Copy/paste from the elven favored class thread:
Grey Elves: Elementalist (wu jen with a retooled spell list)
► IMC, they are mariners, loving nothing more than the freedom one has on the open seas. Not the aloof-snob-midly racist mountainers archetype described in the MM. I liked a magic favored class for them, but wanted it to be more in-tune with a chaotic good race, and the wu jen is just that -- a chaotic wizard in better tune with nature.
High Elves: Hexblade
► Those, on the other hand, are definitely aloof and upnose-looking. They love to fight, and to fight dirty. They develop magical powers too, but only secondarily. They are bastard at heart, use their curses as oppression tools. A chaotic evil culture, although of all, the most likely to produce lawful members.
Wood Elves: Scout
► Wild and unpredictable, the chaotic neutral wood elves can be friendly and hospitable, or hostile and aggressive. One never knows, upon entering their forest, if they'll be welcomed to partake in their bawdy celebrations or hunted to death just for trespassing. It is usually possible, in the case of a wild hunt, to negociate with them, but that usually involves besting their master of the hunt in unarmed combat.
/end of copy
Now, to expand a bit on that: the idea was that there were three (and only three!) elven subraces. One would be barbaric, one would be civilized, and one would be decadent. One would be CG, one would be CN, and one would be CE.
Based on that premise, it was easy to make the associations:
Grey elves are the epitome of what I call the "intellectuel souffreteux" (sickly intellectual), after a kind of character concept I often see: -2 Str, -2 Con, but +2 Int, and in order to have a bit of survivability, +2 Dex. It's the reverse of the "gros bill" archetype (which would rather be +2 Str, +2 Con, -2 Int, -2 Cha, -2 Wis).
So, the initial draft of grey elves were a bunch of peaceful philosophers, whose utterly anarchistic society only works because they're all good-intentionned toward each others. If they were more selfish, the whole civilization would tumble down very fast.
Because their model of civilization, based on spontaneously cooperative anarchy, cannot work for most people other than their likeminded fellow grey elves, they have become somewhat reclusive, spending their time on sea-going vessels, enjoying the freedom given to them by the vast, unending ocean. There, on the calm waters, they are free to meditate on philosophy, magic, mysticism, and a bunch of other hippy stuff.
As both a consequence and a cause of their isolation, they are terrible suckers. They are naïve to the extreme, and it's easy to rob them blind through deception and lies. They know it, but can't help it. They're too nice to be wary.
High elves have nothing especially interesting to go for them. They're standard elves. At this time, though, since I played in a FR campaign, I read the FR forums at the Wizards boards. And I have to be honest: the wizards boards-based elf fans are what gave birth to the evil nazi melnibonelves. Always raving "elves are better at everything than everybody else", "elves can flip out and kill dragons without thinking twice about it", "elves are mammals", "elves are innately magical and they speak by telepathy and they're born knowing everything of elven culture and they can sense whenever someone casts a spell and they speak with animals and they build flying castles made of crystal and they pee liquid sunshine that can be quaffed as a potion of cure light wounds", they made me into the elf-hater I am today. (The worst of the lot being sun elves and drow.)
So, I had plenty of examples of elves being total arschlochen, racist, arrogant, pompous, grotesquely vain, and totally unaware of their own failings.
I took the high elves (as it is pretentious to call yourself the high-something to begin with, it made sense), and turned them into these dreadful forum elves.
Wood elves are wild and dumb. Like orcs, but they're elves. I ran there with my favorite depiction of elves -- really chaotic, flimsy, whimsical, feral, festive. They are the elves that are close to fay -- graceful like a nymph, bawdy like a satyr, cruel like a redcap, kind like a brownie, and so on. They aren't malevolent, but they're scary nonetheless, because you can't never be sure what to expect from them.
