I've got a player in my campaign who is an Eladrin Wild Magic Sorcerer. We talked a lot about how her seasonal transformation affects her Wild Magic Surges as well. Now when this book comes out...oh its gonna bring so much more chaos. I always thought the Fey Step feature the Eladrin from UA had was a little dry...so getting rid of the cantrips for a cooler feature seems pretty awesome.
I never wanted to play an eladrin until now. Props for bringing up the old celestial eladrin from AD&D-they're what I remember, and never quite got why they were a PC race now.
A fun way to roleplay the seasons of Eladrin without breaking rules is that you can change your season whenever you want in order to change your color, but the DM knows which season you choose after each long rest for the Fey Step (like you also have to tell your chosen proficiencies for that day). I play an Eladrin druid who is an entertainer, and every time he sings, his color changes depending on the mood of the song. I even played him changing really fast along with the lyrics of Grace Kelly: "I could be brown, I could be blue, I could be violet sky ..." you get the point.
Marcus Hill so far we know a few of the seasonal effects, Summer deals fire damage with fey step, Spring Charms, Winter crap I forgot. I don't know what Autumn does.
Slubbergully My source is this video, he says Summer's Fey Step deals damage and that another charms, which obviously would be spring although he doesn't mention the season for the charming version of Fey Step.
My only beef with Fey Step in 5e is that its a combat mechanic and not a racial thing. But most racial things are treated as combat mechanics I think. In my games I have the Eladrin player have a separate pool of movement which comes back on a short rest for Fey Step. He gets 20 feet total so if he moves 5 feet at a time he gets to use it 4 times between short rests. I like to think of the fact that the Eladrin have this as a racial ability so to them it's part of how they live, no different from having eyes or a tongue. So buildings are probably built with it in mind; absent doors creatures who need to walk might use, things like that. It would be like Arakocraa making a village one a mountain peak.
Oh... what about a Archfey Warlock and Arcane Trickster Rouge multi-class or better yet two players whose backstory allowed them time in the realm of the Fey??
Am doing an Eladrin Archfey Warlock right now, actually. She’s still teenage in elf years, so I swap my season randomly each day, to go with the chaos of it. Certainly makes for an...interesting play style, to say the least, but I love it personally.
I had a great Eladrin called Trixa Trance. Trixa was an eladrin bard of the college of glamour who worked in one of the high courts. One day she was writing a new song in the woods where a crow court her attention. The crow lead her to a Annis Hag who charmed Trixa and, over the course of a few months, convinced Trixa to attack the fey queen. She failed and was banished from the feywild. With no memory she got by off her natural musical and comedic skills. A 100 years or so later she starts to get her memories back and that’s where the campaign picked up.
My favorite race! I can't wait to see how they function in Mordenkainen's. I've been playing a character based on the UA Eladrin that is actually half-Eladrin half-dryad constantly in the "spring". The whole seasonal and Fey theme fits her so well.
This seems like a match made in heaven for a Glamour Bard...already imbued with Fey magic, the special effects of Misty Step mesh well with a support character. I mean, the "Mantle of Inspiration" is essentially teleporting your allies into better positions...and the "otherworldly" grace fits the description of Glamour Bards.
I currently play an Eladrin Druid and it's a lot of fun. I use a d4 that I roll after every long rest to determine what season she's in. Sometimes though, I change it by choice based on events the day before. Such as last session I chose winter, because we had just buried a team mates parents. It's a big challenge from an RP perspective to play one because of the shifting personalities, but that's what makes it so fun!
Would you mind giving a player some advice on role play? She's a century old eladrin wildfire druid trapped in shadowfell (one of the worst places for eladrin to be stuck in) and is going to be played as coming off as extremely fey and chaotic. I'm not sure how to role play the seasons or even playing a character so influenced by her lifelong exposure to the fey and recently, the shadowfell as well. It feels like I'll be role playing an alien
@@konankunoichi94 That's a tough one. I think the best advice I can give is to try and think what your character would say or do in certain situations. Don't go by -your- instinct, but feel what seems tatural to your character. Another one is to not use her seasons as a way of determining who she is that day. Give her a set personality and use the seasons to flesh it out. Is she summer today? Then she won't respond to injustice calmly. She will march her way through and fix it! Is she winter? Then she will contemplate the injustice and find a way to approach it diplomatically. Or if she is fall and the situation is a party she is more likely to drink too much than she would if she was spring. If she was spring at a party, she would bounce around, talk to everyone, be bubbly and carefree. But in the end, what she thinks makes something injust, who she likes etc is the same. The seasons change how she reacts. I hope that helped and I hope you will have tonnes of fun with her. Wildfire druid sounds great. Good luck!
Well to be fair they were the one so that stayed in the Fey after their Daddy kicked them out of their only home. Then all the rest went on to becoming the elves we know by immigrating throughout the realms of D&D
Can you guys please release a book/audiobook like Neil Gaiman's Norse Mythology, where it's just a collected set of origins and lore of the D&D worlds? We've got 40+ years of lore that's really difficult to get ahold of, let alone often simply finding in between work/social life and planning for the next campaign session. I LOVE these videos, but I feel like they're limited by the form of media and we all know there's more to tell.
3.14 Dragon There's no limit on how big you can make a book, and no requirement for everything to fit into one book. They also don't have to include everything. Neil Gaiman's Norse Mythology doesn't include every tidbit of the Norse Mythos, it just contains the most important/popular stuff.
Check out the Dungeoncast... They go over tons of lore for DnD with a focus on 5e, but they'll discuss how the lore has changed over the years and editions too.
Interesting the mutability of elves makes me wonder what would happen to elves if the settle in a mutable place like limbo. Would they regain their original state and once again be able to use their ability to shift their form ?
That would be with the Fey as they stayed in the realm as they are permitted with the grace of the elven gods. They can become different forms such as gaseous shapes, as a result of the magic. Shadowfell seems interesting but I could rant about them
I'm eager to know where Eilistraee and Vhaeraun, Lolth's and Corellon's twin children, fit in this revised elven history. In their original story, Vhaeraun joined his mother's coup and was then exiled with her, while Eilistraee chose to share the fate of the drow to bring them her light in the dark times that she saw coming. I've always really liked them, hope they get a little spotlight too.
Yeah, likely, but since this takes a "Multiversal approach", with smaller sections dedicated to the various races in the different worlds, I'd really be happy to see how Eilistraee and Vhaeraun and the Realmsian drow fit into this new story.
Been playing mine since 4th Edition, Wizard/Warlock Hybrid; character hit a bit past the Entrancing Mystic Paragon path. Currently continuing the storyline of the character in 5th as a School of Enchantment Wizard alongside some of the original group members. "It's quite charming~" ;p "Forever may he reign; bound to the Kingdom of Mithrendane.", - Unknown Scribe to Astinus
in all honesty I'm not crazy about the fey step options. I like the spring one because the way that functions is directly linked to the fey step in the first place; teleporting someone else instead of yourself. But the other ones don't make as much in-game sense. Why is charming someone directly connected to when you teleport? I'm definitely more likely to play eladrin now than I originally was, it's more interesting than just giving them cantrips like high elves already get, but I feel like the seasonal fey step options other than spring could use some (albeit slight) tweaking
I'm not a 5th ed guy, I DM Pathfinder, but Great Corellon, this is the best take on elves of all editions! Fluff-wise is almost everything I always wanted!
4:45 This always confuses me. Didn’t Lolth betray Corellon all the way back when he lost his eye to Gruumsh? Wasn’t her betrayal what led to the elves being born in the first place?
I thought I commented on this months ago, but I guess it was a similar video. I know that when this video was initially made, MToF hadn’t come out quite yet, but I will try and give a quick review (though I’ve also given it elsewhere). I like that MToF kept the genderfluidy of the Seldarine, Corellon in particular. They can be either male or female. The elves have always viewed them this way (see Cormthanyr: Empire of the Elves). While Corellon in particular has always been this way, it was also nice to see that others, such as Sehanine, who is often depicted as Corellon’s consort, is known to be both genders. I also like that the elven legend of being born from Corellon’s blood is more factual now. The shifting form of the eladrin (such as the seasons) is also rather poetic. But some of the lore seems drastically changed. Elves have longed believed in reincarnation, but previously, Arvandor was viewed as a final reward, a place to be among their gods. But in Mordenkainen’s, Arvandor seems treated as a temporary rest stop, before they *have* to be reincarnated, unless they are the remaining primal elves (fey) and live in Arvandor. And elves who don’t undergo Transcendence are denied access to Arvandor, and their soul just “goes to other planes”? That is rather vague, even if we assume elves who worship non-Seldarine deities go to the realm of that god. It was just enough of a change to make me notice. And, while this video doesn’t touch much on the drow, I must say, I wasn’t really happy with the lore change regarding them. Vhaeraun’s lore has changed (he’s silent, and his followers cut their tongues and act as body guards? What?), and drow are treated as essentially soulless, with no one knowing what happens to them when they die, though Eilistraeens go up in a “burst of moonlight”. I don’t understand why drow don’t get a defined afterlife. Not that being in Lolth’s realm is a cakewalk, but they don’t even go there?
Has anyone noticed that both Crawford and Mearls are super soft spoken, to the point where you have to crank up the volume the really hear what they're saying?
I'm playing an Eladrin cleric in my current campaign, and my friend playing as wood elf is confused every time I Fey Step. It's the little things you learn to treasure.
So, are there now humanoid eladrin, fey eladrin and celestial eladrin? Or just humanoid eladrin and fey eladrin, some of the latter being fey in Arvandor?
The line between true fey (especially Archfey) and celestials is pretty thin. The line between them and the celestials of a fey divine realm? Does it even matter?
So I was wondering, I remember reading somewhere that fey don’t age (I might be wrong) and because eladrin are so heavily connected to/are fey does that mean that you could have an eladrin who’s lived for thousands of years or do they just age the same as other elves? I don’t really expect an answer to this but if I did get one it would be amazing.
A Horizon Walker Ranger Eladrin (or Shadar-kai) would be really cool, coming and going freely between the planes... :D I've been meaning to play a Horizon Walker anyway, so I ever get to play in the right campaign, I think I'll make it happen. 😄
Excellent video. I just think it makes more sense that the Elves are descended from the Archfey, who are in turn descended from the Gods rather than that accidently born from spilled blood myth.
Says who? The ones in my setting do more or less and they are also in keeping with what we now know to be true of the universe in terms of the origin of planets and stars etc. A little realism can make the fantasy much more believable.
It is pretty confusing if it did happen. They were fighting over where the Elves and Orcs were going to live but neither race had been created yet and wouldn't have been if they hadn't fought about them?
I made an eladrin wild sorcerer, and something kinda went awry. So, I rolled on the arcane origin table in Xanathar's guide, and decided that I am the reincarnation of a great old one. so, how did my soul get entangled with the elven incarnation cycle, and what does that mean for things like the Awakening?
I wasn't sure if I wanted this book, but hot dang, if this is the sort of content I can expect I am so down. At first I was hesitant since I don't really play in the published settings (I know a lot of people don't), but there's so much juicy stuff in there to work with and steal!
"Fey ancestry" is a bit confusing term, many homebrew races use that left and right for every fey creature :D even though their monster manual counterparts doesn't have it
Right? I made a Faun based on the Satyr in the MM and previous iterations of the idea, and several people tried to convince me that as a fey it needed to have that trait. I'm like...no, that's an elf trait.
How did Eladrin become elves? Family Drama, & tossing the kids out a the celestial nest into the Fey whereas the Drow came to be by going the other path following the traitorous Lolth. Then from in the Fey the Elves left to migrate. In short, Elves came from Migrating to different realms because their Daddy was having his tamper tandrum
Charisma casting is kind of weird as the Eladrin, I had always thought of the Fey stuff as more nature based but I guess paladins, sorcery and warlocks are more common in Eladrin societies? I mean a choice had to be made and I'm happy it wasn't intelligence since that would be stepping on the high elf toes, but Charisma seems a bit random. Elves who have been around for years, wise to the dangers of the warped natural beauty of the fey. Maybe it's just the mutable nature of the Eladrin that make them so hard to pin down for me when it comes to caster types.
Wasn't a fan of the "seasons" element as presented in Unearthed Arcana, but this makes it at least sound a bit more palatable - especially bringing in the permanent season and association with the archfey.
True, I wasn't necessarily wild about the seasons, but I think when roleplayed right characters would naturally gravitate towards a single season as they get older. My main problem is that spring and autumn are very similar and they could have done so much more with autumn. If they leaned more on the entropy and waning side of autumn they could have conceptualized it as a season of wonder, curiosity and fear. The season of mysteries, magic, death and curiosity about the world. I'd personally add a "charm or fear" effect to the autumn misty step and make the base emotion associated with it "awe and wonder", whether born out of curiosity or fear, or both.
To make another comment (I know this video has been up for over a year now, and MToF has been out almost as long), in rewatching this video, I like that they kept the elf creation story of elves being born of Corellon's blood. I have always liked that. I have always loved Corellon. I don't like that they made him/her (again, I like that they kept the fact the Seldarine can be either gender) so distant, but the fact he cast the elves out "in sorrow" does suggest he had grown to love the primal elves. Again though, I don't like how Arvandor is now treated as a temporary summer home for elven spirits before being reincarnated. While elves have always believed in reincarnation, Arvandor used to be a reward. Exceptions of course are those eladrin who have been gifted with the invitation to live in Arvandor. But that doesn't apply to "regular" elven spirits. The spirits still go to Arvandor when they die, but they don't get to stay there (they are instead reincarnated). Again, elves have always believed in reincarnation, but I liked that it wasn't forced on them. MToF implies that it is now, because elves are denied permanent access. I love elves, and gods, so the lore of the elven pantheon in particular means a lot to me.
Anyone else want to play an Eladrin wild magic sorcerer whose inherent magical ability is chaotic and unpredictable because they're no longer in the feywild?
All of the elves turn from Corellon to Lolth; they develop into the various kinds of elves; all but the drow turn back to Corellon; Corellon casts all of the elves out of Arvandor; all of the elves go to the Feywild; all but the Eladrin go to other planes.
Because they were fey before they went to the feywild, because Avandor is also a place of Fey magic. It's the divine Feywild, more or less. Corellon himself is a Fey god.
Just got my book. These elves look great from a role play perspective but I feel like they need more traits to make them better. The fey step is cool but I feel like it's not enough...
So what about Chaotic Good celestials? How are they called in 5th edition? Making eldarin a subrace of elves was one of the most loathed by me design change. :/
The eladrin that went back to the plane with Corellon are the chaotic good "celestials." They're one and the same. They live in a celestial fey plane, I mean, there's next to no difference between celestial or fey at that point.
Thurman stevenson Sure! Just as there are half-drow, etc. I'm playing a character that's half Eladrin and half Dryad. Stat-wise shes just an Eladrin but the features of the Eladrin just scream with natural dryadlike flavor.
That doesn't sound like any of the stories I've heard about DnD elves. Certainly not the way the elves came to be in Greyhawk. I'm going to ignore this.
Lessons Learned well, this is for the forgotten realms after all. If you are playing in another world it might not be relevant, and if you are playing homebrew then you can either ignore it or use it for inspiration
This is multiversal. This is the canon for 5e, regardless of world, barring DM intervention. Obviously most of this will be ignored in my Eberron game, but since it has no mechanical weight, who cares?
I care, because I care about lore. Lore is important to my game. And that is the problem, that they are making something that clearly has FR roots and making it multiversal.
I want LaShay give me stat blocks for LaShay! (My character is going to use true polymorth to become one,everything is the same except the race is illegal and insane but hey it's 9th level spell so it's fair :P)
Warboss West One of Tolkien's elf factions were the Eldarin, which I think is where this (non-copyright-infringing) name came from, but that's probably why you were pronouncing it that way after hearing it in the movies and stuffs.
Eladrin: "The Elfiest of the Elves" ... It's funny, but it definitely makes sense!
Eladrin: because we had wood elves, high elves, dark elves, sea elves, and now elf elves.
And now Space/Alien Elves
I think my favorite part of Eladrin is where he takes Jasmine on the magic carpet ride.
Here's he is! Prince Eladi
. . .baller.
I've got a player in my campaign who is an Eladrin Wild Magic Sorcerer. We talked a lot about how her seasonal transformation affects her Wild Magic Surges as well. Now when this book comes out...oh its gonna bring so much more chaos.
I always thought the Fey Step feature the Eladrin from UA had was a little dry...so getting rid of the cantrips for a cooler feature seems pretty awesome.
I never wanted to play an eladrin until now. Props for bringing up the old celestial eladrin from AD&D-they're what I remember, and never quite got why they were a PC race now.
Two elves walk into a bar.
Oh great, now we have Bar Elves!
A group of Elves stares at a mirror: the origin of the Sevle. A group of Elves goes to live underground: the origin of the Delves.
Like the Drow? xD @@woodrobin
two elves walk into a barN xD
Somewhere way out west, Wil Wheaton has begun vibrating at dangerous frequencies.
Can't wait for an eventual Fey/Shadowfell adventure book.
curse of strahd can take place in the shadowfell if you so choose.
Feywild! Feywild! I wanna see some Archfey.
Absolutely. Would love a hardcover campaign focused on archfey.
Feywild time
4th edition has a "heroes of the feywild" supplement for those who can't wait ✌️
Keep these videos coming! Your effort is incredibly respected and appreciated. Thank you to everyone involved.
A fun way to roleplay the seasons of Eladrin without breaking rules is that you can change your season whenever you want in order to change your color, but the DM knows which season you choose after each long rest for the Fey Step (like you also have to tell your chosen proficiencies for that day).
I play an Eladrin druid who is an entertainer, and every time he sings, his color changes depending on the mood of the song. I even played him changing really fast along with the lyrics of Grace Kelly: "I could be brown, I could be blue, I could be violet sky ..." you get the point.
Mr Crawford certainly knows what he is talking about
He helped make it, so yeah.
I love how ur knowledge comes across....its so hard to find people who can grasp even a fraction of the D&D world....
I like the Fey Step more, because it's brings something new instead of "here's a cantrip, have fun".
Marcus Hill so far we know a few of the seasonal effects, Summer deals fire damage with fey step, Spring Charms, Winter crap I forgot. I don't know what Autumn does.
Gyor Gyor Would you mind sourcing that? I'm currently playing an Eladrin and would super appreciate that over a random cantrip.
Slubbergully My source is this video, he says Summer's Fey Step deals damage and that another charms, which obviously would be spring although he doesn't mention the season for the charming version of Fey Step.
Gyor Gyor Ah. So he does mention that. My apologies -- I had somehow missed that.
My only beef with Fey Step in 5e is that its a combat mechanic and not a racial thing.
But most racial things are treated as combat mechanics I think.
In my games I have the Eladrin player have a separate pool of movement which comes back on a short rest for Fey Step. He gets 20 feet total so if he moves 5 feet at a time he gets to use it 4 times between short rests.
I like to think of the fact that the Eladrin have this as a racial ability so to them it's part of how they live, no different from having eyes or a tongue. So buildings are probably built with it in mind; absent doors creatures who need to walk might use, things like that.
It would be like Arakocraa making a village one a mountain peak.
I really want to play a very Fey inspired character and go with Eladrin who is either a Glamour Bard, Archfey Warlock, or Dream Druid
Oh... what about a Archfey Warlock and Arcane Trickster Rouge multi-class or better yet two players whose backstory allowed them time in the realm of the Fey??
Am doing an Eladrin Archfey Warlock right now, actually. She’s still teenage in elf years, so I swap my season randomly each day, to go with the chaos of it.
Certainly makes for an...interesting play style, to say the least, but I love it personally.
I'm going with an Eladrin Barbarian.
Don't ask, I don't know what I'm doing, but it's fun.
I have an aasimar whose parents were Eladrin elves. She's a Glamour Bard.
I'm playing an Eldritch knight eladrin
The Eladrin have always been fascinating to me, so I'm excited to see more about them in the new book. :)
I had a great Eladrin called Trixa Trance. Trixa was an eladrin bard of the college of glamour who worked in one of the high courts. One day she was writing a new song in the woods where a crow court her attention. The crow lead her to a Annis Hag who charmed Trixa and, over the course of a few months, convinced Trixa to attack the fey queen. She failed and was banished from the feywild. With no memory she got by off her natural musical and comedic skills. A 100 years or so later she starts to get her memories back and that’s where the campaign picked up.
My favorite race! I can't wait to see how they function in Mordenkainen's. I've been playing a character based on the UA Eladrin that is actually half-Eladrin half-dryad constantly in the "spring". The whole seasonal and Fey theme fits her so well.
This seems like a match made in heaven for a Glamour Bard...already imbued with Fey magic, the special effects of Misty Step mesh well with a support character.
I mean, the "Mantle of Inspiration" is essentially teleporting your allies into better positions...and the "otherworldly" grace fits the description of Glamour Bards.
Hm. Curious to see what the Fey Step effect is. Sounds more interesting than the cantrip options.
Based off the Unearthed Arcana Eladrin, Fey Step is essentially a free Misty Step once per short or long rest.
But as per the interview, there are additional effects beyond just the Misty Step. I think those secondary effects are what Jackson was referring to.
Misty step
Jackson Bockus my guess is Winter is either an AoE slowing or Fear effect, or maybe something like a one-round version of the Armor of Agathas spell.
let me guess what the effects are. Spring = Charm, Autumn = Fear, Summer = Fire, Winter = Frost.
I currently play an Eladrin Druid and it's a lot of fun. I use a d4 that I roll after every long rest to determine what season she's in. Sometimes though, I change it by choice based on events the day before. Such as last session I chose winter, because we had just buried a team mates parents. It's a big challenge from an RP perspective to play one because of the shifting personalities, but that's what makes it so fun!
Would you mind giving a player some advice on role play? She's a century old eladrin wildfire druid trapped in shadowfell (one of the worst places for eladrin to be stuck in) and is going to be played as coming off as extremely fey and chaotic. I'm not sure how to role play the seasons or even playing a character so influenced by her lifelong exposure to the fey and recently, the shadowfell as well. It feels like I'll be role playing an alien
@@konankunoichi94 That's a tough one. I think the best advice I can give is to try and think what your character would say or do in certain situations. Don't go by -your- instinct, but feel what seems tatural to your character. Another one is to not use her seasons as a way of determining who she is that day. Give her a set personality and use the seasons to flesh it out. Is she summer today? Then she won't respond to injustice calmly. She will march her way through and fix it! Is she winter? Then she will contemplate the injustice and find a way to approach it diplomatically. Or if she is fall and the situation is a party she is more likely to drink too much than she would if she was spring. If she was spring at a party, she would bounce around, talk to everyone, be bubbly and carefree. But in the end, what she thinks makes something injust, who she likes etc is the same. The seasons change how she reacts. I hope that helped and I hope you will have tonnes of fun with her. Wildfire druid sounds great. Good luck!
Fascinating! I really love these lore videos!
I could listen to this guy all day.
You guys need to make an adventure book called, ”Into the Faywild”
Am waiting for someone to sat " elves are the eladrins' hill billy cousins"...
Well to be fair they were the one so that stayed in the Fey after their Daddy kicked them out of their only home. Then all the rest went on to becoming the elves we know by immigrating throughout the realms of D&D
That's wood elves and the elves in NADDPOD.
I like the way that elves are treated in 5ed. This is a nice way to bring back the eladrin.
We need Planescape book. Please make it happen, WoC!
Can you guys please release a book/audiobook like Neil Gaiman's Norse Mythology, where it's just a collected set of origins and lore of the D&D worlds? We've got 40+ years of lore that's really difficult to get ahold of, let alone often simply finding in between work/social life and planning for the next campaign session.
I LOVE these videos, but I feel like they're limited by the form of media and we all know there's more to tell.
It is so massive, you couldn't contain it in one book. Don't even get me started on the multiverse.
3.14 Dragon There's no limit on how big you can make a book, and no requirement for everything to fit into one book. They also don't have to include everything. Neil Gaiman's Norse Mythology doesn't include every tidbit of the Norse Mythos, it just contains the most important/popular stuff.
Clearly. I've read that book, and it's only like four hundred pages. Small fry.
Check out the Dungeoncast... They go over tons of lore for DnD with a focus on 5e, but they'll discuss how the lore has changed over the years and editions too.
Interesting the mutability of elves makes me wonder what would happen to elves if the settle in a mutable place like limbo. Would they regain their original state and once again be able to use their ability to shift their form ?
That would be with the Fey as they stayed in the realm as they are permitted with the grace of the elven gods. They can become different forms such as gaseous shapes, as a result of the magic. Shadowfell seems interesting but I could rant about them
I saw the artworks for Spring and Autumn Eladrin! I swear, they should be Eladrin variants. They seem so fun to play around with~
3 years later but still a really helpful video
I can't wait for the book after this, Mr. T's Tomb of Foo's
what tha hell, i was drinkin juice when i read this , you almost killed me foo!
I'm eager to know where Eilistraee and Vhaeraun, Lolth's and Corellon's twin children, fit in this revised elven history. In their original story, Vhaeraun joined his mother's coup and was then exiled with her, while Eilistraee chose to share the fate of the drow to bring them her light in the dark times that she saw coming. I've always really liked them, hope they get a little spotlight too.
I'd imagine all of that is still true in Faerun, where those gods exist, while in worlds where they don't, it isn't.
Yeah, likely, but since this takes a "Multiversal approach", with smaller sections dedicated to the various races in the different worlds, I'd really be happy to see how Eilistraee and Vhaeraun and the Realmsian drow fit into this new story.
I come from the future to say MToF is pretty ambiguous about their origins.
If I hadn't already pre-ordered the book, I would've done it because of this video. I LOVE all the lore.
I look forward to my adventures as one.
I am playing an Eladrin now on D&D Beyond. It has been quite a blast using Misty Step to get into and out of trouble.
man i love your lore video. You make certainly a good DM.
Been playing mine since 4th Edition, Wizard/Warlock Hybrid; character hit a bit past the Entrancing Mystic Paragon path. Currently continuing the storyline of the character in 5th as a School of Enchantment Wizard alongside some of the original group members. "It's quite charming~" ;p
"Forever may he reign; bound to the Kingdom of Mithrendane.", - Unknown Scribe to Astinus
in all honesty I'm not crazy about the fey step options. I like the spring one because the way that functions is directly linked to the fey step in the first place; teleporting someone else instead of yourself. But the other ones don't make as much in-game sense. Why is charming someone directly connected to when you teleport? I'm definitely more likely to play eladrin now than I originally was, it's more interesting than just giving them cantrips like high elves already get, but I feel like the seasonal fey step options other than spring could use some (albeit slight) tweaking
I'm not a 5th ed guy, I DM Pathfinder, but Great Corellon, this is the best take on elves of all editions! Fluff-wise is almost everything I always wanted!
I like the ideia of the eladrin are connected with the seasons. It's a better ideia than elfs with wings or elfs that breath under water.
It certainly accomplishes something different, but I'd hardly say it's "better".
4:45 This always confuses me. Didn’t Lolth betray Corellon all the way back when he lost his eye to Gruumsh? Wasn’t her betrayal what led to the elves being born in the first place?
I thought we were getting more about Shadar-kai this time, but hey this is cool too.
Eyyyy my first D&D character was an Eladrin. So much fun.
I thought I commented on this months ago, but I guess it was a similar video. I know that when this video was initially made, MToF hadn’t come out quite yet, but I will try and give a quick review (though I’ve also given it elsewhere).
I like that MToF kept the genderfluidy of the Seldarine, Corellon in particular. They can be either male or female. The elves have always viewed them this way (see Cormthanyr: Empire of the Elves). While Corellon in particular has always been this way, it was also nice to see that others, such as Sehanine, who is often depicted as Corellon’s consort, is known to be both genders. I also like that the elven legend of being born from Corellon’s blood is more factual now. The shifting form of the eladrin (such as the seasons) is also rather poetic.
But some of the lore seems drastically changed. Elves have longed believed in reincarnation, but previously, Arvandor was viewed as a final reward, a place to be among their gods. But in Mordenkainen’s, Arvandor seems treated as a temporary rest stop, before they *have* to be reincarnated, unless they are the remaining primal elves (fey) and live in Arvandor. And elves who don’t undergo Transcendence are denied access to Arvandor, and their soul just “goes to other planes”? That is rather vague, even if we assume elves who worship non-Seldarine deities go to the realm of that god. It was just enough of a change to make me notice.
And, while this video doesn’t touch much on the drow, I must say, I wasn’t really happy with the lore change regarding them. Vhaeraun’s lore has changed (he’s silent, and his followers cut their tongues and act as body guards? What?), and drow are treated as essentially soulless, with no one knowing what happens to them when they die, though Eilistraeens go up in a “burst of moonlight”. I don’t understand why drow don’t get a defined afterlife. Not that being in Lolth’s realm is a cakewalk, but they don’t even go there?
Perfect for the Fey Druid i've been working on
The Eladrin are the Elfiest Elves indeed. They have more or less become my default Elf subrace.
The magic of the Feywild is really messing with the focus of the camera.
Has anyone noticed that both Crawford and Mearls are super soft spoken, to the point where you have to crank up the volume the really hear what they're saying?
I'm making one who's seasonal form is dependent on the lifestage he is in.
What would happen if elves spent centuries in the 9 hells, or the abyss or the mechanical plane of the modrons?
Tiefling Elves and mechaelves!
@@vecna2101 lol if Modron plane then maybe steampunk elves?!? Haha
I'm playing an Eladrin cleric in my current campaign, and my friend playing as wood elf is confused every time I Fey Step. It's the little things you learn to treasure.
So, are there now humanoid eladrin, fey eladrin and celestial eladrin? Or just humanoid eladrin and fey eladrin, some of the latter being fey in Arvandor?
The line between true fey (especially Archfey) and celestials is pretty thin. The line between them and the celestials of a fey divine realm? Does it even matter?
So I was wondering, I remember reading somewhere that fey don’t age (I might be wrong) and because eladrin are so heavily connected to/are fey does that mean that you could have an eladrin who’s lived for thousands of years or do they just age the same as other elves?
I don’t really expect an answer to this but if I did get one it would be amazing.
Love these videos. and LOVE Jeremy Crawford.
A Horizon Walker Ranger Eladrin (or Shadar-kai) would be really cool, coming and going freely between the planes... :D
I've been meaning to play a Horizon Walker anyway, so I ever get to play in the right campaign, I think I'll make it happen. 😄
Excellent video. I just think it makes more sense that the Elves are descended from the Archfey, who are in turn descended from the Gods rather than that accidently born from spilled blood myth.
Tosh Omni it's a creation myth, they aren't really meant to make sense.
Says who? The ones in my setting do more or less and they are also in keeping with what we now know to be true of the universe in terms of the origin of planets and stars etc. A little realism can make the fantasy much more believable.
It is pretty confusing if it did happen. They were fighting over where the Elves and Orcs were going to live but neither race had been created yet and wouldn't have been if they hadn't fought about them?
You'd think it would bother the Elves more that they owe their existence to the God of the Orcs.
They don't owe anything to any god but they one they were born from, so I don't see why it would bother them.
If Eladrin are “the elfiest of the Elves”, will we get similar things like “the dwarfiest of the Dwarves”, and “the most Draconic Dragonborn”?
Sam Guckian The most draconic dragonborn would probably just be a dragon
Felix Is Dying no, because Eladrin aren’t Fey, because they wouldn’t be Elves. A Dragon is not a Dragonborn.
Sam Guckian it joke
Felix Is Dying I still want these kinds of sub races.
I made an eladrin wild sorcerer, and something kinda went awry.
So, I rolled on the arcane origin table in Xanathar's guide, and decided that I am the reincarnation of a great old one. so, how did my soul get entangled with the elven incarnation cycle, and what does that mean for things like the Awakening?
It would be cool to get more about the SCAG elves (star, wild, winged).
I wasn't sure if I wanted this book, but hot dang, if this is the sort of content I can expect I am so down. At first I was hesitant since I don't really play in the published settings (I know a lot of people don't), but there's so much juicy stuff in there to work with and steal!
"Fey ancestry" is a bit confusing term, many homebrew races use that left and right for every fey creature :D
even though their monster manual counterparts doesn't have it
Right? I made a Faun based on the Satyr in the MM and previous iterations of the idea, and several people tried to convince me that as a fey it needed to have that trait. I'm like...no, that's an elf trait.
Because it makes sense, they are fey.
How did Eladrin become elves? Family Drama, & tossing the kids out a the celestial nest into the Fey whereas the Drow came to be by going the other path following the traitorous Lolth. Then from in the Fey the Elves left to migrate.
In short, Elves came from Migrating to different realms because their Daddy was having his tamper tandrum
Eladrin are so frickin’ cool
Charisma casting is kind of weird as the Eladrin, I had always thought of the Fey stuff as more nature based but I guess paladins, sorcery and warlocks are more common in Eladrin societies?
I mean a choice had to be made and I'm happy it wasn't intelligence since that would be stepping on the high elf toes, but Charisma seems a bit random. Elves who have been around for years, wise to the dangers of the warped natural beauty of the fey.
Maybe it's just the mutable nature of the Eladrin that make them so hard to pin down for me when it comes to caster types.
Fey are naturally charismatic, so a race that's been living in the Feywild since time immemorial is likely to take on more Fey attributes
It’s because everything in the Feywild has INNATE magic.
You have a really good way of saying the elves all followed Lolth lol
This is my jam. :)
castlewise this is my peanut butter.
The green light reflection on the glasses is super distracting. Focus keeps going in and out. Great to listen to though, thanks!
Wasn't a fan of the "seasons" element as presented in Unearthed Arcana, but this makes it at least sound a bit more palatable - especially bringing in the permanent season and association with the archfey.
True, I wasn't necessarily wild about the seasons, but I think when roleplayed right characters would naturally gravitate towards a single season as they get older. My main problem is that spring and autumn are very similar and they could have done so much more with autumn. If they leaned more on the entropy and waning side of autumn they could have conceptualized it as a season of wonder, curiosity and fear. The season of mysteries, magic, death and curiosity about the world. I'd personally add a "charm or fear" effect to the autumn misty step and make the base emotion associated with it "awe and wonder", whether born out of curiosity or fear, or both.
To make another comment (I know this video has been up for over a year now, and MToF has been out almost as long), in rewatching this video, I like that they kept the elf creation story of elves being born of Corellon's blood. I have always liked that. I have always loved Corellon. I don't like that they made him/her (again, I like that they kept the fact the Seldarine can be either gender) so distant, but the fact he cast the elves out "in sorrow" does suggest he had grown to love the primal elves.
Again though, I don't like how Arvandor is now treated as a temporary summer home for elven spirits before being reincarnated. While elves have always believed in reincarnation, Arvandor used to be a reward. Exceptions of course are those eladrin who have been gifted with the invitation to live in Arvandor. But that doesn't apply to "regular" elven spirits. The spirits still go to Arvandor when they die, but they don't get to stay there (they are instead reincarnated). Again, elves have always believed in reincarnation, but I liked that it wasn't forced on them. MToF implies that it is now, because elves are denied permanent access. I love elves, and gods, so the lore of the elven pantheon in particular means a lot to me.
In my world elves are a nomadic people so I can't wait to use Eladrin as their chiefs!
Anyone else want to play an Eladrin wild magic sorcerer whose inherent magical ability is chaotic and unpredictable because they're no longer in the feywild?
So wait, if Drow splintered off before the rest of the Elves came to the Feywild, how do they have Fey ancestry?
JewishPharaoh by colonizing the Feydark. Maybe there is a race that is to the Drow as Eldarin are to High Elves.
JewishPharaoh another possiblity, at interbreeding with other Elves.
All of the elves turn from Corellon to Lolth; they develop into the various kinds of elves; all but the drow turn back to Corellon; Corellon casts all of the elves out of Arvandor; all of the elves go to the Feywild; all but the Eladrin go to other planes.
The simplest answer might be that Corellan was an Archfey or at least related to them.
Because they were fey before they went to the feywild, because Avandor is also a place of Fey magic. It's the divine Feywild, more or less. Corellon himself is a Fey god.
Now I want a splinter faction of the original mutable elves that didn't listen to Lolth and kept their original formless powers.
Why does it matter how human like a race is? I think it's better when races are there own thing.
Humans are the baseline, a point of reference
I love this but it's so hard to get an extra planar into a material plane
Ravenloft and Planescape book please?
something new instead, please? ^^
Just got my book. These elves look great from a role play perspective but I feel like they need more traits to make them better. The fey step is cool but I feel like it's not enough...
Sea Elves incoming.
damn this dude can talk
Why would there be an eladrin that is a 1st level character?
Morgenrath why wouldn't there be?
The same reason an Aasimar, Tiefling, Warforged, or Dragonborn would be a 1st level character.
Ahh this is so helpful!!!
These are my bedtime stories
3:35 so elves are nepo Babies. Got it!
Don't tell me Wizards ripped off the Eldarin idea from Tolkien and only swapped two letters.
Do Eladrin have a similar lifespan as other elves, or does the Feywild impact their lifespan?
No source for this, but I'd guess they live longer thanks to magic saturation
Am I the only one that kept hearing him say "Wolth" when he tries to say it really fast, not Lolth??
I liked the "unbalanced" balance in Volo's playable races. I hope the eladrin are also somewhat over the top, compared to "mere mortals".
So what about Chaotic Good celestials? How are they called in 5th edition? Making eldarin a subrace of elves was one of the most loathed by me design change. :/
The eladrin that went back to the plane with Corellon are the chaotic good "celestials." They're one and the same. They live in a celestial fey plane, I mean, there's next to no difference between celestial or fey at that point.
Jacek Litka still Elves, including Eldarin born on Arborea are born celestials according to the DMG.
Mmmm. Delicious lore.
So um lol are there maybe half elf eladrin
Thurman stevenson Sure! Just as there are half-drow, etc. I'm playing a character that's half Eladrin and half Dryad. Stat-wise shes just an Eladrin but the features of the Eladrin just scream with natural dryadlike flavor.
I hope that we see half-elf variants for eladrin and shadar-kai.
These Eladrin sound awesome. If we're getting more playable races designed as well as these elves sound, then I'm even more hyped now for MToF.
What urcs me is that eladrin player race isnt fey... but the monster is? Bullshit.
That doesn't sound like any of the stories I've heard about DnD elves. Certainly not the way the elves came to be in Greyhawk. I'm going to ignore this.
Lessons Learned well, this is for the forgotten realms after all. If you are playing in another world it might not be relevant, and if you are playing homebrew then you can either ignore it or use it for inspiration
Which I am not happy with since now everything is FR, even iconic characters from Greyhawk. But yeah, it's fluff.
This is multiversal. This is the canon for 5e, regardless of world, barring DM intervention.
Obviously most of this will be ignored in my Eberron game, but since it has no mechanical weight, who cares?
I care, because I care about lore. Lore is important to my game. And that is the problem, that they are making something that clearly has FR roots and making it multiversal.
I guess the LeShay are not a thing anymore...
I want LaShay give me stat blocks for LaShay!
(My character is going to use true polymorth to become one,everything is the same except the race is illegal and insane but hey it's 9th level spell so it's fair :P)
I have been pronouncing Eladrin wrong, I called them Elderin.
Warboss West One of Tolkien's elf factions were the Eldarin, which I think is where this (non-copyright-infringing) name came from, but that's probably why you were pronouncing it that way after hearing it in the movies and stuffs.
Hopefully the Eladrin that are "more fey-like" are not player options.
They aren't. All player races are humanoid. Those eladrin are specifically fey, not humanoid.
Cool! When's non-elf stuff?
Come now D and D dudes isn't it silly to act like this is the first time origins of elves were tied together?
AEOFELLLL
Ick, this answers very few questions and spawns an unholy mess of new ones.