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Greetings!

I know that many people dislike Elves, with often a special animus towards Tolkien-like Elves. I don't care. I like Elves, especially Tolkien-like Elves. However, in my own campaigns, I decided to go against the popular narrative often presented in game worlds and fantasy fiction alike--of the Elves being a dwindling people, overwhelmed by their own diminishing numbers, and faded glory.

I decided to MAKE ELVES GREAT AGAIN!:D

At least, in one region of the world. I created a vast Elven Empire, ruled from a central government, and having a majestic and glittering capital city. The Elven Empire holds numerous imperial elven provinces, as well as several semi-autonomous elven Kingdoms. The Elven Empire is enormous in scope, with over a dozen huge cities, dozens of smaller cities and towns, and many great fortresses. The Elven Royal Army is huge, and has a fierce history of sweeping, glorious victories. The Elven economy is highly advanced and robust, with extensive trade networks stretching thousands of miles, reaching dozens of nations and kingdoms. In a similar manner, the culture of the Elven Empire is bright and robust, with a rich heritage of fine foods, beautiful clothing, perfumes and jewelry, wondrous arts of music, dancing, singing, amongst others.

Having such a dynamic element in the campaign region presents some different kinds of backgrounds and stories for Player Characters as well as NPC's. There's a whole lot of things that can be done with that--as opposed to an always-waning, diminishing Elven culture. I've found that such dynamics can be very fun and rewarding!

However, having such a great power bestowed upon an Elven Empire does make or enforce other, deeper changes in several areas in the campaign, especially within the immediate campaign region. The humans are still dominant, or growing so--but humans must deal collectively with an enormously powerful Elven Empire. While usually friendly, through the centuries, they do not necessarily have to always be allies, or even friendly. There's definitely scope for conflict between the two races--though obviously, there are also many powerful dynamics which push for friendly alliances and positive relationships.

In my own campaign, I have some of the local Human kingdoms have long-standing alliances with the Elven Empire, while other Human kingdoms, principalities, and tribal confederations, have actually engaged in wars with the Elven Empire.

For some added twist--because the Elves of the Elven Empire are Good Aligned, and their realm is highly magical, with many wild areas, and full of faerie creatures and such, the Elves are dead-set against having Humans or others travel within their empire, let alone settle in lands within the imperial borders. The Elves do not want their lands tainted and corrupted by Humans--while also, influenced by these philosophies, the Elves have little interest in occupying or conquering any human-dominated lands, at least beyond a temporary duration.

Have you done something very different with Elves in your campaigns? If you do have any very powerful Elven Kingdoms, how have such an Elven Kingdom or Empire influenced the campaign world around it?

Semper Fidelis,

SHARK

Elves are my favorite race, so they tend to have a prevalent place in my games, even if they're not very numerous as a race. One of my default assumptions about elves is that they're a type of fey, so I tend to approach them from that perspective.

In one of my settings the most powerful kingdom in the world is an Elven Kingdom located in the massive forest that dominates most of the mid-northern region of northern continent. Other groups of elves exist as well (dark elves underground and snow elves in the north pole), but the elves from that kingdom (who are "Light Elves", or high elves in traditional D&D) are the most prevalent and dominant, and most likely to be encountered in the world.

The Elven Kingdom is ruled by a pair of enigmatic and semi-divine dual monarchs. The Elf Queen is the ruler of all fey and primarily in charge of all domestic affairs pertaining to the kingdom and the welfare of its people. Her consort, the Elf King is the kingdom's military leader, in charge of the kingdom's security and military matters, as well as intelligence gathering operations. He has an extensive network of scouts and spies that bring him news of potential threats from around the world, including elite griffon riders, who may quickly carry important messages across vast distances and report back to the king, as well as engage in aerial combat if necessary.

The elves jealously guard the forest from trespassers and consider the entire forest their territory. Those caught defiling the forest are dealt with harshly, and they're typically reluctant to accept visitors unless they're known allies. Various elven settlements loyal to the Elf Monarchs are scattered across the forest for hundreds of miles, and while predominantly elven, their population typically includes all matter of fey creatures as well, such as satyrs, pixies and gnomes (which are not a major character race in the world). Centaurs also venture into the forest as well, although the elves have a tenuous relationship with them, with some of the Nature revering tribes being allied with them, while some of the more warlike and unruly tribes refusing to accept the authority of Elf Monarchs.

The elves also have alliances with various human kingdoms and settlements that surround their forest, particularly along the southeastern portion of the forest, which are the most near to the Elven Kingdom. Some of the human characters in the campaign came from one such settlement, and worked with the King's Guard, to which several of the elf PCs belonged to.

The elves maintain their supremacy across the region partly through their mystique and raw magical power, as well as their military might and prestige of their dual monarchs, who are ancient semi-divine beings and possess vast personal power. Although their numbers are comparatively minor compared to the faster reproducing humans, who have slowly spread across the region in recent centuries and begun to become a concern for the elves.

Their relationship with other groups of elves are also strained due their ancient history, which involved a bloody conflict that led to the split into the three major groups: Light Elves, Dark Elves and Snow Elves.

I've often had the idea to make Elves into carnivorous tribes of savages that raid the human and dwarven lands. Compound this with the fact that these elves live only 40 years and the fact that they breed quickly and always in sets of twins, and you have a nasty creature that is basically akin to the Redcaps of folklore. This wouldn't preclude the existence of half elves or even long lived elves that are omnivorous but prefer vegetables. However the Long lived elves are rare because the Redcap elves often kill the children who aren't born as twins. If you are an elf who is born alone you are one of the "cursed" peaceful long lived elves.

Quote from: arcanuum;1141931I've often had the idea to make Elves into carnivorous tribes of savages that raid the human and dwarven lands. Compound this with the fact that these elves live only 40 years and the fact that they breed quickly and always in sets of twins, and you have a nasty creature that is basically akin to the Redcaps of folklore. This wouldn't preclude the existence of half elves or even long lived elves that are omnivorous but prefer vegetables. However the Long lived elves are rare because the Redcap elves often kill the children who aren't born as twins. If you are an elf who is born alone you are one of the "cursed" peaceful long lived elves.

Jeez, it's like Pathfinder goblins. Interesting idea though.

One of the things about elves that needs to be given weight is their lifespan. Elf lifespan has varied from system to system -- and the longer the lifespan, the easier it should be to take a long view on things. Can't get a treaty signed with a human nation? Opt for a 'holding action' and try to wait out the monarch, then see if his successor is more reasonable.

I've gone back to the roots--well, one particular root--of fantasy elves and made them xenophobic.  The high elven nation had a rotten experience with a human/halfling empire a little over 500 years ago.  That empire is long collapsed.  The high elves are starting to relax.   Now they might not execute you on the spot if caught in their territory.  Now they don't always hunt down high elven emigrants and kill them before they can reveal secrets--they'll give the emigrant a chance to prove he can keep his mouth shut first. Give it another few centuries, they might accept an ambassador again.  

Though maybe not, because there really isn't much reason to change.  The "wood elves" are really just elves that have blended into human/halfling rural communities on the borders and in smaller enclaves elsewhere.  The limited trade between the high elven nation and the rest of the region can be accomplished through those communities.  Plus, the high elves have a fey dragon threat that is a lot scarier than anything that other people can do--which is both a reason to leave other people alone and also not pay much attention to them.

The one truism in my current campaign: Elves are bastards.

Wood Elves
In my campaign, the majority of wood elves (grugach) are small bands of feral warriors who will go full Apache on your ass, with a minority of clans that are mostly peaceful, old faith (druid), but don't take crap from outsiders.  They ALSO had an empire in the distant past that worshiped Old Ones who they offered blood sacrifices too.  I ran Hidden Shrine of Tamoachan and swapped the elves in, tweaking some things.

They are the remnants of the second-class citizenry of the High Elf Kingdom.  

The High Elves of Blaenevon
These cheerful fucks were expansionist, Lawful Neutral, quasi-ancestor worshiping control freaks.  

They've (the PCs) met a pair of survivors from the period - one is a LN Domination Paladin, the other is her grandfather; an archmage with ice water for blood that has no problem smiling in your face, while plotting against you.

The Grand High Arcanist of the Elves smuggled the last surviving member of the royal family, dismissed the majority of the military, and -mystically nuked the entire elvish kingdom- in order to wipe out the orcish horde, and the supposed avatar of Gruumsh.

Most of the survivors took the fleet to the west... not for a peaceful heaven analog, but to settle; or to slaughter and colonize, and to come sailing back in force since its 'only' taken 500 years for the land to recover, and they won't be amused.

Over the course of the campaign so far, they've discovered that:

• The High Elves disdain the gawds
• They've warred with the dragons, trying to wipe them out... chromatic or otherwise
• They not only created the dragonborn in the distant past, they used them as a slave race (reverse draconians, the first generation was made from stolen chromatic eggs
• They have a literal series of gateways to the Abyss, syphoning power (yes, I ripped off the plot of Doom)
• They regularly bargain and traffic with Devils
• They regularly use soul capturing (Soul Jar) magic, trapping the dead souls (see below)

The party has not yet discovered:
That elvish soul trapping is what lead the elves to:

• Creation of the Warforged (they haven't met any/rolled up any)
• A scattering of liches, including an entire undead kingdom among the 'Sorcerer Kings'

...add to all of that the fact that an elf prince married the great heroic queen Braesenia (founder of the PC home kingdom) and created family ties to all the noble houses - so there was a constant 'cold war' between the (metallic) dragon patrons trying to guide the Braesenian Kingdom with the Blaenevon Elf relatives and 'advisors' trying to turn it into a client state.

I don't know if it makes them great, but they sure have impact.

Not a large-scale world building thing, but one problem I always have with the races is how rarely their fluff is represented in the on-the-ground mechanics.

The big thing that I've always done with elves/dwarves is that their average warrior is a much higher level. I know that back in my Eberron campaign (which is generally lower power, with level 10-12 characters considered epic) an average human soldier was a level 1-3 warrior, an average dwarf was a 4-5 fighter or cleric, and an average elf was a 5-6 ranger or wizard. It just made sense to me considering their longer lifespans, but mechanically it's rarely shown that way.


On an unrelated note, one setting that I've played around with is one where the elves super badass and every nation is controlled by them despite humans forming the vast majority of the population. A single elf is able to defeat a dozen humans with ease, which is actually more valuable in keeping them as an underclass than it would be in an open-field combat. The elves use the humans and cannon-fodder against monsters etc., but against opposing nations with elves, the humans' job is largely to tire enemy elves so that the elves on their own side can have an edge.

In that setting, the elves wouldn't be evil per se, they would just think of the humans as lesser - and in many ways they're right. Besides, if a human dies they're only losing a few decades of life versus the centuries or millennia that elves live.

As a Talislanta guy... I'm going to commit some heresy and talk about Elves.


My favorite Elves, if only to differentiate them from whatever D&D has generally portrayed them as, I've always loved the Spelljammer Imperial Elves. Basically borderline Elven supremacists, having fought a many-millennial war against an equially nuanced and evolved Orc species (the Scro). Sure it's still D&D... but it allows for a different context within D&D (and its many settings) that cleaves directly to the meta-layer of what Spelljammer represents.

It doesn't portray the Elves as "receding from the world" ala Tolkien - ceding it to the prevalence of Humanity - mirrored in the Forgotten Realms, Greyhawk, and Dragonlance. Rather it contextualizes their efforts in other places, and allows their "assumed" level of power to flourish - with all the ugly warts and all that come with it. Ancient, alien, arrogant, patronizing, yet ultimately vulnerable, as a generalization.

Quote from: Charon's Little Helper;1141950The big thing that I've always done with elves/dwarves is that their average warrior is a much higher level. I know that back in my Eberron campaign (which is generally lower power, with level 10-12 characters considered epic) an average human soldier was a level 1-3 warrior, an average dwarf was a 4-5 fighter or cleric, and an average elf was a 5-6 ranger or wizard. It just made sense to me considering their longer lifespans, but mechanically it's rarely shown that way.

Depends on whether XP is something you can earn just by being alive. If it takes extraordinary feats, most elves will die before reaching high level. Also elves may be level capped; OD&D elves were capped at Fighter-4/MU-8.

F*ck - Tenbones, now I'm rethinking exactly what sort of ships my elves might have boarded, and where they went.  ;)

I tend to think elves without some type of existential crisis aren't really elves... the "we're better than Men at everything" is really really annoying (especially if they're a PC option) without something to counterbalance it and "dying/disappearing race" or "relics of a past age" are things that thematically pair well with the otherwise "Golden Age of Men" feel elves typically give off.

And its not just the Tolkien elves these themes apply to. Many tales of the Fae-kind involve their being pushed out by the arrival of Men. Hell, the Leprechaun is almost the embodiment of this... Once called Lugh, the all-talented king of the Tuatha De Danann, all that remains of his legend is now a diminutive sprite who hides gold.

In a way the problem with "Elves Ascendant" is the same as if Superman showed up not as the last survivor of a dead world, but as the lead scout for a still-vibrant Kryptonian Republic.

If you want more vibrant elves I think you need to go with less superhuman elves. Go back to the early D&D depictions where instead of standing as tall-or-taller than men they're shorter (say 5' 6" and 120 lb. at the top end for males), weaker and frailer, but more nimble and charismatic (say -1 Str, -1 Con, +1 Dex, +1 Cha in AD&D ; +/-2 to those for 3e and later).

Similarly, long-lived but not insanely so (say 120-200 years, not 1200+ that some have gone with) means you don't need an abysmally low birth rate to keep their population from just overruning everything (i.e. 6-7 of pregnancies over 40-60 years of fertility as a human would have in 20-25... vs. the once per century type of deal that some elves have been portrayed as having).

Quote from: Chris24601;1141956I tend to think elves without some type of existential crisis aren't really elves... the "we're better than Men at everything" is really really annoying (especially if they're a PC option) without something to counterbalance it and "dying/disappearing race" or "relics of a past age" are things that thematically pair well with the otherwise "Golden Age of Men" feel elves typically give off.

Bingo. In Tolkien, it wasn't even the arrival of men but the change of fate. Humans where a sort of outside effort to stabilize the world when god knew the elves would not be able to do it because of intrinsic corruption.
It's a very interesting story that the 'saviors' of the world where not Supermen, but people simply not powered by fate like the rest of the world was.

I've a love/hate relationship with elves.

I prefer the Tolkienesque type myself. Although, I like what they were in Symbaroum. Basically, don't fuck with them and they get pretty alien with age.

I think D&D elves are twee (like in most fantasy games).

Personally I'd have them very rare in my games. So, they'd still have that air of mystery. I'd have them hostile to humans out in the wild for the most part -  Basically like guerillas. Seeing humans as interlopers.

Quote from: LiferGamer;1141953F*ck - Tenbones, now I'm rethinking exactly what sort of ships my elves might have boarded, and where they went.  ;)

Well clearly when the Noldor left, they re-assumed their rightful place as the rulers of Lionheart, to continue the endless war against forces of the Neogi, Illithid, and the Scro Navy.

Makes me want to finish the convention two-parter I was working on.

Bog standard fantasy world where elves are super powerful  seemingly immortal and just one man Machines of monster slaying... till the party accidentally comes upon a dead one... and his magical brooches talking in a dialect of Elvish they don't recognize suddenly elves start teleporting in and trying to kill them.

See these rather a amoral elves are ultratech Wanderers and this planet happens to be a low-tech Game Preserve.  Some Elvish subversives will help them out... but can they really be trusted?

I was considering using drow as the pop-up helpful elves.

I couldn't get the timing right for a convention game, but it might make an entertaining short between campaign games.

Apologies for my speech-to-text wall of verbage again.

I am with  VisionStorm in this, Elves are also one of my favourites.

The only problem that I have with SHARKs Elven Kingdom is that it seems more suited for era before campaign current time.  This seems to be the period where all the dungeons are dug, the gold coins are minted and the magic items and magiced.

Elves being basically better than humans, a la Tolkien, can be countered by having them unable or unwilling to organize. Thus, they get pushed to the margins by lesser beings. In one of my current campaign settings, Idlewhile Uswego, King of the Greenwood, is a vassal of a human king. His long history of defeats at the hands of the dwarfs of Glon,' (see Idlewhile snatches defeat from the jaws of victory, Idlewhile's route and Idlewhile's humiliation) mean that his kingdom is much smaller than it was.
Meanwhile, in neighboring Glon,' the dwarfs get little joy from their ancient conquests. Almost all elves in Glon' are residents, not citizens, not taking part in the money economy and ignoring the fact that they are in a nation. They are not rebels or outlaws, they just hang in the boonies and ignore the authorities. The elf citizens are few but they do bring a lot to society.
There is an elf kingdom west of the mountains and another on islands in the Wraparound Ocean.

Two words: redneck elves.

Quote from: RandyB;1142030Two words: redneck elves.

I see somebody else read Monster Hunter International.

Considering elves have long lives in the MHIverse, I've been tempted to ask Larry Correia if they're playing a long con against the MCB. It'd make for an interesting novel, at least.

I would also like to note that Tolkien's elves were only wise circa LOTR because all the stupid, arrogant, and brash ones had died off. Feanor by himself was just a walking disaster.

Quote from: Shrieking Banshee;1142032I see somebody else read Monster Hunter International.

Yep. One of my favorite bits. I'm still disappointed that MHI didn't give us hillbilly dwarves.

In my own stuff?  Poul Anderson elves; they are not paragons of good, but of pagan neutrality.  

Elves and druids
clerics and paladins
half-orcs, anti-clerics, and assassins

None of these 3 categories will adventure with the other two.  Players must choose which one of the 3 groups are present in the party (or none of them, I suppose).  This will set the overall tone of the campaign and its place in the cosmic conflict.

When running Greyhawk, however, I go with vanilla elves; a bone to the elf-loving players who are happiest playing a human with pointy ears.

Quote from: RandyB;1142063Yep. One of my favorite bits. I'm still disappointed that MHI didn't give us hillbilly dwarves.

Eh I feel thats what makes it great is he balances out the goofy and the more serious. I feel hillbilly Dwarves may have been much.

Quote from: Shrieking Banshee;1142096Eh I feel thats what makes it great is he balances out the goofy and the more serious. I feel hillbilly Dwarves may have been much.

Urban gnomes, redneck elves, and noble savage orcs? Yeah, he hits a good balance, but the dwarves are an obvious omission.

I want the PCs to aspire to making the world a better place, so militarily powerful empires with a well-developed economy and no room for improvement doesn't appeal to me, much, unless the players decide to create this Utopia themselves.  

I like elves that are powerful - living for thousands of years they are high level characters, but they are seen as unresponsive to other nations.  When the human kingdom complains that a vast orc horde will overrun their lands, elves tend to see that as a problem for a day - they can just wait a decade and the orcs will have degraded the land and moved on, and a new human kingdom will arise again.  

Effectively, my elves are 'great' but they aren't interested in exporting their culture.  From an outsider's perspective, there are a lot of things you can claim as flaws so PCs won't have a problem having conflicts with Elven nations if they decide to build their own kingdom.

Quote from: SHARK;1141925Greetings!

I know that many people dislike Elves, with often a special animus towards Tolkien-like Elves. I don't care. I like Elves, especially Tolkien-like Elves. However, in my own campaigns, I decided to go against the popular narrative often presented in game worlds and fantasy fiction alike--of the Elves being a dwindling people, overwhelmed by their own diminishing numbers, and faded glory.

I decided to MAKE ELVES GREAT AGAIN!:D

At least, in one region of the world. I created a vast Elven Empire, ruled from a central government, and having a majestic and glittering capital city. The Elven Empire holds numerous imperial elven provinces, as well as several semi-autonomous elven Kingdoms. The Elven Empire is enormous in scope, with over a dozen huge cities, dozens of smaller cities and towns, and many great fortresses. The Elven Royal Army is huge, and has a fierce history of sweeping, glorious victories. The Elven economy is highly advanced and robust, with extensive trade networks stretching thousands of miles, reaching dozens of nations and kingdoms. In a similar manner, the culture of the Elven Empire is bright and robust, with a rich heritage of fine foods, beautiful clothing, perfumes and jewelry, wondrous arts of music, dancing, singing, amongst others.

Having such a dynamic element in the campaign region presents some different kinds of backgrounds and stories for Player Characters as well as NPC's. There's a whole lot of things that can be done with that--as opposed to an always-waning, diminishing Elven culture. I've found that such dynamics can be very fun and rewarding!

However, having such a great power bestowed upon an Elven Empire does make or enforce other, deeper changes in several areas in the campaign, especially within the immediate campaign region. The humans are still dominant, or growing so--but humans must deal collectively with an enormously powerful Elven Empire. While usually friendly, through the centuries, they do not necessarily have to always be allies, or even friendly. There's definitely scope for conflict between the two races--though obviously, there are also many powerful dynamics which push for friendly alliances and positive relationships.

In my own campaign, I have some of the local Human kingdoms have long-standing alliances with the Elven Empire, while other Human kingdoms, principalities, and tribal confederations, have actually engaged in wars with the Elven Empire.

For some added twist--because the Elves of the Elven Empire are Good Aligned, and their realm is highly magical, with many wild areas, and full of faerie creatures and such, the Elves are dead-set against having Humans or others travel within their empire, let alone settle in lands within the imperial borders. The Elves do not want their lands tainted and corrupted by Humans--while also, influenced by these philosophies, the Elves have little interest in occupying or conquering any human-dominated lands, at least beyond a temporary duration.

Have you done something very different with Elves in your campaigns? If you do have any very powerful Elven Kingdoms, how have such an Elven Kingdom or Empire influenced the campaign world around it?

Semper Fidelis,

SHARK

Elves are a real hot button issue, aren't they. People love'em or hate'em, and even those who love'em often seem to hate other people's take on them.

I've never quite gone the way you are describing, but could be cool. I do tend to go with the decadent faded glory angle, but if I did try a still-vibrant elven empire, I would probably go all Melnibonean with them. Imperial elves would also have to be more numerous than I usually like, but even still, I would make them a minority in their own empire, a ruling elite lording it over other subject peoples.

Quote from: Zirunel;1142156Elves are a real hot button issue, aren't they. People love'em or hate'em, and even those who love'em often seem to hate other people's take on them.

I've never quite gone the way you are describing, but could be cool. I do tend to go with the decadent faded glory angle, but if I did try a still-vibrant elven empire, I would probably go all Melnibonean with them. Imperial elves would also have to be more numerous than I usually like, but even still, I would make them a minority in their own empire, a ruling elite lording it over other subject peoples.

Just wait until you find out about how unbelievably racist they are!

I prefer pre-Tolkien influences and deliberate avoidance of Tolkien tropes.

I like the elves as The Fair Folk (https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TheFairFolk), mysterious, capricious, and dangerous. The evil Christmas elves in Krampus are awesome.

I like Glorantha's elves because they aren't just funny-looking humans but intelligent plants.

I like Raging Heroes' take on elves (https://www.ragingheroes.com/blogs/news/tgg2-update-70-dark-elves-and-void-elves-stories-and-a-video) as consisting of one soul shared between an animal and a plant. I especially like the dark elves being victims of their plant halves being burned to death, rather than just arbitrarily evil or whatever.

You might like Lion & Dragon's take on Elves, then.

I can take you back to my childhood a little here :D
The Scandinavian "Drakar & Demoner" had a "monster book" with an interesting take. Elves are basically associated with specific parts of nature (going back to ideas of elves as nature spirits I suppose, but more in the flesh). So you have wood-elves, cave-elves (with bigger ears), gray elves (a sort of sea elves, I always wondered if these were inspired by Tolkien's Gray Havens), and silver elves that can fly (some sort of realm in the skies I suppose), and frost elves in arctic areas. You would not want to mess with the areas that they protect and consider their realm. Elves are also related to a wider group of "elven" peoples that include things like water nymphs that my younger self found pretty hot.  

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i allow players to use the advantage/disadvantage components of the D6 system to build their non-humans so that no two elves or gnomes are truly alike; ultimately what is the difference between an elven enchantress and a nymph?

I always liked the Tolkien Elves... They were epic. Kind of dropped their sad part though, and added a few things of my own to vary player experiences.

Elves IMC are immortal, and only die of they are slain in battle, or who tire of this life, choose to leave this world, and go to the next. The are immune to disease, don't need to sleep, but do rest or meditate for about four hours a day. There are three types of elves, High Elves, Woodland Elves, and Dark Elves.

The High Elves like magic, and are renowned as Wizards and Sorcerers. They can create any magic items, and often create new and impressive magics that few have seen before. They also like temporal magic, and time-shift or phase shift their cities. They spend time with other spirits and fey, and are capricious and enjoy playing pranks. Being immortal means they are unconcerned with most of what goes on in the physical world, choosing to time-shift away using magic, if threatened, or attacked. You'll typically find a plenitude of pixies and sprites, and some nymphs, and slyphs who live with and share  the arboreal tree cities the elves enjoy living in. Spend just a day or two in the realm of the high elves, and a season or to will pass in the real world.

The Woodland Elves like crafts, and are experts as smiths and carpenters, and use magic to make remarkable tools, dishware and utensils. They don't use temporal magic, and instead prefer elemental magic. They are expert trackers and rangers and gain bonuses for tracking, hunting, and wilderness survival. They like riding Wolves, Giant Ferrets, Eagles, Griffons, and Pegasus. They also spend time with sprites and pixies and other fey, including wood nymphs, and jealously guard the sanctity of the woodlands. Often they can be found in the company of druids as well as wizards and sorcerers.

The Dark Elves are also crafters, and they live beneath the ground in caverns or dungeons. They focus on gemcutting and smithing fine jewels, and specialize in earth and water elemental magic, glyphs & wards, and illusion magic. They are not evil, but neutral, however are solitary and aloof, do not like to be disturbed by other races.

I have Ice Elves too, and they specialize in Light and energy based magic. The have pale blue skin and generally light hair color, with white, deep blue, or black eyes. They also use various cold or ice spells, and are also magical jewel smiths with talents in creating jewel embedded weapons, with spells stored in crystals and gems that are set into weapons, rings, staves, wands, and apparel. They are also adept miners and can delve through both stone, earth and ice with impressive accuracy and speed. They generally live in Ice Caverns or Ice Crevasses, although sometimes they create mountain strongholds by delving into stone, much like the dwarves. They do not spend time with Fey, but do like to roam and explore the Astral and Ethereal planes.

Quote from: GameDaddy;1143907I always liked the Tolkien Elves... They were epic. Kind of dropped their sad part though, and added a few things of my own to vary player experiences.

Elves IMC are immortal, and only die of they are slain in battle, or who tire of this life, choose to leave this world, and go to the next. The are immune to disease, don't need to sleep, but do rest or meditate for about four hours a day. There are three types of elves, High Elves, Woodland Elves, and Dark Elves.

The High Elves like magic, and are renowned as Wizards and Sorcerers. They can create any magic items, and often create new and impressive magics that few have seen before. They also like temporal magic, and time-shift or phase shift their cities. They spend time with other spirits and fey, and are capricious and enjoy playing pranks. Being immortal means they are unconcerned with most of what goes on in the physical world, choosing to time-shift away using magic, if threatened, or attacked. You'll typically find a plenitude of pixies and sprites, and some nymphs, and slyphs who live with and share  the arboreal tree cities the elves enjoy living in. Spend just a day or two in the realm of the high elves, and a season or to will pass in the real world.

The Woodland Elves like crafts, and are experts as smiths and carpenters, and use magic to make remarkable tools, dishware and utensils. They don't use temporal magic, and instead prefer elemental magic. They are expert trackers and rangers and gain bonuses for tracking, hunting, and wilderness survival. They like riding Wolves, Giant Ferrets, Eagles, Griffons, and Pegasus. They also spend time with sprites and pixies and other fey, including wood nymphs, and jealously guard the sanctity of the woodlands. Often they can be found in the company of druids as well as wizards and sorcerers.

The Dark Elves are also crafters, and they live beneath the ground in caverns or dungeons. They focus on gemcutting and smithing fine jewels, and specialize in earth and water elemental magic, glyphs & wards, and illusion magic. They are not evil, but neutral, however are solitary and aloof, do not like to be disturbed by other races.

I have Ice Elves too, and they specialize in Light and energy based magic. The have pale blue skin and generally light hair color, with white, deep blue, or black eyes. They also use various cold or ice spells, and are also magical jewel smiths with talents in creating jewel embedded weapons, with spells stored in crystals and gems that are set into weapons, rings, staves, wands, and apparel. They are also adept miners and can delve through both stone, earth and ice with impressive accuracy and speed. They generally live in Ice Caverns or Ice Crevasses, although sometimes they create mountain strongholds by delving into stone, much like the dwarves. They do not spend time with Fey, but do like to roam and explore the Astral and Ethereal planes.

Hey, that's surprisingly similar to the Scandinavian Drakar & Demoner (post above)

In my eyes he's still the King.[ATTACH=CONFIG]4757[/ATTACH]

Quote from: Trond;1143899I can take you back to my childhood a little here :D
The Scandinavian "Drakar & Demoner" had a "monster book" with an interesting take. Elves are basically associated with specific parts of nature (going back to ideas of elves as nature spirits I suppose, but more in the flesh).

Quote from: GameDaddy;1143907I always liked the Tolkien Elves... They were epic. Kind of dropped their sad part though, and added a few things of my own to vary player experiences.

I think Tolkien has overshadowed the fantasy genre and stifled its possibilities, although that probably deserves a topic of its own.

In pre-Tolkien occultism, the elves were named as one of the many varieties of earth elementals (https://www.sacred-texts.com/eso/sta/sta25.htm) alongside gnomes, goblins, satyrs, dwarves, etc. Occultism assigned elemental affinities to all magical creatures.

I don't know where the idea of elves being associated with all the elements originates, although Legends of the Fire Spirits claims that Tunisian folklore has genies of the air (leriah), sea (baharia), and land (siadna). So that idea wasn't invented by Gygax, although he almost certainly came up with idea independently from the Tunisians since his names for the different tribes were nonsensical (e.g. djinn (or jinn) is the Arabic word for genie, jann is the genderless inflection of jinn, marid is a synonym for genie and has nothing to do with water, ifrit is another synonym for genie, and dao isn't Arabic at all). The Tunisian genies don't resemble the D&D ones at all: the leriah are spirits of disease, the baharia are mermaids and mermen, and the siadna loosely resemble fairies in post-Christianized Indo-European cultures (for example, their name is a euphemism meaning "our sovereigns" similarly to the use of "fair folk").

I think you could make a case for placing elves, genies, etc under an umbrella if you're trying to write a medieval authentic game. I think Ars Magica tries to do something like that, since their Mythic Africa book names the Tunisian genie varieties (I suspect they read the same book I did), but I'm not familiar with it overall. Though what I have read of it is really complicated, since (like the wildly inconsistent folklore it emulates) it mentions that "genie" is an umbrella term for many related and unrelated entities. I have to give it credit for going to the insane effort of creating an underlying logic for the many idiosyncrasies of folklore. You'd never see anything like that in the humpty dumpty world of D&D jargon.