Figures, everything dnd has it's origins in either tolkien or vance.
Or Fritz Leiber or Michael Moorcock or Robert E. Howard or Poul Anderson etc. :P
You see, the elves are already asleep. May the day that they wake never come. The horror of what will happen cannot be described.
This is why I come back to this board. It's a source of such wonderful ideas. :D
RPG Superstar 2009 Top 32, 2010 Top 8
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You see, the elves are already asleep. May the day that they wake never come. The horror of what will happen cannot be described.
I'd missed this. Reminds me of White Martians and how the league thought they 'took care' of them in Morrison's run. Or The Burning. Hmm, makes for a bit of paranoia inducement....
Doh, I failed my perception check!Are elves still immune to ghoul paralysis? I'm looking through my PDF Bestiary, Elves of Golarion, and RPG and missing it.It's under 'Special Attacks' in the Ghoul bestiary statblock.
It's fairly well hidden! I checked the Bestiary after seeing Matthew's post because I was certain that I'd seen the elven thing under the ghoul entry. But even with knowing it was there beforehand I only found it on my second check. Clearly a lot of us don't bother with ranks in Perception. :)
We all have chaotic alignments, so we decide the rules anyway.
At the moment I am having fun making a pathfinder elven druid. As I was going through the special racial abilities, I noticed that elves are immune to magical sleep. Come to think of it I think they were immune to sleep back before first edition, when elves were a character class in the basic D&D game. I was wondering, why are elves immune to magical sleep? I remember all of the flavor about the elven reverie, which meant that they don’t sleep, but meditate to help keep their long memories and minds cohesive.
So in short why are elves immune to magical sleep, and in terms of the games history where does this immunity come from?
Thanks.
Wasn't this just simply to balance them out against some other melee unit way back in the pre-D&D days when Gary and Dave were still just moving minis around a castle? I remember something along those lines...
Figures, everything dnd has it's origins in either tolkien or vance.
I though everything had its origin in Google?
In 1e, the rules pretty much required you to have an elf or half-elf in each low-level party, due to their smorgasbord of abilities -- of which immunity to ghoul paralysis and sleep were arguably by far the most important.
[*} Ability to detect secret doors within "X" feet (Gygax loved secret doors, and they were all over the place in every dungeon);
While James may be still in the thread...
Do Elves still detect secret doors? I don't see the text in their racial write-up, though I notice dwarves get it now. However, at some point in the core book, it does mention elves getting free Perception checks to detect secret doors. Is that a hold-over, or is the other thing a missing piece of rules data?
And the reason, fellow posters, that you're missing things is because Search is now keyed to Wisdom, which is generally lower for D&D players than INT was, leading to smaller modifiers.
I'm not sure why elves have the sleep immunity thing; my guess is that it's some sort of link to Tolkien, though.
And in Golarion, elves do indeed sleep. They're just immune to magical sleep effects. Whether or not elves sleep in other campaigns is up to the GM in those campaigns.
Page 5 of Elves of Golarion. It says elves don't sleep, but rather enter a deep trance that has the same refreshing effect on the mind as human sleep. It also says that elves only have to meditate for four hours.
So, if they don't sleep, then it stands to reason that they wouldn't fall victim to a sleep spell.
In 1e, the rules pretty much required you to have an elf or half-elf in each low-level party, due to their smorgasbord of abilities -- of which immunity to ghoul paralysis and sleep were arguably by far the most important.
Finally, their immunity to sleep prevented automatic TPK through the obscenely overpowered, and widely-available, 1st level sleep spell (4d4 HD affected, with no saving throw).
I agree that elves were important to a party in 1e, although the immunity to sleep was not absolute; it was 90% for elves and 30% for half-elves. It was not clear in the rules if the level of the caster affected the percentage as normal magic resistance did.
Wouldn't say he was "inspired" by Shakespeare, unless you count "I'm gonna show how things should be written, instead of how Shakespeare did it" as inspiration ;)
I certainly WOULD count that as inspiration! So many authors (e.g. David Eddings, Robert Jordan) have said in interviews things along the lines of "Tolkien did it like THAT, whereas I wanted to do it like THIS." The very fact that they considered Tolkien the norm from which they were deviating in some specific respects shows just how much influence Tolkien had on them. Their words, ironically, show that they must have gotten SOMETHING from Tolkien. In my view, that's inspiration. "Was inspired by" is not the same as "imitated strictly."
And by that definition, Tolkien WAS inspired by Shakespeare. When Tolkien read Macbeth, particularly the lines:
"Macbeth shall never vanquished be until
Great Birnam wood to high Dunsinane hill
Shall come against him."
...Tolkien imagined the trees actually marching to war, and was disappointed when it didn't happen that way. Hence, the treeherder Ents.
Sorry, elves aren't mentioned in that extract, nor do I think they are mentioned in the Epic of Gilgamesh...what is your point? That there were mythology before Tolkien? Certainly, no doubt about that.Origins in the Epic of gilgamesh
The Epic of Gilgamesh is an epic poem from Mesopotamia (ancient Iraq) and is among the earliest known works of literary writing. Scholars believe that it originated as a series of Sumerian legends and poems about the mythological hero-king Gilgamesh, which were gathered into a longer Akkadian epic much later. The most complete version existing today is preserved on 12 clay tablets from the library collection of 7th-century BC
Not tolkien nor vance!
I think KenderKin's point, in the form of a tongue-in-cheek remark, is that Gygax and Arneson were inspired by earlier sources, which were inspired by still earlier sources, which were inspired by still earlier sources. In that way, you can trace ideas back to the earliest known written source, which is the Epic of Gilgamesh (unless you count some ancient Mesopotamian tax records, which aren't very inspiring to storytellers.)
I think KenderKin's point, in the form of a tongue-in-cheek remark, is that Gygax and Arneson were inspired by earlier sources, which were inspired by still earlier sources, which were inspired by still earlier sources. In that way, you can trace ideas back to the earliest known written source, which is the Epic of Gilgamesh
Why, exactly, are you limiting this to only written works?
Why, exactly, are you limiting this to only written works?
I think KenderKin's point, in the form of a tongue-in-cheek remark, is that Gygax and Arneson were inspired by earlier sources, which were inspired by still earlier sources, which were inspired by still earlier sources. In that way, you can trace ideas back to the earliest known written source, which is the Epic of Gilgamesh
Obviously, written works were inspired by spoken words as well. But we don't know for sure what words were spoken thousands of years ago. Only written works are verifiable. Yeah, I'm sure the Epic of Gilgamesh was inspired by many years' worth of verbal storytelling, but we can't compare the verbal tellings with the written work anymore.
But of course, all of this is irrelevant. KenderKin has just demonstrated that my interpretation of his post is not what he had intended at all, so all I did was make an @$$ of myself. Ah well, it's not the first time.
A trapper's son, while checking on traps in the forest, discovers Enkidu running naked with the wild animals; he rushes to his father with the news. The father advises him to go into the city and take one of the temple harlots, Shamhat, with him to the forest; 1 when she sees Enkidu, she is to offer herself sexually to the wild man. If he submits to her, the trapper says, he will lose his strength and his wildness.
Shamhat meets Enkidu at the watering-hole where all the wild animals gather; she offers herself to him and he submits, instantly losing his strength and wildness, but he gains understanding and knowledge. He laments for his lost state, but the harlot offers to take him into the city where all the joys of civilization shine in their resplendence; she offers to show him Gilgamesh, the only man worthy of Enkidu's friendship.
Sounds like a wild elf to me!!!!!!
Or, you know, just a wild man, which is pretty common to a large number of stories before and after Tolkien.
So if Elves don't sleep they have reverie or what ever you call it. Reverie is a form of meditation, which is a trained art. Does this mean Elven children/babies don't sleep?
There's no such thing as elven babies. Elves are what happens when gnomes forget how to have fun.
So if Elves don't sleep they have reverie or what ever you call it. Reverie is a form of meditation, which is a trained art. Does this mean Elven children/babies don't sleep?
And neither do their parents for the first 30 years.
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I'm not sure why elves have the sleep immunity thing; my guess is that it's some sort of link to Tolkien, though.
And in Golarion, elves do indeed sleep. They're just immune to magical sleep effects. Whether or not elves sleep in other campaigns is up to the GM in those campaigns.
Page 5 of Elves of Golarion. It says elves don't sleep, but rather enter a deep trance that has the same refreshing effect on the mind as human sleep. It also says that elves only have to meditate for four hours.
So, if they don't sleep, then it stands to reason that they wouldn't fall victim to a sleep spell.
That is quite the contradiction. So was it sacked for final PRPG or a mistake on J.J's part?
Those may be 3.5 Golarion Elves and needs to be errata'd into Pathfinder Elves. Though technically, that makes the "immune to magical sleep" make less sense.
That is quite the contradiction. So was it sacked for final PRPG or a mistake on J.J's part?I'm not sure why elves have the sleep immunity thing; my guess is that it's some sort of link to Tolkien, though.
And in Golarion, elves do indeed sleep. They're just immune to magical sleep effects. Whether or not elves sleep in other campaigns is up to the GM in those campaigns.
Page 5 of Elves of Golarion. It says elves don't sleep, but rather enter a deep trance that has the same refreshing effect on the mind as human sleep. It also says that elves only have to meditate for four hours.
So, if they don't sleep, then it stands to reason that they wouldn't fall victim to a sleep spell.
The PFRB also references this in the Nightmare spell: "Creatures who don’t sleep (such as elves, but not half-elves) or
dream are immune to this spell."So I guess that will need to be changed if they're also going to be changing the multiple Golarion supplements currently out that specify the 4-hour trance deal.
Way I see it, all printed materials currently out either point towards the trance, or don't touch the subject at all. And that's the way I'd like to continue playing it. It adds to the alien mystique of the race, setting them apart as an entirely separate type of humanoid rather than just a human with pointy ears.
I did not read all of the post so some one may have said this already if so sorry.
Anyway elves are a immune to sleep and paralyze because way back when chain mail was still new before D@D 1e undead had the power to but things to sleep or paralyze things and to balance the game elves became immune to the undead power. Can't remember were i read this.