The problem with elves (question posed)

[The Green Adam]

Ah, good -- I can certainly agree with you on that. I was just a bit surprised by your earlier rant asserting that the way some people wanted to play them was discriminatory, prejudiced, preposterous, and limiting.

The assertion was that, IMHO, to make a blanket statement like, "All campaigns are like this. All elves are like this. All dwarves feel this way about that." is indeed limiting. To think that every GM and player has to have them act the way yours do is silly. I tend to dislike blanket statements made about fictional and/or creative endeavours. I apologize for coming on strong but I also dislike when I'm trying to get a point across to people to open their minds to new ideas and I am confronted with, "Well how do we know the limited idea isn't right?" Er...because it's limited. Open ended thinking suggests that maybe it's right, maybe it's wrong, maybe the answer is chartruese. No one way is correct or incorrect when your discussing things you make up for fun. Relax, be creative and do what you want to. Don't feel you have to be the same as everyone else or be different just because I said so.

 

[Edena_of_Neith]

Good gods, we now have a race called Edenas?!!
If those show up in the 4E Player's Handbook, there may be a problem ...

 

[Edena_of_Neith]

Actually, what you are both saying (Roger, Green Adam) is extremely relevant here.
We have the elves as per the RAW. We have the elves as per Tolkien (doomed to fail.) We have the elves as per other authors. We have them as per the settings.
But these don't have to be YOUR elves. YOUR elves can be anything you WANT them to be. That's how it should be: nobody else should ever tell you how you can play your elves, or how you should run your game.
And actually, in my games, I allow my players who play elves to play them as they please. They *never* play them as the pacifists I've described. They typically play them as fiercely aggressive warriors and wizards. I do not interfere: as players they have the right to rp anyway they please.

But there is another point here, and the very fact you debate on it shows that it is relevant.
Elves are, in the final thought, a point of contention. Who are they? What are they? And even, why are they?
If they are chaotic good, what does chaotic good *mean*? If they are not chaotic good, what are they? Why are they?
If they are a doomed race, why is that? If they are not doomed, why is *that*?

It's the difference between playing a paladin and a neutral evil thief. The neutral evil thief might be easy to play because he can do anything he wants. But the paladin requires thought, pre-planning, working with the DM, and careful rping.
I would say that roleplaying an elf is a lot more thought intensive than roleplaying, say, an orc.

In 1st Edition, is was written that elves are frivolous, flighty, and merry. It is written that they are chaotic good, although PCs need not be so. It is written that elves like to dance and sing and frolic in the woods.
And yet, they are capable of producing elven chain, magical weapons, powerful spells, and exquisitely advanced stonework, woodwork, craftsmanship, and construction. They are powerful warriors, magically adept and strong, and one very dangerous opponent to face.

Remember Dragonlance kender? (created by the well known and respected - I respect them! - Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman)
You know that kender don't make sense ... and they weren't meant to. They are a special case, existing within the bounds of disbelief, and a crucial part of the Dragonlance setting.
*Elves* are like that. (And some dare to argue, IC, that elves and kender are related ... )

Elves are food for thought. They are an impossibility. Yet there they are. How to deal with that? Anyway you want, but you do have to deal with them (or, ban them from your campaign, or simply ignore them altogether ...)
But the question remains: how can elves be elves in the sense depicted? How do they do it?
The question infuriates and maddens, and stirs one up to creative and imaginative answers. For 25 years, gamers have struggled with the question and the answers.

What I would like to hear are *your* answers. What are *your* elves like? How do *your* elves behave, react, and cope? What kinds of civilization do *your* elves create? How do *your* elves hold out against an endless parade of enemies?

Edena_of_Neith

 

[Shadeydm]

Tolkein's elves are fine beside picking a fight with a god there is nothing about them which suggests they would be doomed if ported over to a different campaign setting in fact I would even put forward the notion that had Feanor's sons led the Noldor through a portal into say Greyhawk for example instead of into an unwinnable war vs what is basically a god in Middle Earth they would have faired quite well. This notion that you seem to be putting forward that they can't cope or adapt or compete seems wrong to me. If Celine were ruled and populated by the Noldor it would be one of the most powerful kingdoms on Oearth IMO.

 

[Edena_of_Neith]

Ah, Tolkien's elves (grins)
The Noldor were under the Curse of Mandos, so they couldn't win. Let's drop that.
The Noldor went up against a god, Morgoth. As you suggest, let's drop that.

So the Noldor, lead by Feanor, establish a realm in Celene. The Noldor under Fingolfin are united with Feanor, in this scenario, so Celene is swarming with these powerful Elves of Valinor.

The first question is: will they be satisfied with Celene, or want more land?
All the other lands are claimed, and nobody is going to cede their lands peacefully.

To the west, the human nation of Keoland watches with alarm as a new, mighty power arises to the east, run by an elf whose sanity is in question (Feanor was quite mad, in the book.)
To the northeast, Greyhawk City looks southwest nervously.
To the north, Furyondy wonders if this mighty power could help them against Iuz.
Iuz gets another headache, and goes on a rampage, hearing that yet MORE elves are loose in the Flanaess. Ivid's reaction isn't much better. The Scarlet Brotherhood debates what to do. Other, smaller nations start to connive and plot, as the balance of power is massively altered.

What happens next? (The Noldor could overwhelm any one nation in the Flanaess easily, or take on several of them at once and win. They might be able to take on every nation in the Flanaess at once, since the Light of Valinor is not yet dimmed in their eyes (to quote Tolkein.)

What happens next?

 

[shilsen]

What happens next?

Whatever the DM wants should happen. If he's worth his salt, he can justify a whole lot of different possibilities. To use the Tolkien example again, the elves in the Silmarillion were not doomed to failure. Could Tolkien have written a Silmarillion where the Noldor, despite the curse of Mandos and going up against Morgoth have succeeded, and made it plausible? Of course.

The role and success/failure of the elves (or dwarves, or humans, or orcs, or any other race) in any given setting is purely dependent on the person writing the setting. Depending on the quality of the writing, their role and success/failure will seem more or less plausible. But there's no logical ideal result/status for them in a setting.

 

[The_Gneech]

It's not me. It's the way the settings are set up. They are set up to stick it to elves.

D&D awards experience points for killing things. In 3E, experience is also awarded for winning encounters (usually by killing things.)
So, he who kills the most things wins. He wins, in a scenario where nations and peoples compete for power, and the highest level characters have the most power to hurl in behalf of their people or their side.

But even without the mechanics, in a violent, paranoid world where peoples and nations are at constant war (the case in every D&D setting) there isn't much of a place for peaceful elves living quietly in their arboreal paradise, eating leaves, no?
If the elves don't fight back, they are destroyed. If they do fight back, that's 'playing human' and they are still destroyed.
Only by altering reality with magic, can elves make it in the fantasy settings. This is a fact that the elves never seem to appreciate ... and so they go the way of the dotto (or the Noldor.)

Imagine a group of elves living between Cimmeria, Pickland, and Aquilonia. If they were peaceful, gentle types, they wouldn't last very long there ...

Cimmeria and Pictland are vast reaches of wilderness. Other portions of Conan's world even moreso. Given how many lost cities there are in the Hyborian Age I can easily see elves happily living there for centuries at a time without humans ever even noticing them, much less going to war with them.

As for Aquilonia, at its center (if not at the borders) it's a peaceful, cosmopolitan kingdom with enclaves from all over the world and (under the reign of King Conan) remarkable tolerance for outsiders (I forget which church it was now, but there was one particularly mentioned as finally being allowed to establish a temple after Conan took the throne). As such, I don't see a problem with there being an elvish enclave there.

This Klingon model of the world you seem to espouse, where nobody survives unless they kill and eat everybody else and every square inch of the map is under siege at all times, is not the only feasible model for a setting -- nor even really A feasible model in my opinion. Nobody makes alliances? No country ever has a friendly relationship with any other country? By the logic of this setting, the U.S.A. is terribly remiss for not having invaded Canada yet.

Furthermore, the idea that "kill things and take their stuff" is the be-all end-all of character advancement is fallacious. You gain experience by overcoming challenges (hence CR). In the simplest games, fighting is the challenge and that's it. But not in ALL games. And even if it was, that's only the ruleset for the individual advancement of unique individuals (e.g., player characters) -- NPCs don't advance that way, and nations certainly don't.

So, no, I don't think any of the ideas posited hold even a little bit of water. Elves are perfectly feasible, and playing them should be a perfectly viable option.

-The Gneech

 

[Shadeydm]

Whatever the DM wants should happen. If he's worth his salt, he can justify a whole lot of different possibilities. To use the Tolkien example again, the elves in the Silmarillion were not doomed to failure. Could Tolkien have written a Silmarillion where the Noldor, despite the curse of Mandos and going up against Morgoth have succeeded, and made it plausible? Of course.

The role and success/failure of the elves (or dwarves, or humans, or orcs, or any other race) in any given setting is purely dependent on the person writing the setting. Depending on the quality of the writing, their role and success/failure will seem more or less plausible. But there's no logical ideal result/status for them in a setting.

QFT

 

[BlackMoria]

Using Tolkien's elves, I reject the notion that they were doomed.

They were wise to understand that their time of dominance was at an end and chose to accept a diminished role (or no role at all) in Middle Earth. They chose to stand aside, not let history plow them under.

All empires eventually fall. Our own history is full of such examples. However, none of the empires saw it coming. The elves of Middle Earth saw the decline of their dominance and influence coming and rather than fight perhaps hopelessly against it, they accepted it and made the best of the situation. That is not being doomed - that is adapting to the tides of change.

 

[Roger]

Elves are food for thought. They are an impossibility. Yet there they are.

Big deal. You can run across a dozen impossible things before breakfast in D&D. It's nothing to get excited about.

How to deal with that? Anyway you want, but you do have to deal with them

Of course not. Thousands of D&D gamers do just fine without dealing with it, or any of the other countless impossibilities in D&D.



Cheers,
Roger