Reply to thread

Message

<blockquote data-quote="Hriston" data-source="post: 8865513" data-attributes="member: 6787503">I generally agree with how you characterize &quot;race&quot; as a game element. You can still see this in how PC races are designed in 5E. Dwarven Weapon Training isn't a world building dictum that says all dwarves are trained in these four weapons because of some monoculture or whatever. It's a flavorful menu of four weapons a player can choose from to have their dwarf character use with proficiency, or not. If none of those weapons are used in-game by the dwarf, the feature has no bearing on the fiction whatsoever.I have a small nitpick though, which is that &quot;race&quot; was only ever &quot;class&quot; in Basic. In OD&amp;D (1974), they were independent. You could have an elf, for example, that only ever operated as a fighter or one that only ever operated as a magic-user, or you could have one that switched back and forth because elves were allowed to do that. The thing is, as far as I've been able to determine, the term race doesn't appear in OD&amp;D. You would pick a &quot;character type&quot; (either human or non-human) and a class. I guess this was confusing to some, so I think it was Moldvay that made the innovation of making everything a class as a way of simplifying the game. Race first appears in the Monster Manual (1977), and then in the PHB (1978), Gygax makes extensive use of the phrase &quot;racial stock&quot;. I think, with AD&amp;D, Gygax was looking for a term more flavorful than character type and hit upon race. I think the choice now after 45 years of race is between going back to something bland (species), finding a new flavorful alternative, or maybe doing away with the mechanic entirely by folding it into class (the Moldvay solution).</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Hriston, post: 8865513, member: 6787503"] I generally agree with how you characterize "race" as a game element. You can still see this in how PC races are designed in 5E. Dwarven Weapon Training isn't a world building dictum that says all dwarves are trained in these four weapons because of some monoculture or whatever. It's a flavorful menu of four weapons a player can choose from to have their dwarf character use with proficiency, or not. If none of those weapons are used in-game by the dwarf, the feature has no bearing on the fiction whatsoever. I have a small nitpick though, which is that "race" was only ever "class" in Basic. In OD&D (1974), they were independent. You could have an elf, for example, that only ever operated as a fighter or one that only ever operated as a magic-user, or you could have one that switched back and forth because elves were allowed to do that. The thing is, as far as I've been able to determine, the term [I]race [/I]doesn't appear in OD&D. You would pick a "character type" (either human or non-human) and a class. I guess this was confusing to some, so I think it was Moldvay that made the innovation of making everything a class as a way of simplifying the game. [I]Race [/I]first appears in the Monster Manual (1977), and then in the PHB (1978), Gygax makes extensive use of the phrase "racial stock". I think, with AD&D, Gygax was looking for a term more flavorful than [I]character type [/I]and hit upon [I]race. [/I]I think the choice now after 45 years of [I]race [/I]is between going back to something bland ([I]species[/I]), finding a new flavorful alternative, or maybe doing away with the mechanic entirely by folding it into class (the Moldvay solution). [/QUOTE]

Verification