Do Eldar "sound" the same as humans assuming they're fluent in High / Low Gothic?

To put it another way, could you tell a speaker was Eldar by their voice alone?

There would be an accent if they did. But i would say that there might need to be an opposed speak: (x Gothic) test to figure out something is strange about their accent? Provided you are going by voice alone, no visuals. A Xenoarchanist would probably be able to do much better.

The words or tone might also be a clue: I suppose they will all sound like Nobles full of themsevles talking to foolish, ignorant and closed minded little kids who can barely understand how an oven works. and sounding like they hold 'the Truth'.

"Be warned, as what will be said can never be unsaid." "Blinded, you throw yourself willingly into the maelstrom, fet by your own fervour, bathed in ignorance." Or some other random Elf-like line. Mostly with veiled insults barely hiding thier discontent having to deal with us dirty lil' humans.

Um... apparently they have a lot of reverb in their voices if other forms of GW entertainment is to be believed...?

It was from the DoW games where I got the idea something might be different ... I figured that reverb was an artifact of their "radio transmitters" or whatever, but even the un-helmeted have a weird voice:

Wasn't sure if this was ever mentioned in the fluff or just something they did for the video games to make the Eldar sound distinct.

Asgard4tw said:

Technically, there's always an accent - that's simply a fact of linguistics. Even people who speak "normally" do so with an accent, it's just that their accent is considered to be the "normal" one.

Personally, I've always been fond of the idea that those Eldar who do speak Gothic do so without any non-standard accent (or rather, with exacting and consistent precision so fine that human ears can't properly detect it) - their speech is utterly flawless, and that's what distinguishes them... because people don't talk like that. There's also the potential issue of linguistic shift - human languages evolve as generations pass, so having an Eldar character know Gothic as it was spoken two thousand years ago, flawlessly and without any discernable (variant) accent seems like quite a good way to make their speech distinct from that of humans in background terms.

When my Rogue Trader group encountered the Eldar, I made a point of the Eldar characters speaking quietly (Eldar hearing is really, really good, so they seldom need to raise their voices to be heard; the Astartes are similar, and I tend to voice them with a low growl or rumble during normal speech), evenly and carefully, trying to use archaic turns of phrase in favour of more modern ones, in a slightly higher pitch than my normal voice (that's mainly because my normal voice is quite deep - it doesn't take much effort for me to pitch lower and do Marine or Ork voices) and with as little inflection as possible, occasionally having them pause mid-sentence as if trying to find a human phrase that fit the Eldar concept they were trying to express.

N0-1_H3r3 said:

I agree there would probably be something "off" about how an Eldar speaks Gothic, but probably not enough to immediately tip off the listener that he is inhuman. There are millions of worlds out there populated by humans, and not all of them maintain regular contact. Even if someone called out the Elder speaker for using an "ancient" form of Gothic, he could just claim to be from a planet where that form is still used and there's not much any reasonable listener could say to contradict him. Even cultural gaffes or gaps in the Eldar's understanding of certain technologies could probably be passed off as "I'm from a backwater planet that doesn't have these things."

I'm sure there a hundred ways you could allow an Eldar to give himself away in conversation, but I don't think just the way he speaks would be enough all by itself. It would probably be odd, but not "OMG HE'S A WITCH BURN HIM!" odd.

A lot would depend on the Eldar in question, imo.

A Farseer who learned Gothic two thousand years in the past, and rarely deals or interacts with mon-keigh, is one thing.

Its entirely another if its a young Ranger, who actually listens to and watches this race of "humans" and thus would have a basis for mimicking their speech and mannerisms quite well.

I think Eldar could have any range of voices you feel justified, but that they would tend to be quite distinct if not outright alien. It just seems to be in the Eldar nature to be individualistic. Some might say arrogant and superior, but its all in where you're standing...

This is really difficult as everyones perception on the Eldar is slightly different. I do remember reading the 5th ed TT Eldar codex which has some info about how they talk to each other. The Eldar language is both a spoken one and physical one, entire conversations may be done completely with body language without uttering a word. So this makes the Eldar language very very complicated, from a human point of view, I suppose an Eldar using High Golthic, Low Gothic or even a Dialect would speak to a point and be very presice in what they say. As people have posted induvidual Eldar would speak and sound very differently depending on their experience and attitude.

I assume that the eladr have a very complex language that uses a greater vocal range than humans. Due to this i have my Eldar use strange phrases and be very vague(as if there's always some additional meaning the players wouldn't understand anyway). The being vague thing also incorporates phrases like "you would not understand this, even if i had a lot of time explaining it to you". I also have them use a lot of eldar words, then trying to explain the complex meaning that is in the word "You would need a Thel'aram, which is a complex device used in high energy field measurement" they also complain a lot about the simpleness of gothic "i could easily explain this to you, where you to spend about 20 years learning a language spoken by a race that understands these concepts" What i stopped using is making up weird units of measurement, my players like "x seconds" more than "x heartbeats of your species". They are also very exact about facts, for example they would always give you the time to the second.

What they don't do(at least not with the players) is idle chatting. They are very fond of just staring quietly instead of giving an answer.

All in all: My plan is to make my players hate Eldar

Eldar are always thought of as having a musical lilt to any speech they make. In game terms this could equate to both a precise way of speaking as others have already mentioned, which I feel is totally in character with their mastery of lesser forms of communication if forced to use Gothic, but also with a lyrical quality - a use of phrasing which exhibits an aesthetic or artistic bent. I think, going with the idea about how Eldar communicate to each other, this would be a natural thing to add in to communicating using a human language.

The reverb quality may simply be linked to the Farseer's psyker capabilities, conversing as much in the mind of the recipient as vocally perhaps, or lending power and resonance to the voice through mental commands, suggestion and so forth. With fantasy, Elves have always been represented as aloof, haughty or superior - with little outward display of emotion initially - this plays better with Eldar in the 40K setting, as they have to keep their emotions in check after 'the fall.' In such a way, this lack of emotion would also filter into the way they speak as well, with calmness, but the kind of condescending attitude you would expect from a parent having to explain a very simple idea to a child for the upteenth time.