[Spoilers] Elune talks!!! We finally hear/interact with Elune directly.

[Amaterasu65]

I didn't expect we'd have an encounter with Elune herself. The visuals were so beautiful. Guess she sent the souls of the dead NE to Shadowlands instead of keeping them on Azeroth and she got played. Oh well.

[Lolites]

Elune sacrificed her beloved people

did you even listen to the video?

[Dhrizzle]

It would be as easy as Elune asking to her sister "Why?"

Instead, she sent the influx of fresh anima, aka "her favorite children", without a simple fuck given.

If any believes this is good writing... hey, at least explains the nelf dark ranger.

How does communication work between the Everqueen in Ardenweald and Elune in... wherever Elune resides?

[bledgor]

Logic really.
The Shadowlands is responsible for all the dead in the universe. Everyone goes through one of its regions. Since its unlikely that no one in the universe is dying anymore the logical conclusion is that those that are dying don't reach the shadowlands.

Except it really isn't. Shadowlands as existed since the start of time (debatable I guess, but either way billions of years). Nothing like this has occurred before (as far as souls going to the maw directly, droughts might have happened before), therefore how was Elune supposed to magically know that would happen? We have the benefit of knowing all the bad that was happening in our tiny tiny tiny lifespan so it seems logic, for beings that have existed for billions of years the past 4 year blip of chaos is outside there realms of expectations.

[Lolites]

Lol. First time Elune speaks and we just learn that she's a sociopath.

nah, we learned is people dont even listen to the video and give it zero thought just run straight to comments to complain about it being shit...

[Timester]

Except till we got there and investigated even the WQ didn't know why, so still same result

And yet, asking would show concern with the souls of her favorite children. Considering that nelves actually turn into wisps.

But Gods seem that dont give a fuck.

[Raetary]

wait, Elune - who is like the god of the Warcraft universe

Elune is no more a god than the Winter Queen is.

[Tharivor]

Giving Elune a familial relationship and ergo a human face was bad.
Making Elune not followed by near exclusively night elves with a special bond to them but a cosmic deity was bad.
Making Elune's powers so unimpressive her chosen's only recorded win was against a single undead hunter was bad.
Having Elune pull the plug on her chosen's powers mid-fight was bad.
THIS CINEMATIC COMES OUT
Having Elune speak is bad.
Implying Elune could've stopped the Burning of Teldrassil is bad.
Implying Elune could've stopped the Burning of Teldrassil but chose not to is bad.
Having Elune be more oblivious about the fate of souls than random fodder Dark Rangers and a ghostly squirrel in Ardenweald is bad.
YOU ARE HERE
Giving Elune a model will be bad.
Having Elune hand out race and class agnostic quests to kill mobs will be bad.
Having Elune and the Winter Queen quip with each other while in a dungeon will be bad.
Having Elune be lolcorrupted by the next Big Bad will be bad.
Having Elune turn into a raid boss to be raided by nonplussed night elves will be bad.

Honestly, this is all that needs to be said. True deities work best when kept ambiguous, when questions of "Why didn't God/Elune do x?" can be left as a matter of faith- if only because that's how religion works in real life, and thus adds a touch of believable mystery into an otherwise over-explained and increasingly shallow fictional world.

Yes, of course we know Elune exists and sometimes intervenes, but as soon as you establish a means to reliably contact her and have her explain her rationale for her interventions, she just becomes another npc indistinguishable from other "godly" npcs such as the Titans/Naaru/Loa/Ancients/Aspects who do nothing but comedically blunder to make way for player heroism. Even in settings such as D&D where deities are unambiguously real, effort is made to maintain some distance between them and ordinary mortals, precisely to preserve some sense of divine power/mystique and keep them away from player power-creep.

I expect we'll see something similar in the inevitable Light vs Void expansion as Prime Naaru and Void Lords trip over themselves to look ridiculous and hype-up the player character.

[Gorsameth]

Not necessary, Ardenweald has literally the capability to rezz them.

only wild spirits and gods get resurrected and returned to their realm. Pretty sure we don't see any 'normal' mortals being reincarnated. Only turned into spirits to maintain Ardenweald.

[Timester]

How does communication work between the Everqueen in Ardenweald and Elune in... wherever Elune resides?

From the video, it seems they do have some kind of channel, or else Elune wouldnt know about WQ plea.

[Lady Atia]

"Yeah... I let all those elves die so the souls would keep you fed so I did help--- wait WHAT! ...they WENT WHERE? .........fuuuuuck, so that was a bad move on my part."


Omnipotent god-like being wasn't aware of what was going on in the afterlife.


But I guess this would be worse if Elune said "yeah, I knew the souls were going to go to the Maw, because I knew my children would come to you and aid you, so it's all apart of my plan"

She's not more omnipotent god-like being than the Winter Queen, who is literally called her counterpart lol. Guess some people who wanted a "god" in warcraft are now a bit angry haha.

[Gorsameth]

"My life for hers."

She wouldn't let Tyrande die the first time. Now we know why. She realllly wanted her to make another Tear of Elune.

But Elune didn't know all the nelf souls had gone to the maw when she denied Tyrande.

[Vladier]

Logic really.
The Shadowlands is responsible for all the dead in the universe. Everyone goes through one of its regions. Since its unlikely that no one in the universe is dying anymore the logical conclusion is that those that are dying don't reach the shadowlands.

The denizens of Bastion thought that the drought in their realm was merely due to there being no recently dead souls fit for Bastion. In fact, no one except Denathrius and those in Oribos knew that all souls go to the Maw due to the Arbiter being offline, because the Attendants saw it merely as a facet of the Purpose and didn't warn anyone, Brokers appear to be fairly recent arrivals in Oribos themselves, and Denathrius would obviously not tell anyone.

For all we know, Elune's first thought upon hearing her sister's plea for aid was: "Hmm, maybe I shouldn't make every soul that can feed my sister's realm almost immortal magical people and then still keep their souls as Wisps after they die".

[Xilurm]

I really don't know if that's the case. Wild Gods and others like them definitely have the option to be reborn into the mortal realm, so I don't know why that couldn't be extended to others, perhaps via Elune's own blessing, especially if she's part of the Pantheon of Life.

More importantly, I still really have no idea what the endgame for the Shadowlands, as a realm of Death, will even be. There are many, many souls that were wronged by the Jailer and his minions, and part of restoring balance would be doing right by them. There has also been too much talk of the injustice of Death to end with things just returning to the status quo, so I expect there to be some sweeping change to the mechanism of death before everything is over.

Perhaps that will mean that the souls stolen by the Jailer will have the option of renewal and rebirth, or reincarnation. I don't know if that means returning to life as they were before they died, or being born anew, but let me just say that I can 100% imagine a cutscene at the end of this expansion where a cascade of night elf souls stream down from the skies of Azeroth like shooting stars.

That would seriously make me so happy. I'd even be one of the people defending that cutscene or whatever it turns out to be. Heck I'd almost be willing to forgive Blizz about WoD.

But I don't know... After these last two expansions I just have the feeling they just flat out hate Night Elves.

[Gorsameth]

The denizens of Bastion thought that the drought in their realm was merely due to there being no recently dead souls fit for Bastion. In fact, no one except Denathrius and those in Oribos knew that all souls go to the Maw due to the Arbiter being offline, because the Attendants saw it merely as a facet of the Purpose and didn't warn anyone, Brokers appear to be fairly recent arrivals in Oribos themselves, and Denathrius would obviously not tell anyone.

For all we know, Elune's first thought upon hearing her sister's plea for aid was: "Hmm, maybe I shouldn't make every soul that can feed my sister's realm almost immortal magical people and then still keep their souls as Wisps after they die".

right, now Elune causing a drought in the SL. and not the previous 10k+ years that she has taken Nelf souls...

[Jastall]

It's just... meh. I don't understand the point of all this. Our first glimpse of Elune has her be either powerless or unaware of anything important. Tyrande's choice is forced and the decision she has to make renders her entire screentime since 8.1 a useless smokescreen. Night Elves are being shat on as the bargaining tools of powers above them (in more ways than one). Players who would want at least some closure or consequence for a playable race getting almost genocided are told that bad feelings are for losers and winners forget everything and rebuild until the next time they get spanked for the stupid ass faction war's sake.

Nobody comes out of this one having learned anything, no character was developed, no one looks better. It's just the status quo being restored at the beat of overly dramatic writing and music.

[Dhrizzle]

From the video, it seems they do have some kind of channel, or else Elune wouldnt know about WQ plea.

"I heard your cries, I felt your pain..." it doesn't seem like the sort of communication system where they can share details, otherwise the Winterqueen could have said "we're under attack from the Maw, don't send any souls the Jailer will get them."

[Kathranis]

wait, Elune - who is like the god of the Warcraft universe

She isn't "the god of the Warcraft universe" -- she is one deity of many, alongside the Titans and the Eternal Ones. And she belongs to a different realm than Death, almost certainly the realm of Life. So naturally she wouldn't have power or special insight into the Shadowlands, unlike Bwonsamdi, who is a minor death god.

She only has a window into the Shadowlands right now because she's using Tyrande as an avatar and Tyrande is there.

Well Bwonsamdi does often talk about collecting his debts so it is entirely possible he enjoys coming to get peoples soul personally.

But more likely its simply sloppy writing.

Once again, what makes you think that Elune, who is pretty obviously being established as a goddess of Life, would know more about the Shadowlands than Bwonsamdi, a god of Death, even a minor one?

The Cosmic Forces really don't intermingle very much. Elune heard her sister's pleas, that's all. No different from hearing the prayers of her mortal followers.

And she's not omniscient or omnipotent, either. She's just another deity in another pantheon, like the Titans and the Eternal Ones.

The Shadowlands is responsible for all the dead in the universe. Everyone goes through one of its regions. Since its unlikely that no one in the universe is dying anymore the logical conclusion is that those that are dying don't reach the shadowlands.

What are you even talking about? That is not what the story is for this expansion. People still die, they're going straight to hell instead of their intended afterlives. Nobody outside the Shadowlands knew that was happening until we got there. Hell, most within the Shadowlands didn't even know for sure why the drought was happening.

And again, the Shadowlands are not a realm that Elune can just peak into, obviously. She heard her sister's prayer and tried to answer it, that's all.

[Djaye]

More and more i am awaiting the day for a radical "atheist" (for the lack of a better word) movement, whose sole goal is to eradicate the influence of any "divine forces" from Azeroth.

this seems to be what old Sylvie wants, to destroy their whole system of life and death and how mortal souls are used by gods.
this isnt redeeming of her actions, but it explains her motives a bit better. her realization that the jailor is no different than the rest seems to fit in as well.
she is the only character who actually has the best interests of mortal souls in mind it seems imho.

[Kallisto]

The problem I have with this is first:

They are making revenge out to be a bad thing. It's really annoying because this is a story about war. I really hate that path Blizz has chosen.

Secondly, there's no saving the Night Elves. They can save them from the Maw yes, but they will still be stuck in the Shadowlands. So that ship sailed 4 years ago.

I actually don't really mind if Elune isn't all powerful... But I'd rather them be wisps in Azeroth than being stuck in the Shadowlands to live their "new lives".

But the war in wow in regards to the story has always been how this is not the way. That peace is the right way and revenge is wrong. That's been the core of the moral of wow since what WC3 when there actually put in a story beyond WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGH vs Honour.

It seems people pushing for war war war, revenge etc think this is Warhammer when it isn't.