It’s worth mentioning in the quests for unlocking the void elves, it’s implied Drathir’s name is regarded as a curse; for all intents and purposes, a good comparison to Drathir in terms of reputation is Voldemort. I think it’s a little underestimated just how much, as a person, he is reviled.
Edit: With that said the guide is good and an enjoyable read! <3
I fear this may be the case aswell, especially put into highlight by everything I hear and read of people’s opinions on Velves. The stormwind type can sometimes give a rather unpleasant stigma towards the few that really give an effort for the Velf RP
Although initially I was afraid that Velves were just hated in general (although this is still the case for some) other people made me feel better by expressing that my and others way of doing it was good and they liked it.
Nice! Love having guides bookmarked to double check things. Makes it easier to find stuff than skimming through an essay on Wowpedia!
While this was a cool read and had a lot of interesting stuff about void elves, there are a few quotes I’d like to give feedback regarding (though I understand they are only recommendations):
The way this is worded feels as though you’re trying to pigeon-hole what a void elf can or cannot be. There’s no reason why they cannot become a mercenary or sellsword - that’s traditionally what the adventurer has always been, a glorified mercenary.
I wouldn’t exactly call Umbric humble. It’s probably more appropriate to say that he knows how to conduct himself formally and politely, which is more of how the elves are intended to be. Their arrogance isn’t always straight on the nose, but rather a subtle indication that they know that they are superior. Granted, this is something that Blizzard butchers in translations pretty often.
Why? I can certainly see them possessing grand displays of emotion, particularly when it comes to their former homeland. They were cast out and forsworn, and vengeance is a particularly potent part of the blood elven psyche.
To begin with, WoW doesn’t have a good/neutral/evil alignment system, so this is strange to emphasise anyway. As a general rule, the organisation that is the Void Elves, led by Alleria and Umbric, is a good-aligned group (although, if you want to go by the alignment system, the magic they wield is evil and inherently corruptive), but that by no means states that all of its individual members are the same.
The road to hell is paved with good intentions and I think that’s probably a more accurate way to describe the Void Elves. But at the same time, while most of them started out with the intention to protect and safeguard their kingdom by obtaining the power needed to do so, they have no kingdom any more and that’s something worth mentioning.
What they do now with their new position and power doesn’t necessarily remain consistent with the motivation they began with.
tl;dr - I think the way in which you’ve worded this guide makes it seem like there’s a right/wrong way to play a void elf, but only fits an extremely narrow view of it.
I would just do away with the entire Moral Alignment part as it serves 0 purpose beyond a personal interpretation on what flies in the Alliance.
Blood Elves have the capacity to be good, evil, grey, neutral, chaotic, lawful, rebellious, devious, straightforward, chivalrous, villainous or saintly, and they are the stock Void Elves are from. How does getting juiced up on Void Lord essence remove those traits from the equation? Is there a vetting process when the Alliance goes from championing the Holy Light to using Void Elf voidmancers raising undead raptors to break the morale of the natives they are invading?
I can 100% see how some outcast criminal, faking his or her history, goes ahead and seeks the Ren’dorei out so they can continue being criminals or be part of an underworld network behind the walls of Stormwind instead of Silvermoon City.
For all we know Ren’dorei lucked out with Umbric being less like his Island Expedition counterparts and more a traditionally reserved and private Magister.
On that note, I find evil or at least dubious Velves a much better concept than High Elves with a void tint. If my murder hobo is a Void Elf Affliction Warlock it’d be damn dumb choice to try and shoehorn your canonical good idea into his concept.
Agreed. Blizzard have consistently moved away from anything even resembling a tangible alignment system in Warcraft. The Light isn’t objectively good, the Void isn’t objectively bad. It’s about power and what one does with it.
Of course, our characters won’t necessarily know or agree with that, but as players when designing them, we do.
It’s also worth noting that elves often consider power to be its own reward, rather than pursuing it with high-minded morality in mind. Umbric was determined that the Void could be used to defend Quel’Thalas, but there’s nothing to say that some of his followers couldn’t have gone with him because they saw the possibility for great personal benefit.
Huh. I didn’t expect you to come to the same conclusion for a response to this thread. Good job.
the numbers made me wonder so I did a google and the first thing I found said
" the elven kingdom of Quel’Thalas thrived for a strong 7000 years."
that may be worth keeping in mind when considering playing an old elf.
Anasterian was ancient and worn down by his 3,000 years on the throne, but we also know there were two other kings between him and Dath’remar, the founder of the kingdom. He represents the oldest an elf can reasonably be, somewhere above 3,000, but it’s probably best to err on the side of caution and play a character that’s no older than that general figure. It’s reasonable for the oldest among the elves to have fought in the war against the Amani.
I’ll ask to bear in mind that this is a guide, not a book of law. Not every possible portrayal of a void elf is incorporated, simply because… that would be terribly long.
I mean, as stated:
This is not an omnipotent, flawless step-by-step instruction, after all.
Thanks for even more comments! I’m very glad people are enjoying the guide!
If so, you might want to refrain from typing such statements as
At the end of the day, Void Elves are canonically good
Focus here being canonically. If it’s a personal interpretation, keep it that way, and don’t claim it’s what canon lore dictates. Evidently it’s a false, narrow interpretation anyway.
It’s worth bearing in mind that it is still intended as a guide, which means prospective void elf players may use it as a significant point of reference when building their character.
You’re under no obligation to do so, but when you’re writing something to help other players, rather than enforce your view of how a race should be played, it’s best to offer a balanced view, rather than just one side of it.
Currently, rather than 'not every possible portrayal of a void elf is incorporated, only one possible portrayal of a void elf is present.
Overall quite a good guide! I’ve recently picked up RPing my Ren’dorei as my main alt for when I need to play someone who isn’t a GM.
Obviously this is a -guide- and thus people will deviate as fitting their story and their character’s style. But it is a nice starting point, and hopefully will encourage people to explore Ren’dorei lore for themselves! Something I would suggest for a newcomer is to brush up on your Sin’dorei lore as well before taking the plunge.
Best of luck to any new Voidys out there.
According to Alleria in the Legion audiobook thingy, the Sunwell made High Elves essentially immortal. Now we know that elves do suffer from old age, a prime example being the leader of the Scryers, but with Alleria’s statement being the most recent bit of lore on the lifespan of elves it’s not beyond the realms of possibility for a Blood Elf who saw the Sunwell’s creation to still be alive today.
Going off from that, Lonecreek, Alleria does not seem to have aged in the 1000 years she and Turalyon was away with the Army of the Light. Turalyon had the whole lightforged thing to keep him spry past his human lifespan, but Alleria never reached that point.
I am quoting both comments to make it easier.
Right now, there seems to be a problem when it comes to what is canon for elven lifespans. It can be said without a doubt that some time in the past, Blizzard carried on with “they are mortal” choice.
Examples of this include change of Shrine of Dath´remar, which originally talked about his death in Scourge invasion and portrayal of both Anasterian and Voren´thal as old elves. We also have information about 4 kings of Quel´Thalas, so unless they all managed to get premature death, they must have died of old age at some point.
But then we have more modern lore, where multiple elves are shown as being alive during Quel´dorei exile by Malfurion.
While retcons happen, there has been nothing said about this and old information still stands.
It´s just a mess, to be honest, because right now, we have contradicting information, yet nothing has been retconned or declared non-canon.
New lore that goes directly against previous lore is a retcon. Alleria outright stating that the Sunwell granted something akin to immortality is brand spanking new stuff, and goes directly against the idea of them being a mortal race.
The issue is that they still haven´t explained whether Anasterian and Voren´thal were old, why were there 4 kings of Quel´Thalas and so on.
Sometimes, all you need to do to retcon something is to post new, contradicting information. For example, Pantheon were the only Titans instead of being their leaders. This information by itself is enough, because we don´t see other Titans in the game. But if we saw one, there would be problem, because on one hand, new lore overwrote the old one, but on the other, there is actual character in the lore who contradicts new lore and we have no idea who he is.
And right now, there are 2 elves in the lore who defy this new information.
They don’t need to.
In the Storm Peaks we have a tauren NPC, who was made immortal by the Bronze Dragons, that was one of the first druids in existence. Chronicle has retconned everything about his story - the time period he claimed to have lived in, there were no tauren and they were all Yaungol instead, and the Night Elves are now officially the first druids. And yet he still exists in game, still offers the quests and is still involved in the Storm Peaks story.
It doesn’t change the fact that the new lore came out and retconned everything he says. Same with any other example you can name.
New lore > old lore.
You are comparing one minor NPC to pretty much everything post-Troll War we know about last king of Quel´Thalas.
On top of that, you are defending writing inconsistency of Blizzard and lack of communication on their side. Great way to go, let´s just accept every new bit of information as absolute retcon of everything stated before without questioning Blizzard about it or admitting that they might have screwed up their own lore by lazily retconning it whenever they want.