Elune Hot Take

Lore Story Forum
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Since this is the latest discourse, I’ll give my first hot take of the year (if you don’t count how the Warden and Blood Troll sets shouldn’t have been available to all races):

Elune has always had a partial association with the sun.

Ever since Vanilla, it was known Elune was related to Arcane, Life, and Light.
She was the source of Light for the Night Elves, she created the Wildkin with Life, and she is the source of Arcane for Druids. This was all established within Vanilla.

Between Cata and MoP we learn that Velen believes Elune has a connection to the Naaru. Through CDev we learn that this comment from Velen wouldn’t have been made unless he had a VERY good grasp on being accurate. During Legion, Khadgar believes the same thing. This theory is supported when the Tear of Elune reawakens Light’s Heart aka the Naaru Xe’ra.

Likewise, during Legion we see her incredibly powerful use of her domain of Arcane when she raised the fallen Ysera into the sky and manifested stars to form a new constellation.

This all goes to show that prior to Shadowlands, Elune was heavily tied to Light, Life, and Arcane. It’s also why people in the speculation sphere picked up on High Botanist Tel’arn saying how those three cosmic forces were the forces of Creation. This supported the previously established idea that Blizzard had been establishing through interviews and old lore sources that Elune would be one of the TRUE Deities in the WoW universe. The Goddess of Creation.

Even if we want to discount that original intent and simply go with the pivot that took place in Shadowlands, not much changes. Her being part of the Pantheon of Life would still involve her keeping these connections. Life would thus become her main domain, while Light/the Sun and Arcane/the Moon would both continue.

For Life to thrive, it will need Light which is a given. So it’s no surprise that Elune WOULD have some linkage to Light and the Sun.

TLDR: Elune has always had a partial Light/Sun theme and has always represented Balance. The balance/cycle of the Moon and Sun for Azeroth (which is why she’s an icon for Balance druids that use Lunar and Solar abilities).

In Night Elf mythology, Elune represents a single entity of both Moon and Sun.
In Tauren mythology, the Moon and Sun are represented by two separate entities: An’she and Mu’sha.

But hey, I’m just a Pandaren main, I don’t have much interest in either Night Elf or Tauren mythology. :panda_face: :dragon:

I don’t care whether An’she is a real entity or not, but I’ve always said that he hasn’t yet been proven to exist. So either the Night Elves were half right and simply didn’t put enough emphasis on Elune’s solar theme, or the Tauren are right that An’she is real but is letting Elune fill his role while he’s seemingly on vacation.

My personal headcanon is that the Tauren and Night Elves are both half right.
Elune is 75% Arcane/Moon and 25% Light/Sun and An’she is 75% Light/Sun and 25% Arcane/Moon.
Originally they were a combined singular entity (Earthmother), and were split in two (when the Earthmother separated her eyes from her body).
I also headcanon that An’she created Niuzao and Chi-ji, while Elune created Xuen and Yu’lon. They were then fostered by Freya later on.
An’she may have created the Naaru, and Elune being her brother is why the Tear of Elune reawoke Xe’ra.
An’she is MIA because he’s been corrupted by Void from his injuries mentioned in the Folks and Fairytales book. We’ll rescue him eventually. Elune is gathering power and becoming an “Upstart Goddess” to rescue her brother.

Fingers crossed we eventually get our “oh mighty zodiark awaken from your slumber and descend” moment. Some Tauren Agent of the Void casts a spell and the Sun blackens in the Sky and that’s when we start “Mission: Save An’she”

Edit:
let’s also not forget that night elves have always had a racial tied to both night and day. Their druidic culture had also always revolved around balance of sun and moon.

Edit 2:
I do find it funny that this whole discourse is happening this week when it was essentially revealed during Shadowlands. Elune is the counterpart to the Winter Queen. The Winter Queen represents Winter and Fall, which means Elune represents Spring and Summer. Both of those are fairly solar leaning, and by her now being part of the Pantheon of Life/Nature that pushes her even further down the Solar route. It’s not a coincidence that these theme of hers has been getting more fleshed out since that point. The domain of Nature is obviously going to be feature a very solar and nature aesthetic, and thus it’s inevitable that Elune will have a color pallet akin to that of Eonar.

I’ve already figured out exactly how her Lunar theme would be explained.
The light of the Sun reflects off the Moon. Therefore, in order for Elune’s power to reach beyond the “Lifelands” (Meadowlands?) she must channel/shine her solar energy onto/through moons.
Thus, she was mistakenly attributed to a primarily lunar theme when it’s more accurately her secondary theme.

Keep in mind that stars (Night Elves = Children of the Stars) are suns.

Again though, this is entirely irrelevant of An’she.
You can have multiple entities with overlapping domains :dracthyr_shrug:

Elune is Nature which involves the Sun and Moon,
An’she is simply the Holy Light.

Elune is mistakenly attributed fully to the Moon by her followers,
An’she is mistakenly attributed fully to the Sun by his followers.

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My question is, aside from the recent matching warden armor and mount is there anything else that’s happened recently that associates the night elves with the sun?

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no I think elunes light is just like the moon having a dark and light side
and i think azeroth is the earth mother

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Very little of what was canon in Vanilla remains so today. Most vanilla lore is in the dustbin of history, like hivemind Elemental Spirits, or Fel and Arcane being two forms of the same force, or Undead being animated with Void magic.

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We have seen undead being animated by void magic since. Mainly Shadowmoon Burial Grounds, just other forces can do it too. Like we saw fel magic do it on the Broken Shore.

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My personal take.

I don’t think An’she exists. I think An’she, like Mu’sha, is just the Tauren giving names to the Sun and the Moon, in the same way that they named the earth the ‘Earthmother’, even though they likely had no idea that Azeroth was a Titan Soul. Their beliefs are important to them, obviously, but belief in something doesn’t make it real.

It reminds me of Greek mythology in a way, where the Greeks named Apollo and Selene, who were, in Greek myth, the gods that represented the sun and the moon respectfully and were tasked with moving them around the earth. And also of Norse mythology, where Skoll and Hati chase after Mani and Sol, who represent the Sun and the Moon and explain why they rotate around the earth.

Now at the time their individual beliefs were respected and honoured, but importantly, neither of them were real. Apollo and Selene were not responsible for moving the sun and the moon and neither were Skoll and Hati. It’s the same, in my opinion, with An’she and Mu’sha. They aren’t real, they have no power, they’re just legends passed down through the ages by the Tauren.

All that being said. I think it’s likely that Elune is going to be revealed as a goddess that encompasses power over the sun and the moon. We’ve seen Druids dedicated to Elune (Balance Druids) manifest sun based powers in combination with moon based powers as well, and as you said Lore. The Sun has ties to Light and Life, which is very much her domain.

But I suppose we’ll see. Blizzard could take the story in any direction, but I’d be surprised if they decided to manifest An’she as more than just a Tauren legend.

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Elune, The Goddess of the Sun!
Blizzard will always find a way to screw over Night Elves.

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Your goddess getting more power and covering more domains is not ‘screwing the Night Elves over’.

If anything, it’s screwing the Tauren over, because if Blizzard moves in the direction I think they’re going to, it will mean that the Tauren will potentially have to grapple with the fact that the deities they worship are not real.

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Incidentally current Lore suggests most of the subsets of Magic can be used by any Cosmic Force as seen with:

  1. Void seen using Shadow(purest form of the drug) and Necromantic Magics
  2. Disorder seen using Fel(being the purest form of the drug), Necromantic(using Fel) and Arcane(impure and drawn from the Netherstorm) Magics
  3. Order seen using Arcane, Nature(visibly with the aid of Arcane in the Emerald Dream) and Holy(purest form of the drug) Magics
  4. Life seen using Nature(purest form of the drug), Arcane(Elune) and Necromantic(Blood) Magics and…
  5. Death seen using Necromantic(purest form of the drug), Shadow(Revendreth, Devourers & Mueh’zala), Nature(Ardenweald) and Arcane(Bastion and Broker) Magics

Yes… considering how we see the Order-obsessed Titanic Watchers using Yellow Holy Order Magic(a different shade of Yellow from Holy Light Magic) at their most obsessed I would say Holy Order is the purest form of the Order Drug just as Shadow is the purest form of the Void Drug, Holy Light is the purest form of the Light Drug, Necromancy is the purest form of the Death Drug, Nature is the purest form of the Life Drug and Fel is the purest form of the Disorder Drug.

Arcane as far as I am aware of is not the purest form of any Cosmic Drug. That said I dare say mixing Elune’s Arcane Life Magic with Kyrian Arcane Death Magic, Broker Arcane Death Magic, the Titan’s Arcane Order Magic and the Netherstorm’s Arcane Disorder Magic might draw out the true form of the Arcane…

Of course considering how Azeroth’s power is stated to be different from the Titans it might be that Azerite is the purest expression of the Arcane Drug.

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Night Elves have worshipped Elune for who knows how long and somehow they had no idea she had power over the sun all along?
It’s a bad take on Tauren but also on Night Elves.

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Again, Druids dedicated to Elune have been using sun powers for a while. That’s not new.

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That is in fact new because it’s something that started just in Cataclysm.
Also, using Sun doesn’t have to mean it comes from Elune because we even had talents named after Anshe. If Sun magic was drawn from Elune there wouldn’t have been a reason to separate it from her and given to Anshe.

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Cataclysm was 14 years ago.

That’s not ‘new’ and is nowhere close to ‘new’.

Now had Balance Druids only started using sun powers in say… BFA? Or Dragonflight? Yeah that would be new. But Cataclysm? That’s old content now, extremely old content, and despite multiple ability prunes and revamps, Balance Druids have never lost their sun powers.

And druidism, need I remind you, are teachings handed down by Cenarius. Who is the son of Elune. They’re not handed down by Tauren who believe in An’she. The Tauren literally learned druidism from Cenarius.

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It is new if you take into consideration that Night Elf Druids have practiced the craft taught directly from Cenarius for more than 10k years and not once did they show any Sun based spell. So 14 years ago compared to 10k is still new.
Instead of trying to have Elune be other things, how about we let her be what she’s always been? The Goddess of the Moon and have Blizzard develope new characters like Anshe or whatever.

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No, try again.

14 years old buddy, we’re talking about content that is 14 years old. And I’m not even remotely referring to ‘how long Night Elves have practiced Druidism’ before, because quite frankly, we don’t know if they used sun powers before the events of WoW started.

Let’s hit a few nails on the head:

In Warcraft 3, Balance Druids didn’t exist. The only Druids that we knew of were Druids of the Talon and Druids of the Claw. Hell one of their key abilities, Starfall, was part of the kit of the Priestess of the Moon.

In World of Warcraft, when it launched, Balance Druid as a spec was completely underdeveloped and it sucked. It did not get the attention it needed. But hey, back then from Vanilla to the end of WotLK, you’re right, no sun powers were featured in their kit. Now hmm, how long was the period between when Vanilla launched and when Cataclysm launched…

6 years…

And how long has it been since they had sun powers?

14 years…

They’ve had access to sun powers for longer than they haven’t. Hell for longer than Druids even existed in Warcraft lore, since Warcraft 3 launched in 2002, 2 years before World of Warcraft. Meaning at most, if you want to factor in all the time of Warcraft 3 as well, it’s been a maximum of 8 years, which is still less than 14.

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So here’s why I hate this.

Everyone else’s beliefs get to be valid and real, but not the tauren.

Trolls? Loa are absolutely real. Maybe they’re just mislabelling wild gods at the end of the day, but at least the thing they believe in are real.

Orcs? Ancestors might not be real anymore thanks to Shadowlands, but the elementalist beliefs are real.

Night elves? Elune’s very real. Wild gods are very real.

Light-worshippers? Obviously the Light is real.

But the tauren? Rofl, you so dumb. No, ancestors are not real you big dummies, do you even Shadowlands?? And stop thinking the Earthmother is a real thing, because it isn’t and the world-soul of Azeroth doesn’t get to be her just because you’re so dumb. An’she and Mu’sha? Yup, we’re even making them not-real. It’s just Elune you dummy stupid taurens!! You can’t even have your own druidism, you’re just borrowing it from the night elves!!

Like, why though? Why this much hate for the tauren that we have to go out of our way to make sure every belief they have is wrong, and only them?

Sure, the night elves might be wrong about what Elune is, but she still is real and exists. Nobody’s going out of their way trying to invalidate all of their beliefs, just because.

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I literally didn’t say that, and you’re forgetting Goblins, who believe in the power of gold, power tools and wealth, and use that to tap into the Light, even though gold and tools themselves provide nothing spiritual as they’re static, inanimate objects.

Also, hate is a strong word, and not one that I’d apply here. I do not ‘hate’ the Tauren, hell I have enough Tauren OCs, if I hated them I wouldn’t have any at all.

I just personally don’t think An’she is a real deity. Their belief system is real, certainly. I am not invalidating that, but I am guessing that their power comes from Elune, rather than the mysterious An’she that we’ve seen absolutely no trace of whatsoever.

Now maybe I’m wrong. I’m speculating here. Maybe An’she is real and he’s going to drop in like a meteor and do something awesome that will make everyone go “Whoa! The Tauren have an awesome sun god!” and if that happens? Great, fantastic, my opinion will change. But until Blizzard actually does something with him, shows us that he exists beyond folklore, my opinion remains as it is.

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Except those things are real. I’m not forgetting them, I just didn’t bother to include them. But…

Goblins? They believe in Capitalism so hard that it just works for them!! They worship gold? Gold is absolutely real. Tech? So real we have a whole profession about how very real it is!!

I’m not saying you hate them. I’m saying that’s what this vibe amounts to. Again, literally every other race’s beliefs are totally valid and based on real things. Things that are so very real, we interact with them. We talk with them. We fight some of them as raid bosses, and nothing is more real than a lootable corpse.

But the tauren? Their beliefs only get to be about nothingburgers, made-up words about nonexistent things, and nothing else. And people actively argue that’s a desirable outcome??

Yeah, the vibe that gives off is pretty hateful towards one race. Because it is only one race, and the outcome, whether intended or not (and I’m presuming not), is to portray them as too stupid to even look for that same basic level of proof everyone else gets as a default. And never question it!! They know the night elves chat with their wild gods. They even chat with those wild gods themselves. And it never occurs to them to wonder why the Earthmother and An’she and Mu’sha don’t come over and chat with them like everyone else’s gods do?

It’s a weird trend that players, whether knowingly or unwittingly, keep trying to feed into and make a thing.

I don’t think you, Carhagen, want the tauren to be a bunch of silly dummies who are the only race in Warcraft to worship nothingburgers.

I’m saying that’s what invalidating the last remaining possible things they believe in that has yet to be disproven leads to that inevitable ending. All beliefs have a strong basis in real things.

Except tauren beliefs.

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Yes you are, since you’re replying to me, about my opinion and then asking me what’s with the hate.

There’s not a lot of wiggle room there.

End of the day this is a ball that is firmly in Blizzard’s court. They can go one of two ways. They can either flesh out An’she, Mu’sha and the Earthmother and give them very real presences and identities that makes them out to be more than just the Tauren’s name for pre-existing deities/cosmic presences…

Or they can do the opposite and double down in the direction I think they’re going, which is that An’she and Mu’sha are just the Tauren’s name for the aspects of Elune.

It’s up to them, and personally I’m fine with it going either way.

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To think I’ve lived enough to see people defending the idea of Elune The Goddess of The Moon be turned into a Sun deity.
:man_facepalming:t2:

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