There's been plenty of discussion here around the pros and cons of random attribute generation. Occasionally, that discussion also touched on randomizing race selection, which interests me, because all of the same pros and cons bandied about regarding attribute generation would seem to apply to race selection equally as well.

But folks seem reticent to even talk about randomizing race. And I've never heard of anyone actually doing it at their table.

* Does anyone here actually have players roll randomly for character race? If so, how's that going?

* For those of you who do prefer to roll randomly for attributes, why not also race? What's the difference for you?

TL;DR:  Randomizing race is pretty much a bridge too far.

This is one of those areas where we see the truth of the adage:  In theory, practice and theory are the same. In practice, they aren't.

In theory, race, being one of those things you can't control as it happened at birth, is prime fodder for randomization, as with anything else in the background of the character.  As part of my system being random first, then choice after (to ultimately support both), I built a random race and culture chart.  In fairness, the prime reason for doing this early was to speed up play testing, as I didn't want the players in the initial groups (some prone to analysis paralysis) to bog down at that stage.  And also because I wanted a good mix of the races to actually test them. 

There was some friendly grumbling about this early, but the players understood the reasons for it. However, when we went into the second round of play testing, it was universal that everyone was OK (while testing) to have the random ability scores, random culture, even some random background abilities--but not race.

I think part of this is because my races have some significant differences in some cases. Even though there isn't any equivalent of early D&D level limits or class restrictions, the things that are there tend to have more bite.  My elves, for instance, have real disadvantages using metal weapons, and the weapons restrictions on dwarfs and my small race do really limit options.  Whereas the class system that the character does get to pick just sets natural path for the character, without forcing them into a bucket.  Another system could have races be functionally just humans in a skin suit with no difference, in which case it's all cosmetic, and why not let the player pick, same as they would their clothes?

So it's back to the same kind of things as ability scores, where it's more tolerable to be random if you get a chance later to do something about it.  Only way I can envision that working with race is that you got a random race, but then there were some ability expansion choices later to drive the character in different directions.

That's when I kept the race/culture chart, made it optional for "main" characters but required for any other character (companions or associates--roughly equivalent to henchmen and hirelings but with more player control).  The players were fine with that.

Finally, it's also going to matter what specific races are available.  I had human, elf, dwarf, and 3 others of my own invention for the implied setting.  By far the biggest objection I got to random race is that certain players were heavily invested in trying the new stuff while others were equally invested in sticking to something that they knew.

In other systems I have played (including early D&D) we have sometimes done one-offs where race was random. However, we always had some mitigating factor.  Usually, we'd allow the players to trade once the characters were generated.  There were usually enough of a mix in interests that everyone got something tolerable that way.  I've also done it where the player generated 3 different characters then picked.  If you really wanted an elf, but that hobbit has some killer stats, you might change your mind. 

Quote from: Steven Mitchell on February 20, 2025, 02:48:49 PMThere was some friendly grumbling about this early, but the players understood the reasons for it. However, when we went into the second round of play testing, it was universal that everyone was OK (while testing) to have the random ability scores, random culture, even some random background abilities--but not race.

I think part of this is because my races have some significant differences in some cases. Even though there isn't any equivalent of early D&D level limits or class restrictions, the things that are there tend to have more bite. 

My experience is similar. Personally, I've been happy to roll for things like race and gender of my character, but most other players are not.

I feel this goes to show that most players don't want significant randomness in their characters. Random-roll is useful as a way to avoid getting slowed down by too many nitty-gritty little decisions, but players still prefer choice over the broad strokes of their character.

In more modern games, random rolls in character generation are often getting replaced by quick packages or templates to speed things up.

BTW, in my next iteration, I've got three conceptual levels of character generation:

1. Race/Culture/Class/Path picks - which is the broad strokes.

2. Then background is almost entirely random--but influenced by the race/culture picks.

3. Then you fill in the details of your class/path options.

There are two reasons for this tack:

A. It puts "the stuff you can't control" from a setting perspective in step #2, while step #1 is stuff you get to control as a player outside but approaching the setting.

B. It segregates the heavy random stuff into one area of the process, because I've found that players need some clarity there just to understand why/how it happens.

Right now, I'm part of the way there, with the random background working, but the influence from race/culture is too minimal to say it works as intended.  Essentially, what I want is when you pick your race and culture, you aren't merely setting what you get from those elements, but also determining which random tables you roll on for your background.  This gives the players some sense of control over even the random part.

The first edition of Warhammer had random race generation. It allowed it to have 50% of characters be human on average, which is an interesting way of ensuring parties are not too demihuman.

Of course, if we accept that because we don't pick our race in the real world, it should be randomised, it follows that we should do the same with sex. I'm pretty sure that wouldn't have gone down well with teenagers back in the day.

Quote from: Krazz on February 20, 2025, 04:32:03 PMOf course, if we accept that because we don't pick our race in the real world, it should be randomised, it follows that we should do the same with sex. I'm pretty sure that wouldn't have gone down well with teenagers back in the day.

It's a question of does one

a) build the game to the underlying game philosophy, and whoever likes it is the audience

or

b) build the game to match what the target audience likes

Quote from: jhkim on February 20, 2025, 04:50:57 PM

Quote from: Krazz on February 20, 2025, 04:32:03 PMOf course, if we accept that because we don't pick our race in the real world, it should be randomised, it follows that we should do the same with sex. I'm pretty sure that wouldn't have gone down well with teenagers back in the day.

It's a question of does one

a) build the game to the underlying game philosophy, and whoever likes it is the audience

or

b) build the game to match what the target audience likes

Not really, on either point.  Some people might go for random sex and not random race, and others might go the opposite--depending on the exact setting, how you do it, etc.  Of course, many will go all in or all out, but that's part of my initial point.  It's not some bright, straight line between underlying game design and setting concerns versus what the target audience likes. 

Like everything else in real life, it's messy.  To get people to buy into the underlying game design and setting, you'll need to compromise elsewhere on things that aren't critical to making that work.  And sometimes you'll have to back away on what part of the audience says they want in order to make the game meet the goals.  But it's a lot of little decisions that influence each other.

That's the difference between ivory tower design and results.

Random stats are much better than random race.  Random stats give you a guideline about your character, and may even inform your race pick.  They definitely inform your pick of class (or skill).  This gives you a mechanically constraint on your build. 

Random race locks you into a few mechanics, but it's a much more important pick, because races generally have more constrained ways in which they interact with the world.  If you're playing a game where race barely matters at all then random race seems like it's forcing a background on you without any interesting decisions being forced on you. 

As to the other discussion, where you roll for a wide variety of things, I think that's kind of interesting too.  There's definitely merit to rolling up essentially everything (you do need some kind of system to make sure that you aren't generating really rare things very often, or a large number of characters with a lot of strength but other picks that force them away from anything that benefits from it, or something that forces casters with inadequate casting stats into existence, or whatever).  But if you have a system that spits out most of a character for you, I could see being into that. 

Personally I don't even like random stats as a player.  As DM I don't have a strong preference but I won't do fully random stats unless almost all the players want that (a player who prefers point buy loses a lot more pleasure by being forced into random than a player who prefers random loses by being forced into point buy).

Quote from: Steven Mitchell on February 20, 2025, 05:03:44 PM

Quote from: jhkim on February 20, 2025, 04:50:57 PM

Quote from: Krazz on February 20, 2025, 04:32:03 PMOf course, if we accept that because we don't pick our race in the real world, it should be randomised, it follows that we should do the same with sex. I'm pretty sure that wouldn't have gone down well with teenagers back in the day.

It's a question of does one

a) build the game to the underlying game philosophy, and whoever likes it is the audience

or

b) build the game to match what the target audience likes

Not really, on either point.  Some people might go for random sex and not random race, and others might go the opposite--depending on the exact setting, how you do it, etc.  Of course, many will go all in or all out, but that's part of my initial point.  It's not some bright, straight line between underlying game design and setting concerns versus what the target audience likes. 

Like everything else in real life, it's messy.  To get people to buy into the underlying game design and setting, you'll need to compromise elsewhere on things that aren't critical to making that work.  And sometimes you'll have to back away on what part of the audience says they want in order to make the game meet the goals.  But it's a lot of little decisions that influence each other.

That's the difference between ivory tower design and results.

Sorry - the short answer came out as more binary than I intended. I agree that the real life of game design is messy just as you say. I was trying to point out the division that underlies the issue Krazz mentioned.

Didn't Arduin have random race, or am I misremembering?

Anyway, the original Marvel RPG essentially had this, as did Heroes Unlimited and stuff like Gamma World. It was fun and made total sense for the game. But D&D, you get to pick that shit. I think it's because for fantasy games, Forgotten Realms and Greyhawk and Mystara are all humanocentric universes. After the apocalypse, anthropomorphic bears might be the next apex race, but in fantasy it's us, the humans. Talislanta just dumped humans completely, but for some reason picking race still is a personal choice and...I dunno. Is it just fantasy that is problematic here? I want to pick race for those games, for mutant nonsense or superheroes it doesn't matter at all. Star Wars, it matters.

I think this is entirely genre-dependent.

Someone I gamed with online was a fan of using randomized character builders online for the fantasy rpg system we were using which included race obviously.  I wasn't a fan of that at all but he enjoyed the randomness seemingly as he didn't whine or complain about it and kept playing the character for the very short duration of the campaign (if you can call two months a campaign).

TSR's Marvel Superheroes had the option to either choose your origin, which determined race more or less, or roll on the random table. But if you rolled you had to take what you rolled. NO rerolls. Same for powers. Choose, or roll.

This is the best approach as most players are going to baulk at too much random.

Dragon Storm, which I designed 2 cards for, was an oddball. Each started always came with the basic Human/Dragon set. But each starter always had at least 1 other race usually and one other true form. You did not always get a viable set out the gate. But one or two boosters would usually get you at least one match. And that extended to backgrounds. There was always the peasant in the starter and probably something else as well.

One of the few of the rare CCG-RPGs to have a lively trading element between players.

When I first started my starter had some werewolf cards and some unicorn, but lacked an elf to match to the unicorn. So I went with human Werewolf. But once you had a good collection going, or got lucky, you could assemble and play whatever you pleased.

Random, but you had some control still.

Meanwhile 4e D&D Gamma World did not go over well because EVERYTHING was random. And after EVERY long rest your characters mutations and gear randomized again. Possibly more. AND it had a CCG glued on so more random for the random. Suffice to say practically no one liked it.

Quote from: Omega on February 21, 2025, 07:57:25 PMMeanwhile 4e D&D Gamma World did not go over well because EVERYTHING was random. And after EVERY long rest your characters mutations and gear randomized again. Possibly more. AND it had a CCG glued on so more random for the random. Suffice to say practically no one liked it.

That seems kinda stupid as fuck. How are you supposed to maintain a semblance of continuity if everything changes all the time?

Quote from: Brad on February 23, 2025, 06:02:38 PM

Quote from: Omega on February 21, 2025, 07:57:25 PMMeanwhile 4e D&D Gamma World did not go over well because EVERYTHING was random. And after EVERY long rest your characters mutations and gear randomized again. Possibly more. AND it had a CCG glued on so more random for the random. Suffice to say practically no one liked it.

That seems kinda stupid as fuck. How are you supposed to maintain a semblance of continuity if everything changes all the time?

That is pretty much that iteration of GW in a nutshell. The supposed slapstick tone was totally at odds with the circus freak nightmares of the monster art, and the "ha-ha random!" mean that you had Torg levels of reality slippage. That was barely touched on outside the rules.