The problem with elves take 2: A severe condemnation [merged]

[Derren]

That's just not true. You and Edena have both failed to demonstrate this. We, on the other hand, have offered a number of examples of cultures that lived in forests and harvested more food per capita per hour than any pre-industrial agrarian society.

No, you haven't., or rather you are extremly axxagerating. The only examples which were made were societies who managed to survive in a forest environment, but it was not shown that those societies lived an elven life (hardly clearing any trees) and were able to grow enough food to supply a bigger population in a non nomadic lifestyle (being a nomad would limit the technological posibilities of elves and would make them easy targets).

And something you always forget is that the overal amount of food over the year is not the only measurment if elves can survive or not. This food also has to be stoored and distributed

Since you have failed to demonstrate that elves cannot trade, this point is untrue.

Read what I write (or strat thinking instead of replying on a reflex). Elves can trade but they have not enough to trade with to get everything a D&D nation needs to be strong (in the case of elves).

And by "nearly nothing," you include furs, gems, spell casting services, master craft labour, books, scrolls and other magic items. This is not "nearly nothing.[/qoute]

"You are missing what we are saying here. North America and Siberia did not have significant local fur trades at all until higher-tech European countries began purchasing their furs in large quantities. The 16th to 18th century European nations, the consumers of the furs were higher-tech than the human nations in D&D.

I agree. But gems, scrolls, spell casting services and furs are not. They are expensive.

A large fur trade would mean a lot of death animals which does not work with the elven lifestyle. The yield of gems would be extremly low without minign (which the cliche elves do not practice) and elves are no master crafters by default. When one race are master crafters then dwarves who actually has a racial bonus for working with certain materials. And for all magical the market is rather small so you can't sustain a nation by selling magic, not to mention that those things require a huge investment. Not to mention a wizard needs to mantain a spellbook which is also quite expensive as he has to pay much for every spell he scribes into it. The spellbook of a fresh 1st level wizard alone is already worth hundereds of gold.

Elves can give birth to one child at a time. It does not follow that they can only raise one child at a time. Elves' gestation periods are not stated in the rules but if we accept the only figure that has been quoted, it appears that an elf woman could have 20-40 more kids during the time it takes for her first child to grow up.

Yeah, right. Can you care for 40 children at once? Every child is an additional drain on the communities ressources because they consume without producing anything. An elf having about 5 non adult children at the same time is acceptable but not 20. That means that an elf gets 5 children in 100 years. That is quite low.

But more to the point, high birth rates do not equal high survival rates. As has already been mentioned on this thread, societies with low birth rates have much lower mortality rates, much higher levels of education, much higher life expectancies and much higher levels of worker productivity.Why not? You argue that something that is true about all humanoids is true about all elves but then claim that this flaw will only kill elves but not affect the other humanoids with whom they are competing. Just declaring an argument to be "no argument" doesn't make it so.The main things that affect infant mortality are not innate CON. Infant and child mortality is conditioned primarily by access to parental care, medical care and healthy food. Elf children have way better food, parental care and medical care than orc children.5% more likely, approximately. They are also 5% less likely, approximately, to be hit by creatures trying to attack them.

And what when you compare the elven childcare to humans or kobolds? Elves do not do thing inherently better than other races they face the same problems as do all others and they will have losses. And a low con would lead to more children deaths. They are less resistent to injuries and diseases do also play a role. Also every elf will face diseases at some point while not many will be the target of an attack so their con penalty does hurt elves much more than what the dex bonus helps them.

Do you know why because societies with low birth rates have a low mortality? Because if otherwise the society would have died out and you would have never heared from them.

Are all races without superpowers doomed? Because, if so, all PC races are doomed. I guess we'd all better play Minotaurs from now on.

Duh....
Never noticed that unlike many other races the elves do have some big disadvantages against them?

Well, given that 3E is balanced so that class levels are of equal value regardless of what class they are in, I'm not especially troubled by this.

Please, wake up....
Altering reality not more valuable has hitting things with a sword.....

There's no point in us repeating ourselves unduly. You seem to have decided that elves have low birth rates and all creatures with low birth rates are doomed, despite massive, pervasive and overwhelming evidence from the real world to the contrary.

1. There is no massive evidence, just your exagerations.
2. The real world works differently than D&D, for example in the real world a society was never threatened by an (nearly) equally advanced society with 5 times the reproduction rate.

 

[mmadsen]

I have mentioned polyculture (versus monoculture) agriculture, and fusangite has mentioned the related notion of permaculture, so I thought I'd cite a piece on forest gardening:

Forest gardening (also known as 3-Dimensional Gardening) is a food production and land management system based on replicating woodland ecosystems, substituting trees (such as fruit or nut trees), bushes, shrubs, herbs and vegetables which have yields directly useful to mankind. By exploiting the premise of companion planting, these can be intermixed to grow on multiple levels in the same area, as do the plants in a forest.​

Presumably the forest-dwelling elves are much, much better at this than we humans are.

 

[gizmo33]

I'll start at the top, but I'm not going to get through all of this. Besides, I'm not sure you guys are paying attention anyway.

1. Does it say somewhere that in D&D there are trees which grow coal and iron? No? Then answer me how a D&D forest should contain more ressources than real world forests. Especially as elves do apparently not harm the enviroment its impossible for them to gather ore and many other ressources in a forest.

Does is say that trees have to grow coal and iron? I'm not sure why you're thinking that other than you must think that trees are the only thing one finds in forests. Now someone pointed out on this thread that gemstones can be found at the base of trees, and then you proceeded to argue something about how in the "real world, blah blah". That's not relevant. This is a fantasy world. Certainly if the real world provides an example of gemstones existing somewhere in some quantity then it's not too taxing to assume that in a fantasy world that wants to support elfin civilization that you simply have to tweak the quantities. That's assuming that the real world doesn't already support this case. I think "real world" examples are appropriately used to show what is minimally possible, but since there are no elves in the real world, I don't think the logic goes the other way.

So keeping this in mind, we can discuss the issue of elves and iron.

Firstly - there's a question about how much iron elves really need. I think it's in keeping with elfin culture being related to fey culture that elves use proportionately less iron than other races. This means that they'd substitute other materials - mithril and kinds of wood. For an example of wood, I'd point you to the old Greyhawk boxed set - I don't remember what it's called, but hornwood, ironwood, or whatever - wood that can be cured in such a way to be of metallic hardness.

Now the iron itself can come from the forest - a forest is just a place where trees grow. That's anywhere below the treeline. That means a hilly region covered in trees - so why not iron mines? That's probably more the territory of gnomes (at least IMC), but elves would live in the surrounding lands and could trade iron pretty cheaply to the gnomes for other stuff - like silk (another topic). That's in the case where the gnomes wouldn't simply give the elves iron as direct tribute.

Bog iron could be gathered from wetlands within forests. While it's likely that I could find real-world cultures whose primary source of iron was bog iron (vikings?), it's unecessary because, again, we're talking fantasy. The chemical composition of such iron and it's availability would be whatever is required to support the elfin civilization - and given the relatively low numbers I don't see much of a problem. (BTW - the discussion of iron and coal in the same sentence leads me to believe you guys are thinking battleships and skyscrapers - I just don't think the iron requirements of elfin civilization would be as high as you sometimes (perhaps too conveniently) suggest).

Finally, there are meteorites - perhaps a few huge meteorites slammed into the ground at the location of the forest in eons past, and the elves now collect what could be several tons of material from the crater floor. I like this idea because it would explain the source of more exotic materials (like mithril and nickel).

So those are three possible sources within a "forest" - and that's just using real-world examples. Like I said, an alternate material like "ironwood" would probably be in order to give elves the kind of tech level that's assumed.

Say "oh, that's not in the PHB" and then perhaps you can explain why people's clothes in DnD are of colors other than gray. Because last time I checked, "dye" is not on the PHB equipment lists. (Hmmm...dye is an example of a forest resource - but then that's like shooting fish in a barrel - wait...fish...barrels...ahhh - I can't stop thinking of forest resources!). Basic point is that there are tons of resources in a forest environment, and it's a simple matter of thumbing through the encyclopedia to uncover them.)

My time is up. Let me know what you think about the sources of iron, or whether I should bother to come up with others.

 

[gizmo33]

Not to mention a wizard needs to mantain a spellbook which is also quite expensive as he has to pay much for every spell he scribes into it.

Pay for what? Other than the game mechanical logic of requiring a player to deduct gold, what does that represent. Ink? Paper? Quills? Google up some premodern ink formulas, paper, quills or whatever and I'm pretty sure you can find ways that all of these materials are available in the forest.

 

[gizmo33]

Every child is an additional drain on the communities ressources because they consume without producing anything.

Maybe every infant, but children are as capable of many tasks - for example collecting mulberry leaves for silk production. I happen to like the idea of a variety of silk being produced by elves because they seem to wear a lot of it and it would be fairly easy to posit a silkworm or similar creature that lives in the elfin environment.

Elves do not do thing inherently better than other races they face the same problems as do all others and they will have losses.

Why don't elves do anything inherently better? Just because they don't get bonuses? It's already been argued several times that you couldn't explain the existence of human cultures based on the PHB. It would be safe to assume that the average steppe nomad is a better rider than the average farmer, and yet the rules don't make that explicit. There are other ways to model a higher skill level in a certain culture other than just mindless throwing bonuses at them.

And a low con would lead to more children deaths. They are less resistent to injuries and diseases do also play a role. Also every elf will face diseases at some point while not many will be the target of an attack so their con penalty does hurt elves much more than what the dex bonus helps them.

Disease is as much (or more) a function of hygiene, medicine, and genetics - elves could more than compensate for their con scores. Besides, even various human populations show different susceptibility to disease - and that's not a function of constitution but of biological factors. I think you think disease has much more to do with Con than it really does.

Please, wake up....
Altering reality not more valuable has hitting things with a sword.....

How much more caffeine do I need to understand that.

1. There is no massive evidence, just your exagerations.

Don't forget my exaggerations. How about this exaggeration: a pointy-eared humanoid that lives to be 1000 years old. Keep in mind we're talking imaginary fantasy worlds.

2. The real world works differently than D&D,

Exactly - which is one of the basic reasons why there are elves in DnD and not in the real world.

 

[fusangite]

No, you haven't., or rather you are extremly axxagerating. The only examples which were made were societies who managed to survive in a forest environment, but it was not shown that those societies lived an elven life (hardly clearing any trees) and were able to grow enough food to supply a bigger population in a non nomadic lifestyle (being a nomad would limit the technological posibilities of elves and would make them easy targets).

So, what happens when we mention the indigenous peoples of California, the Yucatan, Washington State and British Columbia AGAIN? Do you have a minor seizure that temporarily blinds you and causes short-term amnesia?

And something you always forget is that the overal amount of food over the year is not the only measurment if elves can survive or not. This food also has to be stoored and distributed

Uh-huh? And? Are you now going to present evidence that having a -2 CON penalty causes you to hoard food and then let it rot?

Read what I write (or strat thinking instead of replying on a reflex). Elves can trade but they have not enough to trade

How do you know how much they have to trade? Where is this information coming from?

A large fur trade would mean a lot of death animals which does not work with the elven lifestyle.

We are talking about a lucrative fur trade. As I mentioned, not knowing the supply of the furs, the demand for the furs or the wealth of the furs' consumers, there is no way to know the volume of the furs that will be needed to meet the elves' financial needs. Sadly the DMG does not have a list of fur prices.

Also, on what basis do you want to argue "elven lifestyle" from the core? The core rules say that elves like natural environments and like nature. There are plenty of societies that have venerated nature in the human past while having lifestyles that were far more based on killing, eating and wearing animals than medieval European lifestyles were. Now, I know that this will probably cause you another minor seizure that will reset your memory again but many aboriginal cultures in the Americas can be so described.

The yield of gems would be extremly low without minign (which the cliche elves do not practice) and elves are no master crafters by default.

So now, not only are you magically calculating fur prices without adequate information, you are now prepared to calculate the yield of various gem location and extraction techniques in every possible D&D world.

Again, you have insufficient information to claim that gem gathering is low-yield in D&D worlds. Mining for gems did not become more efficient than gathering them until fairly recently historically.

Furthermore, given the information in table 3-6 of the DMG, you don't exactly need big sacks of gems to pay for stuff in D&D because the average value of a single gem is 145gp.

When one race are master crafters then dwarves who actually has a racial bonus for working with certain materials.

That is true. Fortunately, the working life of a single trained elvish crafter is 4-5 times that of a dwarf. Also, are you now contending that if a species has a racial bonus to something, nobody can compete with them in the marketplace? I guess all the human and gnomish crafters can go home and starve too.

And for all magical the market is rather small

I love this: constant unsupported declarations about the economy of every single possible campaign world that can be generated using the D&D rules. Is that the new strategy? Because, if so, it sucks.

Look buddy, if you want to build a campaign world in which furs are dirt cheap, elves are vegetarians, gem prices have been artificially depressed, dwarves have a crafting monopoly and there is a virtually negligible magic trade, you can. But to suggest that all campaign worlds must be like this because... well, actually you haven't even given a reason... you can. If that's what makes you happy, you can make as many campaign worlds you want in which elves are DOOMED. You just need to stop dressing this up as being the rules of the game.

so you can't sustain a nation by selling magic,

Says who? Look at the profits from making one ring!

not to mention that those things require a huge investment.

Right. And given that, apparently, furs are dirt cheap, elvves are vegetarians, dwarves have a crafting monopoly, gem prices are artificually depressed and there is negligible trade in magic, of course it follows that elves have no liquidity in their economy! It's all so clear now!

Not to mention a wizard needs to mantain a spellbook which is also quite expensive as he has to pay much for every spell he scribes into it. The spellbook of a fresh 1st level wizard alone is already worth hundereds of gold.

Uh-huh? And? Feel free to check out the section NPC Spellcasting on page 107 of the DMG to see how this money might be made back in the space of a single afternoon.

Yeah, right. Can you care for 40 children at once?

Right. So, just so I've got this straight, furs are dirt cheap, elves are vegetarians, dwarves have a crafting monopoly, gem prices are artificually depressed, there is negligible trade in magic, elves don't hire out their services as spellcasters AND now, all elves are all organized into single parent or nuclear families and their children require the same levels of care as our culture currently provides.

You don't know a damned thing about whether older children are involved in elvish child-rearing, whether childcare is based on extended families, villages or what.

Every child is an additional drain on the communities ressources because they consume without producing anything.

Right... and... unlike medieval, hunter-gatherer, ancient societies (indeed, virtually every society before the 20th century), children are not economic actors in elvish societies.

I'm learning a lot, from your posts, about how to build a world in which elves are DOOMED. But I have to say, I've stopped learning anything about D&D rules, sociology or anthropology because you're no longer reasoning. You're just making up a series of worst-case scenarios out of thin air.

Look man, here's the basic flaw in your logic: Just because you can demonstrate that it is possible to design a world in which elves are doomed, it does not follow that elves are doomed in all possible worlds. Now, you can keep making up arbitrary social and economic characteristics and attributing them to all D&D worlds but that's all you are doing here.

An elf having about 5 non adult children at the same time is acceptable but not 20. That means that an elf gets 5 children in 100 years. That is quite low.

So, I've made up a possible number. You've made up a possible number. You like the number 5 more than the number 40. Good for you.

And what when you compare the elven childcare to humans or kobolds? Elves do not do thing inherently better than other races they face the same problems as do all others and they will have losses.

So,

Oh wait. Never mind. I'm realizing that I'm about to make a point about how mechanically identical <> culturally identical but I realize that doing so would be stupid because the other posters and I have already made this point more than 25 times on this thread. So, why say it again? All it will do is cause you amnesia and we'll be back to you posting that elves are DOOMED in fifteen minutes.

If you and Edena want to declare victory by sticking your fingers in your ears and yelling "Nah nah nah nah nah not listening not listening!" that's great. Just don't mistake your behaviour for reasoned argument.

 

[Derren]

I'll start at the top, but I'm not going to get through all of this. Besides, I'm not sure you guys are paying attention anyway.

...

Elves don't mine, that would destroy nature, you forgot? So all the iron under the trees would be useless for elves. And Mithril is so much more common than iron that elves would have no problem to use that instead of iron? Right....

But I see the problem. You simply invent things to justify the elven culture like that in D&D gemstones are common in forests and still valuable. But when you do not invent things left and right with a "its fantasy" justification the elven society does not work.
And even if you do, you fail to think it through. SO gemstones are common? Then they are worthless and not useable as trade good. And you are back at the root of the problem: Elves have not enough goods to trade away.

 

[Derren]

If you and Edena want to declare victory by sticking your fingers in your ears and yelling "Nah nah nah nah nah not listening not listening!" that's great. Just don't mistake your behaviour for reasoned argument.

Its still better than your shouting down arguments with "YOU DON'T KNOW IT, ONLY MY ASSUMPTIONS ARE TRUE!!!!!" (even if they contain no logic at all).
When something is not covered by D&D and can't be deducted from any rules I use the real world and conclusions. You on the other hand seem to be unable to grasp economic connections. For you the number of children in a community has nothing to with the ressource usage of the community which in turn has nothing to do with the environment the community lives in. For you that are all seperate issues and any attempt to connect them is shouted down by you.
Do you really think that 3 or 4 magical rings which will get sold each year will cover an entires nation economy? Do you really think that furs are so valuable that elves could use them to finance their industry without overhunting a territory?
And stop with your exeggerations. Where do I have said that dwarves have a crafter monopol? But when you hire a master crafter from abroad, why hire an elf when you need a dwarf? Elf have no skill which makes them better than a equal level crafter from a other race.

 

[mmadsen]

SO gemstones are common? Then they are worthless and not useable as trade good.

Please. The contention -- not one I'd necessarily share, by the way -- was that gemstones would be relative common in the woodlands of the elves. Thus, gemstones would be valuable trade goods with great buying power.

And you are back at the root of the problem: Elves have not enough goods to trade away.

You seem to be systematically ignoring the fact that the elves are a long-lived race with a magical culture. They have tremendous "humanoid capital". Even if they have no raw materials, they can cut raw gemstones into Silmarils, they can enchant rings and swords, they can grant all kinds of magical boons to wealthy lords of other races, etc.

A nation does not need to sit on oil deposits to be wealthy. Look at Japan, Hong Kong, etc.

 

[Piratecat]

No more bickering, please. If you're about to post in order to tell another member off, you shouldn't be posting.

Thanks.