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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Dire Bare" data-source="post: 7930237" data-attributes="member: 18182">I've been doing some learnin' on the terms you've introduced me too today (landrace, etc) and I'm not convinced they apply to a discussion of real-world human species or fantasy-world demihuman races/species. But, I think to argue about them gets us past the point as the terms are hazily defined and my level of current knowledge hasn't progressed much past Wikipedia yet . . .The relevant terms, culturally and biologically, are race, species, and ethnicity. Which do we use in our D&D games?In my view, the ancient human species that co-existed with homo sapiens hundreds of thousands of years ago is a great parallel to the demihuman races of standard D&D (elves, dwarves, halflings, gnomes). We're still comparing real-world scientific classification to fantasy-world concepts based on myth and literature, but we have a situation of multiple sentient, cultural, tool-using, language-speaking populations competing and interacting with each other, and even in some cases interbreeding. How closely related they are and where exactly to draw the classification lines is a constant debate, fueled by new discoveries every once and a while, but very parallel to the D&D racial situation.I've been intrigued by the current movement by some game publishers to leave the term race behind and use something else, like ancestry and heritage. Still, none of these alternate schema have felt comfortable to me personally. And the scientist in me loves the more accurate use of species and ethnicity, but those words ring strange in the pseudo-medieval worlds of D&D to my ears. Besides, to non-scientists (i.e. most of us), the term species is as well understood as race and ethnicity is social science jargon. And while the term race is not scientific, it is a very real cultural idea that we continue to use today in society, and not just when we are being racist.I'm not done thinking about these ideas and I do think the words we use in our D&D games have impact and importance. But my current thinking is to continue to use race as it is currently in the game. But to replace the term subrace with culture, with race mapping to species and culture mapping to ethnicity.So, my character is of the elven race, and the wood elven culture. It sticks closely to how race and subrace work in D&D currently, sticks with the cultural/mythic/literary tone of the game and genre, and maps (if imperfectly) to the scientific ideas I share regarding the real world.And I think the scholars of my fantasy world are going to have just as much fun as the scientists of the real world when it comes to drawing those lines between races . . . how different are elves and humans really? Do they have a common ancestor? Is evolution even a thing in fantasy land? Can they have viable offspring? Should they? It's going to be messy, imperfect, and probably involve some good old fashioned racism for the PCs to oppose.</blockquote>

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