What's in an elf?

[Glade Riven]

Or really, any other race in D&D - what is the essense of that race?

4e split Urban, magical elves from woodsy elves. 3e mixed both with mixed results, then patchworked with "there's an elf for that." The race started as a class back in the old days as a mix of wizard/fighter. Dragonlance kept them woodsy, Forgotten Realms had them kinda woodsy with the super-evil drow in contrast. Eberron subverted the trope.

Dwarves - surface and near-surface dwellers, or subterranian mountain kingdoms? Should their women be bearded or not? The only thing for certain seems to be a love of axes and gold.

Gnomes, ever the tinkerer...or..not. At least in 4e. Halflings and their hairy or not-so-harry feet.

What do you think is the essence of a race in D&D?

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

there's an elf for that...

Awesome!

 

[Jeff Carlsen]

The races can be difficult, because they're so very setting specific, but if I had to choose what was core, it'd model it directly off of Lord of the Rings. May as well go back to the source. It's familiar to everybody, even those who don't play.

After that, let the race concepts flow freely. Just don't imply that all races are core, but instead options to be included within a campaign world.

 

[Sirot]

My preferred way of doing things, would be that every race has several racial bonuses you can get but you can only pick one or two of them.

For example...

Elf:
+1 dexterity
+1 speed
Low-light vision
Choose one from the following:
[A] Arcane Talent
Heightened Agility
[C] Nature Talent

OR

Dwarf
+1 constitution
-1 speed
You do not get a speed penalty for wearing heavy armor.
Low-light vision
Choose one from the following:
[A] Stone Sense
Giant Killer
[C] Weapon Talent


This is the vaguest of examples, but that is a way of solving identity issues some races have.

 

[Dausuul]

I dislike woodsy back-to-nature elves. My preference would be elves as jaded, devious, arrogant sorcerors... less Noldor, more Melnibonean.

I don't have much to say on dwarves, except that the "bearded dwarven women" thing should have died a long time ago.

I like 3E/4E halflings, as long as they don't veer over into kenderland.

Gnomes? What gnomes? The only gnomes I know are garden gnomes, and you'd be out of your mind to venture into a garden in D&D. That's where gazebos live.

 

[The Shadow]

Sirot, add in that you can get the other racial talents via feats or something similar, and I'm right with you.

"There's an elf for that" certainly did not begin with 3e. I point to the "Valley Elf" as proof that 2e was quite capable of elf-glut. (Or was it 1e, I forget?)

I prefer my halflings to be hobbits, I'm just traditional that way.

Gnomes are tricksters, not tinkerers. And they frequently multiclass into Illusionist. Not wizards specialized in illusion, darnit, *Illusionist*.

3e elves having wizard as a favored class was the Dumbest Idea Ever. They should have been natural sorcerers, and so I have depicted them in most of my post-3e game worlds. And so I like Sirot's "Arcane Talent" idea for them, provided it's sorcery-like in flavor.

 

[trancejeremy]

I think the trouble with Elves is they have sort of two different sources - ones from Ireland and ones from Norse myths.

The Elf that comes from Ireland were sort of woodsy, since they were the group of Celts (Tuatha Dé Danann) who were defeated by the most recent group (Sons of Mil), and had to hide in the forests and inside the hills. (And there were two previous groups, the Fir Bolg and the Fomorians). Originally Faeries or Sidhe, they had the name Elf applied to them.

On the other hand, you have the Norse Elves, which were divided into light elves and dark elves. These were sort of more like a slightly divine group of humans.

But in D&D, you had the Gray Elves coming from Spenser's The Faerie Queen and I guess also Dunsany's King of Elfland's Daughter, while the High Elves were from LOTR (Elrond and such - more the Norse sort) and the Wood Elves from Mirkwood in The Hobbit (more the Irish sort).

 

[TwinBahamut]

Let's see here...

Elves are humans with pointy ears.

Dwarves are short humans.

Halflings are shorter humans.



Okay, more seriously, this is a really tough question.

Elves show up a lot in various forms, but they are almost more defined by the way an author tries to spin them into something new, rather than some core set of concepts. Some of the few things that are consistent tend to be the most annoying aspects, like absurdly long life and holier-than-thou attitudes... I suppose the most core element of elves as a whole is that they live somewhat isolated from human society and they have really ancient culture.

Dwarves are a bit easier. They're gruff, they like beer, they're good at digging in the ground, they're hairy, they're short and stocky, and they're as tough as nails. It's hard to make a bad dwarf, though it can be equally hard to really elaborate upon them and break away from some of their stereotypes.

Halflings really suffer from pretty much never escaping the shadow of Tolkien's hobbits. They're very short, agile, and tend to be better at sneaking around than fighting. It is really, really hard to give them an interesting new spin without creating something potentially aggravating (like Kender).

Gnomes are in the weird spot where they tend to have a very clear concept in myth and fantasy that has never been reflected in D&D. They're elemental creatures of the earth, fey spirits that obsess over gold and are of the same kind as the undines of water, salamanders of fire, and sylphs of wind. I guess their image as short, crazy tinkerers and mad magicians shows up a lot too, but I've never liked that as much.

Orcs are pretty easy. They are either brutal, savage warriors of great strength or proud, tribal warriors of great strength. They used to be associated with evil and darkness, but that version has declined in prominence recently.

Generally speaking, it is races other than these that interest me. Most of what they do in a setting is done well enough with cultures of humans. Races that are less human-like interest me a lot more. Giants, fairies/pixies, centaurs, human-like races with prominent animalistic features and abilities, intelligent magical animals, dryads, nereids, merfolk, dragons, or even angels and devils.

 

[Tovec]

there's an elf for that...

Awesome!

See I've never felt that there is indeed a "elf for that". I never played Eberron or Faerun, I didn't use material, races, classes, <redacted>.. stuff from them. As I saw it there was High Elf, Half Elf, Grey Elf, and Dark Elf, and that was all I needed, I didn't even end up using Drow when I DM'd.

The races can be difficult, because they're so very setting specific, but if I had to choose what was core, it'd model it directly off of Lord of the Rings. May as well go back to the source. It's familiar to everybody, even those who don't play.

After that, let the race concepts flow freely. Just don't imply that all races are core, but instead options to be included within a campaign world.

Races CAN be difficult, they should be setting specific but I doesn't bother me if there is a core concept that gets bits replaced based on setting or preference. I think the important part of ANY race needs to be its background, its fluff.
I enjoy my dwarves to have a long history with steeped traditions, but I can understand the worlds where the dwarves are surface dwelling, or bloodthirsty barbarians, or what have you.

I think there needs to be enough realistic detail there to START with then add in (or change) stuff as needed. Make them -2DEX, +2CON (or whatever) and give them stonecunning, just understand that not all cases are going to have dwarves who actually grew up with a stonecunning background. These are races, certain things should be innate and certain things learned - same as with classes or anything.

 

[underfoot007ct]

“I don’t always play Non-humans, but when I do, I play an ELF.”

-The Most Interesting Gamer in the World