Bilogical Tree of D&D creatures

[Henry]

I don't see "tree" - I see "bowl of spaghetti."

It would be easier to classify by the actual types than by relating them via genetics. For example, all magical beasts are the results of bybridization, but you're better starting a whole different tree than merging one or more trees. Try "treeing" from the D&D Type than from the real-life species. That way, you can relate Griffons and Hippogriffs, or Medusas and Harpies, or the like. Aberrations are the "Gumbo" of the bunch - they are so unrelated as to be non-crossable.

 

[DMScott]

However, the poster does raise the interesting question of how one would organize a D&D chain of being. One could order it in terms of proximity to godhood or one could order it in terms of sentience or perhaps based on some other principle. Thoughts?

After playing with the concept a bit for my homebrew, I think what most D&D worlds would end up with is multiple chains of being, because distinct types of creatures demonstrably arise in different ways. For practical purposes, scholars working in each area would probably sketch out their own chain. A sage specializing in avians, for example, might extend his chain back to the Great Bird Spirit and classify all creatures with identifiable avian characteristics in accordance with how "close" they are - either physically or in some spiritual sense - to that first primordial bird. In the edge cases where you have weird hybrids (such as hippogriffs, pegasi, griffons, harpies, etc.) the sage would probably only note where the avian characteristics came from. Another sage working on the great cats would make his own chain, and again only note the feline source of griffons and similar creatures. The two chains might agree, but most likely there'd be discrepancies. That would only concern the two sages if they somehow became aware of each other's work.

One great advantage D&D systemacists have is that they have a decent chance of finding the source of those weird hybrids - if you've got the money, it's reasonable to ask a deity. I suspect that the chains of being would be closely related to religions, and competing religions might have contradictory chains. That might provide a little flavour to religious disputes.

 

[Driddle]

This entire thread is troubling, and I wish it had some sort of "Warning: Anti-Religion" spoiler tag or something.

Because the Byble tells us that Gawd created humanoids in His image. It's Just That Simple. To suggest that somehow pixies and elves and orcs and man "evolved" from a common "biological" ancestor is poppycock.

At the very least, references to D&D evolution should include the phrase, "This is just a theory. It can't be proven."

 

[Henry]

Driddle's comment is facetious, but it's got a cool point: In D&D, gods and men work alongside one another to create new life left and right - hence, my "bowl of spaghetti" comment. The gods may have planted/forged/seeded Man and Elf in the beginning, but there's almost always meddling after the fact in most D&D settings. Consider Dragonlance, where the beginning was told by Men, Ogres, and Elves. Later, Gnomes entered the equation, and from the Gnomes, Dwarves and Kender via the Graygem of Gargath.

 

[Fenris]

Because the Byble tells us that Gawd created humanoids in His image. It's Just That Simple. To suggest that somehow pixies and elves and orcs and man "evolved" from a common "biological" ancestor is poppycock. "

That only applies to your "homebrew"

 

[DMScott]

Driddle's comment is facetious, but it's got a cool point: In D&D, gods and men work alongside one another to create new life left and right - hence, my "bowl of spaghetti" comment.

It's a point that's been made elsewhere in the thread, and without lampooning any real-world beliefs. A typical D&D biosphere is going to be a lot different from ours, and in some ways more complicated; that doesn't mean that nobody will make the effort to systematically study it, just that the scholars, sages, and priests will have to consider very different criteria than Linnaeus or modern classifiers.

 

[ptolemy18]

Because the Byble tells us that Gawd created humanoids in His image.

Where have I heard that word "Gawd" before...? I know! "Knights of the Dinner Table"! I *knew* they were using it to avoid offending people!

One thing that hasn't been brought up is the possibility of covergent evolution, where unrelated species become similar because they're competing for the same biological niche. So for example, goblins and humans could've developed from totally different ancestors, but since they both ended up walking on two legs and hunting animals, they look similar (but they can't interbreed).

Of course all this is all totally hypothetical, since D&D biology may or may not include evolution, and probably has some degree of "intelligent design", depending on your campaign world.

Jason

 

[ptolemy18]

This entire thread is troubling, and I wish it had some sort of "Warning: Anti-Religion" spoiler tag or something."

Actually, a better spoiler might be "Warning: Anti-Literal-Interpretation-of-the-Book-of-Genesis", since plenty of religious people accept the scientific validity of evolution.

Here's one possible reason why. If you believe in God, you can always believe that God planned the universe out so minutely, that He knew that, from the very beginning, such-and-such collection of atoms and molecules would eventually create life, and that the seeming "randomness" of evolution would eventually lead to humanity. If you believe in God, then the existence of randomness is in question, so it might make sense that what appears to be random to us is actually the work of God.

Like Albert Einstein said: "God doesn't play dice with the universe." (On the other hand, we reading this thread do... )

Jason

 

[Henry]

Uh, ladies & gents, let's not let Driddle's comment segue into a discussion of real-world religion, please. I'm reasonably sure it wasn't meant to, given the context, and it's a thread about trying to come up with a biological classification for a fantasy setting, so let's keep it in that venue.

 

[Tonguez]

Driddles comment does raise an interest point about how a DnD Taxonomy could be created. Carl Linnaeus was a Lutheran and his Kingdom-Genus-Species system is derived from the Biblical 'Theory of Kinds' (ie God created each plant and animal according to its own Kind) (eg Lions and Tigers and the same Kind (Genus) of animal but with different adaptive characteristics (Species), Domestic Cats are a different Kind). The difficulty comes when you extend this basic theory along evolutionary lines (which Linnaeus never did, because evolution hadn't been invented. ie the basic Linnaeus model is NOT an Evolutionary taxonomy))

In DnD then a similar theory could be developed say a Kingdom -Type-Genus-Species

eg Kingdom - Beasts (Animal, Dragon, Magical Beast, Humanoid)

Griffon K Beast T Magical G Heira-Leo S Griffon
Manticore K Beast T Magical G Heira-Leo S Manticore
Sphinx KBeast T Magical G Heira-Leo S Sphinx

Hippogryph K Beast T Magical G Heira-Equine S Hippogryph
Pegasus K Beast T Magical G Heira-Equine S Pegasus

Halfling K Beast T Humanoid G Homo S Minusculus
Gnome K Beast T Humanoid G Homo S Minusculus-Nousae
Sprite K Beast T Humanoid G Homo S Minusculus-Nousae (Fey*) *fey template

(Nousae from Nous = mind, clever, yeah OK I don't speak latin)

(ps Henry hope this meets the criteria of your warning)