Which Elves Have it Worst? (2024)

Specifically between Dragon Age and the Witcher- two long-running fantasy franchises once famous for being somewhat grey.

But per the title- Elves have it bad in both worlds. But which group of pointy-ears has it worse overall?

You can be as in-depth as you like or alternatively just think about which game has Elves you'd rather be- and pick the opposite.

the dragon age elves, at least the writers of the witcher do not seem to actively hate them and want to make them fundamentaly lesser/in a secondary status/role than humanity

yes i hate everything about elves that dai introduced and retconed into existance

Silent Wraith said:

Depends on what you classify as elves

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The current most-dominant set of pointy-eared beings that claim the name in the main worlds of Dragon Age and Witcher.

Peptuck said:

Witcher and Dragon Age elves are both lucky they didn't live in Elder Scrolls Tamriel when Pelinal was around.

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Or just when the Alessian Order in general was in power.

Peptuck said:

Witcher and Dragon Age elves are both lucky they didn't live in Elder Scrolls Tamriel when Pelinal was around.

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not really, at least there they had actual gods and afterlives for them even if pelinal maneged to kill them all before said gods interfered directly

also, at least pelinial did not rape or torture any of the elves he killed

Timewarriors said:

I would say elves In hentai who sole role seem to be get sold into slavery before being rape and gamgbang by either orcs or humans.

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The choice is specifically between Witcher and Dragon Age.

Witcher elves, the ones on the Continent at least, have at least one city which is a puppet to another human empire. They are suffering an overall population decline, and are treated as second class citizens at best, or outright slaves outside of their one city.
The Wild Hunt elves are doing just fine.

DA elves have lost their entire civilization twice, were enslaved like 3 times I think, lost their entire history and culture from their first civilization, were scattered and reduced to small enclaves or nomads after their second civilization was destroyed.

I think both elven groups are facing extinction, with the exception of the Wild Hunt elves.

I'd say DA elves had it worst. They lost more overall, and the Witcher elves at least have a city, even if it's a puppet and mostly populated by the old.

I feel the racism that elves face in Dragon Age is a bit worse, not by much, but at least in the Witcher, there is a small elven nation (a puppet of Nilfgaad, but still a nation), they bond with other non-humans and places like Nilfgaard seem more tolerant that the Northern Kingdoms. In fact, we have examples of elves in the Northern Kingdom that owns a tavern, like Chireadan and Errdil, which would be unthinkable for a city elf in DA.

Again, the difference is not by much, they are still treated as second class citizens, hunted and persecuted in many places and facing at least, cultural extinction...but DA elves have all of that, but have no country or place where they are treated a little better. Quoting a post in the Dragon Age Thread:

zezia said:

Quoting a list of the various sh*t humans have done to elves in general.

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• Slavery is still legal in Tevinter, and still in wide practice almost everywhere in Thedas but behind closed doors; slavers prey on alienage elves all over, and transport them to Tevinter or even sell them in their home nations, like what happened to Fiona. During the Orlesian occupation of Ferelden, they openly sold and bought Fereldan elves as chattel. Antivan Crows most frequently purchase elves as slaves because humans find them beautiful.
• This is because crimes against elves are almost never investigated.
• The segregated communities they are forced to live in known as alienages go without basic services, like clean water and waste disposal.
• Nobles hunt Dalish elves for sport, and terrorize alienages for fun. So do chevaliers as a graduating ritual. Entire alienages can also be "purged" if the elves get too 'unruly' or so much as ask for better living conditions, in some particularly harsh cities.
• Scholars write papers on how elves are more akin to animals than people, and that human-elven relations are a sin against the Maker.
• It is illegal to defend an elf from a human in Ferelden.
• Elves are not allowed to carry weapons at all in Ferelden, and only blades no larger than their palms in Orlais.
• Humans burn Dalish clans out of forests if they get too close to town.
• Templars kill and kidnap Dalish mages, bringing them back to Circles to torture them.
• Worshipping the elven gods is forbidden by the Chantry, and they send harassers to try and convert the Dalish to Andrastianism with threats.
• It is an everyday occurrence for city elves to be called "knife-ear" or "rabbit," and are supposed to just take it.
• City elves are expected to be Andrastian, but are not allowed to actually join the Chantry.
• All Chantry works depicting elves is forbidden, past depictions all burned or altered to erase elven involvement in Andraste's story, and the Canticle of Shartan was made dissonant

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Add the Inquisition reveal that "their gods were just their assholes sorcerers that enslave them and everybody else" and DA elves have it pretty rough.

It also doesn't help that Bioware has an obsession with making the elves as miserable as possible and never allowing them to win.

Honestly, Dragon Age elves have it so rough that they would genuinely be happier dead, but given the kind of world they live in they'd probably be sent to NotHell to be tortured for all eternity by NotSlaanesh.

I'm going to say Dragon Age elves have it worse between those two factions of elves. What they face is ever so slightly worse than the Witcher elves. At least the Witcher elves have a fighting chance.

Thread tax out of the way? Good.

The Mer of Tamriel have it the worst of all elves because they deserve everything that happens to those genocidal, cannibalistic, knife eared degenerates. Just the Ayleid Empire alone was enough to make all Mer deserve Pelinal Whitestrake did to them along with everything the Alessian Order followed up on.

The Orsimer... are probably balaced. The Kahjit... probably aren't elves. The Ayleids and Dunmer practice slavery and are/were absolutely unrepentant about it. The Bosmer are cannibals, and eat men as well as mer due to the Green Pact. The Altmer... have the Third Aldmeri Dominion and the Thalmor who want to destroy Nirn and in the process kill all life.

I'm going to walk back a statement. The Mer don't deserve everything happening to them. They deserve worse.

Number3124 said:

The Mer of Tamriel have it the worst of all elves because they deserve everything that happens to those genocidal, cannibalistic, knife eared degenerates. Just the Ayleid Empire alone was enough to make all Mer deserve Pelinal Whitestrake did to them along with everything the Alessian Order followed up on.

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First off, advocating for genocide is never okay. Second, while Mer in Tamriel do have some messed up cultural traditions, you can't blame the entire f*cking species because of it. The vast majority of elves you meet in the games are just ordinary people, no different from Men or any of the beast races. So please stop advocating for genocide like some kind of Nazi.

Silent Wraith said:

First off, advocating for genocide is never okay. Second, while Mer in Tamriel do have some messed up cultural traditions, you can't blame the entire f*cking species because of it. The vast majority of elves you meet in the games are just ordinary people, no different from Men or any of the beast races. So please stop advocating for genocide like some kind of Nazi.

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It was a bit of hyperbole for comedic effect. I found that post quite funny. We're talking about fiction elves in fictional worlds. There was nothing serious about that post. I had misread the title of the thread as, "Which elves are the worst," at first, and that idea stuck with me because I got a laugh out of it. I figured others would too.

But here. Just to be clear. I'm not sorry about any of the contents of that post. I find it hilarious. I'm sorry about your reaction to it though. I am sorry that you can not delineate between reality and fiction, that you would think this is anything other than jest, that you would think that I am in some way expressing my thoughts on real people when talking about entities that amount to no more than collections of text and pixels. These elves are not real. There is no moral weight attached to hypothetical about them. So please relax a little.

Also, good job speed running Godwin's law and going straight from reading my post to calling me to a Nazi. Really dumps all of your moral authority right out the window.

Number3124 said:

It was a bit of hyperbole for comedic effect. I found that post quite funny. We're talking about fiction elves in fictional worlds. There was nothing serious about that post. I had misread the title of the thread as, "Which elves are the worst," at first, and that idea stuck with me because I got a laugh out of it. I figured others would too.

But here. Just to be clear. I'm not sorry about any of the contents of that post. I find it hilarious. I'm sorry about your reaction to it though. I am sorry that you can not delineate between reality and fiction, that you would think this is anything other than jest, that you would think that I am in some way expressing my thoughts on real people when talking about entities that amount to no more than collections of text and pixels. These elves are not real. There is no moral weight attached to hypothetical about them. So please relax a little.

Also, good job speed running Godwin's law and going straight from reading my post to calling me to a Nazi. Really dumps all of your moral authority right out the window.

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You could of just said you weren't being serious. You don't have to insult me just because I criticized your post. It honestly makes you look really immature.

Silent Wraith said:

You could of just said you weren't being serious. You don't have to insult me just because I criticized your post. It honestly makes you look really immature.

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No. It really doesn't. You went straight to an unreasonable position and made an ass of yourself in the process. My response to you was entirely appropriate. I hope you learn from it though.

Have a good day.

Number3124 said:

No. It really doesn't. You went straight to an unreasonable position and made an ass of yourself in the process. My response to you was entirely appropriate. I hope you learn from it though.

Have a good day.

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Whatever man, you win. I'm not going to derail the thread over this.

Witcher Elves have their own state and can own property outside their reservations. They are also, explicitly, becoming extinct, in no part due to the state I mentioned being run by elitist and old jackasses who live in their own bubble and refuse to improve the live of their fellows. And while the Aen Elle are doing better, their own world is also threatened by a cosmic Ice Age and they have trouble moving to another world due to lacking the power of Ciri.

Dragon Elves have it worse on average perhaps, but they aren't stated to go extinct yet. Make that what you will.

Peptuck said:

Witcher and Dragon Age elves are both lucky they didn't live in Elder Scrolls Tamriel when Pelinal was around.

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I know we joke a lot about Pelinal but Elder Scrolls is the only mainstream Fantasy setting that I can think of where Elves aren't waning. Middle Earth? Warhammer? Warcraft? Forgotten Realms? Elves are waning.

zack32 said:

Witcher Elves have their own state and can own property outside their reservations. They are also, explicitly, becoming extinct, in no part due to the state I mentioned being run by elitist and old jackasses who live in their own bubble and refuse to improve the live of their fellows. And while the Aen Elle are doing better, their own world is also threatened by a cosmic Ice Age and they have trouble moving to another world due to lacking the power of Ciri.

Dragon Elves have it worse on average perhaps, but they aren't stated to go extinct yet. Make that what you will.

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The White Frost is less of an "apocalypse for the elves" and more of a "apocalypse for everybody". Eventually, all worlds would fall to the White Frost, but in the ending of the Witcher 3, Ciri managed to stop that, so the Aen Elle are fine for the most part. I think that in the books, the White Frost wasn't even a thing in the Aen Elle world, only a threat to the Witcher World and more of a natural and slow apocalypse.

And it seems that also in the books, in the future, a second Conjunction happens and most of the Aen Seidhe take the chance and leave to another world, so they don't become extinct.

Ginriu said:

The White Frost is less of an "apocalypse for the elves" and more of a "apocalypse for everybody". Eventually, all worlds would fall to the White Frost, but in the ending of the Witcher 3, Ciri managed to stop that, so the Aen Elle are fine for the most part. I think that in the books, the White Frost wasn't even a thing in the Aen Elle world, only a threat to the Witcher World and more of a natural and slow apocalypse.

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Ciri stopped it for her world but did she stop it for the Aen Elle as well?

Ginriu said:

And it seems that also in the books, in the future, a second Conjunction happens and most of the Aen Seidhe take the chance and leave to another world, so they don't become extinct.

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Was it confirmed they all moved out or they just disappeared?

Ginriu said:

Dungeon Meshi's elves are fine, and one of the top civilizations of the setting. Age of Sigmar not-elves, Eragon elves, the Dragon Prince elves...are all fine.

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I don't honestly know if I'd call Dragon Prince or Dungeon Meshi mainstream, as much as Critical Role is honestly. Dungeon Meshi latter is growing in popularity but I wouldn't compare it to the others I name dropped yet. Eragon... I suppose. And I honestly keep forgetting about AOS being a thing.

Ah, sorry, deleted part of my post because I felt it could go off-topic.

zack32 said:

Ciri stopped it for her world but did she stop it for the Aen Elle as well?

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Wouldn't make sense if she didn't, given that Ciri went to the Source of the White Frost and stopped from expanding to other worlds, which would have prevented from destroying the worlds that already affected, like for example, the Witcher World.

Avallach was helping Ciri in the game because he wanted to save his world of the Aen Elle, and given Ciri confronting the White Frost only happened due to his manipulations, the Aen Elle are probably fine.

zack32 said:

Was it confirmed they all moved out or they just disappeared?

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According to the wiki and what I found on reddit, they move out when the Conjunction happened. They basically took their things, destroyed what they left behind and went to another world.