When everyone talks about elves on the forums I never think about Nightborne in that category. I do realize Nightborne are descended from Night Elves, but I don’t identify as an Elf.
So in my mind there are only Night Elves, Blood Elves, and Void Elves.
Do you group Nightborne with the elves?
Nightborne are Highborne Night Elves; it’s not that complicated!
Night borne are night elves.
Nightborne are just night elves but on the horde side.
…Sigh. Alright, here’s the deal. Somebody find one of those weird, obnoxiously racist dwarves that speaks in a heavy scottish accent. You’ll know you found the right kind because they’ll be drunk in public and will go into an angry tirade if you annoy them. I want you to capture that dwarf and bring them to our nightborne friend here.
If the uncomfortable stereotype dwarf can hold a conversation with a nightborne for 60 seconds without calling him an elven racial slur, then nightborne aren’t elves.
Science.
10000 years near a high concentrate of magic changed the Highbourne like the Sunwell did High Elves.
They’re not really Night Elves any longer just like High Elves aren’t.
There is racial identity and then there is biological species.
You are biologically an elf, but this is also a construct in itself since elves evolved from trolls and so we could just as easily call you a Nightborne Troll. Or simply a troll.
Yes.
Along with the wretched the withered, the felblood the Fal’dorei, sorta the Naga and whatever the Firelands night elves may have been called.
I’d argue they’re actually more Night Elves than Night Elves.
They’re the true Night Elves. The rest of them turned vegan and started living in trees.
Considering the Race is called Shal’dorei… Yes yes I would
Kaldorei(Night Elves)->Shal’dorei(Nightborne). Kaldorei(Night elves)-> Quel’dorei(High elves descendants of Highborne Kaldorei)-> Sin’dorei (Blood elves) → Ren’dorei (Void Elves)
Yes of course. Don’t overthink It
They’re not descended from night elves. They ARE night elves. The same people who are alive and now call themselves nightborne, were alive 10000 years ago and called themselves night elves. They just got changed by the nightwell’s magic.
Quel’dorei is a Darnassian word not Thalassian word, it means a Highborne not only descendants.
Also, answering to the question, the Nightborne aka Shal’dorei consider themselves higher than any other elven races of Azeroth. They consider themselves the OG elves, just remember Elisande on the gates of Nighthold.
They are elves, but the ascended version of Quel’dorei of the Kal’dorei Empire.
Night Elves aren’t vegan lol
Night Elves can still shroud themselves via the moonlight which makes me believe they’re more intune with the night. Especially since every NE can do this.
Thank you for the correction
Here is the long version.
According to lore, Night Elves are trolls that spent a long time exposed to the magic of the Well of Eternity.
High Elves are elves that were exiled, created the sunwell from waters of the Well of Eternity and changed from exposure.
Blood Elves are High Elves with a different name.
Void Elves are High Elves who were exposed to a lot of void and/or learned how to control void magic without going insane.
Nightborne are Night Elves who spent 10,000 years living off nothing but magic changed from the exposure.
Fal’dorei or Spider Elves were the result of Nightborne being exposed to the magic of the 1st Arcandor.
Naga are Night Elves transformed by N’zoth’s magic.
Satyrs are Night Elves transformed by the Burning Legion’s magic iirc.
So, Elves in WoW are just evolved trolls.
Or if we’re going to get all scientific
Night elves, High Elves/Blood Elves, Void Elves, Spider Elves, Nightborne, Naga, and Satyrs are their own species.
They all fall under the Night Elven Genus which falls under the Elven Family.
The Elven Family then falls under the Dark Troll Order which falls under the Troll Class.
Isn’t science great?
It was a lack of exposure. They changed before they established the Sunwell. No idea why it changed them as it did compared to other elves in similar straits.
They’re a curse that turns night elves into demons. Fundamentally what you said but a little different to what most demons seem to come from. Xavius was the first and his curse was spread to others in his circle and then onward from there.
How was it spread? Did he cough on people?
I can’t speak for other Nightborne, but I identify as a Dread Lord.
Nightborne are night elves that have been living on nothing but mana juice for the past 10,000 years.
Still night elves, just a bit different. They’re a reflection of elven society as it was before the sundering. Preserved and undisturbed for millennia.
Their name is a play on words about how their existence as highborne night elves became intertwined with the night well. In elven, their name “Shal’dorei” translates literally to “Children of Night” or “Children of the Dark”