So why did elves fade out when they're better than humans in every way

[mint fractal]

Haven't played this mod for a while and just had this thought when I saw it on Workshop.

[valid prawn]

Fertility ? The mediocrity that is humanity reproduces much faster than elves

In addition, it is difficult to maintain pure and perfect genetics.

[novel geode]

Plus the breaking of connection from the other realms via the great portal and all that

[bronze vapor]

Not with all the perks and books we’ve got in this mod 😂

[valid prawn]

good point 🤔

Yet that should be the other side of the coin

[bronze vapor]

Probably more this, it’s implied (at least how I read it) to be the source of a lot of power for the elves, so cutting it off cut the elves off from a lot of resources.

[valid prawn]

rephrase please ?

[bronze vapor]

Maybe without the power coming from the Portal to give elves access to perks and boons they lost all that extra fertility/strength.

[valid prawn]

@mild drum Why do you think elves have become a minority with all their bonuses?

[valid prawn]

Yes but we play with the portal closed at the start of the game and we have all the advantages

[bronze vapor]

Only because we found an artifact that’s integral to the construction of the portal, meaning it’s got a lot of power.

Elves can only Ascend to True Elf until the portal is restored after all.

[valid prawn]

I don't think the portal artifact is enough,

And from a gameplay point of view this is not the case, if the elves played well they would quickly increase their traits

[bronze vapor]

My reading, based on lore presented in-game, is that the Portal allowed elves and even more powerful beings to travel back and forth between realms. When the portal was shut down, probably because of humans attacking the elves, the remaining elves were left without reinforcements and powerful resources, so they had to fend for themselves. Over the next few millennia they were forced into hiding in the far corners of the world.

They didn’t have the artifacts of the portal, they were lost.

They didn’t have the ability to go seeking these items or blessings.

[valid prawn]

We must not forget that in the lore, humans and elves are the same species, it must be explained why the latter would kill "theirs"

[valid prawn]

precisely, if this is the case, if they are really lost, why is it technically possible for the AI to increase their elf trait?

[bronze vapor]

This is just my interpretation, could be wrong, could be somewhat right.

[valid prawn]

I understand, I'm just trying to do the antithesis to test your opinion, what comes out of our conclusion could be closer to the truth, or better, inspired our architect

[unreal lark]

Biological weapoon

In the beginning of its existence, secret human-superiority organization managed to find a smallox/back plague/siberian plague stamm that hurts elves more than humans. For a long timem this kidnaped elves and, through artificial selection, managed to create a deadly for elves and mid-harmful for humans fast-spreading disease. And because connection with other realms was fragile and there was a struggle among elven rulers, nor Sisters, nor Spark were able to do something about it in time.

Deaths and chaos lead to fall of elven regime. War and after-war inquisition finished the job. That was really The Darkest Plague

Three questions still need an answer: How did this organization appeared? Who sponsored it? Why, with all its size, nobody managed to uncover them?

[uncut stag]

You don't have to work really hard to come up with a reason. Humans have been killing each other for millenia because their skin color is different. Add pointy ears in that time period and you're instantly discriminated/ killed

The reason they killed "theirs"?

They were different. That's all you need. That's just human nature.

[red bone]

(skin color, opinion, religion, they even fight for land or heritage, so...)

[valid prawn]

You are 100% right, but we are talking about a period where humans found pointed ears normal, so we have to think about evolution for having forgotten their origin and forgetting that elves are humans

[valid prawn]

for the land seems the most logical

you have to eat well in life

[red bone]

(Julius Caesar said about the Gauls "they could dominate the world, if they took less time fighting themselves and partying" (as in party = sex and alcohol, sex drugs 'n rock 'n roll style xD))

[uncut stag]

I don't think there's any world where you can all of a sudden make human beings not discriminate.

[valid prawn]

technically they dominated a good part of europe, but were divided, while rome was a city (which is a greater feat technically on the part of rome

[valid prawn]

No but for example, imagine a world where blue and red people are born from the same parents, at the beginning they will not kill each other for their difference because it will be considered normal, they must first forget their common identity/history /common birth to tear each other apart due to difference

[red bone]

I wouldn't say that it is impossible 🤔 but it would be difficult and it needs lots of explication. But I would also rather say "you can't, all of a sudden, make intelligent species being not discriminate"

Since you can't really still call elves "a human specie"

[red bone]

yep, he really admired them, but also knew that they were too "hot blooded"

[valid prawn]

However in eastpointed lore elves and humans are the same species

[uncut stag]

Again, that's a dream world that doesn't exist. If you want to ground the lore in reality, there is no shot humans wouldn't discriminate against elves. As mentioned, humans that were LEFT HANDED were thought of as devil spawn.

[valid prawn]

I agree that it makes sense that humans and elves would go to war over their differences, but I'm talking about the time when they walked through the portal in total harmony.

[uncut stag]

That event was thousands of years ago. Shit in a non digital/ no writing age people are going to forget that happened after like one generation

So yeah, maybe they were cool at that point. But 100 years later they'd forget (no way to write down history, everything is oral)

[valid prawn]

Without human writing perhaps, but... what about elves?

[red bone]

Yes, but I think that elves are more "we are the first specie, and they are degenerate from the sacred lineage". 🤔
Humans would be viewed as some kind of "errors" by supremacists elves.

[valid prawn]

Quite

The question is not how but when in fact

[uncut stag]

Elves can remember, but I'm talking more from the human perspective. They are going to forget after a generation and start being human (ie hating you because your are different)

That's when they started pushing the elves back into the taiga/ Siberia

And the elves that stay salty and vengeful are the ones that are elven superior for the humans pushing them from their homes

Borrowing from GOT "The Elves Remember"

[valid prawn]

I see it a bit like in viking, ragnar is friends with the king of wessex, his children know nothing about it so kill him

[valid prawn]

What house is this again?

[red bone]

(gotta add Myrddin, but as a "good tempered" elf that managed to stay ellusive 👀 )

[uncut stag]

Starks in Game of Thrones

[valid prawn]

But Starks are “winter is coming”

I know it's the motto of another house but I don't know which one

[uncut stag]

The North Remembers

[valid prawn]

you put me in doubt 🤔

[uncut stag]

It's a northern saying, not Starks. Sorry!

[valid prawn]

ah I thought well 😂

[uncut stag]

But the Starks are the ones that say it most of the time

[valid prawn]

especially rob

Besides, it could have ended up becoming Stark's motto

[buoyant marsh]

Could have been a plague that either disproportionately or solely affects elves, could explain why the portal was shut and why there are a bunch of abandoned ruins. Maybe some isolated pockets of elves managed to quarantine and survive.

[uncut stag]

Also a valid route to take.

[buoyant marsh]

Other ideas:

• A great and terrible war between elf tribes that left them open to human conquest, there are historical parallels.
• Like romans, most elves got "too civilized" and were eventually vulnerable to barbarian raids and the like

Can combine these as well, it's frankly unrealistic to have it be a single cause unless we're talking asteroid level crises.

[uncut stag]

Could see the lore going either way humans went "human" and started heavily discriminating until they disappeared into tiny groups, or some kind of elf plague/ sickness decimated them so to protect the other elves, portal was destroyed

Or because of the plague that started decimating the elves, humans freaked out and started culling them as well

[valid prawn]

It is an excellent idea 🤔

[uncut stag]

So a combination as you mentioned.

But maybe in world we never actually know what happened?

So there's a bunch of myths about it

[buoyant marsh]

Yeah something like the story of a great flood irl

[valid prawn]

So to summarize:
Elven plague
Quarantine and destruction of the portal
Humans who become aggressive to those who are more affected by the elven plague
Then humans who become humans and who genocide the elves just because they have pointy ears
I forgot?

[buoyant marsh]

I like a plague or something similar as giving a good reason to shut the portal

[uncut stag]

Every culture seems to have a myth about this, and they are all different. So yeah, exactly!

The big giants in Mongolia have their theories, hot chicks that start at the portal have theories, etc etc

There would be a firm reason why, we'd as players know it. But in universe i think it would be cool if they never found out.

[buoyant marsh]

Elves could have been targeted by man for any number of reasons, "they look different and we covet their lands" is enough. It would make sense for that to not even be documented by historians.

[valid prawn]

the best would be for the information to be partially known, disjointed, and above all dispersed

[uncut stag]

Yep, and just like irl, HEAVILY biased

Depending on the source

So your character could find a book written by some elf 1k years ago... but what were the elves motivations in writing this?

[valid prawn]

Certainly, but in the lore, humans and elves arrived through the portal in full harmony, so there must be at least something at the origin, but that may have been just a trigger and is not the reason for the genocide complete

[valid prawn]

Memory duty

[uncut stag]

No, i mean did the elf who wrote it like humans? Hate humans? Was he biased one way or the other

Similar to all the Roman accounts that were heavily biased based on if the scholar was Greek, Arab, Roman

[valid prawn]

it is necessarily biased, but above all subjective, and then it cannot have all the information as mentioned above

[buoyant marsh]

If the plague is a part of this lore there could be a theory that one of the old elf kingdoms created the plague, but everyone has a different suspect and there’s not enough info to confirm that anyone was actually responsible.

[uncut stag]

Yeah, that could be a theory. Humans blame some big human disease on the weird elves

[buoyant marsh]

it’s natural to search for blame and point fingers after a terrible crisis

[uncut stag]

That tracks with history. Humans mostly just blamed their gods..

[valid prawn]

We can also have several theories but no one really knows which one (or which ones) are the true ones.

[buoyant marsh]

We can also have instances where elves got conflated with local mythology, very easy to do with the celts, for example

[uncut stag]

That's what route i was suggesting. In world, several competing sources heavily biased so they don't actually know

[buoyant marsh]

Not only that, it’s not even confirmed that such a scheme took place

[valid prawn]

Besides, the debate that we are having can exist in a certain form in game, precisely because people will go from their theories and will more or less kindly confront each other to know which one is the most likely.

[buoyant marsh]

That implies that at one time they spoke the same language, but in the years since there was some process equivalent to a tower of babel event and the cultures diverged. I don’t think this needs to be specified outside of vague folklore/myth.

And that notion probably isn’t even present among humans since that concept isn’t compatible with most of the religions/cultures in the game.

[valid prawn]

or just what happens in reality, two isolated communities but speaking the same language will over time speak distinct "daughter" languages

However there may be founding myths resembling that of the Tower of Babel, even if the most erudite would be in "no but you're stupid, languages ​​evolve lol" mode.

[uncut stag]

Inb4 Eastpoint has all his lore in his head already and this is all a waste of time 🤣

[valid prawn]

he has the overall picture, not the details, and the ideas we have that he hasn't had he will integrate them with pleasure if it seems correct to him

[uncut stag]

I know, i was just joking. I gotta remember to use /s

[valid prawn]

Ah my bad I understood the rofl as a nervous laugh rather than a joke

[uncut stag]

I'm bad at emojis

I'm old

[valid prawn]

No it's me, you chose your emoji very well

[valid prawn]

Don't worry about us other elves you're a youngster 👀

[novel geode]

@valid prawn The ultimate end all be all of it, is more than likely just internal turmoil between kings, as seen with east and west capitals between the twin princes, much akin to the roman empire, the only thing to take down the empire was the empire itself.

[valid prawn]

Yes, so on the other hand it's not just the Roman Empire which self-destructed even if I understand your idea, on the other hand we're talking about global genocide not the fall of an empire

[uncut stag]

You can tie it into the empire model. Disease caused even more stress and turmoil in the empire. If the idea is a "super elven empire" sometime deep in the past

[novel geode]

From what I can tell, Elves ruled the world at some point, or major portions of it, so the only two options would be doing a dwarf 'and digging to deep' into magic and that caused a dwemer-esque event from skyrim where all the elves nearly went extinct or mass-disease and the crushing weight of a mega empire that couldn't be supported to some extent

the spark giveth the spark taketh type shit

[valid prawn]

I want us to have our Dwemer on the other hand, more in-depth than in Elder Kings 🤔

On the other hand, I don't think that their lore of "I disappear when I become a god" is compatible

[novel geode]

Well its a hubris of perhaps an elder lord thinking they could ascend past the gods and the spark punished the elves for it

[valid prawn]

The most logical path is the giga-plague and humans who are freaking out wanting to kill everyone affected by the giga-plague

[valid prawn]

that makes sense but the spark wouldn't have made all the elves disappear 🤔

[novel geode]

Well there are remenants as we see with Feywood and the Duedain

[red bone]

why not ? 🤔 isn't the spark a bit present in every elves ?

there are plenty of "god/gods/entities" that were cruel to their believers at some point, in order to "teach them a lesson" often

[valid prawn]

I mean, the spark didn't make ALL the elves disappear, so I don't think there were that many elves who had the pride to become god

not as much as 99%*

[novel geode]

Well what happens after the fall of a large population of lords and kings randomly getting snuffed?

[valid prawn]

But this may be part of the butterfly effect that ruined the elven world

[novel geode]

A massive power vaccum the leads to an all consuming civil war between the remenants

[red bone]

Yup, as Nicholas said 🤔

[valid prawn]

It's true

[red bone]

Plus, from the point of view of the "Spark" (as an entity, I don't really know what's Eastpointed view of that) they may have punished more elves than just the guilty ones, in order to teach a lesson to the entiere race.

Both because "they must all learn" and because "I fucking can't tell the difference between this one and this one"

[valid prawn]

To see, he (eastpointed) will be able to find the right balance

[red bone]

(from an entity point of view, all elves must be some kind of "related")

[valid prawn]

a bit like the snk axis

[red bone]

what?

[valid prawn]

You say like that in English "the axis" for what binds the Eldians?

wait I will check

[red bone]

( ah ok, comme dans l'attaque des titans! désolée, pas familière du manga mais on m'a expliqué le principe de l'axis xD donc oui, un peu comme ça. Et puis regarde, dans la religion catholique, Dieu a puni "les Hommes", le Spark peut punir "les Elfes")

[valid prawn]

ok you call it the path in English

[red bone]

Sorry for the french interlude, it was way easier

[valid prawn]

no problem xD

Actually once again, I think the idea of ​​spark's punishment is likely, but could be part of a whole (basically there are lots of things that happened and it's a slow decline like the 'Roman Empire

moreover we can very well have the theory in play even if it is not considered canon by eastpointed

astonishment my aldarions consider that it is all the fault of humans

[mild drum]

Lol sorry all, heres what I have for an upcoming trailer
Long ago when the Earth was new, Elves and Men arrived through a Grand Portal from another realm.

They spread far and wide to every corner of the world, settling all lands they found.

In the ages since, endless Empires both Human and Elf, have risen and faded away.

Countless cultures with unimaginably diverse customs emerged.
Noble Elves of great honor, Selfish Elves who only desire for power.
Elves that built great wonders of stone and Elves who want only for the simple life of the forest.
Some who embraced the races of Men in friendship, and others who saw them only as slaves to serve.

Time is inevitable and with its passing, whether by war or through the folly of their hubris, the great empires would crumble.

Over a thousand years ago, a new Dark Elven Emperor of unparalleled magical ability rose. One by one, the free lands of Earth fell to his power. His rule was as terrible as his heart and an age of unimaginable suffering followed.

Rebellion was inevitable and war on a scale never before seen on this world soon followed.

A last alliance of Men and Elves marched against his armies, and on the very slopes of the Grand Portal, they fought for the freedom of Earth.

An elite group of the greatest mages and warriors of Earth did battle with the Emperor, tearing the very foundations of the Earth asunder. With great sacrifice they managed to deliver onto the Emperor a grievous wound.

Sensing his end, the Emperor fled the battle to his secluded fortress where he would die from his wounds. The forces of good had their victory, and an age of peace was upon them. Or so they believed.

The nations of Man had enough of Elven lords and soon war rose again. Elven nations, greatly reduced in size and power from their conflict with the Emperor, began to flee back through the portal to seek salvation in other realms. The Human Kings ordered the portal be broken so that they may be free of the tyranny of elves for all time.

Fearing the hatred of Man, the Elves that still remained fled to the edges of the Earth. As generations passed, elves faded from memory until they were no more but a children's fable.

Now in this age something has changed. You, a human lord, have discovered the resting place of the final Elf Emperor and have been changed by the power there. Now a newly made Elf you must rediscover the secrets of the ancient empires and forge a new Elven people. What kind of people you will be is yet to be decided. Whether benevolent ally or dark overlord the choice is yours Realm Lord. It is time to seize your Destiny.

[valid prawn]

can we have the version if we start the game with one of the last elves? 👀

[mild drum]

An alternate opening quest line is definitely needed

[valid prawn]

100% agree