Absolutely vital core races in D&D

[Lord Zack]

It's the name Eladrin that bothers me. Eladrin in my games means CG outsider from Arborea. That and I think High Elves should be natives of the Material Plane.

 

[Morrus]

For me it would just be human, elf, dwarf, halfling. Without subdivisions.

 

[Umbran]

I'm for: Human, some form of elf, dwarf, halfling, gnome, half-elf, as those are the icons that have been present through most of my playing career. Others are nice, but if those aren't in the core rules, I'm likely to make something up to fill the space anyway.

 

[Dyson Logos]

Human.

Cheers, -- N

Yeah, what the penguin said.

 

[billd91]

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 there's a difference between the races that would be necessary for a fantasy RPG and then there's the races that are necessary for D&D to still be D&D.

 

[Holy Bovine]

Human, High Elf (and I do mean 4E Eladrin here, for some reason despite not liking elves in general i really like these ones) and Dwarf would be my only must haves. In fact I would love to run a game where those were the only PC races available.

 

[Hairfoot]

I tagged halflings, but obviously I mean hobbits, and not the giant elfling monstrosities of 4E.

 

[Entreri]

Hey, if wood elves and high elves get a piece of the cake, why not Drow? Devas, Tieflings are definitely 2nd tier races.

 

[Falling Icicle]

IMO, the races that I consider standard D&D races are: Human, Elf, Dwarf, Half-Elf, Halfling and Gnome. The fact that I started playing D&D in 2nd edition and extensilvely played 3rd probably explains why that is my opinion.

 

[Nifft]

I think there's a difference between the races that would be necessary for a fantasy RPG and then there's the races that are necessary for D&D to still be D&D.

Maybe 3.x biased me, but we've had plenty of all-human parties in D&D.

Elves would have their place (in the monster manual...).

Cheers, -- N