[Forum Philosophy] #13 - Races & Ethnicity

[Nomadic]

Celtricia is the rare setting where all the players are hoping to play a Bugbear.

Gartier for life!

[Ghostman]

Well that's a sufficiently different enough method that it's not so bad.  In case of that what I would still hate is if humans were given the opt-out.  Somehow there's always the idea that humans get to be the "special people" who weren't subject to the same restrictive designs as everyone else.

If you want to talk lazy design that's where it is.

Funnily enough, I've always thought that the humans are commonly the only ones that aren't special, having no particular role assigned to them :-p

Another interesting angle to the humans vs nonhumans disparity could be that there aren't really other races as the term is commonly understood; just monsters and spirits and the like. Consider for example, a world where elves are actually fairy-like beings that are born from blooming flowers, that speak in riddles and steal your memories. And that dwarves are actually dead elves that passed into the underworld but who during full moons emerge and accost lone travelers, forcing them to a contest of wits where losing means that one has to switch places with the dwarf.

Emphasize the supernaturalness/unnaturalness of nonhumans enough, and the whole idea of comparing them with humans by diversity and adaptiveness will start feeling silly.

[Nomadic]

Granted now you can no longer have PCs of those people

[Polycarp]

While I agree that a human could never understand an alien mind in depth, I'm not of the belief that an alien mind is impossible to portray. Consider the animal; they don't think in the same way as we do, far from it, but don't you think you could roleplay an animal decently? Animal instincts, hunger, fear and cautiousness are things we can imitate even if we can't never feel them the same way. Yes, animals are comparatively simple, but the point still stands; the alien is not necessarily out of reach.

instincts[/i].  It's not at all hard to roleplay instincts assuming you have any familiarity with the animal, or just animals in general - after all, by definition, instincts require no thinking.  But how does a dog experience love?  If we could get inside a dog's head, would we even perceive it as love as we define it?  People sometimes conjecture as to what a dog would say if it could speak, but would it even understand the concept of language?  Of abstract ideas?  Of conversation?

I don't think it's possible for us to really think in an "alien" manner, assuming it's even possible for anything to think in such a way (after all, maybe our intelligence is the only manner in which intelligence exists, or could exist).  But the argument is really just splitting hairs with a simple question - what do you consider "alien intelligence" or an "alien mind" to mean?  Does someone with a radically different cultural persective than you have an alien mind?  Does a serial killer have an alien mind?  Does a Star Trek alien with a funny forehead have an alien mind?

[SilvercatMoonpaw]

Does a Star Trek alien with a funny forehead have an alien mind?

In that instance I somehow doubt it.

[Gamer Printshop]

The Empire of Kaidan features humans and a variety of shape-changing races from Japanese folklore. In many ways all the sentient beings of Kaidan have a strong spiritual existence unlike other settings, even including the humans.

Consider that at some past time (816 years ago) this realm existed on another world under different circumstances, however a divine curse uttered by the emperor's grandmother prior to throwing herself and grandson into the sea to drown as an alternative to death by swords and arrow, was enacted by a passing powerful evil being that heard the uttered curse. The land itself was remade into its current state and all of its inhabitants intrinsically altered to follow a new set of spiritual forms defined by the enigmatic evil greater being the caused it all to become reality. Kaidan's history is an altered state.

Humans were once normal humans, but the cursed version of their world, which is now Kaidan, has made them into recycling reincarnated spirits, where their human bodies are merely temporary vessels of doomed existence. A duality of linear human bloodlines is combined with the random movement of spirits that travel between families and clans never in a linear fashion. Thus humans are very much enigmatic beings in Kaidan. Of their bloodlines, ancestral spirits of the past give their own spiritual powers.

Of the various shape-changing sentient beings of Kaidan are the embodied spiritual forms of nature, animal and demon essences. These beings are also caught in the spiritual doomed cycle, just as humans are. In fact human spirits are sometimes "transferred" to these spirit shape changers.

Among the nature spirit beings of Kaidan are Spirit Folk, which are the embodiment of flora spirits found in trees, flowers, water plants. The korobokuru, the gnomes of Kaidan, are the baser earth elements actualized into humanoid form.

The hengeyokai are animal spirits made humanoid - bears, foxes, badgers, monkeys, rabbits, raccoon dogs, dogs, cats and even birds form the essences of these humanoid beings.

Ryujin (an invention of mine rather than a folklore derived sentient) are the animal spirits of sea beings, under the rulership of the great sea dragon called Ryu. These dwell in the outlying smaller islands to the southwest of the Kaidan archipelego, as the great dragon city under the sea is located offshore of these islands.

Finally, of the hell realm, demon spirits most of whom are truly monsters of the setting can in their shape-changed human forms mate with existing humans and birth beings derived of these demon essences, called half-oni, as Oni are the primary types of demon spirits in Kaidan.

Thus all the sentients of Kaidan, are very much the actuated forms of spiritual beings that permeate the dark realm.

GP