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And there's no dwarfs.You didn't play Morrowind.
Yes, I did, and no, there are no dwarfs in it. It was a mistake historians made naming them that. They were called dwarfs because, compared to the giants, they were really small. You didn't pay any attention.
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Yes, I did, and no, there are no dwarfs in it. It was a mistake historians made naming them that. They were called dwarfs because, compared to the giants, they were really small. You didn't pay any attention.And there's no dwarfs.You didn't play Morrowind.
Or the Dwemer are Mer, which are also called elves but are all more accurately described as descending from the Altmer.
Meaning there aren't really any elves if you want to be hard core about definitions. Just Mer that are called elves, but called themselves Mer.
So the mistake was calling them elves, actually. Or did you not pay any attention?
But since there are Dwemer who are functionally equivalent to Dwarves to the point that they almost have the same name...
So... about them Dwarves, Elves, and Orcses'. They necessary? Imo, not at all. Iconic and recognizable though!
I decided not to read everything.... just the first page.
I think it is the GM's decision of what the different races look like and how they act (look at anime and what elves look like).
A friend, back in the '90's ran a fantasy GURPS game. In it he had lots of Orcs. He decided that they would be more like American Indians than the evil things from Tolkien.
It is up to the GM and make things fit. Maybe you don't need any race but human. Maybe your entire game takes place inside a vast walled city and all the players are human. It sounds like a video game to me.....Actually, I think I've played it.
I've been running a custom campaign for 35 years. I thought long and hard about whether to include iconic monsters and races, especially since I love to create custom monsters and races. In the end I decided that it was just so much easier to introduce new players to my world if my world was something they could recognize as a fantasy RPG world. Also, it was much easier to find miniatures for the campaigns I was running.
There are parts of the world that are deliberately devoid of the iconic races, and one, interestingly enough, is based on stone age North American cultures. But I've only run one campaign in that area, and it was a short one. The vast majority of campaigns are run in the standard fantasy areas of the world in part because people like choosing standard races to create their characters.
There's nothing wrong with using the iconics, nothing wrong wit not using them, and nothing wrong with a world that allows both approaches.
...because they're always played the same, and when they're not, it comes off as trying too hard. Why have dwarfs when they do everything possible to not act like drunken idiots, you know? I hate how it seems out of character to NOT play a stereotypical dwarf of elf, but with how pervasive they are, they've just become outplayed and boring.
And there's no middle ground? There are only TWO WAYS to play ANY character of those two races, but there are countless nuanced ways to play a character of other races?
I find your conclusion suspect.
...because they're always played the same, and when they're not, it comes off as trying too hard. Why have dwarfs when they do everything possible to not act like drunken idiots, you know? I hate how it seems out of character to NOT play a stereotypical dwarf of elf, but with how pervasive they are, they've just become outplayed and boring.And there's no middle ground? There are only TWO WAYS to play ANY character of those two races, but there are countless nuanced ways to play a character of other races?
I find your conclusion suspect.
Did I say that? No.
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Did I say that? No....because they're always played the same, and when they're not, it comes off as trying too hard. Why have dwarfs when they do everything possible to not act like drunken idiots, you know? I hate how it seems out of character to NOT play a stereotypical dwarf of elf, but with how pervasive they are, they've just become outplayed and boring.And there's no middle ground? There are only TWO WAYS to play ANY character of those two races, but there are countless nuanced ways to play a character of other races?
I find your conclusion suspect.
That's exactly what "they're always A and when they're not, they come off as B" means.
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And then when I come to the "antagonist" race, I much prefer Hobgoblins as they written to Orcs, but I find it awkward to have "Hobgoblin" be the name of the main enemy race while the race called Goblins is a secondary off-shoot, so I think I just make them the orcs, but then they are VERY DIFFERENT from traditional orcs in that they are organized and in many cases intellectual, they are just heavily militaristic and hate gods.
tl;dr I overthink things.
I wouldn't rename them 'orcs', since that comes with a lot of baggage, that the players will expect, like Usually Chaotic Evil, stupid, disorganised, raging barbarians...they need their own name.
'Hobgoblin' is what other races call them. It probably isn't the word they use to describe themselves.
If the first settlers ran into the small goblins first, they named that race, then met their larger cousins, they'd give them a name that meant 'a sort of big goblin'.
But the hobgoblins themselves would never consider themselves to be a sub-race of anybody, especially not those runty idiots.
Their own name would be something proud and macho, "We are Krungarr!", and the smaller goblinoids would be considered a subrace of them "They are Mini-Krungarr!".
And then when I come to the "antagonist" race, I much prefer Hobgoblins as they written to Orcs, but I find it awkward to have "Hobgoblin" be the name of the main enemy race while the race called Goblins is a secondary off-shoot, so I think I just make them the orcs, but then they are VERY DIFFERENT from traditional orcs in that they are organized and in many cases intellectual, they are just heavily militaristic and hate gods.
tl;dr I overthink things.
I wouldn't rename them 'orcs', since that comes with a lot of baggage, that the players will expect, like Usually Chaotic Evil, stupid, disorganised, raging barbarians...they need their own name.
'Hobgoblin' is what other races call them. It probably isn't the word they use to describe themselves.
If the first settlers ran into the small goblins first, they named that race, then met their larger cousins, they'd give them a name that meant 'a sort of big goblin'.
But the hobgoblins themselves would never consider themselves to be a sub-race of anybody, especially not those runty idiots.
Their own name would be something proud and macho, "We are Krungarr!", and the smaller goblinoids would be considered a subrace of them "They are Mini-Krungarr!".
It's something to think about.
I don't know that militaristic orcs is too far off the mark for people to "get" but it's something to keep in mind. They definitely do have their own name for themselves, which I need to invent.
I have dwarves in my main current world . I just concentrated really really heavily on mysticism with them. Rituals, and lore-keepers. Massive underground .... Libraries. Filled with texts from earlier ages saved from cataclysms past. Scholars. Naturally this is not all there is to the culture - they are an entire race after all but they are more known for their philosophers when they are known at all - than their warriors.
This is a question I find myself thinking about a lot as I put together bits of lore and history for my game setting as it gets fleshed out by campaign after campaign.
Worlds that are "human only" fantasy are naturally excluded from it as a general rule, but as to the whole, this genre (and this game) is built upon familiarity. Elves and dwarves are so pervasive that they seem to have bypassed a status as cliche are become virtually essential elements. Almost* every successful/popular fantasy setting/story includes elves and dwarves as familiar staples at least (when one is present, the other usually is too in some fashion). And while elves and dwarves are the heroes we clearly love to be, orcs, arguably Tolkien's greatest creation, are the people we love to hate (or love to be hated as, in some cases).
So the question is: How essential are these three to your "high fantasy experience"? Can we have one without the other(s)? Could creating new races to fill their same spots come off as trying too hard to be "unique"?**
*The only popular fantasy universe I can think of that does has non-human races and does have elves and dwarves is the Tyria/Guild Wars universe. However, dwarves did exist in the world's history at some point and are discussed as an extinct, lost culture in the ongoing Guild Wars 2 story. So, effectively, dwarves are in the game in a fashion.
**Elves and dwarves are such a familiarity that it's hard to not recognize new races as "stand-ins" for the old ones. If having dwarves, elves, and orcs is not a necessity, having a nature race, pragmatic race, warrior race, and misunderstood race (sometimes two are in combination) definitely is, otherwise it feels like there is a hole missing.
Once again, ANet has done a very good job of make their own distinct races to fill these wholes that don't feel like they're merely placeholders. Ironically, the fantasy genre seems to be the only one where you can have something so close to an existing concept that it's...
No, they are not necessary. The fantasy game of Dark Souls does fine without them. I've run games in settings without them, and I'm worldbuilding at the moment something that isn't heavy on the Tolkien (not heavy-metal Tolkien). It has a minor shitty race of the Tanaruuk, which were originally demon orcs, but other than that no need to put them in. I could pull them out with no trouble, plenty of other villains.
The best thing about removing Tolkien races is this, you leave space for others and for other demihuman or monsters to fill the gaps. E.g. take out elves, why not put in Gith and centaurs? Take out Dwarves, why not put in organised Otyughs and lizardfolk? Take out halflings and put a strong emphasis on merfolk.
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I remember one of my oldest fantasy story drafts.
Elves were replaced by catfolk and orcs were replaced by trolls.
Dwarves were allowed to stay, though I put emphasis on giants instead of halflings.
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Dark souls also makes it really hard to tell between the living and undead (not counting hollow). It's a murky gradiation, it seems.
From what I recall, most of the people you meet in Lordran are in fact undead.
I'm not sure if there is an actual list, but there are hints here and there for some.
Those that aren't, soon are.
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When I had pondered making a homebrew setting and a stab at game design (For me EPIC FAIL! LOL!), I had considered eliminating the Tolkien traditional character races. More I realized that I would be replacing them with something similar. I personally like having them in my games. Traditional D&D style fantasy feels strange without them for me.
A co-worker and I were discussing it and how he and I both agreed that they are kind of a crutch when trying to visualize medieval fantasy. A good friend of mine however commented and said that it just shows how powerful of an influence Tolkien had on late 20th century fantasy without intending it.
I dunno, I sure like Paizo's take on it however. They seem to eliminate the annoying subrace aspects and work more on the cultures and why they stand out away from each other as well as humans. I think that is a big plus in my book.
If there is anything to do with the thought of subraces it lies in the fact there is a Darklands version of elves, dwarves and gnomes and each of those is represented well without lumping into a mess of other variants.
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Thinking about some sci fi stuff where the aliens aren't strictly "humans with funny foreheads" (a la Star Trek and Star Wars). For example, E.E. "Doc" Smith's classic "Lensman" series has Kimball, a human; Worsel, a dragon; Tregonsee, a Rigellian with a barrel-like body with multiple tentacle arms; and Nadrek, a cold-planet bug-like being whose body extends into other dimensions and therefore appears to be constantly shifting. No need for elves.
Thri Kreen party!
And maybe a druid.