2.3 - Elf

Hiraeth's elves are long-memory people shaped by environment, magic, and community. Their lives are longer than human lives but not the many centuries common to some other settings.

Hiraeth Context

Hiraeth elves are peoples of concentrated memory, environmental adaptation, and specialized tradition. Wood, Sun, Moon, Sea, Snow, Drow, and Ash expressions have distinct histories, but none dictates alignment, profession, or nationality. Moon Elves retain the rare physical wings described in the oldest accounts, while Drow perceive heat rather than possessing generic sight in darkness. Elven adulthood rites may occur far later than physical maturity.

Lifecycle and Physical Profile

Field	Typical Range
Maturity	Physical maturity near 20; some traditions withhold full adult standing until about 80
Lifespan	Usually 100 to 120 years
Height	Usually 5 ft 2 in to 6 ft 4 in (157 to 193 cm)
Typical Weight	Usually 110 to 190 lb (50 to 86 kg)
Size	Medium

Elven features are often fine-boned and visibly shaped by a Lineage's environment or magic. Their famous 'long memory' is learned as well as personal; Hiraeth elves are not millennia-lived.

These are setting averages, not restrictions. Within the selected size category, choose the height, build, coloration, sex characteristics, mobility aids, scars, and other features that fit the character.

Ancestry Chassis

Field	Rule
Creature Type	Humanoid
Size	Medium
Speed	30 feet
Typical Lifespan	Usually 100 to 120 years

Chassis trait	Rule
Fey Ancestry	You have advantage on saving throws you make to avoid or end the charmed condition, and magic cannot put you to sleep.
Trance	You can complete a long rest in 4 hours if you spend those hours in a waking meditation.

Ancestral Details

Choose one Ancestral Detail at character creation. Details preserve the small sensory and physical choices present in earlier HAG systems without adding another power currency. A Detail supplies reliable narrow information or expression; it does not grant blanket advantage unless it explicitly says so. Your lineage recommends one in its Quick Package, but you may choose any Detail on this page.

Detail	Inherited expression
Pattern Sensitivity	After watching a place for 10 minutes, identify one recent break in its ordinary natural or social rhythm.
Season Sense	Recognize whether local plants or animals are behaving unusually for the season.
Light Memory	After studying a color, constellation, or pattern of light for 1 minute, preserve its broad arrangement in memory for 30 days.
Fine Balance	You can tell whether a visible branch, rail, narrow surface, or stretched line is stable enough to bear your own weight.
Wakeful Stillness	While resting but still conscious, you can remain physically still enough that an observer can tell you are deliberately resting rather than asleep.

Lineages

Choose one lineage, or replace this choice with a versatile lineage. A lineage is a physical, inherited, environmental, or supernatural sub-race package; it is not your nationality or profession.

Wood Elf

Your Lineage reads living cover, root, branch, and shifting green paths with practiced ease.

Lineage gift: Nonmagical undergrowth does not cost you extra movement, and you can attempt to Hide when lightly obscured by natural foliage.

Quick package: choose Pattern Sensitivity as your Ancestral Detail and Elven Training as your level-1 Ancestral Trait. This is a ready-to-play recommendation, not a restriction; you may replace either choice normally.

Sun Elf

Solar symbolism, warm climates, or radiant magic mark your Lineage without prescribing status or temperament.

Lineage gift: Learn the light cantrip. Once per long rest, add your proficiency bonus to a Persuasion or Arcana check after rolling.

Quick package: choose Season Sense as your Ancestral Detail and Memory Keeper as your level-1 Ancestral Trait. This is a ready-to-play recommendation, not a restriction; you may replace either choice normally.

Moon Elf

Lunar and air-borne adaptations give your falls and movement an uncanny lightness.

Lineage gift: You have physical wings. When you fall while conscious, you can glide 10 feet horizontally for every 10 feet you descend and reduce the effective fall distance by 20 feet. Once per short or long rest, you can use a bonus action to fly up to your walking Speed during the current turn, but you must end this movement on a surface that supports you. Medium or heavy armor prevents this flight.

Quick package: choose Fine Balance as your Ancestral Detail and Fey Step as your level-1 Ancestral Trait. This is a ready-to-play recommendation, not a restriction; you may replace either choice normally.

Sea Elf

Your body belongs comfortably to air and water, reflecting generations shaped by coast or sea.

Lineage gift: You have a swim Speed equal to your walking Speed and can breathe both air and water.

Quick package: choose Fine Balance as your Ancestral Detail and Elven Training as your level-1 Ancestral Trait. This is a ready-to-play recommendation, not a restriction; you may replace either choice normally.

Snow Elf

Cold, snow, and ice are ordinary terrain to your lineage rather than proof of any single northern culture.

Lineage gift: You ignore nonmagical difficult terrain caused by snow or ice and ignore nonmagical extreme cold.

Quick package: choose Wakeful Stillness as your Ancestral Detail and Memory Keeper as your level-1 Ancestral Trait. This is a ready-to-play recommendation, not a restriction; you may replace either choice normally.

High Drow

Your eyes are built for deep darkness, often paired with communities that preserved formal magic and rank belowground.

Lineage gift: You have Thermal Sight out to 60 feet. Once per long rest, you can study a visible exposed surface for 1 minute and determine whether a living creature passed within 5 feet of it during the previous 10 minutes.

Quick package: choose Light Memory as your Ancestral Detail and Memory Keeper as your level-1 Ancestral Trait. This is a ready-to-play recommendation, not a restriction; you may replace either choice normally.

Low Drow

Your Lineage emphasizes quiet movement and practical survival in dim or subterranean places.

Lineage gift: You have Thermal Sight out to 30 feet and gain proficiency in Stealth.

Quick package: choose Pattern Sensitivity as your Ancestral Detail and Elven Training as your level-1 Ancestral Trait. This is a ready-to-play recommendation, not a restriction; you may replace either choice normally.

Deep Drow

Extreme depths shaped your senses and spatial instincts more strongly than surface light.

Lineage gift: You have Thermal Sight out to 90 feet and always know your depth below the nearest surface. You have disadvantage on sight-based Perception checks in direct sunlight.

Quick package: choose Wakeful Stillness as your Ancestral Detail and Memory Keeper as your level-1 Ancestral Trait. This is a ready-to-play recommendation, not a restriction; you may replace either choice normally.

Ash Elf

Smoke, ash, dimness, and the aftermath of fire create the concealment your body reads best.

Lineage gift: Once per long rest, you can take the Hide action as a bonus action while in dim light, smoke, ash, or similar obscurement.

Quick package: choose Fine Balance as your Ancestral Detail and Fey Step as your level-1 Ancestral Trait. This is a ready-to-play recommendation, not a restriction; you may replace either choice normally.

Ancestry Talents

Choose one Ancestral Trait at level 1 and another ancestry talent at levels 5, 10, 15, and 20. You may also choose an eligible universal option.

When a later Talent appears, decide how it was discovered: training, crisis, inherited memory, prophecy, supernatural change, or another explanation that belongs to this character.

Level 1 Ancestral Traits

Trait	Rule
Elven Training	Gain proficiency in Perception or one finesse weapon and one ranged weapon.
Memory Keeper	Gain proficiency in History. After 1 minute studying a location or written page, you can accurately recall its broad layout or wording for 30 days.
Fey Step	Once per long rest, as a bonus action, teleport up to 15 feet to a space you can see.

Level 5 Talents

Talent	Rule
Unclouded Mind	Once per long rest when you fail an Intelligence, Wisdom, or Charisma saving throw, reroll it.
Path Without Trace	You can move at a normal travel pace while using Stealth, and tracking you requires a successful Wisdom (Survival) check.

Level 10 Talents

Talent	Rule
Greater Fey Step	Requires Fey Step. Its range becomes 30 feet. After teleporting, you can move 5 feet without provoking opportunity attacks.
Dreamless Watch	While completing a long rest through Trance, you remain aware of your surroundings and cannot be surprised.
Awakened Moon Wings	Requires Moon Elf. Once per long rest, as a bonus action, gain a Fly Speed equal to your walking Speed for 1 minute. You cannot hover, carry another creature while flying, or use this flight in medium or heavy armor. If the flight ends while you are aloft, you glide normally.

Level 15 Talents

Talent	Rule
Ancient Recollection	Once per long rest, when you make an Intelligence check, treat a d20 roll of 9 or lower as a 10.
Fey Passage	Once per long rest, you can cast misty step without a spell slot or components. This is separate from Fey Step.

Level 20 Talents

Talent	Rule
Perfected Trance	At the end of Trance, end one level of Exhaustion in addition to the normal benefits of a long rest.
Between Moments	Once per long rest when a creature you can see targets you with an attack, use your reaction to teleport up to 30 feet. If this moves you out of the attack's reach or range, the attack misses.
Unfettered Moon Wings	Requires Awakened Moon Wings. You gain a permanent Fly Speed equal to your walking Speed while not wearing medium or heavy armor. You cannot hover or carry another creature while flying.

Suggested Ancestry-Associated Flaws

These optional prompts recover the ancestry-associated pressures of earlier systems without awarding extra power. Choose one, adapt one, or use a Universal Flaw.

• Memory Burden: A preserved memory, recitation, or grievance is difficult to set aside even when the present needs you.
• Light Unease: Choose harsh sunlight, total darkness, deep water, or another environment opposed to your Lineage; it makes you visibly uncomfortable.
• Ritual Patience: You resist rushing a decision your tradition would normally approach through reflection, witness, or ceremony.

Roleplaying This Ancestry

• Which memory or recitation are you expected to preserve?
• When did your community consider you an adult, and did you agree?
• Which environmental adaptation do outsiders mistake for cultural behavior?

Quick Builds

For a mobile scout, choose Wood Elf or Ash Elf and Fey Step. For an undersea character, choose Sea Elf and Memory Keeper.