https://imgur.com/a/UGaechH
This is a series of in-game readable books in their starting zone. According to the panel at Blizzcon, after this they eventually found an island of air elementals, befriended the elementals, and the island was carried out of Azeroth and into the elemental plane.
I’m curious who Shal’nan is. I wonder if we will see interactions between the elves of Endre’thelas ie Mordent Evenshade and his Highborne with these Skyborne. Great lore potential for a future revitalized Dire Maul maybe a town next to the old ruins or even rebuilding the city.
Any mention on how they became Druids?
Did you…not read it?
Knowledge was spreading about druidism through Eldre’Thalas because of what the Highborne were hearing about Tyrande and Malfurion’s society to the north. Tortheldrin was against it because an alternative to arcane addiction would mean his people didn’t need to rely on him. He brushed it off as barbaric, beneath the Highborne, and propaganda for usurpers who wanted Azshara’s empty throne. But it spread on the fringes of society and among the rebels. There were also rumors that Malfurion was supporting the rebels and had sent agents to aid them.
The person I got these images from also found a few more.
https://bsky.app/profile/ishura.bsky.social/post/3mvssstgngk2g
https://bsky.app/profile/ishura.bsky.social/post/3mvst6v4czk2g
After Zephras Isle was established, the Shal’nan stepped down for a democratically elected council, but continued to serve his people.
But when the air elementals disappeared a few centuries ago, the Shal’nan did too. So he may still be alive, but he’s missing. Future patch content ahoy.
Bruh, what is with Blizzard and leadership councils that even Forever can’t escape from it
Interesting how they tied in and reinvented a Cata-introduced NPC as a Skyborne instead of a blood elf.
The lore for these elves seem to be really good at least on the surface level and I really like how their founding leader was this aloof and introverted guy to the point where even the people who knew him were like “I knew him, but I didn’t REALLY know him”
Edit: As much as I like the lore that has been revealed so far, I still feel that these guys aren’t “Vanilla” in spirit and feel more like a post Cata addition to the lore and are a fan-fictiony OC race transplanted into a Vanilla-era private server.
I mean I think it makes perfect sense that the guy who just finished rebelling against a tyrannical dictator wouldn’t want to put only one person in charge again. A lot of the council stuff has been silly but this ones works imo.
because they are
(void elfs allegadly also are/were basicly due someones oc)
Never before seen/heard of race thats on island cant get back to inplace of actual excisting races with exicsting splti( belf/helf and if dont wanna do quelthelas yet could make them start in human/forsaken zones and later update if need be)
theyre not classic/wc3
and certanly arent from kalimdor/easteren kingdoms
like they are oppisite of what they state their goals are and all
Sorry… I’m working and I just wanted a quick summary. So far, their lore seems very interesting and surprisingly I look forward to learn more about them.
What it’s curious is the fact that there are 10k year old people there. How are they still alive if they are cut off from Kalimdor?
Ha! One book made Malfurion’s lore interesting again.I feel like Forever will be a great new beginning. We might even meet Malfurion in new world as a dream projection. 
One more lore book, this is about their skin.
https://bsky.app/profile/ishura.bsky.social/post/3mvsqx7dnqc2c
The tl;dr is most of them are actually white. The blue skin, called Sky-Touched Blessing, only showed up five generations ago. Back then it was one out of every twenty. As the generations have gone on more have been born with it, but it’s still not exactly common; as of today, three out of ten skyborne are blue. They don’t know what causes it and scholars estimate that in another two or three generations they won’t have any lingering resemblance to night elves at all anymore.
All good!
This is awesome, thanks for sharing!
Agreed. Their backstory isn’t as bad as I anticipated it would be for a race that was seemingly pulled out of nowhere but they feel really out of place in the Classic era timeframe. I understand this is a different ‘timeline’ but even within those parameters, their introductory zone story and just their overall presence feels very disjointed and like it would be much better suited to Cata and onward.
That being said though, I’m glad they’re doing the legwork to make them feel more implemented into the world with things like interactable books and actual backstory that feels somewhat satisfying. The same can’t be said for many of the newly implemented races of retail so that’s a bonus I suppose!
It’s a huge improvement when a new race doesn’t claim they are better than you and that they are the origin of everything.
Good Job Blizzard! This time you deserve an applause.
They probably would have been a better retail idea than Void Elves, at least they’re more fleshed out with some kind of history.
I genuinely really want them in retail now. Their announcement had me rolling my eyes but I’ve grown fond of them in beta.
One of the very first new races Blizzard added to the game were immortal, sexy, spacefarring, holy crusaders, who came into being by outright retcon. They also made them blue. So whatever standard we are applying, it obviously won’t be what the devs that made Classic would have been willing to add to the world. So what’s the standard? I’m with Blizzard on that one in diagnosing that everyone who talks about it seems to have their own standard.
For myself, I like to look at it from an in-character perspective, and see if there is too much of a disconnect to how I see the world. Void Elves? Not if we can’t purge or heal them. Draenei? Spacefaring sci-fi is a totally different genre, go back to StarCraft!
But Skyborne? A subgroup of the people that ruled most of the megacontinent? No problem. Highborne that thought the lowborn were right, to some degree? Sure, that would exist. Rebellion and exile? Why not? Magical influence changing the race? I’m already buying that for Dark irons and High Elves, so yeah. The only thing I’m even slightly iffy of is frankly meeting those nice Wind elementals that are willing to help, but since they are already hinting that they might have had motives besides altruism, which could easily be explored later, that’s more of an in-character mystery than a break of my suspension of disbelief.
So they easily pass my test for fitting into vanilla. As would some other races that were added later. If it would have been better if they added something else is a different matter, but “fitting in” is good enough for me.
They also don’t diminish the thematics of another race like void elves do to blood elves. Nor are they an entire race of people magicked into existence thanks to fifteen or so people pondering space rocks, again like void elves.
Another tiny detail I hadn’t notice is that Skyborne still speak Darnassian. Their Languange never changed into an entirely new one like Thalassian or whatever Nightborne speak.
I’d argue that Draenei were befitting of the expansion that they were released with but I definitely get where you’re coming from. WoW Forever seems to be it’s own thing rather than a new version of Classic or just a retail-esque Classic, it straddles the line between the two and Skyborne are a little bit of both. So in that perspective, they do fit.
I HAVE been enjoying them so far and I do appreciate that they’ve taken the time to add subtle changes to the world to help them feel ‘implemented’ but I think for those who skew their preference more to Classic era, there is the plethora of established and interesting races that WoW already has in it’s roster that could’ve felt a little more organic. But like you said, definitely a matter of perspective.
I noticed this too and wondered if it was intentional or just part of beta. Some of their voice lines have them speaking an elvish language but I didn’t pick it out as Darnassian unless I just don’t recognize it on anything other than the Night Elven register. 
Something I thought was interesting as well is that the High Order sect joins the Alliance with the Kirin Tor. (The Windshapers join the Horde with the Earthen Ring.) I wonder if there will be anything about how the Night Elves may feel about that addition to the Alliance, since this era they are still very wary of magic and the High Order Skyborne still definitely have Highborne ideals.
I need to reach Shen’dralas and find out!