How would you describe the cultural differences between Nightborne and Blood Elves? I’ve tried to break down some points, but would love to see what others think.
Nightborne
*night preferred
*worship Elune (speculative)
*urban
*hedonistic
Blood Elves
*day preferred
*worship the Light
*a bit nature oriented
*disciplined
Shal’dorei have many cool specificities : skills in telemancy, astronomy and finding ley lines, France-inspired culture in regards to names/wine/courtier society, 10k years of isolation… Overall Sin’dorei strike me as more military-oriented, and Shal’dorei as more science/knowledge-oriented.
I have doubts about the latter still worshipping Elune though, and can we really say the former are worshipping the Light ?
Although they are very similar, there are some obvious differences:
Blood Elves are essentially Sun Elves, while Nightborne are, well, arcane Night Elves.
Blood Elf architecture is marked by a contrast between a bright exterior and a dark interior, which expresses their TBC era themes. The Nightborne don’t have that.
Nightborne LOVE arcwine, which is wine enhanced by waters of the Nightwell. I don’t think Blood Elves have or would drink waters from the Sunwell.
Nightborne are much more advanced magic users than Blood Elves. They use aging chambers / time magic, which is unheard of within Blood elf culture.
Regrettably, Blood Elves generally don’t use tattoos (I think Rommath is the only one). Nightborne like to tattoo their bodies.
Despite being a race of mages, Blood Elves are ruled by a Ranger General, which is weird and needs to be changed. Nightborne magisters still are the leaders of their race.
Nightborne have priests, but don’t have paladins.
They both would be fairing much better if Kael’thas and Elisande were still alive. The leadership of Thalyssra and Bob is weak.
Nightborne priests might be similar to harvest witches in Gilneas: Just a remnant from an earlier stage of their culture that got gradually replaced by a different belief system. Although in the Nightborne’s case I’d say they don’t really believe in anything, but they surely love arcane magic.
We know that High Elves worship the light and that Lady Liadrin regained her faith after the Sunwell got restored and turned into a fountain of Holy Light. So I think the same goes for Priests.
Kael’thas I could do without, but Elisande should have been redeemed instead of killed. She was an amazing leader!
Yes she is amazing.
Not many really. They’re both descended from Highborne Night Elves. The Sin’dorei however didn’t spend the last 13,000 years in side a bottled city though.
I wish they’d given a bit more ‘faith’ lore to the Nightborne. It’s not super clear what their Priests would worship aside from being maybe researchers or mages of Light/Shadow. Even just a small tidbit about them regaining their faith in Elune or adopting a sect that worships the light since their relationship with the Sin’dorei has come along.
Seems like after Legion was through they were kinda dropped like a hot potato story-wise but I guess that’s the fate of pretty much all of the allied races at this point.
As I am a Nighbtborne/Highborne geek, I will write down about the Nightborne.
The Nightborne are the imagine of the Highborne elves of the Kaldorei Empire, if the Highborne of the Kaldorei Empire, would prosper the same way they did before the world sundering, the would be very similar if not exactly like the Nightborne.
A snobby, noble, and xenophobic aristocratic nobles this is a Nightborne.
Fun fact, many of the Nightborne still consider themselves the Highborne, and they think they are the true owners as well as the true protectors of the Quel’dorei culture of the Kal’dorei Empire.
The Nightborne unlike their other cousins, have saved traditions of the Highborne society, meaning the Nightborne still do have Noble houses, the ranks between the society, the Highborne and the Commoners, a socials ranks which were banished from the Kal’dorei, Sin’dorei, Quel’dorei and the Ren’dorei.
Another main tradition they have saved is Tal’ashar, a honor duel, whereby someone may challenge another person to individual combat, it is same as the Mak’gora of the Orcs.
Many of the priestesses of Elune has most likely turned into astromancers after the closing the of the Suramar. The highborne of Suramar were studying the stars as early as twelve thousand years ago, The nightborne kept on with their studies, and inside the Nighthold is an area called the Astromancer’s Rise.
Star Augur Etraeus seen using void priest spell during the encounter as well.
However, in Suramar, you may see some Nightborne kneeling in-front a statue with a half moon scythe on her hands.
Could it the image of Elune for the Nightbonre?
We yet to find.
Oculeth definitely sounds like he might still be a bit religious based on his dialogues
edit - also when it comes to religiosity astromancer already in BC sounded like something that was a mage following magical arts that were probably vaguely descended from the priesthood of Elune in some fashion, to me, or that might just be the fact that when they replaced the Kael’thas statues in Cata Silvermoon a whole lot of the statuary was ancient elf statues with gold leaf
One fun thing is that iirc even in BC the priest side of the magister rooms in the palace in SMC had a statue that was obviously a color swapped version of the statues kept in old elven ruins and the temple of Elune
It is true that no stock has gone into the Nightborne’s spiritual beliefs, but Thalyssra has been characterized to be at least sympathetic to the cursed Priestesses of Elune we encountered in Nazjatar.
The Drowned Oracle World Quest
Thalyssra: The priestesses of Elune never bowed to Azshara, and were cursed for their defiance. Grant their spirits the peace they were denied.
It would have been pretty simple to include a line for Thalyssra to disavow the worship of Elune, while also expressing a desire to free the priestesses, but this wasn’t the approach the writers took.
Not much to add that hasnt been said, but I still find the parallels between the two very interesting. Both could be considered offshoot continuances of the Highborne culture, and both have had their issues with addiction.
The major difference to me is that one had to go out and survive in the world post-Sundering and the other was sealed up away from everything. The Blood Elves have a storied history, with outside relations, alliances, wars, etc, that shaped their culture and how they view themselves in the world. The Nighborne have… wine. Lots and lots of wine.
The Blood Elves are sports dads.
The Nightborne are wine moms.
So you are saying that elves are Horde suburbia?
I’m really torn on this. I think Elune should remain a kaldorei thing, especially after SHL, but nightborne priests do exist and they need a faith or method of empowerment of some kind. I’m personally partial to the “their new BE friends hooked them up with the Sunwell” theory. It’s conspicuous that NB priests didn’t exist until they became playable… which is after their leaders went to visit the Sunwell and Liadrin told them it was half-Light.
I’m not as torn. Suramar was once the former center of Elune worship prior to the first demon invasion, and there are bound to have been priestesses of Elune among the Highborne that sealed themselves off.
I don’t expect the Nightborne as a whole to embrace Elune, but there should be a minority present that reveres Elune and maybe even the constellations as a form of a “religion” or general spiritual belief.
The prospect of the Nightborne being tied to another potentially detrimental dependency is not very appealing to me. I wonder if the arcan’dor would cure the effects of being cut off from the Sunwell.
The problem die Nightborne and the Blood Elves face is the Horde. Without them they would claim their ancestral homelands again and drive off the humans and dwarfs who currently plagues their safe space.
Makes sense to me. You couldn’t play them until after you unlocked them by doing the entire Nightborne liberation questline.
Once the Horde council is gone the Highborne will rise to greatness again.