If the settings supports many races, there should be many playable races. 

Some settings are human only; some involve the infinite planes - I would expect more races in a game that involves crossing multiple dimensions/planets. 

Quote from: Avus on September 07, 2022, 12:52:04 PM
I get banning races is a semi-common practice, I do it myself quite a bit even with the core 5e races (fuck Dragonborn and Tieflings), but when is it time for there to just be enough races period in a game?

Personally, a lot of my RPGs are human-only like Call of Cthulhu or modern-day / historical adventures. So when I play sci-fi and fantasy, I often prefer to emphasize the fantastical elements, and I'll often have a bunch of weird stuff. That includes playing Amber Diceless and having all reality-warping PCs, or similar.

Also, I have a bias in fantasy in that I'm sick of Tolkien look-alikes. I've greatly enjoyed running games in actual Middle Earth with elves, dwarves, hobbits, and orcs. However, I dislike how so many fantasy worlds all have elves and dwarves and halflings just to be similar to Tolkien. I like having more races, to do non-Tolkienesque settings or at least less Tolkien-like adventures.

My current setting is an original D&D, and does use the standard races to be familiar. It's patterned after Incan history and mythology, so a lot of the lore is new. But I've tended to emphasize the less Tolkienesque side of things. My recent adventures have been set in the north of the Solar Empire, where the dominant race is dragonborn. I've found it pretty interesting, and there's been a bunch of lore and intrigue.

In recent years, I've found myself increasingly gravitating to games with only one playable race, usually human. I think the reason for that is this:

The fantasy genre is largely about confronting the unknown, and any element of a fantasy setting loses much of its mystique as soon as it becomes a practical resource for the protagonists. I suspect this is the reason that all the main characters in Star Wars are humans, and why the protagonists of fantasy stories are rarely wizards. It allows things like aliens and magic to still be portrayed as elements of the unknown. As soon as something becomes de rigueur for the POV characters in a story, it stops feeling magical to the audience.

The problem exists in fantasy fiction, but it's compounded in an RPG. Not only is the player directly identifying with their character and controlling them, but the character is then subjected to the utilitarian concerns of playing the game. Fantasy races can't be all that special, because they can't be allowed to have game-breaking powers, and they can't be all that alien, because they need to fit in with the rest of the party. Once an elf becomes a PC, it stops being an ineffable, timeless creature, and becomes just another adventurer that commits petty crimes and fumbles their attacks.

Of course, that's all fine if you don't mind all your fantasy races being stripped of any sense of the fantastical, but it's how you get to the feeling of current D&D settings, where the fantasy elements are treated as utterly mundane by everyone in the setting (and therefore by the players).

Quote from: ForgottenF on September 08, 2022, 08:04:56 PM
In recent years, I've found myself increasingly gravitating to games with only one playable race, usually human. I think the reason for that is this:

The fantasy genre is largely about confronting the unknown, and any element of a fantasy setting loses much of its mystique as soon as it becomes a practical resource for the protagonists. I suspect this is the reason that all the main characters in Star Wars are humans, and why the protagonists of fantasy stories are rarely wizards. It allows things like aliens and magic to still be portrayed as elements of the unknown. As soon as something becomes de rigueur for the POV characters in a story, it stops feeling magical to the audience.

The problem exists in fantasy fiction, but it's compounded in an RPG. Not only is the player directly identifying with their character and controlling them, but the character is then subjected to the utilitarian concerns of playing the game. Fantasy races can't be all that special, because they can't be allowed to have game-breaking powers, and they can't be all that alien, because they need to fit in with the rest of the party. Once an elf becomes a PC, it stops being an ineffable, timeless creature, and becomes just another adventurer that commits petty crimes and fumbles their attacks.

Of course, that's all fine if you don't mind all your fantasy races being stripped of any sense of the fantastical, but it's how you get to the feeling of current D&D settings, where the fantasy elements are treated as utterly mundane by everyone in the setting (and therefore by the players).

This isn't necessarily the case. If everyone is committed to the storytelling then you don't have to describe characters the same way. Although I'd agree that most players either aren't committed enough (for various reasons, often reasonable) or capable of maintaining the mystique you might get from a well-crafted story.

I'm in favor of running mostly-human, mostly-low-magic type games for precisely the reasons you say.

It seems to me that a core player's handbook should include humans and, there should be player's guides for published campaign settings that contain the PC races for that setting. The DMG should contain a rules system for creating balanced, new races. The races and their backgrounds are going to be intimately tied to the setting and, unless PCs are 'fish out of water types,' players should have a book that includes what their characters would be expected to know and expectations for alignment, histories, etc.

being pressured to run dragonlance using D6 and by age of mortals playable dragonlance races are a big list, every amaglamation of draconian, original and new, plus dragonspawn and dragonborn, minotaurs ogres oblins hobgoblins centaurs....i'm tempted to use marvel ultimate powers book for character creation.

now you watch i will go through all this trouble and everyone will still play dwarves elves and humans.

Quote from: ForgottenF on September 08, 2022, 08:04:56 PM
In recent years, I've found myself increasingly gravitating to games with only one playable race, usually human. I think the reason for that is this:

The fantasy genre is largely about confronting the unknown, and any element of a fantasy setting loses much of its mystique as soon as it becomes a practical resource for the protagonists. I suspect this is the reason that all the main characters in Star Wars are humans, and why the protagonists of fantasy stories are rarely wizards. It allows things like aliens and magic to still be portrayed as elements of the unknown. As soon as something becomes de rigueur for the POV characters in a story, it stops feeling magical to the audience.

The problem exists in fantasy fiction, but it's compounded in an RPG. Not only is the player directly identifying with their character and controlling them, but the character is then subjected to the utilitarian concerns of playing the game. Fantasy races can't be all that special, because they can't be allowed to have game-breaking powers, and they can't be all that alien, because they need to fit in with the rest of the party. Once an elf becomes a PC, it stops being an ineffable, timeless creature, and becomes just another adventurer that commits petty crimes and fumbles their attacks.

Of course, that's all fine if you don't mind all your fantasy races being stripped of any sense of the fantastical, but it's how you get to the feeling of current D&D settings, where the fantasy elements are treated as utterly mundane by everyone in the setting (and therefore by the players).

Up to a point, yes.  Then you've got the competing point that for the game to be fantasy, there has to be a certain amount of recurring fantastical elements in it.  Not everyone wants the same level, either.  At a low enough level, very few races, or even human only, makes good sense.  Only so much fantasy, most of it needs to be outside the party.  You reach a certain level of fantastical saturation, though, you want some of it inside the party--in the guise of spells or magic items or companions or ... maybe a fantastical player character.  It's just easier that way.

Granted, the fantasy inside the party is going to be less mysterious than the fantasy outside it, but that can be worked to advantage as well.  That is why, when I include elves as player characters in a setting, the elves aren't practically immortal, super fighter/mages.  Instead, they are "long-lived" in a few centuries, aging gracefully, a tad better at magic, etc.  Likewise, if I want the setting to have the more powerful, alien elves--then they aren't player characters.  (At least in a typical D&D-style game.  Another system with a different focus on what happens, all bets are off.)  In my view, PC elves are just a little bit "humans with pointy ears", no matter what, and I'll make that work for me instead of being a problem.  Doesn't stop me from including something more alien and fey, akin to elves but not elves.  Perhaps PC "elves" really are the "half elves" in spirit, the elf-like descendants of long ago fey/human dalliances. 

Which is the long way around to what several people have said already in different ways, the setting should drive the PC race choices, period.

Quote from: ForgottenF on September 08, 2022, 08:04:56 PM
The fantasy genre is largely about confronting the unknown, and any element of a fantasy setting loses much of its mystique as soon as it becomes a practical resource for the protagonists. I suspect this is the reason that all the main characters in Star Wars are humans, and why the protagonists of fantasy stories are rarely wizards. It allows things like aliens and magic to still be portrayed as elements of the unknown. As soon as something becomes de rigueur for the POV characters in a story, it stops feeling magical to the audience.

This is fine as a personal preference, but many don't share this preference. I note that Tolkien had zero human main characters in The Hobbit, and only 2 of 9 human in Fellowship of the Ring (and 87-year-old Aragorn isn't normal human given his Númenórean blood). I don't think this is a flaw. Tolkien deliberately made his fantasy races like hobbits into something homey and familiar rather than surrounding them with mystique, and I think that was popular with many readers.

Likewise, there are lots of books with wizard protagonists, like A Wizard of Earthsea and many others. For author Le Guin, having a wizard protagonist is deliberate for exploring magic rather than keeping it a mystery.

I get that it's something one wants to do. When I play Call of Cthulhu or Monster of the Week (which I regularly do), I enjoy having humans-only as PCs and magic be more mysterious than in D&D. But when I play D&D, I enjoy having wizard and elf PCs along with other fantasy elements being common.

Quote from: Effete on September 07, 2022, 01:27:42 PM

Quote from: rytrasmi on September 07, 2022, 01:02:20 PM
I remember one player in a game I was in playing an elf so weirdly that it freaked me out. Turns out he was playing the elf as written in the rules: an immortal fey creature of Chaos. It made me realize that most people, including myself, play non-humans as quirky humans in dress-up, like Star Trek aliens. Worf could be human but for the head ridges. To do a race justice, you really have to pull out all the stops and likely offend the other characters and perhaps the players, too. So, yeah, there are too many races and often humans are enough.

I'm intrigued!

Can you provide an example?

It's not going to translate well in a post. In one instance we were on ship during a storm. The humans did the usual nautical things like manning the sails and securing the Judas. Our elf ignored all that and instead communed with the storm. He went to the forecastle and basked in the fury of the storm, howling with the wind and submitting himself to the pelting rain. Elves are chaotic, storms are chaotic, so maybe it worked from that perspective? I don't know thb. I thought it was interesting and immersive. Nobody really cared that he didn't help prevent the shipwreck. But it did make me trust him less with human ideas like take thing A and do thing B.

Quote from: Steven Mitchell on September 09, 2022, 09:09:33 AM
Granted, the fantasy inside the party is going to be less mysterious than the fantasy outside it, but that can be worked to advantage as well.  That is why, when I include elves as player characters in a setting, the elves aren't practically immortal, super fighter/mages.  Instead, they are "long-lived" in a few centuries, aging gracefully, a tad better at magic, etc.  Likewise, if I want the setting to have the more powerful, alien elves--then they aren't player characters.  (At least in a typical D&D-style game.  Another system with a different focus on what happens, all bets are off.)  In my view, PC elves are just a little bit "humans with pointy ears", no matter what, and I'll make that work for me instead of being a problem.  Doesn't stop me from including something more alien and fey, akin to elves but not elves.

Tolkien had both in LotR. Legolas (a party member) was still very human-esque, despite being (approximately) 3000 years old. In all that time, he had never even seen the ocean, and was less knowledgeable in many things than the much younger (but better traveled) Aragorn.

Contrast this with Elrond, or Galadriel... both strictly NPCs. One was literally descended from a Maia (angel) while the other was born in Aman, beheld the light of the Two Trees, witnessed the destruction of Beleriand, and is something like 16,000 years old. Both are more "magical" and more knowledgeable by magnatudes than Legolas, who was born in Middle Earth sometime in the late Second Age/ early Third Age and lived an incredibly sheltered life.

The point is, elves aren't even a monolith in Tolkien's writing... there's absolutely no reason they should be in a game setting. You can have the "pointy-eared human" as a playable race, as well as the nearly-omnicient, angelic "high elves" too.

Quote from: Effete on September 09, 2022, 05:30:35 PM

Quote from: Steven Mitchell on September 09, 2022, 09:09:33 AM
Granted, the fantasy inside the party is going to be less mysterious than the fantasy outside it, but that can be worked to advantage as well.  That is why, when I include elves as player characters in a setting, the elves aren't practically immortal, super fighter/mages.  Instead, they are "long-lived" in a few centuries, aging gracefully, a tad better at magic, etc.  Likewise, if I want the setting to have the more powerful, alien elves--then they aren't player characters.  (At least in a typical D&D-style game.  Another system with a different focus on what happens, all bets are off.)  In my view, PC elves are just a little bit "humans with pointy ears", no matter what, and I'll make that work for me instead of being a problem.  Doesn't stop me from including something more alien and fey, akin to elves but not elves.

Tolkien had both in LotR. Legolas (a party member) was still very human-esque, despite being (approximately) 3000 years old. In all that time, he had never even seen the ocean, and was less knowledgeable in many things than the much younger (but better traveled) Aragorn.

Contrast this with Elrond, or Galadriel... both strictly NPCs. One was literally descended from a Maia (angel) while the other was born in Aman, beheld the light of the Two Trees, witnessed the destruction of Beleriand, and is something like 16,000 years old. Both are more "magical" and more knowledgeable by magnatudes than Legolas, who was born in Middle Earth sometime in the late Second Age/ early Third Age and lived an incredibly sheltered life.

The point is, elves aren't even a monolith in Tolkien's writing... there's absolutely no reason they should be in a game setting. You can have the "pointy-eared human" as a playable race, as well as the nearly-omnicient, angelic "high elves" too.

It's very easy, High Elves live in Underhill, they are the royalty, the older, wiser and more powerful. Wandering Elves (the ones that will be a part of a party) are not High Elves, they don't belong to the High Court, are (by Elven standards) younger, less knowledgeable and less powerful. High Elves almost never leave Underhill, and when they do it's to wage war against their enemies most of the time.

Now concot a similar lore for Dwarves, and since hobbits don't have a royalty nor real magic of their own give the ones who venture beyond the shire an adventurous spirit.

There, solved it.

Quote from: jhkim on September 09, 2022, 03:06:51 PM

Quote from: ForgottenF on September 08, 2022, 08:04:56 PM
The fantasy genre is largely about confronting the unknown, and any element of a fantasy setting loses much of its mystique as soon as it becomes a practical resource for the protagonists. I suspect this is the reason that all the main characters in Star Wars are humans, and why the protagonists of fantasy stories are rarely wizards. It allows things like aliens and magic to still be portrayed as elements of the unknown. As soon as something becomes de rigueur for the POV characters in a story, it stops feeling magical to the audience.

This is fine as a personal preference, but many don't share this preference. I note that Tolkien had zero human main characters in The Hobbit, and only 2 of 9 human in Fellowship of the Ring (and 87-year-old Aragorn isn't normal human given his Númenórean blood). I don't think this is a flaw. Tolkien deliberately made his fantasy races like hobbits into something homey and familiar rather than surrounding them with mystique, and I think that was popular with many readers.

Likewise, there are lots of books with wizard protagonists, like A Wizard of Earthsea and many others. For author Le Guin, having a wizard protagonist is deliberate for exploring magic rather than keeping it a mystery.

I get that it's something one wants to do. When I play Call of Cthulhu or Monster of the Week (which I regularly do), I enjoy having humans-only as PCs and magic be more mysterious than in D&D. But when I play D&D, I enjoy having wizard and elf PCs along with other fantasy elements being common.

So I think we generally agree on this. The broad question is about which elements of a setting you want to be mundane, and which ones you want to be extraordinary. Tolkien intentionally made his hobbits the most utterly mundane characters in his universe, so that even human cultures like Gondor and Rohan could have a certain magic or romance, when perceived through their eyes. A similar thing goes on in the Elfquest comic, where the elves are the POV characters, and humans represent an alien element. Perhaps a better example would be Star Trek, wherein both the multi-species society and the fantastic technology are treated as utterly routine to the characters, because that was part of Roddenberry's vision for the future.

I'm not denying that it's a matter of preference, either. It's just that my preference is for a fantasy setting in which the supernatural gets to retain more of its sense of mystery.

I think that one extremely helpful thing, if you are trying to limit playable races but have trouble saying no to a player who wants to play something that just doesn't fit in the setting, is to have established demographics for the various lands, kingdoms, and empires. Greyhawk was my first campaign setting and it detailed % of each race, IIRC, as did other campaign settings that came after. If the Land of Purple Sand in your campaign world has 90% human, 3% gnome, 2% dwarf, and 5% half-orc, then it's easy to have them players roll d% and stick to the result - no tieflings, no dragonborn, no half-giants. Most of the time, they'll be hoomans...

That isn't to say that the DM has to be a hard-ass all the time, but certainly, eliminating as much schizophrenia as possible in character creation is a good idea. A pirate-themed campaign? Plenty of opportunities to have all kinds of outlaws which widens the aperture on race selection. The campaign had them all from the same village? Not so much.  I remember a Harnworld adventure whose premise was literally that you've been put to work by your lord to deliver a millstone and stumble upon a crime. *Everyone* in that adventure is gonna be human. In a future science fantasy or S&S game like DCC or Gamma World - have at it with talking plant and space hamster PCs...

Quote from: 3catcircus on September 09, 2022, 07:14:04 PM
I think that one extremely helpful thing, if you are trying to limit playable races but have trouble saying no to a player who wants to play something that just doesn't fit in the setting, is to have established demographics for the various lands, kingdoms, and empires. Greyhawk was my first campaign setting and it detailed % of each race, IIRC, as did other campaign settings that came after. If the Land of Purple Sand in your campaign world has 90% human, 3% gnome, 2% dwarf, and 5% half-orc, then it's easy to have them players roll d% and stick to the result - no tieflings, no dragonborn, no half-giants. Most of the time, they'll be hoomans...

Using a percentage chance to play the race is the way Dragon Quest does it. Except, it's even trickier.  DQ has fairly extreme ability score modifications for race.  For example, on a 5 to 25 scale for humans, 15 average, elves have some modifiers in the -5 to +5 range, and dwarves are almost that extreme.  The poor halflings get a whopping -6 to strength to go with their mods elsewhere.  No problem, right, you can just set the scores to compensate?  Except DQ makes you set your scores before you start rolling for which races you want to try.  You can try 3 times for a special race, but there are seldom 3 races that whose mods you want to take.  The mods really bite in that system.

 

Eh... depends on the setting.

I played human-only games often.

For my own settings, I prefer to AVOID elves and dwarves (and certainly halflings and orcs), unless I can do somethign interesting with them.

I prefer something weird like Talislanta or Dark Sun than the usual vanilla.

But TBH most my players use races as cosplay (they behave exactly like humans), which I dislike but doesn't bother me enough to forbid it.

Also, "cosplay" is what MOST people use, I'd bet. I've rarely seem people playing really otherworldy elves, for example.

I don't have other good solution except just ignoring it.

"Fine, you're a tiefling, now let's forget that for the next 20 sessions".

For the same reason, I one let a player play a kobold in Ravnica. "Yeah, okay, but you`re the only kobold in the world". The setting is so weird that it doesn`t make a difference. I`d allow this in Talislanta, Dark Sun, Planescape, and any setting containing mutants.

If I were to play in Middle-earth, I'd want races to MEAN stuff.