I couldn't decide which thread to put this in, since the topic is currently scattered across several, so I'm just making it separate.

A simple enough point: The only way you get a humancentric game is if the rules enforce it. In almost every gaming group, there's going to be at least one (usually more IME) person who wants to play the most outlandish character they possibly can, and will not be dissuaded by anything short of being directly told they cannot. Even average players usually look at fantasy races and think "that's a human with more stuff, so why not?". If there are animal races in a game, someone will play them. If demi-humans are mechanically equal or better than humans, you will probably get a majority demihuman party. If you don't want a high percentage of non-humans, you have to give players a reason to play human. Either ban the races you don't want, or play a human-only or race-as-class game.

I'm running Dolmenwood right now. The party composition has varied throughout the campaign, but I don't think it's ever gone above 60% human. It's an OSR game, and I mostly get veteran players, but I knew going in that this was going to be the case. Dolmenwood has unique races, so obviously players will want to try them, and I chose not to go with the race-as-class rules for it.

Running 3e/4e/5e/Pathfinder or any similar game and then complaining about having a rainbow kids club party is like standing in the rain and complaining that you got wet.

An idea that I had was to revise demihuman PC races to look mostly human aside from minor exotic features. E.g. tieflings have small horns, a tail and hoofed toes, but otherwise pass for human; dragonbloods look like humans aside from a few patches of scales here and there; etc. Treat them as human subraces rather than their own.

muh humans have to be everywhere reee

like why not have them be the only race if you want the setting to be human centric then? GOD forbid humans are the under dog

I mostly play humans and think that when 5E gives them stat bonuses and/or an extra feat that gives a mechanical reason to play them. Most of my players end up playing non-humans as "humans with extras" anyway.

It's like the original Star Trek, where Spock was so interesting and part of the reason is that he was half-alien and on our side. He was so unique. Now, Star Trek Discovery (technically set years before the original Trek) has multiple aliens in the ship and usually on the bridge. Seeing non-humans isn't interesting in that setting.

Quote from: finarvyn on July 12, 2024, 08:46:30 AMI mostly play humans and think that when 5E gives them stat bonuses and/or an extra feat that gives a mechanical reason to play them. Most of my players end up playing non-humans as "humans with extras" anyway.

I also usually play humans in standard fantasy, but it's largely for sentimental reasons. I like a "working class hero" character, and along with halflings, humans are the best at that.

Mechanically, I think a lot of games make a mistake in giving humans very dry/numerical features, bonus feats, stat/xp boosts and the like. Those aren't all that compelling compared to the more flavorful and/or convenient features that other races get.

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales on July 12, 2024, 07:55:29 AMAn idea that I had was to revise demihuman PC races to look mostly human aside from minor exotic features. E.g. tieflings have small horns, a tail and hoofed toes, but otherwise pass for human; dragonbloods look like humans aside from a few patches of scales here and there; etc. Treat them as human subraces rather than their own.

This is much like how Star Trek did most of their aliens.

I think part of the appeal of fantasy RPGs is both encountering and playing non-human races.  But if the DM and the players want to focus on just humans, sure, that's ok.  I really don't see either human-centric or non-human-centric as a problem either way--so so long as the participants enjoy it.

The problem I can predict with the freakshow approach is that it messes with the logic of how adventurers determine "is it a monster or not?" If the PCs look like monsters, then how do they keep track of what monsters are okay to kill? Do they wait to be attacked? Do monsters have red circles around them to indicate they're hostile?

This is one of the resons I am enjoying reading the Tales of Argosa playtest. Humans are featured but you can play elves dwarves, halflings, or half-skorn if you want. Most hon-human races have a few perks but also a couple of disadvantages to counter balance it. Best of all, NO race has any kind of darkvision or night vision. The special perks are nowhere near as good as in most systems and humans are the only race to get an ability score bump. If you play a non-human it will because you like the flavor, not just to load up on cool stuff.

Quote from: DUCATISLO on July 12, 2024, 08:17:19 AMmuh humans have to be everywhere reee

like why not have them be the only race if you want the setting to be human centric then? GOD forbid humans are the under dog

Furry Detected

Quote from: Socratic-DM on July 12, 2024, 02:53:08 PMFurry Detected

old fart detected

Quote from: Osman Gazi on July 12, 2024, 02:14:20 PMI think part of the appeal of fantasy RPGs is both encountering and playing non-human races.  But if the DM and the players want to focus on just humans, sure, that's ok.  I really don't see either human-centric or non-human-centric as a problem either way--so so long as the participants enjoy it.

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales on July 12, 2024, 02:20:32 PMThe problem I can predict with the freakshow approach is that it messes with the logic of how adventurers determine "is it a monster or not?" If the PCs look like monsters, then how do they keep track of what monsters are okay to kill? Do they wait to be attacked? Do monsters have red circles around them to indicate they're hostile?

I'd agree with Osman Gazi here.

There are a lot of settings like historical games where both the PCs and their enemies are humans - similar for Call of Cthulhu where cultists are often a problem. Or there's settings like Star Wars where there are a lot of different races, but there are humans as well as many other species on both sides of the conflict. Or there are settings like Dark Crystal where there are no humans at all, just various nonhuman beings.

I think this is a feature rather than a problem. Even in my D&D games, if PCs instantly rushed in to attack a gold dragon because "kill all monsters", then they got into trouble. I've also regularly had bandits, cultists, and other non-monstrous enemies.

Quote from: DUCATISLO on July 12, 2024, 03:33:45 PM

Quote from: Socratic-DM on July 12, 2024, 02:53:08 PMFurry Detected

old fart detected

Shut up, faggot. Go back to Reddit.

My problem is that the demihuman and nonhuman player races aren't mechanically distinct enough from base humans. There is no option in the Player's Handbook for Tieflings to use their horns to attack, for example. It's often more like a skin than a seperate species.

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales on July 12, 2024, 02:20:32 PMThe problem I can predict with the freakshow approach is that it messes with the logic of how adventurers determine "is it a monster or not?" If the PCs look like monsters, then how do they keep track of what monsters are okay to kill? Do they wait to be attacked? Do monsters have red circles around them to indicate they're hostile?

Agreed, and RPGs are going down that slippery slope already. Players want to play character types which are typically monsters, so then rulebooks start creating rules for PC monsters, then somebody decides that not all of those monsters are bad, then folks feel bad about fictitious creatures feeling bad about other creatures being better than they are, then we wind up trying to be PC about creatures that don't even exist.

I blame Drizzt, as he's the first one I can remember that did this. Drow were clearly evil, then Drizzt became a misunderstood drow, then everyone wanted to be a misunderstood drow, then they had to re-do the Ranger class because players wanted to do all of the things the Drizzt did that broke the rules. Spirals out of control. We can't have one outlier any more but instead have to change the rules so that everyone can be that character type. Ugh.