Hmm, the actual look that tyrande had in Shadowlands might be a bit off, but the tattoos that she had with a white arcane glow, with the option to have it radiant or be faded would actually be really cool.
It would match the Forsaken’s upcoming heritage questline, where they get a tabard, one with Sylvanas’ face and the other does not.
So for Night Elves, the arcane tattoos could represent how the night elf in question, feels about Elune. The more radiant the glow, the more faith s/he still has. The less radiant, the less faith s/he has.
Less radiant would work well for Night Elf Warlocks.
No, but what I’m getting at is:
You have some Forsaken who still feel a sense of loyalty to Sylvanas, whilst others do not.
The same could be for Elune tattoos. Some could still place a lot of faith in her, whilst others do not.
Those who don’t could be Night Elf Shadow Priests, Night Elf Warlocks, Night Elf Death Knights etc.
Those who do could be Night Elf Holy/Disc Priests, Night Elf Hunters, Night Elf Warriors, Night Elf Mages.
So, faded tattoos indicate a sense of lost faith in Elune, whilst the more radiant tattoos still maintain a strong faith in her.
I don’t really agree this idea, just because stuff happened doesn’t mean warlocks and others are accepted into Night Elf culture. Apart from that, most Kaldorei still maintain a strong bound with Elune unless you’re talking about Darkfallen customization specifically.
But you can’t restrict who can/cannot use the Elune tattoos though.
My Night Elf Warden (Warrior) doesn’t hold a strong faith in Elune anymore, but she was a former Priestess, so having faded elune tattoos shows a story of where night elves could be.
Night Elf Warlocks and Death Knights should be able to use the Elune tattoos.
I just think that it would be kind of odd that fel/death users would have any strong current bound with Elune (Not in a religious way, but powers)
Also from what I understood Tyrande’s tattoos do not only come from her faith to Elune, but from her Night Warrior avatar as well, so I doubt anyone would be able to use them lorewise but her.
I would actually love some racial/class specific customization for all races.
I think that could be a nice project for after the heritage sets have all been done.
A Night elf warrior should be able to get Night Warrior customisations, it’s in the name.
Peronally, I’'m not a huge fan, reading all the lore, Maiev is a bit unhinged and viscious - but you also won’t ever mess with her.
you’d believe she’d have you cuffed up and en route to the Warden vault for sneezing out of line.
She’s never forgiven the Highborne or magic users for the war of the ancients, but in particular for destroying Suramar, her home city. After her audio book appearance in the legion pre-quel stories she seems to have regained some sanity, being the one to set the demon hunters free and almost befriend Khadgar.
However it did take realising that it was her prejudice and insanity hatred , not arcane magic was responsible for AU Gul’dan able to break free into our universe and cause that final invasion of the legion… I think this was the turning point.
Before that she had single headedly orchestrated the few kaldorei to oppose the alliance with the Highborne from Shen’dralar and had plotted to kill Malfurion for supporting that return and the lifting of the ban on arcane magic.
She had also hated and wanted to murder Tyrande, her high priestess, for setting Illidan free in WC3.
Jarod is a cool guy, but Maiev hated Illidan for attempting to kill Jarod, when he tried to stop Illidan from completing the formation of the new Well of Eternity. This is why she hunted him so relentlessly in TFT through to TBC.
totally irrational, but utterly deadly, Tyrande admits being aware of this , but feeling someone Maiev was necessary to have around. There was no one better at her role, none.
That’s the best part about her, for me. Her story doesn’t waiver. Characters that flip flop from one persona to the next is so off-putting for me.
Maiev is one of the very few who always remains Maiev. You know what she’s about when she appears.
She’s not a nice person and that’s fine. I don’t want Night Elves to be “nice” now. They should be angry with everything that happened to them. I was happy to see Maiev play a big role in night elf society again and be counted as one of their leaders. I want my Night Elf Warrior to be just like Maiev.
I would have taken more of an interest in the “Night Warrior” stuff if it had been Maiev vs Sylvanas.
Night Elf Warrior should be something that is either, fully dedicated to Elune and serving as such.
Or, for my Night Elf Warrior - just a bloodthirsty Orc and Forsaken murderer, who holds very little faith in Elune since her inaction at the end of the War of Thorns. Her tattoos indicate a former faith, but the light is all but gone.
Well my opinion of Maiev has changed following the latest heritage quest line, gotta admit, her she’s tone down a lot.
I really liked her there, as my like for her has kept growing since Legion, since she stopped being unhinged - I also liked her back then, but she couldn’t be a favourite as crazy, she should be the personification of a no- nonsense side of the night elves that would gut you like a fish if you put a foot wrong, just like Illidan is a personification of of the power of the night elves that will seek anything to destroy the legion for what they did - you can get behind that. Tyrande is the personification of the Elune side of the night elves and the mysterious moon goddess and the wonder of the stars, while Malfurion is a personification of the benevolence of the night elves, their good naturedly sel. Azshara been the personification for the high arcane mage part oft he night elves, as well as their beauty but also their vanity and arrogance.
The new reason Maiev should have for disliking mages.
Now she’s recovered sanity, through the legion questline (from Audio book to in-game quests , then in 8.1 reconciling with Tyrande after trying to murder her husband), to keep Maiev as well, Maiev retaining most of her character but no longer unhinged, she can’t hate mages irrationally like she did before, but she should have a dislike and loathing. not for all again (she’s now sane,) but specifically for the layabouts.
When asked why she hates mages, she should say something like, all the good ones became druids as it was insane to use something that would draw the legion, only the worthless cowards and evil ones remained, and I have fought them for 10,000 years. However, I realise that integrity has returned once more to the mage order, but I do not suffer fool s and cowards lightly, and I do not trust any mage who has not proven to me he sill stand and fight and not given to his urges for power like our kin who betrayed us 10,000 years ago.
I think this provides good reason to be antagonistic but not hostile, but also means you can win her over on your mage character or demon hunter if you play one. It also doesn’t violate her character, and explains a sane enough reason for her not to like them given what happened to Suramar 10,000 years ago - her home for those who don’t know.
one of the things I love about night elves is their range and versatility… they have a version of things that touch multiple areas in unique ways. It’s utterly boring if the forest was the only thing they touched.
But they touch civilization in their unique night civilization of arcane wonders, touch the forest in their unique druidic way too with talking and moving trees and animals they touch magic in fel through demon hunters, arcane through their heritage/Moonguard/Highborne/Moon Priestess order, and nature through druidism with light and void through Elune… and the way they do that i totally unique… they are the only mages (along with nightborne -that have this celestial type star/moon arcane magic), only priests that have this too, they are the only ones that use void in this unique night warrior way tied to Elune, and the way they use fel as demon hunters is totally unique too.
I like that there are assets to represent all of these, both for customisation and in game assets. WE got the demon hunter ones, we got the nature ones, we got the wood elf hunter ones, what we are lacking are the arcane star ones which the likes of Tyrande and the Highborne have been sporting.
In fact, truth be told, I’m surprised we only have one night elf sub race in the nightborne, I expected at least a nature one to follow, either through the night elf worgen that were released from the Emerald dream in 7.0 or Night Fae Sylvar. Wouldn’t have minded a night warrior sub-race too.
No, they are still around when we help save Suramar in 7.1, Lothrius would like to see Silvermoon. And also don’t forget they are the surviving practicing Moonguard. All the leaders survived, and some of hte acolytes, they lost mos t of their numbers… at the time the statement is made the NPC wouldn’t know about other surivors you rescue by hippgryph. you get class order hall missions to rescue more Moonguard.
Secondly there are Moonguard amongst the Darnassians, in fact, nearly all the ancients, i.e. 10,000+ year old male druids are former Moonguard or highborne from 10,000 years ago. exceptions would be the likes of Farodin. we are told that after they (the night elf mages and Malfurion) decided to ban the use of the arcane for spell work, many of them took up druidism.
However when the Highborne are re-instated in Wolfheart (around cataclysm) and the night elves need the power of the arcane to defend their lands in Cataclysm, some of the highborne we get are Darnassians, who were Moonguard or Highborne from 10,000 years ago taking up the call, while some are off course brand new recruits having been born in the long vigil or even during WC3, with the talent, but off course never been able to use it because of the ban.
The returned former Highborne and Moonguard are the Darnassians the blood elf npc in Azshara zone is scornful of and exposes for being outdated and out of practice ( I mean, technically they’ve only been practising for a few weeks after a 10,000 year gap - what does he expect - they were good enough for fighting regular troops, but any seasoned mage would have been able to exploit some of the more outdated techniques they hadn’t been updated… but we also don’t see some of their ancient knowledge lost to the current age either)…
This scenario is logical off course, as due to the high demand for student but shortage of teachers, it turns out that some of these returned Highborne/moonguard who had been amongst the Darnassians (many as druids), are thrust into teaching positions after just a few weeks training. The Highborne teacher killed in Azshara is one of them, as are the lorewalker mages at Talendris point.
This obviously makes sense, as they are thrust into battle to fight Garrosh’s invasion shortly after the night elves and Shen’dralar accept each others terms.
According tot he lore and blizzard devs, there were no actual Shen’dralar during the Azshara zone quests (much to the disappointment of a certain hardcore blood elf fan I am aware of). however we do meet some Shen’dralar in Darnassus, Stonetalon Mountain and in Feralas during the cata quests.
Ah, at the bottom of the WoWpedia page, it states that they hope to revive the Moonguard.
I was mainly going off the below quotes: Thalrenus Rivertree says: We meet again! Lothrius and Syrana have just informed me of your deeds. Lothrius Mooncaller says: We have also decided that it is time to leave this place. Syrana Starweaver says:The Moon Guard are no more. There is no saving our beloved Stronghold. Thalrenus Rivertree says: They will be upon us shortly. I can teleport us somewhere safe. Thalrenus Rivertree says: Here we go!
The rest of the quote is primarily referring to Cataclysm quests which came way before Legion. I am mainly focused on the Legion quests, but their is something that states that they hope to revive the Moon Guard order.
I suspect that this would be under Tyrande’s banner. The possibility of giving Darnassus their own Battle Mage sector, just like Silvermoon, Suramar and Dalaran.
That is the problem about relying entirely on wowpedia, it’s written by fans, if a crucial small bit of knowledge is missing on a small group, you wouldn’t know. It’ dhave to go in, and add acomment, post the mission table, indicate the NPCs in the Suramar assault then make the case.
The above is an opinion, it happens tobe one I agree with, but it isn’t verifiable fact, we can assume they would want to rebuild, after all, the comment about the moonguard being lost is also opinion yfrom an NPC you can understand after the events of the area, but a lot happens after that questline, including important artifactsy ou need to to help your nightborne kin and your ancient city, and the Moonguard help, as do the priest and druids from Val’sharah… Although to be fair, all this was written before they decided to take the Nightborne horde as a playable sub race. The original plan was the current form of htem, dies off completley we kill them all, and the survivors are the Nightfallen who then eat of the fruit of the Arcan’dor and get restored to night elves. I suspect, suramar was going to be the replacement capital for NElves, and shaladrassil the replacement world tree knowing that they were burning down Teldrassil while they were developing Legion. Notice how Azsuna, Val’sharah and Suramar make a trio of zones to replace Teldrassil, Darkshore and Ashenvale. Then the bonus of the broken shore (later renamed Thal’dranath when the continent was ditched for Argus) woudl have ben your Desolace type zone. Highmountain replaecs stonetalon mountain with a small night elf portion at the bottom (instead of the top) and either the Highmountain moved to Kalimdor to live on Stonetalon mountain, or retain it.
This is all scrapped when Nightborne in their NPC form are decided to be made playable. And off course , blizzard never went through with the ANNOUNCED plan of having the Horde in control of Kalimdor (with the alliance fighting to get thier lands back), and the alliance in control of EK (with the horde fighting to get their lands back). Quel’thlaas and Azuremyst aren’t included since they are linked to TBC zones, adn no world revamp was planned to merge those zones, presusmably, if they had gone through with the revamp at some point, they would have addressed Azuremyst and Quel’thalas.
Who knows, it’s possible. It is also possible the Moonguard, along with the Val’sharah night elves may actually join the Nightborne they helped in a reverse high elf situation where you have full night elves on the horde but not playable, and the reason is not because they are going to fight Tyrande and Malfurion who still lead the druids and the priests, but because they are already working with the Nightborne. This is also an indication that originally night elves and nightborne were going to ally, although it was Nightborne that would be restored to Night elves. It was always weird to faction swap a native sub-race, but I would put leadership favouritism and horde Belf fanbase desiring it. Face it Suramar, and the night elf civilization in pristine form is exactly the sort of things all Elf fans love. But that fantasy until that point was only visualised properly on the horde through the blood elves, with the night elves having all their cities in ruins of various degrees, aside from newly built Darnassus, built between TFT and wow classic.
When this content came out, it was desired by both faction groups, but it is worth noting that horde fanbase at this point in the game greatly outnumbered alliance fanbase, and the BELf fanbase has bene consistently louder on the forums too - (which is no surprise - given how poor the alliance lore has been - it’s fanbase has dwindled). So instead of boosting the alliance fanbase by continuing with the original plan, and also providing “compensation” for the to come war of thorns (by inheriting the 4 broken isle zones to replace the ones lost), they catered to the bigger voice, and I suspect used the fanbase to justify giving the horde something else that was massively cool. further depriving the night elves, especially knowing that Dazar’alor, such a grand city was coming for them as well next expac./
Favouritism and bias ruled the way, but what it did was open the door for alliance high elves. Finally the horde they felt could potentially gain something sufficient enough to justify the high elf being playable, but they still didn’t want to give the blood elf model, so they coined the void elf, and worked hard to make it look cool, perhaps too cool , seeing how they nerfed the male model on the final beta release build, changing its torso.
The evidence of this been a last minute.com plan that was never originally attended is evident, because the artwork is cool but the story is almost non-existent, there is no intro zone, a short quest introduces the void elves and they get nothing.
But off course they don’t, because #bias was still operating. They certainly wouldn’t get Silvermoon to replace Suramar that is transferred to the horde from the race who are originally written to come from the very city. Nor would the night elves have gotten Suramar while the horde got the Nightborne who would, like the void elves were with the humans, be refugees with the blood elves in Silvermoon, having each elf race have an elven capital each. Nope, bias interjected, they wanted the best artwork for the horde, so the city was a must, which makes me think it is the city the devs wanted for the horde that most senior devs at the time played, while the models were for the fans. This is how/why we got what we did.
And how disappointed the fans (both horde, and the many night elf fans that switched to horde because of Nightborne) were, because the nightborne models had to be upgraded to playable standard, because the original nightborne were never designed to be playable, they were meant to die out and their night fallen restored fully to night elves. And they didn’t like the night elf looking models they got - expecting the lower pixelated NPC models. I learnt that day fans were happy with crappy night elf models because it was on the alliance, once they got them on the horde - oh dear, the cool NPc models more reminiscent of the pre-WoD NElf models were not playable as is, and that was a disappointed.
Since then however blizzard has tried hard to add options to nightborne to approximate as much of that NPC look as possible. like the original night elves, the Nightborne launched with really poor options, especially the males.
Anyway, I digress…
I think Moonguard should return tot he Darnassians and once more train an elite fighting mage class. We know the Shen’dralar are scholars and magical wonder makers…i.e. engineers as they processed the Queen’s top projects (the wonders) and also kept the l knowledge repository. This means the night elves have the highest concentration of their race’s pre-sundering knowledge and the people who engineered those wonders. which is perfect for building an incredible looking pristine night elf city or restoring Eldre’thalas, but they were never great fighters. For that, it’s the Moonguard. Having a lot of the ones from 10,000 years ago that fought Azshara still alive, even if they are as druids or returned to the mage class, would be helped by the Moonguard stronghold leaders who unlike the Darnassians , a few weeks into cataclysm, were never out of practice, having used their arts to fight the horrors on the broken isles and stay sharp compared to both Nightborne and Shen’dralar who would have dulled, having avoided combat mostly for 10k years. Which is why the Moonguard are able to devastate a far superior number and superior empowered (by the Nightwell,) Nightborne invasion of Moonguard stronghold with a tiny fraction. The Moonguard display one of the greatest displays of night elven magical combat we’ve ever seen or any magical combat in game, in what I would say is reminiscent of their legends. In other words, the devs did the Moonguard justice. (which was a pleasant surprise as wow is quite use to seeing night elves come off quite disappointing, but not the Moonguard, Dreamweavers, Demon Hunters and Wardens of Legion. The Nightborne have the duskguard ( Moonguard who were in Suramar when the shield went up), I don’t think they need the Moonguard joining them.
It’s the night elven mages that do. the playerbase forget that the nightborne are of the same magical stock as the night elves, and don’t know the legendary feats of the Moonguard - at least they won’t if they don’t play legion or read the war of the Ancients, and because nightborne went horde, many don’t even realise that Suramar is a night elven city and that is what the night elves are capable.
Too many view the alliance night elves as weak druids, absentted priestesses, and sexy damsel in distress sentinels, the hard edge and accomplishments of this group hasn’t been visible. for that we need Wardens visible (which we have ben getting), we need to see the Moonguard in action on the night elf side displaying such skill. We also need a night elf city as cool as Suramar (if they don’t get one to show this is night elven). we need Shandris and a few sentinels to have some real badass moments - she’s not been impressive recently, at all, and we still have to recapture the WC3 sentinels that were so fierce against the horde you immediately had respect for them. Damsel in distress has been over used. Finally it’s time to see more feral druids and balance druids (like the feral in the Val’Sharah quest) actually being fearsome and fierce, ones associated with the Darnassians and not neutral faction ones that die after their cool stuff. Maybe they could use Broll and Naralax. basically not Malfurion.
But we also need to see moon Priestesses in action as Moon Priestesses, not as rangers, they have star/moon arcane powers from the light side of the moon and void powers from the dark side of the moon, just like Tyrande showed. if we don’t see them wielding such power and decimating decent opponents, again, the impression we get would be their weak or non-existent.
These need to be shown - fans want Nelves they can be proud of, Night elves that meet all the things they loved about them from the War of the Ancients trilogy, to Warcraft 3 and stuff we saw in legion. we can’t be satisfied with all the cool stuff on the nightborne, the horde night elves, there is no racial pride with that. or Demon hunters cool as they are never helping out, they need a sense of, this is what night elves are… whether Mages, Demon hunters, Priestesses, Sentinels, Wardens , Moonguard or Highborne - they set a very high standard for them, then gave them powers through the well of Eternity, the Emerald dream and Elune (both Night warrior and normal), … even near extinction, they should be formidable, and I would say even more so as now they face extinction and have resources they can utilise to protect themselves, defend their lands and fulfil their roles as defenders of the world. How cool would it be to show a tiny number of night elves successfully defending all their Kalimdor lands and taking Azshara back as a show of strength.
So bring it on, restored tree, resorted city, use of the emerald dream and well of eternity, more night warrior stuff… bring it all on.
Until something happens to replenish their numbers, you should never see many kaldorei ever. it should be one of the minor characters and a few companions, and they should tear up any scene they’re involved with. Even if their mission fails, they should cost whatever enemy they are fighting a lot more, and be able to successfully escape even I they didn’t manage to defend the others,. after the war of thorns, coming up against a night elf should be something anyone would fear.
Also this likely means you only see them when it comes to defending their lands and for global threats the races send help. their horde victories should be only in defense of their lands against incursions -I’m tired of warmongering, but I also want to see night elves proven to actually beat their horde counterparts - to make up for the cataclysm humiliations and the WoT devastation, these need to be shown. Outside that, you involve them when world threats require an elite x force - and night elves can provide the most elite battle mage fighting force in the Moonguard, the best spires and infiltrators , special unit capturers like Wardens, forest terrain rangers and hunters - and yes, let them pair up with Farstriders and other forest able races, and out class them show that having 10,000 years of experience, and Elune empowering you counts for something…
Let them lead many of those missions too.
When it comes to dealing with Azshara, let’s see Farondis and Jarod or Tyrande. Rather than Jaina and Khadgar - it’s insulting to night elves. Not all the time, but enough times. Let’s see that Illidan prodigy, Vandel in action and Altruis, Korvas and the others, not just Kayn Sunfury alone when it comes to Illidari stuff, especially if it is in night elf lands. If it is in EK, we can see more of the Blood elf demon hunters leading. you can’t write some of these guys as incredible in novels or in short game scenes and never see it in game or never see it in game again. It makes them forgettable.
Jarod
Maiev
Drelanim Whisperwind
Arko’narin Starshade
Delaryn Summermoon
Sira Moonwarden
Shandris Feathermoon
Raene Wolfrunner
Naralax
Broll Bearmantle
Rensar Greathoof
Farodin
Prince Farondis
Mordant Evenshade
Starwhisper twins
Lysander Starshade
Delas Moonfang
2 x Priestesses of the Moon [Maestra and Belysra Strabreeze]
Vandel
Altruis the Sufferer
Not sure what your hoping to achieve with an essay, but B+ for effort.
Personally, I just want decent story all round; not one written in favour of the other. Now, that has never happened. Blizzard just picks the races they want to focus on. It’s pretty clear now that many people at Blizzard love Blood Elves. I do hope we get more Blood Elf Demon Hunters and Blood Elf Warlocks in the story - I think Blood Elf Warlocks should be the main group of Elven Warlocks. They have the lore. The Guild. The cool characters like Shinfel…hell, I’d give more lore to Night Elf Demon Hunters if it meant that Blood Elf Warlocks were the main group of Elven Warlocks. That way, both factions of core elves get their time with fel magic.
I mean also - some of the night elf posters here are getting upset that Blood Elves are getting a few more customisations. I mean, that’s just being silly and wanting a reason to crocodile-tear cry.
They are called the “Highmountain” Tribe. “Highmountain” being the name of the mountain they live on. They’re not the “Stonetalon Taurens” because there’s no such thing and you can’t displace them from Highmountain, because that’s what they’re called. The playable race is called “Highmountain Tauren.” Moving them away from Highmountain, just makes them lose that name because you can’t move them to Stonetalon Peak, because it looks like a mountain.
