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.

 

[Jay Verkuilen]

That assumes a more-or-less cohesive approach to the design of such elements. I don't know if such an approach is explicit in the presentation of 4e, but I don't see much evidence that it is in the editions with which I'm familiar. They mostly just pick and choose from various medieval fantasy tropes.

True, D&D is and always has been a grab bag. However, a number of the more explicitly Tolkien-esque influences seem to have reduced over time, or else have been subsumed into "generic fantasy." And, as I said, 4E is by far the least Tolkien-influenced of the D&D editions.

It would just be a case of designing the race to resemble those characters, kind of like how halflings are lucky because Bilbo Baggins was lucky.

Lucky halfling is a pretty new one to D&D. As far as I know it's a 5Eism. The halfling has clear Tolkien influence (the three sub-types) but the 1E halfling was very definitely built on Bilbo Baggins and Shire hobbits. Over time I think that's reduced a good bit. They've become nomadic (unless they stopped being nomadic again), the art often looks much less hobbit-y, and so on.

D&D's elves are mortal (and short), but that doesn't mean they aren't like Tolkien's elves in other ways. The mortality of elves also renders the idea of half-elves having a choice of whether to share the fate of elves or men meaningless. The absence of the choice from D&D's half-elves, however, doesn't mean they might not resemble Tolkien's half-elves in other ways.

Certainly it's meaningless in this case, but the whole "ageless" aspect to elves in Tolkien is pretty key. D&D elves are decidedly more mortal and normal. There certainly are some aspects that are similar. For instance, FR's elves and Greyhawk's elves definitely have a more Tolkien bent, particularly FR's elves with their "bugging out to Evermeet" trope, something that got introduced in 2E as I recall, although in that case I think it's also a common source in the form of the legend of Avalon, too. (Recall that the elvenhome in Tolkien is called Avallone.) Elves and humans intermixing in Middle Earth is pretty rare but seems much more common in D&D, hence half-elves aren't exactly rare, unlike in Middle Earth, where they're quite uncommon. So there are superficial similarities, but D&D elves are notably more mundane and also owe some other sources, such as Poul Anderson's Three Hearts and Three Lions, Michael Moorcock, and Norse and Finnish myth directly (both a big influence on Tolkien as well as Gygax). This makes me feel that, while Tolkien was undoubtedly an influence, he's by no means the only one.

 

[Jay Verkuilen]

This matches my take on it as well - they ran out of bones to throw by the time they got to half-elves and this was all they had left to give 'em.

Yeah, half-elves didn't really have a "thing" before. I like the half-elf a good bit, in no small part because I'm fond of their versatility and like playing bards, warlocks, and such. Half-elves are natural at those classes.

 

[Shasarak]

What irony?

Its kind of like rain on your wedding day or a free ride when you have already paid.

 

[Myrdin Potter]

I have not purported to speak for a significant number of people. I have spoken for me. And I think my posts have done a reasonable job of explaining what my concern is. Did you read them?

You are the one asking for papers and surveys because they exist for the problematic use of race as a concept in the real world? When obviously the use of race in D&D is not the same and all races get bonuses ...

Yes, you are a prime example of someone poorly arguing why the use of the word or concept of race as used in D&D is an issue.

 

[Enevhar Aldarion]

Yup, absolutely. Totally agree that you've been doing the Medusa correct to myth for decades.

What you haven't done for decades though, is use the D&D Medusa the way it was and is written.

Like I said, thank you for providing such a perfect illustration of my point.

But...but...I have watched Clash of the Titans and I know you have to make direct eye contact to be turned to stone!

 

[Enevhar Aldarion]

Well, let's unpack that one shall we?

The various "good" clergy in D&D are never, ever called cults. There is no Cult of St. Cuthbert. There's a church of St. Cuthbert, but, surprisingly, no cult.

Yet, every "evil" clergy, particularly any that worship demons or devils are almost always called cults.

So, the negative baggage of cult is being applied pretty clearly in D&D.

The newer a religion or the smaller the number of followers, the more likely it will be called a cult, at least in the real world. Remember that at one time in history Christianity was just a cult.

And for those evil clergy, they are called cultists, maybe in homage to the cultists in Cthulhu.

 

[Enevhar Aldarion]

Nope, as both the 1/4 orc part and 1/4 elf part have mechanical ramifications in my game (some of which would, admittedly, tend to cancel each other out).

And for a human it'd sure be odd-looking - probably show a bit of tusk, and some point to the ears...

Lan-"tusks instead of ears - now there's an idea"-efan

This is another one of those areas where real world DNA and fantasy world racial stuff just do not match up in any published works that I know of. And another reason why I think the use of Ancestry is a bad choice, In the real world, a couple can have a baby that looks nothing like them because their recessive genes just happen to combine in the right way. As an example, there are sets of twins where one is white and one is black and both parents are the same color. This kind of thing does not happen in fantasy settings. A woman with an elven ancestor is just not going to give birth to a full elf or a half-elf without the rules being written specifically to allow it. I also personally would not want rules that would allow this and I am not comfortable with anything lower than one quarter making a child different that their majority parentage. Anything less than that feels like the One-Drop Rule is getting brought into play. People outside the Southern US may not know what this horrible racist law was about, so here is the link for it:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One-drop_rule

 

[Celebrim]

The newer a religion or the smaller the number of followers, the more likely it will be called a cult, at least in the real world. Remember that at one time in history Christianity was just a cult.

And for those evil clergy, they are called cultists, maybe in homage to the cultists in Cthulhu.

Well, just for the record, every religious organization - nominally good or nominally evil - in my homebrew D&D world is a 'cult'. There are no 'churches' of anything in my homebrew world, and I personally feel labeling the cults as 'churches' is always inaccurate.

Technically speaking, Christianity is a cult. And properly speaking, Christianity is the only cult with churches because 'the church' is the Christian specific technical term for the members of the religion.

 

[Shasarak]

Well, let's unpack that one shall we?

The various "good" clergy in D&D are never, ever called cults. There is no Cult of St. Cuthbert. There's a church of St. Cuthbert, but, surprisingly, no cult.

Yet, every "evil" clergy, particularly any that worship demons or devils are almost always called cults.

So, the negative baggage of cult is being applied pretty clearly in D&D.

Depends if you are winning or not. For example there is a Church of Asmodeus and probably Charlie Sheen somewhere in the multiverse.

 

[Lanefan]

True, D&D is and always has been a grab bag. However, a number of the more explicitly Tolkien-esque influences seem to have reduced over time, or else have been subsumed into "generic fantasy." And, as I said, 4E is by far the least Tolkien-influenced of the D&D editions.

Lucky halfling is a pretty new one to D&D. As far as I know it's a 5Eism. The halfling has clear Tolkien influence (the three sub-types) but the 1E halfling was very definitely built on Bilbo Baggins and Shire hobbits. Over time I think that's reduced a good bit. They've become nomadic (unless they stopped being nomadic again), the art often looks much less hobbit-y, and so on.

All of which is unfortunate, as they work best when left as close to Hobbits as the Tolkein estate will tolerate.

Otherwise they just intrude on the design space belonging to Gnomes.

And I'm not even going to start on the art other than to mention the sample halfling they've got for PF2 is probably the ugliest halfling/hobbit I've evern seen. It's closer to how I'd imagine a crackhead D&D gnome to look, only with bare hairy feet.