Night Warrior Shadowlands Spoilers

Feyawen-wyrmrest-accord · June 23, 2020, 5:52am

Ishnu’alah fellow Wyrmrest Accordians,

I have more than a few thoughts about this, but ultimately I’m simply glad to see more lore about Elune, the Night Warrior and night elves in general. Since the spoilers dropped, I have noticed many night elf lore misconceptions resurfacing and spiraling on multiple platforms. This seems like a decent space to discuss some of those misconceptions, so I will address them below.

_{Note: As always, lore is open to interpretation and subject to change at Blizzard’s discretion. The contents below are my own interpretation of the lore.}

Night Elf Lore & Misconceptions

Matriarchal Society

The perception that night elves live in a matriarchal society originates from early perceptions about the night elves from Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos. In Warcraft III, we [the audience] were first introduced to the night elves who were depicted as a race of warrior women (and some sleepy men) who lived within and protected the wilds. Warcraft III is a game set in the modern era of Azeroth, and by extension the night elves were were introduced to are technically ancient elves living by their modern standards. In these modern standards, the night elf military and clergy is female dominant while the druidic society is largely male dominant. Specifically, the two religious orders, the Sisterhood of Elune (Elunarian faith) and the Cenarion Circle (Druidic Faith), were restricted by gender roles. While religious sects do not typically have any bearing on the form of government within a society, they do in a theocracy. In the case of night elves, the Sisterhood of Elune is the ruling body of government - which is largely dominated by women. Hence the matriarchal perception.

What is often forgotten or overlooked is the fact that night elf societal norms, as we were originally introduced to them, did not necessarily stretch back to their ancient history. In their 10,000+ years of existence, the night elf government has evolved from a primitive nomadic society to a monarchical empire and eventually to a theocracy.

In ancient times (pre-sundering), the Kaldorei Empire was ruled by a monarchy. There was a monarch (King or Queen), the only one we know of being Queen Azshara. There is plenty of supporting evidence in the lore that male nobility existed, and it’s more likely that in ancient times the empire was not a matriarchal society. In fact, if NPCs are anything to go by, the lore seems to indicate that nobility and military was largely male dominant in ancient times. See how night elf society and leadership changes over time below:

Night Elf Society: Pre-Sundering

Female Nobility	Male Nobility	Female Military Leader	Male Military Leader
Queen Azshara	Prince Farondis	Dejahna (clergy)	Kur’talos Ravencrest
Princess Azsune	Prince Tortheldrin	Tyranda (clergy)	Desdel Stareye
Lady Vashj	Prince Toreth	Marinda (clergy)	Jarod Shadowsong
-	Lord Illidan	Maiev (warrior/clergy)	General Tel’arn
-	Lord Xavius	-	Malfurion Stormrage
-	Lord Varo’then	-	Latosius

Night Elf Society: Post-Sundering

| Female Leaders | Male Leaders |
| :-- | :-: | --: |
| High Priestess Tyrande Whisperwind (Sisterhood) | Archdruid Maldurion Stormrage (Cenarion Circle)|
| General Shandris Feathermoon (Sentinel Army) | - |
| Maiev Shadowsong (The Watchers) | - |

Night Elf Society: Today

Night Elf Society: Post-Sundering

It is also worth noting that in the pre-sundering era there was no formal military like the Sentinel Army, which formed post-sundering in 9,400 BDP (before the Dark Portal). Until that point in time, male and female night elves rallied together to defend their people as needed. This behavior seems to remain the same, and is reflected in most of the storytelling for night elves from Warcraft III to the present.

The Night Warrior

For the sake of this interpretation, let's assume the first Night Warrior existed in ancient times, as Maiev implied:

Maiev Shadowsong says: Legend says that long ago, Elune bestowed her fury upon our greatest warriors to secure Kalimdor.

Maiev Shadowsong says: In a sacred ritual, the strongest among them became her avatar–the Night Warrior. Our victory was swift.

[Quest: In Darkest Night]

In ancient times, societal leadership was (presumably) male dominant outside the fact that Azshara ruled as Queen. Furthermore, there was presumably a period of time before the reign of Queen Azshara and it is possible that the Night Warrior character(s) we will see in World of Warcraft: Shadowlands had lives intended to pre-date the reign of Azshara. Today, we have no concept of what night elf life might have been like before the rule of Queen Azshara. All that we do know about that timeframe is that the Sisterhood of Elune did exist, and it was (presumably) female dominant at the time. However, the Sisterhood of Elune was not and has never been a representation of the entire night elf society.

That said, where Elune’s divine powers are concerned, it was a widely held assumption that females were primarily capable at unraveling and understanding the many mysteries of Elune (a female goddess). All aspects of Elune are referred to in the feminine, which may be part of the confusion mentioned above where Maiev’s quotes are concerned:

Shandris Feathermoon says: What ritual do you speak of, Maiev? Who is the Night Warrior?

Maiev Shadowsong says: She is the incarnation of Elune’s wrath. Even witnessing the ritual to become her would put our lives at risk.

Shandris Feathermoon says: And the only life Tyrande wishes to risk is her own. Elune watch over her.

[Quest: In Darkest Night]

In the above quote, Maiev uses the word “She” because the Night Warrior has two parts: 1) Elune’s NIght Warrior essence (Feminine/She) and 2) the vessel of the Night Warrior (the person who holds the feminine essence of Elune). In this case, “She/her” is Maiev directly referring to the Night Warrior aspect/power of Elune, not Tyrande as the Vessel/Avatar of the Night Warrior (“Night Warrior” in title). Those who fulfill the Ritual of the Night Warrior absorb Elune’s Night Warrior aspect, a piece of Elune herself. In this regard if the first Night Warrior is a male it should have no bearing on his ability to attempt to serve as the vessel for the Night Warrior aspect of Elune. However, some may argue (rightly) that one of the reasons the first Night Warrior failed and succumbed to the ritual could be because he was a male and could not fully understand or grapple with the divine powers of the feminine aspect he harbored.

Isveria-moon-guard · June 23, 2020, 6:36am

In Taliesin and Evitel’s weekly round up video today he went through the datamined stuff and said the First Night Warrior has dialogue saying the only way to save Tyrande is to have her “share the power amongst several others” aka split Elune’s power into several other people/Night Elfs…which he said he thinks is going to be Blizzard’s way of giving Night Elf’s Paladins?

It makes sense to me, tbh. Like, Tyrande channels Elune’s power/wrath into a host of Night Elven priests or sentinels and they become Paladins of Elune.

Anakoni-wyrmrest-accord · June 23, 2020, 9:05am

While trolling the deepest, darkest depths of GD, someone reminded me of Lori and Raal, which means that someone at Blizzard knows how to write couples that aren’t incredibly irritating. This person needs to be brought in any time Blizzard wants to show a relationship.

Dawnblood-wyrmrest-accord · June 23, 2020, 11:41am

There’s no proof that they are nelfs. Gender may be irrelevant in other Elune worshipping races.

Irving-wyrmrest-accord · June 23, 2020, 12:43pm

This hits hard because Samwise Didier makes HammerFall’s album art and it’s all badass.

Dawnblood-wyrmrest-accord · June 23, 2020, 1:34pm

I would personally prefer that WoW remain more of the heavy metal setting that is presented as but having read the exchange I personally didn’t find it mushy or annoying at all. The characters really just presented their relationship to one another. It just gave context to who these two guys are.