Old Gods, Vanilla and Shadow

Lore Story
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Hi guys,

The old gods are beings descending from the domain of shadow/void in retail wow lore. But I’m asking myself if this was always the case.

The first time ever we saw something about the old gods in warcraft lore was the forgotten one in Wc3 TFT. The next installment was C’Thun in Vanilla WoW. I can’t recall that at this time, the old gods lore was in any way affiliated with the shadow. Obviously the whole cosmic forces thing wasn’t as fleshed out back then as it is today.

Does anyone has a clue, at which point in WoW history they started to combine old gods and shadow? Maybe I’m just mistaken and it was established as early as vanilla but I really can’t recall. Thanks in advance for your answers.

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I think it started with legion when the shadow priests showed up with tentacles all few seconds. Before it were just old gods driving living beings mad and so on.

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There was nothing about their origin, but we had hints about the black empire and Ny’alota back in Wrath with the Puzzle Box.
We knew the Old Gods were connected in a “rivals to eachother”-way and were imprisoned by titans when they ordered Azeroth (wich failed spectacularely with all of them), but the space-shadow-parasites-stuff came somewere in Legion as far as i remember.

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Space-shadow, yes, likely with the 1st vol. of Chronicles alongside with the Legion. But the parasite part is from WotLK.

Tribunal of Ages encounter
Brann Bronzebeard:
Tell me how the dwarves came to be, and start at the beginning!
Abedneum:
Accessing prehistoric data… retrieved. In the beginning the earthen were created to–
Brann Bronzebeard:
Right, right… I know the earthen were made from stone to shape the deep regions o’ the world. But what about the anomalies? Matrix non-stabilizin’ and what-not?
Abedneum:
Accessing… In the early stages of it’s development cycle, Azeroth suffered infection by parasitic necrophotic symbiotes.
Brann Bronzebeard:
Necrowhatinthe-- Speak bloody Common, will ye?
Abedneum:
Designation: Old Gods. Old Gods rendered all systems, including earthen, defenseless in order to facilitate assimilation. This matrix destabilization has been termed “the Curse of Flesh”. Effects of destabilization increased over time.
Brann Bronzebeard:
Old Gods, huh? So they zapped the earthen with this Curse of Flesh… and then what?
Kaddrak:
Accessing… Creators arrived to extirpate symbiotic infection. Assessment revealed that Old God infestation had grown malignant. Excising parasites would result in loss of host–
…

Now, since at the time Loken was still active, any of that and the rest of the info from Ulduar might be a “modified” version (not fully canon), but still.

gl hf

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It’s now canon that Loken loaded a bunch of untruths into the Tribunal to cover his tracks. However, that particular exchange is vague as it is.

“Excising”. Not “killing”. So, more along the lines of what Aman’Thul did with Y’shaarj, as in, physically separating the parasite from the host. There’s no info in the Tribunal about what happens if you just kill them and leave their corpses be. (Turns out, you need to re-kill them every now and then, I guess).

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I see someone discusses about the Masters.

Before Blizzard decided to explain away everything and, subsequently, ruin everything, Old Gods were just “there”.

Nonsense like their power level, how many there were, where they came from, what was their “goal”, hell even if we really defeated them and not only their physical forms etc was left vague, although I don’t know anymore if that was intentional on Blizzard’s part or they just didn’t bother.

The first major update on their backstory, as Chronorabbit mentioned, was during WotLK, but even then it was vague and incomplete. Mentioned as “parasites” by a Titan facility is misleading at best, since in this instance, the Titans are anything but unbiased on the matter. Loken manipulating the archives in this case doesn’t really matter, as he replaced one instance of “biased” info with another.

Cataclysm didn’t really gave any more insight other than the fact that Deathwing was driven mad by them. N’zoth being the one to specifically drive him mad is a later retcon, I think.

I don’t remember if Y’shaarj getting obliterated by Aman’thul is something first mentioned in Mists, but if it is, it marks the first occasion of Blizzard starting to clearly explain stuff regarding the Titans and the Old Gods and their power levels between them, which were vague. In older incarnations of the lore, the Old Gods fluctuated between being weaker than Titans to being stronger than them, etc.

Then Legion completely killed everything with the complete nonsense that is the Cosmic Powers atrocity of a map and left the Old Gods as husks of ther former lore. BFA was, in retrospect, a mercy killing.

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There are 2 versions of Y’shaarj story. One of them is in the Chronicles, that is the one with Aman’Thul. MoP vesion https://www.wowdb.com/objects/218436-shadow-storm-and-stone#related:comments:

Shadow, Storm, and Stone

The beast of seven heads
Fumed seven breaths.
The land wept shadow
And the swarm blackened the sky.
Supreme was the ancient one;
None dared waken its wrath.
Until the coming of the Storm.
First came thunder, then came Stone.
The thunder Storm’s voice,
The Stone his weapon.
Lightning seared the sky.
The swarm fled from its light.
Stone struck at the heads of the beast.
The shadow bled into land and sky -
Fear and rage that would not die.
Storm’s will was done.
Stone’s purpose fulfilled.

Which one is correct? One, another, or both - not clear so far. Although there is a meta-comment that may or may not be up to date:

gl hf

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