Tiefling, Dragonborn : have they gained traction ?

[Loonook]

No, that's simply not helpful. If you are in a collaborative creative enterprise, you should always try to accommodate the others in your enterprise. Simply shutting others out, even if you think it is reasonable, is antithetical to the collaboration.

Not every game is a vast collaborative exercise in creativity... hell, most aren't. Games can be highly creative (players can build organizations, raise kingdoms, topple tyrants, create towns out of their minds)... but everyone operates within the confines established by the initial theme. We operate within plenty of issues when we initially start any game; we decide the rules set, the basic setting (or to play in a pre-written CS), any house rulings which will pop up.

And if you are a player, it is within your scope to choose not to play in a game which doesn't fit your specific ideas of what it should be. However, no player has the right to have the game completely bent to their will over the will of all of the players and/or the DM. The DM is the storyteller, R&D, economist, referee, and a hundred other jobs... and for doing all of that work, the DM gets to have more say than any single player.

If you want to play a game where everything is topsy turvy its your go... and no one can hold you to it. It's entirely within the right of any player to leave the game... but don't become too dramatic and believe that accommodation is a necessity. Accommodation in gaming only works during that period where the initial frameworks are being set... and then at specific points when the group can get together and discuss things. Otherwise a nice, long, dramatic storyline could be uprooted every time a new sourcebook comes out... and that would be a very sad thing.

The beauty of any roleplaying system, and especially games in the vein of d20 or WoD is that they can have a thousand options... or a handful. We're supplied a number of tools which are only limited by imagination... but in making such a large amount of tools available there should be established local restraint. I've seen too many games fall apart because of complaints about sourcebook X, or race Y, and it can be a sad thing.

If you like the stats of the thing, you could play any creature with similar. Dragonborn, Tieflings... they don't need to LOOK like lizards with attitude, or cheap demon doll knockoffs. On the other hand, you could have a scaly man who walks about with the same stats as any other race. Transformations, demonic bargains, horrible eldritch forces... all sorts of tropes could make for a more interesting character with similar stats.


Sell your soul? You could be a tiefling... stats and all. Born under the auspice of the Dragon Star? Look... he seems to be a scaly. Doesn't force a DM to create an entire civilization around the new sourcebook... and lets you have your freedom in a way that doesn't destroy narrative focus by causing a divergence into a path which may prove antithetical to the campaign. Character growth, story growth, and player growth should not be set akilter to worldbuilding... but they shouldn't shoehorn a world on the whim of a single player.

Slainte,

-Loonook.


PS: On the note of the original thread... I always liked the concept of tieflings, but hate the idea that every tiefling has to be some hot-eyed horned mess. Same goes for Dragonborn, Warforged, etc. It's about what you want to play, or run... not about what gets thrown in your lap by the newest sourcebook.

 

[CelticMutt]

I think for most long time rpgers, they fundamentally change the flavor of traditional campaigns where such races might only have a place as NPC races, if at all. IME, they tend to appeal most to newer players, particularly those who come from a CRPG backgrounds, for whatever reasons.

Tieflings have been around since 1994. Dragonborn are effectively descendants of a) Half-Dragons (1994), b) the Dray (1994), and C) Draconians (1984). While CRPGs may have enhanced their appeal, Tieflings and "Dragon-men" have had fans well before the era of CRPG really took off (I'd say with Baldur's Gate in '98 & Everquest in '99).

But that's what we're talking about by allowing everything in the core, all the time. It's kitchen sinking every campaign world. Dark Sun with dragonboob PCs. Ravenloft with dragonboob PCs. Etcetera.

Firstly, using the term "Dragonboobs" is nowhere near as clever and witty as you seem to think it is. Secondly, Dragonborn already exist in Dark Sun in the form of Dray, and could easily exist in Ravenloft thanks to the Mists.

 

[rounser]

Firstly, using the term "Dragonboobs" is nowhere near as clever and witty as you seem to think it is.

I don't think it's witty or clever, but I'll not give these contrived imposters the time of day by calling them by their poorly chosen name. They deserve mockery. Heck, I save to disbelieve that "they" exist as a core PC race in any D&D milieu worth a damn.

Secondly, Dragonborn already exist in Dark Sun in the form of Dray, and could easily exist in Ravenloft thanks to the Mists.

Barney the Purple Dinosaur exists in both too as a core PC race by this logic, because there's purple dinosaur-like critters in dark sun and he's certainly horrific enough to be taken by the mists. When's he appearing in the core, is there still room in PHB3? What a load.

 

[Mark]

Tieflings have been around since 1994. Dragonborn are effectively descendants of a) Half-Dragons (1994), b) the Dray (1994), and C) Draconians (1984). While CRPGs may have enhanced their appeal, Tieflings and "Dragon-men" have had fans well before the era of CRPG really took off (I'd say with Baldur's Gate in '98 & Everquest in '99).

To be fair, having fans and being integral for PCs are very different things. As in what you quoted, I do not debate that they have been around for some time as NPCs and evil beings. And for me, long timeRPGers can date back as far as 1974.

 

[I'm A Banana]

"Traction" isn't something that individual groups get to determine.

IMO, tieflings already had some form of traction: they were popular in 2e, and appeared with some frequency in 3e. They weren't exactly the tieflings of 4e, though...I'm not sure how many peoples' tieflings are an ancient empire of debauched evil with big awkward tails and big ridiculous horns. My tieflings are more in the 2e Planescape vibe, with being shunned outcasts, mutation-offspring that result from curses and unknown parentage. The birth of a tiefling is a cause for lamentation, accusation, and infanticide in most societies, but enough manage to be hidden, or be subtle, or survive despite the attempts at murder. They were suspicious outcasts with no claim to honor in PS, which made them appealing player characters (outcasts often are), and in most of my non-planar settings, the dial just gets turned up a bit higher (since fiends are a rarer thing).

Dragonborn are a bit harder to judge. They certainly didn't have any traction at all before they appeared in the 4e core book, but the ones in the 4e core book aren't really the same thing as they were before (except for that unfortunate and narm-inducing name). Playing dragon-people definitely has its appeal, and the whole "honorable empire" thing is appealing, too. They do have trouble in that they are pretty monstrous, but most fantasy -- especially newer fantasy -- is very accepting of monstrosity from sympathetic characters.

I'm not a huge fan of dragonborn myself, but that's mostly because I think they don't need to really exist. What needs to exist is robust rules for playing actual dragons alongside other PC's, since that what people actually want. They don't want to be a little dragon knock-off, they want to be a dragon. In any game where people can play a dragon, dragonborn are redundant and useless.

Also, I really think their look is tremendously unappealing. I see they are spikey lizard-men without tails, but that aesthetic isn't something I want for any of my characters (or most of my PC's). I'd rather have Kobolds as a PC race.

Tieflings have had traction, though I'm not sure their 4e-ified version is the most popular version.

Dragonborn don't have traction in and of themselves, but the idea of playing a dragon certainly does -- if you give players a way to be a dragon, dragonborn become pointless. I'd prefer to give people what they want, honestly.

 

[Mad Mac]

To be fair, having fans and being integral for PCs are very different things. As in what you quoted, I do not debate that they have been around for some time as NPCs and evil beings. And for me, long timeRPGers can date back as far as 1974.

Eh, I was playing Half-Dragons in Second edition around 94 or 95-ish. That was a good 14-15 years ago. A playable race concept doesn't have to date back to '74 to be valid or popular.

Dragonborn don't have traction in and of themselves, but the idea of playing a dragon certainly does -- if you give players a way to be a dragon, dragonborn become pointless. I'd prefer to give people what they want, honestly.

I wouldn't be so confident about that. I got over playing a Dragon years ago, and I still like Dragoborn. That is, I really would rather play a Dragonman than a Dragon, and I'm sure I'm not alone. They also overlap with the lizardman concept, which has also been popular for a good while now.

 

[Aus_Snow]

No, that's simply not helpful. If you are in a collaborative creative enterprise, you should always try to accommodate the others in your enterprise. Simply shutting others out, even if you think it is reasonable, is antithetical to the collaboration.

Whatever else might be the case, it was certainly no less helpful than what you have just suggested there. In other words, your opinion on this matter is certainly no more valid than mine. And yes, that's all it is.

 

[Mark]

Eh, I was playing Half-Dragons in Second edition around 94 or 95-ish. That was a good 14-15 years ago.

You're the first person I have heard that has done so. What supplement did you use that detailed the PC class?

 

[Mad Mac]

You're the first person I have heard that has done so. What supplement did you use that detailed the PC class?

To be honest, I don't remember the name of the supplement. I'm tempted to say Council of Wyrms (the box set that let you play full dragons, which I also used) but I could be mistaken on that. I lost my 2nd edition stuff a long time ago, so I'm strictly working off memory here.

I do know that you gained different ability score adjustments and racial abilities based on the Dragon type you selected. It was very similar to the Half-Dragon template in 3rd edition, to the point that I think they used it as inspiration.

 

[I'm A Banana]

I wouldn't be so confident about that. I got over playing a Dragon years ago, and I still like Dragoborn. That is, I really would rather play a Dragonman than a Dragon, and I'm sure I'm not alone. They also overlap with the lizardman concept, which has also been popular for a good while now.

In my mind, they absolutely do not overlap with the lizardman concept. Playing a dragon and playing a lizard-person are fundamentally different experiences. In the latter case, you work with lizard stereotypes -- hissing crocodiles, cold-bloodedness, perhaps a certain sinister hiss, maybe partially aquatic, or able to stick to walls...you know, things that make you a lizard person.

Playing a dragon is about arrogance, greed, knowledge, breathing fire, flying around, etc.

If there was a dragon race that could fit the mold of other PC races....heck, if the "Dragonborn" mechanics were just appropriated for an *actual* dragon instead of the bagged cereal version of a dragon, dragonborn would evaporate as unnecessary.

But dragonborn (probably as much for the horrible name as anything else) kind of annoy me, so there very well could be something about the inherent concept that I'm totally missing.

Lizardmen I like for their own reasons, but dragonborn are not lizardmen -- it takes more than scales to be a reptile, y'know?