New Eberron Race - Blood Elves [Archive] - Wizards Community

New Eberron Race - Blood Elves [Archive] - Wizards Community

Post/Author/DateTime Post
ColtFlenn
02-07-08, 06:17 PM Blood Elf
The Blood Elves were once a race of elves that stood apart from the Necromantic Aerenal elves, and not near as hardy as the elves of Valenar. The Blood Elves lived in a large town called Quel’thalas. They were an extremely arcane-addicted race. They drew power from a magic artifact called the Sunwell. During the last war, Karnnathi Undead marched into the magical city and destroyed it all. The purpose for this is they needed the pure arcane magic of the Sunwell to bring an unfathomably powerful lich back to Eberron. This tainted and drained the powers of the well.

The attack almost drew the elves into extinction. Their crave for magic now more apparent and they began to call themselves the Blood Elves for the blood spilt by the undead horde that swept through their glorious home of Quel’thalas. At the destruction of Cyre, the Blood Elf king, Prince Keal’thas, made a pact with the Rakshasa Rajahs and received a great power to help satisfy their arcane cravings. This was a colossal green crystal that rose with an island just south of the Frostfell. The Blood elves carved a metropolis into this crystal and named it Quel’thalas in honor of their fallen city. The Rakshasa Rajahs await the time when they will use the ravenous Blood Elves’ craving for magic to allow them to make a second attack on Eberron.

Personality: Blood Elves are tend to be slightly more aggressive than the other sub-races of elf, but they can be just as calm friends. They are always remembering the other nations not providing the required help to save their beloved city that was destroyed.

Physical Description: A typical Blood Elf resembles a normal elf in almost every feature save for a pair of eerie glowing green eyes. The demonic energies granted by the Rakshasa Rajahs tainted the once pure Blood Elves with the demonic magic. They elves assimilated it into their own arcane magic.

They have almost flawless skin, as an elf, and stand roughly 4 to 5 feet tall. Their ears are slightly longer and have a finer point. They are lean and slimmer than many of the other races and resemble other elves almost directly.

Relations: The Blood Elves still hold the grudge to the rest of Khorvaire that they did not help the land of the Blood Elf when they needed it most. They seem to take this grudge out on the other races as if it were their fault. They tend to treat them with little to no respect, unless they deserve or earn it in a sense of what is best to the people of the Blood Elf.
The Church of the Silver Flame is the only faction that the Blood Elves of Quel’thalas respect to this day. Respect from a Blood Elf is a great accomplishment.

Alignment: Blood Elves are almost always chaotic neutral. Still trying to come up with a stable government after the destruction of Quel’thalas, the Blood Elves have had a very chaotic nature since the pact with the Lords of Dust was made.

Blood Elf lands: Blood Elves were to the very brink of extinction after the Karnnathi invasion, but have slowly began to repopulate after the building of their new Quel’thalas. Their only land is the island just south of the frigid Frostfell. The crystal at that makes up their capital generated unnatural heat to just the island itself.

Religion: The Blood Elf clerics and paladins try to stick with the Silver Flame. When the undead attacked Quel’thalas, the Silver Flame sent all their available troops to the aid of the Blood Elves. The people of Quel’thalas took this as a token of friendship and help, but the warriors of the Silver Flame saw this as an undead threat, nothing more.

Language: Blood Elves speak common and elven. They can learn to speak all others except Drudic.

Names: Sylvannas, Keal, Theos, Thios, Poralm, Aft’emol, Uenan

Adventurers: A Blood Elf may travel for many reasons. They may travel in vengeance to the lords of the undead in Karnnath, or to full-fill a deed to the church, or just to venture to the land of their origin and learn the history of their people.

Blood Elf Racial Traits
• +2 Charisma, +2 Intelligence, -2 Strength, -2 Wisdom, -2 Constitution. Blood Elves extremely intelligent and charismatic, but lack the strength of some other races, both physically and mentally.
• Medium: As medium size creatures, Blood Elf have no special bonuses or penalties due to their size.
• Speed: Blood Elf land speed is 30 feet.
• Arcane Affinity: The race of the Blood Elf has always practiced arcane magic enough it has become almost second nature to many. A Blood Elf with the ability to cast Arcane spells casts them at +2 caster level. This ability is lost if the Blood Elf loses her bloodstone for longer than 24 hours.
• Magically Inclined: When a Blood Elf reaches 3 HD, they unlock the ability to some spell-like abilities. The Blood Elf gains a number of 0 and/or 1st level arcane spells equal to her charisma modifier. These spells are cast at a caster level equal to the Blood Elf’s character level. The spell-like abilities are each usable once per day. This ability is lost if the Blood Elf loses her bloodstone for longer than 12 hours.
• Weak Willed: A Blood elf is very easily deceived when magic is involved. They receive a –3 penalty on all will saves. This penalty is doubled if the Blood Elf loses her bloodstone for longer than 48 hours.
• Arcane Dependency: Since the pact with the Rakshasa Rajahs, a Blood Elf has become highly dependent on magic to remain sane. A Blood Elf without her bloodstone become weak after 24 hours, this dependency gives the Blood Elf a –4 on all charisma-based skills. After the second 24 hours, she receives a –2 to her charisma score and a –2 Wisdom (in addition to the racial penalty). Beyond 48 hours of depravation, she then suffers all the penalties of starvation. Except when rolling for subdual damage, she rolls 1d8 damage.
• Automatic Languages: Common. Bonus Languages: All other racial languages.
• Favored Classes: Sorcerer.

Ok, here it is. I even added a little fluff that I thought would most likely work well with this race. FEEDBACK PLEASE :D :D
Gurv
02-07-08, 06:24 PM Aw man. This is gonna hurt.
IMAL
02-07-08, 06:45 PM You know, there's a Warcraft TTRPG... And MMO..
Fabius Maximus
02-07-08, 06:53 PM Damn those Karrnathi! They even suck at genocide.
ColtFlenn
02-07-08, 06:55 PM ... um yes I am aware of that but this is an EBERRON version of the Blood Elves. I created the Blood Elves for an Eberron campaign and they have been used by my players and fellow DMs and have been told it is well made for Eberron. Again I know that there is a World of Warcraft RPG and Online Game. I actually play WoW. But this is for D&D. I appricaite the note, but i want Feedback please about on the build of the race for Eberron...

Colt Flenn
ColtFlenn
02-07-08, 06:56 PM Damn those Karrnathi! They even suck at genocide.

Lol, yes they do. But what do you think? Is that an ok way to splice them into Eberron.
Nundahl
02-07-08, 07:41 PM ::Raises index finger and opens mouth::

Wha- ...

::Shakes head, walks away::

Alright, alright ...

Let me begin by the ol' classic disclaimer - What you want in your campaign is your deal, and I'm happy to allow you your vision of Eberron. That stated -

I find this highly unnecessary - we don't need more Elves. We don't need other setting's races or flavor, and we don't need D&D to be more MMO'd than it is. All personal opinions.

Mechanically, it seems heavy, not overpowered necessarily, but too cumbersome, I likes my races easy but unique - Dwarf is too heavy, Half-Orc is too light, Human is cooked just right, the others come close. I don't think I need to state again that I'm expressing personal opinions, but what the hell, there it is again.

Not that I expect anyone to be surprised, but I think you shouldn't claim this flavor as your own, you modified slightly some existing lore from another world, and the mechanics whether you changed them or not, have been done and published in another book, some Eberron players may not be aware of that. Toss up an edit at the top not saying you created a race, but wanted to convert a race and maybe the sour taste in the back of my throat will go away. Or tell me to kiss off because my opinion doesn't matter ... either way.
yossarius
02-07-08, 09:43 PM It reminds me of a racial description from 2nd edition. Ultra-hardcore fantasy-punk race with cool abilites but major drawbacks, almost all of them are the same alignment, they mostly fill one small niche in the setting. I have to agree with Nundahl; I don't see that this is necessary. Of course, the default disclaimer still applies (it's your Eberron; you can do what you want with it), but personally, one of the things that appeals to be about Eberron is that it leaves the old 'sub-race' nonsense behind. Couple that with the fact that this adaptation comes from a video game, and I am forced to come to the conclusion that this creation is actually counter to the flavor of Eberron I prefer.

All that aside, I don't like the weak-willed flaw. It doesn't seem to fit the rest of the description. I can't help but feel that the only reason it was included was to avoid a level adjustment. The only reason to avoid a level adjustment is that having one makes players less likely to play one. Since there are relatively few of them, I would count this as a good thing. Drop weak-willed and just go with a +2 level adjustment.
Ashlock
02-09-08, 12:15 PM That stated -
I find this highly unnecessary - we don't need more Elves.
But there's also no harm in it. Posting blood elves as an Eberron race here isn't the same as forcing it into your copy of the ECS. :)

This is exactly the kind of place for stuff like this, I'd think.
Belabras
02-10-08, 02:46 AM While what Ashlock says is true, if you are so stuck on the idea of Blood Elves, and can't wait for 4e's Eladrin, then it's probably easiest to simply use the writeup for them in the D20 Warcraft book. You can find them on page 42 of the book, under High Elves.
Cloud Divider
02-18-08, 10:14 PM I don't play WoW, nor a particularly large fan of Warcraft in general.

But these are always interesting to look at for consistency's sake, and to see how one would integrate them into a different setting...
Blood Elf
The Blood Elves were once a race of elves that stood apart from the Necromantic Aerenal elves, and not near as hardy as the elves of Valenar. The Blood Elves lived in a large town called Quel’thalas. They were an extremely arcane-addicted race. They drew power from a magic artifact called the Sunwell. During the last war, Karnnathi Undead marched into the magical city and destroyed it all. The purpose for this is they needed the pure arcane magic of the Sunwell to bring an unfathomably powerful lich back to Eberron. This tainted and drained the powers of the well.
So:

Question 1) Did the Blood Elves originate on Xen'drik, like the other elven lineages (Aerenal, Valenar, various drow)? If so, were they slaves to the Giants, like their brethren? Perhaps they were an unusual "magebred" species of elf, designed to be particularly attuned to magic (I forget where I saw it, but there've been hints/suggestions that the dark elves came about from a similar giant program)?

Question 1b) If so, what happened to them during the Exodus? How did they end up in the Frostfell? Why have they been doing the last 20,000-odd years since the exodus? Why are they all based in Quel'thalas/why did they settle in the Frostfell, surely there were better places to go? I recommend thinking a bit more/fleshing out more detail on their history beyond what happened to them during the Last War (which is basically so recent, in elven terms, to be the last 5 minutes).

Question 2) What was the Sunwell, in Eberron-centric terms? A ginormous Syberis shard?

Question 3) What do the other elves think of them?

At the destruction of Cyre, the Blood Elf king, Prince Keal’thas, made a pact with the Rakshasa Rajahs and received a great power to help satisfy their arcane cravings. This was a colossal green crystal that rose with an island just south of the Frostfell. The Blood elves carved a metropolis into this crystal and named it Quel’thalas in honor of their fallen city. The Rakshasa Rajahs await the time when they will use the ravenous Blood Elves’ craving for magic to allow them to make a second attack on Eberron.
Sooo... The Blood Elf king basically made a pact with a Rakshasa Rajah, to feed his people's magical addiction, right?

That seems a bit at odds with this:
Religion: The Blood Elf clerics and paladins try to stick with the Silver Flame. When the undead attacked Quel’thalas, the Silver Flame sent all their available troops to the aid of the Blood Elves. The people of Quel’thalas took this as a token of friendship and help, but the warriors of the Silver Flame saw this as an undead threat, nothing more.
Unless you've intentionally gone for some kind of bizarro irony here (with the mixture of Silver Flame adherence and simultaneously having a demon-pact with a Rajah), I find it really odd that the Blood Elves would have mass-converted to the Silver Flame, just because they were rescued by the Thranes during the Last War. They've got THOUSANDS of years of history behind them - and whatever religion they had followed during those millenia. I'm not certain they'd have dropped their history like that...

Why did the Thranes (who at this time had become a Silver Flame theocracy) make such a major sacrifice, pulling "all their available troops" away from their other fronts (like with, oh, the other Four Nations) in order to rescue the Blood Elves? Why would the Silver Flame have cared? Especially if the Blood Elves had already been sold out to a Rakshasa Rajah? For certain values of "incredible fanaticism," I can far more easily imagine the Flame deciding to help the Karrns with exterminating these elves that have been tainted by the Rajahs. I mean, those two REALLY wouldn't get along.

Physical Description: A typical Blood Elf resembles a normal elf in almost every feature save for a pair of eerie glowing green eyes. The demonic energies granted by the Rakshasa Rajahs tainted the once pure Blood Elves with the demonic magic. They elves assimilated it into their own arcane magic.
Uh, this just cements my point in the prior paragraph. These are dudes who are VERY OBVIOUSLY TAINTED BY THE RAKSHASA RAJAHS. It's not particularly a secret, either. The Silver Flame are the very same folks who really DID do the whole massive genocide against ALL lycanthropes only a few hundred years prior. And that's including the usually lawful and/or good-aligned ones, too. Because to the Flame, lycanthropy was REALLY BAD.

So yeah, I just don't see these two getting along. Pick another religion, and set the Church of the Silver Flame as a known persecutors.

Alignment: Blood Elves are almost always chaotic neutral. Still trying to come up with a stable government after the destruction of Quel’thalas, the Blood Elves have had a very chaotic nature since the pact with the Lords of Dust was made.
Here's another aspect of that Rajah taint, that's again touching very closely to tie-ins with things the Silver Flame has historically been not kosher with.

Adventurers: A Blood Elf may travel for many reasons. They may travel in vengeance to the lords of the undead in Karnnath, or to full-fill a deed to the church, or just to venture to the land of their origin and learn the history of their people./quote]
You've got some interesting material to work with here. This whole "reclaiming my heritage" thing is a cool notion. Hating Karrns, that's also kosher.

What does the typical Blood Elf know about Prince Whats-his-name's faustian deal with the Rakshasa Rajah? What is the extent of that deal (I get the general impression that the Blood Elves as a people were bargained to the Rajah)? What is the average Blood Elf's opinion of their Rakshasa taint? Is there an entire false doctrine based on justifying it? If so, what? Can the Blood Elves be saved? Can an individual Blood Elf overcome his personal taint and become the savior of his people? Are they aware of their impending doom, once the Rajah comes back to collect his payment?

There's some REALLY SWEET dramatic potential there.

[quote]• Arcane Affinity: The race of the Blood Elf has always practiced arcane magic enough it has become almost second nature to many. A Blood Elf with the ability to cast Arcane spells casts them at +2 caster level. This ability is lost if the Blood Elf loses her bloodstone for longer than 24 hours.
What's this about a bloodstone? You posted that thing about Spellforged/Arcaneforged/whatever on another thread, and it had something similar.

Also, I think tying racial abilities to a widget is a bad way to achieve balance. Even if it's an Obvious, Accessible Focus (for those former HERO players around), you (as GM) either ending up screwing over the character by having the opposition specifically exploit this weakness (by stealing/destroying/dispelling), or letting them get away with a massive advantage over another player.

I'd leave this bloodstone as a unique race-specific magic item that Blood Elves commonly possess. Base it off of any of a number of similar magic items (I don't have my DMG handy).

• Magically Inclined: When a Blood Elf reaches 3 HD, they unlock the ability to some spell-like abilities. The Blood Elf gains a number of 0 and/or 1st level arcane spells equal to her charisma modifier. These spells are cast at a caster level equal to the Blood Elf’s character level. The spell-like abilities are each usable once per day. This ability is lost if the Blood Elf loses her bloodstone for longer than 12 hours.[quote]
Again, this is an unusual racial advantage to give. My first impression is that this is really powerful - not only do Blood Elves have an innate advantage (bonuses to Charisma and Intelligence...granting bonus spells), they get ADDITIONAL bonus spells on top of that. Are you intending this to have a level adjustment?

<snip other racial disadvantages>
Yeah. More of this same "these guys are awesome when they've got their widget, but they are SUPER SCREWED without it." In all of my 15-ish years GMing, this never works well.

I mean, think about this. How often do you intend on actually taking advantage of this as a GM? Every session? Every level? How plausible that this weakness will be exploited? Does the typical Khorvairian know about these special stones? Are they worn (ie as a pendant - reasonably easily stolen or ripped off in close combat)? Are they implanted (may not be visible, and you're not likely to be able to remove it without KO/killing the Blood Elf and carving it out of his chest with a hopefully sharp knife)?

If it's a disadvantage that doesn't actually hinder the character meaningfully, it might as well not be there.

Oh, and that -3 modifier for Weak Willed...tweak it to either -2 or -4. Reduce the durations for when the penalties start kicking in. If these guys have been addicted for generations, I'd expect the withdrawal to kick in nigh unto immediately. Kicking in a half day later is...barely inconvenient. If you're more than a half day away from getting it back, it might as well be a week away (or never).

[quote]• Favored Classes: Sorcerer.
Not bad - might want to consider Warlock. The Rakshasa trait makes for a really good reason for why they've got Warlock as a favored class...

Ok, here it is. I even added a little fluff that I thought would most likely work well with this race. FEEDBACK PLEASE :D :D
Not bad. I'd really suggest working on the fluff a bit more - rather than just porting Blood Elves directly from WoW, think about how Blood Elves fit into Eberron as an overall setting.

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
ColtFlenn 02-07-08, 06:17 PM	Blood Elf The Blood Elves were once a race of elves that stood apart from the Necromantic Aerenal elves, and not near as hardy as the elves of Valenar. The Blood Elves lived in a large town called Quel’thalas. They were an extremely arcane-addicted race. They drew power from a magic artifact called the Sunwell. During the last war, Karnnathi Undead marched into the magical city and destroyed it all. The purpose for this is they needed the pure arcane magic of the Sunwell to bring an unfathomably powerful lich back to Eberron. This tainted and drained the powers of the well. The attack almost drew the elves into extinction. Their crave for magic now more apparent and they began to call themselves the Blood Elves for the blood spilt by the undead horde that swept through their glorious home of Quel’thalas. At the destruction of Cyre, the Blood Elf king, Prince Keal’thas, made a pact with the Rakshasa Rajahs and received a great power to help satisfy their arcane cravings. This was a colossal green crystal that rose with an island just south of the Frostfell. The Blood elves carved a metropolis into this crystal and named it Quel’thalas in honor of their fallen city. The Rakshasa Rajahs await the time when they will use the ravenous Blood Elves’ craving for magic to allow them to make a second attack on Eberron. Personality: Blood Elves are tend to be slightly more aggressive than the other sub-races of elf, but they can be just as calm friends. They are always remembering the other nations not providing the required help to save their beloved city that was destroyed. Physical Description: A typical Blood Elf resembles a normal elf in almost every feature save for a pair of eerie glowing green eyes. The demonic energies granted by the Rakshasa Rajahs tainted the once pure Blood Elves with the demonic magic. They elves assimilated it into their own arcane magic. They have almost flawless skin, as an elf, and stand roughly 4 to 5 feet tall. Their ears are slightly longer and have a finer point. They are lean and slimmer than many of the other races and resemble other elves almost directly. Relations: The Blood Elves still hold the grudge to the rest of Khorvaire that they did not help the land of the Blood Elf when they needed it most. They seem to take this grudge out on the other races as if it were their fault. They tend to treat them with little to no respect, unless they deserve or earn it in a sense of what is best to the people of the Blood Elf. The Church of the Silver Flame is the only faction that the Blood Elves of Quel’thalas respect to this day. Respect from a Blood Elf is a great accomplishment. Alignment: Blood Elves are almost always chaotic neutral. Still trying to come up with a stable government after the destruction of Quel’thalas, the Blood Elves have had a very chaotic nature since the pact with the Lords of Dust was made. Blood Elf lands: Blood Elves were to the very brink of extinction after the Karnnathi invasion, but have slowly began to repopulate after the building of their new Quel’thalas. Their only land is the island just south of the frigid Frostfell. The crystal at that makes up their capital generated unnatural heat to just the island itself. Religion: The Blood Elf clerics and paladins try to stick with the Silver Flame. When the undead attacked Quel’thalas, the Silver Flame sent all their available troops to the aid of the Blood Elves. The people of Quel’thalas took this as a token of friendship and help, but the warriors of the Silver Flame saw this as an undead threat, nothing more. Language: Blood Elves speak common and elven. They can learn to speak all others except Drudic. Names: Sylvannas, Keal, Theos, Thios, Poralm, Aft’emol, Uenan Adventurers: A Blood Elf may travel for many reasons. They may travel in vengeance to the lords of the undead in Karnnath, or to full-fill a deed to the church, or just to venture to the land of their origin and learn the history of their people. Blood Elf Racial Traits • +2 Charisma, +2 Intelligence, -2 Strength, -2 Wisdom, -2 Constitution. Blood Elves extremely intelligent and charismatic, but lack the strength of some other races, both physically and mentally. • Medium: As medium size creatures, Blood Elf have no special bonuses or penalties due to their size. • Speed: Blood Elf land speed is 30 feet. • Arcane Affinity: The race of the Blood Elf has always practiced arcane magic enough it has become almost second nature to many. A Blood Elf with the ability to cast Arcane spells casts them at +2 caster level. This ability is lost if the Blood Elf loses her bloodstone for longer than 24 hours. • Magically Inclined: When a Blood Elf reaches 3 HD, they unlock the ability to some spell-like abilities. The Blood Elf gains a number of 0 and/or 1st level arcane spells equal to her charisma modifier. These spells are cast at a caster level equal to the Blood Elf’s character level. The spell-like abilities are each usable once per day. This ability is lost if the Blood Elf loses her bloodstone for longer than 12 hours. • Weak Willed: A Blood elf is very easily deceived when magic is involved. They receive a –3 penalty on all will saves. This penalty is doubled if the Blood Elf loses her bloodstone for longer than 48 hours. • Arcane Dependency: Since the pact with the Rakshasa Rajahs, a Blood Elf has become highly dependent on magic to remain sane. A Blood Elf without her bloodstone become weak after 24 hours, this dependency gives the Blood Elf a –4 on all charisma-based skills. After the second 24 hours, she receives a –2 to her charisma score and a –2 Wisdom (in addition to the racial penalty). Beyond 48 hours of depravation, she then suffers all the penalties of starvation. Except when rolling for subdual damage, she rolls 1d8 damage. • Automatic Languages: Common. Bonus Languages: All other racial languages. • Favored Classes: Sorcerer. Ok, here it is. I even added a little fluff that I thought would most likely work well with this race. FEEDBACK PLEASE :D :D
Gurv 02-07-08, 06:24 PM	Aw man. This is gonna hurt.
IMAL 02-07-08, 06:45 PM	You know, there's a Warcraft TTRPG... And MMO..
Fabius Maximus 02-07-08, 06:53 PM	Damn those Karrnathi! They even suck at genocide.
ColtFlenn 02-07-08, 06:55 PM	... um yes I am aware of that but this is an EBERRON version of the Blood Elves. I created the Blood Elves for an Eberron campaign and they have been used by my players and fellow DMs and have been told it is well made for Eberron. Again I know that there is a World of Warcraft RPG and Online Game. I actually play WoW. But this is for D&D. I appricaite the note, but i want Feedback please about on the build of the race for Eberron... Colt Flenn
ColtFlenn 02-07-08, 06:56 PM	Damn those Karrnathi! They even suck at genocide. Lol, yes they do. But what do you think? Is that an ok way to splice them into Eberron.
Nundahl 02-07-08, 07:41 PM	::Raises index finger and opens mouth:: Wha- ... ::Shakes head, walks away:: Alright, alright ... Let me begin by the ol' classic disclaimer - What you want in your campaign is your deal, and I'm happy to allow you your vision of Eberron. That stated - I find this highly unnecessary - we don't need more Elves. We don't need other setting's races or flavor, and we don't need D&D to be more MMO'd than it is. All personal opinions. Mechanically, it seems heavy, not overpowered necessarily, but too cumbersome, I likes my races easy but unique - Dwarf is too heavy, Half-Orc is too light, Human is cooked just right, the others come close. I don't think I need to state again that I'm expressing personal opinions, but what the hell, there it is again. Not that I expect anyone to be surprised, but I think you shouldn't claim this flavor as your own, you modified slightly some existing lore from another world, and the mechanics whether you changed them or not, have been done and published in another book, some Eberron players may not be aware of that. Toss up an edit at the top not saying you created a race, but wanted to convert a race and maybe the sour taste in the back of my throat will go away. Or tell me to kiss off because my opinion doesn't matter ... either way.
yossarius 02-07-08, 09:43 PM	It reminds me of a racial description from 2nd edition. Ultra-hardcore fantasy-punk race with cool abilites but major drawbacks, almost all of them are the same alignment, they mostly fill one small niche in the setting. I have to agree with Nundahl; I don't see that this is necessary. Of course, the default disclaimer still applies (it's your Eberron; you can do what you want with it), but personally, one of the things that appeals to be about Eberron is that it leaves the old 'sub-race' nonsense behind. Couple that with the fact that this adaptation comes from a video game, and I am forced to come to the conclusion that this creation is actually counter to the flavor of Eberron I prefer. All that aside, I don't like the weak-willed flaw. It doesn't seem to fit the rest of the description. I can't help but feel that the only reason it was included was to avoid a level adjustment. The only reason to avoid a level adjustment is that having one makes players less likely to play one. Since there are relatively few of them, I would count this as a good thing. Drop weak-willed and just go with a +2 level adjustment.
Ashlock 02-09-08, 12:15 PM	That stated - I find this highly unnecessary - we don't need more Elves. But there's also no harm in it. Posting blood elves as an Eberron race here isn't the same as forcing it into your copy of the ECS. :) This is exactly the kind of place for stuff like this, I'd think.
Belabras 02-10-08, 02:46 AM	While what Ashlock says is true, if you are so stuck on the idea of Blood Elves, and can't wait for 4e's Eladrin, then it's probably easiest to simply use the writeup for them in the D20 Warcraft book. You can find them on page 42 of the book, under High Elves.
Cloud Divider 02-18-08, 10:14 PM	I don't play WoW, nor a particularly large fan of Warcraft in general. But these are always interesting to look at for consistency's sake, and to see how one would integrate them into a different setting... Blood Elf The Blood Elves were once a race of elves that stood apart from the Necromantic Aerenal elves, and not near as hardy as the elves of Valenar. The Blood Elves lived in a large town called Quel’thalas. They were an extremely arcane-addicted race. They drew power from a magic artifact called the Sunwell. During the last war, Karnnathi Undead marched into the magical city and destroyed it all. The purpose for this is they needed the pure arcane magic of the Sunwell to bring an unfathomably powerful lich back to Eberron. This tainted and drained the powers of the well. So: Question 1) Did the Blood Elves originate on Xen'drik, like the other elven lineages (Aerenal, Valenar, various drow)? If so, were they slaves to the Giants, like their brethren? Perhaps they were an unusual "magebred" species of elf, designed to be particularly attuned to magic (I forget where I saw it, but there've been hints/suggestions that the dark elves came about from a similar giant program)? Question 1b) If so, what happened to them during the Exodus? How did they end up in the Frostfell? Why have they been doing the last 20,000-odd years since the exodus? Why are they all based in Quel'thalas/why did they settle in the Frostfell, surely there were better places to go? I recommend thinking a bit more/fleshing out more detail on their history beyond what happened to them during the Last War (which is basically so recent, in elven terms, to be the last 5 minutes). Question 2) What was the Sunwell, in Eberron-centric terms? A ginormous Syberis shard? Question 3) What do the other elves think of them? At the destruction of Cyre, the Blood Elf king, Prince Keal’thas, made a pact with the Rakshasa Rajahs and received a great power to help satisfy their arcane cravings. This was a colossal green crystal that rose with an island just south of the Frostfell. The Blood elves carved a metropolis into this crystal and named it Quel’thalas in honor of their fallen city. The Rakshasa Rajahs await the time when they will use the ravenous Blood Elves’ craving for magic to allow them to make a second attack on Eberron. Sooo... The Blood Elf king basically made a pact with a Rakshasa Rajah, to feed his people's magical addiction, right? That seems a bit at odds with this: Religion: The Blood Elf clerics and paladins try to stick with the Silver Flame. When the undead attacked Quel’thalas, the Silver Flame sent all their available troops to the aid of the Blood Elves. The people of Quel’thalas took this as a token of friendship and help, but the warriors of the Silver Flame saw this as an undead threat, nothing more. Unless you've intentionally gone for some kind of bizarro irony here (with the mixture of Silver Flame adherence and simultaneously having a demon-pact with a Rajah), I find it really odd that the Blood Elves would have mass-converted to the Silver Flame, just because they were rescued by the Thranes during the Last War. They've got THOUSANDS of years of history behind them - and whatever religion they had followed during those millenia. I'm not certain they'd have dropped their history like that... Why did the Thranes (who at this time had become a Silver Flame theocracy) make such a major sacrifice, pulling "all their available troops" away from their other fronts (like with, oh, the other Four Nations) in order to rescue the Blood Elves? Why would the Silver Flame have cared? Especially if the Blood Elves had already been sold out to a Rakshasa Rajah? For certain values of "incredible fanaticism," I can far more easily imagine the Flame deciding to help the Karrns with exterminating these elves that have been tainted by the Rajahs. I mean, those two REALLY wouldn't get along. Physical Description: A typical Blood Elf resembles a normal elf in almost every feature save for a pair of eerie glowing green eyes. The demonic energies granted by the Rakshasa Rajahs tainted the once pure Blood Elves with the demonic magic. They elves assimilated it into their own arcane magic. Uh, this just cements my point in the prior paragraph. These are dudes who are VERY OBVIOUSLY TAINTED BY THE RAKSHASA RAJAHS. It's not particularly a secret, either. The Silver Flame are the very same folks who really DID do the whole massive genocide against ALL lycanthropes only a few hundred years prior. And that's including the usually lawful and/or good-aligned ones, too. Because to the Flame, lycanthropy was REALLY BAD. So yeah, I just don't see these two getting along. Pick another religion, and set the Church of the Silver Flame as a known persecutors. Alignment: Blood Elves are almost always chaotic neutral. Still trying to come up with a stable government after the destruction of Quel’thalas, the Blood Elves have had a very chaotic nature since the pact with the Lords of Dust was made. Here's another aspect of that Rajah taint, that's again touching very closely to tie-ins with things the Silver Flame has historically been not kosher with. Adventurers: A Blood Elf may travel for many reasons. They may travel in vengeance to the lords of the undead in Karnnath, or to full-fill a deed to the church, or just to venture to the land of their origin and learn the history of their people./quote] You've got some interesting material to work with here. This whole "reclaiming my heritage" thing is a cool notion. Hating Karrns, that's also kosher. What does the typical Blood Elf know about Prince Whats-his-name's faustian deal with the Rakshasa Rajah? What is the extent of that deal (I get the general impression that the Blood Elves as a people were bargained to the Rajah)? What is the average Blood Elf's opinion of their Rakshasa taint? Is there an entire false doctrine based on justifying it? If so, what? Can the Blood Elves be saved? Can an individual Blood Elf overcome his personal taint and become the savior of his people? Are they aware of their impending doom, once the Rajah comes back to collect his payment? There's some REALLY SWEET dramatic potential there. [quote]• Arcane Affinity: The race of the Blood Elf has always practiced arcane magic enough it has become almost second nature to many. A Blood Elf with the ability to cast Arcane spells casts them at +2 caster level. This ability is lost if the Blood Elf loses her bloodstone for longer than 24 hours. What's this about a bloodstone? You posted that thing about Spellforged/Arcaneforged/whatever on another thread, and it had something similar. Also, I think tying racial abilities to a widget is a bad way to achieve balance. Even if it's an Obvious, Accessible Focus (for those former HERO players around), you (as GM) either ending up screwing over the character by having the opposition specifically exploit this weakness (by stealing/destroying/dispelling), or letting them get away with a massive advantage over another player. I'd leave this bloodstone as a unique race-specific magic item that Blood Elves commonly possess. Base it off of any of a number of similar magic items (I don't have my DMG handy). • Magically Inclined: When a Blood Elf reaches 3 HD, they unlock the ability to some spell-like abilities. The Blood Elf gains a number of 0 and/or 1st level arcane spells equal to her charisma modifier. These spells are cast at a caster level equal to the Blood Elf’s character level. The spell-like abilities are each usable once per day. This ability is lost if the Blood Elf loses her bloodstone for longer than 12 hours.[quote] Again, this is an unusual racial advantage to give. My first impression is that this is really powerful - not only do Blood Elves have an innate advantage (bonuses to Charisma and Intelligence...granting bonus spells), they get ADDITIONAL bonus spells on top of that. Are you intending this to have a level adjustment? <snip other racial disadvantages> Yeah. More of this same "these guys are awesome when they've got their widget, but they are SUPER SCREWED without it." In all of my 15-ish years GMing, this never works well. I mean, think about this. How often do you intend on actually taking advantage of this as a GM? Every session? Every level? How plausible that this weakness will be exploited? Does the typical Khorvairian know about these special stones? Are they worn (ie as a pendant - reasonably easily stolen or ripped off in close combat)? Are they implanted (may not be visible, and you're not likely to be able to remove it without KO/killing the Blood Elf and carving it out of his chest with a hopefully sharp knife)? If it's a disadvantage that doesn't actually hinder the character meaningfully, it might as well not be there. Oh, and that -3 modifier for Weak Willed...tweak it to either -2 or -4. Reduce the durations for when the penalties start kicking in. If these guys have been addicted for generations, I'd expect the withdrawal to kick in nigh unto immediately. Kicking in a half day later is...barely inconvenient. If you're more than a half day away from getting it back, it might as well be a week away (or never). [quote]• Favored Classes: Sorcerer. Not bad - might want to consider Warlock. The Rakshasa trait makes for a really good reason for why they've got Warlock as a favored class... Ok, here it is. I even added a little fluff that I thought would most likely work well with this race. FEEDBACK PLEASE :D :D Not bad. I'd really suggest working on the fluff a bit more - rather than just porting Blood Elves directly from WoW, think about how Blood Elves fit into Eberron as an overall setting.