If elven craftmanship is so good why don't they ever get sub-contracted to make the other mortal races?

>when ancient precursor dungeons exist

I'd buy from Dark Elves.

Their gear is geared towards practicality in every way.

Pic unrelated, since it's fanservice for the ladies.

Most people need gear to make it through the precursor dungeon though.

They do, it just takes a really fucking long time. How long do you think an elven sword takes to make? months? try years, for the common +2 gutter trash we sell to humans. If we're making something for a dwarf lord we're talking decades.

Of course we don't *waste* that time. A smithy can be working on hundreds of orders at once, meticulously crafting every day. But when you literally forge your metal out of STARLIGHT it takes a FUCKING WHILE TO GATHER.

This is why Elves usually just release equipment in year batches, like wines. Oh, this sword is a 1092 Develi. Very good year, most of the owners of the swords from this year don't die horribly. Not at all like the 1086's. We don't talk about 1086.

Again though, this is mass produced. For a truly unique, customized piece of equipment, you're going to wait at least a decade. This is why elves seldom bother to sell to humans, except their 'off the rack' trash, which still functions as +2 gear and has half the weight. Because Elves.

Dwarves are the kind of guys you want to make equipment for your personal elite guard.

Elves are the kind of guys you want to make legendary equipment for the prophesied hero driving back the immortal serpent-kraken of Arag-Atul that surfaces once every 10,000 years to feast on the fat of the land.

Elven craftsmanship is legendary, true, as expected of a long lived and studied race. What they forget to mention when they brag about their crafts, however, is that they take fucking forever to finish anything using small, intricate motions with detailed tools. They don't even carved out large chunks when appropriate, instead slowly chipping and grinding away. To watch them at work looking forward to the outcome is positively maddening.

By the nature of their culture, dwarves would be better at mass production. They're organized and thorough.
Elves have great craftsmanship, but they don't have industry. If you have a buddy who's an elf smith, sure, he can make you a fantastic weapon. But you can't just walk into town and order 50 for a reasonable price like dwarves.

And drow are who you contact when you just want the job done effectively with no flash and flair.

Dwarves make fantastic standard issue service pistols. Elves make custom, "keep in glass case" Desert Eagles with ivory handles.

Drow make derringers.

>make a greatsword for hundreds of years
>it's adamantine gs+3
Pretty fucking slow, to be honest, famalerino.
Your normal human smith who knows what the fuck he's doing could make that shit in a week.

that is why there are hoards of mundane iron swords.

More like Dwarves make M4 carbines, Drow make UMP's complete with concealing suitcases, and Elves... Elves make G11's.

What is it about adamantine that takes forever to forge it?

Hard metal, take higher temperatures to melt, more time to grind the edge. But a week is pretty fucking fast.

In Tolkien, by the Third Age humanity very rarely interacts with elves. There's whole kingdoms where a elf hasn't set foot for generations, and in some like Rohan people have forgot what elves are actually like. There isn't room for commerce. Besides that, it's doubtful they'd even willingly give one of their weapons to another race barring very special circumstances.

Humans make AK47s

This.

>sub-contracted

Haughty elves need to be taught how to sub, and once they are enslaved most master races will simply take credit for whatever craftsmanship.

Elvish technology is too dangerous to let it fall into the wrong hands, or at least that's what the elves think. They don't trust other races generally, or individuals until after most of the shorter-lived ones are long since dead. After a few centuries, they might trust a member of another race with one, as a test.

However, when you consider how much elven military strategy depends on arrows and magic, giving anyone their lightweight magic-proof armor is dangerous. Most stabilized enchantments feed on ambient magic with no input from the end user, so it isn't a stretch to make it "feed" on hostile spells, and it is light enough that a fully armored knight could close the distance between dismounting and cutting down the archer. Many live in fear of the day when someone will figure out how to combine "studded leather armor" and "elvish arrowheads" to create "fairy scale armor."

> why don't they ever get sub-contracted to make the other mortal races?

They do. It results in Half-elves

Alright, who here posts based on headcanon. Be honest. For everyone that did a post already, post your sources. For everyone that wants post, consider your sources.

'Depends on the setting' is a boring answer

"Let me roleplay some headcanon so I can beat up this headcanon strawmen" makes for shit threads. It's really easy to make some shit up, but everyone would benefit from well-versed anons knowing what they are talking about.

So, in how many settings is elven craftsmanship so good that we should consider OPs question?

Every piece is personalized work of an artisan. There is no mass production, plus they're elves so they have the work ethic of an artist.

AYYY
MY FELLOW HUMAN

How is that fanservice. That actually is practical.

>male dark elves
>having a problem with wearing sexualized clothing
Who the fuck drew this? In pretty much all fiction male dark elves own their twinkness.

>smartmotorist.com/motorist-news/mercedes-will-use-renault-engines.html

>Mercedes-Benz will use the new 130 hp 1.6 dCi Renault-Nissan Alliance's new generation A and B-Class and the Stuttgart manufacturer will offer to exchange the 2.0-liter gasoline engine and the new V6 and V8 range.

Yeah, all these 'prestigious Mercs' have always had Renault engines. Gotta show it to Veeky Forums.
Renault has shared only some

>make the other mortal races
If that's literally what you meant, as in getting elves to create other sapient races using magic or what-have-you, not all elves are that powerful.
If what you actually meant was "Why don't elves create weapons, armor, and gear FOR the other races," then my answer is that often, they do.

Elves are only qualified for 3 jobs, shoe making, baking cookies in an oak tree and toy making. All of which humans can do.

I always assume Elves just take LONGER to do things. Their sense of time is hella screwed. They live hundreds of years and even on the short therm, they don't sleep like we do. They chill and meditate for a couple hours then resume being forest queers.

Built by elves.

Bullshit, the only one who ever owned his twinkness was Jarlaxle. The books even go out of their way to say the reason why he dresses the way he does is to make himself stand out from the hordes of male drow who DON'T dress like that.

Remember, in drow society, any male worth noticing either becomes a glorified sex slave, or a sacrifice to Lolth. Or more often then not, a glorified sex slave, and then once his Matron is bored, he becomes a sacrifice to Lolth anyways.

Exactly, you want quantity, you get humans or orcs or whatever to do it. You want the perfect balance between quantity AND quality, you get dwarves to do it. You want the best quality out there, even if it's lacking quantity, you get elves to do it.

It's Zaknafein and Drizzt, who were shitty masculinists who thought male dark elves deserved rights (hint: they don't)

Orcs make those juryrigged Mexican anti-armour-Cartel-van auto-shotguns.
Goblins make their own moist nuggets.

This thread could have died.

I know, right.

My fluff is that elvish weapons or armor isn't better or worse then human or dwarf, but elves found that if they bullshitted a lot of stories about their smiths and weapons, humans pay more