Please explain a Lightforged Deathknight

[Carnagefiend]

Loosening restrictions is the death of creativity. Limitations force us to be creative. When nothing means anything, I don't know what you expect people to do with that.

Yeah, yeah, we can discuss how it "should" be until we're blue in the face. What I'm telling you is -how it is-. If you don't want to discuss -how it is- then just walk away now, because as it stands established lore supports death knights using Light magic since vanilla at least. Get over it.

[Codah]

Yeah, yeah, we can discuss how it "should" be until we're blue in the face. What I'm telling you is -how it is-. If you don't want to discuss -how it is- then just walk away now, because as it stands established lore supports death knights using Light magic since vanilla at least. Get over it.

Don't get cunty with me. OP asked. And also that isn't true.

Infracted.

[derpkitteh]

Plenty of reasonable answers in this thread already. Are you going to repeat this until you convince yourself they don't make sense or what's your point right now?

while it is definitely possible for death knights to use the light, the lightforged deathbomb probably shouldn't work anymore since it's based on their soul being basically made of light at this point.

would be a nice bit of lore flair if they'd change it to an explosion of death energy.

[THEORACLE64]

The original death knight was Teron Gorefiend, an orc shaman/death seer of the shadowmoon clan.

"OG" meaning "original gangster" meaning Arthas meaning the most notable of the lot.

[KOUNTERPARTS]

From a lore perspective, it does seem a odd to see LF Draenei become Death Knights. However, they are still mortal beings. They can still die, thus being raised as Death Knights.


I don't assume Blizzard is going to go out of there way and give us an elaborate lore-reason-loophole to explain it for LF Draenei though.


Perhaps there is some lore difference between "undead" and "damned"?

[Mehrunes]

Blood/unholy/frost themed tats, PLEASE blizzard!

And undead DKs dying 3 times is hilarious that's the main reason I rolled one.

Once as a human, the second time as a Forsaken. When's the third time?

[Feanoro]

OP, it's easy. "Rule of cool". Blizz does not now, nor has it ever given two tin shits about logic and consistency in its own lore.

[Maljinwo]

If I had to look at LF Draenei from a Lore standpoint... I'd say this is probably the same case as with risen Paladins before, but stronger, since they were forged as literal light weapons.
It does seem weird that they still keep they Light racials, but that's purely a gameplay option in my eyes

[Edlarel]

Don't get cunty with me. OP asked. And also that isn't true.

Sir Zeliek would like to have a word with you.
In any case, I haven't read through the other 4 pages, but I will chime in to say that it's pretty clear each of the different types of magic (maybe not life, but maybe the plant-controlled orcs in Draenor count?) can create undead. In the case of new death knights, particularly those of the lightforged variety, they were lightforged, which would ordinarily mark them to go to Bastion or Maldraxxus (depending on their "drive" like X'era), but I imagine Bolvar's wearing of the helm of Domination has given him some control over revendreth magic, which means he can raise them just fine. The only beings known to be untouchable by this magic are the worgen, whose curse has ties to the dream, and by proxy Ardenweald, which also has put no effort into physical undead beings that we were aware of until recently (the drust). Assuming you haven't looked/don't remember, worgen death knights are not created in the same way as others. they were created by Arugal's experiments, and the in game representation is only for mechanical purposes. When we fought Arthas, canonically, we didn't have the Gilneans with us, or I imagine he would have been unable to return them to live as he intended with us (his "champions").

Mind you, this is still only speculation at this point, but I would imagine it's not far off from what we learn in 8.3 with the storyline they give us to bring in new death knights.

As an aside, with the introduction of the drust, we now have official "undead" from each of the known four Shadowlands. Scourge, drust, val'kyr, and san'layn; plus each of their different types of anima (pale green, blue, white, and red, in order). With Sylvannas finally revealing her use of anima from the Maw (black), the characters in lore are confused, having never seen anybody manipulate such magic before.

[FlubberPuddy]

They've already data mined DK skins for Pandaren and all Allied Races. They just haven't implemented them yet. I'd say we'll see them within 1-3 PTR patches with the way Patches have went so far.

Looking forward to those DK Skins! Good to hear they already exist in a sense.

[Vampyrr]

Unholy Lightforged Deathknight can still use the light but are called unholy yet have a sigil of the naaru above their heads. And what exactly makes them Lightforged after death? They would simply be Draenei DKs. This is honestly the most confusing and worst piece of PC lore since undead DKs dying three times.

not only that but when they die in end they’ll unleash a huge burst of light wtf?!

How is it three times for Undead DKs? Normal Human > dead > Undead > dead > Death Knight

[Ealyssa]

Legion lore showed that "anyone" can lightforge if they are worthy. So either :

1)A lightforged Draenei dies, is raised as a DK. And he choose to rather keep fighting than dying.
2)A normal Draenei DK for whatever reason is worthy to become lightforged.

The second version is a little bit harder to accept without any real change of the DK specs. That's where the concept of "class skins" could be amazing. With light themed DK specs (playing the same, with same mechanics. Just a visual change in the spells being of light).

[Temp1on2]

No, Light and unholy is not antithetical....

Death and Life is antithetical
Light and Shadow is antithetical

ok? this is the standing lore, Light and Death (unholy) is not Antihetical. while yes they are often working against each other, so is all of the other greater elements, heck even order is working against Life because life tends to be wild and hard to calculate which the Power major order do not like.

The whole Holy vs Unholy comes from the fact that some people see somethign as not-holy, hell The scarlet crusade, for example, would consider Elune unholy since she is not The Light. and the night elves would possible consider the Light as unholy as the Light is not elune.

This.

I think the word and use of "unholy" has undergone an almost silent 'soft' retcon. It is true that unholy and death were kind of portrayed as the polar opposite of the light until the void was firmly established (indeed before this even shadow magic appeared to be kind of linked to death) - but, like you say, most fanatics see anything not adhering to their beliefs as 'unholy'. To be honest I think the use of 'holy' needs to be recognised more as a proper noun (like Fel, Shadow, Arcane etc) rather than an adjective in the way its commonly understood IRL/

- - - Updated - - -

How is it three times for Undead DKs? Normal Human > dead > Undead > dead > Death Knight

I don't even think that's correct. Wouldn't it be: Human > *dies* > Undead > *is turned into a Death knight*

[LemonDemonGirl]

They've already data mined DK skins for Pandaren and all Allied Races. They just haven't implemented them yet. I'd say we'll see them within 1-3 PTR patches with the way Patches have went so far.

When should we expect them? In a few weeks maybe?

[Soikona]

Players: omg its garbage that new races like panda and allied can't be DKs Blizzard is so lazy

Also players: omg its garbage that race that uses fictional holy power can now use fictional evil power reeeeeeeeeee

There really is no pleasing some of you people.

Here is one for you, not sure if it is something you have ever considered but..... the WoW community is not a hive mind and are capable of independent though?

[Ielenia]

Unholy Lightforged Deathknight can still use the light but are called unholy yet have a sigil of the naaru above their heads. And what exactly makes them Lightforged after death? They would simply be Draenei DKs. This is honestly the most confusing and worst piece of PC lore since undead DKs dying three times.

not only that but when they die in end they’ll unleash a huge burst of light wtf?!

Becoming a death knight seriously messes with your mind.

See: Nazgrim, Trollbane.

Also, ironically: being raised as a death knight actually cured Whitemane of her madness.

[Rotted]

The question is, why would a Lightforged Draenei choose to become a Death Knight? Original Death Knights were turned against their will by Arthas. New Death Knights will do so willingly. Makes no sense for a Lightforged Draenei.

At which point is that confirmed?

The last set of dks lore wise we raised was the 4 horsemen no? None of them got a choice in the matter. Hell we potentially risked a civil war in both factions by ransacking lights hope for Tirions body.

[Edlarel]

The question is, why would a Lightforged Draenei choose to become a Death Knight? Original Death Knights were turned against their will by Arthas. New Death Knights will do so willingly. Makes no sense for a Lightforged Draenei.

I can't see any reason why one's devotion to the light wouldn't exist beyond even death. If this was their only opportunity to be raised (lest they go to the Maw), they likely took it because they saw no other choice in the matter.

[Marrilaife]

I dunno, I'm tired of all the salt in the community at this point.

At this point the only thing you can say to all these "lore purists" is "don't like it, don't play it", I mean if we have Forsaken and Void Elf Holy Priests in game, then we can have Lightforged Unholy Death Knights. And yes, Whitemane became a Death Knight after being a devotee of Light (even if a twisted one).

Limitations force us to be creative.

Damn, that means the Demon Hunter playerbase is the most creative one then?

[Katsutomai]

When should we expect them? In a few weeks maybe?

It's going to have to be within the next 2 PTR patches since apparently 8.3 is being released around January 7th and I think Blizzard employees get like 2 weeks off for Christmas.