People complain about the endless elf subraces

Odradek

But surely that's akin to the level of diverse appearances and cultures a widespread sapient species would have, right?

The problem isn't that there are too many elves, it's not enough dwarves, halflings and gnomes

Hexartes

The concept of an "elvish language" or a "dwarven language" also bugs the hell out of me

Bee

The thing is, in most fantasy settings you don't usually get much diversity among humans.  Appearance, sure, but it's cosmetic; they're usually a small handful of cultures and mechanically identical.  Elf subraces are usually there to pad out gameplay variance and racial bonuses even though logically they'd have the same mechanical sameness as humans.

That and they're not usually all that different from each other anyway.  Elder Scrolls has like three races of elves, and the only major difference is that dunmer are black and bosmer are annoying.  In Skyrim you can barely even tell the difference between altmer and bosmer because everyone is tan and gaunt.

Yarrun XIX

What about Orsimer

Hexartes

Bee said:

The thing is, in most fantasy settings you don't usually get much diversity among humans.  Appearance, sure, but it's cosmetic; they're usually a small handful of cultures and mechanically identical.  Elf subraces are usually there to pad out gameplay variance and racial bonuses even though logically they'd have the same mechanical sameness as humans.

That and they're not usually all that different from each other anyway.  Elder Scrolls has like three races of elves, and the only major difference is that dunmer are black and bosmer are annoying.  In Skyrim you can barely even tell the difference between altmer and bosmer because everyone is tan and gaunt.

I thiiiiink there might be an issue if black people had different skill bonuses than white people which isn't the inevitable conclusion of this but is very much the reason why games go for more elves rather than more humans

Klinotaxis

if I have to read another description of how humans are inherently more flexible than other species and that's why they get a +6 to whatever I'm going to stuff someone into a locker. probably Kexruct. nothing personal

Yarrun XIX

Also, everyone knows the Dunmer are Jewish. 

Hexartes

"Humans are inherently more flexible" is how we avoid giving racial bonuses that- uh- hit a bit closer to home.

Although I suppose the concept of a racial bonus is something rather innately problematic, but I find it's mostly mitigated when the division is lizard/elf/human rather than fantasy European/fantasy African/fantasy Asian

Obā-san

unless the lizards and elves are kinda sorta stand-ins for different sorts of humans

Hexartes

Although to be fair the Elder Scrolls makes the baffling decision to have choice of race affect skill scores rather than attributes which sends it right back into "iffy" territory because of the real world influence on its fantasy cultures

glennmagusharvey

i wish they were species that couldn't interbreed so we wouldn't have to talk about races

go go tabletop RP system that features the following playable "races": human, dolphin, mouse, cockroach, crow, octopus

Yarrun XIX

Racial bonuses are a load of bunk, let's be honest.

I remember one of the various failed campaigns in here where I wanted to play a dwarf who had been raised by gnomes and I'm just like 'how the hell did he get all this dungeoneering skill when he lived on the bloody surface'

Klinotaxis

it still props up the idea of inherent biological qualities based very straightforwardly on 1800s racial pseudoscience, just makes it less obviously offensive to modern sensibility

I have opinions on how fantasy races work most of the time. actually just one opinion, which is that it is stupid

Hexartes

Today is Tomorrow said:

unless the lizards and elves are kinda sorta stand-ins for different sorts of humans

For the record, this ^ was part of my point with this \/

Kexruct said:

Although to be fair the Elder Scrolls makes the baffling decision to have choice of race affect skill scores rather than attributes which sends it right back into "iffy" territory because of the real world influence on its fantasy cultures

Yarrun XIX

Remember when Oblivion or Morrowind basically said "Black people are too dumb to learn magic, but they can run really fast?"

Hexartes

Which is sooooo fucking stupid because aside from this mechanical bullshit the Reguards are interesting and nuanced beyond "LOL KENYANS RUNNING AMIRIGHT?????"

Klinotaxis

I mean I don't think I'm crazy here. if you're going to have "races", make them races like in real life, differences that are overwhelmingly cosmetic but may correlate with more substantial cultural differences due to less than cosmopolitan societal norms

also have bug people who communicate hormonally and have alien moral systems based on emerald cockroach wasp octopamine in jections and

Hexartes

Like, lizards have water breathing? Elves have more magic? Whatever. Fantasy Black People are innately more athletic? Yuck

Klinotaxis

yeah actual physiological differences sure, but "drow are more selfish" or something is sooooo gross

Hexartes

Besides if you're going to go with "cultural differences lead to differing abilities" why not have the player select, you know, a cultural background rather than a race

In case you can't tell I'm literally agreeing with everyone here

Klinotaxis

how dare you

Obā-san

Kexruct said:

Besides if you're going to go with "cultural differences lead to differing abilities" why not have the player select, you know, a cultural background rather than a race

this is a good idea that should be much more widely implemented, though it would prolly be tricky to do right

Hexartes

Kexruct said:

Although I suppose the concept of a racial bonus is something rather innately problematic, but I find it's mostly mitigated when the division is lizard/elf/human rather than fantasy European/fantasy African/fantasy Asian

And to clarify, when I said this I meant more so that the concept of a racial bonus is fine with sufficient fantasy abstraction but EVEN WITH this level of fantasy abstraction most RPGs still fucking bungle it completely. It's bamboozling.

Hexartes

Today is Tomorrow said:

Kexruct said:

Besides if you're going to go with "cultural differences lead to differing abilities" why not have the player select, you know, a cultural background rather than a race

this is a good idea that should be much more widely implemented, though it would prolly be tricky to do right

It doesn't even have to be that hard!

"Dwarf: Grants +3 to Constitution due to your small, stocky build, and -2 to Reflex saves due to the same
Eastern Wastelands: The trials and hardship faced in this desolate land give you a +2 to Will saves"

This is just a token effort and probably involves some problematic tropes but even with just this tiny gesture an improvement has been made

Hexartes

And the thing that kills me about TES is that it's actually, on the whole, a very nuanced look at how differing cultures view themselves and interpret their own values! Going for the cheap "x race innately does better with x skill" isn't just fucking stupid on its own, it's insulting to the series's own quality!

Klinotaxis

it's kind of funny when the mechanics just don't work. I just remembered how in final fantasy tactics advance, there's several species who all have different rpg classes available, and some other stuff, maybe start stats, I dunno. but for one human character they just have her as another species for almost all mechanical purposes because she gets along with some of them better

Yarrun XIX

Klinotaxis said:

it's kind of funny when the mechanics just don't work. I just remembered how in final fantasy tactics advance, there's several species who all have different rpg classes available, and some other stuff, maybe start stats, I dunno. but for one human character they just have her as another species for almost all mechanical purposes because she gets along with some of them better

Inquisition, I believe, did something like that. The annoying elf brat was human raised, so she can't use elf-only equipment but can use human-only equipment.

Dragon's Age gets points for that, but it shouldn't even have to be doing that. It could just be 'Tevinter-trained' or something rather than racial equipment, especially since elf-chavette shows exactly why that sort of thing can be a problem.

glennmagusharvey

Klinotaxis said:

it's kind of funny when the mechanics just don't work. I just remembered how in final fantasy tactics advance, there's several species who all have different rpg classes available, and some other stuff, maybe start stats, I dunno. but for one human character they just have her as another species for almost all mechanical purposes because she gets along with some of them better

Yeah, Ritz counts as Viera for mechanical purposes.

Then again, in FFTA, the entire world was some sort of magical imagination creation.

Also, the game implied that all bangaa are male and all viera are female.

Klinotaxis

it was a magically created world but that world was in-universe based on "Final Fantasy" so I can still blame them. HA

Haven

Kexruct said:

Today is Tomorrow said:

Kexruct said:

Besides if you're going to go with "cultural differences lead to differing abilities" why not have the player select, you know, a cultural background rather than a race

this is a good idea that should be much more widely implemented, though it would prolly be tricky to do right

It doesn't even have to be that hard!

"Dwarf: Grants +3 to Constitution due to your small, stocky build, and -2 to Reflex saves due to the same
Eastern Wastelands: The trials and hardship faced in this desolate land give you a +2 to Will saves"

This is just a token effort and probably involves some problematic tropes but even with just this tiny gesture an improvement has been made

This was basically how 4th edition D&D worked, with its background options.

Hexartes

It's also probably how Dragon Age: Origins was supposed to work, but somehow you ended up with oddities like being able to play a rogue in the Dwarf Noble story (which was blatantly written with a Warrior in mind) which I guess was there for the sake of allowing players flexibility? It just ended up with this weird disconnect where the characters had a set of abilities and behaviors rather separate from their place in the world and this discrepancy is engaged with to an extent but the incongruity of it stands out waaaaay more

Tatterhood

glennmagusharvey said:

Also, the game implied that all bangaa are male and all viera are female.

my favourite is how someone was like "wait, it'd be problematic to have all humans be one gender but we simply can't have different sprites for different genders"

and so they just made all humans look like this

Odradek

The Drow's origin story is literally the same basic idea as the Curse of Ham that people used to justify slavery

Obā-san

Tatterhood said:

glennmagusharvey said:

Also, the game implied that all bangaa are male and all viera are female.

my favourite is how someone was like "wait, it'd be problematic to have all humans be one gender but we simply can't have different sprites for different genders"

and so they just made all humans look like this

!!! adorbs

Odradek

Obā-san

even more adorbs!!!!!

One-Winged Eagle

Kexruct said:

It's also probably how Dragon Age: Origins was supposed to work, but somehow you ended up with oddities like being able to play a rogue in the Dwarf Noble story (which was blatantly written with a Warrior in mind) which I guess was there for the sake of allowing players flexibility? It just ended up with this weird disconnect where the characters had a set of abilities and behaviors rather separate from their place in the world and this discrepancy is engaged with to an extent but the incongruity of it stands out waaaaay more

In Dragon Age, most of the time, "rogue" just means "someone who fights swiftly and nimbly" and by that I mean "uses a bow or dual-wields." The Dwarf Noble can be a rogue and still be warrior-esque because it's a fighting style, not a "class." Leliana and Zevran are classic rogues, but Dragon Age 2 has the DLC companion Sebastian Vael, the most catholic boy you will ever meet, and he's an archer who wears plaster white armor fucking everywhere. I don't know if he can pick locks, though. 

Hell, even the warrior-leader of the Qunari, the Arishok, that gigantic horned asshole who dual-wields a broadsword and a double-bladed battleaxe, is mechanically a rogue.

LOAD Cherry

If humans were consistent with the rest of the DnD races, their ability score quality would be +2 CON +2 INT and -2 STR

In fact I made a pathfinder race based on this idea

One-Winged Eagle

glennmagusharvey said:

i wish they were species that couldn't interbreed so we wouldn't have to talk about races

go go tabletop RP system that features the following playable "races": human, dolphin, mouse, cockroach, crow, octopus

That's the thing: you could CTRL+H most fantasy games and replace "race" with "species" and nothing would change because most of the time they can't interbreed. Elves, humans, and orcs is the exception, and even then, there are fucking. I don't know. Halfling? Tiefling? Dragonborn? Warforged? Tri-keen? Gnomes? Try fucking interbreeding that shit, I dare you.

Odradek

Tieflings are literally part human in some versions of D&D

One-Winged Eagle

Well, fuck me with a rusty shovel and leave me for the undertaker.

Anyway, my point is, "race" is grandfathered as the terminology and everyone who is anything admits that it's stupid, but it's been part of the fiction for so long so they just put in little sidebars in the books that say "it says "race" here but you can totally call it "species", the proper word, if you want."

Odradek

I was just bein' pedantic

Odradek

Remember when Elf and Dwarf were classes?

Hexartes

MachSpeed said:

Kexruct said:

It's also probably how Dragon Age: Origins was supposed to work, but somehow you ended up with oddities like being able to play a rogue in the Dwarf Noble story (which was blatantly written with a Warrior in mind) which I guess was there for the sake of allowing players flexibility? It just ended up with this weird disconnect where the characters had a set of abilities and behaviors rather separate from their place in the world and this discrepancy is engaged with to an extent but the incongruity of it stands out waaaaay more

In Dragon Age, most of the time, "rogue" just means "someone who fights swiftly and nimbly" and by that I mean "uses a bow or dual-wields." The Dwarf Noble can be a rogue and still be warrior-esque because it's a fighting style, not a "class." Leliana and Zevran are classic rogues, but Dragon Age 2 has the DLC companion Sebastian Vael, the most catholic boy you will ever meet, and he's an archer who wears plaster white armor fucking everywhere. I don't know if he can pick locks, though. 

Hell, even the warrior-leader of the Qunari, the Arishok, that gigantic horned asshole who dual-wields a broadsword and a double-bladed battleaxe, is mechanically a rogue.

Well yes, duh, I'm aware of how the game works

My point still stands, because I made it while I was 100% aware of this basic, largely self-evident information that I did not need explained to me

Klinotaxis

there are also half giants in the D&D psychic book. so like.

One-Winged Eagle

Okay, so you didn't need it explained to you, but look at it like I'm introducing an element to the conversation that I think is important.

Hexartes

Then I reiterate my point: the class system's presence in the game feels distinctly incongruous with the diegesis. Dwarves are explicitly considered a warrior culture; they fall very firmly into the standard dwarven tropes; they're blacksmiths who make heavy armor, axes, and broadswords. From a story perspective it doesn't make sense for the Dwarf Noble to be a rogue. The Dwarf Commoner, yes, but not the Noble. The Noble is given weaponry and armor consistent with a warrior's playstyle and the story is written with the expectation that your player is largely in line with dwarven cultural mores.

Dunno how this extends to the elf and human origin stories, but I will note that in a setting that heavily emphasizes the importance of mages and how much they stand out from other people, it is very odd that the decision to be a mage carries (to my knowledge) very little story weight.

One-Winged Eagle

I think a rogue as a different kind of warrior makes perfect sense to me, and it makes the world way more interesting in that light.

However. Dragon Age has always been stupid about mages.

Bee

Kexruct said:

Bee said:

The thing is, in most fantasy settings you don't usually get much diversity among humans.  Appearance, sure, but it's cosmetic; they're usually a small handful of cultures and mechanically identical.  Elf subraces are usually there to pad out gameplay variance and racial bonuses even though logically they'd have the same mechanical sameness as humans.

That and they're not usually all that different from each other anyway.  Elder Scrolls has like three races of elves, and the only major difference is that dunmer are black and bosmer are annoying.  In Skyrim you can barely even tell the difference between altmer and bosmer because everyone is tan and gaunt.

I thiiiiink there might be an issue if black people had different skill bonuses than white people which isn't the inevitable conclusion of this but is very much the reason why games go for more elves rather than more humans

Well yeah, I mean that's pretty obviously why it doesn't happen (often -- see Elder Scrolls).  It's just silly that they invent a completely different species for the sole purpose of inflicting all the unfortunate specialty eugenics implications on them while humans are average at everything or able to be better at any given thing, which is kind of just as bad.

glennmagusharvey

Baldanders said:

now that i think about it, this looks vaguely like Toriel from Undertale

Tatterhood

Yeah, I remember thinking Toriel looked slightly nu mou-ish when I played.