Why do beings of Death mostly use Shadow magic?

[OwenBurton]

I've noticed that the vast majority of beings who are connected with Death seem to always use Shadow magic, look at the nathrezim, or the NPCs in some of the realms of Death, or the dark rangers, and even most of Sylvanas's abilities. Even the very name of the afterlife implies that Death is far more closely associated with the Void than the other cosmic powers. The Void regards Death as its enemy, but for example, the Forsaken and nathrezim always seem to use Void powers without much hesitation, and there seem to be a far greater number of them who use the Void rather than the Light. Why is this so? Isn't this somewhat contradictory?

https://www.wowhead.com/npc=168938/s...ounter-journal

(Of course, this could be because of obvious game mechanics limitations, but it is still interesting to ponder.)

[KOUNTERPARTS]

(Of course, this could be because of obvious game mechanics limitations, but it is still interesting to ponder.)

And there is your answer for almost 90% of the reasoning.

[Nerovar]

I've noticed that the vast majority of beings who are connected with Death seem to always use Shadow magic, look at the nathrezim, or the NPCs in some of the realms of Death, or the dark rangers, and even most of Sylvanas's abilities. Even the very name of the afterlife implies that Death is far more closely associated with the Void than the other cosmic powers. The Void regards Death as its enemy, but for example, the Forsaken and nathrezim always seem to use Void powers without much hesitation, and there seem to be a far greater number of them who use the Void rather than the Light. Why is this so? Isn't this somewhat contradictory?

(Of course, this could be because of obvious game mechanics limitations, but it is still interesting to ponder.)

It's because the distinction between Shadow and Death and was only introduced to the lore at a very late stage.

[loras]

I've noticed that the vast majority of beings who are connected with Death seem to always use Shadow magic, look at the nathrezim, or the NPCs in some of the realms of Death, or the dark rangers, and even most of Sylvanas's abilities. Even the very name of the afterlife implies that Death is far more closely associated with the Void than the other cosmic powers. The Void regards Death as its enemy, but for example, the Forsaken and nathrezim always seem to use Void powers without much hesitation, and there seem to be a far greater number of them who use the Void rather than the Light. Why is this so? Isn't this somewhat contradictory?

(Of course, this could be because of obvious game mechanics limitations, but it is still interesting to ponder.)

The void sees it as no different from the other cosmic powers, neither enemy nor a friend but simply another.
Same goes for most non-opposing forces it seems.
Life can cooperate just fine with void and fel, even if it is evil from our llife/ light / order based point of view.

And they have cooperated thoroughly in the past, as i suspect further Maldraxxian lore will illustrate.

Additionally there seems to be some titanic influence on the Shadowlands, and between order and death lies the void, potentially explaining why the stuff we encounter seems to lean towards it.

But beyond that it is simply a gameplay thing i believe.

[bloodmoth13]

Blizz need to rework magic schools. Death, nature, arcane, fel, light, shadow, fire, frost, storm and physical.

Though i want a LOT more added through that then just pointless ability flavor.

[shoc]

Because all the lore post-Cataclysm is pulled out of a hat in a boardroom meeting of directors a couple of months before the content goes live.

[huth]

(Of course, this could be because of obvious game mechanics limitations, but it is still interesting to ponder.)

It's entirely this. Ingame spell-schools are pretty much entirely game mechanics and have little to no connection to the lore types of magic.

Necrolord abilities deal shadow damage, but lorewise, it's all Necromancy aka Death magic. Kyrian is all arcane, but also Necromancy. Night Fae has a lot of nature damage, but is, too, Necromancy.

[Kathranis]

I've noticed that the vast majority of beings who are connected with Death seem to always use Shadow magic, look at the nathrezim, or the NPCs in some of the realms of Death, or the dark rangers, and even most of Sylvanas's abilities. Even the very name of the afterlife implies that Death is far more closely associated with the Void than the other cosmic powers. The Void regards Death as its enemy, but for example, the Forsaken and nathrezim always seem to use Void powers without much hesitation, and there seem to be a far greater number of them who use the Void rather than the Light. Why is this so? Isn't this somewhat contradictory?

(Of course, this could be because of obvious game mechanics limitations, but it is still interesting to ponder.)

There is no death spell school in WoW, so unholy and necrotic spells deal shadow damage.

[Maljinwo]

Game limitations when calculating damage applied to a school of magic in game


Shadow = bad spooky
Death = bad spooky

[AwkwardSquirtle]

Death, Shadow and Fel were only separated in lore relatively recently. It's the same reason warlocks use Shadowbolts and Voidwalkers, and DKs leave a "Void Touched" debuff when they resurrect you.

[huth]

Actually that sounds EXACTLY how Metzen remembered the time when he was brought in to do voice narration for Warcraft Orcs and Humans. Only it wasn't a board of directors, it was the actual creators pulling it out of a hat. Without considering long term consequences.

I mean, that's pretty much how the entire process works, just that the board is one of lore devs, and it happens regularly. Not sure what people are expecting here.

It's a fictional universe. All of those are made up by somebody.

[Progenitor Aquarius]

Not only shadow. They are using also Frost magic too.

[TheFirstOnes]

Well, mostly just the Maw guys use it, and that’s due to the fact that they’re supposed to be “EVVVIIILLLL” or some shit like that...

[Shaetha]

I mean, that's pretty much how the entire process works, just that the board is one of lore devs, and it happens regularly. Not sure what people are expecting here.

It's a fictional universe. All of those are made up by somebody.

People on these forums think their fan fiction is better, basically.

[darkoms]

Death, Shadow and Fel were only separated in lore relatively recently. It's the same reason warlocks use Shadowbolts and Voidwalkers, and DKs leave a "Void Touched" debuff when they resurrect you.

I think warlocks use both Fel and Void. But yes, inside the game we have no division into Fel, Death and Void. Even the Chaos school of magic, which is only available to warlocks and DHs, deals damage all schools at once.

[Raetary]

They don't.
The majority of death related characters use death related spells.
In game they are classified as 'Shadow' because there is no necromantic spell category.


Then you have characters that simply use a mixture of spell types, dreadlords dabble in necromancy, fel as well as void.

[TheRevenantHero]

It's because Blizzard is lazy and doesn't want to add a new damage type so they just use "shadow" despite death magic having nothing to do with the Void.

[Darknessvamp]

It's likely due to Death magic coming first and it involving shadow magic is why. Void was introduced much later on as it's own separate cosmic power and takes what was originally Death based magic and just says it's void now, For example Priest's shadow spec wasn't void based at first and used what was called the Shadow school of magic.

The priest is a spellcaster with a diverse portfolio of spells. This class has the most potent healing spells, as well as excellent buffs. It also has good defensive spells that can ward allies from physical dangers and spells, as well as purely offensive shadow spells. However, as a primary spell caster, the priest is extremely fragile, with poor health and weak melee power.

Priests are pure spellcasters whose strengths are healing and defensive spells. Priest spells are divided between the holy and shadow schools, and fall into several categories: heals, attack spells, crowd control, and buffs.

Now the abilities they use are characterised as coming from Void energy despite the fact they still have some that deal shadow damage. Basically Blizzard later on in the lore split one type of magic into two but didn't bother differentiating the new magic enough from the original.

[huth]

Is there any functional difference between magic schools at this point? What difference does it make what school it is?

Which spells remain active when you get a school locked out. And there are some buffs or debuffs that only work on specific schools. But it's all game mechanics and not lore.

[huth]

It's likely due to Death magic coming first and it involving shadow magic is why. Void was introduced much later on as it's own separate cosmic power and takes what was originally Death based magic and just says it's void now, For example Priest's shadow spec wasn't void based at first and used what was called the Shadow school of magic.

No, the ingame schools just never cleanly matched the lore types of Magic in the first place. Fire and Frost are used both by Arcane casters and Shamans, as well as other fire or cold based attacks even when they're clearly non-magical. There's also the arcane school that is confusingly also used by Druids for no apparent reason, but not all Arcane spells are in the arcane school even in Vanilla WoW. A lot of the school choices in Vanilla were also clearly intended to make sure that nobody would encounter an enemy that was immune to all of their abilities.

The change with Priests wasn't that they now use Void when before they used Shadow, but that they went and expanded Shadow into what is now called Void. Even the cosmic chart says Void(Shadow).