D&D General What is the appeal of Tolkien fantasy races?

[demonsquidgod]

I'll admit I'm a new school D&D player/DM. I've never discounted a player idea in osr or 5e, but I still wonder. Dwarves, elves, halflings... and so on.

Why do people chose these races?

To me, elves and dwarves are just humans with some tokrm magic element. Turtle people, and cat people and demon people and dragon people seem like a fun experience. Why playa dwarf and not a mountain dwelling human miner? Why wood elves and not tribal forest dwelling humans? Wealthy human wizards instead of high elves? I mean are humans even relevant in D&D anymore?

Is it a role-playing thing, or just a ability bonus power-up thing? I don't think I've ever ran a group that had a single human in it.

 

[commandercrud]

People aren't very creative. 99% of fictional races are just humans with bumpy heads.

 

[Stormonu]

You should see the uproar at a table when someone attempts to play a human with dwarfism (I have; the DM actually banned it and told the player if he wanted to do that, he HAD to play a dwarf).

But I generally agree with commandercrud - not that people aren't creative, but they want to play something near-human, but not quite human. They need a base (human-shaped) to work from and then can go hog-wild from there.

 

[Shiroiken]

To me, elves and dwarves are just humans with some tokrm magic element. Turtle people, and cat people and demon people and dragon people seem like a fun experience. Why playa dwarf and not a mountain dwelling human miner? Why wood elves and not tribal forest dwelling humans? Wealthy human wizards instead of high elves? I mean are humans even relevant in D&D anymore?

I bolded the real problem. Over the decades the standard races have been watered down to become just "funny looking humans." All races are meant to be completely different from humanity, and if you go back to the "Complete Book of {Race}" books of 2E, you can see this. The 3E racial books made a slight attempt at this, but because 3E was focused more on crunch than fluff it gets lost. An elf looks at the world with the perspective of 1000 years of life, so they should think differently than a tribal forest dwelling human or wealthy human wizard. A dwarf may not have as long of a lifespan, but their clannish culture and strong family bonds make them much more than just a mountain dwelling human miner (not to mention they live most of their lives without seeing the sun). Those of us who've been around a long time still think of them differently than the way they're presented now.

There's nothing wrong with the newer "weird" races... so long as they fit into the campaign setting. Sometimes the standard races aren't appropriate for a setting/campaign (one in college DM replaced humans with orcs and elves with drow in his setting). Just like with (sub)classes and backgrounds, your race should fit the game. This should be obvious, and is even mentioned in the PHB, but some players always try to force the issue to be contrarian.

 

[ninjayeti]

Sure elves are basically humans with pointy ears and dwarves are basically stocky humans with beards - but in my experience cat people are basically furry humans who hate dogs, and dragonborn are scaly humans who breathe fire, etc. Playing a character that is 98% human isn't an inherently more creative choice than playing one that is 99% human. Personally, have yet to see a character that was more interesting because it was an exotic race. To the contrary I have seen players that thought their character was interesting BECAUSE it was an exotic race and they really didn't have to put any more thought into it.

When I play an elf, I have a good starting point knowing what elves look like, what their culture is, and how they differ from humans. That frees me up to move on and come up with why THIS elf is interesting, cool, and fun to play.

 

[Warpiglet-7]

People aren't very creative. 99% of fictional races are just humans with bumpy heads.

I AM a human with a bumpy head. Is that bad?

 

[Morrus]

There's something weird going on with that first post. You've copied over a bunch of site architecture.

 

[demonsquidgod]

There's something weird going on with that first post. You've copied over a bunch of site architecture.

I didn't realize. Thanks. While this is indeed a playful copypasta of that other post it's also my genuine opinions on the issue.

 

[Tales and Chronicles]

I guess that depends on how you describe those races.
- My dwarves have the look of Trudvang dwarfs (long arms, short legs, big noses), but with the exceptional hairstyle of the 4e dwarves. Men and women both have an incredible taste for fashions and complex beauty routine for their hairs and beards, which both have. I also stole the rigid tradition and caste system from Dragon Age.

- My elves are also stolen whole from Dragon Age, with the exception of the high elves living in the enclaves such as Evermeet, who still have access to their old traditions and their Spelljamming culture. Drows from the Underdark cities are mostly as described (spider worshipping BDSM culture) but those who lives outside are more like the Ashlanders Dunmers from Morrowind, living tribal lives in the deeps, worshipping their ancestors and refusing the control of the Houses of Lolth.

The classic races can me made different than their Tolkien origins if you take the time to fluff them a little beyond what's in the PHB.

 

[Morrus]

I guess the answer to the question is -- LotR is one of the greatest fantasy works ever written, and it created many of the tropes we take for granted today. D&D was largely inspired by it (despite Gygax's later post-lawsuit protestations to the contrary) and originally included hobbits, ents, balrogs, foresty elves, mountainy dwarves, elves who hate dwarves, dwarves who hate elves, rangers, the whole works before those elements had to be removed or renamed.

That work speaks to a lot of people. And the movies managed to hit a home run.