So… Was wondering how long does elves live? Was wondering because I couldn’t find anything on how old are all the elves lore figures i.e. The Windrunners, Lorthemar, Halduron, Maiev, Tyrande, Malfurion, etc.
I know the night elves are 10k+ but howl were they when the war begin.
Before The Sundering, elves were all ‘virtually immortal’. After that, they could seemingly still live several thousand years without the Well of Eternity. The Night Elves got their tree. The Shen’dralar drained a demon to keep living longer and sate their magical addiction. The Nightborne used the Nightwell. And the High Elves used the Sunwell.
Basically, elves live several thousand years unless they have another source of strong magic backing them up.
So basically an electronic device with the need of electricity.
It will keep function as long as there’s electricity but like all technology will eventually perish…
Interesting, i just wish I could know their ages… For reasons…
It varies and I mean by A LOT. Lagrash for instance remembers the original exile of the Quel’dorei and has a personal beef with Malfurion. and he appears no older than early middle age. Anasterian however was a enfeebled old man even though he was the latest of a line of several kings.
If you want to demonstrate your character’s age, the absolute worst way to do so is to fixate on a number.
Do it qualitatively instead, describe how age defines your character physically, or talk about the character’s history, as demonstrated, you have a lot of leeway to go any way you want.
Technically the feebleness was something Sylvanas only sensed after becoming a Banshee… Arthas mentioned Anasterian’s Soul fading which he indicated was causing Anasterian’s feebleness. Before that the only hint to him aging was white hair.
Lorash’s hair was also white during the War of Thorns and he was far older than Anasterian yet his Soul seems to be in good condition… What caused Anasterian’s Soul to crumble with age? There doesn’t seem to be anything that could explain this.
Issue is we have no idea when or where Anasterian was born. Since elves live so long he could have been born and grew up to adulthood and been a prince for centuries before becoming King. Being an elf means you could know your great great grandfather as an adult people need to keep this in mind.
We do know that the Nightborn were born Night Elves and mutated so it could be Anasterian was also born a Night Elf and became a High Elf over the centuries. With the Nightborne as an example its possible he was born before the War of the Ancients and was well over 10,000 we just dont know for sure.
Before the most recent batch of possibly accidental retconning/Blizz forgetting their own prior lore, it was implied that High Elves and Blood Elves measured their lifespans in hundreds of years, as opposed to thousands. This was per the statement that Anasterian was considered freakishly old for his people, and was ruler during at least the Troll Wars, putting his age at over 2800 years. Moreover, he was the fourth king to rule, and given that it’s highly unlikely that the monarch of the High Elves would die any sort of death that wasn’t natural (the trolls managing to kill a Sunstrider monarch prior to the Troll Wars would have been brought up in Chronicle… one would hope), we have an additional 4k years or so where he wasn’t king, divided between three prior rulers.
Basically what that comes out as, assuming that the Sunstrider line itself is special and might live longer than the average elf, you get a life expectancy of around 1k, and that could have been applied to the natural lifespan of the night elves as well. It meshed decently with the lore, especially for high elves, in that it allowed enough generations to go by between the Troll Wars and the First and Second Wars that most of the high elves who remembered fighting alongside the humans would have been dead, and their children/grandchildren wouldn’t have the same ties. It worked with night elves because it allowed for a handful of generations to pass during the building of the Kaldorei Empire, and thus they forgot their old heritage to an extent, changing culturally over time until the Sundering. It also placed a much greater emphasis on the World Tree because it gave them immortality, making it a tradeoff for losing the Well of Eternity.
But nope, apparently all elves are immortal now and Alleria was alive during the Troll Wars too which means that she’s over 2800 years old and that’s a pretty normal thing, ergo it makes the blood elves look very dumb because they tossed aside ties that many of them apparently remember for the sake of allies they’ve known for an eyeblink in their time.
It’s dumb.
Ties? The Anasterian apparently taught only the bare minimum of Humans needed to win the Troll War and despite making the Blood Oath himself only sent a small amount of High Elves to aid Humanity in the 2nd War until the Horde Armies were at the High Elves’ front door and left the Alliance once the Horde was defeated!
Anasterian’s ties to Humanity were worthless as far as he and many of their Race was concerned. He also only gained Humanity’s aid due to persuading them that the Amani were a threat.
Humanity’s aid against the Amani in the Troll Wars was out of convenience and it’s aid against the Horde in the 2nd War was redirected very quickly.
The Horde Forsaken didn’t abruptly leave the Blood Elves to fight their enemies in the Blood Elf Questline like the Alliance Humans did with the High Elves. The Sha’tar of course aided them just as well.
They fought against a united enemy together, and then were peaceful with each other for 2800 years, before fighting alongside each other again in the Second War, and afterwards apparently keeping enough ties that Sylanas as Ranger-General was able to interact with Nathanos. If elves live as long as what this new lore implies, it means that 95% of their relationship with humans as a race was positive and peaceful, and they hung that out to dry because of the last 5%.
It would be like someone eating the same breakfast at a restaurant they go to every so often for 60 years, and then because they get a bad version of that breakfast once they never order it again and actively tell people it’s bad.
He was not considered ‘freakishly old’. All there was was this quote and they used the term ‘elderly’ at some point.
And though the weight of three thousand years had exacted a heavy toll on his body, the mind and heart of King Anasterian remained sharp and whole; he had gathered and stored all the strength that remained within him and had come now to wage the furious battle he knew would be his last.
The High Elves and Humans have never been anything but allies of convenience. There’s nothing to imply that either side was particularly fond of each other.
There is ample evidence that they did not like each other though. Nathanos’ treatment by the High Elves in Quel’thalas, Garithos’ opinions of the High Elves, Grand Magus Telestra’s anger towards the Humans… not sure the Elves thought they were throwing away anything worthwhile.
Windrunners seem to be partial to human males… alive or dead.
Besides those degenerates then lmao
Well Elf lifespan is a bit difficult to map out thanks to Blizz inconsistency. I’m not sure what the original version of WotA says but most people say that Mal, Tyrande ect were around 3000. Knaak’s version had Malfurion saying he’s only a hand full of decades old, so may 30 or 40. Warbringers tell us that Azshara was watched for 1000 years so she’s at least that old. There’s no telling how old she was prior to being crowned.
So the consensus is that Elves live for at least a few thousand years we just don’t know by how much the well extended that. You could argue that the well just gave them natural long lives into the thousands of years as a part of that mutation from Troll to Elf and the Sunwell did the same on a smaller scale as it is weaker. Then again Alleria says that the Sunwell provided something akin to immortality but I’m not sure if that disputes my previous arugment. The lifespan discrepancy however isn’t with Alleria’s statement it’s the lifespan of Alleria, Anasterian, Lorash and his story.
Immerus is correct, this doesn’t mean his freakishly old but 3000 years weighing on him does clearly give the impression that he is advanced in age and it’s working against him a bit. Alleria who’s nearly his same age shows no sign of that. But then again he was fighting the Arthas and Alleria was not. Now she’s void fused that may change things interm of how long she’ll live. Lorash however is a complete clusterfu*k.
He’s older than both Alleria and Anasterian and he remembers the exile. He also remembers his people as Night Elves slowly changing into High Elves. This is a contradiction or a retcon of a retcon. The outdated History of Warcraft said that they slowly changed over time, but the Sunwell Trilogy showed the Night Elf exiles being immediately transformed by the creation of the Sunwell. Then Lorash’s tale goes back to the original. 
The Sunwell version makes the most sense as its stupid that they would change from Night Elves to High Elves based on their distance from the tree. That’s disputed by WoLK as there were Highborne Elves in Crystalsong forest after the Sundering and in Legion there were still Elves in the Moonguard and probably Val’Sharah too. Why is this important? The Sunwell version of the story allows you to make the arugment that like the first well of Eternity the Sunwell transformed the elves and gave them extended lifespans but on a smaller scale as it was a fraction of the original well’s power.
So while Night Elves now may have naturally a higher number in the thousands of years due to the Well the High Elves have less. It can also explain why there were 3 Sunstrider kings ruled and died within the roughly 4,000 year timeframe prior to Anasterian’s rule and the Troll Wars. It also follows Alleria’s statement about something akin to immortality. You still have those 3 as outliers thanks to the Arthas book and its comment on Anasterian’s age but it keeps some consistancy.
I loved all of your posts, I think that’s my main attraction to them, they are so complicated and sometimes so petty, just love them.
Yeah, I was thinking of making a back story for a char I have in an RP realm. This will help.
Although not all Elves are immortal, it is possible to agree that they do far surpass living beings through magic or otherwise that enhances their living condition and aging which all the same Akins to that of “immortality” through means of enhancement and having a different mindset concept that definitely perceives time very differently than other races. Second to Draenei whom lived far too long, or may be immortal through the same standards as elves with enhancement.
The concept of being a long lived race is too hard to comprehend for us, even if we try to think like an elf it is rather a scary thought that would drive you mad because in reality we are short lived beings that’s always within the time frame in how we perceive time daily and aging within a short gap of maturity as you grow, whereas with elves its something far beyond that in which we will never comprehend it other than through our imagination.
How long do they usually live is still unknown to us all other than “couple thousand years” which seems very vague, although wowpedia begs to differ by saying a night elf lives as long as 25 thousand years or so.
Question is though, aren’t long lived races stagnant upon learning in some sort of manner? or do they slowly learn things over time?
Its very enticing nevertheless…
Lorash should just be wiped from existence. He makes no sense what so ever with the ages thing and I’m convinced he was created by the writers in an attempt to give the Blood Elves a reason to hate the Night Elves. Which is doubly stupid because the Blood Elves already had a reason to dislike the Night Elves from all of the BC stuff… they just forgot their own story.
I don’t need to be convinced, I’m already there. Why not just stick to the BC story line? His entire existence throws a monkey wrench into the lore. He wasn’t even necessary for the story as he was killed pretty early on.
Well even then, he could have still had that anymosity even if they were just stories passed down of his grandparent’s suffering. Plus he talks about Amani decorating their huts with his friend’s body parts. Though, I don’t think his situation is that big an issue in the lore.
And that would have made complete sense.
He’s now charged what the Sunwell did. His story of the Elves being transformed becuase of distance makes no sense as not all Night Elves lived near Hyjal. The Northrend Highborne and the Moonguard in Suramar, and who knows where Jarod abs his wife went to, but I’m assuming it was pretty far away.