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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Harzel" data-source="post: 7907375" data-attributes="member: 6857506">I picked #4 because that's what I did for my current campaign.  In the future, I think it's most likely I would do something between #6 and #7:6.5: Any choice from a limited selection of curated races.  Other races are possible, but DM approval is required, and you'll probably need to help with the work of integrating the race into the setting.On the subject of humanocentrism more generally, I think Tolkien gave us dwarves, elves, and halflings as reskinned humans, or humans with a twist, or humans stylized by focus on certain aspects of the human psyche which were also reflected in their physicality/race.  So, to me, playing a (Tolkienesque) elf, dwarf, or halfling is only a superficial departure from humanocentrism; and you can throw half-elves into the bucket as well since Tolkien certainly allowed for humans with elven ancestry, though AFAIK he never called them "half-elves".Half-orcs seem to me to have started as an imitation of the Tolkienesque reskinned-human-using-racial-features-to-explore-via-exaggeration-aspects-of-the-human-condition technique to represent the dumb brute or the outsider who everyone assumes is a dumb brute.  So I would also generally give them a pass as not much of a departure from humanocentrism.Gnomes are known to be reskinned footballs, suitable, therefore, only for punting.  'Nuff said.For other races, I have a variety of somewhat contradictory thoughts, but I guess in the end it comes down to player motivation and willingness to put some skin in the game (so to speak).  If the player wants to choose a more exotic race because moar powerz, or as an excuse to act wacky, well, cut that out or find a different table.  If they want it simply in order to stand out as extra special, I would also discourage that.If they are following in the tradition of using race as an external, visible representation of the condition of an essentially human interior, well, that's where I'm not sure what I think about it.  On one hand, it's certainly a grand D&D tradition, and if the player is willing to help make it an interesting part of the setting, maybe that works.  OTOH, it's weird to look around your setting and see a lot of races of creatures turning into reskinned humans, and I don't really like that happening.  And that goes double, or triple, or 10x for "monstrous races" - yeah, it's going to be really hard to convince me you need to play a gnoll.Finally, I guess a player might seriously want to play an individual of a truly alien species.  I'm not sure I've ever seen a real example of that, and I think it would take a pretty impressive amount of work and skill to pull it off, and I'm really dubious how you would fit into a group of humans and reskinned humans.  To be fair, I guess DMs fancy themselves able to do this, but, at least for myself, I find myself generally falling back to a human or "traditional" reskinned human (elf, dwarf, etc.) for any character that has an extended or extensive story line.  That at least limits the scope/depth of the RP that I have to do for genuinely alien beings.</blockquote>

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