D&D General on how to build a races story?

Mind of tempest

(he/him)advocate for 5e psionics
I am presently uncertain of how to make one I did however find a setting slot that does not get considered much.
I have an idea on aesthetic and basic key ideas to them although not as many mundane ones as I would like so that they have sufficient grit and connection to the world.
I have ideas for what they like class-wise and what gods they might care for but I lack that thing that makes them more real like what elves and dwarves have.

how do I make such a basic relatively interpretable story to be seen throughout them?
 

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Mind of tempest

(he/him)advocate for 5e psionics
Socratic question (though I don't know the answer already): What do elves and dwarves already have?
I struggle to articulate it otherwise I would not be asking but an archetype story they are x care about y and feel both malleable like clay but as solid in basic definition as concreate
 

Levistus's_Leviathan

5e Freelancer
I'm relatively good at making stories for different races and connecting them to their worlds, but if I'm going to help, I'm going to need more to go off of (typical classes, personality traits, basic culture, physical appearance, etc), especially what differs them from the other races with grit and a strong connection to their world (Dwarves, Goliaths, Orcs, and most Genasi have both of those).
 

Casimir Liber

Adventurer
I am presently uncertain of how to make one I did however find a setting slot that does not get considered much.
I have an idea on aesthetic and basic key ideas to them although not as many mundane ones as I would like so that they have sufficient grit and connection to the world.
I have ideas for what they like class-wise and what gods they might care for but I lack that thing that makes them more real like what elves and dwarves have.

how do I make such a basic relatively interpretable story to be seen throughout them?
Okay - I presume you're a DM, why not give us an outline of your universe, which gives us all something to go on. I get what you mean though, I had thought of it myself. In fact I will start another thread
 

ph0rk

Friendship is Magic, and Magic is Heresy.
At the risk of starting a war, I'd make a story about a people rather than a race, but that's me.

That aside - there are dozens of examples in inspirational literature. Crib something that sounds good.
 


Umbran

Mod Squad
Staff member
Supporter
At the risk of starting a war, I'd make a story about a people rather than a race, but that's me.

I think this may actually be useful, though.

There's a people, a culture. We want them to have certain aspects - where do they sit. Like, physically in the world, where are these people living? Who are they interacting with? What are their needs? What are their approaches to getting those needs? These are questions that can help the OP.
 

Mind of tempest

(he/him)advocate for 5e psionics
I'm relatively good at making stories for different races and connecting them to their worlds, but if I'm going to help, I'm going to need more to go off of (typical classes, personality traits, basic culture, physical appearance, etc), especially what differs them from the other races with grit and a strong connection to their world (Dwarves, Goliaths, Orcs, and most Genasi have both of those).
typical classes include monk and whenever we get the psion, at least two subcultures like artificer, one loves the necromancer and a naturey type loves both rangers and druids, these people are built to the spec of being a major setting race but still transplantable to other settings.
At the risk of starting a war, I'd make a story about a people rather than a race, but that's me.

That aside - there are dozens of examples in inspirational literature. Crib something that sounds good.
this is a dnd forum we more or less all know what that means in context, in my case, I am building something closer to a species as it will be rather clearly different from humanity at anything other than a great distance.
Okay - I presume you're a DM, why not give us an outline of your universe, which gives us all something to go on. I get what you mean though, I had thought of it myself. In fact I will start another thread
technically no I am A player who just build-out of a profound lack of things connecting to me, somehow the phb failed to have anything I got so I must build something I do get plus I build for general purpose so think less warforged and more elf in how easy they can be used in different settings.

I think this may actually be useful, though.

There's a people, a culture. We want them to have certain aspects - where do they sit. Like, physically in the world, where are these people living? Who are they interacting with? What are their needs? What are their approaches to getting those needs? These are questions that can help the OP.
several places one lives in artificer cites in the Underdark cheating death and studying thantonautics to learn the routes of ascension.

one is naturey but something far stranger than the "inharmony with nature" stuff that makes them seem all oddly soft, things involving turning into parts of nature, defending and regulating it and the cycles of things.

one that is really peaceful and finally justifies the psions old habit of crystals flying around them but need to not just make them mindlessly good they need goals and purpose.

the final one is less defined right now in my mind.
 

ph0rk

Friendship is Magic, and Magic is Heresy.
this is a dnd forum we more or less all know what that means in context,
Given discussions over the past year I don't think that is universally true, and it is a simple enough thing to address from the get-go when designing a new culture.
 

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