Yeah, I'm going with 'creates a half-elf' but is socially unacceptable to most eladrin, even moreso now that their race is in jeopardy.
Maybe it's just a difference in phrasing, but I was thinking something a helluva lot stronger than "socially unacceptable. The phrase "blood traitor" springs to mind.
Another thought had occured to me: what if the first elves were actually human/eladrin hybrids? Obviously, they've sort of spun off and mostly bred among themselves for the past millenium or two (especially as the Clergy and Elfaivar locking horns got the parent races really,
really mad at each other). Just a thought I had, since the distinction in 4E (which is where eladrin-the-PC-race originates) is that elves are essentially eladrin whose ancestors went native in the mortal world, but that's pretty much abandoned in the Zeitgeist setting; eladrin have a stronger connection to the Dreaming than elves, but they very much come from this side of the divide.
If you use the "sleeping with humans is blood treachery" thing it might unnecessarily complicate interactions between elven and eladrin characters. Unless elves spun off so very long ago that the origin is either almost or entirely forgotten, but then we get into "If the PC's aren't going to see it or its effects, why bother?"
Anyway, probably a bit late to shoehorn in that bit of lore, but it was a thought I thought I'd share.
So, the Player's guide stated that many Eladrin men fled their lands to seek wives of other races, but they couldn't have kids with them. I guess most of them went to Ber or Risur, as the latter has the second-best connections to the Dreaming and the former is said to have welcomed refugees from Elfaivar with kind of open arms.
Huh, I'd forgotten that detail. Well, it's possible that in the first few years after the Great Malice, some eladrin did shack up with Risuri humans, only to later find they'd earned the hatred of their former countrymen as the Vekeshi and the likes of Asrabey Varal rose to prominence. So, much as single eladrin will disguise themselves as elves or even half-elves to keep a low profile, the rare eladrin-human couple takes a similar route.
Or you could just say that they sought mates from many races... none of them human. (Which might explain the whole "no kids" thing, if eladrin can only produce children with their own kind or humans.
:shrug:
