What They Don't Tell You About Elves - D&D
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- Опубликовано: 26 сен 2024
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Sources
-5e Player's Handbook
-Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes
-Races of Faerun
-Sword Coast Adventures Guide
-Dragon Magazine #354
-Elves of Evermeet
-Grand History of the Realms
-Cormanthy: Empire of Elves
When your entire civilization universally has the sex appeal of super models, how do you judge your standards of beauty?
Once you go Gross, nothing else comes close.
something-something magic, something-something nature, something-something bigger dick.
odor
Maybe they focus more on details that humans miss.
Corvus like personality and interests
This is why Elves are uncomfortable with Half-elves because their soul is an utter mystery, and a majority of the elves believe they have half souls which is pretty wtf.
Moon Elves are OK making Half Elves. Entire kingdoms of them in fact (Aglarond). Then again is not like Moon Elves raise them or anything.
As someone who has never played DND, this sounds fascinating.
You mean why elves are uncomfortable with Half Humans..... Humans might call them half elves but not the elves.
@@Meimoonscan you play that on phone?
Apparently, younger elves believe some half-elves do have Elven souls, as some can see Sehanine’s moonbow, a symbol reserved for those connected to Corellon. This gives them a sense of comfort, believing that it opens the path of elves to experience life from other forms, as they once did in the beginning.
Who knows. Maybe these younger generations learned a secret in their last time in Arvandor.
Elves, huh? Well, if this becomes a trend, we may finally obtain “What They Don’t Tell You About Humans.”
Always knew Mrhexx was a lizard
lmao
OK, NOW WE NEED THAT
naw man we need halfing
Interesting
When you said that reaching adulthood for elves is traumatic, I felt that
Just imagine a elf couple are hoping to have a child, But none of the elf are dying. They can live up around 900 years.They most likely hire an assassin to take care of couples 50 of elves just to start a family!
@@majesticgothitelle1802 That would actually be a pretty cool backstory for a character. Enter adulthood, find out through the Reverie your parents murdered the old you in order to have you, and then run away to become an adventurer.
@@tabathamoonstone8633 I imagine in the Elvin Society the elders served no purpose in life so they perform a traditional ritual of elves reincarnation. If the population and fertility is based off of the death of another elves why keep the old folks around.
@@majesticgothitelle1802 Valid point. I assume they keep the older elves around because they aren't particularly murderous creatures, for the most part, but I do love the idea of that reincarnation ritual thing.
@@majesticgothitelle1802 Might be the Elders wisdom, experience/skills , possible magical ability and the ability to teach younger individuals in order to help them improve and to preserve knowledge and make the next generation better adapt at their trades and crafts, to say nothing of their ability to learn High Magic and therefore contribute far more than any younger elf could.
Here's to hoping we'll get a video on the Half-Elves.
Yeah! I need this after watching this video now.
It'll only be half as long though.
You could just start watching this video from 12:00 in and get essentially the same effect
OK. Half elves now raise some real deep questions.
Their soul and mind mainly .
DO the heave the memories /soul of a real elf
Where do their soul goes when they die
Can they become a real elf .
@@blackgriffinxx i think i read that some have elven souls and some have new 'human' souls. i cant remember where i heard it though.
“What they don’t tell you about Dwarves” PLEASE!
They dont really like beer, mead, ale, or alcohol in general. They just like to chug stuff that would make an elf roll a con save upon drink.
The end.
Play dwarf fortress for a month
I concur
Dwarves are actually a type of plant grown from the beardy-bushes. They start off as a small beard and grow into a baby dwarf, which is then picked by the adult dwarves and taken care of until adulthood.
Moradin literally forges their souls, crafting is not only in there bloods it’s in their souls
Elves: nearly destroys the material plane, causes permanent planetary desfiguration, rips the fabric of the universe, hurt the weave, almost all elves involved in breaking a cosmic rule and defying the gods all because they had a hard on for the heavens. And they wanted to do all this and more. (Gets their own private island)
Humans: 1 wizardy boi trys to save his entire species from Extinction by the hands of toothy horrors that are a threat to the weave by themselves and unintentionally flicks magic off and on. (No one is allowed to play with big boy magic ever again, save elves. And all humans are left to their own devices some even ran into toothy horrors)
This sounds like Dragon Prince and not d&d lol
Also, since elf souls are reincarnated, the elves alive today are reincarnations of the exact same elves that did this.
The human mages however, are completely different idividuals, who are forced to pay for their ancestor's mistake. That being said, the Neterise sounded too athoritarian to be allowed to continue their reighn.
Elves sound like SJWs.
Eaisilly offended, having Gender fuidity, a getting preferential treatment for being "special," and wanting to be in a *community* of like minded idivudual, even thoguh they are *chotic*-good in alignment.
...
Am I misrepresenting anything?
...
Also, elvish souls are probly worth abit more than human souls to devils and other feinds too, because their are only so many of them, they would be like a limited-edition collecter's soul!
matthhias brown an onion chopping Ninja
That moment when you realize that Humans in the og universe don’t have it so good, whereas in the campaign you’re currently playing in Humans rule the worlds and there aren’t many left of the other species.
Ha.. ha.... help us.
That wizardy boi's approach to saving his species was to USURP the position of the God of Magic. Allowing mortals to wield that kind of power would have lead to infinitely worse damage than anything the Elves have demonstrated. Before the ban was implemented, at any time, a sufficiently talented wizard could just strip a god of all their power and claim it for their own...
I have a character who's in a rather unique situation. He's 20 years old and was polymorphed into and raised as a human for that time. It's only in the last few months (campaign time) that he learned of his true nature when the BBEG dispelled the polymorph during a big confrontation, which has given him a rather severe identity crisis. He's always had what he thought were weird, fanciful dreams, but is only just starting to understand that this was the Reverie. He's still adventuring, and is literally a child in the minds of other elves.
If you're wondering why (and are not other players in the campaign, you guys know who you are!)...continue.
The idea I pitched to my DM was inspired by old school faerie tales. In those tales, he'd be called a changeling, though that term means something different in D&D thanks to Eberron's changelings. A fey creature who was shapeshifted into the form of a human baby and swapped with a real human baby shortly after birth. In those stories, the fey are pretty unintelligible and generally just cause chaos, but in this campaign setting, they're a lot more organized and have a very specific goal in mind. In addition to the (recently dispelled) True Polymorph, he's also under the effects of Modify Memory to wipe his memories of being anything other than a human child (which the DM ruled is obscuring enough of the Reverie's images that he's not been able to determine what's going on) and a geas spell to sew discord in the human lands. This has led him to some revolutionary ideas that I'm really looking forward to getting stuck into - ideas like the nobility taking responsibility for their serfs and trying to rule them in a responsible and compassionate manner...ideas that feudal lords IRL always claimed to espouse while doing the exact opposite. I'm looking forward to seeing how things go when a now very successful and rich adventurer starts a medieval variant of a Communist revolution in the Free Cities.
Filthy Commie.
@@StarboyXL9 It's not even communism, actually, just demanding that the nobility actually follow the code of conduct that _noblesse oblige_ sets out. He's a feudalist.
the only 2 word i saw in this entire post are "communist" and "revolution". :)
My first DnD character was a wood elf whose ears were cut by her parents before she was stuck onto a traveling troupe's cart. She knew she was elf, but she was raised primarily by humans and does not relate with other elves. She views her trance as "lucid naps" that can be weird but fun.
I really appreciate your deep insight into the lore here. You’ve made me a significantly better DM, and you seem like a great guy. Keep it up, my friend.
This is just a moodier more serious version of davy chappy's elf video, still love it and makes my 450 year old midlife crisis elf wizard completely nonsensical
×2 cant tell how much these lore videos help
He missed the most the important question. Why are they so sought after in offbrand?
@@anevilrotisserie9136 in what?
@@defensivekobra3873 😏
So if there are limited number of elf souls, do half elves get elf souls or is it more so a human soul.
I would say the average half elf is not the reincarnation of an original elf. It just wouldn't make sense for that to be the case imo. However if the parents union is blessed by Corellon it is possible to give birth to one that is. And they would get the benefits that come with it, like reverie and a longer life span.
This is where a lot of Xenophibia from elves towards other races come from, because the truth is they actually don't know what happens. Many believe that the elf soul that is stuck in the half elf body, can't reincarnate and hence gets screwed over from his heaven.
I think that it's more like a human soul. From what I know, half-elves don't experience the trance that normal elves do, so I would think that since they incapable of seeing past lives, they never had an elf soul to begin with.
@@MrRhexx
Huh. Well, good. I thought they were just assholes.
I agree with Alexander Snyder. The fact that Half-elf's are not allowed acces to Evermeet also supports this, I think.
0:53 Even in normal videos, he cannot stop talking about 10th level spells.
But to be fair it's really cool stuff
@@cortex6065 I agree wholeheartedly.
@@intelligence14wisdom22 no you dont
@@kyrlics6515
Touche'
Ohhh Elves only have a mere 100 years of perfect recollection, reliving all of the happiness enjoyed with their Gods...
I'm shedding tears, I am...
Saddest story ever told, no doubt!
It would probably be better to live a dour life only knowing slight pleasure than having to remain centuries in a state of want and longing for what cannot be obtained.
Finally, we've heard of the high elves
Do you get to the cloud district very often ?
High Elves you mean the ones here ruclips.net/video/ByFvvi1l-Oo/видео.html
High part comes from the type of medicinal herbs they used I guess XD
I don't know you and I don't care to know you.
Western Elves: Mysterious, magical beings that are graceful, wise and skilled.
Eastern/Japanese Elves: Total thots
They must be the ones partying on Lapis Observatory?
ruclips.net/video/ByFvvi1l-Oo/видео.html
haha what? Have you ever heard of warhammer? Not all anime elfs were waifu bait. Record of lodoss war had classic DND depiction of elves interacting with humans and this was the mid 80s. look up dark elves / Drows and enjoy the skin show.
@@TKUltra971
> Elves
You misspelled Slaanesh's sauce
Have you heard of ANY kind of mythical elves? Let's just say they were pretty... different.
@@magiv4205 Depends a bit what you consider to be mythological elves. Tolkien based his elves, I believe, mostly of the gaelic/celtic aes sidhe, who were fairy-type spirit beings, only he made them less supernatural. The word "elf" on the other hand, comes from Norse mythology and... well, we don't really know much about those guys since they aren't described much in the surviving sources.
The "light elves" are simply described as beautiful and fair beings living in higher celestial domains and are implied of be spirits representing light. Apparently the Aesir gods didn't have nearly as many dealings with them as with the jötunn and dwarves since they never show up in the myths, but it's reasonable to assume they were a similar "tribe" as the other big players. The "dark elves" meanwhile are described as living under ground and there is reason to believe they were just dwarves by a different name. There's a also single mention of "black elves" which most assume is just an alternative name for dark elves.
Since light and dark elves are mentioned by Snorri Sturlusson (who was actually a christian) together in a way that implies dualism, some have argued it may have been an attempt to push an angel/demon or good spirit/evil spirit sort of motif, but this is a bit questionable. It's always possible "elf" was just a generic word meaning "spirit that isn't a god or giant" rather than something more specific.
I have grown to love these videos. D&D was never my thing, until I started to watch your "What They Don't Tell You About" series. Keep up the great work!
The elves know a spell to turn powerful undead into mortal men, and they keep it secret from other races? That is not very nice.
Its not rude either
Kyrlics it is when said powerful undead have wreaked havoc on the world for an exceedingly long time.
it's a potential risk if ppl decide they want their loved ones back from the dead, turn them into undead, and then use the spell to make em living again, rinse and repeat; it would screw with the circle of life
CorvusCorone68 you overestimate the number of people who would have access to that level of magical knowledge and skill. Creating undead alone is fairly high level, and I’m sure the ritual for undoing undeath is even more so.
Technically, True Resurrection literally does this and every cleric can get it.
"The elves are shrouded in mystery..." are you familiar with gnomes? There is almost no lore concerning them.
There's a little about Garl Glittergold, and Gond, and Drizz't was sheltered by them for a while but that's about it. They have never been the focus of any lore or had any deep impacts on Fearun or many other D&D worlds. (Unless you're a kobold)
There is a 2e handbook called The Complete Book of Gnomes and Halflings you could look into.
@@nightmoose I feel like they could add more. We have a plethora of knowledge about elves compared to gnomes. They're supposed to be a mysterious and enigmatic race, but we know so much that we might actually know more about them than humans.
1 book, 3 editions ago, that most people haven't heard of?
@@Electric_Wizard I like Gnomes a lot! I fear the demand just isn't there compared to elves though.
In my world "gnome" is literally just slang for dwarf baby. It's a very common insult in Dwarven culture, and lighthearted, unless it's someone tall saying it.
In which case, they're gonna get nut punched. Because he can't reach any higher.
these videos really have me appreciating Forgotten Realms a lot more as a setting. It's convoluted but once you know what's going on it all sounds interesting
*Elf bard sadly playing the lute* : 🎶And you make me feel like I’VE BEEN LOCKED OUT HEAVEN 🎶
it's basically parallel to their concept origin, the elves of middle earth in that certain deeds they do while on middle earth determine whether or not they can go to the undying lands.
>Be me
> Be 99 yrs old female elf in campaing.
>Stare at a human bard without movement.
>Bard blushes.
>Keep staring.
>Bard approach in front of me.
>I keep the stare.
>Bard gets filtry with me.
> I just Stare
>Bard gets nervous. Think I'am a witch or something for staring at him too much.
>Keep staring.
>Party member gets nervous too, tap my shoulder and move me. And shout at me.
> "Sorry I was in the Reverie. What are your guys saying?"
>Myfacewhen all party members now think Elves are fucking weird
>Myfacewhen now I'am the weird chick in the group.
r/notliketheothergirls
r/notliketheotherelfs
Hahaha played well!
Btw, elves are still aware of their surroundings even when in trance
@Bob Bob
Sup Bob Bob from bob the Bob
I have no idea
I mean, I would say, even thou they originally use to build their houses some way, there's no big reason to just keep it always like that
U can see it bc even thou they used to hang only with other elves, through the time they started interacting and even living with other races
(Not all of them, not always)
@Bob Bob yeah it makes sense
Oh boy I can't wait for "What they don't tell you about Goliath's",no, I can't wait for another video of this quality. :*
Goliath's were one of the best new races that came out of 3rd edition. They're pretty awesome.
They are the race of "Hold my beer“
goliaths are dumb tho =p
so imagine an elf, captured by evil forces at birth and tortured constantly. no good memories whatsoever. what about their dreams after the age of 100?
seems like a good villain origin.
Onat how was dark elf society organized again?
@@diazinth all i know is it's led by females. tells you something about feminists amirite guise
The only thing holding dark elf society together is literal divine intervention.
@@onatgz In most cases its led by a bunch of houses in a council and the Matriarchs of the houses are the ruling Body of the respective town.But there is at least one Drowcity that is ruled by a council of Merchants and these are men and women.Its been a long time since I read About it so i do not know how the Name of the City is but that is what i still remember.
They would only have an escape from torture in their first 30 yrs 😬
This is one of my favorite videos you've done to date. Please do more of the primary races in this style. I almost think this series going forward when combined with the other playable races could be almost mandatory viewing for a PC before playing a campaign.
I absolutely love your videos and was really excited to see you did one on the elves! I was even more excited to see my artwork of Eilistraee popped up on the screen! I have NO problem with you using my artwork (in fact, thank you for choosing it), but I was hoping that you could perhaps credit me in either the video or the description?
👏
You made the wrong choice during character creation, you're the 5E version of yourself and Daddy Corellon tells you this erry day for 30 years. Then there's the dryad thing. Corellon senpai's not gonna be impressed that you became a tree and put down roots, a fixed position is what got you stuck reincarnating in the first place.
I continue to absolutely love this series having read Elves of Evermeet decades ago when it was first published. I know you touched on the Gods, but will you ever do an episode on the Gods themselves? The story of Sehanine for instance is one of my favourites in terms of Godly histories
I wonder if an Elf can voluntarily just go: ''Screw Corellon, screw the past lives, I like having a shape, I like my life, I'm just gonna sleep.''?
priests of sehanine moonbow do sleep at times to receive visions from her. Also i think they just get thrown out of the rebirth cycle and go to the respective plane of their deity or end up in that wall of souls if they are atheist.
First character I ever played in D&D was an elf druid. I've been in love with the Elven lore ever since. Soon as I saw this video I knew it was a must-watch personally.
Question though, are there really only a set number of Elven souls? I thought that Primal Elves were the only elves who existed when the race adopted permanent shapes, but their descendants afterward would not be considered Primal.
I don't know, Elves are my favorite Race and I play the way the Trance works is you are simply touching the heart of magic and that is how you restore energy/heal/etc.
wait.... what happens if you cast "Gift of life" on a Lich? what happens to his filactery ?now i got more doubts out of just 1 spell
Very simple:
The Phylactery is dispelled, it might be physically destroyed by this or simply lose its magic as the Soul of the Lich returns to its body once more and the Lich returns to life most likely as a 20th level Wizard of the age that he was before becoming a Lich.
Go back, pause and read the full spell description. It's in there.
As much as I want to hear about the elves, I personally want to hear more about the half elves of each sect of elves. Currently playing a half elf sorcerer and this lore would be super interesting
Hehey, me too! :D
The only thing you need to know is:
"Around elves, watch yourselves!"
I came up with "Knives on their heads, knives in your back" for a campaign where an entire culture was violently racist against elves and any pointy-eared people.
Alternatively known as "Knife for an ear, knife in your rear".
@@Baron_Wurst knife by the cap, knife in the bacj
I happend to like Elfes..
Much better D&D Elf video than Pointy Hat
I made an elf with an midlife crisis once, never got to play my first ever character tho
So what does the fourty-five year old next door neighbor taking out a second mortgage and buying a flashy Porch look like for an elf?
@@joshuaking9408 nonono, instead he goes to all the lands, trying to record ALL INFORMATION EVER in his book, and boi he paniced.
What happens when a soulless elf trances?
Asking for a friend.
If it were up to me, I'd question what a soul means to you in your campaign. Without a soul I'd say you're no more than a fleshy machine who's only purpose is the task at hand and how to perform it optimally. In the case of a trance, you'd probably only be able to access your immediate life's memories, and only the moments about training to perfect/optimize your efficiency to complete your duty. Everything else is useless to the character, despite how they felt when they used to have a soul.
A soulless elf would be more dour in general, not show as much variation in emotion, just as likely to fixate on things but with less obvious intensity. Other elves would be very uncomfortable in their muted presence. Trancing would be similarly there, but a bit fugue-like with no clear memory save that elf’s own. They could be just as intelligent and self-aware but some quintessential spark of joy would be missing compared to other elves.
How does one function with outa soul? Don’t they become like wraiths or something? Zombies?
@@beatrixthegreat1138 Not quite. One can lose their soul by warlock pact, background etc (it's outright part of one of the sage bonds). Undeads usually require death.
Falionna oh ok
There's a lot of people who do d and d videos out there but none of them pit the passion and work into like u do, thanks so much for another great video
Anyone have any fun stories about casting “Gift of Life”? This spell is utterly captivating to me...not the simple “one hit the final boss” but a million others. The spell cost doesn’t even seem that high all things considered.
Umh, how do we explain half elves with this lore and the limited number of Elven souls? Do they have human souls or is the soul fused?
And what about Elven liches?
Perhaps they have a new soul and the heaven they go to depends on which side they favoured. Wouldn’t that infuriate the elves, if the halfbreeds were the only ones with a chance to enter their heaven.
There is not a limit on elf souls. It's just that when more souls have to be created because the former are used up, bad stuff tends to happen. For example the Crown Wars. They have nor elf neither human souls, but elves think they have split elven souls that will never come back as elven again (no reincarnation).
Baelnorn and Liches are undead, therefore their souls stay in their decrepit bodies. No reincarnation but Baelnorn at least are created for a very specific reason. As for Liches, well, if an elf becomes a Lich, it is safe to assume that it's soul wouldn't been able to enter Arvandor in the first place.
Obvious ALOT of work and research went into this, great work and very entertaining
Wait a sec... These are NOT the elves I was looking for this Xmas!
Look up elf on the shelf
If you're doing high magic, will you ever do a video on psionics?
that 100 years aniversary hits hard
This leaves me with so many questions about half-elves...
Literally humans with pointy ears.
@@ARandomCogboi I suppose you are right, makes little sense otherwise.
Human souls, genetic makeup of both
Elf: "Ew, a half breed. What do you want inferior chattel."
Half-elf put down a pipe: "Bra, I can die. Get judged and move with my existence to a heaven. Your entire life is spent ground hogs day your entire history of your soul made of every life since time in memory. Worse, the only way to break this cycle is for you go to one of the hellish underworld because you're God hates you. You like a sad slave but a even a human slave has fair shake of reaching heaven. I could literally go to your heaven, and your God couldn't do shitt about it. We're not gonna talk about the fact that each time you pork some elf, they're probably highly related, if not by body, but by soul. Your probably know what it's like to pork you ex-dad in your wife's body after she remembers. "
All of your videos have given me SO many ideas for DMing, purely off of lore. And, you best believe all of my campaigns are forgotten realms inspired now
Great review of the lore of elves. It's a great exercise to remind ourselves that the standard fantasy races don't have to boring if you're willing to do some work.
My character just had some WILD stuff happen to her, and this video has helped me tremendously with understanding exactly what has happened to her and how to play her, THANK YOU
wow that's where lolth / lloth comes from? never knew. great content mate, love your stuff! cheers!
Yeah I honestly had no clue. Very interesting revelation.
This fantastic race deserves more love
You made me realize I've been playing and depicting my elves incorrectly for years, primarily about and because of their 'trance'... Thanks! Keep up the amazing work!
On the other hand with me I am following the natural inclination of my elvish heritage. The problem is me being captured by human criminals as a baby. I never got rescued and grew up in that thieves guild. I always felt like Drizzt kinda did (basically disgusted by the environment I grew up in). I never developed a hatred for humans because that's all I knew of. So what did I do when my toon reached what age humans consider to be an adolescent? She ran away and was taken into protection by a human priest and that eventually lead me to promise him that I would become a paladin after he died to honor the righteousness that he represented. I then became a paladin and saw corruption in the very group that the priest was a part of. It was my toon's understanding that it was not external forces that shaped him. It was his internal moral compass that lead his actions and so that was the path that I took. I then became a green paladin and went to adventure the world to save as many souls as I could from harm. Eventually I am going to encounter elves so I wonder how that is going to flesh out with what I know now.
Or you simply disregard/homebrew away the limited souls thing or other things you don't care for. That's how I do it and Elves are my favorite race, but the limited soul thing is stupid to me.
Additionally think of this, an Elf Druid can theoretically live 7,500 years. Possibly more if they manage to enter and settle in the Astral Plane!
This is one of those videos that I'm going to end up rewatching a whole lot.
Oooh, always wanted to see elves covered at some point
Your videos take me on a journey with each beat and frame. It's evident how much effort and talent you put into them.
"and 25 years old sounds way too old"
Me, a 34 year old: "25? Too old... These youngin's...."
I'm 46
Lol oh crap I'm 50
Try me! 23 feels old to me!😣😒
I think they meant 25 sounds too old to be considered the threshold of physical adulthood.
I am 16 I still curious about nature and other dimension
What They Don't Tell You About Elves... Every 10,000 years a single straight elf is born.
This is perfect timing, I just started running an all elf game!
He finally did one of the common races omg let’s go my dream came true
The Gift of Life spell is literally a campaign waiting to happen all by itself.
The best part about this series is that you can completely ignore the DnD lore and do whatever you want. Take what inspires you and dump the rest.
Which series?
I love videos like this that goes in depth! now i know what the trance thing actually means, and how to better apply it in games ^_^ i'd love it if you did a video about the different cultural standards and history of the different types of elves, like the avariel or aquatic elves !
I'd love the Eberron elves to get a mention. They're very Aztec/ Arabic /Egyptian inspired (the main two) so different to those of Forgotten Relams and just as fascinating.
You make me realize that I’ve been scratching the surface of lore provided! So excited!
I love this channel so much! I really appreciate the amount of lore and detail that you uncover. Thank you very much!
How about how the Elves defeated the dragons by casting/created a Mythal that makes all Dragons go insane (with no exception good or bad) every 10,000 years - destroying their own hordes, followers and holdings? Which is why the dragons hate the Avariel.
How much of this applies to half-elves?
Half Elves can’t experience Reverie, but they do have some connection displayed via their resistance to sleep magic. It’s left a little vague. Some elves look on them with pity - like an elven soul was split and forced into a form where it won’t ever know its true self again. Or some might say there’s no elven soul there at all, that it’s a human mockery of an elf. Or some might say it’s just temporary, that the elven soul is disoriented but will be freed back to Arvandor on its next death. Some might think it’s their job to guide the half elf to ensure it makes it back into the cycle of reincarnation. There have been cases of the Seldarine favoring a half elf, as well.
@@greygramarye7872 Thanks! That was really helpful :)
@@greygramarye7872 My personal take is that the half-elf is the one exception to "there is always a static number of elven souls". Basically, it is a way for a new soul to join the cycle of reincarnation. A cheat granted by Corellion to make up for the souls lost to Demon Queen of Spiders. A vessel for a proto-elf soul if you will.
@@Krishnath.Dragon or repenting soul ?
@@blackouthorus1519 an especially good drow will be stolen, and purged through the half elf state until becoming a regular elf
9:40
"A-dol-a-scent"
Haha I love you bro. You're videos always make me smile
Really cool video, totally changed what I thought elves were all about. I really like the whole "they don't measure their lives by how many moons they've seen but what aspect of their life they are in" (paraphrase)
I have been playing elves since AD&D. While I do enjoy the 5th ED changes, added by that "thing" that was 4th, I do not incorporate any of it in the new games I run. I definitely do not run the "alternate" origins story, nor the limited souls through reincarnation. I love the Dhaerow. As soon as I found out that I could play a Drow, I did and I never looked back.
Where were you when I regularly DM'd in the 80s and 90s? I would invite you to take my time machine back to those days but my time machine is broke and I am out of E-115 for its power core. I actually had to sit in these ancient buildings called "libraries" to look upon bunches of paper collections called "books" to get most of my information and ideas outside of AD&D sources when I didn't have AD&D sources. You know, the whole conjecture and inference thingies. I extrapolated my own mutations on Elves but that is another story. Those Elves are Forgotten Realms Elves. Mine is similar but warped. High Elves are akin to them. Urban Elves are warped High Elves, very much like Half-Elves. My Drow is a mutation of my original Dark Elves and is very much Drow. I was a 2nd Ed guy. I was many DM's that had to adapt to new lore and fill in the blanks. At the time, age was relative to culture and personality for elves in implied... well, everything implied.
I wish I was born 20 years later for the AD&D stuff even though I hate just about everyone born 5-10 years after I was because they are more pansy and entitled than my most entitled and pansy of my time.
What happens when an Elvish sustains damage so great that they die? Are they reincarmated then? I've always played that an elf does not die, but fades from existence.
Also, in Tolkien, don't elves sail away on the ocean, never to be seen again by the likes of mankind?
Elvish don't die, they go home.
This is the best video.. and i think its because its about a race you would play as player rather than a race you will use as a DM. Youve opened the door to far mlre people with this one
So you are telling me that elves have dream-memory menopause.
man these videos on DND are changing my life my group thinks i am some god level DM because of you.
COUGH "BIRTH OF SLANNESH" COUGH.
This video helps to make more sense of the Legend of Drizzt and the War of the Spider Queen book series. Also, helps to confirm the pronouncing of certain names in those books too. Thanks.
11/10 can’t wait for the next one. I’ll join your patreon as soon as I find a new job.
The elves' biggest secret? Thanks to tooth decay, any elf old enough to pick a class wears dentures
Obviously they spend those hundred years training how to use the longsword and the longbow
Only to be one shoted by the Dragonborn.
And the shorter versions of both. And some wild DoUbLe CuRvEd SwOrDs if a Wood Elf.
As an ardent elf player, there's nothing new to me here.
It can all be found if you care to look.
But cool effort to get this out into the open (although most sources and pictures are taken from AD&D).
I’m going to throw my homebrew setting’s lore down here just to check the opinions of people who are really into normal D&D lore.
Elves, or rather, the Fay in general, are native to Materia in a way most living people are not. They are dependent on its local magics to survive, suffering a form of growing exhaustion often called ‘a starvation of the mind’ when far from their homelands, millions of years of adaptation enabling populations to tune themselves to different and distinct magical springs. The ‘elves’ themselves, (in the modern day divided between black, green, blue, gold and several other colored verities) were those that adapted to the old Faywyld, the greatest region of significant ambient magic on the planet, spanning continents like an ocean. Smaller wellsprings, such as the gith spiral and the dwarfspirits, are responsible for other populations of Fay.
The Old Faywyld, however, is gone. Shattered to scraps barely the size of the kingdoms that claim them, the largest of these having claimed the name ‘Faywild’ for itself. A thousand elvish and a thousand human cultures tell different stories of what happened eight thousand years ago, but there are some broad points in common.
Humans came from elsewhere. The Fen were colonists of some great people long lost in the darkness of Atheria. Their arrival marked the beginning of the greatest change in the history of the planet, as animals and plants from beyond the stars spread to the farthest regions of Materia, strange machines harnessing the Old Faywyld the same way the Fen farmed their wheat. Over millennia, the Fay retreated farther and farther within their individual magical pools even as Fen sorcerers and alchemists tapped them for energy from the outside.
Then, for reasons historians have only began to care about recently, the Age of Wars and Darkness set in, and great Fen and Fay empires of the preceding era went out like so many candles in a great wind. Even the city of Kronimaar was abandoned, the Great Machine mothballed and slowly buried over centuries. The Fay became horrific forest spirits for semi-nomadic bands of increasingly tribal humans to warn their children about, and the Fading Ones protected their flickering life springs to the death as shadows devoured all. For a thousand years there is no history, only pain and death on a scale so great that in the most cold and untouched lands of the north, where generations of life could not dilute it away, the very ground and glaciers will scream and weep blood to passing travelers.
Then came the day of Palot (Pah-low). When the god Uthan demanded the Men of the Golden Hills return to the city of Kronimaar and restore Ulthan’s great machine. In the instant it was finally activated, day one, of year 1 After Palot, began.
For one single moment, across the entire world, it was day.
Lines of pure magical light flowed from one end of the world to another across the sky. Lay lines. In one single instant, the horror was over, as Materia was sundered from Atheria as surely as the meat of a crab from its shell. The life springs expanded as magic flowed to and from them in a vast web, and Fay began to leave their homelands, finding the distance only caused head pains after decades rather than death in mere days. They found that in their generations-long fade, they’d changed. They no-longer resembled each other as the elves always had, a rainbow of colors and shapes and even unrecognizable magics. Fen had diversified as well, ranging from milk-white giants to waist-hight and rock-colored dwarves. Stranger things too, such as men with tails and the skins of lizards and beasts that hid in the flayed skins of others. Humans became a common point, a singularity, where any interbreeding of the races would generate one with only hints of their genetic heritage in their features.
It was a new world, and as one, everything that walked or crawled or slithered set out to find a place in it.
Thoughts?
My main concern about elves (it applies to some other races but especially elves) is tied to how long they live
Why aren't they the absolute peak of doing anything ever?
What i mean is, how can humans even compete in anything ever with beings that lives for centuries?
I get that due to culture and stuff, elves are driven to do alot of things and experience as much as possible, but surely at some point you get the one guy who wants to be the best martial artist ever, and after 600 years of practice, he has to be the absolute master of every arts ever, even creating his own form that is above the others. he even gets to dream about his past memories for 4 hours, so on top of living in his peak 10 times longer, he gets to sleep less, and figure things out during his ''trance'' but somehow a 40 years old human could still mop the floor with him?
This example applies to everything, a 25 years old human can't do anything better than someone 300 years old, if they both trained their entire life to excel at this thing. I just can't see it. I believe there's a certain point where hard work beats talent, and 20x the experience and training should be one of them. So unless humans are, for some reason, godlikely talented, how can they compete with elves, dwarves and other races who lives for centuries? It's a cannon thing, too. Ed greenwood once said the best swordsman alive was human, i don't remember his name.
What happens if we have more elves than souls?
Will husks be born void of soul?
I think that what the lore implies is that the birth of elves is very much dictated by the gods. Essentially, elves are only born if so many souls are ready to return to the material plane.
@@florameeker2906 Generally, since elves live for so long, they are in waaaaay less of a biological hurry to pump out babies, unlike humans. I think most elf couples don't have children, and are generally very infertile with one another. I'm guessing it would be different in a half elf situation, the human counterpart probably making up for it.
So basically when the Elves have a bunch of babies, they have that foreboding moment of seeing the DM roll, like, 15 dice in a row.
Actually 25 is about right for adulthood because that is when the brain is finally fully developed
@God Of The Universe no, it's definitely 25; on average humans enter the final stage of brain development what is considered mental adulthood(aka:young adults) at 15 and finish that phase at 25 becoming proper adults (aka:full adults) where condition stays more or less the same until 40 when low levels of natural decline start to gradually set in at about the same rate until 70 then the natural decline really speeds up.
15-25(young adults)
25-40(adults)
40-70(old adults)
70+(elderly)
It really depends on how you define adulthood. Many use maturity as a sign of adulthood, but there are an awful lot of immature adults.
Bones fully harden about 25 as well
This sort of insight goes unmentioned almost anywhere in full like this, and it makes them several orders of magnitude more interesting.
We have to know what they don't tell us about goblins :D, please
Sure, but let's cover the PHB races first.
Awesome video dude. Looking forward to the next part about the different types of Elves
He married a primal elf!?
*🎵Sweet home Feywild🎵*
Thank you so much! I've very new to DND and you've made it infinitely easier to learn the sheer amount of lore that goes into this game in such an entertaining way! As someone with a writing background, it makes creating characters so much easier!
The reverie gave me an idea for a campaign where elves are struck with some kind of magical curse or bewitchment that causes reveries to recall their most traumatic experiences, so the player need to find the source of the curse.
More people need to see these videos. It's abhorrent how many people think Firbolgs are half human half cows...
lmao
3:44 Elves don’t have beards!
In some worlds they do.
For example, since MTG is now canon to D&D, the Elves of Yavimaya on the plane of Dominaria can indeed grow beards.
They can also grow beards in their old age in Dragonlance. For example one of the oldest elves to ever live named Loralon had a white beard.
It could be a facewarmer
Great video! I’m new to D&D lore, and your videos are super insightful!
"My generation's existence is a portent of your DOOM"
...
"Ok boomer"
Far as I know the Reverence is caused by eating the wrong mushrooms. My friend Amrynn told me this in Novigrad.
Saw elves, never clicked so fast on a video
Love this topic. Looking forward to hearing about all the elves.
When you've been around for as long as DnD has, there's gonna be canon, and there's gonna be a lot. My question is why they only use limited amounts of it for 5e modules because the lore is really good.
Cuz to be honest I adore most of rhexxs vids. Buuuut. As someone dming for decades and being obsessed with elves and their lore. I gotta say this video is the first one with glaring errors. The canon is quite specific over many many gens and Corellon isn't even the oldest elven god for one...basically 80 percent of this vid contradicts what ive read in about 30 source books and ignores every single canon novel(those pesky authors that define our worlds and own them by proprietary means ie: they are the canon...). Im looking right now to find out to be honest where he found half this "info". Doesn't match almost anything I've ever read. I dont really use the newest so maybe that? Otherwise Id suggest he read about the crown war novels, myth drannor etc (mythals aren't an invention of elves!!)...sooo many errors. Not pleased this time sniffle(whining heh) still love him n can't wait for next vid but had a nerd alert...
I think they are getting there, Mordenkainen's tome of foes was incredible and i still they are probably gonna release more like it. They really did drop the ball on the monster manual though.
The lore is there to be had. It need not be reprinted with a 5e label to make it Cannon in your campaign. Fourth edition is a lesson on less is more from a publishing POV.
Just look it up on the google. There are plenty of PDFs, both free and otherwise, that are just books literally stuffed with this kind of lore from older editions. 5e doesn’t need to reprint it, it’s all available one way or another.
Love the fact I suggested this one months ago and there we go and have it, keep up the good videos.
Do you have plans on covering any of the eberron races or any lore from eberron in general?
Thanks a lot ! As of now, this is perhaps my favorite series of videos on YT.
But what happens when you have a human boink an elf and they have offspring?
Who's soul is that? And what face does the main Elven deity make?
I’d say it’s a human soul with pointy ears and the main elven deity goes REEEEEEEEEEEEE