I heard of an intriguing idea to remove elves from the list of playable species. If they were removed, they would still be included as monsters who you can meet and interact with. In stories like LotR, the Inheritance series, and in mythology, elves are powerful creatures far above the level of the average person. It makes sense to me to use them as a higher power that are mysterious, dangerous, and potentially helpful creatures imbued with powerful magic, rather than having one be the restaurant owner down the street that makes over priced food. Right now elves are just normal people that you meet every day even though they live an incredibly long amount of time. I think it would be cooler to actually be in awe of elves when I meet them as a player, because in mythology they were often otherworldly creatures of grace and beauty.
I still think half-elves could be used, and there could be a different subspecies of half-elf for each subspecies of elf. I know there are still a lot of people who want to play elves so they could instead play a half-elf.
I think it would be cool to use this, but I would have to homebrew a bunch of high level elves, and I like using Drow. Maybe Drow could be a weaken form of elf but are still rare and mysterious.
Elves have lifespans ten times longer then humans. So it’s not inconceivable that at different points in their lives they could be simple restaurant owners, who grow in power to become useful allies with powerful magic. Even human characters who get to level 20 are dangerous and can be potentially helpful. So why not have them as both?
Most elves I meet on my adventures are somewhat normal guys who need to ask a band of crazy, level one adventures to help them do simple things like fight off goblins. I think that it would be more interesting if elves were less common, more like the stuff of legends. A band of goblins wouldn't even dare to inconvenience one and elves wouldn't even give them the chance to. If elves were really creatures of legend, I don't think there would be much if any elves who stooped to perform small, simple tasks like run a convenience store. One reason they wouldn't would be because of their pride, in their eyes it is beneath them to perform those tasks. Also, if they were weakened or not yet fully trained, it would be better to dwell in the hidden elven kingdoms where they could develop amongst their own kind and gain strength. In the Inheritance series or in Lord of the Rings would you expect to see an elf running a small store? Only an outcast would go near to that level, but even then, it would rather dwell out like a hermit in the wild on its own rather than be seen dwelling amongst people. If an elf walks down the street, it would be similar in some ways as if a metallic dragon strolled through your neighborhood. Some people would be frightened, some would be in awe, others would be curious and some might be angry. They would be protrayed as more sylvan and closer to the fey. If you see one, you shouldn't be able to expect it to just nod in your direction or make polite conversation about the weather, they would only come across humans on accident or for some strange reason and humans would often be left confused and bewildered by their actions.
I understand a lot of people like playing elves, so this idea probably won't be liked much, but I have grown tired of seeing elves played and portrayed as pointy eared humans. I think it would be more interesting if they were more mysterious, dangerous, fearsome, and/or noble and graceful, rather than that guy who is getting drunk next to you at the bar. Still, a lot of people I know would still like playing elven characters, so that is why half-elves would be the replacement in ways. You can still play that mysterious elven character if you want, but there is an explanation for why they are shopping in a grocery store and not calling on nature to provide them with fruits and berries of the vine and branches.
The problem is that there are a lot of races that can fit that role asimar, firbolg, animal folk. There probably are worlds where elves are still mysterious, but even in Tolkien’s works they were starting to fall apart. They had all but abandoned middle earth to head to what was effectively the after life. Sauron didn’t fear them coming back as much as the humans uniting and even that was a feint to distract him from two hobbits who ultimately destroyed him.
It's an interesting and potentially compelling worldbuilding idea, provided you don't have players who are very fond of playing elves, which many are. :)
If I had to guess, I think the current intention of the lore is that so long as an elf stays in the Feywild, they are quite powerful beings, but when they come to the Material Plane, or perhaps after some time on the Material Plane, they diminish. I agree with you that this is not well defined and could use some additional attention, but the D&D5 eladrin monster rules are at least intended to fill the 'mythical elf' role.
There's been an elf archetype like the one you describe in the game since the early days of AD&D1: the grey elves, described as reclusive, arrogant, and magically powerful (and sometimes even as "faeries"), but they've also often been playable, for some reason, which mostly just created confusion between it and the high elf and resulted in it appearing and disappearing a number of times throughout the editions.
AD&D2 tried to more clearly illustrate the difference between player character elves and more Tolkien-like or mythical elves by introducing the eladrin, which were originally elf-like chaotic good celestials, similar to the role angels play for the lawful good planes, or to the current concept of 'archfey.'
The eladrin didn't get a ton of attention in D&D3, and then D&D4 used the concept to overwrite the high elf, and made wood elves just "elves," which (in my opinion) defeated the whole purpose and continues to create misunderstandings. They introduced "noble eladrin" in the Monster Manual to try to retain some link to a more powerful, unplayable elf archetype, and you can see D&D5 continuing to wrestle with explaining this dichotomy in Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes, provided you can still find a copy.
Monsters of the Multiverse just doesn't address it at all, providing an eladrin PC race and eladrin monster stat blocks that don't differentiate between them with any lore but still represent a substantial power gap.
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J Great Wyrm Moonstone Dungeon Master
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Keep in mind that the elves we typically meet in stories are the exceptions not the rule. Elrond, Galadriel etc are tier 3/4 NPCs pointing the characters in various directions. Legolas is not nearly as powerful despite being the son of a king of elves. If I had to try and stat out the members of the fellowship at the start it would be:
Gandalf - Epic (L20+) Aragorn - L16 Boromir - L12 Legolas - L8 Gimili - L8 Frodo, Samwise, Merry, Pippin - L1 ( in the Shire), L3 (in Rivendell)
making elves a non playable group is a mistake, most elves, like most humans, dwarves, any other playable race are not beings of extreme power/knowledge/wisdom - they are everyday folks, yes they are bakers etc. they are stated out as such (even the basic Drow are only CR 1/4 monsters) There are many of us who enjoy playing elves and making them non playable would take away a considerable amount of our enjoyment of the game so I doubt it will ever happen officially.
I actually don't really think it should happen officially. Lots of people wouldn't like that because they like playing elves and I wouldn't want to take the race option from them. I might use this in my homebrew setting because I like the idea of elves being super powered creatures that most people only hear about in stories and am kind of tired of seeing elves as bar maids and convenience store owners. This is probably because I read a lot of old mythology and folklore where they are often portrayed as mysterious celestial or fey creatures that we cannot hope to fully understand. Seeing elves struggle financially and be scared when a single wolf threatens them feels to me as if they are not really that mystical. They shouldn't really need money unless they are with humans because they can call nature to provide them with what they need, and a wolf would either know better to attack an elf, or be magically persuaded against it. I think Half-elves could fill in the gap left behind by elves and I think they are cooler than elves too. They have that mystical connection to them, but they also are not fully of another world. This is just my opinion though and I wouldn't think it wise for it to be made official that elves are an unplayable race because I think that there are people who really like elves and the game would be less fun for them if they couldn't play them. I am just tired of how elves are portrayed right now but I still want games to have them.
I heard of an intriguing idea to remove elves from the list of playable species. [sic] In stories like LotR, the Inheritance series, and in mythology, elves are powerful creatures far above the level of the average person. [sic]
Isn’t it safe to presume that the only elves those humans interacted with were adventurers, or at least had been adventurers, and therefore had class levels making them “powerful creatures far above the level of the average person?”
But in Inheritance, LotR, Mythology, and other stories like that, they never mention elven commoners outside of their own kingdoms.
But D&D isn’t set in any of those settings unless the DM does it that way. In those cases, it would be perfectly reasonable to restrict those commoners to their respective kingdoms. That’s just not the standard for most of the D&D settings.
I once ran a campaign where everyone was human, I want to say it was in late 3e, maybe early 4e. I told the players they could use whichever racial mechanics they wanted for their character; we were just going to re-skin them as humans. The idea was when the saw something that wasn't a human, it was really weird and foreign. It worked for a campaign, but I don't know if I'd want to do it again. It was fun, but the novelty wore off. And while you open some storytelling options, you close others. It seemed like more were closed than opened by doing it.
The important thing is to get player buy-in. This was a group that had been together a couple years, and we'd had some very good campaigns, so we all trusted each other. I don't know if it would have worked if I'd come in with the idea without having played with them for a while before I tried it.
I think the introduction of more races through the edition is important in developing the future of Toril. Like Elder Scrolls when Orcs went from monsters to a playable race, it adds a sense of progression. I do think there should be some canon "past" or "prequel" adventures that takes place during 1E-4E though, to show what things were like back then.
But in Inheritance, LotR, Mythology, and other stories like that, they never mention elven commoners outside of their own kingdoms.
But D&D isn’t set in any of those settings unless the DM does it that way. In those cases, it would be perfectly reasonable to restrict those commoners to their respective kingdoms. That’s just not the standard for most of the D&D settings.
I know that Dnd isn't in any of those settings, I think that some DMs and maybe some campaign books should be made that use elves in similar ways to those settings.
I like this idea, partly because I have grown bored with how elves are used now. Most players that I have seen play elves, use them as pointy eared humans. Now before you all say that is my players problem, most campaign books do that as well. In many of the adventures I am in or have seen, elves are just every day guys you meet regularly, not much different than humans. I think it would be cool if when you saw an elf, it would be similar to how players react when they see a dragon, beholder, mind flayer, or maybe even an owlbear. Something like a mixture of excitement, fear and maybe some awe.
I also think it would make them cooler. Right now they seem somewhat bland and boring, but if they were made into a stronger creature of myth and legends, they would be more interesting than they are now. I personally like the idea of the mysterious elves from mythology whose appearance marked a momentous and strange occurrence. They should be feared and respected and they should have access to great power and knowledge. Right now they aren't really interesting. They have a certain style, with leaves and nature and stuff, but most elves you meet in an adventure aren't like that, and most characters who play them don't use them that way.
After writing this, it makes me want to play an elf again and use them as a powerful, mystical character who comes from distant, unheard of lands. It would be hard to play him this way though, if every elf I meet is just a normal dude with pointy ears, so I don't think I can use him.
This IS a problem with a number of settings. But it’s a fairly understandable problem. If elves, dwarves etc are relegated to hidden/distant half mythical realms then yes running across them is going to become a significant and memorable event. In addition you will almost certainly not be running across a run of the mill elf/dwarf/etc but across one of significant power which will make it all the more special. This can probably be done in the new Dragonlance setting where the elves and dwarves are primarily hidden away in reclusive kingdoms/enclaves. In settings like FR it’s much harder as nonhuman species are integrated into human societies to a large extent although there are still plenty of hidden enclaves. Of course when you adventure with a Dwarven fighter, an elven Bladesinger, a Dragonborn Paladin, and a gnomish Arcane Trickster to go with your half orc ranger/Druid what do you expect?
Quote from The_Summoning_Dark>> In the Inheritance series or in Lord of the Rings would you expect to see an elf running a small store? Only an outcast would go near to that level, but even then, it would rather dwell out like a hermit in the wild on its own rather than be seen dwelling amongst people.
in both series, elves are mysterois because they dont usually travel outside their realms, but in both, its still very clear, at one point you might have seen an elf running a small store(lotr), or still might (inheritance cycle)
but wildb1ll is right, most of the elves the "heroes" meet, are tier 3-4 adventurers, not because the other commoners dont exist, but because it makes a compelling narrative for a heroes journey story, the same thing can be done with almost any other nonhumanoid race
not only that but if you look outside Tolkien inspired storylines, which inheritance very much is influenced by him, as is much of modern fantasy, youll find that they arent as universilly thought of like that, in some stories you have kingdoms of elves with commoners and the powerful, others they are tricksters, it depends on which mythos your looking at. Tolkien is one modern aspect on something that the game leaves open for a variety of influences
The joy of AD&D is having control of your table. At your table you can make any race playable or not playable. You really can make the game "Your way".
However, to add to the other topics I find it funny you said elves are inherently overpowered. But sit a spell with a few tables and see how easily they can get wiped out by a simple rickety bridge, or the joys of the old days when crossing a river could be more deadly than a bugbear encounter. I promise you they are not at all more powerful than any other race, and that would be due to the game balancing that was provided by WoTC.
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I am not sure what my Spirit Animal is. But whatever that thing is, I am pretty sure it has rabies!
I think in the forgotten realms at least elves aren't as special in terms of raw innate ability as they are in certain other fantasy works.
What's special about them is their ancestry, but most elves aren't first generation celestial or noble eladrin, they're something else, so there are plenty of elven commoners who are just ordinary people, albeit long-lived, can trance etc.
As a DM you're free to decide why certain elves might be more powerful; either they're exceptional in the same way as players, or perhaps they're natives of Arvandor (celestial elves) or the Feywild (fey elves/noble eladrin) etc.
While you certainly could limit elves in your campaign to being only of the "special" variety, with no commoners etc., I'm always wary about axing a race from the players; D&D is a collaboration so if anyone has an elf character they really want to play as I'd discuss with them the idea for the setting, and encourage them to play into the differences more, i.e- think about why a normally detached and insular elf might accompany a rag-tag group of adventurers etc., and encourage them to play with how you want your elves to be (i.e- not just pointy eared humans). The only races I usually consider limiting are constructs like warforged, but even then there are still ways to make them fit (for example, I'm currently playing a character that's a druidic construct rather than mechanical).
Personally when I play a character I go heavy on the race, background etc., as part of the joy of roleplaying for me is making my characters as different from one another as possible. Others might not care so much, or only care about mechanics, but that's something to discuss and hammer out in a session zero or whatever, and you can try and have NPCs reinforce things if the players don't do it naturally, i.e- have them remark on how odd it is to see an elf travelling with humans and such.
But yeah, I wouldn't say "no elves" to players as if they're anything like me and most players I know they may already have character ideas they're looking forward to playing as, and that might just be an elf they were hoping to adapt to the setting. I say let them, but invite them to make their character work within your lore.
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I have unsubscribed from all topics and will not reply to messages. My homebrew is now 100% unsupported.
One of the things that impacts all of this is the way we play (or don’t play) race relations at our tables. While I can’t speak for anything beyond the tables I’ve played at, at those tables the different races and cultures all get along incredibly well. If real life was that good there would be no “race problem” anywhere on Earth. On the other hand, if the worlds we play in had anything even close to the racial bigotry that can be found essentially anywhere here on Earth with only a single species vs the multitude of sapient species on the fantasy worlds the problems and roleplay would be hugely different. Species ghettos and laws would be far more common that generally described in our settings so we need to take some of that into account in our world designs and in our roleplay. Maybe we should be taking our cues from Legolas and Gimli not the NYTimes.
I heard of an intriguing idea to remove elves from the list of playable species. If they were removed, they would still be included as monsters who you can meet and interact with. In stories like LotR, the Inheritance series, and in mythology, elves are powerful creatures far above the level of the average person. It makes sense to me to use them as a higher power that are mysterious, dangerous, and potentially helpful creatures imbued with powerful magic, rather than having one be the restaurant owner down the street that makes over priced food. Right now elves are just normal people that you meet every day even though they live an incredibly long amount of time. I think it would be cooler to actually be in awe of elves when I meet them as a player, because in mythology they were often otherworldly creatures of grace and beauty.
I still think half-elves could be used, and there could be a different subspecies of half-elf for each subspecies of elf. I know there are still a lot of people who want to play elves so they could instead play a half-elf.
I think it would be cool to use this, but I would have to homebrew a bunch of high level elves, and I like using Drow. Maybe Drow could be a weaken form of elf but are still rare and mysterious.
Elves have lifespans ten times longer then humans. So it’s not inconceivable that at different points in their lives they could be simple restaurant owners, who grow in power to become useful allies with powerful magic. Even human characters who get to level 20 are dangerous and can be potentially helpful. So why not have them as both?
Most elves I meet on my adventures are somewhat normal guys who need to ask a band of crazy, level one adventures to help them do simple things like fight off goblins. I think that it would be more interesting if elves were less common, more like the stuff of legends. A band of goblins wouldn't even dare to inconvenience one and elves wouldn't even give them the chance to. If elves were really creatures of legend, I don't think there would be much if any elves who stooped to perform small, simple tasks like run a convenience store. One reason they wouldn't would be because of their pride, in their eyes it is beneath them to perform those tasks. Also, if they were weakened or not yet fully trained, it would be better to dwell in the hidden elven kingdoms where they could develop amongst their own kind and gain strength. In the Inheritance series or in Lord of the Rings would you expect to see an elf running a small store? Only an outcast would go near to that level, but even then, it would rather dwell out like a hermit in the wild on its own rather than be seen dwelling amongst people. If an elf walks down the street, it would be similar in some ways as if a metallic dragon strolled through your neighborhood. Some people would be frightened, some would be in awe, others would be curious and some might be angry. They would be protrayed as more sylvan and closer to the fey. If you see one, you shouldn't be able to expect it to just nod in your direction or make polite conversation about the weather, they would only come across humans on accident or for some strange reason and humans would often be left confused and bewildered by their actions.
I understand a lot of people like playing elves, so this idea probably won't be liked much, but I have grown tired of seeing elves played and portrayed as pointy eared humans. I think it would be more interesting if they were more mysterious, dangerous, fearsome, and/or noble and graceful, rather than that guy who is getting drunk next to you at the bar. Still, a lot of people I know would still like playing elven characters, so that is why half-elves would be the replacement in ways. You can still play that mysterious elven character if you want, but there is an explanation for why they are shopping in a grocery store and not calling on nature to provide them with fruits and berries of the vine and branches.
The problem is that there are a lot of races that can fit that role asimar, firbolg, animal folk. There probably are worlds where elves are still mysterious, but even in Tolkien’s works they were starting to fall apart. They had all but abandoned middle earth to head to what was effectively the after life. Sauron didn’t fear them coming back as much as the humans uniting and even that was a feint to distract him from two hobbits who ultimately destroyed him.
It's an interesting and potentially compelling worldbuilding idea, provided you don't have players who are very fond of playing elves, which many are. :)
If I had to guess, I think the current intention of the lore is that so long as an elf stays in the Feywild, they are quite powerful beings, but when they come to the Material Plane, or perhaps after some time on the Material Plane, they diminish. I agree with you that this is not well defined and could use some additional attention, but the D&D5 eladrin monster rules are at least intended to fill the 'mythical elf' role.
There's been an elf archetype like the one you describe in the game since the early days of AD&D1: the grey elves, described as reclusive, arrogant, and magically powerful (and sometimes even as "faeries"), but they've also often been playable, for some reason, which mostly just created confusion between it and the high elf and resulted in it appearing and disappearing a number of times throughout the editions.
AD&D2 tried to more clearly illustrate the difference between player character elves and more Tolkien-like or mythical elves by introducing the eladrin, which were originally elf-like chaotic good celestials, similar to the role angels play for the lawful good planes, or to the current concept of 'archfey.'
The eladrin didn't get a ton of attention in D&D3, and then D&D4 used the concept to overwrite the high elf, and made wood elves just "elves," which (in my opinion) defeated the whole purpose and continues to create misunderstandings. They introduced "noble eladrin" in the Monster Manual to try to retain some link to a more powerful, unplayable elf archetype, and you can see D&D5 continuing to wrestle with explaining this dichotomy in Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes, provided you can still find a copy.
Monsters of the Multiverse just doesn't address it at all, providing an eladrin PC race and eladrin monster stat blocks that don't differentiate between them with any lore but still represent a substantial power gap.
J
Great Wyrm Moonstone Dungeon Master
The time of the ORC has come. No OGL without irrevocability; no OGL with 'authorized version' language. #openDND
Practice, practice, practice • Respect the rules; don't memorize them • Be merciless, not cruel • Don't let the dice run the game for you
Keep in mind that the elves we typically meet in stories are the exceptions not the rule. Elrond, Galadriel etc are tier 3/4 NPCs pointing the characters in various directions. Legolas is not nearly as powerful despite being the son of a king of elves. If I had to try and stat out the members of the fellowship at the start it would be:
Gandalf - Epic (L20+)
Aragorn - L16
Boromir - L12
Legolas - L8
Gimili - L8
Frodo, Samwise, Merry, Pippin - L1 ( in the Shire), L3 (in Rivendell)
making elves a non playable group is a mistake, most elves, like most humans, dwarves, any other playable race are not beings of extreme power/knowledge/wisdom - they are everyday folks, yes they are bakers etc. they are stated out as such (even the basic Drow are only CR 1/4 monsters) There are many of us who enjoy playing elves and making them non playable would take away a considerable amount of our enjoyment of the game so I doubt it will ever happen officially.
Wisea$$ DM and Player since 1979.
I actually don't really think it should happen officially. Lots of people wouldn't like that because they like playing elves and I wouldn't want to take the race option from them. I might use this in my homebrew setting because I like the idea of elves being super powered creatures that most people only hear about in stories and am kind of tired of seeing elves as bar maids and convenience store owners. This is probably because I read a lot of old mythology and folklore where they are often portrayed as mysterious celestial or fey creatures that we cannot hope to fully understand. Seeing elves struggle financially and be scared when a single wolf threatens them feels to me as if they are not really that mystical. They shouldn't really need money unless they are with humans because they can call nature to provide them with what they need, and a wolf would either know better to attack an elf, or be magically persuaded against it. I think Half-elves could fill in the gap left behind by elves and I think they are cooler than elves too. They have that mystical connection to them, but they also are not fully of another world. This is just my opinion though and I wouldn't think it wise for it to be made official that elves are an unplayable race because I think that there are people who really like elves and the game would be less fun for them if they couldn't play them. I am just tired of how elves are portrayed right now but I still want games to have them.
Isn’t it safe to presume that the only elves those humans interacted with were adventurers, or at least had been adventurers, and therefore had class levels making them “powerful creatures far above the level of the average person?”
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But in Inheritance, LotR, Mythology, and other stories like that, they never mention elven commoners outside of their own kingdoms.
But D&D isn’t set in any of those settings unless the DM does it that way. In those cases, it would be perfectly reasonable to restrict those commoners to their respective kingdoms. That’s just not the standard for most of the D&D settings.
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I once ran a campaign where everyone was human, I want to say it was in late 3e, maybe early 4e. I told the players they could use whichever racial mechanics they wanted for their character; we were just going to re-skin them as humans. The idea was when the saw something that wasn't a human, it was really weird and foreign. It worked for a campaign, but I don't know if I'd want to do it again. It was fun, but the novelty wore off. And while you open some storytelling options, you close others. It seemed like more were closed than opened by doing it.
The important thing is to get player buy-in. This was a group that had been together a couple years, and we'd had some very good campaigns, so we all trusted each other. I don't know if it would have worked if I'd come in with the idea without having played with them for a while before I tried it.
I think the introduction of more races through the edition is important in developing the future of Toril. Like Elder Scrolls when Orcs went from monsters to a playable race, it adds a sense of progression. I do think there should be some canon "past" or "prequel" adventures that takes place during 1E-4E though, to show what things were like back then.
I know that Dnd isn't in any of those settings, I think that some DMs and maybe some campaign books should be made that use elves in similar ways to those settings.
I like this idea, partly because I have grown bored with how elves are used now. Most players that I have seen play elves, use them as pointy eared humans. Now before you all say that is my players problem, most campaign books do that as well. In many of the adventures I am in or have seen, elves are just every day guys you meet regularly, not much different than humans. I think it would be cool if when you saw an elf, it would be similar to how players react when they see a dragon, beholder, mind flayer, or maybe even an owlbear. Something like a mixture of excitement, fear and maybe some awe.
I also think it would make them cooler. Right now they seem somewhat bland and boring, but if they were made into a stronger creature of myth and legends, they would be more interesting than they are now. I personally like the idea of the mysterious elves from mythology whose appearance marked a momentous and strange occurrence. They should be feared and respected and they should have access to great power and knowledge. Right now they aren't really interesting. They have a certain style, with leaves and nature and stuff, but most elves you meet in an adventure aren't like that, and most characters who play them don't use them that way.
After writing this, it makes me want to play an elf again and use them as a powerful, mystical character who comes from distant, unheard of lands. It would be hard to play him this way though, if every elf I meet is just a normal dude with pointy ears, so I don't think I can use him.
This IS a problem with a number of settings. But it’s a fairly understandable problem. If elves, dwarves etc are relegated to hidden/distant half mythical realms then yes running across them is going to become a significant and memorable event. In addition you will almost certainly not be running across a run of the mill elf/dwarf/etc but across one of significant power which will make it all the more special. This can probably be done in the new Dragonlance setting where the elves and dwarves are primarily hidden away in reclusive kingdoms/enclaves. In settings like FR it’s much harder as nonhuman species are integrated into human societies to a large extent although there are still plenty of hidden enclaves. Of course when you adventure with a Dwarven fighter, an elven Bladesinger, a Dragonborn Paladin, and a gnomish Arcane Trickster to go with your half orc ranger/Druid what do you expect?
Wisea$$ DM and Player since 1979.
in both series, elves are mysterois because they dont usually travel outside their realms, but in both, its still very clear, at one point you might have seen an elf running a small store(lotr), or still might (inheritance cycle)
but wildb1ll is right, most of the elves the "heroes" meet, are tier 3-4 adventurers, not because the other commoners dont exist, but because it makes a compelling narrative for a heroes journey story, the same thing can be done with almost any other nonhumanoid race
not only that but if you look outside Tolkien inspired storylines, which inheritance very much is influenced by him, as is much of modern fantasy, youll find that they arent as universilly thought of like that, in some stories you have kingdoms of elves with commoners and the powerful, others they are tricksters, it depends on which mythos your looking at. Tolkien is one modern aspect on something that the game leaves open for a variety of influences
The joy of AD&D is having control of your table. At your table you can make any race playable or not playable. You really can make the game "Your way".
However, to add to the other topics I find it funny you said elves are inherently overpowered. But sit a spell with a few tables and see how easily they can get wiped out by a simple rickety bridge, or the joys of the old days when crossing a river could be more deadly than a bugbear encounter. I promise you they are not at all more powerful than any other race, and that would be due to the game balancing that was provided by WoTC.
I am not sure what my Spirit Animal is. But whatever that thing is, I am pretty sure it has rabies!
I think in the forgotten realms at least elves aren't as special in terms of raw innate ability as they are in certain other fantasy works.
What's special about them is their ancestry, but most elves aren't first generation celestial or noble eladrin, they're something else, so there are plenty of elven commoners who are just ordinary people, albeit long-lived, can trance etc.
As a DM you're free to decide why certain elves might be more powerful; either they're exceptional in the same way as players, or perhaps they're natives of Arvandor (celestial elves) or the Feywild (fey elves/noble eladrin) etc.
While you certainly could limit elves in your campaign to being only of the "special" variety, with no commoners etc., I'm always wary about axing a race from the players; D&D is a collaboration so if anyone has an elf character they really want to play as I'd discuss with them the idea for the setting, and encourage them to play into the differences more, i.e- think about why a normally detached and insular elf might accompany a rag-tag group of adventurers etc., and encourage them to play with how you want your elves to be (i.e- not just pointy eared humans). The only races I usually consider limiting are constructs like warforged, but even then there are still ways to make them fit (for example, I'm currently playing a character that's a druidic construct rather than mechanical).
Personally when I play a character I go heavy on the race, background etc., as part of the joy of roleplaying for me is making my characters as different from one another as possible. Others might not care so much, or only care about mechanics, but that's something to discuss and hammer out in a session zero or whatever, and you can try and have NPCs reinforce things if the players don't do it naturally, i.e- have them remark on how odd it is to see an elf travelling with humans and such.
But yeah, I wouldn't say "no elves" to players as if they're anything like me and most players I know they may already have character ideas they're looking forward to playing as, and that might just be an elf they were hoping to adapt to the setting. I say let them, but invite them to make their character work within your lore.
Former D&D Beyond Customer of six years: With the axing of piecemeal purchasing, lack of meaningful development, and toxic moderation the site isn't worth paying for anymore. I remain a free user only until my groups are done migrating from DDB, and if necessary D&D, after which I'm done. There are better systems owned by better companies out there.
I have unsubscribed from all topics and will not reply to messages. My homebrew is now 100% unsupported.
One of the things that impacts all of this is the way we play (or don’t play) race relations at our tables. While I can’t speak for anything beyond the tables I’ve played at, at those tables the different races and cultures all get along incredibly well. If real life was that good there would be no “race problem” anywhere on Earth. On the other hand, if the worlds we play in had anything even close to the racial bigotry that can be found essentially anywhere here on Earth with only a single species vs the multitude of sapient species on the fantasy worlds the problems and roleplay would be hugely different. Species ghettos and laws would be far more common that generally described in our settings so we need to take some of that into account in our world designs and in our roleplay. Maybe we should be taking our cues from Legolas and Gimli not the NYTimes.
Wisea$$ DM and Player since 1979.
Put the DMG down and keep your hands where I can see them. Now, back away slowly.
Just kidding. It would be a simple matter for you to just decide it and then see if your group thinks it feels good.
Your fun doesn't hurt my fun. Besides, I play Half-Elves, and they're not elves.
Cum catapultae proscriptae erunt tum soli proscript catapultas habebunt