World of Warcraft®

The Blood Elves had the advantage of living in a society that glorified magic and built an entire kindom upon it. They've been allies with Dalaran. For 10,000 years they've been able to practice magic with the best of resources.

The Highborne have spent the last 10,000 years in a hovel of a city, under the rule of a crazed leader, sacrificing their own to keep their magical battery up and running. They had nowhere near the resources or growth the Blood Elves did. Also remember, the Blood Elves -were- Highborne originally.

7300, but yeah... I dunno. Even with that quest, I would put the Highborne against the High/Blood Elves any day. *Shrug* That's just me personally.

I would need to agree with Kaaylee. But if we want true masters of the arcane, Draenei. They have been at it for much longer, well over 20,000 years or so.

I would put a Highborne up against a High/Blood Elf any day of the week as well if we talk about seniority (time spent) in the Arcane Arts.

I would need to agree with Kaaylee. But if we want true masters of the arcane, Draenei. They have been at it for much longer, well over 20,000 years or so.

I would put a Highborne up against a High/Blood Elf any day of the week as well if we talk about seniority (time spent) in the Arcane Arts.

The blood elves and high elves were highborne. as a race they've both been practicing arcane magic for the same period of time, just blood elves evolved during that period.

I would need to agree with Kaaylee. But if we want true masters of the arcane, Draenei. They have been at it for much longer, well over 20,000 years or so.

I would put a Highborne up against a High/Blood Elf any day of the week as well if we talk about seniority (time spent) in the Arcane Arts.

The blood elves and high elves were highborne. as a race they've both been practicing arcane magic for the same period of time, just blood elves evolved during that period.

Yeah, but Highbourne live much longer than Blood/High Elves.

blood/high elves outnumber the highborne. and really lifespan doesn't matter that much since having a breakthrough in magic would effect your entire race and generations to come. since blood/high elves are in contact with dalaran they also have even more resources.

night elves need to swallow their pride and admit that a race may be better at something than they are.

Uhm, okay. Lifespan does matter a great deal in this regard. High/Blood Elves have only a few centuries to learn the Arcane while Highbourne had 10k years. Highbourne have been immortal up until Hyjal. Blood/high Elves havn't.

age only matters if any breakthroughs a blood elf makes is lost with their death, not carried on in future generations of magic users.

Dunno what this break through. Or what Dalaran has to do with it. And I didn't know Highbourne were part of the Night Elves...

dalaran put hundreds of mages together and pooled their work. more people working on more projects means more advancements than the highborne ever could in a bunch of ruins even if they did live for 10k years.

blood/high elves outnumber the highborne. and really lifespan doesn't matter that much since having a breakthrough in magic would effect your entire race and generations to come. since blood/high elves are in contact with dalaran they also have even more resources.

night elves need to swallow their pride and admit that a race may be better at something than they are.

Uhm, okay. Lifespan does matter a great deal in this regard. High/Blood Elves have only a few centuries to learn the Arcane while Highbourne had 10k years. Highbourne have been immortal up until Hyjal. Blood/high Elves havn't.

Dunno what this break through. Or what Dalaran has to do with it. And I didn't know Highbourne were part of the Night Elves...

They are Night Elves.

Also, they are arguing resources. While yes, the Highborne who remained on Kalimdor and so remained Night Elves were immortal and so had many centuries to amass vast knowledge, they practiced their magic with very limited, low quality, materials and sources. The High Elves on the other hand while not possessing immortality did have nearly unlimited resources and better quality tools and materials.

So yes, without having hard data (Blizz dev saying this is how it is) we could draw the conclusion that while the Highborne, individually, would posses more knowledge of the arcane then an individual blood elf, the blood elves as a whole had a better environment to facilitate better arcane knowledge gathering and so more advanced usage of the Arcane.

But that's just one way of looking at it, you have another. But really, maybe it's just the tone I read your posts in, but you seem to be getting very worked up over this. Calm down, these are just opinions.

I love discussing Lore. Its one of my favorite hobbies outside of RPing. Maybe it's excitement

you come off abbraisive then

Really awesome post, Melyria.

There is one implied, some say confirmed, case of homosexuality displayed by a Kaldorei. Sentinel Sweetspring at Star’s Rest openly flirts with Sentinel Amberline, the latter flustered by the approach.

Now see, my brain computed that as tied in with the rest of what we know of Sweetspring. Everything else she says or does is directed at mocking Modoru's fashion sense. Now, I could imagine Sweetspring tormenting Amberline about "Of course you like his robes; I'll bet you wonder what he keeps under them, don't you?" Irritated Amberline IS irritated, after all.

Highbourne have been immortal up until Hyjal.

Actually, the Highborne that are/were in Eldre'Thalas retained their immortality after Hyjal and only recently lost it.

What happened was Prince Tortheldrin managed to imprison the demon Immol'thar which was used as a kinda energy battery. The energy given from the demon granted the Highborne immortality. (Also should point out many Highborne were unaware of this as it was kept secretive within a select few)

It's safe to say now that they lost it since there's quests to kill both Immol'thar and Prince Tortheldrin. So the Highborne would've lost their immortality more recently at the hands of adventurers and not due to Hyjal's destruction.

I hate to say it, since I expected Night Elf mages to be arcane powerhouses myself, but in-game content trumps speculation.

The Azshara questline is pretty definitive. The Blood Elf in question mocks the Night Elves, questions their old, faulty scrying-stone "hardware", and laughs out loud at their choice of using those arcane constructs from Dire Maul as combat pets. Apparently, great as those things are, you just don't use those for combat if you know anything about magic (Khadgar using them as tour-guides is probably still coo', though). Unlike the typical water elemental, those things are really temperamental and really easy to turn against their caster. He does exactly that, hacking an arcane construct and melting the whole lot of Night Elves into goop.

I was expecting a "oh, they're actually not bad!" moment in that questline to break up the stream of "Night Elves? With Magic? AHAHAHAHA! Oh, that's adorable, they're so cute!", but it never came. He winds up completely justified in his opinion that watching Night Elves study magic is like watching children play with firearms. The Night Elves aren't just bad because they're all rookies - the very idea of using arcane constructs is bad, and that has to be something passed down by the High-Borne. It's pretty obvious that most Night Elves just aren't that good at magic yet, and even the original High-Borne are using and teaching "outdated" techniques (and the reception on their scrying stones is just awful!)

Warcraft magic doesn't really seem to be linked to age - and it really is pretty science-like when you get right down to it. It's all about theories and formulas. Things like that don't get better with time - they get outdated. It's not so much about collecting the wisdom of the ancients over the long centuries - but experimenting and doing new things the ancients haven't tried. Jaina and that guy I don't wanna mention are two of the strongest mages around - and they're humans. Pretty young humans, too - so you don't even need to be old-by-human-standards to get really good at magic. Khadgar might be stronger - but, again, he's only old by human standards, and in his glory days, even he was, if I remember right, not actually old but artificially aged by Medivh's curse. Obviously, young people with new ideas or just a natural aptitude can and regularly do surpass the old masters. Blood Elves might not live as old as the High-Borne have, but all signs suggest that learning the new magic theories a hundred years ago is much more effective than having ten thousand years to work and refine the old ones.

In short, it'd certainly make sense to roleplay as an arrogant High-Borne who thinks his ancient lore and centuries of wisdom make him superior to anything the "young races" could possibly do magic-wise - as long as you keep in mind that it isn't actually true. Your High-Borne is going to be in for a very, very unpleasant surprise the day he comes up against an experienced Blood Elf Magister.

http://www.wowhead.com/quest=14430

http://www.wowhead.com/quest=14430

Al'teth la c'tolgar you too, buddy.

I havn't been able to do the questlines on Kalimdor beyond Darkshore yet. These revelations about Highbourne ways are indeed revelating.

The quest in question is Horde only, as is all of Azshara. To get the full feel of the quest you'd have to roll a Horde.

I didn't quite feel like checking all seven pages to see if somebody else corrected you, but Night Elves -do- take up their mate's surname when they 'marry'.

I cite the alchemist trainer in Dolanaar and his wife. She even refers to him as her husband when asking herbalist players a favor.