Originally Posted by
mmoc85591cbece
While i have for a while now been requesting night elves be portrayed more as kaldorei than tree'dorei, I can't help but wonder if the nightborne were initially intended to be the response beforre being diverteed to be blood elves.
It's obvious from what we are shown in-game, the kaldorei we play are far more children of the forest/trees than they are of the stars.. that higher calling and state we older players believed was their identity (because we told this and shown), with the long vigil state we saw in WC3 presentation seeming only a stage in the journey is now 14 years later only appearing to be a title only in name (irony) as blizzard didn't bother to properly expand on that.
However, the nightborne, well these are night elves of the pre-sundering culture. They have maintained the pre-suundering era idenetity, the one in which the name kaldorei was given in the first place.
While blizzard now call them kaldorei, they seem to be more children of the stars than the tree elves. Now while I'm fully aware night elves have highborne amongst them currently, face it, that culture has almost zero exposure amongst the kaldorei group.
The shen'dralar were not expanded in Cataclysm. And before you fans bring up the Farondis, they aren't of the present they are the 10,000 years ago version that aren't even alive.
The nightborne fit that bracket far better.
I think it is high time blizzard give the playable night elves a new name, Tree'dorei - and kaldorei becomes the ancient name of the elves.
This may seem harsh, but i think it better rfelcts the current development direction. Originally, the nighte lves appeared to be a people on a journey. The long vigil, arcane abstienence, full on nature, seemed just a phse their understanding of the world dictated upon them, we were introduced to them at the end of that phase, it was logical to assume that nature would not tbe the only facet we would see, but in time we would see more of the arcane side spoken of in their past, and the star stuff.
But it never showed. they have almost nothing to do with the stars, except for star shards removed from priests, and some balance druid spells, that seem more associated with tauren and trolls than night elves. Whereas the nightborne, they cast lots of moon and star spells in Suramar and the nighthold. Their city, has far more moon and star syymbols all over it. In the walls , the banners, the buildings - full of crescent moons and stars. Then you see Star Augurs, Astromancers, Starmancers - lots of moon spells.
Not once do you see a night elf npc druid cast star/moon spells.
If the night elves were actually going to be the kaldorei, we would have seen more of it by now. I know they didn't flesh out the shen'dralar, but htey did the nightborne, and the nightborne are portrayed as nightborne, not night elves.
And at the moment they seem mroe kaldorie than the Darnassians.
I feel blizzard needs to either.
1. Chang ethe name of the night elves from Kaldorei to Tree'dorei or
2. Bring out the star aspect of the kaldorei a lot more strongly in the Darnassians by either
a) another original kaldorei group being fleshed out like the nightborne were or
b) TIe the nightborne back into the kaldorie and bring out that aspect more - eitherby causing alareg group to defect to the kaldorei and turn into their kaldorie forms continuing in the pre-sundering arcane/elune culture and havingt hat element shown visibly.
c) TAke the Darnassians and focus more on the star /arcane side, connecting that aspect of their identity to their current state - they are no longer in vigil, arcane abstiencne is meaningless now, so is the fear or stigma after the legion's defeat and curing of addiction - use it. to bring out that identity.
Otherwise, develop the kaldorei identity of the nightborne. There is a reason they are Shal'dorei, not shaldorei, they feel more like caste of kaldorei, like the highborne (quel'dorei) than they do a different non-night elf related entity.
THis is just my impression btw. I noticed the Kaldorei identity of the nightborne was strongly shown in 7.0 and 7.1 and in the nighthold, but since then, its vgone awol.. they seem to be just blood elves with a shal'dorei model. They don't feel kaldorei or associated with the akldorei at all anymore.
Even though everything about them in Legion is pre-sundering kaldorei.