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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Someone" data-source="post: 3553374" data-attributes="member: 5656">It doesn't matter. In SHARK's world elves are so wonderfulously great that they can work around that and routinely (in the elf perspective) decimate entire human armies suffering negligible casualties they can raise from the dead in, like, five minutes. (ok, I'm exagerating)  In any case, that's how it works in SHARK's world and game, and that's great. I don't think you're suggesting that SHARK is wrong, that elves in his world shouldn't be doing so well, and that he's having wrongbadfun. I agree with almost none of his points, the same I don't buy Edena's elves, but they have all the right to run their campaings as they want.That said, and since I have some spare time I'll willfully jump into the "elves are so and so" trap and make my contribution. I don't buy that an elf long life and experience in his craft would immediately translate into a racial superiority into that craft. Many radical innovations in the fields of technology and science are brought and invented by people who is relatively fresh in that field: they come without preconceived notions and aren't afraid of breaking the old and trusted ways. Also, experience and specialization in one area frequently invites stagnation - excellency in one craft doesn't grown linearly with the years practicing that craft, so even if an elf lives ten human lives it doesn't automatically mean he's the equivalent of ten humans. So while the elves may be wearing delicate, artistic, state-of-the-art chainmail of finely made rings and wielding bows of exquisite facture, the humans will be bringing full plate to the field and siege machines the elves woul not thought to be possible. Human battle wizards would be also wielding magic the elves never have seen; and magic shown by the elves will be quickly copied and adapted by young human wizards, while the reverse will not be true. The elves' tactics may be great at first, but after a few decades the lesser races will learn all they can do and will be more prepared, and so on.Elves may be also individually rich, but again it doesn't immediately translate into a rich elven kingdom. Nation wide wealth are more related with trade and mass production, not possesion of luxury items: that's just smoke and mirrors. The elves' wealth will evaporate in the blink of an eye, should a war erupt.Elves may be attuned to the natural world and have allies, but humans are notorious for their ruthlessness and desire to win at any price. They won't hesitate to turn the elven forests into a desert and ally with whatever power they have to in order to win.I've ignored D&D rules for the moment. D&D contradicts in some cases my assertion that excellency grows linearly with experience: in fact, is grows faster than that. However in D&D terms you don't get experience for living long: you get experience for taking risks. The more risks you take, the more experience and power you adquire. Also, the more risks you take the more likely is to die. And the adquisition of power can be very quick, so quick that life expectancy isn't really important. This means that the number of powerful individuals belonging to a race only depends on the number of people of said race willing to bet their life into the levelling lottery. Who's more likely to do so, a long lived, filthy rich elf, or a human that in many cases will have little to lose?</blockquote>

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