Bringing back long-dead characters. How does it work lorewise?

[Greengrim]

Hello everybody,

One question has been bothering me for a little while: what happens when long-dead characters get brought back from death/Shadowlands? How does this work exactly?

Now that we know that once you die on Azeroth your anima is transfered to the Shadowlands, where you pick up/are given a new purpose, and kind of...move on (if I may?) . But what happens if during this time you get resurrected on Azeroth?

Let's take Draka for example. Died, was sent to Maldraxxus, accepted, trained for, and is fulfilling her new role. Now, what happens if we found her remains on Azeroth, and simply bring her back, just like we did with Whitemane and the other Horsemen for example?

[T-34]

Hello everybody,

One question has been bothering me for a little while: what happens when long-dead characters get brought back from death/Shadowlands? How does this work exactly?

Now that we know that once you die on Azeroth your anima is transfered to the Shadowlands, where you pick up/are given a new purpose, and kind of...move on (if I may?) . But what happens if during this time you get resurrected on Azeroth?

Let's take Draka for example. Died, was sent to Maldraxxus, accepted, trained for, and is fulfilling her new role. Now, what happens if we found her remains on Azeroth, and simply bring her back, just like we did with Whitemane and the other Horsemen for example?

WoW has always been made by "the rule of cool". So if the developers get a "cool" story idea they will implement it and the explanation will be made post-factum.
You should see WoW just like one of the never-ending soap operas where dead people come back as their cousins, uncles etc.
Don't try to find meaning where no meaning is supposed to be found.
Just enjoy the coolness.

[Aresk]

There was a Q&A on this. Basically, the soul is reaffixed to the undead form but imperfectly. In cases where someone is resurrected, the soul inhabits the body without this flaw. However, most resurrections are for relatively recently dead; I'm not aware of anyone who has been dead as long as Draka coming back through resurrections, though I'm far from an expert in the lore.

[Greengrim]

There was a Q&A on this. Basically, the soul is reaffixed to the undead form but imperfectly. In cases where someone is resurrected, the soul inhabits the body without this flaw. However, most resurrections are for relatively recently dead; I'm not aware of anyone who has been dead as long as Draka coming back through resurrections, though I'm far from an expert in the lore.

Mmmmm, yes, recent deaths make a bit more sense. Even though, as we have already seen, the souls/anima get picked up immediately (Arthas?). I think Whitemane and Trollbane have been dead-dead for a while too. Another example that comes to mind would be when Sylvanas first resurrected Nathanos?

[Reinhart11]

Building up new proper characters would be much easier and way less complicated. That Blizzard isn't competent enough to do that and instead rehashes old characters constantly(and ruining them most of the time) is a major curse on this story in this franchise.

[Rorixis]

There was a Q&A on this. Basically, the soul is reaffixed to the undead form but imperfectly. In cases where someone is resurrected, the soul inhabits the body without this flaw. However, most resurrections are for relatively recently dead; I'm not aware of anyone who has been dead as long as Draka coming back through resurrections, though I'm far from an expert in the lore.

https://wow.gamepedia.com/Derek_Prou...le_for_Azeroth

I was pretty confused by this one but they do put some extra effort/magic into him since he has been dead for longer.

It seems the longer they are dead the more power or other mumbo-jumbo it takes. No mention of the shadowlands tho.

[durenas]

There was a Q&A on this. Basically, the soul is reaffixed to the undead form but imperfectly. In cases where someone is resurrected, the soul inhabits the body without this flaw. However, most resurrections are for relatively recently dead; I'm not aware of anyone who has been dead as long as Draka coming back through resurrections, though I'm far from an expert in the lore.

The Ancients(cenarius, goldrinn, aessina, etc) were restored to life from the Emerald Dream during the cataclysm. And they had been dead for some time.

Since Ysera is in the Nightfae area, it seems logical that that is where the Ancients went when they died. So it would seem no matter how long they remain in the shadowlands, they can be resurrected perfectly if the magic is powerful enough.

[Greengrim]

https://wow.gamepedia.com/Derek_Prou...le_for_Azeroth

I was pretty confused by this one but they do put some extra effort/magic into him since he has been dead for longer.

It seems the longer they are dead the more power or other mumbo-jumbo it takes. No mention of the shadowlands tho.

I think Whitemane and Trollbane were dead for longer than Derek before they got brought back.

It would be a damn shame if Blizzard introduced us to their version of the afterlife, without even having an explanation how this works, given that it's quite common for dead stuff to come back in their world.

[Your Mommy]

Hello everybody,

One question has been bothering me for a little while: what happens when long-dead characters get brought back from death/Shadowlands? How does this work exactly?

Now that we know that once you die on Azeroth your anima is transfered to the Shadowlands, where you pick up/are given a new purpose, and kind of...move on (if I may?) . But what happens if during this time you get resurrected on Azeroth?

Let's take Draka for example. Died, was sent to Maldraxxus, accepted, trained for, and is fulfilling her new role. Now, what happens if we found her remains on Azeroth, and simply bring her back, just like we did with Whitemane and the other Horsemen for example?

I really wish the writing in this game wasn't a clusterfuck mess.
But then again that's what happens when your game's lore is 16+ years old and you keep hiring writers who are only familiar with the most recent/prominent lore pieces.

[Usernameforforums]

Death is nothing but a pocket dimension now.

[Venziir]

I think Whitemane and Trollbane have been dead for more time than Derek.

It would be a damn shame if Blizzard introduced us to their version of the afterlife, without even having an explanation how this works, given that it's quite common for dead stuff to come back in their world.

Derek was killed during The Second War. Trollbane was killed after the third war and Whitemane in either vanilla or cataclysm - so no.

[Greengrim]

Derek was killed during The Second War. Trollbane was killed after the third war and Whitemane in either vanilla or cataclysm - so no.

Wtf, why is he so lightly decayed then?????

[MikeBogina]

Wtf, why is he so lightly decayed then?????

probably to show his significance of being an undead alliance character(there's no unique forsaken models besides Nathanos) but the real question is... how does he have a body after being turned to ash by dragon fire!

[Aresk]

The Ancients(cenarius, goldrinn, aessina, etc) were restored to life from the Emerald Dream during the cataclysm. And they had been dead for some time.

Since Ysera is in the Nightfae area, it seems logical that that is where the Ancients went when they died. So it would seem no matter how long they remain in the shadowlands, they can be resurrected perfectly if the magic is powerful enough.

That's fair. I viewed that more as a reincarnation than a resurrection (akin to say what happens during the Whitemane fight or with Calia in Netherlight or Sylvanas and the Val'kyr.

[haiyken]

They oppened Pandora's box with introducing the Shadowlands. It forces us (and them) to look at a lot of events from the past in a new (and often confusing) light. I think they're doing an okay job explaining the Shadowlands with the big picture stuff but not so much on the small stuff.

Whitemane and Trollbane are really good examples as mentionned.

I think a really big problem (that could have been avoided) is that spirits are transformed while in the Shadowlands. Some of them keep their original form like Draka or Uther but most dead people just become anima and merge with the realms. While I understand why they did it (it's really really difficult to create a world with all the dead characters from a 25 years old franchise and 10.000+ years long universe), I think it was a really big mistake from a lore perspective. It contradicts most of the "bringing people back from the dead" stories we had so far, or even worse, it makes all of those events exception to the Shadowlands rules.

I believe that spirits on the Shadowlands should be altered by the realm/covenant they are a part of, but they should still retain part of what they where before. There is no reason for an Orc to turn into a human-like spirit when joining the Kyrian. This Orc can act like all Kyrians and preach their Way of living. I get the "shed your past" concept, but why do the Orc need to transform physically into something else while what's important with the Kyrian is the reforming of the mind above everything else, much like a cult.

By removing all aspect from the dead person identity, it makes ressurection almost impossible to explain. Spirits in the Shadowlands are completely severed from their life thread. It make no sense they should be able to come back after being assimilated to any Covenant or any realm of the Shadowlands, as most of them just disappear or transform. Its even worse for characters dead for so long it's impossible to justify them being themselves after ressurection.

The only one that kind of makes sense is Ardenweald because souls are put into statis and fed anima to grow in order to be reborn. The caveat is that it's only for Wild Gods and powerful being, and most souls are just food (no ressurection possible for them...).

Overall, I think that while Shadowlands is a great new setting with a lot of cool concepts, the main thing it doesn't do well is actually deal with the afterlife itself. "Every living thing is anima" is just not enough...

[Razion]

I think in terms of general ruling people who have been dead a long time (like Whitemane, etc.) have seemed to lose all memories of their time in the Shadowlands and basically go back to being whoever they were at the time of their death.

If I were to speculate, because Anima is basically a collection of all your memories I'd probably imagine that whatever experiences they accumulate in the Shadowlands as extra anima would basically be left in the Shadowlands or expended as a resource by whoever is raising them. It may also account for the reasoning of certain powerful beings like Kel'Thuzad needing sources like the Sunwell to be resurrected -- because the amount of anima or raw power needed to animate him would be large.

probably to show his significance of being an undead alliance character(there's no unique forsaken models besides Nathanos) but the real question is... how does he have a body after being turned to ash by dragon fire!

DKs raise ghouls from corpse dust all the time!

[Greengrim]

DKs raise ghouls from corpse dust all the time!

Not for a loooong while.

[Venziir]

Wtf, why is he so lightly decayed then?????

Oh it gets worse... He was killed by dragon fire. He should be nothing but a pile of ash.

[Arrashi]

Simple - it just works.

[Greengrim]

Oh it gets worse... He was killed by dragon fire. He should be nothing but a pile of ash.

Yeah, someone already mentioned that in an earlier comment. Honestly to say, I didn't even know Jaina had a brother before questing in Kul Tiras. I never got hooked enough to look into her, other than her friendship with Thrall.

But yeah, this is a true bummer man. Big bloopers. Weak and illogical story. I can clearly see why so many people bash on Blizzard storytellers.