D&D (2024) One D&D Permanently Removes The Term 'Race'

In line with many other tabletop roleplaying games, such as Pathfinder or Level Up, One D&D is removing the term 'race'. Where Pathfinder uses 'Ancestry' and Level Up uses 'Heritage', One D&D will be using 'Species'.

Moving On From 'Race' in the 2024 Core Rulebooks

We understand "race" is a problematic term that has had prejudiced links between real world people and the fantasy peoples of D&D worlds.

www.dndbeyond.com

In a blog post, WotC announced that "We have made the decision to move on from using the term "race" everywhere in One D&D, and we do not intend to return to that term."

 

[Henadic Theologian]

I favour Origin over species, like Autognomes, Warforged, Shardminds (if they ever get an update), aren't species, they haven't evolved via reproduction (or descend from races that have), so species is too constrictive, Origin more flexible.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

1. Leonardo da Vinci (his work ethic was problematic, often accepting works and not delivering, like a kickstarter not fulfilled, not to mention having a romantic involvement with his apprentice he became in charge of when he was 10... talk about creepy)
2. Caravaggio (several count of agression, and a real problem with alcohol)
3. Roald Dahl (obviously a racist and anti-Jews)
4. Handel (staunch supporter of monarchy, rabid character)
5. Berlioz (abandonned his fiancé, engaged with another woman, and when he received a break letter from his former betrothed, he planned to murder her).

I don't know what conclusion we can draw from this list of horrible people about classical art lover community.

I think responding to a bunch of living designers literally of whom are still working (even if in some cases no-one buys their stuff) with a bunch of dead people who haven't been working in decades to centuries means you're either responding in bad faith or you don't understand the issue on a pretty basic level.

Also "classical art lover", wth lol? There are only two "classical" artists on that list of five people. That's a pretty severe error rate.

If you wanted "problematic classical artists" you could have just listed like any random 5 male artists from between 1500 and 1800 and been right. But no, you had to randomly bring in composers and 20th century writer/cartoonist. Totally bizarre but very funny at least.

On top of all that, you're responding with a non-sequitur, because I didn't imply anything about the audience by pointing out the issues with various creators.

 

[Levistus's_Leviathan]

So a question for those that are smarter than me on these matters...

Does this change of words fix the "bioessentialism" problem some where having? Make it worse?

To me, this is like asking "Does this insulin cure cancer?"

No. It's intended to solve a different problem.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

The current hobby's inclusive zeitgeist didn't come about by "new blood" pouring in recently, but from the older views of "millennial and up" designers who were all deeply involved in the TTRPG community in the early days, so I'd argue that most were not.

I don't think that's a "fact in evidence".

That that's your view is absolutely fine. But you've provided no evidence to support it, and I'm at least moderately familiar with the history of RPGs and their designers, and an awful lot of them has pretty heinous ideas in the early days (Gygax being a great example - positively quoting a guy who was calling for the genocide of the Native Americans, for example). The early D&D crowd seems to have been moderately conservative, if anything, and wasn't seemingly particularly open to "off-beat" people who weren't like themselves. I'm not saying they were all bigots but I'm not seeing the "inclusive zeitgeist" you're claiming.

When did it come in then? I feel like you see the start of it in the late '80s, but that it's more accidental than intentional in most cases (with notable exceptions like Mike Pondsmith's approach, which intentionally included minorities and excluded people of all kinds). I'd suggest most of the inclusivity of RPGs was accidental, to be clear, and more stemming from the basic concept of RPGs. RPGs differed from videogames and the like because if you wanted to play someone like you, many/most RPGs allowed it, or at least had no rules specifically preventing it.

So I would absolutely say the much stronger push, the actual zeitgeist for inclusiveness largely from people who are 40 and under. You can see this in RPG design, even, I'd suggest. That was absolutely helped along by some of the older designers, but in many cases it clearly wasn't a particular goal or the like.

 

[vecna00]

I haven't read any of the 23 pages of this, and for my mental health I probably won't, but I'm fine with this change.

 

[Jahydin]

Sure, but . . . again considering that fantasy races are stand-ins for real people, it's a bad design idea.

(Also @Galandris) Thanks for the long explanations, I think I understand the differences now.

This sentence of yours is troubling to me though. I didn't realize there were people that think this way. If I'm reading a book about a race who has a celebration similar to Day of the Dead, my first thought isn't, "Oh, these folks must be Mexican stand-ins", but, "Oh, they have a celebration just like the one we have in real life."

I guess this explains the need for sensitivity experts. Rather than spend the resources on these specialized teams though, wouldn't it just be easier to acknowledge fantasy is not real life? It can reflect it, but it's no more real than an image in a mirror is?

 

[Bagpuss]

The problem is that all of these fantasy races are stand-ins for real-world ethnic differences between people.

Only they aren't, unless you try and make them to be. Which is the problem, not "bioessentialism" between species that have clear physical attribute differences. Stop equating fantasy species to different human ethnicities, the issue goes away. The different human ethnicities are ALL already represented in fantasy RPGs by the Human race species and they don't have different stat mods (well unless you are playing Birthright 2nd Ed AD&D).

 

[Jahydin]

So I would absolutely say the much stronger push, the actual zeitgeist for inclusiveness largely from people who are 40 and under. You can see this in RPG design, even, I'd suggest. That was absolutely helped along by some of the older designers, but in many cases it clearly wasn't a particular goal or the like.

I think maybe you don't realize how much of the industry is still ran by Gen X (ages 42 - 57)? Pretty much every major name that comes to my mind is within that age range. None of them strike me as people that needed "pushing" from their younger coworkers. If anything, they seem to be the trendsetters the younger generations are learning from.

But you're right, just my view and all.

 

[Cadence]

This sentence of yours is troubling to me though. I didn't realize there were people that think this way. If I'm reading a book about a race who has a celebration similar to Day of the Dead, my first thought isn't, "Oh, these folks must be Mexican stand-ins", but, "Oh, they have a celebration just like the one we have in real life."

Tangentially, The question I might ask concerning the game is - What about the race (species) causes the entire race to celebrate a certain holiday, as opposed to the national/cultural/ethnic subset of the race celebrating it?

If it's not the whole race then does it hurt to name their nation/culture/whatnot as the ones generally celebrating it?

 

[Raduin711]

Only they aren't, unless you try and make them to be.

My problem with this is that you can say this about any interpretation of a work of fiction. Even interpretations that most people would agree on. Nothing means anything until you "make it out to be." Until then, it's just ink on paper.

What is happening here is that D&D is being brought to a wider audience now, and some of the language and images that came from figures like Gygax and Tolkien are being examined with new perspectives, and a not-small number of folks (large enough for WotC to take notice) are pointing out ways that those images are not very welcoming, and echo modern and historical issues regarding race relations, colonialism, etc. We have a choice to either to be welcoming and empathetic and try to see things from another point of view, or we can be gatekeepers, and say "That's like, your opinion, man, and if you don't like it, there's the door."