Having races co-exist, how do you do it?

[Cadenzo]

So I've been homebrewing a campaign world and I've been kinda stuck with a problem.

I have about 3-4 definitive races where I'm like "Players will pick one of these." but I've gotten myself written into a bind.

Of them I have one (The Tyr) who are the most populous but also don't know or are usually ignorant of other races existence. For the most part they rarely have contact with them, and when it happens most Tyr think its just tall tales, urban legends, conspiracy theories ect. You know how our modern human society thinks of people who saw bigfoot or Aliens.

Other races consist of the Mau (Pygmy catfolk people) Whom plaster casts of their footprints and alleged sightings exist but they are centered on a sparsely populated and largely uncharted continent.

The Azaren (Basically a race of Dhampirs) mostly dwell within the planets second moon, only having a few colonies on the surface and mostly raid for blood and are considered an urban legend or story country folk made up to scare tourists.

Another race I might do is an offshoot of the Tyr who traveled to another plane and lived there during the races early history but have returned (possibly by accident) and may be completely unknown to the Tyr.

My problem is..... well..... Obviously how do I have a party with more then just 1 race? Should I rewrite lore to say that contact has been established? How would that go down? Idk, my only previous world building attempt was a world of only humans so I avoided this problem.

[Coyote_Ragtime]

I think just letting your players figure out how to react for themselves would be half the fun in this scenario. Just imagine how you would react if you suddenly found yourself hanging out with bigfoot and dracula, and then had to team up to achieve a common goal.

[Ninten]

If most of the races of your world are rare, unknown to the most populous one and have not been seen in generations, those races aren't appropriate for Player Characters, just like how the majority of Races living on the other planets around Golarion aren't playable options in most Pathfinder campaigns.

If you want Players to play the other Races you made, you pretty much have to change the story so that they are known, and are at least 2% of the population or something similar.

If you don't want them to play those Races, just don't mention them to the Players as options, and leave them in as odd stuff to be found around the world.

[Kimera757]

I think you need to establish contact. Otherwise you'll have situations where members of this race don't speak Common and don't understand basic things about the world.

[Coyote_Ragtime]

It really just depends on what your story is. The cat guys might be sneaking around Tyr society in secret. Maybe the player was sent to reveal the existence of the Cats to ask the Tyr society for help, or maybe they are trying to keep the cat society from being discovered. I think it would be fun if the whole group had to disguise themselves when dealing with Tyr. The cat player has to pretend to be another player's house cat. Depending on how good your story is, you could easily make it work as is.

[Juda de Kerioth]

give a truñy purpose to every race in your world. If some one just can´t fit... don´t doubt to dump it and make a common race version with those abilities, check how the race fit in the world and if don´t... well i guess you get the point here...

Remember not all the races are for all the games/campaigns

[Cadenzo]

Coyote_Ragtime wrote:

It really just depends on what your story is. The cat guys might be sneaking around Tyr society in secret. Maybe the player was sent to reveal the existence of the Cats to ask the Tyr society for help, or maybe they are trying to keep the cat society from being discovered. I think it would be fun if the whole group had to disguise themselves when dealing with Tyr. The cat player has to pretend to be another player's house cat. Depending on how good your story is, you could easily make it work as is.

One idea I had was say a multi-racial party starts out on a Tyr military instillation, and the players playing Azaren or catfolk are basically captives about to be held, interrogated, dissected and studied since like "WHAT THE HECK ARE YOU?!" comes up and the fearful governments might suspect they are a threat and want to assess the danger.

So the Tyr players would be kinda pushed into a role of an underground group that knows of them and is going to bust them out of .... more or less magical Area 51. XD

Also currently the Mau (Little cat people) many of them are primitive but lead by the Azaren who liberated them from their captivity. The other race, the Tyr offshoot might regard the Tyr as kin or long lost cousins and could at least somewhat blend in with them more easily.

[Coyote_Ragtime]

I can dig it! XD

[Cadenzo]

Kimera757 wrote:

I think you need to establish contact. Otherwise you'll have situations where members of this race don't speak Common and don't understand basic things about the world.

I too think I might have to establish that. For example the other races might seek contact with the Tyr to try and deal with some greater threat.

They players finding themselves by happen stance involved in such an event.

[Zhayne]

Have a nexus ... a huge city or something that all the races can access somehow (be it road or teleportal), where all of then mingle and interact, probably with lots of import shops, a black market, and suchlike.

[Cadenzo]

Coyote_Ragtime wrote:

I can dig it! XD

It might be the whole "Hey we come kinda in peace but also did you know some crazy stuff is coming?"

Of course I also have to explain how seemingly advanced races need the help of the Tyr. Either because the Tyr are themselves advanced enough to be useful, or they are numerous enough to make up for the incredibly low numbers or simply the existence of magic negates the need for incredible technology.

The Azaren have the problem of being divided by civil strife within the moon of the world. Some Azaren even themselves just wanting to conquer and use the world below as livestock. Others devolving into feral blood suckers. Others given way to cults.

The Tyr offshoot could be long lost kin seeking to warn their kin against a plausible threat from beyond the stars like some terrible demonic aberrational Cthuloid being. Or seeking to finally return "home."

The pygmy catfolk are even slightly related in that every race on my world is at least partially human in origin.

[Cadenzo]

Zhayne wrote:

Have a nexus ... a huge city or something that all the races can access somehow (be it road or teleportal), where all of then mingle and interact, probably with lots of import shops, a black market, and suchlike.

I might actually have the first campaign be the players trying to establish that sort of a thing.

Possibly either being a city existing in a Demi-plane or transitive space, or just simply a city on planet.

Or having such a city appear as property of one race who is trying to create a situation to unite the various other races to combat some B.B.E. threat. Though they may be acting in secret as the other races might be acting in their own interests or hiding purposefully.

[Whale_Cancer]

Civil rights legislation.