Voodoo

Voodoo (also known as black magic) is a dark and powerful form of magic, referred to as the "ancient power of the trolls" by Rokhan. It is practiced primarily by troll shadow hunters, hexxers, and witch doctors as well as others. While not practiced by all trolls, voodoo is certainly at least as widespread as cannibalism. Little is known about its emergence among the trolls, since most tribes that possess such knowledge are unwilling to share it with outsiders. However, following the advent of Zandalari trolls to Yojamba Isle, several notable researchers have come to speculate that voodoo may have originated with the Zandalari. The trolls' use of mojo in their voodoo magic has long been established. Drinking blood provides power, the darkest of voodoo.

A practitioner of voodoo is sometimes called a voodooist or vodouisant.

Usage

 * Voodoo can reform a physical body for a brief time, such as in the case of Trebor.
 * It can also empower spirit totems.
 * Empower tikis to become animated warriors, such as enchanted tikis, Tiki Lord Mu'Loa and Tiki Lord Zim'wae.
 * A high saturation of powerful voodoo–like around the Necropolis in Nazmir–can animate powerful aberrations such as T'zane and the smaller Mire Terrors.
 * Enslave spirits.
 * Raise the dead as Shadowed Voodoo Spirits like Gara'jal does in the Throne of Thunder.
 * Enslave and mind control other living beings.
 * Raise the dead. Seemingly in masses and with ease.
 * Voodoo may have been responsible for raising the dead in the Amani Catacombs.
 * Voodoo may have been responsible for resurrecting Mogh the Dead (formerly Mogh the Undying).
 * Voodoo may have been responsible for resurrecting High Priest Venoxis and for trying to resurrect High Priestess Jeklik.
 * Raise the same body multiple times.
 * Food infected with voodoo can turn its consumers into zombies.
 * The rare magic is able to turn the evil of something against itself, such as scourgestones into Holy Mightstones.
 * Demonic imps affected by the magic suffer side effects, what exactly is unknown.
 * However, Impsy who was affected by voodoo feathers stuffed into a doll appeared to make him a little bit more compassionate for some time.
 * It can empower allies for a brief time.
 * Enhance armor and weaponry.
 * It is possible and likely that the Zandalari use voodoo to perform their Loa-Infusion on animals, armor and weapons.
 * Turn allies invulnerable to damage and spells for some time. As seen with the usage of "Big Bad Voodoo", an iconic troll ability encountered in both Warcraft III and World of Warcraft.
 * Big Bad Voodoo is also capable of hexing enemies that come within its radius, as displayed by Kaza'jin the Wavebinder's usage of it against the mogu at Warport Rastari.
 * Fishing lures imbued with voodoo is able to attract the biggest and most stubborn of fish.
 * It can be used to empower potions and poisons to the point where it is strong enough to kill the physical embodiment of a loa.
 * Cure ailments.
 * Voodoo can be used to apply a disguise on someone.
 * Witch Doctor Kejabu used voodoo to enter a Flight Form in the shape of a raven.
 * It can shrink and enlarge creatures.
 * Voodoo totems can be deployed to drain a village's worth of spirits.
 * Voodoo totems can also be used to discern the feelings of a creature, a witch doctor can then feel what the creature targeted by the totem feels.
 * Voodoo touches the hearts of everyone, whether they believe in the magic or not.
 * It can be used to read the minds and emotions of creatures.
 * It can also be used to make "voodoo love incense".
 * Voodoo can be infused into items such as a whistle, allowing its sound to break through to the Other Side, attracting the attention of spirits.
 * Amani troll witch doctors set about casting hexes and curses against the arcane weapon Felo'melorn, but history bears out that even the darkest voodoo did little to negate the effectiveness of the blade during the Troll Wars.

Shadow hunters
Shadow hunters are masters of voodoo magics who can use their spirit-powers to both heal their allies and place curses upon their hapless enemies.

Voodoo Figurines
Voodoo Figurines, mechanical golems, are powered by flasks of mojo, troll sweat, the flesh of tribal enemies, or by devouring tiny portions of their owners' souls.

Loa
Each of the troll priests within Zul'Gurub worships a particular loa, called a primal god, and has the ability to assume an avatar of that god. For example, High Priest Venoxis can become the avatar of Hethiss (a snake).

There are four primal gods worshipped in Zul'Aman: the bear, lynx, dragonhawk, and eagle gods. In addition, any spirit of a dead ancestor — or even the shadow ascendants of the Forsaken — can be considered loa.

Voodoo practitioners

 * Hexer, a type of voodoo priest.
 * Shadow hunter
 * Witch doctor

Items

 * Zandalari Voodoo Doll
 * Torn Voodoo Doll
 * Personal Voodoo Doll
 * Punctured Voodoo Doll
 * Voodoo Skull
 * Voodoo Doctor's Hovel
 * Severed Voodoo Claw
 * The Shadow Hunter's Voodoo Mask

In the RPG
Some scholars view voodoo as a type of animism, and to an extent that theory is true. The trolls’ religion takes a decidedly different dark bent than the shamanistic beliefs of the orcs and tauren, though. Trolls have a complex belief system involving malign spirits and their effect on the world, but no scholar has established what is truth and what is simply long-held belief. The Darkspear trolls come from a dark and bloodthirsty history of sacrifice, cannibalism and black magic. They consider spirits to be individuals much like living creatures. Spirits are greedy, hostile and dangerous. Trolls also believe their ancestors linger on as jealous spirits who miss the land of the living and require blood sacrifices to appease them. Trolls sacrifice and eat their enemies. They conduct these practices for two reasons. First, they believe the sacrifice of sapient creatures appeases malicious spirits. Second, they believe that after death, an enemy’s spirit can visit misfortune on its killer. By consuming the flesh of their enemies, trolls believe they can also consume their enemy’s spirit, or at least damage it enough to render it impotent.

The orcs’ influence tempers the Darkspear trolls’ spiritual beliefs. The trolls willingly support Thrall and the Horde, and they understand that their destructive rituals offend their allies. Under Thrall’s tutelage, the Darkspear trolls abandoned the sacrifice of sapient creatures and took up animal sacrifice instead. These trolls no longer eat their enemies, but practice other methods of trapping, injuring or destroying enemy spirits. These methods include witch doctor blessings, the burning of enemy hearts, drowning corpses and head-shrinking.

Witch doctors hold an important position in troll society. Trolls respect their witch doctors as the wisest and most powerful tribe members, and show them courtesy and deference. Trolls are superstitious. They see bad omens everywhere and rely on witch doctors to interpret and exorcise these omens. Witch doctors govern success or failure in battle almost more than the warriors do; trolls believe that a witch doctor who reads the portents correctly and conducts the proper rituals can guarantee success in any endeavor. Until Thrall’s involvement with the Darkspear trolls, only male trolls became witch doctors. Female trolls have since seen the equality other Horde women possess and crave their own emancipation. Despite their efforts, few female witch doctors exist, and those who attempt to take on the role of tribal witch doctor meet with much derision and resistance. Trolls call female witch doctors “zufli,” a corruption of the voodoo master prefix “zul.” “Zufli” is a derogatory term and literally means “baby witch,” but some females have taken on the title as a mark of pride.

Troll death rituals used to involve ritual mutilation of the body. The trolls believed that simulating the sacrifice of a corpse distracted nearby malign spirits. The spirits, drawn to the pretend sacrifice, would fail to notice the new spirit entering their world. This allowed the deceased’s spirit to pass more easily into the next world and find a place for itself without harassment. Now trolls avoid these rituals because the Horde finds them disturbing and the rituals evoke unpleasant associations with the Scourge. Trolls frown on cremation, as they believe the body provides the spirit with a tie to the mortal world, and to destroy it sets a spirit adrift and confused for eternity. Recently the trolls have taken to cutting the eyes out of a corpse, thus opening a path into the skull where the spirit resides. Often a witch doctor sacrifices an animal nearby to distract any hungry spirits; if the mourners have no time for such a ritual, they may instead cut their arms and let their blood spill to achieve the necessary distraction. To avoid the possibility of undeath, trolls either bury their comrades’ bodies in hidden places or in sections (usually the body in one place and the head in another).

Troll head-shrinking
Supposedly, upon his death, an enemy’s spirit lingers in his body for a short time. Then the spirit flees the corpse and is free to wreak havoc and revenge on its killer. Troll witch doctors believe that a fallen enemy’s spirit lairs in the corpse’s head before fleeing the body. Trolls who wish to trap enemy spirits often turn to head-shrinking. To shrink a head, a troll first decapitates his fallen enemy. Then he makes a slit up the back of the head and carefully removes the skull (which he saves or discards). The troll then sews up the incision and boils the head for two hours to shrink. The troll uses scalding hot rocks and sand to fill the head cavity and shrink the head further. When the head is fistsized and rubbery, the troll sews up the eyes, mouth, and neck with elaborate stitching. The enemy spirit now remains trapped inside the head forever. Most members of the Horde look askance at the practice of head-shrinking, but consider it a step up from human sacrifice and cannibalism. Some trolls have techniques to shrink skulls as well, which involve removing key pieces and reconstructing the skull as a smaller version using animal parts and resins to hold it together.

Notes and trivia

 * In World of Warcraft mechanics, its power appears to be a combination of shadow and nature magics as well as alchemy.
 * The concept for troll voodoo magic is derived from Louisiana Voodoo (aka New Orleans Voodoo), Haitian Vodou (or Vaudou), and West African Vodun (or Vudun).

Speculation

 * It could be possible that Mogh the Dead (formerly Mogh the Undying) resurrected himself with voodoo as it has been used to raise the dead in the past.
 * Another witch doctor of the tribe may have resurrected him as well.
 * In the quest Knowledge Is Power, the Zandalari are said to use a "different kind of magic" which is most likely referring to voodoo. However, following that is a sentence mentioning the Zandalari's impressive control over shadow and arcane magic, possibly implying that voodoo has the power to control both of those schools.