I’m wondering whether a magus who practices fel magic openly could attain the rank of magister in Quel’thalas.
I’d imagine that many of the elven mages came into contact with fel magic in some way before the reignition of the Sunwell. Still, fel magic is surely something that isn’t fondly remembered thanks to the Sundering, the actions of Kael’thas and his followers and the Legion invasion.
Is the practice of fel magic something that would absolutely ruin your career if anyone finds out about it these days?
I think the only school of Magic that is outlawed is Necromancy
If you playing with Fel, you are a Warlock… and at the moment, they are accepted/tolerated
But I guess in time that could change…
While their is much evidence to suggest that the practice of fel is frowned upon within Elven society as well as much of the Horde for that matter (Warlock quarters being hidden away, demon NPC’s being much the same), it was for all intensive purposes a necessary evil in order to sate their magical addiction.
The narrators comments in the current Blood Elf intro comes to mind “Over time the Sunwells light could cure the Blood Elves of their cursed sate, but many still cling to the new Arcane powers they’ve procured” I think its an easy oversight but Arcane is a likely reference to Fel as after all Fel is merely a corrupted form of Arcane magic. Though your characters continued use of Fel in the face of his peoples “new found” faith in the light could be interesting from a character development standpoint certainly he is more lightly to encounter more Elves who’ll disapprove now more than ever.
But in answer to your original question, yes they can openly practice fel and would likely find little resistance within that particular sect of society, others however? The Priesthood, Blood Knights etc… you’ll likely to clash.
I can see there being a rift in Quel’Thalas society at the moment.
There is no denying fel saved the Blood Elves are a critical junction in their history, but it was a source of power they knew well enough to stay away from before the third war, and after the madness of Kael’Thas and having Quel’thalas almost destroyed by the Legion TWICE(The Quel’Danas incident, and subsequent Legion expansion), it’s very probable that a large portion of the Blood Elven population are no fans of the fel.
Another proof to this is the harsh reaction Umbric and his followers received, where he was straight up exiled for pursuing Void(which has barely inconvenienced Azeroth in the past compared to Fel). This could suggest Quel’Thalas is moving towards a less open approach with regards to the question of which types of magic are acceptable.
Such a cleft might make for some very interesting roleplay scenarios as far as the Blood Elves are concerned, where you may have conflicts between the two factions, where one proposes the uses of fel, while another abhors it.
As a consequence for your character, it will likely take the form of where if a magister chooses to openly pursue fel, he will end up receiving stronger opposition than if he had just pursued the arcane, and he will also have a more narrower group of people with which to work and associate with.
And Void, of which warlocks and priests meddle in abundance. Quel’Thalas is increasingly golden and sun-elfy.
Technically wrong as Fel is Chaos magic and not at all Arcane, messing up its magely counterpart in several ways. As a warlock, you might not get invited to the fancier parties but people know that you’re useful and powerful within your area of expertise.
A quick glance at the Wowpedia page gives a more objective viewpoint in that they’re not in fact different but in fact part of the same spectrum, Dave Kosak’s tweet gave a good clarification of this;
Albeit the writers have a tendency to kinda just make things up on a whim but I think it’ll be lightly reductive to say it isn’t Arcane magic at all given the evidence.
Edit:
And given that they do have a tendency to come up with things on a whim I’m given the impression that the whole Chaos magic thing kinda came into force on the simple basis that; “Chaos magic sounds cool” though I do agree he’ll likely not to get invited to certain parties, because ya know? Demons are smelly and are likely to burn the furniture.
It’s more that the tweet is from 2015 and that Fel as Chaos vs Arcane’s Order as a separate force is newer lore codified and used in modern lore as a direct retcon. Fel being anti-arcane is a whole thing in the demon hunter class hall questline with it not playing nice with its opposite.
Chaos magic as a thing dates back to warcraft 3, too unless I’m mistaken but Fel is not Arcane in modern lore.
I mean regardless of the timestamp if that is the only present standing of lore then surely then there is no reason to think over wise, also you’ll have to forgive me but I’m having a little bit of a hard time understanding your point, are they are opposites (like you said in the demon hunter class hall quest line) because if that’s the case it might be a difference in interpretation of what they mean exactly by opposite, personally I find the phrase opposite to imply a sense duality and is part of a spectrum not completely different things (because there is a key difference in that) when we understand something as a spectrum we know it not to be completely different but two or more parts of the same whole, certainly the general populace of Azeroth would never know of the duality and would regard them as different things, but from an objective viewpoint generally seems to be the consensus of a spectrum like state.
I’ve also gone and done some quick reading from the perspective of Chaos magic and have really come a blank as to what it actually is, while there maybe some representation in Warcraft 3 I personally wouldn’t use Warcraft 3 representation as a paragon guide to roleplaying, entires spells being swapped over to other classes when the story transferred over to WoW still gives me headaches, also there seems to be very conflicting information into its regards, apart from it being an actual damage type in gameplay another thing that can change an expansion later the only real bulk of information I can gather from it comes from the RPG Books which are sadly no longer canon, as well as some odd behaviour of spells casts from NPC’s opening “Chaos Portals” and summering Void creatures which seems to be a different form of magic all together its seems to be a very vague area of lore.
Also in regards to the Demon Hunter quest I suspect you’re making reference to the Quest ‘Opposites Repel’ which in a nutshell explains the purpose of Demon Hunters ‘Arcane Runes’ to ward away fel corruption which I took away as further emphasis as this duality/spectrum kinda vibe that they’re currently going for.
It’s pretty much that they’ve actively moved away from the spectrum since the chronicles and Legion to assert Fel and Arcane as opposites as Chaos and Order magic, oil and water won’t mix and that makes it so that these powers cannot combine. Demon hunter tattoos are one thing, locking in the demonic but it’s also the case that a former mage, now demon hunter can no longer use his old spells and must apply his existing knowledge to a new way.
There’re different magics now and the lore of arcane and fel being the same with the latter just its purest, unstable form is now non canon.
Ah! Do you have an example of this, I’m generally curious as to this transition and while Jace Darkweavers is an interesting point in his quest there really isn’t any explanation as to why this is the case, interestingly he says he as small glimpse of his old abilities perhaps there is a chance he can reconcile with completely moving over to fel magic and counter intuitively Illidan seems to retain all of his old abilities when explained in the novel and I also don’t see how the removal of this opposites narrative is to explain why powers can’t combine seems to be self explanatory that has always been the case.
Again I’m really getting the vibe that this is coming down to interpretation because I did not get this from the Chronicles at all is there a direct quote to summarise this, again I’d be generally interested in knowing also is there any explanation or expansion on Chaos magic that I missed because maybe this is the missing part of the puzzle I don’t have.
My sources are chronicles and many bits of quest text all over the place that I can’t readily produce. Anything from major questlines to offhand mentions of the properties of Fel, as I want to portray this correctly.
Its nature is less a transition and more a straight retcon with the mention of Fel being another form of Arcane being written out of the lore. Around the Burning Crusade, you’d have Divine magic of Light and Shadow and the Arcane of mages and warlocks with druids and shamans doing nature magic. Stuff changed since then and the writing has moved on to assert Fel as its own unique path of ruin and Shadow as being more unambiguously Void magic.
Fel is its own thing, deemed Sacrificial Magic by the Titans who were quite familiar with the Arcane as a different thing entirely. They sent the creatures that became the demonic Doomguards to police its use throughout the cosmos. Fel fuels itself by destruction, consuming and burning body and soul. It’s uniquely destructive in this regard and something to which they had no counter when Sargeras used a fel storm to destroy their physical forms.
It’s rather firmly established as being its own thing, dangerous and destructive and one of a handful of different magics under the dark umbrella that makes a Warlock.
Old school WC3 Chaos was just an armour ignoring damage type used by demonic creatures, green fire and all. Fel in all but name.
I mean I too am garnering my information from the chronicles and from what I can gather we are also using the same quests as our examples and while these are wonderful explanations as to the nature of these magics (what they do, how they’re used etc) Isn’t quite removing the idea that there isn’t a duality is there? You say it’s firmly established, where? who? when?
from the examples you give I can only think of a more reinforced idea of duality certainly they sit on the opposite ends of the beautifully illustrated table in the first book and the fact the two are surmised in the same paragraph is quite telling, Order, Disorder etc and all those comparisons made its almost as if they playing on an idea I wonder, another thought also came into mind seeing as the tweet was made in 2015 and the first book came out in 2016 it wouldn’t be too far from the imagination that the tweet was made whilst the book was still in development with the idea still being very present in mind, I dare say it isn’t a retcon at all merely reinforcing the idea of the tweet further in the book.
You mention that Fel is more unambiguously Void magic but I don’t get that interpretation at all, again I’m drawn back to the idea that Void plays its own dualistic role with Light certainly that is the idea imparted in the paragraph describing the two but I suppose once again you might have a different interpretation, If anything the Light and Shadow is an even greater reinforced idea of duality, the Naaru becoming Dark Naaru or even Void Entities and all that and well of course Discipline Priest ruining the fun for everyone I see.
As for Titan/doomguard reference I think it very easy to slide what he says into what you’re saying but I don’t think that’s the case at all I believe his exact words were “before Sargeras freed us, we were the Titan’s hounds. Forever enslaved to police the use of arcane magics.” Well which is it? Arcane or Fel he’s policing seems to me he would of made the distinction were they completely different things after all seeing as you said the Titans thought as such, using sacrificial means to subvert arcane magic seems to be the more likely idea they were implying here but again that old interpretation thing, huh?!
I think at the core of the problem here is how we’ve each of us walked away from the same source with very different ideas of what they imply unless you can provide an actual quote for this desire to bin the narrative of duality I’m gonna have respectively disagree with you, each time I’ve replied I just found more examples of the idea of duality in every aspect of magic for that matter not just fel and arcane.
I don’t think it’s necessarily a disagreement. What I see just establishes Fel as its own, uniquely harmful magic. The duality is a different discussion entirely.
I didn’t. I was saying that the nature of Shadow magic as used by priests has become more certainly Void just as Fel is certainly its own thing rather than arcane.
Fel may well be the opposite of Arcane in a dualistic cosmic design scale. That still has its own issues in the cosmology with the Fel being a purely destructive, consuming force. In the sense of the Chronicle cosmology, I’d place Fel in the Entropy sphere as an agent of chaos. That doesn’t even touch upon their writing of the Void as chaotic and all consuming.
Of that it certainly is! I clearly misread the sentence regarding the Void I have only my afternoon caffeine rush to blame for the misread as for the rest I think you’re bang on the nail on the head, glad to see the gist of my point was shared, as the void I couldn’t agree more garnering more clarification from the writers is wishful thinking I suppose
I think he’d be able to practice fel fairly openily, although, consider openly as, openly discussing it. Casting spells on the street would be frowned upon imo.
And I also very much doubt he could become a magister if he didn’t become one already, before he started practicing fel.
This character of mine is a Magister and also a warlock.
He has a bit of a bad reputation as he went from bloodmage to warlock while he was in the Sunfury. I think he would have some additional bother these days now that the elves have reverence for the Light instead of abusing it. He isn’t bad (anymore), but there are those that would bypass him for another Magister out of mistrust.
It’s not official lore or anything, but IMO they would have a bit of a harder time than ‘normal’ Magisters. My guy has the benefit of being a war vet and was a Magister before the Scourge invasion.
Having earned the title before becoming a warlock is another story, but I agree that he should be fine retaining the title but would be welcomed with a lot of mistrust from all over.