While you wait you can catch this.
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They typically mean the numbers they are referencing.
That’s how numbers work
If I lose 90% of my bank account, i could be poor or still a millionaire depending on how much I had at the start.
Without knowing what 100% is, throwing arbitrary numbers like 90% holds no meaning.
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Losing 90 percent of your population is a massive blow no matter what that number is.
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90% isn’t arbitrary, 90% is 90% whether we are talking about 100 million or just 100.
90% of anything that is removed is a cataclysmic event. You are being a reductionist if you think 90% is a meaningless figure.
I will be charitable and say that Blizzard throws around figures with little care or understanding of what it means.
90% of a civilization being wiped out brings them to cultural extermination, doesn’t matter if the 10% survived, there is so much lost that whatever remains will never compare to what it was before. Or one civilization being over ten thousand years old. Human civilization doesn’t even get close to that number but we got individuals walking around that are older than that.
For example Shandris being therapized by Lilian, Lilian is what 25? 30? Shadris is older than the pyramids, whatever complex emotion she is feeling she has felt a thousand times before.
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There have been events that wiped out over 95 percent of extant human population… as long as you have sufficient genetic variety you’ll have recovery.
Of course if we lose our technological civilization now and completely, our descendants will have no easy oil and coal to rebuild on… we’ve used all of that up. In that sense you’d be one hundred percent right.
Its why I said cultural rather than genetic.
There are craft’s techniques, languages, cooking methodes, arts etc and etc that exist within a civilization.
If you take 90% of that civilization there will be so much that will be forever be lost.
Here is another example.
India has over a billion people, take away 90%, we still have more people than multiple countries put together in europe.
But you will be losing so much culture and history that is passed through families and communities that date back hundreds of years even by the most conservative estimates. India will never be the india it was before the loss
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True, but they can still rebuild.
10% of 1 billion is still a big number that can thrive, 10% of 100 thousand is problematic on every way.
I explained twice why whatever they rebuild will never compare to what they were before.
Do you understand the issue? Do you understand why 90% is not a meaningless number?
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I’d argue that it’s meaningless in one other capacity. Namely, the 90% figure applied to the elves inside Quel’Thalas at the time the Scourge attacked it, and does not account for those whom were outside of it at the time, like Kael’thas in Dalaran, or elves in the Alliance expedition to Kalimdor, or those in Outland, or the various lodges, etc…
If 90% of Quel’Thalas was destroyed, but so many elves returned home and became Blood Elves that the effective loss was 50%, well… it’d still be the end of a culture as it was, but rebuilding feels much more possible.
And considering Blizzard is not above pulling entire civilizations of elves out of thin air (the Nightborne), who’s to say for sure? Today the Blood Elves teeter on the brink of extinction, tomorrow they could be so populous all other races in the setting combined don’t even come close to 1% of their total population.
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If Blizzard says it was 90 percent, then it’s 90 percent. counting all of that crap.
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Blizzard’s 90% is actually Schrödinger’s Number. It is 90%. also 9%. But sometimes its 19%.
Never trust their ability to count years or populations.
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I read it as mostly being about Thalassian unification which I’m all for. It’s a long time coming. I dunno if the Kaldorei and Shal’dorei are counted in that. Shal’dorei pretty much already are since they’re just blood elf arm candy at this point. Night Elves though have their own problems to deal with so I dunno if them uniting with the eastern kingdoms elves while they lack a main base on Kalimdor is a good idea.
Blizzard did say it was 90%. Of the Kingdom of Quel’Thalas. So, not counting, ‘all of that crap,’ assuming by that you mean the elves out in Dalaran, Lodges, Kalimdor, Outland, and whatever new elves Blizzard may pull out of thin air.
Numbers mean nothing in this setting. Percentages like 90% of Quel’Thalas being slaughtered when Arthas attacked the Scourge, are for shock effect more than anything. Despite losing that much, Silvermoon is pretty lively, and we see the elves fielding forces across the globe.
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Void elves were like one small group of researchers and somehow despite that were fielding armies in BfA. Population numbers simply do not matter.
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They are recruiting constantly.
Yes, but we have no evidence that they can create more elves like themselves. There is nothing to suggest that the accident which originally transformed them can be replicated. Even if it could… why would anyone want that, when Alleria proves you can learn how to wield the void without the deformity?
Blizzard really messed up with that race in general.
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A high elf or blood elf goes into the Void Elf leadership office, then they sign a waiver that lists the risks and benefits of void infusion, and the mandatory affiliation to the new nation.
Dumbest allied race and I have one.
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More like…
A Blood Elf or High Elf go to the Telogrus Rift. There’s some crack addict shivering in the corner with greasy tentacle-laden hair who keeps mumbling to himself while trying to convince you to get transformed. Every time he rambles off track, his own tentacles slap him, and occasionally his eyes go completely dark and he starts rambling in a language you don’t understand.
A pale skinned, blond haired elf comes up to them and starts talking about the safer method of learning how to wield the power of the void, speaking rationally and calmly, outlining the dangers and risks, but also the safety measures in place. Once or twice they seem a little not right, but their appearance puts you at ease, as does the fact they don’t seem to be completely mad like the poor wretch who was transformed LONG before ever learning how to control the void and the whispers.
You’re telling me they’d flip off the Alleria-looking elf and go ask the corpse-looking guy to hook them up? Good sir, they’d not even give that fool the time of day just for his looks alone. Elves are stupid vain.
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