-The changing of the terms is a "metagame" issue. That is, it's something that happened in D&D. Did it happen in the Forgotten Realms? No. Moon Elves are still referred to in the Forgotten Realms as Moon Elves. Sun Elves are still referred to in the Forgotten Realms as Sun Elves. Wood Elves are still referred to in the Forgotten Realms as Wood Elves. In the books, it is mentioned that many Sun/Moon/Star Elves who have chosen to take up residence in the Plane of Faerie like their ancestors, or who find a particular affinity with the plane call themselves 'Eladrin' in game, a likely nod to the Eladrin (pre-4e terminology) that serve most members of the Seldarine.
-The added abilities of what would be in 4e D&D Eladrin, as opposed to pre-4e Eladrin- most notably the teleporation power- has been explained somewhat in the context of the setting as the Plane of Faerie moving "closer" to the Prime Material Plane, affording Sun Elves, Moon Elves and Star Elves more of an affinity to the magical powers of the Plane of Faerie. There are a bunch of problems or holes with the explanation, but I don't particularly feel like getting into them- if you want to know, just be my guest and say so, and I'll go on. But, suffice to say, it's very "ho hum" in terms of changes and such- which is a good thing. No news is good news, being that nothing bad happened.
Gomez
a likely nod to the Eladrin (pre-4e terminology) that serve most members of the Seldarine.
"On rare occasions, the eladrins join with the aasimon who serve the Greek and elven powers when some profound evil threatens all of Arborea. But for the most part, they prefer to leave the powers be and govern their own affairs." - Planescape Monstrous Compendium Appendix II, page 28.
"The eladrins of Arvandor are not servants of the elven pantheon, though they respect the elf deities and generally cooperate with them in everyday matters as well as urgent ones. But when the elf deities require powerful servants to travel to other planes, they usually call upon angels rather than eladrins..." - Player's Guide to Faerun, page 143.
(Demihuman Deities, 96)
"...but Corellon is also served by...Eladrins (particularly Firres and Ghaeles)..."
(Demihuman Deities, 101)
"...but Deep Sashelas is also served by...Eladrins (particularly Novieres)..."
(Demihuman Deities, 105)
"...but Erevan is also served by...Eladrins (particularly Coures)..."
(Demihuman Deities, 109)
"...but Hanali is also served by...Eladrins..."
(Demihuman Deities, 114)
"...but Labelas is also served by...Eladrins..."
(Demihuman Deities, 118)
"...but Rillifane is also served by...Eladrins..."
(Demihuman Deities, 122)
"...but Sehanine is also served by...Eladrins..."
(Demihuman Deities, 126)
"...but Shevarash is also served by...Eladrins (particularly Ghaeles)..."
(Demihuman Deities, 130)
"...but Solonar is also served by...Eladrins..."
(Demihuman Deities, 133)
-Player's Guide to Faerun doesn't invalidate the Seldarine's list of servitors, being as it does not provide a newly updated list that is supposed to be referenced instead of Demihuman Deities. And, each entry with the exception of Angharradh and Fenmarel Mestarine specifically lists Eladrin or specific kinds of Eladrin as serving the individual members of the Seldarine.
Non-natives to Fearun would most likely call themselves Eladrin, but natives will, 9.8 times out of ten, call themselves Sun, Moon or Star Elves respectively.
What differs them from say aasimon is that eladrin, like the archons, have their own paragon leaders that are at least on par with demigods. So while some of them definitely serve the Seldarine the bunch of the eladrin still serve (or better, are more associated) the Court of Stars.
Because, ya' know, Eladrins don't exist in FR... at least not in canon, and certainly not before 4e.
Subjective 'canon' at it's finest. :P
What differs them from say aasimon is that eladrin, like the archons, have their own paragon leaders that are at least on par with demigods. So while some of them definitely serve the Seldarine the bunch of the eladrin still serve (or better, are more associated) the Court of Stars.
-Eladrin do indeed have their own paragons, Eladrin (as in specific Eladrin, not the entire race) still serve the Seldarine, in addition to, or with some, for whatever reason, perhaps instead of other, more powerful Eladrin.
Because, ya' know, Eladrins don't exist in FR... at least not in canon, and certainly not before 4e.
-Demihuman Deities mentions Eladrin multiple times, making their existence in the Forgotten Realms definitive and canon. Unless you are trying to play with semantics, because it says 'Eladrins', instead of 'Eladrin'...
Powerful Eladrin still rule over the others, and many, if not all, serve the Seldarine, both in the mortal, fey and outer realms.
Hmm, no wonder Corellon is so damn powerful. He's got all of his followers on Toril, some of whom roam the planes and he's got almost the entire Feywild to himself (not counting the Feydark).
So, in essence, the only thing that changed about Eladrin (if we care to call it a change in place of, say, a revelation) is that they come from the Feywild instead of the outer planes... oh, and that 'normal' Eladrin/Elves & fey can become them.
-While I think it is official, with the terms 'Ghaele' and 'Bralani', the Eladrin of pre-4e (Chaotic Good extraplanar paragon creatures from Arboria) are not the same/synonymous as the Eladrin of 4e (in the Forgotten Realms, Sun/Moon/Star Elves, or in general D&D terms Elves from the Plane of Faerie). I don't think any of the 4e books have touched on disjointedness of it all. I remember someone using the term "Elder Eladrin' for what were Eladrin in pre-4e, but I don't know if this is an actual official term or not.
-While I think it is official, with the terms 'Ghaele' and 'Bralani', the Eladrin of pre-4e (Chaotic Good extraplanar paragon creatures from Arboria) are not the same/synonymous as the Eladrin of 4e (in the Forgotten Realms, Sun/Moon/Star Elves, or in general D&D terms Elves from the Plane of Faerie). I don't think any of the 4e books have touched on disjointedness of it all. I remember someone using the term "Elder Eladrin' for what were Eladrin in pre-4e, but I don't know if this is an actual official term or not.
Bold mine; They are called Noble Eladrin, found in the Monster manual and they are, in fact, elder/more powerful Eladrin. Quite a few places have touched on the 'disjointedness of it all' as you put it.
I mistook Demihuman Deities for Monster Mythology (thus, thinking it was core).
I often get those two mixed up. :embarrass
Anyhow, ignore what you don't like.
Thats why they made the 4e lore so bad - to force people to realize they should be creating their own stuff. Those clever designers... ain't they somethin'?
-Player's Guide to Faerun doesn't invalidate the Seldarine's list of servitors, being as it does not provide a newly updated list that is supposed to be referenced instead of Demihuman Deities. And, each entry with the exception of Angharradh and Fenmarel Mestarine specifically lists Eladrin or specific kinds of Eladrin as serving the individual members of the Seldarine.
The ham-fisted kitchen-sink approach that Eric Boyd used in Demihuman Deities listed every monster that could conceivably have anything to do with a given deity as their "servants" rather than attempting to construct a list that would give a clear picture of a given deity's celestial court. The result was an incohesive muddle that illuminated nothing. Normally I like Eric Boyd's work, but he really dropped the ball there; by listing so many disparate creatures, and not ranking them in order of preference or giving the DM any clue about relative numbers, the whole list becomes more misleading than useful.
So among Aerdrie Faenya's servants are included air elementals, kenku, androsphinxes, atomies, avorel guardinals, hippogriffs, silver dragons, pegasi, opinicuses, lillendi, and shedu - but I don't think anyone would argue that a substantial percentage of kenku or androsphinxes are off in Arvandor/Ysgard serving Aerdrie, to give just two examples. Lillendi almost always serve Selune, and eladrins as a race serve no one - as personifications of chaos, the very idea of servitude (even to the Court of Stars, which "isn't really the government of the eladrins as much as it is the heart and spirit of the race" - PSMCII28) is anathema to them.
If someone wrote about air elementals serving the Seldarine, or guardinals, or dragons, it'd be clear from the context that these are marked exceptions to the rule. How many kenku heralds and planar allies do you really think Aerdrie Faenya has available? And eladrins in Demihuman Deities aren't given any more emphasis than any of those, making any reference to "the eladrins that serve the Seldarine" a case of dramatically distorting the relevant canon and intent. Or a simple lack of reading comprehension.
According to both their original source and the PGtF (a Realms-specific source), the eladrins are free agents who dwell in their planes independently of any deities. Claiming that Demihuman Deities suggests otherwise ignores the context both of the DD references and other canonical sources.
Sorry, but throughout 2e and 3e, I was repeatedly aggravated by repeated attempts, mostly by fans, to link together elves and eladrins simply because they looked similar and lived on the same plane - something that I thought did great trauma to the chaotic good alignment by depriving it of exemplars that weren't linked to a single race. There are many, many ways to be chaotic good without being elf-like.
Eladrins were always poor design in this regard. We should have had a chaotic good race of planeborne that were as varied as demons, so the alignment and associated race didn't seem so pigeonholed and one-dimensional. Eladrins worked well enough, and they were interesting, but only if clear lines were drawn between them and elves/fey.
Obviously, I lost that war in a sense, since eladrins were demoted from personifications of chaotic good, benign equivalents of demons or chaotic equivalents of archons, depending on how you look at it, to a synonym for gold elves and human-sized fey. In another sense I won it, because at least they're decoupled from the chaotic good alignment (which anyway no longer exists) - which was the only reason I cared.
But I'm still tetchy enough about the subject that I want to speak up when people make misleading statements about their role in previous editions of the game.
So, in essence, the only thing that changed about Eladrin (if we care to call it a change in place of, say, a revelation) is that they come from the Feywild instead of the outer planes... oh, and that 'normal' Eladrin/Elves & fey can become them.
Not at all. The 4e eladrin are completely different creatures, even if they share some of the same names. If you don't believe me, ask Rich Baker.
Previous-editions eladrins were celestials, personifications of good. They were liberty and freedom incarnate, champions of righteous chaos and defenders of the weak, crusaders against evil chaos and so on.
Prior to 4e, the essential nature of eladrins could be summed up in two words: chaotic good. Not all of them looked particularly elf-like, and all of them had alternate forms that weren't elf-like at all, but they all had as a common element the fact that they were defined by the chaotic good alignment, and in turn defined it.
4e eladrin are simply fey, and they can be good, evil, or neither. Their previous-editions equivalents aren't eladrins, but creatures like sidhe, verdant princes, and leShay - any powerful, medium or large-sized, elven-looking fey creature that ruled over the others.
Words like "ghaele" or "bralani" in 4th edition describe powerful fey who draw magical power from a connection to the seasons. In 3e, there was a template presented by Gwen Kestral in Dragon Magazine to represent fey who gained power from the seasons in this way. In 2e-3e, a bralani was a wild, boistrous celestial being native to a plane of endless dust and capable of transforming into a whirlwind. In 4e, it's a noble fey associated with autumn. To say that they're the same creature is stretching things.
Gold (or grey, in 3e core) elves are also lumped in as less-powerful "common" versions, changing the definition of what they are, too, but not as drastically.
The question, however, is whether or not the 4e designers expect references to 2e-3e eladrins to be read as referring to 4e eladrin in 4th edition. The answer is probably yes - though this results in some absurdities, like a crusade of unaligned fey ending the reign of the obyriths in the Abyss. It'd be better if they introduced a new celestial race to replace them retroactively, but the chances of creating a race of celestials to represent an alignment that no longer exists seems small.
My bad.
I mistook Demihuman Deities for Monster Mythology (thus, thinking it was core).
I often get those two mixed up. :embarrass
Anyhow, ignore what you don't like.
Thats why they made the 4e lore so bad - to force people to realize they should be creating their own stuff. Those clever designers... ain't they somethin'?
*Pulls out +6 rod of righteous indignation and wags it at MT* Now now, no need for all that implied hate...
Not at all. The 4e eladrin are completely different creatures, even if they share some of the same names. If you don't believe me, ask Rich Baker.
I point to part of your link;
3e eladrin and 4e eladrin aren't quite the same thing. The term eladrin no longer refers to chaotic good immortals who live in Arvandor (although some eladrin probably do). It refers to a race of fey who run the gamut from "high elves" -- the most common eladrin -- through various noble or royal beings who include some of the 3e types you might remember, such as bralani or ghaele eladrins, and even on up to extremely powerful archfey -- unique individuals who are as powerful as demon princes or archdevils.
This, to me, sounds like he is saying they are still what they were, except that they are now Fey, instead of Chaotic Good Immortals.
My bad.
I mistook Demihuman Deities for Monster Mythology (thus, thinking it was core).
I often get those two mixed up. :embarrass
-Alright, you had me scratching my head there for a moment, wondering what kind of weird thing you were proposing that would invalidate Demihuman Deities as not Forgotten Realms canon.
So among Aerdrie Faenya's servants are included air elementals, kenku, androsphinxes, atomies, avorel guardinals, hippogriffs, silver dragons, pegasi, opinicuses, lillendi, and shedu - but I don't think anyone would argue that a substantial percentage of kenku or androsphinxes are off in Arvandor/Ysgard serving Aerdrie, to give just two examples. Lillendi almost always serve Selune, and eladrins as a race serve no one - as personifications of chaos, the very idea of servitude (even to the Court of Stars, which "isn't really the government of the eladrins as much as it is the heart and spirit of the race" - PSMCII28) is anathema to them.
-The text doesn't say that "All [Race] serve [Deity]." It says that
"[Race] serves [Deity]." So, with Aerdrie Faenya as the example provided, yes, she is served by Air Elementals, Kenku, Androsphinx, Atomies, Avorel, Hippogriff, Silver Dragon, Pegasi, Opinicuses, Lillendi, and Shedu. Do these creatures serve no one other than Aerdrie Faenya? Of course not. Is Aerdrie Faenya served by these creature- perhaps some more than others, or some more often than others? Yes. Do specific Eladrin do Aerdrie Faenya's bidding when/if she calls upon their service? Yes.
If someone wrote about air elementals serving the Seldarine, or guardinals, or dragons, it'd be clear from the context that these are marked exceptions to the rule. How many kenku heralds and planar allies do you really think Aerdrie Faenya has available? And eladrins in Demihuman Deities aren't given any more emphasis than any of those, making any reference to "the eladrins that serve the Seldarine" a case of dramatically distorting the relevant canon and intent. Or a simple lack of reading comprehension.
According to both their original source and the PGtF (a Realms-specific source), the eladrins are free agents who dwell in their planes independently of any deities. Claiming that Demihuman Deities suggests otherwise ignores the context both of the DD references and other canonical sources.
-Again, see above. The source does not state "All [Race] serve [Deity]." That Eladrin are listed in Demihuman Deities demonstrates that various members of the Seldarine are served by Eladrin in some capacity. The quote from Player's Guide to Faerûn does not do anything to annul that information. That quote itself confirms that various members of the Seldarine- the ones listed in Demihuman Deities- as having Eladrin servitors: "... they usually call upon Angels rather than Eladrins...". If specific Eladrin did not serve specific members of the Seldarine, no mention of Eladrin, or of Angels being used more commonly than Eladrin, would have been mentioned.
If Richard Baker is claiming that eladrin are "still what they were," he's a liar. But he didn't claim that. And I don't think anyone familiar with both 3e and 4e eladrins would claim that. But I think the 4e Realms is going to pretend they were always unaligned fey - which is to say, that they were always something completely different in every important respect.
_______________
"Here is a coin for your troubles"
My main concern is that it's clear that the vast majority of eladrins do not, as of 3e, serve the Seldarine. Is there an occasional exception, like Aerdrie Faenya sending a hippogriff servitor on important grass-eating missions? Sure. But casual references to "the eladrin who serve the Seldarine" make my hackles prickle. Broadly speaking, the notion of 2e-3e eladrins serving anyone, even the Court of Stars, is a contradiction in terms. They are proudly independent incarnations of freedom, and no one's servants.
I agree. That said, Eladrin, by and large, still are proudly independent.
If Richard Baker is claiming that eladrin are "still what they were," he's a liar. But he didn't claim that. And I don't think anyone familiar with both 3e and 4e eladrins would claim that. But I think the 4e Realms is going to pretend they were always unaligned fey - which is to say, that they were always something completely different in every important respect.
Well, to start, in FR Corellon is good, not unaligned. As such, Eladrin/Elves also lean toward good.
Anyways, I never said they are exactly the same as before. But they are both very similar, to the point of being one and the same (IMO).
I'm not seeing how they are 'completely different in every important respect'... How do you mean?
*Note, I'm asking and not being snarky, just generally wanting to know your opinion here. I don't see it as that big of a leap.
Well, to start, in FR Corellon is good, not unaligned. As such, Eladrin/Elves also lean toward good.
I'm not sure that follows. Yondalla was lawful good in 3e, but halflings were neutral. I think probably gold elves still lean toward good, since they did in previous editions, but the eladrin of the Feywild are probably unaligned and... wild, more like the amoral and tricksy daoine sidhe of legend.
I'm not seeing how they are 'completely different in every important respect'... How do you mean?
I think their alignment was the most important thing about them (this is also true of demons, devils, rilmani, modrons, guardinals, etc.). What they looked like was inconsequential - they were normally intended to be encountered in disguise, as originally conceived. Other than physical appearance, I don't see any connection at all. Certain words like "ghaele" have been preserved, but they're used in an entirely different way. Their history, the names and natures of their rulers, their planes of origin have all changed.
4e eladrin are a combination of 3e elves, 3e eladrins, and various 3e fey races, with an emphasis, I think, on the fey aspect. In the process, everything that mattered about 3e eladrins has been sacrificed in order to make them into elf-fey.
My main concern is that it's clear that the vast majority of eladrins do not, as of 3e, serve the Seldarine.
-As of 2e, I think it was clear that the vast majority of Eladrin did not serve the Seldarine, either. Nothing in the Demihuman Deities text that I cited seemed to me to point in that direction. So and so is served by Eladrin served, as well as Celestial creatures. Do all Celestial creatures serve whoever the deity is, because it is mentioned that Celestial creatures serve him/her/it? No, of course not, since there's pretty much an infinite amount of Celestial creatures out there, given the generalist nature of the term. Likewise, not all Eladrin out there serve the deity.
4e eladrin are a combination of 3e elves, 3e eladrins, and various 3e fey races, with an emphasis, I think, on the fey aspect. In the process, everything that mattered about 3e eladrins has been sacrificed in order to make them into elf-fey.
-Blood Elves, I think is the race from Warcraft that the 4e Eladrin race seems to be based very much off of, and from what I am told of them, they are very much a High Arcana blend of Elves and Fey.
You can't really apply the old lore, because it's a case of Apples and Oranges. Whereas before they were Outsiders akin to Archons (or whatever), now they are just 1e's 'High Elves'.
You can try to reconcile the two, by saying the old Eladrin are the new Eladrin that had 'gone Epic', but the simple fact is that they have changed the meaning of the term 'Eladrin'.
I never played Planescape, and didn't even know of the Eladrin until coming to these boards, so for me, it's no big deal. I don't notice it as a retcon, because I was unfamiliar with the 'old-con'.
I suppose if I was a fan of that lore, I'd be upset, so I do see why others are.
I know this was talked about by WotC, in a preview or something? They said something along the lines of having two very similar things and consolidating.
I'll try to find it.
Given the story we'd settled on for the high elves (a race of fey lords who live in castles in Faerie), it seemed that it would actually be counterproductive to also bring forward th eladrin into the new edition (a race of fey lords who live in Arborea, a plane that looks a lot like Faerie). In a sense, eladrin and high elves were competing for the same conceptual space, so we chose to combine them into a single race of fey lords and made the Feywild their home. The name "eladrin" became available to use as the name of the "high elf" player character race. Now there are three races-not subraces-of elvenkind, and each is equally distinct from the others: Drow, Eladrin, Elf.
True enough, I suppose, but it isn't that big of a deal for me. I've always considered the possibility that highly powered, lucky or blessed elves could become Eladrin when they leave the mortal world... this just cleans that up a bit for me.
I don't think it's as clean as that. In previous editions, there were numerous races/castes of eladrins, equivalent to the demonic, diabolic, guardinal, rilmani, and modron subtypes. For those who don't know, these were the eladrin types:
Bralani, an entire race inhabiting the wastes of Pelion resembling short, stocky elves with rainbow eyes and white hair. "They're the wildest and most feral of their kind, existing from heartbeat to heartbeat in a glorious, never-ending passion. No eladrin can match the fury of an angry bralani, or the keening depths of her grief or sorrow, or the blissful heights of her joy."
Coures, tiny spritelike creatures equated with imps, quasits, and mephits.
Firres, the bards of the eladrins, resembling half-elves with eyes of flame. "Their lives are consumed by a fiery passion for art of any kind, and they strive to make their own existence a living image of wonder and delight." In a way they were the good equivalents of succubi, inspiring rather than corrupting with their charms.
Ghaeles, the knights errant of the eladrins, often found in disguise on other planes helping noble rebels against tyrants.
Novieres, aquatic eladrins, "somewhat more human in appearance than a full-blooded aquatic elf." The primary eladrins of Ossa as the bralani were the primary eladrins of Pelion, they were, like the bralani, examples of eladrins adapting to different climates rather than advancing in social caste.
Shieres, "graceful eladrin knights" and "the highest of the common eladrins."
Shiradi. These were new to 3rd edition, introduced in the Book of Exalted Deeds. They looked like muscular, brawny, pointy-eared humans with angel wings, which I liked because they looked more like devas than elves and helped move the race away from the faerie stereotype they'd been saddled with.
Tulani, the actual nobles of the eladrins, resembling seven foot tall elves and being roughly the equivalent of pit fiends or balors.
So the problem is that these creatures were depicted as being whole races, especially the bralani and novieres (with only the tulani as "nobles"), and as such aren't easy to simply replace with 4th edition's version of creatures like the "bralani of the autumn winds" and the "ghaele of winter." First off, for those who don't know what a "bralani" or a "ghaele" is supposed to be, the names are meaningless and unnecessary gibberish. Just call them "eladrin lord of the autumn winds" and "eladrin lord of winter." The first rule of fantasy writing ought to be not to deluge your readers with unnecessary gibberish, and it seems to be a good rule of thumb that the more of that you see, the worse the book is (there was an xkcd cartoon on the subject). The only ones likely to appreciate words like "bralani" and "ghaele" are those familiar with eladrins in previous editions - and they're more likely to be either confused or frustrated by the gratuitous discontinuity. I wouldn't care that a 4e bralani (a noble fey connected with autumn) has nothing to do either conceptually or statistically with a 3e bralani (a wild, tempestuous celestial race inhabiting an upper planar desert) or that the 4e ghaele (a noble fey connected with winter) has nothing to do with the 3e ghaele (a kind of celestial secret agent) if they hadn't given them the same names to no useful purpose at all that I can see. For that matter, it was senseless to give the whole race a gibberish name like "eladrin" which will only put off new fans and confuse old ones. If they're intended to be "high elves" or sidhe, call them that. Especially in the Forgotten Realms, which has had silver elves, green elves, and gold elves since its beginning, to suddenly (after an in-game century) to give them another unnecessary name is both disconcerting and dismaying.
So yeah, while in some cases you can interpret previous-edition references to eladrins as referring to communities of "high elves" dwelling in the celestial planes (not a very useful or flavorful addition to those planes, which already have elven communities, but whatever), you can't read previous-edition references to bralani and think, "ah, this should be read as referring to noble fey who personify/draw power from autumn" because you can't really have entire tribes of nobles frolicking in the dust - nobles need someone to rule, or they aren't really nobles, and anyway the themes of previous-edition bralani have nothing to do with autumn - a distinct lack of vegetation in Pelion means a lack of important thematic elements like fallen leaves, for example. You'd have to read it as "tribes of boisterous white-haired desert fey with no connection to the bralani."
So it's not a clean conversion at all. It's far messier than it needed to be.
Mind you, a lot of people liked to make connections between eladrins and elves in previous editions, because evidently it wasn't important for them to have an independent race that represented the chaotic good alignment in the same way that all the other alignments got races that weren't tied to a specific PC race. As I said above, this was to some degree a flaw in Rich Baker's original design of the eladrin (he's the one who created the race in the first place, as the author of the Planescape Monstrous Compendium Appendix II, a book that was inspired in parts, but suffered from a general lack of imagination, with numerous races just being "planar" versions of Material Plane races - so it had planar neogi (tso), planar beholders (observers), "good" tieflings (the unfortunately-named aasimar), planar boars (fhorges), planar illithids (eaters of knowledge), planar will-o-wisps (ghostlights), planar lions (leomarh), planar owls (noctrals), planar porcupines (quills), planar spiders (hook spiders), planar fireflies (sunflies), planar k-rin (t'uen-rin), planar hyenas (vorrs), planar lizardfolk (khaasta), and so on instead of creating unique creatures that advanced the themes of the planes in question - of course, all this was more than made up for by Tony DiTerlizzi's breathtaking art, and gems like the rilmani, darkweaver, and dhour, and there were some incredible fan interpretations of even otherwise bland races like the guardinals and the tso ). It wasn't inherently a deal-breaker to create a chaotic good celestial race with a vaguely "faerie" theme, but doing so led a lot of people to link the two in unwholesome and incestuous ways, as in your suggestion. And I think such a game is poorer for such a two-dimensional, unimaginative interpretation. I agree with Rich Baker that there's absolutely no reason to have two races of fey lords dwelling in similar planes. D&D always had plenty of elfy, faerie-looking things and didn't need another one. The challenge, then, for fans was to identify how eladrins are different from elves or fey - how they're a broader, more robust race that manifests benign chaos in a broader way - and I believe we (James O'Rance, Dave King, me, and others) succeeded.
Planescape was a creative challenge in many ways, but for years the fan community responded to it with enthusiasm, and the Planescape community was the most vibrant and interesting D&D group on the web. Sigh. With the books out of print for years and years, the creative energy has drained some, with some of the best fan writers having moved on and not being replaced at an equivalent rate.
Anyway, personally I have no problem with a chaotic good elf "evolving" into an eladrin, but only under the assumption that a chaotic good gnome, dragon, or orc could do the same thing, and is equally likely to. If eladrins are intended to be the good version of tanar'ri, I can imagine that all chaotic good souls have an opportunity to rise from petitioner status to eladrin status, elves included. Restricting their ranks to elves only, however, seems to me to do a disservice to all chaotic good characters looking for a celestial race to champion and exemplify their beliefs.
(My other problem with eladrins was that they only had three paragons instead the vast number of interesting personalities demons, devils, and to some degree archons and guardinals got, and they were structured in a way that it wasn't easy to add more - certainly possible, and I did make up some of my own independent eladrin lords, but it was counterintuitive enough that TSR/WotC never bothered. Rich Baker originally only gave them only one (not counting the tulani), Morwel, and Chris Perkins gave her a family in Warriors of Heaven, a book which was to the planes as Jar-Jar Binks was to the Star Wars mythos (the whole bisexuality theme added in Book of Exalted Deeds made them a little more interesting, though).
Anyway, personally I have no problem with a chaotic good elf "evolving" into an eladrin, but only under the assumption that a chaotic good gnome, dragon, or orc could do the same thing, and is equally likely to. If eladrins are intended to be the good version of tanar'ri, I can imagine that all chaotic good souls have an opportunity to rise from petitioner status to eladrin status, elves included. Restricting their ranks to elves only, however, seems to me to do a disservice to all chaotic good characters looking for a celestial race to champion and exemplify their beliefs.
(My other problem with eladrins was that they only had three paragons instead the vast number of interesting personalities demons, devils, and to some degree archons and guardinals got, and they were structured in a way that it wasn't easy to add more - certainly possible, and I did make up some of my own independent eladrin lords, but it was counterintuitive enough that TSR/WotC never bothered. Rich Baker originally only gave them only one (not counting the tulani), Morwel, and Chris Perkins gave her a family in Warriors of Heaven, a book which was to the planes as Jar-Jar Binks was to the Star Wars mythos (the whole bisexuality theme added in Book of Exalted Deeds made them a little more interesting, though).
While I don't disagree with much of your post (aside from the fact that it bothers me far less) I wanted to let you know something it sees you are unaware of.
Bold mine; See, I believe you are mixing up eladrin (high elves) with Archfey (more powerful and unique eladrin and other creatures).
Eladrin are high elves, we know.
Eladrin can become Archfey (noble eladrin in 3e), just as can other fey creatures and even some non-fey (IE warlocks with the fey pact).
This is not exactly the same as it was in 3e, but it is not exclusive to eladrin only. Nor just fey. Most noble eladrin are exemplars of good, as per MotP's, and all our chaotic by nature.
EDIT: Correction, there seems to be degrees of power more then what I mentioned.
We have normal eladrin (high elves) and normal fey. Then there are noble eladrin (like the ones in the monster manual), which could also include other fey of equal power (like sprites and satyrs, but it is possible they are known by another name, we don't know yet). Then there are the Archfey, which we know as the upper most on the food chain, so to speak.
So, really, it might not be as different then it used to be, we just do not have enough examples of the other powers in the Feywild...
We have normal eladrin (high elves) and normal fey. Then there are noble eladrin (like the ones in the monster manual), which could also include other fey of equal power (like sprites and satyrs, but it is possible they are known by another name, we don't know yet).
Yeah, I think they would become noble sprites and noble satyrs, not noble eladrin. Any of the three could become archfey.
The only reason I wanted a variety of chaotic good races to evolve into eladrin after death was to make them better parallel the tanar'ri - which is only relevant if they're outsiders/immortals rather than fey. As fey, I'd rather have eladrin start out as eladrin and remain eladrin.
I should note, though, that the 3e eladrins seem to have been contemporaries of the obyriths, and thus far older than mortals. As such, they may not have had any ability to recruit more of their kind from mortal souls (as the obyriths didn't).
I should note, though, that the 3e eladrins seem to have been contemporaries of the obyriths, and thus far older than mortals. As such, they may not have had any ability to recruit more of their kind from mortal souls (as the obyriths didn't).
Well, to be more in line with CE, CG then lacks a successor race of the eladrin (similar to the tanar'ri), but a race the eladrin have a more friendly relashionship with.
Anyway, not really on-topic anymore:
Rip, since most alignments got a predecessor race of sorts (no matter if they were created by other such races or by the forces of Good/Evil/Law/Chaos, respectively) I wonder if you know of any canon race that would fit this role for LG (maybe a counterpart to the ancient baatorians)?
Well, to be more in line with CE, CG then lacks a successor race of the eladrin (similar to the tanar'ri), but a race the eladrin have a more friendly relashionship with.
Anyway, not really on-topic anymore:
Rip, since most alignments got a predecessor race of sorts (no matter if they were created by other such races or by the forces of Good/Evil/Law/Chaos, respectively) I wonder if you know of any canon race that would fit this role for LG (maybe a counterpart to the ancient baatorians)?
I don't know of a canon term, no. I've been using the term "aeons" in line with Gnostic myth (where the Aeons are the angelic beings from the Pleroma and the more-recently-created Archons rule the material world). My idea is that the aeons departed to the Seventh Heaven and parts unknown, leaving the archons behind to watch over the lower heavens (and the multiverse as a whole) in their stead.
The archons do canonically share the Heavens with the zoveri (octupus-centaurs native to Lunia) and the noctrals (celestial owl things), but there's no indication that they're older than the archons are.
Thanks.