The Human Race has no Culture!

[Minigiant]

(Most) PCs are superhuman because of their class not ability scores. A level 1 fighter knows weapons combat better than 99% of his village.

A farmer with 18 STR is still a Normie. He can't go hunt goblins. But almost every fighter can own a goblin. Any character without the STR CON and DEX to fight will most likely not be a fighter. Ability score attract characters to super heroism but the training of class and level make them superheroic.

That being said, their would be some sort of culture in humanity. Perhaps a simple Civilized and Barbaric split.

 

[TrippyHippy]

So personally, I might prefer a separate,fifth character choice of "culture", to go with the other four. But this may be too complex for other players' tastes, at least in terms of the core rules. This is probably something I will add if it's not in the game, since I run things in my own game world. A lot of the time, this separate Culture would effectively be a lightweight Background, and act as a pre-requisite for other Backgrounds or Specialities.

How about straight replacing 'Race' with 'Culture' and incorporating the Non-Human Cultures into this?

After all Race as a separate aspect hasn't existed in all editions of D&D - remember the Races-as Classes? You could have Cultures including 'Mountain Dwarf' or 'High Elf' alongside 'Human Barbarian' or 'Civilised Man', etc.

 

[Nagol]

Well, there we go.

Let's put it this way then: In 1E, all these 1st level characters were based off 3D6 rolls by default. That had them set at an average of 10.5 on each of these scores, which was exactly the same as the scores rolled for NPCs. The bonuses in editions since then were done for no other reason than for gamist reasons - with mechanics leading to narrative justifications, not the other way round.

Could we talk about Human cultures now?

Well, no.

Here are the methods of stat generation presented in the 1e DMG:


Method I: All scores are recorded and arranged in the order the player desires. 4d6 are rolled, and the lowest die (or one of the lower) is discarded.

Method II: All scores are recorded and arranged as in Method I. 3d6 are rolled 12 times and the highest 6 scores are retained.

Method III: Scores rolled are according to each ability category, in order, STRENGTH, INTELLIGENCE, WISDOM, DEXTERITY, CONSTITUTION, CHARISMA. 3d6 are rolled 6 times for each ability, and the highest score in each category is retained for that category.

Method IV: 3d6 are rolled sufficient times to generate the 6 ability scores, in order, for 12 characters, The player then selects the single set of scores which he or she finds most desirable and these scores are noted on the character record sheet.

I don't dispute your desire for human cultures. I just want to make certain information presented is correct.

 

[TrippyHippy]

Well, no.

Here are the methods of stat generation presented in the 1e DMG:


Method I: All scores are recorded and arranged in the order the player desires. 4d6 are rolled, and the lowest die (or one of the lower) is discarded.

Method II: All scores are recorded and arranged as in Method I. 3d6 are rolled 12 times and the highest 6 scores are retained.

Method III: Scores rolled are according to each ability category, in order, STRENGTH, INTELLIGENCE, WISDOM, DEXTERITY, CONSTITUTION, CHARISMA. 3d6 are rolled 6 times for each ability, and the highest score in each category is retained for that category.

Method IV: 3d6 are rolled sufficient times to generate the 6 ability scores, in order, for 12 characters, The player then selects the single set of scores which he or she finds most desirable and these scores are noted on the character record sheet.

I don't dispute your desire for human cultures. I just want to make certain information presented is correct.

I don't have the advantage of having a 1E book in front of me, but were these not alternative methods of rolling up characters?

Anyway - enough - this thread was started to discuss human cultures as a possibility, and the only reason I brought up the universal +1 scores was that a) they are BORING representations of culture, and b) it kinda defeats the purpose of having a 3-18 scale if the 'average' is already skewed.

 

[Prickly]

How about straight replacing 'Race' with 'Culture' and incorporating the Non-Human Cultures into this?

After all Race as a separate aspect hasn't existed in all editions of D&D - remember the Races-as Classes? You could have Cultures including 'Mountain Dwarf' or 'High Elf' alongside 'Human Barbarian' or 'Civilised Man', etc.

The Dragon Age RPG does this. You choose a background which includes race and that background determines which class you qualify for (either warrior, rogue or mage).

 

[Nagol]

My take is the developers did not want to be accused of racism, stereo-typing, bias, and all those unpleasant side issues.

Canada is currently going through a controversy based upon an image on the new $100 bill Carney moves to stamp out fire over 'Asian' $100 bill - The Globe and Mail.

And that sort of thing becomes toxic to an entertainment business.

 

[TrippyHippy]

My take is the developers did not want to be accused of racism, stereo-typing, bias, and all those unpleasant side issues.

Then stop using the term 'Race' and use the term 'Culture' instead.

 

[Nagol]

Then stop using the term 'Race' and use the term 'Culture' instead.

And that'd help? Really? It's not like humans have more than one race in the real world.

Complaints in popular culture don't have to be true; they have to be interesting to popular media.

Brandishing a book and claiming the game is really <insert least favorite cultural group>'s subliminal propaganda and a brainwashing attempt aimed at our impressionable youth is both interesting to the media and damning for the company publishing it.

Avoiding such complaints is almost impossible as well. Look at the Canadian $100 dollar bill. A single image of a non-descript person is first cast as non-inclusive and sterotyping (asian female looking into a microsope) and then as non-inclusive and a affront to diversity when the features are made less distinctive/more Caucasian.

To make cultures interesting, you need a combination of mechanical and cosmetic variation. The cosmetic variation is the dangerous one. There is a lot of cosmetic variation over recorded history and someone will be able to associate a variant in game with a real-world analogue and take exception to its depiction.

 

[Arytiss]

I suppose the difficulty here is that human culture tends to be inherantly tied in to the setting of a game. The moment that they say that humans are one thing, I can guarantee that there would be an outcry saying it should be the other because the human culture as written won't work in their games. There's no generic human like there is a generic dwarf, kender, or Dragonborn.

 

[Obryn]

Let's put it this way then: In 1E, all these 1st level characters were based off 3D6 rolls by default.

No, they weren't. In AD&D, the recommended method for die rolling (Method I) was 4d6, drop 1, arrange to taste. (Edit: Nagol already pointed this out. But no, these weren't alternate rolling methods; they were the actual suggested methods of making a character. 3d6 in order is one of the Methods, too. But 4d6 was certainly the default. We could also talk about the Unearthed Arcana rolling method which resulted in probably the highest ability scores of any edition to-date, but since that book also gave us spell resistant PC races who could summon earth elementals, I don't know if it's relevant. AD&D suffered from serious stat inflation - you needed 15+ in most scores to get a bonus.)

You might be thinking OD&D or B/X.

-O