It’s time. With Midnight taking place primarily in Quel’Thalas now is the time to lay the groundwork for expanding Blood Elf lore. With Blood Elves breaking their addiction to the corrupted Sunwell it’s a good chance to let them reconnect with other kinds of magic.
Blood Elves use runestones connected to the Sunwell and the Mother Tree Thas’alah to create a protective barrier around Quel’Thalas and Eversong called Ban’Dinoriel (“The Gatekeeper”). It had historic use in conflicts with the Amani trolls and others. The elves of Quel’Thalas use arcane magic mixed with Druidic nature magic for a unique take on the class and this predates WoW or Burning Crusade.
Imagine for example a school of Druids whose mission is to revive the damage done by Arthas’ Dead Scar when he marched on Quel’Thalas. You could even link it to the phoenix which symbolizes revival and renewal. We are not trying to copy Night Elf or Tauren druids but come up with a unique angle that is Blood Elf styled.
Side note Blood Elf botanists have been in the game since burning crusade so there is a precedent. There was also High Botanist Telarn in Nighthold although that was Nightborne, but there are offshoots of the quintessential nature magic all around. Druids themselves are no longer the uber class they once were so it’s not a big deal to expand it to other races.
As for asset concerns, there are already plenty of well-made cat models that could fit. The arathi imperial lynx basically looks like the springpaw lynx from eversong woods. The flight form could be phoenix styled, treants based on eversong woods, etc.
Yea the lack of shaman and paly are pretty annoying. Druid can somewhat be overlooked because class fantasy and making the forms and such… but meh. It’s been 20 years.
I want a non spacegoat/dwarf shaman.
Panda and kt are too restricted on customizations for my taste and if I want to play human, I’ll play humans.
I also don’t play horde. And if you don’t play horde… rip shaman races lol.
Can’t they be pretty much every single class aside from evoker, druid and shaman?
No. It would be the worst thing to happen to this game for lore reasons (why did day elves even splinter off from night elves?! etc) and immersion-breaking reasons (worsening of BElf lopsidedness in player population).
Contrast is a nice way to differentiate between the cultures. Keep BElves haute couture and keep NElves dirty hippie.
Historically they do care. They just went through a rough patch with nature when they got on the demon juice. Remember that quest in eversong where we had to kill the old treant? That was sad! I’d love for them to make amends.
Personally I think it would be REALLY cool to see some Blood Elf druids arise who learned druidism from the Amani Loa who also reside in Quel’Thalas.
Personally I’d find Ogres to be less likely to be druids or even shaman for that matter, than Blood Elves.
As per Chronicles, when the Ogre Empire was at its peak – They went from being ‘amused’ to growing envious of the orcs mastery of shamanism leading to the Ogres trying to take such powers by FORCE → Destroying what the Throne of the Elements USE TO be, which was made from Grond’s sacred & enormous elemental head; who died saving Draenor.
Chronicles:
Ogre’s were amused by the orcs’ practice of shamanism, seeing the tradition as nothing more than quaint trickery to make the wind blow a little harder or a fire burn a little hotter. It wasn’t until ogres witnessed the might of an elder shaman — turning away a flash flood that would had destroyed an orc village — that they began to understand the true power of the elements.
Rather than seeking to learn this power with the same humility and awe that the orcs had, the ogres decided to take it by force. The Gorian leader of this time, Imperator Molok, sent an army into orc territory and claimed the Throne of the Elements for his empire.
The incursion enraged the orc shaman, but the clans themselves were not yet stirred to action. The Gorians had not engaged in wanton slaughter; they had simply driven away the orcs.
The ogres eagerly dissected the Throne of the Elements with their arcane spellwork, examining every inch of the site. Unbeknown to the ogres, this land was the final resting place of Grond, the massive elemental giant empowered by the titan Aggramar.
The Gorian sorcerers never could have imagined the mix of raw titan and elemental power that still lingered in the ancient giant’s remains, and their careless experiments were disastrous. One fateful day, the dissonance between the ogres’ magic and Grond’s residual energies ignited an explosion. The temple the orcs had carved out of the giant’s skull was blown apart and destroyed.
The blast killed every Gorian sorcerer inside the structure and left behind only some standing stones that now remain to this day.
This act threw the elements out of balance, leading to far-reaching effects. Huge storms lashed across the entire world, and Draenor’s native spirits descended into turmoil. And yet, the Gorians sent MORE sorcerers to replace the ones who had been killed. Imperator Molok was not deterred in the slightest. He now had proof of the true power of the elements, and he was determined to claim it for himself.
The tormented elementals cried out to the orc shaman for help. Finally, the clans were moved to act.
SOURCE: Chronicles Volume 2, pages 46-47.
Thus …
Long-story-short - The elemental spirits & orc shaman unified and nuked them!
My ultimate point is though that Ogres appear to be FAR more prideful & ill-fit to shamanism — let alone druidism than the Blood Elves are
I suppose I could see a particular sect of each go towards shamanism with the right lore & backstory — However like druids, I don’t think they should just yeet the class @ the races incoherently.
Personally I’m irked that Night Elves didn’t get much of a lore explanation to having WARLOCKS amongst their people & culture … That’s like part of the whole reason to why they forbade arcane & mages in the first place, because they didn’t want to be anywhere so much as near that kind of magic with a 10,000 year ft pole.
I’m sick of the whole ideology of “WhO cArEs aBoUt LoRe?!!” — Because a great deal of many players alongside myself care. It’s a game built around a narrative for story & content direction … and more importantly, it’s an RPG game.
I was betrayed.
Personally I think it would be REALLY cool to see some Blood Elf druids arise who learned druidism from the Amani Loa who also reside in Quel’Thalas.
Thus …
