Imperial Elven Navy

The Imperial Elven Navy, or IEN, is an alliance of elves from across the Known Spheres that have pooled their resources into a single military force for the protection of all elvenkind. Since the end of the First Unhuman War in 1072, the IEN has been the dominant military power of the Known Spheres, though their hardwon victory against the Scro in the Second Unhuman War of the 15th century threatens to overturn their once unquestioned hegemony.
Soldiers and leaders of the IEN tend to be drawn from all the subraces of elves that comprise the alliance, but leadership positions are generally dominated by astral elves, whose spacefaring origins leave them well suited to the needs of the navy.

Structure

A predominately military organization, there are four primary ranks within the IEN:

• Warrior, the lowest rank occupied by common soldiers and sailors
• Knight, the rank occupied by most small detachment leaders, helmsmen, mages, and Flitter pilots
• Lord/Lady, the commanders of most elven vessels
• Prince/Princess, the elven equivilent of admiral and the equivilent of nobility

While the IEN does allow non-elves to join its ranks, the highest rank they could achieve is Knight. Most crystal spheres contain only one Prince or Princess, though some more populated spheres may contain multiple if a large enough fleet is present.
Commanding and coordinating the IEN is the Council of Admirals, which is comprised of elven of the most decorated Princes and Princesses from across the fleet, though according to tradition, the Council is expected to contain at least one representative of each major member of the alliance. During times of crisis, such as the Unhuman Wars, one of the admirals is selected to be Grand Admiral and given full command of all elven resources. The location of the Council of Admirals was always in Lionheart, the secrative and mobile command base of the IEN formed through the fusion of eleven Armada class spelljammers, the flagships of the original eleven councilmembers.

Public Agenda

The IEN is committed to the protecting and furthering the interests of elves across the Known Spheres. While initially a more defensive alliance, allowing various elven nations and peoples to pool their resources and protect themselves against their enemies, the centuries since the First Unhuman War have seen that mandate become more proactive. One can hardly visit the most populous crystal spheres without encountering an elven Man-O-War or fleet stationed nearby for trade or protection. A stable astral community suits the interests of the IEN, and so they are committed to hunting pirates, maintaining safe trade routes, and engaging with the astral community through civilian organizations, like the transport company Sindiath Line, to maintain a strong presence across wildspace.
As a part of this massive influence, the elven standard calendar, based on the Faerunian Calendar of Harptos, became the astrally standard calendar.

Assets

Beyond the shared resources of the various elven peoples that have joined the IEN, the Imperial Elven Navy possesses the largest spelljamming fleet currently in existence. The core of the IEN fleet is comprised of the Armada class command vessels, Man-O-Wars, and short-range attack Flitters. The IEN also contros numerous military bases across the KNown Spheres. While weakened in craft and personnel following the Second Unhuman War, the elves currently remain the strongest single spacefaring community.
The IEN favors full-covering headpieces for their uniforms to emphasize that all of their members are one people, the elven people, despite differences in appearances.

History

Myth of Founding

Spacefaring elves have long aided one another in war and commerce, drawn to one another by their shared origin of being created by the same elven pantheon, the Seldarine, despite their differing homeworlds. According to elven legend, the Seldarine had originally built within every elven world portals that could connect their scattered people together. However, these perfect creations were looked upon jealously by the other gods, who sought to make creatures in their own image too, but lacking the patience of the Seldarine, designed flawed creatures. None were more jealous than Gruumsh, god of the orcs, who led his people in war against the Seldarine and the elves, a war that would see the destruction of the world-binding portals, the ultimate betrayal and banishment of Lollth, and the creation of the drow.

Now separated from one another Corellon and the rest of the Seldarine had faith that they would discover each other once again. His faith was rewarded, as elves tenatively began making their way into Wildspace, taming the starfly plant and fruit to serve as their vessels and ultimately gaining spelljamming helms from the mercane. But space was full of as much danger and opportunity, and the elves each designed small fleets to protect their people from their jealous enemies. As the elves once again reunited, it was decided that they should band together formally, recognizing each other as one people scattered through space. And thus, the thirteen largest elven fleets fused their command vessels together, forming the Imperial Elven Navy's capital: Lionheart.

The First Unhuman War

"Never trust an orc...even a dead one."

-Elven aphorism

Following its foundation, the IEN continued growing and expanding its influence and its military power. A consistent thorn in the IEN's side were the so-called "monsterous race," comprising of orcs, kobolds, ogres, and goblinoids. Similar to their groundling counterparts, these spacefaring races tended to live in nomadic tribes that sustained themselves through raiding and pillaging. Though collectively possessing large spelljamming fleets, these races were not unified and spent just as much time fighting each other as others. However, the sheer volume of their numbers extracted a great toll on other spacefaring communities, as settlements were burned, mercantile vessels were looted, and innocents killed. After centuries of this, the Imperial Elven Navy decided to end this state of affairs using what they saw as the only possible solution: total war against all raiding species.
From 1063 to 1072 CR, the IEN waged the First Unhuman War, so named by the human communities that saw the war as not involving them, against their monsterous enemies. Soon, the conflict would grow to encompass the entirity of the Known Spheres, as nuetral systems were forced to choose sides or defend themselves. The war saw the development of the biosphere destroying witchlight marauders by orcs and the creation of bionid soldiers and spirit warrior by the IEN.
Though the war was nearly always in the IEN's favor, it was not easily won. The spacefaring goblinoids of Borka in Greyspace posed quite the threat until IEN mages destroyed the entire planet in retribution, though the IEN fleet that performed this act of mass destruction was subsequently destroyed in turn. But the IEN's greatest threat came from the half-orc Gralnakh Longtooth, who managed to unite the various enemies of the IEN into a formidable fighting force. Unable to dislodge Longtooth's Combined Fleet, elven Grand Admiral Aldyn Longbower negotiated an armistice to the ire of the Council of Admirals.

Hegemony

Longtooth's surrender marked the functional end of the First Unhuman War, and the terms of the armistice included giving him and his followers a world free from elven-influence. In an act most attribute to spite, the Council of Admirals located one of the most barren, barely-hospitable frozen worlds they could find in Winterspace and settled Longtooth and his soldiers there. The planet, renamed Armistice, was then guarded by a permenant elven blockade to prevent anyone from contacting its inhabitants.
Fearful of another Longtooth rising up and uniting the now defeated races, the IEN also began what would be known as the Great Hunt, a multiyear campaign to find and destroy the remaining spelljammers of their conquered foes. The Great Hunt brought elves to the very edges of the Known Spheres and forced their enemies even beyond those to escape their pursuers. In some instances, spacefaring orcs, goblins, and kobolds took refuge with their groundling cousins and abandoned spacefaring all together.
Following the war, most other spacefaring races grew wary at the elves lack of demilitarization. To assuage these concerns and to keep elven presence strong across the Known Spheres, many military vessels were retired and privatized into Sindiath Line, a commercial passenger and good transport agency. The creation of the Line, and the establishment of far-flung elven bases as a result of the Great Hunt, marked the start of the next four hundred years of elven hegemony over wildspace. Though they did not own every sphere, the IEN's presence could be felt everywhere, and elves operated as the functional astral police. As elven policy and standards began to be adapted across the astral community, many chaffed at the domineering often haughty elves and their unquestioned power while others benefitted from the stability they brought.

Second Unhuman War

Though the IEN believed for centuries that they had completely beaten their foes from the First Unhuman War, they were unable to destroy all of them. On an unknown world, the orc Dukagsh brought a group of followers and formed the Scro. Recognizing that the monsterous races could never have stood a chance against the elven forces from the first war, Dukagsh radically reshaped his followers' society into a highly militarized, highly disciplined, and highly tactical force with the sole purpose of dethroning elven rule over wildspace. After centuries of planning, the Scro began striking in the middle of the 15th century, taking out individual elven bases and warships, weakening their foes without the IEN properly catching on to the fact that their losses were part of a coordinated attack. It wasn't until the Battle of Lar in 1479 that the IEN Court of Admirals recognized that they were in a war.
Unlike the First Unhuman War, IEN victory was by no means guaranteed. The early period of the war was marked with Scro victory after victory, especially as the elves struggled to identify who their attackers even were. The intelligence war turned, however, after the Scro Tarantula Fleet was spotted by happenstance by the Rock of Bral. But knowing their enemy was not enough. During the Battle of Borka, the IEN took massive casualties fighting against the remnants of the Borkan goblionoids that had rebuilt their fleets in secret. The Scro also launched a bold assault on the world of Armistice, freeing their long-exiled bretheren.
Despite these victories, the Scro could not handle the elven warmachine once it was rolling. The IEN slowly began winning victory after victory, ultimately destroying the fearsome Tarantula Fleet in the Battle of Gardenspace, though at the cost of their own, and were able to win their final victory during the Second Battle of Armistice, where the IEN prevented the Scro from forming a new fleet from the inhabitants of Armistice. With no realistic hope of victory, the Scro sued for peace in 1485, and the IEN accepted.

Present Day

Though the Imperial Elven Navy remains the largest military force in wildspace, the losses in vessels and manpower from the Second Unhuman War have not gone unnoticed. This, combined with the slow growth of new elven vessels and the race's glacial birthrates has led to fears that the Second Unhuman War might mark the beginning of the end of elven power. In addition, while the Scro were defeated they were not destroyed. The unresolved tensions between the two groups have left most of the astral community on edge, fearing that a third war is only a few years away.
In the meantime, the remaining elven vessels and fleets are stretched across the Known Spheres, unable to maintain the strong grip they had prior to the war but still a major force that all spacefaring races must content with.

by Dungeon Master Loki

Type

Military, Space navy

Training Level

Professional

Veterancy Level

Veteran

Controlled Territories

• Coldspace

Related Historical Events

• 1479 CR
  Second Unhuman War
• 1063 CR
  First Unhuman War

by Nikki Dawes, Copyright Wizards of the Coast

Astral elves in Imperial Elven Navy uniform