Mannoroth was not undead. His soul was shoved back into his skeleton to serve as a distraction, but as more fel power was given to him, the rest of his body reconstituted so he became a living demon before we killed him and sent him back to the Twisting Nether.
As for the first Death Knights, yes, Gul’dan created those, but the Death Knights he created are not even remotely close to the ones the Lich King created. The first generation of Death Knights were created by shoving the souls of dead Orcs (specifically members of the Shadow Council that Orgrim had killed while Gul’dan was comatose) into the bodies of dead Stormwind Knights.
At best Bolvar could employ necromancers to speed up the reanimation process of a Man’ari, but that wouldn’t make a Man’ari Death Knight, it would simply allow the Man’ari to respawn faster, since unless a Man’ari dies in the Twisting Nether, they’re effectively immortal and can never be permanently killed.
And in the event that a Man’ari was killed in the Twisting Nether and then reanimated later… well, they’d be completely mindless, like a zombie, because undead as we know them have their souls improperly attached to their bodies. That’s what not only makes them undead, but also makes them extremely vulnerable to holy magic. But in the case of the corpse of an actually dead Man’ari, the soul would be obliterated, gone, never to return, so there would be nothing there at all to give the corpse any real sentience. It would be a puppet on a string, nothing more.
He’s classified as undead. He’s undead during the battle. His body was literally torn back into place and Mannoroth was forced to reconstitution by Gul’dan. That is a literal undead demon.
The ritual to bring back a mortal or a demon to their old corpse using necromancy or fel remains the same. Just as raising Calia into undeath via the Light remains the same. Undeath is undeath no matter the magic used to fuel it. The ritual is what’s important and an undead demon is merely a demon who has been reconstituted into “life” via necromancy forcing his/her soul back into their bodies instead of the natural cycle of having their souls return to the Twisting Nether to reform a new body.
That goes against precedence in the lore. We know it’s not the magic power it’s the ritual and outcome desired. In the case of a Man’ari Death Knight the ritual of forcing their souls back into their bodies to achieve a Death Knight soldier is what’s the endgoal. Just like it was with Calia via the Light, Mannoroth via the Fel/Shadow, and as with now playable Death Knight Man’ari. They are another version of Death Knight using of different material. In this case, a Man’ari corpse.
I wasn’t talking about the first generation death knights. Merely the magics used to raise them into undeath. Whether fel or light or shadow. All that is needed is a proper ritual and the magic to fuel it. Man’ari Death Knights are raised corpses using Man’ari bodies. Whether demon or human, draenei or elf. It matters not, necromancy works the same. Have we forgotten what was told to Calia in the Shadowlands?
Thats the problem with making an entire race and what probably shoulda been an allied race into a customization/skin color.
Officially, the manari joined the alliance after shadowlands during dragonflight. Anything you do before that (leveling up) technically wouldn’t be considered rp canon, they’d only be involved after whenever that quest took place (I think between 10.1 and 10.2). I guess the leveling up stuff you do could just be considered gameplay mechanics.
As for classes, lots of options and exceptions to the rules and similar classes r options. For example, we’ve seen a dark paladin raid boss. And shadow priests exist (which is pretty much the reason that several races even have access to that class). With them ditching the legion and going alliance they could rediscover faith in the light and bam, light priests and light paladins.
Shaman could force elements like a dark shaman and later develop a good relation with the elements.
The lich king and scourge were originally created by the dread lords, so by extension death knights too. It’s possible that they could have had soldiers similar to death knights, and as demons weren’t quite dead or alive.
And i see no reason one couldn’t be a hunter.
Remember, the legion is massive and spread out. It’s quite likely that there are manari classes we simply never saw.
Or i guess you could rp a draenei that got corrupted later on? Idk how long it takes for them to go from blue to red or how deep the corruption would need to be. I figured it’d be quick for a warlock tho.
Presumably it was consorting with demons that lead to Gul’dan knowing how to create Death Knights for The Horde in Warcraft II.
The Legion were the origional masters of The Scourge. They held its chain and they unleased it on Azeroth. Its very reasonable to assume they could make their own death knights.
As far as Lightforged Death Knights go, well. When they die the light is expelled from them in an explosion. What’s left behind is a tattooed carcass. What’s so unfathomable about that being raised as a death knight?
An eredar that willingly gets turned into a DK by another DK. We have seen with arthas that you don’t necessarily need to die and be raised to become a DK.
A draenei DK sips in too much fel and becomes a demon.
Now that the Argus demon resurrection machine has been destroyed, a powerful necromancer can pull the soul of a demon from the twisting nether and bind it to its corpse.
If you want to come up with a decently solid lore background for RP purposes, just say that your Man’ari was part of the scattered Legion forces that remained on Azeroth after Archimonde’s defeat in Hyjal, and that they died during the clash between Arthas loyalists and the Dreadlords in Tirisfal Glades. Always looking for powerful champions to raise (and believing that this Man’ari’s knowledge about the Scourge could prove useful in the future), Arthas harvested their soul with Frostmourne, preventing them from being reborn in the Twisting Nether, picked up their corpse upon fleeing to Northrend, and turned them into a Death Knight.
We meet Tyrant Velhari in Hellfire Citadel in WoW. She’s a Man’ari paladin and she has priests as mobs on the way to her. We also see Man’ari Auchenai in Auchidoun. So, 2 of the 3 checked. Shamans? They mastered the elements. Monks? They learn to punch. Death Knights? They created the original Lich King and mastered necromancy with Dread Lord insights.
No way in hell they’re canon I’m sorry to say. Arthas did not raise veterans of the Third War, as the passive for non-allied race and non-Pandaren DK’s said, from Man’ari.
Playing them is like playing a Demon Hunter and fighting Illidan in the Black Temple.
I mean, not really ? There are plenty of playable elements (customization options, spells, etc) than can hardly be considered canon until proven otherwise. Horde-aligned Sand/Dark Trolls and Ren’dorei Darkfallen for instance.
There have always been little desyncs between the lore and the playable content, and those kinda exist outside of the canon/non-canon dichotomy
Has there ever been a case of a gameplay thing not being canon? Besides the weird PC interactions of “who wielded this weapon or did that thing”. Every time a character option in creation was made, it was made lore to support it or implied, thats half the reason we still have class limitations on races.
We were never shown all specs of a class were necesarily canon. For a long time, many assumed LFD Shadow Priests or Void Elf Holy Priests couldn’t exist, but since LFD can be Warlocks, who use the Void, that calls it into question.
No. During Cata we stop a banshee from turning one of the pally pals (the dwarf) into a DK. Said Banshee was independent from Bolvar. As were most scourge in the plaguelands at the time.
There are many times in the lore where an entity has its nature fundamentally changed with sufficient injection of another force into it. Like Nathrezim being altered into Demons (who resurrect in the Nether, e.g. Tichondrius, Varimathras, etc.) despite being entities of Death originally. Lothraxion is likely not even technically a demon anymore, after being lightforged.
So just take some Man’ari, and blast them with an absolutely silly amount of Death magic, and there’s no reason to think they can’t lose their status as a demon, and the Twisting Nether won’t take them anymore. This probably doesn’t constitute resurrection, but instead some kind of transformative ritual, but whatever.
Is this contrived, such that there would be like, less than five such beings in existence? Heck yeah, but it’s possible.