Ridding D&D of All Races - Multiple Choice Poll

[Satyrn]

Warforged are about the only race I don't care for. I want to, but I've never been particularly happy with the results of having androidish characters in the game, whether it was Monte Cook's ironborn, Dragonstar's robots, or warforged.

 

[Azzy]

Get rid of ALL of them!

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Just don't draw a haphazard line between what you can and can't play:

"You can play a warforged, but you can't play a shield guardian.

You can play a dragonborn, but you can't play a lizard man. Or a half-dragon.

You can play a tiefling, but you can't play a succubus, marilith, glabrezu, balor, dretch..."

Dragons, devils, etc, have set alignments,and thus by definition less free will than mortals. You can only play mortals in DnD. It's not haphazard at all.

Gnome: the Jar Jar Binks of the D&D Universe

Man, I am really sorry that you have such terrible players in your group. That has got to be a trial for you.


Anyway, the only race worth removing in DND is humans.

If I had to get rid of another race,it would be high elves or halflings, purely because they're redundant with more interesting races. That is, every other type of elf, and gnomes and goblins, respectively.

 

[TaranTheWanderer]

Man, I am really sorry that you have such terrible players in your group. That has got to be a trial for you.

.

My players are great. I’m not sure how my view on Gnomes reflects on my players. They don’t even play gnomes. . The few people I’ve played with who’ve played Gomes (as a player, usually in a pickup group) played them in typical annoying fashion.

 

[Li Shenron]

I voted all.

 

[WaterRabbit]

There might be places above ground that would accept them, but even in my hobgoblin-run empire they wouldn't have much of a chance. Just because two species are evil doesn't mean they get along.

Funny thing, I also have a hobgoblin-run empire. I am currently running a modified FR campaign where Calimshan was overrun after the spell plague by hobgoblins from the plane of fire who worship Kossuth. This has resulted in a refugee crisis that has overwhelmed Baldur's Gate and started to affect the rest of "The North". Currently this new empire is at war with Tethyr and will soon overrun it.

And yeah, they don't much care for drow.

 

[Mercurius]

It really depends upon the campaign setting. Is it a "D&D default" style setting, ala the Realms? Then allow all races. Is it more thematic? Then include races to fit the theme.

I generally don't allow goliath, dragonborn or tieflings, because I don't really like them aesthetically and they tend to clash thematically with my homebrews (don't get me started on shardminds). I do like exotic races (Talislanta is one of my favorite settings), but these races tend to feel too...Warcrafty to me. But I tend to add in more options via sub-races, or my own homebrew races.

Now if I had a player who absolutely "had to" play a dragonborn or tiefling, I would try to encourage them to play one of the other races, but alter it slightly. A human with demonic heritage that shows up in subtler ways than goofy horns and tail. Maybe a sub-race of "storm elves" that live in high mountains and have an affinity with dragons. That sort of thing.

I also don't think it is the DM's job to cater to every whim a player has. To some degree, yes, but part of the DM's privilege (in taking on the burden of doing most of the work) is that they get to make creative choices about the setting and campaign. This can include limiting or dis-allowing certain character options, if they don't fit the overall picture of what the DM is trying to do (e.g. evil PCs).

 

[Shiroiken]

I think that adding new races, even ones I won't ever allow or play, is good for the game as a whole.

That said, anyone who likes races beyond the 1E PC races is BADWRONGFUN

 

[ad_hoc]

That's right. Let's get this out of the way. While I believe it is possible in theory to have non-human races that are fully fleshed out and aren't stereotypes and are roleplayed well, it never, or almost never, happens in fact. This is, of course, based purely on my anecdotal observations and personal experience, which is exactly the kind of irrefutable evidence that I prefer.

This also applies to humans. Every character is just going to be a caricature. It's just the nature of the limits of the format.

I do think that the majority of a table should be human. 3 out of 5 PCs (or more) is a good number. There needs to be a human baseline for the other races to make any sense. Other races should be the exception.

I do think in general that other races are not played as alien as they should be. We're all used to elves and dwarfs, but they should still be played as weird aliens with entirely different outlooks. Half-elfs and Halflings are the most relatable of the races.

I used to dislike any of the non-core races, but I've come around to many of them as they provide the opportunity to play with an alien mindset. I still don't like Tieflings, Drow, and the other evil races to be played as PCs (throw Aasimar in there too) and would disallow them if I could. Some other races I dislike but don't have a good enough reason to disallow like Dragonborn.

 

[Blue]

How's this:

I want races refactored so that there's enough design room to include more powerful but not uncommon player wishes. Half Ogres, minotaurs, centaurs, fliers, what-have-you. Which will also allow more design space for the existing races to make them more interesting.

(Bonus point: For some races there are racial classes you can multiclass into that further expand out the race for features that would be "too much" for a starting character.)

At that point, I want enough races that tailoring a race list to match a setting becomes standard practice.