Absolutely vital core races in D&D

[kitsune9]

So, I've wondered. There has been some banter about the "Mos Eisley Cantina" factor of... most any D&D setting that's not Greyhawk, and there's no secret that some people don't approve of the Tieflings and Dragonborn in 4E. And the response tended to be that gnomes don't really have a niche in earlier editions, "my setting doesn't have elves" and whatnot.

So I figured I'd put up a poll. What races absolutely have to be in the core rulebook for you to consider it a worthy PHB for whatever edition of D&D.

(You'll not that I put all races from the 3E and 4E PHB1:s in the poll. If Thri-Kreen are vital for your D&D experience, check "other". )

I'm of the 31 flavors variety. If a campaign setting has X, Y, and Z races as core, then that's core. If we're talking about D&D in general, making the changes they did didn't bother me. To me, I would like my fantasy to be even more fantasy and less ye olde skool Tokienism simply because it's been around three decades. One of the campaign settings that I really enjoyed was Arcana Unearthed with introduced totally new classes and races with humans being the only common race. If D&D had did that for 4e or if Pathfinder wanted to do something like that, I would be cool with that.

 

[Fallen Seraph]

While I would put my bets on Humans, Elves, Halflings, and Dwarves for a PHB. That wouldn't be really what I would want, I very much like bizarre races. So lets see all manner of weird stuff. My PHB would be more like:

• Warforged
• Elan
• Thri-Keen
• Tieflings
• Mind Flayers
• Githzerai/yanki
• Changeling

And so forth.

 

[El Mahdi]

Human, Dwarf, Gnome, Halfling, and Elf (not Wood Elf, not Eladrin, just plain ELF).




Edit: Oh Yeah, and Apple Pie.

 

[Ariosto]

Yeah, arthropod, mollusk, reptile, robot and fungus should cover the basics. Who would want to play a mammal?

 

[Obryn]

Human, Dwarf, Halfling, and (for the sake of this poll) Eladrin, being closer to High Elves than Wood Elves. We're talking the fighter/magic-users, not the rangers.

If your definition of "essential" means that the Red Box Basic Set is incomplete, I think your definitions are off. More than any other edition I can think of, the Red Book/Red Box is kind of a baseline experience for my age bracket.

-O

 

[Nifft]

We seem to be shifting from necessary to ideal. IMHO the only necessary race is Human, because there needs to be a baseline to which everything else is compared.

I think my ideal PC race palette would be:

• Human: One standard unit of Adventurer.
• Mojh: Former human who has transformed himself into a dragon-like dude.
• Elan: Former human who has transformed himself into an aberrant dude.
• Tiefling: Human born with an infernal curse, or former human who was transformed via an infernal curse.
• Changeling: Human of fey lineage.
• Warforged: A created race, the work of human hands.
• Kobolds: A created race, the work of dragons.

This gives a lot of RP options, while staying within the realm of the evolutionarily plausible (dragons excepted).

Cheers, -- N

 

[Lord Zack]

The bare minimum for me is human, dwarf, elf and halfling. Gnome is slightly lower priority then the half-races, then wood elves as well as high elves (not eladrin). I'd also like to have the goblin races as well.

 

[Mercule]

I voted for High Elves as one of my choices because they were the default elven race until 4th edition... when they became eladrin for some reason.

Huzzah! I was beginning to wonder if I was the only one.

Gah! I knew this was going to be ambiguous. Guess the two elves are a bit of a wild card.

I think the official WotC stance (especially considering Eberron) is that the 4e elf is how elves have always been. Personally, I think they're smoking crack because elves have always been a bit woodsy, but masters of the arcane. Mostly, I'm okay with Eladrin because it means I get what I want and one of my players (woodsy) gets what she wants.

So, in answer to the original question: Human, dwarf, and eladrin. Elves are acceptable, and I find dragonborn are beginning to grow on me (much to my chagrin), but neither is either particularly important to D&D. Likewise, I like reclusive little prankster gnomes that live in burrows, but they aren't important to D&D, either.

And... I'm not a fan of the Mos Eisley model. I don't mind a crapload of races, but I prefer elves over there, dwarves yonder, orcs to the left, etc. If there's not enough alien mindset between the races to generate some isolationism, there really isn't enough difference to justify having any race other than human.

 

[AllisterH]

I think the split between elves and eladrin was one of the most "well duh" concepts...

I mean, the first thing any campaig setting seemed to do was split the elf into wood and high elf versions.

Mystara split them, DL did, as did FR and GH.

The only campaign settings that didn't were Darksun (and they had some degenerate elves there) and Birthright - who seemed to have a Feywild type realm in the middle of the Prime.

It seemed like somebody say "you know what? Every damn time we do a campaign setting, we split the elf anyway, so why not just do it once and get it over with"

 

[Nai_Calus]

I *hate* Mos Eisley syndrome. Gimme rubber forehead aliens. (Star Wars does little for me. The original trilogy is ok, but I'm a Star Trek fan, period.)

I don't like 'monster' races, or races that look like such(lookin' at you, Dragonborn and 4e Tieflings) unless it's a completely non-standard setting like Planescape where 'weird' is bog-standard. Generic fantasy, no, get out the pictchforks guys, we're being invaded. (I would expect, were I to ever actually get to play one of my drow PCs, that walking into most towns would get the townspeople riled up, and drow are just black-skinned elves. If it looks even less 'normal', people are scared stupid animals. Riot time.)

That said, my votes were:

Human, because people complain if they're not around and not the most common and in charge. I actually find humans dull and boring, being one, but hey.
Dwarf, I've never played one and probably never will, but I like 'em well enough when run by others.
Elf(wood elf), because some people prefer that archetype of it.
Eladrin(high elf), because the fighter/mage stereotype elf is my favourite and my preferred race. 4e Eladrin I actually consider different enough from that to be seperate entirely, but I'm also fond of them.
Half-Elf, because my favourite PC of mine is a half-elf.
Gnome, because I like 'em better than halflings and I like having a short race around.

And of course apple pie, because there's a rockin' Dutch Apple Pie sitting in the fridge calling me. Think I'll go answer.