Sorcerers Apprentice
Hero
Your players sound really boring, I'd try finding New ones if I were you.
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D&D 5E My players want Human Centric
- Thread starter GameOgre
- Start date
Mercule
Adventurer
I have to say, [MENTION=57914]GameOgre[/MENTION], I'm kinda with your players. I much, much prefer human-centric settings. Humans ground a setting and give it that anchor of relatability that actually allows the other races to be interesting. That isn't to say that I wouldn't play in or run a campaign that focused on or only included some other race. Just that I expect there to be justification for it.
That justification doesn't have to be extreme, but it does have to exist. Take, for example, classic pseudo-Medieval European D&D vs. Oriental Adventures (sake of same ruleset). I prefer the stock D&D tropes, but don't hate OA. If you want to run a full-on OA game, I'm actually probably going to be all for it because it's a little different and unique -- assuming this isn't intended to be an indefinite shift of the group's focus (i.e. I'm in for 12-18 months; one campaign). Why? Because I'm open to trying different things. I'm going to have expectations, though, of the game being steeped in Eastern flavor. If you end up describing a setting that smells a lot like near-Renaissance France/Italy, except that everyone has Japanese features and katanas roxxors, I'm going to be frustrated because there's no reason to call it out as an OA game.
Likewise, if you're doing an all-elf game, I expect it to feel a lot different from a human-centric game. I want to be reminded -- a lot -- that we couldn't have done this game with humans. If it's sans-human for the simple sake of being sans-human, but otherwise plays the same as it would if the main race was human, then you're flipping a lever for no value and I'd actually say it actively diminishes my respect for the game.
All that said, as I reread your post, I don't see anything that would specifically throw me off -- especially if the focus of play was still human-centric (i.e. the PCs were the underdog races). Even if the PCs were elven, incorporating the long life into the campaign theme makes it different and gives a reason for the racial difference.
I find it strange when people talk about "racism" in regard to fictional critters. Elves don't exist. They're a genre trope that some people don't like. I find the idea of a race of short thieves with high natural curiosity and almost no sense of self-preservation to be absurd. That doesn't mean I'm a bigot. It means I don't like the element in my fiction. To switch modes, I find the idea of magic powered by subjective reality to be ridiculous and strongly dislike it, but some folks like it. There's nothing in there that reflects on anything beyond personal taste.
Elves have long been portrayed as over-powered and Mary Sue characters. I ignore that and actually kinda like elves, but it really puts a bad taste in some folks' mouths. Both elves and dwarves could be seen as "tired tropes" in the genre. Maybe part of the problem is that your group actually wants something even more different. What if you reskinned the elves as dragonborn? Nothing says dragonborn can't live for millennia.
Of course, it could all come down to a mis-match of tastes, for the group. I've had Aces & Eights sitting on my shelf since the first printing. I think it looks like a blast, but everyone else in my group is adamantly opposed to westerns. It sucks, and I could complain about my group's tastes and/or their unwillingness to get outside their comfort zone. The reality is, though, there's sufficient overlap in what we all consider "fun" that we're enjoying ourselves and have years and years of enjoyment left in D&D, WoD, Champions, and Shadowrun. Life is too short.
That justification doesn't have to be extreme, but it does have to exist. Take, for example, classic pseudo-Medieval European D&D vs. Oriental Adventures (sake of same ruleset). I prefer the stock D&D tropes, but don't hate OA. If you want to run a full-on OA game, I'm actually probably going to be all for it because it's a little different and unique -- assuming this isn't intended to be an indefinite shift of the group's focus (i.e. I'm in for 12-18 months; one campaign). Why? Because I'm open to trying different things. I'm going to have expectations, though, of the game being steeped in Eastern flavor. If you end up describing a setting that smells a lot like near-Renaissance France/Italy, except that everyone has Japanese features and katanas roxxors, I'm going to be frustrated because there's no reason to call it out as an OA game.
Likewise, if you're doing an all-elf game, I expect it to feel a lot different from a human-centric game. I want to be reminded -- a lot -- that we couldn't have done this game with humans. If it's sans-human for the simple sake of being sans-human, but otherwise plays the same as it would if the main race was human, then you're flipping a lever for no value and I'd actually say it actively diminishes my respect for the game.
All that said, as I reread your post, I don't see anything that would specifically throw me off -- especially if the focus of play was still human-centric (i.e. the PCs were the underdog races). Even if the PCs were elven, incorporating the long life into the campaign theme makes it different and gives a reason for the racial difference.
I find it strange when people talk about "racism" in regard to fictional critters. Elves don't exist. They're a genre trope that some people don't like. I find the idea of a race of short thieves with high natural curiosity and almost no sense of self-preservation to be absurd. That doesn't mean I'm a bigot. It means I don't like the element in my fiction. To switch modes, I find the idea of magic powered by subjective reality to be ridiculous and strongly dislike it, but some folks like it. There's nothing in there that reflects on anything beyond personal taste.
Elves have long been portrayed as over-powered and Mary Sue characters. I ignore that and actually kinda like elves, but it really puts a bad taste in some folks' mouths. Both elves and dwarves could be seen as "tired tropes" in the genre. Maybe part of the problem is that your group actually wants something even more different. What if you reskinned the elves as dragonborn? Nothing says dragonborn can't live for millennia.
Of course, it could all come down to a mis-match of tastes, for the group. I've had Aces & Eights sitting on my shelf since the first printing. I think it looks like a blast, but everyone else in my group is adamantly opposed to westerns. It sucks, and I could complain about my group's tastes and/or their unwillingness to get outside their comfort zone. The reality is, though, there's sufficient overlap in what we all consider "fun" that we're enjoying ourselves and have years and years of enjoyment left in D&D, WoD, Champions, and Shadowrun. Life is too short.
jasper
Rotten DM
...has anyone else experiences moments like these before....
Yes. Had a player get ticked off when Deities and Demigods came out. KING ARTHUR MUST BE THE HIGHEST LEVEL FIGHTER in the mythos. He just blew off the Lancelot stories. His reasoning was a King must be the best fighter otherwise someone else would be king.
Poor dude later became an LT in the US Army.
Yes. Had a player get ticked off when Deities and Demigods came out. KING ARTHUR MUST BE THE HIGHEST LEVEL FIGHTER in the mythos. He just blew off the Lancelot stories. His reasoning was a King must be the best fighter otherwise someone else would be king.
Poor dude later became an LT in the US Army.
I'm A Banana
Potassium-Rich
Salamandyr
Adventurer
(nvm).
Last edited:
Ralif Redhammer
Legend
Most of my group seems to think very poorly of halflings, treating them as little more than comic relief.
Some players get rather worked up over little things. That sort of vehemence is a bit odd, but not outside the realm of strange things people have made their stands on.
Some players get rather worked up over little things. That sort of vehemence is a bit odd, but not outside the realm of strange things people have made their stands on.
Tony Vargas
Legend
I'm more accustomed to players despising humans as a racial choice because they got nothing cool, or being disappointed that elves aren't more wildly superhuman. But the reverse, the expectation that humans should have something going for them - even something like largely-theoretical 'adaptability' or arbitrarily greater population, that doesn't benefit any given human PC - to make them the 'dominant' (or at least default) race, is not uncommon, either.
Humans are, afterall, that much easier to identify with.
Humans are, afterall, that much easier to identify with.
Flexor the Mighty!
18/100 Strength!
I've never really seen a player play a demi-human as anything more than a human with one exaggerated stereotypical trait. which is part of why I wouldn't mind an all human world.
Mercule
Adventurer
I've played an elf as an elf a couple of times. It was interesting. My 2E 10/10 Druid/Wizard was extremely interesting. I based the concept around some things in the old Dragon magazines around how elves had essentially no fear of death, since they would just be reincarnated, anyway -- which is totally different from a lack of self-preservation. It was all good until we stepped through a portal to Hell (or some other lower plane). Absolute terror ensued as soon as I realized that my spirit would be trapped if I died and I didn't actually know how to deal with that fear -- as opposed to humans who get one shot and live with it.
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