them dragons walked with night elves pondering the mysteries of the arcane, this was in Nar’thalas city, a province of Suramar. You have to remember all of the broken isles is Suramar to night elves, not just the city, which is Suramar City, Thal’dranath, Val’sharah, Azsuna, and all the smaller cities and towns on the coasts of Highmountain and Stormheim, that is all Suramar, most of it is on the ocean floor, but that much is around
For the night elves who remained in Suramar, the shield was just as effective, no energy signature escaped it, nothing in, nothing out, complete bubble.
Fascinating huh.
Oh and yes, sword of truth series butchered that book completely,
And while I like Shanara chronicles tv series much better than sword of truth book, it also butchered that series.
GoT is the only one that was brilliantly fitting the books and capturing it well, I hope they get people great fans of both like we had Peter Jackson and Fran Walsh for Lots, and George RR Martin himself was integral to the series, just like JK Rowlings made sure she was dictating what was possible for the Harry Potter universe films
![:zipper_mouth_face:](https://d1bg94bbsh66ji.cloudfront.net/en/wow/images/emoji/twitter/zipper_mouth_face.png?v=6" ":zipper_mouth_face:")
(Otherwise, i’d pirate it).![:neutral_face:](https://d1bg94bbsh66ji.cloudfront.net/en/wow/images/emoji/twitter/neutral_face.png?v=6" ":neutral_face:")