I'm sick to death of dwarves, elves, halflings, and gnomes!

[Xarlen]

People alway give me weird looks for playing Lizard, Wolf, or Catmen in a game. Most of them think I have some sort of fetish for furry anthromporiphics. The truth is that I am soooooo tired of playing elves and dwarves and humans.

Right on! Of course, I have a fetish for them, but that's beside the point.

I *would* like to see some differences for some other races. That's one reason why I liked the concept of the gameworld where everyone's a Monster race (Green world?). Way too many demi-humans, 'evil' humanoid races, etc, etc, for them to even *fit* in the world.

If it's me, I'll play a Kobold before I play an elf, dwarf or halfling (Gnome Smnome). And, I agree, that people play 'demi-humans' as humans. Like the example of sleeping in a tree or complaining about the castle, that is *good* roleplaying, and taking the race to heart. Congradulations.

My suggestion? Embrace the Kobold.

 

[Arcane Runes Press]

On Elves, Drawves, Halflings, and Gnomes: My wife fully agrees, and will probably never again play in a game world were any of those four appear on the grounds that any game world in which any of those four appear is severely lacking in imagination. Hence, because my D&D world contains two of those four, she isn't playing in my D&D world anymore.

Hmmmmmnnnn...

That's a bit, extreme might be the best word.

I can see wanting a change....

But believing that a game world with (paraphrase) "any of those four is severely lacking in imagination" is, yep, extreme is a good word for it.

Patrick Y.

 

[Deadguy]

I admit that when I started running 3e, one of the things I really wanted to do was to get away from a world full of demi-humans that aren't really distinct alien races, but instead subsets of human personality and culture. After giving the matter some thought, I got rid of all of them, made humans by far the dominant race, and sprinkled wilder lands with Orcs (of several varieties) and Goblins (made more magical, to distinguish them from the orcs).

Since the back history had a major Cataclysm in the past, I had the satisfaction of saying that once there were Elves and Dwarves and Halflings and whatnot, but that they died out during the wars that lead to the Cataclysm!

Actually no player has complained about the setting (and one of my players runs the same setting for another bunch of players). Instead I encourage them to fold in the cultural and personality traits of the demi-human races into human behavious and origins. So one person plays a rather short man with a fun-loving nature that comes from a travelling background. Some might say he is playing a (3e) Halfling, but he doesn't have to fake being another race, just use the components of their description that he enjoys.

As an aside, when the d20 Star Wars came out, I was tempted to try creating a fantasy world that was part of a Galaxy-spanning community, where the races would be those of the Star Wars canon (I know it sounds a little like Dragonstar, but this was before that game!). Basically, I guess, anything to get away from the demi-human stereotypes!

 

[Aeolius]

How about a campaign filled with locathah, merfolk, and other undersea races, then?

 

[Geoffrey]

I prefer FRPG settings at either of these two extremes:

1. Only humans as PCs. Any non-human race is simply too, um, non-human, to interact well with a party of adventurers.

2. A truly exotic and imaginative world such as Talislanta or Tekumel. Talislanta is full to the brim with outlandish races, while Tekumel is a unique fantasy creation second only to Tolkien's Middle-earth.

IMO, the standard "dwarves, elves, gnomes, and halflings" falls into the mushy middle and is by now a bit of a yawner. Only Tolkien does these races well (gnomes, as others have said, being the exception--though these seem uncomfortably like short, jolly dwarves to me).

I can understand why the campaign worlds that have their origins in the 1970s or before (such as Greyhawk, Forgotten Realms, and Judges' Guild's Wilderlands of High Fantasy) have dwarves, etc. in them. When these worlds were created, the demi-humans weren't trite yet. After all, only Tolkien had them. The Conan books, the Lankhmar books, the Dying Earth Books, the Elric books, the Cthulhu Mythos books, and all the other books that helped inspire D&D don't have the by-now "standard" races.

But worlds created after about 1980 really should, I think, try to do something unique. Each world should have its own central vision, and I simply can't believe that demi-humans are essential to all these worlds. Take the Scarred Lands, for example. I own the gazetteer for this imaginative world which has a very strong flavor to it. Then the publishers had to go and make sure halflings and all the rest are running around in it! They just don't fit, and neither do dwarves and elves.

 

[Dinkeldog]

I'm sick to death of dwarves, elves, and halflings. I'm still holding out for WotC's new setting: Gnomeworld!

 

[Chrisling]

I find when I put elves/dwarves/halflings/gnomes in my games these days, it's primarily an exercise in deconstruction. I want to show how the standard attitudes that prevail about these creatures are at variance with the actual things they do. So, you're likely to find educated, urbane orcs in my world accusing elves of imperialistic wars and attempts to destroy orcish culture -- and the orcs being found right -- than the happy forest prancing tree-huggers.

I recently drove a player out of my game because he refused to accept the notion that dwarves were neither lawful nor good.

 

[tsadkiel]

I believe Weis and Hickman will be presenting Talislanta as an option in their conversion of 3e Dragonlance, due next Gencon US.

Rav

Talislanta? I think not. Taladas, yes.

Or were you Honging?

 

[Dr. Strangemonkey]

Ja-vol, my pointy eared Fuhrer

I too like to go post-modern with my races.

I mean they may or may not be cliches, but they are signs everyone understands.

So when you tell the players that the world is locked in a cold war between an Orcish Khanate and a Gnomish Imperium who possess capabilities way beyond that of the other third worldish nations they are from. That tends to provoke a some really interesting reactions.

Nothing, NOTHING, got 'em going like the concept of Reichs-Elves.

My hardcore Tolkien-fan friend shivers every time they're mentioned.

 

[tsadkiel]

Pick up Oathbound from Bastion Press. Barely a mention of elves, dwarves, gnomes, or halflings is to be found in the book, and even those can be easily ignored. Plus, there is a bunch of really cool new races in there, and it is a great campaign settings.

Buy it! Buy it now!

Theah (the setting of 7th Sea and Swashbuckling Adventures) doesn't feature elves, dwarves, gnomes, or halflings. (There are Sidhe, but they're different and not PC material.)

The notorious Dragonlords of Melnibone is traditional demihuman free. Same with the equally notorious Diablo d20 setting. Diomin is supposed to have its own set of races as well.

All of which is beside the point. Buy Oathbound - it has sentient telekinetic jellyfish as a PC race. Papa don't preach - I'm going to keep my jellyfish!