PHB2 Races = Mos Eisley Cantina

[CPT PLAYDOH]

With any game there's bound to be some material you don't like — that's why banning stuff was invented. I did it all the time when I ran 3e – with bards, druids, Frenzied Berserkers, gnomes, halflings, etc. I hear some people even banned Wizards. It's not that hard. When a player says 'I want to play X' you just say 'No. I don't like X.' It really is that simple.

Thats why I kick it old school, still playing AD&D or C&C. I am the Dm and I am spinning the setting for the players. There are too many rules in 3e and (probably) 4e (haven't read it). The players are going to argue regulations with you and you get tied up in the rules. It is good to see Campbell keeping it real as a DM.

 

[Scott_Rouse]

So are you saying this book should make as much money as Epidsode IV: A New Hope and will give generations of fans years of enjoyment?

Awesome!


Han barfed first

 

[Garthanos]

...There's nothing particularly ancient about any of the PC races.

Thanks for say that (better explained than I managed) . D&D invokes myth on a shoe string appearances maybe (anthropoid animals are probably old egypt had croc headed gods) , but the elements we think give us roleplaying handles are the modern parts not the ancient ones.

 

[CubeKnight]

This thread made me look through my catalog of 4E characters (all made for the LFR campaign and prior to teh release of PHB2). I'd be curious what other players' character selection looks like.

Human x 8
Halfling x 1
Tiefling x 2
Genasi x 1
Half-elf x 1
Warforged x 2
Elf x 1
Dwarf x 2
Dragonborn x 1

Those that have actually seen play include an elf rogue, human cleric (x2), and dwarf wizard.

Chad

Hmmmm, that I remember, I've played: 2 elves, 1 kobold, 1 goliath, 1 human, 1 shifter.

Tho that is 3.5, I have yet to play 4E, only been DMing so far *sigh*
But I'm itching to play a Genasi Swordmage.

 

[Fallen Seraph]

So are you saying this book should make as much money as Epidsode IV: A New Hope and will give generations of fans years of enjoyment?t

Scott you better be careful then when, PHB5, 6 and 7 comes out. You better make sure you get my Psionics out before then!

As for the actual conversation in this. I am perfectly fine with out there races. My main complaint is that unless there is some logical reason, ie; they have travelled here from all various realms like Sigil. I prefer there to be some amount of co-history and connection between the races. I dislike it when races just exist within a vacuum of each other. I really like the idea too of all sorts of various races rubbing shoulders with each other in close-proximity thus why I run so many urban campaigns in densely populated, multi-racial cities.

As for how I add races I go with what other people have said. I tell the players to pick the race they want based on stats. Then we together decide their culture, appearance, etc. for the campaign.

Heck my current campaign setting has as far as really out there races:
-Demon Spirit possessing Humans: Their appearance altered substantially in multiple ways from simple things like horns to centaur like insectiod bodies, etc. (This covers a lot of races actually from Tiefling to Dragonborn, etc.)
-Cybernetic bodies brought to life by a Spirit: You can figure out this appearance pretty quickly essentially a cybernetic Warforged kind of appearance.
-Various animals who have become anthropomorphic. This is self explanatory.
-Shape-shifters whose basic appearance is the same as the Doppelganger.

As for myself I usually DM, but the races I have played the majority of the time:
-Gnoll
-Elan
-Tiefling (my most common and appearance has varied wildly)
-Human

 

[Mallus]

The basic problem I have with wierd PC races is that they are basically unroleplayable.

Only if you spend more time on problematizing than characterizing. First and foremost they need a limp and few interesting things to say...

They are all just humans that look wierd.

Welcome to science fiction and fantasy literature. I hope you enjoy your stay.

(Really, how many classic SF aliens beat that rap? The only one that comes to mind --and mind you, I haven't had any coffee yet this morning-- is Lem's sentient ocean in Solaris).

But Dragonborn? No clue.

Can you characterize a dragon? Start w/that (but make it a biped). This seems like a fairly rudimentary fiction for a fantasy aficionado to create.

(In our 4e campaign they are a proud race that once ruled a massive Statist bureaucracy w/both Roman and British undercurrents, known for their baroque clockwork technologies, that now spend most of their time living in the stories of the past.)

 

[Mallus]

4e is superhero fantasy miniatures with a splash of role-playing tacked on to it.

You should see the way my group plays 4e!

In the second-to-last session the PC's put on a pseudo-Bollywood musical (about the giant boar sow that they started a false religion around), complete with sexy dancers dressed as wraiths, fireworks, and actual combat, both intentional (why use stage combat when the play stars mercenary adventurers?) and not (a wealthy rival playwright hired assassins to infiltrate and disrupt the performance).

 

[Klaus]

So are you saying this book should make as much money as Epidsode IV: A New Hope and will give generations of fans years of enjoyment?

Awesome!


Han barfed first

I think what he means by "PHB2 Races = Mos Eisley Cantina" is that they don't serve droids, either.

 

[Klaus]

Dragonborn? No clue. Don't know how to use them. Don't know what role they'd fit in a story. Don't know how to imagine being one. Not sure that I'd enjoy imagining being one if I knew how. Maybe what I need is out there somewhere, but the problem is that as a race with no mythic connections really, its entirely dependent on the fluff provided by the game designer to make it interesting. Generally, I haven't found that working. You'd need 30 pages or so just to flesh the culture out a bit.

In a 4e PbP game, I'm playing a dragonborn like the character of Azeem, from "Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves", who is fond of cursing "By the sweaty armpits of Tiamat!"

But the first thing that came to my mind after reading about the dragonborn:


They're samurai from the desert.


Try that.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

In a 4e PbP game, I'm playing a dragonborn like the character of Azeem, from "Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves", who is fond of cursing "By the sweaty armpits of Tiamat!"

But the first thing that came to my mind after reading about the dragonborn:


They're samurai from the desert.


Try that.

Klingons. They are Klingons.

"Today is a good day to die!"