D&D (2024) What new jargon do you want to replace "Race"?

[Yaarel]

again I think we are talking about simplification here. The whole monocultural elves and dwarves thing, is usually a matter of simplification in the PHB, but something that tends to show more complexity and variety in actual settings. I don't think making general cultural statements about dwarves, elves, humans, and halflings is an issue. It is a simplification and one can argue more variety would be more realistic, but ultimately this is also a game, and a particularly simple one that abstracts a lot. But like I said there are also lots of games that do more realistic complexity and variety with culture better than D&D.

And yes you can have a variety of drwarven cultures but saying something like 'dwarves tend to live below ground and often mine' isn't that different or any worse than saying 'humans tend to live above ground and often farm or raise herds of animals'. That is just a general statement, it doesn't preclude a city like Derinkuyu from existing among humans for example, nor does it preclude dwarves from having a city like Rome.

Personally, I want the Players Handbook to be Human-only. Human be the only species options described.

Then each Setting Guide describes whatever other playable species are prominent in its setting. The Guide describes them according the flavor that is true for its setting. Each Guide might refer to the same Elf species with the same biological traits, but the Backgrounds for the elf-founded cultures will differ between the Guides.

Some D&D Settings will be better at avoiding reallife racism than others. We can learn from trial-and-error. Meanwhile keep the core rules of the Players Handbook as setting-neutral as possible.

I feel One D&D does well to have four core rule books:
• Players Handbook: Human-only, every rule necessary to play a complete game of D&D.
• Forgotten Realms Guide: the flavor of the FR setting, playable Nonhuman species according to FR cultures.
• DMs Guide: how to homebrew new cosmologies and worldbuilding for very different kinds of Settings, including Modern etcetera, encounter building for new adventures, magic items, and playtested variant gaming rules.
• Monster Manual: hostile encounters including traps. Possibly with FR flavor if other Settings have their own Monster flavors.

Altho the Forgotten Realms Guide is a default core, the book is self-contained and easy to swap out. It is easy to use an other Setting Guide instead, such as the Eberron Guide, the Dragonlance Guide, indy Amethyst Guide, any of the Magic the Gathering Guides, or any other Setting Guide. The Human-only Players Handbook will provide gaming rules that are as setting-neutral as possible (especially avoiding cosmology) to work seemlessly with the DMs choice of any setting. Especially the DMs Guide will encourage the DM to homebrew an entirely new setting.

 

[Yaarel]

"If gorillas or chimpanzees kept most of their other general traits like larger/smaller size, differences in strengths and agility, brachiation, lifespan, etc... but had near human intelligence, they would develop the same kind of cultures as each other or that humans would" seems strange to me.

(Which doesn't mean one shouldn't be careful about which road one goes down and how it's done. Or that a human couldn't be raised by intelligent apes or vice-versa).

Notice "Strength" and "Dexterity" are now cultural (like Ability Score Improvements while leveling) − no longer biological.

Precisely to avoid reallife historical racism.

Color-coding gaming options is unethical when it perpetuates reallife racism.

 

[Cadence]

Notice "Strength" and "Dexterity" are now personal − no longer biological.

Precisely to avoid reallife historical racism.

That strength and dexterity vary by individuals doesn't mean that some species generally tend to have a lot more of the one or other. That the distribution of bear-oid's physical strength stochastically dominates that of thr cheetah-oids, and the cheetah-oids distribution of speed stochastically dominates that of the bear-oids seems like things one would expect to find in anthropomorphic bears and cheetah's. (I would not be surprised if no actual cheetah could match the median actual bear in measures of strength, and no actual bear could match the median actual cheetah in speed).

 

[Yaarel]

That strength and dexterity vary by individuals doesn't mean that some species generally tend to have a lot more of the one or other.

This is the racism of the 1800s and the 1900s.

The racists wrongly believed that the European "race" tended to have a higher Intelligence than the African "race".

The racist "explained" their hatespeech via the pseudoscience as if these races were different species or subspecies.

"Slightly better" is the worst kind of reallife racism, historically.

 

[Cadence]

Notice "Strength" and "Dexterity" are now cultural (like Ability Score Improvements while leveling) − no longer biological.

Precisely to avoid reallife historical racism.

Color-coding gaming options is unethical when it perpetuates reallife racism.

Your edit feels like it significantly changed your point from what I just replied to.

Then just use typical size range, brachiation, and powerful build. That the percentiles in size for chimps << gorillas, and that chimps have brachiation and gorillas have powerful build makes it feel like if they were isolated groups that some things that are part of culture (say architecture?) would probably develop differently, while there may be no reason for other things to.

 

[Cadence]

This is the racism of the 1800s and the 1900s.

The racists wrongly believed that the European "race" tended to have a higher Intelligence than the African "race".

The racist "explained" their hatespeech via the pseudoscience as if these races were different species or subspecies.

"Slightly better" is the worst kind of reallife racism.

I'm fairly well read on issues about real life racism. I am fine with ability score ASIs, especially mental ones being taken out to avoid accidentally stumbling on to tropes.

But I wasn't talking about human beings or things particularly like them I was talking about species that differ in major ways from each other. Bears and cheetahs in particular.

Likening everything to real life racism [edited: doesn't seem helpful].

 

[Yaarel]

I'm not talking about human beings. I'm talking about species that differ in major ways from each other. Bears and cheetahs in particular.

Likening everything to real life racism makes is uselessly asinine. Do better.

Describing gaming options as if anthropomorphics − namely humans − makes reallife racism a perpetual possibility endemic within D&D.

There must be a methodology to categorically END D&D racist traditions.

 

[Bedrockgames]

This is the racism of the 1800s and the 1900s.

But that was based on ideas about differences between humans. Cadence is literally talking about bear people and cheetah people having different stats.

The racists wrongly believed that the European "race" tended to have a higher Intelligence than the African "race".

The racist "explained" their hatespeech via the pseudoscience as if these races were different species or subspecies.

"Slightly better" is the worst kind of reallife racism, historically.

And we all agree that was wrong. I've pointed out many times my concern about some of the terminology being proposed linking to German ideas about the Aryans and the racialist science of the early 20th century (which I think is insidious and led to genocide). There is a lot people can learn from that history. The reason that was wrong is human races and ethnicities aren't subspecies. And it is always wrong to treat people cruelly or differently because of perceived differences. We are all basically the same. But you can agree with that, while also realizing there is a possible alternate history where other species similar to humans developed intelligence and did have vastly different physical or mental characteristics without rebounding to real world human racism. You can also imagine a world where mythical beings are substantially different from humans, like elves who live for hundreds of years, can see in the dark, are more physically dexterous than humans and have natural resistance to certain types of magic. You can imagine that and not believe in racial pseudoscience about real humans. One if fantasy and the other is reality. When you are engaging fantasy I think you are dealing with things on a much more mythic level. You are trying to create wonder by having a variety of humanoids that are similar to but not the same as human, to create the impression of world filled with all kinds of possibilities.

 

[Bedrockgames]

Personally, I want the Players Handbook to be Human-only. Human be the only species options described.

That is fair if that is what you want, but it absolutely isn't what I want from D&D. When I play D&D I want elves, dwarves, gnomes, and halflings. I'll take other options like half orcs, half elves, and whatever else. But I want a nice range of races/species to choose from, and I like to have the classic fantasy races to at least be part of that mix.

And again there are lots of games that approach this very differently and do it well (like I said I mostly don't play D&D I usually play more grounded fantasy games). I just don't think D&D needs to change what it does well to chase this, when there are games that do it so much better.

 

[Cadence]

@Yaarel

If one wanted to do British faerie knights or Norse alfar as beings in D&D (in the Monster Manual) that could also be used as a PC options, how would you want them described?