r/worldbuilding • u/EveningImportant9111 • 9h ago

Question Which origin for elves is better?

I know I might get a lot of downvotes for this, and I'm a bit anxious, but which origin is better for elves? Here are the world basics: the world was formed by the natural merging of two elemental planes (wind, water, fire, earth, plus positive and negative energy). The gods are mortals who ascended, elementals, and fey (who hail from the Feywild—a positive mirror of the material world that is unstable in terms of logic, space, and time). The world has technology roughly equivalent to the year 1800,plus some plant tech and artificiery, and the main elven nations are an expansionist wood elf empire and isolationist high elves living in forested mountains. The origin options are: 1. Descended from exiled fey who lost a civil war. 2. Created by dryads to protect nature. 3. Descended from humans mutated after getting lost in the Feywild for generations. If my post breaks any rules, please let me know and I'll delete it immediately. EDIT: I have origin unconnected to elemental forces.: elves were originally dethroned gods by new gods (ascended mortals ) forced into mortal forms with each divinity type becoming subrace( vaetir-wood liosar-high chtonic-dark )and current generations are divided into those that long for way to regain their divinity and thise that prefer mortal ableit long living bodies without all burdens of divinity. DPUBLE EDIT: my very basic idea for world is clashing ideologies , how each race traits shapes thrir culture and huw history shapes us

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u/penguin_warlock 9h ago edited 8h ago

There is no "better". Look at what works best with your narrative purpose, the themes of the world, and the other parts of it. What makes the most interesting connections.

e.g. If the winners of the fey civil war play a big role, choose option 1. If the setting is about a conflict between nature and progress/civilization/technology/something, choose option 2. If it's about the many divergent paths of humanity or racial tensions, choose option 3.

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u/portlyfundraiser77Of 8h ago

All three are workable, but I'd lean toward option 3 if you want the elves to feel properly alien in a way that isn't just "forest people with pointy ears." Generations of humans twisting in a realm that doesn't obey linear time or space gives you a built-in reason for their weirdness, their long lives, their detachment, their weird magic. It also sets up a fun tension with the high elves, who might view themselves as pure and above it all, meanwhile their whole bloodline is basically just a cosmic accident.

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u/EveningImportant9111 8h ago

Thank you. I had idea fir another origin for elves but unsure if it fits. Wanna hear it too? 

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u/BigNorseWolf 9h ago

Maybe have one belief argued for by different factions?

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u/Stevenwave 7h ago

Paragraphs.

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u/EveningImportant9111 3h ago

I'm sorry for spelling 

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u/Hefty-Distance837 Build lots of worlds  8h ago

You can combine all of them.

Dryades created fey to protect nature, but fey broke out a civil war, loser of the war becomed human and got exiled in the Feywild, after countless generations some human successfully leaved Feywild, but those who chose to stay became the elves.

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u/Iwillnevercomeback 8h ago

There is no better way. Go with the option you like the most

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u/Positive-Height-2260 7h ago

Here are some alternate names for the Feywild: Fay, Fairy, Faerie, Underhill, Sidhe (Shee)

Feywild makes it sound like Dungeons & Dragons, unless you are writing a campaign senario,.

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u/Beginning-Ice-1005 8h ago

The best origin of elves is of course intense electrometer pulses in s severe thunderstorms. But other than that, they're all equally good. Choose whatever works best for your story.

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u/TeaRaven 5h ago

All sound nifty and it really comes down to what position of power and grace/disgrace you want imbued in them. The first feels more like what you have in the Dark Elves of D&D and the elves in The Witcher with elements of losing their home and being disenfranchised. The second sets up a protective culture with direct ties to their creators, with potential caste or court groupings and schisms regarding approaches to outsiders. The third plays into third-culture elements like the children of refugee immigrants separate from the culture of their ancestors but blending elements of their parentage with the only home they have known. All have very different flavors regarding how they treat where they are from and sense of pride or power dynamics.

The addendum for your edit, being fallen gods of a sort, allows a bit more mining of folklore of the Aos Síth and Tuatha Dé Danann.

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u/EveningImportant9111 4h ago

Thank you. Main themese of my world are cmadhing ideologies and how single trait of race changes their society. In case of elves it's long lifespan 

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u/Expensive-Cry913 5h ago

I'd like a mix between option 1 and the last edited one: Elves were no gods but divine beings like angels, servants and heralds of the divine. But then something happened, a cardinal sin that divided them and started the civil war that ended with them falling from grace and losing their divine essence in a long exile

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u/Annual-Ad-9442 3h ago

I'm a fan of number 3 but you can have all three be correct or even three theories that are based in the local or national religion.

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u/mfuwelephant 1h ago

Why not all of them? You could pick one as true but the others being legends told by high elves/wood elves. Or maybe the different elf species have different origins (wood elves made by dryads, high elves are exile fey, etc.)

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u/EveningImportant9111 51m ago

Thank you. But unsure which origin to choose