D&D 5E Am I no longer WoTC's target audience?

[billd91]

No it's not. You can use magic to hide your appearance, file down your horns, face paint, all kinds of things. Wear a helm at all times like Goblin Slayer, or the Mandalorian. Plenty of ways to "prove your worth" to the local town before revealing your true appearance.

I'm honestly quite shocked at the lack of creativity some people are showing here. A lot of folks are really coming down on the "NOPE DOESN'T WORK BAN IT" when it comes to playing in Greyhawk.

Don't assume it's all a lack of creativity - aside from being somewhat pejorative to say that on a board filled with people who use their imaginations for their hobby a lot - it might also be because they recognize that having so much of the interactions and play in a new town being focused on one player's choice of character race might actually be annoying for them and everyone else at the table. Sometimes it's better to just say No to players.

 

[billd91]

Halflings are traditional only in the sense that JRRT is a huge influence on D&D's tropes. Gnomes in the D&D sense aren't traditional to anything but D&D as far as I'm aware.

If Tolkien doesn't count as traditional fantasy but only "a huge influence on D&D's tropes" then I don't know what the hell traditional fantasy is.

 

[billd91]

And looking through the Rogues Gallery - also pretty old school - I discovered the following:

Phoebus (Player: Jeff R Leason)​

Phoebus is presently a lizard man but certainly has not been this all of his career. Originally a fighter, Phoebus rose to 10th level before he was slain. A cleric being unavailable, a druid was prevailed upon to perform a reincarnation. . . .​

​

He is the source of wonderment to those who are unfamiliar with him. . . . When most expect lizard men to be savage and cruel, Phoebus behaves with good nature and tact. Due to the attention his own condition draws, he has learned to be tolerant of others.​

This is why I think some of what is being advocated as "GH purism" is really more like a sort of projection that is not grounded in the actual published material.

You sure of that? Looks like ol' Phoebus here may be the exception that kind of proves the rule. He wouldn't be considered a wonder or expected to be savage and cruel if being savage and cruel weren't the predominant expectation.

 

[Urriak Uruk]

Don't assume it's all a lack of creativity - aside from being somewhat pejorative to say that on a board filled with people who use their imaginations for their hobby a lot - it might also be because they recognize that having so much of the interactions and play in a new town being focused on one player's choice of character race might actually be annoying for them and everyone else at the table. Sometimes it's better to just say No to players.

I found that one particular response, of someone saying that a tiefling doesn't work because they'll get "insta-killed," particularly lacking in any thought that was beyond the obvious. But you're of course right, if accommodating these choices is simply too much work for a table, they obviously have the right to shut it down.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Halflings are traditional only in the sense that JRRT is a huge influence on D&D's tropes. Gnomes in the D&D sense aren't traditional to anything but D&D as far as I'm aware.

Lawn ornaments.

Actually, the Wikipedia entry for gnomes makes interesting reading - Gygax didn't pull them out of thin air, although it's not clear which was his primary source. The D&D gnome suffers from a failure to commit to any particular version, and is therefore rather bland.

The gnome has been (amongst other things):

• A 12 inch tall earth elemental (original)
• An ugly fairy
• A technologically inclined elf
• the true species of Santa's little helpers

 

[LuisCarlos17f]

If you thinks drows are been nerfed to allow be used as PC, then you only have to add class levels oreven create a drow racial paragon class.

Gnomes need the right racial traits. I suggest something like the customizable PC races from Pathfinder. If you don't like any racial trait this is replaced by other racial feat.

Spelljammers and planar gates to Sigil (Planescape) allow whatever race can go to another world, for example kenders to FR or GH. Maybe in those world they mixed with native halflings and their personality changed. Tielflings would be something like villains kid from Disney's Descendants. Tainted by their ancestors' blood they couldn't be punished for sins commited before they were born, and then allowed to live in the material planes as refugees. And many players want tieflings because they are characters the rest of people don't trust. Playing these characters is like a catharsis.

In my homebred setting aasimars are good guys, at least most of them, but they have got the worst reputation. They arrived to a new world, conquested previous empires and gave them the gifts of advanced civilitations, but secret lodges conspirated to cause civil wars, and propaganda war still is causing damages. They really weren't perfect but not worse than previous countries. The truth is that secret lodges don't want to allow the rerise of this empire if they can't controll the main religion.

* The main media can changes of previous franchises. For example Harley Quinn appeared in the animated Batman serie, and later her look in Arkham videogames became the canon version. I mean the media staff could give some good ideas for TTRPGs.

* I say it again. If Cris Perkins' Iomandra setting becomes canon, I advice to allow enough space in the lore/background to add later, without retcons, all species dragons (gem planar, lung, outer(sun, star, moon) from all previous editions, even the cobra dragon o the minidragon from Dragon Magazine. If they can't in that planet at least in another space body of the same crystal sphere.

 

[pemerton]

I ran a 3E campaign when the Savage Species book came out, and all the players created some non-standard race. The party consisted of a drow, a mind-flayer, a shadovar, and a goblin. I’d call it one of the most memorable campaigns I’ve ever run.

It didn’t consist of the party walking from town to town and seeking adventure, though. This was a campaign based around these characters specifically.

I think that last paragraph may explain the differences on this issue.

I remember a little over 30 years ago I ran a GH-based thief campaign - a duergar and a deep gnome. Of course they didn't interact with the people of the Shield Lands or, when they ended up there, the City of Greyhawk, in the same way that the elf and humans in my next GH campaign did.

And their hijinks didn't consist of walking up to the town "quest giver" to see what their next mission was.

 

[pemerton]

Henchmen are still NPCs. You couldn't play an Orc.

In not claiming things don't exist. I'm saying letting PCs play anything is a bad idea for some settings.

<snip>

Using Dragonlance as an example I'm not a fan of Kender, gully Dwarves etc but they are natural parts if the setting. They have lore that fits, nation's if their own etc.

Draconians as PCs is a bad idea, Dragonborn reskinned as Draconians is even worse.

I think comparing GH to DL is inapt.

DL self-consciously changes the race spread - eg there are no orcs or halflings in DL - and it also has a distinct theme which means that playing draconians is comparable to playing orcs and Nazgul in a Middle Earth game.

But GH doesn't change the race spread - they're all there except dragonborn for whom there is easily room given the number of existing reptilian and draconic-type humanoids. And GH doesn't have any particular sort of thematic emphasis which makes playing a half-orc or a tiefling a problem for the setting and its default orientation.

In one of these threads people were talking a lot about Expedition to the Barrier Peaks (not my own cup of tea, but I know many like it). A tiefling and dragonborn can investigate that just as easily as can a dwarf and an elf. Likewise the nobles of the Yeomanry might send a tiefling and a dragonborn as much as anyone else to clear out the hill giants on pain of death. And a tiefling and a dragonborn might as easily come across Keraptis's note and head out to White Plume Mountain as a character of any other race.

GH is a very capacious setting both in the personalities it can encompass and the sorts of adventures that might take place there. Which is one reason I find this and the other thread a bit odd.

You sure of that? Looks like ol' Phoebus here may be the exception that kind of proves the rule. He wouldn't be considered a wonder or expected to be savage and cruel if being savage and cruel weren't the predominant expectation.

But he was played. There was no requirement that players choose only from "traditional" (ie PHB) races.

 

[pemerton]

Lawn ornaments.

Actually, the Wikipedia entry for gnomes makes interesting reading - Gygax didn't pull them out of thin air, although it's not clear which was his primary source. The D&D gnome suffers from a failure to commit to any particular version, and is therefore rather bland.

The gnome has been (amongst other things):

• A 12 inch tall earth elemental (original)
• An ugly fairy
• A technologically inclined elf
• the true species of Santa's little helpers

I feel that this reinforces my point!

I have had one player who loved playing gnomes. But I tend to ignore them whenever possible, including in my GH campaigns (if that player is not involved).

 

[pemerton]

If Tolkien doesn't count as traditional fantasy but only "a huge influence on D&D's tropes" then I don't know what the hell traditional fantasy is.

So GH is all about S&S and low- rather than high-fantasy - but we have to stick to tradition=JRRT PC races (+ gnomes, because , , . ?).

It's trivial to say (for instance) that dragonborn live in small clans in the Yatil Mountains and are known to be strong, passionate and honourable. Meaning that there is no more reason that NPCs in a random town (at least in the northwestern parts of the map) would look askance at a dragonborn any more than a gnome (are they going to swindle me? or curdle all my milk?) or a dwarf (are they going to get angry at me and cut my head off with their axe?)

There's no real basis for suggesting that GH villagers would reject dragonborn as monstrous and dangerous because . . . all dragons are evil? (Except the good ones?) The setting will support whatever lore about dragonborn is desired to make them a fun race to play.