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Message: <blockquote data-quote="GreenTengu" data-source="post: 6856306" data-attributes="member: 6777454">You know... If I were to write it, I would twist the knife a little and reveal that elves aren't nearly as "good" as they claim to be.Think about it... ever known an elf to do an honest days work? I mean... really?High Elves in particular seem to have all the stone, natural gas and metal they could possibly need... but where exactly does it come from? Can you really imagine elves working down in the mines? Stripped down, covered with soot and swinging those pick axes with all the strength their frail bodies have?No... of course not.And can you really imagine an elf plowing the fields? You can claim gathering and hunting all you like, but frankly-- you can't feed a real population that way. Unless you have a method of producing a large amount of food in a small space rather efficiently, you aren't going to feed your sizeable population of human-like beings that live for a thousand years and never sleep.Is this happening through trading? Unlikely. We are told elves generally keep to themselves and, even if they were trading, there would have to be something they produce that would be worthwhile that could be traded-- and, again, what could they imaginably be trading if none of them is capable of a real honest days work and instead universally all elves get to spend all day every day partying or studying and generally being chaotic, valuing freedom over order?I'd bet you anything that there are very good reasons elves never let outsiders visit their cities-- because any real outsider's examination of them would reveal their arrogant high and mighty moral principles to be simply a farce.Maybe their work is done through magic. Summon beings from other planes and compel them doing the work, reasoning it isn't slavery because these beings don't have discernable thoughts or intelligence... or a least they can't communicate such. Or maybe that is too difficult, maybe they regularly capture outsiders and put them under charm spells in order to get them to do all the heavy labor and serve the elves every whim. It is fine as long as they, the master race, are the ones doing it and they are using magic to compel service rather than chains and the whip. And that's probably the real reason charm spells don't work very well on them, they have a built-up resistance.Or maybe they go out and rob other peoples of everything. Maybe they like to target the particularly physically unappealing peoples. Orcs, Goblins, Giants, etc. Then when those people go stomping around in retaliation, the elves tell the humans and dwarfs 'hey! there are monsters over there!! go get 'em!!' and the humans and dwarves are all too happy to rid the world of these monsters-- after all, are you going to believe the flawlessly beautiful, virtuous, perfect, never wrong elf or a 'monster'? And thus rid elves of receiving consequences for plundering others...And this game works only so long as the elves make sure that outsiders, outside of the most trusted, conditioned outsiders sworn to absolute secrecy, are allowed to view their civilization. Because if anyone ever realized just how elves manage to get away with living carefree, wistful lives and making sure they remain unblemished with perfect skin and perfect manicures and delicate and graceful yet receive all the benefits that humans, dwarfs, halflings and everyone else has to work from dawn to dusk at backbreaking labor for.... well, the gig would be up and they might soon face an uprising forcing them to either have to use their powerful magics to eliminate all threats to them or relocate and hope rumors don't catch up to them.See, that would be the ideal way to do an elven city. Secret, hidden and guarded because if it was ever found out, one would realize that the elves entire 'like humans, just flawless and perfect in every way' is all built on lies and deceptions and is really the result of being the ruling class of a dystopian slave state, albeit a totally clean, tidy and beautiful one on the surface.... so long as you can ignore the silent suffering of those whose backs it is built on who have been effectively lobotomized and their faces forced into a 'content' smile.</blockquote>

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