To speak or not to speak? The Elvish Language in game.

I have noticed a few times in my RP that at times, common elvish words are mistaken for strictly 'drow' words.

The drow players on this server heavily use drow language during regular role play. There are many words that are shared between both elvish and drow. I am making this thread to shed some light on the subject, as it has led to some rather odd RP, and accusations.

Here is a good link with information on elvish words, and phrases.

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Do I expect everyone to do as the drow roleplayers and lace every single sentence they utter from now on in an elvish/english mash up? No, of course not. But some players do use more of the common terms regularly.

The basic ones I think all elf players should know are:

'Vendui' = It means 'greetings', or 'hello'. This is one of the words that is used in both drow and elvish.

'Namaarie' = This one means 'farewell' or 'good bye'

'Tel'quessir' = It means 'The people'. Surface elves commonly refer to themselves using this word.

Those three should be more than enough. At times you might see someone call themselves an elvish word you do know know, like as if it were a title or rank perhaps. If in doubt just ask. I am sure the player would gladly tell you what it means.



I hope this isnt stepping on anyone's toes.

I thought elven greeting was "Iracce".

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This site might be helpful for even English/Elven and English/Drow translation

The problem with those other sites is that they may come from other settings than the Forgotten Realms.

Here is some greeting/parting words confirmed by Ed Greenwood to be words used in the Realms.

From Glossary of Phrases, Sayings and Words of the Realms

# “Alae” – Common:- (a contraction of an old Elven phrase of the same meaning) a greeting (and reassurance of peaceful intentions) between travellers in the southern and eastern coastlands around the Sea of Fallen Stars, meaning: “Fortunate meeting” (Polyhedron #74; also collated in Lore from the Sages)

Used in both Common and Elven

# “Hykyath!” – Elven:- a parting used by satyrs, meaning: “Prance!”; it has been picked up by some poets among the elves and half-elves, and even orcs have been heard, in battle, derisively telling their foes and underlings to “look lively” in the few breaths left before they die (Polyhedron #74; also collated in Lore from the Sages)

# “Uluvathae” – Elven:- a friendly, informal greeting and parting used by elves and half-elves to others (of any race) they welcome the company of, meaning: “[May your] fortune bring you joy”; between close friends, its use is an insult, or a neutral “say-nothing-we’re-being-listened-to” warning (Polyhedron #74; also collated in Lore from the Sages)

I think that Grey Company uses at least partly Tolkien elven. Probably a mix or both FR and Tolkien elven has same words. Quote from their site: "The Grey Company's Elven is a growing language based 'loosely' on the elven found throughout JRR Tolkiens works."

I have seen the Grey Company's elven been used on several FR rp serves. *shrugs* Probably because it's more "fluent" and has better reference. At least I myself like Vendui and Namaarie better but then again I'm used to those and somewhere have the nifty reference that had all useful sayings. My chars name is also the same elven to which my char refers to as some form of old elven and/or dialect.

All in all I usually just type common and sometimes use sayings that are also in perfect common. I hate the one liner elven ingame and try to avoid it as much as possible. However, if someone wants to spice up their elven speech with words much like the drow do then I wouldn't mind as long as they are willing to provide a transtlation should it be needed. What particular elven language source is used doesn't matter really.

Isn't there already a language bar in nwn2? I mean, what if there's someone who's character understand drow/elven, but the player doesn't have a clue about it? Why make it complicated OOC? =p

In forgotten realms lore undercommon, which is what most drow speak, is an amalgam of many languages, from elven, common, dwarven, orcish and what have you. It is a trade language bastardized from all the other languages that drow come into contact with.

High Drow, or True Drow, which is spoken by very few usually just high priestesses and powerful wizards, is nearly a dead language. It is a modified form of the Ilythiiri's ancient and original language, which is elven.

That is why a lot of words are shared.

As for Iracce ;p, that is the NWN2 language scrambler at work. I prefer the language bar as most conversations with underdark drow take me much longer because I have to decipher it. My PC understands undercommon, but sadly I don't know all of it and have to look things up or hope I have the context right. If the elves started doing that too, ugh, well it would be a serious headache. Language bar for me.

Todd wrote:

Isn't there already a language bar in nwn2? I mean, what if there's someone who's character understand drow/elven, but the player doesn't have a clue about it? Why make it complicated OOC? =p

THIS!

Half-drow can't even learn drow, yet all the drow speak their bastardized version of it like everyone should understand it.

I am fine with an occasional phrase (like hello and goodbye, if and elf referes to elves as Tel-quessir, or says a blessing of the Seldarine on you) but I really am not fond of people just replacing all their pronouns, articles, and conjunctions with words from other languages. If you did this in real life you would confuse people speaking either language. Not to mention that those are the words you are probably going to learn first in any given language (which is probably why you as a player are using them).

Ka dos ph'aluin ulu telanth ilythiiri telanth ol xunne. Usstan think this is really annoying and if dos are going to do it half and half, dos should just speak common/english. Makes dos look like a moron who only speaks half of dosst language. All the european players are naut speaking bits of other languages at dos.

I never had much problem with the flavor factor of mixing drow and common words. It's a little fun learning the different words of the drow language. That said, the only time I don't like it is when other drow players try to force it on others like it's mandatory to learn these words. I always imagined it is more of an accent on the part of the drow than an actual language.

Personally, it makes me grit my teeth whenever someone uses the language bar for casual conversation, since then I have the choice of either answering Elven with common and getting "why can't you speak the REAL language?" looks, or using the language bar, and honestly I find the language bar one of the more frustrating features in the game to use for an extended period of time do to the length limit on it.

If a dev would make a better language bar, I guess he/she'd have -MANY- kudos.

A bigger dmfi language bar is a pending update, just have some patience please

Wow.

Seems Ive inadvertently touched on a nerve with this thread. It was not my intent to compare RP habits and start a 'I don't like it when others do this' thread.

Some people like to do the mish-mash, some don't. If you don't like it then there is no reason for you to do it yourself. But please don't start a crusade to stop others from doing it. Ive noticed quite a bit of this when I play my half-drow on the surface, some players are actually hostile about it.

Canon or non-canon let others RP as they wish. No one likes it when someone else tells them how to play a character.



Now as for the chat bar, all it does it replace one letter, with other letters. It is not really a dictionary. Like if you type an 'a' and hit enter, the chatbar replaces the 'a' with 'la' (example). It doesnt matter if you use it by itself or if you put that same letter in a word.

It creates a jumble to make it difficult to understand unless you have the proper language token, or you spend weeks figuring out what the replacements are.



As for the elvish tongue, keep in mind most of the FR elvish is hard to find, where as the Tolkien elven is much more common on the internet, therefore it is easier to find words and meanings this way.

Again, I'm not asking anyone to learn every phrase and meaning of each elvish word then never use the chatbar again and speak only in true elvish. I am just showing a few words that they may see used in game.

There was this other server on NWN1 that had a much better implementation of a language system, that didn't need for you to have any additional bars or anything.

You simply write a command to switch language. Like " /s -common ", " /s -drow ", "/s -elven " for example, and once turning that on, your text would be converted to the desired language, and you can write as much text as you could in Common.

Would it be possible to get something like this?

honchocat wrote:

Seems Ive inadvertently touched on a nerve with this thread. It was not my intent to compare RP habits and start a 'I don't like it when others do this' thread.

Some people like to do the mish-mash, some don't. If you don't like it then there is no reason for you to do it yourself. But please don't start a crusade to stop others from doing it. Ive noticed quite a bit of this when I play my half-drow on the surface, some players are actually hostile about it.

Mhm, perfectly agree. To those players who actually go to the forums and complain about others using it, I have to speak plainly and say, that sometimes it strikes to me as an argument against people who are trying to represent lore with some extra flavour.

If you don't understand it, don't be afraid to ask those people OOC what it means. Then you're likely to solve it with no feelings hurt. I don't think anyone speaks for example Drow entirely here, most people just use simple basic words and occasionally phrases.

I myself mostly speak entirely English, the only Drow words I use are: Xas (Yes), Nau (No), Vendui' (Greetings), Aluve' (Goodbye), and a few other select terms and phrases. I myself, like using bits of it, because it does add an element into making the Drow a distinguishable culture.

Personally I don't tell them to RP differently, but I always ask them what Xas and Jalil meant, constantly, when playing a drow. =p

You are right Honcho, people shouldn't be telling others in game how to RP, and if they are that's rude, and very close to blurring the line on griefing. While I don't like the mish mash, I certainly don't tell others not to use it. I just try to figure it out and if I don't understand I chalk it up to my surface born drow not knowing the dialect.

For my old elf, I always used the language bar because she was particular about speaking elven.

Now, if someone decided to use one of the online language translators and use all elven, I probably wouldn't even bother. The Mish mash is at least better than that.

My bad.

I am kind of hostile about it I admit. I wouldn't try to force someone to stop, but I do have my opinion about it. I think phrases and things are fine but that the mish-mash just sounds dumb.

People will keep doing it, just giving my (unwanted) opinion. XD

One can always ask what something means if they don't know be it other language or even a word in english that you just can't find from dictionary.

Besides, I'd think that if let say there's a group that only has elven individuals in it and they type english and not use the screen cluttering language bar they are still likely to speak elven amongst each other even if they don't add *elven* in front/after each sentence. Of course that's just my opinion.

I've always imagined Drow sounding like a Frenchman trying to speak Russian. Makes it immensely more amusing.

i dunno like the differentce between Sufrace elves and Drow honstly makes rp different from char to char