Why is Onyxia purple?

[Vampyrr]

The more realistic answer is probably that they wanted Onyxia to look distinctly female in her dragon form and this is one of the easiest ways they could do so in vanilla.

That said, as much as you want to argue the point, she's not purple. She's black/brown with purple highlights. Her actual scales are the same colour as other black dragons in vanilla.

Ding ding ding this person has the answer. It makes her look like a female dragon as she is one of the first dragons in WoW to be shown as female. We really didnt get introduced to any other female dragons until much later in the game. Also our first interactions is with her human form and her outfit matches her dragon form. It makes it very obvious who she was when she transforms.

[Thage]

If she's a black dragon, why is she purple?

Most of her scales are black, she has purple highlights because an all-black monster in Onyxia's Lair would be very visually uninteresting. The extra pop of color also helps with visibility in a predominantly red-and-black environment with red lighting.

[Auxis]

But the black dragonflight is called black because they are black.

They're not really black, more like a really dark brown.

[Eurhetemec]

Deathwing (and the Obsidian Worldbreaker mount) uses a nice charcoal color, which I think would be a good color for the black dragonflight instead of the strange color they all have atm.

Yeah he's kind of more dark grey (i.e. charcoal) and orange than actually black, but you get what they're going for. I think WoW's artists had improved a lot in terms of how well they used the medium by the time Cataclysm hit (let alone more recently).

The red-brown & orange is kind of a cop-out that i think results from them wanting to keep the rest visually differentiated from Deathwing (which I agree is kind of a mistake). I suspect they may fix it if they ever do a truly dragon-centric expansion.

[Easyclassictopkeklel]

If she's a black dragon, why is she purple?

Same reason why my dick is purple. It takes a lot of strokes to take her down.

[InfernalDark]

How many stupid threads will OP start today?

[Sagenod]

She is.

Source? I'd like to see where you're getting this from.

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It's not like just being female was the reason they made Onyxia purple or there would be more examples especially across the Black Dragonflight if it were the case. It seems specific to Onyxia more or less, so I guess they just thought Onyxia's story was special enough that it deserved its own special unique model. Probably because the deception in the throne room is supposed to be a really big deal and they probably wanted people to remember the dragon that did it rather than just being another named dragon that looks the same as the rest. They also may have just thought it looked cool at the time, but in retrospect it is pretty weird they decided to make the coloration specifically so different from the rest of the flight without making it consistent as a color option really anywhere else of note.

They didn't just think Onyxia was special enough, they wrote her to be lol. She was a very important antagonist in vanilla

[Dimmak]

If she's a black dragon, why is she purple?

In game the reason is that black is very difficult to render as a base color. In software its usually the color used to indicate zero light radiance. Couple the fact the technology back then did not have have actual light tracing it made it more difficult.

Then as a traditional artist you try to avoid using black as a base color. Usually you attempt a very deep dark color reserving black as a very rare instance. Look around nature, true black is rare, very rare. Even your black kittens, look at them their really not truly black. Pathers are an almost irredent purple.


TLDR: black is hard to use in graphic engines and is considered a weak design in traditional art.

[Kyphael]

Cause she's a girl. D'uh!

[Schattenlied]

She is.

Uhh, you sure about that?

Yep

Because this looks a whole lot like black scales with purple accents to me.

[taishar68]

If she's a black dragon, why is she purple?

Because she really, really, likes grape juice.

[Rustedsaint]

She’s black with purple highlights, you may need to see colour specialist about your eyes if you can’t tell the difference

[sunnycutie]

MMO C posters going places.....

Next up: Why are republicans red and democrats blue when in reality none of them are?

What a terrible comparison.

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She’s black with purple highlights, you may need to see colour specialist about your eyes if you can’t tell the difference

Why is she black with purple highlights?

You aren't answering the question, you are just changing the question.

[Kyphael]

Why is she black with purple highlights?

You aren't answering the question, you are just changing the question.

It's like the Presidential debate all over again! Tell'im OP!

[Eldar45]

What a terrible comparison.

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Why is she black with purple highlights?

You aren't answering the question, you are just changing the question.

Because if she was straight jet black with no variation in shade or color then she would look... wrong.

Purple adds color contrast and makes her, ironically, look more real.

[Neuroticaine]

Why is she black with purple highlights?

You aren't answering the question, you are just changing the question.

Natural pigmentation variations, like pretty much any other animal in existence.

This thread's giving me an aneurysm

[Soulwind]

Yep

There, I fixed her.

[tangers58]

Her scales are black, the membranes on her wings are purple.

[Ninix]

There, I fixed her.

Perfect.
Thread closed.

[Mrbleedinggums]

If she's a black dragon, why is she purple?

OMG, Karen, you can't just ask someone why they're purple.