Are Half-Elves Boring?

[Archpaladin Zousha]

Let me start by saying, I like half-elves. They've got an elfy sort of perspective that's human-like enough that I can wrap my head around (I have a really hard time roleplaying an elf's long-lived perspective) and they can grow beards where usually elves can't! That said...I worry that sometimes I gravitate to them TOO often when thinking of characters, wanting to play characters that are "cool" and "handsome" and have a kind of "protagonist energy." Like, you don't really SEE fantasy media that treats other non-human types like dwarves and gnomes as anything but sidekicks. Most of them don't get much personality beyond "They're a dwarf," or "They're a gnome." Half-orcs have similar issues, since the average one has the fact that they ARE a half-orc dominating their roleplay. So...am I a boring roleplayer because most of my characters fall into the special-snowflake half-elf category?

[Elves]

Yeah they're extremely boring and fulfill no role whatsoever.

If they're to be kept they need to live up to old-style changeling folklore and be weird demented moonheads with fey mutations.

[Willie the Duck]

I think half-elves fit an interesting spot in the fantasy race conceptual space... if that then gives elves license to be truly alien. Despite lip service to the long-lived thing, much of fantasy literature (and lots of iterations of fantasy games) treat elves as vaguely hippy-dippy or magic-infused pretty people, and not much else. When that's the case, being halfway between that and human isn't really anywhere to be, since the elves really aren't outside the normal range of humanity (just to one side of it). If, however, elves are full on seelie/unseelie, living in an alien world/have and genuinely alien mindset, etc. etc. etc., well then half-elves are a great linking spot between that and normal humanity. In other words, I think there's a great place for half-elves to be, it's just a spot currently occupied by elves themselves most of the time.

[quinron]

I hate elves as player characters. In terms of lifespan, humans are to elves as dogs are to humans. There's a reason the elves in Tolkien's work lived separately from men and hobbits, who viewed the elves as rare, powerful, and otherworldly. Having elves live alongside humans and behaving as if they're not fundamentally different creatures just feels like lazy worldbuilding.

THAT SAID.

I usually allow elves in my games; I just drastically reduce their lifespans. And when I do that, I tend to cut half-elves out, because the niche half-elves fill is just "elves, but not as mystical," which is what elves become when you reduce their lifespans.

I think choosing to play a half-elf specifically because they feel closer to humans indicates that you're interested in having a player character that feels like they come from a race that's meant for player characters, in that they'll actively respond to the world around them. I think that's a lot more interesting to engage with than a stoic and unchanging elf.

EDIT: I spent too long tweaking my ramble and Willie the Duck snaked my point!

[gijoemike]

You are just in a rut. Make a point in the next campaign to play something different. Like a half orc, halfling, or gnome. Any character, race, or class can have a personality and take the spotlight in a given scene. You do not need to feel like half-elves are the special snowflakes. Every race is.

Make a point to play something outside your comfort zone. This is how you can grow as a role player.

[Dienekes]

Let me start by saying, I like half-elves. They've got an elfy sort of perspective that's human-like enough that I can wrap my head around (I have a really hard time roleplaying an elf's long-lived perspective) and they can grow beards where usually elves can't! That said...I worry that sometimes I gravitate to them TOO often when thinking of characters, wanting to play characters that are "cool" and "handsome" and have a kind of "protagonist energy." Like, you don't really SEE fantasy media that treats other non-human types like dwarves and gnomes as anything but sidekicks. Most of them don't get much personality beyond "They're a dwarf," or "They're a gnome." Half-orcs have similar issues, since the average one has the fact that they ARE a half-orc dominating their roleplay. So...am I a boring roleplayer because most of my characters fall into the special-snowflake half-elf category?

I don’t think any of the fantasy races are boring by their nature. Even humans can be the most fascinating interesting people to talk to. It really just depends on the decisions of the player roleplaying them.

This reads to me that you’ve liked half-elf stereotypes and keep getting drawn into it. But everything is more than just their stereotype.

Play against it, be an ugly half-elf. Sure they still have their natural boost to charisma/diplomacy, but plenty of ugly completely uncool people are charismatic. Think of that guy who got the whisky nature of elves mixed with their humans sides male pattern baldness to make some gaunt looking weirdo. Have fun with it.

Or if you don’t want to do that. Just look at other heroic tropes you enjoy and see if you can make a character fit those instead be it half elven or otherwise.

[Bugbear]

It is true that a LOT of media makes just about any character "boring". And this is quite common with non humans.

If you want the Classic Half Elf, read the Dragonlance books about Tanis Half elf or the Forgotten Realms Arlyn Moonblade books.

[KillianHawkeye]

I worry that sometimes I gravitate to them TOO often when thinking of characters, wanting to play characters that are "cool" and "handsome" and have a kind of "protagonist energy."

I kind of like the idea of half-elves representing the cliche pretty boy anime protagonist archetype, being mostly human but halfway to something more special.

[Khedrac]

This totally comes down to a combination of the Game System and the Gameworld lore.

In Tolkein there are exactly 2 half elves acknowledged as such - Elrond and Elros (which is a bit weird when you look at their family tree - the grandmother was an elf born of an elf and a maiar, and their mother was an elf born of the elf/maiar and a human - so how come they are the only two judged to be "half elves").
What's more, they don't really get to be human-elf hybrids - they have to choose which race to link their fate to, as did Elrond's daughter, and if they choose human they get an extended lifespan.
At this point the ganme system doesn't matter if faithful to Tolkein's work.

In Runequest/Glorantha where elves are living plants there is just one half-elf - Pavis who achieved some pretty amazing feats but I have seen no record of how he was born. (The original 2nd Ed of Runequest did actually include stats for 1/2-elves but it was in a non-Glorantha product called Questworld designed for solo play.)

So in these two examples half-elves are anything but boring, but they are also not really available for play.

I don't recall if Shadowrun supported half-elves, but with 99% of humans turning into a fantasy race they might have been quite interesting.

And then we get to (A)D&D where yes, half-elves can be boring. AD&D they were not too bad, and BECMI D&D didn't have them, but 3rd Ed D&D made half-elves a "what's the point?" race.
The ability to rescue the situation would flow from the campaign setting - e.g. making elves very segregationist - but with most talked-about campaigns allowing people to play pretty much anything then yes, half-elves are boring.

[Elves]

It's time to admit that Tolkien's elves fit his story but suck for fantasy games because they're just immortal humans with heightened passions and aesthetic sensitivity. And someone who is half of that is nothing at all.

[Batcathat]

It's time to admit that Tolkien's elves fit his story but suck for fantasy games because they're just immortal humans with heightened passions and aesthetic sensitivity. And someone who is half of that is nothing at all.

Considering Tolkien (and later D&D) led to generations of fantasy authors somehow thinking that you have to have elves (and dwarves and orcs and possibly some version of hobbit) when writing fantasy, the odds of his version of elves being abandoned seems bad.

[Morty]

There's two layers to this. In OP's particular case, I'm inclined to say: no, you're not boring. Play what you want. They're your characters and you do what is fun for you. But on the other hand, if you're concerned you're stuck in a rut, you should try playing something else just to see what happens. But do it for you, not for other people's judgments.

In the more general sense of elves in fantasy gaming... yeah, that's a whole big ol' ball of issues. Fantasy races are typically humans but X: humans but short, humans but big and green, humans but with a wolf's head. Elves are humans but better and writers and players alike kind of tiptoe around the subject. They're prettier, longer-lived, more magical. It's hard to untangle.

Also, on the specific subject of lifespan - if I were to run a game involving elves in some fashion, I'd unilaterally declare they live as long as humans, maybe a bit longer. A whole civilization of people who live for centuries would be completely alien to us and since it's not going to be properly explored by any system or setting, all it does is leave a logic hole you could ride an elephant through.

But, to bring it back to the issue at hand: if you worry you play the same kind of character too often or that you do it for the wrong reasons, try playing someone different. There's no other way to address it.

[Mastikator]

I kind of like the idea of half-elves representing the cliche pretty boy anime protagonist archetype, being mostly human but halfway to something more special.

Agreed. TBH I think any race will seem boring if you ignore all of their fluff and lore and what not. I think the issue stems from players playing themselves or worrying that they'll play some racial stereotype. (never seen that happen, with most players I can't even tell that they are not playing a human until I take a look at their character sheet)

[Mechalich]

And then we get to (A)D&D where yes, half-elves can be boring. AD&D they were not too bad, and BECMI D&D didn't have them, but 3rd Ed D&D made half-elves a "what's the point?" race.
The ability to rescue the situation would flow from the campaign setting - e.g. making elves very segregationist - but with most talked-about campaigns allowing people to play pretty much anything then yes, half-elves are boring.

There's also a sort of progression in crossbreed availability. In 1e AD&D, if you wanted to play a half-something, half-elves and briefly half-orcs were the only supported option. This changed as time passed. Dark Sun allowed human/dwarf crosses (Muls), Council of Wyrms allowed half-dragons, and Planescape uncorked the whole clade by throwing Tieflings, Aasimar, and Genasi into the mix. By the time 3e rolled around racial options were coming out of everywhere and you could also throw templates around like crazy. This increase in racial options coupled with an elimination in race-based restrictions on character concept, which meant that for players not highly concerned with immersion (meaning the majority of D&D players), race simply became something you picked for its build synergy. Half-elves, as written, had very few such synergies. They're basically humans only you picked the worst possible way to spend that bonus feat and extra skill points. This left half-elves without any real place to occupy in the system.

[Morty]

Traditional fantasy races have always been humans in funny costumes. That's all they'll ever be and part of the convention is suspending our disbelief to pretend otherwise. I am beyond sceptical that old-school D&D's restrictions on them somehow changed that.

[Imbalance]

No, you're not a boring player. Yes, half-elves are boring - perhaps slightly less so when they're called Bretons. Humans and human-adjacent people are boring in general, but real world human consumers lack the imagination to go very far away from humanoid limitations and mindsets, so the product is geared towards the greatest mass appeal rather than creatively exploring non-human identities as protagonists. It's an ironic truth of commercial fantasy fiction that it can't escape its own reality.

[Max_Killjoy]

Depending on the system, half-elves can be "boring" because they're an easy mechanics-driven pick in combination with certain "classes".

[LibraryOgre]

It is true that a LOT of media makes just about any character "boring". And this is quite common with non humans.

If you want the Classic Half Elf, read the Dragonlance books about Tanis Half elf or the Forgotten Realms Arlyn Moonblade books.

Though, I think some of that goes away with the normalization of Half-elves. Tanis had a degree of outcast, because he was too human for elves and too elven for humans. Notably, he used 1st edition half-elven age categories, where you didn't hit middle age until 100.. His "Mature Adult" stage was a human lifetime.. but he'd be long dead before an elf reached middle age. After 1e, half-elves became, in a lot of cases, "humans with pointy ears", relatively well-integrated into society. Their lifespans were shorter, their life cycle less divorced from humans, so they were far less divorced from humanity.

[Democratus]

As portrayed in modern D&D? Yes. Half-elves are boring.

Not to say you can't make them interesting. But that would be a deviation from what we have now.

I try to make each of the fantasy races unique in some way in my worlds - with varying degrees of success.

[Wizard_Lizard]

I mean I like 'em. Gives 'em the elf vibe without having to worry about weird wibbly wobbly immortality things.

[MoiMagnus]

They're mostly equivalent to humans in term of boringness. They're race is pretty much as relevant as the social class the character comes from, and I'm fine with it.

Additionally, while that's not official in any setting up to my knowledge, they are in my mind the go-to humanoid form for a dragon (or other shapeshifters) trying to live among humans. It's expected for half-elves to have high charisma, and to be a "stranger" to a human society. Having been "rejected by the elves" makes a believable fake backstory to justify why you're wandering in the human society, and explain your awkwardness when interacting with other humans and some of your instinctive arrogance you're trying to suppress. And who would question the fact that someone raised by the elves know few words of draconic?

[Alternatively, the fact that all half-elves are in fact dragons in disguise can be a conspiracy theory in your universe]

[Wizard_Lizard]

Yeah, I think Half elves, along with things like Aasimar, and Genasi, are just.. Human+ races. For when you want to play human but think human is boring.

[Anonymouswizard]

Traditional fantasy races have always been humans in funny costumes. That's all they'll ever be and part of the convention is suspending our disbelief to pretend otherwise. I am beyond sceptical that old-school D&D's restrictions on them somehow changed that.

This is the main reason my preferred races are humans and human-raised hybrids. It means I can be certain my character is mostly psychologically human. I don't see the point in pretending my character isn't a human in a funny hat.

Especially when there are so many funny hats to wear openly. Generally with feathers.

[Archpaladin Zousha]

I kind of like the idea of half-elves representing the cliche pretty boy anime protagonist archetype, being mostly human but halfway to something more special.

That is part of the issue, at least for me: playing the cliche pretty boy anime protagonist archetype and finding it hard to roleplay a real elf's perspective convincingly. And while I'm aware I could play this archetype with other ancestries (I mean, it's tailor-made for one of my other favorites, the half-orc paladin that seems to be growing in popularity as well), for some of the most immediate things I'm considering it's kinda redundant with other characters.

There's also a sort of progression in crossbreed availability. In 1e AD&D, if you wanted to play a half-something, half-elves and briefly half-orcs were the only supported option. This changed as time passed. Dark Sun allowed human/dwarf crosses (Muls), Council of Wyrms allowed half-dragons, and Planescape uncorked the whole clade by throwing Tieflings, Aasimar, and Genasi into the mix. By the time 3e rolled around racial options were coming out of everywhere and you could also throw templates around like crazy. This increase in racial options coupled with an elimination in race-based restrictions on character concept, which meant that for players not highly concerned with immersion (meaning the majority of D&D players), race simply became something you picked for its build synergy. Half-elves, as written, had very few such synergies. They're basically humans only you picked the worst possible way to spend that bonus feat and extra skill points. This left half-elves without any real place to occupy in the system.

This is why I like what 2e Pathfinder's done with them: Half-elf doesn't stand as its own ancestry anymore but instead is a modifier to other ancestries, so half-elves aren't limited to humans as their other half. I got this really fun idea for a half-elf whose non-elf parent was a DWARF. Heck, you wanna go REALLY wild, you can make an ORC a half-elf, or make an elf HALF-ORC! So many possibilities!

No, you're not a boring player. Yes, half-elves are boring - perhaps slightly less so when they're called Bretons. Humans and human-adjacent people are boring in general, but real world human consumers lack the imagination to go very far away from humanoid limitations and mindsets, so the product is geared towards the greatest mass appeal rather than creatively exploring non-human identities as protagonists. It's an ironic truth of commercial fantasy fiction that it can't escape its own reality.

I see no lie here.

I mean I like 'em. Gives 'em the elf vibe without having to worry about weird wibbly wobbly immortality things.

EXACTLY! And they can have BEARDS!

Yeah, I think Half elves, along with things like Aasimar, and Genasi, are just.. Human+ races. For when you want to play human but think human is boring.

That's definitely what's been buggin' me in this instance. I have a concept I want to go with, but it's tied on a fundamental level to a specific in-world organization where the majority of its membership are humans, so I want to play something human-adjacent for it to make sense. But I don't want to go with a half-orc because one of the NPCs I'll be working closely with is a half-orc member of that organization, so I'd basically be a carbon-copy of that NPC, redundant.

Plus, because of the archetype I'm building my character towards (a King-Arthury type of handsome, princely leader), half-elf all but seems to slot perfectly into that archetype. Like I said in the OP, you don't see types like dwarves, halflings or gnomes in this protagonisty kind of archetype. They almost always feel more like supporting characters, even when they're nominally the heroes (like the dynamic between Bilbo and Thorin in The Hobbit, Thorin always feels more like a supporting character than a deuteragonist because most of the narrative is told from Bilbo's perspective, and Bilbo himself acts more like a sidekick than a protagonist to emphasize his humble and unambitious nature).

Talked with a friend of mine about this too and he had an interesting insight I feel might be worth discussing, and I think some other folks here have touched on: half-elves used to have that "trapped between two worlds" niche for their backstories, but now there's all these other peoples like half-orcs, tieflings, and changelings who have the exact same issue, but with more EDGE, so all half-elves have left is the "human for people who don't want to play a human" niche.

[Morty]

Plus, because of the archetype I'm building my character towards (a King-Arthury type of handsome, princely leader), half-elf all but seems to slot perfectly into that archetype. Like I said in the OP, you don't see types like dwarves, halflings or gnomes in this protagonisty kind of archetype. They almost always feel more like supporting characters, even when they're nominally the heroes (like the dynamic between Bilbo and Thorin in The Hobbit, Thorin always feels more like a supporting character than a deuteragonist because most of the narrative is told from Bilbo's perspective, and Bilbo himself acts more like a sidekick than a protagonist to emphasize his humble and unambitious nature).

That they're not portrayed this way doesn't mean they can't or shouldn't be. And trying to buck stereotypes looks like it'll do you some good, frankly.

[LibraryOgre]

Plus, because of the archetype I'm building my character towards (a King-Arthury type of handsome, princely leader), half-elf all but seems to slot perfectly into that archetype. Like I said in the OP, you don't see types like dwarves, halflings or gnomes in this protagonisty kind of archetype. They almost always feel more like supporting characters, even when they're nominally the heroes (like the dynamic between Bilbo and Thorin in The Hobbit, Thorin always feels more like a supporting character than a deuteragonist because most of the narrative is told from Bilbo's perspective, and Bilbo himself acts more like a sidekick than a protagonist to emphasize his humble and unambitious nature).

I mean, one of the major inspirations for modern fantasy had a main cast of 13 dwarves, a halfling, and a celestial pretending to be a human... and the last came and went throughout the story, serving as an angelus ex machina as much as anything. Another book in that world has a sizable portion that is all about the exploits of elves, ages ago. (Middle Earth) Another stars a semi-immortal humanoid (but not human) sorcerer. (Elric) Or the book about the human raised by elves? (Broken Sword) Or immortal, reality hopping demigods? (Chronicles of Amber)

Non-humans might not be really common protagonists, but there's a fair bit out there, even without going into D&D-specific novels, which range from an ensemble cast of humans and non-humans (Dragonlance Chronicles), outright race-specific novels (the Dwarven and Elven Nations trilogies for Dragonlance, Last Mythal for Forgotten Realms, Richard Knaak Chaos War books), or smaller works which nonetheless have a non-human protagonist (Drizz't, Arlyn Moonblade, Kaz the Minotaur has like 3 books).

[False God]

I guess I'm a bit of an odd duck here because I like half-elves.

On the other hand, I don't find almost any of the races interesting in the slightest. Hands down, most of the "traditional fantasy races" are some of the most mind numbing generic dribble that one could possibly hope to rip off Tolkien and not get sued.

But, to be fair I think that's so that people can make "the elves in this setting" detailed in by their own hand. And then detail in their player character even further. If the game is telling me "I must be this." and "I must be that." Because of my race, I'm probably not very interested in that game. Doesn't really matter if the DM or the Book is telling me these things.

So ya know, it's up to you to make half elves or whatever else interesting in your own way. I think ultimately most people are probably pretty boring, without some interesting life circumstances or adventures (read: interesting backstory and in-game development) and that's on the player to make their character interesting.

I think folks fixate, in D&D especially, too much on what "the race" brings to the table. Honestly unless your character is real big on their race, probably not much.

[Silly Name]

I guess I'm a bit of an odd duck here because I like half-elves.

On the other hand, I don't find almost any of the races interesting in the slightest. Hands down, most of the "traditional fantasy races" are some of the most mind numbing generic dribble that one could possibly hope to rip off Tolkien and not get sued.

But, to be fair I think that's so that people can make "the elves in this setting" detailed in by their own hand. And then detail in their player character even further. If the game is telling me "I must be this." and "I must be that." Because of my race, I'm probably not very interested in that game. Doesn't really matter if the DM or the Book is telling me these things.

So ya know, it's up to you to make half elves or whatever else interesting in your own way. I think ultimately most people are probably pretty boring, without some interesting life circumstances or adventures (read: interesting backstory and in-game development) and that's on the player to make their character interesting.

I think folks fixate, in D&D especially, too much on what "the race" brings to the table. Honestly unless your character is real big on their race, probably not much.

This is probably the best answer. A character's race can inform some things about them, but an extremely common trope is also the outcast/going against type.

Play what you like, just try to keep the actual character interesting. Your race can be a starting point for backstory and personality, or it may matter hardly at all. Go crazy, play against type, play according to all the tropes, make your own thing!

[Lord Raziere]

Indeed, on a racial level, half-elves are boring. They're a blend of two species that already look very much alike and are diet elves when elves are already diet mythical elves

On a personal level, it all depends on the details and circumstances you figure out for your particular character, as personal stories can be very creative and interesting in their specific details that can be interesting beyond the racial ones. was your parents both half elf? one elf one human? was the father or mother the elf? how did that effect how they see them? were they good parents? bad parents? things like that. an outcast is one thing, but another good archetype you might want to do for any race is the "Failure to Meet Expectations" character. This is a character that TRIES to live up to the species ideals but FAILS to do so and has lower self esteem about themselves than they deserve. Its a good archetype to point how even if you specifically shoot for what a culture or species is about, that the ideal may not be achieved anyways because the ideals are unrealistic and can't be expected for everyone to follow them whether out of personal preference, circumstances beyond their control or other factors.

[Silly Name]

One interesting addendum is that half-elves in fiction are usually extremely rare: their specialness and what makes them interestesting is that there are very few of them not only in the present time, but across history, usually numbering in the single digits.

So, playing a lot of half-elves may take away the uniqueness that made them interesting to you in the first place, because they now are "commonplace" in your mental landscape.