RPG Evolution: Do We Still Need "Race" in D&D?

The term "race" is a staple of fantasy that is now out of sync with modern usage. With Pathfinder shifting from "race" to "ancestry" in its latest edition, it raises the question: should fantasy games still use it?

“Race” and Modern Parlance​

We previously discussed the challenges of representing real-life cultures in a fantasy world, with African and Asian countries being just two examples. The discussion becomes more complicated with fantasy "races"—historically, race was believed to be determined by the geographic arrangement of populations. Fantasy gaming, which has its roots in fantasy literature, still uses the term “race” this way.

Co-creator of D&D Gary Gygax cited R.E. Howard's Conan series as an influence on D&D, which combines Lovecraftian elements with sword and sorcery. Howard's perceptions may have been a sign of the times he lived in, but it seems likely they influenced his stories. Robert B. Marks explains just how these stereotypes manifested in Conan's world:

The young, vibrant civilizations of the Hyborian Age, like Aquilonia and Nemedia, are white - the equivalent of Medieval Europe. Around them are older Asiatic civilizations like Stygia and Vendhya, ancient, decrepit, and living on borrowed time. To the northwest and the south are the barbarian lands - but only Asgard and Vanaheim are in any way Viking. The Black Kingdoms are filled with tribesmen evoking the early 20th century vision of darkest Africa, and the Cimmerians and Picts are a strange cross between the ancient Celts and Native Americans - and it is very clear that the barbarians and savages, and not any of the civilized people or races, will be the last ones standing.

Which leads us to the other major fantasy influence, author J.R.R. Tolkien. David M. Perry explains in an interview with Helen Young:

In Middle Earth, unlike reality, race is objectively real rather than socially constructed. There are species (elves, men, dwarves, etc.), but within those species there are races that conform to 19th-century race theory, in that their physical attributes (hair color, etc.) are associated with non-physical attributes that are both personal and cultural. There is also an explicit racial hierarchy which is, again, real in the world of the story.

The Angry GM elaborates on why race and culture were blended in Tolkien's works:

The thing is, in the Tolkienverse, at least, in the Lord of the Rings version of the Tolkienverse (because I can’t speak for what happened in the Cinnabon or whatever that other book was called), the races were all very insular and isolated. They didn’t deal with one another. Race and culture went hand in hand. If you were a wood elf, you were raised by wood elves and lived a thoroughly wood elf lifestyle until that whole One Ring issue made you hang out with humans and dwarves and halflings. That isolation was constantly thrust into the spotlight. Hell, it was a major issue in The Hobbit.

Given the prominence of race in fantasy, it's not surprising that D&D has continued the trend. That trend now seems out of sync with modern parlance; in 1951, the United Nations officially declared that the differences among humans were "insignificant in relation to the anthropological sameness among the peoples who are the human race."

“Race” and Game Design​

Chris Van Dyke's essay on race back in 2008 explains how pervasive "race" is in D&D:

Anyone who has played D&D has spent a lot of time talking about race – “Racial Attributes,” “Racial Restrictions,” “Racial Bonuses.” Everyone knows that different races don’t get along – thanks to Tolkien, Dwarves and Elves tend to distrust each other, and even non-gamers know that Orcs and Goblins are, by their very nature, evil creatures. Race is one of the most important aspects of any fantasy role-playing game, and the belief that there are certain inherent genetic and social distinctions between different races is built into every level of most (if not all) Fantasy Role-Playing Games.

Racial characteristics in D&D have changed over time. Basic Dungeons & Dragons didn't distinguish between race and class for non-humans, such that one played a dwarf, elf, or halfling -- or a human fighter or cleric. The characteristics of race were so tightly intertwined that race and profession were considered one.

In Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, the changes became more nuanced, but not without some downsides on character advancement, particularly in allowing “demihumans” to multiclass but with level limits preventing them from exceeding humanity, who had unlimited potential (but could only dual-class).

With Fifth Edition, ability penalties and level caps have been removed, but racial bonuses and proficiencies still apply. The Angry GM explains why this is a problem:

In 5E, you choose a race and a class, but you also choose a background. And the background represents your formative education and socio-economic standing and all that other stuff that basically represents the environment in which you were raised. The racial abilities still haven’t changed even though there is now a really good place for “cultural racial abilities” to live. So, here’s where the oddity arises. An elf urchin will automatically be proficient with a longsword and longbow, two weapons that requires years of training to even become remotely talent with, but a human soldier does not get any automatic martial training. Obviously, in both cases, class will modify that. But in the life of your character, race happens first, then background, and only later on do you end up a member of a class. It’s very quirky.

Perhaps this is why Pathfinder decided to take a different approach to race by shifting to the term “ancestry”:

Beyond the narrative, there are many things that have changed, but mostly in the details of how the game works. You still pick a race, even though it is now called your ancestry. You still decide on your class—the rulebook includes all of the core classes from the First Edition Core Rulebook, plus the alchemist. You still select feats, but these now come from a greater variety of sources, such as your ancestry, your class, and your skills.

"Ancestry" is not just a replacement for the word “race.” It’s a fluid term that requires the player to make choices at character creation and as the character advances. This gives an opportunity to express human ethnicities in game terms, including half-elves and half-orcs, without forcing the “subrace” construct.

The Last Race​

It seems likely that, from both a modern parlance and game design perspective, “race” as it is used today will fall out of favor in fantasy games. It’s just going to take time. Indigo Boock sums up the challenge:

Fantasy is a doubled edged sword. Every human culture has some form of fantasy, we all have some sort of immortal ethereal realm where our elven creatures dwell. There’s always this realm that transcends culture. Tolkien said, distinct from science fiction (which looks to the future), fantasy is to feel like one with the entire universe. Fantasy is real, deep human yearning. We look to it as escapism, whether we play D&D, or Skyrim, or you are like myself and write fantasy. There are unfortunately some old cultural tropes that need to be discarded, and it can be frustratingly slow to see those things phased out.

Here's hoping other role-playing games will follow Pathfinder's lead in how treats its fantasy people in future editions.

 

[Obryn]

Fundamentally, I'm in favor of not insulting people, but I'm against this kind of extreme speech enforcement and censorship, especially when there are no clearly defined logical limits.

Where is "extreme speech enforcement" happening? Where do you see censorship? In what way do Shadow of the Demon Lord and PF2 fit into this argument, having already made a change? How in the world is a potential 6e deciding on "ancestry" any kind of censorship?

None of that is happening here.

 

[Jester David]

Redbeard mentions ….Neil Gaiman who? Oh the author of Coraline. I saw the movie. You going to quote something from an author who I never hear of to make a point. Yawn. Yes I google his quote.

He's the New York Times bestselling author of the books adapted into the movies Coralie and Stardust and the TV series American Gods and Neverwhere. He's also written for the TV series Doctor Who and Babylon 5. As a comic book writer he is most famous for the comic Sandman which has won every single award a comic book can win and one comic books can no longer win.

When his new books go on sale, he doesn't just tour book stores, he goes on shows like Colbert. He's probably one of the five most famous genre writers in the world at the moment. Prior to Game of Thrones on HBO he was probably more well known than George RR Martin.

 

[Celebrim]

What amuses and bemuses me the most in these types of topics is just how much people have internalized their own interpretations to the point where they can no longer distinguish their own idiosyncratic takes from what is actually stated in the game.

No, not at all. I started playing around 1982 and was DMing by 1985. My takes are takes that begin mostly in the late 1980's when I begin to try to organize my homebrew world in a more systematic way and ask big cosmological questions about how everything worked. In point of fact, the origin of my take on elves not having bow proficiency not as a result of nurture but as a result of nature was based on the write up of Elvish deities in 'Unearthed Arcana' were it was implied that each of the elvish deities had given the elvish people a particular gift. If it the ability to use bows and swords was a divine gift, then it was more biological than cultural. I ran with that ever since.

I'm certainly aware that later editions have given different takes on different bits of lore I either had decided on, read in Dragon Magazine and adopted, or which actually differed from the lore of prior editions. I view all that changing and changeable lore as just some other DM's house rules - their own take on the lore.

You your said, "2e is silent on the issue - elves simply gain +1 to hit with bows and swords. There is no background given whatsoever." Well, some of us that were gaming back then made our own decisions at that point. We don't have to change those decisions just because some other DM got his ideas published.

Beyond that, the case of elvish archery is to me only an example meant to question the basic assumption that alien intelligences are similar enough to humans that if something is nuture or nature in humans, we can infer that it is nature or nurture in the alien. In general, not only is that not true, but in particular I don't even think it's particularly interesting. It's much more interesting in my opinion if the things that are not human are distinctly not human in various ways, and certainly I think it is far more imaginative if that is the case. Obviously, your mileage may vary, but that's OK - I'm not going to insist that you adopt my points of view about everything.

You certainly should know by now that I have no loyalty to the RAW. Part of the reason I have no loyalty to the RAW is that it keeps changing on me without my consent. I didn't leave the RAW, it left me.

So, angryDM's point is pretty valid. For a good chunk of the game's history, elves do not gain any innate understanding of swords or bows. So, why does being an elf grant automatic proficiencies?

AngryDM's point could be valid. You are certainly free to imagine that any skill appearing in elves which would be a result of their nurture if found in a human is a result of their nurture when found it something else. But the point I'm trying to make is that you should question whether this is true because it certainly doesn't have to be true, and I think AngryDM (and even the designers of 5e) are blind to their own assumptions. There is a lot of that failure to question their own assumptions going on here.

One obvious problem with AngryDM's assertions can be to throw your argument back in your face. Clearly the ability to use bows and swords is not cultural precisely because an elf raised in a city doesn't lose that proficiency. I mean, it's right there in the rules that all elves have that proficiency regardless of background. It's actually AngryDM arguing to change the rules to fit his preferred conception, and not me.

 

[Celebrim]

He's the New York Times bestselling author of the books adapted into the movies Coralie and Stardust and the TV series American Gods and Neverwhere. He's also written for the TV series Doctor Who and Babylon 5. As a comic book writer he is most famous for the comic Sandman which has won every single award a comic book can win and one comic books can no longer win.

When his new books go on sale, he doesn't just tour book stores, he goes on shows like Colbert. He's probably one of the five most famous genre writers in the world at the moment. Prior to Game of Thrones on HBO he was probably more well known than George RR Martin.

So argument from authority, eh?

I'm not going to touch Neil Gaimen's assertion, except to say that he is deeply wrong and his assertion about political correctness deeply dishonest. There is much of his work I admire, and much I don't, but that quote reflects on him really badly.

 

[Eltab]

- Do you remove demons, necromancy or magic in general because they deter overly religious people ?

- Do you remove religion and gods because some people may have been raised in abusive religious households/communities ?

Curiously enough, D&D had to deal with these problems in the 1980's - and managed to do so without nearly the kerfluffle we are facing within the hobby over the 2010's issues.

 

[jasper]

He's the New York Times bestselling author of the books adapted into the movies Coralie and Stardust and the TV series American Gods and Neverwhere. He's also written for the TV series Doctor Who and Babylon 5. As a comic book writer he is most famous for the comic Sandman which has won every single award a comic book can win and one comic books can no longer win.

When his new books go on sale, he doesn't just tour book stores, he goes on shows like Colbert. He's probably one of the five most famous genre writers in the world at the moment. Prior to Game of Thrones on HBO he was probably more well known than George RR Martin.

Again I looked him up. I don't remember his name from B5 or who. The parts of Sandman comics ( I read at friends house long long ago in a young thin body) were boring. I quit reading comics in 89 when Marvel did the Inferno summer crossover all our comics series event. Listing his street creds means jack. You do better mentioning a Football coach, rapper, or celebrity. HINT. If I don't know of x,y,z work, his quotes mean jack (beep).

 

[james501]

Yes, I am familair.
Are you actually SAYING that I'm making a fallacious argument and that "race" isn't an inaccurate term at best and potentially offensive at worst?

It isnt innacurate when dealing with fantasy races which is the point. Also again, religion/gods/magic could be offensive to many.

So rephrase.

"People of elven ancestry have pointed ears."
There. That works just fine. That literally took me 2 seconds.

What's the point of intentionally hampering easy language ?
"Race" in fantasy terms works fine in the same way "nation" and "nationality" do in real life. To censor those terms and adopt long winded phrases seems backwards.

Species does sound too scientific. I prefer it for Star Wars/Trek.

Race, however, brings along connotations of "pure race" and racial distinctions, which very much are not humane and have literally been used to deny people person-hood. To many, "race" is as dehumanising" as "breed".

And it's not like "race" as we use it is any less modern than "species". Race in the modern sense dates to the 17th Century. Meanwhile, "species" dates to the 14th Century.

Was "species" used to refer to human classifications or animal ones ?
Not to mention the concept is much older : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historical_race_concepts#Etymology

Only because you're making it.
I'm sure people used to thing "black" and "African American" sounded awkward. Doesn't mean we should keep using the previous term.

No, not really. It's the difference between saying "greek people", "greek nation" and "people of Greek ancestry".
Why use the last one when the first ones are easier ?
You still need a proper noun to describe what the group of people itself is referred to as.
Just like we have nationality/ethnicity in reality, a similar construct for fantasy is useful.

And if given the choices of writing something that sounds awkward and writing something that makes people feel uncomfortable and carries a long history of racism, I'm going to choose awkward every single time.

The concept of "race" is older than the European racist construct. It wasnt always a racist negative aspect.
I think we can try to put taht in perspective.

The "elf nation" sounds just fine.

"Nation" is a sociopolitical construct as opposed to "race" which is a biological one.
All elves are of the same race but not necessarily of the same nation. That is true for many fantasy settings from Lotr to Warcraft and many others. it wouldnt be useful.

You missed the part where Races are not really biologically differentiated and that the "races" have been mingling and mixing for 12,000 years.
It's a term with a long history of use in racism, at its core being a way to define people as "white" and "non-white". Or, in the case of D&D, human or demihuman/ non-human.

Yeah... I'm sure literally calling an entire group of people "non-human" won't cause intense emotions from anyone...

But we arent talking about the real-world conception of race but a fantasy one in which these groups are different biologically.
Since race is already a debunked antiquated term it is fitting for a fantasy setting.

1) Who decides what is and is not "innocuous"?
2) Because you find their offences innocuous, it doesn't matter if you offend them?
3) Because one group is offended by innocuous things, all offences are innocuous?

1) Realistically ? The majority I would say for good or worse.
2) But does it matter ? In the context of religion, you couldnt make anything that wouldnt offend some. I am not talking about purposefully pissing them off, just doing your own thing inspired by myhts/legends and suddenly some religious people declare them satanic and offensive.
3) No, but we as people can look at things logically, put them in context compare them with similar situations and make a judgement.

Pathfinder & Shadow of the Demon Lord use "Ancestry". I think One Ring uses "Origin". Those and "Heritage" are likely the choices D&D should pick from with its next edition.

Again, those terms dont sound fitting. I had explained my reasoning in the earlier post.

 

[Jester David]

So argument from authority, eh?

The post I was replying to was mocking Neil Gaiman as an unknown. I was countering that he's not only known, it's hard to be more well known without being Stephen King to Tom Clancy...

I'm not going to touch Neil Gaimen's assertion, except to say that he is deeply wrong and his assertion about political correctness deeply dishonest. There is much of his work I admire, and much I don't, but that quote reflects on him really badly.

*shrug*
I get the intent and agree with it. There's extremism on both sides (and extremism is generally bad in all situations) but the *general intent* of things labelled as "politically correct" is to be nice to people and try not to upset them. There's other aspects to it for sure, but the term "politically correct" is usually not used by the people being "politically correct" and is a term used at them. It's largely derogatory. Mentally replacing it with another term de-powers that term while also reminding you that we're discussing real people.

(Plus, the quote was written, what, 5 years ago? There's a chance that modern things dismissed as being "politically correct" are not what he was referring to.)

He's also old enough and well read enough to probably remember the similar push-back against "political correctness" in the 1990s. Because every generation spends a decade learning the same lessons and slowly coming to grips with changing language and ways of thinking before the next generation comes up and pushes for further advancement. $50 says that we'll have another wave of pushback on being "politically correct" in 2035 as Millennials protest having to learn new words while the younger generation calls them out on their biases.

 

[HawaiiSteveO]

Do We Still Need "Race" in D&D?


And whom, shall I say, is asking . . ?

View attachment 95966

 

[talien]

Yo @talien, were you commissioned by Morrus to write this?

I pitch these articles of my own volition, but I do get paid for them. So in other words, Morrus doesn't ask me to write anything (he's never done this, as far as I recall). I pitch these articles and he approves them for posting.

This article came out of my research on writing the article about Black Panther/Wakanda, which led to the article about Oriental Adventures as well.