An advantage of D&D being word-based is that DMs don't have to specify which race their human NPCs are, or rather, not race but ethnicity. We simply say, "A tall man in half-plate armour" and let the player decide for themselves which of the real-world human races he resembles most, since it's not really important to the game.
Of course, a human in any given D&D world must have one skin tone or another, a certain eye colour, and so on. This has gotten me thinking - in D&D, how many ethnicities are we likely to see and how do they differ? If I walk into Sharn, Waterdeep or Greyhawk, will I see dark-skinned humans as well as fair-skinned, and if so, do the dark-skinned humans and fair-skinned humans originate from different regions of the game world?
I believe that Faerun says "Yes, humans have all real-world ethnicities and more" while Eberron says "It's not important, ignore it". What I'm wondering is, what do you think about it, how is it in your game world, and how much does it really matter?
I describe the ethnicity of a human in my campaign world only when it's relevant or they stand out significantly, for example there's a pure Suel paladin serving in the forces of Irongate that my players recently ran into. I mentioned the race then, but otherwise I don't unless someone asks. I think the players assume every human they meet is Oeridian unless I say something or they ask and I tell them something different.
Greyhawk actually has several ethnicities in the setting. Across the Flanaess, humans can be Suel, Bakluni, Flan, Oerid, Rhennee, Olman, or a mix of any of these.
There each have distinct cultural differences and physical traits that distinguish them from one another.
The Bakluni are similar to greater asian and arabian cultures. The Suel are similar to anglo-saxons and northmen. The Oerid are a mixture of european-like cultures. The Flan are similar to north american peoples. The Rhennee are often likened to river-dwelling gypsies. The Olman are similar to south american peoples.
Greyhawk fans with stronger familiarity than mine will most likely chime in with more accurate analogies.
In the campaigns I play in, human ethnicity takes a grand back seat to what humanoid race one belongs to. Actually, more like it's in the trunk. Skin tone and other ethnic identifiers are really only important when they're the halmark of distinct and generally hostile subraces such as Duergar or Drow.
Not to say ethnicity doesn't exist. In the homebrew the other DM is running, we're playing in an alternate earth and all the human ethnicity is represented. Asians in the far east, middle eastern types, african descent, germanic/caucasian... all of 'em. Even in Eberron (which I run), ethnicity is present. There's the hallmarks of House Cannith - red hair and fair skin, I believe - or Karnnath with their dark hair, etc.
But in a game where humans are not the only intelligent species, I guess it becomes much more important that the guy eyeing you with disdain has white hair, ebon skin, and pointy ears. Or that brute snarling at you is really hairy, looks animalistic, and has big sharp fangs and claws. Compared to these, what color skin the human over yonder has kind of takes a back seat.
Unless it has that unhealthy pallid look. Or rotting bits.
Races of Faerun has an excellent section detailing the ethnic traits of various human ethic groups in Faerun. While some are what you might predict, there is a pretty good variety, and it is a lot more fun to describe the actual traits of the character rather than simply ascribing a real world racial type to them, or telling them flat out their ethnicity.
In one case, upon describing a man as being thin, sallow skinned, with dark hair that is slicked back and no facial hair, the players assumed that the NPC was southern, likely from Mulhorand or somewhere else in the old empires. The character was from the south, but actually an Extaminaar, a species more or less related to yuan-ti, but the player's made their own assumption, which was great.
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I love playing with ethnicities because it makes a fantasy world seem more real. One of my favorite things about Greyhawk is that - because of the details on different ethnic groups - it seems more like a world with history. Other worlds I've seen that have well-developed ethnicities and cultures are Caen in the Iron Kingdoms and Aryth in Midnight.
My own campaign centers on an alternative Earth (I teach history and usually play with students). In my version history, dwarves are a human sub-group that went underground before the last ice age and re-emerged in Northern Europe toward the end of the Roman Empire, so just as nations were coming together on the surface, they were forming underground too. For dwarves, ethnicity and physical characteristics are more a factor of depth than geography. But for your average Saxon peasant, a dwarf would be about as unusual as an Italian or Russian. An African or Chinese human, however, would be very unusual.
Similarly, giants are humans who got big and elemental to survive the ice age (think hyper-Neanderthals). Ethnicity for them is more like fire, frost, stone, etc. Like I said, ethnicity adds flavor for me. It also keeps me from making everyone in my world white Europeans.
Here's a question for those of you who also use ethnicity - in our world, humans tend to vary by things like skin color, eye shape, hair texture, etc. and are grouped into "races" (somewhat arbitrarily) according to these characteristics. Most fantasy worlds seem to use the same groups - there are dark and light skinned people, rounder and narrower eyed people, etc. By what other, new, non-Earth physical characteristics could fantasy humans differ?
I was thinking of things like some people having really wide noses, like an inch or two wide all the way up the bridge. Or some people have smooth vs. lumpy skin. Maybe blothcy vs. one-tone skin. I'd be interested in other folk's ideas about adding a little variation to our species.
I like the idea of races in fantasy settings not being the same races that we see in our world, but that ethnicity abound. Some things are pretty clear, that in sunny areas you'll see more kink in hair, darker tones, more almond shaped eyes, wider flatter noses. The exact combinations however don't have to equate to races we see in our world--in fact it's much better if they don't. It helps establish the fantasy setting as something new and interestingly different. Ethnicity is the spice of life however, and honestly character description gets bland as dry white toast if there aren't a lot of shades in the pallete. Same goes for other races than humans too, by the way. It's nice to see the differences between elves, dwarves, etc. be so rich and textured that the PCs can guess region and subrace often before the NPC has formally announced themselves. That's when a setting comes alive for me.
Many historians these days argue that the concept of "race" originated in the Enlightenment era, when Europeans began to try to categorize the world around them according to "scientific" principles, and were also busy trying to justify denying peoples who looked different the rights they claimed for themselves, so that they could keep them enslaved or take away their land.
Of course the awareness of physical difference between peoples of different origins is much older than that--in a world where long-distance travel is rare, though, it is rare to encounter someone who is physically as different from oneself as the different "races" who live side by side in modern America.
In my home campaign world, the physical differences between neighboring peoples tends to be slight, except where one group has recently migrated from far away. What marks them off are different customs, costume, hairstyle, and language. In this way, it is relatively easy to assimilate to a new society, although people may wonder about where your ancestors came from if you look significantly different. People with really different physical appearances (skin color, hair, facial features, physique etc.) tend to be from far corners of the world.
Of course, in a world filled with other intelligent races (using the term in D&D fashion here), the physical and cultural differences between human peoples tends to seem rather small.
I actually design my campaign world, Saern, around various cultures, which often include ethnicity by default. The frozen northern lands of Aksal are influenced by, obviously, Nordic culture and thus Aksalans are like Nordic people on Earth. Humans from Alambia and Paolis are Germanic in culture. The city of Calrothe is Rome re-named for all practical purposes. The Isles of Ergon are Celtic. The Khaermani Empire is a mix of Arabic and purely fantastic cultures. So, ethnicity exists and, I find, is rather fun to play around with. Especially when you get an odd combination that rises just from the way you design your world. However, I present to my players more by cultural differences, rather than skin tone and physical traits.
I actually design my campaign world, Saern, around various cultures, which often include ethnicity by default. The frozen northern lands of Aksal are influenced by, obviously, Nordic culture and thus Aksalans are like Nordic people on Earth. Humans from Alambia and Paolis are Germanic in culture. The city of Calrothe is Rome re-named for all practical purposes. The Isles of Ergon are Celtic. The Khaermani Empire is a mix of Arabic and purely fantastic cultures. So, ethnicity exists and, I find, is rather fun to play around with. Especially when you get an odd combination that rises just from the way you design your world. However, I present to my players more by cultural differences, rather than skin tone and physical traits.
I think most of us do this, to some extent, for convenience if nothing else. My main human culture-group, the Coramines, are a sort of generic medieval European, but with a somewhat different religious system and some ideas I borrowed from various Asian cultures. Another group, the Brithondians, have a kind of Celtic flavor, and other cultures use the Norse, Mongols, Tocharians, Tibetans, Khmer, Indian, medieval West African and several native American groups as partial inspirations. Whenever I detail a culture, though, I always end up adding or subtracting some things.
I've done the same thing with the demi-human races, with the result that they all end up with a slightly non-standard flavor in my campaign world--especially gnomes and halflings.
Inventing cultures is fun.
I've done the same thing with the demi-human races, with the result that they all end up with a slightly non-standard flavor in my campaign world--especially gnomes and halflings.
Inventing cultures is fun.
Yes, it is...I've done interesting things with gnomes and halflings in my homebrew as well.
I'd like to add some...
1st: I'd like to borrow a quote from the old Shadowrun sourcebook which claimed: "Believe us: people in [that fictional game world] do not view races like we do. The THING next to you in the subway has fists the size of your head! Don't you feel that the dark-skinned human next to you is like your twin bother in comparison?" Yes, ethnicities do exist in most fantasy settings. But skin colours etc. tend to pale in comparison to more obvious things like sheer size, prolonged teeth, feet-long pointy ears etc. So a resident of the fictional world may fail to mention that the fellow human he encountered, yes indeed was of a different ethnicity. Test yourself, if you tell your parents etc. of a pal of yours - do you mention eye colour? Because that may be the level of difference a fantasy resident feels...
2nd: In contradiction to 1st, I do feel that ethnicities enrich a game world and thus a gaming experience. And as usual it's the balance between well-known cliches (which do have the benefit of an instant feel-at-home) and creative ideas. Since Earth has such a rich ethnic lore, I usually blend several Earth cultures/ethnics in one fantasy culture... I once had a culture of south pacific Tahiti-like people blended with vikings once: fearsome, dark-skinned warriors raiding the tropical seas... Mix visible attributes: desert people could be dark-skinned, yes, but with radiant green or blue eyes...
3rd: Ask yourself: humans hava a plethora of visible ethnic differencies. And the other fantasy races? How come there is usually a monolithic gnome culture, and all halflings are pretty much alike? Answer: most fantasy settings tend to assume a human-dominated world. And variety comes with these greater numbers... (Usually I tend to slightly discourage fantasy races and exotic ethnics with the players to keep the sense of wonder when encountering these.)
4rd: rule of thumb: Sociology teaches that something is alien, evil and hostile, unless there is something even more alien coming around the corner: in which case the previous subject might be viewed as sufficiently similar to unite against the looming alien threat. (Here's one basic motive of world history by the way.) Do not underestimate the tendency of simplifying the world by any sentient being: it's always black-and-white etc. Being cheated by an elf once? All elves are bastards, believe me! Remember that one time you lost money to one? See! Got some torches and pitchforks handy? Heard there's an elf moved in the neighborhood...
(Hint to creating a background and history of your setting: it's always the low motives that drive a history and never virtues: it's usually greed, fear, hate (or even lust or sloth). A country that selflessly aids another rings hollow. An alliance to mutual benefit makes sense, however...)
Thanks for your patience,
Cornrelius
(Historian, world builder and cynic)
Ethnicity plays a big part in my homebrew as well. What I did however was play a little with the ethnic steriotypes we are used to. So no ethnic group truely corosponds to Earths. Nothing so outlandish like blue skin or anything but the shades might be slightly different. Hair and Eye styles and colours don't mimic our real world versions and usually each ethnic group has some minor trait that stands out such as having eyes that might almost belong to a cats. Certianly I enjoyed making up the varous ethnic groups and it helps with envisioning what members of the varous cultures look like if I know not just how they dress and what they do but also what they themselves look like.
I have to agree with the comments about ethnicity adding flavor to a setting. Variety is a good thing in almost all cases. A reasonable selection of races, like classes or religion can give springboards for characterization. For example, my character is of ethnicity X which have practices and beliefs Y. Does my character follow the party line? Does he disagree with his fellows? Is this disagreement what has caused him to leave his nation to adventure? Perhaps the character must pass a test before he can be considered an adult member of his people or before he can legally receive an inheritance? This kind of character detail can also provide the GM with plenty of plot hooks. (The more help we can get the better:) Also even subtle differences between groups of the same species makes the seem more believable. Many interesting possibilities to be had here. If anyone is interested the Wheel of Time setting, based off of a series of books by the same name written by Robert Jordan, describes a wealth of unique fantasy ethnicities. Lots of source material for those trying to add such things to their campaigns.
Along the rocky coasts of Kalaponi and out to the Great Western ocean come the Maori (Think Polynesian). From the cold fjords of the Northern Kingdom of Ilsig come the Northmen (Think Vikings). Then there is the waning empire of the Han (think Feudal Japan). To the south west lies the Sea of a Thousand Islands (think Greek, Indian then Indonesia the further east you go. Across the Great Barrier Mountains (how original) live the people of the Great Eastern plains (Think American plains indians).
I think I have been inspired by fantastic heroic stories from all the cultures in my world and try to fit them in. Besides..,
"It's the DM's world and mine all mine!"
I would say tendency of physical variation in differnet climates should definitely exist and people would recognize it...even while different biological races like elves and dwarves would be around.
If the different areas are isolated enough, it might even be that the humans of a certain region would feel stronger connection to elves and dwarves of their region than to humans from obviously different area (if the area is isolated, all sentient people would probably be of relatively similar skin hue and have stronger cultural influence within themselves).
So a lot depends on the world, and strange folks like lizardmen are naturally whole different thing...
Of the non-human races I would guess that dwarves, mostly living in underground in relatively similar conditions, would have rather uniform physical outlook, cultural differences however might be very pronounced (different clans sticking strongly to _their_ way of living). I'd guess halflings and especially orcs would develop clear ethnic diversity, and for elves some of that is already included in sub-types though larger variation should be expected (how do elves from cold forests differ from their temperate and jungle kin?)
Ethnicities in D&D in my opinion are in general a waste of time. This is adventure, not a Dr. Martin Luther King speech. The one thing I hate about Greyhawk is the endless BS I have to read through about these ethnicities. In my campaign we have RACES. Dwarves, Elves, Humans, ect. Humans from one country are obviously different from those from another country. Hill Dwarves are not mountain dwarves. But, history about tons of tribes, and strains of people, and cultures is not my thing... I like a campaign brewed to the essentials... Just my opinion.
That's fair. A good thing about a writing-based game like this is that it's entirely plausible to ignore certain aspects and let the players' imaginations fill in the rest.
On the other hand, I sometimes wonder, "Y'know, if such-and-such an NPC is described as having white hair and brown eyes, surely he must have a skin colour too? Does every human have the same skin colour as him? If not, what ethnicities exist in the world and what effect does it have?"
Then I run a game, describe an enemy NPC, and the players are like, "Aye, whatever. I cast disintegrate. Wait, do I have to roll initiative first or do I get a surprise round or what?"
On the other hand, I sometimes wonder, "Y'know, if such-and-such an NPC is described as having white hair and brown eyes, surely he must have a skin colour too? Does every human have the same skin colour as him? If not, what ethnicities exist in the world and what effect does it have?"Then I run a game, describe an enemy NPC, and the players are like, "Aye, whatever. I cast disintegrate. Wait, do I have to roll initiative first or do I get a surprise round or what?"
Thats why I think the best stories are part of adventures. I can give all the visions, and backstory I can dream up to my players. They ignore it and wait for 1 more magic missile. On the other hand if the adventure depends on some story based issue, (like returning Allastor Lands Bones to his graveyard in The Whispering Cairn) then the players seem to enjoy it more than straight Dungeon Crawls.
Yes, there are many diverse cultures in my game worlds, because I usually gun for a mythic earth type setting. While I rarely get that Greyhawk is standard enough that the group submits to playing there.
However that being said race isn't nerly as important as the culture one subscribes to, in games or IRL.
The Koga has always saw the differant playable races as well.. differant races lol!
Elves=Whites.
Orcs=Blacks.
Dwarves=Hispanics.
Gnomes=Asians.
Hafling=Native.
Non core races=Mddle Eastern.
The Koga comes to that conclusion by the races general attitude and how they act towards one another.
I have never seen ethnicity as something missing from RPGs. IN my games I always think of my characters as some sort of ethnicity when deciding skincolor and so on. It might not be the MOST important part but it's always there.
My favvourite character for instance is a half white/ half asian sorcerer. It doesn'r define him but it helped me develop a backstory, and gave me some guidelines to use while drawing a character sketch.
On the same topic I would also like to say that I recently started to develop a set of rules (for a future campaign) pertaining to different cultures in human society. This was done by removing the four extra skillpoints at lvl 1 and instead giving the characters +2 on two different skills depending on culture. Then I would give them some other small bonus based on cultural inclination.
For instance:
+2 Survival, +2 Knowledge(nature), treats shortbow and longbow as simple weapons.
Or...
+2 Diplomacy, +2 Sense Motive, gains a +2 bonus on will saves against compulsions and charms.
The first are a people known for living in the wilderness and producing natural hunters. The second are a people known for producing excelent diplomats and who learn at an early age never to loose it.
Elves=Whites.
Orcs=Blacks.
Dwarves=Hispanics.
Gnomes=Asians.
Hafling=Native.
Non core races=Mddle Eastern.
Whites live in harmony with nature, blacks are superhumanly strong and all hate whites, hispanics are dour and taciturn, asians like to play pranks, native Americans are dextrous and sneaky, and middle easterns were built thirty years ago for the Last War?
I think The Koga has his list a little out of whack... either you live in an unusual country, or you play a particularly wacky D&D setting!
(I resent being called an elf)
IN my games I always think of my characters as some sort of ethnicity when deciding skincolor and so on. It might not be the MOST important part but it's always there.
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What does skin color have to do with ethnicity?
I have dark brown skin. But so do people from Pakistan and India? Ethnically I am Hawaiian. Heck racially I am Polynesian but so are Tongans and Somoans, but ethnically we Polynesians are different. I know many white skin Japanese but they are not the same ethnicity as the white skin friends I have from North Corolina.
The Koga has always saw the differant playable races as well.. differant races lol!
Elves=Whites.
Orcs=Blacks.
Dwarves=Hispanics.
Gnomes=Asians.
Hafling=Native.
Non core races=Mddle Eastern.The Koga comes to that conclusion by the races general attitude and how they act towards one another.
Koga the Ninja trick does not know of Polynesians?
To bad for Koga the Ninja trick.
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Greyhawk actually has several ethnicities in the setting. Across the Flanaess, humans can be Suel, Bakluni, Flan, Oerid, Rhennee, Olman, or a mix of any of these.
There each have distinct cultural differences and physical traits that distinguish them from one another.
The Bakluni are similar to greater asian and arabian cultures. The Suel are similar to anglo-saxons and northmen. The Oerid are a mixture of european-like cultures. The Flan are similar to north american peoples. The Rhennee are often likened to river-dwelling gypsies. The Olman are similar to south american peoples.
Greyhawk fans with stronger familiarity than mine will most likely chime in with more accurate analogies.
Agreed; this is one of the reasons I have enjoyed our group's return to GH. I actually recognise the cultures, unlike say, FR, where I would be constantly wondering "Where are we again?".
On learning the location of Cauldron in GH, I immediately decided my character would be Baklunish. I don't know if most players bother with this aspect, or just write 'human' on their PC sheet.
One reason I could see for having a homogenous human culture is that it avoids people making unfavourable comparisons with real-world politics, race & religion, or prevent people taking offense when none was intended.
To all the posters demanding more ethnic representation; how would you react if one of your racial group appeared in an adventure as an evil, devil-worshipping, baby-killing rapist? Sure, you would demand examples of good NPCs of the same race, but how many good or neutral NPCs would it take to outweigh one heinous stereotype?
A recent letter to Paizo, accusing them of defaming a real-world Finnish Olympic athlete comes to mind...needless to say, the answer (that you'd never heard of him) probably didn't change the writer's opinion that the staff had it in for the Finns.
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So a resident of the fictional world may fail to mention that the fellow human he encountered, yes indeed was of a different ethnicity. Test yourself, if you tell your parents etc. of a pal of yours - do you mention eye colour? Because that may be the level of difference a fantasy resident feels...
True, but whenever I play a rogue/ranger/scout I get the job of tailing or tracking someone, and it really honks me off when the only description I get is 'human', or their clothing/armour (which can be changed).
Huh?I once spent a session on a wild goose chase that eventually led nowhere. Once the villain was eventually caught and beaten, I was shown a picture, and asked "Didn't you think to tell me that the guy I was looking for was the only black guy in town, with a green mohican, to top it off?"
desert people could be dark-skinned, yes, but with radiant green or blue eyes...
You been reading Dune?
(Usually I tend to slightly discourage fantasy races and exotic ethnics with the players to keep the sense of wonder when encountering these.)
I agree some people SHOULD be discouraged from playing non-standard races/classes if they just intend to arse around. Ask yourself if the player is the sort to enhance the game, or if he/she is just a focus-hogger. If every encounter becomes another excuse for them to them to run through their 'routine', then I can do without it.
Plus, ask yourself if the player REALLY intends to run this PC for the full stretch. Often it's just a Johnny Onejoke character, who they get tired of once the shine has worn off, after which they'll be whining at you to let them play something else (after screwing up the adventure, of course).That's the reason most DMs give for disallowing monks (even in 3E). If you're running a reasonably serious 'fantasy-Europe' campaign, then you want some joker with his 'Oh-so-hilarious' Ching-Chong-Chinaman PC like a hole in the head.
I think that while ethncities can really make a game better, it does lead into the "lets be more realistic" trap in D&D. Some things may be more realistic, but will complicate the game.
From my experience, most human cultures are played like the cultures the players hail from, and there will be some variation. My group of California born-and-bred players play different (culturally, in game) than guys I have played with at GenCon from Canada.
Let me introduce a few problems with ehtnicites:
First: I am a college history student and enthusiast. I have a fairly encylopediac knowledge of groups form history, and I fall into making too many, or basing them off of obscure groups only I find interesting.
Second: alot of players are not as interested in the many different groups. It is easier for them to say, "I want to play a Norse-type guy" and let them decide where he is from, than to lay out a few openings. Alot of them will just play "regular humans."
Third: Inevitable issues with stereotyping. If one person sees a certain ethnicity a certain way, and assoicates his character with insensitive stereotypes, it either ruins the game or makes things tense.
Finally: There are already a bunch of different races. It is easier to play the races by thier type, and let humans be the "baseline", that is, medieval european types. With other races, you can take excerpts from cultures and make them a bigger part of that race.
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...If the different areas are isolated enough, it might even be that the humans of a certain region would feel stronger connection to elves and dwarves of their region than to humans from obviously different area (if the area is isolated, all sentient people would probably be of relatively similar skin hue and have stronger cultural influence within themselves).
In my homebrew, I have an isolated mountain nation of humans, who have social/historical/religious ties to the dwarves, this being the region of first contact between the races. They are surrounded by humanoid tribes and feel abandoned by the rest of humanity, looking to the dwarves for aid.
The PCs will hear of 'half-dwarves' in my campaign background notes, and may assume these are a cross-breed race, but in fact this is just a side-effect of social conditioning and different aesthetics. The usual skinny, bony freaks who constitute the 21st century 'ideal' get passed over, in favour of the rugged, solid, dependable, trustworthy, short, fat, hairy people for a change.(paraphrased) Of the non-human races I would guess that dwarves, mostly living in underground in relatively similar conditions, would have rather uniform physical outlook...
...for elves some of their diversity is already included in sub-types though larger variation should be expected (how do elves from cold forests differ from their temperate and jungle kin?)
The dwarven uniformity may be due to their relatively low numbers; when your population is low, or the distance between settlements is long, you end up marrying a cousin out of neccessity.
Another factor is their traditionalist, lawful nature. At this age, you wear your hair this way, until you kill your first orc, you cut your beard this way. Axe-soldiers wear this colour, hammerers wear this colour, etc.Regarding the elves; anyone else think the drow skin colour is wierd? Shouldn't they be all pale, like the Morlocks, or those blind cave-fish?
A recent letter to Paizo, accusing them of defaming a real-world Finnish Olympic athlete comes to mind...needless to say, the answer (that you'd never heard of him) probably didn't change the writer's opinion that the staff had it in for the Finns.
Ah, yes, Lassiviren the drow assassin, that was funny (it would be a bit similar to have a NPC named Kariimabduljabbar or Greglouganes appear in the magazine).
But barring the chance that the name really by coincidence was so similar, it might just be that the writer is using an obscure list (like Olympic winners in 70's) to come up with NPC names...personally, I use Bulgarian dictionary and know one guy who uses names of bacteria...Oh, and I took no offence about that. After all, we also have Mielikki as FR god (oh, and Loviatar too).
To another comment, I was also wondering about that "evil underground elf race having dark skin" thing and in one campaign where drows actually featured I came away with an explanation that drows are born albinos but going through early birth initiation rite their skin is turned dark. Oh, and that means that drows born outside the society still keep their albino hue (also otherwise drows were not exactly similar to what RA Salvatore would have us to believe...)
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The Koga has always saw the differant playable races as well.. differant races lol!
Elves=Whites.
Orcs=Blacks.
Dwarves=Hispanics.
Gnomes=Asians.
Hafling=Native.
Non core races=Mddle Eastern.The Koga comes to that conclusion by the races general attitude and how they act towards one another.
The Aberzombie wonders...WTF!
As to the drow skin color issue, in the Forgotten Realms, the Ilythiiri, the race of elves that eventually becomes the drow, always have dark skin, even when they lived on the surface.
As to the drow skin color issue, in the Forgotten Realms, the Ilythiiri, the race of elves that eventually becomes the drow, always have dark skin, even when they lived on the surface.
That's true - I'm also a fan of the variant that says when the Seldarine cast them down, their skin became as black as their hearts. :-D
3rd: Ask yourself: humans hava a plethora of visible ethnic differencies. And the other fantasy races? How come there is usually a monolithic gnome culture, and all halflings are pretty much alike?
Er... My Monster Manual lists ethnic variations, or subraces, for all the core races... Rock, Svirfneblin, and Forest Gnomes; Lightfoot, Tallfellow, and Deep Halflings; Deep, Duergar, Hill, and Mountain Dwarves; Aquatic, Drow, Gray, Wild, and Wood Elves.