If elves can't hear any better than other races, why do they have big-ass ears?

I wish she did her ear with silicone instead of that type of plastic.
that doesnt look rub able and cute as could possibly be.

gosh elves are too much. I am overheating.

ALSO. yeah they got way superior hearing than all the other races. CUTE.

if big titties don't give more milkies than itty bitty titties why do we all want to fug christina hendricks?

They're actually magical radio antennas.

except this is not the reason for big ass schlongs

Thermo-regulation. Usage of magic increases body temperature significantly and the large ears help to keep Elves from overheating.

Elves use their ears for non-verbal communication.

Aye aye. I asked meself that a long time ago since nobody in the village knows a foockin' thingy. I say that the longer the ear, the assholer the elf. This logic applies to their eyebrows and nipples (both male and female).
Or maybe they are so full of shite that they use their ears to keep their balance, same way a cat uses its tail.

They generally are portrayed as hearing better, though.

Deedlit is still best elf waifu.
How did the Nips do it?

Sexual selection dumbass

What is it like to be gay.

It kind of is. To gorillas, humans are weaklings with enormous wangs.

Most systems give them a bonus to perception checks. So they do have superior hearing. BTW, that's why elves also have big dreamy eyes.

Also, it can be about mate selection, thermo-regulation, or other stuff. There's nothing magically optimized about human ears. They'd be slightly more vulnerable to frostbite, but elves need cosmetic regeneration anyway or they'd be a solid mass of scars by the time they get to typical adulthood ages with the lifespans most settings give them. Also, plenty of animals have anti-frostbite adaptions anyway. It could also be about mate selection.*

Humans evolved mostly in the forest, and then left and became highly optimized for long hot pursuits through hot dry grasslands. And even then many human features like our feet and pelvis were still undergoing changes when we achieved civilization.

So there's plenty of room for differently-adapted, better-adapted, and non-adaptive features in fantasy race.

* Or created via magic if the Elves are the result of ancient magic-induced transhumanism. In which case the answer is that forgotten wizard eugenicists just decided that knife ears were prettier than spoon ears.

That's his point. That the same reason might apply to ears.

Or elves evolved in forests where sweating wasn't the best way to cool down.

Evolution doesn't give a fuck what it does so long as it doesn't stop you from reproducing. One of my professors described it as: "90% of mutations are harmful, 9% are benign, and 1% are beneficial." Why do humans have engorged breasts outside of nursing, why do giraffes have Laryngeal nerves that go down the entire length of their neck to travel two inches from where it started? Evolution doesn't give a fuck. Pointed ears don't help elves but they don't hurt them either.

>hey use their ears to keep their balance, same way a cat uses its tail.
I'll have to use that at some point.

So they can be differentiated from regular humans

Ears are an important part of body language for them.

That's like saying if I hold my breath then the world will try to forec feed me air.

>ears are for listening/balance
>wangs are only for peeing
my point was the sex characteristics you absolute mong

More like saying if you evolve to only find deep fried bacon-wrapped sticks of butter appetizing, you won't cram every butter-fried corndog into your mouth. And this helps you somehow and is more feasible than finding healthy food tasty.

It still sounds like a pretty shit theory, but supposedly actual eggheads with degrees in it believe it so maybe there's something I'm not seeing.

Handlebars.
The ability to wiggle is also a vestigial adaptation from when their species were closer to deer, the better to identify the direction of sounds, be they mating calls or predators snapping branches underfoot. Sadly, an increasing number of elves, especially those with human blood in their veins, find themselves unable to do more than wiggle their ears a few millimeters up and down, let alone side to side.

And this is why you should never mate with roundears. It amounts to flushing your history down the toilet.

brain cooling for when they meditate instead of sleeping.

Elf ears are sexy, you have a problem with that?

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Heat diffusion. Actually a somewhat common use for big ass ears in mammals.

What are those "ass ears" and how common are they in mammals?

Elves aren't mammals

Evolution isn't a directed process, basically. Sometimes, you just fucking die. But, sometimes, for a stupid reason, you don't. And, since your offspring will share genes from both you and your mate, that stupid reason you didn't die might also get passed down.

Remember, it's not about how well you survive, but how many kids you have before you kick it. Everything dies, but everything doesn't get laid. If I only live for five years, but have fifty kids in that time, I'm going to have more of an evolutionary impact that someone who lives for fifty years and has five kids in that time.

Only the more primitive aspects of your history. Tell me, should the humans be concerned when their children no longer bear appendixes?

The half-elves bear the best of their houses, and ours.

What is that you consider the "best" about roundears? Short lifespans, aggressive temperaments or unattractive facial features?

Artificial Selection.
Their ancestors had a fetish for pointy ears.

Like modern humans, then?

But most systems DO give elves better senses, you stupid mong.

Who do you think their ancestors were?

Easily controllable thermal regulation of vascular system around the brain?
Sweat isn't really a fitting characteristic for them anyway.

One of the things the Widowbird experiment implies is that this is regardless of whether that trait holds any survival benefits: all it has to do is improve the selected sex's chances at getting laid.

To apply this to elves, suppose male elves, being a bunch of snobby fags, only mate with females with the most prominent ears.
Maybe they see it as a show of personal strength and therefore good genes, as an individual that has managed to survive that long despite the handicap such a massive ears would provide would be less likely to die giving birth. Mybe they think that, since everyone loves long ears, having daughters with equally long ears means they're more likely to find a husband. Maybe they just like the way they blush and wiggle when they're embarassed.
At the end of the day, from an elf's point of view the underlying reason doesn't really matter, regardless of how uncomfortable having such gargantuan ears might be. If some longer-eared harlot is having more kids (ideally ones that don't die before they hit their first century of age) because of them, it's an essential trait to have no matter how useless to your individual survival it might be.

The only real threshold to this would be when the population starts producing some female elves with ears so comically large they all end up dying before they can breed. Maybe Goblins use elf ears in their traditional medicine, I don't know. Male elves would still favor females with the longest ears available at a given moment, but the outside world and requirements to survive effectively restricts just how big these ears can feasibly be. Like most things in nature, there's usually a balance between evolutionary selection and outside pressures.

Holy shit the dwarves were right are all.
They are a bunch of ear-fuckers.
Since we humans kind of invented sex positions based on our erogenous zones...do you think elves give "earjobs" or have "ear-teasing"? Do you think that somewhere out there, an elf scholar is travelling across the land looking to try the ears of all the races?

Magic detectors.

Because massaging and fondling their ears is considered foreplay. Longer ears, more nerves, greater pleasure. It's like oomox but for elves.

>Deedlit
>Not Pirotess
Deedlit was borderline retarded, Pirotess was loyal af.

They function similarly to whiskers on cats, and allow the elf to determine what narrow confines it can fit through.

No, that's vampires. The ear-whiskers allow them to deliver quick and precise killing bites.

This.

they do hear better tho?, but yeah its mostly to seduce men

...

Then it's awfully convenient that fetish for pointy ears seems to be carried by the same genes that cause longevity and high intelligence.

Are you seriously telling me a girl has never given you an earjob?

...

>The only real threshold to this would be when the population starts producing some female elves with ears so comically large they all end up dying before they can breed.

What's the species of deer/elk that ended up going extinct because their just-for-show antlers got too large and caused them to be unable to move through trees, etc.?

You're probably thinking of Irish Elk, and the antler-extinction thing is dubious. Still funny, though.

Ahem

I'd imagine the ears will have to be as long as the elf before they start causing serious evolutionary disadvantage.

so the elf chicks can ensnare beta human males to their will

What do elf ears taste like?

The honest answer is because it is easier to show the human looking person someone drew is an elf if they have exaggerated ears.
In sources of fantasy from the early days of tabletop gaming and fantasy writing elven ears coming to a point weren't massive floppy things, they were just ears fitting to the fact that elves have angular features.

Well, there's gotta be something to them; why else does this shit keep happening?

>starts producing some female elves with ears so comically large they all end up dying before they can breed.
I need to find a drawfag to make an elf with Dumbo ears, right now.

Chocolate or vanilla, depending on if the elf is standard or delicious brown

+2 perception, -4 str

What about purple elves?

Your short story explains it all. It's a way for elven grannies to get laid.

They taste like drank, of course

What the hell is that?

...

Looks like the last thing you'll ever drink.

Gypsy sand elves taste like caramel

like the berry flavored nugget inside a Violet Crumble

What a horrible way to go

youtube.com/watch?v=NuTjQLfU6Gk

What do Drow taste like?

Spider and Lol randumb

Or licorice

Honestly not sure which would be worse

Ahead of his time

>user wonders why Americans posting on an American website hosted on American servers doesn't care about him

Your waifus have been dethroned for some time now

Longer ears like that was probably some sort of evolutionary trait. Basically longer ears = more attraction. Similar to how chins are in modern day.

To judge the size of holes. If the ears fit, the elf fits.

Long term survival is less important to evolution than reproduction is. If only eating bacon-wrapped sticks of butter made you intensely attractive to the opposite sex and made you more likely to reproduce it wouldn't matter that it cut down your life expectancy.

Isn't the most popular elf the fat piece of shit that /a/ can't stop fetishizing?
I like Marcille a whole lot, but she can't stand up to UUUUUGGGGHHHHTHICCCCCFAGS

Yeah in pre history it let the elf girls hear humans behind them sayaing "do you want some candy"

"sugar, water and of course, purple." Man I haven't watched this dude since high school. He's great.

>caring about /a/'s opinions
I didn't realize we stopped considering their tastes complete shit

Big titties give more milk.

Are you talking shit about my chubfu?

Your waifu is shit, your manga is shit, your tastes are shit. Return to the dirt from whence you came and begone from this place.

no u

handle bars when they suck dick

>Elves aren't mammals

Oh yeah? Well then explain these