Long long ago, human beings all around the world (of Earth, not Warcraft) investigated different ways of describing how the world around them worked. Many different cultures found that the materials they encountered seemed divided into four or five separate elements, each with its own properties: earth, fire, water, and air. Space, "void," or "aether" was often noted as the fifth element, or, as in the case of China, the understanding of these elements looked a lot different but in the end produced a similar sort of system.

In Azeroth, however, these ideas about the elements never got swallowed up by modern science and the periodic table of elements. They turned out to be real forces in the world, each with its own set of elemental spirits, which people could communicate and cooperate with.

Shamans are the masters of this magical task, charged with helping to maintain the balance of nature in a very different way from druids. While druids are focused more on nature as a system of energy, life, and growth, shamans focus more on the spirits of the land, flames, waters and skies as they all interact with one another. They gain great wisdom by learning of the different characteristics of these elements, and in turn bring this wisdom to the people they serve.

Spirits

The spirits of the elements exist all across the Warcraft universe, in more or less the same state on all worlds with life on them. To most mortal creatures these spirits are invisible, however -- it is only when they choose to share their wisdom with a particular race that a people may come to know of their existence. On Draenor, it was the orcs (and later the draenei and the broken) who came to know of the elemental spirits and the path of the shaman, while on Azeroth, the tauren were the only ones to discover them (the trolls learned about shamanism from the orcs later on). Each of these races practices the same basic form of shamanism, since the spirits which teach them are the same.

A shaman does not cast spells in the same way that most other magic users do. The power of the elements is not like modern human electricity which they can plug into and then channel through their body or their mind. Rather, shamans call upon the spirits when they seek to use this power, asking permission to use it and channel it through themselves. The totems a shaman creates represent this relationship, and serve as a focal point of their communion with the spirits. So in a sense, each shaman must humbly remember that his power is not his own, he borrows it from the spirits of the world, and uses it at their good pleasure. Each type of spirit represents a force of nature at work in the world, all existing in balance with one another.

The spirit of Earth is the force of stability and trust. Its nurturing quality allows crops to grow, while its strength and firmness allows it to quake and destroy its enemies. Its voice is steady, slow, warm and persistent.

The spirit of Fire is the force of destruction and illumination. For unpredictable reasons of its own, it may alternately wipe away all the withered death of the world, making way for new life, or when it moderates its hunger and passion, it may serve as a nurturing force too, as in a candle or fireplace. Sometimes Fire may even grant shamans visions of the future or far distant places.

The spirit of Water is the force of healing and adaptability. It adjusts to any situation in an appropriate manner, whether with force or with infinite patience, no matter how severe a calamity it may be. It is the voice of wisdom, clarity and mirth.

The spirit of Air is the force of mystery and communication. It may take the form of a gentle breeze or a violent storm, for reasons mortals may not comprehend. Yet at the same time, its gentle voice often whispers in the ears of the shaman, a constant companion wherever he or she may go.

Different sorts of shamans may have different relationships with the spirits of nature. They may feel a special affinity for one over the other, and may even know many individual spirits by name. They might even have a kind of friendship with one another, although not a relationship of equals as mortal people might share -- the spirit would definitely be in a place of reverence or worship. A shaman is also more likely than most other classes to have special rituals and practices that are overtly religious in nature; other classes may also have strong beliefs, but not many others are able to commune with spiritual entities that actually talk back!

Mortal races

Each race that believes in shamanism follows not only the spirits of the world but also its own ancestors. The shamans of the past guide their people and help them to understand the ways of the spirits.

Although the draenei themselves are an ancient race, they are the newest to take up the knowledge of the spirits. A draenei shaman does not have many shamanistic ancestor spirits to act as guides, but the living instructors such as Nobundo teach shamanic knowledge accurately.

The tauren, on the other hand, have communicated with their ancestors for generations. These ancestors hold such esteem in tauren culture that each individual tauren learns to recite his or her own lineage stretching back many generations. Shamanism is the default way of life of all tauren, even if they are not themselves shamans.

Like the draenei, trolls are somewhat new to the practice of shamanism, although in this case the shamanic belief system supplants rather than supplements their previous religion. Trolls who have learned the ways of the shaman from the orcs can turn away from the dark voodoo rituals and beliefs which they followed in the past, although to some degree they may be unwilling or unable to totally separate the two. A troll witch doctor may become a shaman, and try to blend voodoo and shamanism into his own particular mixture.

People who roleplay orcish shamans have a lot of special opportunities that other races do not have. An elderly orc may have learned the ways of the shaman as a youth on Draenor (now known as Outland), back before his people were corrupted by the demonic power of the Burning Legion. Such a character may have even followed the demonic path for a while and become a warlock, as Drek'Thar did, only to return to the path of shamanism later on in life, filled with the deepest regret for their actions while under the influence of demons.

A younger orc shaman would have an entirely different story, however. Like Thrall, his or her path to shamanism might have been a path of discovery and amazement. He or she might have grown up in Azerothian internment camps and learned of shamanism while Thrall was reuniting the orcish tribes into the new Horde. Surely for this kind of character, Thrall would be the ultimate hero and role model, and shamanism would be a way of reclaiming everything that was good about your people, arising out of the depths of lethargy into the bright field of meaningful action.


There's something about shamans that gets us thinking and talking. Whether it's something as simple as the proper pronunciation of "shamanism," or something as profound as a shaman's humility in relation to the source of his or her power, the lore and ideology of the shaman class often resonates with players more than many others in the World of Warcraft.

One reason for this is that shamans have been such a pivotal force in the lore, possibly more than any other class in the game (depending on your point of view). Other classes, such as warriors, or paladins, come as a sort of pre-defined archetype in fantasy games that don't seem all that different from their original forms in other fantasy settings. The actual beliefs of a priest, for instance, don't seem to matter so much to many players, so long as the class can heal like we expect them to. Even the druids, with their central place in night elf society, sometimes seem more like nature-based magic users rather than true philosophers in their own right.

Shamans, however, have a major burden to bear in one of the central plot shifts of the Warcraft storyline -- namely that the orcs, who entered the Warcraft stage in the Warcraft 1: Orcs and Humans computer game as rampaging demonic evildoers bent on destruction, and actually turned out to be a peaceful race that just got tricked into being evil. Shamanism had to be much much more than just an archetype with some special powers -- it had to be a way of thinking, a system of belief that could be taken over by demonic corruption and yet at the same time act as a beacon of truth and goodness once that the demonic taint had been defeated. Shamanism has got to be complex and profound, or else the story wouldn't make sense.

The fifth element

Playing through the game as a shaman, the vast majority of your shaman-specific quests will be about the four elements we talked about in last week's article. But there is a fifth element in shamanism, one which is probably the most important of all to those who dare commune with it.

Historically, there has almost always been a fifth element in any classical Earth philosophy concerning the elements, most notably in the case of the Chinese, for whom 5 elements were standard. The other elemental systems tended to have a feeling of 4 practical elements plus 1 mysterious element they didn't understand very much, with names like "space," "void," or "aether."

In Warcraft shamanism, the fifth element is similarly an all-encompassing element that defies concrete explanation. It is called the Spirit of the Wilds, and it seems to have to do with life, growth, restoration, and rebirth. You won't see any "Wilds elementals" walking around Azeroth, however, perhaps because this element may be the sum of all the others. As the Spirit of Air says in a short story about shamanism, "Everything that is, is alive." In a sense, every living animal in the world is a "Wilds" elemental, and every plant a totem. There is tremendous energy in this spirit, perhaps more than in all the other elements combined, and yet this spirit may lie hidden for years without a shaman ever coming to know of it.

The Earthen Ring

Last week, we noted how shamans call upon and serve the elements in a reciprocal relationship rather than a dominating one, such that shamans "call" their magic into the world rather that "casting" spells as other magic users do. In this way, they reflect the calm relationship with nature that we see in many animal species, where all the various parts of a system reinforce each other.

But the spirits of the elements should not be misunderstood as a happy-family pantheon of cheerful nature gods. Sometimes, the elements can rise in opposition to one another if the balance between them is not maintained, and end up wreaking great damage upon the system as a whole.

About 150 years prior to the current setting, the shamans of the tauren founded the Earthen Ring in order to work together to maintain this balance and prevent the elements from stepping out of place to wreak havoc upon the world. Orcs who regained their shamanistic heritage were invited to join the Earthen Ring, and now make up roughly half of the Earthen Ring's number. Since draenei and the broken have also started along the path of shamanism, some of them are now included in the Earthen Ring as well, thus strengthening the neutrality of the Earthen Ring (much like the Cenarion Circle of the druids).

It is said that the Earthen Ring as the primary voice in support of allowing the Forsaken to join the Horde. Thrall had originally wanted to reject the Forsaken, until prominent shamans of the Earthen Ring suggested that the Forsaken were much like the orcs, in their need to overcome their own inner demons. Also, the Earthen Ring believed that the Forsaken curse of undeath might possibly be curable, and to this day are conducting research that might bring this end about.

Role of shamans in society

Shamans are the spiritual leaders of their people among the tauren, orcs, and to a lesser extent, trolls. Shamanic beliefs tend to guide these races, even when they belong to another class (with obvious exceptions in the case of, say, an orcish warlock or a troll who still follows voodoo).

To play such a spiritual leader in World of Warcraft might be a little difficult, though, unless you spend some time thinking about the sort of wisdom that your character would have gained. There's no need to insist that your character is a spiritual leader in the game, but rather, it would work best to simply share whatever insights you can find based on your own reflection on the elements and the spirits of nature. If you've studied a little bit of real world philosophy that you think will fit, go ahead and put that in there, but be careful to try and just fill in the holes in Warcraft lore for the sake of consistency with other players.

Shamans in draenei society have the same wisdom of their Horde counterparts, but not the accompanying social status as spiritual leaders. The draenei, of course, already had a firmly established system of spiritual leadership before shamans came along, involving priests and paladins and their faith in the Holy Light. When Farseer Nobundo first introduced shamanism to draenei society, many draenei had trouble accepting it, especially since Nobundo himself was a "Krokul," or "Broken" -- a kind of outcast whose connection to the Light had been mysteriously severed by demonic energies during the war with the orcs on draenor. For a while it seemed that most draenei would treat Nobundo as an enemy until the prophet Velen stepped in and declared to all that shamanism was also a valid path.

In the game itself, you may see some degree of prejudice against shamans in the low-level quests for draenei (which are actually set to take place right around the release of The Burning Crusade), but these drop off completely as your character grows and eventually reaches Outland (and now, of course, Northrend). Although some players may wish that the prejudice continued, it seems that the majority of draenei society has actually taken Velen's assertion on the value of shamanism. Even if they don't think the path of the elements is as good as the path of the Light, neither do they necessarily treat all shamans as outcasts. Many draenei shamans may even combine the teachings of the Light and of shamanism together in a number of ways. Draenei shamans do not lose their "Gift of the Naaru" ability, of course, so it stands to reason that they don't lose their faith in the Light either.

Any roleplayers who wish to do justice to a draenei shaman character should really read the short story, "Unbroken," which Blizzard published around the time that they released The Burning Crusade. It tells the story of how Nobundo became Broken and established the first draenei connection with the elements. Keep in mind that many of the events you read about in that story take place about 30 years prior to the current setting, before Medivh first opened of the Dark Portal, at one of the darkest times in draenei history, when the future of the entire race was in grievous peril. Many of the draenei act in unpleasant ways that they wouldn't necessarily repeat today now that things have settled down quite a bit for them. The same people who rejected Nobundo then might sincerely respect him today, or even follow his teachings as a shaman in their own right.

Players who are serious about getting into shaman lore, especially on the Horde side, would do well to read the novels Rise of the Horde, and Lord of the Clans, which deal at great length with shamanism and shamanic philosophy as it pertains to the orcs. The circumstances of the orcish war on the draenei (which drove the elemental spirits away from the orcs) also features prominently.



Elemental Shaman: The Elemental Shaman has a very close bond with the Elemental Planes. He/she uses these planes to draw his/her power, summoning the awesome might of the elements to brutalize his/her enemies. Wind, fire, earth, and water - These four basic elements make Elemental Shaman the incredible power they are. Elemental Shaman, as all Shaman, give offerings to the elements and spirits they draw their power from. These can consist of herbs, ritual drinks, or other things found within the natural world. Shaman are not typically found in civilized societies, since their powers come from primal, uncontrolled sources. In Orcish / Troll / Tauren culture, Shaman are conduits to the spirit world, performing spiritual rituals and speaking to the natural world. Some Shaman are loners, preferring to commune with the wilderness rather than companions, while others integrate themselves into culture by becoming keepers of knowledge, sages, seers, or ritualists.


Enhancement Shaman: With the knowledge of the spirits behind their words and the gifts of the elements powering their strikes, Enhancement Shaman are arguably the most primal of the three specializations. Enhancement Shaman use their fury and the spirits' blessings to back their blows, often resorting to a mix of both magical and physical brawn (as opposed to Elemental Shaman, who use their magical abilities rather than physical strength to fight). Enhancement Shaman are the most likely to go off into the wilderness, as they look to a deeper, more primal part of themselves than either Restoration or Elemental Shaman to fight. They still give offerings to the spirits and elements with which they associate, but are less likely to become sages and seers, rather finding their place on the battlefield or training younger warriors.


Restoration Shaman: Many shamans feel a special affinity to the purifying spirits of Water, and are therefore called to seek out and cleanse impurities. These shamans possess an edge over others in the healing arts, and their understanding of "flow" helps them easily replenish spent mana. These shamans are often in high demand from both injury-prone warriors and mana-greedy spellcasters.