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

[Jim Hague]

And of course those diamond sources do not involve any mining and forest clearly or other environment destroying things...

Perhaps you missed the bit earlier about gemstones tending to be found around tree roots?

 

[Slife]

Perhaps you missed the bit earlier about gemstones tending to be found around tree roots?

And to clarify my earlier comment...

Gemstones tend to be, on the whole, much denser than the surrounding matter. Tree roots tend to act as a natural sieve, which makes it a lot easier to find gemstones in areas with trees than without. This would make it more feasible for elves to sell gemstones, since they tend to live in forested areas, and would be better able than other races, even if those races had the same geologic conditions. Tree roots grow through the path of least resistance, and as such can break into pockets of stones, such as granite, which contain gems.

EDIT: Found a source for you doubters.

[/url]The photo of a typical Crystal Peak dig near Lake George, Colo., shows how common it is to dig along tree roots in pursuit of pockets of amazonite and smoky quartz crystals. The reason? Tree roots seek the path of least resistance and often are able to penetrate into the voids and spaces of the pockets and mineralized seams in the harder granite. Notice however, how crumbly the granite is here, at least on the surface. The smoky quartz taken from here was mostly grade B, although some of decent size, up to 6" long. However, there were numerous single small amazonites taken from here varying in places from light colored to very dark, some with selective stripes (see 1st amazonite photo). Very little of the material was in groups or clusters. There was also some very unusual purple cubo-octahedral fluorites found here which unfortunately do not photograph very well. Most of the best crystal groups taken from the Pike's Peak granite are dug from pits 6 to 12 feet deep, below the "frost line". Some productive land is private property, some is national forest, but there are many active mining claims in the forest, and finding a good collecting area can be difficult and confusing.

 

[gizmo33]

Perhaps you missed the bit earlier about gemstones tending to be found around tree roots?

Not all gemstones, of course, at least on Earth. AFAIK Diamonds form deep within the interior of the earth and are expelled outward by volcanic processes.

However, tree resins, whether petrified (amber) or not (dragonsblood) exist in plenty of forms in various places on planet Earth, and have similar value to semi-precious stones. If one was concerned about the elfin economy, it would simply be a matter of inventing one or two more types found more commonly in temperate sylvan woodlands, and valued for their use in incense, medicine, or jewelry.

 

[gizmo33]

It used to be (before extensive mining occurred) that you could just pick them off the ground.

In the old days there was a canyon, the floor of which was covered in diamonds (and poisonous serpents). One merely had to throw a sheep carcass into the canyon, which a roc would swoop down and get and take to it's nest. Then it was simply a matter of sneaking into the nest and taking the diamonds that stuck to the carcass. That's if you believe the Arabian Nights, and aren't inclined to complain to the DM about the CR of a roc. Regardless, I would say that tossing sheep carcasses into canyons is not too terribly harmful to the environment.

 

[Edena_of_Neith]

Holy mackeral. A lot of posts since I was last here.

Let me go back to an earlier post. I wanted to comment on something.

Would I give Lifeproof to all the elves across the world. No. That would totally destroy the campaign setting.
Would I even give Lifeproof to a small elven nation? Well, I did: Haldendreeva. But there is giving, and then there is the part of your mind that shrieks: Why did you do that?! And in my case, that part won't shut up, and demands answers. So I wrote a story backwards from that point (and other Haldendreevan concepts) until I got all the way back to Delrune, 100 years earlier. I felt I just needed to do that, if for no other reason than my own satisfaction (or so stated that part of my mind screaming in protest about Lifeproofing the elves.)

Based on all the 1st and 2nd edition material I read (I can't cite specifics) it would be very difficult to Lifeproof thousands of people (even the Haldendreevan elves only Lifeproofed 3,000.)
Lifeproof requires a 10,000 gp gem, for each spell cast. That's a gem worth half a ton of gold! That's a pretty valuable gem (on Krynn, it'd be 10,000 steel. On Athas, 10,000 coins of the realm, with the buying power of gold pieces.)
I can imagine a nation with the awesome might of the Suloise Imperium producing three thousand 10,000 gold piece jewels, given a few weeks. Powerful Evermeet could do it in a few years. Cormyr could do it given decades. Qualinesti could do it, given a century or three.
Haldendreeva pulled off this stunt in only a few months, indicating that at that time they had power greater than the strength of the entire nation of Evermeet. But it took that kind of might, that level of prodigal magic and skill, to do it. And the elves had to gain that might somehow. And so, the rest of the backstory.
Funny how one spell (one small rulesset) can cause you to think, and ponder, and end up writing a whole backstory. Which, of course, alters the whole campaign world ... or helps create that world.

I advocate giving the elves abilities, extraordinary abilities, and supernatural abilities, for the purposes of flavor, character, and viability, yes.
But not Lifeproof. No 1st level character is going to ever start out equipped with Lifeproof. Not in my game. Not unless we're rping in the Land of Oz or Land of Ev or the Gnome Kingdom (from the works of Frank Baum, where everyone was, in effect, Lifeproofed.)

I tried to write something about how switching Arwen for Glorfindel implied colossal changes in Tolkien's setting, colossal changes in it's history, and colossal changes in elven culture there.
The Lifeproof spell, if it exists, is sorta like Arwen replacing Glorfindel in Peter Jackson's film LOTR. It's there (and she was there) for a reason. And it's (or her) existence (presence) implies all sorts of things, which imply all sorts of other things, which demand answers, which define the setting (and usually, creating a king sized headache for the DM.)

 

[Umbran]

You are wrong.

Well, he's correct that you can't get an unlimited amount of money out of the things. The point is more that you don't need an unlimited amount of money - merely a very large amount. It isn't as if whole nations on our earth are not founded on the export of natural resources.

 

[Edena_of_Neith]

If we were to give the elves the starting supernatural ability of Agnakok: Forests, All, then we have to ask the Why of the matter.
In my case, the answer to the Why is the classical depictions of elves in so many books of literature, portrayals of them in the official campaign settings, and partly due to how I would like to see them work. A partly personal thing, then.

It would certainly resolve a lot of the questions being raised in this thread, if they had Agnakok at the start.
It would not please everyone. It might not please a lot of people. Who knows? I can only guess. But it would certainly please me.

 

[gizmo33]

EDIT: Found a source for you doubters.

Well, "Crystal Peak" in Colorado hardly seems like the kind of temperate, low-lying sylvan forest that I would assume elves would favor. Therefore, your entire elfin smoky quartz industry has failed and my poor elves have been forced to turn to banditry and software development for their survival. Thanks alot!

 

[fusangite]

I advocate giving the elves abilities, extraordinary abilities, and supernatural abilities, for the purposes of flavor, character,

Glad to see I wasn't totally off-base, even if I got the specifics wrong. You would like to redo the elf race in your game because what you perceive to be the default flavour isn't working for you. That's great.

and viability, yes.

Maybe you might want to consider whether your belief that these modifications are necessary to prevent the elves' extinction is grounded in an honest appraisal of the game mechanics or in wishful thinking.

It seems to me that if you want to go ahead and do this in your game, you don't need to demonstrate to anybody that it is a necessity, merely that it is desirable and workable in the game you are playing right now.

 

[Banshee16]

For information on ‘Natural Iron’ check here.
http://www.hurstwic.org/history/articles/manufacturing/text/bog_iron.htm
Deer, swine and chickens were all originally forest animals. There is a lot of eating on a boar. Eggs are readily available (lots of birds live in trees).
Fruit and nuts grow on trees (so do edible fungi – though hopefully not the same trees). Apples, pears, oranges, quinces, etc., the list is very long. Okay, commercial fruit farms are not exactly forests, but our ancesters were pretty good at planting and maintaining trees.
Depending on the climate, olives (and therefore olive oils) could be produced, they are a valuable export crop (at least they were a millennium or two ago).
Grapes make wine which can also make a huge trading profit.
A quick google check should take you to some sites where you’ll be able to pull up details of forest tubers and grains. I’m no expert.
Bees make hives in forests and make honey. Sweeteners were difficult to find in medieval times, and were valuable.

Given that I was at a birthday party a few weeks ago that included a pig on a spit, I can affirm that a relatively small pig was able to provide enough meat for approximately 40+ adults...and there were leftovers. There was a lot of meat on that animal, and I've seen much bigger pigs.

The contention that elves can't grow food, or gather enough food in the forest to be able to survive seems rather baseless.

Banshee