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On the Common Terms page of the d20PFSRD website, the "Rest" section says:

The Pathfinder Core Rulebook is somewhat vague on the requirements of resting and sleeping [...]

I found that this is true.

Is there any errata that addresses the argument about how elves sleep/trance/rest?

Their immunity to magic sleep seems to indicate that designer either forgot to mention that elves don't sleep as humans do, or they mistakenly left that immunity from 3.5 re-design.

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  • \$\begingroup\$ I'd argue that leaving the immunity in isn't necessarily a mistake even if they do sleep, there could be plenty of reasons why a creature is immune to magical sleep but still requires natural sleep. \$\endgroup\$
    – Cthos
    May 4, 2011 at 14:32
  • \$\begingroup\$ Well, that's correct, but my feeling is that someone missed something at some point during re-design :) \$\endgroup\$ May 4, 2011 at 15:15
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    \$\begingroup\$ New arrivals - this is asking for an answer according to Pathfinder rules, not speculation or Tolkien lore or whatnot. \$\endgroup\$
    – mxyzplk
    Feb 6, 2015 at 19:12

3 Answers 3

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From the Unofficial Pathfinder FAQ (Q: Do Elves Trance?), quoting Creative Director James Jacobs:

Elves not sleeping is indeed relatively setting specific, and while trances are in Elves of Golarion, it's something we'll honestly probably be moving away from in Golarion. We've done a fair amount to reimagine our elves, and by having them sleep (or at least implying they sleep) does help to make Golarion's elves more Golarion and less Forgotten Realms [...]

They dropped trance because they felt it was setting specific. Default Pathfinder Elves don't trance, but they could in your setting.

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    \$\begingroup\$ Yes. You can choose what you like for your campaign. The magic rules descriptions of how to prepare spells for arcane and divine casters seem written specifically to side-step the issue completely. It doesn't seem to really matter, mechanically speaking, whether Elves sleep or not with respect to spell-casting. Make a call for your world, and be consistent is all that matters, I suspect. \$\endgroup\$ May 4, 2011 at 14:12
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The SRD eliminates the notations specific to elves in the section on preparing wizard spells, which I recall from D&D 3.0 (and I believe it was in 3.5 as well).

One of the elf alternative racial traits is called 'Dreamspeaker':

Dreamspeaker: A few elves have the ability to tap into the power of sleep, dreams, and prescient reverie. Elves with this racial trait add +1 to saving throw DCs for spells of the divination school and sleep effects they cast. In addition, elves with a Charisma of 15 or higher may use dream once per day as a spell-like ability (caster level is equal to the elf’s character level). This racial trait replaces the elven immunities racial trait.

Neither of these, nor the base elf race explicitly mention that elves do not sleep.

A thread at Giant in the Playground's forums is inconclusive.

Essentially, I think it depends on the campaign setting, as the GitP link indicated, but I would lean towards, "Yes, they DO sleep for 8 hours."

Not sleeping is an explicit trait in D&D 3.x and the lack of that trait in Pathfinder indicates they are no longer special in that regard.

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The Nightmare spell from pg.316 of the Core Rulebook states that:

Creatures who don't sleep (such as elves, but not half-elves) or dream are immune to this spell.

So either the CRB is stating that elves don't sleep, or they don't dream. I'm guessing because of the Dreamspeaker alternate racial trait that elves sleep but they don't dream.

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  • \$\begingroup\$ Welcome to RPG.SE! Take the tour if you haven't already, and check out the help center for more guidance. As written, it looks like the specific placement of the parenthetical can only be interpreted to mean that elves don't sleep (and half-elves do); it doesn't necessarily say whether or not they dream. The parenthetical is specifically after the phrase "Creatures who don't sleep", not after "or dream". (I'm not basing this assessment on any other evidence, just what's quoted in the answer. It looks like okeefe's answer suggests the intent may be otherwise.) \$\endgroup\$
    – V2Blast
    Aug 1, 2020 at 2:36
  • \$\begingroup\$ Elf (not Half-elf) alternate racial trait Dreamspeaker: "A few elves have the ability to tap into the power of sleep, dreams, and prescient reverie. Elves with this racial trait add +1 to the saving throw DCs of spells of the divination school and sleep effects they cast. In addition, elves with Charisma scores of 15 or higher may use dream once per day as a spell-like ability (caster level is equal to the elf’s character level)." \$\endgroup\$ Dec 24, 2020 at 17:27

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