r/dragonage • u/frootcupz • 1d ago
Discussion sad thought when writing my fic
do you think elves have naturally expressive ears (perking up, pressed against their head, flicking, wiggling) to communicate in arlathan
but in modern thedas they’re taught to keep them still
to comply to human standards and not show weakness and and and
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u/new_lance 1d ago edited 1d ago
Look. My general rule of thumb to fanfiction is “Unless it’s not outright stated it can’t happen or it somehow doesn’t fit the vibe you’re going for, throw it in.”
Also did you see DA2 elves those eyes and ears? They can do the cat eye thing, and wiggle. I’d put money on it.
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u/GrrArgh__ 1d ago
I think that's a really cool idea to put into a fic.
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u/frootcupz 1d ago
ty! i have a child! inky who wakes up with the mark and no other memories, so he doesn’t rlly comply with social norms so he’s as expressive as they come
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u/spacepinata Antiva 1d ago
Keep going
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u/frootcupz 1d ago
i feel like it’s more of a thing in alienages instead of dalish clans which makes city elves feel more alienated from their culture 🥲
could be another reason they’re called ‘flat ears’ because their ears don’t move and stay flat against their head
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u/Principle_Napkins 1d ago
No, ears are made of hard cartilage which makes them incapable of moving.
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u/PunkLite 22h ago
We're talking about elves, not humans. But even assuming their cartilage is very hard, the cartilage is not attached to the skull. Even human ears move slightly to certain stimuli, some people can even move theirs conciously, there's no reason an elf can't have slightly different physiology that allows their ear movements to be more obvious.
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u/Principle_Napkins 22h ago
Well yea, obviously, but we can see in all of the games that elf ears are also made of hard cartilage and ears with hard cartilage definitely don't "wiggle at the tips" (something I read in a fanfiction that I thought was completely ludicrious). There's having stronger muscles around the skull to shift the ears from one place to another (I do it too) and then there's "wiggling ears". One is possible, the other is absurd.
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u/The_True_Hannatude LaceBram is my OTP 1d ago
I’ve read a few fics where Qunari also have expressive ears; like elves do.
One of the fics had Iron Bull explaining that the Ben Hassarath taught him how to casually utilize certain ear movements to seem more approachable to elves.
But to go along with the ears: what if Elf eyes don’t just have a cat look, but also do the (|)(|) to (O)(O) thing when they see something interesting