5) Tiefling: Horns, Ilike horns, they make a beautiful head decoration, and all manner of interesting variations on the human physique, digitigrade legs with hooves, tails, strange skintones. They are almost as variable as an eidolon, when it comes to their look, and I like having a wide range of options to my character's description.
4) Undine: I have an affinity for the element of water. Undines also fill the void when I can't play a merfolk. They don't have a tail instead of legs but they still get close.
3) Ifrit: They too can have horns, alsofiery looking hair, and skin tones ranging anywhere between red and volcanic rock black. And as much as I like water I'm pretty much equally drawn to the opposite element of fire.
2) Goblin: I'm a fan of the idea of the disorganized swarm of tiny, malicious mischief makers. And goblins fill that spot quite well. Big eyes and ears, and sharp teeth help as well.
1) Merfolk: beautiful creatures and both a mechanical and roleplaying challenge to play. For some reason I love races that have a tail instead of legs. (If there were a paizo official playable version of the serpentine lamia, they would also be on this list)
1. andriod
2. assimar
3. Samsaran
4. human
5. half elf
|
My top five races, and the races I consider always allowed in the Pathfinder games I run are pretty simple with one oddball:
Human
Elf
Dwarf
Halfling
Orc
I don't care for the flavor of half-races and I have never liked gnomes. For any given campaign I will often throw in another oddball or two and my players will frequently come at me with other choices that, given a decent reason, I will allow.
Gnomes
Humans (versatile)
Tieflings
Aasimar
Changling
|
|
In no real order, my four favorite races are humans, aasimar, dwarves and catfolk. Elves and Tieflings are a bit overrated (:P), half-orcs, halflings and gnomes don't really do anything for me, and I prefer drow to be evil, fleshwarping psychopaths :P
I also like androids, but they're not legal in PFS :(
Are Catfolk legal in PFS?
1> Human
2> Suli (Seriously, I'm the only one?)
3> Gnome
4> Half-Elf
5> Dwarf
My top 5... Haven't played in a while, but based on racial rules, this is how I'd count down.
Coming in at #5 are the Changelings. There's something about being the daughter of a hag that makes that race all the more flavorful to me. Add in that they feel like even while adventuring they're always on the razor's edge, trying to keep out that siren call from their mother's blood that sings to them to become a hag, and you've got a race that I would love to play.
Next on the list, in place #4, are Aasimars and Tieflings. I'm grouping these two pairs of native outsiders together because they're close to being mirrors of one another. Their books in the Player Companion line even came out one right after the other. They're both wonderfully, flavorfully crunchy, although I'd like it if we could get equivalents for the Law-Chaos dichotomy to have the other eternal conflict get some mortal pawns of its own (and so that I could play a child born during the attempted gating of a Protean Lord or Primal Inevitable without having to build the race from the ground up).
The bronze medal, at #3 goes to the Orcs. Orcs are the one race that truly never gave a crap about rules or bureaucracy, in most settings. Even goblin society, as presented in Pathfinder, has some rules — don't write, avoid dogs and horses, yadda yadda — but orcs are completely, brilliantly, unfettered. If only they didn't have -2 to every mental ability score in their standard write-up... then we'd have a race of playable Incredible Hulks.
They say that if you come in #2 you're simply the best loser, but while our entry at this spot, the Humans, may agree as a whole, I'm going to have to call bullcrap. I love humans. The extra bonus feat and skill point can be hard to determine sometimes (if only because there are so many choices), but as far as immersion goes, few things are easier for me than playing a human character. Beyond that, however, is the fact that a low-intelligence human can't hide insults from most NPCs without there being regional languages. You can't call the farmer down the way (who just outwitted you at checkers, since your Int is 7 and his is 12) a "chicken lover" in some weird foreign tongue without having studied it, which means he knows exactly what you said... so in a way, humans have to watch their words more than any other race.
The top spot, however, is snagged by Androids. Yes, yes, technology in the fantasy, yadda yadda... look. The truth is, androids, with their emotional cluelessness, innate curiosity, and "weirdly similar but at the same time very different from humans" vibe, feel like I'm playing the closest thing to a "me" this game has to offer (although I don't have a nanite surge, as far as I'm aware). They have weird weaknesses, oddball strengths, and they try their hardest to fit into a world that they weren't built for... which, again, really strikes at the whole "me" of everything. The little buggers look human, but they're out of place in most societies. Even when they learn the customs and the way to react, it's still being done without knowledge of some of the subtle nuances that human culture develops because the bullcrap social rules develop all these little "ifs" and "buts" that you practically have to learn from birth to truly understand. Androids feel like the closest any RPG has ever gotten to having a me to play. And I love the crap out of them for that.
1. Catfolk - It's what I truly truly truly wish I was IRL (I hate being human. In rpgs and IRL) Also I'm a mountain lion furry so sue me. Best and sexiest race ever. Period.
2. Gnolls - So happy the ARG removed the absolutely stupid and pointless level adjustment on these guys, they are so much fun to play.
3. Kobolds - Small and deadly, AND HIGHLY underrated.
4. Ratfolk - They make such fun wizards and witches. ^-^
5. Wyvaran - Kinda fit as that race for those that want to play half-dragon, but still be in the same league as any other starter race. I want more on this race hopefully.
If I expanded out to ten
6. Half-Orc
7. Changeling
8. Tiefling
9. Kitsune
10. Dwarf