You make the case for the expansion of the Warlock Class to those races.
“Warlocks defy convention. Can you imagine defying convention in a race built on convention? Who does that? Oh…. Warlocks…”
I do not see it as much of a retcon. That actual evidence of it corrupting from usage was really non existent. It seems like it was originally conceived to justify green and brown orcs. The threat was always there but it was more “deal with the devil” and not radiation poisoning. Classic warlock did not have a single fel themed spell or chaos damage. The closest they had were summoning demons.
Even offhand comments from certain orcs are best interpreted as “absolute power corrupts absolutely” and not anything physical. All the warlocks we have encountered have suffered nothing from any effects unless they take it to the extreme like any magical power.
To me this is just returning to a baseline where individual warlocks only worry if they start going full Palpatine
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What’s absurd is pretending all instances of a given class adhere to a specific fantasy and combination of powers.
Do Draenei Auchenai (Shadow Priests) use Old God powers? No.
Do all Fire Mages summon Phoenixes? No.
Does every Druid follow Cenarion teachings? No. This has been thoroughly diversified.
Does every Paladin follow the Church of Light? No. Originally yes, then it was thoroughly diversified for the good of the game, and now we have Anshe Paladin Tauren and Rezan Paladin Zandalari, with more to come later.
But for some reason, warlocks you all demand be constrained within a narrow fantasy pretentiously, when in canon and in gameplay, warlock toolkits are wide and varied, ranging from blood magic, to Old God magic, to cosmic Void magic, to fel, to elemental, to necromancy, and more.
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Not exactly.
The point I was making is that I rather keep the corrupting aspects of the Warlock class instead of removing them altogether for the sake of including it for a race that has as main motto the rejection of said corruption.
To keep what makes a Warlock, be a Warlock.
I’d also argue that I would rather they also kept wha made the Mag’har, be Mag’har. Uncorrupted.
Because I’ll repeat that yes, even if the theme itself wasn’t the best to lean on in order to create a playable faction that should’ve probably never existed, we should accept that they indeed exist now.
And if the Uncorrupted aspect is their “main thing”, they should be allowed to keep it that way.
Is it their main thing, though? They have trains and explosives and stuff. In their appearances, they usually use tech, instead of… strutting about showing off their uncorruptedness.
If a child came through the portal with Maghar Parents in the Exodus from Yrel and her Light Crusade - and then this child learned about Warlocks on Azeroth, and the child liked being a Warlock - the child would still be of the Maghar.
There is not some ritualistic Maghar rite that I know of, based on tying Fel users to train tracks, or something.
This Maghar Warlock would be a Maghar Warlock - no matter what you said.
In said regard, I quoted bits from the Rise of the Horde novel that showed that corruption was indeed spreading even through Warlocks that didn’t use Fel. (Can quote them again if you want to take a look at them)
I think it was Baalsamael the one that tried to discard it by saying it was old lore that didn’t really count anymore, to which I answered that no new bit of lore contradicts it to this day.
Warlocks usage of several forms of magic, ended up corrupting MU Draenor.
I think it was it was also in this thread that the book of the Legacy of the Masters was brought up, as a way to point out that there were other sources of power that were used by the Warlocks even if the source wasn’t corrupting in nature.
To that, I must add again that there are several sources of both old and new lore, that further clarify the nature of a Warlocks way of addressing power sources. Regarding their two main specs: Destruction and Affliction.
- Destruction: The obvious distinction between Shaman and Warlock. Even if both tap into the Fire plane, the Warlock seems to have a more perverted angle that corrupts the power wielded in the end, even if the “source” is pure. A more recent example of this, involves this guy:
When Gul’dan himself, uses warlock magic to corrupt a denizen of the Firelands.
This is mirrored in other examples like the one of Ritssyn who wanted to learn new spells and knowledge by tapping into the Firelands. Presumably, this gave him the knowledge to cast the Cataclysm spell that was added around that time in game (although i’m not sure if its canon, or a widespread assumption).
- Affliction: Another interesting example here, we have it with Shinfel. An elf warlock that battled the Twilight Cult, and after being defeated by Cho’gall, then went to take some additional notes by actively hunting them down. I’d say that its not hard to imagine the sort of Void-touched Warlock spells she’d learn from the Cult that was created around Gul’dans second…
I think that the canon contribution Shinfel made, was to give players the Dark Bargain talent.
https://wowpedia.fandom.com/wiki/Dark_Bargain?so=search
Which if I’m not mistaken, included a quote from her as flavour text.
In all I’d certainly say that lore so far indeed sustains the fact that Warlock practices are corrupting regardless of where they get their power from.
Could this be changed in the future? Certainly.
But as of now, I personally prefer to have it that way. Mainly because it allows us to have a far more clear distinction regarding how the different caster classes work on a narrative level, without simplifying them all to studying a particular spellbook and knowing the words of a certain convocation.
If the source material was the same, and Warlocks didn’t add any sort of flavour to their spells, that would, in my opinion, kill all the uniqueness that comes with their class.
It would blur the lines between Shadow Priests, Shamans, Warlocks,…
And it would also open the door to a world of incoherence such wondering why is it that the Draenei reject the Warlock practices up until now, if the Auchenai delved in the same shadow magic as them.
Or how did the Shadowmoon Valley/Taanan in AU remained uncorrupted, if their main equivalents were?
There were close to no Fel spells showcased in most of the narrative for the MU Orc Warlocks. All leaned mostly on Shadow/Void.
That’s why the only reasoning left to have is that the Warlock practices on themselves, must include something other Void users do not use.
Most of the tech has already been incorporated for the MU Orc faction. Even if yes, its a big part of them still.
And about showboating their Uncorruptedness…they decided to use it as their literal name. If thats not showing off, I don’t know what is.
Could they still have other aspects to lean if that was removed? Certainly.
Just as the LF Draenei would if they removed their Lightforged condition.
But being slightly spiker, or slightly shinier, doesn’t really give much room to narrative development.
Those would be very superficial aspects that are already being absorbed by other factions (which is only natural with any technological advancement).
He would belong to the clan his parents are from, that’s for sure.
But strictly speaking, once he dumped the defining trait of a Mag’har-Uncorrupted, he would cease to be such.
Again, just because you cease to be Uncorrupted, it doesn’t mean your past or your AU Clan allegiances just cease to exist.
In said Orcs case, he would just have the exact same story as the MU Orc clans, only a few chapters behind.
That seems head canon. That has not been stated anywhere. We have no examples of such. It is purely conjecture.
However, we will soon have Maghar Warlocks, and that will be that.
I can not wait for this to happen, so we can start talking about it as present lore. Instead of debating head canon.
At least you can couch that as opinion- others pretend it is some universal truth we all must abide by.
You feel the current lore says one thing, others feel differently. What ever our feelings on current lore, new lore is incoming. And that will be that.
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And these all stem from Gul’dan. The single worst warlock in history. I cannot with any certainty claim its the results of “warlocks” or just guldan maliciously spreading his corruption. He has destroyed one planet, nearly a second, his skull was so heavily infused with fel he made the nightelves rename their forest to felwood.
This is like saying arcane naturally corrupts because crystalsong forest and any of the leyline explosions. They seem well above and beyond the normal experience
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I don’t think its headcanon to note that the orc word for Uncorrupted, means that the Orc involved isn’t corrupted by Warlock magic.
The only bit that could be subject to debate, is how much of it is being used as defining of the playable faction.
Given the character of Geya’rah, and some of her quotes so far, I’d say a lot of it.
Could she still open her faction to these walking oxymoron? Personally, I highly doubt it.
At least, not in the sense of acknowledging with the adjective of “mag’har”.
If you gain weight, I think there is a point when evidence piles against you to describe yourself as thin…
Yes.
And I hope that Blizzard reads the feedback/Backlash enough to adjust them accordingly to fit with the story.
How will that happen? We do not know.
Hope it doesn’t happen like it did with Tauren Mages.
In said regard, I think you are exaggerating a bit.
I may need to go over all the thread, but I don’t recall anyone having said radical posture except Baalsamael in certain bits (which I didn’t really take all to badly even when disagreeing with me), and a comment I read about Carhagen being “obnoxious” (even if it didn’t give me said impression at all).
I think its better to avoid constructing such strawmans, because it kills any attempt at discussion.
And this is an open forum that shouldn’t shun anyone based on their opinion.
Not exactly. One of the quotes I mentioned, features a young shaman called Ghun, that was slowly turning green even after the book showcases he majorly dealt with Affliction/Void/Shadow spells.
And all this was way before drinking the blood of Mannoroth.
In said regard, the book makes it abundantly clear that it wasn’t Gul’dan alone.
I can quote the fragment where they mentioned this, but in essence, it was the widespread practice of the Warlock spells, that seemed to diseccate the planet.
This phenomenon was accelerated after the fall of Shattrath, but as far as the canon lore of the book goes…it was indeed the joint work of a lot of warlocks going at it at the same time.
EDIT: Jesus, that “going at it” of the last sentence seemed awfully dirty lol. Please tell me if you rather I rephrase it 
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Yes, but where did they learn it. I will say Gul’dan again. And i highly doubt his prerogative was clean casting when his entire goal was to corrupt the orcs, get them to drink some green pudding juice, and send them to war.
When we look outside the orcs there doesn’t seem to be a single problem. Humans or elves. The Shen’dralar was sucking on the teet of immolthar for thousands of years with zero problem. The blood elves get?.. green eyes? After they consumed tainted mana boxes from outland from distilled neather energy?
Sorry to keep bringin it up, but one thing the book tries to make abundantly clear is just how widespread said practices were.
Yes, we have cases of lesser impact from the usage of Warlock practices. But bear in mind that from all the examples you’ve mentioned, none are even close to the sort of widespread phenomenon that orcs caused in said time.
Each and every shaman was forced to convert to Warlock out of sheer necessity.
And even those that weren’t really as exposed to it, had tints already seeping into their skin years before the actual pact with Mannoroth.
The shaman i mentioned earlier, was a Frostwolf. And even them, who didn’t go as deep as say the Blackrock, had their people developing a “green tint” out of their continued use of said magic.
Even if your hypothesis is correct, and it was Gul’dan’s doing, with a particularly corruptive variant of the Warlock practices, those are the practices that were then carried forth to the warlocks we have these days.
So any side-effect we’d have, would be the same those orcs suffered from.
And so you jump to the conclusion is must be magic? Its not that the orcs are doing something wrong, somehow shadows know when they’re being used by someone who identifies as a warlock and starts “corrupting” them but those shadow priests and dark shamans? Nah they’re okay.
This sounds absurd.
Gul’dan is the defacto most powerful mortal warlock ever. No one was as talented or as powerful as he was. I think what Rhito is trying to say that between his corruptive magics/aura and Mannoraths blood pact is what caused most of the Orcs to turn green.
No, what I’m saying is that the nature of Warlock spells is what causes their surrounding corruption.
That Warlock spells, regardless of the source, are a perversion of other energies that ends up tainting everything around the caster (as well as the caster himself).
This effect is amplified the moment there are a ton of warlocks doing it all at the same time, all over the same world. Hence why MU Draenor started getting corrupted before the final pact with Mannoroth.
For the Mag’har in particular, that’s why I see that the Warlock class as is, is incompatible.
If the premise behind being labelled with the “mag’har’ adjective, is basically to be Uncorrupted, you can’t expect to remain such if you start wielding magics that corrupt everything around you as well as yourself.
That’s why I mentioned earlier, and we have some proof to, that the way the Warlock spells work involve additional elements that corrupt the source power.
We have Cyrukh, a Fire elemental from the firelands twisted to serve Guldan.
And we have Chogall, who basically is the patron of most Affliction spells, using shadow.
And again I must add, that there is “tangible” proof in the form of novel excerpts that show how the Shadow spells warlock used, indeed ended up corrupting.
So again, taking all in mind, the conclusion is pretty obvious: Warlocks way of conjuring said powers, leads to turning them into sources of corruption.
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Who was taught by Gul’dan. All the warlocks were. Everything ties back to Gul’dan in some shape or form
Id even say that all warlocks tie to Guldan in some way or form to be honest.
But I’m afraid that I don’t see how that goes against the things I said.
Sorry if I missed or misunderstood some point.
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It doesn’t go against anything you said. I was just pointing out that most everything that went wrong on Draenor, Gul’dan had his hand in it. Either directly or through his Shadow Council agents
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I agree with all of these points. I was just pointing out that the corrupting nature of the magic that warlocks use, whatever it’s source, seems to be what some people keep getting stuck on. It doesn’t need to be such.
I don’t understand why people are arguing with Gerwin claiming that what he’s saying is headcanon or inaccurate. It isn’t.
He’s cited official lore that Blizzard has created, lore that, at least to this day, has not been retconned or replaced by new lore to make it invalid. Rise of the Horde shows quite clearly that all warlock magic corrupts and turns Orcs skin green. The process is slow for those exposed to it or those who practice but it does happen.
The constant denials of canon lore that I’m seeing is puzzling.
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I can’t speak for anyone else, but I do agree that the lore denials are weird. I at least have attempted to make the combos work with the existing lore.
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