D&D General What is the purpose of race/heritage?

[doctorbadwolf]

It's because of the game mechanics.

I firmly believe we'd have more Humans in D&D if race gave no mechanical benefit whatsoever and it was purely a flavor thing a player would append to their character story upon creation.

We see all the time people here talk about not wanting or bothering with "character backgrounds" or "character histories" and instead want their story to come out of gameplay at the table. If a character's race became just one more thing you'd create in your character's "background" or "history" and had no impact at the table... I believe a large number of players would stop bothering to choose.

Some players of course would continue to select a race for their character-- those that actually created a background and past history of their PC prior to adventuring-- but that number would be less than it is now because of all the players who select non-human races because of the mechanical benefit.

Yes, I'm jaded.

I think you may be right about more humans appearing, but I think your reason for that is off.

DnD is a game that is built, in it's current incarnation, in such a way that mechanical representation is the fictional reality for many players. If there is no mechanical impact to being a dragonborn, they aren't playing a dragonborn. The game "allowing" them to say they're doing so would just be meaningless. Sure, I can also say my character is super strong, but if the strength score don't back me up....my character isn't super strong.

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

The purpose of races and heritage is to create additional space for Elves to colonize.

ALL UR RACES R BELONG TO US - The Greater Lamer Elf Hegemony

 

[beancounter]

The proliferation of species is just a way to appeals to as many different people as possible, especially a younger audience.

I personally don't need dozens of choices, but I don't see a problem with it.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

I don't think so... or maybe. Not really sure. But from my experience, when 5e was just the PHB, the depth and culture often came from the races. Now it seems not to be the case.

More or less, my argument is that if the game is a toolkit, it needs to be light and portable--able to slot into many different contexts. For example, dragonborn are pretty clearly getting slotted into the "viashino" race from Magic: the Gathering in the newest setting, New Capenna, even though previous settings have had them be essentially lizardfolk and not at all draconic. They're centered on Red to begin with so it's a fitting shift, but it mostly works due to dragonborn being flexible enough that they can slot into most "reptilian people" concepts so long as you can add a bit of draconic flair. (And this overall idea seems to be picking up some traction even outside of D&D, what with stuff like Divinity: Original Sin 2 having the Red Prince and other people literally from a race just called "lizards," who are related to dragons.)

The toolkit approach would seem to naturally lead to a reduction in "inherent" flavor/depth/etc., because the role of the rules is to offer you, metaphorically, a wider variety of paints and brushes and canvases. It then is incumbent on those who use the tools to use them well. Anything that would mandate specific stories and depth would seem to necessarily pull away from the "toolkit" approach, by binding things to a particular method or style.

For my part, I have a sort of...."open door, but silent on unused stuff" policy. Gnomes and halflings, for example, have never been included or excluded in the game I run. They might exist, and we just haven't seen any yet. Or they might not exist. When I do use something, though, I try to work through implications and impact. There are no racial monocultures (e.g. there is no "orc culture," orcs can and do come from multiple cultures and some even work to change their personal culture's norms) nor monocultural races (dragonborn do not all belong to Yuxian culture, and instead are found in Yuxia, the Ten Thousand Isles of the Sapphire Sea, the "elf forests" to the south, and the Tarrakhuna where most of the game has occurred; some have even earned a place as recognized saints or martyrs amongst local religious groups in the Tarrakhuna.)

 

[Frozen_Heart]

I enjoy races for both flavour and mechanics.

I love Genasi due to being hooked on elemental themes ever since Bionicle first appeared. That love of elemental stuff has continued ever since.

But I also like the races I'm playing to mechanically back up that flavour. If my 'fire genasi' has no traits involving fire at all, then I don't feel like I'm playing one. I'm just playing a red skinned generic playable race instead.

 

[DEFCON 1]

I think you may be right about more humans appearing, but I think your reason for that is off.

DnD is a game that is built, in it's current incarnation, in such a way that mechanical representation is the fictional reality for many players. If there is no mechanical impact to being a dragonborn, they aren't playing a dragonborn. The game "allowing" them to say they're doing so would just be meaningless. Sure, I can also say my character is super strong, but if the strength score don't back me up....my character isn't super strong.

I find the argument that you can't play a race unless you have four pretty much meaningless racial features that you barely use and are completely overshadowed by the myriad of Class features you are actually using to be a relatively weak one. But that's me.

 

[HaroldTheHobbit]

With the path WotC has taken, I just wish they went all the way. Let race and heritage be all freeform skins, and have a bunch of options for starting features. I.e., you can have darkvision OR flight etc.

 

[Scott Christian]

With the path WotC has taken, I just wish they went all the way. Let race and heritage be all freeform skins, and have a bunch of options for starting features. I.e., you can have darkvision OR flight etc.

I get that, but then all the lore needs to be rewritten and the culture reskinned. (If the group cares about such things.)

 

[Gimby]

For what may be an interesting example about whether players would play non-human characters without mechanical effects, in the UK LARP Empire there are seven non-human options : Lineage - Empire

Orc - Empire

www.profounddecisions.co.uk

The six lineages offer very minor mechanical effects - of the scale of minor "ribbon" D&D heritage effects and Orcs are actually cut off from one section of the game and gain no mechanical benefits.

In addition, to play a lineaged character requires at least some makeup and possibly (often extensive!) prosthetics. Orcs require a full head latex mask.

Despite this a very large fraction of the characters are not baseline human (of the order of 50%)

While we were designing this, there was some concern that people would not play non-humans (partially due to the costume burden) without mechanical benefits. In the end we decided to try it and it all worked out.

That said, there's some fairly extensive roleplaying notes on the non-human characters and being non-(fully)-human has certain diplomatic effects when dealing with some NPC factions.

Essentially, non-mechanically supported heritage can be sufficiently compelling, though I suppose without the continual reminder of costume it might not be quite the same at a tabletop compared to a LARP

 

[Micah Sweet]

For what may be an interesting example about whether players would play non-human characters without mechanical effects, in the UK LARP Empire there are seven non-human options : Lineage - Empire

Orc - Empire

www.profounddecisions.co.uk

The six lineages offer very minor mechanical effects - of the scale of minor "ribbon" D&D heritage effects and Orcs are actually cut off from one section of the game and gain no mechanical benefits.

In addition, to play a lineaged character requires at least some makeup and possibly (often extensive!) prosthetics. Orcs require a full head latex mask.

Despite this a very large fraction of the characters are not baseline human (of the order of 50%)

While we were designing this, there was some concern that people would not play non-humans (partially due to the costume burden) without mechanical benefits. In the end we decided to try it and it all worked out.

That said, there's some fairly extensive roleplaying notes on the non-human characters and being non-(fully)-human has certain diplomatic effects when dealing with some NPC factions.

Essentially, non-mechanically supported heritage can be sufficiently compelling, though I suppose without the continual reminder of costume it might not be quite the same at a tabletop compared to a LARP

Yeah, I believe is really a different beast.