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All the World's a Stage: So you want to be a draenei
This installment of All the World's a Stage is the eighth in a series of roleplaying guides in which we find out all the background information you need to roleplay a particular race or class well, without embarrassing yourself.The draenei are one of Warcraft's more unique contributions to the realm of fantasy fiction, the one player race without no real precedent in earlier fantasy worlds. These are not your typical elves, orcs and dwarves borrowed from Tolkien or Dungeons and Dragons; the draenei are tall, with hooves, tails, horns and even face-tendrils -- but they are noble and spiritual people, the last remnants of an ancient civilization of magic and beauty.To begin thinking about what it must be like to live as a draenei, imagine how the human race might be many thousands of years into the future, maybe a quarter of a million years from now. Whatever technology those people might have would probably seem like magic to us. Our descendants might unravel the mysteries of biology to such a degree that they can halt the aging process and live as long as they want to. They may be able to tap on sources of power we haven't even imagined, and act with motivations and purposes we could scarcely understand.The draenei as a people were once like this, 25,000 years before the setting of World of Warcraft. Even at that time, they were already ancient in their history and advanced far beyond what you and I might understand. Their world, called Argus, was a prosperous society full of great achievements and magical wonders, quite unlike anything we see today. They had a different name then, however -- they were called, the "eredar" -- a name which now upsets the draenei as a painful reminder of everything they have lost, the corruption, the betrayal and the near extermination of everything they have ever known and loved.
RP Spotlight: Inadra's tale
RP Spotlight highlights little things people do to deepen their experience of the story of World of Warcraft, whether they are roleplayers or not. Inadra's voice chills you from the very outset of her story: "I have walked on the bones of my people," she begins, "on a path so long that I could not see where it ended, or where it began..." So have you. You remember walking on those same bones, on the Path of Glory in Hellfire Peninsula -- where the corpses of the draenei people that were killed in a genocide by the Old Horde paved the way for the orcs' march to the Dark Portal and into Azeroth. (For more on the background of this genocide, find out how the orcs became so bloodthirsty.) If you've done the quest called "Path of Glory" at Honor Hold, then you will have seen a glimpse of the tragedy in this story. Perhaps, like me, you felt touched at the cleansing of some draenei bones, reminded of real people who had suffered similar ends at the hands of merciless enemies. Phaedria, of the Venture Co. realm, must have been touched too. She drew on this element within the Warcraft lore to craft a beautiful and heartbreaking tale of her own, set on Draenor just as the genocide against the draenei was beginning. It's about how the draenei in families such as her own faced such a terror with bravery and sacrifice, and how a few managed to survive with hope alive in their hearts. Phaedria narrates her tale in the voice of her main character, Inadra, and sets the mood perfectly, with background music, and subtle changes in her tone of voice. It's a great piece of audiodrama; so give it about 10 or 20 minutes of your time. After listening to it, you may never see draenei, or the World of Warcraft, the same again. [Thanks Tyche, for letting us know!]
