D&D 5E What is the appeal of the weird fantasy races?

[EzekielRaiden]

So, before I write any of my usual excessively-long answers, @Maxperson , I would like to ask a simple and straightforward question.

Are you asserting that any case where someone has such an assent power is, by definition, an example of absolute authority? Even if that assent authority, if denied, would mean the end of the relationship involved?

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Edit: To add a little bit of extra contribution to the thread overall, since I really do want to focus on productive stuff here rather than all the useless bickering, I have a question for all of the DMs out there who are skeptical of players who come to the table with character ideas before they know about the campaign.

Why do you, as DM, bring so many hard-line no-debate ideas to the table first? Do you truly never seek out ideas or suggestions from your players on the kind of world they would like to see? It just baffles me that so many think it's patently ridiculous for a player to bring world-building contributions to the table, yet also that it's patently ridiculous for a DM to NOT bring an EXTREMELY DETAILED world that apparently breaks at the slightest addition of something just beyond the horizon, variably known about but not often discussed because it's From Over There.

When I built my world, I actively sought out player contributions, because I know I'm not talented enough to fill an entire world with ideas. I regularly seek out advice from other DMs too, but my players are my primary source because they're the ones that will be impacted by it. As one example, when building this world originally, I had a player who wanted to play the Grim World "Slayer" class--which kinda straddles the line of Evil stuff and thus could be a Problem^TM--so I asked him how the character gets his killing fix. He proposed that he was more of a monster-hunter than a murderer, which made a lot of sense. We collaboratively built an idea of "hunters in the waste": wandering hunters, neither Nomads proper nor City-Folk, who stalk the sere landscape hunting the dangerous beasts that dwell in the wilds, both a boon and a headache for the many merchants who own a private estate in the middle of nowhere. Without that player's input, a significant (albeit not necessarily vital) portion of my campaign world simply wouldn't exist.

Does this really happen so rarely? Do DMs really get so attached to a single setting of their creation that they never try anything new or solicit player involvement for new ideas, elements, etc.?

 

[Maxperson]

I mean, fear of the unknown is at the root of most bigotry.

It's at the root of multiple things including that, yes. It doesn't have to mean that, though.

 

[Maxperson]

I guess this is one of my basic problems. Why are elves and dwarves "known" but, Tabaxi or Dragonborn aren't?

It's pretty much RAW. Those races are the uncommon ones, some of which are fairly rare.

"Scattered among the members of these more common races are the true exotics: a hulking dragonborn here, pushing his way through the crowd, and a sly tiefling there, lurking in the shadows with mischief in her eyes."

"And there, well out of the sunlight, is a lone drow-a fugitive from the subterranean expanse of the Underdark, trying to make his way in a world that fears his kind."

And from the Uncommon Races section in Dragonborn.

"The dragon born and the rest of the races in this chapter are uncommon. They don't exist in every world of D&D, and
even where they are found, they are less widespread than dwarves, elves, halflings, and humans.

In the cosmopolitan cities of the D&D multiverse, most people hardly look twice at members of even the most exotic races. But the small towns and villages that dot the countryside are different. The common folk aren't accustomed to seeing members of these races, and they
react accordingly."

So there you have it. Even in the largest cities are people what aren't accustomed to the uncommon races. In the small villages they are rare. And this is for the PHB races. For the even more exotic races from the other books, like Tabaxi, they are likely to be completely unknown in the smaller towns and villages that PCs often enter.

Oh, and the bolded portion from the first paragraph even tells the players that they may not be able to play an uncommon race, as that race may not even be in that world.

I mean, it's pretty easy for the DM to just say, "Ok, yup, race X is just as known as these other races".

Sure. You could homebrew your game like that.

 

[Gammadoodler]

To contribute to the pointless 'how common are the halfling adventurers' tangent, I'd like to point out that D&D halflings are not just hobbits, they have some kender influence too. They're pretty fearless and even have a racial feature to represent it. This certainly would increase the likelihood of them becoming an adventurers, albeit not necessarily very long lived ones...

This is actually an interesting thing that I wish were better explored in the fluff, and would serve as fertile ground for worldbuilding regarding halflings (at least in 5e).

1. How does this feature happen? Is it genetic, or, as a culture, do halflings somehow train their young to be resistant to fear. What would such training look like?
2. Either way, what would does a culture look like when all it's members are, more or less, fearless? They shouldn't live in cozy burrows, but in towering hives with no handrails or guards where members use rope swings to get from place to place. Monstrous beasts should serve as mounts and work animals. And they should procreate like crazy without concern for the consequences.

Seems like they could very easily be the frat bro of the races, though that probably is not a compliment.

 

[Gammadoodler]

It's pretty much RAW. Those races are the uncommon ones, some of which are fairly rare.

"Scattered among the members of these more common races are the true exotics: a hulking dragonborn here, pushing his way through the crowd, and a sly tiefling there, lurking in the shadows with mischief in her eyes."

"And there, well out of the sunlight, is a lone drow-a fugitive from the subterranean expanse of the Underdark, trying to make his way in a world that fears his kind."

And from the Uncommon Races section in Dragonborn.

"The dragon born and the rest of the races in this chapter are uncommon. They don't exist in every world of D&D, and
even where they are found, they are less widespread than dwarves, elves, halflings, and humans.

In the cosmopolitan cities of the D&D multiverse, most people hardly look twice at members of even the most exotic races. But the small towns and villages that dot the countryside are different. The common folk aren't accustomed to seeing members of these races, and they
react accordingly."

So there you have it. Even in the largest cities are people what aren't accustomed to the uncommon races. In the small villages they are rare. And this is for the PHB races. For the even more exotic races from the other books, like Tabaxi, they are likely to be completely unknown in the smaller towns and villages that PCs often enter.

Oh, and the bolded portion from the first paragraph even tells the players that they may not be able to play an uncommon race, as that race may not even be in that world.



Sure. You could homebrew your game like that.

PHB cultural descriptions are not rules, and, as such, are not RAW.

 

[Maxperson]

So, before I write any of my usual excessively-long answers, @Maxperson , I would like to ask a simple and straightforward question.

Are you asserting that any case where someone has such an assent power is, by definition, an example of absolute authority? Even if that assent authority, if denied, would mean the end of the relationship involved?

Yes. If the players deny the authority and the DM won't change his mind, their ONLY recourse is to leave the game. Leaving the game doesn't remove the DM's power over his game, but it does leave him rather lonely.

What I don't think you are understanding is that if the DM can say no to something the players want to do(and you could in all of your examples), then the players have no authority there. The DM has it all. Saying yes is exercising that authority every bit as much as saying no is. It's you making the choice about what happens.

In some games the DM cedes a portion of his authority to the players and they get to use it to build portions of the game and influence the game's direction in ways the DM cannot counter. But without the DM ceding power, the players have none and can only stay and live with the decision, or leave if the DM exercises his authority in a way that they dislike.

Edit: To add a little bit of extra contribution to the thread overall, since I really do want to focus on productive stuff here rather than all the useless bickering, I have a question for all of the DMs out there who are skeptical of players who come to the table with character ideas before they know about the campaign.

Why do you, as DM, bring so many hard-line no-debate ideas to the table first? Do you truly never seek out ideas or suggestions from your players on the kind of world they would like to see? It just baffles me that so many think it's patently ridiculous for a player to bring world-building contributions to the table, yet also that it's patently ridiculous for a DM to NOT bring an EXTREMELY DETAILED world that apparently breaks at the slightest addition of something just beyond the horizon, variably known about but not often discussed because it's From Over There.

Has that argument been made in this thread? I admit to skipping some posts. In the past when I've made a campaign prior to the players showing up, it was just fine for them to bring ideas to the table without knowing the campaign. If an idea would be disruptive, I would say so, but that rarely happens.

For the last 10 years or so it's a non-issue. We have a special session 0 where all 5 of us put 3 campaign ideas in for consideration. We all have one veto that we can use if we absolutely don't want a campaign to happen. Those get used sometimes, but not every time or by every person. Then everyone except me ranks the campaign ideas from 1 to X and we tally up the highest numbers. The top three campaigns get set aside and everyone re-votes. The highest of those three is what I'm going to run. The reason I don't vote is that if I don't really want to run a campaign, I'd have vetoed it already and I want to run the one the players want to play in the most.

Since the campaign is chosen first, all of the PCs are made to fit that campaign and there's no possibility of a player coming to the table with a PC without knowing in advance what the campaign is.

Does this really happen so rarely? Do DMs really get so attached to a single setting of their creation that they never try anything new or solicit player involvement for new ideas, elements, etc.?

My players have to write up a background for their PCs and they like doing so. I encourage them to make NPC contacts and even small towns if they come from one. That's the extent of it, though. Once the game starts, they don't have the ability to create world content except through game play.

 

[Maxperson]

PHB cultural descriptions are not rules, and, as such, are not RAW.

So that's not a cultural description and it's every bit as much a rule as Elves have darkvision. Rules do not have to be mechanical. The game has set up common and uncommon races. That's a rule. It even organizes those races by that division.

 

[FrozenNorth]

PHB cultural descriptions are not rules, and, as such, are not RAW.

Do you really want to start a fluff vs RAW argument in a thread that has otherwise shown such measured restraint?

Also, you can’t really play the fluff vs RAW card in a discussion that is precisely about the lore of a race/how they are presented in the rulebooks.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

Regardless of what actually constitutes as rules, one really cannot coherently claim that players should expect to be able to play any race because they appear in the rulebooks, when the said books themselves state that this is not the case.

 

[Gammadoodler]

Do you really want to start a fluff vs RAW argument in a thread that has otherwise shown such measured restraint?

Also, you can’t really play the fluff vs RAW card in a discussion that is precisely about the lore of a race/how they are presented in the rulebooks.

To be fair, I did not pull out the 'rules' card. And it is absolutely reasonable to engage when a conversation changes from 'how do DMs build worlds and what role do players have in it..' to 'what are the rules for world building'