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SteveLightblade
2022-02-24, 11:57 AM
This might belong in homebrew, but simply put, what changes do you usually make to standard fantasy races in terms of fluff, especially those found in D&D/Pathfinder?

From my homebrew setting from my last campaign I ran, these were my most notable changes

Elves: Lifespan similar to even slightly shorter than humans. Most of them in the setting do not exactly live in what could be called cities, and to me the race that gets a -2 to constitution living longer does not exactly make sense to me. Additionally, I'm not JRR Tolkien, and elves living forever was not an essential part of the setting.

Dwarves: Open and friendly to most people. Evil dragons hoard treasure; people who want food, clothes, and alcohol but do not have large amounts of area to produce organic resources, but instead have large quantities of valuable mineral resources, trade for them. Dwarvish merchants and nobles regularly hold citywide parties and banquets as business initiatives to draw in people with wealth, especially agricultural wealth, to make trade deals.

Orcs: Nomadic, but just as good or bad, as well as civilized, as any other individual. Also, like real nomadic groups, they don't just wander around aimlessly pillaging as they go, but actually have routes based on animal movements and seasonal climates. As an aggregate they could be considered a violent and warlike people, but so could pretty much every other civilization.

Gnomes: Perpetual edgy teenagers who live in statelets that get formed every five to ten years because everyone else isn't contrarian enough for them. I thought it would be a better take on chaotic and crazy fey people without doing LOLSORANDUMB. Also, my group absolutely loathes regular Pathfinder gnomes.

What about you guys?

KorvinStarmast
2022-02-24, 01:37 PM
what changes do you usually make to standard fantasy races in terms of fluff, especially those found in D&D/Pathfinder?

Elves: Avg lifespan 210. (Three score and ten tripled). Low birth rate. Mildly to heavily xenophobic, depends on where in the world they are. Heavy into astronomy, hold heavenly bodies in deep reverence. Always have extensive 'buffer' zones between their settlements and human settlements.

Dwarves Clannish, industrious, taciturn. Fast friends when friendship is made. Difficult to get to know. Do not have faux Scottish accents

Orcs: Varies with the campaign. In my longest kept world, they do not exist. (Most of that world is humans, plenty of good, bad, and ugly to go around with that group)

Gnomes: No longer exist in any of the worlds I have in my old file box.

Trask
2022-02-24, 01:50 PM
Most of the fluff changes I've made in my work adheres to trying to make fantasy races more distinct but without straying into weird and unplayable territory that I feel some DM's inadvertently do. I like to draw on classic fantasy and folklore first and foremost rather than modern sources, but I take inspiration wherever I find it really.

Some of the more interesting changes I've made:

I've emphasized the Elven connection to fey folk by elaborating on that vague connection. Elves are largely the descendants of fairies who lived close to humans, ate of human food, drank human wine, and so ingested "human-stuff" into their bodies which slowly but surely made them less fey-like over time. They are still far more magical than humans, but far less magical than fey as a result.

Dwarves were once a tall and beautiful race of giants who stole the secret of steel from the gods and so were punished with diminutive size (and a rather unlovely appearance), as well as with insatiable greed that they must satisfy by constantly digging in the earth. As a result they have become a very bitter and surly race, but retain great valor in battle and immense courage that other races find hard to match.

Dragonborn are hard to place for a lot of worldbuilders, just because they dont seem to naturally fit in anywhere (even in their "native" forgotten realms they're an anomaly) so I like to run with that rather than fight it. The first of the Mandrakes were summoned to this world by the church to serve as crusaders against evil. Although the war for which they were made has long since passed into history, they remain and find a place in the palaces of kings as knights and bodyguards, and in the fortresses of paladins sallying out against evil lands, as well as simply on the road as travelers from place to place. A race without a home, they are wandering warriors respected and feared by all they encounter. Nothing is known of the world from which they came, not even by the Mandrakes themselves except for folk tales.

Also while it might be an increasingly unpopular opinion in D&D circles, I still like my orcs to be pretty horrible. They can be reasoned with by alliance and parley, but they are famously fickle with such things and rarely honor them once it does not suit their interests. Orcs are pushed by their priests to fulfill their racial destiny of world conquest, and that is what they aim for at all times. It is important to remember that when dealing with an orc.

SteveLightblade
2022-02-24, 04:47 PM
Dragonborn are hard to place for a lot of worldbuilders, just because they dont seem to naturally fit in anywhere (even in their "native" forgotten realms they're an anomaly) so I like to run with that rather than fight it. The first of the Mandrakes were summoned to this world by the church to serve as crusaders against evil. Although the war for which they were made has long since passed into history, they remain and find a place in the palaces of kings as knights and bodyguards, and in the fortresses of paladins sallying out against evil lands, as well as simply on the road as travelers from place to place. A race without a home, they are wandering warriors respected and feared by all they encounter. Nothing is known of the world from which they came, not even by the Mandrakes themselves except for folk tales.

90% of the time my group usually ends up playing all humans since we play a lot of Pathfinder, but in the few times they play a different race that I forgot to include in the setting, I just ask them if they can come from another continent or something. I often don't plan out the entire world, so if they want something to exist, I can just put it somewhere irrelevant.


Also while it might be an increasingly unpopular opinion in D&D circles, I still like my orcs to be pretty horrible. They can be reasoned with by alliance and parley, but they are famously fickle with such things and rarely honor them once it does not suit their interests. Orcs are pushed by their priests to fulfill their racial destiny of world conquest, and that is what they aim for at all times. It is important to remember that when dealing with an orc.

I do have games with all evil orcs, since orcs are to D&D/most fantasy RPGs what stormtroopers are to Star Wars, but I usually reserve that for shorter, simpler games. It's the same thing if I want the bad guys in the campaign to be a cult. If it's a longer game, I'll spend time developing social aspects of the cult, why it's considered a heterodox religion, the effects on the member's psychology. However, in a shorter game, they'll just be all crazy people that just so happen to have casters with specific evil aligned spell loadouts. In longer campaigns, orcs get more nuance, in shorter campaigns, there's a more stark contrast of good and evil.

InvisibleBison
2022-02-24, 05:03 PM
I haven't had any opportunities to DM recently, so this is more a change I'd like to make, but I'd just love to get rid of the equivalency between race and culture. It's lazy worldbuilding and it promotes stale cliche characters.

PhoenixPhyre
2022-02-24, 05:15 PM
1. Strongly compressed lifespans. High elves (now named gwerin) are the longest lived at ~200. Dwarves next at ~150. Wood elves & gnomes end up at 120-ish. Everyone else is in the 80-100 range.

2. Culture =/= race.

3. Split apart the elven subraces into actually separate races. And most of them don't like each other.

4. Dark elves are radically different in all ways other than skin color.

5. Halflings are weird. Three sexes (fertile female, fertile male, neuter), strong disparities in sex ratios (very few males live to birth), litter-style births. So they're weakly eusocial, like bees.

6. Goblinoids are all one race. Goblins are the base race, which shares a tribal memory. A single goblin has very little long-term memory. Basically a human-intelligence cat with hands and a toddler's sense of object permanence. A tribe is normal, although they tend to be all over the place (constantly trying things, dropping them half-way through and starting something else). When under stress, a tribe pours its energy (unconsciously or consciously) into a few, who transform into hobgoblins (neuter leaders, not connected as hard to the tribal memory because they have a copy of it) and bugbears (fighting/labor forms). This transformation is temporary--if the tribe's stress goes down, they revert. But most live most of their lives that way.

7. Only elves, dwarves, goblins, and goliaths are "natural". All the others were artificially created at discrete points in history, mostly out of goblins (or further out of humans, who were created out of goblins). Mostly by elves (or their ancestors), who had a fascination and talent for biological magic.

8. Goliaths, giants, and dwarves are all tightly related. Specifically, giants are what you get when you subject a goliath to rune-based rewriting. And dwarves share a direct ancestor species with goliaths and were forcibly degenerated as part of the titan (the progenitor race)/wyrm (ancestors of the dragons) wars. Not by the dragons, by their own who wanted to fuel a "final weapon". It failed, causing the titans to degenerate into the goliaths. Giants are a later (failed) attempt to try to produce something like an old titan.

LecternOfJasper
2022-02-24, 05:58 PM
I haven't had any opportunities to DM recently, so this is more a change I'd like to make, but I'd just love to get rid of the equivalency between race and culture. It's lazy worldbuilding and it promotes stale cliche characters.

I've done a bit of this in my current game, mainly with the subraces, as it's annoying and I don't like it. There are plenty of different races in most of the various groups and cultures around, though some of the more secretive/cloistered ones are more monolithic (mainly the elves, unfortunately). I also include Faction bonuses, which are similar to a bonus feat with benefits related to the character's starting faction/history.

This game/world is much closer to a standard D&Desque world than what I usually do, mainly because my players told me the earlier games weren't grounded enough for them to understand what's going on or have a clear idea of how they should react to things. A lot of things are in threes as well.

For the elves, their traditions and histories have given rise to a number of spirits that embody those traditions and histories, that they tend to revere. There are three main bodies of elves in three of the main forests that are left after the serious rearranging of the landscape the last 1000 years had wrought.

Tritons hold power in a rather large and stable civilization (only partially underwater) in the warmer reaches of the world, and generally have grand orators and schools that teach the finer points of oration, diplomacy, science and the arts.

Dwarves, I admit, I haven't changed much, as one of my players is leaning into the aesthetic pretty hard.

Dragonborn weren't a thing until someone discovered in somewhat recent history (past 300 years) how to turn into one, so a bunch of unchecked fools with newfound fire in their hearts started a big bloody war. After a variety of dramatic events (being stalled until they, er, ran out of fuel, I'd rather not detail it here just in case), they called it a draw, gave back what could be given, and helped rebuild. Most of the mainline civilizations have officially forgiven those involved (and they've all died of old age) but there are a few groups on both sides who still believe the war could've been won.

Yuan-ti were elvish royalty who got tricked/made a deal with strange serpent like figures from Beyond the Veil for great power. Overthrown a few thousand years ago, most people that aren't elves know why they look so weird, and the main enclaves that participated in the coup generally aren't telling people. They aren't all literally unable to feel emotion, but they are all a bit crazed, and a few of them still have ties to the dark powers that changed them.

There is a big group of mainly orcs and humans called the Khorrmari that once had a major hold over the realm through worship of AZA, the god of knowledge and power, (predating even the elves, who were more unified at this point), and were cut down by the elves when they tried to do a really stupid grab for power. In a desperate bid, one of the elvish lords literally shot the eye out of AZA's high priest while they were channeling the god's full might, which broke SEVERAL things about the Khorrmari people, who collapsed and were relegated to the badlands to the south where these fights took place.

So I guess, TLDR; Dragonborn are made of people and dragonstuff, Yuan-ti are corrupted elves, Tritons Matter, and orcs were more individually and societally intelligent once. Also subraces aren't region/faction specific, and most cultures have a decent mix of races thrown about at this point.

Pex
2022-02-24, 06:02 PM
In my world kobolds are Team Good Guys. They believe themselves descended from or related to dragons. They had a Civil War and those who follow "The Metallic Path" won. They abhor slavery and are determined to earn the respect of everyone.

When the world was created 19 Entities wanted to be the gods but there were only 18 positions, two of each alignment. One volunteered to renounce his claim if he could take one Portfolio to be his alone of utmost Mastery. This Entity happened to be Lawful Good. The Good Entities reluctantly agreed for the sake of Harmony. The Neutral Entities were fine with it as it settled the matter. The Evil Entities agreed since he would take something they didn't want any. They were horribly mistaken. The Entity took for himself the Portfolio of Undead. While the Evil Entities screamed in rage the Others had fits of laughter for Evil was deprived of a potent weapon.

Becoming the first Lich he strictly controlled the prevalence of Undead. Because he wasn't a deity he wasn't powerful enough to prevent Undead from existing at all, but he was the Lord Of Undead. In game terms, because of him no Undead creature from any sourcebook not of the Monster Manual can exist. He can directly interfere to stop someone from becoming a Lich if they're not clever enough to hide it from him. He allows those who follow his teaching to become Liches which he calls his Disciples. What this Entity does is redeem undead. He can soothe the spirit of a Ghost. Vampire spawn whose master is slain are liberated from bondage and join his flock. He can satiate the hunger of Ghouls. His Mummies guard sacred holy places. Undead of his Church, usually Wights, travel in disguise to do works of philanthropy. The Lich has his own Undead Army ready to fight against a world threat. Not all Undead are his Followers. The typical flesh hunting and eating monstrosities do exist, but Undead are not a major threat to the world. They are a major defender.

Warforged are recently spawning. A powerful artifact was destroyed releasing energy onto the world. It has caused side effects, such as psionics, but mechanical creatures/golems have been given the Spark that elevates them from automatons to living creatures. The good news is they aren't rampaging across the world like an army of Terminators, but the environment in which they gained their sentience can influence individual behavior as they learn about what it means to be alive. There is suspicion the God of Knowledge, the Forge, and Craft had a hand in this.

Fiery Diamond
2022-02-24, 07:16 PM
In my world kobolds are Team Good Guys. They believe themselves descended from or related to dragons. They had a Civil War and those who follow "The Metallic Path" won. They abhor slavery and are determined to earn the respect of everyone.

When the world was created 19 Entities wanted to be the gods but there were only 18 positions, two of each alignment. One volunteered to renounce his claim if he could take one Portfolio to be his alone of utmost Mastery. This Entity happened to be Lawful Good. The Good Entities reluctantly agreed for the sake of Harmony. The Neutral Entities were fine with it as it settled the matter. The Evil Entities agreed since he would take something they didn't want any. They were horribly mistaken. The Entity took for himself the Portfolio of Undead. While the Evil Entities screamed in rage the Others had fits of laughter for Evil was deprived of a potent weapon.

Becoming the first Lich he strictly controlled the prevalence of Undead. Because he wasn't a deity he wasn't powerful enough to prevent Undead from existing at all, but he was the Lord Of Undead. In game terms, because of him no Undead creature from any sourcebook not of the Monster Manual can exist. He can directly interfere to stop someone from becoming a Lich if they're not clever enough to hide it from him. He allows those who follow his teaching to become Liches which he calls his Disciples. What this Entity does is redeem undead. He can soothe the spirit of a Ghost. Vampire spawn whose master is slain are liberated from bondage and join his flock. He can satiate the hunger of Ghouls. His Mummies guard sacred holy places. Undead of his Church, usually Wights, travel in disguise to do works of philanthropy. The Lich has his own Undead Army ready to fight against a world threat. Not all Undead are his Followers. The typical flesh hunting and eating monstrosities do exist, but Undead are not a major threat to the world. They are a major defender.

Warforged are recently spawning. A powerful artifact was destroyed releasing energy onto the world. It has caused side effects, such as psionics, but mechanical creatures/golems have been given the Spark that elevates them from automatons to living creatures. The good news is they aren't rampaging across the world like an army of Terminators, but the environment in which they gained their sentience can influence individual behavior as they learn about what it means to be alive. There is suspicion the God of Knowledge, the Forge, and Craft had a hand in this.

Okay, this is pretty awesome. Thanks for sharing!

Like some others, I also make the long-lived races shorter lived than the default. I also tend to make the "civilized" races have certain tendencies, but otherwise be socially and intellectually the same as humans. For example, gnomes have a penchant for creating things and tend to be curious, but that doesn't mean all gnomes are inventors or suicidally "curiosity killed the cat." Dwarves tend toward being industrious and enjoying physical work, but that doesn't mean all of them are blacksmiths or miners. Elves... well, okay, apart from living longer than humans do, I usually have Elves be pretty much identical to humans, just with a physical tendency toward appearances that humans find beautiful - hence the prevalence of half-elves, despite low birth rates for cross-race unions. Most of the time, I do not have societies that are predominantly one race, unless that race is human.

As for "monster races," like goblins, kobolds, and orcs, that varies a lot depending on campaign. In one story I was working on set in a D&D setting, orcs were basically wandering tribes that were ruled by the strongest, and had no more tendency toward evil than any other race. They were, however, usually more violent - but not necessarily more aggressive. Disputes settled by combat, frequent nonlethal fights among themselves where nobody held a grudge afterward, those sorts of things. The protagonists of that story interacted with three separate orc tribes: one was split along by loyalties along Good/Evil lines after an evil orc killed and took the position of the previous good orc leader; one was entirely Good, and one was a bunch of fanatics following an Evil leader who had gained special powers.

I like kobolds, so I usually don't run kobolds as straight evil. Goblins... well, I usually have goblins as the baddies, so not much change there.

Xuc Xac
2022-02-24, 08:58 PM
Elves and Dwarves regard each other as siblings by the same mother―the Earth goddess. They are both part of the same tree. The elves are the leafy branches that reach for the sky―hence the elvish fascination with stars, the sun and moon, and greenery. The dwarves are the roots―sturdy, strong, and unrelenting in their drive to dig ever deeper.

Orcs are vegetarians most of the time, because they believe you are what you eat. Eating the flesh of lesser beasts only dilutes your true orcish power. The only flesh they will eat is that of powerful beasts like dragons, mastodons, and whales. They will occasionally ritually cannibalize a fallen hero as a show of respect for their power. Most of the time, they only eat (large amounts of) grains, mushrooms, and vegetables, because they see flora as the flesh of the earth, which is mighty indeed.

Melayl
2022-02-24, 11:38 PM
This might belong in homebrew, but simply put, what changes do you usually make to standard fantasy races in terms of fluff, especially those found in D&D/Pathfinder?

From my homebrew setting from my last campaign I ran, these were my most notable changes

Elves: Lifespan similar to even slightly shorter than humans. Most of them in the setting do not exactly live in what could be called cities, and to me the race that gets a -2 to constitution living longer does not exactly make sense to me. Additionally, I'm not JRR Tolkien, and elves living forever was not an essential part of the setting.

Dwarves: Open and friendly to most people. Evil dragons hoard treasure; people who want food, clothes, and alcohol but do not have large amounts of area to produce organic resources, but instead have large quantities of valuable mineral resources, trade for them. Dwarvish merchants and nobles regularly hold citywide parties and banquets as business initiatives to draw in people with wealth, especially agricultural wealth, to make trade deals.

Orcs: Nomadic, but just as good or bad, as well as civilized, as any other individual. Also, like real nomadic groups, they don't just wander around aimlessly pillaging as they go, but actually have routes based on animal movements and seasonal climates. As an aggregate they could be considered a violent and warlike people, but so could pretty much every other civilization.

Gnomes: Perpetual edgy teenagers who live in statelets that get formed every five to ten years because everyone else isn't contrarian enough for them. I thought it would be a better take on chaotic and crazy fey people without doing LOLSORANDUMB. Also, my group absolutely loathes regular Pathfinder gnomes.

What about you guys?

I very much like this take on the races!

Shpadoinkle
2022-02-25, 05:48 PM
Lifespans for most core races are significantly shortened. Elves max out at around age 200. Dwarves top out at around 180, gnomes 150, and halflings and half-elves 120. These ages are approximately equivalent to a human of 80 or so.

A race that regularly lives 800 years should have a perspective and mindset that's virtually unfathomable to (and unplayable by) the average human. 800 year-old elves just makes a lot of things make no sense or not work very well. "Oh hey, I know this place that's been abandoned for 500 years, my uncle Dave helped build it, he told me about it! Heck, he even carved his name right there, see? Man, wait until I tell him I've been here!" Ehh... doesn't really work for me.

Orcs aren't a race of roving, destructive marauders (that role is filled mostly by ogres.) They tend towards nomadic and mostly make their living as hunters of dangerous or rare creatures, or just live off the land. Need a glabrezu heart or two dozen manticore spines? Might as well check with the local orc clans, probably they've killed a few and harvested any valuable body parts. Need a guide for this dangerous mountain pass? Hire an orc from the area, they know these lands better than anybody, and so on.

Jay R
2022-02-26, 03:01 PM
It will change from one game to the next. The introduction to my last game I ran included the following:

DO NOT assume that you know anything about any fantasy creatures. I will re-write many monsters and races, introduce some not in D&D, and eliminate some. The purpose is to make the world strange and mysterious. It will allow (require) PCs to learn, by trial and error, what works. Most of these changes I will not tell you in advance. Here are a couple, just to give you some idea what I mean.
1. Dragons are not color-coded for the benefit of the PCs.
2. Of elves, dwarves, gnomes, halflings, kobolds, goblins, and orcs, at least one does not exist, at least one is slightly different from the books, and at least one is wildly different.
3. Several monsters have different alignments from the books.
4. The name of an Undead will not tell you what will or won’t hurt it.
5. The first time you see a member of a humanoid race, I will describe it as a “vaguely man-shaped creature.” This could be a kobold, an elf, or an Umber Hulk until you learn what they are.

I do not assume that sentient races have defined alignments. I do, however, assume that the nearest group of any sentient race will have a culture that is primarily based on the alignments that my players are going to expect. The nearest tribe of orcs or goblins will very likely be an evil culture, based on raiding villages. That doesn't mean every member of the tribe is evil. Obviously they will have been brought up in an evil society, which increases the likelihood that an individual is evil, but it isn't automatic.

More importantly, the presence of evil raiding orcs near the PCs' home doesn't say anything about orcs far away. There could be a culture of neutral sea-faring trader orcs in the Great Sea, or peaceful good orc farming communities on another continent.

I never have halflings; I have hobbits. When I started playing D&D, hobbits were included. I understand that TSR had to stop using the name for a commercial venture, but I don't make any money off of D&D, and I still have hobbits.

Also, based on watching the glorious battle scene of wildings vs. the undead in Game of Thrones, I have a new approach to corporeal undead who cannot be hurt with non-magical weapons. They can't be damaged by the weapon, but they are still subject to physics. They can be knocked down or back; they can have an arm cut off; etc. [I have not run a game since watching that, so I don't know completely how I will handle it, but I will have the player roll for damage, and will make a call based on how much damage it might have done. Bludgeoning weapons are more likely to knock a creature back; slashing weapons are more likely to cut something off. Piercing weapons won't do much, but will run the body through. On the next action, a strong PC might be able to use it as a handle to throw the creature elsewhere, like casting with a fishing rod.]

Anonymouswizard
2022-02-26, 04:32 PM
I'm leaning more towards all human, although I definitely do the compressed lifespans thing. The absolute oldest elves get to near 300, dwarves reach the mid hundreds, and everybody else tends to have their bodies give out in their early hundreds. Immortality is achievable, as shown by the ancient elves, but good luck getting them to admit that anybody else can do it (and the requirements aren't nice anyway, we're talking mass human sacrifice or the equivalent).

Dwarves are the ones I've changed the most. Long beards are out, they're just not practical, male dwarves have neatly cropped beards. But they wear their hair long, generally braided or tied back, and take good care of their appearances* due to their pride and vanity. They also have a cultural tendency towards specialisation, a dwarf will generally pick a trade in childhood and then practice it for the rest of their life. Their pride also means they do not wish to be separated from their tools and carry them everywhere, which causes dwarven warriors trouble when travelling abroad with openly displayed arms. Beer is also mostly out, dwarves primarily drink spirits and make the best cocktails.

* And they take the elves' place as 'attractive nonhumans'. It's the CON boost.

Gnoman
2022-02-26, 04:46 PM
In my world, Elves are immune to time - they can die of violence or disease, and go from children to adult to aged, but suffer no infirmities and will not simply perish of age. They are also cross-fertile with anything, which has produced nearly all of the various "monsters" and oddball races like Centaurs; and have a deeply ingrained wanderlust and crusading spirit that tends to get them killed young.

Orcs are physically strong and innately magical.

Both are fully integrated into human society and culture, whatever that happens to be.

Kapow
2022-02-26, 05:59 PM
I haven't had any opportunities to DM recently, so this is more a change I'd like to make, but I'd just love to get rid of the equivalency between race and culture. It's lazy worldbuilding and it promotes stale cliche characters.

I do this in the setting I'm building (for a long time)

Cultures aren't race specific either.
A human, gnome and a dwarf could come from the same culture of people settling in a forest area. Dwarves and gnomes would be rarer.
Starting class options are also tied to starting culture.
A desert (not-) half-orc won't start as a "Tidal Sorcerer" or Pirate for example.

There are three cultures, which are race exclusive though, higher levels of the dwarven theocracy (necromancy, ghosts and ancestor worship), gnomish magocracy (arrogant and infighting heads of magic academies) and the oasis dwelling (not) half-orcs (isolationist fugitives from dwarven persecution)

The Glyphstone
2022-02-26, 06:32 PM
My perpetually-in-development setting mostly strips out the expected 'core' races, but several of them are close enough to be X-by-another-name.


Elves Sidhelings, formed from the essence of fey, have roughly the same lifespan as humans, but grow to maturity much faster and decline quickly and abruptly at the end. Rather than being 'pretty', they tend to invoke an Uncanny Valley effect by having eyes a little too big, or joints that bend just a little too far, etc. They are cross-compatible with humans, the only two races that are, but any children are automatically sidhelings.

Dragonborn Scalekin are formed from the essence of dragons, and suffer from a sort of inferiority complex due to this quasi-divine ancestry. Most form nomadic tribes, and the tribal culture heavily revolves around young adults declaring a great feat they will accomplish to prove themselves worthy of their heritage, and effectively going into exile until they can return home with proof of having made good on their boast.

Dwarves Stoneborn are, in the current draft, formed from the essence of earth and more like a sort of earth elemental than a living being. Formed from craggy living stone, they deliberately sculpt their bodies to present the appearance they think represents them best. Instead of outright dying like other races, they progressively become slower and more craggy at the end of their lives until they're essentially statues that think glacially slow thoughts and commune with the earth. But they're the odd ones out, and I think they'll get replaced with a race of mole-people in the next iteration.

Fiery Diamond
2022-02-26, 08:27 PM
My perpetually-in-development setting mostly strips out the expected 'core' races, but several of them are close enough to be X-by-another-name.


Elves Sidhelings, formed from the essence of fey, have roughly the same lifespan as humans, but grow to maturity much faster and decline quickly and abruptly at the end. Rather than being 'pretty', they tend to invoke an Uncanny Valley effect by having eyes a little too big, or joints that bend just a little too far, etc. They are cross-compatible with humans, the only two races that are, but any children are automatically sidhelings.

Dragonborn Scalekin are formed from the essence of dragons, and suffer from a sort of inferiority complex due to this quasi-divine ancestry. Most form nomadic tribes, and the tribal culture heavily revolves around young adults declaring a great feat they will accomplish to prove themselves worthy of their heritage, and effectively going into exile until they can return home with proof of having made good on their boast.

Dwarves Stoneborn are, in the current draft, formed from the essence of earth and more like a sort of earth elemental than a living being. Formed from craggy living stone, they deliberately sculpt their bodies to present the appearance they think represents them best. Instead of outright dying like other races, they progressively become slower and more craggy at the end of their lives until they're essentially statues that think glacially slow thoughts and commune with the earth. But they're the odd ones out, and I think they'll get replaced with a race of mole-people in the next iteration.

Gonna be honest, that last one sounds like something out of horror. I think I'd rather cease to exist than have that final fate.

Grim Portent
2022-02-26, 10:46 PM
Well for a setting I'm currently tinkering with;

Orcs and goblins are slave races created by a long dead and largely forgotten dwarven sorcerer-king, the former as shock troops and the latter as gofers and household servants, which have since spread to other places and are mostly free but suffer from prejudice. Some have attributed their creator with mythical status, but largely they idealise more recent cultural heroes unique to their individual groups.

Dwarves are split into four broad ethnic groups, Greater (tall dwarves) Lesser (shorter dwarves) Black (survived a long volcanic event) and Green (nomadic exiles), with those ethnic groups being divided up into kingdoms and cultures, with each ethnic group having different gods. All of them tend to dislike dwarves of other races due to long standing baggage, and prejudice within an ethnic group is normal between differet cultures, kingdoms and regions.

Elves are theoretically immortal, but due to a self inflicted curse they tend to commit ritual suicide around 500 years old. The magical rites that gave them such a long lifespan as a race also brought them closer to a primordial state, which in setting means closer to being demons. As an elf ages they become more and more likely to spontaneously turn into a monster, with the likelihood spiking dramatically after 500 years. So they hold a pre-funeral of sorts, say their goodbyes and sort out who inherits what, then kill themselves in a manner deemed fitting by their culture. Due to the curse they've been forced into a nomadic liftstyle and are victims of widespread prejudice, with no one else really wanting a permanent elven community nearby.

Trolls are another magically created race, resembling humans with extreme gigantism and occasionally animal like features. Trolls are born nearly the size of adult humans, and grow for as long as they live. Due to their rather extreme anatomies they live in constant pain of varying degrees, leading to them almost all being short tempered and extremely irritable. This has led to something of a gradual degeneration of them as a species, with cycles of neglectful parenting, substance abuse and violence resulting in them being less likely to be educated or functional in a social setting than most other races. Other races can help mitigate this, and create an environment in which a troll can grow to be a member of their society, but such relationships tend to last only for as long as the community has need of the adult troll's labour.

The Glyphstone
2022-02-27, 07:33 AM
Gonna be honest, that last one sounds like something out of horror. I think I'd rather cease to exist than have that final fate.

It does come across in re-reading as more horrific than I think it was meant to be originally. Less 'I have no mouth and I must scream', more like LotR Ents on steroids. Becoming one with the earth and all that, no longer concerned with things that happen on mortal time scales.

Anonymouswizard
2022-02-27, 08:29 AM
It does come across in re-reading as more horrific than I think it was meant to be originally. Less 'I have no mouth and I must scream', more like LotR Ents on steroids. Becoming one with the earth and all that, no longer concerned with things that happen on mortal time scales.

Yeah, this how I saw it. Just a natural progression that's slow enough for them to get used to it, until eventually they're moving on the timescale of continents.



Because the setting I'm currently building is for Fantasy AGE rather than D&D I'm considering having elves be mostly completely replaced by the Beastfolk from the companion. Essentially they'll be escaped serfs from Faerie, with a chaotic mixture of animal features and a tendency towards nomadic hunter-gatherer lifestyles. They considered attractive in a 'look at the cute ickle fuzzikins' way rather than a sexual way, and have a goo relationship with the dwarves due to a tendency to trade animal skins and high quality wood for metal tools whenever they camp by one of their cities. Also slightly shorter lived than humans, although the average lifespan is similar thanks to disease and violence.

Elves, if kept, will be ethereal and magical precursor remnants, and aren't in the PC-appropriate camp at the moment. Humans, dwarves, and halflings were created as elven slaves and there's a lot of bad blood. This is because on my experience everybody plays a bloody elf or half-elf, so I want other races to make up most parties.

These are, of course, mostly the primary cultures among each species. Go to any culture and you'll find natives of every race, except elves.

Asmotherion
2022-02-27, 09:39 AM
Elves: Eat plenty of meat, and are good hunters. Post age 20, they age 1 year per 10 years of life. They come from a neighboring planet based on the feywild.

Dwarves: While they still are excelent blacksmiths, they have a rich Runes tradition and run the most successful bank in my setting. They are essentially short giants, cousins to the Giant race. They are also relativelly taller than in most settings, ranging from 4'5" to 5'3", and are only called Dwarves because they so small compared to giants. As giants, they come from moons of a Gas Giant Planet.

Humans: While not exactly a change, the bonus feat they gain determines their origin.

Gnomes: Essentially a variant of small elves.

Halfings: Small Humans.

Dragonborn: They come from an exoplanet and worship Dragons as God-Emperors. Their culture is looselly based on Ancient Egypt.

Kobolts: Small Dragonborn.

Hobgoblins: They have a rich culture were Pride and Code of Honor is everything. They come from a planet loosely based on Japanese Mythology.

Goblins: Small Hobgoblins.

Orcs: They have a strong sence of tribalism, and consider their tribe an extension of themselves. They share a limited form of Hivemind with their tribe, where they communicate telepathically. Their culture is looselly based on a pop culture depiction of martians, and their planet looks similar to Mars. They come in Green, Blue and Red.

Dienekes
2022-02-27, 02:08 PM
Well let's see. There's a little mechanics in here, but it's always for the fluff.

I'll start with elves. Elves in my world are fairly Tolkienesque in some ways. They are essentially immortal, and prone to the melancholy and malaise that Tolkien weaved through them. The difference is where they go from here. Because of the crushing weight of their own existence, most elves use their Trance to hide away decades or even centuries of their life. They can call upon them, but this can lead to problems. In mechanics, elves can call upon their many years to gain half proficiency in any skill, tool, or language. Only one at a time and per Long Rest. But any attempt to do that, gives them a chance of having whatever tragedies are tied to that knowledge come back to them, and they gain a debilitating status effect called Grief-Stricken. The more often they use this ability the higher chance they gain the condition.

The exception is one character called the Eternal King, the lord of the elves, who claims to be the child of the Elven Gods and has knowledge of the entirety of his life. And he does this, by essentially living a completely sociopathic and hedonistic existence. No loss ever really fazes him, and his life is surrounded by whatever pleasure he wants. He is also possibly the most powerful character in the setting.

My boys, the dwarves, are actually all descendants of the slaves of the first real empire. The ogres were once the rules of the known world, essentially Oni in 5e or Ogre Mages in earlier editions. They used the dwarves as laborers and slave soldiers and frequently as food and sacrifice. Eventually all this boiled over to a massive revolt where thanks to some magical shenanigans the ogres were brought low and their natural intelligence and skill at magic was broken creating the standard ogre. But a few of the true Ogre Lords remain, each of them transforming themselves into dwarves and taking the lead that way. There are now three dwarven kingdoms, each (possibly) headed by one of the remaining Ogre Lords. And they all hate each other. Whatever the dwarves were first is unknown, but what is the dwarf today has been completely shaped by what the Ogre Lords wanted from them. They were shaped to be small and sturdy to work in mines and collect important ores and jewels for the Ogres. They were given surprisingly long and dexterous fingers for crafting those jewels. Even their minds were shaped in such a way that they focus and master one thing at a time. Dwarven smiths are the best in the world, because when a dwarf is tasked with performing that action their entire mind and body will go into working that one thing until they get as close as possible to perfection. As such their minds are very difficult to convince either with magic or words, especially when whatever is being said or done is going against what their current focus is. However, should a dwarf not have a focus, or somehow become unable to perform the task that they have set for themselves, well, the ogres had no need for a slave that couldn't work. And a dwarf will wither away into little more than a twisted stone.

Orcs are in a somewhat precarious state. They are often considered to be the wild peoples off in the wastelands where no civilization could survive. But, the orcs are surviving pretty darn well, and they have their own cultures and identities. That doesn't stop others from looking down from them with a bit of fear and revulsion though. And there is some reason for it. Orcish raids along borders are incredibly common, since, again, they live in a place called the wastes and they are bordered with good sized kingdoms and empires with lots of nice farmland. It is pretty common throughout history for various cultures to try and conquer into the wastes for one reason or another, and the Orcs have thrown them back every single time. This has made them fairly militarily capable, and so there is often a crossing over of Orcish mercenaries pretty everywhere that can afford them. These mercenary armies are more like traveling cities than anything else. They take a contract and do the war, and then they're just there. Sometimes they're given land and territory, other times they just move on. Sometimes to other places that require mercenary work. But it is not unheard of for some of these groups to cause a bit of trouble when times are lean. This has culminated into a lot of bad blood between the orcs and basically everyone. But it's largely one sided, while not every Orcish mercenary band, tribe, or kingdom is the same they tend to be fairly egalitarian. Sure there is definitely a species of creature called Orcs, you can look at see the tusks. But if you fight with your brothers and sisters, take your share of the burdens, and provide food for those who need it, then to many that makes you as much of an orc as anyone else. This has led to a lot of "Orc Clans" ending up being led or advised by humans, and creates a nice abundance of half-orcs.

The last of the real important factions are Hobgoblins, who are a vicious expansionist empire from the West. Which is basically the worst parts of Rome, Sparta, and the Mongols wrapped up together. Goblinoid isn't really a thing, exactly, other than just an easy grouping to give to all these people within this empire. Really, it's just that Hobgoblins have conquered the goblins and bugbears and see them as a second class of citizen. In effect, the Hobgoblins see themselves as the descendants of the fallen Ogre Empire and will carry on its legacy. And there may be a kernel of truth to that, but whatever the case, when the Hobgoblins come things get serious. But it does lead to a lot of fun, for me anyway, since the players can interact with members of each of these three peoples and try and figure out the internal divisions. To the outside, the Hobgoblin Empire looks like one massive colossal coordinated empire. But there are definite factions and fractures going on.

ngilop
2022-02-27, 03:13 PM
Orcs: Orcs are not warhammer-esque in my campaign world. They are gray to black skinned and have rage as a racial feature and are almost always evil. This is because Orcs were spawned from the drops of blood Gruumsh shed during his battle, wherein he lost his eye to Corellon. Being born of the deific anger of a god tends to make one also angry.

Ogres: Used to be for lack of better term. a perfect race. Their physical stats were the same, but their mental stats did not have the penalty (in my notes it seems I go back and forth over giving them a bonus to int or not) Just just did themselves in in trying to wipe out their biggest rivals, it backfired and destroyed their mental capacities. Every once in a great while a smart (for an ogre) one pops up but that is rooster teeth rare.

Hobgoblins: Hobgoblins are roman/greek. By that I mean they prima facie seem roman, but instead of being a unified empire are comprised of individual city states more like the greeks. They are still warlike and tend to be in at least a 'warm' war (minor disputes and skirmishes) at all times. I made them Lawful Neutral.

Goblins: are lazy. While they could make a great civilization that equals any of the PhB races, they just are not motivated enough as a race to do that. Instead taking what others have worked hard to do and achieve.

Elves: Elves were at one time the pinnacle and when humans, dwarves, and the rest were starting to make inroad to become substantive civilization they went "oh they are not as good as us, we are superior, lets ignore everything they do" Then in a dozen or so elven generations they had https://wallpapercave.com/wp/wp5338275.jpg this face when they found humans had gotten decent magic, gnomes has crazy clockwork stuff going on, and dawrves had massive industry going on and are now trying to play catch up.

Gnomes: Gnomes were actually a form of dwarf created by Garl. When a big cosmic battle happened Garl took his dwarves and hid them in the Fae. Time works and/or doesn't work differently there and so when he brought them back (which he may or may not have forgotten he even did it to begin with) they were changed. infused with a bit of the essence of the fae themselves. They were far enough removed from their origin that they were no longer dwarves. The gnomes had soem neew dieties as well that came with them and so Garl and Moradin agreed to stay close allies, indeed calling the new race cousins to dwarves that came with their own brand new pantheon.

Kobolds: are back to their pre 3rd ed lore, nothing at all to do with being mini-dragonborn things.

Humans: actually, have different cultures instead of the mono-culture that other races have. This in part is why they have been so successful and why a lot of other races just don't get humans. Why can they travel over a mountain and the human speak different, wear different types of clothes, and their buildings all look different?

Eladrinblade
2022-02-27, 03:20 PM
I stick to the core races, and I stick close to what people expect of them. My setting is just a small part of a world (750 mile wide circle); I don't bother with what's outside it, so my races really are cultures.

Humans: Western europeans, basically ("Cydonians"). Castles, lords, peasants, etc. Are mostly LN. Typically brown hair, light skin, grey eyes.

Elves: Tall, long-limbed, thin, beautiful, straight blonde hair, blue-eyed, fair-skinned, soft with sharp features. +2 int, -2 con. Are mostly CG. Maturity at 25, middle-aged at 75, old at 125, venerable at 175, up to about 220. I actually like the elves from 3.5 PHB/MM the most, but these are closer to what people expect.

Dwarves: About the same, except less rowdy scottish clansmen and more serious mountain kings. Hair has metallic tones/colors, irises like brightly-colored gemstones, skin has shade and coloration of various stones but is only slightly harder than other races skins. Are mostly LG. Between elves and humans in lifespan.

Hobbits: Curly "red" (orange) hair, green eyes, pale skin w/freckles, small, round-featured. +2 wis, -2 str. Are mostly NG. +2 alchemy. Similar to Tolkiens, but less "staid british countryfolk" and more "plucky positive irish countryfolk" except not so much on drinking (more eating/cooking instead). Excellent farmers, cooks, service professionals in general. Between dwarves and humans in lifespan. They live in between several of the other races and are largely unmolested (except by goblins mainly) because they give away excess food and have agreements with others for protection.

Gnomes: Garden gnomes. Tiny-sized fey non-player race. Live in mushrooms and burrows in the forests/hills. Illusion magic, speak with burrowing mammals, etc.

Orcs: Same general size as Cydonians, but heavier due to more muscle mass. Black/blue-black straight smooth hair, brick-red eyes, green/gray-green skinned or tan/light brown, short kinda-porcine noses, tusks. Can look like anything between Conan with small tusks, to Azog, to a typical green warcraft orc (though smaller). Are generally CN. Somewhat shorter lived than humans. +2 str, -2 int. Along with elves, they are the only other playable race with low-light vision.

They have a few different societies that have a lot in common with each other, and are more widespread in the setting than the other races, though they also have a "homeland" where they are the clear majority. Some live as raider clans out of fortified locations, most have a scottish hill-clan kind of society, some are nomadic bison hunters, some are reclusive lumberjacks. They have a single primitive stone city in the setting.

Goblins: Bald or smooth straight black hair, yellow eyes with somewhat slitted pupils, tight/wiry, long/pointed noses OR wide/flat noses, kinda wide flat skulls, long pointy ears sticking out as much sideways as back, corners of mouth go farther back. Are generally NE. +2 dex, -2 wis, fast for their size. The most evil of the playable humanoid races. Are basically lotr orcs, stick to the underground, live primarily by raiding/scavenging/thievery/hunting. Short-lived. Along with dwarves, they are the only other playable race with darkvision.

Kobolds: Basically as you know them, but less physically pathetic and live in deserts, or the volcanic mountains area as servants/slaves of the fire giants. Imagine small-sized argonians without horns or frills and that's pretty close. +2 cha, no penalties. Have a weak bite attack with a weak anticoagulant poison. No darkvision or low-light vision. Tend to have slicker/smoother and more brightly-colored scales.
Are generally LE. Imagine reptilian al-qaeda/viet-cong. Once had a more advanced civilization (or believe they did) and want to re-acquire that greatness.

Saurians: Lizardfolk-lite, prefer wet areas but range around in small bandit/raider clans. The least civilized playable race, have hardly any civilization but have been known to stack stones in the past. 2 claws and a bite. +2 con, -2 cha. Are generally CE. Tend to have rougher/duller scales.

Gnolls: Tall, long-limbed, kinda greenish/beige fur that may have some spots or stripes, look similar to 4e gnolls. Are large-sized monstrous humanoids but their stats are almost the same; the smallest large-sized race. Savannah/steppe hunters, use bows and spears (a step up in damage, but not fully large-sized). They were elves who were magically mixed with wargs into one cursed evil race. Not a player race, but take up territory on the map like one. Use wargs like humans use dogs.

Sahuagin are the one fully-aquatic race, but don't have a fancy underwater civilizations since that's basically impossible. They live in the shallow waters of the continental crusts and frequently raid sea-side areas.
There are no ogres or hill giants; stone giants are the smallest/weakest giant and are split between neutral groups and evil groups.
Frost giants are vikings who live in the arctic but go a-viking in winter in their massive timber longships.
Fire giants are a serious power in the setting; probably the single-most powerful but don't like to leave their volcanic not!mordor mountainous territory, but do love to exert their power and generally be tyrannical *******s to the smaller races.
Cloud giants are reclusive; they come down from the clouds to gather and either trade or raid depending on their alignment.
Storm giants live in the sea and are mostly unknown.
Troglodytes and grimlocks are merged into one race, based on homm3 trogs. They are eyeless pure-NE savages who live deep underground, lower than goblins, and only come up to raid/hunt before going back down to brumate. +4 str/con, -4 int/cha. The most evil race.
Aside from goblins and trogs, the underworld is inhabitated by various monstrous aberrations, with undead in some areas. Of these, illithids are the only "civilized" race, but they are barely known to exist; they are very paranoid and manipulative, interacting with other races only through illusion and enchantment.
There are a few varieties of trolls (forest, cave, frost, mountain), which are monstrous humanoids that are only barely more intelligent than animals and have no societies.
Dragons are beasts, but the most impressive and powerful of them. Some get to huge-sized, only in legends are they known to reach gargantuan. They do not speak or cast spells, at least nobody knows if any do for sure. They are not friendly.

My world caps at 12th level, and civilization is not as pervasive and stable as in most settings.

Phhase
2022-02-27, 03:45 PM
In my setting, I've made the following changes

Kenku: Instead of mimicry, they are entirely mute. To compensate, they are the ones that invented sign language (and also braille) and tend to gravitate toward effects that grant telepathy.

Aarakoa: technically speaking, they are the same race as kenku. The differences are because in the past, there was a war between the two, and a curse was unleashed that took the kenku's wings and voices. There's still bad blood between them and neither agrees whos fault the curse was.

Orcs/bugbears/goblins: Tribal, but in a traditionalism way rather than a primitivism way. Some are more nomadic, others build fortresses for thier clans. Most have friendly contact with goblinoid cities. Orcs specifically have a blanket tradition of following the geneva conventions, to some degree or another.

Hobgoblins: Premier goblinoid citybuilders. Have a complex tradition of glatorial rites that keeps all citizens fighting fit. Lots of politics in there.

Locathah: They're out there on the coast. They make incredible squid barbecue they call horb'nok. 2 Internets to anyone who gets the reference.

Gnolls: There are actually two kinds of gnolls. The southern gnolls follow Yeenoghu, and are vicious, physically stronger, and procreate faster. The Northern gnolls are slightly smaller and more agile, less numerous, and follow the Three, a triad of gods that represent the three main ingredients of gunpowder, sulfur, saltpetre, and charcoal. The Northern gnolls were the first to invent firearms and gunpowder and are still the top of the craft. Guns, gunfighting, and even gun fu are thier bread, butter, and religion. There is a constant war between the Southern and Northern gnolls.

Dwarves: There are two major dwarven city-centers. One is in the north in a volcano, and is traditionally dwarven, experts in stone and metal craft. The dwarves that live beneath the sands of the southeastern desert are monster hunters that hunt the strange beasts of the desert. They're basically Dwarf fortress australians.

Moulg: Replace the warforged. Entirely metallic. Are immune to poison and have unique capabilities per individual. Are refugeees from some war beneath the earth, their memories are damaged (true origins are unknown). Quite durable and very clever scientifically and in engineering. Have built walking city-platforms. However, the elves dislike that some of thier designs are known for pollution (which they don't have to worry about, lacking lungs). Still require food, but thier physiology makes for a unique cuisine that other races aren't always able to stomach (including things like complex hydrocarbons, for example).

Elves: mostly normal.

Dragonborn: Very trade oriented. Many merchant clans, and a merchant city named Dragouvar, a trade hub of the empire. Also a congregation point for dragons.

Changelings: Actually not a distinct race per se. Instead, they're more like Harry potter, where changeling is a template that other races can contract or be born with due to magical exposure. Their "default" form still resembles their original race exactly. Changelings who spend too long in other forms are at risk of suffering a unique form of depression where they begin to forget their own true identity. A changeling that forgets themselves entirely becomes a doppelganger. Genetically, a changeling is always treated as being thier original race.

Gnomes: Technologically advanced in a way somewhat similar to the Moulg, but slightly less pollution. However, they have a STRONG tradition of industrial espionage, so gnome designs and blueprints are always jealously copyrighted. Don't try to disassemble a gnomish contraption, it's probably copy-protected. Gnomes are the ones who invented icecream. Gnomish icecream takes the form of superchilled icecream droplets, very similar to dippin dots, and comes in myriad flavors.

Troglodytes: Are to Lizardfolk as drow are to elves.

Drow: Mostly the same, if a little more insular and less likely to meddle in surface affairs. In addition to traditionally evil cities like Menzoberranzan, there are also others that are much more neutral and cosmopolitan, relatively speaking.

Ethergaunts: Exist. Not making themselves obvious just yet though.

Kaorti: Exist, deeply encysted in forgotten corners of elven forests. Busy plotting.

False God
2022-02-27, 05:42 PM
As above, shortened lifespans all around. Humans ~100, Dwarves ~200, Elves ~300.

Humans: Humans are the only natural humanoid race, the ancient descendants of Titans who slowly devolved into the Giants, then the Goliaths and now humans. All other races are the result of godly meddling (sometimes on purpose, sometimes on accident). There are a wide variety of human nations around the world, ranging from the large and expansive to the small and quiet. There are a great number of languages and cultures between them. Humans come in all variety of colors just like IRL.

(This is a bit world specific, but my main setting is one of dying magic set roughly in the Renaissance era. Basically, evolution happened, but with so much magic whizzing about it super-charged it and gave rise to all the ancient super-big, super-powerful creatures of legend. As magic has dwindled, so has the number and size of magical creatures. The primary racial gods, Zarus/Pelor, Moradin, Corellion/Lolth, Bahamut/Tiamut, Grummush/Orcus, etc... are all ancient ascended Titans or other ancient creatures, it is extremely difficult to ascend now. The gods are mostly distant, as any one of them acting on the world tends to piss off half a dozen others. Generally speaking the various races have all finally noticed the distinct lack of truly monstrous threats in the world an an era of exploration and expansion has begun, with very different people starting to bump up against each other, however Humans are the only race "untouched" by the gods and therefore not suffering any ill effects from the waning magic.)

Elves: The Drow are a specific religious cult among dark elves. Elves come in a variety of nature-based colors, from snowy white to leafy greens and woody browns to dark ebon black. Elves are empire-builders, but not aggressively expansionist, they prefer long periods of circling their wagons and strengthening their culture before periods of brief targeted expansion. This process allows them to keep their culture, language and national identity fairly solid. Each "primary" elven flavor-nation (Snow, Wood, Desert, Dark) has their own specific language and culture. "Elven" exists as something as a trade language between them, and to be taught to outsiders so they don't have to share their culture. Numerous, old, splinter, and insular elven civilizations dot the rest of the world with their own unique languages and cultures.
-Dark elves tend to be the most "open" of elven cultures, in large part due to lack of resources, numbers, and general dangers of the Underdark.
-Physically, elves are slightly shorter and slimmer than humans (4'5-5'5_ with many presenting the androgenous look. Dark Elves(who actually range anywhere from snow-white to ebon-black) remain the odd exception of being taller(5'5-6'5, with the women holding a couple extra inches over men on average), heartier built and more sexually dimorphic than their surface counterparts.
--As an interesting note, elves tan "backwards" to most other races, becoming lighter with more exposure to sun, and darker with less.
---Fun Fact: Elven "darkvision" is actually a product of their glowing eyes. And they're the only surface race with "darkvision", with their underdark cousins having superior darkvision, with sunlight sensitivity; all other deep-dwelling species (orcs, deep-gnomes, duergar, etc..) all only have "regular" darkvision and still get sunlight sensitivity.
---Fun fact 2: They don't like to talk about it, but all the tauric races in the world (Driders, Centaurs, Lamia, etc...) come from elves.

Orcs: The orcs come in nearly as many flavors as Elves though in more muted tones, and express a level of diversity of mindset and culture closer to humans. Nearly every orc nation has a unique language and culture, from simple and savage to industries rivaling the dwarves. (There is a saying: "If you want a shield, ask a dwarf, if you want a sword, ask an orc.") Like the elves "orcish" is something of a trade language, but conversely Orcs in general are a very open culture. Anyone can be an "orc", it simply means passing the same rites an orcish child would (which varies from culture to culture) and adopting an orcish way of life. While they are not unified into a grand Empire like the Elves, they mostly recognize all orcish ways of life as acceptable, even if very distinct. Rejection of others ways of life tends to be more of a clan-by-clan thing.
-Grey orcs, the deep-dwelling variant, are an odd bunch, having deep halls like dwarves and a penchant for learning and magic like elves and are MUCH less accommodating of others than their surface brethren.
-Physical diversity is more based on cultural practices than any innate physical traits, they are comparable in build to humans with a distinct head shape and small protruding tusks. Grey Orcs once again are the odd-orcs out, being typically thinner and lankier in build.

Dwarves: Come in 4 distinct varities, and are the least racially diverse: Hall-dwelling, clan-centric mountain dwarves. Hill-country agrarian-folk "hill" dwarves. Islander beardless fisher-dwarves and the deep-dwelling duergar. Dwarves are one of the few races that can't interbreed with any other humanoids. Unlike most of the other races, the dwarves lack a "opposite" patron deity. Mountain dwarves are highly insular and generally unfriendly, they are *not* good-natured, beer-drinking scottsmen. In-world, people compare mountain dwarves more to ants, leave them alone and you're fine, kick over a hill and they'll pour out in numbers you couldn't imagine. Similarly their clan-centric nature often results in long, violent "family feuds"(which look more like full-on wars to outsiders). Their out-doors counterparts are much friendlier and much less aggro.
-Dwarves are universally stocky and broad. But only Mountain-Dwarf women have beards. Islander-dwarves have very little facial hair and only mild body hair. Dwarves have a very narrow range of skin-tones and hair colors within their racial subgroups.

Gnomes: An offshoot of elves typically treated as second-class citizens within most elven territory. Like halflings, A Gnome and an Elf make either a tall Gnome or a short Elf. Deep-gnomes actually hold a better standing among Dark Elves than their surface counterparts. The "Underdark" is extremely hostile, and lacks the racial diversity of the surface, forcing many races to get along better underground than above.
-A Gnome typically stands about half as tall as an elf, with a slightly enlarged head and eyes.

Halflings: Technically just short humans, but with a strong enough genetic line to maintain their existence within themselves. A Human and a Halfling make either a tall Halfling or a short Human. Their stature is eventually bred out when reproducing with other races. Within their own communities, they're about on-par with human development and diversity.
-A Halfling typically stands half as tall as a human, with a stockier and hairier build on average, almost looking like skinny dwarves.

All the Touched races are just roleplay and variant trait-options for one of the above base races. This includes: Tieflings(pick a race, has devilish/demonic features), Aasimar(pick a race, has angelic/celestial features), Eladrin(pick a race, has very elfin features), Genasi (elemental features), Dragonborn (Draconic features). Their appearance can range from the subtle to the extreme, but are roleplay choices. They are true-breeding within their own base race or the usual crossovers.
-Lycanthropes are playable as one of the touched races, you get a pile of bennies, but any time you take more damage than your DR, you have to make a save or fly off the handle into a murderous rage. The check goes up by 2 if you're in hybrid form, and 4 if you're in animal form. The check goes down by 1 for each level you gain beyond your racial HD, but a nat 1 is always a fail. Lycans are always true breeding, two different types of were-creatures will randomly generate one or the other.

Elves and Humans can make half-elves. Orcs and Humans can make half-orcs, but these function like the touched races above. Elves and Orcs breed basically a human. Yes you can have a Touched-Lycan-Half-Orc. Dwarves are not able to make halfbreeds, but they can be Touched or lycans.

There is also a mer-variant to all the base races. So yes you can have a Touched Mer-Half-Elf. Elves, Humans and Orcs are all various fish-people. Dwarves are shark-folk. There is a unique race of cephalopod-people underwater that doesn't have a land counterpart, most notably where the "mer" species have upper-torsos matching their land counterparts, the cephalopod-folk have cephalopod-like skin over their whole bodies and very fine "tendrils" in place of hair. "Crab people" are basically the driders of the sea.

"Monstrous" races: If it's smart enough to speak and use tools, it has a civilization somewhere. Goblinoids have a substantial feudal-level empire, and a variety of small settlements around the world. The "Serpent people" (Yuan-Ti) have a smaller empire themselves though its much older and currently in decay, with few settlements beyond it, the Serpent-kind also have a water-counterpart. Kobolds tend to have a variety of small settlements anywhere they can find, but are generally disliked by almost all the other races. They're typically considered the monstrous version of Kender and the world took care of that problem some ways back. Generally speaking the more innately magical a species the smaller it's population and the more devastating the effects of waning magic.

There's no underdark variant of Humans or Halflings. There's just a couple small settlements of humans and halflings who live underground, typically semi-underground in basically "border towns".

Outsider Races: Angels, Demons/Devils, Elementals, Fey, etc... Are exceedingly rare on the mortal plane because they feed off magic. Yes they can eat, drink, etc...but it isn't what REALLY powers them. Prolonged habitation on the mortal plane basically turns them mortal, or they die. The "Outsider" languages are languages of power and basically unspeakable by mortals without literally making heads explode.
Celestial: The Language of Truth
Abyssal: The Language of Destruction
Infernal: The Language of Secrets
Deep Speech: The Language of Understanding
Elemental: The Languages of Creation
Draconic: The Language of Knowledge
Fey: The Language of Lies
Bits and pieces and butcherings of these languages mixed with mortal words are what make up "New Magic" (the stuff mortals use), which is why if you read most spells it just looks like gibberish. "Old Magic" is literally speaking in one of these languages words of power to rewrite reality. These languages cannot be understood with Tongues, and Tongues cannot convert them into an understandable language. Like mortals, creatures that can speak these languages still have to learn mortal languages to be understood by a mortal. Though they can use Tongues to understand a mortal language.

----
Hmmm, well, that was a bit wordy, but I only have one big primary setting and a lot of the changes are contextual to that specific setting. The rest I typically run as in the book for whatever edition I'm using.

Telok
2022-02-27, 06:02 PM
D&D:
rule 1, no half-things & halfling = hobbit. No half orcs, no half elves, no half trolls, no half dragons, no half oompa loompas, etc.

Rule 2, dragons come in three types: drakes, lesser, greater. Drakes include wyverns but common varieties are based off reskinned salamanders & salamander nobles witn no spells & reduced intelligence. Drakes have variety by swapping the element/breath weapon/immunity/vulnerability type (cold, swamp=poison spray, air=poison gas, thunder, earth=crystal shards).

Lesser dragons are just big drakes with wings & 6+1d8 intelligence, they use the regular dragon rules but cannot have multiple types of breath weapons or magical ability/powers. They have noticably less treasure than d&d standard. These are still color coded.

Greater dragons are hand crafted to the setting, based on the biggest & baddest standard dragon stats then with more awesome on top. They all have magic abilities & spells & some martial moves/tricks. The weakest should be a 50/50 tpk match for a prepared 15th level party & the strongest are functionally low end demigods. These guys are not color coded & there should be a list in the setting material with at least name & looks, if not something like "ruler of the <foo> empire, likes chinchillas, raises volcanos to expand territory".

DtD40k7e:
Kobolds come in 2 types, classic & neo-kobold. Classic looks like the old 'Keep on the Borderlands' od&d ones, generally reclusive & clannish & backstabby grouchy. Neos are modded with genetic changes & magic surgery to look like the current draco konolds, generally whiney & pushy & trying to 'dragon up'. Either way they come from an engineered expendable slave labor race, but theres a feat in game to be a classic kobold that makes any encounter with kobolds start as social instead of combat.

Aboleth are the adult form of mind flayers. The whole "elder brain" thing is a ruse to get people to attack a fancied up organic computer that runs an advanced intruder scan & alert program. The tadpole-in-brain thing is just advertising to squick out lesser beings as a racial joke, they use cloning vats & pop out as fully educated "adults". They become aboleth after eating a certain xp eorth of other mind flayer brains, which theres a cultural taboo against. So all aboleth are by definition (any definition) sociopath rule breakers. They are also, amusingly, not the settings bad guys. Yup, the brain eating, slaving, horrible monsters are not the bad guys. They're generally just fine following galactic international norms/laws & being left alone.

Draconi Redfir
2022-02-27, 06:25 PM
Elves, Humans, and Orcs: Closely related cousins. Similar to our real-world Humans, Chimps, and Bonobos. But close / similar enough that they can still interbreed, explaining how half-elves and half-orcs can exist. Orcs and Elves might be distant enough that they can't interbreed with one another though.

Gnomes: Offshoot of Halflings. Gnomes were made when their common ancestor with Halflings split off, and one group was exposed to a lot of magic over a long period of time. Typically associated with Wild / primal magic. Dwarves are also related to these two groups, but much more distantly.


Dragons: Feral beasts. No magical powers, no hyper-intelligence. Sapient Dragons are either myth, or only exist due to magical / Divine (in the context of D&D) intervention, which is incredibly rare, maybe at most 2 exist / have existed in the past thousand years.

Trolls: Hyper evolved Starfish. Helps explain the whole "Regeneration" thing without resorting to "Because magic".

Hobgoblins: Biological cousins to both Goblins and Bugbears, but the most civilized of the bunch. Very similar to humans in society, with mostly Sparta-like cultures. Known to make cities and towns all their own, will usually accept other Goblinoids so long as they behave, and otherwise act as the Goblinoid-version of human settlements.

Goblins: They give birth in litters. No other major change.


Kobolds: This one might not work with the "Feral Dragons" as mentioned above, so this particular change to Kobolds might be reserved for worlds with Sapient dragons. But an idea i had for Kobolds that sounded neat was that they originate as Haploid dragon eggs, like male Ants. They only have one set of chromosomes, and for whatever reason this causes them to be small, bipedal, and wingless. When a Dragon lays a fertilized egg, she then lays around 100 smaller haploid eggs around it to hatch into the child's servants before flying off. The Kobolds will hatch first and take care of the egg, growing a nest around it and caring for it as it develops and possibly well into adulthood if the Dragon is so inclined. Kobolds don't live as long as Dragons do though, so they're still able to reproduce with one another to keep up their population. The resulting offspring are just more Kobolds though. Kobold dens can still exist independently of Dragons, it just means that at some point in their past either their sibling Dragon left them, or a group of their ancestors left the Dragon's den to explore and start a den of their own independently.

Shinizak
2022-02-27, 09:29 PM
If it looks humanoid, than it probably WAS human at some point. Meaning that all races descended from the union of a human and some other non humanoid race.

Elves? Descended from non human fey.
Dwarves? Probably some manner of earth elemental.
Orcs? Some boar god.
Halflings? Not sure, but obviously something very tiny.

All of these bloodlines eventually stabilized into a race, but most are closely related enough that they could still interbreed and create halfhumans

Mlmiii
2022-02-28, 09:38 PM
Humans: As normal.

Elves: Ageless members/descendants of the various noble houses of an old empire that had a pretty large Mad Science (Biology) knowledge base before it collapsed. The agelessness and the "human-but-better" aesthetics are the Baby's First Transhumanism that all the nobles took, with environmental adaptations being the cause of the million-and-one biome variants of elves. Half-elves are rare among elven communities that care about the old empire, and those that dislike burying their children, but those elven societies prone to one-night-stands or moving on from the empire's past glories do tend to produce a steady stream of them. "High Elves" and "Drow" are political groups trying to rebuild the old empire, usually stemming from the Plains Elf/Cave Elf variants. Speaking of...

High Elves: Generally trying to rebuild the empire, but without quite so much Mad Science. They act slowly, leveraging their long lives to accumulate personal power and political influence. This rarely works, as to keep it fully a secret, they have to work at a slower pace than most governments change at, and the collapse of the elven empire was so catastrophic that most other races are very suspicious of an elven-majority government.

Drow: Still matriarchal, but being a Drider is something to aspire to rather than a punishment. While most other elves have abandoned Mad Biology (except for the occasional cottage-industry batch that produces centaurs or catgirls or somesuch), the Underdark has sharpened the Drow's branch of it down to Fleshcrafting, creating Driders and the like as improvements to the base creature. While which exact noble house one was descended from is of little concern to most elves, Drow hyperfixate on it, arguing that their continued survival disproves the empire ever completely falling, despite the nomadic-plus-fortresses lifestyle that the Underdark has forced them into. Becoming a Drider is something that the individual clan's Khan and Shaman are both expected (but not strictly required) to do, with the option open for noblewomen of sizable wealth and soldiers who have shown promise. While they have adopted artisanal labor (weaving, smithing) for themselves as a necessity, they still consider themselves above "peasant" labor, which brings us to...

Orcs: The human equivalent of Cave Elves. Put through a more Strength-oriented version of the process by which an Elf becomes a Cave Elf, Orcs are near-universally seen as the slaves of Drow, or else as nearby escapee societies. Due to their relatively low population and biological compatibility with humans, those that escape to the surface tend to be absorbed into human populations after a couple generations, producing half-orcs along the way.

Dwarves: Don't exist--I usually use at least one Construct race in my settings, and they outcompete Dwarves in the mining/industry sectors that are usually their niche. If someone really wants to play a short surly Scotsman I'll let them have the stats but they'll just be a human-with-dwarfism, rather than a "proper" Dwarf.

Halflings: Don't exist. Similarly to Dwarves, their stats are usable, but Tolkien's original use for Hobbits (separating "city humans" and "relatable country humans" into separate bloodlines, from what I can tell) just... doesn't appeal to me, and D&D's stereotype of them being plucky underdog rogues works just as well if you cast orphan children into the role.

Gnomes: Don't exist. Genuinely unsure why you would ever use these, tbh. Guild Wars 2 made it work with the Asura but otherwise "short steampunk tinkerers" feels like more of a country description than a racial one. As mentioned with Halflings, I don't like job-based racial divides, and physically speaking they just look like thin Halflings but with the kind of just-slightly-off color schemes you'd see from MS Paint or a fursona. Speaking of furries...

Lizardfolk: Just Regular Dudes. None of this obligate-carnivore tribe-from-before-time stuff that D&D tries to pull with them, they're just dudes with scales, tails, and claws. Fills the +Str, +Con gap that the core races leave open, which is doubly useful given that Orcs/Half-Orcs are very rare in my settings due to not being on the surface. The swim/climb speeds also give them an ecological edge over humans in rough terrain, giving them a reason to exist that Halflings and Gnomes lack.

Kobolds: I also have haploid dragons producing Kobolds, but instead of their eggs being laid alongside the True Dragon offspring, they're the draconic equivalent of menstruation--this egg cell is about to go bad, might as well make use of it. True Dragon offspring are produced as normal, and the other various dragons are produced as a by-product of the True Dragon switching from batches of Kobolds to a single True Dragon, much like how Mystery Flavor lollipops are produced when switching from one flavor of syrup to the next in the factory. Kobolds largely serve as slaves/servants to the dragon that spawned them, though it's not unheard of for them to strike out on their own (usually when their master dies). Kobolds, like naked mole rats, are sterile in the presence of their parent Dragon, but fertile when outside of their influence. Kobolds left alone to reproduce rapidly evolve into True Dragons over a few generations, mirroring the transition period from Kobold to True Dragon offspring that their parent went through. It's fairly rare for a Kobold village to complete the ascension, however, as the generations leading up to True Dragon offspring produce draconic creatures of sufficient territoriality to derail the project with infighting.

Dragons: As normal, but their shapeshifting extends to changing their biological sex at-will, which A) makes gender largely a non-issue for them, and B) gives them the option to stop producing Kobolds. Being agender myself, having a giant fire-breathing beatstick to slap a more "gender is a scam invented to sell more bathrooms" attitude into my settings' cultures is a nice comfort.

Grippli: These guys aren't strictly swamp-dwelling hunter-gatherers (many of them are swamp-dwelling farmers, for instance, and they're all capable of city life), but they're otherwise unchanged beyond some buffs (I try to get most races to 16 RP, by the Pathfinder race creation rules, largely so that humans can have stuff like endurance running to mirror our irl ecological niche). In Gripplis' case, it's Obvious Poison Dart Frog Things like being Amphibious, having poisonous skin, and jumping better.

Goblins: Creature type changed to Fey, motivation changed from "lol CE" to "it is a wonderful day in Faerun and you are a horrible goose", stats unchanged. Frequently wander into town singing about the (not necessarily lethal) mischief they're going to cause like some kind of My Little Pony villain. I find this a good compromise between "evil-by-default races are bad writing" and "I need faceless disposable humanoids to fight at level 1", since you just need to lean on Fey misunderstandings of what mortals can and cannot survive to flip the switch between "MLP social villain of the week" to "credible threat".

Curbludgeon
2022-03-01, 04:53 AM
Species are not referred to as being members of different "races", because that noise was creepy when Tolkien pulled it 75 years ago.

Gnomes whom live in forests tend towards natural hair colors reminiscent of flowers in bloom, while those living underground instead develop shiny metallic growth.

Every dwarf is left-handed, and with their dominant market position on precision tools are the cause of constant minor irritations.

LibraryOgre
2022-03-01, 02:17 PM
In a major change from how I usually see them in D&D, I try to give gnomes a personality that isn't "manic state".

Grim Portent
2022-03-01, 02:47 PM
I'm actually considering a take on gnomes as a type of elemental fey, associated with damp earth, freshwater and mud and having a true form that resembles a dimutive humanoid salamander. When they dry out they look like small ugly men and women, and have some innate magic to bestow misfortune on people that anger them.

Don't know if I'd let them be playable, if I even wind up using them.

Saelethil
2022-03-01, 03:15 PM
When halflings settle (get trapped) in the Fey Wild their descendants end up as gnomes.
When gnomes/halflings settle (get trapped) in the Shadowfell their descendants end up as goblins.

Xervous
2022-03-01, 03:31 PM
Elves are fae descended, orcs are another type of elf. Dwarves came about from long term exposure to earth magic in specific regions. Halflings and gnomes get lumped in as “dwarves” first, and then by region=specific magical influence second, though it’s the fae sort that leads to the odder individuals.

Magic in this case trends towards winner takes all past a point, so thoroughly diluted elven bloodlines just end up human, a strong dwarven bloodline could overrule a weak elven bloodline, and dormant bloodlines can yield a surprise elf in the family.

Naturally the typical individual is ignorant of all the particulars, they just know the elves delight in certain activities focused around a specific emotion. One bloodline favors simplicity and contentment because their fae ancestors drew nourishment from mortal feelings of calm satisfaction , another sees the world as a series of challenges to overcome because the fae ancestors craved the flavors of struggle and triumph. The weaker the bloodline, the more it’s cultural. The stronger the bloodline, the more it’s an inborn drive.

The scaly types are just as often amphibious as not, there’s a whole lotta water out there.

Kobolds are explicitly not related to dragons, Dragonborn are unique creations. And overall there’s no Half-X stuff running around, unless an experiment escaped somewhere.

PhoenixPhyre
2022-03-01, 03:52 PM
When halflings settle (get trapped) in the Fey Wild their descendants end up as gnomes.
When gnomes/halflings settle (get trapped) in the Shadowfell their descendants end up as goblins.

I actually go the other way.

Halflings? Their ancestors were goblins who were exposed to huge amounts of magical "radiation" during a war about a thousand years ago. Breed true now, but are fairly limited in territorial extent.

Gnomes? When a tribe of goblins is heavily influenced by primal forces (fey, mostly), they begin "evolving" into forest gnomes. Goblins influenced by civilizational forces (the spirits of cities and technology, found wherever industry is high) gradually evolve into rock gnomes (the tinker-style ones). Exposure to elemental forces tends to make various other "gnome-like" groups. But this transformation isn't stable--remove the influence and the tribe will de-transition over a few generations.

Kobolds? goblins influenced by draconic forces (ie serving with/under a legendary dragon for a few generations). There's one small group of "stable" kobolds due to some experiments involving trying to make "dragonborn goblins" (ie injecting fragments of dragon souls into unborn/cloned goblins) that went a bit sideways.

Fiery Diamond
2022-03-01, 04:44 PM
Species are not referred to as being members of different "races", because that noise was creepy when Tolkien pulled it 75 years ago.

It's only really problematic if you equate it to the use of "race" to describe ethnicity/skin color/ancestry. Note that "the human race" is a use of the word "race," too, and that it is actually that use of the word "race" that is being used in fantasy for the different fantasy "races." Furthermore, in some settings they aren't different species, being more like different subspecies in that they all breed true with one another.

Like, I have no issue at all with someone preferring to make them be different species and use that term, but it does lowkey bother me when people act like it's some sort of objective fact that using the word race is... racist or something?

SteveLightblade
2022-03-01, 05:25 PM
One from a defunct campaign that was abandoned after the first session due to a 6 month hiatus and a new DM after we got back together.

The campaign was a cyberpunk fantasy campaign with an emphasis on the fantasy part. However, there was presence of advanced "technology" in the world due to it being a high magic setting (most of my settings are low magic), and all "races" are humans genetically modified in utero with gene modding potions, partially to augment their abilities and partially to reinforce the feudal caste system that the country the campaign took place in.

Humans: Peasants, social outcasts, and people who hate magic. Normal humans.

Elves: Nobles who are modified primarily to be primarily attractive and graceful, but also to increase their lifespan. As a downside, natural death of an elf is often sudden and usually agonizing.

Dwarves: Guild craftsmen and crown backed merchants and bankers. Modified to be more effective at skilled labor, but have been predisposed to have a harder time forming empathy and developing emotional intelligence

Orcs: Soldiers whose modification formula was originally developed by Definitely Not Medieval Soviet Union and captured by several countries by examining the genome of killed orcs in various battles. Created to be tough and hyper aggressive, but many of them also have magic activation codes that casts Dominate Person on them.

Gnomes: Wizards, Alchemists, and all other forms of "smart people" who had been engineered to be smarter and have the large majority of their caloric intake go to their brains. This in turn makes them short and anemic.

Halflings: Somewhat rare. Failed gene modification experiments who end up as physically children their entire lives. Halflings never reach puberty, but have the upside of having faster natural healing.

Good Outsiders (Angels, Agathions, Archons, etc.): Synthetic androids made by the good aligned gods for various divine purposes, which leads to...

Aasimars: The divine androids from above, but having their CPUs and data put into mostly human bodies similar to the Replicants from Blade Runner. Since many good outsiders can't operate without a lack of subtlety or destroying large amounts of infrastructure and human life, Aasimars are relied on for discrete and precise action on behalf of the gods. Always good as a result.

Evil Outsiders (Demons, Daemons, Devils, etc.): Aliens who are hell bent (pun intended) on invading and corrupting the universe to expand areas of the evil planes, and are mostly based on the demons from Doom. This also leads to...

Tieflings: Possessed humans altered by being exposed to enough evil energy from invasions. People know when evil outsiders are going to show up in an area due to a sudden appearance of multiple Tieflings. Always evil.

Vahnavoi
2022-03-01, 06:30 PM
Dwarves and giants of human legend are echoes of different human sub-species, comparable to h. neanderthalis and h. sapiens, meeting for the first time. Majority of existing humans are mix of both, plus some non-human influence. As a corollary, smallest existing humans are smaller than most "dwarves" were and largest existing humans are larger than the "giants" were. First generation Half-"giant" half-"dwarf" people actually grew to be larger than either parent due to hybrid vigor, before further interbreeding normalized the effect. "Dwarves" and "giants" were both off-shoots of an even earlier human species that was split due to a natural disaster.

Halflings are a particularly small sub-species of humans found on a handful of isolated islands. There are other small sub-species of usually larger animals in their territory, and some unusually large sub-species of usually small animals as well. Halflings think of themselves as normal humans - it's the other humans that look like giants to them.

Mermaids, sahuagin, deep ones, nixies, sirens and what have you are one species that undergoes multiple stages through their biological lifes. Humans have many names for them and classify them as multiple species because merfolk life stages are dramatically different from each other and exhibit massive morphological variamce. Merfolk were uplifted through cultural interaction and interbreeding with early humans - they seem more ancient and more advanced because they survived better due to effects of biological immortality than early humans. Origin of merfolk is extraterrestrial - they are by-products of the blood of a celestial being interacting with earthly life.

Goblins, kobolds, gnomes, bugbear, orc, and what have you are also different names for one species. Encounters between them and humans are just so rare and distant that humans have come up with multiple distinct ideas of who or what the evil underground dwelling creatures that occasionally appear in or near mines are. The ones close to surface are exiles from a mythical underworld. Said underworld contains nightmare civilizations that put most above-ground civilizations to shame.

Elves eat humans - a running gag across settings in my games. As one elf player put it, "we're not even the same species, it's like a dog eating a cat, completely normal". :smallamused: They are also soulless and hate humans for vaguely or explicitly environmentalist reasons. They are very distant off-shoots of early exiles from the underworld, taking human form because their encounters with early humans. Merfolk do not know this and believe elves to be ancestors to humans. So do most elves, because their real origin was shameful to them as they renounced their past ways upon seeing the sun for the first time.

As a human, understanding true nature of elves and goblins entails realizing that pointy ears are equivalent to devil horns and you should stay away from such creatures. Understanding true nature of merfolk and their relationship to humans entails realizing that your ancestors shagged a weird fish-creature and under certain conditions you can be turned into one as well.

RedMage125
2022-03-02, 11:57 AM
Note: A good chunk of my setting (Antheron) has been shaped by 2 major events in the last few centuries. 1- The War of Shadows (This was the plotline of a 3.x game I ran in college), the drow invaded the surface in a war that lasted almost 20 years. A great deal of the Sylvanwood (enormous forested region) was damaged or destroyed. The old dwarven king actually allied with the drow, until he was betrayed and assassinated by them, his son (who is still the current king) broke that alliance and joined with the surface races to fight the drow. This war ended about 500 years ago. 2- The Godswar, some time after the WoS, reality was invaded by the Primordials, titanic elemental beings of great power. They caused great planar upheaval, the Prime was altered forever, and several gods died, others surrendered their divinity to successors. One key takeaway is that many deities are now worshipped across racial lines (Moradin is the god of the forge for all races, for example). This ended around 350-400 years ago.

2nd note: Player Options in my game are separated into 3 categories: Green/Yellow/Red Light. Green Light is most stuff, no restriction. Yellow Light is "yes, but..." and includes some sort of restriction (see Drow, below, for an example), and Red Light means "My default answer is 'no'". If a player has a concept that uses a Red Light element, and it REALLY impresses me, I may allow it, but they'll still be unique.

Elves: I use longer elven lifespans. An Elf reaches Middle Age around 500, Venerable at 750, and doesn't usually die of natural causes until 900-1,000. Elves usually have a low birth rate, but that's because they naturally attune to their environment, and their population is affected by what the region can sustain. However, thousands of elves had died during the War of Shadows. On top of that, the Sylvanwood has been growing back for almost 500 years, so in that time, elves have experienced a population boom that has only recently begun to slow down. More than half the elves of the world are under 500 years old. Wood Elves typically live in forest-cities. High Elves typically live in Mountain cities. Eladrin are descended from elves who used Elven High magic to retreat to the Feywild during the Godswar, and their cities only reappeared a few decades ago, so they're relatively new to most people. Shadar-kai live in the Shadowfell (but there is no Raven Queen in my world).

Drow: Drow get special mention. Most drow worship Lolth and are evil. However, there is a small town of drow who, over the course of centuries, have created an isolated haven on the surface. The town is neutral ground for the followers of Eilistraee and Vhaeraun. Some of these drow actually disguised themselves and helped defend the human fortress-city of Cyran during the War of Shadows. In gratitude, Cyran opened their doors to them and their families. It took over a century for the residents of Cyran to get used to them, but now they are. Player Characters who wish to be drow MUST be from one of these two communities. No "underdark rebels".

Dwarves: Dwarves are also long-lived. They reach Middle Age at 300, Venerable at 500, and typically die of old age around the 700 year mark. The differences between dwarf subraces are mostly cultural. After the War of Shadows, many did not trust dwarves, and many dwarves were ashamed of what their king did. Some chose to forsake returning to dwarven lands and stayed on the surface. These are Hill Dwarves. Mountain Dwarves are the ones who returned to dwarven lands, and rarely mixed with other races. In the last century, this has started to finally relax, and some Hill dwarf families moved back to their ancestral homes, and some Mountain dwarves left the mountains to mingle with other races (so players don't have to feel OBLIGED to be one or the other).

Halflings: Stout halflings are like hobbits. They live in hilly fields and live pretty laid back lives. Lightfoot halflings are largely nomadic, travelling in communities with wagons that convert to houseboats to travel riverways.

Half-Elves: While mixing human with elf still results in a half-elf, most of them have one or more half-elf parent. No amount of breeding back into elf lines will ever result in a full-blooded elf again, and as long as they're at least 1/8th elf, they are mechanically a "half-elf".

Half-orcs: Similar to half-elves, it takes generations to breed out the orc blood to produce a full human. Most half-orcs have at least one half-orc parent.

Dragonborn: There is a southern continent that, before the Godswar, was isolated from Antheron. Here, the Drakkensari Empire (or, Empire of the Drakkensrad) rules. The culture is similar to feudal Japan, with true dragons ruling as daimyos over dragonborn. In the Drakkensrad, dragons do not always follow typical alignment conventions like in Antheron. During the Godwar, the two continents became connected by a new landmass that now bridges them. Since then, many dragonborn emigrated north, as their society offers little chance for upward mobility. Dragonborn are now very common in Antheron. Some still hold to the tenets of Bushido, but not all.

Gnomes: Not too much deviation from core. However, gnomes have not, in recorded history, ever held their own lands. They live peacefully among humans, elves, dwarves and halflings. Rock Gnomes, in particular, are viewed as "little cousins" by Mountain Dwarves. Forest Gnomes are more common among Elves. Those that live in more cosmopolitan "mixed" towns and cities are of both subraces.

Kobolds: Most kobolds live as described in Volo's. But there's one city where they're different. Scalyheart is built into a volcano, and these kobolds are somewhat cleaner and more civilized. They're still usually Lawful Evil, but they've learned the value of cooperation and trade with their neighbors. They feel little kinship with other kobolds, who live like animals to their standards. Players may choose to play as a Scalyheart kobold.

Planar Refugees: During the Godswar, the planes were in great upheaval, and extremely unsafe. Mortal races dwelling in the planes, not having immortal ties to the planes themselves, fled to the Material Plane. These races are all often collectively referred to as "planar refugees", even though some members may have lived on the Prime before the Godswar, the overwhelming majority of members of these races have only been on the Prime for a few centuries. Planar refugee races are: Tieflings, Aasimar, Genasi, Gith.

RED LIGHT RACES
Gnolls: While gnolls who worship Yeenoghu (and reproduce in the manner discussed in Volo’s Guide) exist, they make up only about 25% of all Antheron gnolls. The remaining 75% of gnolls are a true-breeding race, and refer to these demonic gnolls as “The Butcher’s Brood”. The majority of gnolls tend to follow Primal traditions, and the majority of them see themselves as the chosen of Ragashak, the Chaotic Evil deity of beasts, slaughter, and winter. Druids, Rangers and Barbarians are very common among them. A small number (less than 5%) of gnolls are non-evil. But these tribes are extremely xenophobic. The only non-gnolls they interact with are usually druids.

Goblinoids: Goblinoids in Antheron are usually evil, and most of them quite primitive. Hobgoblins are a notable exception, but even they, while civilized, live in a martial society where might makes right. Hobgoblins tend to dominate Bugbears and Goblins. It would be extremely unusual for a hobgoblin (and even more unusual for a bugbear or goblin) to leave their society and adventure among other races. Not to mention that most people would flee from or attack them on sight. Since the Godwar, there is an established goblinoid "nation" (really a collective of small city-states) to the east in Antheron, but not all goblinoids headed there, and contact with it is minimal.

Orcs and Yuan-ti: Very little deviation from core.

Races from other settings: There are no dragonmarks in Antheron. No warforged. No Shifters, No Changelings, and No Kalashtar. None of the races from Ravnica exist, either. Centaurs exist, but not the Medium sized variety found in the Theros book. Minotaurs likewise exist, but almost all are under the sway of the demon lord Baphomet. Leonins do not exist. Satyrs are mischievous fey that prefer their lives in the Feywild.
Tabaxi: There isn’t currently a place for Tabaxi in Antheron.
Winged Races: This is a game balance issue, and at-will flight from level 1 is something that too easily mitigates challenges. So no Aarakocra, Winged Tieflings, or Owlkin.
Witchlight Races: While Harengon and Faeries exist in the Feywild, they are not known for travelling to the Material Plane, and such a character would be a unique aberrant, even among their own kind.

Trask
2022-03-03, 06:35 PM
Species are not referred to as being members of different "races", because that noise was creepy when Tolkien pulled it 75 years ago.

Not to derail or go there, but Tolkien's use of the word race is more aligned with a pre-modern idea of any grouping of alike people than anything else. The "race of the kings" for instance, or the Homeric convention of referring to all the great heroes of the trojan war as "a great race". Tolkien just didn't like words like "species" because they were too Latin-y for his Anglophilic tastes and sound too scientific in a world resembling myth.

RedMage125
2022-03-03, 08:51 PM
Not to derail or go there, but Tolkien's use of the word race is more aligned with a pre-modern idea of any grouping of alike people than anything else. The "race of the kings" for instance, or the Homeric convention of referring to all the great heroes of the trojan war as "a great race". Tolkien just didn't like words like "species" because they were too Latin-y for his Anglophilic tastes and sound too scientific in a world resembling myth.

Not to mention calling them "species" would imply that interbreeding was not possible. And given that humans and elves are capable of interbreeding and creating fertile offspring..."species" would be inaccurate.

Draconi Redfir
2022-03-04, 03:27 AM
also it's a pronunciation thing. "Race" (one syllable, only one "S" sound) is just flat out easier to say then "Species" (Two syllables, three "S" sounds).

Race just flat out rolls off the tongue better, really not a lot deeper then that.

Metastachydium
2022-03-04, 04:43 AM
Not to derail or go there, but Tolkien's use of the word race is more aligned with a pre-modern idea of any grouping of alike people than anything else. The "race of the kings" for instance, or the Homeric convention of referring to all the great heroes of the trojan war as "a great race". Tolkien just didn't like words like "species" because they were too Latin-y for his Anglophilic tastes and sound too scientific in a world resembling myth.

The Homeric corpus is not the best of examples here, since it predates the English language in general and the first attested use of the English word race in particular.

That said, Merriam-Webster has these definitions for race:
"1 b dated: a group of people sharing a common cultural, geographical, linguistic, or religious origin or background

c archaic: the descendants of a common ancestor : a group sharing a common lineage

2 a a group of living things considered as a category

b archaic: breed

3 biology: a group within a species that is distinguishable (as morphologically, genetically, or behaviorally) from others of the same species
also: a usually informal taxonomic category representing such a group that is often considered equivalent to a subspecies

4 archaic: a group of people sharing some habit or characteristic (such as profession or belief)"

In other words, could we just leave Tolkien alone?

Anonymouswizard
2022-03-04, 07:32 AM
It comes down to 'Tolkien used it for a reason, not every following work kept that reason'. It applies to a lot of elements really.

But it's just controversial enough that we could swap it out for Lineage or Ancestry, which get the same idea across. If 6e (or whatever system you're playing) drops backgrounds 'Origon' could work as well*.

* And now I want to pick up the Dragon Age RPG.

Metastachydium
2022-03-04, 08:02 AM
It comes down to 'Tolkien used it for a reason, not every following work kept that reason'. It applies to a lot of elements really.

Granted. But that's hardly Tolkien's fault, and Curbludgeon called his use of the term creepy.


But it's just controversial enough that we could swap it out for Lineage or Ancestry, which get the same idea across. If 6e (or whatever system you're playing) drops backgrounds 'Origon' could work as well.

What's an origon?

Anonymouswizard
2022-03-04, 08:08 AM
Granted. But that's hardly Tolkien's fault, and Curbludgeon called his use of the term creepy.

Yeah, true. But I think it's important to remember that a lot of the time when people say 'Tolkien' what they mean is 'Tolkien imitators'.


What's an origon?

A rare species in the tyop family.

Eldan
2022-03-04, 08:08 AM
Should have used "kind". "Mankind", "Elvenkind", "Orckind". Done.

Catullus64
2022-03-04, 08:53 AM
For the whole question that seems to have sprung up about the word 'race' itself, if you feel it has problems, then I find that 'Peoples', 'Folk', and 'Nations' (in its older sense, rather than the modern use to refer to nation-states) all work well and preserve a more old-world feel.

As for the main subject of the thread:

Half-Elves: This isn't really a fluff change since the idea is vaguely supported by the 5e book, but I prefer to have half-elves as entire ethnic groups that result from the mixing of human and elvish populations. Once I ran a setting where the half-elves were specifically the aristocrats of a kingdom where human conquerors married en masse into local elvish nobility to gain legitimacy. I sometimes do something similar for half-orcs. This change usually goes down without a fuss because it still allows room for players to do a classic half-breed character if they want one.

Tieflings: Always sat weird with me as being a core race, but I've learned to have fun with them. Not all of my settings have traditional D&D fiends, or even other planes of existence. My favorite re-imagining of Tieflings is that in the past there was a powerful and evil empire, and that to combat them the other nations unleashed the magical equivalent of thermonuclear attacks, turning the entire country into a blasted, sanity-defying hellscape. Tieflings are the survivors (the word in their language actually meaning 'remnant') of that empire's people, who have endured on the barely-livable borders of that land, mutated to suit its hellish conditions. Distrust of Tieflings comes not from religious stigma, but from historical grievance, not to mention that many Tieflings are raiders and scavengers of necessity. Physically, I think D&D Tieflings are too sexy-looking for beings supposedly carrying the blood of hell, so I describe their appearance as more monstrous. Their skin is leathery and hide-like, their horns & tails are painful growths often accompanied by swelling and scarring, and they tend to have rasping voices.

Dragonborn: Never made sense to me as an actual 'people.' In my current setting, and a few others, every living Dragonborn was custom-made by one dragon or another to be its servant; they do not procreate. This is a change I like for a number of reasons: it gives an immediate conflict to all dragonborn characters; do you fight for the purpose for which you were created, or strive against it? It also adds a sense of melancholy if the players have to fight and kill a dragon: Dragons are dying out, after all, and when there are no more dragons there will be no more Dragonborn.

I tend not to muck about too much with Elves, Dwarfs, Halflings, & Gnomes. My Dwarfs are generally very Warhammer-inspired: grim, isolationist, forever brooding over slights and grudges, with a tragic sense of honour.

My halflings are aggressively close to the mold of Hobbits, to the point that I often just call them that. WoTC has to worry about copyright, I don't! I'm still miffed that so much 5e art portrays them wearing shoes.

Gnomes are their usual selves, but usually with the implication that at one distant point in history they were tall, serious, noble, and martial, moreso even than Elves.

Elves have what seem like skewed priorities to humans. Like all other non-human major player races, they spend a lot of time brooding over their lost glories and fallen empires. My elves can live for millennia, but the older they get the more they are afflicted by loss of memory and a tendency towards dangerous melancholia.

RedMage125
2022-03-04, 09:54 AM
So...I already put out what I do in my home setting, but I have an idea I've been tossing around in my head. I thought I'd share it with the playground, see if anyone else wants to adopt it.

It's a re-telling of the enmity between elves and orcs, and exactly why humans seem to be compatible with both.

Many millennia ago, elves and orcs lived together in relative harmony. "Relative" being a key word, because elves were the dominant race, being more intelligent, more sophisticated, and more long lived. The orcs, while not slaves, were somewhat treated as "lesser". Eventually, members of the two races started mixing, and their hybrid children combined some of the best of both races. These hybrids were more fair in appearance than orcs, more intelligent, more charismatic, more creative. They lived about twice as long as orcs, but still not nearly as long as elves. However, they were also a lot more creative than their elven relations. They were innovative, finding new ways to do things faster than the elves (sometimes with dangerous results). They also inherited the orcs' propensity to breed prolifically (by elven standards). The hybrids felt kinship with both, and to a degree, neither. They became a unique race and began forming their own unique culture, one mostly focused on accomplishment, rather than tradition (like the elves), or on conflict (like the orcs).

After only a few hundred years, this hybrid race became a cause for concern for both elves and orcs. The orcs worried that these hybrids held themselves above the orcs, like the elves did (which also increased resentment they felt towards the elves). The elves feared that the hybrids and orcs combined would soon outnumber them, even though the hybrids were possessed of a better sense of reason than the orcs (which bred mistrust and suspicion of the orcs). The hybrid people became a catalyst for the the boiling over of what had been minor grievances between elves and orcs, and eventually, there was a massive war. Thousands upon thousands of lives lost among all three races.

In the end, the elves were (mostly) victorious. The orcs and hybrids were expelled from elven lands. But even the elves had to rebuild most of their civilization. The Elven and Orc deities made it so their races would never be fertile with each other again. However, given the birth rate and adaptability of the hybrid race, it was clear that they, eventually, were the true victors. They settled their new lands, but a great deal of their knowledge of their time with the elves and orcs was forgotten. Not having a Creator Deity, these hybrids worshipped gods based on their portfolios. Those that worked the fields prayed to deities of land and harvest, those with a mind for battle worshipped gods of war, those with a talent for magic worshipped gods of knowledge and magic. Orcs, for their part, felt the most bitter resentment. A resentment nurtured by their deities, who encouraged them to be angry, and to take back what they felt was "rightfully theirs".

Eventually, all knowledge of this conflict was lost to time (although there might be ancient elven ruins somewhere chronicling it). And while elves and orcs would never breed again, these hybrids, having both as common ancestors, were able to breed with both. Humans, obviously, are those hybrids, although no one even remembers anymore that they used to be a blend of elf and orc. So much so that when humans are considered a true race in their own right, and a human who re-mixes their blood with orc or elf produces an individual with more pronounced elven or orcish features (half-elves and half-orcs, respectively).

So...that's the idea. My stance for all of my creative concepts is Plagiarism Is The Sincerest Form Of Flattery. So, if you like it, feel free to cherry-pick, or yoink wholesale.

KorvinStarmast
2022-03-04, 11:35 AM
What's an origon? It's a gaming convention that got started by Avalon Hill. :smallbiggrin:

It's a re-telling of the enmity between elves and orcs, and exactly why humans seem to be compatible with both. Because humans, like dragons, are promiscuous by nature. (I chose not to use the S word, but if the shoe fits ...)

Xervous
2022-03-04, 11:40 AM
Because humans, like dragons, are promiscuous by nature. (I chose not to use the S word, but if the shoe fits ...)

Hey this is tabletop, not an industrial programming forum. I don’t see why slice look up tables are relevant.

Who even was responsible for all the half dragon nonsense that cropped up in 3.5e? I remember Dungeon Magazine being littered with them.

Vahnavoi
2022-03-04, 11:44 AM
For the whole question that seems to have sprung up about the word 'race' itself, if you feel it has problems, then I find that 'Peoples', 'Folk', and 'Nations' (in its older sense, rather than the modern use to refer to nation-states) all work well and preserve a more old-world feel.

It's completely purposeless trying to dodge specific words based on some people willfully misinterpreting them. It's right up there with trying to avoid using words like "witch" or "barbarian" because in some context those can be used as insults or, worse, because somebody somewhere at some point of history was hurt because they were called such, completely forgetting what is actually happening in a game.

PhoenixPhyre
2022-03-04, 12:15 PM
It's completely purposeless trying to dodge specific words based on some people willfully misinterpreting them. It's right up there with trying to avoid using words like "witch" or "barbarian" because in some context those can be used as insults or, worse, because somebody somewhere at some point of history was hurt because they were called such, completely forgetting what is actually happening in a game.

Yeah. The euphemism treadmill is a real thing. Those that want to use them as insults will adapt to whatever the new term becomes; those that want to perceive something as offensive will, regardless of what's being used.

KorvinStarmast
2022-03-04, 12:18 PM
It's completely purposeless trying to dodge specific words based on some people willfully misinterpreting them. It's right up there with trying to avoid using words like "witch" or "barbarian" because in some context those can be used as insults or, worse, because somebody somewhere at some point of history was hurt because they were called such, completely forgetting what is actually happening in a game. In the context of a D&D 5e discussion, I would presume that barbarian is a positive term (and fans of Mr Schwarzenegger would approve); while going back 3000 years in a more original usage I think "they don't speak Greek" is the rough meaning. That would mean that I am a barbarian. (My sister-in-law, descended from Greek immigrants, will now and again agree with this assessment).

See also the use of the term Philistine to either connote an ancient people in the Middle East or someone with 'poor taste' as seen by some effete snob from New York City, Paris, London, etc.

Alcore
2022-03-04, 12:21 PM
Elves;

Typically I return them to their fey lord roots. An npc race.


Dwarves;

Warhammer variety (as described so a little embellished and exaggerated) that carry grudges. You wrong a dwarf? He WILL get back at you. Accidentally kill him in self defense? His family will come to kill you, why? For the audacity of spilling dwarf blood. A lesser creature such as you must bow to their right to your life. Will keep escalating until a kingdom is at war with dwarves foaming at the mouth at the audacity of lesser creatures dared to exist in their world. Don’t believe them? Better be willing to kill them down to the last child.

Incidentally they are a dying breed and replace the orcs for “always evil”.


Gnomes?

Back with the fey (also ncp race).

Halflings?

Don’t exist unless a player wants one; always called hobbits.

Orcs?

Nomadic tribesmen that carry the noble warrior tropes. Usually regulated to inhospitable areas for humans killing them because they look funny or savages or brutes. (Worlds without orcs tend to favor goblinoids instead)


Half elf/orc

Don’t exist.

Catullus64
2022-03-04, 01:06 PM
It's completely purposeless trying to dodge specific words based on some people willfully misinterpreting them. It's right up there with trying to avoid using words like "witch" or "barbarian" because in some context those can be used as insults or, worse, because somebody somewhere at some point of history was hurt because they were called such, completely forgetting what is actually happening in a game.

Some people are bothered by a word and its connotations, others aren't. I see no real harm in offering options that can be used as substitutes. The word 'race' used in its normal D&D context doesn't bother me, but neither is it so crucial to me to use it that I can't be perfectly content with substitutes if it bothers somebody else at the table. I've got (slightly) more important hills to die on.

Vahnavoi
2022-03-04, 05:09 PM
Try writing a certain common English name or transliterating some common Japanese phrases on these forums, and you will very rapidly find where the harm is in appealing to equivocational thinking.

Draconi Redfir
2022-03-04, 05:20 PM
So...that's the idea. My stance for all of my creative concepts is Plagiarism Is The Sincerest Form Of Flattery. So, if you like it, feel free to cherry-pick, or yoink wholesale.

i like it! Helps explain the whole half-elf / half-orc thing well, and makes an interesting dynamic between the three races. Very neat!



Not sure if it's really a properly fluff change, but if my setting ever happens, I'm thinking Orcs, Humans, and Elves would all be island-dwelling people, with Orcs pulling the Viking-style "Raider" niche, but with the twist that they are the only ones who know how to make / have access too a specific kind of metal, either Cold iron or Steel, not sure yet. So while Humans and Elves don't like being raided by the Orcs for obvious reasons, every fallen Orc leaves behind valuable weapons and armor made out of this metal, with a bit of an industry or even reliance popping up around it. If humans want to make something out of this metal, they need the orcs to raid so that they can take the metal off them.


Trade could also be possible of course, but I'm thinking it'd be unlikely either due to Orcs not willing to trade with their prey, and / or human and elven civilians being unwilling to have their enemies treated as equals. Maybe there could pop up sort of "Mock raids" that are planned between the groups. Humans set up a "Village" full of food, cloth, and supplies, but with all the people being trained soldiers. the orcs "Raid" this village, and fight the people in the village. But it's agreed that the fights won't be to the death, and that orcs will drop their weapons when they're defeated / before they leave (or otherwise "Accidentally" leave behind bits of this metal) while running off with the other supplies. This way the Orcs still get a fight, still get the supplies they need, Humans don't loose people and get the metal they need, and everyone else believes it's just another legit raid.

So it could be "Trading", but slightly more violent.


Got the idea for this whole thing after watching someone play a "Rimworld ice sheet, single colonist challenge". Where their colonist had little to no natural resources of their own, and relied on those brought in and dropped by raiders. Weapons became walls, survival meals became lunch, and clothing became cloth.

Psyren
2022-03-04, 05:25 PM
Some of these are mechanical rather than fluff, and I wanted to respond to one in particular:


It will change from one game to the next. The introduction to my last game I ran included the following:

I'd be fine with these changes as long as it's possible for characters to learn them in-game through means other than fighting. Like if Red Dragons in your world breathe lightning and are immune to cold, and all undead creatures are immune to Radiant, that's all fine - but I'm going to expect that someone in that world figured that out at some point and wrote it in a book or song that my PC can or was able to read at some point without always being forced to fight one. The game is Dungeons & Dragons, not Trials & Errors.

Anonymouswizard
2022-03-04, 05:48 PM
I'd be fine with these changes as long as it's possible for characters to learn them in-game through means other than fighting. Like if Red Dragons in your world breathe lightning and are immune to cold, and all undead creatures are immune to Radiant, that's all fine - but I'm going to expect that someone in that world figured that out at some point and wrote it in a book or song that my PC can or was able to read at some point without always being forced to fight one. The game is Dungeons & Dragons, not Trials & Errors.

It be be worth creating personalised cheat sheets for the players with the basic knowledge their characters would have. Ideally between Session 0 and the start of play, but really just when you have the time.

Most characters might not know that undead are resistant to Radiant damage, but I'd expect somebody who worked for an undead-hating church to. You can probably get a decent idea from race/class/background to avoid silly situations like the elf not knowing that elves cone from coastal communities.

That extends to things like 'evil spells', although in that situation the player should probably know the spell is corrupting even if the character doesn't. Other players might not, that really depends on if the group plays with open or closed sheets.

PhoenixPhyre
2022-03-04, 06:22 PM
One major change I've made globally is removing any trace of "presumed alignments" for any living thing. Including extra-planar types. Everyone is an individual, and any one can be any alignment. And that's flagged very heavily up front and throughout the campaign.

And yes, this includes things like dragons (who are still color-coded by element, although I've shuffled those a bit[1] and mostly by terrain, but not by personality any more) and outsiders. Now devils, demons, other fiends, and celestials are all sorted by source of energy[2] and thus by their role in the universal economy, not by alignment.

[1] for instance black dragons do necrotic damage and are technically metallic. The metallic/chromatic distinction is now about whether you're an active spell-caster or not. Metallics all can transform and have learned and practice "normal" spells beyond just direct elemental manipulation; the change in their scales reflects that for reasons no one's quite sure of. Chromatics don't know or don't regularly use "normal" spells and (generally) can't transform. Oh, and all dragons are one species. Colors are not hereditary--each hatchling gets a connection to an element and bathes in it, transforming into a (colored) wyrmling; further growth depends on gaining a hoard (which depends on the individual).

[2] everything needs a source of energy. And outsiders can't create their own. So celestials get it from the Great Mechanism of the universe as payment for their service in the Eternal War against things from Outside; devils (and generic fiends) are the same species of being, but get theirs as payment for serving gods, other devils, other ascended beings, or via contracts with mortals for a (renewable) piece of their soul (effectively "worship", but much less than real worship). Devils get theirs by consuming sapient beings' souls and imprisoning them inside themselves, drawing off their energy. Yes, demons are generally not the nicest. But they're not made of evil. Most of them were formerly mortals who chose this path for "immortality" or were infected as spirits by other demons (demon-ness is contagious). And many dislike their nature and feed only on those who offer themselves in exchange for power (ie cultists), and only after the cultist's death.

Bohandas
2022-03-05, 01:58 AM
Drow- Have a red hourglass shaped marking covering their backs because apparently the black widow spider analogy is lost on a lot of people

Creatures With Infravision- Infravision uses seperate eyes from normal vision, like a snake's loreal pits (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loreal_pit)

Trolls Trolls have an extremely fast metabolism and need to eat in excessive amounts

Everything- everything that isn;t human needs to be, in general, less human

Humans D&D humans are on average about 1/2 human, and 1/2 miscellaneous/assorted, and it's this second part that the bonus feats and skills come from

Draconi Redfir
2022-03-05, 08:44 AM
Drow- Have a red hourglass shaped marking covering their backs because apparently the black widow spider analogy is lost on a lot of people

Honestly, that's just cool. Gotta keep that in mind if i ever make a spider-based Drow.

LibraryOgre
2022-03-05, 11:12 AM
Half-Elves: This isn't really a fluff change since the idea is vaguely supported by the 5e book, but I prefer to have half-elves as entire ethnic groups that result from the mixing of human and elvish populations. Once I ran a setting where the half-elves were specifically the aristocrats of a kingdom where human conquerors married en masse into local elvish nobility to gain legitimacy. I sometimes do something similar for half-orcs. This change usually goes down without a fuss because it still allows room for players to do a classic half-breed character if they want one.


Reminds me of another one:

Most half-orcs are 2nd+ generation half-orcs, even in more old-school worlds. Very few are "rape by orcs resulted in half-orc" or "consensual relationship between orc and human"... most are "Well, human society doesn't like me, and pushes me to the fringe. She is also disliked by human society and pushed to the fringe, and so we hook up" (to varying degrees). They're not necessarily a stable cultural group, and have the influx of 1st generation half-orcs every so often, but most are half-orcs born to half-orcs born to half-orcs.

KyleG
2022-03-29, 03:51 AM
Elves known as Alcrys: The Great Alcrys forests are wonders to behold. The fruit they bear is picked and provided as food across the lands. Those who consume the food magically transfer their knowledge to the tree it was picked from and after 50/100? Years a humanoid emerges fully grown and with worldly knowledge. Although some remain with the Alcrys forests many will continue to seek knowledge while others will find their homes amongst other forests.
V’Alcrys: When the fruit of an Alcrys falls to the ground unpicked and rotting this creates dark entities with a thirst for knowledge only temporarily sated by the blood of mortal creatures. These long lived creatures grow only as long as their list of victims gaining some knowledge and physical traits from those they consume and because this most often happens in the depths of forests they shun the light. - a vampiric type entity.

Halflings aka Farmers: When the Alcrys forests were first created by the Ancient Ones another of their kin created the Farmers as a gift to her to aid her in the upkeep of her great forests. When the Ancient Ones moved on, the Farmers, with a fundamental drive to farm and cultivate spread far and wide no longer just tending to the great forests. Some would say they have neglected their purpose but no matter where they have settled the small folks generous spirit and gifts with cultivation have made them welcome beings across the cradle.

Dwarves aka D’War: Another of the Ancient Ones carved this race from Great Chunks of Rock. They were created as a show of power, a huge army of stone carved warriors (D’War comes from Daven’s Warriors). Hearty and Strong both physically and mentally more often than not they keep close to the mountains where they strive to craft as well as he who crafted them, but ready to be called upon to fulfill their ancient purpose. Although some would have features we would associate with either male or female the D’War actually have no sexes. When a D’War (of sufficient size) finds a partner whom craftsmanship impresses them both they will enter a union where one of the two will turn into stone. From this stone the other will craft usually one or two smaller D’War who will begin this new life upon completion. Thus D’War can range in size quite a bit. The Halls of the D’War carry no politics, each look after their own and for the most part they work on their craft or look out for themselves.
Unfortunately their reproduction methods means their numbers are in decline.
The Unborn: Sometimes a D’War statue is not completed. In rare circumstances both partners become rock, or perhaps the D’War craftsman is killed before completing their work. Left unfinished but with life infused these monstrous blocks of earth live a half-life of eternity in constant torment of life unfulfilled. Tales say that an Unborn freed from their imprisonment is not freed from their insanity and are hulking monstrosities whose desire to destroy is only matched by the D’War desire to create. The grounds where the original D’War were carved is said to contain several Unborn left unfinished when the Ancient Ones moved on. These oldest unborn have spent an eternity in the half life.
Giant D’War (Giants): A D’War who grows too large will not be able to craft well, and therefore unlikely to find a partner. Agelessly immortal these creatures forget much of themselves becoming far less intelligent, prone to violence they fight amongst themselves

Dragonkin: Unos Draconis: The Unos Draconis were not tribal but rather a large nation with no strong directed leadership. Leaders would come and go but life was fairly stagnant. This all changed when 11 of their kin started to gather a horde of treasure letting nothing stand in their way, least of all each other. So began the Horde Wars and the now named Horde Lords fought ruthlessly and without caring about anyone else in their pursuit of all the riches they could get their hands on. When the Draconis were almost decimated by the constant war for treasure the Horde Lords gathered and in a rare moment of agreement decided to take their lust for treasure beyond the lands of the cradle. With no means to traverse the mountain tops they turned to the D’War craftsman to craft them a vessel to leave this place and the D’War sought only the finest of treasure as payment from each. In their strongholds the D’War craftsman created magnificently crafted beasts with the treasure received and when they were done the Horde Lords came and shed their old body for their new.
Side note: The heart of an Unos Draconis grows harder as they age and should it be removed upon death it will harden fully into a precious stone.
Dragonkind: The original Dragonkind were the 10 Horde Lords who received new bodies from the D’War. They flew across the mountains and that is all we know. But it is believed the 11th Horde Lord also received a new body and using this he watched over the Draconis and Dragonkind of the cradle. The dragonkind are likely the descendants of those original Horde Lords. Dragonkind for all their power are also physically sexless the D’War not knowing better crafted them as such. But the power to give life was not lost and in time the Dragonkind would learn that the heart of an Unos Draconis (when birthed in Dragonbreath would harden and become a Stone egg until it was sufficiently incubated.
Neo Draconis: After the Horde War the few remaining people gathered and set forth to create a new era for themselves. Treasure for the purpose of having was shunned and any prosperity should be shared. A very enlightened age of Draconis began (akin to Marvels wakanda).

Tiefling and Aasimar are the Touched: Creating using energy from the negative Plane (mirrorverse). The energy that courses thru their bodies forces additional changes to what appear to be human children upon reaching puberty. Whether skin colour, or tails, wings or horns the dramatic shift can be both painful physically and mentally. Children raised around the other races are usually kept away from others during this time which only adds to a lifelong feeling of isolation, even when they choose to live within the greater world. Small conclaves of Touched therefore are not uncommon near more populous areas, where those undergoing the change can do so without fear or

Tabaxi, Aarakocra, Goblinoids etc are the Moreau: The most chaotic of the Old Ones cared not for the other races his kin had created but took each of them (as well as animalkind) for his own means. Quick and ‘messy’ experiments yielded a number of new species from beastial abominations to more humanoid creatures. But like all those created they were left to fend for themselves once the Old Ones left this world behind. Some have progressed to a level akin to the other races whilst others have remained feral, uncivilised or just animalistic. The worst of them a combination of both.

Jay R
2022-03-29, 10:59 AM
Some of these are mechanical rather than fluff, and I wanted to respond to one in particular:

Yes, you're right; many of these were mechanical changes.


I'd be fine with these changes as long as it's possible for characters to learn them in-game through means other than fighting. Like if Red Dragons in your world breathe lightning and are immune to cold, and all undead creatures are immune to Radiant, that's all fine - but I'm going to expect that someone in that world figured that out at some point and wrote it in a book or song that my PC can or was able to read at some point without always being forced to fight one. The game is Dungeons & Dragons, not Trials & Errors.

1. When I say that dragons are not color-coded, I don't mean that the color code is unknown, I mean that they are not color-coded. Most dragons were the same species, which could be red or gold or green or whatever, just as a single breed of dog can be black or white or brown. In fact, most dragons would breathe fire, a few (mostly found in swamps) breathed poison gas, and only in the far north did dragons breathe cold.

And I introduced a pack of small dragons of several colors early on, all breathing fire, so they could know about it.

2. There was nothing that all undead creatures are immune to. Most undead were unchanged; I introduced some slightly more deadly zombies; a weapon that went into their flesh would be harder to pull out.

3. An essential fact about that world, which the players learned early on, is that most monsters weren't native, there were very few people who could learn magic, and most of the time, life was pretty mundane, with no adventurers. Every once in awhile, monsters from some other world (not a standard D&D plane) would break through, and there would be an Age of Heroes. One such age was just starting, and the PCs were on the forefront. At third level, they were great heroes. The PCs found out pretty early that monsters of one age did not necessarily match monsters of another age -- so nobody knew what they would be like this time.

4. The PCs all grew up in an isolated village deep in a haunted forest, and knew very little about the world.

5. The goblins they met early on were semi-bestial. They would rush in with no tactics at all, and flee almost immediately when they started taking losses, unless they were led by some other creature. After the PCs figured this out, they stopped a siege of 200 goblins attacking a village by simply taking out the ogres leading them. The joy they got by figuring this out, and defeating 200 1-hd creatures by themselves at third level, was far more than they could have gotten by reading about it and just applying what they learned.

The introduction that you read specifically included this:
"The purpose is to make the world strange and mysterious. It will allow (require) PCs to learn, by trial and error, what works. Most of these changes I will not tell you in advance." [Emphasis added.]

Yes, it was D&D; yes, it was trial and error, and yes, all my players loved it. People were asking me to get back to it years later.

LibraryOgre
2022-03-29, 01:11 PM
So, Hackmaster has two cultures of gnomes... the standard gnome, or fulmaran, and the gnome titans, the dalgul. They diverged a few hundred years ago (3-4 gnome generations) when several clans of gnomes, in 12 cantons, were cut off from the rest of the species by a centuries-long war involving orcs, goblins, and a couple different types of giant. The dalgul became hard little bastards to survive.

Both races have the "inappropriate sense of humor" trait, but I have them differ in how and why they exercise it. Fulmarans will just tell you the bad things that might happen; they name them to drive them away. Dalgul name them, too... but they name them so they can dare them to show their faces.

BRC
2022-03-29, 01:12 PM
It's not much of one, but I'm amused by one feature in my current setting.

"Dwarves" as in "Stocky, 4ft8 people with beards" don't exist in the setting. There IS a race CALLED "Dwarves". They are what the rulebooks would refer to as "Goliaths". They generally stand around 6'9, and are very strong. They are also known as skilled miners, smiths, and enchanters.

This is because their home continent is where the Giants come from. The next-smallest sentient species there are Ogres. In the language of the place, referring to them as "Dwarves" makes perfect sense.

In the same setting

"Tieflings" are not the offspring of mortals and fiends, or anything like that. Without getting into too much setting backstory, there was a god who was really into Kingship as a thing, and in exchange for loyal service, he blessed the royal lines of a certain region. That god Died. In this setting Fiends are not Servants of Evil Gods, they're what's happens to the servants of a god that dies, as without the source, the divine power becomes fel and corrupted.

So, the blessing bestowed upon the royal lines turns from "Occasionally one of your descendants will be supernaturally beautiful and live a very long time and have magic powers" became "Occasionally, one of your descendants will look like a demon and have magic powers".

For a while people just killed Tieflings in the cribs, then the tradition was to hand them off to the church to be raised. The old royal lines lost their thrones, devolving into a mercenary-aristocracy in service to the newly ascended Trade Princes, who they intermarried with. The Trade Princes didn't want to give up their children because of an ancient blessing-turned-curse, and had enough cultural power to make having a tiefling child something of a fashion statement. "Look at me, my house is great enough that we've intermarried with one of the old royal lines".

So Tieflings in this setting are not "Feared and mistrusted outsiders", they're generally either 1) Pious lifelong servants of the Gods (It's been centuries since the Blessing, so there are plenty of "Royal Descendents" with no idea living as common farmers. Common-Born Tieflings usually get dropped on the nearest temple doorstep) 2) Mercenary Captains or 3) Wealthy Merchants.


Edit:

Not mine, but I recall an idea somebody had where Orcs, Goblins, Hobgoblins, and Trolls were all technically one species, they all started out the same and, as their settlement required, would be fed different alchemical brews as infants that would cause them to mature in different ways.

Cluedrew
2022-03-29, 08:10 PM
You know I have written a lot of different settings over the years (some of which other people even found out about) but honestly there is pretty much only one change that is universal across them: Standardize Lifespans. There are so many issues having two races live side by side with an order of magnitude difference in lifespan that are often just ignored. And that's fine, but if you are going to ignore them why have it at all? So I usually bring it back to the extreme cases still only being twice/half over all.

But for particular cases, I've got ones where orcs have three genders, another were elves are just what happens when a human is exposed to too much magic, dwarves are part earth elemental and others.

Bohandas
2022-03-30, 12:17 AM
You know I have written a lot of different settings over the years (some of which other people even found out about) but honestly there is pretty much only one change that is universal across them: Standardize Lifespans. There are so many issues having two races live side by side with an order of magnitude difference in lifespan that are often just ignored. And that's fine, but if you are going to ignore them why have it at all? So I usually bring it back to the extreme cases still only being twice/half over all.

Now I personally would be inclined to try and go the other direction and make them weirder

NRSASD
2022-03-30, 06:42 AM
So, lots of tweaks.
First: Species doesnÂ’t equal culture. There are cosmopolitan societies that are massively intermixed, in one case founded by dwarves, another by humans.

Goblins and bugbears are the same species, a form of fey. Native to the Feywild, they can cross over when natural conjunctions occur (which happens several times a year) and like other Outsiders, arenÂ’t dead when they die in the prime material, just sent home. TheyÂ’re aggressive, mischievous raiders, trying to cause the most destruction and acquire the most loot, so they can petition the fey courts back home and be granted a higher form. TheyÂ’re a constant menace and just as likely to pop out of an especially dark shadow as live in a cave.

Most reptilian creatures, including dragons, are bio weapons created by an ancient reptilian species, now extinct. ThatÂ’s why they all speak draconic, they all have the same origin as servants/tools.

Kenku are bio weapons created by an ancient avian species, now extinct, to fight the reptiles. Their inability to speak was a curse. When the ancient reptilians and avians signed a peace treaty, they agreed to disarm, which meant exterminating their creations, lizardfolk, dragons, and kenku included. One avian leader defied those terms because he valued the lives of his creations, the kenku, as living beings, not tools, and rather than disarm restarted the conflict. It finally ground to a halt again, but the damage was so severe that both the reptilians and the avians were doomed to go extinct. Before they did though, they conceded the point that their creations deserved life and emancipated their minds rather than destroy them. However, as punishment, they trapped the rebellious general in a state of Undeath and bound him in such a way that he could observe the world but not interfere. They also cursed the entire kenku species to remain as tools, incapable of independent thought and the perfect servants for anyone for as long as the rebellious avian leader continued to exist. Over the course of a long campaign, the party found the rebellious avian leader and granted him a final death, permitting the kenku to become a free-willed species fully capable of independent thought and speech.

Psyren
2022-03-30, 01:56 PM
The introduction that you read specifically included this:
"The purpose is to make the world strange and mysterious. It will allow (require) PCs to learn, by trial and error, what works. Most of these changes I will not tell you in advance." [Emphasis added.]

Yes, it was D&D; yes, it was trial and error, and yes, all my players loved it. People were asking me to get back to it years later.

Glad they enjoyed it.



"Tieflings" are not the offspring of mortals and fiends, or anything like that. Without getting into too much setting backstory, there was a god who was really into Kingship as a thing, and in exchange for loyal service, he blessed the royal lines of a certain region. That god Died. In this setting Fiends are not Servants of Evil Gods, they're what's happens to the servants of a god that dies, as without the source, the divine power becomes fel and corrupted.

So, the blessing bestowed upon the royal lines turns from "Occasionally one of your descendants will be supernaturally beautiful and live a very long time and have magic powers" became "Occasionally, one of your descendants will look like a demon and have magic powers".


Were Aasimar the ones whose gods didn't die?

BRC
2022-03-30, 02:12 PM
Were Aasimar the ones whose gods didn't die?

Theoretically, but the only god who went around blessing bloodlines like this is the one who died, so there aren't any aasimar.

So one of the rules of the setting is that Gods mucking around with the material plane weakens the fabric of reality. Clerics are a loophole because that's Mortal Will doing stuff, the gods are just lending them power to do it. The Cleric's magical skill and will is what's actually working, even if they're using divine power to cast the spells. Divine Intervention is the gods deciding that it's worth it to break the rules this time.

(The local trickster god loopholes this rule in a few ways, mainly by being vague and insufferable and generally only showing up to his clerics if they've been heavily drinking and dropping a few hints, such that whatever they end up doing is more about their interpretation of what he said than anything HE actually did.)

The god in question, Oberok, wanted to build a great empire, the obligatory hyperadvanced fallen civilization. Part of the way he did this was with flagrant divine intervention, directly guiding his chosen followers, supercharging his clerics, all sorts of stuff.

The Bloodline Blessing was a reward for these particular kings petitioning to become subjects of Oberok's Empire, saving him the trouble of conquering them. However, the same laise-faire attitude towards divine intervention that led Oberok to bestow these blessings is ALSO what led the rest of his particular pantheon (His children) to murder him before his meddling tore the fabric of reality apart and got everybody eaten by extradimensional horrors.

The actual tipping point was when Oberok threw a hissy fit over his glorious empire not being able to subjugate the goblins and so he supercharged his clerics and had them destroy the goblin homeland with Earthquakes and Floods, turning fertile hills and valleys into a horrible, broken swamp.


TLDR: In theory, if other gods went around blessing bloodlines yeah, that's how you'd get Aasimar, but no other gods do, because it's a Bad Idea.

Anonymouswizard
2022-03-30, 02:40 PM
On that note, gods in my world's: basically nonexistent, in any form other than 'powerful spirit or fey'. Oh, they might be out there, but they don't grant spells or perform miracles, and no self-titled angel or demon has ever been able to prove they serve a god.

This is partially me preferring a lower power level, partially me wanting a lot more religious diversity than D&D tends to have. This has other knock-on effects like different religions having vastly different creation myths, none of them correct, and I might start having characters identify primarily by religion rather than species/race/ancestry (nationality/culture is still important). But this also allows for serious schisms and conflicts which matter but aren't necessarily all out war.

And of course this inevitably leads to an expansionist theocratic empire somewhere on the map, although rarely officially ruled by the church. But I'm not sure if I actually want them still around in the world I'm currently building.

Shpadoinkle
2022-03-31, 12:32 PM
In the setting I'm running a game in at the moment, merfolk and locathah are major players, and essentially make up two castes of the same nation.

Except... they're not different races, they're the same race. Via a ritual that takes 8 hours to complete, merfolk can shift into a locathah form, which they mostly reserve for things like if they're gearing up for a battle or if they're traveling overland. (The setting has lots of lakes and rivers everywhere.) The major mechanical changes that this has is that locathah have a land and swim speed of 30' each. (Merfolk have a land speed of 5' and a swim speed of 50'.)

Merfolk guard this secret very closely, as on the whole they tend a bit towards vanity, and hate having to take on their locathah form, which is one of the reasons they don't dominate the land a lot more.

Telonius
2022-04-02, 06:38 AM
This one is as much a fluff change to a deity as it is to a race, but: Kobolds, and their conflict with the Gnomes. Each of the races has their own story about exactly how the whole "cavern collapse" thing went down between Garl Glittergold and Kurtulmak. The fluff change is that both sides only have a part of the puzzle. The missing piece is Asmodeus, who engineered the whole thing in a bid to turn the Kobolds to Evil forever.

Jay R
2022-04-02, 08:43 AM
One of my fluff changes is this: No sentient race is inherently any single alignment

The goblin culture near the PCs happens to be Neutral Evil tribes, but on other continents there could be peaceful Good goblin farming communities, or an advanced Lawful goblin empire, or even a mountain retreat of philosophical goblin monks, of any alignment at all.

This gets rid of the moral issues of an "always evil" race, without changing anything that affects the PCs and their adventures.

LibraryOgre
2022-04-02, 10:05 AM
One of my fluff changes is this: No sentient race is inherently any single alignment

The goblin culture near the PCs happens to be Neutral Evil tribes, but on other continents there could be peaceful Good goblin farming communities, or an advanced Lawful goblin empire, or even a mountain retreat of philosophical goblin monks, of any alignment at all.

This gets rid of the moral issues of an "always evil" race, without changing anything that affects the PCs and their adventures.

I go slightly differently.

Mortal races have about the same distribution of alignments; goblins and orcs, being created by evil gods, and elves and dwarves, created by good gods, may have the thumb on the scale a bit, but they still have generally the same range. From there, their culture influences their alignment, which leads to a lot of [goblins] being evil. But there would still be a good chunk of good goblins, just like there are evil dwarves and evil elves (individuals, not subraces).

The difference comes in a couple places.
1) Smaller societies (such as you get with largely tribal goblins and orcs) are less likely to tolerate "alignment deviants". Off by a step? Yeah, they can handle that. Off by two? You're weird, but there may be a niche. Off by 3 or more? There's no place for you; you disrupt a small society too much. Big nations, like you get with elves and hobgoblins, can absorb a wider array of alignments, and find a niche for them.
2) Good societies will let alignment deviants survive; evil societies are less likely to. It's not that Good societies will let evil individuals get away with everything forever, but they're more likely to give second chances. Evil societies will often just kill you.

So, you see fewer good goblins than evil elves, simply because there's more space for the evil elves, and they're less likely to be murdered or executed.

Arutema
2022-04-10, 02:59 PM
For the campaign/setting I'm slowly working on:

Races of Gaia:
Elves:
Keep the long lifespan from 3.5, and combine with slow reproduction rates. (Elven women only ovulate twice a year, and pregnancies last 5 years.) This means both high elves and dark elves are still recovering both population-wise and societally from a war between their nations fought 400 years ago, while other races have moved on and prospered. High-elven culture is based on the Byzantine empire.

Dark Elves:
Do not call them "Drow", that's a high-elven slur. Use standard elf stats, but keep the dark skinned, pale-haired look. Society and architecture are Egyptian-inspired and lightly matriarchal. (Sons can inherit noble titles, but only in the absence of female heirs.)

Halflings:
Created as a fast-breeding, easy-to-feed slave race by high elven epic magic. They were quick to rebel and claim independence once they had sufficient numbers. Mostly live in the Free Federation under it's elected government, while a few still live as freed citizen among the high elven empire. They tend towards farming if only because the lands they've now claimed were long ago stripped of mineral wealth by the old elven empires. Due to lack of metal and mineral resources, they trade extensively with dwarves.

Dwarves:
Live in numerous underground kingdoms. Have recently discovered the secrets of gunpowder, and make basic flintlock firearms. Due to their tendency to live underground, they have trouble growing their own food, and often import bread, gain, beer, and mutton from halfling farmers in exchange for metal tools, ore, and occasionally firearms.

Gnomes:
Don't exist in the setting, as I find them redundant with halflings.

Orcs and half-humans:
Also don't exist.

Races of the Terran Empire:
Humans:
The main antagonist race. Come from Earth, where the year is 4022 CE. Have access to spaceships plus all sorts of goodies from Pathfinder Technology Guide, but have never seen magic before.

Androids:
Synthetic life forms created by humans and now integrated into their interstellar empire.

Kasathas:
A four-armed, bronze age people whose planet was conquered by the Terran empire. Often used by said empire as slave labor.

Bohandas
2022-04-10, 03:03 PM
Elves:
Keep the long lifespan from 3.5

It's my understanding that 3.5 actually drastically shortened elven lifespans


I go slightly differently.

Mortal races have about the same distribution of alignments; goblins and orcs, being created by evil gods, and elves and dwarves, created by good gods, may have the thumb on the scale a bit, but they still have generally the same range. From there, their culture influences their alignment, which leads to a lot of [goblins] being evil. But there would still be a good chunk of good goblins, just like there are evil dwarves and evil elves (individuals, not subraces).

Now you see I might be inclined go the opposite way and have strong species alignment tendencies that are counterbalanced into a wider range of alignment tendencies by having different societies. Like the Vulcans versus the Romulans on Star Trek

Arutema
2022-04-10, 03:17 PM
It's my understanding that 3.5 actually drastically shortened elven lifespans

I don't have earlier edition rulebooks on-hand to check, but the ~500 years from PF3.5 is enough for my purposes.

Enixon
2022-04-10, 03:54 PM
It's my understanding that 3.5 actually drastically shortened elven lifespans


If I remember right, and there's a good chance I'm forgetting a lot of the details, they had more or less the same "lifespan" as 3.x in old editions, the biggest difference being that when their time was up instead of actually dying of old age they just went full Tolkien and were struck with an irresistible urge to drop everything and go retire in the Grey Havens secret elven homeland.

Eldan
2022-04-11, 10:13 AM
Yeah, they went the full Tolkien. Elves are immortal.

MornShine
2022-04-18, 08:16 PM
Speaking of elves, in my world-in-hopefully-progress, elves aren't a race so much as... I suppose you could say a title?

Essentially, when someone becomes influential enough, they'll sometimes get an offer from an elven enclave to become immortal. If they accept, they'll travel to the enclave and after a while return as an elf. Not everyone accepts, because doing so requires a handful of sacrifices, the only one I've fully decided on so far being essentially that one has to forsake all titles and citizenships and that their family does not get to be

Offers are fairly rare, think on the order of nobel prizewinners or people being knighted.

Elves are creating by finding trees that contain dryads and essentially bonding to them and the dryad (how much the dryad consents is intentionally left ambiguous). Because dryad-trees are very rare, elven enclaves essentially cultivate forests. This also limits how many people can become elves.

The older an elf gets, the closer they have to stay to their tree, so elves over about twice normal lifespan pretty much disappear from larger society (and they only live as long as the tree does). Some exceptions may apply.

The children of elves (whether with other elves or mortals) are altered by their parents' traits, but not immortal and not automatically full elves. Many half-elves aspire to be invited to become an elf, most don't.

Gnomes are animists, believing that every item has a soul and endeavoring to make the best items they can. The Ship of Theseus is a serious moral quandary among them and has started at least one war. Interestingly, gnome-made items probably do slowly develop a soul, but most other cultures believe that the moral value gnomes place on items is horrible (saving a centuries-old heirloom from a fire rather than a child is sometimes expected).

Dark Gnomes invert this and tend to treat non-gnomes as items, engaging heavily in slavery.

Azuresun
2022-04-23, 04:40 AM
When I ran a game in the Primeval Thule setting (a sword and sorcery world, with a map based on a defrosted Greenland), I went into a bit more detail on possible PC races that aren't given stats in the book, but which do feature in the background, or could plausibly be added given the hints about other lands. This is what I came up with:


Beastmen are brutal and primitive cousins of humankind that dwell in the wilderness, marauders who swarm from the wilds to burn and plunder, driven by a deeply ingrained culture that commands them to scorn and hate civilisation and humankind. They appear as gorilla-like humanoids with stooped stances, pale skin and dark hair, with simian-like faces. Beastmen are not available as PC’s in this campaign. Among some barbarian tribes, notably the Mudrak tribe who dwell within the Gloamwood near Orech, human and beastman bloodlines have mingled--such characters use the stats for Shifters or Half-Orcs.

Goliaths are elusive denizens of the northern lands of Hellumar and Nimoth, seldom seen this far south. Their legends suggest they are native to “the crown of the world” in the far north but were driven from their homeland following a war with the strange pallid humans known as Hyperboreans and their terrible ice magic. The goliath creed of constantly challenging themselves comes from a belief that they must become strong enough to one day reclaim their home. Those goliaths who come south are usually exiles or renegades, or hunters in search of mighty opponents or monsters to test themselves against.

The Hrafnmann (“raff-en-man”) are a peculiar raven-like folk who come from the mountainous land of Ierne, to the south of Thule. They are a moody and superstitious people, looking for omens in everything and seeing themselves as driven by the inescapable hand of destiny. Their own legends tell how they were the servants of a great god of the southern lands, sent into the world from a divine realm in order to gather knowledge for their deity, to try and avert some great disaster. They are driven then to seek out forgotten lore and their wanderings sometimes carry them to Thule, which has no shortage of buried secrets. Such characters use the stats for Aarocackra.

Snake-Blooded are rare humans whose ancestry includes serpentfolk blood. Appearing nearly human with subtle physical signs of their inheritance (such as slitted eyes, a long neck, patches of scales, hairlessness, and / or a forked tongue), they tend to be self-controlled, cool and calculating, but do not have an inherent bias towards evil--at least not more than humans do. These characters use the rules for Yuan-Ti Purebloods.

Tieflings are descended from human servants of the ancient rakshasa empire, who were reshaped into forms more pleasing to the fiends. They were mostly wiped from Thule when the empire fell over 1400 years ago, and are known to most modern Thuleans only in fanciful legends, if at all. Now, tieflings mostly dwell in a handful of small villages in the northern land of Hellumar, within the so-called “Striped Empire” of Jhi Anool. Tieflings who travel to Thule may be on a mission for a fiendish master, or renegades seeking to escape their overlords. They will likely be considered some mixture of exotic, alluring or sinister by most of the inhabitants of Thule. Some bloodlines of tiefling manifest tiger-like feline features instead of fiendish ones (and can be represented as tabaxi), and the variant tieflings from MToF can also be taken.

Other races do not exist in this setting by default. It’s possible that such a character might be a unique mutant, an explorer from another land or world, or a variation of another race created by strange sorcery.

solidork
2022-04-23, 06:25 AM
We're returning to a previous custom campaign world and I felt like playing a Harengon, but they didn't exist on that world. Rather than explain where these hitherto unknown rabbit people were living hidden or unmentioned, I was like "what if some people got cursed by the gods?"

And it was so.

(Some soldiers raided the temple of a snake goddess so they and their descendants were marked as her prey, and cursed to take an appropriate and, to them, humiliating form)

King of Nowhere
2022-04-23, 10:51 AM
orcs are adapted for cold climates; treat the temperature as 5 degrees warmer when determining the effect of wheather on an orc. they are no longer cave-dwelling, so they have no darkvision or light sensitivity.

goblins have no intelligence penalty. they do need very little food, about one tenth of a human. they live fast and they are explosive breeders. they use this combination to survive in places that everyone else finds too inhospitable.

nymphs have the power of always being presentable; they don't sweat, they don't smell, they are never dirty. Some of them have found a good use for this by working as high-end laundresses; they only need to wear a piece of garment, and it will become incredibly clean. A nymph sweating, or getting visibly dirty, is a sure sign that she is under great strain, pushing her magic to the limits, for examply by sustained use of wild emphaty. which works by making animals behave like they were in a disney cartoon.