The problem with elves (question posed)

[Nifft]

Actually, I think he was talking about the Edena strain of elf. Such a breed of idyllic creature is rather at odds with the idea of living in the world. Alternate takes on elves could have a better go at things.

Right. The biggest problem with Edena-flavored elves is keeping them from landing butter-side down when you take them off the campfire.

And while I have my own concept of elves to handle both player attitudes and popular conceits, I'm a little surprised that Edena can't see a good way for "elves to remain elves" and not die in droves. As otherworldly, quasi-fae beings, it might be good to remember that fae were most fond of fighting by proxy and misdirection in "real world" tales. A simple confusion spell, illusions to convince your foes to strike each other, diplomatic wrangling, buffing one's allies, and turning your foes' weapons and spells against them are all quite unusual and philosophical ways to handle a conflict. (Even if the last is ill-supported in this game. Spell turning ideas past the Spell Turning spell add a nice spice to any magical duel.) Finding a player who wants to play that way - and rewarding her for nonstandard combat over standard inflicting of damage - would probably give you a good idea how elves could remain other while still remaining effective in this game.

Yep yep. Lots of ways a high-magic race can "fight" a low-magic race without actually killing any of the low-magic-ers. Just make sure there is a stark imbalance in magical firepower, and they'll be fine. Occasional adventures excepted, of course.

Cheers, -- N

 

[Brazeku]

From a design perspective, I can see how Edena's elves could wind up in a state of decline. If they simply couldn't understand violence and the 'kill or be killed' nature of survival, it would stand to reason (at least under one interpretation) that they would be gradually (or swiftly) pushed into extinction.

The section on their changing hot-bloodedness with age might not be appropriate - the only reason an elf would ever need to compete for anything would be for lovers, and they don't need any survival traits passed on and basically bypass evolution. Maybe they shouldn't be born at all - they could be presented as a natural phenominon which simply springs forth from the world. That way, the elves could serve as a metaphor for an idyllic state of nature which is brought to ruin through strife.

 

[Nyeshet]

I only see one problem with your elves: how you interpret CG.

Many characters in the game are CG - NPCs and PCs alike, yet none of them can exactly be described as being horrified at the thought of harming - let alone killing - another sentient being. Also, chaos is perhaps the alignment best suited to adapting to a situation, for it ever looks for a new path to tread, yet you seem to suggest that the elves (being mostly CG) are incapable of adapting to humans - despite having literally two thousand years with which to do so.

Presume that the cycle happens the first time as you stated: the elves are forced to flee, find a new sanctuary, and adapt to a new setting and situation (combat with humans). Centuries pass with little change, little or no significant contact with humans. Then once again the humans are upon them. The elves living there are the same ones that faced the humans once before! While the humans have changed somewhat over the centuries, some of their tactics are the same - and the elves recognize those tactics, know what did not work last time and what did. The elves are also known for their high level of magic use. Having literally centuries to study and tease out the paths and spells of magic, I would expect them to have more high level mages than humans (albeit fewer mages over all). That alone should give them an edge.

And why do you presume that the elves find it difficult to adapt to human ways? Why would they even need to resort to human ways to combat them? They have a long and strong tendency (not quite a tradition, due to being Chaotic) of martial-ism - look to their common proficiencies in longsword and bow. They may not be starting too many wars, but they should be more than able to defend themselves just based upon that, I would think.

Humans lack the 'near invulnerability while in a temperate forest' you have given the elves, but they can manage to survive in a forest quite well enough despite the (far more) problems they face with such. And they manage to survive in frontier regions, traveling on roads, living in towns, etc - without any of the advantages of the elven abilities you mention. If humans can do so, why couldn't elves, who have an edge over humans in surviving in forests. Sure, in cities they are only slightly over humans (due to natural disease immunity), but if humans can survive in a city (including CG humans), why couldn't elves?


I suppose the only reason elves might be difficult to play in your games is the presumption that CG means horror at harming any being for any reason, but then that is matter of your interpretation of alignment more than a matter of elven nature. Remember, CG is as much Chaotic as Good, and Chaos is the very soul of adaptability. So long as their foes are evil or at least harmful and non-good, I can easily see a CG character being able to harm them in return if sufficient cause exists - due to their (CG) alignment, rather than in spite of it, as you seem to presume.

One can readily imagine a CG freedom fighter: using deceptions to confuse their foes, guerrilla warfare, ranged strikes, and swift flanking attacks followed by just as swift a retreat to whittle away at their forces while maintaining their own numbers and health to the best of their ability, and so forth. CG combatives would be more likely to move in small groups hitting where they wish than in massed armies, or perhaps they might come as a barely organized horde upon their foes, but it can be easily imagined.

Personally, I'd be more willing to accept the idea of LG dwarves being stimmied by their cultural traditions than CG elves, for at least the Lawful nature of the dwarf discourages non-traditional approaches, innovations, and so forth. Not much, perhaps, but certainly far more than the Chaos of the elven nature. Being Chaotic, Elves don't have traditions, they have tendencies.

 

[Edena_of_Neith]

And while I have my own concept of elves to handle both player attitudes and popular conceits, I'm a little surprised that Edena can't see a good way for "elves to remain elves" and not die in droves.

I'm surprised in me too, that I couldn't find a way.

When I was younger those I knew asked the question, gave up on the question - or provided an answer of their own - and we played and had fun. Which is how it should have been.
Now, I look for a creative way, a way this disbelievable race (elves) could exist in a given fantasy setting (Krynn, Oerth, Toril, etc.) other than the obvious reason (fantasy races exist in fantasy settings!)

One answer was presented in Dragon Magazine 155 (or thereabouts.) The elves could be allowed to retreat into the Realm of Faerie by Rhiannon/Titania. And return to the Prime Material as they pleased thereafter. (the article didn't state that ... I extrapolated from the article ... of course the elves wouldn't want to return, nobody wants to return, and so finis the elves!)
This is the course taken by the Vanyar, Noldor, and Teleri in the Simarillion. Had the Valar not intervened, the Numenorians under Ar-Pharazon would have killed or enslaved them all.
In other words, there ain't no place so deep or dark They can't find you. If elves can go to Faerie and return, the others (humans, illithid, phaerimm (!), dwarves) will find the way too.

It makes a point. If life and living is a game of chess, the elves cannot get up and walk away from the table. They can choose to play poorly, but they must play, and there are consequences for losing. That's life.
Feanor could not escape the thralldom of the Valar, as he put it ('If thralldom it is, thou can'st escape it, for Manwe is Lord of Arda, not Valinor only.') Well, the elves cannot escape Life.

If life is a game of chess as an analogy, then consider that.
In chess, he who plays better typically wins. How does one play better at chess? Practice, learning, dedication, and actually trying to play well, right?
When you are singing and dancing, frolicking and frivolous, merry and nonchalant, and you waste time in bucketloads in idle contemplation, you are not studying how to play a better chess game.

Or *are* you? Because if you *were*, then you would be an *elf*, and you would be competitive with humans and dwarves and all the other races.

Here is a conception given in FOR5 Elves of Evermeet, which if taken to it's logical extreme, would provide the elves with the strength to endure in a harsh world: the concept that elves love the world so much they can eschew Arvandor and become baelnorn (liches, and even remain in the elven community!) and nymphs (2nd edition nymphs were devastasting: a single nymph on the walls of Minas Tirith would have stopped the whole Morgul Host) and other powerful beings.
If a majority of elves made the decision to eschew Arvandor, and they were somehow able to use High Magic to do it, and thus they became powerful beings like baelnorn and nymphs, and these stayed as part of the elven community and defended it, I think the elves would compete quite well in the harsh fantasy settings.

My praises to the creators of FOR5 Elves of Evermeet. Because what they did was creative and neat.
You know why the elves could use High Magic to eschew death and Arvandor?
Love.
Love for their families, people, and world. And that's an elven enough concept to be truly new and different.
With love, the elves defer death and Arvandor, and stay in the world to protect their own.

Let the humans and dwarves and illithid and phaerimm and others match that!

There's one concept for elves, and how elves might compete, that keeps elves elves and still lets them compete in the fantasy world.

 

[Edena_of_Neith]

Hi, Edena:

A slight correction: it was in the 2nd IR (Industirial Revolution, a play by post game here at EN World) where the elves of Realmspace for the most part decided to attack Toril for the defeat and genocide of the elves committed in the 1st IR. The elves returned and chose to live among their former enemies, the humanoids, whom they had fought back-to-back against their foes.

That is true. The elves of Evermeet surrendered to Forrester, Lord of the Humanoids, and joined the elven race to the humanoid races, and they became one people.
The elves gave up their antipathy to humanoids, and Forrester (incredibly!) gave up his hatred of elves.
It happened in the 2nd IR. But would it happen in most games? Yes, the elves of Evermeet were horrified at the doings of the Elven Imperial Navy of Realmspace, and at their own earlier actions, but would they make amends in that way?
Remember that Queen Amlaruil gave up her title, and her eldest daughter became Forrester's concubine. Would they do that? (of course, I said yes. Other DMs might not ...)

However, in the 3rd IR set on Oerth, which I played in, the Elves formed alliances -- as did the other good and neutral races and nations. (snip) THe elves of Celene, the Ulek states, the Lendores and elsewhere on Oerth worked and fought next to their neighbors and can be considered to have successfully adapted. Indeed, if outside powers such as Mina (the main villain from the more recent Dragonlance books) had not intervened -- many of the evil powers would have fought among themselves to a greater degree. Indeed, they could have been overwhelmed by an alliance of humans, elves, dwarves, gnomes, halflings and more enlightened humanoids. (One could argue that they were as an outside power sought to help the peoples of Oerth and the other worlds survive. Elves cannot be seen as the losers in the 3rd IR at least.)

And yet, everyone came very close to being exterminated by Melkor (not to be confused with Tolkien's Melkor) and his Shadow Hosts. If the Demiplane of Hope had not been created, Melkor would have won. It took outside help to create that Plane, from the taraakians.
The elves did not save the day. They barely survived, along with the others. They were saved by outside influences.

I would daresay that noble people like the Archcleric of Veluna and clever people like the King of the Union of Oerth saw to it that this outside help came. No thanks to the elves ... or to many others!

Each DM has to chose how each world works, and that includes the races. (snip) So, I think that DMs need to figure out how their world works. A key question to ask one's self is how different races think and interact. (snip)

True enough. And it's a hard enough piece of work for the poor DM. Now he has to figure in fantasy races (Dragonlance DMs must figure in kender ) I guess that's why the game features humans as the dominant race, as Gary Gygax said.
I just wish Chaotic Good had been defined a little more clearly. Heh. LOL. Can't be done, actually, it would seem.

 

[Edena_of_Neith]

I don't know about many other campaign settings, but at least in the Realms and in Midnight, they're very good at fighting.
And Cormanthor (with Myth Drannor - recently purged from hordes of devils and daemonfey by an elven crusade

(snip)

Again speaking for the FR, elven history is anything but peaceful. There's some areas that have been rendered inhabitable by the high elven magic version of nuklear fallout (snip)
There was a 3000 year period where elves covered all of Faerûn with terrible war.
And they managed to wrest dominion of faerûn from the dragons.
Note that most atrocities were commited by two nations, Aryvandaar and Ilythiir. The others just defended themselves (or carried out divine edict). Not even all gold elves were like that (or all dark elves, for that matter).

(snip)

I read up on the history of the elves of Toril. After reading that, it was all too believable that the Elven Imperial Navy of Realmspace would attempt genocide on the planet in retaliation for Forrester's genocide against Evereska, Evermeet, and most other elves on the planet (with the tacit support of the other nations.)
The elves of Arvandaar (sp?) were extremely aggressive, and a good comparison to them might be the klingons from Star Trek (!) After all, they destroyed Miritar in the Dark Disaster, blasting tens of thousands of square miles of land into permanent waste. (klingonish enough!)
The Ilythyrri (sp?) were busy playing Melnibonian themselves. And succeeding, until the elves outdid them by blasting apart the entire continent of Faerun and killing millions of people in the process.

Hmmm ... maybe Forrester was right about extermination of all elves ...

Well, ok, Queen Amlaruil came back from the dead - she Resurrected herself while dead - out of love for her people. That's elven (and fortunately for all the other races, very rare) since humans generally couldn't care less for their own people, especially human politicians and rulers.
If more of the elves of Toril were like Queen Amlaruil, and fewer like Kymil Nemesin or the elves of Arvandaar, it would be a good thing.
I think Elaith Craunobar and Arilyn Moonflower (yes, Moonflower!) would agree with that.

With the elves of Toril, sometimes they are wonderful people, sometimes terrible people. You can't pigeonhole them. I would compliment Elaine Cunningham and Steven Schend and Ed Greenwood and others here, for they wrote very well about their elves.

But will the remaining elves of Toril ever again be a major power? Will they escape further decline and ultimate extinction? Will they ever regain large scale use of High Magic, and if they do will they learn from history? Will they be good people or rotten people?
Don't know.

Will they be pacifists? I can't imagine it.

 

[Edena_of_Neith]

See, I think this is essentially what I don't get. When you say you think they're inferior do you mean your Elves, Elves in 3.5, Elves in comparission to Humans...

My Elves are far from inferior to the other races.

(snip)

I just done understand where the basis of your statement originates.

If they cannot survive, and become extinct, while other races such as humans flourish, that's a *kind* of inferiority.
A lot of the races on Athas that were exterminated by Rajak and his Cleansing War would take exception with that statement, of course. But there it is, and Rajak had more power than they did, and they lost and died.

As for the elves of Athas, they survived, but at what price? Reduced to savagery, as nomadic tribesmen, thieves and assassins, stripped of their former ways and culture, civilization and magnificence, reduced to ruin. While humankind still endures. That is also a kind of inferiority too. (Although again I think the elves would take exception to that statement: *they* did not produce the Dragon, humans did!)

I am guessing the Olvenfolk of the Flanaess want their continent back. Good luck. The human flannae and baklunish, the suloise, and the triumphant oeridians, took it all for themselves and intend to keep it.
Are the olvenfolk inferior? I think most of the sneering people of Aerdi would say yes (but then again, the olvenfolk didn't destroy an entire part of their own nation (Medegia) out of sheer insanity.)

What is inferior? A good question.
Perhaps being flighty and frivolous, merry and laughing ('Oh where are you going, with beards all a-wagging? no knowing, no knowing' ...) is the superior way to be!!
If the elves stick around, and are having a good time, enjoying life and all there is to it, but otherwise unproductive and creating nothing ... while humans build magnificent cities and civilizations but their peoples are wretched and poor and disease riddled and violent, which situation is superior?
Hmmm ...

I was simply saying that if one race endured, and another did not, the enduring race was superior. They are superior simply because they survived.
That is in no way the last word in definitions of who is superior or inferior, but it was my arbitrary approach for the purposes of this thread.

EDIT: Mina, the girl, the warrior, the champion of Takhisis, would definitely say the elves are inferior. And she certainly tried to make her point by crushing Silvanesti, while her allies destroyed Qualinesti.

 

[Edena_of_Neith]

Huh? It's not like they were that powerful.

Hehe, you haven't looked at that Faerunian supplement!
Faerunian Elven Bladesingers can cast ANY one wizardly spell AND conduct any and all other combat actions simultaneously. That is, the spell is effectively a Free Action. If they have a Quickened Spell, they can get that off also.
I favor a more 2nd edition (or even 1st edition) feel to magic, in that magic is more powerful. No nerfing has occurred. A fireball is a fireball, a disintegrate a disintegrate, and a time stop is a time stop!

So, you have this elven girl, and she can cut you to ribbons with her sword (a Full Attack), while throwing the (greatly annoying and dreaded) 2nd edition Hold Person spell on your whole party. If we go with the 3.0 Haste, she can make yet another attack with her sword AND throw a second Hold Person at your party.

Which, of course, is why you hire Lidda to track down and put said elven girl out of commission with the Sneak Attack (I love how they have strengthened the Rogue in 3rd Edition!)

 

[Kae'Yoss]

Hehe, you haven't looked at that Faerunian supplement!
Faerunian Elven Bladesingers can cast ANY one wizardly spell AND conduct any and all other combat actions simultaneously. That is, the spell is effectively a Free Action. If they have a Quickened Spell, they can get that off also.

You got the bladesingers wrangled up:

The older Bladesingers (From Tome and Blood, its Web Enhancement, and then Races of Faerûn) could indeed cast one free spell (which would probably have been changed to swift had the terminology been around back then - and I'm not sure if the classes didn't actually say that that one spell counts as your quickened spell) while making a full attack, BUT they had their own spell list, containing buffs and the like only (sure, a free true strike is cool, but I've seen worse). I played one of those, and while it was indeed effective, I've seen more devastating characters since. That restriction to using a blade one-handed (and keeping the other hand free) isn't helping.

The new Bladesinger (Complete Warrior) trades in his spell list for extra arcanist levels every other level, but only gets to cast one (2nd-level, later 4th) spell per day as a free action (and 3.5e has more effective methods for this).

I haven't seen one in action, but I'd say that a straight duskblade can outperform a bladesinger with ease.

I favor a more 2nd edition (or even 1st edition) feel to magic, in that magic is more powerful. No nerfing has occurred. A fireball is a fireball, a disintegrate a disintegrate, and a time stop is a time stop!

So, you have this elven girl, and she can cut you to ribbons with her sword (a Full Attack), while throwing the (greatly annoying and dreaded) 2nd edition Hold Person spell on your whole party. If we go with the 3.0 Haste, she can make yet another attack with her sword AND throw a second Hold Person at your party.

Huh? Yeah, if I mix some 2e, 3e and 3.5e stuff together, I can pull off stuff like that, but what you describe is not possible under the current rules.

She could make a full attack (with an extra attack even) and cast 3.5e hold person on you - once per day. More if she has metamagic rods (quicken), but then again, a wizard can use those to shove two sets of meteor swarms down your throat. Or a war cleric uses first harm on you, followed by power word (kill) (or, if you use 3.0 haste and 3.5 rods, he'll use haste to cast harm, then cast a quickened harm, followed by power word kill. Or maybe a greater dispel magic after the first harm, should you look like being close enough to the end, but might be warded by death ward)

Which, of course, is why you hire Lidda to track down and put said elven girl out of commission with the Sneak Attack (I love how they have strengthened the Rogue in 3rd Edition!)

What about that cleric? He's probably a cleric of Corellon and friends with that elven girl (probably her husband, since power is a force of attraction) he'll beat the living bejeezus out of Lidda, true res his gal, and then speak with dead Lidda to find out who sent her. One scry/buff/teleport later drops like 1 elven doom spell per second (eds/s) upon you.

 

[Forrester]

That is true. The elves of Evermeet surrendered to Forrester, Lord of the Humanoids . . .

Damned straight they did. Little bitches . . .



PS -- I can't find my elf rant. From what I read elsewhere, apparently it disappeared in the server crash.



Don't suppose anyone's got a copy laying around?