Do You Prefer to Play a Human PC When RPGing?

[Tsillanabor]

I enjoy elves, but then I play for fun and escapism, not to practice my acting

 

[fusangite]

I'm not a big fan of non-human races. The way they are done in D&D is kind of an ugly meld of ancient myths of elves, fairies and dwarves with 19th century ideas of race and heredity. Because I really dislike the latter and find it gives pre-modern ideas of non-humans an ugly taint, I tend to, as both GM and player, avoid non-human races where a human of a different culture will suffice.

 

[The Thayan Menace]

Übermensch Magocracy! (x2)

I find that a pretty good solution to humans taking the spotlight away from nonhumans is to ban nonhumans.

True, but I prefer running a campaign in a xenophobic setting (that practices slavery) ... and letting non-human PCs suffer the consequences of their exotic racial background(s).

Bharek Nhurev

Autharch of Subhuman Affairs (Bezantur, Priador)


​

 

[Aus_Snow]

It's impossible. Humans can only play non-humans as abstracted humans.

Nope.

No one can really play an elf or dwarf convincingly; only as a human analogue. A race which lives for centuries and doesn't sleep? Or someone who remains an adolescent til age 50, with geneology and rigid codes of behaviour drummed into them all the way?

Sure, why not.

Really, fantasy races are human sterotypes writ large. Otherwise they'd be in the RP zone reserved for gods or insects. Actually, only insects, because RP gods behave like humans with extra resources.

Not necessarily.

 

[Umbran]

It's impossible. Humans can only play non-humans as abstracted humans.

I think you vastly underestimate the power of the human imagination.

While many folks will tend to play non-humans as "humans with pointy ears" or the like, that doesn't imply that we are incapable of doing otherwise. Humans are not merely restricted to what we know, we can also "think outside the box". We can concieve (and thus portray) behaviors that are fundamentally different from our own.

 

[Mallus]

I think you vastly underestimate the power of the human imagination.

I don't know, I think he's spot on...

While many folks will tend to play non-humans as "humans with pointy ears" or the like, that doesn't imply that we are incapable of doing otherwise.

I think its a *monumentally* difficult task, one that really hasn't been tried outside of a few anthropologically-oriented SF novels (I'm think C.J. Cherryh works, and the like).

Could you name some fiction or film where you think non-humans are portryaed as convincingly alien. As something other than humans with exaggerated traits? Or pointy ears, as is often the case.

 

[sniffles]

I voted "no", which is not to say that I prefer to play a non-human character.

Most of my characters have been human, historically, even in games (like my first Third Edition D&D game, a Planescape campaign) where they weren't necessarily the dominant race.

However, this isn't because I prefer playing them; it's just that most of the time I find myself seized by a character concept which has no reason to belong to a nonhuman race.

I'd say this shows that you do prefer playing humans, if only subconsciously. If you didn't have a subconscious preference, then you would be able to fit a character of any race into your concepts, or come up with concepts specific to a particular race other than human.

I know I have a very obvious preference for elves for the same reason: every time I think of a character concept I automatically see that character as an elf.

 

[Graybeard]

I do not preger playing a human. I have played an Elf, Half0Elf, Human, and Assimar. I play whatever race fits my charatcer idea best.

 

[Agback]

Not to mention the question was asked on a D&D board. It's just assumed.

It Was Asked On The General RPG Discussion Board Of The Forum, And The OP Did Specify 'RPGing', Not 'Playing D&D'. I Think We Are Seeing A Selection Effect: ENWorld Members Are A Biased Sample Of RP Gamers, With A Higher Proportion Of Players Who Play Only D&D Than Is Found In The General Population Of RPGers. And Therefore More People Who Are Basically Ignorant Of The Wide Range Of RPGs.

 

[mhacdebhandia]

I'd say this shows that you do prefer playing humans, if only subconsciously. If you didn't have a subconscious preference, then you would be able to fit a character of any race into your concepts, or come up with concepts specific to a particular race other than human.

Actually, it comes from something I couldn't express to my satisfaction in my original post, so I chose not to try. I will give it a go now:

I have a prejudice against people who play a nonhuman race for the sake of not being human. This is not to say that I begrudge them the right to do so, but I enjoy the game less when someone's playing their character as a dwarf to be different, or because "dwarves are awesome, dude", rather than because their character concept is best represented by a dwarf.

Therefore, I personally prefer playing with people who are more likely to make their character distinctive and individual through their portrayal, not because they're "the elf" or "the orc".

That said, in a D&D setting some of the character concepts that would be best fulfilled by a human in another setting are best fulfilled by a nonhuman character. For instance, in Eberron, I would suggest that playing the outsider who seeks to prove his worth to mainstream society is best done as a shifter or warforged or changeling or goblinoid, because my perception of the setting is that there's not much in the way of "real-world" style racism going around, between people of the same D&D race with different skin colour.

You could also play this character concept as a former citizen of Cyre trying to find a place in the world after the destruction of her homeland, of course, and that would make sense too; that decision, though, comes down to the choice of additional elements. Playing this outsider as a warforged implies different additional facts about the character than does playing her as a shifter, because the ways in which those races are counted "outsiders" differ, as do their ways of coping with social marginalisation.

So I think of characters as "human unless they need to not be" not because I prefer playing humans per se but because I'm sick of people who play their race as their personality, as if that makes them genuinely distinctive. A really distinctive character is distinctive because of who they are; a well-realised human PC is preferable to another cookie-cutter elf like all the rest of them.

(Which is not to imply anything about your motivations for playing elves all the time, sniffles, or to suggest that they're cookie-cutter characters. )