So I was thinking about how elves view gender, if they are patriarchal, matriarchal or neutral... most depictions of elves have them as either neutral or matriarchal, and on most settings, I think they are. Dragonlance sent a mixed message, Laurana mentions that the qualinesti females used to fight alongside males, but I found no clue about that in the other subraces. Any thoughts about that? How do you like them?
I think that since elves -- especially tolkienesque ones -- represent idealized humans, a neutral society with better balanced gender roles than in our world makes sense. If it isn't an official setting with set rules, just make it up to match how the elves work in that world. Drow are supa matriachal though.
I think it's only Drow that have it as Matriarchal because of Lolth. Other elves could have either male, female or like a counsel.
Even for wars i don't think female were stopped from fighting but i could be wrong. MrRhexx is a youtuber that delves into lore and made couple of videos about elves so you may find out more about them.
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Born under the watch of something from the furthest corners of the far realms.... It knows all.... it sees all... and it asks: "What is it that you want to see?"... and my answer is... ALL"
Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes even reveals that some elves are born with the ability to willfully change sex, further kinda cementing elven androgyny into their culture and at the same time causing conflict in Drow society (being so rigidly matriarchal that that ability challenges the social order).
Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes even reveals that some elves are born with the ability to willfully change sex, further kinda cementing elven androgyny into their culture and at the same time causing conflict in Drow society (being so rigidly matriarchal that that ability challenges the social order).
Born under the watch of something from the furthest corners of the far realms.... It knows all.... it sees all... and it asks: "What is it that you want to see?"... and my answer is... ALL"
I think it's only Drow that have it as Matriarchal because of Lolth. Other elves could have either male, female or like a counsel.
Even for wars i don't think female were stopped from fighting but i could be wrong. MrRhexx is a youtuber that delves into lore and made couple of videos about elves so you may find out more about them.
Evermeet always has a queen.
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Please check out my homebrew, I would appreciate feedback:
I think it's only Drow that have it as Matriarchal because of Lolth. Other elves could have either male, female or like a counsel.
Even for wars i don't think female were stopped from fighting but i could be wrong. MrRhexx is a youtuber that delves into lore and made couple of videos about elves so you may find out more about them.
Evermeet always has a queen.
sorry, i should have said only Drow have queens (because of how Lolth wanted them to be) and other elf sub races can have queens, kings or a counsel.
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Born under the watch of something from the furthest corners of the far realms.... It knows all.... it sees all... and it asks: "What is it that you want to see?"... and my answer is... ALL"
I think the elves probably have no real division between the sexes. I kind of got this image in my mind that the elven communities just have magic to do all the labor, grow all the food, gather all the materials for crafting and smithing for them. That no one actually has to engage in any any strenuous labor because they just have magic that solves all of that for them. You just never hear about an "elven peasant" unless it is an elf who went to live in a human community and found themself at the bottom of the social heirarchy.
As a result of that, whatever 10-20% more physical body strength the men might have over the women, as we do see the standard amount of sexual dimorphism as in humans in the elves according to the height and weight charts, just really, really, really doesn't matter in elven society. So things would generally be even and maybe even favor the women by a small margin when it comes to success and status within the community.
But as the "matriarchal" and "patriarchal"-- Personally I think it is a bit odd for elves to even have a king or queen. Given they are a Chaotic Good race, are we really to believe that they would put total and complete authority over their enclave/clan/tribe into the hands of a single person or couple for the millenium or so that elves live?
Assure us they are "good" all you like-- power corrupts and centuries of sole, unchecked rule over their people is going to alter the way one sees the world and others for the worse. Which is what we clearly get for the Drow-- but if we are to believe the other elves are different?
I've kind of got to think that the Elves would elect to have Republic rule with a counsel that switches up fairly frequently. Or maybe they have a true democracy.
In fact, on the slightly sillier end of things, it could even be some elaborate system where the whole village meets and a person needs nearly unanimous support to even be officially sanctioned to draft the proposal of any change to the current policies or to enact a plan of action. These are a people who live for a thousand years and never sleep and literally have nothing better to do-- they have all the time in the world to reach some compromise that everyone in the community accepts.
It could well be that any time one sees the "elf king" or "elf queen" that, in reality, that's just the diplomat to outsider races. They know that humans and dwarfs have kings and queens and will only be satisfied if they are told they are talking to the "king" or "queen", so the elves just temporarily appoint someone to that position even though it has no actual power just so that they can placate and deal with the neighbors.
Also, every single time any elf boy or girl gets lost, they just tell the humans that it is the "elf prince" or the "elf princess" because they know that if they are told that, the humans will be far more motivated to go retrieve them than if they are told it is just "a member of our community".
But these are just my personal thoughts on how I would have them work if I were running the game. Since these are just ideas I have had over the years, I guarantee there are D&D books published that absolutely contradict the notion of things being run in this way by standard canon. But-- every D&D world is different.
The first crowned ruler of Evermeet was King Zoar Moonflower. After he was assassinated, Queen Amlaruil became the sole ruler. She was his second wife. The history was written in Evermeet: Isle of the Elves by Elaine Cunningham [Note - I am recalling the title by memory]. Its a good book, sort of a history of the Elven nation. It was the second edition setting of Forgotten Realms.
Currently, the Queen is missing and a Council rules Evermeet.
Myth Drannor was ruled by Coronals (spelling?) and I seem to recall both men and women serving before the destruction of the city. This is per my recollections of the box set for exploring the ruins.
Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes even reveals that some elves are born with the ability to willfully change sex, further kinda cementing elven androgyny into their culture and at the same time causing conflict in Drow society (being so rigidly matriarchal that that ability challenges the social order).
Only the chosen of corellon iirc.
Which are 1/1000 elves, which is not really that rare. And something that's available to player characters.
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Find your own truth, choose your enemies carefully, and never deal with a dragon.
"Canon" is what's factual to D&D lore. "Cannon" is what you're going to be shot with if you keep getting the word wrong.
Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes even reveals that some elves are born with the ability to willfully change sex, further kinda cementing elven androgyny into their culture and at the same time causing conflict in Drow society (being so rigidly matriarchal that that ability challenges the social order).
Only the chosen of corellon iirc.
Which are 1/1000 elves, which is not really that rare. And something that's available to player characters.
Really? No number was mentioned in MToF unless you got it from another source, " The rarest of the blessed elves can change their sex whenever they finish a long rest" this to me means they are very rare.
However "Yet occasionally elves who are born androgynous that they are *proclaimed* to be the blessed of Corellon..." you might be mixing up with this?
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Born under the watch of something from the furthest corners of the far realms.... It knows all.... it sees all... and it asks: "What is it that you want to see?"... and my answer is... ALL"
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So I was thinking about how elves view gender, if they are patriarchal, matriarchal or neutral... most depictions of elves have them as either neutral or matriarchal, and on most settings, I think they are. Dragonlance sent a mixed message, Laurana mentions that the qualinesti females used to fight alongside males, but I found no clue about that in the other subraces. Any thoughts about that? How do you like them?
I think that since elves -- especially tolkienesque ones -- represent idealized humans, a neutral society with better balanced gender roles than in our world makes sense. If it isn't an official setting with set rules, just make it up to match how the elves work in that world. Drow are supa matriachal though.
Proud poster on the Create a World thread
In Evermeet, they're matriarchal, IIRC.
Drow are matriarchal.
The others I assume would be more open-minded and neutral on the topic than humans are, real life and fantasy.
Please check out my homebrew, I would appreciate feedback:
Spells, Monsters, Subclasses, Races, Arcknight Class, Occultist Class, World, Enigmatic Esoterica forms
I think it's only Drow that have it as Matriarchal because of Lolth. Other elves could have either male, female or like a counsel.
Even for wars i don't think female were stopped from fighting but i could be wrong. MrRhexx is a youtuber that delves into lore and made couple of videos about elves so you may find out more about them.
Born under the watch of something from the furthest corners of the far realms.... It knows all.... it sees all... and it asks: "What is it that you want to see?"... and my answer is... ALL"
Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes even reveals that some elves are born with the ability to willfully change sex, further kinda cementing elven androgyny into their culture and at the same time causing conflict in Drow society (being so rigidly matriarchal that that ability challenges the social order).
Only the chosen of corellon iirc.
Born under the watch of something from the furthest corners of the far realms.... It knows all.... it sees all... and it asks: "What is it that you want to see?"... and my answer is... ALL"
Evermeet always has a queen.
Please check out my homebrew, I would appreciate feedback:
Spells, Monsters, Subclasses, Races, Arcknight Class, Occultist Class, World, Enigmatic Esoterica forms
sorry, i should have said only Drow have queens (because of how Lolth wanted them to be) and other elf sub races can have queens, kings or a counsel.
Born under the watch of something from the furthest corners of the far realms.... It knows all.... it sees all... and it asks: "What is it that you want to see?"... and my answer is... ALL"
I think the elves probably have no real division between the sexes. I kind of got this image in my mind that the elven communities just have magic to do all the labor, grow all the food, gather all the materials for crafting and smithing for them. That no one actually has to engage in any any strenuous labor because they just have magic that solves all of that for them. You just never hear about an "elven peasant" unless it is an elf who went to live in a human community and found themself at the bottom of the social heirarchy.
As a result of that, whatever 10-20% more physical body strength the men might have over the women, as we do see the standard amount of sexual dimorphism as in humans in the elves according to the height and weight charts, just really, really, really doesn't matter in elven society. So things would generally be even and maybe even favor the women by a small margin when it comes to success and status within the community.
But as the "matriarchal" and "patriarchal"-- Personally I think it is a bit odd for elves to even have a king or queen. Given they are a Chaotic Good race, are we really to believe that they would put total and complete authority over their enclave/clan/tribe into the hands of a single person or couple for the millenium or so that elves live?
Assure us they are "good" all you like-- power corrupts and centuries of sole, unchecked rule over their people is going to alter the way one sees the world and others for the worse. Which is what we clearly get for the Drow-- but if we are to believe the other elves are different?
I've kind of got to think that the Elves would elect to have Republic rule with a counsel that switches up fairly frequently. Or maybe they have a true democracy.
In fact, on the slightly sillier end of things, it could even be some elaborate system where the whole village meets and a person needs nearly unanimous support to even be officially sanctioned to draft the proposal of any change to the current policies or to enact a plan of action. These are a people who live for a thousand years and never sleep and literally have nothing better to do-- they have all the time in the world to reach some compromise that everyone in the community accepts.
It could well be that any time one sees the "elf king" or "elf queen" that, in reality, that's just the diplomat to outsider races. They know that humans and dwarfs have kings and queens and will only be satisfied if they are told they are talking to the "king" or "queen", so the elves just temporarily appoint someone to that position even though it has no actual power just so that they can placate and deal with the neighbors.
Also, every single time any elf boy or girl gets lost, they just tell the humans that it is the "elf prince" or the "elf princess" because they know that if they are told that, the humans will be far more motivated to go retrieve them than if they are told it is just "a member of our community".
But these are just my personal thoughts on how I would have them work if I were running the game. Since these are just ideas I have had over the years, I guarantee there are D&D books published that absolutely contradict the notion of things being run in this way by standard canon. But-- every D&D world is different.
In regards to Forgotten Realms
The first crowned ruler of Evermeet was King Zoar Moonflower. After he was assassinated, Queen Amlaruil became the sole ruler. She was his second wife. The history was written in Evermeet: Isle of the Elves by Elaine Cunningham [Note - I am recalling the title by memory]. Its a good book, sort of a history of the Elven nation. It was the second edition setting of Forgotten Realms.
Currently, the Queen is missing and a Council rules Evermeet.
Myth Drannor was ruled by Coronals (spelling?) and I seem to recall both men and women serving before the destruction of the city. This is per my recollections of the box set for exploring the ruins.
Which are 1/1000 elves, which is not really that rare. And something that's available to player characters.
Find your own truth, choose your enemies carefully, and never deal with a dragon.
"Canon" is what's factual to D&D lore. "Cannon" is what you're going to be shot with if you keep getting the word wrong.
Really? No number was mentioned in MToF unless you got it from another source, " The rarest of the blessed elves can change their sex whenever they finish a long rest" this to me means they are very rare.
However "Yet occasionally elves who are born androgynous that they are *proclaimed* to be the blessed of Corellon..." you might be mixing up with this?
Born under the watch of something from the furthest corners of the far realms.... It knows all.... it sees all... and it asks: "What is it that you want to see?"... and my answer is... ALL"