The Dark Elves

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Long ago, when Chaos was first unleashed upon the world, the Elven champion Aenarion drew the dread Sword of Khaine from its altar and used its terrible power to save his people from annihilation. When Aenarion died, his son Malekith was deemed unsuitable for the throne. Although he was a mighty warrior, a great sorcerer , a brilliant general and the rightful heir, many Elves opposed his coronation. They feared he was too focused on war, and potentially a de-stabilizing influence on the High Elf race. In retaliation, over many years Malekith engineered a terrible civil war that divided the race of Elves into two factions.

It was the High Elves who emerged victorious and drove the evil Dark Elves out from the ancestral home of their race. Under the leadership of Malekith the Witch King and his Sorceress mother Morathi, the Dark Elves sailed across the Great Western Ocean and founded for themselves a new kingdom in the northern reaches of the New World. This land they called Naggaroth, meaning 'land of chill'.

Unlike the High Elves, who continually seek to suppress their passions lest they be overcome by them, the Dark Elves willingly embrace their hedonistic nature. Dark Elf society emphasizes individualism, selfishness, and pride. They have little regard for one another and even less for the other races of the world, whom they see as potential slaves and subjects.

In battle, the ruthless warriors of Naggaorth blend Elven discipline with savagery and ferocity, for the patron deity of the Dark Elves is Kaela Mensha Khaine, the bloody-handed God and the Lord of Murder. Nowhere is this more evident than in the beautiful and deadly Witch Elves, who serve in the Temples of Khaine and revel in violence and bloodshed.



Since their expulsion from Ulthuan, the Dark Elves have desired nothing more than to return to Ulthuan and avenge their defeat, reclaiming the land they believe to be theirs by right. In the Age of Reckoning, Malekith learns of an impending Chaos invasion of the Empire and uses this knowledge to set in motion a chain of events that will leave the island home of the Elves defenseless against an invasion. At the Witch King's command, a great fleet of Black Arks – great floating islands laden with soldiers, monsters, and engines of war – sets sail across the sea to conquer the island kingdom of Ulthuan and fulfill the destiny denied the Druchii so long ago.

Conflict with the High Elves
Of all the innumerable conflicts that have defined the history of the Warhammer world, there may be none as lengthy or as bitterly fought as the ongoing war between the noble High Elves and their evil kin, the malicious Dark Elves.

This ancient struggle is very much at the heart of the Age of Reckoning. Malekith, Witch King of the Dark Elves, is obsessed with reclaiming the Phoenix Throne, a birthright denied him by the High Elves millennia ago. When he learns that a new Champion of the Dark Gods is marching to war with the Empire, the diabolical ruler of the Dark Elves hatches a sweeping plan to conquer the isle of Ulthuan and install himself as the true King of all Elfkind.

Knowing that the plague-ravaged Empire will call for aid when the Chaos warhost reaches its northern borders, the Witch King conspires to prevent the Dwarfs from answering that call. Through vile sorcery, the Witch King crafts amulets of power and gives these to the leaders of the Bloody Sun Boyz, a powerful greenskin tribe. The Orcs quickly amass a great army and attack the Dwarfs, and war spreads across the Worlds Edge Mountains.

Sure enough, the Chaos Warhost descends upon the Empire's northern provinces with terrible fury. The Emperor knows that the Dwarfs are fighting for their very survival against the green horde, and so he must turn to the Lords of Ulthuan for relief. In the gilded city of Lothern, Finubar, Phoenix King of the High Elves, receives the urgent plea.

The wise Phoenix King knows that the fates of men and High Elves are intertwined. If the Empire falls to the Ruinous Powers, Ulthuan will be next. Finubar appoints Prince Tyrion as General of the Shining Guard, an elite regiment formed to defend the High Elves' homeland in the absence of the king. With that, Finubar and his legions set sail for the Old World.


From Wikipedia
No sooner have the flowing white sails of the High Elves' longships passed beyond into the horizon when shouts of surprise and fear fill the streets of the glittering city. Great black shadows fall across the marble streets and silver towers. A fleet of Dark Elf Black Arks fills the seas, great floating fortresses of stone filled with legions of Druchii warriors and their vicious, hate-filled beasts of war. The invasion of Ulthuan has begun.

Days later, following a great Council of Wisdom, Finubar pledges his aid to the Empire and the realms of the Dwarfs. That night, the dreadful news of the Dark Elves' attack reaches his ears. Leaving some of his warriors behind to fight alongside his allies, the Phoenix King returns to his ship and races homeward. Will he arrive in time to aid his people, or has Malekith's insidious plot already succeeded? If all hope is lost for the High Elves, then the fates of Men and Dwarfs are already sealed.
Over the long millenia since the Sundering, the darker side of the elven psyche has risen to become prominent in the Druchii, driving them to extreme acts of cruelty, hatred and selfishness. They worship Khaine to the exclusion of the rest of the elven pantheon, venerating him as the Lord of Murder. The Druchii are driven by the will of Malekith, the Witch King, whose sole ambition is to exact bloody revenge upon those who betrayed him and prevented him from claiming what was rightfully his – the crown of the Phoenix King. In the many millennia since the Sundering Malekith has hatched several elaborate plans to conquer the High Elves and gain control of Ulthuan, but he has not yet met with success.

From behind the fortified city walls of Naggarond, Hag Graef, Ghrond, Karond Kar, Clar Karond and Har Ganeth the Druchii rule over Naggaroth, the Land of Chill, on the northeastern shore of the New World. The nation of Naggaroth is built on the lives of countless slaves sentenced to a slow death working in dark pits, or butchered in the bloody rituals of the Witch Elves. Like their High Elf cousins, the Druchii are masters of the seas, but instead of trade, the Elven Corsairs raid the coastal settlements of both the Old World and the New in search of fresh slaves and plunder to bring back to Naggaroth. The most feared vessel to be encountered on the seas is the dreaded Black Ark, a vast floating fortress capable of carrying thousands of warriors and slaves, and few have seen one and lived to tell of it.


Dark Elf Sorceress The sorceress' of the Druchii are as adept at controlling magic as any elf, but they draw their power from the Chaos tainted dark magic of Dhar. Through this they can wield spells of great potency and gain mastery over the many wild beasts which inhabit the cold plains of Naggaroth.

The society of Naggaroth is a hierarchical one, with their Witch King, Malekith, at the top. At his right hand is his mother and consort, Queen Morathi. The powerful noble houses and sects at the top of Dark Elven society compete with each other to maintain their position in the hierarchy and to keep the favor of Malekith. Rival houses use subterfuge and assassination against each other on a regular basis, but all ultimately pay homage to the Witch King, and open fighting between houses is relatively rare. This suits Malekith because it keeps all factions strong by culling the weak, but also keeps them under his complete control.

[edit] The Dark Elves in WARThe Witch-King, ruler of the Dark Elves, still has his sights set on the throne of the Phoenix King, which he believes is rightly his. As the Age of Reckoning approaches, the armies of the High Elves leave Ulthuan to fight the forces of Chaos in the Empire, giving the Dark Elves an opportunity to launch an invasion while the island is weakly defended. He has turned to Lord Uthorin, head of House Uthorin, to deploy the elite warriors of his house at the vanguard of the invasion.

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The Dark Elves, or Druchii to give their name in Tar-Eltharin, were expelled from the Elven Kingdoms several millennia ago in a series of bloody civil wars. The ancestors of today's Druchii inhabited the northwestern part of the island of Ulthuan called Nagarythe (Shadowlands) and they were also known as the Malteeras (People of the Northern Reaches) and the Naggarothi (Folk of Nagarythe.)

Nagarythe had for long been known as a place of great learning and where great works of art were produced. A new order sprung from this renaissance called the Cult of Pleasure and the High Priestess was Lady Morathi. In fact the Nagarythe cult was dedicated to the worship of Slaanesh, the Lord of Pleasure. The cult proved very popular and it wasn't long before many High Elven nobles pursued their vices in the cover of this cult not knowing that they were sliding towards Chaos. Indeed, many of the Elves did not see the connection.

It wasn't long before the Phoenix King, Bel-Shanaar, worried by the increasing excesses of the Cult of Pleasure, which degenerated to the sacrifice of living beings, declared war on one of his own realms to rid its influences and this was the heart of the cult: Nagarythe.

It was Malekith, the son of Lady Morathi and the late Phoenix King Aenarion, who first sowed the seeds of doubt in the Ulthuan nobility by claiming that the agents of the Cult of Pleasure were everywhere, threatening the very moral standing of the entire Elven race. It was Malekith's agents, working at the behest of Bel-Shanaar, who took away anyone suspected of involvement with the Cult of Pleasure for interrogation.

But Malekith had long coveted the Phoenix Throne, because it was denied to him when the Eldar Council decreed that he was unworthy of the crown, and at the last he denounced Bel-Shanaar, the Phoenix King himself, as an exponent of the Cult of Pleasure. Rather than go through the indignity of interrogation Bel-Shanaar took poison and killed himself. Malekith seized his moment and declared himself the rightful heir to the Phoenix Throne, despite the protestations of the Eldar Council, who were themselves denounced as enemies of the Elven race and placed under arrest.

Malekith was revealed for what he was: an ally of the Cult of Pleasure and a usurper. The Phoenix Flame, the trial by fire ordeal as set down by the priesthood of Asuryan to choose a pure soul for the crown of Ulthuan, horribly burned Malekith's body and rejected his spirit, giving evidence to those assembled that he was totally unfit to rule. With his followers, Malekith escaped to Nagarythe and the Eldar Council was freed.

A period of war ensued: the Naggarothi, and their supporters, against the other realms of Ulthuan. With the support of the Eldar Council and the High Elf nobles, Caledor the First was hailed as Phoenix King and carried the war to Nagarythe. After Malekith's defeat at the Battle of Maldour the Naggarothi became ever more desperate and resorted to the black sorceries that previously they were forbidden to learn. At the dawn of the Battle of Maldour, Malekith was hailed as the Witch King by his supporters, largely because of his twisted and fell appearance after his form was ravaged by the Fire of Asuryan.

So it was that the Witch King caused the cataclysm that was to send much of Nagarythe under the Great Ocean, the southern realm of Tiranoc was to also suffer a similar fate although much of it still stands today. Malekith sort to unbind the vortex of the Isle of the Dead, which kept the Realm of Chaos out of the world, so that the daemonic forces of Chaos could aid the Naggarothi against the forces of Caledor. But the mages of the Isle, who are to chant their protective spells for eternity, countered the Witch King's magic causing a huge wave to rise from the ocean, sending the Shadowlands beneath the sea, drowning many of the Naggarothi in turn.

However, Malekith had known the possibility of failure and ordered that many ships be built, the largest of these were the huge floating fortresses called Black Arks. When the cataclysm came some of the Naggarothi managed to escape on these ships. It is written in some ancient chronicles that the Black Arks were in fact the palaces of the Naggarothi, torn away from the ruined land and kept afloat by powerful sorcery.

The naval battle of Deloth's Shoals completed the expulsion of the Naggarothi from Ulthuan. The High Elves allowed the survivors to escape to the frozen lands of the northwest, content that the Naggarothi would perish there. But they did not. Thus the Naggarothi were named the Druchii, the Dark Elves.

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Thousands of years ago, the High Elves were a unified race living in the island kingdom of Ulthuan.

The first Phoenix King, Aenarion the Defender, was the greatest warrior to walk the earth. It was by his hand that the first great invasion of Chaos was thwarted. During this war, he rescued an Elven maiden from a Slaaneshi warband. Her name was Morathi, and she was beautiful beyond description. Aenarion fell deeply in love with her, and she bore his son Malekith. Under the tutelage of both his father and mother, Malekith became a formidable warrior, a skilfull general and an accomplished sorcerer.

According to birthright, Malekith was the rightful successor to the throne of Ulthuan. But when Aenarion died, the ruling Council of Princes, feeling the Elves needed a more peace-minded leader now the war was won, decided that Malekith was too impetuous and warlike, due to a troubled life overshadowed by the terrible legacy of his father and the insidious influence of his mother. Declaring that Malekith was not fit to rule, they selected another to sit on the throne - Bel Shanaar of Tiranoc, a hero of the Daemon Wars.

Malekith was relegated to the rank of High General and supreme commander of the armies. This suited him well, as he was an outstanding warrior and peerless general in the manner of his father. During his time in the army he wandered the globe, and with his mother's guidance, started experimenting with Dark Magic. After a few years Malekith became discontent. In his mind the Elves must be a warlike people to face the ever-growing menace from the forces of Chaos. He became increasingly critical of the nobles, who grew soft and complacent under the protection of his armies. Worse yet, the Cult of Pleasure; a society of poets and artists founded by Morathi herself; had become a front for a Chaos cult of Slaanesh, was taking root in Elf society, being particularly strong in his homeland of Nagarythe. Malekith took personal command of the investigation and used this power to eliminate his political enemies, accusing them falsely of being cultists and executing them without trial.

Then events turned critical. Malekith claimed Phoenix King Bel-Shanaar was a worshipper of Slaanesh and Bel-Shanaar died of poisoning shortly afterwards. Those loyal to the Council accused Malekith of assassination. Those loyal to Malekith claimed Bel-Shanaar committed suicide because he couldn't live with his failures. The argument between Malekith and the Council of Princes turned violent and Malekith and his followers ended up killing most of the Princes in the name of saving Ulthuan (or to simply destroy all opposition to his ascension; both sides say different).

Now the Council was out of the way, there was only one thing left to do in order to become Phoenix King. Malekith had to pass through the Sacred Fire of Asuryan, king of the Elven gods. Malekith stepped forwards, confident he would pass the ordeal just as his father had done. Yet the Sacred Flame would not suffer Malekith's polluted body and it burned him, scarring him horrifically. Malekith's followers claimed treachery - that the Sacred Fires of the Creator God Asuryan must have been corrupted to reject even the rightful heir. They fled back to the province of Nagarythe with their leader. In confusion over the death of their king and council, the High Elves did not pursue.

Near to death, Malekith was taken to one of his mother's temples. His body had healed sufficiently, but, according to the high elves, his mind was destroyed beyond repair and Malekith was completely lost to insanity. He knew of the need to lead his followers into battle against the High Elves, but also knew his withered body would not survive the rigours of battle. Morathi called upon Hotek, a renegade priest of Vaul, the Elven smith god, to forge a suit of armour that would give life and strength to Malekith's flame-ravaged body. Malekith had the armour fused directly to his skin, forming a sorcerous shell granting him immense supernatural powers. From that day forth, Malekith was known as the Witch King, for he truly had become a figure of dread.

Once healed, Malekith was consumed with a bitter hatred for those who has resisted him. He summoned those Elves who were loyal to him to aid him in taking the throne by force. This included a large part of the standing military, most of his home province of Nagarythe and many other Elves throughout the kingdom who believed in Malekith's cause.

Meanwhile, the High Elves started organising themselves and elected a new Phoenix King, Caledor the First. Caledor gathered his armies to him and a bloody civil war erupted between the High Elves and the followers of Malekith. Great victories were won on both sides, but in the end the scales tipped in the favour of the High Elves. Although their stronghold in Nagarythe was nearly impregnable, Malekith's followers were slowly getting outnumbered and Caledor proved to be an equally skilled general as the Witch King. Finally Malekith and Caledor faced each other directly at the head of their mighties armies. Caledor managed to defeat the Witch King, driving his army into the marches of Maledor.

Desperate, Malekith decided on a final gamble: he gathered his sorceresses and attempted to unravel the Vortex of Ulthuan that prevented the return of the full force of Chaos. As Malekith and his coven began this dark ritual, the mages of Isle of the Dead intervened, weaving powerful counter spells. The resulting magical backlash caused the cataclysm known as The Sundering, and submerged great parts of Nagarythe and Tiranoc beneath the sea.

As the province sank, several of the great fortress-cities of Nagarythe were pulled from the bedrock by sorceresses and kept afloat by their magic. Malekith and the surviving loyalists sailed their fortress-ships, which would become known as "Black Arks", to the continent called the new world and established a new kingdom that they named Naggaroth in honor of their destroyed home.

As a result of the Sundering, the overriding obsession of Malekith (and by proxy much of the Dark Elf society) is the death or subjugation of the High Elves of Ulthuan and the restoration of Malekith to the throne of the Phoenix King.

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this is not my work, I found it while digging for lore on the dark elves, I'll try to provide a link to the origional

The Warhammer world is one of great conflict between opposing factions, ideologies and philosophies. While few races of the Warhammer can be subjectively considered wholly 'good' or 'evil', there are indeed those that can be aptly categorized as such. Of all the races of the Warhammer world there are two that are most definitely Evil: The Skaven and the Dark Elves. While we will be seeing both of these races in the game at launch, only the Dark Elves will be the playable of the two.

Thus, given my recent coverage on the superiority of the High Elves, I thought it would be only just to also discuss in more detail their wicked counterparts. Previously I have written material trying to enlighten folk on the nature of the Dark Elves, however this time I wish to expand upon these previous works and go into more detail as to the means, nature and perhaps even the 'why' behind the Evil of the Druchii.

The inclusion of Evil Elves has been a longstanding tradition in many types of fantasy. Even the ancient and dark fairy tales and stories of the fey could be classified as such. Certain these so-called 'children tales' really may not have been entirely meant for children given their graphic and interesting (if disturbing) nature. The Warhammer world itself is a very dark, dangerous and frightening place. As the old saying goes "Here be Monsters", a truism that could certainly be applied to the Druchii.

The Dark Elves of Warhammer are an entire populace that has been touched by and corrupted by Evil. However unlike the Skaven, who admittedly do not have a choice in being evil as they are essentially creatures of Chaos, the Dark Elves do have a choice in the matter. They choose to be the way they are, knowing full well what all it entails (most of the time) and rather than balk or shy away from their dark nature, instead they have chosen to revel in it. Their entire societal structure is built around perpetrating an endless cycle of atrocities, both upon themselves and upon other races.

There are two main contributing external forces to the Evil that is in the hearts of the Dark Elves: The worship of Khaine and the worship of Slaanesh. Both of these forces, though mutually exclusive to one another, have shaped the very nature of the society, philosophy and the very essence of their race ever since the split with the High Elves during the first strokes of their civil war. The primary catalyst of this can be attributed properly to the influence of Slaanesh, primarily through the Cult of Slaanesh and its champion: A singular woman who is both the mother of (and reputed lover/consort) of their King, a Dark Elf named Morathi.

Though it is likely that the cult of pleasure existed in some form before her arrival in High Elf society, under her guiding hand the cult became a very powerful force, which still likely has remnants left among the High Elves. However the primary worship and focus of Dark Elf society is in the singular Elven Deity that have chosen to follow, that of Kaela Mensha Khaine, the Bloody Handed God. By narrowing their religious and cultural focus to include but a single aspect of the Elven Pantheon, the entire nature of these renegade elves changed very swiftly after the beginning of the civil war.

Under the guidance of the temple of Khaine, terrible rituals, sacrifices and other festivities have become a regular part of Dark Elf society. For example there is a time of the year among them known as Death Night. More than just a single night really, this period of time is one sacred to Khaine when his most beloved servants (the Witch Elves also known as the Brides of Khaine) roam the cities seeking those to sacrifice for their dark god. None are safe during this time and thousands are slain and sacrificed every year during this time. Even the survivors of Death Knight engage in their own bloody ritual after its completion, choosing and slaying a member of their own households in gratitude for having been spared.

The reckless abandon by which the Dark Elf people have embraced this singular aspect of their nature extends well beyond religion. Their practice of magic is almost exclusively that of Dhar, Dark Magic, and while they are a much more resilient race than humans when it comes to the corrupting nature of magic the continual use of Dhar and the associated dark rituals only seek to further enhance the corrupted nature of the people.

There are a great many outlets the Dark Elves have available to them for expressing the darker side of their nature. Through war and raiding they bring back many slaves that can be tortured, sacrificed and forced to work at their behest. Murder, assassination and cruel bloody sports are common occurrences within their society and one must always beware the knife in the dark from both enemy and ally. Even the art and architecture of the Druchii is but a manifestation of their cruel nature.

Given all this, there are still likely a lot of people who are drawn to the sadistic, sociopathic nature of the Dark Elves. As a race they are quite a fascinating study of how depraved a civilization can descend while remaining intact and not descending into a more base state of Chaos. To many players the allure of the Dark Elves likely stems from the possibility of playing something that is wholly inhuman and alien, evil and self-important creatures who seek to enslave and master all they encounter. While a great many folk love to play as the "good guys" in many games, so too are those who have a penchant for wishing to portray or play as evil characters as a break from their everyday lives.

It is thus among the Dark Elves of Warhammer that those of us who like to play as the badguys will find a most excellent race to select. Unlike the Greenskins, who are simply barbarous violent and cruel, the Dark Elves have a sophistication and a culture that is far more developed and which can provide a great many roleplaying opportunities. Unlike the forces of Chaos, Dark Elves do not seek an overthrow of the natural order, or the ruin of the world or any of a myriad other goals; rather the Druchii simply seek the mastery of all they survey, the enslavement of other races to whir whims and unquestionable power and mastery over all life itself. Simple enough goals, no?

The Dark Elves, as they are portrayed in the lore of Warhammer, are one of the most quintessential evil races in fantasy. Whatever the initial four career options may be, they are certain to be iconic representations of various aspects of the Dark Elf people and their nature. Each career is likely to be a method of expressing a different aspect of Dark Elf society and culture, one at its best as such things go, during a time of war and strife. Opportunistic to a fault the Dark Elves could never have idly sat by during the events that lead up to the Age of Reckoning and the beginning of WAR.

As a people the primary goals of the Dark Elves are the conquest of the High Elves and the taking of Ulthuan. Though they have established a new home for themselves in Naggaroth, the Dark Elves (and especially Malekith) covet their ancestral lands, seeing them as their own home that has been denied to them. Though the island nation has been wracked and damaged greatly by the conflict between the High and Dark Elves, the Dark Elves still push every opportunity to reclaim what they have lost. Unlike the High Elves who have been more of a dwindling race, the Dark Elves are actually quite a populous people by comparison. However their own infighting and self-destructive nature when coupled with the continuous conflict they seek has managed to keep their population much more stable than it would have been otherwise.

In order to obtain victory, in this new Age of Reckoning, Malekith has devised an ingenious plan to divide the attention of the High Elf people by instigating a great assault by the Greenskins to occur during a new incursion of Chaos from out of the north. These great troubles that will thus plague the world will leave, as it is hoped, Ulthuan open to their assaults. However in order to achieve victory the Dark Elves must ensure that not only the High Elves are defeated but also their allies, lest their noble kindred lower themselves to requesting the aid of human or dwarf.