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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Winterthorn" data-source="post: 3869339" data-attributes="member: 1702">Excellent topic! Let me share my recent brainstorm...I think this topic actually touches on many levels of the game and speaks of many solutions:1) DM's camapign interpretations/DM's worldbuilding,2) house rules,3) in-game explanations,4) alternative game design/game mechanics, and combinations of the above.I too have felt there was damage to my suspension of disbelief whenever the question of a non-human race's age was compared to "experience" and knowledge. And I think the principle cause of this effect was the gradual diminishment of mechanical and conceptual distinctions between humans and other races. Look at the 3E rules that separate humans from elves: a couple of +2 racial bonuses, bilingual but less diversity in bonus languages, low-light vision, and a few weapon proficiencies, and some rarely used racial special abilities. These differences are mechnically trivial, especially as one gains levels, in the sense that advantages only occur under a few specific circumstances - mostly when dungeon delving as low level adventurers - and otherwise they are just humans with pointy ears. Dwarves and the other classic "demi-humans" are no better mechanically speaking. (That's been my expereince in many games as DM or as a player.)This problem of weak distinctions between races is underscored by the nature of this thread's topic. While one can adequtely argue that elves are very different from humans in their development - as the tables on racial ages strongly suggest - my experience tells me the differences are effectively feeble in practice. 1st level elves can adventure with 1st level humans who are 1/5th their age, but the in-game explanations can look like trite, convenient excuses - very unsatisfying to me. I know some of this in 3E is designed to protect game balance between players, but there's a lack of luster and logic. It just shows that endless choices in a game system actually risks a loss of distinction and undermines flavour. The bigger the buffet of combinations the bigger the mess. So all we are left with to explain this is to invent some deeper convoluted reasoning or create our own interpretations in our campign worlds. Or something more radical: start seriously tweaking the rules on races.My preference: look back at earlier editions to re-examine what made races more distinct then than now. (I expect going forward 4E will be even worse on racial distinctions; I bet we'll just have funky looks, very weak racial rules, and racial backgrounds of low relevence while in actual play). Earlier editions don't offer precise answers (and have their own logic problems) but many players and DMs definitely felt that elves then were really different than humans.Since 3E gave us a whole host of fully detailed game rules that we can more easily tinker with, I'm on the path to creating more profound changes to races to account for differences - so elves are no longer humans with pointy ears. Not only that, but as we are dealing with the genre of fantasy, we can more easily justify racial differences in rules built from ideas stemming from fantasy. (The trick to making fantasy logic "work", IMHO, is to make it consistent!)I'll have to post my details on this later (and in the HR forum), but I'm all for reintroducing limits upon alignments*, classes, and even levels in classes, predicated upon racial physiological, psychological, and cultural differences! For starters we can easily double almost all the race-based skill modifiers so the mechanics are genuinely and continuously relevent in-game. Give long-lived races, especially elves, lots of racial skill modifiers (mostly bonuses, but penalties could be a good idea too - e.g. if elves are typically aloof, give them a racial penalty on diplomacy skill rolls, that way half-elves can play a more significant social role considering they have a bonus to that skill).So why not re-introduce limitations and also award bonuses predicated on the fantasy race one chooses to play. Those limitatation and bonuses, if planned well, can expain a great many things about age vs knowledge/experience. If these changes are logical and wholely playable, then maybe the distinctions that make an elf very different from a human can become very relevent to the in-game experience. Grant a racial bonus to elves for their decades of study of Spellcraft (and a penalty for dwarves for their many years of lack of interest in Spellcraft). Give elves a racial bonus for Use Magic Device. Give some sub-races of elves a racial bonus to Knowledge (arcana). These, and other potential changes, are not game breaking bonuses, but more defined advantages that can be countered by "realistic" limits on class options, etc.Then there's the question of overall game balance itself: well, if need be, I'd favour implementing Level Adjustments (for ECL) where it would be most effective and fair. 3E has given us the rule set that allows us to make effective and playable changes borrowed upon ideas from past editions. Now "ancient" elves in a low-level adventuring party can be made to "work" without contrived explanations. Race limits can add to fun and be logical, and can therefore enrich the flavour of the game. The details are up to our creative imaginations. What will happen in 4E relating to this topic? I really don't know.-W*example: if alignment really matters as a game concept, I'm having it that elves absolutely cannot be Evil but not immune to "falling", and drow are absolutely always Evil but still redemable. How? Elves of any sub-race who "fall from grace", actually transform into drow! (Although the idea is that such an occurance is very rare and the stuff of legendary tragedy.) And a drow who, through some incredible act of heroism, redeems herself/himself, actual tranforms into an elf (sub-race dependent on campaign conditions and DM's guidance). That's an example of fantasy logic that can work. It has a lot of interesting potential relating to both magic and divine influence/campaign world history. Lots of symbolism at work. (The same fantasy logic can be employed on dwarves vs duergar.) Humans, in comparison, are allowed to be any alignment (but a DM can say "no Evil in the PC party please"), and thus retain the realism of the trials of being human that we all know so well from real life.</blockquote>

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