The Use of Old Races in New Ways and New Races in Old Ways

[Fatal Error]

Warning: This post was not created to offend anyone, merely to state an observation and put forth an opinion on how the names of races should be used. Any similarities of examples in this post to your own campaign setting are entirely coincidental.

In my time checking out various campaign settings in various forms (obviously not primarily here, as I only recently joined) I have found something interesting. This something is the use or disuse of "standard" fantasy races, and the use or disuse of "standard" fantasy cultures.

Consider why you use or don't use such fantasy classics.

Some people use them and twist them, because they think the old versions are tired. Dwarves that aren't based in the mountains. Elves that own slaves, have an affinity for necromancy, or are actually on the rise. Goblins that form a merchant class of the predominantly human kingdom. All of these take the established fantasy idea, and twist, sometimes rend and re-sew, these ideas into new forms.

But, when one does that, is there actually a point in having them keep the name? Why bother with calling them elves, if they don't act like elves or their empire isn't in the state of decline/reclusivity that has become attatched to elves?
They might still look like elves, but when you tell your player, "My elves are necromantic, own slaves, have a law-heavy society and recently expanded out of the southern swamps." You're explaining more than you're leaving to be said by the name "Elf".

Then there is the opposite, a race you invented just to make "un-stereoypical" but is actually the same stereotype of an already existing race, it just looks weird. Make dwarves lean, tentacled and beardless and you probably come up with a new name, but if they act the same and have the same types of cultures of a stereotypical dwarf, why not just use the stereotypical dwarf? Oh that's right, because you wanted to be different for no reason.

There's no need to reinvent the wheel unless it doesn't fit your axle. I'm quite sick of seeing people alter races, both physically and culturally, just to make them artifically unique, when a fantasy stereotype would have fit just fine.

By keeping a race's name the same what you accomplish is linking that race with the stereotypes presented in more widespread fantasy sources. If you say elf to your player, most will think of the elves of every fantasy game and book descended from Tolkien.

Thus, you should have a reason for using or not using that name. If you use that name, don't use it just so you can say, "Oh, but my elves are different and that makes my setting unique." Do it for a reason, such as being able to utilize that already present image of the elf in your player's mind.

The same holds true for not using a name. If you choose not to use elf for a race that occupies the same niche as the stereotypical fantasy elf, you should have a reason other than, "These people are the Qualistar, tall, thin, graceful and with an empire on the decline, but they're not elves and that makes my setting unique."

I'm not saying you should always or should not ever use the name of a stereotypical fantasy race. All I'm saying is, change your races, and their names, for the right reasons. Also, be aware that if you use a standard name your players will jump to conclusions, but if you use a new name you will have to more fully explain your race to them.


So, what are your thoughts on using or not using standard fantasy race names and concepts?

[Raelifin]

Heh. For a second there I thought you had stolen my thunder. I wrote an article for the CBGuide on just this topic. However, because my work is under wraps, I think I'll hold off on the discussion until mid November when issue #3 comes out.

Sorry for the wait. Cheers,
 - Rael

[CYMRO]

What about returning the traditional sterotypes to races D&D has, for reasons legal and otherwise screwed up?
Put the Hobbit back in the halfling.
Return the Gnome to his proper size.

[Raelifin]

Make drow and dwarves one in the same? Oh wait, I said I'd hold back. ^_^

[SilvercatMoonpaw]

Let's start with the use of names for races that aren't the same as the stereotype:

Excuse me for a second while I say this:  :soap:

HOW DARE YOU TELL ME THAT A NAME HAS TO BE CONNECTED TO A SINGLE IDEA?!

But you did preface your post with a disclaimer, so I do not direct that comment at you but rather at the community of stubborn word use.  But my comment is true: it is a word.  It's a sound.  In another language it might not be the same word.  People are allowed to expect it to have the same meaning as they have heard before, but if it is not there is no reason to get stubbornly confused over its use.  Let me use an example from D&D: the lamassu is not a winged lion, it is a winged bull with the head of a crowed man.  Yet I do not see anyone up in arms over this use of creative liscence.  The name sounds cool, so let it be.  People need to adapt.

There are good reasons for evoking a previous stereotype associated with a name: it saves on decribing elements of the race that the established stereotype already has.  If you says "elves" and keep their D&D physical appearance (which, I would like to point out, is too large for the original European legends) the players will already know what they look like.  Then the GM must make an effort to describe their new culture so that the players under stand what his/her "elves" are like non-physically.  If instead the GM wants to change the appearance of the elves for some reason (maybe make them historically accurate) but likes their stereotypical culture just fine, then "elf" evokes the culture and the new appearance has to be carefully explained.  In each case the GM is saved work by using the connection to the stereoptype associated with the name.

"I'm quite sick of seeing people alter races, both physically and culturally, just to make them artifically unique, when a fantasy stereotype would have fit just fine."
As stated this is your opinion.  So I approach it merely to state mine:
In some cases I am prepared to believe that the races are being made arbitrarily unique.  But I highly doubt it.  Likely there is a reason that has just not been fully articulated.  Even in the case of an inscrutably arbitrary change there can be a very good reason to do it: it sends the message "Do not treat this setting as you expect it rather than what it is."  Someone who has already changed one aspect of an established fantasy stereotype is likely to change something else, and it's good to warn players via not just telling them but by having them expereince the new element.  And sometimes the change is made just because the designer is sick of the established way and wants to vent.  Let them.

Something confuses me: in the beginning you said that if a designer changes a race than they should use a new name so as not to invoke the wrong impression, but then later you say that if a race is the same as the established stereotype that the established name should be used.  This is a contradiction: first you say that names are important then you say that they aren't.  If a designer chooses a new name for an established race then that is a statement about a subtle difference between that race and the stereotype.  If I choose to use the word "enoc" instead of "elf" how does this not reflect a new aspect of the culture?  Perhaps they have their own name for themselves, while it is humans who call them "elf".

In closing let me try to summarize:
People should not become stubbornly attached to definitions of a word.
Use of an established idea means less work in describing something.
Arbitrary changes may still be important to the person who changed them.
What's wrong with a new name for an old idea?

[Fatal Error]

In closing let me try to summarize:
People should not become stubbornly attached to definitions of a word.
Use of an established idea means less work in describing something.
Arbitrary changes may still be important to the person who changed them.
What's wrong with a new name for an old idea?

Hmmm, perhaps in my post-Halloween weariness I rambled a bit much. I basically agree with most of what you just said. It just helps to be aware of what you're trying to accomplish when you use or don't use a name attached to something in most people's minds.

Most people who play D&D probably have no idea what the original version of the Lammasu was. On the other hand, the majority of people, especially those playing D&D, will automatically think of elves as D&D and other similar fantasy genres portray them, same for dwarves, same for orcs.

I believe I mentioned somewhere in that swamp of a post that using an old name for a new idea can save you time, assuming that new idea has some ties. Looking back on it, however, it appears to be entirely based off physical appearance. If someone said "dwarf" and then went on to explain their differences from a normal dwarf I'd be fine. But then if someone said "dwarf" and then went on to explain how they're tentacled, beardless and tall, I would be quite confused as to why they didn't simply call them by a different name.

So I suppose it really turns out that it's the appearances that make the name, and the culture is what you explain. After all, it has always been harder to convey physical descriptions with words than societal ones.

[Lmns Crn]

I think there's a threshold in the concept-changing process somewhere. Past a certain point, you've departed so drastically from the original concept that your interpretation is unrecognizable as related to it.

I mean, I can take an iron cube, soften the corners a bit, paint it pink, and carve my name in the side, and you can still easily recognize it as an iron cube, albeit slightly altered.

Or, I can take an iron cube, elongate it, cover it in fur, give it four legs and a wagging tail, change the iron to organs, give it big ears and an elongated muzzle, put a face on it, define it as alive and affectionate... but at some point in the process, it is in everyone's best interests if I quit calling it an "iron cube" and start calling it a "puppy."

[Hibou]

I like to think that what I'm doing with elves, dwarves, and gnomes for Vilydunn - The Golden Age of The Nightmare is something uniquely interesting. Of course, I could get bashed for having them play the roles that they do.

[Xeviat]

I'm a fan of making races unique for a setting. My setting uses the standard Dwarf, Elf, Goblin, and Orcs, and they fit the same role (dwarves are hardy, elves are quick, goblins are sneaky, orcs are strong), but they're undergoing many changes to make them fit my setting more.

But by and large, they fit the same roles. My setting has it's own reasons for using those names, though I could easily use different names if I didn't want to create confusion. Because my players enjoy my story telling style and they understand my setting is a setting for games and my future novels, they've found it easy to engrose themselves in the world.

On my two other worlds, though, my cowriters and I have been creating new races, which are both statistically, culturally, and physically different.

[SA]

I am very much a proponent of having different races call each other by names contrary to the one chosen by the race itself: men call the soqi 'elves', the soqi call the men 'gahude', the breog call the men 'szampah', the men call the breog 'hobgoblins'.

I have a similar approach to stereotypes: my elves are nothing like the archetypical elf while in their homelands, but their culture dictates certain manners while in the lands of others; certain ways of diplomatic speaking, certain forms of dress, particular mannerisms gesticulations and postures, makeup (they have moderately dark complexions, but make themeslves up to appear pale when beyond their own borders), and so on.  This has resulted in a certain understanding of what elves are like, and what their homeland must be like.  However, they do this as a matter of tradition, not a matter of deception, and in the company of non-elven friends, when political issues are cast aside, they quite willingly engage socially without their "faces on".  Similarly, if one were to travel to elven lands, they would find not only that the fair folk do not look or act as they portray themselves (they are louder, darker and less restrained), but that in intra-elven politics thay have an entirely different set of traditions (black paint rather than white, different mannerisms and postures, a confusing sing-song manner of speech rather than the quiet intonations they espouse in foreign lands...)

In that manner, I seized the stereotype and both embraced it and cast it aside.  The idea of immortal, graceful, pale incarnations of humans is a construct that has become real in the eyes of men, but for the soqi themselves it is simply a political face.

[Kindling]

I suppose this also brings up the question of.... Why should one use non-human races at all?

[SA]

That's easy: because sometimes people want to play creatures that neither think like, nor look or act like human(oid)s.  It adds new dimensions not only to roleplaying the individual character, but also the nature of the game world.  Just ask my new gaming group; they think humans suck and sentient fungus-people are teh shit.

I'm sure that if I really wanted to, I could launch into a pseudopsychological spiel about escapism and wish fulfilment, but I think I'll sum all that up by simply saying: the joy of fantasy comes in stepping out of reality and the familiar.  Non-humans tend to accomplish that quite nicely.

If you don't want to stray as far from home as a campaign featuring psionic octopi fighting telepathic wars with antediluvian primordials making and breaking microcosmic universes in paradimensional mindscapes on the fringes on incomprehensibility, then by all means, use something less outlandish, but if you do, I see no logical reason to refrain.

[Matt Larkin (author)]

Sometimes one changes the "base archetypes" for other reasons.  My setting is based off of mythology, so the elves are based in many ways off Norse and Celtic mythology (where elves aren't tiny little faeries, either).  Of course, Tolkein originally based his elves off the Norse ones, but he changed them to fit his specific world.  I may very well do the same.

You might also say, well look, on Kishar you've made it so all these normally evil races aren't evil.  Why are dismissing these stereotypes when you cannot claim a mythological reason for it?  The answer is that by blurring the lines of morality I feel I have a deeper setting.

I can agree that changing something just to be different may not be worthwhile, but I think you have to realize many people might have good reasons for changing the existing archetypes without giving them new names.

Most of the races I use, I give them the mythological name not because I want to attach standard fantasy baggage, but because those are the mythological names.  I'm not going to change the name elf just because someone else has already made another interpretation of that myth more popular.

[Hibou]

In the new version of Vilydunn, elves, dwarves, and gnomes aren't playable at all. They're a subtype of Hellfey, nightmarish creatures who take the appearances of benevolent and loving spirits and warp them into evil monstrosities. In the case of elves, dwarves, gnomes, and a few other creatures in the Hellfey category, some of them are "Ex-Human", as in, people who were touched by the True Dream when the Verkem and Ayrmarians returned from their exodus and tore a hole in reality. They were turned into creatures of the Vilydunnians' fantasies and dreams, only they were unimaginably, impossibly evil and sadistic with grotesque and fearsome physical features. They don't need reasons for desiring to murder innocent people and creatures, because they're creatures born out of the pure, alien force of nightmare energy. The justification is that they are part of the very force that wishes to harm and terrify the world.

[Matt Larkin (author)]

Kudos, WitchHunt.  That rocks.  Also, I kind of approve of not making all races playable.