Elven start age

[JusticeZero]

So in all the versions of D&D I've dealt with, elves start adventuring after two lifetimes of being a kid and having spent longer to learn their trade than the other party members have been alive. Leaving the question of what the heck are they DOING that whole time? There's two pieces to that.
One, adolescence. I can imagine kid elves being kept at home because they don't even hit puberty until close to a century, and it hits suddenly and hard. That still leaves a lot of time for kid elves to get in trouble though, almost to the extent that you could even have two "races" out of the whole thing.

Secondly, they spend a lot of time learning their first level. Seriously a LOT of time. Do Elves just love really awful educational systems or something? You can wax poetic about spending years perfecting the basics, but "wasting time" is usually a pretty universal concept. If you take twenty years to teach how to do a basic task that everyone else manages to learn in one year, it doesn't matter how sublime they do it. Sublime can come later. It means that you wasted nineteen years on unimportant stuff.

So what am I missing here?

[toapat]

So what am I missing here?

Those pointy ears? Those are radio antennas.

Elves actually are fully mature at age 25. you just cant get them motivated till they have watched HBO for 75 years more on their parrent's couch.

Basically, there is always some expansion that at least notes that elves mature while not reasonably quickly at least passibly enough for a reality where a dragon will take 400 years. They just never explain what they do for the remaining century

So the standard response is Elves have HBO and the AEthernet.

[JusticeZero]

I'd think that that would be better shown with a huge variance in start age - say, 20+1d100. The ridiculously high numbers make it hard to figure out what was going on over all that time more than it helps communicate anything about elf culture.

[KillianHawkeye]

Despite it being a common joke, elves don't actually spend decades in diapers. In fact, they become physically mature about as quickly as the other races do.

The difference with elves is usually depicted as a lack of mental or emotional maturity that really does take a long time to develop. Basically, they spend decades acting like teenagers, frolicking among the trees and playing pranks and generally getting over all of that sylvan fey nonsense that is second-nature to them.

Or from another perspective, a 200 year old elven parent is unlikely to take a 30 year old "kid" seriously enough to let them do anything important. Couple that with the idea that elves probably dabble a little bit in everything before deciding what they really want to do with their lives (and by dabble, I mean spend a couple of years trying something out), and that there are a ton of elven traditions that they need to learn about on top of all that, and it's pretty easy to see why an elf doesn't really start learning actual class skills until they're like a hundred years old.

Also, it takes them a while to master that "better than you" attitude that they like so much. Probably. :smallwink::smallamused:

[Yora]

In my setting, elves are fully grown at 24 and gain full adult status at 32. Then they live to about agen 300 until their age starts to show and it's very rare for anyone to make it to 400.

[JusticeZero]

Sure, but if they're dabbling, they could be dabbling in something adventurous earlier on. It's just hard to plan around.

[Hand_of_Vecna]

Ya, elves are weird. If you go by the numbers in the book, elves either spend 70ish years in a state equivelent to a twenty something modern adult living with their parents or their immaturity resembles someone with severe learning disabilities who needs near constant supervision to do relatively simple tasks.

In either case they should still have more to show for it at starting age, even if it was just 2 ranks in a bunch of random skills (skilled but not, professional) and maybe some extra gear to represent a decade or two of hobbyist crafting.

In my own world I kept the starting ages, but had elves enter real apprenticships that gave them a minimum starting age higher than 1.

[Xuc Xac]

Elves grow up, get married after a long courtship, have kids, work at basic commoner type jobs to support the community, enjoy some wine with friends, watch their children get married, and help raise their grandkids. Once the grandkids are grown, an elf is ready to retire and start enjoying the riskier side of life.

Adventuring is the elvish equivalent of traveling the world to spend your kids' inheritance. Why would such a long lived race risk getting killed and losing all those centuries? Because they've already lived a fulfilling life of love, family, and community. After that first century, it's "me time".

[JusticeZero]

Which of course doesn't resemble anyone's background.. :smalltongue:
Is there anything "official"? Or even several contradictory" official" stances? Anything in commonly cited inspiration for elves?

[VoxRationis]

By the book is kind of odd. I've actually thought of it as the opposite of the "matures at 25." Elves have longer lives and slenderer hips than humans, which means they're probably born even more "prematurely," proportionally, than humans are compared to great apes. Which means that they are born with time to do a lot of quick mental development but take time to get ready to do the physical development. Therefore, what they do is spend all that time doing largely mental tasks while getting ready to be physically capable enough to go out and about.

[Esprit15]

One of my friends in his setting gives them a few racial levels. Elf adventurers are already older than most of the party put together, and it should show by having more experience: a wider set of skills that your average would have, perhaps more nimble reflexes and better (or worse) skill with weapons due to trying a little bit of everything. Maybe treat Elf levels as levels in your first class to prevent elf casters from being crap and represent them still having time to learn a specific craft. No actual level adjustment, because LA is annoying as heck and being an elf isn't [i]that awesome.

[Angelalex242]

Depends on which genre you're in.

Tolkien Elves...

Yeah, your basic sylvan/sindarin elves are LA 0...

But Noldor are LA +2, at least (As far beyond normal elves as drow are above standard elves)

Caliquendi are LA +4 (Now you're just half celestial, flat out.)

[Talentless]

Well, was a while back when I saw what I adopted as my personal take on why. Was a thread on this board, can't remember or find the link to the post though.

But basically boils down to an Elf's lack of natural sleep, which for everyone else that actually has to sleep is the time that short term memory gets added to the long term memory archive.

So, it takes about 70ish years to learn how to meditate properly/ do whatever it is that allows elves to turn short term memory into long term memory.

To use an analog, Elves are born without hard drives for their systems, and it takes around 70 years to install the hard drive upgrade that lets them learn to be productive.

[Mr Beer]

It's problematic because they are somehow unable to get that first level for ages, then they can suddenly start levelling up like everyone else. This is kind of inherent to D&D anyway, it's just more obvious when someone starts adventuring at age 115 or whatever and by 117 they are now level 12.

I think the explanations above (delayed emotional maturity, restrictive adults etc.) are good enough to handwave it away. I like the idea of a lower floor to the starting age though, I think that's the simplest solution.

[JusticeZero]

Or even just a better explanation. It both begs adressing in a background, and is left without models to pattern it after. Which makes backgrounds difficult. It's hard to discuss your childhood when your race's childhood is a freakish black box.

[Mr Beer]

Or even just a better explanation. It both begs adressing in a background, and is left without models to pattern it after. Which makes backgrounds difficult. It's hard to discuss your childhood when your race's childhood is a freakish black box.

If you want to keep it is canon then delayed emotional maturity probably fits best. It's not something I would worry about too much because D&D has so much material that's questionable from any realistic perspective, this is pretty far down the list.

[Milo v3]

Iirc in Races of the Wild it basically says that during that first century they do a mix of "gaining skills" and having really severe ADD. Where they change what they are working on so often that they don't really get good at anything till the later years.

[Oneris]

So, it takes about 70ish years to learn how to meditate properly/ do whatever it is that allows elves to turn short term memory into long term memory.

So elves are goldfish for 70 years? :smalltongue:

[Angelalex242]

Worse, they're magikarps, except they take 70 years to evolve into useful. :P

[SickBritKid]

One of many reasons that I used the Half-Elf age table(because my character is a Half-Elf in-character) while using the Elf ability template(because the Half-Elf abilities are mediocre and worthless). So he can be at a reasonable age of maturity while also getting a decent lifespan(seeing as he doesn't hit Middle Age until 55).

[The Insanity]

I ignore starting age guidelines.

[Averis Vol]

I basically just accepted that elves were bad at life, and to match the tenacity of the overly ambitious humans, they have to work a lot harder. This sounds a little base, and, well, knowing me as well as I do it's intentionally dickish. But it's the only thing that really makes sense to me without being handed a better reason.

I know in my game, I've changed elves up a lot. In essence they come from small DNA seeds that were stored on the moon, but once collided with a meteor, got dropped deep into a wild forest. So they spread like dandelions and the first fe generations were raised by the sylvan creatures in the forest. As such, the sylvans tend to jerk the elves around a lot with things of like riddles that lead to no conclusion, jokes, etc, etc. Once they became fully established race they still really only had those poor teaching methods to teach their youth by, so once they reached maturity at the age of 20, they were taught by their spawners for another 30ish years and then forced into military service until they spawned youth of their own to take their place.

They become physically mature enough to spawn at the age of 75, so they are relieved of military service at about, 95 years of age when their "Children" take over. They are then effectively retired, and free to do as they wish. Some become lazy good for nothings, but most pick up jobs and crafts and the other things that make civilisation go round, while even fewer go off and adventure. That being said, elves live to about 200 years, so once they're free to be adventurers, they're about half way through their lives, but their physical bodies start to decay at about, 115.

[Kalmageddon]

I ignore starting age guidelines.

/thread. :smallamused:

[Cikomyr]

Elves have a very, very slow reproductive cycle. That doesnt necessarily mean slow gestation, but maybe once-in-a-year ovulation.

So what do you think teenager immature elves during 60 years of safe sex? XD

[aldeayeah]

Caliquendi
California elves? :smallbiggrin:

by the way, speaking from memory here, but I'm pretty sure Noldor are Calaquendi

[Sidmen]

What you're missing is that you're trying to apply the Human traits of ambition and urgency to the elves - who don't have such traits in anything near the same levels as Humans do.

A human will begin learning at Age 6, and go to school 200 days a year for instruction until they are 22-25. Now, in a fantasy setting you will say "they don't go to school", but a player character's Class is special - it represents someone really well trained, so I respond with: they will probably spend the same amount of time and effort (condensed, if they're younger) to become a Level 1 adventurer.

Now, an elf will live for centuries, compared with a Human's bare 50+ years. Why should they be overly concerned with learning fast? Combine this with a more juvenile attitude for a much longer period and you have your answer. They don't spend years faffing about - they just put as much effort and attention into a week of school/training as you do in a day. Expecting them to do more is ridiculous - like expecting a kid to have mastered geometry and algebra by age 10.

Imagine Peter Pan, who has spent who knows how long in Neverland, but hasn't become an adult yet. That's the Fae, they simply don't grow and evolve as fast as we do.

So why do they level up as fast as Humans? Mostly because they have to. When they go out adventuring, they start living on Human time instead of Elven time. If they get to catch their breath and go home - they could easily wait for their Human adventuring companion to grow old and die before going out to adventure with his grandson - without having evolved too much or gained any levels in the meantime.

[toapat]

I'd think that that would be better shown with a huge variance in start age - say, 20+1d100. The ridiculously high numbers make it hard to figure out what was going on over all that time more than it helps communicate anything about elf culture.

i really would prefer if Elf starting age was ridiculously convoluted(like 20+(1d10)d6) to figure out then the current "you spent 80 years on the couch" or just made 25+XdY.

[Segev]

Warning: Two disparate interpretations will appear in this post. I'll try to clearly demark them.

First interpretation:

In my own setting that I ran, I made elves simply age at 1/10 human rate. This had some interesting (verging on jocular to fridge horror) consequences, but made calculating age and apparent age easy. I had them mentally mature a little slower on the low end and a little faster (relatively) on the high end, based on one biological factoid: elves don't sleep.

They have that trance state they enter, instead. In my setting, I treated this as a learned trait. Elves don't actually get tired and thus don't need to sleep if they don't want to. However, the phrase "days run together" is one that comes up with humans who don't sleep...and it becomes even more true for elves. They really can lose track of time if they let more than a full day-night cycle pass without trancing. Not just because it gets harder to count them, but because trancing and sleep serve at least one similar, important purpose to elves and humans.

In humans, one of the things we do when we sleep is sort through the events of the day, put them in context to recent and long-term memories, and store them in long-term memory. We do a lot of our actual permanent learning while we sleep, as things we learned that are in short-term memory get committed to long-term. It's why "sleeping on it" works so well for us in terms of contextualizing and understanding things, and can help us make decisions by bringing long-term knowledge into the same frame of mind as the decision-making criteria.

That is something elves need, too. Before they learn to trance, they have a very, very hard time learning. They get the motor skills down, but it takes them about 10x as long. They learn to talk. But they remain intellectually and knowledge-base immature as they forget things they've been told that just...slip away with time.

They are taught, over the course of decades, how to trance. As they get better at it, they take longer each night, and are able to maintain it longer and to more depth. They start to be able to process and learn information and skills on an intellectual level. Physically, their bodies and brains remain immature according to their 1/10-human age rate, so they are emotionally their apparent age all the time (as a general rule). But they finally start to learn at something like a human rate when they learn to trance correctly and thus are getting the equivalent of a night's sleep.


That's why they take so long to hit level 1, but are able to advance just like humans do beyond that point.


The second interpretation:

It's mostly cultural. This one I use for at least one character concept I have - an elven wizard who was adopted by humans as a small child. He grew up - mentally - in a human town, with no other elves around. Eventually, he made friends with humans his age. As is the nature of friends, he stuck with that group rather than making new ones his apparent age every year or two. His ambitions were sparked to keep up with his friends as they grew up. "Not growing up sucks" is kind-of a trope for him, as he views being still a kid when he's just as old as his nearing-adulthood friends as a problem. So he struggled and strove to learn and be ready for the stages of life his friends were entering, despite still being a (relatively) little boy, physically.

Thus, rather than 120, he's 30 and a first level wizard. But, being an elf (and not going with the "yeah they age normally then stop" interpretation), he looks like a not-so-small child (not quite a pre-teen). But other than the emotional maturity he has to wrestle with constantly, he's mentally in his early 20s by education and by life concerns (because his peers are 15-20 years old).

I'd probably use a Halfling's stats for him and call him an elf-kid.

But this interpretation relies on the elf's slow learning being cultural. Elves just don't expect adult behavior until the 90s at the earliest, and spending a couple decades on your schooling for the basics is a-okay when you live the lackadaisical life of an elf, studying a few things each week as the fancy strikes you. They advance as fast as other adventurers when they go adventuring because, again, the pressures are on to learn fast, both to keep up with your companions and to avoid dying horribly.

[JadedDM]

I'm with Sidmen. In fact, I think the Complete Book of Elves agreed with this. Basically, elves live for so long they aren't in a big hurry. Taking 20 years to learn a skill for a human is outrageous, but it's not very long at all for an elf.

When you have that much time, I don't think you'd live a very fast paced life at all.

What about dragons? They are even longer lived than the elves, and it's often said they sometimes take naps that last years.

Or if I can quote Star Trek Insurrection:

Picard: There's one thing I don't understand. In 300 years, you never learned to swim?
Anij: I just haven't got around to it yet.

[Angelalex242]

California elves? :smallbiggrin:

by the way, speaking from memory here, but I'm pretty sure Noldor are Calaquendi

Some Noldor are Caliquendi, but not all of them.

Basically, any Noldor born after the two trees are destroyed are Moriquendi and don't have the awesome bonuses.

[JusticeZero]

Taking 20 years to learn a skill for a human is outrageous, but it's not very long at all for an elf..
The thing is, I don't learn skill X in one year instead of 10 because i'm in a hurry. I learn skill X in one year because it's a fun diversion. If I have a good teacher, it might only take 8 months of painless fun. I'd still be doing it afterward, but i'd have advanced to higher level stuff of the same skill. To spend 10 years on getting to the 1 year mark requires a really very incompetent teacher.

[Esprit15]

Again, you are thinking in a human culture. We rush things a lot more than a race that has lives measured in centuries rather than decades. Think about school - What if you had to pass every class perfectly to move on to the next level, and there was no stigma around staying back a grade once, twice or five times until you got it right? 95% on the alchemy final? Hm, not bad. Another year and you'll be at around 98%!

When you have decades, you can afford to take time. Remember the saying: "Work is a gas. It expands to fill the time allotted."

[toapat]

Again, you are thinking in a human culture. We rush things a lot more than a race that has lives measured in centuries rather than decades. Think about school - What if you had to pass every class perfectly to move on to the next level, and there was no stigma around staying back a grade once, twice or five times until you got it right? 95% on the alchemy final? Hm, not bad. Another year and you'll be at around 98%!

When you have decades, you can afford to take time. Remember the saying: "Work is a gas. It expands to fill the time allotted."

this logic fails because if that was the case, Elves would have MBTs, interceptor aircraft, and have a total stranglehold on world politics by virtue of being able to manufacture something that Instagib's dragons and treats infantry like a very minor inconvenience.

You have to remember, DnD does assume that the scientific method does exist in universe. it is the basis of researched arcane power that wizards love to exploit

[Tvtyrant]

I usually have Elves start at the same age as everyone else, and the average Elf has a few levels on the average human due to their longer lives. There are a lot less of them though, and average is more like 150.

[Slipperychicken]

I prefer the biological approach: Elven minds and bodies are built to last, but it takes a very long time to develop something that enduring. As a result, elves take ~100 years to hit puberty, each decade being the rough equivalent of a human year of development.

[Erik Vale]

this logic fails because if that was the case, Elves would have MBTs, interceptor aircraft, and have a total stranglehold on world politics by virtue of being able to manufacture something that Instagib's dragons and treats infantry like a very minor inconvenience.

While I don't do this in established DnD settings, I do do basically this in my own setting. The elves are a I win button, why, because their natural abilities + hundreds of years focus on a career [should they do so], beating a elf in anything is mostly luck and brute force... And really really hard.
Oh, and the Elves are reclusive and don't particularly care about anyone else.



Warhammer and 40K attempt this as well... But fail really hard [High elves were really nasty last time I looked, but Eldar Autarchs who've given themselves over to their path completely, live for centuries, and are guided by millennia of ancestors? +1 Attack and call it a day. :smallconfused:]

[JadedDM]

The thing is, I don't learn skill X in one year instead of 10 because i'm in a hurry. I learn skill X in one year because it's a fun diversion. If I have a good teacher, it might only take 8 months of painless fun. I'd still be doing it afterward, but i'd have advanced to higher level stuff of the same skill. To spend 10 years on getting to the 1 year mark requires a really very incompetent teacher.

Right, but elves aren't quite as focused as humans are. Maybe you decide you want to learn painting. You play around with it for a couple of years, but then get bored and decide you want to try archery later. And so on, and so on, and then twenty years later you remembered you liked painting so give it another go. The assumption is that an elf won't sit down and focus on one skill for 8 months, but would rather dabble in lots of things over the years, sometimes taking long breaks between them.

[toapat]

Warhammer and 40K attempt this as well... But fail really hard [High elves were really nasty last time I looked, but Eldar Autarchs who've given themselves over to their path completely, live for centuries, and are guided by millennia of ancestors? +1 Attack and call it a day. :smallconfused:]

The problem with Eldar is that when they do it, they focus so much that any valuable non-primary thought is gone. To them, dedicating oneself to War means you become a Viking Berzerker, not a Reasonable Marine. An Autarch of sculpture would be incompetent when it comes to adding paint to the Sculpture because paint is an entirely separate discipline.

Granted, the only Canon factions that reasonably do engage in combat under a realistic millitary Doctrine are the Blood Angels and Imperial Guard's Armored divisions. Well, except for all of their tanks. Also everyone lacks drones to fight with.

[Slipperychicken]

Also everyone lacks drones to fight with.

Were UAVs even a thing when Warhammer 40K was being written?

[Erik Vale]

The theory's been around for ages, but the practice? I don't know.

However as for Autauchs becoming useless, that's why they lead squads, not armies. And someone who's an expert in cutting things up and has been one for mellenia [Striking Scorpions, Howling Banshees] shouldn't be having trouble killing a rank and file space marine [not that those two phrases really go together].

[SimonMoon6]

"On the Origin of PCs" addresses this briefly.

Basically, elves have a learning disability. :)

[toapat]

"On the Origin of PCs" addresses this briefly.

Basically, elves have a learning disability. :)

i think thats moreso a stealth joke at the raw stupidity of anything except for dragons taking a century to grow up. However its also true that in prop[er third elves took forever to grow up and had no loophole ala RotW

Rich hasnt handled that since but i think the comment would go RotW in terms of what they can do

[Sith_Happens]

Rich hasnt handled that since

"You have two children, both age 26..." (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0629.html)

[Coidzor]

I do prefer my Elf adventurers to be renegades who are the equivalent of teen runaways.

The ones who finished up in the society experience the equivalent of not being allowed to graduate from university with a bachelor's degree until one has completed several semesters' worth of unpaid internships, only instead of semesters, in this case it's basically decades of unpaid internships.

Elves are basically an object lesson in why such things are undesirable.

That said, Elves do spend a lot longer in diapers than any other sapient race I can recall. I can never quite decide if I want them to spend an entire Goblin's lifetime as Small creatures or not, though.


Were UAVs even a thing when Warhammer 40K was being written?

They were part of Sci-Fi at the time, I believe. They were probably even in development at some level in meatspace too. Warhammer 40K's from the late 1980s, and we didn't really start openly using them to kill until the 2000s, IIRC.


I prefer the biological approach: Elven minds and bodies are built to last, but it takes a very long time to develop something that enduring. As a result, elves take ~100 years to hit puberty, each decade being the rough equivalent of a human year of development.

Ah, yes, the "Contraception is the first thing we invented as a species" version of Elves.



Edit: One semi-Tolkien-inspired idea I had was that there's only so many Elven souls floating around, or at least, most Elves are reincarnated other Elves. Despite their birth rate being low, there's not always enough souls to go around for all of the elf bodies getting born.

So sometimes the elfling is fairly well into its development before its assigned soul catches up.

How much horror this entails is something I haven't quite determined yet.

[Sidmen]

Again, you are thinking in a human culture. We rush things a lot more than a race that has lives measured in centuries rather than decades. Think about school - What if you had to pass every class perfectly to move on to the next level, and there was no stigma around staying back a grade once, twice or five times until you got it right? 95% on the alchemy final? Hm, not bad. Another year and you'll be at around 98%!

When you have decades, you can afford to take time. Remember the saying: "Work is a gas. It expands to fill the time allotted."

I actually disagree with this. I've never seen elves (especially young elves) as perfectionists. Sure, an adult elf in fiction is often times superior - but they've usually been an adult for far longer than a hundred years. No, I've always seen elves more along the lines of faeries - they're mercurial, especially at younger ages.

An adolescent elf that wants to paint doesn't really want to be a painter - he just wants to grab some color and throw it on a canvas. Next week he'll want to do some smithing and hammer himself out some crude arrowheads. Both the painting and arrowheads are tossed away as unimportant (think of what happens to your kid's finger paintings or crafts projects when they're young), and the very next week he'll be really into yoga for a few days. An elf never gets good at any of his "hobbies", just like how I never got good at building things despite having constructed more than one tree fort in my youth.

At the same time he's doing all these things, he's running around with other adolescent elves doing things that make sober adults cringe. Playing pranks, getting into mischief, sneaking through the forest to catch glimpses of humans and halflings. City elves are probably a pain - breaking into buildings to play with the random crap stored in them and painting tag names on the walls.

The only good thing is that there aren't ever very many elven children running around at any one time. Elves aren't very fertile - they have one kid every century - maybe two if they're particularly virile. So, yes, adolescent elves probably spend weeks or months at a time exploring each others' bodies whilst hopped up on mushrooms and other easily attained drugs.

The thing to remember is that they neither have to, are biologically programmed to, nor particularly want to grow up as fast as humans do.

[Sartharina]

You have to remember, DnD does assume that the scientific method does exist in universe. it is the basis of researched arcane power that wizards love to exploitWhere the heck are you getting this? As far as I know, magic is an anti-science, powered by a mind's ability to accept nonsense and WTFery instead of remaining fixed on casuality, testability, and other things critical to the scientific method.

[Yuki Akuma]

Where the heck are you getting this? As far as I know, magic is an anti-science, powered by a mind's ability to accept nonsense and WTFery instead of remaining fixed on casuality, testability, and other things critical to the scientific method.

Wizards are basically magical scientists, though. They write spell formulas down, share research, test each other's theories, and even name their spells after themselves. Their casting stat is Intelligence because their approach to magic requires them to learn theories and then apply that knowledge.

I have no idea why you think D&D magic is powered by the mind's ability to accept nonsense. That's completely wrong. Except possibly in regards to the Wild Mage class.

Magic is the ability to manipulate underlying forces of reality - called the Weave in Forgotten Realms (and everywhere in 5e). Wizards do it scientifically. Others call on higher powers, or are just born with a natural talent.

[Coidzor]

Vancian Casting = Math Magicianery, no?

[The Insanity]

Magic is just science that we don't yet fully understand.

[SimonMoon6]

I can never quite decide if I want them to spend an entire Goblin's lifetime as Small creatures or not, though.

Hmmm, maybe Goblins are just elf larvae?

[Coidzor]

Hmmm, maybe Goblins are just elf larvae?

That'd explain their low numbers, only the ones that survive all the Adventurers can go on to become Elves.

And it might also tie into the whole "not enough souls to go around" idea I had too... To explain why all of those levels gained as a Gobbo go away once the Elf-soul arrives.

Heh. Nice. :smallamused: