D&D General The Tyranny of Rarity

[Vaalingrade]

To me it seems silly to shackle world builders to what WoTC deems to release. What has rules constantly keeps changing, WotC releases new stuff and on the other hand some things might not get rules in a new edition. A lot of people use the same setting for a long time.

I wasn't asking for WotC stats. I'm just lazy and don't want to do the research to dev them to satisfaction.

 

[Vaalingrade]

Choose a response.

1. "You're not my DM."
2. "Tasha says I don't have to."
3. "Reskinned half-orc. Reskinned half-elf. Reskinned gnome."
4. "Do you see the problem now?"
5. "I was just kidding."

None of these are stats.

3 is close, but boring.

 

[jmartkdr2]

I've never forgotten what race a PC was once we were past session 1, and rarely even then. And those few times were the newness of the PCs, not what race they were.

And what you call minor, many of us don't.

On the other hand, I have never remembered what subrace of dwarf someone was playing after character introductions, unless they were a duergar.

So there's some line somewhere.

 

[Lanefan]

On the other hand, I have never remembered what subrace of dwarf someone was playing after character introductions, unless they were a duergar.

So there's some line somewhere.

Agreed.

I've got four sub-types of Elf and they're different enough that we can usually tell who is what.

In past campaigns I always had three sub-types of Hobbit but there was so little difference between them that both I and the players largely ignored them. So for this campaign I only put in one type of Hobbit*, and it's called "Hobbit".

* - to begin with; some PCs have since travelled far enough to meet a quite-different seafaring culture/sub-species of Hobbits but haven't had all that much interaction yet other than to know they exist - and to establish that each type of Hobbit thinks the other type is bloody-well nuts.

 

[Helldritch]

Am I the only one here that keeps an updated character record sheet of every players?
No I am not the one that had this idea.
No I am not the one that update the sheet. 5 minutes is allowed at the end of each session for that.
Yes, it helps a lot when a player can't make it to the game for "x" reason and that player could not bring the character at home.
Yes, I do look at the sheets and often make suggestions. Especially in the forms of divine omens if a particular feat/skill/spell might come in handy.
So do I forget character's background, race, sub race, skills, class, sub class and equipment? Nope, in fact, I often know their character even more than they do. And it helps a lot in tailoring adventures to each specific group/member so that everyone has a chance to shine.

 

[Oofta]

No, it is not.
For starters, any world with smurfs needs to either be instantly destroyed by a giant meteor or every smurf struck and killed by blue lightning bolts from the sky!

Smurfapocalypse!!!

 

[Minigiant]

No, it is not.
For starters, any world with smurfs needs to either be instantly destroyed by a giant meteor or every smurf struck and killed by blue lightning bolts from the sky!

doesn't work.
Smurf villages are impossible to find. Forget targeting it with meteors.
And even if you flood or burn the forest, the blue things always survive.
Waste of spell slots.

 

[Faolyn]

But as already noted, how about when new characters are needed?

Also, it really isn't about the number of species, it is about their place in the world and thematic coherence. I don't think that choosing four species effectively random and building the world around them is necessarily a super good way to produce a thematically coherent world, especially as this seems to assume that said world building probably happens very quickly. Granted, I think it could be an interesting challenge, but definitely not how I prefer to work. I intentionally left my current world very sketchy and vague so that there is room to improvise and add things. I still started making it at least year before the characters were created. I'd imagine that world that was effectively created only after character creation (so presumably a week or so before you start playing) would by necessity ne incredibly shallow.

Furthermore, why should the setting creator even limit themselves to the things WotC decides to print? Race mechanics are very light, so mechanically creating new ones is super easy (unlike with classes.) Personally I alter the species to better suit the theme of my world, and create completely new ones.

I made the eldri, a small elf-like species to fulfil the niche of elves, halflings and gnomes in my setting. It would be thematically incoherent to have normal D&D elves, halflings and gnomes alongside with them. (More pics and sketches here.)

Personally it bugs me how many D&D species are very similar to each other, and there is a lot of thematic overlap, or if you want give them a definite niche it makes them weirdly narrow. Having so many species makes more sense if you see them as a toolkit to choose from or as an inspiration to your own creations.

Did you do the art? Beautifully done!

 

[Crimson Longinus]

Did you do the art? Beautifully done!

Yes I did. And thank you! (It's a cropped closeup of a bigger pic.)

I like to do some concept art for my settings, especially of original elements. (And as I said, more on my Instagram.)

 

[Maxperson]

Smurfapocalypse!!!

Smurfageddon.