D&D 5E (2014) What is the appeal of the weird fantasy races?

[Zardnaar]

Or the lack thereof. It's just an absolutely alien and backwards way of thinking about the game for me.

What the DM chose the game and designs things?

If I ran Theros or Ravnica and limited the options to those books makes sense yes?

 

[Aldarc]

What the DM chose the game and designs things?

If I ran Theros or Ravnica and limited the options to those books makes sense yes?

This has always been something of a group conversation for me. I don't even necessarily choose the game. My approach has been to provide a list of alternative campaign ideas to my group, who are always friends, and we discuss it as a group and tweak them as necessary depending on the wants of the group. On the whole, I find DM authoritarianism antithetical to why I'm playing the game in the first place.

 

[Hussar]

/snip
Just don't default to "You can't do that stupid thing because I say so."

Heh. This is hillarious. I had this discussion, almost verbatim, years ago on this board. And, what you just said, is exactly what got me labeled as anti-DM. Then again, back then, I was the only one, it seemed, who seemed to lean this way, so, it was me arguing with about half a dozen or so folks. Funny how things change.

To me, this thread also somewhat lines up with that other thread I started a little while ago about players playing in settings that they haven't really bought into.

When it comes to playing some race that I hadn't anticipated, my reaction is going to come down almost entirely to how much work is the player expecting me to do? If the player, to use the dead horse example of the Egyptian themed campaign, says:

Player: Here is my Samurai character. He's fresh off the boat. Doesn't know anyone, doesn't have any connections to the setting or the campaign. Ok, Mr. DM, entertain me.​

well, I have very, very little sympathy for that player and, I'm probably going to side with @Zardnaar here and just veto the character. Sorry, you're dumping all this work on my lap because you cannot be bothered to read the campaign summary and make a character that fits the campaign? That means I'm going make zero effort to accomodate you.

On the other hand, if the same player came to me with this pitch:

Player: Here is my Samurai character. A few years ago, a treasure fleet from my homeland did the rounds (similar to the Chinese treasure fleet of the 13th (14th?) century) and when they came to this city that we're in, they established a small trading post. My father and brother are attached to the trading post, handling family trading stuff, while I was brought along and completed my training. Now, after just completing my training, my father has tasked me with venturing out into the broader setting, learning all that I can and reporting back. While I am a stranger here, I have lived in the city for a couple of years, so, I have some casual contacts among the merchant classes as well as some very minor contacts among the court. These are things we can work on together Mr. DM, if you're interested. What do you think?​

I'm all in. There's a character, that, despite being a fish out of water character, fits into the campaign, has reasons for adventuring in the setting, and is dripping with all sorts of hooks to rope them into all sorts of shenanigans. Is it the class/race I expected in my Egyptian themed game? No, it's not. But, the player has done most of the work for me, and handed me this big bundle of gift wrapped campaign ideas. Fantastic.

So, at the end of the day, it really does depend on how the player approaches the DM.

 

[Hussar]

I'm not ambushing anyone. I am clear and upfront on what options are available.

If someone wants to join my campaign and brings an option that they know is not available, then I expect that they may have a difference in expectations.

No one has claimed that you are ambushing anyone, have they? Again, it's a lot less antagonistic than you seem to think it is.

Now, you have a pretty short list. Fine. But, 5e is now what, 5 years old? There's a MOUNTAIN of material for 5e. Coming in with something you don't have doesn't seem like too much of a stretch to me.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

Exactly. D&D editions after a few years have multiple races that go to an angle.

That's why I really don't think the issue is DMs banning a single race. If you can only play a single race, the issue is likely you.

I really 100%think it's DMs banning a whole lot of races and not having any representative of a archetypical culture in their setting.

A DM who's setting bans all the water races and has no sea dwarves/elves/halflings/humans depite it not being against the tone or genre. Now a whole bunch of character ideas are gone.

A player wants to be an advocate for their discriminated people but the DM bans all the races that are discriminated against.

A player wants to play a "fish out of water" foreigner but the DM never designed anyone on the edges of the map so Wacky Foreigner is impossible to play.

The race list has no treehugger, nature lover race.
Or no magical wizardy race.
Or no tribal brute race.
Or no tricksy schemey race.
Or no imperialist empire race.

This is where the rational butting of heads results from.

Yeah, I think there should be an option to play various archetypes and this is certainly something I think about when designing species and cultures for my settings. And I actually like the species having rather strong archetypes, and that's why I limit the roster; with hundred different intelligent species there is just too much overlap; either the archetypes become muddled or they become incredibly narrow. And of course none of the things you mention need to actually be different species, they could just be cultures within one species. Furthermore some of those could be easily even be descriptions one and same culture. For example a culture who is strong in magic using that power for empire building or tribal 'brutes' who love nature and fiercely defend it etc.

 

[Hussar]

Yes, but, the thing is, no one says you have to display a hundred different races. No campaign ever will, even if you say that race choice is wide open, you're only going to have as many races represented as you have players. So, it's not like a player asking for something that isn't on the menu as it were is suddenly causing a hundred different races to spontaneously explode in your setting.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

Yes, but, the thing is, no one says you have to display a hundred different races. No campaign ever will, even if you say that race choice is wide open, you're only going to have as many races represented as you have players. So, it's not like a player asking for something that isn't on the menu as it were is suddenly causing a hundred different races to spontaneously explode in your setting.

That certainly will depend on how long you use the same setting!

Furthermore, designing a proper setting takes time. I really don't get this idea that you just create characters and then create a setting around them. How much time you will have between the character creation and starting to play? Will you redesign the setting every tine someone creates a new character?

 

[Oofta]

Like @Crimson Longinus, I have a persistent campaign world and have for every edition since 2E. I want a world history that makes sense and unique species popping up only to later disappear doesn't make any sense to me.

I made an exception for 4E because of eladrin, but I had to justify that with an apocalyptic event with the borders between planes of existence became "thin". Admittedly I'd been toying around with the idea for my Ragnarok campaign for a while but it was a realms shaking event. I liked the concept well enough - there was war in the feywild and some Sidhe had been exiled to become eladrin, stripped of most of their power. But it's not really something I want to repeat.

But some of the comments on this thread are so overblown. That somehow, refusing to allow a race that doesn't exist in my campaign world is somehow tantamount to firing kittens from an air cannon*. That not allowing someone to play a kenku will destroy the PC's fun, destroy friendships and prove that I have no soul.

Give me a break. I guarantee the virtually all DMs limit what is allowed in their campaign. I had a guy who wanted to play a half dragon half vampire. The fact that there were no rules for how such a thing would work didn't slow him down a bit. I doubt anyone would allow someone to play The Incredible Hulk. Not talking about an orc barbarian here, even one with a girdle of giant strength. They want to have a PC that grows to giant size, can leap 3 miles at a time, toss around tons of rock like they were snowballs, able to lift hundreds of tons, virtually indestructible Incredible Hulk. Not in the book? Well, maybe a creative DM could compromise and figure out how to make a giant with a strength (based on lift capacity of 100 tons which is the low end) of 1,667.

I've had a couple of people want to play drow, I said no, they still had a lot of fun in my campaign. Race is one infinitesimally small aspect of a character for a player, races IMHO have a fairly significant impact on world look in feel. So I'm not going to allow that half dragon half vampire in my campaign. It's never really bothered anyone I've met in real life all that much. Well, except for that half dragon half vampire guy, of course.

*I exaggerate ever so slightly here mostly to make a joke about an air cannon that shot kittens would be a catapult.

 

[Scott Christian]

Exactly. It's never just a single race that bothers me, it's whole concepts that do. No aquatic races or no planetouched races or no underdark races or no monstrous races or no "evil/edgy" races all cut out some interesting character concepts that are a breath of fresh air after years of playing Tolkien Fellowship races.

What if the DM says no aquatic races.

Player: Why?

DM: The world's races are constructed in the same way that our real world races are - flesh and bone/cartilage. The world's logic follows the biology of living creatures. If you live in the deep, how do you survive on land without an extraordinary physiology that is adapted from being able to compress your lungs, hold insane amounts of protein in your cells, and have layers upon layers of blubber? Something like that survive on land for extended periods. On top of this, being aquatic, your skin would dry out and die in a few hours without a constant maintenance of moisture.

Player: How about I can just breathe underwater?

DM: That still doesn't solve the problem of being able to stay warm and the pressure and your epidermis.

Player: Well how do lizardfolk do it?

DM: In this world, they do not live underwater. They can hold their breath for ten or so minutes.

Player: How about the Sahuagin?

DM: They are creatures. Their shark god gave them this ability. With each offspring, he gives a blessing, and that allows them to do this. They also never leave the water. If they did, they would suffocate within ten or so minutes.

Player: What about sea elves and other aquatic races?

DM: They do not exist because of the physiological reasons I gave.

My question is: If the DM gave you these reasons, would it be acceptable?

 

[Scott Christian]

I think narrow theme settings are harder work than broader ones.
Why?

Because although the DMs get to make the setting, DMs don't get to make the PCs. That's a big No No. So when a DM creates a setting with a narrow theme like a Desert setting or a High Nobility setting or a Tolkienesque setting, they should add in as much as they take out.

Before where you could have survived with generic Desert Country of the Sandy Hats, you need to make 3 or 4 desert countries. You have to delve deeper into worldbuilding at levels some DMs are not skilled at or willing to do.

I agree with the premise that it requires more work and more thought to do a narrow setting versus kitchen sink. But I do not understand the need for say, three types of the same ecosystem. If you have a continent and there is no vast overseas or intraplanar travel or mass abilities like teleportation rings to move people from one continent to the next, why can't the DM just create one desert biome?