Quote from: Spinachcat;720846I have been running a humanocentric OD&D game for some time, but I have recently learned that several potential players haven't joined my game because they "only play elves" or "only play dwarves".

I personally don't get that, but I have met really good gamers who will only play Character XYZ and for them, having fun playing D&D means playing their favorite race and/or class.

I have to respect that. If someone's fun is "being a dwarf with an axe and Scottish accent", then as long as they're fun at the table, I guess as a GM, I should make room for that PC in my game world.

I just feel a bit odd having to make every OD&D setting into something where Bilbo, Gimli and Legolas somehow make sense as PCs. I can do otherwise, but then I diminish the potential audience for my games. And as a OD&D GM at FLGS game days and conventions where nobody has heard of the OSR, it does not make sense to turn a potentially good player away from my table.

I would love to hear your thoughts.

I can recall a LOT of groups I ran back in the day, where humans were the minority in the adventuring group, even as I had set up the world as humanocentric. I noticed I got more humans in the gang when they got a few advantages beyond dual-classing and no cap levels (for levels we were never going to reach anyway). For a lot of players, there were mechanical advantages or flexibility (multi-classing, for one).

Interestingly, the current campaign has had mostly humans, one elf, and a halfling (after the player's other two human characters got killed). Not one dwarf. In fact, dwarves just recently appeared at their basetown thanks to a demand for engineers. I mentioned they were there, and one of the players remarked, "That's the first we've seen." We hadn't really noticed until then.

I wrote out demi-human spins for Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperborea (posted on that forum And my blog). In return Ghul *promised* me an all gnome version of the game. (He even said so on Facebook)

I like using demi-humans more as their mythical or early fantasy literature roots, pre-Tolkien. Gnomes are creepy nisse, dwarves are wily spellcaster, elves are more morbid and see humans like playthings more than to be taken too seriously. Whatever works for your group is the right way to go.

Quote from: Spinachcat;720846I have been running a humanocentric OD&D game for some time, but I have recently learned that several potential players haven't joined my game because they "only play elves" or "only play dwarves".

I personally don't get that, but I have met really good gamers who will only play Character XYZ and for them, having fun playing D&D means playing their favorite race and/or class.

I have to respect that. If someone's fun is "being a dwarf with an axe and Scottish accent", then as long as they're fun at the table, I guess as a GM, I should make room for that PC in my game world.

I just feel a bit odd having to make every OD&D setting into something where Bilbo, Gimli and Legolas somehow make sense as PCs. I can do otherwise, but then I diminish the potential audience for my games. And as a OD&D GM at FLGS game days and conventions where nobody has heard of the OSR, it does not make sense to turn a potentially good player away from my table.

I would love to hear your thoughts.

You actually don't. But the short story is Elves especially actual Tolkien and Norse elves are what humans strive to be. OD&D Gygax can kiss my ass. They are stupid and and actually piss me off. Thank God Palladium, Pathfinder, 5e among many others gave that fucker the huge middle finger as he deserves. Dude went off the reservation in my opinion.
 
In game it's all about no GM I ever met likes a 0-2e game above 7th level. So that means I automatically go demihuman and multi-class just to screw the little baby over. I once got my DM so outclassed he made an  entire campaign of Sword of Truth and I still screwed him over just because he deserved it for trying to make my character a single class fighter when he knew that bores me. Hence he got exactly what he deserved. I prefer my Elves and any demihuman multi-classing in old DnD. Deal with it.

In newer versions that are expected to go much higher level I just play whatever strikes my fancy at the moment.

Quote from: Necrozius;952944My awe overcomes my ignorance. I will investigate.

I assume you found this but for other who may not know the publishers of Talislanta put almost all their material up on their site for free.

With some very few exceptions, elves, dwarfs and halflings actively turn me off a setting. I just can't find any use for them. They're too generic to give the kind of fanciful flavour to a setting that genuinely alien races (the Thri-Kreen come to mind) do, but at the same time they're enough of a diversion from realism that it ruins any sense of grittiness. In most settings, they're just... there. There's no particular reason for them and they often clash wildly with the aesthetics of the rest of the setting. (behold Ravenloft, the setting of Gothic horror... with halflings. )

I do like the versions in Warhammer Fantasy, though - funnily enough, there they actually manage avoid both of my above complaints, being both unnervingly alien in many ways and also feeling weirdly plausible. And the ones in The One Ring also feel shiny and new to me, I can't imagine why.

Quote from: Baeraad;953022but at the same time they're enough of a diversion from realism that it ruins any sense of grittiness. In most settings, they're just... there. There's no particular reason for them and they often clash wildly with the aesthetics of the rest of the setting. (behold Ravenloft, the setting of Gothic horror... with halflings. )

Um... you are aware theres people naturally under 5ft out there right?

As for Halflings not fitting Ravenloft. Go read (or watch Cormans version) Masque of the Red Death.

Quote from: Omega;953037Um... you are aware theres people naturally under 5ft out there right?

Yes, I am. And I'm fine with the addition of a setting having races (or species) of naturally short humanoids. But that's not the same as D&D-style dwarfs, now is it? There's more to those than just being short.

Quote from: Omega;953037As for Halflings not fitting Ravenloft. Go read (or watch Cormans version) Masque of the Red Death.

I have read it, actually, though it was some time ago and I may have forgotten the existence of small hairy people in it (as in: I can't recall anything of the sort, but if you say that they were there, I'll believe you). But what of it? My above argument applies here too - I am not opposed to anyone adding races to their setting that have a few things in common with halflings, I am opposed to them adding halflings to their settings without a care for whether transplanting them right in with a few cosmetic changes make sense or not.

I like dwarves and elves. They are flexible archetypes, allowing for a wide range of interpretations, while still being recognizable to everyone in a game. Robust.

Hobbits. I have no time for hobbits. They're done. I'll never play one. Gnomes are much more interesting (and funnier) to me.

Quote from: bat;952996. . . Ghul *promised* me an all gnome version of the game. (He even said so on Facebook)

You should totally sue him for fraud if he doesn't deliver.

I no longer chafe at elves and dwarves in fantasy settings.

An uncountable number of great stories have been set in our world and built on its humans, no special effects added.

Thus, an uncountable number of great stories can be set in D&D style worlds and built on their elves and dwarves. Whatever, it's the telling not the trappings.

Quote from: Omega;953037As for Halflings not fitting Ravenloft. Go read (or watch Cormans version) Masque of the Red Death.

   You'll have to watch Corman's version or read the novelization. The little people in that version aren't in Poe's original of that tale, but were brought in from another of his stories, "Hop-Frog."

   I would note that Ravenloft pretty well sidebars its demihumans--there are only two domains where they have any notable presence. Everywhere else, they range from obscure to nonexistent.

Quote from: Armchair Gamer;953161You'll have to watch Corman's version or read the novelization. The little people in that version aren't in Poe's original of that tale, but were brought in from another of his stories, "Hop-Frog."

   I would note that Ravenloft pretty well sidebars its demihumans--there are only two domains where they have any notable presence. Everywhere else, they range from obscure to nonexistent.

True. Meant Hop Frog the story and Masque the move as just recently was watching that.

Quote from: Spinachcat;720846I have been running a humanocentric OD&D game for some time, but I have recently learned that several potential players haven't joined my game because they "only play elves" or "only play dwarves".

I've had this happen with other stuff: Woman who only played Scottish, kilt-wearing warriors even in settings where this no Scotland. Guy who only played halflings. But also, yes, the guy who wanted to play an elf in a Star Wars campaign. (Not sure if that was an "I only play elves" thing or just oddity.)

Some people seem to play RPGs in order to pretend to be a very specific alternative version of themselves. It's a very specific form of escapism / self-expression.

Quote from: Justin Alexander;953485I've had this happen with other stuff: Woman who only played Scottish, kilt-wearing warriors even in settings where this no Scotland. Guy who only played halflings. But also, yes, the guy who wanted to play an elf in a Star Wars campaign. (Not sure if that was an "I only play elves" thing or just oddity.)

Some people seem to play RPGs in order to pretend to be a very specific alternative version of themselves. It's a very specific form of escapism / self-expression.

Back in the day, I had more than a few players who only liked to play Samauri or Ninja type characters.

Quote from: Justin Alexander;953485Some people seem to play RPGs in order to pretend to be a very specific alternative version of themselves. It's a very specific form of escapism / self-expression.

It's fucking fetishism.