Elf Book?

[TRose]

Anyone get the Elf book yet?If so what did you think of it?

 

[sidkfjjteidlkkf]

Great book. Covers them well. I especially like the gods listed as complete cults, or very close to it.

I was almost amazed when I read that elfs do not really hate any other race, though toleration is more the word.

GET THE BOOK

 

[soltakss]

At last, we have a source book for the Aldryami and we have waited a long time.

The picture is of a bunch of very treeish elves dancing around a sacrificial altar in front of an old tree. It looks impressive, but I, for one, don't hold with treeish elves and prefer them to be a lot more humanoid and a lot less treeish. But that's my opinion. It's a very striking cover and there are a lot of black and white illustrations within.

What's in it? A fair amount, all about elves, as if you hadn't guessed that.

The Aldryami is an introductory chapter written in the fashion of a Seshnelan Wizard. Ho-hum, I suppose all Mongoose books will have this kind of thing in them. I prefer impersonal accounts, not ones written from a biased third-party viewpoint. This covers a general overview of Aldryami and more in-depth descriptions of the different types of Aldryami, Vronkali (Green Elves), Mreli (Brown Elves), Embyli (Yellow Elves), Slorifings (Red Elves), Muthoi (Blue Elves), Halamali (White Elves), Dryads, Elflings (Runners and Pixies) and Trees. They are good, but didn't really grab me in the same way that the descriptions of Dragonewts did in the Dragonewts Book. There are sections on Elf Gardening, Aldryami Culture, Aldryami Communication, Aldryami Philosophy and Aldryami Society. These are again fairly good, covering a lot of Aldryami Lore, much of which is new and much of which is odd. Finally, it covers Myth and History which is a maddening mix of sketchy information and interesting nuggets. For example, the plants grew in the Golden Age and cracked the Sky Dome, causing chaos to seep in, which is a fantastic little nugget. There are a lot of new deities mentioned and many new names to old deities, which is a bit annoying and confusing. The History is very short, with each Age having a couple of paragraphs.

Elf Communities covers the major Elf Homelands. Each homeland is described in a sketchy form, with a brief description, sketches of the main leaders and a sample village or settlement. Arstola has Womangrove, Tallseed Forest including Tradelands and Errinoru Jungle, including Talking Beach. These are interesting and contain a lot of background. They could have included more areas - what about Rist or Winterwood?

Playing the Aldryami allows people to play Aldryami as PCs or NPCs. It contains all the information needed to roll up a new character. Aldryami have new skills of Life Sense and Treespeak, Dryads have some new powers and any Aldryami has special abilities when in their Forests. The backgrounds are generally split by sub-species, but some are also split by area, which is a nice touch. There are some new professions, largely building on those in the Players' Handbook, and some new equipment and weapons. The rules on Runes specify how the inhuman Aldryami have different effects when attuning certain Runes and I can safely say that I would not use any of those rules in any of my campaigns. Roleplaying the Aldryami gives some ideas on what motivates Aldryami, how to play them and why they are different to humans. Ho-hum, I didn't find this particularly interesting or useful.

Aldryami Religion breaks down into several groups The Grower Gods, Aldryami Heroes and The Dark Gods. The Grower Gods covers Aldrya, Bengara (Babeester Gor), Eirennor, Eron, Falamal (Flamal), Gata, Halamalao (Yelmalio), Larayse, Murthdrya, Syotel, Trileme and Veratha (Voria). Elf Heroes covers Weiinoru, Fwalfa Oakheart, Makisante Waverider and Vronkal (High King Elf). The Dark Gods covers Ekeem, Ferotha Life-To-Die, Inlri, Kitipah Iri, Trigora Death-After-Death, and Zasara. Each of these has a sketch cult description, unless this has appeared in other books, and a very short and very unsatisfying mythos. This certainly didn't grab me at all and I love reading the Prehistory and Godtime Myths of Gloranthan Deities. New Spells includes one new Runespell and 20 new Divine spells and are useful spells to have access to. New Elementals contain several new elementals, the Barren (Stone Elemental), Boreal (Ice Elemental) and Lume (Light Elemental), which are OK.

So, what did I think of it? Well, if you have made it this far, you will have guessed that I am not particularly overwhelmed by it. The backgrounds are OK, the mythology sketchy and unsatisfying, the deities confusing and the homelands sketchy and under-represented. It comes across as a book originally written to be twice as big but which has had to be cut down in size (whether or not that is the case, I haven't a clue, but that's the impression I got).

It certainly isn't as good as Dragonewts or even Trolls. It will be useful to anyone who wants to play elves in a game, but hasn't the depth that, say, Elder Secrets had for RQ3.

Would I recommend it? Now, that's tricky. On the one hand, it is about elves and anyone who wants to play elves in Glorantha, Second or Third Age, would probably find it useful. On the other hand, if you had to choose what supplement to buy, I'd say but Dragonewts and Trolls before Elfs.

So, I'm not very impressed and was fairly disappointed by this. I'd give it a Buyability 75%, B-.

Sorry.

 

[Mark Mohrfield]

Is there any information on the Errinoru Empire?

 

[soltakss]

There are a couple of pages of History, which is interesting - I didn't know that Errinoru was started during the Sunstop.

There are also 4 pages on the Jungle itself. This sketches an overview, sketches the Seven Jungles (Gaskalia, Jhastrobbios, Moino, Novarooplia, Onlaks, Ytarian and Zhnaquafian - names that really roll of the tongue), a couple of paragraphs on the Embyli and the settlement of Talking Beach, where the Valiant Four made their stand. Talking Beach is visited occasionally by the Mother of Monsters and has the following locations (Last Stood, Talking Sands, Skull Pyramid, The Tree Line, Warder Dwellings and Last Dead).

 

[Mark Mohrfield]

There are a couple of pages of History, which is interesting - I didn't know that Errinoru was started during the Sunstop.

That is odd. Elder Secrets claimed that it was started in 610. There is a reference in Cults of Terror that during the Sunstop the elves "sent their energies coursing through the world to call upon a spirit to come to their jungle to help combat a virulent rot besetting their inner fibers." Perhaps this was Errinoru?

 

[duncan_disorderly]

At last, we have a source book for the Aldryami and we have waited a long time.
[. . . ]
It certainly isn't as good as Dragonewts or even Trolls. It will be useful to anyone who wants to play elves in a game, but hasn't the depth that, say, Elder Secrets had for RQ3.
[. . .]
Sorry.

Simon's opinion largely mirrors my own. It's nice to get the elf book, but I prefered the 'newt one. The sample elf communities were a bit "Neither nor", there was too much detail for a "quick overview", but it stopped short of being a "ready to play" scenario situation that players could be dropped in to explore the community "in play" - either approach would have been preferable IMHO

Where we do differ

The Aldryami is an introductory chapter written in the fashion of a Seshnelan Wizard. Ho-hum, I suppose all Mongoose books will have this kind of thing in them. I prefer impersonal accounts, not ones written from a biased third-party viewpoint.

I like setting books to be (explicitly) written from an "in setting" point of view. Quite apart form anything else, it allows you to easily apply YGWV, since if you want to ignore or alter anything you can take the approach that (in this case) the Wizard was wrong and your version is what really happens, which can make integration of other works (whether "offical" or "fan generated") easier

 

[soltakss]

There are a couple of pages of History, which is interesting - I didn't know that Errinoru was started during the Sunstop.

That is odd. Elder Secrets claimed that it was started in 610. There is a reference in Cults of Terror that during the Sunstop the elves "sent their energies coursing through the world to call upon a spirit to come to their jungle to help combat a virulent rot besetting their inner fibers." Perhaps this was Errinoru?

I'd forgotten that. The Sunstop reference is when the Dryads of the jungle went off to gather some tools to make a new type of plant. They planted it and it took 150 years to grow.

So, started during the Sunstop (gathering tools and planting), but he only grew later on.

That makes sense.

 

[soltakss]

At last, we have a source book for the Aldryami and we have waited a long time.
[. . . ]
It certainly isn't as good as Dragonewts or even Trolls. It will be useful to anyone who wants to play elves in a game, but hasn't the depth that, say, Elder Secrets had for RQ3.
[. . .]
Sorry.

Simon's opinion largely mirrors my own. It's nice to get the elf book, but I prefered the 'newt one. The sample elf communities were a bit "Neither nor", there was too much detail for a "quick overview", but it stopped short of being a "ready to play" scenario situation that players could be dropped in to explore the community "in play" - either approach would have been preferable IMHO

I'm glad it wasn't just me being grumpy.