D&D 5E What Nonstandard/Untraditional Races do you wish would return?

[The Crimson Binome]

Tibbit

 

[Jefe Bergenstein]

I agree about the warforged, but Kieth Baker home brewed a 5e version that I like. Having a Large or Tiny race would be an interesting expansion to the ruleset; I don’t find Medium minotaurs or firbolg very satisfying.

Sometimes you have to say “screw balance, let’s get weird with it.”

That's why I really liked their aarokoka (or however it's spelled). They just get to fly. No farting around with some lame half-measure flight at low levels, or having to end a turn on solid space. Your flying bird man just gets to fly, and they trust the DM to make challenges or ban it if they don't want to deal. When DarkSun comes out, I hope they just let half giants be 10+ feet tall and actually large size.

 

[Wiseblood]

There are few that I think would be neat in the right campaign. Kir-Lanan gargoyles from FR looked pretty badass.

 

[Sunseeker]

I really should have made my own answer, but I didn't want to clutter up the opening post...

From 4th Edition:
Deva: Because these reincarnating, willfully-fallen angels and their risk of transforming into rakshasa just has so much more to it than the aasimar do.

I agree with this, and it was also a nice shout out to Hindu mythology which is some very rich material that almost never sees the the light of day in D&D.

 

[Wulffolk]

Is none an acceptable answer?

As both DM and player, I like to tell stories about familiar heroes (humans, elves, dwarves, etc). Nothing wrong with dipping into the weird races, just not my cup of tea.

I did have a fascination with avariel from 2e, but 20 years and lots of DMing later, I strongly dislike flying races as PC options!

100% in agreement with this. After decades of playing D&D I still have not run out of interesting concepts for characters of the primary races. For me the primary races are the most easily relateable, and therefore generate the most engaging stories. The further a character is from human the more difficult it is to empathize with them, and the less invested I become in their story. The best stories are heavily influenced by the relationship between the characters in the party, and a party of characters that look like they belong in the Star Wars cantina scene tend to not have much of a relationship with each other beyond effectively slaughtering monsters.

On the other hand, the more options that I have for creating NPCs the better. To that end I encourage WotC to publish everything that they can think of. If I don't like it then I don't need to use it.

 

[QuietBrowser]

Is none an acceptable answer?

As both DM and player, I like to tell stories about familiar heroes (humans, elves, dwarves, etc). Nothing wrong with dipping into the weird races, just not my cup of tea.

I did have a fascination with avariel from 2e, but 20 years and lots of DMing later, I strongly dislike flying races as PC options!

100% in agreement with this. After decades of playing D&D I still have not run out of interesting concepts for characters of the primary races. For me the primary races are the most easily relateable, and therefore generate the most engaging stories. The further a character is from human the more difficult it is to empathize with them, and the less invested I become in their story. The best stories are heavily influenced by the relationship between the characters in the party, and a party of characters that look like they belong in the Star Wars cantina scene tend to not have much of a relationship with each other beyond effectively slaughtering monsters.

On the other hand, the more options that I have for creating NPCs the better. To that end I encourage WotC to publish everything that they can think of. If I don't like it then I don't need to use it.

Here's what I don't understand: if you don't have any interest in the idea of having non-traditional races return to D&D, then why are you even here? This thread has nothing for you.

 

[Wulffolk]

Here's what I don't understand: if you don't have any interest in the idea of having non-traditional races return to D&D, then why are you even here? This thread has nothing for you.

Umm . . . To participate in a discussion on a public forum. That's not so hard to understand after all, is it?

Just as there are proponents of adding every race ever conceived there are also those that would prefer to not have to deal with that kind of strangeness at their table. When a race gets published in a book that a player spends money on quite often they feel entitled to play that race, and get upset if a DM denies them their "rights as a player".

However, as I mentioned in the post that you quoted, I expressed my support for adding everything possible in order to give me more options for NPCs. I have no problem communicating the tone of my setting to players and disallowing things that don't fit my setting.

 

[epithet]

...
Aranea: They're shapeshifting spiders with an affinity for arcane magic, but they're not evil, they just want to live in peace. I just wish they'd come back, they're too good to languish in Mystara.
...

Nope.

Nope, no way, nun-uh, negative, nyet.

I am pretty open minded about character options. Hell, for the right campaign I could go along with some insane crap; black pudding paladins and animated tree rogues and whatnot. Spiders? Hell no. Never.

Did you not realize that those creepy bastards have eight eyes? EIGHT! EYES!

I neeed to lie down a moment.

 

[mrpopstar]

Bariaur! Because who doesn't want to play a carefree, vain, vegetarian, fierce centaur-not-a-centaur capable of ramming attacks (in which they occasionally knock themselves unconscious)?

 

[Mad_Jack]

animated tree rogues

That was one of my favorite old-school Gamma World characters right there...


I'm one of the folks who thought the 4E pixies were really cool, even if their actual mechanics were an outright rules kludge to get around the pricklier issues with their flight and size. I liked that I could have a druid who could turn into a bird and fly right out of the gate.
And I thought the wilden were a great concept as well.
From 3.5 I really loved the warforged, as there were so many ways you could refluff the basic concept beyond the original campaign-related stuff.