So, Blizzard has built the warcraft universe in a way, where we have 6 cosmological forces, 6 elements between them, and all of these 12 have their own Plane.
Then additionally to that, Blizzard has “magic”, which includes stuff like conjuring, necromancy, etc. However, apparently even Light and Void can do “Necromancy”, not only Death. Also, apparently Blizzard equalizes void with shadow, but at the same time death, as a cosmological force, is called shadow too in terms of magic classification. I don’t really have an overview anymore.
There are other issues: For example, Shamans use Spirit to draw power from the elemental plane with consent from the Elemental Lords. Dark shamans use Decay to control the elements against consent. Mages meanwhile use Arcane to make Bindings, which control the will of elementals too? So are they basically dark shamans, that use Arcane instead of Decay? Or are the bindings made out of decay? Probably not, as Fire and Frost are classified as magic, even though they are elements. The bindings are classified as arcane. Meanwhile Fel and Void can also be used to control the elements apparently. For example Gul’dan controlled the Elemental Lords in Nagrand to manipulate Ner’zhul. The Elemental Lords on Azeroth were controlled by the Void before the Titankeepers ordered them. But Decay and Spirit are elements, which control other elements too? That’s in multiple ways weird:
It’s asymmetric, as decay/spirit seem to be closer in nature to cosmic forces than to elements.
It’s homogeneous, as every force seems to be able to do same thing in different colour variations.
I’m not sure, whether it’s just badly explained, or if it’s actually paradox, but one thing is for certain: It’s very confusing.
You may also use this thread to list other examples of this system, that confuse you, or clarify the logic behind it.
You can be sure of that. Basically the whole lore explaining the “cosmic forces” is a single page and one diagram.
Probably that as well, but hard to be sure with the lack of explanation.
Well, not exactly/naturally. As far as I know there are only 4 elemental planes, and those are only on Azeroth and artificially created by the Titan keepers. The elementals supposedly are a normal part of the physical world that the titan servants forcefully bound to another plane. Which is something they can apparently just do, ehich thankfully could never create any world-building problems ever. And I don’t think we have any knowledge of elemental planes of spirit or decay. (So maybe that’s why they’re singled out for shamanism, with the shaman contacting the other elements over the ones that are already free in the world? In any case, pure speculation).
Maybe. I certainly have seen shaman players in RP make that point. But frankly, it’s just not really elaborated on in lore.
To be charitable here, Gul’dan was also trained as a shaman by Ner’zhul, and there is nothing preventing him from using both fel and decay. But yeah, if arcane can do it, it’s reasonable to suppose that any cosmological force could have its way with elementals.
I don’t think the first one is a problem, just a curiosity that could get explored further in the future, but yeah, the distinction between the cosmic powers has been throroughly trashed over the years. At this point there is no reason to suppose that any cosmic power can do anthying the others can’t. I guess one can argue that they are still accessed and worked in different ways by mortals, but it does make for quite a flat cosmology.
Frankly, I think adding the cosmic forces was a failure on all fronts. They aren’t needed or useful to explain anything that happened before and they aren’t interesting as pseudo-“characters”. Any antagnist we face must still have their own motivations to be interesting, and none of their magic gets any more predictable or understanable by tying it to the six. And most egregiously, they just put the great power stuff in lore books instead of making the characters in the world discover and theorize based on what they actually experienced, so they could never have felt non-artificial.
