you mean sprites?

Theoretically. In practice, there are certain constraints. The child of two metahumans is always one of the parents' races (except for orks and trolls, in which case the child might be human and Goblinize later, or any metahumans that could theoretically carry out the full term in a no-mana environment, in which case the kid would be human-but if they carry the ork or troll metatrait, would still goblinize if introduced into a positive mana environment), and even then elves don't give birth to orks or trolls, orks don't give birth to dwarves, etc.

Going by the old 2050 material, even that is an oversimplification.

The Dwarf/Elf group is distinctly different from the Ork/Troll group. Not just in its propensity to goblinize at puberty, but also in the dominance of its expression.

A child born to an Elf and a Dwarf is approximately equally likely to be an Elf or a Dwarf (chances of another expression such as Human or Ork are either very low or zero depending upon which lines you feel like interpretting literally). A child born to an Ork and a Troll parent is roughly equally likely to be an Ork or a Troll (and is less than 5% likely to be a human).

But a child born to an Elf and an Ork parent is almost always born human, and in turn is 95% likely to goblinize at puberty. Same results are found for an Elf/Troll pair or a Dwarf/Ork pair, or a Dwarf/Troll pair (painful as that last one is to even contemplate it does happen).

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Or at least, that's what I got ou of the SR2 main book's description of Metahumanity contrasted with the SR4 main book's description. Of course, there's little problems like the fact that the SR4 main book gets the number of teeth that trolls have wrong - so these numbers are highly suspect.

For example, the Elf/Dwarf pair is described as "always" producing an elf or a dwarf - but that's part of the sentence that talks about how there are no half-elves, so it's hard to tell if that means that specifically an Elf/Dwarf pair is an exception to the statement that a mixed race pairing "almost never" produces an offspring that isn't one race or the other.

Similarly, when the book states that the offspring of one parent from the Elf/Dwarf group and one parent from the Ork/Troll group almost always produces "a goblinized expression" (SR2, p. 34), I am not sure whether that literally means that the result is human which then usually goblinizes at puberty or whether it's just inexact terminology and they really just meant that the Ork/Troll genes won.

:shrug:

-Frank

Nothing official, but my intuition is yes and no. Sure, you could get them to change if you could expose them to a higher mana level, such as by taking them to a power site or maybe maybe exposing them to powerful ritual sorcery, but just bludgeoning them repeatedly with spells? I'd say 'no' to that part. They need to be exposed to a higher mana level, not beaten with the current mana level.

So, what you are telling me is that humans are the only race that give birth too all other races?And as such either the highest on the totem pole or the lowest...

Trolls have 34 teeth.

In the SR4 rulebook it is misprinted and says

32 is of course the standard number of teeth for a normal human, so you can figure out from context that they are supposed to have 34. In previous editions, the number of teeth was correctly given as 34.

That is also known. Each metahuman lives out the rest of its natural lifespan without changing and dies with its normal metatype intact, even with no ambient mana at all. If the metahuman has any children, they will all be humans. And if the metahuman dies, its corpse will slowly revert to a human corpse as it decays.

We can infer this from the direct evidence of the life history of the immortal elves, and the remains of various Earthdawn settlements. Also the results of metahumans living on space stations.

Someone carrying the genes that would allow for an Ork or Troll expression will be born a human if gestated in a null-mana zone, but may goblinize later if subsequently exposed to magic. A carrier of Dwarf or Elf genes who is born in a null magic zone will be born a human and will never express as a dwarf or elf even if he spends the rest of his life licking a mana storm.

-Frank

That would be Shadowtech.

-Frank

Not necessarily, supposedly there's elves still alive from the fourth world, the last cycle of magic, since they don't really die from age.

Besides the ears, I didn't think elves differed strongly from humans. They're taller than average, slimmer, etcetera, but other than gestation period, are there any other real structural differences?

Not true. There were enough reports of "spike babies" (usually elves) that were born during the downcycle. Certain of today's "little people" may even be Shadowrun-style dwarves, minus the thermographic vision.

I recall reading somewhere that most of the immortal elves, upon seeing magic dwindling and no more of their kind being born, wove a final spell to alter their ears to a more human appearance. I have no idea where I read this as it was literally years and years and years ago, but I do recall it somewhere.

Well, SURGE proved that there is still something that can happen if the mana level rises. Regular old goblinization was a part of that (and probaly an increase in UGE type babies as well).

As for getting hit by spells, I doubt it. Spells, even high force ones, don;t increase the ambient mana levels much, unless you're talking serious Blood Magic or Tir Tangire level, long term, large area magics. Even then, I think it would require being in the area for a decent period of time before you'd feel the effects.

Bull

IRCC In Worlds Without End, it's mentioned that the elves basically bob their ears ad heal them up to look human. Yes they can still do some magic, think of the downcycle being the entire world is a rating 6 mana ebb, no one with magic 6 or less can do anything. The IEs with their double digit magic scores however still function fine and outlive the other mortal powerful mages.

Edit - damn beaten to the punch...