
Elf Species Details
Created by the god Corellon, the first elves could change their forms at will. They lost this ability when Corellon cursed them for plotting with the deity Lolth, who tried and failed to usurp Corellon’s dominion. When Lolth was cast into the Abyss, most elves renounced her and earned Corellon’s forgiveness, but that which Corellon had taken from them was lost forever.
No longer able to shape-shift at will, the elves retreated to the Feywild, where their sorrow was deepened by that plane’s influence. Over time, curiosity led many of them to explore other planes of existence, including worlds in the Material Plane.
Elves have pointed ears and lack facial and body hair. They live for around 750 years, and they don’t sleep but instead enter a trance when they need to rest. In that state, they remain aware of their surroundings while immersing themselves in memories and meditations.
An environment subtly transforms elves after they inhabit it for a millennium or more, and it grants them certain kinds of magic. Drow, high elves, and wood elves are examples of elves who have been transformed thus.
Drow
Drow typically dwell in the Underdark and have been shaped by it. Some drow individuals and societies avoid the Underdark altogether yet carry its magic. In the Eberron setting, for example, drow dwell in rainforests and cyclopean ruins on the continent of Xen’drik.
High Elves
High elves have been infused with the magic of crossings between the Feywild and the Material Plane. On some worlds, high elves refer to themselves by other names. For example, they call themselves sun or moon elves in the Forgotten Realms setting, Silvanesti and Qualinesti in the Dragonlance setting, and Aereni in the Eberron setting
Wood Elves
Wood elves carry the magic of primeval forests within themselves. They are known by many other names, including wild elves, green elves, and forest elves. Grugach are reclusive wood elves of the Greyhawk setting, while the Kagonesti and the Tairnadal are wood elves of the Dragonlance and Eberron settings, respectively.
Elf Traits
Creature Type: Humanoid
Size: Medium (about 5–6 feet tall)
Speed: 30 feet
Darkvision
You have Darkvision with a range of 60 feet.
Elven Lineage
You are part of a lineage that grants you supernatural abilities. Choose a lineage from the Elven Lineages table. You gain the level 1 benefit of that lineage.
When you reach character levels 3 and 5, you learn a higher-level spell, as shown on the table. You always have that spell prepared. You can cast it once without a spell slot, and you regain the ability to cast it in that way when you finish a Long Rest. You can also cast the spell using any spell slots you have of the appropriate level.
Intelligence, Wisdom, or Charisma is your spellcasting ability for the spells you cast with this trait (choose the ability when you select the lineage).
Lineage | Level 1 | Level 3 | Level 5 |
---|---|---|---|
Drow | The range of your Darkvision increases to 120 feet. You also know the Dancing Lights cantrip. | Faerie Fire | Darkness |
High Elf | You know the Prestidigitation cantrip. Whenever you finish a Long Rest, you can replace that cantrip with a different cantrip from the Wizard spell list. | Detect Magic | Misty Step |
Wood Elf | Your Speed increases to 35 feet. You also know the Druidcraft cantrip. | Longstrider | Pass without Trace |
Fey Ancestry
You have Advantage on saving throws you make to avoid or end the Charmed condition.
Keen Senses
You have proficiency in the Insight, Perception, or Survival skill.
Trance
You don’t need to sleep, and magic can’t put you to sleep. You can finish a Long Rest in 4 hours if you spend those hours in a trancelike meditation, during which you retain consciousness.
yes do to special training, that take years to perfect.
and? i mean campaigns don't really last that long so mechanically why does a long life span matter? and why can't elves be better then humans? don't get the issue
like I've said, it doesn't really affect your young elf fighter, but it break the lore when every elf becomes a master craftsman/archmage/legendary fighter.
the problem isn't that elves are generally better than humans, it's than every elf is eventually better than every human, and they just don't die (so you have entire civilizations composed of 20th level badasses older than most human kingdoms). Every story becomes "just get the elves to do that".
High elf
🔥
why was trance proficiencies taken away from the 2024 elves after being added to all the ones in recent books?
New to it
idk
The elf has lost its +2 dexterity modifiers? isn’t that a huge debuff? I was about to pick high elf as my new wizard character in the upcoming very long campaign, starting from level 1 all the way to level 20, is it worth to use the new high elf over the old high elf, even though the new one doesn’t have the +2 dexterity modifiers anymore? I was planning to change the origin and make the +2 in my intelligence, no I’m not sure about using the new elf anymore.
If all you are worried about is the Ability Scores bonuses, then you could pick the 2024 Criminal background. It gives an optional 1/1/1 or 1/2 Ability Score bonus to Dexterity, Constitution, or Intelligence. You could have your +2 Dex or your +2 Int that way. Plus a bonus to that background is that you can have criminal contacts that you can always rely on. That could be a good background for an elf wizard trying to turn their life around.
Or the elves could be the bad guys of the story and just tenderize everything in there path...
There were a ton more elves... What happened to:
Moon/Silver elves? (vs Sun/High/Gold elves)
Star
Ice/Snow
Avareal (Winged) elves
Desert elves (Dark Sun)
Aquatic
etc.
Those guys were from other sourcebooks. That would be a lot of choices for one species, and the elf section of the Player's Handbook would be 100 pages long and way overwhelming for players if it included every new elf lineages introduced between 2014 and 2024.
The reason they picked High, Wood, and Drow is because those were the original three from the 2014 Player's Handbook.
If you want to use one of those other elf lineages you mentioned on a 2024 character, you probably could because '14 elves and '24 elves are pretty similar.
Some do lore wise have the language in there blood tho and they removed those to. Demonic, Abissal , infernal ,Celestial and Draconic are all bloodline languages that any Creature with the bloodline in relevant amounts Should know as the creatures that originally have that bloodline don't normally teach there Spawn they just expect them to Know from day one.
In the 2024 rules, no species provide ability score bonuses. You get them from your background instead.
Elves are awesome, except when you're a wizard and have 6 HP. I'm a bit squishy, don't ya think?
Always wanted to play as a drow
That was MY first reaction when I saw the 2024 elfkin entry! The next one was, 'wtf happened to HALF elves?!' If there isn't some serious backlash on that already, I predict some in the near future. I mean, wt DOUBLE f, now Elrond, Jaheira, Shadowheart, and Tanis bleepin' HALF-ELVEN are non-canonical?!
the first species im going to play! wish me luck my first session 0 is october 11 2025