Moon Elf

The moon elves hail from the Forest of Darkness and the mountain valleys of the Great Barrier Range. Their skin tones range from cream-colored, at the darkest, to an almost translucent porcelain white, which most humans find disconcerting. Their eyes may be any light hue; common colors include pale pink, ice blue, pale yellow, and lilac. Truly red eyes are uncommon but striking to behold, and red-eyed individuals have a reputation for being lucky. Hair colors include white, silver, blond, and pastel tints of blue, green and purple. As with sun elves, red hair does not occur naturally.

Moon elves in general are isolationist, and few venture far outside their ancestral homelands; nearly all Elves encountered by humans are sun elves. The major exception to this is in the Lom Shi'Un Dynasty, where moon elves live alongside humans, vampires, giants, draconians, and even some dragons. Moon elf society is focused more on mastery of magic than on woodland survival or martial proficiency, so all moon elves know at least a little about magical theory and how to use magic items.

History

The moon elves originated thousands of years before the coming of the Great Darkness. Their oddly pale complexion was due to a natural genetic mutation similar to albinism, or the pale skin of the Sathmorans; their bodies just didn't produce much pigment. This mutation made them highly susceptible to sunburn, so they kept to a nocturnal schedule. Magical research was one of the few practical jobs that could be done as easily by night as during the day — more easily, in the case of some incantations — so a mages' guild was formed where these people could work together with others like themselves. The other elves called them "moon elves" because of their nocturnal habits and their moon-white skin, which contrasted with the sunny golden complexion common among most elves.

The moon elves quickly became a prominent wizardly caste in the Elven realm, greatly respected for their arcane talents. They developed their own ethnic and cultural identity, marrying among their own kind and quickly inducting into the group any elf who was born with the same mutation. What had previously been a potentially debilitating affliction became a mark of their status as the magical elite.

At some point in their history the worship of Lilith became very prominent among moon elves. This may have been because of her identification with the creatures of the night, or perhaps because she did not command her followers to shun certain types of magic the way that the other gods often did. Whatever the reason, Lilith showed unexpected kindness to the moon elves, teaching them new magic in exchange for their loyalty and service. The moon elves' unique cultural identity worked to her advantage; they quickly came to see themselves as Lilith's chosen people, and her religion came to be as much a part of their identity as the study of magic.

The moon elves' widespread adoption of Lilith as their patroness began to worry the sun elves, who feared that the moon elves might attempt to practice Lilith's ethos of "survival of the fittest" against them. The Gods of Heaven played on this fear in order to draw the sun elves more solidly into their camp and away from the influence of the Daedra Lords. Where once the moon elves were widely respected, many now looked at them with fear and suspicion. Whereas before their white skin was seen as a disability that they had courageously found a way to work through and become successful members of society, it was now seen as a disturbing sign of their loyalty to the Queen of the Undead. As suspicion and persecution mounted, the moon elves migrated out of Aelfwood and the Midlands and up into the valleys and alpine meadows of the Great Barrier Range, where they could be left alone to practice their religion. They still engaged in trade with the rest of the Elven realm, selling magic items and metal drawn from the mountains in exchange for the food and textiles grown in warmer climes, but otherwise they largely kept to themselves.

The moon elves remained neutral in the war against the Great Darkness; though they were devoted to Lilith, they did not have any particular love for Ba'al, and they did not want to take up arms against their southern cousins. They supported themselves by selling mithril, iron and other ores to both sides. After the war was over, though, the surviving sun elves shunned the moon elves as traitors and collaborators. Unable to trade with Quenardya for food any longer, most of the moon elves moved out of the mountains and into the Forest of Darkness to the north, which was a land sacred to Lilith and contained a magical nexus that was attuned to her power. Though the rest of the Giantdowns were extremely cold in the winter and generally inhospitable, Lilith's magic kept the Forest of Darkness alive and flourishing, and the moon elves flourished there as well.

About a thousand years after the moon elves' exodus, a group of humans migrated to the Giantdowns and settled in Tarnianiaas, the abandoned capital of a long-extinct Giant civilization that happened to lie close to the edge of the Forest of Darkness. These humans, who called themselves the Lom ("lost"), were natives of the Eastern Regions who had been exiled from among their people for practicing "strange" magic; they had come through the Great Northern Desert and over the treacherous Devil's Pass into the Giantdowns in hopes of finding a place to pursue their studies in peace. The moon elves quickly established a rapport with these kindred spirits and converted them to the worship of Lilith. The Vampire Queen was pleased to accept these new converts and commanded the moon elves to accept them as equals, rather than making them bondservants as the sun elves had done with the humans of western Galendor. This alliance grew into the realm known as Lom Shi'Un, which now covers the eastern half of the Giantdowns.

d20 Notes

Ability Score Adjustments: +2 Dex, -2 Con, +2 Int, +2 Cha.
Automatic Language: Elven.
Bonus Languages: Celestial, Draconic, Giant, Infernal, Lutin, Northlander.
Darkvision: Moon elves can see in the dark up to 60 feet.
Spell Immunities: Immune to sleep spells and effects, and they gain a +2 species bonus on saves against Enchantment spells or effects. They also gain a +2 bonus on Will saves against spells and spell-like abilities.
Born to Magic: Knowledge (arcane lore), Spellcraft, and Use Magic Item are class skills for all moon elves.
Level Adjustment: +1.

Moon elves do not have the sun elves' species bonuses to Listen, Search, and Spot, nor do they have the racial weapons proficiency with longsword, longbow, rapier, or shortbow.

Moon elves may be of any alignment, but in Lom Shi'Un it is rare for them to be Good; their most common alignments are Neutral and Neutral Evil.

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