Battle Born

Revision as of 20:51, 23 July 2018

A variety of elf for joyful stick jocks. We value work ethic, and time spent on the field. Author: P.Socrates

Intro

Battle born spend most of the time on the field, rather than off. They take and hold a childlike joy of fighting. A curiosity and enjoyment of learning. They tend to 'get gud', because fighting's fun and because it would be boring not to. While elves, they value function before beauty. That's not to say they don't value having nice things. That's part of promoting their forest after all. They'd just rather have a crappy looking thing that works, than a beautiful thing that doesn't. Minimum viable product, then iterate. Joyful Stick jocks welcome.

The steps to becoming one are:

• 1) Try on elf ears. Realize that they don't impair field fighting at all.
• 2) Battle born wear woad. Get some blue face paint on. Any design(or lack thereof) you'd like.
• 3) Go back to Fighting.

Both 1+2 are available on Amazon.

Relations with other races

Battle born elves see little inherent difference between the various types of meat sack. They all harm the forest, just in different ways and amounts. Since it's been long established that eliminating them all is infeasible, the best that can be done is passively maximizing casualties. That doesn't mean breaking alliances in a fight, or sabotaging your side. We play the long game, and that's bad for business. Instead, this consists of:

• Too many of any one type is disastrous. If possible, join the 'loosing' side.
• If your side is winning, making sure that the newbies on your side are able to actively participate in the engagement.
• Other elves at least try to help the forest(though most are lousy about it), so hanging with them is probably good.

Culture

Life-cycle

They are not individuals in the normal sense- Battle born are plants, rather than meat. Their life cycle is considerably different than that of a meatsack. For instance- their 'mother' is a tree. After 'birth', they spend the first hundred or so years of life linked to their mother, as one of her blossoms- a dryad. It's an idyllic existence- a dryad's needs are simple, and most exit this period of life with a childlike nature.

The next phase in life is as a worker drone. It is in this second phase of their life, that they interact most with the other races. Tasked with tending their tree, promoting their forest, and defending the shade, they do so to the fullness of their ability. Their childlike joy remains. But what changes is the source- most find that their greatest joy comes from training, and the ebb and flow of battle. It is a good life. But as they age, they are able to go further and further from their tree. And with it comes 'the call'. The call to rest. To sleep. To lay down, and plant themselves, in the largest pile of freshly slaughtered fertilizer they can muster. That the body count be as high as possible, where they find their rest. This too is a good life.

If successful, in a year or so's time, a new sproutling, a new mother tree will begin to grow, starting the cycle, once again.

Social

Let's be blunt- there's a reason why they spend more time on the field than off. Battle born are not known for their social graces- Battle born elves are known for their work ethic. While they care deeply about their community('promoting their forest'), and wish to be a part of it, they are often awkward as hell when they don't have tasks to perform(They are often quite shy, and appreciate the structure). If you see one floundering in a social situation, gently and deftly direct them to where they can be of use (when in doubt, offer block strike). They may or may not understand social subtleties, but they do understand work in exchange for acceptance- if you have them work for you, make sure you extend to them said acceptance/inclusion. You'll have a fast ally.

Death and rebirth

Each battle born soul inhabits multiple bodies, all created by the same mother tree. Though they can only experience and learn from one at any given time, each body leads a separate, unique life. These run in parallel, with the battle born inhabiting the shell that's most interesting, or most in need of attention at any given moment.

While they are paranoid about damage to their soul(It needs to last a long time). Their unique perspective means that they care little for any given shell. There's always next life. This also leads to behavior that would otherwise be inconceivable. For instance, battle born have been known to gift their own ears to monsters that have won their respect.

Diet

Battle Born do make ethical distinctions based on diet. Plants are family. Offering them dead plants to eat is sort of like offering you the mutilated corpse of your sister. Not cool. But also not as bad as all that- her soul's probably fine in some other body. If they are hungry enough they may even eat it, but it's just weird.

One plant eater is the same as another- parasites upon the land. Clearly, the only ethical diet is carnivorous fruitarianism. Straight up carnivores are also recorded respect- after all, they prune the plant eaters.