Is a "human PCs only" game in whatever flavor of D&D and its derivatives still a legit thing to do in the current year?

>>95925315 (OP)
Yeah, my group does it all the time.
Why wouldn't it be?

>>95925315 (OP)
It's become much easier with race-mechanics moved into character backgrounds as this overtly supports swapping demihuman races for human nationalities, doubtlessly to the chagrin of the blank-slate cultists who write such rules.

>>95925379
>human nationalities

Gayyyyyyy

>>95925315 (OP)
I personally think humans-only works better in lower fantasy or epic fantasy settings so would recommend a different system because the default assumptions of D&D are not very conducive to those styles.
But that's entirely personal preference based and not a statement of objectivity.

>>95925315 (OP)
>all human gladiator barbarians in Darksun trying to fight the nerd sorcerer kangz
>All Eberron goblins loot'n Cyre in the Mournlands while dying horribly
>all gargoyles spelunking castles in Ravenloft when the darklords aren't looking
>all Greyhawk orcs protecting a dungeon created by their god from pesky humies
>all awakened animals trying to convince smog lord humans to stop destroying the forest and shooting them in Arcadia
>all Gauntlgrym dwarves having an underdark war with the Drow while calling them bad names
>all evil Chilexan gnomes binding devils to take over the world
>all high elves trying to be lawful good in Warhammer

Race themed campaigns are kino

>>95925379
Yeah man I love those human nationalities with night vision and fire breath

>>95925315 (OP)
My GM did it for a Strahd campaign with this simple trick:
>If you use human you get an extra reward (magic item)
>If the party uses the core classes (fighter, cleric, wizard rogue) you get another extra reward
We didn't go the second one because the caster wanted to be a Warlock but still cool.

>>95925315 (OP)
Only if you allow feats, start at level 4+, or play literally any edition other than 5E.

>>95925491
>night vision
vietnamese
>fire breath
mexicans

>>95925491
fantasy setting

>>95925315 (OP)
>in the current year?
They changed variant human and feats for 6e so maybe not as much as it used to be, but 5e it will still be meta

>>95925315 (OP)
How did your last session go?

Human party is the standard. You are actively nerfing yourself playing anything else.

>>95925315 (OP)
>human campaign
>posts steroid king

>>95926270
Who else is going to play the drow that fucks human men if not me?

>>95926445
Good point, you're banned for faggotry.

>>95926445
No-games.

>>95925315 (OP)
Then why'd you post a Dwarf?

Remember, overreliance on monster races is a shortcoming to someone's ability to roleplay, but so is overreliance on human exclusivity. A real tabletop savant can do both, and do both well.

>>95925315 (OP)
Every time I visit my game store I see fliers for Cthulu and Cyberpunk themed games using 5e.
For the love of god there are other systems.

>>95925491
Clearly you've never met a deepwater jew.

>>95926008
>>95927732
>>95926021
Much better than shitty non human races

>>95925379
Based, here's my old old pathfinder nationality list I replaced races with https://pastebin.com/McqcTN5Z

I'd make a new and improved one if I ran a fantasy setting again.

>>95927873
Nobody thinks this way
If you had a button that would replace every single poojeet on the planet with dwarves or elves are you saying you wouldn't press it?

>>95925315 (OP)
Unironically depends on the edition. 5e kinda sucks with all-human party, but it is manageable. 3e is a struggle, since two thirds of builds depend on the right race
>inb4 i don't care about minmaxing
Then why are you playing modern editions of D&D

>>95928032
If you had the option to play a fantasy game of pretend with no Mexicans, Jews, niggers, gooks, S*edes and other kind of shitskins, are you saying you would insert those?
Because you seem to miss the actual appeal, just to be edgy

>>95926270
>t. utterly clueless on how DnD races work
Playing all-human party is a self-imposed challenge and at least one player will end up with an underpowered character, which renders them barely playable by lvl 9.

>>95925315 (OP)
Yes

>>95925491
>implying a Dutchman would be as adept at mountain traversal as a Peruvian
clearly you've never met another nationality

>>95925491
I like my human nationality's dig speed.

>>95928746
Anon, we are a Pathfinder 1e household here.

>>95925315 (OP)
Most settings may as well be human only anyway since elves, dwarves, and orcs are just humans anyway but with specific traits.

>human only
I shan't be playing your mudcore slop campaign.

>>95925315 (OP)
I know this is just basic shitposting but damn what a stupid way to say that.

"Legit thing to do"? The entire setup of fucking DnD is "here's a bunch of options for making your character" and people make their character with those options.

If your setting is mainly or only humans that's just your setting. People do that. They also do settings that don't have humans. They do settings with furries.

Could you sound more like you've never played these games before? Even some of the most obnoxious podcast games that people here hate have done humans only before.

>>95926021
if there's a race of humans in your setting who breath fire and see in the dark then you're not running a human only setting, you're just doing fantasy races and changing what you call it.

There's a fantasy series I read where it's just different races of humans, but the races are based on magic bug themes giving them magic bug powers and specific features based on the bug. But when you look at how the mantis people are described they're just dangerous elves. And then you realize it's technically a no humans setting because everyone is some weird fantasy race, they just don't give them the lore distinction of elves and dwarves.

If all your fantasy races and mammals and humanoid then you're running an all humans setting. They're just funny looking because of magic and lore reasons.

This whole line of thinking shows how empty the concept is.

>>95928032
>dwarves or elves
Those are both way shittier than even shit tier human races.
I'd do it if you had said hobbits/halflings though.

>>95929241
>3.PF
Then the deal breaker will be reached by lvl 7

>>95929273
And said traits are narrowed down to the point of retardation.

This board loves to jerk off dwarves, and to a big extent I like "dwarf" the character, but as a race it's like a bunch of clones, and if they're not then they just feel like they're breaking stereotypes just for the sake of it and then why play a dwarf at all? It's just a short stocky hairy man with a love for digging precious metals and alcohol doing a scottish accent cloned thousands of times. Elves are almost as narrow in their stereotypes and orcs I'm actually okay with since their stereotypes usually only go as far as "they're savage and usually evil" which still lets them have a lot of variety even if they could just be replaced with a savage human tribe without losing out on much. And with orcs and such you can justify genociding them a lot easier too if you make them a full on evil race. Dwarves and Elves also both posses the trait of living for hundreds of years which makes player characters non believable as no matter how good of a roleplayer someone is, and most people aren't remotely good, their age is either going to be played for jokes or just make no fucking sense. Any good writers who involve very long-lived characters tend to present them as mystical and not delve too deeply into them so having PC races as such was always very retarded to me.

>>95929620
Yeah, I can't think of many fantasy settings where dwarves aren't just "short grumpy usually scottish human miners who live in the mountains" and elves aren't just "haughty usually english human nobles who live in the woods or a fancy enclave", and even orcs are just "angry usually english human barbarians".

I feel like a fantasy setting with humans as the only civilized race would work better, since you could have those same types of characters anyway. Then thrown in dwarves and elves like they were in historic folklore and you're golden. Make them actually weird or supernatural instead of just humans with quirks. Have your elves be beautiful but weird pixie-like people dancing around mushrooms who will lure you in to dance until you die if you piss them off.

>>95929620
This post is so full of truth, but fags will still insist on muh elves and muh dwarves forever because they're too ingrained in ttrpg DNA.

>>95925315 (OP)
Everytime I see a thread like this, I have to assume it's some weird White People = Humans thing. It could also just be an autism thing where they're mad people have fun different than them, but character race is such a specific fixation.

>>95925315 (OP)
Of course. Play your game, anon. It's your table. Getting to be in charge of your own world is half the reason we enjoy GMing.

>>95925315 (OP)
I have players like you who struggle with making/RPing characters they can't relate to. Not having every tool available to other Players doesn't make you lesser. If your comfort zone is human fighter with a down to earth backstory that pulls from your own real life experiences, then more power to you. I don't push players like you to change, or 'shame' you for liking what you like. I imagine someone did shit on you for wanting to play that way at some point, or called you uncreative for not wanting to play a space bug swarm, or whatever, and those sorts of people can go fuck themselves. Lots of them probably were just jealous you could do something cool with a more basic concept.

But don't reverse it and hate on people who have more fun with strange, out there concepts. Yes, there are just as many people playing shallow 'weird' races as a crutch for their lack of creativity as there are people who play human fighters because they're on the simple side, but those are just both examples of people who suck.

You don't actually believe that restrictions like that are necessary for good writing. If you did, you'd be the sort of theoretical person who thinks artist who use more than one color to paint are lazy. Just be the best tabletop gamer you can be and don't spend time with people who don't appreciate you.

>>95925315 (OP)
Not having anyone with infravision can screw you over if the DM is strict about visibility and light sources duration. But most D&D DM's won't bother tracking that, especially nowadays.

>>95928700
You're the one saying non-human races should be replaced with shitskins
Full parties of human men are boring

>>95930223
Off topic, but is it better to be a shitskin or a smegskin?

>>95930223
9 times out of 10 a party of four humans will offer more variety than a part with one human, halfling, elf, and dwarf, not least because almost every single elf/dwarf/halfling character will be identical while humans aren't as rigidly defined by fantasy tropes.

And no, making a dwarf who hates mining and drinking wouldn't make it better. Then his entire personality becomes the subversion of expectations, a trope in and of itself.

>>95929620
> Any good writers who involve very long-lived characters tend to present them as mystical
That's because classical literature tends to portray old age as wisdom, but i know most people i interacted with in my life, they were dumb in their 20s, are still dumb in their 60s and they'd probably still be dumb in their 200s.

>>95931658
Dwarves live in an undergrounder society where mining is valued labor, the trope is not that all Dwarves are miners
Gimli was a fighter and noble who just had family that lived in mines

The point is that races differ in culture in ways that are fundamentally different from human civilization and thus should impact characters as well
A Drow rogue offers something different from a Human rogue
A Gnome barbarian offers something different from a Human barbarian
A Tiefling monk offers something different from a Human monk

They should anyway; if your problem is shit players not actually attempting to roleplay what they've chosen then your problem is with shit players rather than the variety available to you for character creation.

>>95931968
I think it's an issue of modern representation of fantasy species in general, i cannot honestly count the works other races felt like actual races and not just humans in make up. in most recent works you could basically replace every other race with humans and literally nothing would change beside a pointy ear becoming round. Divinity Original Sin cannibal elves that pass on memories from one to the others feel like a race, elves in baldur's gate 3 are just humans complaining about losing their carpenter job are just... sloppy.

>>95931968
I think it's an issue of modern representation of fantasy species in general, i can honestly count the number of works where other races felt like actual races and not just humans in make up.

in most recent works you could basically replace every other race with humans and literally nothing would change beside a pointy ear becoming round.

Divinity Original Sin cannibal elves that pass on memories from one to the others feel like a race, elves in baldur's gate 3 complaining about losing their carpenter job to refugees are just... sloppy.

>>95931658
Wow. I can't believe you got such a huge survey together and aren't just pulling from your experiences and the experiences of people who find you tolerable. How did you collect enough info to definitively determine that 9 out of 10 times people lean too heavily on their racial tropes, rather than using them as elements to enhance their character? You must work for the NSA.

I bet you're the guy who came up with modern English food. Spices are just flavor crutches when used. At all. Nine out of ten times. Did the research on that myself.

>>95931658
It sounds like you're arguing that culture and origin are meaningless. Like saying you shouldn't play a black person because the idea of a black person is too much of a stereotype, and also there's no point in playing a black person who hates fried chicken, because then it's just a subversion.

Do you just not get how shit like being able to fly might subtly alter a person's attitude and way of approaching the world? Even in the real world, someone being Italian changes there character at least a little. It's literally crazy to say that there's nothing creative to be done with a character having different circumstances than another character.

>>95925315 (OP)
What about dwarf only games?

>>95931658
>source - trust me bro, I played thrice back in high school in 2007
And that's being generous here

>>95925315 (OP)
If your DM is unironically pushing for human PCs only for no particular thematic reason then they're fully bought into the "anyone who disagrees is a furry troon" narrative from seething nogames on this very board, some of whom could be posting in this (very gay) thread right as we speak. Terrifying stuff.

>>95925315 (OP)
Humans only across the whole setting? No, then it becomes a little too mundane for working with the usual D&Dlikes. Humans only as player characters? It's the best way to do things. When not bound by the need to be balanced as a player character option, fantastical and weird races can actually BE fantastical and weird. The majority of racial options can be replicated by different human cultures, anyway, so it doesn't even need to come at a cost of player options.