Cavern Elves
HISTORY
Cavern Elves are a sub-race long-since separated from their cousins. They are most closely related to the Wood Elves, but even that is a bit of a stretch. In skills and abilities, they end up rather similar to the High Elves, but in appearance and a few key points, they are very different.
Cavern Elves have become most comfortable in relatively dark places. Their ancestors, so they claim, wandered across a land of waste and rock, headed for the "Green Land." Before making it there, however, their food and water began to run out. They appealed to the Elvish Pantheon, but the only Deity that would answer was Westra of the Unknown. The story goes that Westra appeared to these ancestors and brought them to a great mountain that rose up like an immense rock in the desert. Westra told them to "enter the mountain," and so they discovered life underground.
Cavern Elves take pride in the story, because Westra--being of the divine unknown--did not show them the way, or give any instructions. They led the people to safety, and they disappeared. Over the next millennia the elves came to love the Caves, with their plentiful waters and cool rocks and interesting foods. They comeout at night for hunting, business, or revelry, but the caverns are their homes now.
APPEARANCE
An elf of this heritage presents as a slightly shorter (but equally slender) elf, but their ears are long and pointed to the extreme, and their chins and noses are slightly more angular and long. Their eyes are strange, almond shaped like an elf, but with the pupil enlarged, rarely taking up the entire eye, so no whites show. There is a very slight stoop to many of these Elves' postures.
Their skin ranges from deep tan to brown, and a thick mat of black or dark bown hair grows disheveled on their head. Most adult Cavern Elves wear their hair up or back some way, in an effort to contain it. Rare is the Cavern Elf that goes among friends, even more rare among places "outside", with hair undone. In certain places, in settlements near their home (or adventuring far away), Cavern Elves will defiantly and wear their hair wild as an order of pride.
Cavern Elves cultivate this pride, for in many places they are pariahs or on the fringes of society. Bravery is valued among these Elves, and those who end up adventuring beyond their lands often take a sense of fearlessness with them, daring others to denigrate their appearance or heritage. Even the High Elves often show thinly veiled disdain.
CULTURE
Cavern Elves are masters of rock paintings. Their renderings of cavern walls are truly awesome, sometimes covering the ceiling and walls of an entire underground space. Their music is likewise best when heard in a cavern space. Drums boom and echo, ethereal wordless singing reverberates, and flutes travel down passageways or up to the top of caverns. Cavern Elves have a writing system, making paper from special fungi that they cultivate. Poetry is the most common writing, although there are historians and mythologists among them. Cavern Elf sorcerers are rarely met, but they carry their culture's fascination with and skill with magic of any kind.
Their architecture is relatively crude, but they most often do not alter the underground spaces where they live. They prefer the unpredictable chaos in the twists and turns of a raw cavern. Now and then, they seek out new places to live and spread their culture. They haven't been known to leave their general regions.
Cavern Elf adventurers leave their cavern settlements for many reasons, whether it be rebellion, curiosity, identity questing, or seeking riches.
These Elves live fairly close to the High Elves and Wood Elves of the Elvendell region. Rarely they will be sought out for help with divining and soothsaying, for the Elves of the forest have superstitions (founded or not) about the Cavern elves' magical abilities, and their dealings with the Unknown. So other Elves have a certain grudging respect.
See more at Elven Desert The Elven Desert can be a harsh place, and the Cavern Elves stay underground except at night. There are small mountains called goo'dain, where over the centuries the Cavern Elves have found openings to the Below. Far down, through the winding passageways, there are running streams and good food to gather. The caverns of these elves are rarely augmented, but instead kept in their natural form. The Cavern Elves of the Desert know the Cavern Elves well, and the two groups trade readily. They see each other as mutually essential, and could band together against danger. CAVERN ELVES OF THE ANCIENT VOLCANIC CAVERNS OF YELVEHAVEN
Often Called Yelvedrow, but more a relative of the Cavern Elves
See more at Yelvehaven / Yelvewoods An obscure, reddish-tinged species of Drow elf lives here, mostly underground but also underground beneath the forest here. These elves are great stonemasons, and they have created a great network of caverns and dwellings among the basalt here, using the hills, the gullies and canyons and old riverbeds, to their advantage. Their purposefully hewn cavern homes are unlike any other Cavern Elf group, showing a more refined sense of architecture. Those who know enough to surmise will say these elves have demon blood.[br
]The Cavern Elves of Yelvehaven look like a cousin to the drow most of the world knows. The cultures are likewise similar in other ways, such as the reverence for spiders. The Yelvehaven cavern elves go further though, and they revere many of the invertebrate creatures with whom they share space underground. While their true home is carved down into the basalt of the Yelvehaven, they do come up at night, and they're said to have a good relationship--a mutual truce and respect at least--with the Wood Elves, even sharing revelry and wine now and then at the wood elves' invitation.
Living where they do, at the edge of the Demonlands, the Yelvehaven Elves have periodic dealings with Demons, though usually of a lesser kind, seeking domination or control, or asking for favors. These Cavern elves are proud, and they hold their ground, and rarely do Demons get the better of them. (Nevertheless, the balance always seem fragile.) Yelvehaven Elves of extreme power are said to deal regularly with Demonkind, and portals to the Abyss. They exploit the link between their Race and Abyssals. CAVERN ELVES OF THE YOLDWOODS (sub-continent of Yold)
See more at Yoldwoods
Living in the isolation of the old, largely wild sub-continent of Yold, these Cavern Elves have learned ways of accessing or tunneling passageways, or finding complexes (sometimes enormous, vast) naturally occurring in the sandstone and limestone hills and cliffs among the woods. This group more than any other will come out on cloudy days to hunt or do businness / pleasure with the Wood Elves of the Yold. In times of stress or danger, this allied relationship has saved both groups a number of times throughout the centuries. Nevertheless, the Cavern Elves of Yold love their cavern homes, and their bards sing of it and tell its tales, and their painters decorate walls and ceilings with fantastic skills. Yoldwoods Cavern Elves live a life of isolation, and few have ever left the forest. Some make their way to the coast and look out across the Yolden Sea in all its stormy grey, and they wonder what might lie beyond it. And a few of these acutally make it across, or sail elsewhere with whatever ship might take them, and become adventurers in the land at large.
CAVERN ELVES BY LOCATION... For Bonus Attributes, See Sidebar
CAVERN ELVES OF THE ELVEN DESERT on DREAMSGATEThese Elves live fairly close to the High Elves and Wood Elves of the Elvendell region. Rarely they will be sought out for help with divining and soothsaying, for the Elves of the forest have superstitions (founded or not) about the Cavern elves' magical abilities, and their dealings with the Unknown. So other Elves have a certain grudging respect.
See more at Elven Desert The Elven Desert can be a harsh place, and the Cavern Elves stay underground except at night. There are small mountains called goo'dain, where over the centuries the Cavern Elves have found openings to the Below. Far down, through the winding passageways, there are running streams and good food to gather. The caverns of these elves are rarely augmented, but instead kept in their natural form. The Cavern Elves of the Desert know the Cavern Elves well, and the two groups trade readily. They see each other as mutually essential, and could band together against danger. CAVERN ELVES OF THE ANCIENT VOLCANIC CAVERNS OF YELVEHAVEN
Often Called Yelvedrow, but more a relative of the Cavern Elves
See more at Yelvehaven / Yelvewoods An obscure, reddish-tinged species of Drow elf lives here, mostly underground but also underground beneath the forest here. These elves are great stonemasons, and they have created a great network of caverns and dwellings among the basalt here, using the hills, the gullies and canyons and old riverbeds, to their advantage. Their purposefully hewn cavern homes are unlike any other Cavern Elf group, showing a more refined sense of architecture. Those who know enough to surmise will say these elves have demon blood.[br
]The Cavern Elves of Yelvehaven look like a cousin to the drow most of the world knows. The cultures are likewise similar in other ways, such as the reverence for spiders. The Yelvehaven cavern elves go further though, and they revere many of the invertebrate creatures with whom they share space underground. While their true home is carved down into the basalt of the Yelvehaven, they do come up at night, and they're said to have a good relationship--a mutual truce and respect at least--with the Wood Elves, even sharing revelry and wine now and then at the wood elves' invitation.
Living where they do, at the edge of the Demonlands, the Yelvehaven Elves have periodic dealings with Demons, though usually of a lesser kind, seeking domination or control, or asking for favors. These Cavern elves are proud, and they hold their ground, and rarely do Demons get the better of them. (Nevertheless, the balance always seem fragile.) Yelvehaven Elves of extreme power are said to deal regularly with Demonkind, and portals to the Abyss. They exploit the link between their Race and Abyssals. CAVERN ELVES OF THE YOLDWOODS (sub-continent of Yold)
See more at Yoldwoods
Living in the isolation of the old, largely wild sub-continent of Yold, these Cavern Elves have learned ways of accessing or tunneling passageways, or finding complexes (sometimes enormous, vast) naturally occurring in the sandstone and limestone hills and cliffs among the woods. This group more than any other will come out on cloudy days to hunt or do businness / pleasure with the Wood Elves of the Yold. In times of stress or danger, this allied relationship has saved both groups a number of times throughout the centuries. Nevertheless, the Cavern Elves of Yold love their cavern homes, and their bards sing of it and tell its tales, and their painters decorate walls and ceilings with fantastic skills. Yoldwoods Cavern Elves live a life of isolation, and few have ever left the forest. Some make their way to the coast and look out across the Yolden Sea in all its stormy grey, and they wonder what might lie beyond it. And a few of these acutally make it across, or sail elsewhere with whatever ship might take them, and become adventurers in the land at large.
PLAYER CHARACTER ATTRIBUTES AND GAME STATISTICS FOR CAVERN ELVES
- Interested in playing a Cavern Elf?
- Each Cavern Sub-Ancestry has its own set of attributes, AND
- Each Cavern Elf location Receives a Slightly Different Set of Attributes.
- Follow the Link Below to See Them and Possibly Play Them.
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