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Author Topic: RPing non humans.  (Read 1863 times)

Battlemaster
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RPing non humans.
« on: June 24, 2022, 03:51:03 PM »
Do you RP non human characters?

If so what game do you do it in?  What type of character do you play?  Is it a royally fucked up human like a WoD vampjre? A DnD elf or dwarf?  A vulcan in star trek?  A vargr or aslan in traveller?

What about the non human attracted you?

I'm following the Westworld series and think it would make a good rpg, and that I wouldn't mind playing a host in it.

The funny thing is I'm making a new character in battlelords 7e,  and despite  15 races I picked human, mainly becuase they get more skill points than anyone else and don't pay more for armor, helmets, etc. But I thought about playing an alien seriously.
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KindaMeh

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Re: RPing non humans.
« Reply #1 on: June 24, 2022, 04:08:09 PM »
I often RP humans, half elves, elves who aren't especially old, and various other admittedly more boring choices. In part because my RP proficiency level is kinda low despite having gamed since like the age of 13. That said, when I do go for something that isn't human, I tend to like to explore the potential for a more alien mindset, or a different set of values or perspectives. I've done VTM Dark Ages and Dark Age Inquisition before, since you mention WOD. In the former, I emphasized the alien nature of the Road my character was on and how morals and views had changed a bit from the human base that spawned said road, and although I played a human in the latter, I got to kinda get into a different religious mindset than is standard for me. I've done some completely non-humans, but I always felt my portrayal was a bit stilted and gimmicky, and none come to mind as especially fun to share.

I think for me what I like best about pseudo-humans is that it makes it easier for me to relate and get into character while still being different enough that I can explore a different mindset. Also, I think this kinda shows that to me non-humans are alien and of not only a different mindset but a different species, to the point where some of the claims about racial essentialism and parralels between fantasy races (species) and real life races in games like D&D ring a bit hollow the way I've experienced such things as well as other people playing them in game. I also didn't like it when Tasha's took away the flavor of say a gnome barbarian as compared to a minotaur barbarian not just starting stat-wise, but in the flavor. It isn't wrong to say that different species, as opposed to races, would be capable of different things. And backtracking on that honestly kinda makes it seem more like a different flavor of human/a race as compared to a species. Which I guess may be what  they want so that they can have more political drama. IDK.

Anyway, tangent aside, this is a pretty cool question. I look forward to hearing some other folks' stories.

rytrasmi

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Re: RPing non humans.
« Reply #2 on: June 24, 2022, 04:26:27 PM »
I'm playing a manimal in MCC. He was a randomly generated level-0 that survived the funnel. I didn't choose him, the dice did.

I'm attempting to emphasize his animal side: always interested in food, more likely to respond with flight or flight instinct rather than rational contemplation, poor planning and impulsive, sensing the more base motives of others but oblivious to higher motives, using the mouth much more to interact with the world.

It's quite fun getting into that mindset, nothing serious, just a light game.
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Lunamancer

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Re: RPing non humans.
« Reply #3 on: June 24, 2022, 06:26:22 PM »
I mostly play humans. Every now and then, I'll play a human with pointy ears to get some different sort of stat advantage.

I often find it hard to take playing non-humans seriously. Because either they're just humans with pointy ears, or they have an alien mindset and their behaviors seem absurd to humans. Though it is fun to play an absurd character from time to time.

There's also an issue of I don't think I've ever seen any specifically RPG lore regarding non-humans that I didn't think was either goofy or dull. And so half of what I'm doing whenever I'm playing a non-human is creating what that non-human is like in the campaign. At the same time, I kind of hate this thing I usually see in fantasy where you have one good character of a non-human race, usually a dwarf, and all of a sudden their personality is supposed to be representative of what the entire race is like. So when I do play a non-human, I try to challenge some of the ideas we might have about that non-human race. Nothing as lame as, "I'm a drow. But. Wait for it. My character is a good guy!!!"

I see gnomes get mostly ignored. And what are they, anyway? Just smaller, friendlier versions of dwarfs? So I rolled up a few gnomes for my stable of characters.

Ballsack the Buff, a gnome fighter/illusionist. He wears little more than a loin cloth to show off his exceptional strength physique. Grappling is his first go-to if he's not grossly out-sized. This character was inspired by an illustration towards the back of the Fiend Folio. You'll know it when you see it.
Stelter the Salty, a gnome assassin. He's a somewhat silly sower of discord. He'll play the clown so you let your guard down, he'll slander those he doesn't like and does not hesitate to murder deplorables. He's completely ruthless when he has the upper hand.
Willowmane the Wild, a gnome fighter/thief. He's a dual-wielding, wheeling and dealing, willow-bearded bravo. Charming as far as gnomes go, he's always taking risks that tend to land him in trouble, even has he tries his best to do the right thing.
That's my two cents anyway. Carry on, crawler.

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Spinachcat

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Re: RPing non humans.
« Reply #4 on: June 24, 2022, 06:48:55 PM »
When playing a non-human, have your character do NOT human stuff.

AKA, delve into the perspective of the not-human and how its biology, culture, history , etc affect how it interacts with the world in a way far different than humans, and then take actions reflecting that perspective.

I had dwarf who complained incessantly about why are doors so tall yet so thin? And why is everything in human society made so crappily? Don't you people have any respect for the rock you break or the wood you cut? Oh wait, you idiots can't even name your own grandfather's grandfather!

Chris24601

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Re: RPing non humans.
« Reply #5 on: June 24, 2022, 08:22:44 PM »
When I run, I rp non-humans all the time. Some of the spirits during my decades long Mage the Ascension campaign were a downright blast precisely because you could hit the PCs with “blue & orange morality.”

As a player though, I pretty much just do humans, the occasional half-elf or similar half-human and, in the case of WoD Vampire (since the OP brought it up) a dhampir (i.e. child of a human and thinblooded vampire).

This lets me have a fundamentally human frame of reference when necessary, while the various halves give a link to something beyond the normal world if the setting requires it (ex. one setting I played in literally did not let humans have arcane magic classes; magic outside the purview of the gods required an innate spark of the divine that humans didn’t possess… ironically because their racial god was dead so they could only access magic by worshiping the gods of the other races).

Steven Mitchell

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Re: RPing non humans.
« Reply #6 on: June 24, 2022, 09:16:48 PM »
Far as I'm concerned, it's a non-issue.  I role play all kinds of characters as a GM--some better than others, of course.  If I can do it as a GM, switching constantly, then players can do it as a character with more focus. 

As for the "humans with pointy ears" bit--don't care, think it's the wrong way to see it.  It's all humans as players. It's all humans as audience.  What makes it interesting to play a non-human is where the line gets drawn between the alien aspect and the parts that are relatable to us humans present.  A player or GM can go just as wrong trying for too much alien as they can for not-enough.  Probably worse, in reality, because at least the not very alien, non-human, is at least still relatable.  A little bit of alien nature played well and consistently can go a long way, and is better than a scattershot approach.

I do think it is helpful to limit the number of types of non-humans in any given game.  Everyone playing something different means that the alien bit has to get pushed hard to stand out, which makes it more like to come off cheesy and be not very relatable to humans at the same time.  A couple of times I've played games where all the PCs were non-humans of only 1 or 2 types.  That really stands out, because you've got other individuals to play off of.
« Last Edit: June 24, 2022, 09:18:40 PM by Steven Mitchell »

Jason Coplen

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Re: RPing non humans.
« Reply #7 on: June 24, 2022, 09:53:15 PM »
I only play dwarves because I love sexy chicks with beards! ;)

On a serious note: I suck as a player and my dwarves (not into pointy-eared bastards, unless DMing) tend to be...Hell, I break every bad cliche in the world.
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Zelen

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Re: RPing non humans.
« Reply #8 on: June 25, 2022, 04:16:09 AM »
I only play dwarves because I love sexy chicks with beards! ;)

On a serious note: I suck as a player and my dwarves (not into pointy-eared bastards, unless DMing) tend to be...Hell, I break every bad cliche in the world.

As long as you're having fun, all good.

People like to turn their noses up at the cliches & tropes, but they are time-tested fun and part of the gaming hobby. It's both part of the shared understanding of these fictional worlds, and the culture of tables.


To answer the OP, generally I prefer of humans make up the dominant species in the game world, because it's really hard to sell truly non-human mindsets. With standard fantasy races, Elves, Dwarves, Hobbits, they don't bring anything hugely unique under most game rules systems, so they're effectively just personality & cultural traits.

What's the difference between a druidic outpost and an elven settlement? I feel like these often step on each others' toes. I'd rather emphasize a rich breadth of human cultural styles personally. That being said if the players want a menagerie game I'm open for running that. But I don't expect deep roleplaying exploration of mindset if the game is inherently signaling that different races are just minor faces of human psyche.
« Last Edit: June 25, 2022, 04:44:13 AM by Zelen »

hedgehobbit

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Re: RPing non humans.
« Reply #9 on: June 25, 2022, 09:48:59 AM »
Most RPGers are familiar with Pendragon's Personality rules, where you have a set of opposite traits (generous/selfish, prudent/reckless, etc). Way back in the day, these traits were used in Runequest to play the alien Dragonnewts. You'd effectively roll on the chart to determine the action of your PC but if you rolled in between the two numbers, the player would get to choose and the gap between numbers would grow (thus giving the player more control over this particular trait). The goal was to gradually give the player more and more control over the character's actions as the player grew to know character's personality. It was a neat idea although I know of no one who has actually used it.
« Last Edit: June 25, 2022, 09:45:41 PM by hedgehobbit »

jeff37923

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Re: RPing non humans.
« Reply #10 on: June 25, 2022, 12:10:35 PM »
Star Wars, Star Trek, any elfgame out there - nonhumans are depicted and played as humans in funny rubber suits with a lot of forehead makeup. So far, only Traveller has treated aliens, as aliens. Beings that can think as well as humans, but not like humans. Because of this, I'm leary of letting players play aliens in Traveller.

So far, in the Official Traveller Universe there have been over 400 pages of material written about the Aslan and over 300 pages written about the Vargr, but in forty years of running Traveller I've been lucky if a player has read 5 pages of all that. There are essays on religion, culture, economics, sociology, physiology, technology, and psychology for each race. Enormous, rich, fulfilling reading about these races and their civilizations that when used really brings an incredibly fun experience to the game table. Yet most players look at the images, do a mind-meld with their Inner Furry and squeel, "Cat-men and Dog-people! My character chases laser pointers or chews up the crew's footwear!" So it all goes to waste.

I can think of a handful of players who I let play aliens in Traveller when I referee.

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Battlemaster
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Re: RPing non humans.
« Reply #11 on: June 25, 2022, 01:11:50 PM »
Some if my favorite traveller aliens were the kafer and the eber. Not as PCs of course but they are some of the best,  most original and believable aliens I ever saw. The kafer's I. Q.  going up in combat was something I never saw in any film or show.

In CT I like hivers and k'kree, again they seem original and plausible. Admittedly the hivers are close to niven's puppetteers. Still their evolution is interesting.
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Visitor Q

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Re: RPing non humans.
« Reply #12 on: June 26, 2022, 10:48:33 AM »
Most RPGers are familiar with Pendragon's Personality rules, where you have a set of opposite traits (generous/selfish, prudent/reckless, etc). Way back in the day, these traits were used in Runequest to play the alien Dragonnewts. You'd effectively roll on the chart to determine the action of your PC but if you rolled in between the two numbers, the player would get to choose and the gap between numbers would grow (thus giving the player more control over this particular trait). The goal was to gradually give the player more and more control over the character's actions as the player grew to know character's personality. It was a neat idea although I know of no one who has actually used it.

That's a really cool idea for framing non human personalities

Philotomy Jurament

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Re: RPing non humans.
« Reply #13 on: June 26, 2022, 12:23:07 PM »
Do you RP non human characters?

These days I only play humans unless I have to play a non-human for some reason. At some point I simply lost interest in playing non-humans. And to be honest, when I do play a non-human I'm still basically playing a human in a "funny suit" with some special abilities. I'm not against others playing non-humans and enjoying it; it's just not my thing.
« Last Edit: June 26, 2022, 12:25:01 PM by Philotomy Jurament »
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Re: RPing non humans.
« Reply #14 on: June 26, 2022, 04:02:54 PM »
I honestly feel that most of the people I personally have encountered playing non-humans anymore are only doing it because humans don’t get kewl powerz. Most of the 5E players who have responded to any of my questions about why they aren’t playing a human gets answered with “+1 to every stat is so boring. Unless you’re going to let me play a Variant? It’s really the only human worth playing.”

I only tend play non-humans in Shadowrun, but they pretty much are human with no differing outlook anyway. I think there isn’t enough to build on having a truly alien outlook in D&D, anyway. All of the races are mostly presented as “pretty much human, but”.