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<blockquote data-quote="AbdulAlhazred" data-source="post: 8021761" data-attributes="member: 82106">I think subraces, as most often seen in D&amp;D, are more like cultures, possibly with some element of subspecies in there. Neanderthal are, arguably, homo sapiens, so that fits both Frostburn and reality. In terms of the topic at hand though, it doesn't really matter. Whatever sort of grouping, social or biological, you see D&amp;D 'race' as, it represents specific groups of people as having very distinct characteristics, some of which are positive, and some of which are negative. I think it is also pretty easy to see that the PATTERN of this allocation echoes, deliberately or not, patterns which are present in racist thinking in the real world (IE humanoids are generally depicted as having darker skins, primitive cultures, evil dispositions, violent tendencies, etc.). What we name these groupings, and whether we consider them social or biological in nature, is not going to change any of this. This is why I think, at least in some sense, WotC is on the right track in saying &quot;we won't dictate these things based on 'race' (whatever they decide to call it).&quot; Only by dissolving these associations can the game stop taking a fundamentally racist stance on human characteristics. Again, this is why in my own game design there are no such thing as traits like these reflected in your choice of PC race. You can pick to be a dwarf with 'Raised by Elves', you won't get the 'Fey' attribute, but you will get the Glammer that elves use. You can depict yourself however you want, your race only provides the most general physical description and a couple of thematic related core traits (speed, vision, possibly some other minor benefit). I suppose there is still some danger there in how this might be interpreted, but I did want species to mean SOMETHING, however minor its game effects, just to remind the players of their PC's nature.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="AbdulAlhazred, post: 8021761, member: 82106"] I think subraces, as most often seen in D&D, are more like cultures, possibly with some element of subspecies in there. Neanderthal are, arguably, [I]homo sapiens[/I], so that fits both [I]Frostburn[/I] and reality. In terms of the topic at hand though, it doesn't really matter. Whatever sort of grouping, social or biological, you see D&D 'race' as, it represents specific groups of people as having very distinct characteristics, some of which are positive, and some of which are negative. I think it is also pretty easy to see that the PATTERN of this allocation echoes, deliberately or not, patterns which are present in racist thinking in the real world (IE humanoids are generally depicted as having darker skins, primitive cultures, evil dispositions, violent tendencies, etc.). What we name these groupings, and whether we consider them social or biological in nature, is not going to change any of this. This is why I think, at least in some sense, WotC is on the right track in saying "we won't dictate these things based on 'race' (whatever they decide to call it)." Only by dissolving these associations can the game stop taking a fundamentally racist stance on human characteristics. Again, this is why in my own game design there are no such thing as traits like these reflected in your choice of PC race. You can pick to be a dwarf with 'Raised by Elves', you won't get the 'Fey' attribute, but you will get the Glammer that elves use. You can depict yourself however you want, your race only provides the most general physical description and a couple of thematic related core traits (speed, vision, possibly some other minor benefit). I suppose there is still some danger there in how this might be interpreted, but I did want species to mean SOMETHING, however minor its game effects, just to remind the players of their PC's nature. [/QUOTE]

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