Wood Elves are an ethnic group of Elves that live primarily within the Deepwoods and neighboring Escann. The Wood Elven people descend from Moon Elves who entered into the Deepwoods forest while retreating from an engagement during War of the Sorcerer-King, inadvertently crossing the Verdant Veil and entering the Feyrealm. Due to the strange temporal nature of the Feyrealm, these Moon Elves would spend over a thousand years isolated from the rest of the world despite only 400 passing outside, limited to interacting only with Forest Goblins, Fey, and each other. As a result, by the time the Verdant Veil fell during the Greentide, Wood Elves had grown to become culturally and biologically distinct from the rest of the elven people.
History[]
Moon Elf Progenitors[]
The beginning of Wood Elven peoples is classically marked in the spring of 1017 in the aftermath of the Battle of Hornwood. The battle had ended in the tactical loss for League of Free Realms forces due to sudden and unexpected heavy downpours, rendering Moon Elf archers and allied Free Castanor heavy cavalry useless. Unable to regroup with the main army due to poor visibility, Commander Liandiel Speardancer ordered her troops to withdraw and seek shelter in the nearby Deepwoods. In doing so, they crossed the Verdant Veil and left the Prime Material Plane.
Records for a period afterwards are sparse with little being known other than that Liandiel and other Moon Elf leaders seemingly became aware of their entrapment in the Deepwoods and made camp in what would become Ciranmyna.
For following decades, efforts to break through the Veil would be attempted on and off by the handful of accompanying Moon Elf mages. During this time, the stranded Moon Elf army, under the orders of Liandiel, would steadily transform their makeshift camps into proper forts and settlements. Scouts, meanwhile, would begin to bring back reports of what the elves would later learn were the Fey and Forest Goblins.
Initial relations with both groups began rocky. The Fey were frequently reported as fickle and conniving while the Forest Goblins were recorded as barbaric and hostile. Relations with the Fey, however, would normalize to some end as various accords and understandings were made, forming the basis of what would become the practices of the Fey Court. The relations with the Forest Goblins would remain less understanding, with a competitive rivalry forming over time.
Rise of the Salla[]
After a century of living within the Deepwoods, the original Moon Elf army had given way to an elven society that had largely come to terms with their new home. The consequences of this showed itself in several ways.
The first was the transformation of Liandiel Speardancer’s role. While still ostensibly commander of the elven army, her authority increasingly stemmed from seniority rather than rank, especially in the eyes of the first generation of forest native elves who were coming of age.
In addition, these young elves also began to treat the units that had made up the original army as familial clans rather than regimented structures.
The second was a steady build up of elven influence over the Deepwoods. As the soldiers and other members of the army formed families, the search for more favorable land to settle grew. Leveraging the Gladeways, as shown by some more friendly fey, the elves began to explore and settle the various groves. In many places, like the Lake Grove, the result of this expansion was repeated conflict with the existing Forest Goblin clans residing there, diminishing that already faded goblin power over the woods.
The final consequence would be the end of elven unity which came with the passing of Speardancer, a little under two hundred years after the Battle of Hornwood. As the second generation of elves came to age, the context of the old army was largely lost. The world outside the Deepwoods became fantastical stories while the old units that their grandparents hailed from were now known as salla, or clans. In the place of commander of the army (or ceannasaí in native tongue) came the ceann (f. ceanna) meaning literally "head" or connotatively "head of" or "leader” who would lead their individual clan in place of the old commander.
The Greentide[]
Main article: Greentide Invasion of Deepwoods
After Liandiel’s death, another eight hundred years of isolation would pass for the elves, who were recognizably Wood Elves. However, after almost one thousand years after the first Moon Elves had entered the Deepwoods, that isolation would come to an end as orcish raiders from the Greentide crossed the Veil, ironically retreating from Escanni foes just like the Moon Elves once had.
These initial raiders heralded what would be multiple waves of orcish incursions with the last resulting in the destruction of several ruling salla and nearly bringing a collapse to Wood Elf civilization as a whole. However, this traumatic moment would be the inciting event leading to the eventual reunification of Deepwoods elvenkind and reconnection with the outside world.
As the elven salla struggled against the invading orcs, Narawen Drennen of Salla Drennen would bring together a conclave at Elynáile to forge an alliance between the remaining clans. Soon after, Corin, the avatar of Agrados, and part of her circle would interrupt this conclave as a part of her search for aid against the Greentide in Escann. The resulting confrontation led to two key events. The first was Corin and her allies setting out and striking down an ancient archfey known as the Eldest, bringing down the Verdant Veil and reuniting the Deepwoods with Escann and beyond. The second was the reconciliation of the salla leaders after years of various strife and feuds resulting in an accord being struck, later known as the Verdant Pact.
With the Wood Elves united and the path back to Escann freed thanks to the fall of the Verdant Veil, Corin would return with the aid she was looking for. The Greentide, in both Escann and the Deepwoods, would then fall apart with the death of Korgus Dookanson at her hands shortly after leaving the newly unified Wood Elves to begin attempting to reclaim the Deepwoods.
Society and Culture[]
Main article: Wood Elven Culture
Compared to the other elves of the Remnant Fleet, who integrated into human society early on, the initial Wood Elven experience was a frightening one. They were isolated in a strange land and often subservient to the whims, follies and tricks of the Fey all while fighting off all manner of wild beasts and hostile flora. This combined with their descendance from warriors and soldiers has led to Wood Elven society deeply rooting itself in community, family, and service.
Salla[]
Due to this deep interdependence, clans, or 'salla' in their dialect have played a key role as the bedrock of Wood Elven society. Most, if not all, social services and organized efforts such as child rearing, infrastructure building and mutual defense first originated from the various salla. Indeed, the greatest of these salla, whose origins can largely be traced to the original units that made up the Moon Elven army, even ruled over all of Wood Elven civilization until the formation of Cyranvar.
Such is the prominence of salla that Wood Elven introductions start with identifying one’s salla before even mentioning one’s name. Because of this, one of the harshest non-capital punishments in Wood Elven law is the expulsion from one’s salla. The result leaves the criminal quite literally stripped of a part of their identity in society.
Comparisons With Other Elves[]
Wood Elves are well known for having multiple biological distinctions from their Sun and Moon Elf cousins. Studies and research have concluded the cause of this to be due to their unique long term exposure to the Feyrealm and its magics, which is known to influence and change various living creatures. These influences, despite misconceptions, do not mean that Wood Elves are fey or feymarked. They, like their Ruinborn cousins, are definitively elves.
Lifespan[]
Perhaps their most notable difference, Wood Elves have noticeably shorter life spans than other elves. The average Wood Elf is expected to live approximately two hundred fifty years as compared to the four hundred years of a Moon Elf or Sun Elf.
Family Size and Fertility[]
Due to a combination of cultural and biological differences, the average Wood Elven family tends to be significantly larger families than other elves. On average, they tend to have as many children over their lifespan as that of an average human.
Magical Ability[]
Of the eight traditional schools of magic, Wood Elves tend to have a more difficult time grasping and mastering six of these schools to other elves; these being Abjuration, Divination, Illusion, Enchantment, Evocation, and Necromancy. While mastery can still be achieved given time and persistence, Wood Elven mages, often known as druids, tend to eschew those schools in favor of Conjuration and Transmutation, whose spells often correlate with the magics naturally found in the Feyrealm. As a result of this, traditionally “powerful mages'' tend to be a rarer sight in Wood Elven society.
Digestion[]
Capable of digesting a wide array of plant material entirely unheard of to other races, Wood Elves are known for incorporating a range of otherwise inedible material from tree bark to various grasses to fruit rinds and husks.
Detection of Fey[]
While connections to the Feyrealm exist throughout Halann, they are typically undetectable without the aid of magic. Wood Elves however are capable of “sensing” fey and fey magic presence in the same way that other races might hear something approaching.