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  1. #281
    Quote Originally Posted by Magical Mudcrab View Post
    Note: Obviously, this isn't me saying "people should reject the change", just that Blizzard really needs to start getting their ducks in a row before publishing a deluge of contradicting sources that fragment the story and introduce confusion.
    This. This is exactly why I can't keep picking at this scab. The nature of necromancy is a silly, frivolous debate of course. But the way Blizzard went about something seemingly trivial seems to indicate that the authors themselves lack a single source of truth.

    See, the way to responsibly handle a fictional universe, is to build it on top of immutable truths. Axioms that apply to everything in the setting. These axioms are meant to be kept secret, far away from the prying eyes of the fans. The fans only get to see the tip of the iceberg. It can be an inaccurate, unreliable representation of what's actually going on, it can conflict with what other iceberg tips are telling them. But these tips are still attached to massive icebergs deep beneath the surface.

    Games Workshop does this. There are like three veteran authors that hold a manuscript/encyclopedia with all the hard cats in the 40k universe. But that information is a strictly guarded secret, even more junior authors don't get to know it. Whenever a 40k author has an idea, they will have to get it vetted by this council of senior authors to make sure it remains consistent to this secret canon.

    Blizzard quite evidently doesn't have such a system in place. They may plan their expansions far ahead, but the story itself is ad hoc, and then these types of expositions, even just a few sentences, can cause a rippling effect that damage, if not collapse perfectly good lore that was established beforehand.

  2. #282
    Quote Originally Posted by Ielenia View Post
    They developed it on their own. That happens. It's similar to "convergent evolution" where two separate and independent species develop the same trait, such as bats and dolphins both developing echo-location.
    So, Azerothian necromancy is not the same as other necromancy? They don't pull it from one of the cosmic forces?

  3. #283
    Moderator Aucald's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Iain View Post
    If death isn't a school of magic then what is 'death magic'?
    I tend to think of the distinction as fuel vs. application. Death magic or essence is the "fuel" that is derived from the domain or primordial sphere of Death. Necromancy is more an application of said fuel, in this case, the application or process of reanimating a previously dead entity into a state of undeath. You can swap out Death magic with a number of other fuels to achieve the same basic application, albeit with varying results - you still wind up with an undead subject if properly applied, but as we've seen the presentation can be quite different. Undeath via Death magic is probably the most "natural" way to go about it - and the undead dwelling in Maldraxxus are a natural manifestation within the realm, as strange as that might sound to us. Necromancy fueled with the other essences like Arcane, Light, and Shadow tends to be more unnatural, and often creates undead beings where they ought not to be (such as in the physical universe), more a perversion of the Death/Necromancy/Undead relationship seen in Maldraxxus.
    "We're more of the love, blood, and rhetoric school. Well, we can do you blood and love without the rhetoric, and we can do you blood and rhetoric without the love, and we can do you all three concurrent or consecutive. But we can't give you love and rhetoric without the blood. Blood is compulsory. They're all blood, you see." ― Tom Stoppard, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead

  4. #284
    Quote Originally Posted by Aucald View Post
    I tend to think of the distinction as fuel vs. application. Death magic or essence is the "fuel" that is derived from the domain or primordial sphere of Death. Necromancy is more an application of said fuel, in this case, the application or process of reanimating a previously dead entity into a state of undeath.
    That's already very close to how I see things.

    Where I would expand upon, at least in my head canon, is that death magic would be the crude oil, necromantic energy the refined fuel, and then necromancy being the application on which the fuel is spent.

    That intermediary part is important. It doesn't deny that Necromancy is also still reanimating the dead by any means, and it certainly doesn't invalidate the possibility to reanimate the dead (after all, you can use various fuels to keep an engine running, provided it's not too picky), which literally is necromancy, through other schools of magic.

    All it does is keep the existence of necromantic essence alive in the game. And then it makes sense that Maldraxxus is a well-spring of necromantic essence, ready to use to conveniently raise the dead at will. Maldraxxus would be an ecosystem living on top of the realm of death, consuming it and freeing up its essence in more convenient substances.

    It feels as though Blizzard is invalidating that last part, even though they clearly presented 'necromantic' as a material property onto itself.

  5. #285
    Moderator Aucald's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Iain View Post
    That's already very close to how I see things.

    Where I would expand upon, at least in my head canon, is that death magic would be the crude oil, necromantic energy the refined fuel, and then necromancy being the application on which the fuel is spent.

    That intermediary part is important. It doesn't deny that Necromancy is also still reanimating the dead by any means, and it certainly doesn't invalidate the possibility to reanimate the dead (after all, you can use various fuels to keep an engine running, provided it's not too picky), which literally is necromancy, through other schools of magic.

    All it does is keep the existence of necromantic essence alive in the game. And then it makes sense that Maldraxxus is a well-spring of necromantic essence, ready to use to conveniently raise the dead at will. Maldraxxus would be an ecosystem living on top of the realm of death, consuming it and freeing up its essence in more convenient substances.

    It feels as though Blizzard is invalidating that last part, even though they clearly presented 'necromantic' as a material property onto itself.
    For me, what you think of as "refinement" is more the metaphysical aspect of touching on or interfering with the domain of Death in its ordered fashion - in this case, using any of the various magical "fuels" to create an undead entity outside of the natural place for such a thing, specifically Maldraxxus. As an example, Calia Menethil was raised into undeath using the Light to fuel the Necromantic process; but despite the fact that this didn't happen with true Death magic as its fuel, the process still touches on the function and purpose of the realm of Death specifically to hold Calia's soul from entering the Shadowlands and keep it anchored to her now-undead form. In this sense, Necromancy always touches on (or if you prefer, belongs to) the realm of Death - though it might be fueled by a number of sources, the very process of creating undead is deeply involved with and profoundly concerns the functionality of Death as a primordial concept.

    That's one aspect of the cosmological map from Chronicle that I think gets overlooked, the idea of the primordial realms not just as sources of power, but as platonic symbols of functionalities that exist within the metacosm. Death and Necromancy aren't just energies, they're systems and practices respectively, and while you may fuel Necromancy with any number of energies, the system you're working within (or interfering with) is that of Death, to which Necromancy as a practice rightfully belongs.
    "We're more of the love, blood, and rhetoric school. Well, we can do you blood and love without the rhetoric, and we can do you blood and rhetoric without the love, and we can do you all three concurrent or consecutive. But we can't give you love and rhetoric without the blood. Blood is compulsory. They're all blood, you see." ― Tom Stoppard, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead

  6. #286
    The Unstoppable Force Ielenia's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Iain View Post
    If death isn't a school of magic then what is 'death magic'?
    Death magic is a type of magic.

    Types of magic:
    • Death
    • Nature
    • Light
    • Elemental
    • Arcane
    • etc.

    Schools of magic:
    • Necromancy
    • Abjuration
    • Conjuration
    • Evocation
    • Illusion
    • Enchantment
    • etc.

    - - - Updated - - -

    Quote Originally Posted by Magical Mudcrab View Post
    I don't think it's just a matter of conflicting evidence, but of conflicting meta-accounts of what is reliable evidence.
    Not really? I mean, it's a rule of thumb that the most recent information is the most reliable information.

    - - - Updated - - -

    Quote Originally Posted by username993720 View Post
    So, Azerothian necromancy is not the same as other necromancy?
    I never said it's not the same.

    They don't pull it from one of the cosmic forces?
    Without any evidence that they did, Occam's Razor dictates that they didn't.
    "Torturing someone is not an evil thing to do if it is done for good reasons" by Varodoc
    "You sit in OG/SW waiting on a Mythic+ queue" by Altmer <- Oh, the pearls in this forum...
    "They sort of did this Dragonriding, which ushered in the Dracthyr race." by Teriz <- the BS some people reach for their narratives...

  7. #287
    Reforged Gone Wrong The Stormbringer's Avatar
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    Gonna repost this because why not.



    They decided that the WoW Cosmology chart is wrong. What am I talking about, you may ask? "Necromantic" and "Undead" are over there with Death.

  8. #288
    Quote Originally Posted by Ielenia View Post
    Death magic is a type of magic.

    Types of magic:
    • Death
    • Nature
    • Light
    • Elemental
    • Arcane
    • etc.

    Schools of magic:
    • Necromancy
    • Abjuration
    • Conjuration
    • Evocation
    • Illusion
    • Enchantment
    • etc.
    But Wowpedia categorises Nature, Light, Elemental and Arcane as a school of magic.

    https://wowpedia.fandom.com/wiki/Magic_schools


    But not Death. Death is not a school of magic.

    Likewise, that cosmic chart puts Death on par with Order, Disorder, Life, Light and Shadow.

    Necromantic on the other hands holds the same hierarchical position as Arcane, Nature, Holy, Fel and Void. If Nature is a type of magic, then so is Necromantic a type of magic of the same order.



    Now to avoid retreading the same cycle:

    You can dismiss the chart, say that it's old information that is now superseded by Sin'Dane's remark. And again, well spotted, because to me that remark and this chart are indeed in conflict. Unless some specifics are added.

    But doesn't the way such a big piece of lore gets cast aside by four sentences said by a NPC? And does this retcon only apply to the (rather sizable) 'Necromantic' part or the chart as a whole? What is being replaced by it?

    And therein lies the crux of my issue. I like the way the World of Warcraft seemed to flow with necromantic energies seeping from a place beyond which now turns out to be Maldraxxus. All of that made perfect sense to me. It explains all the different atmospheric effects in these zones and it explains why there are roaming undead that don't seem to have been risen or controlled by anyone alongside undead that clearly are under the control of some lich or necromancer.

    So when Is say that Blizzard probably didn't understand the ramifications of such a piece of trivia laid out there by a NPC, I'm actually cutting them slack. Way more slack than they've earned by this point.

    - - - Updated - - -

    Quote Originally Posted by The Stormbringer View Post
    They decided that the WoW Cosmology chart is wrong. What am I talking about, you may ask? "Necromantic" and "Undead" are over there with Death.
    Indeed they did. And I'm not convinced they realised the implications here. And if they didn't, then that's a clear piece of evidence that WoW's entire lore is on very thin ice as of now. I care about this game, but this does puts a major dent in the amount of confidence I put in Blizzard's capacity to understand their own universe.
    Last edited by Iain; 2022-06-07 at 03:23 PM.

  9. #289
    Quote Originally Posted by Ielenia View Post
    I never said it's not the same.
    So, what makes the denizens of the Shadowlands not the first ones to use Necromancy?

    Without any evidence that they did, Occam's Razor dictates that they didn't.
    -_-

    I need something better than this.

  10. #290
    The Unstoppable Force Ielenia's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Iain View Post
    But Wowpedia categorises Nature, Light, Elemental and Arcane as a school of magic.

    https://wowpedia.fandom.com/wiki/Magic_schools
    That article is talking about the game mechanic term of 'spell school', not the in-game lore about it. Remember: "physical" such as the damage caused by the Warrior's Rampage ability is also considered by the game mechanics as a "spell school".

    As for the cosmic chart? It apparently has become outdated information in lieu of what Sin'dane told us.
    "Torturing someone is not an evil thing to do if it is done for good reasons" by Varodoc
    "You sit in OG/SW waiting on a Mythic+ queue" by Altmer <- Oh, the pearls in this forum...
    "They sort of did this Dragonriding, which ushered in the Dracthyr race." by Teriz <- the BS some people reach for their narratives...

  11. #291
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    Quote Originally Posted by The Stormbringer View Post
    the WoW Cosmology chart is wrong.
    At least follow up the discussion before posting random stuff. We've already determined several pages ago that the cosmology chart and the newest description of Necromancy remain true without retcons. Aucald's posts provided good examples, like:

    Quote Originally Posted by Aucald View Post
    Calia Menethil was raised into undeath using the Light to fuel the Necromantic process; but despite the fact that this didn't happen with true Death magic as its fuel, the process still touches on the function and purpose of the realm of Death specifically to hold Calia's soul from entering the Shadowlands and keep it anchored to her now-undead form. In this sense, Necromancy always touches on (or if you prefer, belongs to) the realm of Death - though it might be fueled by a number of sources, the very process of creating undead is deeply involved with and profoundly concerns the functionality of Death as a primordial concept.

  12. #292
    The Unstoppable Force Ielenia's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by username993720 View Post
    So, what makes the denizens of the Shadowlands not the first ones to use Necromancy?
    What the fuck are you talking about? You really got lost in your own arguments.

    Just like your previous accusation, I have also never said the denizens of the Shadowlands were not the first to use necromancy.

    -_-

    I need something better than this.
    That's on you, though. You want to make a claim where you have no evidence to support it.
    "Torturing someone is not an evil thing to do if it is done for good reasons" by Varodoc
    "You sit in OG/SW waiting on a Mythic+ queue" by Altmer <- Oh, the pearls in this forum...
    "They sort of did this Dragonriding, which ushered in the Dracthyr race." by Teriz <- the BS some people reach for their narratives...

  13. #293
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    necro-
    /ˈnekrō/
    combining form
    relating to a corpse or death.

    -mancy. divination. (fantasy) Variety of magic, especially that controlling or related to a specific element, substance, or theme.


    Pretty much does mean Death Magic. but I understand what you're saying.

  14. #294
    The Unstoppable Force Ielenia's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Phob View Post
    necro-
    /ˈnekrō/
    combining form
    relating to a corpse or death.

    -mancy. divination. (fantasy) Variety of magic, especially that controlling or related to a specific element, substance, or theme.


    Pretty much does mean Death Magic. but I understand what you're saying.
    Necromancy is magic that affects the dead, but it's not death magic.

    Like many others, you're taking a real life definition of the word and avoiding the in-lore definitions. We have magic types (such as Death, Nature, Light, Elemental, etc) and spell schools (such as necromancy, divination, illusion, abjuration, etc.)
    "Torturing someone is not an evil thing to do if it is done for good reasons" by Varodoc
    "You sit in OG/SW waiting on a Mythic+ queue" by Altmer <- Oh, the pearls in this forum...
    "They sort of did this Dragonriding, which ushered in the Dracthyr race." by Teriz <- the BS some people reach for their narratives...

  15. #295
    Quote Originally Posted by Ielenia View Post
    Necromancy is magic that affects the dead, but it's not death magic.

    Like many others, you're taking a real life definition of the word and avoiding the in-lore definitions. We have magic types (such as Death, Nature, Light, Elemental, etc) and spell schools (such as necromancy, divination, illusion, abjuration, etc.)
    Yeah to me it's like how we have coal, solar, wind, hydro, nuclear energy and can use any of them to power a fan. The source of the energy is different but the result is the same.

  16. #296
    Reforged Gone Wrong The Stormbringer's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by A Chozo View Post
    At least follow up the discussion before posting random stuff. We've already determined several pages ago that the cosmology chart and the newest description of Necromancy remain true without retcons. Aucald's posts provided good examples, like:
    /shrug I didn't read all the comments.

    Also, Aucald's post is not a guarantee or confirmation of anything. It's a good theory, but we don't know for certain. Hell, I'll even say it's a really good theory that could (and should) be put into place, but we don't know if it will be. That's up to the WoW story devs.

  17. #297
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    The charts that show Necromantic as tha same level of arcane, light etc. and calls the power source as necromantic, not necromancy.

    I believe we can agree that Necromancy (school) is similar to Evocation (school), whereas Necromantic magic is a power source similar to Arcane.

    It would have been much better if Necromantic was named to something different to avoid confusion but calling it death magic would name it similar to the domain.

  18. #298
    The Unstoppable Force Super Kami Dende's Avatar
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    Spirit healers resurrect us all the time lorewise. Would they be Necromancers? or is the reanimation of a Person only Death Magic if the Corpse remains a corpse.

  19. #299
    So basically what the Margrave SinDane is saying is that every time we wipe in a raid we are brought back to life by some form of necromancy.

  20. #300
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    Quote Originally Posted by Super Kami Dende View Post
    Spirit healers resurrect us all the time lorewise. Would they be Necromancers? or is the reanimation of a Person only Death Magic if the Corpse remains a corpse.
    Gotta remain dead for it to be considered necromancy. It's animation of unliving flesh, the unliving flesh doesn't become living.

    Anyone who makes lame-ass jokes saying that paladins, spirit healers and what else are necromancers because the resurrect us completely missed the point and shouldn't even be posting.

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