Them still existing makes no sense for reasons I’ve stated elsewhere, but will repeat if you like.
If we decanonize everything that sounds really stupid, we’re going to have to get rid of a lot of lore.
4 Likes
No they haven’t. The only true “evil” light users were the Scarlet Crusade, who were brainwashed by a dreadlord.
The whole aspect of the light kinda makes it impossible to go fully evil because it fills you with positive thoughts, feelings and warmth.
The scarlet crusade are literally corrupted into feeling good in doing bad things because of the dreadlord. But the light usually doesn’t allow this.
Look at Arthas, he was using the light and doing what he thought was right but his negative thoughts about the things was making him fail to use the light. Doubt filled his heart and negative emotions clouded him. He thought it was the light leaving him but it was him himself that was failing to call upon his inner light because of his negative mind.
That is why the scarlet crusade is such an outlier.
You might get Naaru’s like Xe’ra who might go full zealotry but thankfully everyone knew she was in the wrong. We don’t talk about Yrel because that was just a complete 180 from what happened in WOD expansion, just to give us a allied race.
But two light users can fight against each other but it would be unlikely. The Light users are made up of people who are mostly like Anduin of Turaylon who are all about forgiveness, understanding, compassion. They are not full of zealots.
7 Likes
TBF, even the General said the prior went way too far into their thinking that it went against what the empire taught. It seemed the Prior church went on full “I’m afraid mode” and went and did things that go against their edicts.
Bingo, people forget that the scarlet crusade are literally paladins, priests and citizens of Lorderon and also part of the silver hand order. There was a falling out, a lot of them who weren’t brainwashed by the dreadlord left and did the Argent Crusade. The Argent brought in forsaken, gnomes, trolls, goblins etc to cleanse their land. The scarlet crusade went full on Zealot and human only way because of the dreadlord.
Argent Crusade now is part of the Silver hand that was remade, with Tyr’s guard as well.
1 Like
Arthas Menethil.
This is ignoring Xe’ra.
Like most cosmic forces, the Light is a spectrum of morality, and not a moral absolute. We have Naaru like A’dal whom created a sanctuary that even accepted demons and undead so long as they kept the peace. Then we have Naaru like Xe’ra, who believed all must conform to the Light and be turned to it.
The Light is not inherently, ‘Good,’ or, ‘Evil,’ nor has it been since WC3 at the earliest. I think its fair to say that it is a far more harmonious power in general, but that doesn’t mean it cannot corrupt others.
And she was in the wrong.
No, it isn’t but the fact is that the light is more likely to not go evil because of the affect it has on the users. People who use the light are more like Anduin than not. They are compassionate, they are loving, they are filled with positive thoughts and hopes and dreams. They are vastly less likely to go Zealot.
Hence why the only real light enemies, the scarlet crusade, were all brainwashed and manipulated by a Dreadlord.
The light doesn’t corrupt. Only manipulation of the users corrupts.
1 Like
You missed the whole story of Arthas. His light powers were leaving him because of his doubtful intentions, his negative thoughts. After Stratholm, which he thought was just, he started to lose her powers because deep in his heart, he knew he did wrong but couldn’t face it.
The light didn’t make him do that, HE did that himself and the consequence of his actions was his powers leaving him. The light never corrupted him, he never turned Zealot. He turned because of fear of the scourge taking over everything. He turned because he started to hear the whispers of Mal’Ganis who kept taunting him and using the void to chip away at his resolve. It became so much of an issue that he totally lost his abilities to call upon the light, which lead him to frostmourne and that eventually took his soul and made him into a death knight.
He never went Light Zealot. He went from Paladin, prince of justice, into a scared prince because a demon was manipulating him towards darkness and he fell.
Remember, the paladins turned their backs on Arthas.
You missed the whole story of Tirion.
He firmly believed he was right to save Eitrigg, but he still lost his powers just because he thought he lost them. Anduin’s going through a redux of that right now.
The Light responds to will, not morality. Arthas’ will was shaken by the unfolding events.
3 Likes
I didn’t miss that, that just goes with my point. He THOUGHT he lost his powers because he 100% fully believed that the order took it from him, which is impossible. It was his own doubts and willpower that made him “lose” his powers but he eventually found it again while in exile and realized they can never truly take the light from you.
Same with anduin.
Again, you are proving my point. That was my point and my point is that people, who are filled with the light, are filled with POSITIVE EMOTIONS AND COMPASSION to the point that when negative thoughts and doubt starts to invade their mind, they lose their power. Tirion, Anduin, Arthas, all started to lose their compassion, their positive thoughts, their warmth and let the doubt take hold, the negative aspects and they lost their willpower to use it.
The light is all about the positive thought, which is why the Scarlet Crusade is such an outlier. The dreadlord Balthazaar was sooo good in his manipulation that he literally got these men and women to believe what they were doing was correct and just but literally half of the order didn’t agree and left and became the argent crusade.
You might get some in AU Yrel but that was more of a 180 ruggpull than an actual storyline.
The Arathi one is vastly more interesting because the Arathi did not fully only use the light. The Arathi are more like the bloodelves, their Scared Flame is more of a combination of Light and Arcane magic.
Some even consider that Titan Order magic is a combination of light and arcane because of Azeroth’s worldsoul and azerite. Even the rememberance mounts is a combination of golden light and arcane blusih glow.
1 Like
Except for the Scarlets.
Or, for that matter, Sir Zeliek.
Again, I brought into why the scarlet are the way they are and why they are the sole real outliers. Because of the dreadlord twisting them so much that they legit feel positive emotions doing the evil stuff they do. They are psychopaths now. Which is scary.
They did the same story in the diablo universe with the faith of Zankrum or whatever. A prime evil infected the church and twisted the people, not the power, into psychopaths that they feel positive emotions doing evil acts, which allows them to use their powers.
The Crusaders are the uninfected ones who fled to the east and came back.
He was also an exception. A death Knight still using holy magic was such an outlier that he became Iconic because of it. He was literally the only one to do so. Even though he was a death knight, he wasn’t fully corrupted. He was more like Anduin, forced to do things but he 100% still had his sanity and compassion and was always against what he was forced to do.
Sir Zeliek yells: Invaders! Cease this foolish venture at once! Turn away while you still can!
Literally tried to let us out of the raid and tell us to get out. While the rest of the horseman was gleeful, he wasn’t.
That is why he was so interesting. He was still 100% full of compassion and love but he was still forced to be a death knight. One of the very few to be a being of forced enslavement but still totally there.
This part I have to disagree with. Most of the scourge were forcefully enslaved, and that would include other horsemen. Pretty sure the only willing member of the Horsemen was Rivendare. Korth’azz was a paladin and likely served with Uther before he was killed. Mograine was very much not a willing member.
Zeliek was different not because he was the only one enslaved, but rather he was the only one whose will and personality was not also dominated. He held on to who he was, even though he could not resist the orders he was given. The others were completely dominated.
2 Likes
Zeliek was different not because he was the only one enslaved, but rather he was the only one whose will and personality was not also dominated. He held on to who he was, even though he could not resist the orders he was given. The others were completely dominated.
That was what I meant when I said he was totally there. While most death knights, while changed, also have a huge change in personality and become gloomy, hostile, sadistic or a combination of all. Zeliek was still just himself, like the paladin he was, but stuck in a death knight body and controlled.
I get that. Just wanted to clarify the enslavement part. 
On a side note: It is a shame Zeliek’s story ended there. He could have made for an interesting character in either the Ebon Blade or the Forsaken.
From [Preformatted text](https://warcraft.wiki.gg/wiki/Ask_CDev#Ask_CDev_Answers_-_Round_3)
Is there a reason that many priest spells, especially shadow priest spells, have names that refer to psychic phenomena like " [Mind Spike]" or " [Psychic Horror]"? Are priests implicitly telepaths?
The Light is often said to bring about feelings of positive emotion— hope, courage, comfort— and the like. Shadow abilities are just the opposite, able to impart feelings like despair, doubt, and panic. In a poetic sense, it can be said that the emotions which the Light brings about come from the “heart,” whereas the emotions manipulated by shadow are often based on survival logic, and therefore affect the “mind.” That said, priests and their abilities are not necessarily always psychic or telepathic in nature.
Light is not about Forgiveness but of Confidence!
Forgiveness or Mercy or Love aren’t the Light’s Virtues!
Confidence/Valor/Pride, Courage/Fortitude/Willpower, Hope, Peace/Comfort/Contentment and Faith/Loyalty are the Light’s Virtues!
Of course Pride is also the Light’s Vice as well as just one of it’s Virtues.
Lose Pride and Hope, Courage and Faith and you lose the Light.
The Shadow’s Vices are Doubt, Despair, Fear, Anger, Violence, Hatred and Pride.
The Shadow covers all bases in terms of Vice because it is not limited to the One True Path of Pride like Light is.
Shadow’s Virtue is Logic(the One True Path through the Shadow infact).
Irony how the Light has One Vice yet Multiple Virtues while Shadow has Multiple Vices(including the one that Light has) and yet One Virtue.
Arthas’ will was shaken because he was killing innocents.
The moment he brought his hammer down on the first civilian who asked him for help, it was over. This is emphasized in the novel.
The morality defines the will. Self-confidence grows from one’s own moral integrity. Someone who knows he is a bad guy will not have access to light skills. Basically, Anduin’s entire questline in TWW confirms this principle again. He feels guilty because… he attacked us in that one raid, I guess? A weak reason, but a reason nonetheless.
Moral integrity necessitates a moral compass. This is difficult to define and requires a high level of writing skill because it is a combination of knowledge, reason, belief, emotion, and social and cultural influences. Maybe even more: The fact that the power you worship gives hope, courage and comfort will make it hard for you to justify bringing despair, fear and agony. Well, excpect for undead and demons. It burns them, after all, doesn’t it?
Then, all of this must then be also in harmony with the unique personality.
The Scarlets, Xe’ra and the Lightbound have all taken this into account. When it is said that the light is not necessarily good, this refers to the fact that the morale of the wielders doesn’t necessarily match that of the player. In the end, it’s just a power and not a god.
It’s not. Lightwielders are humble.
Pride is shadow; sha of pride and stuff.
No, it is not. You’re ripping the word logic from its source, but ignoring the context. The source says that the shadow spells (like mind spike, psychic horror)attacks the victim’s mind like a cosmic or psychological horror movie. It’s an answer to a specific question.
The link between psychological / cosmic horror and the logic of human survival stems from deep-seated human fears of the unknown, the uncontrollable, and the incomprehensible. Both horror genres use these fears to create existential threats that call into question human survival, both physically and psychologically.
And before that is questioned, I’d like remember that the Void and the Old Gods are almost a direct ripoff of Lovecraft.
3 Likes
the scarlets were racists before the dreadlord. read ashbringer. tbh the most depressing part of this thread is we turned an interesting conversation to ‘let’s para-post our misunderstandings of psychology and zeal by just trying to make the light look like Moral Goodness:tm: in the setting.’ like y’all
6 Likes
More like some in the scarlet were fairly racist, but their leader Morgraine was not and probably a good chunk of them were not. And maybe more importantly they were the sort of the racist that at least wouldn’t kill anyone on sight.
1 Like