Favorite (Chaotic) Evil Races?

[Gnorman]

Exactly what it says on the tin. What evil races get your proverbial engine revving, and why?

[123456789blaaa]

Too many to list right now. Off the top of my head two I really like are gnolls and kaorti.

I like gnolls not for what they are but for what they could have been. Hyenas are really cool creatures with some unique and somewhat messed up traits. If the writers had taken more inspiration from them (why do the gnolls worship a male demon lord again?) I think the gnolls could have been really unique. As they are however, they're really just a generic evil monster race with a somewhat cool look (also, Yeenoghu is LAME!).

Now Kaorti...THESE guys are a really cool race. I've always loved lovecraftian/cosmic horror creatures and these guys finally allow me to play one :smallbiggrin:. Secreting resin to protect themselves from the "taint" of the materal realm is cool, their look is cool, and actually not being bad for their LA is AWESOME! :smallbiggrin:.

Off topic: I posted some stuff in one of your threads on the minmaxboards. You may want to check it out.

[Gnorman]

Off topic: I posted some stuff in one of your threads on the minmaxboards. You may want to check it out.

Minmaxboards are back? I thought they were still hacked.

Anyway - I agree 100% on gnolls, and feel like they got the short end of the stick on a lot of situations. Pathfinder adapted them to have Lamashtu, which I think was a pretty apt change.

[123456789blaaa]

Minmaxboards are back? I thought they were still hacked.

Anyway - I agree 100% on gnolls, and feel like they got the short end of the stick on a lot of situations. Pathfinder adapted them to have Lamashtu, which I think was a pretty apt change.

Its been back for...oh...about a month now :smalltongue:. I presume you missed the migration call to the Rule of Cool forums? That's where all the updates were.

I thought Lamashtu was a jackal goddess?

[Gnorman]

I thought Lamashtu was a jackal goddess?

Gnolls too. (http://pathfinderwiki.com/wiki/Lamashtu)

[123456789blaaa]

I wonder why they picked jackel to be her sacred animal (and a jackel head to be her holy symbol). Having one specific animal be focused on (even a little bit) seems a bit weird for a goddess of fertility. Not only that but a jackel isn't particularly tied in with her portfolio in RL myth and their biology doesn't really align with her portfolio either...

[ArcturusV]

For me it's Goblins (though not necessarily Chaotic). It's mostly because when you tell people to play an Evil campaign or a Monster Race campaign you get a lot of weird stuff, usually aiming for really OP stuff where the ECL is too low or something.

Goblins are... just goblins. No one really thinks of them as broken. Hell, no one even thinks of them as a serious threat. You go up to a town with a group of Goblins and you can almost see everyone in there laughing about Free XP Walking.

It makes when you do something masterful with them so much more interesting. Least to me. Everyone EXPECTS this Infernal Blooded thing, or Drows, etc, to be powerful. No one blinks if you do something awesome. But a Goblin does something awesome? No one sees it coming.

[Gnorman]

Two I would throw into the running, who always had a special place in my heart, are the minotaurs and the yuan-ti (ever notice how chaotic evil races tend to have prominent animal traits?).

The minotaur could have been so much more, though it has been getting a little love recently. Too often it is just "cruel maze-dweller" when you could really play up the cunning, the strength, the divine curse aspects. I don't know if I buy them as sailors, though.

Yuan-ti always end up with this weird tension where one half of the race is obviously inhuman monsters and the other ones humans with forked tongues or scales or something, and it always makes me question how it's supposed to work. If they're infiltrators, why are they always trying to set up their own temples and society? If they're civilization builders, why are they always trying to hide? There are reasons, I'm sure, but they never quite meshed in my head.

[navar100]

Ever since Sunless Citadel and my playing group at the time befriended the kobolds and became honorary members of their tribe I've always had a fondness for the little guys. I really liked Meepo. Since then I see them as Rational Evil. They aren't megalomaniacs. Instead, because of the low opinion other races have of them and their size, they need to whatever it takes to survive. They aren't conquerors. Leave them alone and they'll leave you alone. Even be willing to trade. Gard Glittergold was a donkey cavity. Kurtulmakk is in the right.

I also like to think of hobgoblins has honorable foes. They are aggressors, but they can be reasoned with. I like it when DM have orcs behave like this too.

Going back to 2E, I had a soft spot for Flinds and their never ending quest to tame the Gnolls.

[Gnorman]

Ever since Sunless Citadel and my playing group at the time befriended the kobolds and became honorary members of their tribe I've always had a fondness for the little guys. I really liked Meepo. Since then I see them as Rational Evil. They aren't megalomaniacs. Instead, because of the low opinion other races have of them and their size, they need to whatever it takes to survive. They aren't conquerors. Leave them alone and they'll leave you alone. Even be willing to trade. Gard Glittergold was a donkey cavity. Kurtulmakk is in the right.

I also like to think of hobgoblins has honorable foes. They are aggressors, but they can be reasoned with. I like it when DM have orcs behave like this too.

Going back to 2E, I had a soft spot for Flinds and their never ending quest to tame the Gnolls.

Ah, the powers of lawful evil. My personal favorite.

Kobolds seem to be making a whatchamacallit, heel face turn? The days of them being evil little buggers are making way for them being sympathetic. I don't know if I'm on board - I want my kobolds to still be nasty, brutish, cruel, and apt to laugh hysterically at the pain their traps cause. Turn them into industrious miners who just want to be left alone and you start treading on dwarven toes...

[Psyren]

I suppose the Illithids are my favorite. A worthy foe for any psionic character.

The Quori are downright scary, what with their creating Fantasy North Korea.

Oh yeah, I love the arabian nights style baddies like Rakshasa and Efreeti/Djinn.

[ngilop]

In no particular order my faveorite CE races are

Minotaurs, but I thought the Cunning, strong, and divine curse WAS their focus. did 3rd ed mess that up? Probabyl.. damn 3rd ed messing everything up like those damned snivelling Kobolds.. Sorry for the rant

GNolls, gnools are just too brutish and uncarring to really ever pull toghter and make a decent civilation, but what do you expect form a female led hyena species? there would be a HUGE potential for a super awesome civilation IF somebody actually somehow managed to make a few dozen tribes cooperate together for a couple of centuries

Orcs, I keep my orcs bestial, dumb, aggressive, and horde-ish none of that craptacular Warcraft Orc BS.

Ogres, ohh yeah!.. in my world the Ogres used to be all really smart and had mighty magics on par with what the elves could muster. only they really angered the Lizard men (think war hammer not standard D&D here) and their race curse backfired and turned them all dumb as a box of rocks, though in a very very remote are some 'high-ogres' still exist

Bugbears, just the whole super stealth goblin concept has alwasy fascinated me.

Trolls, regenration and Bridge dominance 'nuff said

Gargoyles, them being chaotic evil has alwasy saddened me as gargoyles were created for protection from evil spirits. i still thinking of making normal gargoyles good and have cool anti-outsider abilities and just making margoyles corrupted fiendish gargoyles.

well thats alli cna think of right now. are troglodytes chaotic evil and what about quaggoths?

[123456789blaaa]

Ah, the powers of lawful evil. My personal favorite.

Kobolds seem to be making a whatchamacallit, heel face turn? The days of them being evil little buggers are making way for them being sympathetic. I don't know if I'm on board - I want my kobolds to still be nasty, brutish, cruel, and apt to laugh hysterically at the pain their traps cause. Turn them into industrious miners who just want to be left alone and you start treading on dwarven toes...

Kobolds sort of confuse me nowadays. Their different traits and attributes just don't mesh together very well in my head.

One thing I disagree with though, is the notion that they should laugh hysterically. IMO kobolds should almost never laugh. It goes against their whole racial personality (remember a certain incident involving their god and Garl Glittergold?). I also don't think they should be brutish (kobolds are hardworking trapmakers, not goblins or orcs).

(don't make them haughty though. They are a mook race)

I was thinking of playing up the "reptilian" aspect. Making them cold and alien. That sort of seems like stepping on the Yuan-Ti's toes though...

What about making them fanatics? Have them look up to dragons as the ultimate race and all other beings (including themselves) as vermin. Don't make them yell and scream and froth at the mouth. Instead have them be coldly hateful.

Maybe make this a learned trait instead of a racial one? After all, kobolds are supposed to revere ALL dragons aren't they? Their god was supposedly born of green dragons blood so that's why they're so green dragon like in personality IIRC. It's very possible that since kobold society is so tight-knit, there's lots of unspoken social pressure to be like everyone else. Maybe kobolds have the potential to have personality's that are like the personality's of all True Dragons.

[Yora]

I love me some aboleths. Unlike orcs, goblins, and dark elves, aboleths actually have the motive, the opportunity, and the means to be an all evil race.
To them, people are cattle at best and they couldn't really care less what they think about being mind-slaves and food. They are doing their aberration stuff all day for centuries and they don't care at all about being mean to humanoids. Humanoids are simply irrelevant colaterral damage. If they need more workers, they grab themselves some people from the surface or the underdark and turn them into skum, easy as that. And when someone knows something they want to know, it usually is the easiest way to just eat their brains.

Also, 3-ton tentacle-fish! :smallbiggrin:

Quori are also cool. Despite their nightmare alieness, they have actually logical motives.
In regular perioids, the nightmare plane becomes the happy dreams plane, and then the nightmare plane again. But every time this happens, the quori cease to exist and are replaced by a new quori race. They are completely immortal, but the change of seasons in the dream plane will be their inevitable end.
So they go to the world of mortals to make sure the nightmares never end.

[123456789blaaa]

I love me some aboleths. Unlike orcs, goblins, and dark elves, aboleths actually have the motive, the opportunity, and the means to be an all evil race.
To them, people are cattle at best and they couldn't really care less what they think about being mind-slaves and food. They are doing their aberration stuff all day for centuries and they don't care at all about being mean to humanoids. Humanoids are simply irrelevant colaterral damage. If they need more workers, they grab themselves some people from the surface or the underdark and turn them into skum, easy as that. And when someone knows something they want to know, it usually is the easiest way to just eat their brains.

Also, 3-ton tentacle-fish! :smallbiggrin:

Quori are also cool. Despite their nightmare alieness, they have actually logical motives.
In regular perioids, the nightmare plane becomes the happy dreams plane, and then the nightmare plane again. But every time this happens, the quori cease to exist and are replaced by a new quori race. They are completely immortal, but the change of seasons in the dream plane will be their inevitable end.
So they go to the world of mortals to make sure the nightmares never end.

I really like Abeloth too. I'm really suprised you didn't talk about their racial memory though. IMO that's the coolest thing about them.

[CIDE]

Hands down Trolls. I even play one. Still trying to find a more player-friendly way to do it though.

[Telonius]

For CE, Derro. I just love those creepy little lunatics.

[Yora]

I love derro, I just don't feel very happy with the 3.5e revision suddenly deciding to make them all insane. Why the need to break with 20 years of established identity?

[CRtwenty]

Hill Giants. Not so much because of their fluff or even their stats but because when I send them at my PCs I get to talk in a hulk voice.

"Durr, Grog squish little men!"

[Xenogears]

Now Kaorti...THESE guys are a really cool race. I've always loved lovecraftian/cosmic horror creatures and these guys finally allow me to play one :smallbiggrin:. Secreting resin to protect themselves from the "taint" of the materal realm is cool, their look is cool, and actually not being bad for their LA is AWESOME! :smallbiggrin:.

Off topic: I posted some stuff in one of your threads on the minmaxboards. You may want to check it out.

Gotta agree on the Kaorti. First thought when I saw the thread.

I wish they had only 1 HD though (although there is a small line in their description that says something along the lines of "only exceptional Kaorti (those with more than 1 HD)..." which implies there should be 1HD Kaorti which would make them so much more playable...

Still a rogue Kaorti Fleshgrafter is a character concept I would love to play.

[limejuicepowder]

Bugbears are a long time favorite of mine. Besides an awesome name, they are the perfect thug-in-a-can: brutish and cunning. If they didn't have the LA they would even be a decent playable race.

I actually like all of the goblinoids. I get a "primitive but capable" vibe from all of them, and can easily imagine any of the types as a BBEG.

[Mithril Leaf]

The Ethergaunts, mainly because back when I was first learning of planar binding and polymorph any object abuse, I stumbled across this lovely lovecraftian piece of fluff (http://www.oocities.org/ripvanwormer/ethergaunts.html). It stuck with me, they're quite cool in that Jesus Christ How Horrifying kinda way.