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Endless Horizons: Elves, Elves, and more Elves

Started by Xeviat, February 25, 2012, 08:56:36 PM

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Xeviat

Elves are done a lot. They're intrinsically fantasy, with firm roots in mythology and fairytales. Many fantasy settings have them, and others willfully avoid using them. I intend for my setting to use them to their full potential; rather than hiding from their frequency, I wish to embrace the small part of our collective conscious that they call home. Here's what I have so far:

Elf
Beautiful, lithe, inhuman. Aloof, subtle, farseeing. Elves are the people of nature, at one with the forests and other untamed wildernesses. The most wild of the civilized races, they are only count elves amongst them because of their history of shared enemies. They are descended from the people of Avalon, the enigmatic Sidhe, but have since become wholly a part of Terran. Elves have a long perspective, often acting in ways mysterious to the shorter lived races.

Appearance: Elves stand from 5 to 6 feet tall, and weigh between 100 to 160 pounds. They possess large almond shaped eyes and pointed ears that sweep backwards and away from their head. Elves do not grow body or facial hair (with the exception of sideburns in males), adding to their general androgynous appearance. Males and females are, on average, the same height, and females only have the smallest bit of added curvature to their chests and hips when compared to males. Unlike humans, whose skin darkens from extended sun exposure, their skin color fades and lightens when they are exposed to more sunlight. Possessing a deeper tie to their homelands than other races, an elf's coloration is as much dependent on their lineage as the terrain they're born in. Their skin often possesses earthy and woody tones, while their hair is the color of vegetation. In their youth, their hair is the color of spring in their homeland, changing through summer, to fall, and finally to winter as they age. Their eyes are universally blue, the color of the sky, vibrant and full of life.

Personality: Elves prize their freedom above all else. They are whimsical and often flighty, seemingly careless about their activities on a day to day basis, but oddly well planned from year to year. Their moods tend to shift quickly too, relatively speaking. As children, they do not learn well by being told; they have to experience things for themselves. This is in part because of their general aloof nature, but is also caused by their vast life spans. Elves rarely consider their actions, typically doing what feels right; when they do put consideration into their decisions, they tend to only look at long term repercussions. Because they often have time to spare, many elves take up artistic expression in the form of painting, music, poetry, and wood working.

Life: Elves are strict herbivores, living primarily off of fruits and nuts. Nomadic communities gather all that they eat, but permanent settlements farm in such a way that fits with the environment. Elves do not seem to eat as much as humans, and some believe they can live off ambient magic. Elves age incredibly slow, and aren't considered adults until 50 years. Young elves learn best by experiencing, taking years to learn the things that other races take for granted. They can live for several hundred years, though a true limit of their age is unknown.

Adventurers: Elves can sometimes be the most simplistic of adventurers: they adventure to have adventures. Becoming a hero is the best way to gain notoriety amongst elves, so it is a dream many adolescents and young adults dream about. Elven adventurers tend to be young adults, as older elves become more concerned about continuing to live out their years. Elven adventurers prefer adventures that defend the weak, combat tyranny, or protect nature.

Wood Elves
Residing in the deep wild forests, wood elves are the most encountered elves, as their forests often abut other nations. Wood elves have become one with the forest, and they build their communities amongst the trees themselves. Expert archers and spearmen, elven hunters are master woodsmen. To those unskilled in woodcraft, wood elven settlements are invisible; one could pass within twenty feet and never see them.

Appearance: Wood elves are well muscled and lean. Their skin is the color of bark, ranging from pale to rich brown. When young, their hair is dark to vibrant green, fading to a rich green, to autumnal reds, oranges, and yellows, and finally to silvery white as they age. Wood elves typically wear clothes of loose silk.

Wood elven warriors wear armor of specially cured and woven leaves, ranging from light armor made of large leaves to heavy armor made of a coat of small scale-like leaves. Their weapons are most often wooden, grown straight from the tree and magically shaped. They favor bows and spears, but cruel curved wooden swords are also common. Large elven communities boast the rare metal armor or weapon, won in someone's travels or bought from a trader.

Society: Wood elves mostly live in nomadic communities of an average of 200 elves, with only a small number of children. These communities are all related by blood, though their exact lineages are unimportant to them. All adults equally contribute in food gathering and defense, while the adolescents are responsible for taking care of the children. Adult elves come together as mates for ten to twenty years at a time, producing one to two children over this time. These settlements are guided by the community's elders, though truly governing decisions are made by the adults as a whole. The few permanent settlements, which are built into the trees and consist of many platforms, huts, and bridges, are structured in much the same way, except that these communities tend to be less communal. These settlements are not all related by blood, and are truly governed by their elders (who also oversee the adolescents in their raising and care of the children).

Religion: Wood elves revere the spirits of their forest home, striving to live as one with their distant cousins. To a wood elf, religion is deeply personal. They do not view the greater spirits as gods who lead, but parents who guide. Many tribes have a patron spirit, a great being who resides in their territory. Tribes also have ancestral spirits, great heroes of history, whom they believe reside in the stars above.

Names: Wood elves possess three names, though they generally only hold one name at a time. Their first name is the name of their tribe or settlement, which is used primarily in inter elf dealings; these settlement names are generally made of two elven words (an adjective and a noun), such as Goldenwood or Starryglen. Their second name is generally considered an affectionate name in adulthood, which is given to elven children by the other children and adolescents. When an elf reaches adulthood, they choose their third name, often a name which means something to them, or the name of a great hero they wish to emulate.

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For my "western" continent, I'm exploring ideas for other groups of elves. I'm searching for other idea seeds.
Endless Horizons: Action and adventure set in a grand world ripe for exploration.

Proud recipient of the Silver Tortoise Award for extra Krunchyness.

Superfluous Crow

I'm unsure what sort of comments you are looking for here? I tried commenting anyway, but since I'm of "avoid elves at all costs" school (or at the very least of the "make the elves super-strange" school) you mentioned, you should take it all with a grain of salt :D

All in all, there is nothing new nor exceptional idea-wise, but as you said, that wasn't really your intent at any point and as a big plus the writing is coherent, both structurally and meaning-wise, and generally good. Most of the evocativeness seems to come from preying on our aforementioned collective idea of "the Elf", but there is nothing wrong with using the resources at hand :)

I'm still a bit concerned about their low learning rate. I know that was intended as a fix for the often comically high age of adulthood in fantasy literature, but even if they have a serious predilection for trial-by-error it strains credibility that it takes them 50 years to do what would take humans 15.
Also, does this refusion to learn by example carry on into actual adulthood? If so, it seems unlikely the elves would ever excel at science or wizardry. Only skills that follow almost directly from natural talent would be possible. Sorcery would be much preffered over wizardry (assuming a D&D-like magic structure) and music and swordsplay might well come easy to them, but astronomy, strategy and mathematics would baffle them. If they need to learn everything by themselves I can also imagine that elven societies are predominantly illiterate as knowledge isn't passed on in the same way. Not that they can't learn to read, they just wouldn't care particularly about it.
Or maybe I'm reading too much into it and seeing it as a psychological aspect of the elf rather than a mere quirk of personality, but this harsh interpretation seems like the only thing that could get you in the area of a 50 year adulthood age.
Incidentally, when do they go through puberty, if ever? And do they grow old and wrinkly or does their hair just fade? Do they die?

Depending on what the west looks like, horseriding nomad elves or coastal fishing elves seems like likely alternative archetypes.   
Currently...
Writing: Broken Verge v. 207
Reading: the Black Sea: a History by Charles King
Watching: Farscape and Arrested Development

sparkletwist

You had some bold tags you forgot to close. I fixed your post for you.

Xeviat

Thanks Sparkle! I didn't look at the bottom of the post to notice.

Superfluous, these types of open ended thoughts were exactly what I was looking for.

Their strange learning habits don't remain as strong as an adult, but they are by far dominated by kinesthetic learners. I'm actually very fine with them not having wizards, while their fey nature does trend them towards sorcery (I have a similar break, it's about where and how you draw your mana). Having them not have a written language is actually a quirk that I hadn't considered, but I like how it works. With their long lifespans, I could see oral tradition having a strong hold. I also love the idea of them not being skilled in hard sciences, and favoring deeply individualistic things. Again, adults can learn from observation and teaching, they just prefer first hand experience. Children "could" learn the same way, but they'd give an ADD kid a run for their money.

I haven't fully decided on their benchmark ages. One of the ideas I'm working with is making elves mildly plant-like. It's suggested with their hair coloration and the way it ages like the seasons, but I did decide to make them mildly photosynthetic, just enough to supplement their eating. Since I doubt the world would have figured out what photosynthesis is, I don't think anyone would have really made the connection other than possibly noticing that elves that live in doors seem to eat more.

I do want Elves to be very much tied to their land. Coastal elves would be a very interesting thing to tackle. The more I think on elves, the more I'm seeing where more and more races are going to overlap. Elves are going to be an omnipresent minority in the world, and their passive nature is really the only thing that has them treated as a "civilized" race (when they share far more in common with the wild races). Planes elves would also be interesting, possibly a very strained group since they'd have a less defensible (yet also less desirable) land.
Endless Horizons: Action and adventure set in a grand world ripe for exploration.

Proud recipient of the Silver Tortoise Award for extra Krunchyness.

O Senhor Leetz

Between your original ideas and Crows comments, I'm really digging the Elves that are coming from this conversation. Having them be fairly un-scholarly is a pretty neat idea. The thought of having them be more or less illiterate (or at least indifferent to literacy) is really, really awesome, and if you don't run with it, I just may.

However, I question I think that needs to be answered is the unity of the race as a whole. Humans, in most settings, often seem to be at war and varying levels of conflict with each other, while Elves always seem united as a race. But the way that you are presenting them as these super-individualistic, hands-on creatures puts a strain on the believability of the Elves being a unified race (which may or may not be true, as I didn't see anything mentioned). Would Elves, being so chaotic and free be at war with each other as much as they are with other race? Or is there something that binds them all together? 
Let's go teach these monkeys about evolution.
-Mark Wahlberg

Xeviat

Elves aren't a unified race at all. Even within a given region, which humans may refer to an an Elven nation, elves aren't unified. A tribe is unified, and they share a strong enough bond with other elves to not seek their destruction out of pure spite, but they are very much in conflict with one another from time to time.

There is a strong cultural similarity between elven tribes in a given region, possibly stemming from the demands of the terrain (as elven regions are defined by the ecosystem therein) or that the tribes probably all stem from a single tribe. Elves fight with each other only slightly less than Humans fight with each other.

Because elven settlements take a long time to establish (planting an orchard amid a forest takes time), ancient settlements would be prized areas. These "cities" still have a critical mass, though, and will spawn fractures and create offshoot tribes. Tribes have a smaller and more rigid critical mass (read up on the monkey sphere), but they also have an easier time splitting and spreading since their numbers are still sustainable by gathering.

So yeah, Elves don't make nations at all. The closest thing to an Elven nation would be a group of tribes banding together in mimicry of the nation building races simply in order to deal with them. One example, one that is central to the book I'm writing, is the group of Forest Elves represented in this thread. They live very close to the human republic of Hunurst, the center of my campaign setting, and the story centers around growing tension between the humans and the elves. The elves don't have a nation, but they've been forced to create a united council to address their concerns about the human's recent expansionist policies.

They're going to end up sort of like orcs and goblins in other settings, but less "evil"; they'll only be united by a strong personality, and only for a short period of time.
Endless Horizons: Action and adventure set in a grand world ripe for exploration.

Proud recipient of the Silver Tortoise Award for extra Krunchyness.