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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Spatzimaus" data-source="post: 2684608" data-attributes="member: 3051">Like others have said, it's not a pro-Elf/anti-Elf issue.  It's that everything these Elves have done and said has given the impression that their side is the only one that matters; they've basically written off any Human objections as being irrelevant.  This is hardly a new thing, and the Ebisites have done it too to some extent, but not with the single-minded obliviousness that the Shesher have seemed to.Basically, their side comes down to four points:1> They left healing.They attacked and mutilated innocents, and then left a token amount of healing that couldn't possibly make up for it, even assuming the humans could have recognized the braids as magical scrolls in the first place.  It'd be like shooting an unarmed man in the leg, handing him a band-aid, and saying that you're now even (better than that: it's something you plan on bragging about afterwards!)  Effectively, they were meeting the letter of the "law", so they could say they weren't harming anyone, while completely ignoring the spirit of it.  It's worse than doing nothing at all; they acknowledged that healing is needed, but refused to provide the right amount.  It's like tipping your waiter a nickel; if you left nothing, he could at least believe you forgot, or put it on a credit card or something.If they had arranged for a healer to regenerate the ears, that'd be different; if the victim had been an Elf, would they have done the same?  And I don't just mean an Elf like Reyu, I mean a member of their own tribe.2> It's just a flesh wound.Some societies pride themselves on scars, or at least don't care about minor disfigurement.  Maybe an Elf would accept the loss of an ear in this manner, although I doubt it.  But that's irrelevant; the real indication of how serious the offense is is how the victim sees it, not how you do.  Based on previous contacts, the Elves should have known that this is something the Humans wouldn't just write off as "kids being kids"... but they probably just didn't care.  In their culture it was okay (maybe), so anyone who objects is just ignorant, and any punishment is unjustified.3> They're just kids.The Elves are treating the other townsfolk as being guilty by association in not letting them evacuate... and yet their tribe isn't doing the same.  If the Elves who did this truly were "children", implying that they don't bear responsibility, then someone else must.  Even if they truly thought that no crime was committed, they'd still argue that someone more senior should assume responsibility in place of the children.  It's the classic hostage situation, where the negotiator says "take me instead, let them go"; you're not acknowledging the other side is right, just that the truly innocent shouldn't suffer either way.  But they haven't.  Even if you didn't hold the individual parents responsible, the tribe as a whole could have offered restitution.4> Go along with it, or we kill you in the name of Honor.And finally, here we have their real position.  The other three arguments are so full of holes that they inevitably fell back to this.  This is the only one that affects the players directly, of course.I'm not saying the situation isn't convoluted.  I'm just saying that there's been absolutely no reason to take the Elves' side on this.  Arguing that the sentence of slavery is too severe is a separate issue.</blockquote>

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