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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Yaarel" data-source="post: 9415620" data-attributes="member: 58172">Me too. At level 1, and even earlier during the background, I want to see a hint of the character concept already mechanically playable, even if the trait only becomes fully available later.A nonmagical "nightvision" would be something like being able to see in black-and-white if there is any illumination whatsoever, and for mechanical purposes even a single star or a single candle in the distance means there is enough light for nightvision.It is possible to have a nonmagical Halfling, but then it should swap out the luck. It might even make sense to have a Small Human to represent the concept.All in all, I find the D&D 2024 Elf sufficiently flexible. Swapping the ability improvements was crucial.Where the D&D Elf divides into magical cultures where certain spells typically prevail, it is simple enough to switch these spells for a different elven culture. Sometimes the best way to represent an elven feature is to design a new spell. It is ok to assume that most members of an elven community enter full-caster classes. (Similar to how some Human communities require all citizens to train in the military.)Other elven aspects are environmental. Being ethereal, as a Fey being, is sufficient to convey the immaterial, outofbody, aspects of an elf. The only caveat is there must be a "Border Fey", like the Border Ether, where beings in the Feywild can plainly observe Humans walking around in the Material Plane. In 5e, the Feywild already "overlaps" the Material Plane, but the observability needs to be explicit. From the perspective of the Material Plane, these Fey beings appear as subtle forces that normally go unnoticed.With regard to animism, these Fey beings, including the Elf, including Scottish and Norse concepts, are the souls of natural phenomena. The Scottish concept retains the Celtic identity of a sidhe, Scottish sith. These sith elves are the souls of literal fertile soil, and anywhere vegetation flourishes is evidence of an Elven community in the overlapping Fey Plane. The souls of soil have the ability to project and manifest a human form, and their virtual bodies are human enough while roaming the overlapping Fey Plane. They are the soil itself literally, and always maintain a connection to specific area of soil in the Material Plane. For D&D, when this Scottish elf dies, it returns to the soil and might later recover enough to reform a new body within the Feywild, possibly with a new identity. A Resurrection spell essentially recalls the soul from the soil thus works normally. Happily, these virtual bodies are human enough to have D&D stats, and can virtually bleed if injured. Their powers are magical powers that Humans can also learn how to do. Only powerful Elves are powerful enough to figure out a way to materialize into the Material Plane as a creature of flesh-and-blood. But until then, and while in the Feywild, they are virtually flesh-and-blood.The same is true for the Norse concept of elf, except they are animistic souls of the sky (not soil), especially the upper atmosphere. They maintain a connection to the sky of the Material Plane. For them, the entire skydome is their "hall" and the clouds are their floor. These skyey souls can manifest a humanlike form, that is human enough within the "Border Fey". Thus there can be an "Alfheimr" as a normal enough viking town but that floats high in the sky of the Feywild, on a "ground" of empty air while watching humans far below.Also [USER=2525]@Mistwell[/USER]. To be clear, I want rules to mix-and-match player species traits. Also for the sake of inclusiveness. In the meantime, I feel singling out the Elf "race" only is unhelpful, and the 2014 "Half" Elf redundant. It needs to be rules for recombining every 2024 player species.</blockquote>

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