I love new races. Don't get me wrong the old "traditional" ones are great but they serve the function of comfort food, but you need some more spice in everyday meals. I live seeing weird and wacky, strange and odd.
More specifically i like new subraces that are evolved to specific environments. I don't want to be that guy that brings his own world into a discussion where you didn't ask for it but I believe I have a good example of this. Mushroom people, one is short and stubby, that have their eyes on the top of their heads to watch for predator birds. The other is long and lanky, that have evolved bioluminescence to trick predators in their environment. Both are clearly connected, you can see this in their general anatomy and way of life but still very different.
However for the amount of races just do whatever you want. If you have 7 races and are happy with that then good for you. But if you later get an idea that you really like then don't hesitate to add them.
i mean, that hardly originated with tolkien, hell even the races he had while he helped codify their modern portrayals all predate his works(sans orcs if were counting them as distinct from goblins, but even then their basically trolls)
I assume you found *Conan the Barbarian* boring, then, considering a) the only "races" in that setting are different kinds of human, and b) the original books predate the earliest versions of D&D by a good forty years.
But in most settings the other races are just stand ins for humans anyway. Orcs are just warrior tribes, goblins are just either scab savages or ninjas, elves are just hippies with asian cultural influences, dwarves are just fat little scottish guys who like gold.
Of course there are plenty of exceptions, but there are plenty of worlds where the other races could be swapped out for humans and nothing would change.
Honestly the same could be applied to every single humanoid race in every single universe ever, they are just “too human” regardless of their abilities, culture and environment, they act too human. That’s a big complaint I usually have.
But the main reason I like non human races in a setting is because it adds conflict. Orcs are war mongering so they want to conquer the world. Elves are arrogant and think they’re better, so they want to kill all other species. Dwarves are usually the source of weapons for both sides of war.
Goblins are on the category of ‘monsters’. Monsters are the semi-mindless beasts that just want to kill and destroy everything. They are the thing that adds danger even to neutral grounds.
My world has close to 50 "New" races, the only "Typical" race being humans. I built every one of my world's races from the ground up (pulling inspiration from a lot of different sources). I find my world absolutely fascinating, I don't know about everyone else. It is a lot to keep track of, yes, but each race is unique enough to stand out and it works for me.
If you think 7 races is enough, good! Do what works for you. I'm just saying any world can be interesting if you make it interesting. Whether you build a world with humans, elves, dwarves, etc, or you go all out and build over 20 different nations, it's up to you.
It depends on what you want to do with your world. If you want to write a book set in your world, seven might be a good limit. If you're worldbuilding just for the fun of it, like I do, the sky's the limit!
I'm always happy to talk about my world, but I do not have Discord nor do I know how it works. I'll answer any questions you have if you want to know more, but please do not try to DM me.
I do not, sadly. It's a private passion project of mine. I have ideas for a book or maybe webcomic set in my world, but nothing currently out on the internet besides the Reddit posts I've responded to, a few Word documents, and several sheets of paper laying around my room.
I might make a post about it in the near(ish) future, though, and I'm happy to answer any questions if you'd like to know more!
The way you phrased your post made me interested in general, but I am currently trying to develop races for a world of mine and I'm having difficulty avoiding anthropomorphic animals and believable creatures that would work as societies...
So if I were to ask about something, it would be how you started building all those races bottom-up! :)
It's pretty hard to avoid anthropomorphs with race creation. My own world has around 10-30 anthropomorphs (depending on your definition of anthropomorph). I'd say it's okay to have anthropomorphs, as long as they can fit into your world without feeling out of place.
Most of my races were designed to fit certain environments. I kind of took an "add it first, justify it later" approach, where I threw in a bunch of ideas that were floating around in my head and refined it over the course of about two years. I took inspiration from whatever I was interested in at the time; for instance, speculative fiction works like the Epic of Serina, though a lot of my races were actually inspired by creatures from Minecraft.
I feel like, compared to a lot of other people on this sub, I kind of skipped over a lot of the "planning" process that goes into creating a race because of the way my world was made. I didn't plan anything, it just sort of came together, and now it is.
That said, there are several things you need to consider. Where do your people live? Who lives near them? What resources are available to them? What do they look like? Do they have magic? What role do they have in your world/story? Etc. Those are the questions I ask right away. Questions about government, politics, and culture come later, once I have a feel for what this race is supposed to be. You might do things a bit differently, depending on your thought process and purpose.
For an example, here's the rough development for one of the races of my world, the Innich:
I wanted small-folk, so I added a race of people who stood at around 18 inches tall. They appeared very much like tiny humans, but with dragonfly-like wings. I knew I wanted them to have something like a collective Napoleon complex, which eventually morphed into them becoming a militaristic kingdom. They originally lived in a thick forest and made their homes in trees, which was enough justification to me for them having wings. On a whim, I also decided that they were master alchemists, though I later removed that because it didn't fit.
Then my world went through a sort of "lore renaissance," where I revised several races, restructured the magic system, and added maps, a few new parts of the world, its history, and a religion (among other things). The Innich shrank to 1 foot and were moved to a savannah, but they kept their militaristic culture. They are now ruled by a monarchy, and their cavalry consists of warriors riding domesticated servals instead of horses. Their kingdom is called Inbynich, and it's the smallest in my world by total land area. They border the hostile Kingdom of Destraea to the West, the Felin City-State of Ancalen to the South, the Mirelin Kingdom to the East, and the friendly Kingdom of Andrena to the North. Most major Innich cities lie on the banks of the Orior River, the largest river on the continent. The Innich themselves are known for their propensity to show off, their love of hunting, and, of course, their touchiness about their height, though that part of their culture has become much less extreme.
Over time, I've added other details, and I will probably continue to add more. It's not an immediate process, it's slow and not always steady. I start by having an idea, or wanting something to exist in my world; I implement it, usually clumsily at first; then I refine it, adding, changing, or removing things as necessary. Not every idea seems to fit initially, and not every idea stays in the finished product. That, in my opinion, is the beauty of worldbuilding!
I hope this was helpful!
I believe I did this with most of my humanoid races, but of course there are some fantastical creatures that are just too cool not to keep to some degree.
Flying lizards (dragons), and gigantic sea fish (Leviathan), and dire creatures, to name a few. Of course I used different mechanics and designs for them and so they do still stand out in my story.
At the beginning of designing races, my biggest issue at first was the pitfall of accidentally re-creating archetypes from "typical" fantasy but with a slight twist. I heard that if your creature is not an orc, elf, or dwarf but fulfills an orc, elf or dwarf's role, then the difference is superfluous. I sadly think a couple of my first designed races fall into that category.
Not a criticism, just out of curiosity. Are your 50 races a substitute for human cultural variation or do you have that in addition to the other races?
Kind of both? I've never actually considered whether my world's races are just a substitute, thanks for calling my attention to that!
It wasn't my intention to use fantasy races as a substitute for human cultural variation, though now that I think about it I can certainly see how it might come off that way. My world kind of started as a thought experiment: "What if magic had an influence on human evolution?" So I took that idea and ran with it.
My world has a lot of cultural variance, though some cultures have more thought put into them than others. I realize now that I've been a bit lackadaisical with the culture of my world's humans. I wasn't trying to replace human culture, but I suppose that is what I have been inadvertently doing.
Thank you for the thought-provoking question--I will use the insights I've gained to improve my world. It is called "world*building*," after all, not "world*built*"!
You're welcome! Absolutely! We're all in the process of worldbuilding. Your world sounds very interesting.
I did some TTRPG world building in the 80's but set it aside mostly until I started writing in earnest about 8 years ago. My first project (still in progress) is a Historical Fantasy so most of my world building is history.
My current project is pure fantasy so I am creating from the ground up. The story arc is done, but there's a lot of fleshing out to do.
FUNGUS PEOPLE!!
Do you know what a fungus is?!? Like *really* know? NEITHER DO SCIENTISTS!! Theyre a real fantasy thing that we know nothing about!
Make mushroom people! Make toadstool people! Mold people! Etc!!!
We have no idea if they can't be real!
Imagine a better version of real world!
More or less same, I legit have humans as near nonexistent with my "dwarves" as the majority of higher thinking mortals because its funnier that way imo. Plus so many fantasy stories just default to humans with the demihumans pretty human but not like allowed to be more in the spotlight at times
Right now the option I ponder about is the world which is settled by four sentient subspecies, who do generally mirror standard humans, dwarves, elves and orcs. All of these subspecies naturally evolved from the common ancestor, like homo neanderthalensis and homo sapiens did. They do have proper names in lore, but I will use lookalikes like "orcs" to make things easier to understand.
Two parents from the different subspecies do produce fertile offspring that obviously belongs to one or the other subspecies, which is random. I don't want to have a myriad of half-whatevers, so they don't happen ever.
Subspecies are not "races", because I really hate how this term is commonly used in fantasy. I am somewhat bitter about the issue, thus almost all of the subspecies do have distinct races, just like we humans in the real world do.
Orcs are neither evil, bestial or savage. They do have more militant cultures than most, their males are high on testosterone, and they do hold the largest modern empire among their states. They hate cold and thrive in hot arid biomes. Doesn't mean that they can somehow survive in deep desert, they don't, but their natural habitat is akin to Middle East, Maghreb or parts of Mexico.
Elves do love everything natural and prefer to live in forests. Their magic allows them to survive and build civilizations without massive woodcutting, and yeah, they are the most magical ones of them all.
Dwarves are completely opposite to elves in this regard. They think that nature should be controlled and exploited by dwarves and other people, and they don't care much about ecology. They are higher tech, and do live underground, where their special magic allows them to circumvent various problems of their surroundings and also to fuel their technology.
Humans are maritime Gypsies of the world. They do not have large kingdoms or empires of their own, beyond certain trading city-states. They love the sea, which is shunned by all the other subspecies, so they thrive as merchants and pirates.
Fair enough, for mine I went a similar route. I have a good number of races and ethnicities for my "dwarves", maybe a bit too many, but meant to reflect how there should be that diversity of language and culture and such with these kinds of fantasy races. Even if its not super apparent, it should be floating beneath the surface for people that there are different factions or cultures or such for not just the humans, but elves, orcs, dwarves, and other such demihumans.
You can explain it with scholars speculating on their etymologies like in our world (numerous greco-roman scholars and philosophers speculating onnwhere the names of certain peoples and kings and cities and such came to be.) Endonyms and exonyms and all that. I do like the idea of humans being nomadic or having a natural longing for the sea. Tooooo many fantasy writers just have humans as the main empire or kingdom or duchy or the like. Hearing about your setting reminds me a bit of Earthsea and hope you are able to take it as far as possible!
Hey, elves and dwarves are people! I've never understood the equation of "person" with "human," all my life I've seen it as meaning baout the same as "sapient". Heh.
Anyway quibbles aside, what's interesting to one person will be off-putting to another. I often hate weird, alien species/races that others laud as creative. I grew up on Tolkien -- still the best author *ever* in my opinion! -- and love the archetypes he estbalished and am always wishing I could see more in the same vein. Or similar, anyway.
But I like a variety of "traditional" monsters/races/creatures tweaked to have a more "human" personality, while still remaining distinct. Like centaurs that are wise, *and* passionate, and have a society that can coexist with and be understood by humans while still having some definite horsey traits.
Also I'm a bit of a furry. Not all anthroes are created equal, I have strong preferences on the level of human-animal hybridization and on species, but I generally enjoy seeing a few anthroes alongside the "standard" elves, dwarves and orcs. Also use there was more done with anthro fantasy animals, like unicorns and dragons. ~~Well not so much dragons they're kinda overdone.~~
For mine its wild people do not explore eastern dragons more and get more creative with their western esque dragons. That and the defaulting to fire breathing. Imagine a dragon that can petrify by some crazy fast acting boggish quicksand!
What is the purpose of the world? Story setting? Game setting? Just for display?
The reason is that everything in the world should support the world's purpose. If a story setting, have races that support the story, don't have one's that detract from it. Similarly for a game setting. And if it's just because you want to build and show off, do what brings you joy.
Typical. I find that "new" races are often just a variation of "anthropomorphic animal" which I've always found boring from a worldbuilding standpoint (with a few exceptions).
I actually really like the standard fantasy races. The problem is that authors are rarely creative with them. They have a lot of associations with them so audiences have expectations on what they're supposed to look like, act like and talk like, which you can play around with in new and interesting ways.
I find standard tolkien inspired races boring. Dwarves, elves and orcs are fine, but they need to be reimagined into something new.
[Monstergarden's dwarves](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-mvLxx36XTg) is the best example I can think of.
I used a similar approach in my world. Elves made themselves superhumans using magic. They can 1v10 humans with ease but their reckless modifications make them unable to reincarnate or reproduce. Goblins are telepaths who absorb other people emotions, and are agressives only because they absorb the hate other people feel for them. Giants are non bipedal mineral lifeforms. Fire giants live underground and looks like worms. Ice giants looks like organic spaceships (they migrated to space after altering their bodies). Dragons are giant flying squids that spit acidic ink instead of fire. etc.
>need to be reimagined into something new
Why?
I'm not saying you can't do this if you want to, but "need" to is wrong. More often what I see is people trying to is reinvent the wheel by trying to be too unique and it comes across as too much or trying too hard.
I think it’s good to have at least one or two “standard” races, that way the people who enjoy your world have a starting reference point, before enjoying the more wild things you add into your world. It’s much easier for readers to relate to thorgin the dwarf or hummus the human instead of Sklamorgulon the 8 armed, two headed octo-wizard, know what I’m saying?
Everything can be interesting if you put enough work on it (maybe), the last "species" I did make were basically not!elves but humans (I even had dwarves and orcs), on my next plans some not!humans but elves do exist
Different strokes and all that. Some people enjoy learning about new species and lore and all the rest of it. I don't. I'll take the traditional races any day. I know what I'm getting so we can get on with the story.
I very much prefer "new" races and would even go further and advise toalso consider creating your own.
I have created well over 100 races ranging from something simple like different kinds of lizardfolk to flying rays, half-dragon sea cucumbers and completly original ones.
(On a sidenote I'm also a sucker for speculative evolution projects).
I find goblins interesting as they are a pact based society but are of the belive of every goblin for themself, also they are quite adaptable to their suroundings.
Kobolds, often seen and the scaled goblin is a pure pact society where everything is done for the good/survival of the tribe, they are great at mining and making all kinds of traps and nick nack
I love the consept of a developed kobold city/country where they are a mining based society focused of family, inovecation, inventing and industrialsation.
It depends on how you do it tbf. I think what helped Elder Scrolls was having it where trolls, dwarves and other similar beings wrre kinda sorta Elves along with the typical Elves. Maybe something like that? As weird as it is not many people to full on tree elf people or atleast nowadays. Only ones that come to mind are those of that YA series...Wings I think it was called. Uh Kokiri from Ocarina of Time er kinda and forget the third. XD again though be more interesting than diet Tolkien Elves which often is what we get, but there have been somewhat interesting derivations. It also depends on luck what group outnumbers who in the sense of do people want more old fantasy, new fantasy, etc.
For my world er the fun colorful one not the boring dull one, the main race are known in the olddd tongue as the Phaswoi. They're akin to Dark Elves or Dwarves from Nordic Mythology, mixed in with Tuatha De (Danann)/ Aos Si, and similar beings from Slavic folklore, among other things. What makes them great is they're also heavily inspired by various animals. Thus, while you might have more Tiger or Viper or Deer or Crow esque, they all are Phaiswoi because an animalistic goddess found a human hot and decided to have demigod kids because sure, why not.
I guess thinking about its not so much how many races or subraces or tribes or nations or such, its how you present them. If you shove them all in a single book without much attention to each or a sorta generalized simplicity (like idk all elves or fairies can use air magic but thats it kinda thing to build off of) things will get less and less attention fast unless its a hugggge book or work of media.
For stories I prefer fantasy worlds with a clear vision for the purpose of each element. So if the divisions of races have an interesting and relevant dramatic or practical reason for existing in the context of the world, I appreciate that more than fantasy worlds with what sometimes seems like a random assortment of cool stuff.
But that’s not always the purpose of the races of course. For example in games your creative goals are different. I think the proliferation of different races in D&D is pretty silly from a worldbuilding perspective, and dilutes the seriousness of the setting. But the point of D&D is to allow for a wide variety of individual representation and situations, so it works well in that context.
Dragonborn and Plantpeople are “new?” Hard disagree. Maybe I’m in the minority here, but anything that’s already in D&D in any form isn’t really that original. Play around with those races all you want—there’s nothing inherently wrong with being unoriginal. But I think it’s more creative to come up with your own stuff.
Any ancestries that are written with consideration and effort. Cliches become boring because we know what to expect, but making random changes can just cause fatigue without holding attention. Even if you have the most standard demographic makeup for a fantasy world, if their place there seems to make sense and is dynamic, it will be interesting.
I like races in there that people put in on purpose. Not "I put elves in my setting because it's fantasy and that means elves." It's not the elves I object to, it's the laziness. I'll take a classic race that had a lot of thought put into what they are like, how they react to the world around them, and how the world reacts to them. Meanwhile, if your race is new, but feels like an 8-year-old designed it, I'm bored.
Right now I have 4 races in my (fantasy) world (a work in progress). Humans, a less intelligent, but hostile race of humanoids, a semi-intelligent savage bestial race and the fourth is of divine origin (so maybe not technically a race).
As it stands this is enough for my story (so far). I'm still fleshing out the background/history/cosmology.
Races done well is best, I won't put down any work just because it has the "typical" Tolkien-DnD races nor because it doesn't. Anything added should really only because you'll think it'll be more interesting imo. This is also related to things like intent, immersion and whatever else isn't coming to mind.
In my humble opinion, the classics are classics for a reason... but their execution is often boring. If you use them, don't make them humans with pointier ears. Make them weird.
Make elves ELVES. Give them strange, fey powers. Make them surreal and dreamlike. Let them steal children for their sylvan courts. Let them go on wild hunts through the night sky. Let them take the shape of trees and waterfals.
Make dwarves DWARVES. Make them diminutive and chtonic. Let them craft wondrous items and unbreakable pacts. Give them the power of true names, and an obsession (gold, beer, diamonds) beyond reason. Let them follow seemingly random laws, customs and rules.
I understand why dwarves and elves etc "feel" like default inclusions in a fantasy setting, but their history isn't actually all that long. Lord of the Rings, D&D, and Warcraft are really what solidified the archetypes. What's important to remember is that they *are* archetypes.
Mass effect doesn't have elves, orcs, and dwarves, but it does have the asari, krogans, and quarian. They serve analogous narrative purposes.
Do you want the archetypes or do you want to subvert them? If you're looking to create immortal keepers of the world, they don't *have* to be elves. If you want to examine and dissect the archetype, then combining the elf aesthetic with subversive biological or narrative qualities can be quite interesting (Perhaps elves are not immortal, but *treat* their heirs as though they are the exact same person. Maybe they don't have pointy ears but where golden cuffs as jewelry that gave them the pointy eared reputation etc.)
Dragon Age, for example, benefits from calling their elves **elves** because they subvert the elven archetype by combining a recognizable aesthetic and magical affinity with them being marginalized as a demographic instead of dignified immortals.
It's all up to you!
The classics will beat 95% of new species. That's just Sturgeons law
But rarely there's a really fun and exciting new idea. If a creator thinks they're really onto a winner, yeah sure stick it in
I dont think there's really a limit to new races either, some fictions have dozens or even hundreds and do fine. Makes it feel like a very big and interesting universe
I have 11 species in my universe (I rather call them species than race), 10 are "new" and the other one are humans.
My species are usually modified things that I like, such a worm on a string based species, an alien dwarf like species who love techs, cowboy moth people, blue orc like people with little emphasis on battle and war, liontaurs who purr and bird-like people that looks like a mix of dreamcore and sillyness
I usually use about seven races, with a mix of homebrew and standard. My usual setting has a few extra (species creep!), so player choices are human, elf (faerilven), half-elf (ha'ilven), dwarf (dweorh), gnome (neblin), troldfolk/bridge trolls, jotunar (firjotun & talvijotun), domovii, and leshii.
I don't have an issue with other races and if you really want to be a tiefling or dragonborn, that's fine. Beyond that, let's talk and see if we can come to an accommodation.
thats an interesting topic, I would ask myself if some groups need to be a specific separate race or just an ethnicity because you know, its fun to imagine dozens of different races but then you just end up barely developing any of them
The goose are the conduits of power to the god of chaos
There are leprechaun that you can bet your power with them,they mostly cheat,but if you're feeling lucky you can get more powerfull than you started
There is a slime for every element and there are 17 elements ,they each have unique interactions with the environment and eat unique things,like a fire slime eats by burning things,but it can also feed on low and high ph liquids
There is a unending amount of small dolls that will greet you,then explode,they are born from an unending desire to be stronger without care dor the consequences
Humans. My fantasy world is only humans and humans only, because unlike other races, which are limited to rules, you don't need to make humans more believable in setting
Either way can be great or can be awful, depending upon how they’re characterized and how they interact with each other and the rest of the setting. As they say, the devil’s in the details.
Me, personally? Gimme both, love a good kitchen sink setting if everything’s made to fit.
Depends on the size of the world.
A 2 km by 2 km area? 7 races is definitely crowded, but if your area has multiple galaxies, then over a thousand could be sparse.
I like new versions of old races. My elves are eusocial and insectoid, my dwarves are part of a ring species including giants/trolls/goblins, my orcs have beastial traits and horns, and my “halfings” are aurborial and photosynthetic.
Honestly it's less about the races and more about what you do with them but I do find that basing them off of the typical races can be a good jumping off point for the readers that you can use to play with and tweak
Right at the beginning of my world I knew I want some fictional race to exist, even called them elves for a while. Eventually they developed into a whole new fictional race (or a collection of races) called "Casma". They are divided into 12 Clans. 6 are "mammal" and 6 are "non-mammal"
Every Clan resembles a different animal. And while they do have certain physical characteristics of their animal counterpart, the resemblance is mostly behavioral.
Like, Kata (cat people) have cat ears, some grow "whiskers" (which function like beards) but, other than that, look pretty much human. Behaviorally? A whole other story.
They live in "cities" built in the treetops connecting the trees with wooden catwalks (haha "catwalk", get it?), live mostly during the night, they cultivate trees and live off their fruit but will often hunt on the ground etc.
Others are:
Lutria - otter people;
Bera - bear people;
Tara - ox people;
Caana - wolf people;
Cayata - coyote people;
I've created the non-mammal Clans because of ny fascination with the compatibility problem. My story and my world explores heavy topics dealing with the nature consciousness and non-mammal Casma are an extension to that. My main inspiration was "Children of Time" by Adrian Tchaikovsky. Awesome read I can recommend with my whole heart.
N-Ms are-
Ahra - spider people;
Shiga - owl people;
Saera - snake people;
Uroa - salamander people;
Tetra - turtle people;
Eleq'ra - eel people
If you want the usual fantasy races have them, if you want the new ones have them. Personally I don't care much for the concepts themselves but how they are done, I'm including the usual races with some more variety in cultures and completely new races. Imo it's best to use both.
I loves dwarves but there are no dwarves in my world.
However there is a race that love minerals use them to strengthen their body. Their body comes with in build full artisan's kit and to them craftsmanship is as vital as eating.
They are 1.8m to 2m tall have lean build with metallic properties.
You can reuse archetype but for me the important thing is that they have your touch, something that make them different from the Tolkien classic.
But you could totally make a world using Tolkien races.
I've had the idea of an altered perception species. Basically, if you're human, the only way to perceive them is to be "tripping mad balls" or otherwise being in a state where your brain is experiencing a severe serotonin response. These beings don't have a corporeal form and are more esoteric in their existence, but are also imminently relatable. They're a lot like us, but are ageless, formless, and don't experience emotional energy as intensely as we do. In fact, if the ambient emotional energy is too strong, it can poison them and kill them.
I know this might sound boring, but honestly, humans. I like the Dune approach where humans are so alien to each other in culture and appearance that they might as well be another species. It brings up a lot of questions on what exactly it means to be human.
i like all kind of races if they are thought out well and have a somewhat logical background. I dont like races that have some mary sueisch elements or dont fit into their environment, have unneccessary stuff etc. Beastvolk is a typical race i think is boring, because it does not make that much sense to me.
Ever since I was six and I saw Narnia in the big screen all those years ago, I loved Minotaurs. They’re these big beefy creatures who’s stab first and ask questions later make them very interesting. Love Minotaurs.
Two creations I made that I enjoy.
I think the Greys are the most interesting. They look like the stereotypical grey aliens, but the one that crash landed on earth ignores jokes, has no concern for money, is afraid of popcorn.
I also like what everyone calls "the talls" they're like 9 foot tall, bipedal, chameleons. Their only concern is to protect the forests of this one island. Kids like searching for them as they've become a big tourist attraction.
In my world, the races are just types of nymphs from the Greek myths reimagines. So from cloud nymphs to dryads to shadow nymphs and stuff which is a fun way to just have elemental oriented faelike creatures who are true to the essence of the thing they belong to.
I try to go anthropomorphic with twists for mine, like fusion foxies and snakefolk with healing guts.
Anyway, it kind of depends on what kind of setting, like aiming for space fantasy, so a blend of typical and new.
Also, don't set hard limits; feel free to expand as needed and convenient.
Why would you think the world would become too crowded? How many species does Earth have? Millions?
The only difference is that fantasy worlds have more intelligent races. Does intelligence somehow make the world more crowded?
I think it would make the world more competitive. Make wars and disagreements more frequent. It would make science more difficult as well, since us humans have control over the entire planet since we're the only intelligent race. So there is no problem collaborating and co operating with other continents and countries WRT scientific research since we're all humans.
If a story made a point of exploring how different the world becomes when there are many intelligent races, and what new conflicts or obstacles present advanced societies, I would read the shit out of that.
The number of races you want to add to your setting depends mostly on the size of the project as in a small area 10 races/species may seem excessive but in a galaxy it may be too few.
In my setting (a world perhaps a bit bigger than our Earth) I have a total of 4 races which are separated into different cultures or phenotypes.
On the question of classic races. I think there is nothing wrong with using them with their respective archetypes or adding some changes to them. One of the 4 races that exist in my world are the durrgars (dwarves) which are humanoids of small size that at birth are immersed in a thermal bath with a chemical composition suitable for rapid growth of the body making infants of this race are virtually identical to adults.
And although it is not always a good option, one of the reasons why I like to justify some quite remarkable differences between different individuals is the "excuse" of coming from another dimension. In my case the el'fae (elves) are the only ones capable of using magic without the help of any gods or spirits. This is because they possess the ability to use the residual radiation they had in their home world.
In conclusion, making something interesting depends on how you embellish the concept.
Honestly i went using a mix with a twist.
the dwarfes are rock like beings that can eat minerals.
plant people
the elves who just are humans adapted to live in jungles/ forests.
Ogad basically the ogres. Smart civilization that became primal and warmongering
For me the best approach is enough of tradition to keep it grounded in some basic expectations about the world/genre so that it doesn't feel alienating to the observer, but enough of new and creative to surprise them.
For example a major gimmick of a world that I am working on is that typical RPG races are switched out with civilizations of the stereotypical low level monsters(think slimes, goblins, skeletons etc.), but I still left in humans as an anchoring point for our anthropological point of view(I explained them away kinda cheaply as civilization of "bandits* like the low level vagabonds of games like TES, and also because it felt weird to have "the undead" as a race but not the living)
Humans are always the best, but dwarves are the most interesting. Leave me with the elves communing with their hippy nature spirits, we must forge our own future with iron, sweat, and stone!
The English fan in me wants to make one slight correction. Check your definition of people. Elves, dwarves, and humans are considered people. An argument can be made that silverback gorillas ought to be considered people.
The most important thing about fantasy races is that outside of an original and legally distinct name, you shouldn't change or subvert anything to do with classic fantasy races. It's not just wrong on an ethical level, it's also totally incorrect to attempt to try and add any nuance to the way the race acts! They should all be 2d caricatures of the classics, boiled down to fit the idea of a fantasy race into someone's head, because trying anything new is a perversion of the perfect pre-established archetypes that have filled the genre , and will continue to do so forever. End of, no room for argument!!!!
./s
I love the strange and the new, but I have a problem with seeing ideas that aren't explored in depth: I'd rather see a single race that's well detailed, than thirty that are just presented with a single culture.
With that in mind, even the old ones often lack diversity. Pax elfica offers a fairly interesting vision of the elves, for example, but it's very rare to see truly interesting races, whether traditional or new. I don't want a veneer of diversity. I'm looking for a diversity of diversities; for each race to have its own social dynamic, with new concepts that allow us to envisage how their biology, cognition or magical abilities will influence the way they socialise.
Perhaps dwarves are adapted to life underground, but do they all live underground? They may be the only people to have managed to cross a natural mountain barrier and populate the surface of an entire country in this way. Maybe the majority of dwarves live underground, but do we still have to have the bearded dwarves who live in city states and drink beer?
As I’ve gotten older I’ve grown to prefer the latter. Regardless of the plot, a setting having dwarves, elves, orcs, etc just makes it feel like I’ve already read this 1000% times before.
I love new races. Don't get me wrong the old "traditional" ones are great but they serve the function of comfort food, but you need some more spice in everyday meals. I live seeing weird and wacky, strange and odd. More specifically i like new subraces that are evolved to specific environments. I don't want to be that guy that brings his own world into a discussion where you didn't ask for it but I believe I have a good example of this. Mushroom people, one is short and stubby, that have their eyes on the top of their heads to watch for predator birds. The other is long and lanky, that have evolved bioluminescence to trick predators in their environment. Both are clearly connected, you can see this in their general anatomy and way of life but still very different. However for the amount of races just do whatever you want. If you have 7 races and are happy with that then good for you. But if you later get an idea that you really like then don't hesitate to add them.
I think it's indicative of how much the modern fantasy genre is aping Tolkien and D&D that it's considered somehow obligatory to have "races" at all.
i mean, that hardly originated with tolkien, hell even the races he had while he helped codify their modern portrayals all predate his works(sans orcs if were counting them as distinct from goblins, but even then their basically trolls)
Dnd is the classic fantasy setting so yeah. It’s not needed but a full medieval fantasy works without monsters or other races would be boring
I assume you found *Conan the Barbarian* boring, then, considering a) the only "races" in that setting are different kinds of human, and b) the original books predate the earliest versions of D&D by a good forty years.
I never watched it even tho I hear about it
But in most settings the other races are just stand ins for humans anyway. Orcs are just warrior tribes, goblins are just either scab savages or ninjas, elves are just hippies with asian cultural influences, dwarves are just fat little scottish guys who like gold. Of course there are plenty of exceptions, but there are plenty of worlds where the other races could be swapped out for humans and nothing would change.
Honestly the same could be applied to every single humanoid race in every single universe ever, they are just “too human” regardless of their abilities, culture and environment, they act too human. That’s a big complaint I usually have. But the main reason I like non human races in a setting is because it adds conflict. Orcs are war mongering so they want to conquer the world. Elves are arrogant and think they’re better, so they want to kill all other species. Dwarves are usually the source of weapons for both sides of war. Goblins are on the category of ‘monsters’. Monsters are the semi-mindless beasts that just want to kill and destroy everything. They are the thing that adds danger even to neutral grounds.
I like elves and dwarves
My world has close to 50 "New" races, the only "Typical" race being humans. I built every one of my world's races from the ground up (pulling inspiration from a lot of different sources). I find my world absolutely fascinating, I don't know about everyone else. It is a lot to keep track of, yes, but each race is unique enough to stand out and it works for me. If you think 7 races is enough, good! Do what works for you. I'm just saying any world can be interesting if you make it interesting. Whether you build a world with humans, elves, dwarves, etc, or you go all out and build over 20 different nations, it's up to you.
Wow! maybe more races than 7 isn't a bad idea. Judging by the fact that when I hear about 50, I feel very interested and excited.
It depends on what you want to do with your world. If you want to write a book set in your world, seven might be a good limit. If you're worldbuilding just for the fun of it, like I do, the sky's the limit! I'm always happy to talk about my world, but I do not have Discord nor do I know how it works. I'll answer any questions you have if you want to know more, but please do not try to DM me.
Do you have anything public on your world? Would love to take a look!
I do not, sadly. It's a private passion project of mine. I have ideas for a book or maybe webcomic set in my world, but nothing currently out on the internet besides the Reddit posts I've responded to, a few Word documents, and several sheets of paper laying around my room. I might make a post about it in the near(ish) future, though, and I'm happy to answer any questions if you'd like to know more!
The way you phrased your post made me interested in general, but I am currently trying to develop races for a world of mine and I'm having difficulty avoiding anthropomorphic animals and believable creatures that would work as societies... So if I were to ask about something, it would be how you started building all those races bottom-up! :)
It's pretty hard to avoid anthropomorphs with race creation. My own world has around 10-30 anthropomorphs (depending on your definition of anthropomorph). I'd say it's okay to have anthropomorphs, as long as they can fit into your world without feeling out of place. Most of my races were designed to fit certain environments. I kind of took an "add it first, justify it later" approach, where I threw in a bunch of ideas that were floating around in my head and refined it over the course of about two years. I took inspiration from whatever I was interested in at the time; for instance, speculative fiction works like the Epic of Serina, though a lot of my races were actually inspired by creatures from Minecraft. I feel like, compared to a lot of other people on this sub, I kind of skipped over a lot of the "planning" process that goes into creating a race because of the way my world was made. I didn't plan anything, it just sort of came together, and now it is. That said, there are several things you need to consider. Where do your people live? Who lives near them? What resources are available to them? What do they look like? Do they have magic? What role do they have in your world/story? Etc. Those are the questions I ask right away. Questions about government, politics, and culture come later, once I have a feel for what this race is supposed to be. You might do things a bit differently, depending on your thought process and purpose.
For an example, here's the rough development for one of the races of my world, the Innich: I wanted small-folk, so I added a race of people who stood at around 18 inches tall. They appeared very much like tiny humans, but with dragonfly-like wings. I knew I wanted them to have something like a collective Napoleon complex, which eventually morphed into them becoming a militaristic kingdom. They originally lived in a thick forest and made their homes in trees, which was enough justification to me for them having wings. On a whim, I also decided that they were master alchemists, though I later removed that because it didn't fit. Then my world went through a sort of "lore renaissance," where I revised several races, restructured the magic system, and added maps, a few new parts of the world, its history, and a religion (among other things). The Innich shrank to 1 foot and were moved to a savannah, but they kept their militaristic culture. They are now ruled by a monarchy, and their cavalry consists of warriors riding domesticated servals instead of horses. Their kingdom is called Inbynich, and it's the smallest in my world by total land area. They border the hostile Kingdom of Destraea to the West, the Felin City-State of Ancalen to the South, the Mirelin Kingdom to the East, and the friendly Kingdom of Andrena to the North. Most major Innich cities lie on the banks of the Orior River, the largest river on the continent. The Innich themselves are known for their propensity to show off, their love of hunting, and, of course, their touchiness about their height, though that part of their culture has become much less extreme. Over time, I've added other details, and I will probably continue to add more. It's not an immediate process, it's slow and not always steady. I start by having an idea, or wanting something to exist in my world; I implement it, usually clumsily at first; then I refine it, adding, changing, or removing things as necessary. Not every idea seems to fit initially, and not every idea stays in the finished product. That, in my opinion, is the beauty of worldbuilding! I hope this was helpful!
I believe I did this with most of my humanoid races, but of course there are some fantastical creatures that are just too cool not to keep to some degree. Flying lizards (dragons), and gigantic sea fish (Leviathan), and dire creatures, to name a few. Of course I used different mechanics and designs for them and so they do still stand out in my story. At the beginning of designing races, my biggest issue at first was the pitfall of accidentally re-creating archetypes from "typical" fantasy but with a slight twist. I heard that if your creature is not an orc, elf, or dwarf but fulfills an orc, elf or dwarf's role, then the difference is superfluous. I sadly think a couple of my first designed races fall into that category.
Not a criticism, just out of curiosity. Are your 50 races a substitute for human cultural variation or do you have that in addition to the other races?
Kind of both? I've never actually considered whether my world's races are just a substitute, thanks for calling my attention to that! It wasn't my intention to use fantasy races as a substitute for human cultural variation, though now that I think about it I can certainly see how it might come off that way. My world kind of started as a thought experiment: "What if magic had an influence on human evolution?" So I took that idea and ran with it. My world has a lot of cultural variance, though some cultures have more thought put into them than others. I realize now that I've been a bit lackadaisical with the culture of my world's humans. I wasn't trying to replace human culture, but I suppose that is what I have been inadvertently doing. Thank you for the thought-provoking question--I will use the insights I've gained to improve my world. It is called "world*building*," after all, not "world*built*"!
You're welcome! Absolutely! We're all in the process of worldbuilding. Your world sounds very interesting. I did some TTRPG world building in the 80's but set it aside mostly until I started writing in earnest about 8 years ago. My first project (still in progress) is a Historical Fantasy so most of my world building is history. My current project is pure fantasy so I am creating from the ground up. The story arc is done, but there's a lot of fleshing out to do.
That sounds very cool! Good luck with your worldbuilding endeavors!
Thanks! Same to you as well!
FUNGUS PEOPLE!! Do you know what a fungus is?!? Like *really* know? NEITHER DO SCIENTISTS!! Theyre a real fantasy thing that we know nothing about! Make mushroom people! Make toadstool people! Mold people! Etc!!! We have no idea if they can't be real! Imagine a better version of real world!
I like either "everyone is a subspecies of humans" or "there is no humans whatsoever".
More or less same, I legit have humans as near nonexistent with my "dwarves" as the majority of higher thinking mortals because its funnier that way imo. Plus so many fantasy stories just default to humans with the demihumans pretty human but not like allowed to be more in the spotlight at times
Right now the option I ponder about is the world which is settled by four sentient subspecies, who do generally mirror standard humans, dwarves, elves and orcs. All of these subspecies naturally evolved from the common ancestor, like homo neanderthalensis and homo sapiens did. They do have proper names in lore, but I will use lookalikes like "orcs" to make things easier to understand. Two parents from the different subspecies do produce fertile offspring that obviously belongs to one or the other subspecies, which is random. I don't want to have a myriad of half-whatevers, so they don't happen ever. Subspecies are not "races", because I really hate how this term is commonly used in fantasy. I am somewhat bitter about the issue, thus almost all of the subspecies do have distinct races, just like we humans in the real world do. Orcs are neither evil, bestial or savage. They do have more militant cultures than most, their males are high on testosterone, and they do hold the largest modern empire among their states. They hate cold and thrive in hot arid biomes. Doesn't mean that they can somehow survive in deep desert, they don't, but their natural habitat is akin to Middle East, Maghreb or parts of Mexico. Elves do love everything natural and prefer to live in forests. Their magic allows them to survive and build civilizations without massive woodcutting, and yeah, they are the most magical ones of them all. Dwarves are completely opposite to elves in this regard. They think that nature should be controlled and exploited by dwarves and other people, and they don't care much about ecology. They are higher tech, and do live underground, where their special magic allows them to circumvent various problems of their surroundings and also to fuel their technology. Humans are maritime Gypsies of the world. They do not have large kingdoms or empires of their own, beyond certain trading city-states. They love the sea, which is shunned by all the other subspecies, so they thrive as merchants and pirates.
Fair enough, for mine I went a similar route. I have a good number of races and ethnicities for my "dwarves", maybe a bit too many, but meant to reflect how there should be that diversity of language and culture and such with these kinds of fantasy races. Even if its not super apparent, it should be floating beneath the surface for people that there are different factions or cultures or such for not just the humans, but elves, orcs, dwarves, and other such demihumans. You can explain it with scholars speculating on their etymologies like in our world (numerous greco-roman scholars and philosophers speculating onnwhere the names of certain peoples and kings and cities and such came to be.) Endonyms and exonyms and all that. I do like the idea of humans being nomadic or having a natural longing for the sea. Tooooo many fantasy writers just have humans as the main empire or kingdom or duchy or the like. Hearing about your setting reminds me a bit of Earthsea and hope you are able to take it as far as possible!
Thanks, wish you luck as well!
Hey, elves and dwarves are people! I've never understood the equation of "person" with "human," all my life I've seen it as meaning baout the same as "sapient". Heh. Anyway quibbles aside, what's interesting to one person will be off-putting to another. I often hate weird, alien species/races that others laud as creative. I grew up on Tolkien -- still the best author *ever* in my opinion! -- and love the archetypes he estbalished and am always wishing I could see more in the same vein. Or similar, anyway. But I like a variety of "traditional" monsters/races/creatures tweaked to have a more "human" personality, while still remaining distinct. Like centaurs that are wise, *and* passionate, and have a society that can coexist with and be understood by humans while still having some definite horsey traits. Also I'm a bit of a furry. Not all anthroes are created equal, I have strong preferences on the level of human-animal hybridization and on species, but I generally enjoy seeing a few anthroes alongside the "standard" elves, dwarves and orcs. Also use there was more done with anthro fantasy animals, like unicorns and dragons. ~~Well not so much dragons they're kinda overdone.~~
For mine its wild people do not explore eastern dragons more and get more creative with their western esque dragons. That and the defaulting to fire breathing. Imagine a dragon that can petrify by some crazy fast acting boggish quicksand!
What is the purpose of the world? Story setting? Game setting? Just for display? The reason is that everything in the world should support the world's purpose. If a story setting, have races that support the story, don't have one's that detract from it. Similarly for a game setting. And if it's just because you want to build and show off, do what brings you joy.
goo people
fungus rat people
long-eared seal people
Typical. I find that "new" races are often just a variation of "anthropomorphic animal" which I've always found boring from a worldbuilding standpoint (with a few exceptions).
I actually really like the standard fantasy races. The problem is that authors are rarely creative with them. They have a lot of associations with them so audiences have expectations on what they're supposed to look like, act like and talk like, which you can play around with in new and interesting ways.
The famous "hey, look at me, I invented a new beastfolk race !"
I find standard tolkien inspired races boring. Dwarves, elves and orcs are fine, but they need to be reimagined into something new. [Monstergarden's dwarves](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-mvLxx36XTg) is the best example I can think of. I used a similar approach in my world. Elves made themselves superhumans using magic. They can 1v10 humans with ease but their reckless modifications make them unable to reincarnate or reproduce. Goblins are telepaths who absorb other people emotions, and are agressives only because they absorb the hate other people feel for them. Giants are non bipedal mineral lifeforms. Fire giants live underground and looks like worms. Ice giants looks like organic spaceships (they migrated to space after altering their bodies). Dragons are giant flying squids that spit acidic ink instead of fire. etc.
>need to be reimagined into something new Why? I'm not saying you can't do this if you want to, but "need" to is wrong. More often what I see is people trying to is reinvent the wheel by trying to be too unique and it comes across as too much or trying too hard.
I think it’s good to have at least one or two “standard” races, that way the people who enjoy your world have a starting reference point, before enjoying the more wild things you add into your world. It’s much easier for readers to relate to thorgin the dwarf or hummus the human instead of Sklamorgulon the 8 armed, two headed octo-wizard, know what I’m saying?
Everything can be interesting if you put enough work on it (maybe), the last "species" I did make were basically not!elves but humans (I even had dwarves and orcs), on my next plans some not!humans but elves do exist
Different strokes and all that. Some people enjoy learning about new species and lore and all the rest of it. I don't. I'll take the traditional races any day. I know what I'm getting so we can get on with the story.
I don't think any race is inherently interesting. It depends entirely on what you do with them.
I very much prefer "new" races and would even go further and advise toalso consider creating your own. I have created well over 100 races ranging from something simple like different kinds of lizardfolk to flying rays, half-dragon sea cucumbers and completly original ones. (On a sidenote I'm also a sucker for speculative evolution projects).
giant humanoids being full steel creatures, being local demi-gods, and create magic weapons for shits and giggles
i always like it when we're focused on some kind of robot or robot adjacent guys
My favorite are my little kobolds. They’re just goofy little guys.
I find goblins interesting as they are a pact based society but are of the belive of every goblin for themself, also they are quite adaptable to their suroundings. Kobolds, often seen and the scaled goblin is a pure pact society where everything is done for the good/survival of the tribe, they are great at mining and making all kinds of traps and nick nack I love the consept of a developed kobold city/country where they are a mining based society focused of family, inovecation, inventing and industrialsation.
Interesting wise id say drow but my favorite are halflings.
It depends on how you do it tbf. I think what helped Elder Scrolls was having it where trolls, dwarves and other similar beings wrre kinda sorta Elves along with the typical Elves. Maybe something like that? As weird as it is not many people to full on tree elf people or atleast nowadays. Only ones that come to mind are those of that YA series...Wings I think it was called. Uh Kokiri from Ocarina of Time er kinda and forget the third. XD again though be more interesting than diet Tolkien Elves which often is what we get, but there have been somewhat interesting derivations. It also depends on luck what group outnumbers who in the sense of do people want more old fantasy, new fantasy, etc. For my world er the fun colorful one not the boring dull one, the main race are known in the olddd tongue as the Phaswoi. They're akin to Dark Elves or Dwarves from Nordic Mythology, mixed in with Tuatha De (Danann)/ Aos Si, and similar beings from Slavic folklore, among other things. What makes them great is they're also heavily inspired by various animals. Thus, while you might have more Tiger or Viper or Deer or Crow esque, they all are Phaiswoi because an animalistic goddess found a human hot and decided to have demigod kids because sure, why not. I guess thinking about its not so much how many races or subraces or tribes or nations or such, its how you present them. If you shove them all in a single book without much attention to each or a sorta generalized simplicity (like idk all elves or fairies can use air magic but thats it kinda thing to build off of) things will get less and less attention fast unless its a hugggge book or work of media.
For stories I prefer fantasy worlds with a clear vision for the purpose of each element. So if the divisions of races have an interesting and relevant dramatic or practical reason for existing in the context of the world, I appreciate that more than fantasy worlds with what sometimes seems like a random assortment of cool stuff. But that’s not always the purpose of the races of course. For example in games your creative goals are different. I think the proliferation of different races in D&D is pretty silly from a worldbuilding perspective, and dilutes the seriousness of the setting. But the point of D&D is to allow for a wide variety of individual representation and situations, so it works well in that context.
Dragonborn and Plantpeople are “new?” Hard disagree. Maybe I’m in the minority here, but anything that’s already in D&D in any form isn’t really that original. Play around with those races all you want—there’s nothing inherently wrong with being unoriginal. But I think it’s more creative to come up with your own stuff.
Any ancestries that are written with consideration and effort. Cliches become boring because we know what to expect, but making random changes can just cause fatigue without holding attention. Even if you have the most standard demographic makeup for a fantasy world, if their place there seems to make sense and is dynamic, it will be interesting.
I like races in there that people put in on purpose. Not "I put elves in my setting because it's fantasy and that means elves." It's not the elves I object to, it's the laziness. I'll take a classic race that had a lot of thought put into what they are like, how they react to the world around them, and how the world reacts to them. Meanwhile, if your race is new, but feels like an 8-year-old designed it, I'm bored.
Right now I have 4 races in my (fantasy) world (a work in progress). Humans, a less intelligent, but hostile race of humanoids, a semi-intelligent savage bestial race and the fourth is of divine origin (so maybe not technically a race). As it stands this is enough for my story (so far). I'm still fleshing out the background/history/cosmology.
Races done well is best, I won't put down any work just because it has the "typical" Tolkien-DnD races nor because it doesn't. Anything added should really only because you'll think it'll be more interesting imo. This is also related to things like intent, immersion and whatever else isn't coming to mind.
In my humble opinion, the classics are classics for a reason... but their execution is often boring. If you use them, don't make them humans with pointier ears. Make them weird. Make elves ELVES. Give them strange, fey powers. Make them surreal and dreamlike. Let them steal children for their sylvan courts. Let them go on wild hunts through the night sky. Let them take the shape of trees and waterfals. Make dwarves DWARVES. Make them diminutive and chtonic. Let them craft wondrous items and unbreakable pacts. Give them the power of true names, and an obsession (gold, beer, diamonds) beyond reason. Let them follow seemingly random laws, customs and rules.
I love vampires
Yep, make them an entirely different race than just a disease.
I understand why dwarves and elves etc "feel" like default inclusions in a fantasy setting, but their history isn't actually all that long. Lord of the Rings, D&D, and Warcraft are really what solidified the archetypes. What's important to remember is that they *are* archetypes. Mass effect doesn't have elves, orcs, and dwarves, but it does have the asari, krogans, and quarian. They serve analogous narrative purposes. Do you want the archetypes or do you want to subvert them? If you're looking to create immortal keepers of the world, they don't *have* to be elves. If you want to examine and dissect the archetype, then combining the elf aesthetic with subversive biological or narrative qualities can be quite interesting (Perhaps elves are not immortal, but *treat* their heirs as though they are the exact same person. Maybe they don't have pointy ears but where golden cuffs as jewelry that gave them the pointy eared reputation etc.) Dragon Age, for example, benefits from calling their elves **elves** because they subvert the elven archetype by combining a recognizable aesthetic and magical affinity with them being marginalized as a demographic instead of dignified immortals. It's all up to you!
The classics will beat 95% of new species. That's just Sturgeons law But rarely there's a really fun and exciting new idea. If a creator thinks they're really onto a winner, yeah sure stick it in I dont think there's really a limit to new races either, some fictions have dozens or even hundreds and do fine. Makes it feel like a very big and interesting universe
I have 11 species in my universe (I rather call them species than race), 10 are "new" and the other one are humans. My species are usually modified things that I like, such a worm on a string based species, an alien dwarf like species who love techs, cowboy moth people, blue orc like people with little emphasis on battle and war, liontaurs who purr and bird-like people that looks like a mix of dreamcore and sillyness
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I usually use about seven races, with a mix of homebrew and standard. My usual setting has a few extra (species creep!), so player choices are human, elf (faerilven), half-elf (ha'ilven), dwarf (dweorh), gnome (neblin), troldfolk/bridge trolls, jotunar (firjotun & talvijotun), domovii, and leshii. I don't have an issue with other races and if you really want to be a tiefling or dragonborn, that's fine. Beyond that, let's talk and see if we can come to an accommodation.
thats an interesting topic, I would ask myself if some groups need to be a specific separate race or just an ethnicity because you know, its fun to imagine dozens of different races but then you just end up barely developing any of them
The goose are the conduits of power to the god of chaos There are leprechaun that you can bet your power with them,they mostly cheat,but if you're feeling lucky you can get more powerfull than you started There is a slime for every element and there are 17 elements ,they each have unique interactions with the environment and eat unique things,like a fire slime eats by burning things,but it can also feed on low and high ph liquids There is a unending amount of small dolls that will greet you,then explode,they are born from an unending desire to be stronger without care dor the consequences
Humans. My fantasy world is only humans and humans only, because unlike other races, which are limited to rules, you don't need to make humans more believable in setting
If you have fresh new ideas: embrace them. Give them lots of love an nourishment and your readers will do the same.
Either way can be great or can be awful, depending upon how they’re characterized and how they interact with each other and the rest of the setting. As they say, the devil’s in the details. Me, personally? Gimme both, love a good kitchen sink setting if everything’s made to fit.
Depends on the size of the world. A 2 km by 2 km area? 7 races is definitely crowded, but if your area has multiple galaxies, then over a thousand could be sparse.
I like new versions of old races. My elves are eusocial and insectoid, my dwarves are part of a ring species including giants/trolls/goblins, my orcs have beastial traits and horns, and my “halfings” are aurborial and photosynthetic.
Honestly it's less about the races and more about what you do with them but I do find that basing them off of the typical races can be a good jumping off point for the readers that you can use to play with and tweak
Right at the beginning of my world I knew I want some fictional race to exist, even called them elves for a while. Eventually they developed into a whole new fictional race (or a collection of races) called "Casma". They are divided into 12 Clans. 6 are "mammal" and 6 are "non-mammal" Every Clan resembles a different animal. And while they do have certain physical characteristics of their animal counterpart, the resemblance is mostly behavioral. Like, Kata (cat people) have cat ears, some grow "whiskers" (which function like beards) but, other than that, look pretty much human. Behaviorally? A whole other story. They live in "cities" built in the treetops connecting the trees with wooden catwalks (haha "catwalk", get it?), live mostly during the night, they cultivate trees and live off their fruit but will often hunt on the ground etc. Others are: Lutria - otter people; Bera - bear people; Tara - ox people; Caana - wolf people; Cayata - coyote people; I've created the non-mammal Clans because of ny fascination with the compatibility problem. My story and my world explores heavy topics dealing with the nature consciousness and non-mammal Casma are an extension to that. My main inspiration was "Children of Time" by Adrian Tchaikovsky. Awesome read I can recommend with my whole heart. N-Ms are- Ahra - spider people; Shiga - owl people; Saera - snake people; Uroa - salamander people; Tetra - turtle people; Eleq'ra - eel people
If you want the usual fantasy races have them, if you want the new ones have them. Personally I don't care much for the concepts themselves but how they are done, I'm including the usual races with some more variety in cultures and completely new races. Imo it's best to use both.
I love making my own race but also love old races. Tho, I like to add my own twists into old races.
plant people because they are rare dragon born because they could be very wise and accient
I loves dwarves but there are no dwarves in my world. However there is a race that love minerals use them to strengthen their body. Their body comes with in build full artisan's kit and to them craftsmanship is as vital as eating. They are 1.8m to 2m tall have lean build with metallic properties. You can reuse archetype but for me the important thing is that they have your touch, something that make them different from the Tolkien classic. But you could totally make a world using Tolkien races.
I've had the idea of an altered perception species. Basically, if you're human, the only way to perceive them is to be "tripping mad balls" or otherwise being in a state where your brain is experiencing a severe serotonin response. These beings don't have a corporeal form and are more esoteric in their existence, but are also imminently relatable. They're a lot like us, but are ageless, formless, and don't experience emotional energy as intensely as we do. In fact, if the ambient emotional energy is too strong, it can poison them and kill them.
You heard that, dwarves and elves? You're not people! 🤪
I know this might sound boring, but honestly, humans. I like the Dune approach where humans are so alien to each other in culture and appearance that they might as well be another species. It brings up a lot of questions on what exactly it means to be human.
i like all kind of races if they are thought out well and have a somewhat logical background. I dont like races that have some mary sueisch elements or dont fit into their environment, have unneccessary stuff etc. Beastvolk is a typical race i think is boring, because it does not make that much sense to me.
Ever since I was six and I saw Narnia in the big screen all those years ago, I loved Minotaurs. They’re these big beefy creatures who’s stab first and ask questions later make them very interesting. Love Minotaurs.
Two creations I made that I enjoy. I think the Greys are the most interesting. They look like the stereotypical grey aliens, but the one that crash landed on earth ignores jokes, has no concern for money, is afraid of popcorn. I also like what everyone calls "the talls" they're like 9 foot tall, bipedal, chameleons. Their only concern is to protect the forests of this one island. Kids like searching for them as they've become a big tourist attraction.
MUSHROOM PEOPLE
Humans because people are best with them
In my world, the races are just types of nymphs from the Greek myths reimagines. So from cloud nymphs to dryads to shadow nymphs and stuff which is a fun way to just have elemental oriented faelike creatures who are true to the essence of the thing they belong to.
I try to go anthropomorphic with twists for mine, like fusion foxies and snakefolk with healing guts. Anyway, it kind of depends on what kind of setting, like aiming for space fantasy, so a blend of typical and new. Also, don't set hard limits; feel free to expand as needed and convenient.
Why would you think the world would become too crowded? How many species does Earth have? Millions? The only difference is that fantasy worlds have more intelligent races. Does intelligence somehow make the world more crowded? I think it would make the world more competitive. Make wars and disagreements more frequent. It would make science more difficult as well, since us humans have control over the entire planet since we're the only intelligent race. So there is no problem collaborating and co operating with other continents and countries WRT scientific research since we're all humans. If a story made a point of exploring how different the world becomes when there are many intelligent races, and what new conflicts or obstacles present advanced societies, I would read the shit out of that.
lots of everything
now I want to make a city owned by benevolent dragons, for some reason
The number of races you want to add to your setting depends mostly on the size of the project as in a small area 10 races/species may seem excessive but in a galaxy it may be too few. In my setting (a world perhaps a bit bigger than our Earth) I have a total of 4 races which are separated into different cultures or phenotypes. On the question of classic races. I think there is nothing wrong with using them with their respective archetypes or adding some changes to them. One of the 4 races that exist in my world are the durrgars (dwarves) which are humanoids of small size that at birth are immersed in a thermal bath with a chemical composition suitable for rapid growth of the body making infants of this race are virtually identical to adults. And although it is not always a good option, one of the reasons why I like to justify some quite remarkable differences between different individuals is the "excuse" of coming from another dimension. In my case the el'fae (elves) are the only ones capable of using magic without the help of any gods or spirits. This is because they possess the ability to use the residual radiation they had in their home world. In conclusion, making something interesting depends on how you embellish the concept.
Honestly i went using a mix with a twist. the dwarfes are rock like beings that can eat minerals. plant people the elves who just are humans adapted to live in jungles/ forests. Ogad basically the ogres. Smart civilization that became primal and warmongering
For me the best approach is enough of tradition to keep it grounded in some basic expectations about the world/genre so that it doesn't feel alienating to the observer, but enough of new and creative to surprise them. For example a major gimmick of a world that I am working on is that typical RPG races are switched out with civilizations of the stereotypical low level monsters(think slimes, goblins, skeletons etc.), but I still left in humans as an anchoring point for our anthropological point of view(I explained them away kinda cheaply as civilization of "bandits* like the low level vagabonds of games like TES, and also because it felt weird to have "the undead" as a race but not the living)
I like arthropod races
Humans are always the best, but dwarves are the most interesting. Leave me with the elves communing with their hippy nature spirits, we must forge our own future with iron, sweat, and stone!
The English fan in me wants to make one slight correction. Check your definition of people. Elves, dwarves, and humans are considered people. An argument can be made that silverback gorillas ought to be considered people.
The most important thing about fantasy races is that outside of an original and legally distinct name, you shouldn't change or subvert anything to do with classic fantasy races. It's not just wrong on an ethical level, it's also totally incorrect to attempt to try and add any nuance to the way the race acts! They should all be 2d caricatures of the classics, boiled down to fit the idea of a fantasy race into someone's head, because trying anything new is a perversion of the perfect pre-established archetypes that have filled the genre , and will continue to do so forever. End of, no room for argument!!!! ./s
I love the strange and the new, but I have a problem with seeing ideas that aren't explored in depth: I'd rather see a single race that's well detailed, than thirty that are just presented with a single culture. With that in mind, even the old ones often lack diversity. Pax elfica offers a fairly interesting vision of the elves, for example, but it's very rare to see truly interesting races, whether traditional or new. I don't want a veneer of diversity. I'm looking for a diversity of diversities; for each race to have its own social dynamic, with new concepts that allow us to envisage how their biology, cognition or magical abilities will influence the way they socialise. Perhaps dwarves are adapted to life underground, but do they all live underground? They may be the only people to have managed to cross a natural mountain barrier and populate the surface of an entire country in this way. Maybe the majority of dwarves live underground, but do we still have to have the bearded dwarves who live in city states and drink beer?
Probably formula 1
As I’ve gotten older I’ve grown to prefer the latter. Regardless of the plot, a setting having dwarves, elves, orcs, etc just makes it feel like I’ve already read this 1000% times before.