PHB Elves (Wood, High, Drow), Palid Elf, Mark of Shadow Elf, Astral Elf

by Prince Phantom

Elves. Dear lord, there are so many Elves. It’s like WoTC can’t go a year without printing a new Elf or they’ll all explode. There are far too many variants of Elves to cover in one review, so I’ll be sticking with the subraces found in the PHB and the subraces that are actually listed as subraces and not entirely new races for now and other Elves will get their own reviews. Let’s start with the features that all Elves get, regardless of subrace.

Base Elf Features

Ability Score Increase: +2 Dexterity: There are a ton of classes that want good Dexterity, so this is widely applicable if you are not using the Tasha’s rules for racial ability score improvements.
Darkvision: Always nice to have.
Fey Ancestry: Advantage versus Charm effects is fairly useful, though the sleep prevention will probably never come up. Still, against the right opponent this could be a lifesaver.
Keen Senses: Perception is arguably the best skill in the game, so a free proficiency in it is great to have.
Trance: At first glance, this probably reads like a ribbon feature, however with the right build and playstyle it can be game changing. This essentially cuts our long rest time from 8 hours to 4 hours, and while that alone isn’t a huge deal, what it does is give us 4 free hours every day to do whatever we want without slowing our party. There are myriad ways to spend this time, like copying spells into a spellbook, scribing scrolls, creating alchemical items, crafting magic items slowly over time, taking short rests and recovering pact slots that you spent on long duration spells like Death Ward, and so, so much more. If you’ve got even an ounce of creativity (and some magic, martials don’t really have much to do with downtime), then you’ll definitely find something productive to do with those 4 hours.
Special Note: Access to Elven Accuracy: Arguably the best racial feat in the game, Elven Accuracy is a cornerstone for many builds (especially crit fishers, which are by the way, bad). Only Elves have access to it, so that’s a point in favor for them.

Wood Elf

Ability Score Increase: +1 Wisdom: Dexterity plus Wisdom definitely leans you toward Ranger and Monk, though Clerics and Druids can definitely work with this as well. Or just ignore this and use the Tasha’s rule.
Speed: 35ft: Having even just a 5ft boost to your movement speed is a huge boon that literally every character build can benefit from. It allows you to outpace many enemies while retreating, and if you have ranged attacks you can just always stay outside of an enemy’s melee range and pepper them with ranged attacks until they are dead, assuming you have the room to pull this off. It’s just a shame that this is basically the only real feature that this Elf subrace gets.
Elf Weapon Training: This will probably only matter to Monks thanks to Dedicated Weapon, as basically any other weapon using build will pick up the proficiencies they need automatically through their class.
Mask of the Wild: This is a ribbon feature at most tables, as hiding, obscurement, and stealth rules are largely either misunderstood or ignored by the vast majority of the player base. Hard to blame them, considering how needlessly complex it all is, but for those tables who do sweat the details, this might come up occasionally, though I still wouldn’t expect to get much use out of it.
Special Note: Access to Wood Elf Magic: This feat is actually pretty underrated in my book. Pass Without Trace is the best 2nd level spell in the game, Longstrider works well with our increased movement speed, and the Druid cantrip could be any number of great options. Shame that we can’t cast these with spell slots after we’ve expended our free cast, but if you don’t get access to Pass Without Trace and no one else in your party does either, this might be worth a look.

Speed is really the big draw of this race, and if speed is what you’re after, other races can provide that and much more. Nothing particularly wrong with this option, it’s just been outclassed by powercreep.

Final Rating: 3/5

High Elf Subrace

Ability Score Increase: +1 Intelligence : Decent for Wizards and Artificers, but just use the Tasha’s rule.
Cantrip: One Wizard cantrip of our choice may not sound like a lot, but depending on our build this could be very useful. Melee Rogues would love to have Booming Blade for example. I think the Kolbold does a better job with its Sorcerer cantrip though, as that is generally a better race overall and the Sorcerer and Wizard cantrip list is pretty comparable.
Elf Weapon Training: As already stated, probably only Monks will care about this, though I suppose that maybe some Rogues might like the Longbow proficiency.

If an extra cantrip is what you need, other races can do that and more. Again, this isn’t a terrible option, it’s just been surpassed as the years have gone on.

Final Rating: 2/5

Drow (Dark Elf) Subrace

Ability Score Increase: +1 Charisma: Lots of classes like this, but most will want a +2, so just use the Tasha’s rule.
Superior Darkvision: This is actually worth talking about. 120ft range darkvision out ranges most of the Monster Manual, meaning you can see opponents in the dark before they can see you. This is a huge advantage, literally, as attacking creatures who can’t see you grants advantage. This means Drow are best suited to be a ranged combatant in some capacity.
Drow Weapon Training: Again, only Monks, some Rogues, and maybe a few fringe builds care about this.
Drow Magic: We get three spells here, and they’re all pretty good. Dancing Lights is situational but harmless, Faerie Fire is a great option to give your whole team advantage, and Darkness is a great build-around spell. You probably picked Drow for these spells, and I can’t really blame you.
Sunlight Sensitivity: And here’s the catch. Disadvantage on attacks when we or our target are in sunlight. You can mitigate this by building a character that doesn’t rely on making attack roles, like a full caster, so this isn’t as big of a deal as some make it out to be. If you are looking to play an attack focused Drow though, I’d have a talk with my DM first to see if the campaign will be accommodating for me. I won’t deduct many points from this however, as the Drow is definitely best suited to being a caster, so many Drow players will skirt this issue entirely.
Special Note: Access to Drow High Magic: This is the single most potent magic granting feat in the game, giving us Detect Magic at will, and Levitate and Dispel Magic once per day for free. No other feat grants a 3rd level spell, and especially not one as good as Dispel Magic. Granted, only Charima based characters can really take advantage of this, but for those who can, this is very compelling.

Drow are weird. In the right setting or with the right build, Sunlight Sensitivity can be completely ignored. This does limit the number of builds a Drow can be a part of heavily though. Drow Fighters may have a very hard time, but Drow Sorcerers could take Drow High Magic and be adding a total of 6 more known spells to the Sorcerer’s usual 15. This makes the Drow very build dependent, but on the builds that it fits on, it fits like a glove.

Final Rating: 4/5, 2/5 if Sunlight Sensitivity is going to be a problem for you.

Palid Elf

Ability Score Increase: +1 Wisdom: Of course Rangers, Monks, and some Clerics and Druids can work with this, but just use the Tasha’s rules.
Incisive Sense: Advantage on Investigation and Insight checks sounds neat, until you realize that an ally could just take the help action and give you this for free.
Blessing of the Moonweaver: We get three spells here, none of which care about our casting ability so they will work well on any character. Light is very meh, Sleep is good, but only at level 1-2 and we obtain it at level 3, and Invisibility is a genuinely great spell that I’m happy to have, though we can only cast it on ourself. That’s a bit of a bummer, but it’s still a good feature overall.

Most of you probably forgot that this Elf exists, and I can’t blame you. Nothing here excites me and about all of it can be done with better races. In a vacuum this is fine and certainly better than some bottom tier options, but when compared to the field I find it quite lacking.

Final Rating: 2/5

Mark of Shadow Subrace

Ability Score Increase: +1 Charisma: Same as what I said for the Drow.
Cunning Intuition: A d4 added to Stealth checks is very nice, and I guess Performance might come up once or twice per campaign.
Shape Shadows: Minor Illusion is one of the best cantrips in the game, and Invisibility isn’t half bad either. Very happy to pick up both of these spells.
Spells of the Mark: As always, these are added to your class’ spell list, assuming you have one. You still have to select and prepare them as you would any other spell from your class list. This list is full of bangers, Silent Image, Pass Without Trace, Darkness, Major Image, and Greater Invisibility are all fantastic spells that many classes like Cleric, Druid, Paladin, and others would love to have. Big points for this one.

This is one of the best Dragonmark races available, and it all comes down to the spell list. The variety of classes that these spells come from means that any casting class will find at least one or two options that they would love to have. The only downside is that none of these spells are really character defining, they’re just all great to have. Still, just about any caster would love this option.

Final Rating: 4/5

Astral Elf

Astral Fire: A choice between Sacred Flame, Light, or Dancing Lights is really just picking the lesser of three evils. There are much better damage cantrips available to all casting classes than Sacred Flame, and Light and Dancing Lights are both mediocre. Still, it’s a free cantrip so I won’t complain too much.
Starlight Step: This is comparable to Misty Step, but even better because it consumes its own resource, and it allows you to cast a leveled spell on the same turn you teleport, something not allowed by Misty Step due to the bonus action casting rules. Misty Step is one of the best 2nd level spells, so a feature that compares favorably to it gets very high marks. That being said, both the Eladrin and Shadar-Kai have even better versions of this ability, and the other features of this race aren’t enough to make up the difference.
Astral Trance : The only difference between this and normal Elven Trance is that you get a free skill and tool/weapon proficiency that you can swap out each time you trance. An extra skill is alright, and the tool could be something like thieves tools or something like a poisoner’s kit. Take a look at the expanded tool uses found in Xanathar’s and pick your favorite.

The Astral Elf at first glance seems exceptional, and in a vacuum, it is. Sadly, both the Eladrin and Shadar-Kai blow this out of the water on all fronts. That’s really the only problem here, well, that and the fact that I find this race incredibly boring, but that’s a me thing. It’s objectively a good option, just not one is ever pick as there are better options that can basically be flavored in the same way.

Final Rating: 4/5

Sea Elf

Because not even the depths of the ocean are free from these pointy eared freaks, we have Sea Elves. Not going to lie, this race is incredibly boring and should have just been presented as a new elf subrace, but for some reason WOTC presents them as a unique race all their own, so therefore they get their own review here.

Darkvision: Always nice to have and necessary for underwater exploration.
Speed: 30ft walking speed and swim speed equal to walking speed. Swim speeds are hard to come by outside of racial options, so this will be very nice to have in certain campaigns. Note that this increases with your walking speed, so effects that increase walking speed will increase swimming speed too.
Child of the Sea: We have the typical aquatic race ability to breathe air and water alongside resistance to cold damage. I don’t have enough experience in aquatic campaigns to tell if cold resistance will come up super often in them, but I do know that cold is potentially a very good resistance to have in a campaign like Icewind Dale, and it will even come up occasionally in a typical campaign.
Friend of the Sea: Again, this is mostly useful in an aquatic campaign as you’ll be unlikely to run into these types of creature elsewhere, especially since it only applies to beasts. Even then this is mostly a ribbon feature, as past low levels your DM won’t be throwing beasts at you anymore.

Despite my earlier grumbling about how this race is presented, it is genuinely probably the best aquatic race in the game, at least in terms of campaigns that don’t take place exclusively underwater, where the Locathah shines. This just gets more stuff than any other aquatic race, from cold resistance to a ton of extra proficiencies, plus all the usual Elf stuff. Outside of an aquatic campaign, most Elves will serve you better than this, but in one you’ll struggle to find a better option.

Final Rating: 2/5 in a normal campaign, 4/5 in an aquatic campaign.

Sea Elf (Legacy)

The old Sea Elf gets more restricted proficiencies, a swim speed that’s set to 30ft, and doesn’t get cold resistance. There is no reason to select this over the revised version.

Elves are pretty good even at their worst, as they just have a massive laundry list of abilities. It’s definitely a case of quantity over quality, but that’s perfectly fine in my book. These Elves may not be the single strongest choice for the majority of builds, but they will provide you meaningful benefits that you will enjoy having while being applicable to just about every class in the game.

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