Topic: Immortal Elves

[Skaran]

Removing skills is also effectively stripping DPs from a character. Few players I know would stand for this even if it was a skill they had never used. (They would never miss it until it is gone then they would complain)

Remember Elrond Half-Eleven reminiscing about the battles before the gates of Mordor in the days of the last alliance comparing the forces to those of the elder days during the wars against Morgoth. (I'm sure most people could find the passage in Lord of the Rings), it is one reason why in my games players do not play elves or half elves.

[markc]

Skaran,
 I also played in a game where the GM would only let his wife and maybe one other play an elf in his game as nobody else had played for 20 years in his game world. That is one tough requirement to play an elf.

MDC

[vroomfogle]

I was not suggesting elven PC's ever lose skills.   Rather I was attempting at an explaination of why all old elves are not level 100+.   The effect of level loss should only happen on the scale of centuries, certainly not in game-time (unless you are running a game that runs over several centuries which is doubtful).

[Skaran]

Ah that's clearer now. Tolkien of course took the easy way out and had Morgoth's and then Sauron's orcs wipe out most of the elves leaving only a few who remembered the old times. (Not including the silvan elves here who may have a lot of ranks in nature skills but didn't get out much)

[Dreven1]

Vroomfogle,
I think that is a perfect way to introduce level 1 (1000 year old elves) into a game! I will use that myself.  I like the idea that you can play a lolly-gagging, non-determined elf that is 1000 years old (or longer) and he/she still be at level 1!  They could have been level 10 but that could have been over 700 years ago... and now they are back to level 1 when the player starts playing them.

Good call!

In addition, I tell my characters that they can play a 5000 year old elf if they want... when they argue or debate that they should have more skills or extra points because of it I simply do a GM override and say "no". 
If they happen to persist then I would just say... you don?t like the idea of a 5000 year old elf that is only level 1? Then you play a 30 year old elf. 

Logistics as a GM are so easy sometimes! 

Drev

[B Hanson]

Yes. I am resurrecting this thread--but specifically for Shadow World. Should SW Elves (one type, some or all) be Immortal? Given that Elves and other sentient beings were brought back to Kulthea in the early interregnum, are the major Elvish NPC's 100,000 plus years old?

[MisterK]

Yes. I am resurrecting this thread--but specifically for Shadow World. Should SW Elves (one type, some or all) be Immortal? Given that Elves and other sentient beings were brought back to Kulthea in the early interregnum, are the major Elvish NPC's 100,000 plus years old?

We already know that a number of Loremasters have been there since the beginning of the Second Era at least (notably Kirin T'Thaan). We also know from Emer II that Prince Elar of Namar-Tol has held his title since the Loari came to the isles in c. SEI 3000.

Not to mention that the Master Atlas [Master Atlas IV pp59+] classify all elven races as "immortal" (Linaeri, Loari, Dyari, Erlini and Shuluri).

I think it's safe to say that they are.

Of course, immortality never stopped a blade. The longer you live, the higher the chance of an "unfortunate accident", especially given the troubled history of Kulthea.

[Vladimir]

Yes. I am resurrecting this thread--but specifically for Shadow World. Should SW Elves (one type, some or all) be Immortal? Given that Elves and other sentient beings were brought back to Kulthea in the early interregnum, are the major Elvish NPC's 100,000 plus years old?

  Considering SW doesn't really go into demographics (such as birth and death rates) there really isn't any way of knowing. What age is the average Elf character what starting? 18? 25? 75? Older? I usually start characters out at about 16, no matter the race, and build on that.
  An Elf at 1,000 years of age as the opportunity to have more skills at higher levels than an Elf at 100 years but not everybody takes advantage of their opportunities -I'd even venture to say that very few do as Adventurers make up a tiny fraction of the population. Most Elves would lead a passive, day to day life for 100,000 years, and be happy with it. Not every Elf wants to become an Elrond or Galadriel.

  Skill loss: My grandmother taught me how to cook in the 1960s. Even after decades of not cooking at home (my time in the Army and living in New York) I can still make biscuits and bake bread without looking up a recipe or even measuring ingredients.
Knowledge is a funny thing. Can you remember a time when could not ride a bicycle? Or drive a car? Or read? There are some skills we learn that we cannot imagine not having them.

[jdale]

I doubt that humans completely forget skills. You might be out of practice but retraining is easier than starting from scratch. Still, I used to be able to converse in Spanish and I've definitely lost some ranks there from disuse. Getting back on a bicycle after many years is not as easy. I'm not sure I remember any calculus at all. And I'm way younger than 1000 years.

[B Hanson]

What if you are 50,000 years old, or 100,000?! You might have forgotten some things..or perhaps the Elvish brain is structured differently. Either way, is there any need or point in making Shadow World Elves immortal? Does it serve any purpose or just raise issues or is it irrelevant?

[rdanhenry]

Elves aren't immortal. They die if you cut off their heads, just like anybody else. What they are is ageless. And you don't live past a thousand by being stupid or clumsy or naive or failing to adapt. All the less-capable are weeded out by the hazards of life, until the older Elves are also the most capable Elves. They shouldn't just be high-level, they should have excellent stats.

[Vladimir]

Elves aren't immortal.

  Even the gods aren't mortal...and can be fallible.

[MisterK]

What if you are 50,000 years old, or 100,000?! You might have forgotten some things..or perhaps the Elvish brain is structured differently. Either way, is there any need or point in making Shadow World Elves immortal? Does it serve any purpose or just raise issues or is it irrelevant?

It could be that elves "shelve" memory and skills they don't need and have some kind of deep storage that is not accessed as easily as "surface" memories. And if they do want to access them, they must also restore the context in which those memories and skills applied - in essence "going back" to what they were at the time, mentally speaking. This is by no means canon in Shadow World (and there are hints that it actually is not true at all), but it could make for interesting reactions.

Having immortal elves is a perspective thing in a world with such a relevant timeline (it's not only that the timeline is long, it is that the events that took place so long ago are still relevant now). It means that, beyond the movers and shakers of the world (the K'Taa'Viiri, the Dragonlords, the Gods and greater Spirits), there are people who have memories long enough that they could remember what happened *then*. Of course, most of them don't (because attrition is a thing), but some might and make for interesting NPCs to look for (Elor, anyone ?).

But genetically immortal beings requires you to kick your suspension of disbelief up a notch. Not only is there a potential problem of population control, but there is also the issue of having a race where people can live indefinitely, yet never progress beyond the technological limits of the "now" while it is fairly obvious that other people before them *did* and that there are plenty of remains around to give the elves hints. Plus, since all races on Kulthea are basically Lords of Essaence genetically created servant races, one might wonder why they would program some of them for genetic immortality and not others - especially if the Althans themselves were *not* immortal (the K'Taa'Viiri were according to MA4, but whether the Althan were or not is never stated, i think). Perhaps elves were *favoured* servant races and that K'Taa'Viiri wanted to keep their favourite pets as long as they themselves lived - if only to avoid the bother of having to retrain new ones (and they did not give the same genetic advantage to mortal races because those were probably used for manual labour and as cannon fodder in Althan warfare, all occupations where long genetic lifespan is basically useless since you are not expected to live long anyway).

So, having immortal elves provides some entertainment if you like to speculate about *why* they are immortal and how it all works for them, but more pragmatically, you can just ascribe it to being a generic Tolkienesque fantasy trope, hang your disbelief a bit higher on the coat rack, and roll with it

[B Hanson]

That all makes sense, but is still explanatory of the status quo. My question, given the opportunity to re-set or retcon some aspects of Shadow World, does it make sense to keep all or some Elves "immortal"?

[foilfodder]

Yes. I am resurrecting this thread--but specifically for Shadow World. Should SW Elves (one type, some or all) be Immortal? Given that Elves and other sentient beings were brought back to Kulthea in the early interregnum, are the major Elvish NPC's 100,000 plus years old?

I only purchased the 4th Edition Shadow World Atlas a few days ago, but I am a long-time player of Rolemaster and MERP.

Elves aren't some special case in Shadow World, a list of race sbelow are just as "privilaged" if not more so:
 - K’ta’viiri, the elves and fauns who are "near-human", they just don't have to worry about growing "old" and will live until killed by physical trauma
 - Dragonlords, Fey Folk are not quite human; but they are physical beings, eat, breathe, etc. Often have super-human abilities and magicall powers
 - Demons/Elementals, some Undead, have a physical body but aren't really "living beings" in the organic life cycle thing.
 - Lords and Spirits of Orhan, Dark Gods of Charon, some Undead are beings beyond the physical. Some can interact as physical beings, but it is not their "true" nature

Why change something intrinsic to the setting of Shadow World? 

Try consider these three points:
 1) A player character elf doesn't start out any older or more skilled than their human counter-part. 
 2) Beings that don't age still die to violence. Only six Dragonlords have survived to "present-day" on Kulthea; I'd say they are much stronger than an elf.
 3) Elves can give-up (or possibly loose) their immortality; How many "BFFs" will a 10,000 year old elf have out-lived and what does that do to their mental health?

Elven immortality is a perk that really doesn't come into play at the game-table.  It is mere window dressing for higher level NPCs (who were born in the 1st or 2nd Era) which could just as well be Dragonlords, K’ta’viiri, or demons in disguise.

So keep the elven immortality.  Like the dragonlords, just because they CAN live indefinately, doesn't mean they'll survive long on Shadow World.

[Vladimir]

I never liked the idea of an immortal race as Tolkien/RM elves.

The second reason is a gamebalance concern. If a player?s character is 1000 years old, he could know a lot of ancient history as he was actually alive when it happened. And if he doesn?t have this information, whats the point in being so old.

  Tolkein doesn't delve into the specific reason why Elves were created. They just were, and allowed to wander ME and eventually splintered off into the various sub-groups.
  Elves were a semi-divine race whose presence in ME was temporary. They were scheduled to appear and scheduled to leave by divine plan. Just as Eru declared that even Melkor's disruptions originated with Eru, so would the deeds of all his creations. This pretty much made all races fragments of an overall plot mechanism, where even the conclusion was forgone. It isn't the destination, but the journey...
  Middle Earth isn't Earth. It is a product of creationism, where most of the beasts and races were conjured into being. Through science, archaeology and DNA research that most modern humans are the result of earlier sapient races interbreeding with human subspecies and reflect the genetic advantages and disadvantages of the previous generations.

  Playing an Elf should be no different than playing any other nonhuman race. But...every GM has his own interpretation of Elves, and even an interpretation of how Tolkein portrayed them. Me, I use speculative demographics...Example: Out of a total population, only a small percentage are motivated to join a military, of those in a military, only a small percentage actually fight, of those who actually fight, an even smaller percentage become heroes...and so on. The vast majority of any population is satisfied with getting by without notice or consequence. 
  Elves would have a concept of time entirely alien to humans: "The human king is a tyrant? We'll be back in a few centuries to see if there is any change."

  From Tolkein, we have the numbers of the first three generation of Elves (Quendi, "Who speak with voices") : 14 Minyar (Firsts), 56 Tatyar (Seconds), and 74 Nelyar (*yawn* Thirds...but adopted Lindar, "Singers" as nobody wanted to be called Thirds...); Oromë found them and led a portion of them to Valinor, where they became known as Eldar (People of the Stars), the 82 that remained became known as Avari (Unwilling). From the Avari who traveled West, some were captured by Melkor and used to create the race of Orcs...and the rest is ME history.
  Tolkein portrayed Elves as wise and benevolent but still could be corrupted by Melkor's influence as the Avari were led to mistrust Oromë...and eventually abandoned their usual rational nature that resulted Fëanor's actions after Melkor's murder of his father and theft of the Silmarils. Again, all part of the creator's plan...

[Vladimir]

I never liked the idea of an immortal race as Tolkien/RM elves.

The second reason is a gamebalance concern. If a player?s character is 1000 years old, he could know a lot of ancient history as he was actually alive when it happened. And if he doesn?t have this information, whats the point in being so old.

  Tolkein doesn't delve into the specific reason why Elves were created. They just were, and allowed to wander ME and eventually splintered off into the various sub-groups.
  Elves were a semi-divine race whose presence in ME was temporary. They were scheduled to appear and scheduled to leave by divine plan. Just as Eru declared that even Melkor's disruptions originated with Eru, so would the deeds of all his creations. This pretty much made all races fragments of an overall plot mechanism, where even the conclusion was forgone. It isn't the destination, but the journey...
  Middle Earth isn't Earth. It is a product of creationism, where most of the beasts and races were conjured into being. Through science, archaeology and DNA research that most modern humans are the result of earlier sapient races interbreeding with human subspecies and reflect the genetic advantages and disadvantages of the previous generations.

  Playing an Elf should be no different than playing any other nonhuman race. But...every GM has his own interpretation of Elves, and even an interpretation of how Tolkein portrayed them. Me, I use speculative demographics...Example: Out of a total population, only a small percentage are motivated to join a military, of those in a military, only a small percentage actually fight, of those who actually fight, an even smaller percentage become heroes...and so on. The vast majority of any population is satisfied with getting by without notice or consequence.  An Elf adventurer is an anomaly, almost an outcast.
  Elves would have a concept of time entirely alien to humans: "The human king is a tyrant? We'll be back in a few centuries to see if there is any change."

  From Tolkein, we have the numbers of the first three generation of Elves (Quendi, "Who speak with voices") : 14 Minyar (Firsts), 56 Tatyar (Seconds), and 74 Nelyar (*yawn* Thirds...but adopted Lindar, "Singers" as nobody wanted to be called Thirds...); Oromë found them and led a portion of them to Valinor, where they became known as Eldar (People of the Stars), the 82 that remained became known as Avari (Unwilling). From the Avari who traveled West, some were captured by Melkor and used to create the race of Orcs...and the rest is ME history.
  Tolkein portrayed Elves as wise and benevolent but still could be corrupted by Melkor's influence as the Avari were led to mistrust Oromë...and eventually abandoned their usual rational nature that resulted Fëanor's actions after Melkor's murder of his father and theft of the Silmarils. Again, all part of the creator's plan...

[MisterK]

Elven immortality is a perk that really doesn't come into play at the game-table.  It is mere window dressing for higher level NPCs (who were born in the 1st or 2nd Era) which could just as well be Dragonlords, K’ta’viiri, or demons in disguise.

Clearly you've never had elf PCs that were 1500 years old.

It's an interesting experience. Mostly because the player has to consider how to make it work.

The memories sort themselves out : anything worth remembering is remembered, anything not worth remembering is buried in the mists of history. Same as humans, really, only on a longer scale.

But the thought patterns are different. It was interesting to see how the players (I actually had two elven characters: one 900 y.o and one 1500 y.o) actually explained how they could interact with the short-lived races instead of "waiting it out". How they could explain that being immortal was not necessarily a boon all the time. And, as a GM, you have a hand in helping them them figure it out - the centuries-long slights that fester. The pain at losing loved ones an age ago and never getting over it. The despair at seeing humans make the same mistakes *over and over again* and the temptation to just "nudge things a little" so that they go in the "right" direction at least once...
Coming back to a city and getting to see your human friend... only to discover that he is a great-grandfather now and his trade has been taken over by his younger grandson.
And the wonder at watching them throw their lives away as it was worth nothing. When you can live millenia, the idea of taking risks is a bit more difficult to swallow.

You show them all that. And at the same time, you show them why there are things worth actually living and fighting for.

Honestly, having immortals (who have lived long enough to know it) and humans in the same group make for very interesting roleplaying situations.

[jdale]

The memories sort themselves out : anything worth remembering is remembered, anything not worth remembering is buried in the mists of history. Same as humans, really, only on a longer scale.

I don't know. I remember a lot of stupid things I wish I didn't, like that thing I said in high school. And forget things I want to remember, like people's names.

[foilfodder]

Elven immortality is a perk that really doesn't come into play at the game-table.  It is mere window dressing for higher level NPCs (who were born in the 1st or 2nd Era) which could just as well be Dragonlords, K’ta’viiri, or demons in disguise.

Clearly you've never had elf PCs that were 1500 years old.

It's an interesting experience. Mostly because the player has to consider how to make it work.
…
Honestly, having immortals (who have lived long enough to know it) and humans in the same group make for very interesting roleplaying situations.

With good players and the right campaign, I imagine the roleplay could be very inspired.

However, I have GMed one MERP group, been a player in two Rolemaster groups.  None of the campaigns went past 10th level. Out of a total of 13 characters, only one was an elf. So in my experience, elves that are 10,000+ years old and have outlived the re-invention of the wheel 3-4 times are only NPCs.