Illarion.org

I started this topic a while back on the vanima board, but now i'm curious to hear the veiws of other players of illarion.

I mean should we be the boring sweet gentle creatures that cries for 8 days when he accidentally steps on an ant.

Or a proud race with little tolerance of others behaviour.

Or..something else?

I want to know.

PO Thalodos (duh)

And before you bang on about Moonsilver... it's a great site and everything but it's description for elves (the english version at least) isn't that detailed.

I think you already know my opinion slightly.

Or a proud race with little tolerance of others behaviour.

And you said it perfectly.

Misj

I don't think elves should have any particular personality, really. Each one should be an individual. Although if you're asking for a characteristic of the race in general, I'd lean more towards a proud, arrogant race. But of course you need to eave room for individuals ^^

I wouldn't limit players to just one single interpretation of elf behaviour.

But maybe creating a separate tribe for every major elf philosophy would be a good idea so they all can have a community.

I don't mean 'indivisual' behaviour i just wonder if you agree with how elves are 'portrayed now.. (Treehugging hippies) or if you think these elves need to be more 'original' and not so 'lord of the ringsy'.

Personally, I veiw elves as more native-american like people who worship and respect nature. Using what they need but not "liek omg a tree was cut down!!!!111". I think treehugging is dumb and simply illogical. Bows? wood. Buildlings? some wood. Boats? wood. Staves? wood. Chairs? wood. Tables? wood. Vegetarianism is contridictory to not hurting living things because they know as well plants are living things too. I think they are very weary of outsiders and mysterious based on moonsilver.

Another thing i'd like to ask is violence? i mean the average illarion elf, will quite happily see his entire family killed before resorting to violence? is this logical?

I dont think we need to try and define how an elf should be as any character can be pulled off if some one has the inventive and descriptive ability.
An elf raised by orcs would be hilarious played by the right PO, How ever what i wish people would bear in mind is that elves are ancient and noble by nature.
Very often I will encounter a player who is playing elf but really that character is just a human with pointy ears.
I was tempted to write a long list of what i enjoy in an elf character but then again we fall into the trap of dictating RP and conclude X is good and Y is bad rp.
Simply remember an elf is not a human they are ancient beings who have so much time before or behind them they are near immortal. Consider what you wish to bring to an elf that sets them apart from a human one could play. As long as it is something different to a long eared human I am happy.

Violence, tolerance etc that’s character creation one could have a passive human and murdering elf.
The elf i play i attempt to bring a sense of wisdom how ever skewed, patience and grace beyond that of an average human. For me my elf is something ancient and mystical, an elf is more in tune to subtle rhythms and patterns about them. They posses self control from a hundred years of practice and in that living have garnered much insight.
Brian

I agree with brian, everyone could have a different idea of what an elf should be. Elves themselves would have different ideas of how they should act. This question can be posed to elf, orc, dwarf, halfling and lizard.

Well a mix off all of them would go nicely

Eliron is a vegetarian who cries when a tree dies. Yet he beleives elves should be proud and are superior to other races... He is also sly and intellegent, talking his way out of fights.

He is my idea of an elf.. what about yours?

Authors of moonsilver.de wrote:The reasons for the elven living ways lie in the elven nature. Elves can become very old, in fact, noone has ever seen an "old" looking elf. Since they don't speak of their age often, and don't seem to like being questioned about personal things, most humans will never learn the age of an elf. But there are reports of elves aged six or seven thousand years, still without looking older to the human eye.

Since elves can become that old, ( they count as "adult" with one hundred and eighty years ), they seem to think in other time periods than humans do. To a human, the patience of an elf can be almost unbearable.

Elves ( except for very young ones ) don't become angry easily. They have time. Time to think, and any problem caused by humans, simply solves itself with time. That's why most elves tend to act calm and friendly, they know that they don't need to get into trouble.

That's the part I find the most important on moonsilver. That's elven nature in a nutshell. I only played one elfess on Illarion so far, but that is generally the essence of any fantasy elf I've ever roleplayed, because they all share the trait of very long lives. Personally though, I try to help out players with this when playing other races and interacting with elves. I consider it somewhat a responsibility to RP my humans as more rash and impatient than elves; this automatically generates a contrast most of the time if the elf-player picks up on it.

Moirear Sian wrote:

Authors of moonsilver.de wrote:The reasons for the elven living ways lie in the elven nature. Elves can become very old, in fact, noone has ever seen an "old" looking elf. Since they don't speak of their age often, and don't seem to like being questioned about personal things, most humans will never learn the age of an elf. But there are reports of elves aged six or seven thousand years, still without looking older to the human eye.

Since elves can become that old, ( they count as "adult" with one hundred and eighty years ), they seem to think in other time periods than humans do. To a human, the patience of an elf can be almost unbearable.

Elves ( except for very young ones ) don't become angry easily. They have time. Time to think, and any problem caused by humans, simply solves itself with time. That's why most elves tend to act calm and friendly, they know that they don't need to get into trouble.

That's the part I find the most important on moonsilver. That's elven nature in a nutshell. I only played one elfess on Illarion so far, but that is generally the essence of any fantasy elf I've ever roleplayed, because they all share the trait of very long lives. Personally though, I try to help out players with this when playing other races and interacting with elves. I consider it somewhat a responsibility to RP my humans as more rash and impatient than elves; this automatically generates a contrast most of the time if the elf-player picks up on it.

However I must say, that this description of elves is rather vague, and I hope (I think) it is getting redone. And to the ones who do like the elves another way, just start a different elven community, with a different structure and moral values. Just my 4 cents =3.

Oh and Sian, black is terrible. And, I always tried to pick up onto the rash and entirely differnent from Misjbar Moirear Sian.

I am sorry, but I think a certain vagueness ensures a certain degree of creativity within reasonable borders.

I do agree however that if you want elves to be greatly different, why not start seperating into different communities?

Why I'd prefer to be vague about elves, is because all races are vaguely described; and it's allowed to deviate from any "rule" there, as long as it makes sense.

Also, what's good and at the same time not good about those racial descriptions on moonsilver, is that they mix culture and nature and make both rather vague. What shouldn't be vague is the racial nature; culture may be as vague as however as people should fill in some blanks there themselves.

Authors of moonsilver.de wrote:Most do not like fighting, but they seem to be traditionally skilled in the use of bows and long, one handed swords.

This is contradictory to itself at best, but what exactly is wrong about that? A racial portfolio in a fantasy RPG should also have some cultural molds to fit in, and this is just another example for that idea that variation is necessary.

What I'm saying is, there are always exceptions, deviations, and aberrations. The exception makes the rule. I think it's a pretty silly thing to dictate beyond a racial description like that how a race of characters must be played (although Moonsilver sure needs some work in that area.)

Don't you remember that time when there were alot of dwarves around, and almost all of them seemed the same in personality? That's not really the idea of an RPG, either, I don't think.

Don't you remember that time when there were alot of dwarves around, and almost all of them seemed the same in personality? That's not really the idea of an RPG, either, I don't think.

Galim and Ghorn were and are not like other dwarves!!! To be honest I seldom see really dwarves who are really dwarflike. And I try my best with my own dwarves to give others an idea how dwarves should and could be.

I play Ghorn like a true bastard of a tough dwarf, and what happens? The peoples don't know how dwarves really are and want to kill him because of a simple "longleg", lol.