D&D General what are the setting functions of elves?

[Mind of tempest]

In my grand quest to make something that can fill the role of elf without being an elf I realised that outside of being overly romanticised and if left in any environment spawning a new type with a retroactive history of ten thousand years.
I do not really grasp outside of being magic call and mystical in a vague sense what they bring to a setting and why a player might play them outside of magic being overly romanticised and being able to outlive most nations.
anyone got ideas as I am lost?

 

[Scribe]

anyone got ideas as I am lost?

I'm old, and see no reason to break from what I've always seen them as.

They are elitists.
They think they are better than anyone else, besides maybe dragons, or your settings Angels.
They are magic users.
Some (many/most?) are more in tune with nature.
They are graceful, intelligent, and easy on the eyes to humans.

What is their purpose? In my setting, they are lost glory, a civilization supplanted by the younger races.

The typical stuff.

 

[Shades of Eternity]

They are what happens when the fey goes through puberty.

They should be almost computer like in nature...really good at those few things, but a serious fish out of water out of it.

They are a species of posers that claim to be better at everything, but that might be society chauvinism to some degree. This often takes them from going from seeming celestial and otherworldly to incredibly petty when this is pointed out.

An embarressed elf is a murderous being.

They also have built a civilization based on living with nature, but in a manner that more synergizes then being one with nature. magic often acts in a manner not unlike technology in our own world (because elves really hate being stuck in a rainstorm...it ruins their image).

in short, what if a boy band took up adventuring.

 

[Seramus]

They are better than you. Remnants of a better time, where people were more beautiful, physically superior, and wiser.

Only the need for balance reigns elves in from their Better Than You trope, which results in them just thinking they are Better Than You.

 

[MarkB]

They've been around a long time, both individually and as cultures. That makes them a good source of historical information. If something happened in the last several hundred years, you can probably find an elf who lived through it. If it happened in the last ten thousand years, they probably still have records of it in their libraries' newspaper archives.

 

[Shades of Eternity]

This scene also comes to mind.

 

[TerraDave]

better than anyone else

You took the words right out of my post!

 

[Stormonu]

Elves are ageless specimens of bodily and mental perfection.

 

[Shades of Eternity]

Until you make them think outside their box and break a few of their rules.

Then they accuse you of cheating.

 

[theCourier]

To dunk on repeatedly and with great spite. Aim to outperform an elf, in all aspects of life.