I’ve been enjoying your game for quite some time now — nearly six years in fact. That’s an awfully long time for a video game to hold my interest, so congratulations on producing a game that is engaging enough to do so. Hooray! But you know, I’m not here to talk about that. I’m here to talk about this silly thing you’ve implemented called Real ID. I’m sure you’ve been getting a lot of feedback on it already, but seriously, stick around. This is worth reading, this right here.

I understand the Real ID system in game, I even tested it on the PTR servers and it was kind of neat. Not for me, but kind of neat regardless — however, while I consider my guildmates my friends, I don’t really feel close enough to them to share all my personal information, and I do enjoy my private time on random alts here and there. Since you’ve neglected to include an “invisible” option on the system, I’ve decided not to use it. It really is quite a nifty tool though, and I’m sure there are plenty of people that enjoy it.

I’ve been posting on your forums for a long time now, (I did mention I’ve been playing the game since the beginning, right? Right.) offering feedback, writing stories, writing RP guides, helping out those that needed items crafted, reporting the odd bug or two that I come across, asking for help on the Customer Service or Technical Support forums if I needed it, and generally having a good time with things. Sure there are trolls, but they are easily ignored for the large part. But yesterday I learned that if I wanted to continue posting on your forums, providing feedback, stories, guides, crafting or getting any kind of support come Cataclysm, I am going to have to post using my real first and last name.

Don’t get me wrong here — my name is public already, as I now write for a high-profile website regarding your game. But there is something intrinsically wrong with requiring people to use their real name when posting on your forums, and I’m going to try to lay this out as clearly as possible, so hang in there with me.

I don’t play your game to engage in social networking. If I want to engage in social networking, I use a social networking site like Facebook, or Twitter.

There is one reason I play your game, and it’s a reason that a lot of players share:

Internet dragons.

I enjoy killing dragons. On the internet. This has nothing to do with my real first and last name. This has nothing to do with social awareness. This has everything to do with those amazing internet dragons you have created.

This internet dragon was really hard to kill and took forty people. FORTY FUCKIN PEOPLE GUYS THIS IS ONE BADASS INTERNET DRAGON LET ME TELL YOU

I SEE HOW YOU ARE TRICKY BLIZZARD WITH YOUR FRIENDLY INTERNET DRAGON STRATEGIES

BUT WE KILLED THIS DRAGON AND SKINNED HIS CORPSE BECAUSE HE INSULTED OUR MOTHERS

THIS DRAGON IS BADASS BECAUSE SHE’S GOT FUCKING EARRINGS ON HER HORNS I MEAN WHO DOES THAT SHIT FOR REAL SHE ROCKS

KILLING INTERNET DRAGONS IS SO EXCITING EVEN THE GROUND WANTS TO DO IT

GOD DAMN WE WILL KILL THAT DRAGON WE WILL KILL IT WITH FIRE UNLESS IT IS FIRE RESISTANT THEN WE WILL KILL IT WITH FROST

Not only do I enjoy killing internet dragons, I like killing internet orcs, too. And humans. And bug things that live in the ground, and demons from another dimension, and undead kings that raise other undead kings and stuff them in swords and aliens that don’t have bodies and live in bandages and goblins and ogres and you know what else I like, I like exploring all over the landscape, scenic mountains and grassy plains and dear god we just went through a portal to another fucking realm and THERE ARE PLANETS IN THE AIR OH MY GOD ARE THOSE ISLANDS IN THE SKY I WANT TO GO TO THE ISLANDS IN THE SKY TELL ME I CAN GO THERE HOLY SHIT I CAN YOU KNOW WHY

BECAUSE NOW I CAN FLY ON MY OWN INTERNET DRAGON HOW COOL IS THIS SHIT

FUCKING HELL I LOVE THIS GAME SO SO SO MUCH MAN ALL I WANT TO DO IS ADDRESS THIS INTERNET DRAGON PROBLEM

…

…okay. Sorry. Little carried away. But that’s it, you get it? That’s why I play. That’s why my friends play. Because we like to come home from a long day of being John Smith or Jane Doe and get on the computer and MURDER SOME REALLY AWESOME INTERNET DRAGONS.

We don’t want to be John Smith.

We don’t want to be Jane Doe.

We don’t want our friends to just be John Smith, or Jane Doe. That’s not the point. That’s not the point of what you’ve given us. What you have given us is an awesome, amazing, awe-inspiring game where we don’t have to be ourselves. Where we can pretend we are Kronk, gruff and oft-misunderstood orc warrior with an odd penchant for interior design. Where we can pretend we are Gisella, noble paladin of the Light and kidnapper of baby wolvar . Where we can forget about the real world, the real world’s problems and issues, the real world’s pressures and annoyances and just settle back and kill some internet dragons.

We don’t want Facebook. If we want Facebook, we’ll go to Facebook.

We don’t want Twitter. If we want Twitter, we’ll go to Twitter.

We don’t want people knowing our real names or our real lives. That’s not the point. It’s a fantasy. You gave us a fantasy, and now bit by bit you are trying to take that fantasy away and convince us that it is “cool”.

We love the fantasy you gave us. It is beautiful, it is not perfect but you are working hard every day to keep it as perfect as possible, and we love it. That’s why we’re all still playing after all of these years.

You talk about “concentrated coolness,” you talk about how everything should feel “overpowered and epic,” yet bit by bit you are taking this away. You cry that posting on the forums is optional, but for those of us that have been posting for years, giving you feedback, asking for help, providing help — now we can’t. Not if we want to stay in our fantasy. Now if we want to offer feedback to you, we have to be John Smith. Or Jane Doe.

We loved the fantasy, we loved putting our words out there for you to hear, but now we can’t do it unless we want to expose our real first and last names to the world. Sure, it may help your internet troll problem — but in doing so you are silencing the voices of thousands of players who just want to offer the player base help, advice and creativity. Some people may be okay with putting their real names out there for all to see. Some people, however — many of my friends even — aren’t.

You’ve heard from parents expressing concern that their child’s name would be exposed. You’ve heard from women that live in constant wariness of predators that could easily track them down if they had that first and last name. You’ve heard from military personnel that are concerned with the safety of both themselves and their families should their real names be somewhere easily found. You’ve heard from members of the GLBT population who are still in the closet out there in the real world, but free to express themselves under the blanket of anonymous fantasy that you’ve provided.

“It’s optional,” you say. “Optional to post on the forums.”

What you have created is a community. A beautiful community full of amazing people and yes, jerks here and there. These people have grown to know each other under that safe blanket of anonymity, where they can simply be whoever they want to be without having to worry about whether or not their next door neighbor will find out anything unsavory about them. Where they aren’t judged on how they look, how they dress, how they speak, what they drive, what they wear. Where they are just voices sharing thoughts and ideas, and ears hearing thoughts and ideas in return.

And you are taking that community away.

“It’s optional,” you say. “Optional to post on the forums.”

You gave us a playground that over 11.5 million people love to play in. We felt comfortable and safe there. We aren’t feeling so safe anymore. You’re not only killing the voices of trolls, you’re killing the voices of thousands of players who simply don’t feel comfortable sharing their names.

You’re losing feedback. You’re losing the creativity. You’re losing the community that made this game so amazing in the first place. In return, you’re gaining nothing but a sharp increase in technical and customer support calls because people are far more likely to call in with a problem than post their real name someplace so public that anyone could retrieve their information in a matter of minutes.

Do you have the staff to handle that influx? Because that’s what’s going to happen. That, and you’re going to get a lot of people canceling their accounts. Why?

Because they played this game for what it was — a fantasy. And now it’s looking like you want to take that fantasy away.

Without the fantasy, there’s no reason for them to stick around.

Even with a thread that is at this moment 1,755 pages long and growing, you’ve been largely silent on this issue. I’m beginning to wonder if you’re actually going to do something about it.

I’ve already said goodbye to Kronk, and Gisella, and countless others — friends, all of them — who have decided to cancel their accounts. Logging on isn’t fun right now. It’s a litany of “how could they do this” and other similar opinions. I’m tired of seeing “friend not found.” Please at least let us know what you are thinking. What’s going on out there in Blizzard HQ, and whether you are going to do something about this, or continue to ignore the people that have been enjoying your game for so long.

I’d just like to kill the internet dragons, please.

Sincerely,

Shade

Edit: And, two days later we have our answer — they listened to us. NOW WE CAN GET BACK TO THOSE INTERNET DRAGONS HELL YES WHAT DO YOU HAVE TO SAY ABOUT THAT INTERNET DRAGONS

THANK YOU INTERNET DRAGON WE APPRECIATE YOUR CONTRIBUTION AND WILL BE AROUND TO BEAT YOU LIKE A SCALY PINATA LATER

SHIT MAN CHECK OUT THAT AWESOME INTERNET DRAGON IT’S GOT BLUE CRYSTAL SPARK SHIT EMBEDDED IN ITS HIDE HOW AWESOME IS THAT

Aw. Will do, Ysera. Will do.

The Old Gods

One of the largest players to date in World of Warcraft lore are these mysterious figures called the Old Gods. If you are a raider, chances are you’ve met and killed a couple of them in your raiding lifetime – C’thun, down in Ahn’Qiraj, and Yogg Saron, up north in Ulduar. But where did these Old Gods come from, and why are they here?

The Old Gods are, simply put, pure evil. These are malevolent deities that were said to have ruled Azeroth in the past – long before the Well of Eternity, long before the introduction of the night elves. While the nature of the Old Gods is well known, what is sketchy at best is the timeline in which these events took place. Some Warcraft lore suggests that the Old Gods were present when Azeroth was created, and their activities were responsible for drawing the Titans to the planet in the first place. Other lore, generated from the Wrath of the Lich King expansion, suggests that the Titans created the world, took off for parts unknown, and were called back because the alarms were being raised due to these nasty critters. As the lore currently presented in Northrend is the most current, this is the timeline I am going with.

The Titans are creatures of order and organization, of creation. The Old Gods are the exact opposite, creatures that seek nothing more to bring about chaos and destruction. In Wrath of the Lich King, it is revealed that the ‘Curse of the Flesh’, a disease that was created specifically to break down and assimilate the Titan’s creations, was placed upon Azeroth’s creations by the Old Gods. News of the Curse soon reached the Titans, and they returned to find the little world of order and perfection that they’d created in absolute chaos. The Old Gods ran rampant, their lieutenants, the Elemental Lords, assisting them in razing the world. A great war ensued, and the Titans were triumphant – but there was a catch. The Titans discovered that the Old Gods and the Curse that they placed on the planet could not be removed without destroying Azeroth itself.

Making planets is pretty hard work, and it’d be a shame to throw all that hard work away. So the Old Gods were imprisoned, deep below the earth where nobody could get to them, and left to rot for eternity. The Titans then put in a few safety measures and precautions, and created The Forge of Wills to re-create the seed races that had been weakened by the Curse.

Unfortunately for Azeroth, Old Gods are not so easily taken care of, and this has resulted in a small series of events that is, if my theories and speculations are correct, about to avalanche into something a heck of a lot messier than races up and turning fleshy.

Depending on the source, there are three, four, or five Old Gods imprisoned. Other sources imply that there were more, but for now…well, let’s just look at what I’ve dug up.

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Tirisfal Glades

While there is nothing said via quests regarding this location, it is referenced in a book that does exist in game, The Founding of Quel’Thalas . In the book, the following is stated:

“Forging inland, the high elves founded a settlement within the tranquil Tirisfal Glades. After a few years, many of them began to go mad. It was theorized that something evil slept beneath that particular part of the world, but the rumors were never proven to be true. The high elves packed up their encampment and moved northward towards another land rich with ley energies.”

While it is not directly stated, it can be assumed that the evil that slept beneath the earth was one of the Old Gods. Interestingly, if one pieces together the Azeroth map into one continent as it was pre-Sundering, this location is just under or near the original location of the Well of Eternity. Given the fact that Azshara made a pact with an Old God when she and her city were submerged, a pact that introduced the naga as a race, it can be assumed that this Old God is the one that yammered at Azshara and made her a not so little mermaid.

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The Master’s Glaive – Darkshore

This is a location that has either been overlooked or ignored by the majority of the Warcraft player base. Located in Darkshore, it’s a little out of the way for anyone that isn’t leveling a night elf or a draenei – most horde players wouldn’t even see this location unless they were out getting the Explorer achievement. In the Master’s Glaive, there is a monument, or the remains of a battle – a giant glaive impales the skull of some strange creature with tentacles. The night elves consider it a sacred area, and believe that a Titan killed an Old God at this location, as the glaive is too large for anything other than a Titan to wield.

In game, the area is now under the control of the Twilight’s Hammer – a cult often known for consorting with Old Gods. They believe the statue, or skull, or monument, or whatever it is, is actually the corpse of an Old God. Whether or not this is true has yet to be addressed, but the evidence is stacked to suggest that there was an Old God here, but it met its end at the end of a Titan weapon.

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Ahn’Qiraj – Silithus

This is the moment that people really started noticing the Old Gods. Rather than being some mysterious, unknown force that was vaguely referenced by lore, suddenly players found themselves confronted with direct and unequivocal evidence that the Old Gods existed. The War of the Shifting Sands was incorporated into existing Warcraft lore, and involved the night elves extensively – notably one of their leaders, Arch Druid Fandral Staghelm who had up until that point no particular reason for being nasty to players other than being a big old jerk. It was revealed that Staghelm sought the help of the Bronze Dragonflight to solve the problems presented by the Old God C’thun, and while these efforts worked for a short time, C’thun had risen again to cultivate chaos and destruction.

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Ulduar – Northrend

Are you seeing a pattern on that map yet? This was the point where the dots started connecting for me. Ulduar, high up in Northrend was the host and home to yet another Old God – Yogg Saron, imprisoned in the Titan stronghold of Ulduar. Players once again got to fight and defeat one of these creations.

These map points were proving terribly interesting to me, and I found it necessary to plug in that last and final point.

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Duskwood?

While Hakkar, the vengeful boss at the end of the Zul’Gurub instance is often called an old god, he is not an Old God. More powerful than an elemental lord, but slightly less than a god, Hakkar was worshipped by the trolls. So why is there a mark on the map here?

Karazhan, the mystical home of Medivh is often referenced as having been constructed on some powerful ley lines that attribute to the strong magical energy that surrounds the tower. It is possible that parts of the peculiar properties of Karazhan are because of an Old God as yet discovered. There is, however, something else that makes a lot more sense.

Duskwood, that creepy zone that low level Alliance love and fear, has a rich history of people going mad. The Scythe of Elune is mentioned, the Black Riders of Deadwind Pass, worgen and undead, and humans that have completely lost their minds. But the most peculiar and as yet unexplained part of Duskwood is the portion nestled directly in the center of the otherwise unsettling zone – The Twilight Grove. This crater is supposedly the remains of a volcano, and carries an oddly night elf feel to it. The logical leap to make is that Duskwood itself, the corruption, the darkness, and everything that has befallen the area is the direct result of an Old God buried somewhere below.

Why did I make that fifth connection? Take a closer look at the map. I have clumsily connected the dots, line tool style:

Click for a larger image.

Oh Blizzard. You are fond of putting pentagrams in strange places , but this is far too interesting to be coincidental.  Notice that the center of my messy pentagram is none other that the Maelstrom, that nasty swirling bit of chaos and tidal fury that all ships make a strong point to avoid when sailing about Azeroth.

Is your mind boggled yet? It gets better. So much better. Read on, and prepare to start making cardboard ‘The End Is Near’ signs to wave about your nearest street corner.

There you have it. Five Old Gods, five locations that can either be verified, or assumed with little stretching involved. Five Old Gods, five points on a pentagram, say you know what else do we have that we can count five of?

Oh wait. Dragon Aspects.

Let that sink in for a moment.

Done? Here we go – a current look at the five Dragonflights and their status, as according to Warcraft Lore:

Neltharion and the Black Dragonflight

Neltharion, now known as Deathwing, was the Earth-Warder and leader of the Black Dragonflight. Empowered by the Titans with dominion over the earth, and the deep places of Azeroth. The deep dark places, coincidentally, that also housed the Old Gods. Neltharion was unfortunately driven to insanity by the voices of an Old God, causing him to create the Demon Soul. The night elves were able to capture the Demon Soul, but in the process Deathwing wrecked the Blue Dragonflight. This all took place during the War of Eternity – the War that caused the Sundering of Azeroth into the continents that exist today.

It is important to note that again, the location of the Tirisfal Old God could be, pre-Sundering, very close in location to the original Well of Eternity.

Malygos and the Blue Dragonflight

Malygos the Spellweaver is the Aspect of the Blue Dragonflight. Norgannon, the Titan in charge of magic and the keeper of lore, gave Malygos a portion of his power and placed him as the guardian of magic and hidden Arcanum. Malygos’s flight was devastated by Deathwing’s original attack, and as a result he lost a large portion of his sanity. Malygos regained his lucidity after Deathwing was defeated and the Demon Soul was destroyed at the end of the Second War.

However, while Malygos has begun to regain much of his sanity, it is revealed in Wrath of the Lich King that the Aspect has suddenly deemed the lesser races use of magic unacceptable. He worries that the reckless use of arcane magic may bring the Burning Legion to Azeroth in force again, which is why he’s hostile and killable in game – he’s declared war on all magic users, and wishes them destroyed.

This does make sense, but please note that the location of Yogg Saron, another Old God, is in Northrend.

Nozdormu and the Bronze Dragonflight

Nozdormu the Timeless was empowered by the Titans to watch over the flow of time to make sure that events occur normally, without interruption and as fated to pass. He was granted domain over the ever-spinning pathways of fate and destiny, and thus knew when events were gong to occur, and what was yet to come. However, his powers came with a price – Nozdormu was shown his own demise. It was a lesson, so that the Aspect would never think that his power so great and terrible that he had to answer to no other. Nozdormu is well aware of when and where he will die, as well as the events surrounding his death.

During the events of the Burning Crusade, is it revealed that Nozdormu is currently ‘away on a quest’, and his whereabouts are unknown. Leading in his are Anachronos, Soridormi, Andormu and Nozari, who keep watch over the Caverns of Time and wait for their leader’s return. It is also revealed in this expansion that the Bronze flight now has a unique problem  – the Infinite Dragonflight has suddenly appeared, intent on altering the events of history past. The origins of these dragons are unknown, although there is a reference by an NPC named Indormi in the Caverns. She states, “Do you think the rumors about the Infinite Dragonflight are true? I’ve sensed it…the familiarity.”

In Wrath of the Lich King, Chromie, Ambassador of the Bronze Dragonflight, sends players on a quest to take a powerful artifact to the Bronze Dragonshrine in order to divine the true identity of the leader of the Infinite Dragonflight. Instead of the leader being revealed, players reveal Nozdormu himself. While this is shrugged off as merely being interesting by Chromie, it blatantly suggests that Nozdormu himself is responsible for the Infinite Dragonflight.

It is unknown at this time whether Norzdormu is the leader, and it is also unknown what, if anything, would lead him to this fate. Why would an Aspect suddenly go from carefully guarding the events and happenings of time, to trying to disrupt them? Why, he’d have to be…mad.

It is important to note that the primary lair of the Bronze Dragonflight is located in Tanaris. It is also important to note that the Bronze flight was heavily involved with the original imprisonment of C’thun in Silithus.

Ysera and the Green Dragonflight

Ysera the Dreamer, leader of the Green Dragonflight, was blessed with a portion of nature’s influence. Ysera fell into an eternal, never-ending trance bound to both the waking world, and the waking Dream of Creation. Ysera was empowered by the Titans to watch over the growing wilds of the world from her realm, the Emerald Dream. Ysera, being a guardian of nature, is also heavily tied into druidic lore – the Emerald Dream is something of a sanctuary for druids that walk the path of the earth. When the first World Tree was created and crowned Nordrassil, Ysera enchanted it so that it would be bound to the Emerald Dream.

Ysera has long been reported to simple reside in the Emerald Dream, however the Dream has been corrupted by something called, aptly, the Emerald Nightmare – a mobile area of corruption within the Emerald Dream. The origins of the Nightmare have not been made entirely clear. Some speculate that Hakkar the Soulflayer is responsible, due to events in the Sunken Temple. The Raven Lord Anzu has been mentioned in Burning Crusade – but the most logical explanation is this: the Nightmare, a nightmare, is the direct responsibility of the dreamer that dreams it up. Ysera is the being responsible for the Emerald Dream’s existence. For some reason, she’s having Nightmares. It’s almost like there’s a little voice telling her terrible things as she’s sleeping…

Please note that the Old God location mentioned as being a possibility in the Duskwood area has a gigantic crater in the middle of it. A crater that contains one of the large portals directly connected to the Emerald Dream.

Alexstraza and the Red Dragonflight

Alexstraza the Life-Binder, leader of the Red Dragonflight, was empowered by the Titans to be the guardian of all life in the World of Azeroth, and the Titans also appointed her as queen of all dragons. Alexstraza works to safeguard life on Azeroth, and has limitless compassion for all living things. Currently, she is the head of the Wyrmrest Accord in Northrend, the united efforts of the Dragonflights against Malygos’s somewhat odd crusade against the magic users of Azeroth.

Alexstraza and her Dragonflight have no real issues, problems, or strange things afoot with their flight – the most that happened to them was their imprisonment and enslavement by the orcs of Grim Batol and Blackrock Lair. Actually, the biggest challenge in Alexstraza’s life at the moment is simply trying to balance the efforts against Malygos with the efforts to help the other dragonflights and the efforts of the races of Azeroth against the Lich King. She has a lot of things going on, but there’s nothing there to suggest she’s anything but perfectly sane, compassionate and wise as always.

It is important to note that the final verified location of an Old God is one that is long dead. There’s nothing there but a corpse with a gigantic glaive stuck in it.

What Does This Mean For Azeroth?

After connecting all these bits of random information, bits that are nearly fully supported by existing Warcraft lore, there are a few startling and eye-opening speculations that can be made.

The Dragon Aspects were put in place after the Old God’s imprisonment to watch over all aspects of Azeroth. Neltharion was driven mad due to voices of Old Gods – it’s not surprising that he came to this fate, given that he was the Earth-Warder. However, these voices told him how to create the Demon Soul – an object that could be used against all living things on Azeroth, including his fellow Aspects.

The obvious conclusion is that the Old Gods hope that the destruction of the Aspects would once more set them free, but there’s a second, more devious part to this plan. It’s all well and good if the Aspects are dead, but that still leaves the Old Gods stuck under the earth. What if the Demon Soul was created not just to destroy the other Aspects that protected Azeroth, but as a deliberate catalyst for the Sundering, an event which ripped the world apart? What if the Sundering was just the first step to a plan to not only destroy the Aspects, but also free the Old Gods from their imprisonment?

Once the Sundering had been completed, Deathwing was far from done with his machinations, but he was thwarted, and the Demon Soul destroyed. Deathwing retreated to the Elemental plane, Deepholm, to recuperate. The Elemental Plane also happens to be the prison of the Elemental Lords, lieutenants of the Old Gods from that first huge war with the Titans so long ago. This plane is separate from Azeroth, and thusly the Old Gods would no longer be able to contact Deathwing as readily as they had when they first corrupted him so many years before.

What’s an Old God to do? Why…work on the other Aspects in the meantime, of course. C’thun sought out Nozdormu, corrupted him into thinking there was a way he could keep his power and avoid his own death by twisting future versions of the Bronze dragons into the Infinite Dragonflight and altering the timelines in such a way that his demise would be prevented. Nozdormu knew this was going to happen, which is why, during the War of the Ancients, he apologized for actions he would commit against him in the future, stating that not even he could change his ultimate fate.

Meanwhile, Deathwing’s chaos had rendered Malygos largely insane, but after the Demon Soul was destroyed, he slowly began to regain his sanity. This wouldn’t do, and so Yogg Saron whispered to the Aspect of the corrupt nature of the mortal races, and how they were not worthy to wield the magic that Malygos oversaw. He played on Malygos’s fears; feeding him nightmares of the Burning Legion and other horrifying events in order to recreate the madness that Deathwing had originally stricken Malygos with. This theory is backed up in part by the visions in the brain of Yogg Saron – while two of the events directly involve efforts in Northrend, the third is oddly, the creation of the Demon Soul – the object that the Old Gods convinced Neltharion to create.

Ysera…how DO you corrupt a dragon that spends most of her time asleep? Why that’s easy – whisper to her of nightmares, of horrors yet to be, of corrupted versions of mortal races, warped mirrors of reality, Corrupted Ones. Ysera is half awake, half asleep, and almost wouldn’t realize that anything had been said – easily confused and rarely lucid, it was easy enough to create the Nightmare, a swirling vortex of chaos itself, by simply mumbling to Ysera for long enough that she generated it herself. Mumbling via a portal that connects directly to the Emerald Dream.

And then we have Alexstraza. There were probably some awesome plans for Alexstraza, but the fifth Old God was dead, and so she escaped unscathed. There wasn’t an Old God available to address her and her flight – the four that remained alive were all busy with their respective flights.

With the announcement of Cataclysm and Deathwing’s reemergence, there are more conclusions to be made.

Deathwing was hiding out in the Elemental Plane – the abyssal plane to which the Elemental Lords were banished at the end of the war between the Old Gods and the Titans. The Elemental Lords don’t particularly care for one another, but they had a specific purpose in the early days of Azeroth – to serve the Old Gods and keep Azeroth in a perpetual state of chaos. While these lords are seemingly no longer under the Old God’s control, this may only be an assumption – and Deathwing, still faithful to the Old Gods that whispered to him so long ago, is looking to free the loyal lieutenants, and the Old Gods, once and for all.

Cataclysm isn’t just Deathwing out to get his revenge. Cataclysm and the events surrounding it are the very deliberate efforts of the remaining Old Gods to do what they’ve been waiting thousands upon thousands of years to do: Escape their prison, release their lieutenants, and once and for all annihilate all semblance of order on Azeroth. The Old Gods managed to sunder the earth once before – this time they have their tool, Deathwing, to do it again and perhaps nudge them that much closer to freedom.

And when the Old Gods’ freedom is gained at last, you can bet there will be another War on Azeroth. A War of Titanic proportions.

So Draenei are Eredar?

Absolutely. They’re still eredar to this day – they just took the name draenei because it differentiated them from their corrupted kin. That’s why the night elves were so frightened of the draenei at first – because to the night elves, the draenei looked startlingly similar to the demonic eredar that had slaughtered so many of their people during the War of the Ancients. Archimonde was a leader of the eredar right alongside Velen – and Archimonde appeared during the War of the Ancients, so it’s no wonder really that the night elves were as terrified as they were.

How exactly does a spaceship fit into Warcraft Lore?

Spaceship is sort of a relative term, here. The ‘spaceships’ were something introduced to the draenei by the Naaru, who have been alive as a race for an undisclosed period of time. The draenei didn’t make the ships, the naaru did – they just showed the draenei which buttons to push. The ‘spaceship’ isn’t really a spaceship so much as a dimensional ship that can travel between worlds without the use of portals like the Dark Portal in Outland.

Think of it this way – the portals that exist between various worlds, the most notable being the Dark Portal, are portals that people have to run up and walk though, one person at a time. The Dimensional Ships create the portals as they go, capable of taking large amounts of people all at once. They are, in essence, a gigantic portal that one rides around in and manipulates so that you go exactly where you need to go. But – and this is an important clarification – they are also capable of simply traveling through space, as the driver of the ship wouldn’t necessary know where to set down at if he’d never been to a particular location before.

So why did the draenei end up on Azeroth, of all places?

Simple serendipity. Azeroth happened to be the closest habitable planet that the ship could land on at the time of the sabotage. If they’d been closer to another planet, doubtless they would’ve landed there. But that wouldn’t have tied the story together anywhere near as neatly, and wouldn’t have given the Alliance a new playable race to begin with.

What’s up with the draenei being so pretty, when all of the draenei we’ve seen to date are hideously deformed? They just didn’t want to give the Alliance an ugly race to play, right?

Yes and no. While it’s true that draenei existed in game long before the events of the Burning Crusade, these draenei had been warped to the point of being unrecognizable. The Lost Ones of the Swamp of Sorrows and the Broken that wander the Blasted Lands are an extreme view of what happened to the draenei that were corrupted by the fel energy of the orcs.

While it has been suggested that the Alliance should have played these draenei instead of the ones that were introduced, that would’ve been a bad move on Blizzard’s part. The draenei in Azeroth are largely devolved and don’t really possess the mental capabilities or, well, sanity required to be a playable race.

Did Blizzard just throw together the draenei back-story so that the Alliance could have yet another pretty pretty race to play? Well…that’s really up to Blizzard to answer, but in looking at the lore that was presented surrounding their origins it seems like they were being set up as a legitimate race that would have legitimate reasons to join the Alliance. Being attractive is a byproduct of this – and when one takes a step back and looks at thing through unbiased eyes, well…of course the draenei are pretty. If they weren’t attractive in some aspect, nobody would want to play them – and that sort of defeats the purpose of a video game, doesn’t it?

Wait – I thought the Eredar corrupted Sargeras, not the other way around. What gives?

This is the single piece of Burning Crusade’s story that infuriated the largest part of Warcraft’s fan base, and legitimately so. In the original Warcraft storyline, and even in books that are currently able to be read in game, the Eredar are clearly listed as ‘an insidious race of devilish sorcerers’ that used ‘warlock magic’ to corrupt and mutate races into warped, twisted and demonic versions of their former selves.

Wait, what?

Yes, that’s right – originally, the Eredar corrupted Sargeras. When the history of the draenei was finally announced and posted on the Burning Crusade website, fans were outraged. How could something as large as this have been overlooked? Didn’t the writing team at Blizzard even know or understand the property they’d been developing stories and games for all this time? Chris Metzen responded directly to the rampaging mobs with the following:

Right. To be totally up-front with you guys, it’s my bad, straight up. The obvious lore contradiction with Sargeras and his encounter with the eredar was clearly documented in the Warcraft III manual. I wrote those bits about four years ago, and to be totally honest, I simply forgot. Genius, right? With my excitement to get the draenei up to speed and root them more firmly in the setting, I forgot to do my homework and go back over my earlier writing. I can assure you, no ones more crushed about this mistake than I am. Ive spent the last few days kicking my own ass over this one. Sucks to fail. It may not always be evident, but we take this story stuff really seriously at Blizzard. It’s been one of my personal missions at this company to maintain a high level of integrity throughout the Warcraft game setting (all of them, actually) and I think weve done a pretty decent job of upholding the continuity over the years.

I think it’s important to note that world building is far bigger than just storytelling, and it requires (in my humble opinion) a certain amount of flexibility. Sometimes you need to expand certain ideas or retcon whole sections of continuity to broaden the scope and accessibility of your setting. There are a good number of these types of situations already (like totally revising our timeline, suggesting trolls were the progenitors of all elven subspecies, etc. there’s a hundred other examples). To make an omelet, ya need to break a few eggs, and WoWs one big omelet.

The trouble is, this has become a pretty big setting. There are literally thousands of characters, hundreds of locations, and all sorts of creatures, items, and plot themes that all define this world. As you can imagine, it’s a lot to police. Sometimes things do fall through the cracks, mistakes get made and were forced to scramble to come up with clever solutions to continuity errors. (Hakkar, anyone? ). You not only have me jamming ideas, but a ninja team of quest designers, an army of freelance RPG writers, and a commando squad of red-hot novelists who are all involved in fleshing out the lore and making it more than just wallpaper on a game.

I’m explaining all this not to excuse this particular mistake, but to give you some understanding of how the mistake was made. I’ve read a fair amount of posts over the past few days and I know theres a lot of confusion and frustration surrounding the whole eredar/draenei train wreck. Believe me, I know exactly how you feel. At the end of the day, we’re all just a bunch of geeky fanboys and fangirls, and we all get pretty fired up when people start screwing with the worlds we love. If anything, all of the venting and creative suggestions Ive seen over the past few days have reinforced for me the fact that you guys really do care about this world and its troubled denizens.

While I can’t promise that these types of mistakes will never happen again, I do want to state clearly that we take the responsibility of crafting and maintaining this lore very seriously. You all pay good money to adventure through this world month by month, and you deserve the best we can give.

-Chris Metzen

The full post that addressed other lore-related concerns involving the Burning Crusade is archived here and well worth the read.

Honestly, I think Metzen handled it the best possible way that he could, just by owning up to it, apologizing, and moving on. When you are dealing with a story as large and intricate as Warcraft has gotten over the years, it is difficult to keep track of all the storylines past, present, and yet to be and weave them together into a cohesive unit. There is a difference between being a reader, and being a writer – while it is easy for a reader to simply memorize everything they’ve been presented with, as a writer it is more often than not difficult to remember every last nuance of work that’s been printed, because in a writer’s mind, there’s a million more things that haven’t. When you apply this to Warcraft, a storyline that has been in progress since 1994, you’re looking at over ten years worth of story ideas to keep track of, both those that have been written, and those that haven’t.

But there’s a way to work these misprinted books into existing lore anyway, regardless of Metzen’s goof. History as a whole isn’t static. Historians are constantly discovering things that shed an entirely different light on events that had been though to be set in stone, and the retelling of historical events tends to shift over time, because each person notating that history has a little bit of their own say on what gets said, and what doesn’t. It’s like a giant game of telephone – what happened, or what’s said at the beginning, rarely matches what is said to have happened, or what comes out at the end of the telephone chain.

It’s not a far jump to assume that whoever had written these books sitting around in various Azeroth locations (and just how DID these books come to be, anyway? That’s never quite been explained.) didn’t quite get it right the first time. Whoever was in charge of the second printing fudged it a little, too. And so on and so on, until the books currently read in game bore little to no resemblance to what actually happened. But hey, that was all over twenty thousand years ago, so nobody from that time period really existed to set that record straight, did they?

Enter the draenei. Suddenly Azeroth is confronted not only with a new race – but a new race that disproves the history that had been taught and written down for however many thousands of years. You can’t really tell the survivors of a historical event, people that were present at the time it all happened, that they didn’t get it right. They were there, and they know what happened, and that changes everything about the way history is presented.

The draenei race could be considered an extreme retcon, but they could also be assumed to be from a lore standpoint, and the point of a character in game, a simple unknown. It wasn’t the history that had changed – it was everyone’s perception of that history that changed as a direct result of the draenei’s sudden arrival.

While the draenei have settled in as Azeroth’s most unlikely citizens, they also have the luxury of being the citizens with the clearest lore, timeline, and history. Unfortunately there are still thousands upon thousands of players that simply view them as the space-goats that should never have been, an element to be largely ignored. I hope that this brief exploration into the world of the draenei manages to clear up a few of these misconceptions, and shed some light on a race that has been largely left in the dark.

Next time on Lore History: We’re moving right along through Alliance and Horde, and it’s time to look at the most evil of evil races – The Forsaken!

The mysterious race known as the draenei have been referenced in Warcraft lore prior to Burning Crusade, however the draenei we were presented with were very different from the playable race. Little guys that look largely like potato sacks with legs, it was difficult for players to imagine how anyone could ever want to play them as a character in game. But the draenei’s origins are a startling departure from the magic-wielding elves, the savage orcs, and the other playable races available. The draenei were covered briefly in Orc History – you can go back and read parts One and Two here, or simply read ahead, as I’ll be recapping the events presented in the orc history segment.

The Eredar, the Naaru, and the Birth of the Burning Legion

The draenei originated as a race known as the Eredar – a group of supremely talented magic users who originated on the planet Argus, millions of years prior to Azeroth’s creation. These creatures were led by three of the strongest magic users – Archimonde, Kil’jaeden, and Velen. Sargeras, the dark titan intent on destroying worlds and devouring magic, was in the middle of building a vast army to carry out his dark purposes – and the inherent power of the Eredar quickly drew his attention. He approached the three leaders, offering them both vast powers and immortality in exchange for their allegiance.

While Archimonde and Kil’jaeden were quick to agree to join the Burning Legion, becoming the first sentient race to pledge their allegiance, Velen had many misgivings about accepting Sargeras’s offer. Velen, unbeknown to the other two leaders, had experienced a vision – a dark foretelling of the Burning Legion’s creation and the aftermath that followed. But the other leaders remained firm in their stance, and knowing that other races would inevitably join the Legion’s ranks, the eredar declared that their language, Eredun, would be the Legion’s common language. The Legion soon grew in power – but one remained who was largely unhappy about this arrangement.

Velen watched his fellow eredar quickly fall to the machinations of Sargeras, twisting into a warped reflection of their demonic corruption. These Eredar were now the man’ari – a word with no real translation, but one that implies that there is something horrifically wrong in the Eredar language. And once again Velen was approached by a vision – but this was no vision. A naaru appeared, offering to take Velen and any other like-minded Eredar to safety.

The naaru are a dimension traveling race of beings that are intent on purifying worlds and imbuing them with the harmony of peace and understanding. They saw what had happened to Sargeras, and knew what the ultimate consequences of the Burning Legion would be – something that they had shared with Velen before, in the hopes that the vision would convince the Eredar to turn Sargeras down. When Velen was the only one to abstain, the naaru decided to save the few Eredar that they could.

And so Velen and his followers left Argus, whisked away via one of the dimensional ships that belonged to the naaru. For thousands of years they traveled, exploring dozens of worlds and adapting a new name – ‘draenei’, or ‘exiled ones’. Unfortunately the draenei were not left to their own devices – the man’ari left behind viewed Velen’s departure as an act of ultimate betrayal, and pursued the draenei wherever they went. While Archimonde was angry, it was Kil’jaeden who was furious – Velen had not only been a leader with him, but he had been one of Kil’jaeden’s best friends, someone he had loved like a brother. While Kil’jaeden’s wrath was relentless, Velen, the draenei, and the naaru were far too cunning, and soon vanished.

The Light And How To Swing It

It was during this journey across dimensional space that the naaru spoke to the draenei of the Light – the concept of practicing virtue wherever one fled. The Light teaches that there is a connection between the self, and the universe – that senses and emotions, love and peace all connect one closer to the universe from which one was created. When a person is moved, that emotion connects them to the universe, reminding them that they exist. Because they exist, the universe must exist as well, to create and instill that feeling or emotion inside. From this circle, one can create more changes to create more feelings – in essence, spreading peace and ‘light’ among others simply by existing and creating those emotions that trigger those feelings. The Light, or the Holy Light, is in essence the glory of the universe, reflected upon the soul and mirrored back onto itself, and others. The draenei embraced this knowledge, and the naaru reassured them that one day, other forces would join them in the stand against the Burning Legion, and the naaru would forge them into a single, unstoppable army of the Light.

But where had the draenei and their naaru teachers vanished to? Well, the naaru had found a little planet out in the middle of nowhere that seemed a perfect fit for the fleeing draenei – a world inhabited by a few sentient races, the most powerful being the orcs. The naaru landed safely on this little world in the dimensional ship known as Oshu’gun, and the draenei spread out upon it, calling the planet Draenor, or ‘Exile’s Refuge’. The orcs, a primitive sort, were a largely shamanistic society, and the draenei lived peacefully beside them, sometimes indulging in some limited trade, but mostly keeping to themselves out of respect for the orcs.

The Return of Kil’jaeden

This idyllic peace unfortunately was not meant to last.  Kil’jaeden, under orders from Sargeras to find a mortal army that could be used to invade worlds, had sent servants out to find suitable mortals for his master’s wishes. These servants returned with news that delighted Kil’jaeden – they had stumbled across a world that showed signs of the draenei’s magic, and this time, it wasn’t just a world they’d landed on and fled – the draenei had actually settled there. Not only this, but the little world contained a mortal race known as ‘orcs’ – creatures that showed shamanistic potential, and exactly what Kil’jaeden had been looking for.

Kil’jaeden had his potential army – and he also had his potential revenge, if he played his cards right. Speaking to the elder shaman Ner’zhul and taking on the guise of his late wife, Kil’jaeden tricked the orc into thinking that the draenei were plotting against his people. Once that foothold had been established, he subtly introduced warlock magic to the clans, and encouraged them to strike back against their draenei ‘enemies’. The orcs, believing they were working under their ancestor’s orders, complied – and soon the draenei found themselves under attack by the one-peaceful cohabitants of their new home.

The conflict lasted nearly eight years, during which over eighty percent of the draenei race was mercilessly slaughtered. The draenei fell in droves, and those that were left were changed, mutated by the fel energies wielded by orcish warlocks into shadows of their former selves. These draenei were called the ‘Broken’ – devolved versions of the draenei. The most notable of these was Akama – once a guardian of the Temple of Karabor, he was responsible for evacuating as many of the draenei civilians as possible, and one of the most exposed to the fel energies that caused the draenei to mutate. Akama went into hiding in Zangarmarsh with the survivors.

A few draenei survived unchanged – Velen and a scant handful of his followers also fled to Zangarmarsh, where they managed to successfully hide from the orcish assault. But Velen could see that this world the draenei had settled on was no longer safe for his people to remain on. This is where the path of the Broken and the path of the Draenei split – for Velen gathered his followers to him and prepared them to once more take flight – this time not on the broken ship of Oshu’gun, deep in the orc territory, but to the north – Tempest Keep, a naaru fortress stationed in Netherstorm.

The Draenei of Azeroth

But Velen and his followers had another small problem – Tempest Keep had been overrun by blood elves led by Kael’thas Sunstrider, and the naaru guardian Mu’ru had been taken prisoner by the strange little pointy-eared magic-obsessed elves. Velen knew that the Keep – or rather, one portion of it, the wing known as the Exodar, was his people’s only chance to escape the dying planet and find a new hope for survival. And so he led his people in an assault on Tempest Keep itself. The draenei somehow managed to fight their way into the Exodar and take off, but they were not alone – some of the blood elves had managed to follow them into the Exodar, and as the ship flew through the skies, the blood elves worked quickly to sabotage the dimensional engines. Once activated, the engines went haywire, sending the Exodar hurtling out of control through the Twisted Nether until it reached the closest habitable planet – Azeroth.

Screaming through the skies of northern Kalimdor, the crippled ship ripped through a small island chain off the coast of Darkshore, coming to a crashing, abrupt halt. The draenei had survived, again.

Sort of. While the ship landed, it didn’t land safely, and still more of the draenei were killed in the crash. The few survivors awoke, taking the islands as a new homeland, embarrassed at the sheer amount of destruction the crash had caused. Surviving too were some of the blood elf attackers, who gathered and made their own base on the islands to the north to recover and come up with a way to wrest the Exodar from the draenei’s hands and return it to Tempest Keep. This is the official origin of the draenei on Azeroth.

The Draenei of Outland

Meanwhile on Draenor, while Velen and his followers hid in Zangarmarsh, Akama and his Broken followers had less success. While at first the draenei were sympathetic to their condition, as the fel corruption worsened and the physical changes grew more dramatic, the draenei grew wary, afraid. It was unknown if the affliction that corrupted the Broken was contagious, and the draenei didn’t wish to risk suffering the same fate as the Broken had. And so the Broken were…asked, politely, to take their leave. This understandably upset the Broken – they were draenei, simply hurt – and yet instead of receiving help from their people, they were being tossed aside.

Akama was the worst affected by the fel corruption, a shadow of his former draenei self. He and his Broken followers formed a tribe called the Ashtongue. They hid well, but were soon forced out of hiding – the pit lord Magtheridon and his army of demons and fel orcs had taken over the Temple that Akama had once called home, tainting it with his demonic presence. Akama and the Broken fought relentlessly, wishing nothing more than the pit lord’s extinction, but as the battle raged it became clear that he and his people were vastly outnumbered. It was at this point that two unlikely allies – Lady Vashj, leader of the naga, and Kael’thas Sunstrider, leader of the blood elves, joined the fight. Both races had come from another world called Azeroth, to escape the clutches of human captors. Akama, grateful for their assistance, agreed to pledge his loyalty to their master, Illidan Stormrage.

Fighting alongside the naga, the blood elves, and Illidan, Akama finally saw what he’d been waiting for – Magtheridon fell, and the Temple was taken over once more. But rather than give the Temple back to Akama and his people, Illidan took it for himself, a throne from which he would rule all of Outland. Akama craved vengeance on the orcs and demons that had corrupted, warped and slaughtered his race. But he knew in his heart that Illidan was not the savior that his followers had described. Illidan served Kil’jaeden, ultimately – and while it is unknown if Akama was among those that originally lived on Argus, it can be assumed that he knew who Kil’jaeden was.

It was Kil’jaeden who appeared before Illidan, ordering him back to Azeroth, to destroy the Frozen Throne – and it was Akama who stayed behind to guard Illidan’s holdings, while Vashj and Kael’thas went with their master. While it’s never directly mentioned, it can be assumed that this may have been a logical point at which Akama started speaking to Maiev Shadowsong, Illidan’s warden on Azeroth. The night elf, presumed dead by her people, had been captured while trying to bring Illidan back to Azeroth for punishment for his crimes, and imprisoned underground near the Black Temple. Maiev lived for nothing more than vengeance upon Illidan Stormrage, and would stop at nothing to see him dead. Akama, for his part, wanted the Black Temple restored, and wanted his people’s reputation restored alongside it.

Twisted, battered, and assumed to be the ultimate betrayer of the draenei people, Akama quietly planned his own revenge…and Illidan’s downfall. Akama and the Broken that knew of Akama’s true intentions surrounding the temple took up a name for their faction – the Ashtongue Deathsworn – sworn to kill Illidan and regain their home, through any means necessary.

The Lost Ones

A third group of draenei exist as well, on Azeroth of all places – the Lost Ones. These draenei have devolved even further than the broken, bearing little resemblance to their eredar origins. When the Dark Portal was reopened into Azeroth, a small tribe of Broken calling themselves the ‘Broken Exiles’ traveled through it, scarred by the violent events of their world’s destruction. They settled in the Swamp of Sorrows, but soon found themselves devolving even further from their Broken state – perhaps because of the separation from their home world, but even more likely due to the fel corruption combined with the energies of the Dark Portal they had passed through. These former draenei split even further – one group losing all that remained of their sanity and taking up residence at Harborage in the Swamp of Sorrows. The others took the name Lost Ones, in mourning for their lost world, and established a colony called the Fallow Sanctuary in the Swamp of Sorrows.

A few other Broken Exiles took up residence near the remains of the Dark Portal in the Blasted Lands, ever hoping that the way would open so they could once more find their way home.

That’s it for the Draenei, at least until I go over the events and lore of The Burning Crusade. Their history may seem short because it is short – while from a timeline standpoint the draenei have been around far longer than anything save the Titans and the Naaru, they were pretty much an unknown until they were announced as the new Alliance race. While some people hate them and think they’ve got no business in Warcraft Lore, I think that Blizzard managed to fit them in neatly enough – with one or two gigantic gaping holes in lore than can be easily explained. There are still a lot of unanswered questions about the Draenei however, and I’ll be going over those tomorrow. Be sure to check back for the summary!

It may seem like the ‘blood elf’ portion of blood elf history is awfully short – and it is. The sin’dorei didn’t become the sin’dorei until quite recently in the Warcraft timeline. For now though, it’s time to wrap up with some of the most commonly asked questions and misconceptions about the little pointy eared buggers, as well as making sense of some of the in-game contradictions.

Blood elves are night elves?

Oh heck no. They were, at one point in time – mind you this was well over 10,000 years ago in the Warcraft time line. But the changes that struck them after they left Nordrassil’s range of protection were enough to dramatically differentiate them from the night elves you know today.

So who are these high elves wandering around then? They don’t have the green eyes but they look like the blood elves do.

Those are the high elves that left back after the Second War. Remember when Anasterian pulled his support from the Alliance, Kael’thas stayed behind because he was in the Kirin Tor? There were other high elves that stayed behind as well, to continue teaching the humans and other races the magic that they’d learned. These high elves weren’t affected by the destruction of the Sunwell – why? Probably because they had spent so much time away from it that they were nowhere near as closely tied to it as the elves that lived in Silvermoon proper.

These high elves had to learn proper control, and how to deal with being away from the Sunwell right from the start – so its destruction simply didn’t affect them in the same way. It may also be (and this is speculation, mind) that they learned a few things from the creatures they were teaching about alternate ways of keeping that power that is inherent to their survival alive. The humans they taught weren’t really tied to the Sunwell after all – they looked for ley lines and other sources of magic to pull their abilities from, so perhaps the high elves just learned to do that.

How come the high elves are allied with the Alliance? Or they con friendly with the Alliance anyway, but they don’t seem to like the blood elves at all.

Because these high elves that left did so in order to teach the various Alliance races magic. It could be that they didn’t agree with Anasterian’s decision to pull his support from the Alliance, it could be that they saw the path the quel’dorei of Quel’Thalas were headed down, and they simply didn’t wish to follow that path. And now that the sin’dorei are obviously following a much darker path…well, they don’t really want anything to do with that.

So why is that Highborne in Darnassus a night elf?

The highborne we’re talking about is Archmage Mordent Evenshade, who is seeking an audience with Tyrande regarding the use of arcane power. He believes that the kal’dorei will once again need the knowledge that the Highborne possess.

Why’s he a night elf? Take a good look – that’s what the blood elves looked like BEFORE the physical changes that happened to them occurred. Well…sort of. It has been mentioned that the highborne were bleached, somewhat – so his skin tone ought to be lighter than it is, but…well close enough. This is an early plant to justify the addition of night elf mages in Cataclysm. I hope that they update the Archmage’s model a little bit and bleach him out a little more, but Blizzard only has so much time to address these things.

Now as to why this particular Archmage hasn’t suffered the same physical changes as the rest of the High Elves…well that’s interesting, and there’s no real justification for it so far. I’m assuming that he never left when the rest of the quel’dorei were banished to the Eastern Kingdoms, so he never suffered the sudden collapse of leaving Nordrassil’s reach. There’s no real back story for him yet, but I’m speculating that this guy was off hiding in the forests somewhere on his own for all these thousands of years, possibly with a few others.

It’s really the only logical leap to make – they can’t change the night elf model in-game for just one class choice.

Speaking of classes, what’s up with blood elves not being able to be warriors? They can be paladins and haul heavy weapons around, so why not warriors? And Kael’thas had warriors when he joined the Alliance army, didn’t he?

He did! And this is a good question – the only logical explanation for the absence of warriors in blood elven society is this: The destruction of the Sunwell weakened them to the point where they were no longer physically capable of hauling a sword and shield around. Those warriors that Kael’thas took with him were the last and strongest to survive – and they went merrily tromping away with him to Outland. The blood elves left behind in Quel’thalas were nowhere near as strong – or Kael’thas would’ve taken him with them to begin with.

The paladins can haul those heavy weapons around because they’re imbued with the essence of the naaru – or they were. Now they’re working with other elements, but originally? Merrily suckin’ Light from an all-powerful windchime with a straw.

Now that the Sunwell has been restored to a degree (you see, I told you there were events in TBC that are yet to be covered!), the blood elves are slowly regaining their strength, and the old abilities they had. This is why in Cataclysm we’ll see a return of the blood elf warrior – they’ve got their strength back, and they can run around merrily being meat shields again.

Why are the Blood Elves so freakin evil, anyway?

So by this point in high elf history, there are, once again, two factions starting to come into play. While most of the elves were content to once more retreat to the Sunwell and the spires of Quel’Thalas, there were others, priests and sorcerers, that wished to continue exploring the world and teaching the humans the arts of magic. Among the high elves that chose to live outside of Quel’Thalas was the son of Anasterian, Prince Kael’thas Sunstrider.

The Fall of Quel’Thelas and the destruction of the Sunwell

Kael’thas was a powerful mage – perhaps one of the most powerful mages in the world, and he studied and worked extensively with the Kirin Tor, a neutral collection of the greatest mages in Azeroth. Not only was Kael’thas a member, he was one of the Six – the high council of the Kirin Tor that together voted on and discussed the most important matters concerning the city. Kael’thas had been a member of the Kirin Tor for quite some time, and while his father withdrew from the Alliance, Kael’thas still stood by the Kirin Tor – not a member of the Alliance, the Kirin Tor was simply a neutral party.

Life continued on – although the quiet of Quel’Thalas was soon to be shattered in the most spectacular of fashions. Prince Arthas Menethil fell under the influence of the Lich King, had picked up the corrupted blade Frostmourne, and had killed his father King Terenas in cold blood. Arthas had a task set before him by the dreadlord Tichondruis – he was to resurrect the necromancer Kel’Thuzad. In order to do so, he had to take the remains of the necromancer to a place where such a powerful magic could be performed. The Sunwell, source of the high elves powers, was his next destination.

The forests of Quel’Thalas were still protected by the enchantment that had been laid in place years before, and so Arthas had to find a way into them, an insider that could get him in. He found one in Dar’Khan Drathir, a member of the Convocation of Silvermoon. Dar’Khan was bitter, egotistical, and believed he deserved far more power and prestige than he was getting – and Arthas promised him that power and prestige in return for his betrayal. Dar’Khan gave him two powerful artifacts, the Stone of Light and the Stone of Flame, which together had warding powers against the undead and would allow Arthas and his Scourge army to circumvent the defenses that had been placed over Quel’Thalas.

And so Arthas marched together with his army of undead Scourge, along a path that is now known as the Dead Scar – destroying one of the protective runestones, and leaving death and destruction in his wake. Arthas was not met without resistance however – the high elves, in a desperate attempt to slow the Scourge’s progress and stop the blight from spreading further, set the area around the destroyed runestone ablaze, burning their beloved forests that they’d sought so hard to protect. But the Scourge pressed on.

Leading the defense against the Scourge was the high elven Ranger General Sylvanas Windrunner. While Windrunner put up quite the resistance, she too finally fell against Frostmourne’s blade. Arthas, in a deliberate gesture of dominance over the elf that had been such a thorn in his side, took Sylvanas’ lifeless body and ripped her spirit from it, creating the first banshee. Sylvanas now served the Lich King and his Scourge, who pressed on to their final destination – the Sunwell.

Silvermoon fell under direct attack, and while the high elves tried the best they could, they were no match for the Scourge forces – soon the city lay in ruins, and the beloved leader of the high elves, King Anasterian Sunstrider, lay dead at the Lich King’s feet. Finally, with grim determination, Arthas reached the Sunwell, throwing the remains of the necromancer into the pool and achieving his goal. Kel’Thuzad rose again, not as a human necromancer, but as an undead lich. The Sunwell had been corrupted irrevocably.

With Anasterian dead, leadership fell to his son, Prince Kael’thas. Kael’thas had returned, bringing the beaten and battered high elves a small spark of hope. While he knew the Scourge were an unrelenting army and still posed a great threat to his people, there was something that posed a far greater threat – the corrupted Sunwell. He had no choice, and together with the aid of the most powerful remaining magi, destroyed the Sunwell.

The Birth of The Sin’dorei

All was not lost – for while the Sunwell was destroyed, unbeknownst to everyone a wizard named Borel – who was secretly the red dragon Korialstrasz – gathered what remained of the Sunwell’s energies and hid them away in the guise of a young human girl, Anveena Teague. He fabricated a life for the human in an effort to make the guise a genuine one, giving her parents and a small farm on which she had been ‘raised’, and left her there until the time came that the Sunwell could be restored again.

Prince Kael’thas gathered what remained of his battered people, so few in number after the Scourge attacks, and declared that they would now and forever be known as the sin’dorei, ‘blood elves’, in remembrance of those that had fallen in defense of their once-beautiful homeland. But Kael’thas could not have predicted what happened next – the blood elves sank into withdrawal, the same withdrawal as the original quel’dorei had felt when the original Well of Eternity was destroyed. The elves of Quel’Thelas were once more deprived of that which imbued every essence of their bodies, and fell quickly into sickness and depression, the youngest and oldest of them dying off, one by one.

Kael’thas, thirsting for vengeance against the Scourge that had decimated his people and killed his father, took the healthiest of his warriors and immediately joined the campaign against the Scourge in Lordaeron. He left behind Lor’themar Theron, the second-in command of Sylvanas, and another ranger named Halduron Brightwing remained behind to safeguard the land and seek a cure for the weakened blood elves.

Kael’thas and his soldiers were sent to the Silverpine Forest when a disturbance began to rile up the undead in and around Dalaran. Kael’thas ordered a retreat, and as his soldiers were loading up the wagons, two entirely unexpected strangers, night elves named Maiev Shadowsong and Tyrande Whisperwind, who were in pursuit of a rogue night elf named Illidan Stormrage, met him. Kael’thas guessed that Illidan was behind the disturbances at Dalaran, and when he told them of this, Tyrande immediately offered her assistance, thinking that perhaps Kael’thas could help them track Illidan down. With the protection of the night elves, they traveled to Pyrewood Village to retrieve the rest of the buried supply caches, and Kael’thas told them of the destruction of Quel’thalas. Tyrande empathized with his plight, but warned him that the path of vengeance and rage was not the best path to follow.

The group was ambushed in Pyrewood by undead attackers, and Maiev and Kael’thas rushed the caravan across the bridge to safety while Tyrande stayed to fend off the undead. As she called upon Elune to protect her, the bridge fell away, sweeping Tyrande down the river. Kael’thas wanted to find and rescue Tyrande, but Maiev stopped him, telling him Tyrande was a warrior and knew the risks and demanding that Kael’thas honor their bargain and help her capture Illidan. The two tracked Illidan to Dalaran, where Kael’s scouts found him performing a strange ritual with a mysterious gem. They were met by Malfurion Stormrage, who told them that the gem was none other than the Eye of Sargeras, and that the ritual was intended to break Northrend apart. The three fought off the undead and interrupted the spell, and Malfurion immediately began blaming his brother for Tyrande’s death. Kael’thas, surprised and a little confused by this, suggested that it was a bit premature to assume the woman dead and was silenced abruptly by Maiev – but not quickly enough. Malfurion, realizing Maiev had duped him, entangled the woman in vines and took off with Illidan to save Tyrande. Maiev freed herself and set off in pursuit of the two, leaving Kael’thas in the ruins of Dalaran.

Bad Blood and Bigotry

Kael’thas was to say the least mildly confused by all of this but he and his soldiers soon met up with Grand Marshal Garithos – a human general and Kael’s commanding officer. Garithos also harbored a poorly hidden disdain for all non-human races, and treated both Kael’thas and his troops with barely disguised contempt. The Grand Marshal told Kael’thas that a strike force was encroaching on Dalaran, and that he was going to head them off at the mountains – and when Kael’thas offered the assistance of his forces, he was abruptly turned down and told that he needed to instead head to the east, as a second force was believed to be approaching from that direction. Garithos ordered Kael’thas and his troops to this location, across the water, to repair the arcane observatories so that the Alliance forces could spot the approaching forces before they appeared at their doorstep.

Kael’thas and his small band of troops did as asked, but when they came to Lordamere Lake, they found the shipyard in ruins, with no route across the water. It was then that unexpected help arrived – a troop of naga led by a witch named Lady Vashj. Vashj offered her assistance, citing the ancestry that the naga and the elves shared. An ancestry that ran back to a time long, long ago – for the naga were the remnants of the Highborne that served Queen Azshara so many thousands of years before, prior to the Sundering. The Old Gods, who had their own purposes for rescuing them, transformed these Highborne into the naga as they were swept under the sea when the Sundering occurred. Prince Kael’thas, left with no other options, agreed to accept her assistance, and the naga gave him boats with which to cross the ocean, leaving soon after.

When Garithos returned from the front, he was told of the naga’s assitance, and angrily informed Kael’thas that consorting with the naga was akin to treason. He warned Kael’thas that he would not tolerate this kind of betrayal, and when the Alliance forces were called once more into battle, left the blood elves behind in Dalaran. An emissary was sent the next day by Garithos with further orders – the observatories had detected an undead force in the west, and Kael was to defeat them. However, Garithos wasn’t finished – he ordered the emissary to pull all foot soldiers, cavalry, and support teams to the front lines. Prince Kael’thas was left with only the few fellow elves he’d brought with him to defend the outposts – and there were simply not enough of them to hold back the undead forces. Once again, Lady Vashj arrived with her naga. Prince Kael’thas was wary of accepting her offer of help, but she insisted that without it, he and what remained of his brethren would surely fall. Kael’thas realized that she was right – the human general, in his gleeful display of disdain for the blood elves, had removed anything that would certainly help in this situation, and Kael’thas had little other choice. He accepted the assistance, and together Kael’thas and the naga defeated the undead.

After the battle, Prince Kael’thas told Vashj about the destruction of Quel’Thalas and the Sunwell, and the weakening of his people. Vashj explained to Kael that they were more alike than he’d thought – both the naga and the elves were addicted to magic. Without the Sunwell to give them a constant supply of magical energy, the entirely of the blood elves would eventual suffer fatal withdrawal. Kael was shocked, but heard the approach of the Grand Marshal and bid Vashj to flee before they were discovered. Lady Vashj and her naga fled quickly, but Garithos’s men had seen them escaping and promptly arrested Kael’thas and his people for treason. The Grand Marshal smugly told Kael’thas that he now had all the proof he needed to give him and the other elves the treatment they deserved, and imprisoned them all in the dungeons beneath Dalaran.

Kael’thas, enraged at the behavior of the General, and of the Alliance itself, had no way to escape- until, once again, Lady Vashj and her naga crept forth to rescue him. She promised him a safe escape through an inter-dimensional portal. On the other side, they would meet with her master – Illidan Stormrage, the former night elf that Maiev had been so desperate to capture. Illidan was a powerful creature imbued with demonic essence, and perhaps one of the most powerful creatures in existence, she told the beleaguered prince, and perhaps he could help the blood elves with their plight. Kael’thas, bitter at the treatment of his people and done with the Alliance, agreed – and he and his blood elves along with the naga escaped and fled through the portal, soon finding themselves standing on another world.

The Sin’dorei as they are currently called weren’t always the blonde, bright-eyed, egomaniacal self obsessed little buggers that you see in World of Warcraft today. Sin’dorei is a name they gave themselves after events in their history warranted the name change. Originally, they were called the Quel’dorei, or high elves – children of noble birth. In order to properly understand where these elves came from, one should probably take a look at the Night Elf History segments from a few weeks ago: Part One, Part Two, and Part Three. I will be picking up with elf history shortly after the timeline presented in the night elf history segment – after the Sundering that split the world into the continents we know today.

Don’t Bleach, Use Chamomile Tea For Natural, Sun-Kissed Highlights

The kaldorei had been firmly split into two different factions – there were the night elves, and the quel’dorei. While the night elves worshipped Elune and followed a largely druidic, nature-based path, the Quel’dorei had become masters of managing the arcane energies and magic of the Well of Eternity – a mastery that had proven disastrous in the War of the Ancients. There was another difference between the two factions however. As the night elves never came out during the day, and usually did their work and worship by night, they had darkened skin and hair, brilliant hues of purple, blue and green, and their eyes retained a normal silver glow – gold in the cases of those that showed druidic potential. The quel’dorei however found it better to work under the light of the sun, and found their skin and their hair fading as well into a lighter version of the night elves dark colors.

Queen Azshara, oddly enough, was a night elf – while she used the Well’s energies quite possibly better than anyone else, she also slept during the day, emerging only during night, and thus retained her dark-skinned ‘night elf’ look. Her eyes also remained gold, the mark of a great destiny at that time. This indicates that it wasn’t just the Well usage that caused the physical changes; it was a combination of both the usage and living in the sun. Please note that the kaldorei by this time had been living by that well for several thousand years, so the physical change itself was more than likely a gradual process spanning a lot of time, rather than an immediate ‘wake up in the morning and you’re a blonde’ moment.

Keep in mind that all elves, night elves and quel’dorei both, were tied to the Well of Eternity. It was the thing that kept them immortal, and living and being in its presence for so long had imbued both factions with the energies of the Well. When the energies of the Well were cut off, everyone felt the effects, including the night elves – it’s just that the quel’dorei were more affected than their night elf cousins, because they had actually worked with the Well, rather than just living next to it. The largest conflict between the two factions was the Well itself – once destroyed, the night elves were convinced that it and the arcane magic it possessed were directly responsible for what had occurred, while the quel’dorei were of the opinion that it wasn’t the Well or the arcane, it was the usage of both that had been corrupted. The quel’dorei firmly believed that with the right balance in place, the arcane could be mastered, and the night elves simply didn’t want anything to do with the arcane at all. But there was another issue at hand for the quel’dorei, one that shaped the very core of who they were, and who they were to become.

Rehab Is For Quitters

The quel’dorei had been using the Well and the magic of the arcane for thousands of years – it was something that they simply depended on to survive. When that source was abruptly cut off, the quel’dorei felt it much more strongly than the night elves – to the quel’dorei, the Well wasn’t simply something that was there making them immortal, it was a way of life, and the thought of surviving without it was incomprehensible. Warcraft lore speaks often of the ‘addiction’ that the quel’dorei had to arcane magic – I sometimes wonder if it’s really an addiction so much as something that they need to continue existing.

Wild speculation time – the addiction to the Well that the quel’dorei possess isn’t entirely a mental thing, it’s physical. The city of Zin’Azshari that the quel’dorei called home was built right up on the edge of the Well of Eternity, bordered it pretty much on all sides. The quel’dorei were concentrated mostly in the center of this, while the night elves lived farther away from it. The Well itself teemed with pure energy pulled from the Great Dark Beyond, and the quel’dorei breathed the air that the Well evaporated into at its strongest point, day after day, for thousands of years. It’s not too far-fetched to assume that the power that existed in the Well almost became a physical part of those quel’dorei, forming an almost cellular bond with these creatures. Think of it as extra insulation for lungs – with the insulation, their breathing was easier, moving was easier, it was possible to physically and mentally do much more than they were previously capable of. When the Well exploded, all of a sudden that insulation was gone, and physically they were unable to do the majority of the things that they’d been doing day to day for the length of their impossibly long lives. So the quel’dorei went into a ‘withdrawal’ of sorts,  leaving them weak, largely helpless, and mentally craving that which would make them strong again.

The leader of the quel’dorei who survived the Sundering was Dath’Remar, a quel’dorei who was originally part of the Highborne that stayed and served Queen Azshara prior to the Sundering. Dath’Remar was one of ‘those guys’, but he was smarter than the rest of them – the Highborne’s affiliation and allegiance with the Burning Legion and Sargeras bothered him greatly, and he sought out other like-minded Highborne, gaining their allegiance. These rogue Highborne worked in secret to slow the work of Azshara’s chosen ones in making the portal between Sargeras’s world and Azeroth a reality.

After the Sundering, Dath’Remar was present at the formation of the new Well of Eternity – the one Illidan made, that was expressly forbidden. He was also present for the forming of the new World Tree, Nordrassil – and he knew that his people, the quel’dorei, would have to make amends with the night elves if they ever hoped to revive their civilization as it existed pre-Sundering. Dath’Remar wasn’t a bad sort, he just wanted things back the way they were – and he wanted to resume using the arcane arts and magic that had imbued his people for so long.

The night elves on the other hand had a different plan altogether. As the night elves weren’t that closely tied to the Well of Eternity, they picked up the arts of druidism fully, and with these arts continued to delve into magic, natural magic. The night elves viewed the Sundering as the kaldorei’s greatest folly – and they placed the blame squarely on the arcane arts of the quel’dorei, as it was the quel’dorei that had been working on these portals to the Burning Legion and essentially, in the night elves opinion, mucking about with things that they had no business mucking about with. The night elves didn’t need the Well to survive – why should anyone need it? And why should they allow anyone to start practicing these arts again, and cause yet another Sundering to come to pass? And so the night elves forbid the use of arcane magic entirely, on penalty of death.

Needless to say, the quel’dorei weren’t very happy about this. The magic that had imbued them and made them what they were was simply gone now, and they needed it to survive in the manner that they were accustomed to surviving. Dath’Remar tried to persuade the night elves that their forbidding of the arcane arts was too severe of a punishment, but the night elves wouldn’t agree.

The quel’dorei were convinced that it wasn’t the arcane arts that was the issue – it was the matter of corruption, of letting the arcane get to them and twist them that was the problem. Simply forbidding the arcane wasn’t a solution; it was cowardice – what the quel’dorei felt they should be doing was learning to use the arcane properly. Years passed, around seven thousand of them, give or take a few, and the quel’dorei grew more and more desperate. Here they were, immortal, and doomed to a weak half-life, a life in which they were forbidden to do that which came naturally to them.

Dath’Remar had had enough. He took his followers, the quel’dorei, the leftover Highborne, and they banded together to unleash a magical storm across Ashenvale forest. Perhaps he wished to catch the night elves attention – perhaps he hoped that the night elves would put his people to death, as it seemed a better alternative than living the shell of the life they’d been forced to live for seven thousand years. Regardless, the night elves couldn’t bring themselves to kill so many of their kin, and so they chose a different path for the quel’dorei – they banished them from Kalimdor altogether.

The night elves, for whatever reason, seem to enjoy this ‘let’s just shove everything that’s unpleasant under the rug or across the ocean so we don’t have to look or think about it anymore’ tactic. First it’s arcane magic, then it’s the quel’dorei themselves. Interesting.

Settlements and the Founding of the High Kingdom

So Dath’Remar led his people over the oceans, on ships that were specially constructed for the long journey, glad to be rid of his night elf cousins once and for all. The ships landed in Tirisfal Glades, and Dath’Remar took the name Sunstrider for himself, meaning ‘he who walks in the day’, to suit the changes that were taking place among the quel’dorei. The quel’dorei abandoned the concepts of Elune and nocturnal living entirely, embracing the sun instead, and the quel’dorei formed a settlement in Tirisfal for a time, becoming ‘high elves’ in full.

They left Tirisfal after a time – there are references to some elves being driven insane, and the belief that something evil slept beneath the earth. This indicates Tirisfal as a possible location for one of the Old Gods that was locked beneath the earth by the Titans at the beginning of time. Around this time, the quel’dorei also became completely severed from the Well of Eternity, or what remained of it under Nordrassil, becoming vulnerable to the elements and losing their immortality entirely. They weakened further, gradually becoming the pink-skinned, fair-haired, shorter elves that we are familiar with today.

These high elves discovered the primitive humans, but ignored them, moving on and finding a much larger menace – the forest trolls of Zul’Aman, a branch of what was left of the great Amani Empire. The elves and trolls fought relentlessly, and the high elves finally discovered a land in the northern forests that suited them and built the kingdom of Quel’Thalas, ‘high kingdom’ or ‘high home’. They vowed that their beloved city would soon become an empire that would dwarf that of their weaker cousins. Unfortunately, they soon discovered that Quel’Thalas was built upon the ruins of an ancient troll city that the Amani still viewed as sacred – and the Amani, already angry with the elves encroachment upon their lands, promptly began attacking the elven settlements.

The high elves fought back and won; utilizing what little magic they had left over from the Well of Eternity. Some elves, still wary of possible infiltration by the Burning Legion that had twisted their brethren and caused the Sundering, decided to create a protective barrier around the city to allow them to continue using their magic without attracting the attention of the Burning Legion. They placed a series of runestones around the borders of their lands.

The Sunwell and the First Troll War

Quel’Thalas flourished, becoming a shining monument to the progress of the high elves – while the high elves no longer held the same reverence for nature as their cousins to the west, they still appreciated it, and went to great lengths to incorporate their surroundings into their architecture. They placed an enchantment on the surrounding forests, so that it would always appear to be springtime, bright gold, yellow and red. And the high elves created a new well for themselves, to once more imbue their people with the power that they’d lost so long ago: the Sunwell.

The Sunwell was created at a convergence of powerful ley energies in Quel’Thalas by high elves that used a vial of water stolen from the original Well of Eternity. A mini Well of Eternity, the Sunwell’s potent magic fed and strengthened all the high elves on Azeroth. While it was weaker than the original Well, it was strong enough for the high elves to practice the magic they’d missed for so long. For four thousand years, the high elves lived in Quel’Thalas, bathed by the light of the Sunwell, the runestones keeping the Burning Legion ignorant of their secret magic practices, and also serving to keep the superstitious troll war parties away as well. During this time Dath’Remar retired from leadership, passing the mantle on to another elf named Anasterian Sunstrider. It’s not really mentioned in lore if this is Dath’Remar’s son, or someone who simply took up the mantle of Sunstrider because it was an appropriate name for a leader.

The Amani, however, were far smarter than the high elves anticipated. They hid in the forests, biding their time and increasing their numbers until the moment was right. And when they had enough warriors to fight, they struck. A mighty troll army charged out from the shadowy forests, laying siege to Quel’Thalas with the intent of destroying it for good. The high elves fought back, but this time the trolls had the upper hand – their numbers were simply too great for the high elves to continue fighting. And so, in desperation, the high elves turned to the only neighbors they had – those primitive humans to the south that they’d encountered after leaving Tirisfal.

Those ‘primitive humans’ had banded together and formed the human empire of Arathor in the meantime, led by a man named Thoradin who was also dealing with the troll’s attacks upon his people. While Thoradin, being a sensible sort, was distrustful of magic in general, he agreed to send aid to the elves – because he realized that if Quel’Thalas fell, the trolls would turn their attentions fully on Arathor. In exchange for the alliance, the high elves offered to teach the humans magic, how to practice and control it for their own purposes. The alliance was struck, the tide soon turned in the favor of the two empires, and the troll’s empire was shattered – they pushed the Amani tribes away, forever breaking the legions of Zul’Aman. Anasterian, grateful for the assistance, pledged an oath of loyalty and friendship to Thoradin and his bloodline, and the high elves went back to quietly puttering away with the Sunwell.

The Second War and the Alliance

Nearly three thousand years after the defeat of the troll empire, the high elves found themselves with another problem. King Terenas, leader of the human kingdom of Lordaeron, sent a missive to Anasterian. It seemed that a human kingdom had fallen to a new threat, a orcish horde that the high elves had neither heard of nor concerned themselves with overly. But there was a catch – a man named Anduin Lothar, who was a direct descendant of Thoradin and the last of the Arathi bloodline, was currently leading the kingdom that had fallen. And so Anasterian reluctantly agreed to offer a token amount of assistance, as his oath required him to do so.

This reluctance soon changed when the high elves realized that these orcs that were battling the humans had forged an alliance with the Amani trolls. The two forces promptly began to encroach on Quel’Thalas. Enraged, Anasterian threw his full support behind the war, joining the Alliance and mobilizing his armies to battle the Horde. Unfortunately, a good majority of Eversong Woods, the outlying forests of Quel’Thalas, was burned during the war. While the Alliance was victorious over the Horde, Anasterian pulled his support and withdrew from the Alliance, citing the human’s poor leadership and blaming the burning of the forests on that.

The high elves withdrew once more into their kingdom, with few exceptions. Some elven priests and sorceresses that left to practice and teach their magics to others, and one other very, very important figure also left Quel’thalas at this time; Anasterian’s son and heir, a man who had a destiny spanning further than any other high elf in history and a member of the Kirin Tor of Dalaran, Prince Kael’thas Sunstrider.

There is a lot more to cover, including how the blood elves got their name, what happened to the Sunwell, and just what’s so important about that Prince. Stay tuned tomorrow for Blood Elf History Part Two: Say Illidan, You’re Looking Awfully…Uh…Horny?

And pies to bake.

And stuffing to make.

And sides to make.

And…you get the picture. Soon as I’m done with the cooking frenzy, we’ll be back on track – blood elf history this week. Stick around!

How do I find a roleplayer to roleplay with?

Tricky question. Are you on a roleplaying server? If not, you may want to go make sure you’ve rolled on one – most people on PvP or PvE servers don’t bother with roleplaying, they’ve got other things in the game that they’d rather do. RP servers not only have the people who are focused on PvE and PvP, but they’ve also got a good chunk of the population that’s usually focused on RP. The best places to find roleplayers vary from server to server, although I’ve found that across the board, Stormwind appears to be popular on Alliance, and Silvermoon always seems to be a hot spot for Horde. The best way to find out is to just ask – on my server, we often have people ask on the realm forums where the good places to RP are located. Check the link here and scroll down to the realm forums section, and then choose the server you wish to play on. Remember to be polite – demanding answers is never a very good first impression.

The other indicator is pretty easy to spot. The roleplay addons mentioned the last post aren’t just for reading what other people look like – they’re also a gigantic ‘LOOK AT ME I ROLE PLAY’ sign. People that use these addons on roleplay servers are more often than not roleplayers themselves, especially if they have a description set up.

How do I know if they’re busy?

Check out their description. There is usually an indicator for whether or not they are IC – that’s ‘in character’, or OOC – that’s ‘out of character’. If they’re out of character, it means they aren’t roleplaying just now. If they’re in character, there’s a good chance that they are roleplaying, or will roleplay in character if approached.

How do I roleplay with them?

Well…you walk up and say hello, of course. Start up a conversation. Check out their description, or what they are wearing, or where they are at, and ask a question. Come up with a reason to approach them. If you’re a new character, maybe you’re lost and can’t find something in town – ask them if they could help you find it. You know…talk to them. They’ll talk back, I promise.

If you are nervous about walking up to people and just jumping into roleplaying, don’t be – it’s just…acting, only written out. If this intimidates you, I encourage you to go find someplace that is fairly active from an RP standpoint. Have a seat, and watch the show! See how people interact with each other, what is said, how emotes and /say are used, get a feel for the people who are roleplaying. If someone is particularly interesting, maybe you could get away with nonchalantly following them around a bit, see where they go, what they do. Observation is an excellent idea.

Nobody wants to RP with my character!

This is a common complaint, and one that will require some frank and honest self-exploration. So people are avoiding you, or don’t appear to want to roleplay with you. There could be a few differing reasons for this.

A. You aren’t really in a highly trafficked roleplaying area. Check around in various parts of town, find someplace that looks like it’s got a fairly large gathering of people, and watch.

B. You’ve run across a group of people who are in the middle of their own storyline, and don’t wish to be bothered. You may want to try politely whispering one of them – use your OOC brackets, and ask if you can join in. If they say no, then head off and find someone else – it isn’t personal, nine times out of ten. If you’re in the middle of a heated argument with your best friend, you’re not likely to notice that stranger watching you from across the room, and if they interrupt the argument for no reason, you’re apt to be angry with them. It’s a normal, IC reaction.

C. There’s something wrong with your character, and it may need to be tweaked.

Point C is the one that people don’t really want to look at or consider, but if your character is being flat-out ignored, then it’s the point where you need to ask yourself some important questions:

1. Is your character too overbearing/odd/unusual/strange? If your character is constantly interrupting conversations between other roleplayers to shout gleefully about socks and earwarmers, it is likely your reputation is not going to be good. If you’re content with this, and more than willing to play a psychopath, by all means carry on – but don’t get angry when people ask you to go away, because buddy, you brought that one on yourself.

2. Are you roleplaying something really outlandish? Chances are if you are roleplaying something completely out of the box, people are going to ignore you. World of Warcraft has many different characters and factions in it, but the following don’t really exist: Fairies, Vampires, Catboys/Catgirls, or pretty much any species of furry (excluding tauren but personally I don’t think they really count). If you are playing someone who is a vampire(half), then you should probably realize that most serious rpers are going to look at this, laugh, and walk away. They don’t exist in this world, and creating a character who is one of these things generally puts a big old red flag over your head that says ‘I am an amateur roleplayer who is not capable of working within the limits and boundaries of the world I am given to play in. Please ignore me.’

Please note, the above was written before the introduction of the Darkfallen in WotLK. Vampires do, indeed, exist in-game now – but they aren’t friendly, they aren’t nice, and it is highly unlikely that a character with any kind of sanity is going to want to hang around with one.

3. Are you godmodding?

Godmodding is one of the worst symptoms of an inexperienced roleplayer, and most people who godmod will be, as a rule, ignored. What’s godmodding, you ask? Godmodding is taking control of someone else’s character, and acting things out for them.

An example: “(Charactername) angrily stabs you in the heart with his [Steel Dagger of the Monkey], piercing deep into your flesh and wounding you terribly and making you fall over.”

Or: “(Charactername) has had enough of your foolishness, and throws a handful of sleep dust at you. You collapse into a deep sleep.”

Or: “(Charactername) sneaks up behind you, burying his sword into your back and killing you instantly.”

Or: “(Charactername) is invincible, your blade tries to pierce his flesh but snaps in two, broken forever.”

In all four of these examples, you are essentially telling the other player what they are supposed to be doing and saying that their character does it, or ‘playing god’, in other words. In the world of roleplaying – no matter what the game or genre – it is handy to keep a simple rule in mind: The only character you have any control or power over is your own. This is…an interesting puzzle to figure out in a game where you cannot fight with those of your own faction, and requires some dancing around. To re-write the descriptions above:

“(Charactername) angrily pulls out a dagger, rushing at you with a yell, clearly intent on stabbing you.”

“(Charactername) has had enough of your foolishness, and pulls out some sleep dust, throwing it at you in the hopes that it will silence you.”

“(Charactername) pops out from the shadows, lifting his sword with a snarl.”

“(Charactername) dodges the attack, ducking into a roll and calling for the city guards.”

All of these leave the person you are interacting with several options to play with. If you deliberately try to goad someone into one course of action, they will not want to play with you. Be nice, and be aware of this.

4. Your character simply isn’t interesting. This is, without a doubt, the hardest question to ask yourself and look at.

Take a good look at your character, and I mean a REALLY good look. A character is much like a story, an ongoing story – it should have an interesting premise, some sort of conflict, and some sort of feasible resolution. If your character has poured out their entire life’s story to anyone and everyone that will sit still, there is nothing more that your character has to say. If your character is constantly happy and never has a care in the world, nothing ever makes them unhappy or phases them in the least, then what exactly makes that character interesting to other people? On the other end of the spectrum – if your character is constantly miserable, constantly getting into fights or brawls, insulting people and generally behaving as if they don’t like ANYBODY, nobody is going to want to interact with you.

Another thing to look at is your character’s back story. Have you made them the son/daughter/long lost sibling of someone very prominent in the World of Warcraft lore? Have you taken liberties with the lore as it was written to make your character ‘important’? Let’s look back at the example description from last week:

(Character) is the long-lost son of Arthas and Jaina Proudmoore, disowned at birth by his mother and possessing part of the spirit of the Lich King. He grew up in Nagrand because that’s where they left him at and likes horses and chocolate. He’s killed over 12,000 people in his lifetime.

First off, in the Warcraft lore, Jaina and Arthas never had a son. This has already been written, so it is impossible that such a thing would occur. Secondly, even if they had had a son, there is no way that son would end up in Nagrand, as neither Jaina nor Arthas has set foot in Outland, according to Warcraft lore. Third, when Arthas and Jaina WERE an ‘item’, as it were, it was waaaay before Arthas had found Frostmourne, or had any contact with the Lich King. This character premise is impossible within the constructs given by the story already written, making your character highly unlikely. In this case, those familiar with Warcraft lore are going to look at you REALLY funny, and most will just choose to ignore you entirely. In Warcraft lore, you cannot possibly exist – and so, to them, you don’t.

Any of these are more than enough reason for people to ignore you.

So now we know where gnomes came from! Sort of. While there is a large amount of information missing from gnomish history, enough has been revealed about the origins of the race to at least speculate on answers to some common questions.

1. If Gnomes are all about the technology, how come they can be mages?

Gnomes are smart. Really, really smart, and with the sort of thirst for knowledge that suits arcane studies quite well. Since gnomes are so intent on inventing and creating, it only stands to reason that they’d be curious about the arcane arts, and how they could use those arts as a modifier to existing technology that they’ve created. The gnomish race in general is so intelligent that their grasp of the arcane arts is above all other – they show a terrifying amount of skill in it. Fortunately, where most races would immediately become drunk with power and corrupt, the gnomes aren’t really interested in gaining more power. They have far too much humility and humor for their mastery of the arcane to really get to them, and they aren’t really interested in ruling the world. They just want to make it a better, more efficient, more orderly place.

2. Why aren’t there any gnome priests?

Because religion is something that simply doesn’ t exist in a gnome’s world. Higher beings, the Light, gods – these things simply don’t matter to a gnome, and while they appreciate healers and think that healing is a nifty thing in general, they simply don’t understand or wish to understand a higher power. This can be explained in large part by their origins – a machine doesn’t have a god, it has a creator – and that creator was unknown to the gnomes for thousands upon thousands of years. To the gnomes, they simply…exist, and where they came from is immaterial. There is nothing that cannot be solved by throwing together gears, metal, springs, and jolt of electricity, so why would they have any need to pray? Their loyalty is to themselves, their friends, and their inventions – in their world, they need nothing more.

It has been revealed that gnomes in Cataclysm, the upcoming expansion, will be able to be priests. This change is as yet unexplained, but I suppose it would stand to reason that if the gnomes discovered their origins in Wrath and discovered that they do, indeed, have a creator/higher power, then the possibilities for further exploration into knowledge would be limitless. The realization that they are essentially little fleshy robots is likely something that was a shock to the race as a whole, and who knows how they’re going to deal with that sudden information.

3. Why do people hate on gnomes so much?

Well, they’re a superior race of highly intelligent little guys that in spite of being so are incredibly friendly and choose not to lord it over anyone. They beat the pants off of all other races that try their hand at inventing, and they beat the pants off of any other race trying their hand at the arcane. And yet, despite it all, they’re so…damn…nice about it.

It’s like the sudden urge one gets to punch the super-perky-at-five-am person at the Starbucks counter. It’s not that you hate them, it’s that their general cheeriness in the face of oh-god-o’clock in the morning is intensely irritating.

And they’re short.

That’s about it for the gnomes – a backwards Pinocchio, they are the dolls that never wanted to be real boys, but didn’t really have a choice in the matter. Very little is known about their past, and little is apt to be uncovered between the Curse of Flesh and the Second War. Will Gnomeregan ever be restored? How will the information about their unique origins affect their future? All we can do is look to the future, and beyond – which for a gnome, is terribly appropriate.