Can I find clarity on in the books for a storied reason behind this or perhaps an online explanation by one of the writers? I'm fine with it but a player is asking to play a High Elf Apprentice Wizard and I'd like to know why I should avoid that…

Coreyvw said:

I think that because Apprentice Wizard is one of wizard's "grades" in human 's Colleges of Magic.

From my experience.

High Elves learn magic in the Tower of Sorcery. They spend decades or is it centuries learning magic. Before they can even go out into the world.

A lvl 5 High Elf mage is so powerful that 3 of them created the Schools of magic that the empire used. Some people think a lvl5 human wizard is equal to a level 1 high elf mage.

The mean reason I was told is that they spend most of her lives stuck in that tower, so you never meet one anywhere.

But one of the members of this forum has created rules to cater for High Elves, if you download it from his post.

the problem is story related:

according to the history of the old world teclis the mage thaught the humans how to use magic. high elves can by nature conrtol and cast all 8 winds of magic.

teclis thought that humans were not as capable of casting as elves so he limited them to only 1 wind per person so to speak.

that is also the reason why there is no elf supplement. they wrote themselves into a corner it is hard to get our of again

Thank you all. My suspicion was that it was indeed a flavor issue based on the story arcs surrounding the gift of spells use to the Empire from Teslic (sp). It's kind of like running a Tolkien world and holding some options back to make those sorts of things special or rare I suppose.

Here's my suspicion: They thought maybe someday they'd finally get around to releasing an elf project and in there, you'd see elven wizards.

Quoting the canonical WFB source, here's what the actual world from Games Workshop does:

NOT ALL ELVES ARE HIGH MAGES: "Only those who are most magically gifted, and have proven their dedication beyond ar doubt, are giveint he privilege of being taught wihtin the White Tower" -- 7th ed. p.45

"Only in the WHite Tower is High Magic Taught." p46

"..master the eight Lores of Magic studied by men before beginning the harder task of learning High Magic." p.46

Want to create a high elf high mage? Well, first you have to go through ALL of the 8 lores and then you can APPLY to study High Magic.

Working out the math in my head, that's about 320 advances. Since High Elves supposedly master regular magic more easily, you could probably knock that down to about 160 advances before they could apply to the White Tower. I think Valvorik's campaign when that high

In the meantime, just do what they do in Warhammer Fanasy battles (and download Yepesnopes' fan material).

As the GM, you can allow him/her to play a High Elf Wizard Character. You just need to work out in the story how he/she came to be.

For example, there was a pregnant High Elf aboard a ship that wrecked itself killing everyone but her. An elderly couple who always wanted a child found her on the beach and tried to help her, but alas she died. Now either she already had given birth and the elderly couple decided to raise the child as their own… OR (My Favorite) once she was dead, they cut her open to get to the baby. (Kinda like 'Snow White: A Tale of Terror)

The child was raised as a human, always hiding his/her elven features, and eventually went off and joined one of the colleges of magic.

Or you can say that the Baby was born retarded and was to be thrown into the sea because the High Elves do not like retarded babies. And his/her wetnurse took pity upon it and gave it to some humans to look after. Even being a retarded elf, he/she was highly intelligent by human standards, but can only study one wind of magic.

Now my Dwarf thinks all Elves are retarded, especially the wood elf in our party. He especially likes to use 'my life for yours' on the wood elf, and watch as he has to swallow his pride and accept help from a dwarf. It is either that or be killed by whatever huge monster our GM throws our way. (He likes to have Rat Ogres toss my dwarf around a lot)

I use a house rule inspired by 2nd edition. In 2nd edition, the Apprentice Wizard career was open to elves - you just didn't have the College fluff (and the College legal approval etc.).

In line with the material above, I play it that high elves start mastering one wind of magic and when they have done that adequately, they have demonstrated worthiness to enter the Tower of Hoeth.

In mechanical terms, when you're as powerful as the game system says a PC can ever be you're ready to go off and start learning "real magic", and eventually (as an NPC) you too would be one of those Tower of Hoeth megapower types.

What Teclis taught humans is the "crayon, colour within the lines" version of magic for children (so they don't hurt themselves) is another way of looking at it.

This is much less flavourful/complicated than the houserules in Book of the Asur etc. If you're going "all elf" and want to delve into elfiness they might be better. I was mostly concerned to let a player have an option, reconcile with fluff and keep mechanical balance by "actually using same rules".

Rob

(PS my last campaign did not quite make it to 320 advances, a few shy of 100, and no elf mages in it, the current campaign has an elf wanting to start to learn magic)