Faolyn
(she/her)
So stick with the races with interesting non-cultural traits, or make up new traits for existing races you find boring.
D&D 5E I thought WotC was removing biological morals?
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Vaalingrade
Legend
I'd argue that 'universally evil so as to be guiltlessly killed' is both cultural and boring.
Lanefan
Victoria Rules
Which in itself is sad.
You're doing 1e a disservice here. In 1e defeating a monster got you xp, but defeating it didn't necessarily mean killing it. Avoiding it, parlaying with it, tricking it, charming it into your party - all of these got you the "defeat" xp; or should have if the DM was paying attention to the DMG.
Further, if your game was using xp-for-gp (many didn't) and your PCs were at all diligent about searching for the loot, the gold-given xp outweighed the monster-given xp by at least a 3-1 ratio and sometimes as high as 10-1. There's some ancient threads in here started by @Quasqueton where this analysis is presented (sometimes in excruciating detail!).
2e is where combat took over as xp-for-treasure was, in practice, gone.2e tried to become more about "story" but it was clumsily done and tended to lean very much on the heavy handedness of AD&D resulting in all sorts of problems. If your DM is "Always right!" then you can never complain about railroading and being sidelined.
Even 1e had a hit-to-subdue option; originally intended for use specifically against Dragons but often* extended to be useable against any living foe with a discernable anatomy. The difference in 1e, and personally I think it's better than how 5e does it, is that you declare you're striking to subdue before your attack rather than after the fact.
* - not sure if this was ever made "official" by the TSR gurus; though I've a feeling it might have been.
jasper
Rotten DM
Two legs, two arms, head, and beard better than my ugly uncle. Looks humanoid to me.
Scott Christian
Hero
I think the original concept of different stats was - "as compared to humans." I could be wrong, and anyone out there, feel free to correct me. But I swear when we started, that is how we viewed it. It believe it was the same for Gamma World too.
Scott Christian
Hero
No doubt that in the next edition or even 5.5 that will be the objective. Then, I guess, people will have nothing to argue about.
Lanefan
Victoria Rules
Indeed.
Yet Humans can interbreed with both Orcs and Elves (to give Half-Orcs and Half-Elves); and the question then becomes whether Half-Orcs and Half-Elves can interbreed with each other. If yes, it'd become very possible to have a mostly-Human individual showing elements of both Elf and Orc ancestry...and when you take this idea and expand it to include all the other what-can-reproduce-with-what scenarios in fantasy (including deities reproducing with mortals), things get interesting in a hurry.
Scott Christian
Hero
They have already addressed it. The have already built the dirt road, and soon enough it will be paved.
Attributes, skills, etc. are cultural. They said so, even if some feel it was disingenuous to the original writing or intent of writing. So they will have this world's culture, or this realm's culture or this place's culture, and that world's culture, that realm's culture, etc. On one elves will blend into the forest. On another, they will receive spell benefits. On another they will gain divine abilities. All of this will be able to skirt the issue, and publish a boatload of player-based books, which just so happen to sell more than their adventures.
Lanefan
Victoria Rules
What makes you say that?
I see the fantasy-world creature collection as Darwin dialed to eleven, with fewer mass-extinction events and more species capable of sustaining their own place in the pattern.
Scott Christian
Hero
A discussion that reminds me of the Yes song, Roundabout.
The real issue is you only have so many things to work with, and inevitably, if you also want balance, you can only tweak so many things. (And there are very few things to tweak!) At one time, I asked for a list. I think there was a total of 16 or 18. That's it. Could you come up with more. Maybe. Will it suddenly let one race favor a specific class - absolutely!
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