D&D General No Humans? (Well, the players... but that's it.)

[Paul Farquhar]

I've already played this game back in 2E. The DM's world had the humans and elves wiped out by an alliance of orcs and drow, who then replaced them.

You could go into Planet of the Apes territory with this. The world's new rulers aren't really much different to the old ones, but the PCs find themselves in the situation of being considered animals or less.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Land of the Giants. "Medium" is normally defined relative to humans. What if the planet was ruled by giants, and huge was the new medium? Humans are tiny.

And with giants, you could keep the medieval trappings.

 

[Corinnguard]

Back in 2e, there was the Council of Wyrms setting where you could role-play as a dragon, a half-dragon or as one of three humanoid races (elf, dwarf and gnome). Humans in that setting were made into the bad guys by Io so that his draconic children would have a common foe to unite against.

Hmm....the continent of Argonessen in the Eberron setting would make for a good retake on the Council of Wyrms setting.

 

[DEFCON 1]

I'm pretty sure Talislanta has at least one edition wherein there are no Humans on Archaeus. I haven't played/read all the editions so I can't comment on whether it's universal for the game that there are no Humans at all... but at least one of them was Humanless.

Granted, even without "Humans" there were plenty of bipedal humanoids with eyes, nose, ears, mouth, two arms, two legs etc. so they might as well have been Human (even if their skin color was like green or something) so it didn't really change much. And that's invariably the issue that comes up when playing any alien or fantasy race... they have been created by humans, we do not know any sentient creatures except humans, the only references we have are human characteristics... so invariably any race ends up just being played as "Human in a Funny Hat" because we have no knowledge for anything else.

 

[el-remmen]

I run humanocentric worlds. But would I play an RPG with no humans? Sure! The aforementioned Bunnies and Burrows for example. Would I play in a D&D game with a setting with no humans? Sure. Depending on the DM and game premise.

There is someone playing a tabaxi in one of my current games and I can tell she gets disappointed when I forget to have the NPCs in town react to the “weird foreign cat person.”

 

[CreamCloud0]

even if you don't have Humans you're still going to most likely end up with something that is treated as basically 'humans' in one form or another, i don't see the point in removing them just to end up having them replaced.

 

[Maxperson]

We're developing a medieval fantasy RPG, with more emphasis on the "fantasy" than the medieval, and we have seven new custom races so it won't be the typical elf, dwarf, halfling, etc. But, it got us thinking, do we even still want humans in the game?

So, I'm just doing a simple poll on it. Would you play in an RPG without human PCs or NPCs?

Thanks, and for any feedback you have on it.

For me it depends on the setting. If no humans are in it, I have no problem playing a game with no humans. If humans are in it, then I feel like they should be a playable race.

 

[Maxperson]

Not if we can help it!

I'm not sure you can avoid it. Not because of anything on your part, but because those roleplaying the non-human races are humans in human masks. It's extraordinarily hard to roleplay a non-human well on that front, because we the players are all human and our human perspectives will seep through all over the place. It's the only perspective we know.

 

[TwoSix]

I'm not sure you can avoid it. Not because of anything on your part, but because those roleplaying the non-human races are humans in human masks. It's extraordinarily hard to roleplay a non-human well on that front, because we the players are all human and our human perspectives will seep through all over the place. It's the only perspective we know.

And let's face it, sometimes (a lot of the time) we don't want to do a deep dive into roleplaying an alien psychology. Sometimes we're just in Avatar mode, where we want to be US, just bigger, stronger, and with a sweet tail.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

The vast majority of D&D races are some variation on human. Skinny humans with pointy ears, short humans with beards, etc. A difference that makes no difference is no difference.

And? They're still different. The differences don't have to be dramatic and obvious to still be interesting. Dragonborn are pretty much just humans with elemental halitosis, egg-laying, higher-protein dietary needs, and overall shorter time from infancy to adulthood.

And if you make your dominant race something other than near human, you can give up on using "medieval" or any other human style as your reference. Why would an aarakocra civilisation build castles when everyone can fly?

And if the difference isn't such a ridiculous extreme, but is still different? Theoretically all eladrin can short-distance teleport. Not often enough for it to alter how they design buildings, but often enough that it should have societal effects....but won't suddenly make their civilization incomprehensible to humanity.

I genuinely don't get this obsession with "if they aren't human it has to be TOTALLY INCOMPREHENSIBLE XENOFICTION or it's just not worth it." It's a false dichotomy through and through. Human-like but NOT human beings give us the chance to see the familiar in the strange. Just as fantastical humans being humans (and thus diverging from expectations) gives us a chance to see the strange in the familiar. It doesn't have to be differences as society-redefining as "everyone can fly" or "everyone is telepathic" or the like. Exploring the consequences of subtle differences is a huge part of what makes science fiction and fantasy interesting--and the authors who build entire well-thought-out, rigorous worlds with only small changes have well-earned their praise.

And that's not even touching on the possibility of (for example) fundamentally different number systems or the like. Dragonborn might count in octal or duodecimal, since they have only four digits per hand. Elves might associate having lights inside the home with opulent extravagance, since a small dwelling isn't big enough to have longer than 60' lines of sight. Tieflings, being resistant to fire, might eschew safety equipment or standards that other races rely on, causing friction in workplaces. Etc. Just because the gross, general approaches to life and living are pretty much the same doesn't mean there's nothing to see, nor that it's impossible to still have large differences that arise from small effects. Even something as small as the (4e) Dragonborn ability to heal more quickly from injuries could have altered human history dramatically.