What races are appropriate to Heroic Bronze (Greece) setting

[Desdichado]

Looks like someone mentioned satyr, but oddly enough it hasn't been suggested. Satyrs and fauns could be related (but separate) races.

Gnome is based on a Greek word, but nothing much like gnomes as we know them exist in Greek mythology.

I'd agree that a lot of planetouched races could be appropriate, with some back-story to explain how they came from that's a little better than "great grandpa was from the Elemental Plane of Fire."

Although maybe that'd work too; the four elements as we know them were based on Greek thought.

 

[Krieg]

Looks like someone mentioned satyr, but oddly enough it hasn't been suggested. Satyrs and fauns could be related (but separate) races.

Tonguez specifically mentioned using the name Faun instead of Satyr. so I think everyone just let it rest at that.

I'd agree that a lot of planetouched races could be appropriate, with some back-story to explain how they came from that's a little better than "great grandpa was from the Elemental Plane of Fire."

Although maybe that'd work too; the four elements as we know them were based on Greek thought.

The planetouched are actually a very easy way to deal with abundance of godly bloodlines.

 

[SWBaxter]

What races are appropriate to a Greek (or at least Bronze age) setting that could be created with existing stats (at LA +0)

Kinda depends on your approach. OGL Ancients goes the route of having everybody be human, but giving racial-style bonuses based on city-state or nationality. So Spartans are better fighters, Athenians have higher intellectual skills, etc.

Another approach could be to recast D&D races in roles appropriate to a Greek-style setting. The Greeks themselves would be humans, the Persian empire could be the bad guys represented by hobgoblins, Egypt could be the ancient empire run by dwarves or elves, Crete and/or Minos could be founded the other elder race and inspire the Greeks, and so on with analogues to the Phoenicians, Nubians, barbaric Europeans, or whatever else seems desireable.

On the divine front, in addition to people with divine ancestry Greek myth also features a lot of characters who get help from the gods, either on a continuing basis (Jason, for example) or receiving some one-time gift important to their destiny (like Achilles). Those can be modelled via racial or bloodline-type mechanics.

 

[Desdichado]

Tonguez specifically mentioned using the name Faun instead of Satyr. so I think everyone just let it rest at that.

Yes, but then he asked for more racial suggestions. Since the fauns and satyrs (in D&D, anyway) are two seperate races, one from Dieties & Demigods and one from the MM, they could both be used.

 

[Tonguez]

Yes, but then he asked for more racial suggestions. Since the fauns and satyrs (in D&D, anyway) are two seperate races, one from Dieties & Demigods and one from the MM, they could both be used.

Yes you do have a point - it is possible to have them as two different races. Perhaps have Satyrs be a taller species (standing near human height) and Fauns the dwarf version. But then how to distinguish them so they don't share the same Niche? (as drunken libertines)

Ancient Kingdoms: Greece
* Chapter 2: Characters (28 city-states, 12 races including amazon, autochthon, cabiro, centaur, cyclops, gorgon, minotaur, myrmidon, nymph, satyr, siren, spartus)

Ancient Kingdoms: Greece sounds interesting and could be worth a look at later. So will keep it in mind. I suspect the City-States will be worked using Background feats and how the autochthon, myrmidon and spartus are invisaged will be interesting.
Still not sure I like the idea of cyclops, gorgon, (and minotaurs too) as PC races (even siren is pushing it if they keep their sonic weapon)

PS anyone know what a Cabiro is?

 

[SWBaxter]

PS anyone know what a Cabiro is?

In Greek mythology, Cabiro was a Thracian woman who had children with Hephaestus; her children are referred to as the Cabiroi. They're often associated with the Corybantes, who were depicted as kind of like bacchanalian berserkers and hedonists. No idea if that's the direction Ancient Kingdoms: Greece is going with them or not.

 

[Desdichado]

Yes you do have a point - it is possible to have them as two different races. Perhaps have Satyrs be a taller species (standing near human height) and Fauns the dwarf version. But then how to distinguish them so they don't share the same Niche? (as drunken libertines)

I'd make that description go with the satyrs, and then have a more mercurial fey-like approach to the fauns, personally. More mystery and melancholy than Bacchanalian woodland partiers.

 

[Tonguez]

In Greek mythology, Cabiro was a Thracian woman who had children with Hephaestus; her children are referred to as the Cabiroi. They're often associated with the Corybantes, who were depicted as kind of like bacchanalian berserkers and hedonists. No idea if that's the direction Ancient Kingdoms: Greece is going with them or not.

Aah ok Corybantes I know of - protectors of the baby Zeus irc

 

[tsadkiel]

I can't find the book, but I do know there was a horse-humans like fauns that are only known by pottery

Sileni

and there was at least one half dragon (his legs and lower torso are dragconic and has a very long tail) who was a king.

Cecrops

 

[tarchon]

Races in the sense of intelligent non-unique (or limited-issue like the gorgons) creatures would include:
centaurs
titans
human demi-gods (aasimar is reasonable, but I'd probably tweak it a bit - demi-gods seldom had anything resembling spell-like abilities, but their stats were heroic)
nymphs (naiads, nereids, okeanids, dryads, oreads, and another dozen or so http://www.paleothea.com/Nymphs.html)
tritons
satyrs (faun is of course little more than the Latin equivalent of a satyr - it's not Greek)
gigantes (giants) including the hecatonchires (the hundred-handed), cyclopes (wheel-eyes), and heka-gigantes (hundred-giants)
erinyes (furies, "the madnesses," thought of by some as a race of spirits, but in other sources they're limited to the three well-known Furies)
keres (female death spirits)

Gorgons, pegasi, and minotaurs were not conceived as races so much.

If you really want to adhere to the ancient Greek worldview, there isn't really a "human" race. To the Greek mind, a "race" was defined by descent from a common (usually male) ancestor. Kelts or Egyptians or Hellenes, for example, might be thought of as distinct races just as nereids or titans, and all were generally regarded as interfertile. Anything with an "-id" on the end is really being denoted as a group with common descent, like nereids from Nereus.