Curious since alot of people don’t really think that Warlocks for Night Elves don’t make sense but could that be further from the truth? Think about it like with the Night Elf Mage Situation who are the Highborne. Highborne are a Powerful Kaldorei Magic Based Civilization and they controlled all kinds of wild magic ranging from Arcane, disorder, light, shadow, and so on. So since the Highborne were Mages they too must have Warlocks in their ranks when the Legion make contract with Queen Azshara.
Since after the War of the Ancients there had been some Night Elf Highborne Warlocks within Dire Maul if memory serviced me correctly with the Shen’dralar that is. So I guess since then with Summoners they could be warlocks during that time but we didn’t get warlocks and got mages instead.
So if there are some Highborne Survivors out in WoW that we don’t know about could Warlocks for Night Elves make just as more sense as to Mages? From a Mage point of view as the Highborne that’s a yes but for Warlocks it’s a mixed theory and question I have for myself about the current lore of WoW and it’s classes for all races.
Makes plenty of sense. Night Elf Warlocks have existed in the lore since vanilla with the Shen’dralar in Dire Maul. They just weren’t playable until recently. Perfectly reasonable that at some point a Shen’dralar warlock snuck their way to the Slaughter Lamb in Stormwind and established themselves there with the rest of the Alliance warlocks.
As others have mentioned, the most notable NE Warlocks were present in Dire Maul since Vanilla but I think introducing NE Mages in Cataclysm was a small step that was controversial at the time (and still is to some degree). The Shen’dralar that we interacted with pre-Cata were primarily Mages with the Warlock contingent having gone off the deep end, so Mages (if anything) were the more natural fit at the time.
That being said, with Night Elves being so long-lived you could make plenty of cases for Ancient Highborne that were Azshara devoted sorcerers that became Warlocks (Similar to the Felborne in Suramar) and went into hiding after the Sundering. Perhaps Night Elves who sought to be Demon Hunters but didn’t want to dedicate to the full transformation or even regular Joe Blowdorei who was interested in the study of demons after the end of Long Vigil introduced new races who had folks who practiced with Fel.
There’s tons of possibilities where NE Warlocks make sense!
I like the idea of a N.Elf Warlock being a member of the Illidari who didn’t take the final step to becoming a Demon Hunter, for whatever reason, and instead became a Warlock. I’m thinking of making that part of my N.Elf Warlock’s backstory.
I think it’s a cool concept as well! Wanting to subjugate the power of a demon to have them work in your favor rather than initiating yourself to become one seems like a very ‘Warlock’ vibe to me!
Given what we we in Bel’ameth I would expect many new Warlocks to be Darkfallen kaldorei who likely do not feel like they have a lot to loose at this point.
…and likely under close supervision of the Illidari.
There’s an entire questline in Ashenvale (Felwood?) to get a Satyr turned back to a kaldorei so it’s not impossible, really (and destro as a standalone spec is basically a regular mage who went too deep)
Most spellcasters can step over the threshold to warlock, mostly because it’s not entirely defined as just Fel magic, per the green fire quest chain in MoP. Many of the warlock spells are canonically just dangerous magic that they took from actual bosses we killed in lore. Even if Blizzard… removed a lot of those spells later.
In essence, a Warcraft warlock is just a spellcaster who went “we clearly should have stopped a while ago… but let’s keep going and see what happens!”
As many said, Warlocks are kinda outcasts (or at least people outside the mold) for most races in the game, specially alliance races.
There is also the fact that considering the majority of the night elf population just died almost a decade prior, I Think the remaining night elves are more than willing to accept even those that don’t fit the norm now.
The older I get, the less I can conceive of anyone spending even one precious brain cell on caring about class/race combo justifications. Who cares? Give me one minute, I can come up with a plausible reason for any class/race combination you can think of that’s good enough to justify a few dozen such people existing in the lore, and that’s good enough for a playable character; you only need one.
Man’ari Paladin? Sure, why not, maybe there’s one out there like Kil’jaeden and never thought resisting was an option and now wants to repent.
Night Elf Shaman? Of course, maybe a handful of Nelves start exploring other natural forces more reliable than Elune, and are attracted to the transactional nature of Shamanism that makes the Shaman/Elemental relationship very upfront and non-vague.
Pandaren Death Knight? Maybe a necromancer raises a panda, who decides the peace-loving culture is too unrealistic and naive, deciding that dark forces need to be embraced to protect what they care about.
If you can justify ONE person existing in the entire world, that’s good enough for a player character. Stop thinking about it too much, it’s a waste of your time.
Alternatively they could theme them around Tyrant Velhari. A Sargerai paladin who uses void themed paladin spells.
Given the connection between the moon and the tides in real life, maybe Night Elf shamans studied under the Kul Tiran Tide Sages. Plus it would further the theory that the Tidemother is actually Elune.
My Night Elf mage is not Highborne nor ancient. She may have taken lessons from them but she’s one of most lore grounded characters I’ve made.
On the completion her first quest a group of Sentinels come to Aldrassil to specifically check on the training “of the new mages”. So yes, despite what some holdouts might feel about it, Night Elf Mages are a mainstream asset of the Kaldorei military. They were essential support in Warlords of Draenor and were a key part of Malfurion’s arsenal in the Wall of Thorns.
Of course the Horde Warlocks simply had the Warlock Spell knowledge dumped into their Minds by Gul’dan and Kil’jaeden.
Azerothian Warlocks seem more experienced at Warlockery than even the Legion which suggests the Legion Warlocks simply had Warlock Spells dumped into their brain and unlike the Horde and Alliance Warlocks never bothered to improve on that knowledge.
The statement by Sargeras possessing Medivh that there is always one final sliver of knowledge any Mage has yet to learn now is rendered pointless as the Azerothian Warlocks are now the experts in the knowledge said Magi would have to seek.
Of course some people still fall for Lord Banehollow’s trap on Darkmoon Isle(which he lends to the Darkmoon Faire for a week every month) requiring an expert come in and help kill the guy so that they can go look for the proper Warlock Trainers.
Culturally, no. There’s no basis for night elf warlocks. Anyone who would’ve followed a similar path would’ve tried to become a Demon Hunter instead, as that’s more a core part of their racial identity.
But biologically, nothing stops any currently playable race from becoming a warlock. Arguably the only one who would’ve been a big “no no” is the LF Draenei because they’re juiced up on holy energy but they kinda handwaved that away with no explanation so there’s no bad reactions from trying to mix the bucket of ice cubes that is the Light with the boiling fryer that is Fel magic.
Since they’re abandoning the “We need it to be culturally present to be a playable class” idea entirely, nothing stops any class from being any race. You can find ways around just about anything that might halt or hinder class/race combination notions, same as you would in a tabletop RPG.