Mixed race characters...?

[Falcii]

One of my players offered up a strange question recently. If humans and elves can produce seemingly fertile half elves, aren't they the same species? Additionally, could say... A dragonborn and a gnome procreate? What about a dragonborn and a tiefling? Is this kind of thing supported either mechanically or lore wise? I just waved my hand and said mongrelfolk but that seems a bit to simple an answer.

[torrasque666]

Don't try to apply real-world genetic science to D&D. We have giant flying lizards that are somehow capable of breeding with everything. Humans are similar, but to a lesser extent. Humans are such a blank slate that they can breed with everything. Or rather, everything can breed with them.


As for the dragonborn question... dragonborn are specifically called out as sterile.
While a dragonborn retains her sexual characteristics, she is essentially asexual. A dragonborn has no interest in even the visceral comfort of sex as most humanoid races know it. Indeed, no lures of the flesh quicken either her pulse or her imagination. She has no drive to procreate, and dragonborn are in fact sterile.

[DrMotives]

The concept of species, as it's understood by science, really doesn't apply at all to D&D. You just have to roll with game logic. And lorewise, tieflings and other planetouched races aren't exactly another species. They're a set of traits from a more alien ancestor that pop up every so often in the family tree. A pair of human parents can have a tiefling child, because one of them has a great-grandparent from the Abyss.

[martixy]

It's http://www.reactiongifs.com/r/mgc.gif

So yea, what tor said.

If we can have centaurs and owlbears, half-elves should even raise an eyebrow.
The problem I have with the whole thing is the lack of crossbreeds that do not involve humans. Like elf-orc or gnome-goblins or what-have-you.

[BowStreetRunner]

Keep in mind that most of the concepts contained in Dungeons and Dragons can trace their origins back to Tolkien's books about Middle Earth. There, Humans and Elves did produce offspring (Elrond and Elros) and there were Half-Orc or Goblin-Men created by Saruman. So the original D&D had Half-Elves and Half-Orcs, but no other mixed races that I can recall. No explanation was required as to why Humans could breed with Elves and Orcs but there were no Orc/Elf mixed breeds. It was just accepted because it was how High Fantasy was conceived at the time. (In Middle Earth Orcs were descended from Elves who had been changed by the first Dark Lord.)

As to a more real world consideration, interbreeding between species (http://rafonda.com/interbreeding_between_species.html) does occur and is often misunderstood. But really, it's better to leave science behind and spare the catgirls (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?264360-Catgirls).

[Karl Aegis]

You can get an entirely new subrace just because grandpa had a bad diet. Races in D&D make no sense whatsoever. (Frostblood Orcs or w/e)

[atemu1234]

If you're looking for mix-and-match stuff, Bastards and Bloodlines is the way to go. It's 3rd party and not terribly balanced, but it's still enjoyable.

And yes, in general, don't think too hard, don't ask questions and spare the catgirls.

[Bakkan]

I build this into my setting. In my campaign's prehistory, there was a single humanoid race that was extremely physiologically adaptable and diverse, and so a halflings and an orc might only be separated by a couple generations.

Following a Fall of Man event, the humanoid race lost its adaptability and distinct races began to emerge. Those that diverged the least from each other (humans and elves, or humans and orcs, mostly) managed to remain interfertile while retaining phenotypical distinction. The offspring of a human or elf has about equal chance to be a human, elf, or half-elf. Pairs of creatures whose races diverged further from each other (elves and orcs, halflings and humans) are infertile.

Dwarves are different; dwarves were created by a vastly powerful subterranean race to tend to the earth and mountains. They have no sexual organs and in fact reproduce completely differently than humanoids.

Dragons are not biological in quite the same way that humanoids are. Dragons are creatures of magic, as much philosophical beings as physical ones. Dragons do mate with humans and other creatures; half-dragons are the result when a dragon mates with an already pregnant creature. The unborn child is tainted by the draconic essence that is transferred from the dragon to the object of its lusts.

[Dr_Dinosaur]

One of my players offered up a strange question recently. If humans and elves can produce seemingly fertile half elves, aren't they the same species? Additionally, could say... A dragonborn and a gnome procreate? What about a dragonborn and a tiefling? Is this kind of thing supported either mechanically or lore wise? I just waved my hand and said mongrelfolk but that seems a bit to simple an answer.

Much like all the wildly different breeds of dog can procreate, most members of the Humanoid species can. However most combinations’ offspring are sterile and thus uncommon. Humans are genetically close enough to both elves and orcs to produce viable offspring.

Dragons are beings of magic and thus only have genetics when in shapeshifted form

[Remuko]

One of my players offered up a strange question recently. If humans and elves can produce seemingly fertile half elves, aren't they the same species? Additionally, could say... A dragonborn and a gnome procreate? What about a dragonborn and a tiefling? Is this kind of thing supported either mechanically or lore wise? I just waved my hand and said mongrelfolk but that seems a bit to simple an answer.

Why not refluff? If they want a Orc/Elf Take half elf or half orc stats and then just refluff the appearance and change the aging tables a bit. might be a little harder for races that dont already have a "half" template (not template in the game definition, but in the general out of game definition) to work with, but some mild homebrew could work it easily enough I'd think.

[Âmesang]

I knew the Book of Erotic Fantasy would come in handy some day! :smallbiggrin:

[Draconi Redfir]

One of my players offered up a strange question recently. If humans and elves can produce seemingly fertile half elves, aren't they the same species? Additionally, could say... A dragonborn and a gnome procreate? What about a dragonborn and a tiefling? Is this kind of thing supported either mechanically or lore wise? I just waved my hand and said mongrelfolk but that seems a bit to simple an answer.

Maybe kind of, perhaps a subspecies. Being different species doesn't always guarantee infertile children however, mules and ligers are both common examples and infertile, but that isn't always the case.

Look up "The Big Bird Lineage" in reference to the Galápagos islands. essentially a bird from another island wound up on a new island that it's species doesn't exist. so he mated with two members of a different species, and their hybrid offspring mated together to eventually create a whole new species.


If nothing else, it can be safely assumed that humans, elves, and orcs have a semi-recent common ancestor since they can breed together fine, akin to humans, chimps and Bonobos (Please don't breed with chimps or bonobos) With Dwarves being more akin to Gorillas, a much less recent common ancestor, but still related. (Since Half-dwarves with elves and humans tend to be infertile if i recall correctly.)

If nothing else, "Race" is kind of use improperly in media. Races are Africans, Asians, and Caucasians, all members of the human species, but different breeds of it adapted to different environments with different traits.

Race in the D&D / warcraft sense is more like being Species, as a Troll is in no way related to an Orc, and yet in both games they are referred too as "Different races".

Really it just boils down to "Race" rolling off the tongue better.

[ZamielVanWeber]

One of my players offered up a strange question recently. If humans and elves can produce seemingly fertile half elves, aren't they the same species? Additionally, could say... A dragonborn and a gnome procreate? What about a dragonborn and a tiefling? Is this kind of thing supported either mechanically or lore wise? I just waved my hand and said mongrelfolk but that seems a bit to simple an answer.

Under the Morphological Species Concept and Phylogenetic Species Concept humans and elves are separate species and the Biological Definition of Species can have the definitive pre-zygomatic barries overcome (pizzlies, for example) so just because they can interbreed does not mean they are the same species.

[Goaty14]

A wizard did it.

That is all.

[ShurikVch]

If we can have centaurs and owlbears, half-elves should even raise an eyebrow.
The problem I have with the whole thing is the lack of crossbreeds that do not involve humans. Like elf-orc or gnome-goblins or what-have-you.This article (http://www.wizards.com/dnd/article.asp?x=dnd/mc/mc20010829e) mentioned "Dwelves"
There are elf-orcs in the Kingdoms of Kalamar - called "Tel-amhothlan"
Midnight (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Midnight_(role-playing_game)) campaign setting have Dwarrow (from Gnomes and Dwarves), Dworgs (Orcs and Dwarves) and Elflings (Elves and Halflings)

Also, there are, obviously, non-Human-originate planetouched