Blood Knights

Blood Knight Order
Main leader	Lady Liadrin
Secondary leaders	Knight-Lord Bloodvalor, Magister Astalor Bloodsworn, Lord Solanar Bloodwrath
Race(s)	Blood elves
Capital	Silvermoon City
Other major settlements	Undercity, Orgrimmar
Theater of operations	Azeroth, Outland
Language(s)	Thalassian

The Blood Knights are an elite group of blood elf paladins serving as Silvermoon's equivalent of the Knights of the Silver Hand. As high elves, many were members of the Church of Light. Many later became priests and a few became paladins.Template:Cite Template:Cite Template:Cite After the Third War, the majority of high elves became blood elves, and soon the race began to lose its light given powers. Thus they needed to find a new way to access the Light. They did this by sapping Light energy from the captive naaru M'uru held beneath the Blood Knight headquarters. In a mad lust for power, Kael'thas Sunstrider sent the felblood to attack Silvermoon City and seize M'uru for his own personal uses. The Blood Knights are now pledged to aid A'dal and the Shattered Sun Offensive in defeating Kil'jaeden.

History

Stealing the Light

From the official Burning Crusade website:

A blood elf paladin.

Not long ago, in Outland...

Prince Kael'thas Sunstrider and his blood elves waited until the newly arrived naaru departed Tempest Keep. He had little interest in what the naaru hoped to accomplish on this shattered world: it was Tempest Keep that had brought him here. At the prince's signal the elves stormed the dimensional fortress, quickly defeating its automated defenses and claiming its satellite structures. The only real threat the elves discovered was a lone naaru who had stayed behind to maintain the keep's defenses. With some difficulty, Kael'thas subdued the energy being and sent it to Quel'Thalas so that the magic-addicted blood elves could feed upon it.

Back in the capital city of Silvermoon, Magister Astalor Bloodsworn was not content with this idea. After long months of study and experimentation, he and his fellow wizards learned how to manipulate and corrupt the naaru's luminous energies. In the end the wizards devised a process by which the powers of the Light could be transferred to recipients who had not earned such abilities. Instead of feeding upon the naaru's magic, the blood elves would wield the naaru's Light-given powers themselves.

Lady Liadrin, formerly a priestess, had recently renounced her vows, for she felt the Light had abandoned her people. She learned of the wizards' achievement and volunteered to be the first to bend the stolen powers to her will. With her decision a new order was born: the Blood Knights. These renegade paladins are able to harness the sacred powers of the Alliance's noblest heroes.

Though many blood elves applauded the creation of the Blood knights, just as many dislike their methods and their attitude, especially the Farstriders. Curiously the naaru don't express any sort of dislike for the blood knights and even allow them in their cities. Blood knights, despite their capture of M'uru, don't seem to have any enmity with the naaru of Shattrath City, some even living in the city.

It is also important to note that not all high elves, now blood elves, abandoned their former ways to become Blood knights. A very small minority of blood elves continued to follow their path as true Paladins of the Light.^{[citation needed]} 

Treachery of the Prince

For the dialog between Lady Liadrin and A'dal, see: Lady Liadrin.

Travelling to Quel'Thalas once more, Kael'thas and his "felblood" minions entered Silvermoon, took M'uru from his place under Blood Knight headquarters, and took the naaru to the Sunwell Plateau. In the empty chamber, the magisters that drained the Light energy stand around, dazed; young initiates seeking to learn the powers of resurrection (who would normally tap the power directly from M'uru) must instead collect the residual holy energies from the dazed magisters.

Seeing Kael'thas' treachery for herself, Lady Liadrin travelled to Shattrath and met with A'dal , who informed her that M'uru had known his fate - to aid in the redemption of the people of Quel'Thalas, as prophesied by Velen. With this new insight, Liadrin pledged herself and the Order to the Sha'tar and the Shattered Sun Offensive, the army raised to battle Kael'thas and his nefarious master, Kil'jaeden. With Liadrin absent from Silvermoon, the duties of training aspiring Masters - normally undertaken by Liadrin herself - are now being handled by Lord Solanar Bloodwrath.

Horde-specific paladin spells and items

There are a great number of similarities between Alliance and Horde paladins, but there are also major variations of the Horde paladins over their Alliance cousins. These are but a few:

Blood-Tempered Ranseur

At level 20, blood elf paladins receive a quest from Knight-Lord Bloodvalor in Silvermoon to create a spear that serves as both weapon and badge of office as a Blood Knight Adept. However, many have complained that the result - the  [Blood-Tempered Ranseur] - is weaker than both the sword  [Sin'dorei Warblade], the quest reward for killing Dar'Khan Drathir and the Alliance's own paladin weapon, the mace  [Verigan's Fist]. However, the Blood Tempered Ranseur does have subtle advantages. The stat buffs are substantial (+ 6 Strength and Intellect, +9 Stamina, as opposed to the Warblade's +10 Strength, +4 Stamina (no Intellect bonus) or the Verigan's Fist's +7 Stamina, +6 Intellect, and +12 Spirit (no Strength bonus)), and the weapon is quicker, allowing more chances to interrupt enemy casting, as well as more chances to score crits. Also not to be overlooked from an RP aspect is the weapon's undeniable visual appeal and striking distinctiveness.

Mounts

Like the Alliance, blood elf paladins receive their class-specific warhorse mount at level 20, from their class trainer for 1. Formerly, it was completely free and obtained from a quest, but 1 gold is not too difficult to obtain.

Also like the Alliance, blood elf paladins receive their epic charger mount quest at level 40. But the quest requirements are somewhat different - described as somewhat easier than the Alliance's - and the only instance required is Stratholme (though some may wish to run Scholomance, as Dark Runes are required for the early parts of this quest).

There are also variations in appearance. Alliance paladin horses are white, with blue livery and silver armor plating (gold at 60). Blood elf paladin horses are black, with red livery and brass armor plating.

Blood Knight tabard

Upon completing the Charger quest chain, in addition to receiving the epic mount and required riding skill, blood elf paladins receive the  [Blood Knight Tabard] to mark their promotion to the rank of Master in the Blood Knight order. This is the only mount quest on either side that provides a tabard in addition to the mount.

Seal of Blood

At level 64, blood elf paladins will receive the spell [Seal of Blood]:

All melee attacks deal additional Holy damage equal to 35% normal weapon damage, but the Paladin loses health equal to 10% of the total damage inflicted.

Unleashing this Seal's energy will judge an enemy, instantly causing 445 to 488 Holy damage at the cost of 148 to 163 health.

Seal of Blood is a popular choice for players whose weapons do enough damage to raise the bonus above that of [Seal of Righteousness], especially seen in tanks, the constant healing the tanks receive negates in damage done to them by the spell.

Blood elf and Alliance paladins received seals in Patch 3.0.2 that were very similar to Seal of Vengeance and Seal of Blood, respectively: blood elves received [Seal of Corruption], while Alliance received [Seal of the Martyr].

File:BloodKnightRiding.jpg

A Blood Knight Riding a charger

Ranks of the Blood Knight Order

There are four "ranks" that are obtainable by blood elf paladins, and some that are only obtainable by the NPCs.

Player ranks

• Initiate: Where all blood knights begin, at level 12
• Adept: Obtained after completing the Blood-Tempered Ranseur, around level 20-25.
• Knight: Obtained after learning the Blood Warhorse summon, level 30.
• Master: Obtained after completing the Blood Charger quest, around level 60. This rank is also held by some NPCs (Master Pyreanor in Orgrimmar, for example).

NPCs

• Champion: Some blood elf paladin trainers (Champion Cyssa Dawnrose in the Undercity, for instance) have this rank.
• Knight-Lord: Presumably the teachers of aspiring Blood Knights (Knight-Lord Bloodvalor in Silvermoon).
• Matriarch: The rank held by Lady Liadrin, supreme leader of the Blood Knight order.

M'uru, the imprisoned Naaru from which the Blood Elves harvest their "holy" powers, pre-patch 2.4.0

Concerns and controversy

Main article: Blood elf controversy

The introduction of paladins to the Horde along with shamans to the Alliance was initially controversial. The decision to eliminate faction-specific classes was explained by Blizzard as an attempt to refine and distinguish the two classes from one another. They had previously suffered from comparisons of their abilities, and the attempt to "balance" them and yet have them remain distinct led to the two classes becoming more and more similar to one another. The introduction of these classes to both sides would reduce the controversial issue of faction balance. Nevertheless, this decision has met with some criticism by players and even Blizzard employees have expressed that the decision was not an easy one.

Notable

Name	Location		Information
Lady Liadrin	Terrace of Light	Shattrath City	Matriarch of the Order and the first Blood knight, former priestess; trains aspiring Masters (pre-patch 2.4).
Lord Solanar Bloodwrath	Farstriders' Square	Silvermoon City	Trains aspiring Masters (post-Patch 2.4)
File:IconSmall Naaru Small.gif M'uru	Sunwell Plateau	Isle of Quel'Danas	Captured Tempest Keep technician, former source of Blood knights' powers. (Kidnapped by Kael'thas Sunstrider, patch 2.4.)
Magister Astalor Bloodsworn	Farstriders' Square	Silvermoon City	Creator of the Blood Knights, led the project to drain energy from captive naaru.
Knight-Lord Bloodvalor	Farstriders' Square	Silvermoon City	Oversees Blood Knight training in the lower ranks.
Mehlar Dawnblade	The Bulwark	Western Plaguelands	Former student of Uther the Lightbringer, aids in creation of  [Scourgebane].
Champion Cyssa Dawnrose	Royal Quarter	Undercity	Only Blood Knight trainer in Eastern Kingdoms outside of Quel'Thalas.
Master Pyreanor	Grommash Hold	Orgrimmar	Only Blood knight trainer in Kalimdor.

For a more detailed archive of blood knights see:

• Famous paladins

External links

World of Warcraft Community Site Burning Crusade Blood Knight page