Comments on: My Elves are… Odd

By: Scott

Scott — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 05:27:01 +0000

@Benpop: Hadn’t thought of that, but yeah, you’re right. They’re not exactly primitives, but until fairly recently they were considered “barbaric.”

@Bob: Dark Sun was once one of my favorite settings, but they didn’t do most of the races well at all. Aside from the halflings (who were, I have to admit, quite interesting), there wasn’t much history behind any of them, as far as I can remember.

It seems as if the 4e devs would like to bring Dark Sun back in some form. I’d like to see that. From what I hear, the FR campaign setting was done reasonably well…

By: Ishmayl

Ishmayl — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 13:58:00 +0000

@Scott – The Dresden Files does sound interesting, I will definitely check them out – thanks for the recommendation!

@benpop – You know, I didn’t notice it before, but I can somewhat see a bit of similarity (the good kind!) in Earth Children as well. Great books.

Ishmayl’s last blog post: Finding Inspiration in Odd Places

By: Bob

Bob — Sun, 31 Aug 2008 21:07:22 +0000

I like these. Remind me a lot of the elves from Dark Sun but without stereotyping them as rogues. You’ve gave them a proper history rather than the roaming virtually storyless race from the aforementioned setting.

By: benpop

benpop — Fri, 29 Aug 2008 08:21:27 +0000

Your elves remind me a great deal of the Clan from Jean Auel’s Earth Children series of books. The totems and the periodic meet especially call up those memories.

I like a lot the world-building between the Dwarf entry and this one (especially with the Dwarf one, with the bizarre stereotypes there — seriously, Scottish? Who thought of that?). I’m guessing you’ll have more posts like this, so I wait with anticipation!

By: Scott

Scott — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 01:53:02 +0000

Jim Butcher wrote a series of books called the Dresden Files, an urban fantasy about a private investigator of sorts in Chicago who happens to be a wizard. The faerie courts of Summer and Winter have played large roles in some of the books. Summer Knight and Small Favor, in particular (if I’m remembering correctly).

The whole series is pretty good, definitely inspirational if you ever plan to run urban fantasy.

By: Ishmayl

Ishmayl — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 12:45:21 +0000

Yeah, the same ideas don’t always work for everyone, I’ve seen other people use the Seelie/Unseelie method, and it didn’t necessarily work that well. The Feywild does seem to be meant for something similar to what we’re trying, but what is closer I think is some older (and newer) fantasy works, like Tad Williams’ “Shadowmarch” series, or Steven Brust’s “Vlad Taltos” series.

I’m not familiar with Jim Butcher’s Summer and Winter, I would like to know more about it.

By: Scott

Scott — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 05:20:35 +0000

I think you may be right, at least as far as the races go. Settings themselves… I’m fairly certain there are still some original roleplaying settings out there. Entirely unique might be a bit much to ask, but original is less so.

I like the Seelie/Unseelie split, but it didn’t work for Galadria at the time. Now that 4e is out, I’m taking a close look at the Feywild and the Shadowfell, because they seem designed to be put to such a use. Of course, that’d be similar to Jim Butcher’s Summer and Winter…

By: Ishmayl

Ishmayl — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 00:32:47 +0000

It’s an interesting concept. In my opinion, the only way to really make campaign settings unique anymore is to really change around the cultures so that standard races (or even nonstandard races) feel completely different from what they’ve always felt like before.

In my campaign, the sydhi are a fey race that takes very much after the Seelie and Unseelie Courts of celtic mythology, with bits of Japanese and Hindu culture thrown in. My first blog post (http://tatwd.wordpress.com) was about these people.

Great article, I like your races so far, let’s hear more!