Cultural Differences Among Races?

[Ratter]

There are a lot of things that we as humans take for granted, but honestly, don't make much sense when used for different races. Races obviously have differences, so what are those differences?

I don't think that elves need beds, as they don't sleep, they meditate. Dwarves are resistant to food poisoning, so they, along with goblins, might eat their dead. What are other differences are there?

[JackPhoenix]

No decent dwarf would eat their dead, however, their resistance keeps them from dying to alcohol poisoning. There's a reason dwarves are widely known as a bunch of alcoholics.

[kamap]

- Elves don't need beds to sleep but there are other uses for beds.
- Humans travel far and wide most other races aren't so keen on it.
- Humans vary a great deal, most other races have a far less broader spectrum of differences between them.
- Dwarfs and elves live far longer, so they tend to be harder to befriend by any race that lives only a 3th to a 6th of their livespan.
As a human you'll be dead before they really get to know you they might be good friends to your offpsring.
- A tabaxi doesn't care about money, they trade in tales, mysteries and items with a story or mysterie behind them.

The list of cultural differences between the D&D races is very long.

[the_brazenburn]

- Elves don't need beds to sleep but there are other uses for beds.

In OOtA, the drow priestess' chambers had a large and cushion-y bed in it. My players absolutely did not get why I kept snickering, even though they were fully aware that elves don't sleep.

I once came up with the possibility that goblins have exceptionally low pH body fluids (gastrointestinal juice, blood, etc). This allowed me to explain away their penchant for eating raw or barely cooked meat and copulating with no fear of STDs.

Then I had to invent a series of new diseases that could function in a very acidic environment, and thus would affect goblins and black dragons exclusively.

[JellyPooga]

- An 8ft door-frame is normal for a Human; for a Halfling that's a very grand door indeed! Some shorter folk may even feel agoraphobic in human dwellings/buildings ("I can't take all this space...even their interiors are lofty!"). Similarly for furniture; a Halfling will struggle to sit at a human sized table with any dignity. The opposite is also true. For a 3ft tall halfling, a 6ft ceiling is going to be normal, but for a 6ft Human (or a 7ft Half-Orc), that's going to be claustrophobic and awkward.

- Tieflings might appreciate a slightly warmer environment than Humans; fireplaces could be a family focal point, lit even at the height of summer. Where a Human is sweating, a Tielfling might be just fine and dandy. Same for food and their utensiles. A Tielfling at a Human table might complain that the food, plate or cutlery is cold (maybe they even appreciate firey, spicy food as well and much as a Human might complain of food being bland because of a lack of salt, a Tielfling might complain of a lack of spice). No backup of this one from a fluff perspective, but the Resistance to Fire damage has got to count for something culturally!

[Ratter]

No decent dwarf would eat their dead

Why wouldnt they eat their dead? do they have religious reasons? I mean, its just extra meat and they dont have the reasons humans do to not eat it.

[JackPhoenix]

- Tieflings might appreciate a slightly warmer environment than Humans; fireplaces could be a family focal point, lit even at the height of summer. Where a Human is sweating, a Tielfling might be just fine and dandy. Same for food and their utensiles. A Tielfling at a Human table might complain that the food, plate or cutlery is cold (maybe they even appreciate firey, spicy food as well and much as a Human might complain of food being bland because of a lack of salt, a Tielfling might complain of a lack of spice). No backup of this one from a fluff perspective, but the Resistance to Fire damage has got to count for something culturally!

Just a note: spicy food isn't hot because it's got high temperature. It's (in D&D terms) bunch of various poisons and acids. Tieflings and other fire resistant creatures won't be protected from that.

[Ratter]

Just a note: spicy food isn't hot because it's got high temperature. It's (in D&D terms) bunch of various poisons and acids. Tieflings and other fire resistant creatures won't be protected from that.

So does that means dwarves can handle spicy food?

[hymer]

Why wouldnt they eat their dead? do they have religious reasons? I mean, its just extra meat and they dont have the reasons humans do to not eat it.
Some humans do eat their dead, whether beloved family members or mortal enemies.
The humans that don't have this practice have social taboos against eating their own dead. The origins of these taboos are up for debate, but disease isn't the main contender. If infection was the main problem, vegetarianism is the answer to avoid eating infected meat and getting sick. Or learning what to prepare and what to throw out.
But whatever the reasons for the taboo are, if dwarves share these taboos, the origins are likely to be at least similar.

Edit: As for some differences, here's a link (https://www.deviantart.com/peninsulacampaign/art/On-elven-sexuality-in-the-Atheist-campaign-347073345) to something I wrote about surface elf sexuality in a campaign years back. A player wanted the Nymph's Kiss feat, and was looking to understand the context of that choice a little better.

2nd edit: Dwarves are among the cleanliest of races. They live in close quarters, with ventilation a particular problem to solve, they are hairy, and often work dirty (mining, smelting, smithing). That is why they take such pride in their beards. They may get splattered with orc blood, and stand near a coal blaze most of their waking hours, but they keep their beards clean so everyone can see that they are decent dwarves that can be counted upon to uphold the honour of the family, clan, and all of dwarvendom - by taking their [expletive deleted] baths! Bath houses are common, and free to enter. You don't get to go inside a tavern to do your quaffing if you have a dirty beard. Dwarves are rowdy enough when drunk without that extra unaccountability.

[Dr. Cliché]

- Elves don't need beds to sleep but there are other uses for beds.

Can elves actually sleep if they want to?

Also, what do you think an elf would prefer to sit/lie on when he enters a trance? Presumably he could enter a trance whilst lying on a bed, but do you think they'd prefer to be in a chair, or sitting on a cushion maybe?



- Tieflings might appreciate a slightly warmer environment than Humans; fireplaces could be a family focal point, lit even at the height of summer. Where a Human is sweating, a Tielfling might be just fine and dandy. Same for food and their utensiles. A Tielfling at a Human table might complain that the food, plate or cutlery is cold (maybe they even appreciate firey, spicy food as well and much as a Human might complain of food being bland because of a lack of salt, a Tielfling might complain of a lack of spice). No backup of this one from a fluff perspective, but the Resistance to Fire damage has got to count for something culturally!

I like this idea. In face, I might use something along these lines next time I play a Tiefling. :smallbiggrin:

[Vogie]

More importantly, you can put culture differences WITHIN the races. Northern High Elves may have a completely different culture than Southeastern High Elves. And a great way to flesh out areas is by mixing the fantasy races, then building an overarching culture around those blends.

[JackPhoenix]

So does that means dwarves can handle spicy food?

Possibly. In real life, birds lack receptors responsible for the hot feeling humans (mammals, really) get from capsaicin... they can eat chilli peppers without any trouble. It's something that isn't covered in stat blocks... there's no universal "poison resistance". Chocolate is toxic to dogs, humans have no problem with it (or rather, different sort of problems). In the german RPG Dark Eye, dwarves are resistant to mineral poisons, but violently allergic to the most common healing herb, certain otherwise harmless plants are poisonous to elves, and elves can't stand alcohol or fermented food thanks to their oversensitive senses, amongst other things.

Most RPGs doesn't do that sort of thing, though.

[PhoenixPhyre]

More importantly, you can put culture differences WITHIN the races. Northern High Elves may have a completely different culture than Southeastern High Elves. And a great way to flesh out areas is by mixing the fantasy races, then building an overarching culture around those blends.

I very very much agree and have tried to to this in my setting. This (blended cultures) is harder, however, with the very-long-lived elves and dwarves in stock D&D because they're living at a very different time-scale than the humans and halflings around them. I decided (for this and other reasons) to cut the life-span by a lot. High elves ~180, wood elves ~120 (they're separate races in my setting although closely related), dwarves ~120-140. These are maxima, not averages.

I have a culture of (mostly) humans and halflings with some dwarves and elves (and half-elves and half-orcs and tieflings and aasimar), a culture of humans, half-elves, and dwarves, one of humans, half-elves, and wood elves, and one of dragonborn, goblinoids, and orcs. And no that last one is not evil.

Plus many others in other parts of the world.

[JellyPooga]

Just a note: spicy food isn't hot because it's got high temperature. It's (in D&D terms) bunch of various poisons and acids. Tieflings and other fire resistant creatures won't be protected from that.

As a chilli fan myself:smallwink:, I'm well aware, but for a fantasy game, being resistant to fire seems to be a good fit for resistong hot food too!

[PhoenixPhyre]

As a chilli fan myself:smallwink:, I'm well aware, but for a fantasy game, being resistant to fire seems to be a good fit for resistong hot food too!

And in a fantasy universe, hot food may be hot because it's got large(r) amounts of fire-aspected matter in it. Modern atomic theory does not necessarily translate to fictional worlds!

[Chaosmancer]

There are smatterings of lore here and there that are official and then things that aren't official.

For example, a friend and myself worked on gnome lore that said gnomes create special monuments called "laughing trees" to honor the dead, and they believe in "The Echo" a gathering of every gnome and thing gnomes have done that one of their goddesses weaved into the air. So, laughter was already important to gnomes, but we seeded that into rituals and things.

For orcs, my orcs are currently in flux. They have the old laws of Gruumsh but he was overthrown by his wife (Gruumsh banned magic and it was killing the orcs to not have responses to an ongoing magical disaster) and so now they are trending towards a theological matriarchy while still keeping some traditional ways like making weapons from slain enemies.

I have humans as hyper-religious while the elven gods are more legendary heroes and dwarves have hundreds of sainted individuals and the Firstborn (the dwarves first crafted by Moradin).

[Laserlight]

More importantly, you can put culture differences WITHIN the races. Northern High Elves may have a completely different culture than Southeastern High Elves.

I believe you mean "Southeastern Elves, y'all"

In addition to cultures changing by location, the ebb and flow of migration / invasion means it will also change over time. You might have the upper class be the equivalent of Norman French, the peasants Anglo Saxons, and some British holdovers on the fringes. Or a more bureaucratic / sophisticated area (China, Persia) conquered by a more martial people (Mongols). Displacement of the Old Gods by the New Faith.

[JellyPooga]

And in a fantasy universe, hot food may be hot because it's got large(r) amounts of fire-aspected matter in it. Modern atomic theory does not necessarily translate to fictional worlds!

I like this. In a universe where elemental fire is a thing, something hot is hot because it has a higher concentration of it. If that means a flame, or molten rock from deep underground, or an exotic spice from an arid environment, it's the elemental influence that makes it "hot". If Tieflings were to have a preference for hotter climates, why not Fire Genasi also; a culture of animosity between those races (or any other similarly resistant races), due to territorial conflict might also be an interesting addition to a setting. A tribe of "Swamp" or "Jungle" Dwarves that have moved from hill and mountain to find land (or exile?) in territories typically rife with poison, vying with Lizardfolk or Yuan-ti might be a reasonable encounter, for example.

[Damon_Tor]

My particular setting has some serious biological differences between races. Dwarves are a male-only race that reproduces via symbiosis with a species of yeast. Goblinoids are a single eusocial species. Orcs were bred as a slave race and can't give birth naturally, and so have developed a ritualized form of surgical childbirth. Most forms of "fey" creatures are the result of a hallucinogenic reaction between various plant spores and the latent psychic ability of elves, who are just a population of humans who have adapted a semi-symbiotic relationship with the flora. Culturally, they barely recognize each other as people.

[Chaosmancer]

A tribe of "Swamp" or "Jungle" Dwarves that have moved from hill and mountain to find land (or exile?) in territories typically rife with poison, vying with Lizardfolk or Yuan-ti might be a reasonable encounter, for example.

Sigh

Pulls out notebook

If people keep giving me great ideas I'm gonna run out of space in this thing


Speaking of Yuan-ti, made them neutral with ritualized cannibalism. They'd never eat someone without permission, but they see devouring snakes (and therefore each other up the tiers) as concentrating the blood of the gods, who will consume the worthy to restore themselves.

[Ganymede]

Why wouldnt they eat their dead? do they have religious reasons? I mean, its just extra meat and they dont have the reasons humans do to not eat it.

Dwarven prions are potent enough to slay an entire stronghold.

[Ratter]

Goblinoids are a single eusocial species.

What explanation is there for Goblinoids to have not taken over the world then?

[Damon_Tor]

What explanation is there for Goblinoids to have not taken over the world then?

There are a few reasons. Probably the most pressing one is the constant turnover in leadership. Their "soldier caste", the hobgoblins, are sexually immature males, and they only remain "adult" hobgoblins for 15-20 years. At that point they undergo a kind of puberty that transforms them into bugbears, the "drone caste". Once they become bugbears they lose interest in the military, and shift their focus on competing with other bugbears for breeding rights. This means their military leadership, their generals or admirals, will never hold their jobs for more than a few years. This seriously limits the amount of experience they can amass, and an army built on the charisma of a single general will simply fall apart when he grows out of the role.

The civilian leadership is centered on a single "Queen" a mature female, but the comparison to eusocial insects breaks down here: in the vast majority of cases, a goblin Queen will not survive a single pregnancy, giving birth to around 100 goblin/hobgoblin infants. At this point, another goblin (goblins are sexually immature females) will undergo a similar physical change to become a Queen, but this means any political policies made by the old queen are subject to radical change at the whims of the new one. There are rare instances where a goblin queen survives childbirth, creating a sort of fifth caste, a "Matriarch". She can't give birth again, and a new Queen will appear to take her place in the lifecycle, but she retains her position of power. This does create a potentially dangerous situation for the region: while a matriarch lives, the goblins can become a serious threat.

The one-queen-per-warren issue also puts a hard limit on the size of a warren: a warren can only produce as many new goblinoids as they can produce with one queen at a time. There's about a month between a queen giving birth and another goblin completing her transformation into a new Queen, then the Bugbears mate with her for several days, and her pregnancy lasts about 6 months. So every seven months or so 100 new workers/soldiers join the warren, and that's it. The infants grow to useful adulthood as Goblins or Hobgoblins in around 5 years. That's a fantastic birth rate for a new colony, but it's terrible for building anything like a civilization.

[PhoenixPhyre]

It's interesting to see different types of goblinoids.

My goblinoids are different and similar all at once:

Goblins are the base creatures. Every goblinoid is born a goblin in the usual fashion. But goblins have a particular quirk that changes things--they share a kind of unconscious "working memory" among the tribe. Each individual goblin isn't smart (or more particularly they have crappy short-and-long-term memories). So a lone goblin is like a really smart, ADD cat. As the numbers increase, the exponential growth of this shared memory brings them up to human level (if quite a bit different in thought process). A tribe is the basic unit, not an individual (although they're still individuals). This caps at between 100 and 250 adult individuals in most cases, with larger tribes really being a group of close-allied tribes and smaller tribes "hiving" off of the larger ones and breaking new ground.

This also means that they share anima (the stuff of souls/magic/creation in this setting). This is important for the next part.

Hobgoblins are the result of a tribe of goblins pooling their anima into a few individuals. Most tribes of ~50 (the baseline size for a tribe) have a few (3-5) hobgoblins soaking up their spare anima. This manifests as certain chosen youths are literally transformed into bigger, brighter, more structured hobgoblins who can act independently of the shared memory. This is not a permanent transformation--it only lasts as long as the tribe can spare the anima. During times of crisis, the tribes will cannibalize any spare energy and make more hobgoblins to act as the military backbone for the tribe. Hobgoblins are naturally neuter beings.

Side note: Humans, orcs, and many if not most of the other races (other than dwarves and elves) are magically-altered ("fixed-form") hobgoblins, created centuries ago, mostly by elves.

Bugbears are what happens when a tribe is in extreme peril, or when something goes wrong. Some of the transformed youth get changed so much that they break, becoming bugbears. Bugbears are big, strong, mean, and not very smart. This transformation is permanent and bugbears tend to be in the thickest part of any fighting. A large tribe might have one or two bugbears more or less constantly even when not in peril--sometimes the malformation happens by accident.

All in all, goblinoids do best when they have others more stable giving direction and reining in their wild and crazy ideas. Goblinoids, all by themselves, will go down every rabbit hole with little concern for individual safety (because most of the important stuff is in that "shared storage space").

[GlenSmash!]

More importantly, you can put culture differences WITHIN the races. Northern High Elves may have a completely different culture than Southeastern High Elves. And a great way to flesh out areas is by mixing the fantasy races, then building an overarching culture around those blends.

This is my preference too.

In fact I like it when a diverse community feels more kinship to those around them, then far off members of their own race.

Style of clothing, naming conventions, diet etc would be similar among dwarves, elves, and humans from the same community.

[thoroughlyS]

Dwarves are among the cleanliest of races. They live in close quarters, with ventilation a particular problem to solve, they are hairy, and often work dirty (mining, smelting, smithing). That is why they take such pride in their beards. They may get splattered with orc blood, and stand near a coal blaze most of their waking hours, but they keep their beards clean so everyone can see that they are decent dwarves that can be counted upon to uphold the honour of the family, clan, and all of dwarvendom - by taking their [expletive deleted] baths! Bath houses are common, and free to enter. You don't get to go inside a tavern to do your quaffing if you have a dirty beard. Dwarves are rowdy enough when drunk without that extra unaccountability.
I have a bit of headcanon about goblins that has a similar logic. Goblins are commonly described as being filthy and smelly in D&D, and I reason that has to do with how they are raised. Goblin warrens are always overcrowded, and even basic necessities like water are scarce, so baths are a luxury they simply can't afford. Being crammed shoulder-to-shoulder with dozens of other goblins who spend all day tending to animals, foraging through undergrowth, or raiding nearby settlements means constant exposure to odorous conditions. This quickly deadens goblins' sense of smell and subsequently their sense of taste. Therefore, goblin cuisine (when possible) involves heavy use of spices and bathing is seen as misguided, at best. None of my goblin characters bathe regularly, but I'm assuming if they did they would accidentally rub one or more areas (behind the ears, etc.) raw and find the whole process to be a bit of a nuisance. They also prefer their food with healthy servings of onions or pepper where available.




In the german RPG Dark Eye, dwarves are resistant to mineral poisons, but violently allergic to the most common healing herb, certain otherwise harmless plants are poisonous to elves, and elves can't stand alcohol or fermented food thanks to their oversensitive senses, amongst other things.
2nd edition had a reference to a special kind of cheese which made halflings trip out because their digestive systems couldn't process it properly. To other races is was simply a rather pungent and soft cheese.

[Beleriphon]

3.5 had reference to a special kind of cheese that made halflings trip out, because their digestive systems could process it properly. To other races is was simply a rather pungent and fetid cheese.

Fun fact, this is the reason humans can get drunk (plus a few other critters). We evolved to be able to eat fallen, and fermenting fruit, without getting violently sick from the relatively low ethanol content.

[Ratter]

Fun fact, this is the reason humans can get drunk (plus a few other critters). We evolved to be able to eat fallen, and fermenting fruit, without getting violently sick from the relatively low ethanol content.

Does this mean that dwarves can't get drunk and are only drinking because they like the taste?

[Damon_Tor]

Does this mean that dwarves can't get drunk and are only drinking because they like the taste?

Dwarves drink because they have a symbiotic relationship with the yeast in their ale and drinking it is a critical part of their lifecycle. Drinking ale with their buddies is the closest thing dwarves have to sex.

[Ratter]

Dwarves drink because they have a symbiotic relationship with the yeast in their ale and drinking it is a critical part of their lifecycle. Drinking ale with their buddies is the closest thing dwarves have to sex.


Wait a minute. How does dwarven reproduction work?

[kamap]

In Damon_Tor settings dwarves are weird.

Read post 19. (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showsinglepost.php?p=23455179&postcount=19)

[GreatWyrmGold]

First off, natural selection applies to cultural traits (to some extent). Cultural norms which promote survival, societal cohesion, resistance to outside threats, etc will generally be selected for as cultures with such norms will tend to be more prosperous and populous than those without; over time, cultures without will either adopt parts of the more dominant culture's culture, migrate to more prosperous areas, or (all too often) simply be subjugated. This is not good, it just is.

The greatest shaper of culture, on the "macro" scale, will be meeting the basic necessities of life, particularly food. (Water is common in most places people settle [and a major shaper of culture when not], and while the architecture of shelter changes from place to place, the essence of "take raw materials, make them hold up a roof" is pretty universal.)
A classic example is ancient Egypt. First off, the blatant and crude: Egyptian agriculture is governed by the cyclical flooding of the Nile, and Egyptian religion is full of cyclical themes. That sort of thematic resonance should be present in cultural beliefs. There's also the subtler and more practical side of things: The Nile not only nourished Egypt, it also allowed government officials easy access to all of Egypt. In addition, without any farmer's almanac or even a widely-available word-a-day calendars, trained officials were needed for farmers to know when to prepare fields and plant; this lead to strict government control over farming, which ultimately reached the point where the government distributed seeds each year and told farmers where to plant them. This entire system only exists because of how the Nile shaped Egypt, and influenced the Egyptian government in other ways (making them more generally authoritarian).

Another important shaper is, of course, available resources. You're not going to have a proud smithy culture if you don't have any good ores, for instance. With regards to a couple of tiefling-related ideas brought up in this thread: The spiciness of a culture's cuisine is generally proportional to the availability of spices in the region, and temperatures considered comfortable are generally in a similar range to the temperatures of one's homeland (to a certain extent).

History isn't strong enough to shape the general form of a culture, but it's certainly strong enough to shape the details. For instance, parts of how the West conceptualizes and often idolizes the military can be traced back to the Roman Empire, with intermediates such as medieval knights and levies and the early professional armies of the colonial era.
With respect to ideas raised in this thread: Why would elves use beds for lovemaking if they didn't already have beds but presumably already had lovemaking; on the other hand, I love the idea of orcish culture being in the shadow of Grummsh's traditional laws despite them being painfully ill-suited to the modern world.


You may note that I haven't proposed many ideas of my own yet. That's because I fundamentally disagree with the notion that different races would be inherently predisposed to having meaningfully different cultures. Sure, a race which doesn't sleep wouldn't have beds, and a race which is only two feet tall would build with four feet to the story instead of ten, but that's not a particularly meaningful or interesting difference. The important bits of culture come from context.
I'm going to try to discern some of that context from the stereotypical elements associated with each race:

Humanity: Generic McGenericCulture. When this is averted, it's usually averted by having humanity be the only race with multiple meaningfully distinct cultures. (As opposed to, say, having elves in two different forests who are almost identical except in the celestial body they revere and how susceptibele they are to the villain's plots).
Elves: Typically live in forests, in small communities (often with some kind of central authority). This makes them sound like various cultures in Oceania, particularly Indonesia, but this is somewhat disrupted by their minimal obvious agriculture and generic-"in-tune-with-nature"-ness (a trait which isn't shared by any real-world culture, no matter what Hollywood tells you*). This suggests that they rely on druidic magic for sustenance, whether directly (goodberry), indirectly (supernaturally-intensified agriculture, to the point that a single massive fruit tree can sustain an entire village), or both. They're also the usual race of choice for having once had a world-spanning empire.
Dwarves: Typically live in mountains, in isolated communities, with a strong central government. How they get food varies; common variations are trade, mushroom farming, and mountainside pastoralism. The latter two are low-productivity forms of food production, and the former (obviously) makes them reliant on the outside world. We also often see a divide between "hill" and "mountain" dwarves, with the latter being more isolationist than the latter. Government aside, the dwarves remind me of Scandinavian culture in the post-Viking age (which goes well with their common low-key warrior culture).
Halflings: Wanderers, generally with an innate wanderlust and little sense of homelands. This suggests a historically nomadic culture which was absorbed by a more prosperous culture (typically human).
Gnomes: Generally a mixture of elf and dwarf, with some kind of quirkiness meant to set them apart from either. Frequently have special talents in some combination of minor magic (especially illusions), machinery, jewelry, and fine metalwork. All of this suggests that gnomes may have been assimilated into elvish and/or dwarvish culture (possibly with gnomish communities subsequently coming together and making a new gnomish culture), and that they were forced into professions others didn't want to do (jewelry and fine gilding detail in the heavy-smithy-focused dwarven culture, "lesser magics" in elven culture, etc). Why are dwarves the standard Jewish expy, again?
Goblins, orcs, and other "evil" races: While any given setting with multiple antagonistic races tries to make them distinct, they do so in enough different ways that the traits shared by most orcs are very similar to those shares by most goblins, so I'll lump them all here. They frequently live in lands unsuitable for most forms of food production. (This may just be because swamps, deserts, wastelands, etc are ominous, but it's still true.) They are also prone to raiding neighboring lands, and rarely have much organization beyond individual communities (which are often small themselves). Leadership is generally based around individuals with the power to protect them or the charisma to unite large groups, and rarely has any standard succession. This shouldn't be surprising when you notice, as the Giant has, that such leaders tend to be killed and such large groups dispersed by counter-raids of the "good" races.
And with that in mind, I'd like to suggest further context and the culture it provides:

In the Olden Days, elves ruled the world with their mastery of druidic magic. Nobody could challenge the wisdom and power of the elven archdruids who ruled elven communities, providing food, shelter, and security in exchange for influence and power surpassing most later kings. But times changed; the "lesser" beings which the elves looked down upon developed new tools. They began cultivating massive fields of grain, allowing any peasant to feed their family with far less land than any but the most powerful druids could manage; they tamed the beasts of the field, which enhanced their farming capabilities while diversifying their diet. The archdruids could still reign supreme when providing shelter and security, until the lesser races began developing arcane magics and raising deities with more concentrated and diverse divine power than nature. As elven society was uniquely dependent on the druids, they could not easily adapt and began to fade into obscurity.
Some elves rejected the old ways and began adopting the newer and more potent tools. They called themselves the High Elves, for they raised spires of stone into the sky. And yet, for all that they thought themselves superior to the old Wood Elves, the High Elves were still much the same at heart; still were they ruled by a council of the eldest and most powerful magicians, each ruling a single community which the mages tried to personally provide for with the assistance of the less prominent magicians.

Elven society revolves around powerful individuals holding up small, largely independent communities, where status largely comes from their power and age. Hence, other aspects of their culture are likely to resonate with this idea. For instance, they likely think of Nature as being such a powerful pillar supporting the world where the gods live, and each major god is likely to support and "protect" a sub-pantheon of related but younger and lesser gods. Elven settlements are likely centered around one massive structure (a supernaturally-enhanced tree, a massive tower, a sprawling market, something) with both symbolic and practical importance to the community.
While elves historically gave near-absolute power to their archdruids, and while modern elven leaders still tend towards the autocratic in principle, the fact that most of said leaders personally know everyone under their command meant that individuals were, in practice, given a good amount of freedom as long as they continued to help the community as needed.

Drow are, of course, elves who were cast underground. The reasons for this vary, but given the popularity of "chaotic good rebel" drow, as well as my distaste for calling anyone Inherently Evil (especially in a way that can be passed down), I'm going to say that it probably had at least as much to do with not respecting elvish traditions as with anything specific they did. Since skepticism and distrust of tradition was the only thing all proto-drow had in common, aside from their shared elven heritage, it would be baked into their culture. This would lead to future generations of drow not respecting their traditions.

But what would those traditions be? Well, the elves cast down to be drow would probably not include many powerful druids/mages. This means that more drow would need to be protected by each individual arch-whatever. However, the drow would continue trying to practice the form of government they were familiar with. Absolute power combined with a community too large for the leader to know everyone leads to dictatorship. Combine dictatorship with the aforementioned distrust of tradition (including the leaders dictated by tradition), and you could expect certain kinds of politics to take shape. Individuals who were screwed over by their Glorious Leader might turn to various sources of power (ranging from magic granted by a demon goddess to a thorough knowledge of poisons) and try to change things to suit their own desires by force.
In short: The upper class is what you get when village-scale political systems are applied to small nations, the lower class is what you get when a bunch of rebels united only by rebelliousness are given reason to rebel, and Lolth is what you get when a minor demon queen takes advantage of the situation.

I'd imagine that drow rabble-rousers would focus on the "threat to our existence" angle. Part of this is that, between the crappy natural resources of the Underdark, its monsters, and the way surface-dwellers tend to treat drow, there would be a fair number of existential threats...but it's also an effective way to get people to follow you, especially if they've been primed to expect existential threats from basically anything they don't have working for them.
If a drow state grew in power, or were near small/weak communities, they might try creating a "tiered" version of the original elvish social structure. The monarch would rule over the community of elites, the elites would rule over specific groups of common folk, and commoners would rule over slaves. Depending on the details of how this was set up and how many people each individual ruled over, this could actually be fairly benign, as far as slave-owning societies go; if each individual drow could know everyone they ruled over well and cared enough to not only do so but also try to ensure they had the best life possible, it might result in a mass of individual, interdependent, village-scale subcommunities working together. I'm not sure how plausible that would be, but but it would certainly be a contrast to how drow societies are normally portrayed.

In nearly all media, dwarves share two distinctive characteristics. Dwarves live in the most inhospitable environments available at temperate latitudes; and they work, but do not get along, with elves. Combine this with the common ancient, world-spanning elven domination, and we can come to the conclusion that both of these traits can be traced to ancient elves driving dwarves out of the verdant lowlands and into the rocky highlands in times long passed. This explains both their preferred biome and their traditional enmity with elves; the original transgressions may have been long forgotten, but the resentment they caused has catalyzed further transgressions from both sides, ensuring that the two sides will continue to feud until someone develops a philosophical/ethical framework for overcoming demographic conflicts like this in a more productive way. (At which point, they will probably be called a social justice paladin.)
Anyways, how would dwarven culture react to this? The initial response would probably involve generations of dwarves trying to protect the dwarven homelands and way of life, followed by periodic attempts to reclaim the dwarven homelands and way of life, followed by being resigned to a new homeland and way of life. Said way of life would probably involve a mixture of herding goats, llamas, or whatever livestock they have that can thrive in such mountainous areas; terracing and engineering any scraps of arable land available to maximize food output; and trying to find resources worth trading in the caves of the upper Underdark. This last would lead to the mining and smithing industries dwarves are known for, and would ultimately contribute to the downfall of the elves.

Anyways, it's not hard to see how dwarven culture would be split between hill and mountain dwarves; there's more farming to be done on the hills and more Underdarky things to do in the mountains, but not as much arable or pastoral land in the mountains or (possibly) as easy access to the Underdark in the hills. (If nothing else, mountains don't have aquifers to get around.) Of course, this would make hill dwarves more self-sufficient and mountain dwarves more reliant on trade...as well as more isolated. There are a few ways to make this work.
One option (which sticks close to the traditional model) would have some kind of ideological split (possibly occurring in the wake of disrupting the traditional archdruidic hegemony), where more isolationist dwarves retreated into the mountains while more xenophilic dwarves migrated to the hinterlands. The mountain-dwarves-to-be stewed in their isolationism, trading only with fellow dwarves, living off of a combination of mushroom farms and food imported from the hills. Their culture would be an odd mixture of reactionary xenophobia and mercantile practice, which sounds like an interesting concept to explore. (Or maybe the "trade" could mostly be in the form of customary exchanges; e.g, every month the hills send X cows and Y bushels of grain in exchange for A metal ingots, B pounds of gemstones, and C valuable monster bits.)
Meanwhile, hill dwarven culture would be a blend of traditional dwarven culture and cultures of outside realms. They would be more self-sufficient, but since they're still farming subpar land and exporting food to the mountainhomes, they would probably be at least as reliant on trade. This trade would probably involve either trading the mountainhomes' goods for lowlander goods, or importing raw materials from both mountainhomes and lowlands and refining them into finished products to sell to the lowlanders. The former would make dwarves straight-up merchant races (which might lead to them being seen as unskilled and "lesser" in the eyes of outsiders—in real-world feudal cultures, merchants are often considered to be very lowly due to selling the goods of others rather than "producing anything themselves"), while the latter would lead to the hills becoming industrialized and ending up not unlike dwarves in most fantasy settings. (Though they might also have skilled weavers and tailors if they also imported thread/cloth from the lowlands...and the cloth industry is where many early developments in our world's industrial revolution took place.)

An alternative option would be to have the more isolationist dwarves create fortified communes in the most productive dwarven lands (think Switzerland, but with lower mountains, higher walls, and more goats). The dwarves who live deeper in the mountains don't have this option, whether because of poor food availability or constant attacks from underground or both, so they maintain roads winding between hill dwarf communes so they can trade with lowlanders or receive reinforcements from them. It could lead to mountain dwarves being perceived as a race of desperate merchants, while hill dwarves (the dwarves people would be most likely to encounter at home) being seen as aloof and surly. Of course, if their skill with (or supply of) metal goods was healthy enough, they might still manage to make up for their lack of respect with a dose of need.

Duergar are the evil underground variant of dwarves, a race already associated with caverns. It would make sense for them to be more closely related (culturally and genetically, though the former is more important) to mountain dwarves, so their origins and culture would be more closely-tied to those of mountain dwarves.
If mountain dwarves are the xenophobes, duergar might be a splinter faction who thinks they shouldn't even deal with hill dwarves. They would retreat further into the caverns, seeking to harvest the resources of the Underdark. Over time, if they established themselves properly, they might decide that even the mountain dwarves were too "corrupted" by lowlander influences to trust and bar contact with anyone but other duergar. This would let them transition into...well, there are multiple ways this could go, but the idea of them making a dryer version of Rapture is weirdly appealing to me.
On the other and, if mountain dwarves are merchants defending against the horrors of the Underdark, how could duergar fit in? The easiest possibility would be to make them derro-lite; they were corrupted or driven insane by what they faced, exiled, and banded together in a new society. (This would make them decent parallels to the drow.) On the other hand, they might be descended from mountain dwarf settlements who decided to settle further in and band together with some faction or another of underground nasties, and mumble mumble now they're fighting the mountain dwarves, too. Obviously, this is a lot weaker than the other version; it also rethemes it from anti-xenophobia to anti-interacting-with-people-we-don't-like, which is obviously...not good.


Halflings, as a culture, are defined more by their relations with other races than by anything they do themselves. Their fluff makes this clear, as does the fact that their subraces are "elfier halfling" and "dwarfier halfling," rather than (say) "elf who tried to live 'more in tune with nature'" or "dwarf who emphasizes isolationism". This has roots all the way to Tolkien; hobbits were, in many ways, treated more as a subrace of humanity than a separate species (the way elves and dwarves were). This suggests that, at some point, their culture was assimilated into dominant human/elven/whatever culture.

I'm inclined to suspect that the ancestors of the halflings we know, like dwarves, were driven to less-prosperous lands—this time, places where the rain or soil weren't good enough to support good, elfy forests. Of course, this also meant they probably couldn't support good, healthy crops of grain (or if they could, they'd be plagued with periodic droughts that would ruin the area, or something). This could drive halflings to adopt a more nomadic pastoral lifestyle (something like pre-colonial South Africa or the Mongols). Unlike the Mongols, they wouldn't be able to use their skill with horseback archery to conquer much of anything, both because their preferred ranged weapon is even trickier to use while mounted and because they're two feet tall.
Eventually, something (whether pressure from people living in even less-arable lands, humanity discovering the wonders of irrigation, something supernatural...) either forces them into human lands or lets human lands force themselves on the halflings. The halflings adapt, perhaps ending up a bit like the Romani. I could see some halflings trying to continue a pastoral lifestyle, bringing their herds to any pastures they can find for as long as they're allowed to stay there (and probably earning the small folk a nasty reputation), while others tried to find other ways to use their herds to pay for bread and oats (e.g, trade caravan, traveling circus, courier services...).
Ultimately, halflings end up as an ethnic minority in a larger culture rather than forming a culture of their own.

Gnomes are a bit tricky...especially because they're sort of a combination of things I've already mentioned. They were probably forced out of their antediluvian homes millennia ago and partly-integrated into other cultures, but weren't ever similar enough to be fully assimilated. They were always kept at arm's length, which let some core parts of the gnomish identity survive into the modern day. Possibly, they have found some place to call a gnomish homeland, where the surviving "core gnomish identity" and scraps of all the cultures they integrated into can forge a new kind of culture. As I joked about above, this is pretty much exactly the history of the Jews. (Which are an ethnic group as much as a religion, so I think it's fine to talk about them?)
I'm serious. For a while, they were their own thing, but then Israel was conquered by a few empires in a row before the Second Temple was destroyed. That caused the Diaspora, which spread them across Europe, where they maintained Jewish traditions while picking up elements of local cultures. Finally, after the Holocaust made everyone realize the Jews had a raw deal, they got a homeland for their people, where they reconstructed what they could of traditional Jewish culture (to the point that they resurrected Hebrew!) as part of a new culture all their own. I just came across a guide for taking inspiration from history (https://mythcreants.com/blog/six-tips-for-taking-inspiration-from-history/) which I'll just leave here.

Obviously, having a Jewish-expy culture is a good path to all sorts of unfortunate implications...especially since one of the most distinctive physical features gnomes possess is a major part of Jewish caricatures. But I think it should be possible to do well, if one focuses on the history of the Jewish people rather than traits of the Jewish people themselves.
Don't make the gnomes (say) gold-hungry, or even perceived as gold-hungry; look into Jewish history, look at how Jews reacted to their treatment, and work from there. I'd love to see a fantasy equivalent of Cyrus the Great or Count Emicho; that would be way better than the collage of Jewish stereotypes that stick to fantasy dwarves, thanks to fantasy writers not bothering to clean the unfortunate implications off of their century-old fantasy templates.

Fifth verse, same as two through four, right? Wrong. The ancient elven empire so common in fantasy (and yet so unlikely to seriously affect non-elves' history or culture) had conflicts with the ancestors of modern dwarves, halflings, and gnomes (as well as humans), but they made up after said hegemony fell. Not so with goblinoids, ogrekin, and orc...orcites? (Is there a word for "people like orcs"?) While the five "good-guy" races (by default) enjoy a status quo of peace, broken up by rivalries and only rare wars, their relations with the various "bad-guy" races have a status quo ranging from border skirmishes to de facto genocide. Throw in some examples of exploiting ogre labor and destroying orcish culture while "civilizing" their tribes, and you'd have essentially all the most heinous aspects of European colonialism.
Needless to say, this angle has a lot of potential for interesting worldbuilding. Also needless to say, you'd need to avoid using the sort of imagery that fantasy authors already borrow from common perceptions of "primitive" cultures, since that comes with as much baggage as dwarves lusting after gold and speaking in Yiddish accents. Also also needless to say, the "focus on history and cultures' reactions to it over superficial elements" is as good of advice for goblins as for gnomes.
There's a whole range of reactions that assorted native peoples had to Europeans coming along and sticking flags everywhere. Sometimes there were new religious movements, promising the downtrodden masses that they could have the power required to cast out the invaders. Sometimes their society was disrupted, leading to wild increases and decreases in population. Sometimes warlords arose, and sometimes existing warlords allied with Europeans against native rivals.

The biggest difference between colonialism and goblins/orcs/etc is the aspect of change. When Europeans came to Africa, the Americas, and other places whose names started with A, the effects they had came from change. New players were at the table, new tools (literal and figurative) were available, new ideas and mysteries were revealed. However, antagonist races generally have a long history with the protagonist races. There would be no Shaka Zulu or Mfecane, because there would be no single great change which catalyzed an abrupt shift in their societal structure and economy.
This leads to another problem...it's hard to come up with a reason why goblins are living like (at best) an unusually-disorganized Iron Age tribe while humanity has constructed late middle-ages/early Renaissance societies. The only option I see is to imagine that they were treated the way the USA (and probably other colonial nations I don't know as much about) treated the native populations within its borders, keeping them systematically oppressed, but that makes the protagonist races into pretty blatant villains.
...I'm starting to see why so many fantasy worlds skimp on the worldbuilding when it comes to antagonist races.


There are a lot of people who are trying to make the various races more different than humanity, but I don't think that's a good way to go. After all, it's inevitable that fantasy races are going to be viewed (if only subconsciously) as that world's equivalents to the various lines that divide humans in the real world—race, nationality, religion, whatever. That's just how human beings think. And if you say that those people are fundamentally different from humans, that the ways they're different are just how they are and nothing contextual, you end up saying a lot of nasty things about people separated by those lines. Whether you believe the research saying that media has the power to affect us or not, do you want to say that?


*It would probably be more accurate to say that they are more reliant on nature, and/or that their understanding of the natural world isn't one respected as scientific by the people calling them "in tune with nature," depending on the culture in question.

[Damon_Tor]

Wait a minute. How does dwarven reproduction work?

Every so often during a dwarf's life, when he's feeling safe and happy, a hormonal shift inside him will trigger a particularly boisterous, gregarious mood, driving him to want to surround himself with close friends and get very very drunk. After this his hormones stabilize a bit, but he'll feel oddly compelled expand his dwelling and clean it. About a year later, he gets an intense longing for a son, and he'll generally pray to his Gods for one at this time. Several days later, a son (usually) arrives for him, an infant dwarf crawling out of the labyrinths beneath the holdfast. The father knows this is his son, as he's been expecting him (and it looks just like him) and they begin their life together as a family.

Dwarves are unaware of the role their ale plays in this process, and generally don't connect the drinking binge with the child.

The yeast that ferments the dwarven ale survives inside the bodies of dwarves and produces spoors in their urine. The dwarves' urine carries their gametes as well. The dwarf whose gregarious mood initiated the drinking binge releases a large egg-like gamete while his drinking buddies produce more standard sperm. As the dwarves urinate, their gametes as well as the yeast spores flow into the septic caverns beneath the holdfast, where the yeast can feed on waste and grow into its next phase of the life cycle, large fungal cysts.

The dwarf sperm will find the larger gamete and eventually one will fertilize it. The resulting zygote will then implant into one of the fungal cysts much as a human zygote would implant into the lining of the uterus. The cyst feeds the embryo for about a year before it emerges as a dwarf infant. These infants are already quite mobile, able to crawl within minutes of leaving the cyst, and they instinctively climb up to the holdfast above where they find their fathers waiting for them. Dwarf children instinctively mash grain and add it to water, in the process contaminating the mixture with the yeast spores which still cling to their body hair, thus producing a new batch of ale, and the cycle is complete.

[Lord Vukodlak]

In my setting by default the soul of non-humans belong to their creator deities. Only by being a devout follower of another god(not necessarily a cleric). An Elf who never pays attention to the divines belongs to Corellon, a Dwarf to Moradin. An Orc to Grumish.

One of the reasons that "evil races" tend to be evil is their creator was evil and unless they are truly devout to another deity when they die their soul will go to their creator who will likely do very unpleasant things to them. And even if they are devout in those teaching that doesn't guarantee the god will claim them. And Orc who devotes his life to the forge, creation and Moradin is unlikely to be accepted into the Dwarven afterlife. At best Moradin will claim his soul and then have him reborn as a Dwarf.

Garl Glittergold on the otherhand would accept kobolds into his realm but only because it annoys Kurtulmak.

Humans were a collaborative effort by many of the gods, and thus that's why their culture and alignments are the most varied and the ones who can interbreed with other races most easily. If a Human wasn't very religious in life he's judged by Charon god of the dead and sent to whatever afterlife best suits his temperament... but after performing years of civil service on his realm of Judgement.


In the case of Hobgoblins over the course of a few centuries enough of them turned to the worship of Hiraxis god of Tyranny that he was able to wrestle control of the portfolio from Maglubiyet. So that by default the souls of Hobgoblins belong to him.

[GreyBlack]

Forest gnomes talk to their pets constantly, much like us crazy people do with our cats. In fact, because of how in tune with their woodland friends they are, they might just break into conversation with a cat in the middle of the market without realizing that none of the humans in the market have a clue of what the cat is saying.

[GreatWyrmGold]

Forest gnomes talk to their pets constantly, much like us crazy people do with our cats. In fact, because of how in tune with their woodland friends they are, they might just break into conversation with a cat in the middle of the market without realizing that none of the humans in the market have a clue of what the cat is saying.
I find that extremely unlikely. Have you met cats? I doubt they'd have much interest in conversation. Dogs, on the other hand...