May the true dark elf please stand up!

[matrix123mko]

Their "Dark Elves" are nocturnal Wood Elves with purple skin.

I meant the ones that live in a blackhole and listen to whispers.

[ravenmoon]

So.. the dark elves are naga. Yeah, that is probably the closest to the truth. Well except the unwavering loyalty.
Edit: It even works to some degree with the traditional aesthetic, which is a darker looking version of the shaldorai.

well we are never going to get the concept exactly, the night elf was created to be a modified dark elf, with the best parts of the dark elf and the best parts of the wood elf, presuambly the pre-sundering civilziation shows the best parts of the dark elf the clearest and the long vigil the wood elves part the clearest, but both of these are present in the night elve sin the presundering era.

The greatest distortion comes towardst he end of Azshara's Night elf reign when she gets all super obsessed.

It's a complex story with it's own twists, but essentially yeh, in that invasion period is the closest they come tot he fantasy dark elf because she is plain ol evil at this point even though most don't know it.

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The thing with azshara's court is that they are pretty much roman imperialists that dominated large parts of the world at that time. They don't really have the shunned exiles thing going for them (pre-sundering), they were the absolute opposite in fact. The exiles theme was with the highborne that later became the high elves and then way later with the void elves in WoW. So they lack the persecution and revenge theme, but they certainly have the (spiritual) matriarchy theme going for them as well. The difference is more in the detail again though. While they also have the whole female only cleric shtick in both WoW (more so post sundering) and D&D, in WoW the ruling class were mages fed by the well of eternity, wheres in D&D they were ruled by a priest class that worships a spider god.

Hmm now that I think about it again, post sundering Azshara's court certainly was "forced" into hiding, just below the waves instead of below the earth. I guess the naga really have the strongest dark elf theme in WoW going for them. Though I have issues labling ugly ass hentai monsters as elves .

Yep pretty much this. Azshara's court isn't evil at first, it's just as benevolent and high achieving as elves can get, it's part of the night elf ethos, but she gets obsessed for more knowledge/power, well power in particular, and gets addicted and corrupt and her court too. in many ways they are even worse than she is.


You can see the dark elf priesthood theme in the sisterhood of Elune all the way, with modifications, Elune isn't a spider god ofc, but the high priestess leads the Night elves at some point I believe and does so again after the sundering when the monarchy is ofc defeated.

The high arcane affinity and mastery of the night elves is another dark elf fantasy feature, as is the nocturnal and dark skin. It is shown in game best in the Nightborne which are essentially kaldorei civilization displayed but with a modified version of the race. Nightborne aren't really a different thing to kaldorei, they are a particular aspect of the kaldorei focused on in an allied race.

Night elves are given a very broad scope , as the original elven race, it's a shame that this isn't thoroughly continued in the kaldorei themselves, but now seems split between night elves and Nightborne, rather than night elves continuing to carry the fullness of kaldorei, and Nightborne just reflecting the dark elf side, like most allied race who also reflect parts of their original core race rather than replace them. It's a bit unfair to keen night elf fans, to see a half of your race you liked now ported to the opposite faction and you have to switch to enjoy it.

Imo, night elves should continue to be developed in their original full vision, they really are like the Zandalari are to trolls, having the full expression and totality of what it means to be elves. They should create a separate allied race like the night elf worgen or cenarians to focus purely on the forest elf half just as the Nightborne focus on the dark elf half, while the night elves the core race have all those elements.

I say this because they are created as the only elven race to remain unchanged and still maintain the original identity of the kaldorei as children of the stars, - this is meaningless if they're shoe horned entirely into either forest elves or dark elves, they must have both, and must have their unique elements.

The best night elf surgery is to bring out their kaldorei aspect as their primary focus, not the wood elf or dark elf, but the star elf. So while they have all the elements of wood elves and dark elves that their sub-races (nightborne and nelf worgen home in on), they have this star theme at their centre that's cascading powerfully through their dark elf (highborne/moongaurad arcane, priesthood) and forest elf (druid, hunters etc) powerfully

[Verdugo]

the night elf was created to be a modified dark elf, with the best parts of the dark elf and the best parts of the wood elf

And they failed.

[BillCosby14]

Night Elves are the only Dark Elves. Blood Elves just get the nigger skin to appease the diversity degenerates

[Sangris]

I meant the ones that live in a blackhole and listen to whispers.

Fair enough. But Void Elves are trying too hard to be good for me to count them as Dark Elves.
I just find it funny that Blizzard said they basically made Night Elves their Dark Elves when they in fact have aboslutely nothing in common with them except maybe their matriarchal society (even though that's not really a thing either) and their goddess worship. They're just Wood Elves.

[Verdugo]

Void Elves are the closest race to drow/dark elves.

Not really, since they are sucking up to humans.

[matrix123mko]

Fair enough. But Void Elves are trying too hard to be good for me to count them as Dark Elves.
I just find it funny that Blizzard said they basically made Night Elves their Dark Elves when they in fact have aboslutely nothing in common with them except maybe their matriarchal society (even though that's not really a thing either) and their goddess worship. They're just Wood Elves.

Yes. They for some reason made their second attempt at making dark elves and they screwed up again. They should have made void elves an option for Horde blood elves.

[Mace]

Fair enough. But Void Elves are trying too hard to be good for me to count them as Dark Elves.
I just find it funny that Blizzard said they basically made Night Elves their Dark Elves when they in fact have aboslutely nothing in common with them except maybe their matriarchal society (even though that's not really a thing either) and their goddess worship. They're just Wood Elves.

it's cos they haven't properly developed the night elves, and to make matters worse, half of their development is in novels.

they did work for them in classic - then avoided them till Cata - that is no development for 6 years. In TBC and WOTLK, you only saw night elves when the Cenarion expedition was out, and this reinforced the forest elf theme - rather than diversifying them and showing other bits like the dark elf arcane theme from the pre-sundering era - which only had dire maul, and the temple and warrior terrace in Darnassus hearkening too.

They never once even showed an in-depth of the sisterhood of Elune, where the star focus or where the Kal is in the kaldorei.. Most of the focus was on other race.

You only see NPCs and Tyrande's first cameo role in MoP (first time she does ANYTHING in wow).. but you have to wait till Legion to see any real development of the ngiht elves. At this point there are so manythings to catch up on. When they made the Nightborne a sub-raec instead of making them full night elves, they alienated a half of the night elves by posting them to the horde, then failing to develop them as night elves on the horde - so what you effectively have is the majority of people considering the Nightborne as blood elves with purple skin rather than Highborne kaldorei culture and Kaldorei civilization which is EXACTLY what they are.

ALl of this is due to failure to present the race properly. They went so out of the way on the druidism, failing utterly on Elunism based matriarchy, and the high arcane magic - which are the hallmarks of dark elves (minus the evil, dark elves are known to be devilishly brilliant with arcane magic and have this matriarchal society). So the night elves have this element via the sisterhood, and they have the arcane expertise that is written into the race (not just pre-sundering lore, but that is included, every night elf is aracne adept, and arcane powered by virtue of their birth and creation, it's just that only those talented enough to wield it at the level required for the mage class, train for it these days amongst the kaldorei)

But many details are obscured, half presented, we never see the details. They really need to do another Warcraft RPG book, or make an effort to show culture and peoples in the game, to flesh this out. But we know lore and world building /realism is not the aim of the franchise.

[Hubbl3]

I said the closest not that they were 1 to 1.

They use dark magic, their heritage armor is -very- reminiscent of Warhammer Dark Elf aesthetic.

They're a brooding people lead by a matriarch residing in a place that's probably the closest out of the elf races' homes to the Underdark.

They're the Coca Cola Light version of Drow/Dark elves just like every other race in WoW is a Coca Cola Light version of more interesting fantasy races.

Can't say much about Drows but Void Elves have next to nothing in common with Dark Elves from Warhammer except sometimes wearing kinda familar clothes and having pointy ears. I mean, you could say they are the closest of the Warcraft Elves, but that isn't saying much.

[Sangris]

I said the closest not that they were 1 to 1.

They use dark magic, their heritage armor is -very- reminiscent of Warhammer Dark Elf aesthetic.

They're a brooding people lead by a matriarch residing in a place that's probably the closest out of the elf races' homes to the Underdark.

They're the Coca Cola Light version of Drow/Dark elves just like every other race in WoW is a Coca Cola Light version of more interesting fantasy races.

San'layn are actually the closest. In my opinion, they should have given Nightborne to the Alliance (since the magical Elf niche was already taken by Blood Elves anyway) and San'layn to the Horde.

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it's cos they haven't properly developed the night elves, and to make matters worse, half of their development is in novels.

they did work for them in classic - then avoided them till Cata - that is no development for 6 years. In TBC and WOTLK, you only saw night elves when the Cenarion expedition was out, and this reinforced the forest elf theme - rather than diversifying them and showing other bits like the dark elf arcane theme from the pre-sundering era - which only had dire maul, and the temple and warrior terrace in Darnassus hearkening too.

They never once even showed an in-depth of the sisterhood of Elune, where the star focus or where the Kal is in the kaldorei.. Most of the focus was on other race.

You only see NPCs and Tyrande's first cameo role in MoP (first time she does ANYTHING in wow).. but you have to wait till Legion to see any real development of the ngiht elves. At this point there are so manythings to catch up on. When they made the Nightborne a sub-raec instead of making them full night elves, they alienated a half of the night elves by posting them to the horde, then failing to develop them as night elves on the horde - so what you effectively have is the majority of people considering the Nightborne as blood elves with purple skin rather than Highborne kaldorei culture and Kaldorei civilization which is EXACTLY what they are.

ALl of this is due to failure to present the race properly. They went so out of the way on the druidism, failing utterly on Elunism based matriarchy, and the high arcane magic - which are the hallmarks of dark elves (minus the evil, dark elves are known to be devilishly brilliant with arcane magic and have this matriarchal society). So the night elves have this element via the sisterhood, and they have the arcane expertise that is written into the race (not just pre-sundering lore, but that is included, every night elf is aracne adept, and arcane powered by virtue of their birth and creation, it's just that only those talented enough to wield it at the level required for the mage class, train for it these days amongst the kaldorei)

But many details are obscured, half presented, we never see the details. They really need to do another Warcraft RPG book, or make an effort to show culture and peoples in the game, to flesh this out. But we know lore and world building /realism is not the aim of the franchise.

All that aside, it's still a joke that Blizzard actually consider Night Elves their version of Dark Elves.

[ravenmoon]

Yes. They for some reason made their second attempt at making dark elves and they screwed up again. They should have made void elves an option for Horde blood elves.

They didn't screw up because they weren't trying to make dark elves, but void elves. New concept.


with night elves they screwed up because they haven't really developed them as night elves/kaldorei as originally defined and mapped, but seem to be progressing them as forest elves only - that's a screw up (but then can we say it's a screw up? It's a decision to not properly portray atheir original concept and just settle for the easier more familiar wood elf trope).


It's not screwing up as much as not caring much anymore or dropping the ball.


The Kaldorei should have been star focused or heavily star influenced from the outset of wow that starts exploring their world. We should have seen it in the character creation, and the lore - because they are NIGHT ELVES - Children of the Stars, not dark elves nor wood elves.

[Cosmic Janitor]

Yes. They for some reason made their second attempt at making dark elves and they screwed up again. They should have made void elves an option for Horde blood elves.

The existence of void elves is entirely predicated on giving the alliance the blood elf model, while, like a petulant child, finding a "Blizzard-spin" way to do it, that is not the simple solution the playerbase has suggested them for years. Well only to cave in now anyway, lol.

[matrix123mko]

The existence of void elves is entirely predicated on giving the alliance the blood elf model, while, like a petulant child, finding a "Blizzard-spin" way to do it, that is not the simple solution the playerbase has suggested them for years. Well only to cave in now anyway, lol.

They are surely cooler than high elves. Even cooler than current take on blood elves. However, I think the idea of giving a void based race to Alliance is not particularly good.

[Hubbl3]

They are surely cooler than high elves. Even cooler than current take on blood elves. However, I think the idea of giving a void based race to Alliance is not particularly good.

It would work better if they would be more secretive about it, especially considering the lightforged draenei and not so "look at us, we are using void powers!".

[matrix123mko]

It would work better if they would be more secretive about it, especially considering the lightforged draenei and not so "look at us, we are using void powers!".

Yes. They could have made them have two forms and they would pretend to be high elves. They would make the story quite morally grey.

[Beloren]

San'layn are actually the closest. In my opinion, they should have given Nightborne to the Alliance (since the magical Elf niche was already taken by Blood Elves anyway) and San'layn to the Horde.

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All that aside, it's still a joke that Blizzard actually consider Night Elves their version of Dark Elves.

It's funny you should say this, but I actually agree with you.

If the Nightborne were on the alliance with the Night elves it would have worked quite well togehter for them. You'd likely have the Highborne moving in with the Nightborne, The sisterhood of Elune re-establishing itself in Suramar, with the nightborne gaining some druidism and Elunism whiles the Night elves having their civilization side lived in/through alongside the Nightborne, while their forest side continues as is. ElegyGood war would have still happened, but either with the Nightborne broken isle help arriving too late and not enough, and the portals being made to Suramar instead of Stormwind.

The Night elf government would launch the Darkshore warfront from the Broken Isles, after only getting Worgen help.

Hmm, I think I see Raven's point at last on this one. Actually that does seem to work quite well from the night elf perspective, much better than what the Nightborne are currently doing on the horde, which is why I agree with you. San'lyan would have been a much better prospect - edgy, cool, vampiric and have a forsaken link. it would not have felt like them taking alliance stuff and we wouldn't have 100 posts complaining about it.

Personally I would have liked San'layn - i do think that vampire vibe could be extended and made really cool.

I mean the alliance like void elves and the horde like Nightborne, but that route has kinda broken the night elves and consigned them to forest elves (which some people are just refusing to admit), the grander kaldorei vision died when they took the Nightbone horde and decided not to actually do any development with them along their kaldorei roots.

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They are surely cooler than high elves. Even cooler than current take on blood elves. However, I think the idea of giving a void based race to Alliance is not particularly good.

I also agree with you here. Void elves fit better on the horde. 100% agree, we have the racial support for it too with the Forsaken and Mag'har shadowmoon orcs, and it fits our theme better.

Between Void elves and San'layn - the void elf in its current rendition is cooler, but if San'layn were to be playable they would have improved and remodelled them, the vampire vibe is cool.

They broke the elves when they took the Nightborne to the horde. It was the Nightborne been given to the horde that prompted the creation of the void elves and given to the alliance. So now we have blood elf race playable on alliance, and night elf race playable on the horde

This is opens the door for high elves on the alliance which is now a reality, meanwhile Nightborne as pre-sundering night elves (with new elite NElf bodies), are on the horde.


Tbh, they didn't break the elves as much as they broke the faction separation - and it's only a matter of time night elves are involved with Nightborne - either as unplayable allies, or playable body slider option for Nightborne.

[tmamass]

none of them. dark elves have BLACK skin not dark brown. there are no dark elfs in wow as this aint DnD.

[Triceron]

None. Try Warhammer instead

This x100000. There is no real 'Dark Elf' in Warcraft.