Does anyone actually like Dragonborn and Tieflings?

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

I'd hug many things but not a dragonborn or tiefling as pictured, let alone a group of them. I'm not sure i'd feel confortable around their lovers either.

Maybe with a different look... does poking them with a ten foot pole count as a hug?

A Pincer Staff might be closer to a hug...

 

[MerricB]

That said, I would imagine that the more traditional races might have similar degrees of popularity

If one were to look at traditional (real world mythological) races, one finds...
...human (duh)
...elf
...dwarf
...and that's about it.

Hey, I'm reaching on elf. Tolkien (via Norse, sort of) and Celtic Myth.

Dwarves have a stronger lineage, although - again - Nordic mythology is the strongest source for Dwarves As We Know Them.

After that, Halflings sort of exist (apart from Tolkien) as the little men of fairy stories: perhaps brownies and others of that sort. They're not really a strong PC race (as oD&D halflings weren't, either! You played a halfling only because you Really Really Liked Halflings).

(Asian Mythology has a bunch more animal and river spirits, of course...)

Cheers!

 

[EATherrian]

I was just looking through some old video games last night and discovered my Planescape:Torment discs and it came to me. I really think that my dislike of the Tieflings is more tied to their current look and back story than the race itself. If they presented a Tiefling like my beloved Annah I'd be more open to them. As for Dragonborn, I've been going over some old campaign world notes and actually found a place for them! So, I'm moving up from dislike to neutral. I still don't like the fluff and look for them, but I can see how to do decent work with them. Also regarding the breasts argument, I always thought that Dragons had live births. Has it ever been revealed, maybe in an Ecology article?

If one were to look at traditional (real world mythological) races, one finds...
...human (duh)
...elf
...dwarf
...and that's about it.

Hey, I'm reaching on elf. Tolkien (via Norse, sort of) and Celtic Myth.

Dwarves have a stronger lineage, although - again - Nordic mythology is the strongest source for Dwarves As We Know Them.

After that, Halflings sort of exist (apart from Tolkien) as the little men of fairy stories: perhaps brownies and others of that sort. They're not really a strong PC race (as oD&D halflings weren't, either! You played a halfling only because you Really Really Liked Halflings).

(Asian Mythology has a bunch more animal and river spirits, of course...)

Cheers!

I actually think the old version of the gnome is more in tune with traditional fairy tale creatures, at least with the affinity for pranks and illusions; but you have a good point overall.

 

[Doug McCrae]

D. Furthermore, I would suggest not taking certain phrases too literally or as solid dogma; my usage of "universally despised" was obviously overly dramatic and inaccurate, but I didn't mean it in a heavy handed or permanent way. I should have used less strong language, but I certainly didn't mean it to be set in stone (Yet another semantic wrangle on ENWorld ). This is symptomatic of taking things too politically here; notice how when a politician says something somewhat controversial, pundits hold onto it and chew over it endlessly, like a dog gnawing on a bone. What is worse about the internet is that you can always go back and say, "Look what he said! That is his permanent, fixed viewpoint." Even if something was said in-the-moment, somewhat whimsically, and/or for effect. So yeah, I think it would behoove all of us to take things a bit more lightly around here. And of course I should probably be more careful with my language and "de-incendiarize" it a bit

Consider this, the claim that the cancellation of Dungeon & Dragon 'felt like being raped', which was made by a poster on ENWorld, will never be forgotten.

 

[Particle_Man]

I agree. I mean, who comes up with these sequences:
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 ...

really?!

Disclaimer: I have never seen an AD&D rulebook.

IIRC, before page 1, there are some small roman numeral pages...at least for the DMG 1st ed AD&D.

 

[williamhm]

I like the more monsterous aperance of the dragonborn, and like I said earlier the only thing I do not like about tieflings is the tail. But then Im inclined to like anything that adds beyond the tolkienesqueness of dnd.

 

[Doug McCrae]

If one were to look at traditional (real world mythological) races, one finds...
...human (duh)
...elf
...dwarf
...and that's about it.

I think if you look at European myth and folklore, the strongest case can be made for a small trickster humanoid whether it's called a troll, leprechaun, goblin, fairy, elf, brownie, kobold or whatever. Like hobbits they tend to be very domestic, either cleaning your house or messing it up. And the other common one is a nature spirit such as the green man, dryad, nereid or rusalka.

So there should be three races in D&D - humans, leprechauns and dryads.

 

[Tervin]

I think if you look at European myth and folklore, the strongest case can be made for a small trickster humanoid whether it's called a troll, leprechaun, goblin, fairy, elf, brownie, kobold or whatever. Like hobbits they tend to be very domestic, either cleaning your house or messing it up. And the other common one is a nature spirit such as the green man, dryad, nereid or rusalka.

So there should be three races in D&D - humans, leprechauns and dryads.

I would add one more. The changeling. In this case meaning the seemingly human individual who is actually a fey creature in disguise, which was swapped with the real baby at birth.

 

[lutecius]

I think if you look at European myth and folklore, the strongest case can be made for a small trickster humanoid whether it's called a troll, leprechaun, goblin, fairy, elf, brownie, kobold or whatever. Like hobbits they tend to be very domestic, either cleaning your house or messing it up. And the other common one is a nature spirit such as the green man, dryad, nereid or rusalka.

So there should be three races in D&D - humans, leprechauns and dryads.

and ogre/giant/troll, you forgot a big race!

In one of my homebrews the humanoid races were:
- human
- gnomes (generic small race including dwarves, halflings, leprechauns, goblins...)
- fairies (hawt nature spirits, nymphs, dryads, male and female elves...)
- ogre (generic tall brutish race, half-giants, hags, orcs...)
everything else was a subtype.

 

[SuperGnome]

Sad to say i'm on the Grognard wagon. The races are alright, but I have a deep dislike of them being core. If there were in the phb2, that's totally cool with me, but they don't fit into the history of almost anything. To just plop them in like they were always there and retroactively change the histories and topography (and cosmology I suppose) to fit bugs me. It bugs me more when classic core races are pushed out to make room. And yes, you can just choose to not use either/both of these races, but because they're core it cuts into the players options in a pretty serious way.

That all being said, and recognizing I've purchased my Grognard Express tickets, I allow them as core. If my players all think they don't belong, I'll take em out and substitute gnomes and half-orcs back in. If they like these two new ones, that's fine by me.