There are lots of half-human races. Half-elfs, half-orcs, half-dwarves, half-whatever else. Humans (and dragons) are the most prolific ring species. This got me thinking that maybe humans and at least some demihumans and humanoids share common ancestry. So I got an idea from reading other (http://lonelygm.blogspot.com/2013/03/changing-gamers-assumptions-about.html) ideas (http://www.terminally-incoherent.com/blog/2012/06/11/reinventing-fantasy-races-my-elves-are-different/) (and Tolkien cosmogony).
In the beginning were the true fey, beings of chaos that could assume any form they choose. So some of them became trapped in physical forms. Humans were those trapped in flesh, elves those trapped in trees, dwarves those trapped in stone, etc. Thus, they are able to produce fertile hybrid children and thus resulted in the many different varieties that now exist. The demihumans races commonly known are those which share the most human (mortal) blood and hence the most human-like psychology.
Thoughts?
In the Majestic Wilderlands the One (i.e. God) created Men and Elves and sent the Lords to teach them. Yes very Tolkienesque and deliberately so. Eventually a faction arose that advocated what they believe was a better plan for creation. They decided to say to hell with and decided to impose it on everybody else. This faction became known as the demons.
Among other things they did they took the race of man and mutated dozens of new races in a desire to create the perfect servitor race. (Dwarves, gnomes, halflngs, orcs, goblins, lizardmen, minotaurs, centaurs, etc, etc). Eventually the demons were overthrown and imprisoned in the Abyss. The Lords became gods when they decided the best way to teach was through faith and religions, and the survivors were left to find their own destiny as the different sentient races we find in D&D.
One afternoon, back in the 80s, I went through the MM, FF, and MMII and listed all the sentient culture forming races , filled up most of a letter size page. There a lot! So I eventually I came up an explanation of how it came about.
The Elves are deliberately omitted because they had a different nature than Man. Elves were an immortal unchanging part of the Wilderlands. They could be killed but at some point their body would reformed and they would resurrected. It took a while for this to happen and the more powerful the elf the longer it appears to take. Some Elven rulers that were killed at the dawn of history still haven't resurrected yet. While Elves that lived only a century often reappeared within a decade.
And yes I am well aware that this is barely modified from the Tolkien original. I am a fan of the Silmarillion and this is one of its aspect I used in my campaign.
I did something similar, as I thought that most of the humanoid races should be "human".
First came the ur-Adan, formed and ensouled by the Ancient of Days. The Ancient's command- "Create, Grow, Build, Change, Ruin. But Never Destroy."
Those that became the Adan (human) we adopted by the Patron of Spring, Midwife of the Inundation. They are the most varied and best at enduring change.
Those that became Umbarim (dwarven) were adopted by the Patron of Stone, Mother of Mountains. They are the strongest and always wear an item of stone.
Those that became Henggrin (halflings) were adopted by the Patron of Sea, Keeper of Secrets. They hide on their islands, and have since their Patron was lost in the Strife.
Those that became Glaetyri (elves) were adopted by the Patron of Summer, the Far-Sighted. Seeing the strife to come, He hid the Glaetyri so that they would be strong when the others were broken.
Lastly, the Yarcha (orcs) who were not formed or shaped by the Ancient of Days or the Seven Patrons, but rather by the hand of the Adan. Souless, rapacious, hungering to fill a void within them that they cannot understand.
* * * *
Items crafted by the Adan, Umbarim, and Henggrin can be used pretty interchangeably. Glaetyri items are not understood by other races, and act chaotically if used. Yarcha items can be used by the Adan, but are uniformally violent. Only the first three are available for PCs, although there are some who have a Glaetyri bloodline.
I also don't use "half-" races, although bloodlines are a possibility. The difference for me is your character can look like however you want but these are the available lists of racial bonuses, penalties, and quirks. Pick one.
Quote from: BoxCrayonTales;946186Thoughts?
Humans tell one story. Elves another. Dwarves another still. Orcs and goblinoids yet another.
Who's right?
I don't fucking care.
Eh, I've got a big sticky in the Design and Development sub-forum where I lay out a fantasy world where an Ur-race created most of the known fantasy races as slaves of one sort or another, then... in the big secret of the setting (or not), the Elves and Orcs interbred (not all of them, obviously) and created the Humans while under siege from one of the few races not linked to that Ur-race (the Titans, in the setting). It was a big deal around here an eon ago in internet time.
Dwelflings, the UR-demihumans.
Short, thin, broad shouldered, pointy ears, beards, live in rocky hills in the forest, like throwing axes...
Quote from: Ashakyre;946214Dwelflings, the UR-demihumans.
Short, thin, broad shouldered, pointy ears, beards, live in rocky hills in the forest, like throwing axes...
Are they on a hunt for a Dark Crystal perhaps?
In D&D and any setting where theres cross compatibility I just assume that either A: the races are all variants of some original progenitor species that over time split off into variations where one or more mutations became ingrained into the branches as a whole due to nature. Or B, magic and/or gods did it.
Similar to how in the real world there are towns where everyone has six(or more) fingers and toes instead of 5 since it is an autosomal dominant mutation. Or where my dads family hailed from in Europe where apparently everyone was under 5ft(1.5m) tall.
But you can make of it whatever you want. Like maybee there are no half-elves or half-orcs. Or maybee theres half-dwarves and half-half-lings and half-kobolds and... you get the idea.
Thunder Rift had the idea of a dwarf-elf hybrid. Another one from Polyhedron had half-Kobolds.
Quote from: Spike;946209Eh, I've got a big sticky in the Design and Development sub-forum where I lay out a fantasy world where an Ur-race created most of the known fantasy races as slaves of one sort or another, then... in the big secret of the setting (or not), the Elves and Orcs interbred (not all of them, obviously) and created the Humans while under siege from one of the few races not linked to that Ur-race (the Titans, in the setting). It was a big deal around here an eon ago in internet time.
Meh, pretty nonsensical, I'm with Black Vulmea on this. Sorry but stupid is stupid.
Quote from: Omega;946240In D&D and any setting where theres cross compatibility I just assume that either A: the races are all variants of some original progenitor species that over time split off into variations where one or more mutations became ingrained into the branches as a whole due to nature. Or B, magic and/or gods did it.
Similar to how in the real world there are towns where everyone has six(or more) fingers and toes instead of 5 since it is an autosomal dominant mutation. Or where my dads family hailed from in Europe where apparently everyone was under 5ft(1.5m) tall.
But you can make of it whatever you want. Like maybee there are no half-elves or half-orcs. Or maybee theres half-dwarves and half-half-lings and half-kobolds and... you get the idea.
Thunder Rift had the idea of a dwarf-elf hybrid. Another one from Polyhedron had half-Kobolds.
So your version of elves is Shadowrun with hatred of actual elves? Cool. Elves are supposed to be taller, prettier, faster, longer lived, more intelligent then us. Yet dying as a race because God doesn't like a race that actually could question why he's an asshat. Cool, it matches my view of the asshole perfectly and I worship him IRL full on no pass go.
It's why I play Elf Cat Shamans in Shadowrun. If you're going to be an asshole at least have a believable reason. Yours isn't.
Quote from: Marleycat;946245So your version of elves is Shadowrun with hatred of actual elves? Cool. Elves are supposed to be taller, prettier, faster, longer lived, more intelligent then us. Yet dying as a race because God doesn't like a race that actually could question why he's an asshat. Cool, it matches my view of the asshole perfectly and I worship him IRL full on no pass go.
It's why I play Elf Cat Shamans in Shadowrun. If you're going to be an asshole at least have a believable reason. Yours isn't.
While running the 5e campaign I was playing up a faction of elves who think themselves better than other races and would like to kick the humans and other "lesser" races off the continent. Half-elves are looked on as little different from half-orcs (and are viewed as human). While not as big as the elf kingdom over the mountains. They are steadily driving out of the forests the goblin and human settlements. "Retaking what was theirs" Or so they claim. Meanwhile the gnomes are trying to drive out the halflings from the hills and expand their territory further south and also encroach into the human lands.
On the other hand the campaign Im in with Jan and Kefra has no hybrids. Half-orcs are just called orcs as they breed true with humans. And Half-elves are treated as a variant human race for the same reason. One of the players from one of the tandem groups is one of those and from his account theres some contention over the fact elves dont breed true with humans but orcs do.
Whereas in BX when I GMed there werent any hybrids.
Quote from: Spike;946221Are they on a hunt for a Dark Crystal perhaps?
I liked that movie...
I once created a setting in which Orks are male-only human-Demon halfbreeds, Elves were in fact half Fae creatures, and Dwarves were humans, ancient clans that were magically twisted into mining creatures. Like most settings I created, it didn't go anywhere this one.
Quote from: Marleycat;946243Meh, pretty nonsensical, I'm with Black Vulmea on this. Sorry but stupid is stupid.
Would you care to elaborate or are you dismissing with a mere word?
Quote from: Marleycat;946243Meh, pretty nonsensical, I'm with Black Vulmea on this. Sorry but stupid is stupid.
I agree, except for Dark Sun's hilarious cannibal haflings who are secretly the world's Master Race. Class A gonzo shit.
Quote from: Christopher Brady;946272I liked that movie...
I once created a setting in which Orks are male-only human-Demon halfbreeds, Elves were in fact half Fae creatures, and Dwarves were humans, ancient clans that were magically twisted into mining creatures. Like most settings I created, it didn't go anywhere this one.
I would have LOVED a Dark Crystal RPG as a kid. There was a pretty good ultra-primitive computer game. Stafford would have done a great job with the setting.
Quote from: Marleycat;946243. . . I'm with Black Vulmea on this. Sorry but stupid is stupid.
It's not so much that it's stupid, mmmmmmCat, so much as it's the kind of detail which adds nothing to playing the campaign. It reminds me of the shit that asshole Silverlion posts, which means it's time to trot out my reply to him again.
Quote from: Black Vulmea;720787I think the problem is you ask for feedback and when it's not what you expect you believe others are at fault.
Want an example of what I'm talking about? Read the bill of fare for the Inn of the Welcome Wench in The Village of Hommlet. If I start my campaign with nothing but the village of Hommlet, I know that there's a place called Keoland which exports reasonably priced brandy and wine. That could mean the quality is merely middling, or it's simply closer and therefore less expensive to ship - most likely it's some combination of the two. I get a sense that the vintners of Urnst enjoy some natural advantages over the Keoish, and that the two are probably trade competitors. I'm also pretty sure that Veluna is someplace special, because their wine is in demand enough to be found in a small country inn at a price few locals could ever hope to pay.
I can build a region from a wine list, a wine list that is something with which the adventurers can interact from the first time we sit down to play.
I didn't need to detail Keoland, or how it came to be called Keoland, or what it was called a thousand years before it was called Keoland, or what the terrain of Keoland was like ten thousand years before that and then a hundred thousand years before that, in order to plant the seeds - grape vines, actually - of a place called Keoland in the minds of the players.
My bullshit detector works really well, and it tells me the difference between 'stuff that matters to the players' and 'stuff that's primarily written for me.' My first order of business as referee is create stuff that matters to the players, and that means understanding what they are likely to want to do.
You know why Traveller UWPs work so well? Because they answer the questions player want to know first: can I fuel my starship? will the air kill me? can I pack heat? what kinds of gear are available?
Right now there's a not a gawdamn'd thing in your campaign notes that makes me the least bit curious about where you're going with this. If your goal is to create a campaign setting that excites the imagination, you couldn't be further from it. If you want to know how to draw me into your setting, give me The Hobbit, not the appendices to The Silmarillion.
BCT offers up more of the same
Silmarilion-lite masturbatory background detail as Silverlion does.
This came up in our campaign last weekend. Since my characters are in Dodge for a little while, we adapted the adventure "Shootout in Dodge City" from
Gunslingers: Wild West Action! to
Boot Hill. The adventure began with my characters and his npc hands questioned by the town marshal, then moments later the marshal was gunned down on the streets outside the saloon. The constable and a local judge then asked my characters to form a posse, we rode out after the malefactors, and ambushed them in their camp. The father of the killer then came after us back in Dodge City leading to a shootout in the middle of town.
I was struck by how easy it was to ambush the killers and then the father. In the case of the killers (who are called rustlers, though rustling never enters into the adventure), my posse approached out of the sunrise from the east, crept up a ridge, and had the camp under our guns before they ever knew we were there. The lookout was on a far hill and never saw us coming until a ball from Pancho's buffalo rifle killed him at a range of over a quarter-mile. Once we got back to town, I went all
Rio Bravo, circulating the story that the killer was wounded but alive in jail so I could use him as leverage with the father - try to take the jail and your son may get himself shot in the crossfire. I expected a night attack on the jail, so we strategically placed lanterns and rigged a couple of deadfalls to channel them where I wanted them. Instead the father and his gunmen rode straight up Front Street at high noon, right into the posse's kill zone. It was a turkey shoot. - in two rounds five of the gunfighters were dead, two, including the father, were wounded and unconscious and one escaped, ridin' hell-bent for leather out of Dodge.
Now we'd just come off a couple of epic battles, a gunfight between the Pinkertons and family of rustlers back in El Dorado County and my characters' fight against Comanche raiders during the cattle drive. In the former, the rustlers were former Confederate soldiers and the battle took place in an arroyo flanked by rocky hillsides - there was a rattlesnake den, mine shafts, and the ever-present threat of a flash flood. In the latter, the battle was at night, so sighting range was limited. One of my characters came as close to dying as he has since the start of the campaign, getting shot twice and taking an arrow through the shoulder, while killing seven Comanches with a knife in one hand and a pistol in the other, sneaking from one patch of brush or rock to another, shootin' and scootin' to avoid being swarmed.
After these gunfights, the
Gunslingers adventure seemed incredibly tame, and when I asked the referee about it, he said he played it straight as it was written and handed me the pages of the adventure. I shit you not, there were
three fucking pages of backstory on the feud between the marshal and the badman,
stretching all the way back to Ireland decades earlier, and just four gawddamn
paragraphs for the ultimate fight of the adventure. People paid real money for this abortion of irrelevant writing.
I refuse to use the word hate to describe anything related to as trivial a topic as roleplaying games, but masturbatory 'world-building' and illusionism get pretty fucking close.
See, I don't think you read my stuff any more than Marleycat did, but that's a blind criticism of it I can actually respect and make use of. I already know I tend to dig far too deep into the weeds of my setting building, and often at my own table I see huge amounts of my stuff being useless, while things I need to present to teh players is... not there.
My problem is that I can't just say there are reasonably priced wines from Keoland... I, as a setting builder, have to KNOW where Keoland is and all the stuff that goes into it. As a reader I can usually see when an Author has just slapped a name/fact on the table without effort, and I've see all too often what happens when they are forced to build around details that they just slapped down without thinking.
Conversely, I can see the opposite effect currently going on in Star Wars, where they've been putting monumental amounts of effort into what amounts to insane levels of foreshadowing and, functionally, world building... so much so that they can't seem to get a good story going for the very flagship movie of their own lineup.
OF course, this topic might be better explored in a seperate thread.
Quote from: Black Vulmea;946349I refuse to use the word hate to describe anything related to as trivial a topic as roleplaying games, but masturbatory 'world-building' and illusionism get pretty fucking close.
You're probably already familar with it but this seemed like a good time to link to M. John Harrison's piece on excessive 'worldbuilding' but it seems to have been taken down. It was in reference to fiction but applied nearly as well to RPGs too.
Quote from: Spike;946370See, I don't think you read my stuff any more than Marleycat did. . .
You wrote stuff?
I don't pay [strike]much[/strike] any attention to the D[esign] & D[evelopment] forum so it's nothing personal.Quote from: Spike;946370I already know I tend to dig far too deep into the weeds of my setting building, and often at my own table I see huge amounts of my stuff being useless. . .
That's a shame, but it's not really a problem so much as it's a waste of time.
Quote from: Spike;946370. . . while things I need to present to teh players is... not there.
That, however, is an absolute critical failure.
Quote from: Spike;946370My problem is that I can't just say there are reasonably priced wines from Keoland... I, as a setting builder, have to KNOW where Keoland is and all the stuff that goes into it.
You can if you change how you prep (http://black-vulmea.blogspot.com/2012/10/points-of-light-in-sea-of-lights.html).
Quote from: Spike;946370As a reader I can usually see when an Author has just slapped a name/fact on the table without effort, and I've see all too often what happens when they are forced to build around details that they just slapped down without thinking.
Yes, we've all seen the effect of that (http://www.therpgsite.com/showthread.php?35740-A-Calm-Converstation-(hopefully)-on-GM-Improv&p=936466&viewfull=1#post936466), yet the wine list example is rich with setting detail, not just names "slapped down without thinking."
Quote from: Voros;946377. . . [T]his seemed like a good time to link to M. John Harrison's piece on excessive 'worldbuilding' but it seems to have been taken down.
Your Google-fu is weak (http://web.archive.org/web/20080410181840/http://uzwi.wordpress.com/2007/01/27/very-afraid/).
Whatever you need to keep your setting coherency at the forefront of your mind when improvising content at the table! :)
Stuff like, "elves believe they actually came from trees!" is useful cosmology because it directly impacts campaign prep AND at-table improvisation. Whose dress blew everyone's mind during last century's premiere gala... unlikely as much. (But holy hell, if it did, can I get an invite at your table?! Love you, Killer GM!)
So, unless the content is somehow table playable -- for either the players or the GM -- it slips into the other delightful RPG tangential hobby, world building. And well, if you're not careful it can get into navel gazing.
For example, if I wanted racial cosmology & alignment to take a forefront in my campaign, I could take 9-point alignment, assign a race to each besides human, and say all non-human races come gradually from adhering to X alignment while proximity to Y condition (near magic/mana sources, away from human civilization, using metal, etc.). After too much exposure the transformed human eventually leaves for company of its new kind forever, trapped and breeding more inflexible, warped mutants. Now players must engage this new cosmology (& alignment) of my setting in order to play in my campaign, because it is built into their day-to-day concerns. (If they still don't want to, knowing that such setting conceits will effect their PC regardless their opinion, good to know, get off my table, you are wasting both our time, go have fun elsewhere.)
Quote from: Black Vulmea;946452You wrote stuff?
I don't pay [strike]much[/strike] any attention to the D[esign] & D[evelopment] forum so it's nothing personal.
I referenced it in my first post in the thread. Its not a terribly big deal, and I do get a bit embarrassed to keep flogging it, seeing as its a project from.... what full decade ago now?
QuoteThat's a shame, but it's not really a problem so much as it's a waste of time.
That, however, is an absolute critical failure.
Eh, this is why I suggested a separate thread, since we've sort of moved away from demihumans into the process of building backgrounds. The very first session I ran in that setting had my players leaving the major city I'd set up, with a modestly complex backstory to join a pepper caravan that they stumbled across in the marketplace, because it looked so very colorful. If I hadn't worked out those particular details of international trade in my exploration of the weeds... or for that matter the cultures that lay along the major river that they traveled for must of the journey... the campaign might not have gone nearly so well. First and only travelogue campaign I think I've ever run.
QuoteYou can if you change how you prep (http://black-vulmea.blogspot.com/2012/10/points-of-light-in-sea-of-lights.html).
Prep is weird for me. Building, or learning in rare cases, a setting so I can riff and improvise pretty much IS my prep work. I have never, not since the bad old days of learning the ropes, given players a singular quest they must perform 'for the sake of the world!', so a lot of my learning to GM was learning how to lay out possibilities for players without limiting them. Put me in a situation, a setting, as a player with no quest and I'm in hog heaven. I'll create the adventure all on my own, and I give my players the same opportunities... but again: I had to learn how to give them quest like options so they could get started, as it turns out most people aren't like me, and won't... maybe can't... leap into a setting and situation and just start DOING.
QuoteYes, we've all seen the effect of that (http://www.therpgsite.com/showthread.php?35740-A-Calm-Converstation-(hopefully)-on-GM-Improv&p=936466&viewfull=1#post936466), yet the wine list example is rich with setting detail, not just names "slapped down without thinking."
Maybe. I doubt any of the places named in the wine list (Seriously: Sometimes i feel like the only gamer never to have played or ran Homlet) were well detailed, they were just names given to wines. That can work, especially if the guy expanding the setting remembers that he named some wines, and keeps that in mind when he details the setting, but if he doesn't you later find out that Keoland is a desert country that has a religious sect that abhors alcohol and only exports giant-scorpion carapaces or some such. Or its on a dark and mysterious continent that no one from 'setting continent' even knows exists, much less has trade with... and sure, the existance of said wine could be used humorously to spin a wild tale of mysterious mystic wine merchants... it's most likely to just be one of those 'oops moments' that so often crops up when settings expand after they've been written/published.
Hardly the worst, admittedly. That's a minor goof that not even super-diehard geeks would normally catch.
I think sometimes its good to establish early on in a campaign wether or not cross compatibility with races exists or not. Not necessarily the WHY. But that it exists in the campaign and any known ones.
Example: Half orcs are well know in the area. But no one local has ever seen or heard of a Half elf. And no ones even aware that Stout Halflings are descended from halfling/dwarf pairings while Tallfellow Halflings are from some halfling/elf union in the past.
Quote from: Opaopajr;946467So, unless the content is somehow table playable -- for either the players or the GM -- it slips into the other delightful RPG tangential hobby, world building. And well, if you're not careful it can get into navel gazing.
I'm always going around with myself about such things. Writing classes and animation classes and graphic novel classes all stressed worldbuilding to some extent... long lists of details to consider that will make your creation 'live'. But most of the time it feels more like sucking the life out of the thing... leaving a dull grey husk.
Same as a reader/player. Give me small bits of information and I'll fill in the blanks with questions and imaginings... but spell it all out for me and my mind will wander somewhere, anywhere, else.
I've got half a dozen explanations of 'goblins' in my fantasy settings (the ones that have them) and I try to keep them all equally true/false. Same for how magic works and who/what the 'gods' are.
My world is based on Earth.
Humans = cro magnons. Orcs = Neanderthals, Elves = Homo Erectus (or rather, a more evolved form of them). Since they are all on the same branch, so tp speak, they are all compatible with each other
OTOH, goblins are like evolved versions of Chimps, Hobgoblins are Gorillas, Bugbears Orangutangs. So they aren't compatible, being on different branches.
(The trouble with gods creating humans and elves and dwarves and so forth is that they really probably wouldn't. At best they'd create a base form and have it adapt and evolve. But you'd have to be a very silly god to create a human, much less a dwarf or gnome)
Quote from: Simlasa;946523I'm always going around with myself about such things. Writing classes and animation classes and graphic novel classes all stressed worldbuilding to some extent... long lists of details to consider that will make your creation 'live'. But most of the time it feels more like sucking the life out of the thing... leaving a dull grey husk.
Same as a reader/player. Give me small bits of information and I'll fill in the blanks with questions and imaginings... but spell it all out for me and my mind will wander somewhere, anywhere, else.
I've got half a dozen explanations of 'goblins' in my fantasy settings (the ones that have them) and I try to keep them all equally true/false. Same for how magic works and who/what the 'gods' are.
There's something to be said for mystery, isn't there? Well, it's what inspired humans for generations to go, "what's over there?", "how does that work?", "why does it do that?", & "where did it come from?" There is a reason for that grey pablum distaste -- it has no appliable reference in reality.
Even in world building, I think Logical Unifying Theory Uber Alles is the wrong approach. Nothing's that "logical" and devoid of mystery, especially our only reference point Planet Earth & Sol System. Abstract models presuming omniscience is the proper tone, but rarely the proper structure. The world's too big for comprehension, let alone "perfectly logical & objective consistency."
I like to think of such world-divorced pursuits as a sterile pipe dream. Things need to be messier, like life.
Quote from: Black Vulmea;946452Your Google-fu is weak (http://web.archive.org/web/20080410181840/http://uzwi.wordpress.com/2007/01/27/very-afraid/).
Thanks. I always liked the Elvish mythology in The Complete Book of Elves and the GAZ for Shadow Elves. Course nerds get mad about the OP kits in the Complete but that's their own fault for not having the spine to just exclude something if they find it OP.
Quote from: Spike;946511I doubt any of the places named in the wine list (Seriously: Sometimes i feel like the only gamer never to have played or ran Homlet) were well detailed, they were just names given to wines. That can work, especially if the guy expanding the setting remembers that he named some wines, and keeps that in mind when he details the setting, but if he doesn't you later find out that Keoland is a desert country that has a religious sect that abhors alcohol and only exports giant-scorpion carapaces or some such. Or its on a dark and mysterious continent that no one from 'setting continent' even knows exists, much less has trade with...
This wine list is actually a bad example as Keoland, Veluna, and Urnst are countries that are detailed in the World of Greyhawk Folio, published 1980, one year after The Village of Hommlet. Both products were written by Gary Gygax. We can assume that Gary had the details of his long-played campaign setting firmly in his head when he wrote Hommlet for publication.
So this could be an example
for excessive world building that turned out so well that Gary was able to give setting info via a wine list - info that a casual DM might be oblivious to but a Killer DM could use to great effect.
That said, I am more on Vulmea's side in this argument. Give me
playable info, no backstory that doesn't help me bringing the setting to life or that players will never be able to learn.
Off topic still. But I think setting info can be useful to a DM for getting a feel of an area. Even if its never used. It might spark ideas.
But excessive setting info can end up with anything interesting lost in the sea of data. Kingdom or area histories can be useful too in the same way. Especially in fantasy settings where events of the past can very easily trigger events in the present in some way. Ancient rivalries reach a boiling point. Whatever brought a kingdom to ruin has re-awoken. etc.
Back on topic. The Dwarven+Elven union in Thunder Rift example noted previously. The killers were never brought to justice. And elves and dwarves have long lifespans.
Quote from: Omega;946588Off topic still. But I think setting info can be useful to a DM for getting a feel of an area. Even if its never used. It might spark ideas.
My view is that for the referee if the detail develops the motivations and personalities of NPCs then it useful at the table. Note motivations and personalities, setting detail work better if it shown through how NPCs act not telling in a big o' infodump.
But like all such advice sometimes the infodump is what needed. However in my experiences that is few and far between.
Where i strongly disagree with Black Vulmea and others is that setting detail is always bad. I believe the general issue is that RPG authors don't do enough to show how does a particular detail impact play.
Historical context and world detail doesn't matter.
Horseshit.
Anything that can provide insight into someone's motivation matters. If you don't know your enemy's WHY, you're just flailing in the dark.
I don't think their argument is so stark. It's not a binary on/off issue of playability. It's more an issue of degree, of distance & pertinence. Again, back to my "last century's 'belle of the ball' ball gown," it's only as pertinent as it relates to the PCs' everyday today. Otherwise it might as well be extraneous.
Quote from: Opaopajr;946722I don't think their argument is so stark. It's not a binary on/off issue of playability. It's more an issue of degree, of distance & pertinence.
The example that springs to mind was our old Earthdawn GM. He LOVED that setting, was a walking encyclopedia of its history and trivia. That knowledge was behind a lot of the stuff he threw at us and the game was better for it... BUT, he also knew there was other fabulous stuff in every corner of the map... and had the campaign pushing to visit as much of it as we could. So when the setting info served the game, it was great... but when it became a travelogue of Barsaive, it kind of sucked. When he'd let us discover, or not, the reasons behind what was going on in-game... good... but when he'd get frustrated and give us long lectures, with maps, of what it all meant... bad.
We could tell that the evil nethermancer had reasons for what he did, but the GM needed to be OK with us not caring what they were and just wanting to beat him to death for being such a dick.
So I don't think it's 'wrong' to have that level of detail, but it seems to make people to want to use it all, show off their work/knowledge... and that's when it gets dull.
Which is why I started my defense of my original post on this topic by pointing out that marleycat had called my setting stupid sight unseen. The history of demihumans in my setting is a very small part of a lot (a metric fuckton. I measured them on an industrial scale) of words on the topic. I don't mind if people think my work is stupid and/or bad, but I do object to blithe characterizations from ignorance.
That's an excellent example, Simlasa. It shows the difference from natural vs. forced pertinence, and likely why this can trigger 'bad GM habits' flashbacks (I really wish trigger was not such a laden word...). Background material revealed in regular play feels better to player agency than forced guided tours.
It's also possible to put background material in the forefront, like unavoidable play mechanics, such as in my 9-point alignment as race mutation example.
But either way it's also useful to consider how such material is pertinent for GMs at the table as well.
Quote from: Opaopajr;946467Whatever you need to keep your setting coherency at the forefront of your mind when improvising content at the table! :)
And this is where I see Spike and many creative others come in. Spike reminds me of Aos in how they approach creativity -- it's a different structured approach than mine, and seemingly more loose and
inspired! than I can do. The results are fantastic, in my view! But it definitely seems like from an art-student-like creative brain, where the meandering and circuitousness is crucial to get to the campaign juicy morsels.
It may take me more reading, (or in the case of Aos, artwork,) to get to content I as a GM may want to separate for my campaign. But the content ends up being more of a buffet than a prix fixe, which is great for future divergent campaigns. However, you have to
invest in exploring, analyzing, & re-synthesizing their content to your table needs. Not everyone's so interested in such investment, let alone interested in setting divergence.
That's why, since we all come to aesthetic challenges with our favored approaches, I am perfectly OK with whatever floats someone's creativity boat -- as long as it doesn't get too lost up its own navel. It's not for everyone, especially a lot of the "enough talk! let's play!" style. But one-size doesn't fit all when it comes to creativity and campaign organization.
I go with genetics.
Like horses and mules. If humans and elves can breed their offspring is infertile, like a mule. Same if humans and orcs can breed. But if humans can breed with both orcs and elves, does that mean elves and orcs can breed? IF so what do you get.
In general I really, really despise the half-this half-that mentality and does violence to internal setting consistency, genetics, and smacks of whining munchkinism of the highest order. You get much more flavor from respecting genetics and just making up a new species if a payer just must have all the benefits.
Quote from: Opaopajr;946758And this is where I see Spike and many creative others come in. Spike reminds me of Aos in how they approach creativity -- it's a different structured approach than mine, and seemingly more loose and inspired! than I can do. The results are fantastic, in my view! But it definitely seems like from an art-student-like creative brain, where the meandering and circuitousness is crucial to get to the campaign juicy morsels.
.
I'm not sure how to take that... I've always thought of myself having more of an engineering sort of mind, wanting to know how everything works, what are the underpinnings, how does x create/connect with y.
Presentation? Sure... I'm damned loose in my presentation, but... wow.
Self conception = Mind, Blown!
Quote from: Spike;946783I'm not sure how to take that... I've always thought of myself having more of an engineering sort of mind, wanting to know how everything works, what are the underpinnings, how does x create/connect with y.
Presentation? Sure... I'm damned loose in my presentation, but... wow.
Self conception = Mind, Blown!
:p Well, impressions are based on presentations and all that. :p I most likely am wrong in my assessment -- your design behind the scenes is probably highly analytical -- but I can only work with what I can openly see. ;) So you're an engineer that expresses like an art student! :D
Yeh. Its probably just as well I gave up on trying to earn that degree. I'd make some awesome bridges, but no one would let me get past the blueprint stage!
Quote from: Opaopajr;946550There's something to be said for mystery, isn't there? Well, it's what inspired humans for generations to go, "what's over there?", "how does that work?", "why does it do that?", & "where did it come from?" There is a reason for that grey pablum distaste -- it has no appliable reference in reality.
Even in world building, I think Logical Unifying Theory Uber Alles is the wrong approach. Nothing's that "logical" and devoid of mystery, especially our only reference point Planet Earth & Sol System. Abstract models presuming omniscience is the proper tone, but rarely the proper structure. The world's too big for comprehension, let alone "perfectly logical & objective consistency."
I like to think of such world-divorced pursuits as a sterile pipe dream. Things need to be messier, like life.
I like using multiple explanations. Every living thing is essentially a form and multiple paths lead to the same forms: spontaneous generation, deliberate engineering, magical thinking, etc. (I use Stormbringer and Runequest's Chaos as one of the foundations of reality. It makes anything possible, even the contradictory.)
Orcs could arise from a multitude of sources: corrupted elves, uplifted vermin, conflict incarnate, plants, mutation, etc. Regardless of their origin they would all be orky. Humans could have evolved from elves or dwarves independently and multiple times, or vice versa, and all these humans would be the same.
This allows more diverse world building and keeps players on their toes. If they are accustomed to orcs being conflict incarnate coming down from the mountains, having a band of orcs show up born from plants is a great way to keep things fresh without needing to add whole new monsters.
Quote from: Opaopajr;946722I don't think their argument is so stark. It's not a binary on/off issue of playability. It's more an issue of degree, of distance & pertinence. Again, back to my "last century's 'belle of the ball' ball gown," it's only as pertinent as it relates to the PCs' everyday today. Otherwise it might as well be extraneous.
The volumes devoted to setting details for Forgotten Realms, Earthdawn, Tekumel, Harn, Golorantha, all boil down to two basic things for a tabletop RPG campaign.
What do locales look like?
How do NPCs act as individuals and as a group?
If isn't clear how a particular set of setting detail relates to either one of those two then it is cruft in regards to a tabletop roleplaying campaign. My experience the problem with cruft isn't that totally useless that it needs to be reorganized to make more useful as an aid to tabletop roleplaying and less of a story that tries to be entertaining.
In that respect it is binary. What isn't binary is whether the players will actually find it interesting or not. What I found is that if I focus more using the stuff I write as a basis for defining how NPCs act then the players who don't give two shits about it work out just fine. For the players who do find the detail interesting they wind up seeing the interconnections and get a kick from figuring something out about the Majestic Wilderlands.
I agree that most settings material should focus on locales, NPCs and their relationship to each other and the PCs (intrigue, associations and secret societies, plots and counterplots, etc).
Quote from: Dirk Remmecke;946570This wine list is actually a bad example as Keoland, Veluna, and Urnst are countries that are detailed in the World of Greyhawk Folio, published 1980, one year after The Village of Hommlet.
While Spike never ran
The Village of Hommlet, I never owned the Greyhawk folio, so to me the wine list was a whole and complete piece of setting material.
Quote from: Dirk Remmecke;946570Give me playable info, no backstory that doesn't help me bringing the setting to life or that players will never be able to learn.
Quote from: estar;946604Where i strongly disagree with Black Vulmea and others is that setting detail is always bad..
One of these two posters has a fucking clue.
The other is estar.
Quote from: CRKrueger;946637Anything that can provide insight into someone's motivation matters. If you don't know your enemy's WHY, you're just flailing in the dark.
Knowing your friend's WHY may be even more important, but in either case, developing the WHY in "Shootout at Dodge City" didn't require anything like three page of useless backstory to a feud that could be summed up in a sentence: rancher Charlie Reed wanted Shannon Washington but she married Marshal Tom MacSween instead and bad blood festered for years.
Quote from: Opaopajr;946722It's not a binary on/off issue of playability. It's more an issue of degree, of distance & pertinence. Again, back to my "last century's 'belle of the ball' ball gown," it's only as pertinent as it relates to the PCs' everyday today. Otherwise it might as well be extraneous.
The wine list or the UWP manages to introduce setting detail while being directly pertinent to actual play, so yeah, I do think playability should come first.
Quote from: Opaopajr;946550There's something to be said for mystery, isn't there?
Ambiguity is your friend, which goes back to my original example in this thread: humans, elves, dwarves, orcs, goblinoids, lizardfolk, dragons all have their creation stories. Which one is 'objectively' right? It doesn't matter one fucking whit the vast majority of the time unless it is forced in, usually by referees trying to show off how fucking 'clever' or 'edgy' they are. In my experience, shit like the OP is autofellation, and no one should have to sit through that spectacle just to play a game.
Quote from: Black Vulmea;946885Knowing your friend's WHY may be even more important, but in either case, developing the WHY in "Shootout at Dodge City" didn't require anything like three page of useless backstory to a feud that could be summed up in a sentence: rancher Charlie Reed wanted Shannon Washington but she married Marshal Tom MacSween instead and bad blood festered for years.
True, it didn't have to be 3 pages, but it should have been there, and depending on what happened in those years, peaceful resolution could be possible or not, "beat someone up" vs. "kill on sight" can be determined, etc.
I'm not saying they didn't over do it, they did, but "They overdid the backstory" becomes "there is no need for any backstory", which is as useless as too much. Especially when not everyone's definition of "too much" is exactly the same.
Quote from: Black Vulmea;946885Ambiguity is your friend, which goes back to my original example in this thread: humans, elves, dwarves, orcs, goblinoids, lizardfolk, dragons all have their creation stories. Which one is 'objectively' right? It doesn't matter one fucking whit the vast majority of the time unless it is forced in, usually by referees trying to show off how fucking 'clever' or 'edgy' they are. In my experience, shit like the OP is autofellation, and no one should have to sit through that spectacle just to play a game.
An alternative approach to have an discoverable objective truth however just informs doesn't solve the current issues. In the Majestic Wilderlands the demons created the various non-human races except for elves which were co-created with man. That knowledge does little when it comes from the PCs dealing with the fallout of human bandits who raided an isolated dwarven mine. Or the PCs are lords of a border realm and trying to figure out how to handle a crisis between two much larger kingdom.
The effects of what the demons did is "baked in" into the description and mechanics of each race.
Where it could (and had) come up is to engineering a crisis of faith by a demon trying to tempt a mortal. Happened once back in the 90s where the player of dwarven character was rocked back on his heel for a moment when a demon told him that his race was created by demon. But ultimately amounted to nothing. It is a very specific weapon for a very specific set of circumstance which doesn't come up often.
The overall problem isn't that people write too much setting detail, is that they are not taught good ways of tying that detail to what they do at the table. The level of detail is purely a preference issue. Sure the average is more towards the less detail side but that doesn't do shit for predicting what your table likes. The best rule is to pay attention and learn your players preferences.
In Dark Albion, it's strongly suggested that humanity were originally genetically engineered by the Elves, as worker-slaves. When the elves fell into a profoundly decadent period, some of them started using humans as sex-slaves. The offspring, having elvish blood, were able to use magic, and eventually became numerous and powerful enough to overthrow the Elves and kick them out of this reality.
Most humans alive today probably have some tiny amount of elvish blood, and that might be why humans are able to become Magisters and use magic at all; but the Cymri (and some other ethnic groups found on the Continent) have a stronger strain of Elvish blood, which is why they have a "sixth sense" and so many of them are able to easily learn magic with less formal training than Anglish magisters.
My upcoming Medieval Authentic OSR Rules (which will probably be called "Lion & Dragon", based on the recent title poll I held on my blog) will keep this as part of the implicit setting.
In Arrowflight (http://despotmedia.com/deep7/?p=106), Elves are the children of a goddess. Dwarves are the children of the same goddess, albeit via her rape at the hands of a mountain god.
Humans are weird, suspected of being either Elf/Dwarf or Elf/Demon hybrids, possessing resistance to both magic and mental trauma, and having a great capacity for both Law and Chaos.
I have that game. I rather like the look of it, though the setting building struck me as wildly offtrack for reasons I can't recall. Could never get my players to give it a spin.
The cross-breeding thing makes me think about how races are represented. Nearly all fantasy games that have such races don't mechanically allow characters that are interbred except as a single specific exception - normally half-elf. You can't have a character who is half-dwarf, half-elf; or one-quarter dwarf, one-quarter human, and half gnome.
Point systems like GURPS and Hero in principle might allow for a spectrum of features, but even then, the fantasy games tend to say that races are all-or-nothing fixed packages. i.e. In Fantasy Hero, you can either take the elf package or the dwarf package - but it's not expected to mix-and-match, even though the underlying system allows for it.
In ZWEIHÄNDER Grim & Perilous RPG, all races share the same 'ancestry' in the artwork, but not the writing. Without an implied setting, we took this approach to bridge the real world to the 'in-game' world. Instead of relying on traditional RPG stereotypes, we portray a multi-cultural hodgepodge of RPG fans as the races.
We literally posted about this today on Kickstarter: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/grimandperilous/zweihander-grim-and-perilous-rpg/posts/1820798
Quote from: jhkim;948490The cross-breeding thing makes me think about how races are represented. Nearly all fantasy games that have such races don't mechanically allow characters that are interbred except as a single specific exception - normally half-elf. You can't have a character who is half-dwarf, half-elf; or one-quarter dwarf, one-quarter human, and half gnome.
AD&D has halfling/dwarves and Halfling/elves in the PHB. But they apparently arent direct like apparently all PC half-elves are.
And this is something AD&D never seemed to explore. Half-elves and half-orcs as a stable race. I do not recall any 2nd gen half-elves or half-orcs? They all were direct offspring.
Quote from: Omega;948833AD&D has halfling/dwarves and Halfling/elves in the PHB. But they apparently arent direct like apparently all PC half-elves are.
And this is something AD&D never seemed to explore. Half-elves and half-orcs as a stable race. I do not recall any 2nd gen half-elves or half-orcs? They all were direct offspring.
Half-elves and Half-orcs are a reference to Lord of the Rings. Half-orcs were created by Saurman in his quest to breed a better orc. Half elves are the descendants of Beren and Luthien, Tuor and Idril. Among them include Elrond, Arwen, and to a lesser extend Aragon (the line of Numenorian kings are descended from Elros, Elrond's brother).
Hence why they been "stable" races as that how they are presented in Tolkien. Just as the OD&D/AD&D ranger class was a thin veneer of Aragon and the Dunedain.
Quote from: estar;948883Half-elves and Half-orcs are a reference to Lord of the Rings. Half-orcs were created by Saurman in his quest to breed a better orc. Half elves are the descendants of Beren and Luthien, Tuor and Idril. Among them include Elrond, Arwen, and to a lesser extend Aragon (the line of Numenorian kings are descended from Elros, Elrond's brother).
Hence why they been "stable" races as that how they are presented in Tolkien. Just as the OD&D/AD&D ranger class was a thin veneer of Aragon and the Dunedain.
Well, there are some D&D settings that state that Half-Elves breed true, as in pairing of them. I remember something about that in 2e, but I may be incorrect there, however, in Eberron that is the case. Same with Half-Orcs. However, apparently, there's no such thing as 3/4s of one race or another.
Quote from: Christopher Brady;948987Well, there are some D&D settings that state that Half-Elves breed true, as in pairing of them. I remember something about that in 2e, but I may be incorrect there, however, in Eberron that is the case. Same with Half-Orcs. However, apparently, there's no such thing as 3/4s of one race or another.
Right. By 2e there was some material scattered about allowing for the "half" races to breed true. 2e though went nuts with the "half" races. Half-ogres, half-dwarves(Mul?) and half-dragons come to mind. Then theres the Tieflings, Aasimar and Genasi from Planescape.
BX on the other hand didnt have any half-races. But BECMI did eventually.
Quote from: Christopher Brady;948987Well, there are some D&D settings that state that Half-Elves breed true, as in pairing of them. I remember something about that in 2e, but I may be incorrect there, however, in Eberron that is the case. Same with Half-Orcs. However, apparently, there's no such thing as 3/4s of one race or another.
I think there was a dragon article or two that talked about this. But the main issue is the fiddliness of trying to track genetic cross breeds. It was far easier to say 3/4 is a full elf with a human ancestor, and 1/4 was a human with some elvish physical traits.
As for the original source material, what distinguished the half-elves what the ability for their descendants to choose to be considered as an elf or a human. If they choose to be human they got to live longer and healthier lives that was passed on to their children. There was a spiritual component as well. The further they drifted away from Eru and the Valar the less they benefited from the virtues of their ancestry.
Obviously after their dealing with Tolkien Enterprises/Estate Gygax and TSR couldn't emphasize this at all so it just sat there and people tried to fill the gap with ideas taken from genetics.
Quote from: Christopher Brady;948987Well, there are some D&D settings that state that Half-Elves breed true, as in pairing of them. I remember something about that in 2e, but I may be incorrect there, however, in Eberron that is the case. Same with Half-Orcs. However, apparently, there's no such thing as 3/4s of one race or another.
Quote from: estar;949555I think there was a dragon article or two that talked about this. But the main issue is the fiddliness of trying to track genetic cross breeds. It was far easier to say 3/4 is a full elf with a human ancestor, and 1/4 was a human with some elvish physical traits.
A few general comments:
1) D&D was indeed emulating Tolkien, but it's not like interbreeding is unique to Tolkien. It is extremely common in myth and fantasy for elves, dwarves, giants, titans, gods, demons, monsters, and others to interbreed.
2) Having two defined half-races (elf/human and orc/human) was clearly a nod to Tolkien, but a very limited one that doesn't even cover the main characters such as Aragorn - whose fractional elvish ancestry is clearly very significant in the books.
3) The simplest approach to interbreeding is to allow racial characteristics to be chosen to match the character's breeding, rather than having static packages for all possible combinations. It has a lot of parallels to class-based vs. skill-based design for profession/training. This could be easy, say, in Fantasy Hero, GURPS, or other broad point-based systems (FATE, etc.). There's nothing wrong with fixed race packages - but if one wants to have a setting where different fantasy races breed true (which is the topic from the OP), then this seems like the best way.
4) In D&D, this would obviously take changing the rules. The result would probably be something more like a point system. There have been a few of these for D&D, like those to allow playing arbitrary monsters, for example.
In Dark Albion, humans were created by elves, possibly genetically/magically engineered from more basic primates. During the period of decadence of the late Elven civilization, they interbred with their human slaves, and thus the Cymri (the folk) who were born from those unions could use magic to overthrow their creators.
There's also some kind of implication that some dragons may have assumed human forms and interbred with humans producing some royal bloodlines (like the Tudors, most notably Henry Tudor, the Prince of Dragons).
Quote from: jhkim;949568A few general comments:
1) D&D was indeed emulating Tolkien, but it's not like interbreeding is unique to Tolkien. It is extremely common in myth and fantasy for elves, dwarves, giants, titans, gods, demons, monsters, and others to interbreed.
2) Having two defined half-races (elf/human and orc/human) was clearly a nod to Tolkien, but a very limited one that doesn't even cover the main characters such as Aragorn - whose fractional elvish ancestry is clearly very significant in the books.
3) The simplest approach to interbreeding is to allow racial characteristics to be chosen to match the character's breeding, rather than having static packages for all possible combinations. It has a lot of parallels to class-based vs. skill-based design for profession/training. This could be easy, say, in Fantasy Hero, GURPS, or other broad point-based systems (FATE, etc.). There's nothing wrong with fixed race packages - but if one wants to have a setting where different fantasy races breed true (which is the topic from the OP), then this seems like the best way.
4) In D&D, this would obviously take changing the rules. The result would probably be something more like a point system. There have been a few of these for D&D, like those to allow playing arbitrary monsters, for example.
I give the player three options if they want to play a hybrid that's not in the books (half-elf, half-orc, half-ogre*):
1) If a human + demi-human/humanoid hybrid is similar to one already in the game, they can use that template. For example, a half-dryad would be a half-elf minus the pointy ears. A half-hobgoblin will simply be a taller half-orc with maybe greyish skin.
2) Hybrids of other demi-humans have to choose one parent or the other. A dwarf/halfling can either be a taller halfling with a thick beard, or a beardless dwarf with hairy feet.
3) All other human, humanoid and demi-human crossbreeds are considered human, maybe with some vestigial trait from a non-human parent. A pixie and a hill giant get it on? They give birth to a human kid.
I handle it this way for a few reasons. One, I'm not about to fabricate stats for every possible hybrid. Players can adapt an existing one, flip a coin and choose a parent for the PC to emulate, or just be a human with a couple of odd branches on the family tree. Two, as you point out, myths and fairy tales are chock full of stories where gods, giants, ogres, titans, fairies, dwarves, nymphs, dryads and other fanciful anthropoids bang away with humans and produce offspring -and in most cases that offspring is human. Even the offspring of gods and nymphs will be human after a generation or two.
I think of all these human-like beings as analogous to different types of wild or domesticated canines. There are a dozen or so types of wolves, jackals, coyotes and wild dogs. While at first they might seem very different, in fact their DNA is almost identical and they will readily interbreed with each other (and domestic dogs), producing fertile offspring. After a few generations, these mixed-breed dogs start resembling something like the dingo or pariah dog or tropical wolves, only with some signs of mingling between types. For example, in some populations of gray wolf there are some with solid black fur. This turns out to be the result of breeding with domestic dogs, as are piebald patterns that pop up in dingoes, jackals and other canids. As George Carlin used to say, this is the kind of thing I think about when I'm home alone at night during a storm and the power goes out.
In other words, all the humanoids are basically humans that have been molded by some combination of evolution, magic or selective breeding by more powerful beings.
* I added the half-ogre from Dragon Magazine.
Elves are the survivors of an ancient transhuman starfaring civilization, who would scoff at the idea that they come from human stock, and probably believe that humans are the degenerate descendants of their storied, long-dead empire.
Dwarves, once a slave-race bred to withstand the gravity, pressure, toxicity and radiation of deep-earth mining operations, are only dimly aware of their origins as thralls to the ancient elven star-empire; but aware enough to cultivate millennia of enmity.
Humans, though genetic progenitors to all of these races, tend to be seen as the young interlopers, as their own climb out of primitivism and back to civilization was longer and more difficult.
Orcs are uplifted humanoid boars bred as infantry for the elven empire. Same with Minotaurs and bulls, Gnolls and hyenas, the elves were on a big Dr. Moreau kick after their empire collapsed. Chimeras were probably just a bunch of undergrads fucking around, though.
Goblins are ancient enemies to the elves, having been the original inhabitants of Arcadia, the legendary capital and crown jewel to their star-empire. Hobgoblins and bugbears are also byproducts of elven bio-sorcerous meddling.
Quote from: Omega;948833AD&D has halfling/dwarves and Halfling/elves in the PHB.
[citation needed]
Quote from: Black Vulmea;957537[citation needed]
PHB specifically says the two types of halflings have respectively elven and dwarven blood in them meaning that halflings are getting it on with elves and dwarves. Not necessarily recently. But it is happening.
Or maybee it means halflings are all vampires and... :eek:
That would make for a fucked up setting. Stouts and Tallfellows have to drink the blood of the respective race to maintain their bonuses.
Quote from: Black Vulmea;957537[citation needed]
AD&D 1st Edition Players Handbook, p.17 (races)
Certain Halfling characters have infravision.
Those with mixed blood are assumed to have infravision which functions up to 30' distant, while those of pure
Stoutish blood are able to see heat radiation variation at up to 60' (normal infravision).
Similarly halflings of mixed type, and those of pure Stoutish blood are able to note if a passage is an up or down grade 75% (d4, 1-3) of the time, and they can determine direction 50% of the time. Note that these abilities function only when the character is concentrating on the desired information to the exclusion of all other thought and activity.
If alone (or well in advance-- 90' or more -- of a party of which does not consist entirely of halflings or elves not in metal armor) and not in metal armor, halfling characters are able to move silently.; thus if they do not have to open some form of door or other screen, they will surprise (q.v.) a monster 66 2/3% (d6, 1-4) of the time. If a door must be opened chance for surprise drops to 33 1/3% (d6, 1-2).
Note: Complete information about halflings available in the Monster Manual.
D&D 1e Monster Manual page 50.
Tallfellow: A Taller 4'+ slimmer halfling with fairer skin and hair.
Me: elf halfblood... elf... elf/halfling ...ELF ABOMINATION... etc. et. al.D&D 1e Monster Manual page 51.
Stout: this kind of Halfling is a bit smaller 3 1/2'+ and stockier than typical (hairfeet).
Me: Dwarf Halfbreed. Dwarf/Halfling... DWARF ABOMINATION... etc. et. al.My notes:
This was just one more reason I didn't adopt 1eAD&D in favor of original D&D (0D&D) and continued to favor 0D&D over the years. I found many of the subtle little changes in detail AD&D dismaying actually and didn't use any of that in my games, at all. I much preferred the Tolkien halflings even for my D&D games long after they discontinued the use of Hobbits, and had much less interracial wankery in my games. Same deal for the Belt/Helm of Sex Change and other assorted and perverted magical items that other old school GMs wanted in their games (these things were incredibly popular, and out of my starting home group of five GMs/Players, two preferred to run games with 1e AD&D perverted rules/mechanics interpretations of which examples are provided here. Invoking rule 0 GM fiat, I never included this in my D&D or AD&D(when I ran it) games.
Right. Theres a passage somewhere in there that says it more clearly I believe. But cant find it at the moment.
Quote from: GameDaddy;957564AD&D 1st Edition Players Handbook, p.17 (races) . . .
Well, I suppose that's one way to read that. Another is that it applies to Hairfoots crossed with Tallfellows or Stouts. Since there are exactly zero other references to elf-halfling or dwarf-halfling crosses, I think the latter makes far more sense.
Quote from: Black Vulmea;957756Well, I suppose that's one way to read that. Another is that it applies to Hairfoots crossed with Tallfellows or Stouts. Since there are exactly zero other references to elf-halfling or dwarf-halfling crosses, I think the latter makes far more sense.
Depends on how you read it yes. But Stouts have various dwarf-ish traits and get along with dwarves while Tallfellows have some elvish traits and hang out with elves. And D&D tends to use terms like "mixed blood" and such to refer to hybrids. Not race variants. Though of course not consistently.
But since I cant pin down the reference at the moment I cant say one way or the other. But far as I know its never come up in any module or setting book.
5e though does mention it. But Im certainly not counting that. O and BX D&D make no mention of variants at all.
I tend to prefer settings where races can't interbreed naturally. Unless it's a very silly setting, in which case absolutely everything might be able to interbreed.
Quote from: RPGPundit;958722I tend to prefer settings where races can't interbreed naturally. Unless it's a very silly setting, in which case absolutely everything might be able to interbreed.
Do you not like Middle Earth as a setting, then? Also, where does Greek myth / Lords of Olympus fall?
Quote from: jhkim;958759Do you not like Middle Earth as a setting, then? Also, where does Greek myth / Lords of Olympus fall?
In Middle-Earth, it's not natural interbreeding. Beren and Luthien both died, Luthien went to the Halls of Mandos and Mandos did something that's never happened before or since, he brought a human back to life, and something we know of only happening to Luthien and Glorfindel, he let an Elf return to Middle-Earth. He also did something never done again, made an elf mortal. After that, only the bloodline of Luthien could interbreed with humans and choose to be mortal.
I just call them all different species, they don't interbreed or even necessarily intermingle unless they have to. When I use them, which is hardly ever.
Although I must say I don't much care either way and don't speculate on the origins of elves and their ilk.
Quote from: jhkim;958759Do you not like Middle Earth as a setting, then? Also, where does Greek myth / Lords of Olympus fall?
Half-elves can be OK, I guess.
As for Lords of Olympus, greek gods can fuck just about anything and produce offspring. I wouldn't be surprised at some PC demigod having a table for a mom, or a pot of soup.
Quote from: Black Vulmea;957756Well, I suppose that's one way to read that. Another is that it applies to Hairfoots crossed with Tallfellows or Stouts. Since there are exactly zero other references to elf-halfling or dwarf-halfling crosses, I think the latter makes far more sense.
It's pretty clear they are referring to mixed blood within the halfling race. Any other reading makes zero sense.