I've been thinking about fantasy ancestries (generic term for playable races/species) and about the idea of "monstrous ancestries" who are often treated as enemies despite being sapient and social creatures. This post will be about fantasy TTRPGs and RPG Video Games to be specific. I guess with the public starting to accept how racist Gary Gygax was and the bigoted origins of certain monstrous ancestries like orcs, goblins, and drow I've been thinking about the idea in general and what to do about it in my own settings that I make. I'm not here to say that the concept has no place in fantasy, racism is a real part of human society and fiction should be allowed to address that, but I think just including it out of obligation is the bad approach. I also recognize that modern usage of orcs, goblins, and drow are pretty fun--- I love the cute goblin comics and the funny orc characters. This post is gonna be kinda scatterbrained cause I have a lot of different things to say. Here's my hot take: If there is a sapient, social ancestry of creatures in your setting, even if they are seen as monsters they should be playable. The only exception is if they would be really mechanically difficult to make playable, e.g. giants. But even then maybe not.
Okay let me try to organize my thoughts better. Let's take the Elder Scrolls as a case study cause I know a freakish amount about Elder Scrolls Lore. In the modern mainline games, there are 10 playable races: 4 Men (Imperial, Nord, Breton, Redguard), 4 Mer (Altmer, Dunmer, Bosmer, Orcs), and 2 Beast (Khajiit, Argonian). Despite this, there are the following mundane ancestries that are capable of language and society within the lore presented in Morrowind, Oblivion, and Skyrim: Giants, Goblins, Rieklings, Falmer, Imga, Minotaurs, Sload, and races from other continents. It's understandable that races not present in the games' respective settings aren't playable, but why aren't goblins and minotaurs playable in Oblivion? Why not Rieklings in Skyrim? The answer is because they're put there to be a type of enemy to fight, but in such an open ended RPG it feels arbitrary to make these distinctions, especially with the presence of beast races that are often seen as savage by the men and mer which are playable.
Yet again Daggerfall offers an interesting perspective to this. In daggerfall, Orcs aren't a playable race, despite Orsinium, their home, being a major quest location, and their king Gortwog being an important character in the plot. When you find the Totem of Tiber Septim at the end of the main quest, Gortwog may ask you to give him to totem so he may use Numidium to make Orcs an equal amongst the other races of Tamriel. In Morrowind it's revealed that the use of Numidium caused several timelines to converge (the warp in the west), making all of the endings of Daggerfall canon, and beginning in Morrowind Orcs are a playable race.
It's stuff like this that I find compelling, and once again points to the weird arbitrary line between playable and not-playable monstrous races. Why are Hobgoblins playable in D&D but not Quaggoths? If a monstrous race isn't playable, I think you need a very good reason, and "general savagery" is quite the bad reason. The whole idea of savagery has always been rooted in "othering" a group of people to moralize doing something bad to them. It's fine to have that within the setting itself as a thematic point to build upon with the story, but to cement it mechanically in the system subdues roleplay by not allowing your character to have that perspective.
Here's my quick takes on typical monsters and if they should be playable. Skeletons? No, they're not sapient. Sphinxes? No, they're sapient but not social. Mind Flayers? They're sapient and social, true, but they're also like a hive mind which I think is a good reason not to make playable. Demons? This one's a tough one. I'm aware of the Frieren being racist stuff cause she automatically hates demons but like idk they're demons? If we're gonna have automatically evil people make em Demons I guess? Idk I haven't convinced myself with this one... Anyways, Centaurs, Minotaurs, Goblins, Orcs... if they're capable of society then they should be playable!
Anyways for my setting I'm making I'm thinking of doing away with any of these monstrous ancestries. It's either playable ones or truly inhuman creatures.
I've been thinking about fantasy ancestries (generic term for playable races/species) and about the idea of "monstrous ancestries" who are often treated as enemies despite being sapient and social creatures. This post will be about fantasy TTRPGs and RPG Video Games to be specific. I guess with the public starting to accept how racist Gary Gygax was and the bigoted origins of certain monstrous ancestries like orcs, goblins, and drow I've been thinking about the idea in general and what to do about it in my own settings that I make. I'm not here to say that the concept has no place in fantasy, racism is a real part of human society and fiction should be allowed to address that, but I think just including it out of obligation is the bad approach. I also recognize that modern usage of orcs, goblins, and drow are pretty fun--- I love the cute goblin comics and the funny orc characters. This post is gonna be kinda scatterbrained cause I have a lot of different things to say. Here's my hot take: If there is a sapient, social ancestry of creatures in your setting, even if they are seen as monsters they should be playable. The only exception is if they would be really mechanically difficult to make playable, e.g. giants. But even then maybe not.
Okay let me try to organize my thoughts better. Let's take the Elder Scrolls as a case study cause I know a freakish amount about Elder Scrolls Lore. In the modern mainline games, there are 10 playable races: 4 Men (Imperial, Nord, Breton, Redguard), 4 Mer (Altmer, Dunmer, Bosmer, Orcs), and 2 Beast (Khajiit, Argonian). Despite this, there are the following mundane ancestries that are capable of language and society within the lore presented in Morrowind, Oblivion, and Skyrim: Giants, Goblins, Rieklings, Falmer, Imga, Minotaurs, Sload, and races from other continents. It's understandable that races not present in the games' respective settings aren't playable, but why aren't goblins and minotaurs playable in Oblivion? Why not Rieklings in Skyrim? The answer is because they're put there to be a type of enemy to fight, but in such an open ended RPG it feels arbitrary to make these distinctions, especially with the presence of beast races that are often seen as savage by the men and mer which are playable.
Yet again Daggerfall offers an interesting perspective to this. In daggerfall, Orcs aren't a playable race, despite Orsinium, their home, being a major quest location, and their king Gortwog being an important character in the plot. When you find the Totem of Tiber Septim at the end of the main quest, Gortwog may ask you to give him to totem so he may use Numidium to make Orcs an equal amongst the other races of Tamriel. In Morrowind it's revealed that the use of Numidium caused several timelines to converge (the warp in the west), making all of the endings of Daggerfall canon, and beginning in Morrowind Orcs are a playable race.
It's stuff like this that I find compelling, and once again points to the weird arbitrary line between playable and not-playable monstrous races. Why are Hobgoblins playable in D&D but not Quaggoths? If a monstrous race isn't playable, I think you need a very good reason, and "general savagery" is quite the bad reason. The whole idea of savagery has always been rooted in "othering" a group of people to moralize doing something bad to them. It's fine to have that within the setting itself as a thematic point to build upon with the story, but to cement it mechanically in the system subdues roleplay by not allowing your character to have that perspective.
Here's my quick takes on typical monsters and if they should be playable. Skeletons? No, they're not sapient. Sphinxes? No, they're sapient but not social. Mind Flayers? They're sapient and social, true, but they're also like a hive mind which I think is a good reason not to make playable. Demons? This one's a tough one. I'm aware of the Frieren being racist stuff cause she automatically hates demons but like idk they're demons? If we're gonna have automatically evil people make em Demons I guess? Idk I haven't convinced myself with this one... Anyways, Centaurs, Minotaurs, Goblins, Orcs... if they're capable of society then they should be playable!
Anyways for my setting I'm making I'm thinking of doing away with any of these monstrous ancestries. It's either playable ones or truly inhuman creatures.
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tv pitch: a completely average workplace sitcom except that itβs established at the end of the pilot that it takes place on the 90th floor of the world trade center in 2000. every episode the date is shown, just to build the sense of impending doom. the show is otherwise a completely generic the office ripoff. the intro sequence is a montage of airplanes taking off.
at the end of the second season, we reach 9/10/01. after six months of waiting, season 3 drops. now itβs 9/12/01. nothing has happened. the characters carry on as normal. fans of the series go insane. the show never explains what happened, and continues to pretend itβs a normal sitcom.
Broke: Imma kick your ass
Woke: You are invited to join me on the
I didn't go all the way to Yorkshire for 72 notes
Maria SkΕodowska-Curie's notebooks are crazy once you think about it. They're so radioactive they have to be sealed in a lead box. Imagine a world where atomic theory is forgotten and a dude just goes "yea there's a book that details the secrets of the universe, the machinations of the creation of existence down to its barest essentials, but if you get close to it you fucking die. The more you read it the more your body slowly disassembles into mush." like wat excuse me
