New Design article: Elves

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

I have it easier than some, because I didn't care for the plethora of different types of celestials. I found a lot of them unnecessary, and I've never used an eladrin in my life. I'm happy to see them reshaped to be more fey creatures; I think it fits them better.

I'm in a similar boat. I like the old eladrins, but I never used them, except to pine over them and say "gee, it would be nice if these guys were explicitly the sidhe court." And now they are.

When I need good guy celestials, I need angels. I don't need dog-headed men, I don't need more-elf-than-elves, I just need angels. I'm not in love with the D&D versions (seriously, why green and bald?), but they're what I reach for instead of the other choices, as flavorful as they might be.

 

[Rechan]

I must be one of those few people who don't... really care about the cosmology, the history of Demons and Devils and Celestials and so-on. If the other planes were big floating clouds where outsiders threw toasters at one another, I... really wouldn't care. As long as the evil entities throwing toasters are really mean when you encounter them in the Prime Material and there's no toaster in sight, game on!

But I never played Planescape and I've never in a game went to another plane, so I understand I'm an outlier.

 

[Kae'Yoss]

It sounds to me like "elf" = wood/wild/moon elf, while "eladrin" = high/sun elf.

I thought so, too. Why do I have some sort of premonition that the 4e FRCS will have a hell of a time explaining why eladrin are called sun elves here?

 

[Kae'Yoss]

Very interesting. Especially 'They prefer the magic of the natural world to arcane magic'. That's a pretty major change, and a welcome one. They might get a stat bonus to Wisdom or Charisma than Dexterity.

Or they get all of that. We don't know yet how races will look, but it was said that they will matter throughout an adventurer's career, and there was something about ability score choice influenced by races. Could be that they get +2 Wis on 1st, +2 Dex on 5th, and so on.

 

[Kae'Yoss]

The Eladrin in the playtest was a ranger, which seems odd.

Nah, not really. You don't have to play to the racial stereotype.

 

[Kae'Yoss]

I wonder what this change will mean to bladesingers.

I love the comment about the elves having once been closer to their fey cousins, but have lived too long in the world.

They stole that from me!

 

[hong]

That squishy, popping sound you just heard was Forrester's head exploding.

 

[Frostmarrow]

I wonder what this change will mean to bladesingers.

I wonder what this change will mean to dwarves.

"There is nothing as sure in the world as the glitter of gold and the treachery of Elves."

 

[Lurks-no-More]

This looks pretty good, I think; wood-dwelling, sharp-shooting, passionate elves, and more distant, fey and magical eladrin.

I have no problem w. them reusing the name; eladrins, in my experience at least, were probably the least used celestials (even more so than the guardinals), perhaps because they felt too much like celestial elves anyway.

 

[Gold Roger]

I really like having elves clearly defined now.

I never liked that the CG Exemplars where just better elves that felt like they belonged more in the fey subtype. Eladrin as playable highly magical detached fey suits me well enough.

I wonder, with Corellon as the good fey god, will we get Lolth as some sort of unseelie fey queen (note that the MM5 already contains a fey race that serves Lolth).