Welcome to The House of Silverthorn, a website for the drama and goings-on of the eponymous World of Warcraft RP Guild. Detailed below we will be outlining the history of our guild and our OCs.
Important disclaimer: Our philosophy vis à vis official WOW lore is “bend, don’t break.” If you read any of this and feel a great need to tell us we are wrong, please feel free to leave us alone.
The “guild” is, in fact, a husband (bnet tag Forosuul#1740) and wife (bnet tag Tindomiel#11909). Currently we are the whole shebang. We play (or conceived in the case of some background NPCs) every character you may see in these writings, apart from official lore characters that sometimes sneak in*. We have tried many times over the decade-plus we have played WOW to find an RP group we like. Inevitably, other players have left the game, guilds have disbanded, or there was just that one guy whose RP made you want to punch a baby, so now we do our own thing. We are not militant about this, and are perfectly open to including others, but we would both have to admit the bar for consideration is high. More on that later.
Here are some additions to official lore/headcanon parts we employ for our story:
The Kal’dorei House System
Blizzard gives us very little detail on how the government of the kal’dorei people works. We have leaders in Malfurion and Tyrande (ugh), and a defense and police force in the Sentinels and Wardens, but essentially nothing on the day-to-day. This presents a storytelling opportunity, provided we can craft something that does not egregiously violate Blizzard’s canon. To that end, we created the House System. Yes, we are aware of the similarities it has with the Houses of Menzobarranzan and the guild houses and families of the D’ni in the Myst series. Please shut up.
The basic idea is that, following the fall of Azshara and her Highborn, the power vacuum was filled with House lineages. The essential tenets are:
- Houses can be of Greater or Lesser status.
- Houses compete for prestige and influence.
- Houses are female-led by custom.
- Lesser Houses often scheme or work to increase their own standing and achieve Great House status.
- Lesser Houses can also willingly submit to a Great House and become Client Houses in order to increase standing.
- The bulk of the kal’dorei population are Commoners, with no House status at all.
- Commoners often seek positions as retainers within Lesser or Greater Houses.
- A form of adult adoption exists, in which a blood member of a House can renounce it and be adopted into another. Adopted members have all the rights and privileges of those born into the House, and are treated as blood relatives. House Retainers often dream of serving the House in such a spectacularly good fashion that they are adopted.
- The House System, is, in fact a de facto nobility, although kal’dorei are very sensitive about that and do not like it being pointed out.
- House members do not hold titles like Baron, Count or the like among the population at large. However, they do have titles and positions within the House. The only House title recognized in any way among commoners is that of Matriarch, who is the head of the House.
Those attempting to flaunt their House title outside the House are looked down upon and referred to “highborn minded”. - The House System is not much known to the other races of the Alliance. The kal’dorei themselves do not speak of it much with outsiders.
- If you are interested in exploring this (wholly non-canon from an official standpoint) idea of kal’dorei society in your own RP, please feel free. If you would like to ask our thoughts or just share your ideas with us, find us in-game!
The Silverthorn Bloodline
A primary element of our RP is the Silverthorn bloodline, which stretches back to the earliest days of the kal’dorei, all the way to the interstitial period when the kal’dorei were evolving magically from the dark troll base. We conceive a time period beginning about 16,000 years ago, in which the kal’dorei are beginning to take shape, and are coexisting with dark trolls and intermediate forms. In natural evolution this is of course not possible, but the magically augmented evolution of the kal’dorei was accelerated (canonically speaking). The mixture of people’s led to conflicts, as many kal’dorei began to set themselves above their troll antecedents.
Highlights:
- The Silverthorn line springs from one man, the mage Kalithil (more on him later).
- All kal’dorei of Silverthorn descent share the traits of the palest possible skin tone – white with barely a shade of blue/violet – and silver/white hair.
- This coloring was initially a mutation held only by Kalithil himself. As far as anyone knows, any kal’dorei expressing these morphological traits is descended from him.**
- The House of Silverthorn was one of the earliest to experiment with the House system, in the latter days of Azhsara’s reign, just before the War of the Ancients.
- The House has waxed and waned over its long history. After the Sundering, the House entered a long period of decline due to deprivation from war and the Sundering itself. By the modern period in Azeroth, the House was considered a historical curiosity and was believed extinct (the idea of all pale and white haired kal’dorei being descended from Kalithil is not generally known) until Kalithil himself re-emerged and began to gather his lost descendants.
- The House is non-traditional in many ways, and has often been considered an upstart House.
- If any readers would like to use this in their own RP, play their character as a Silverthorn descendent, or whatever, give us a shout in game and let’s talk about it
The Shadowthorn Bloodline
The Shadowthorn bloodline is an offshoot from the Silverthorn that was established by Kalithil approximately 14,000 years before the Dark Portal. His intent was that this branch of the family would form a secret society with the primary goal of chronicling the history of the Kal’dorei people in general, and the Silverthorn in particular, without the political biases and revisionism being practiced by the emerging Highborn class.
- Kalithil chose one of his grandsons, Thélan, to be the founder of this bloodline.
- Once established, the Shadowthorn removed themselves from the active participation in society, assuming their observer role.
- During one of Kalithil’s periods of exile, something went wrong with the Shadowthorn. What was supposed to be a secret society of scholars and record-keepers became a quasi-religious cult, which practiced strange customs and inbreeding to the point of nearly dying out.
- The person or people responsible for the change are unknown, as they destroyed the texts which chronicled their actions.
- The line dwindled to the point of only two living members, Tellanon Shadowthorn and his mother, Feranæ. Feranæ would go on to commit suicide by setting herself ablaze once she believed Tellanon was ready to assume the duties of his people.
- Tellanon is the biological father of Tindomiel Silverthorn, having been drugged and seduced by Mire Whisperwind millennia ago in her efforts to bear children.
- Unless Tindomiel chooses to take up the name, Tellanon is the last of the Shadowthorn.
- The repository of knowledge and artifacts overseen by the Shadowthorn is referred to as the Treasury. It’s location and existence are kept hidden.
The Greythorn Bloodline
The Greythorn bloodline was established by one of Kalithil’s sons, Gilræn. In the years leading to the War of the Ancients, Gilræn sought tutelage among Azshara’s highborn, very much against his father’s wishes. Gilræn and Kalithil had a very bitter falling-out over the issue, and Kalithil disowned him. Gilræn ended up among the rebel highborn of Dath’remar Sunstrider, and in the aftermath of the war; assuming Kalithil would not forgive him, he stayed among them, in hiding. When the rebel highborn went into exile and sailed east,Gilræn went with them.
- Gilræn established a well-thought-of, but not noble, family.
- As the Sunwell altered the former highborn into the Quel’dorei, Gilræn used his sorcery to alter himself as well. The only thing he could never change were the signature pale skin and white hair.
- Gilræn has had to reinvent his identity several times, as he retained the lifespan of a Kal’dorei. Even he is unsure of his long years are the result of Kalithil’s sorcerous meddling or if perhaps he was effected by the Kal’dorei pact with the Green Dragons.
- Once a prosperous and fairly numerous family, the events of various wars throughout the ages reduced the Greythorn line, until the Scourge invasion all but wiped it out.
- The last known members of the bloodline are Gilræn and Niquisse, his great-great-great-great-great-grandaughter.
- Gilræn became involved with the Ren’dorei, and Niquisse, with no other living family, went with him. In the events at Telogrus Rift, both were transformed into Void Elves.
- The infusion of void power did the one thing no other sorcery has ever been able to accomplish. It changed their hair to a dark but brilliant blue. Their skin remains pale.
*We try to minimize this, to avoid major lore conflicts.
**If this conceit bothers you or impacts your own RP, please feel free to ignore it, and moreover, keep it to yourself.