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I’m confused on why the night elves killed in the Battle of Dark shore even went to the Maw
I’m not an expert on lore, but I thought night elves become wisps upon death but remain in the mortal world. It’s like their own form of “Immortality” in a way
So what happened?
The Arbiter was shot down shortly after the Emerald Nightmare raid in Legion. Since then any souls who’ve died have gone straight to the Maw.
The wisp thing is kind of a weird unknown in night elf lore. We don’t know much about it.
Evil people go to the Maw.
So they go to the arbiter just to be sent back to Azeroth as a wisp?
I’m confused
Since Hyjal in WC3, Night Elves lost their immortality. Effectively nerfed themselves.
Since Legion, the Arbiter got broken down. Afterwards, anyone who dies goes straight to the Maw.
Kinda unfortunate to the Night Elf that are now trapped in Torghast wondering if Elune abandoned them.
From my understanding: Includes possible spoilers.
The Jailer with the help of Sire Denathrius or another outside party enchanted the arbiter to fall into a sleep and only funnel souls into the maw. Was probably easy to manipulate the arbiter since its power was Zovaal’s own to begin with.
There’s also hints that the Burning Legion was influenced or had something to do with Zovaal as well. Like, this guy had his hands in every cookie jar. Dreadlords were his tools to make everything happen.
So I don’t know exactly who enchanted the arbiter specifically, but that’s why souls are being funneled.
There’s a lot of lore on Korthia.
I think Aessina might have something to do with it. She’s like the queen wisp, the Wild God spirit of the forest. But it’s never really been spelled out how and why some night elves turn into wisps and others don’t.
As of now it looks like they do go to the SL as normal spirits. Wisps have been described as night elves who gave themselves to the forest to become one with it after death. Those who died suddenly, like at Teldrassil, were probably not given that choice and just passed on regularly. I imagine there’s a ritual or circumstance to become one and it’s not a default setting.
Well you have to ask yourself, where do night elves belong if not the maw?
I think shandris is the only one in lore with any redeeming qualities
Oh, well that makes more sense. I didn’t know it was a choice for them. I thought it was just their default afterlife to be a wisp
If it’s any comfort to those souls. Night Fae Maw Walkers have their soul collector thingy near Tyrande at one point so the souls kinda “sense” Elune’s power and flock to the collector
Not exactly:
https://wowpedia.fandom.com/wiki/Wisp
At the same time, Kyrian Maw Walkers have to send the Night Elf Sentinels to the Maw.
It was very awkward for my Night Elf Hunter. >:(
See ya at the Maw 
When a mortal dies in WoW, they reappear in “limbo.” This is what you see normally when you die in the game. From here, souls will find Spirit Healers which will evaluate whether or not a soul is ready to pass on. If they’re not ready yet, they’ll stay on Azeroth or whatever as ghosts/whisps until they fulfill whatever is holding them from passing on.
When a soul is ready, the Spirit Healer will blow their horns and the Kyrian will swoop down from Bastion to guide the soul to the soulstream that flows to the Arbiter. Now that the Arbiter is no longer sending souls to their afterlives, they are now going to the Maw.
I wonder if the ritual involves agreeing to have their disembodied form be used for labor in construction or used as batteries for force fields.
Since the end of legion sylvie and the jailer where messing with the afterlife. The vast majority of all those killed during bfa and sls souls went directly to the maw.
The point being to empower the jailer. Thats the real reason why sylvie started the war in bfa. She used everyone well the jailer was using her for years.
Because Blizzard hates night elves.
Normally they wouldn’t have.
But the Arbiter was disabled sometime between the end of Legion and the start of BFA. It’s not clear exactly when it happened, or what caused it, although there are theories out there that it was either an assault by Sire Denathrius or the Arbiter being hit with the soul of Argus the Unmaker that may have caused it.
Either way with the Arbiter broken, the being that normally would sort the souls into one of the infinite afterlives can’t do their job, and so all the souls go straight to the Maw.
(giggle)
It would be a pretty boring expansion if you were just flying around as a whisp. At least a little more boring.