Which race should rule the world?

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

I think the low Charisma Score of Dwarfes might really cause difficulties. Maybe they could be good conquerers (but if most of their enemies are neither chaotic nor evil, why should they do it?), but poor leaders.

Maybe the most succesful race is that race that is able to blend with all creatures - and if I look in the PHB, only the Halfling might be able to do this. (Bonus to all saves, "fearless", favored class rogue?). On the other hand, they have no real interest in power, as far as I see.


In my campaign (that is losely based on Dragonstar), many of the mentioned races have their own empire.

The Human have the Terran Empire.
Dwarfes, Humans, Gnomes and even Halflings lead in the Confederation, the Elves have the Elven Republic, and the (Hob)goblin have the Hobgoblin Hegemony. Than there are the Dragon Terretories, where Kobolds and Dragons rule (since the Dragon lost the Great Dragon Wars, they were forced to work together with Kobolds - some say they even depend on them - so they are more or less equal in power) .

The Orc conquered some terretories in the recent time (they were forced to leave their home region due to a supernova), but they are only losely organized, and their tribes do not get along too well. Anyway, sometimes great orc leaders appear (one of them lead the orc out when they lost their homes) and can union the orcs, albeit only as long as he lives...

Rumors tell of a Yuan-Ti Empire outside the well explored terretories (approximately 30% of the galaxis are considered "explored", even if only some probes visited it), and maybe even Giants have their own Empires.

(There are also some regions controlled by Artificial Intelligence, often ai-controlled space crafts that decided to battle their humanoid masters, but - similar to the dragons - they failed to regain total control and thus had to leave the inner terretories.)

And there are some outsiders (unbeknownst to most people, including the player characters at this time) planning to invade the Milky Way - Formian established a "stronghold" in the small magellan cloud, and their attack just starts (being Lawful Neutral and having mind controll abilities, they have good chances to succed. And they have allies...)

 

[MerakSpielman]

Illithids, all the way. Nobody will even KNOW they're ruling the world. Honestly, if you were told, as a PC, to take an Illithid and attempt to rule the world, you'd be able to, right? And that's with somebody with the INT of a human (you) controlling them.

They're MUCH smarter then you. Or me. Or almost anybody.

I'll bet a few Illithids could even control the dragons, if they played their cards right.


While I'm thinking of mind control, why not Vampires? Create a few hundred Spawn and have them Dominate every creature they see. You could control a large city in very little time. Make sure your coffin is only assessible to undead in gaseous form (C'mon, you can think of a way) and you'll be immortal. The whole sunlight thing can be a problem, but if the city is enslaved, it shouldn't matter.

 

[Sagan Darkside]

While I'm thinking of mind control, why not Vampires?

Too limited by their environment- it would leave them vulnerable not only to their enemies but their not as limited followers during the day.

Though- one could probably run a small area with ease, and even get the people to love him/protect him.. in the short term. I spelled such a situation out once before- I wish I had cut/pasted it.

But- you are close- all the races would rule the world, as an animated mass of undead. Many undead self-replicate, and those victims that don't- will be animated.

You just need a patient lich or a lot of necromancers.

SD

 

[Voadam]

Dwarves traditionally have a problem with low birthrates.

Orcs have the advantage of high birthrates and the desire to mate with anything that crosses their paths. It doesn't take much for a new generation of the hordes to get going on an expansionistic rampage due to overcrowding and competition in their combative society.

Drow are militaristic and use lots of slave labor such as bugbear grunt slave warriors. Their weakness is their ECL so it takes them longer to get rolling to higher levels.

Halflings and gnomes, please, next you will say the pixies take over.

Vampires have too many weaknesses in general with running water, invitations, specific grave earth, and sunlight.

Shadows are the ones who will overrun the world with their no special vulnerability unlimited spawn. Let one enter a village of commoners and watch out when 300 controlled spawn com rampaging against the city, then even the high church will be overwhelmed when hundreds more swarm all at the same time.

 

[clark411]

Wights possibly. Well.. that *sounds* a little worse than I thought, but it's worthy of consideration. Wights are equal or better than humans in every way save their complete lack of a constitution score- which could mean "better" in most realms of conquest. Wights are intelligent enough to form fighting forces, and they're capable of raising new soldiers from the dead who also are equally deadly during combat. While enemy troops grow tired, the wights do not.

In political terms, wights have as much ambition as any of the young races, at least according to the MM flavor text- yet their wisdom and intelligence is high enough to keep this from being too great of an achilles heel.

Seriously, beyond massive numbers of clerics of pelor or other "super turners", and paladins, wights would steam roll any equally matched civilization, barring the amazing last minute save by adventurers or divine intervention itself.

 

[MerakSpielman]

No! No! No!

The rulers of the world... that's obvious! It should be

GODS!!!

Well, some of them are humanoid, right?


OK, I'm making this thread more pointless than it needs to be. Sorry.

 

[BiggusGeekus@Work]

My vote is for Ogre-Mages.

Good call.

Re: Elves.

In college I ran a 2e campaign that was an alternate-magic Earth. The sole idea was to construct a timeline that incorporated the elven lifespan into human history. I based the campaign in 2137 (after the "fall of technology") and noted that the elves who were around in the 1400's were still alive and kicking!

Yikes.

 

[Larcen]

...Then again, why would one good race want to rule over the others? They may not see eye-to-eye on everything, but I think they could overlook this to keep cooperative trade relations as well as team together to ward off strong evil foes.

[minor rant]
Look to the real world for the answers to this. Land. Religion. Jealously. Greed. Are good-aligned races immune to all this? Are not wars being fought right now where both sides are claiming to be the "good" guys?

For example, would you have called the English settlers evil, or the native americans evil? Yet, one side all but wiped out the other.

Then again, we ARE talking about a black and white fantasy world in this topic, with good and evil clearly descernable. So yeah, in a fantasy world good-aligned nations would be more reasonable towards one another. I think. Until they all start claiming the same scrap of land is their Holy Land.
[/minor rant]

 

[Sagan Darkside]

GODS!!!

Well, some of them are humanoid, right?

OK, I'm making this thread more pointless than it needs to be. Sorry.

Heh, they are the rulers in my upcoming campeign- they live on the material and most are rather.. tyranical.

SD

 

[Nightfall]

I prefer mortal types of races to rule. That said, All hail the Ratmen/Slitheren!