Mercurius
Legend
I can't remember, was Taladas before Spelljammer? Either way, they were the same year. And if we want to broaden to other RPGs, the first "weird" setting was probably Tekumel, although I suppose Glorantha could qualify. And then you have Talislanta and Jorune (science fantasy) in the 80s.You mean the tomorrow's halflings?
Sure, they could be, but given the perennial popularity of part-demons or good-demons or morally ambiguous demons in media, like back certainly well into the 20th century (Marvel brought in the good-guy superhero "Son of Satan" in 1973 for example, and Nightcrawler, who obviously isn't actually a demon but equally obviously is one of the key inspirations for Tieflings, is one of the very most popular mutants), I would be pretty surprised. I think their most likely fate is to get so overplayed in the present that they slightly decline with "the next generation". We see no sign of part-demons slowing down in popularity as a broad media concept.
Dragonborn I admit I am a little surprised by but I think they hit three notes D&D is otherwise lacking:
1) Scaly race (not necessarily in the Furry-variant sense). Some people just want to be the lizardman or whatever, and this guy is right here in the PHB.
2) Draconic fantasy as a PC (without having to pick a specific kind of sorcerer). Breath weapon is spot-on for this.
3) Strength race that isn't ugly, short or ignoble (there are loads of alternatives now, but again, not in the PHB).
Plus people have always liked dragon-people - I remember back in 1990 when I found the Advanced Fighting Fantasy RPG (not to be confused with the choose-your-own-adventure books the system derived from), and Out of the the Pit, and I really wanted to be able to play the dragon-man race in the latter. It was still a mistake not giving DBs tails though, I swear to god.
Definitely agree.
I think it starts with the very first 2E setting is Taladas, in 1989, which includes, as default, not "ask your DM" or anything, playable lizardmen, goblins, ogres, and minotaurs, and has a setting which features dwarves who hate the underground, elven steppe-barbarians going full Mongol Horde, kender who are depressive and not thieves, elves who aren't clever, nor have a superhuman culture, and mostly run around a jungle dodging degenerate mind-flayers, tinker gnomes who aren't incompetent, and all sorts of other trend-breakers.
Then we have Spelljammer in 1989, Dark Sun in 1991, and Planescape in 1994, as you say. Indeed there are fairly few 2E settings which could be termed in any way traditional beyond the continuations of the Forgotten Realms and hilarious repeated failed attempts to "Make Greyhawk happen!".
I still have my Titan setting book - for the Fighting Fantasy adventure books.
Anyhow, I do hope that if they bring back Dragonlance, they do the whole world. While Ansalon worked for the novels, Taladas made Krynn a much more interesting campaign world.