What is the most advanced civilization

[Seon]

Perhaps because they don't breed as much as humans

 

[Duruk]

But aren't most orcs not part of CoE at least early on? Later on when Jonas and Sheelba had explained to the rest how it would be wise for them to join. Of course the two came to the conclusion that they should unite the scattered clans and tribes after careful meditation. (Hey I need a civ other than Malakim to play Empyrean.)

Yay, I'm not the only one that plays Empyrean Clan of Embers!

 

[Vernacular]

.....

 

[Broken Hawk]

If Brigit is on the map, my Clan of Embers always converts to the Empyrean and Chalid Astrakien frees her from her prison to overthrow Bhall.

A rebellion against the goddess they worship?

 

[Duruk]

Well of course; societies face upheavals all the time.

Ultimately, I think FfH2 has been designed so that players can tell their own story. That's part of the beauty of FfH2; you're given the back story, and allowed to do whatever you want with it; you're only limited by your ability/wish to rationalize.

 

[Avahz Darkwood]

if elves are immortal then why are there so few of them? is it because of always wielding glowing swords?

Becauae they are not immortal in this game, they just live a lot longer.

 

[Monkeyfinger]

Who says they're underpopulated in FfH? That's certainly not true from a gameplay perspective and I haven't seen any lore which contradicts that.

 

[Kyzarc Fotjage]

There are 2 elven nations, roughly equal in size each other nation
there are 14 human or mostly human nations
that is quite a gap...
if the elves are live 300 years on average, and the humans live 65 (probably less), and the elves had 1/10 as many people as the humans in the beginning of rebirth then they should have at least 1/5 if not more within 300 years. (these assumptions are probably horrendously inacurate)

 

[Kyzarc Fotjage]

the only reason i can think of is either a more bigger population gap in beginning, or the civil war constantly wiping out generations of elves. (How many years in each turn? i've been assuming 5, that's probably also to much)

 

[Skitters]

There are 2 elven nations, roughly equal in size each other nation
there are 14 human or mostly human nations
that is quite a gap...
if the elves are live 300 years on average, and the humans live 65 (probably less), and the elves had 1/10 as many people as the humans in the beginning of rebirth then they should have at least 1/5 if not more within 300 years. (these assumptions are probably horrendously inacurate)

A longer life, could also imply a longer period it takes to reach full maturity and perhaps even a longer gestation period

There could also well be social reasons - perhaps Elves for the most part will only have one child for example, and/or have/had social taboos on when the appropriate time to have a child would be (ie; not just raised eyebrows when the bride has a lump, but perhaps within two years after marriage?)

Or perhaps Elves suffered a particularly high infant mortality rate in the Age of Ice - not helped by the mistrust sparked by the schism between the Winter/Summer court

 

[Kyzarc Fotjage]

If the elves started near the same time as the humans then they should have as much variety culturewise as humans do. The elven cultures seem very homogenous, they would have had the same amount of time as humans to diversify and create several elven civilizations, each unique with different value syatems. the values that emphasized population growth probably would have won out over the ones that didn't.
The elven values should be similar to humans, if only from social darwinism and prolonged exposure to human culture.

 

[Kyzarc Fotjage]

and why would the elves have a much higher mortality rate than the humans? They lived in warmer areas and had better technology. They were friends with their surroundings and weren't as warlike as other groups. (not so sure about this though)

 

[MagisterCultuum]

I believe that elves tend to be much cleaner than humans, which means they didn't develop many of their own diseases. The most elven of the elven (the Fyrdwell) are vegetarians, and rely on foraging rather than intensive agriculture and herding, so they are not as often exposed to diseases than can pass from animals to humanoids. This means that elves, like the Native Americans, would have considerably weaker immunities to diseases than men. Their herb lore and medical knowledge can often make up for this, but we see from Kithra Kyriel's entry that when living among men a simple stomach flu that most mortals could easily overcome would be lethal to an elf.


I don't think they live in a warmer climate than most humans. The lands near the Umbrawood are described as a taiga. Their environment is certainly not as hot as the jungles where the Clan and Bannor live.


The elves tend to keep old technologies better, but they aren't as advanced as many of the human civs. Being in the nature sphere means they do advance technologically instead of regressing, but the expansion is a very slow one. Their culture does not really encourage technological innovation, and refining old skills.


The Elves of the Age of Magic weren't very warlike, but the civil war has hardened them considerably.



The main point isn't that they would have particularly high mortality rates, but rather low fertility rates. I think it would be reasonable to assume that Elves don't even reach puberty until around the age when human women reach menopause. Three hundred years into the age of rebirth might mean 15 generations of mankind, but only 2 or 3 generations of elves.

 

[Kyzarc Fotjage]

​

They live in contact with humans, travelers visit their city's, they go abroad, etc. so they would have plenty of exposure to disease, unlike native americans who had almost zero contact

​

But why do they only have one culture? if they are thousand's of years old then they should have several cultures. Are they similar to Imperial china? if that is so then they would have been forced to adapt or be assimilated by foriegn cultures. Like the Mongol invasions, or European dominitation in 1700's-1900's(read "Guns, Germs, and Steel" it talks about why society's succeed or fail)

​

Natural selection would have caused the one's that have genes that increase fertility would become more dominant, increasing the overall fertility of the elves.

​

The war's would make them more resistant to the age of ice in general, and i was responding to skitter's comment about it maybe because of high infant mortality

 

[Tyrs]

You're looking at this from a biological and evolutionary perspective. Elves are how they are from long exposure to their god, not from millions of years of evolution

 

[MagisterCultuum]

Elves tend to be very isolationist. While there has long been some contact with humans, there was never very much. They used to have more contact with the Aifons, but those are all dead now. Elves only get close to those that already share their values and have more similar ways of life.

The elves are very arrogant, and consider all other cultures inferior to their own. This is true of both courts.

Why should living so long make them have more cultures? Having the same individuals live for thousands of years would probably have the opposite effect. Adults tend to become set in their ways, so the cultural changes come largely from innovations made by the youth over several generations. The elves have fewer youth, and fewer generations. The queens of both courts have rules at least since the Age of Magic, possibly the Age of Dragons, and have no intention of changing their culture an more than they have to. Both courts cultures have adapted to changing circumstances, just not as much as human civs. They won't change their language, for instance, since they would consider it a perfect, divine tongue derived directly from the mouth of Sucellus and Cernunnos.



Even if they are in the nature sphere, natural selection in Erebus is really supernatural selection, and does not work the same way as on Earth. Even so, the claim that natural selection always leads to higher fertility is not accurate. Real life studies have found that is essentially all species fertility rates tend to decrease when longevity increases, and that creatures reproduce more in response to greater environmental stresses. Humans and other animals naturally have fewer children when their children have a better chance to survive. There is no reason for genes that increase fertility to become dominant over genes that lead to extremely long life, especially if the later also delay menopause for thousands of years. The elves value being in balance with nature, so having more children than the environment can support would be discouraged. Throwing off this equilibrium would not be advantageous. There is a theory that the Bonobos evolved to have a much lower fertility rate than their cousins because of less scarcity of food and less competition among individuals. The importance of casual sex to their social relations made the ability to mate often without causing getting pregnant often socially advantageous, and the importance of these social relations to survival made low fertility evolutionarily favored. It may be worth noting that bonobo and elven society are both female dominated, and that both elves and bonobos are smaller and more slender than their cousins.

 

[Kiwi Tyrant]

To the O.P..........the Dural.

 

[Valkrionn]

Elves tend to be very isolationist. While there has long been some contact with humans, there was never very much. They used to have more contact with the Aifons, but those are all dead now. Elves only get close to those that already share their values and have more similar ways of life.

The elves are very arrogant, and consider all other cultures inferior to their own. This is true of both courts.

Why should living so long make them have more cultures? Having the same individuals live for thousands of years would probably have the opposite effect. Adults tend to become set in their ways, so the cultural changes come largely from innovations made by the youth over several generations. The queens of both courts have rules at least since the Age of Magic, possibly the Age of Dragons, and have no intention of changing their culture an more than they have to. Both courts cultures have adapted to changing circumstances, just not as much as human civs. They won't change their language, for instance, since they would consider it a perfect, divine tongue derived directly from the mouth of Sucellus and Cernunnos.



Even if they are in the nature spell, natural selection in Erebus is really supernatural selection, and does not work the same way as on Earth. Even so, the claim that natural selection always leads to higher fertility is not accurate. Real life studies have found that is essentially all species fertility rates tend to decrease when longevity increases, and that creatures reproduce more in response to greater environmental stresses. Humans and other animals naturally have fewer children when their children have a better chance to survive. There is no reason for genes that increase fertility to become dominant over genes that lead to extremely long life, especially if the later also delay menopause for thousands of years. The elves value being in balance with nature, so having more children than the environment can support would be discouraged. Throwing off this equilibrium would not be advantageous.

I agree completely here. Just look at our own history.... The vast majority of important advancements have been made by relatively young people. Darwin's Theory of Evolution, Einstein's Theory of General Relatively, etc... Both were in their 30s when they first formulated their theories. Age tends to make people set in their ways, so advancements are generally made by young people.

To the O.P..........the Dural.

The Dural are an FF civ, so I don't think they count in the standard lore.

 

[Skitters]

If the elves started near the same time as the humans then they should have as much variety culturewise as humans do.

The elven cultures seem very homogenous, they would have had the same amount of time as humans to diversify and create several elven civilizations, each unique with different value syatems. the values that emphasized population growth probably would have won out over the ones that didn't.
The elven values should be similar to humans, if only from social darwinism and prolonged exposure to human culture.

I don't see that that is a given. The sheer fact they are longer lived may actually mean that in many ways they generally follow a slower pace of life (in a similar way that it is believed that a long lived species such as a tortoise perceives a unit of time quite differently to a gnat, and how and adult perceives the length of a year as shorter than a child).

Humans, by nature of their shorter lifespans have perhaps developed into more frenetic beings, whilst Elves have perhaps developed a more thoughtful, perhaps even conservative outlook that makes them less prone to splinter off into various factions. Indeed, perhaps this would even go some way to indicate what a real culture shock the schism of the Summer and Winter courts would have been to the Elves as a whole?

and why would the elves have a much higher mortality rate than the humans? They lived in warmer areas and had better technology. They were friends with their surroundings and weren't as warlike as other groups. (not so sure about this though)

I'm kind of assuming that the climate of the Elven lands would have dropped in the Age of Ice. Perhaps seeing a change from temperate woodland. That whilst friendly with their surroundings, what they had known changed rapidly so that they were presented with almost alien conditions

- perhaps deciduos-like trees became barren with the temperature drop, perhaps ground ice hindered the growth of plants, perhaps the natural conservationist amongst Elves means that - unlike humans - they would be less prepared to change their diet to meet the new needs. Again, I guess I'm imagining a conservatism amongst them that perhaps implies a susceptibility to sudden change.

 

[Kyzarc Fotjage]

Elves tend to be very isolationist. While there has long been some contact with humans, there was never very much. They used to have more contact with the Aifons, but those are all dead now. Elves only get close to those that already share their values and have more similar ways of life.

The elves are very arrogant, and consider all other cultures inferior to their own. This is true of both courts.

Why should living so long make them have more cultures? Having the same individuals live for thousands of years would probably have the opposite effect. Adults tend to become set in their ways, so the cultural changes come largely from innovations made by the youth over several generations. The elves have fewer youth, and fewer generations. The queens of both courts have rules at least since the Age of Magic, possibly the Age of Dragons, and have no intention of changing their culture an more than they have to. Both courts cultures have adapted to changing circumstances, just not as much as human civs. They won't change their language, for instance, since they would consider it a perfect, divine tongue derived directly from the mouth of Sucellus and Cernunnos.



Even if they are in the nature sphere, natural selection in Erebus is really supernatural selection, and does not work the same way as on Earth. Even so, the claim that natural selection always leads to higher fertility is not accurate. Real life studies have found that is essentially all species fertility rates tend to decrease when longevity increases, and that creatures reproduce more in response to greater environmental stresses. Humans and other animals naturally have fewer children when their children have a better chance to survive. There is no reason for genes that increase fertility to become dominant over genes that lead to extremely long life, especially if the later also delay menopause for thousands of years. The elves value being in balance with nature, so having more children than the environment can support would be discouraged. Throwing off this equilibrium would not be advantageous. There is a theory that the Bonobos evolved to have a much lower fertility rate than their cousins because of less scarcity of food and less competition among individuals. The importance of casual sex to their social relations made the ability to mate often without causing getting pregnant often socially advantageous, and the importance of these social relations to survival made low fertility evolutionarily favored. It may be worth noting that bonobo and elven society are both female dominated, and that both elves and bonobos are smaller and more slender than their cousins.

I spoke of human contact chiefly to refute your point about disease, any contact is enough to spread disease (Pizaro, Cortes, Mississipian civilization)

If the humans were more advanced than the elves in most aspects during the Age of Magic then why were they so arrogant?

Cultural change would be slow I'll admit, but it wouldn't be stagnant. Cultural would still occur and splinter factions would schism and form new nations.

Natural selection would be similar, the gods would have an impact but they have interfered very little since Age of Dragons (besides Mulcarn and Mistress of Pain). Life expectancy would have dropped dramatically near the end of the Age of Magic with the Civil War, Fall of Bhall, Mulcarn, and the beginning of the Age of Rebirth being so dangerous. Most of several generations would have been wiped out and that would have led to a higher birth rate among survivors. "creatures reproduce more in response to greater environmental stresses. Humans and other animals naturally have fewer children when their children have a better chance to survive." The Age of Ice was a fairly large enviromental factor, and their children probably wouldn't have had all that large chance to survive compared to earlier times. The equilibrium was already thrown off, they would try to restore while grabbing more land for themselves.

Just how long do elves live? I'm working off of the assumption that the average is about 300-400 years.