D&D General What races/species populate your DnD world?

[Azzy]

Hey guys, got another question for EnWorld regarding Dungeons and Dragons. What races/species populate your world when you create them?

I try to include all the options from the PHB, but right now I'm a little stuck on how/where to include Aasimar. I'm also open to other species from MotM.

Do you mix things up like having Dwarves in Fey Forests, do you keep things by the book, or a mixture of both?

Absolutely. I have a nation of elves and dwarves that have an fully integrated society that speak a creole of the dwarven and elven tongues. The elves mostly live above ground in an Incan/Andean fashion (I saw a picture of Machu Pichu and decided I need something like that in my setting). The dwarves mostly prefer the underground (and I draw inspiration from Petra and Cappadocia). They also have a syncretized religion.

I also have some not-drow that have no connection to Lolth or spiders that are descended from elves that were afflicted with a horrible disease that once afflicted the elves in ancient times and subsequently exiled from the original elven homeland. They do not like other elves, for obvious reasons) and don't like being called elves.

 

[Shades of Eternity]

Let's go with Elderberry tales, my 5e heartbreaker.

Thanks to the Bastard breaking the sacred order, peasants are changing species to fight against them.

You could have grown up with your buddy peasant, and one day, they would wake up as orcs because they needed strength to stomp a knight or two.

They are still them, but they have gone through a change.

Plus you can play the 4 elemental species as pcs, and if you die, living reliquaries are a pc option.

 

[Stormonu]

Pretty much all of them, except maybe Warforged, Autognomes and Kalashaltar.

I do have some custom races that replace other races:

Hellchilde - replaces Tieflings, Aasimar and Genasi. They look human (albino), but when the magic starts flying, they take on an otherworldly appearance.

Titanborn - replaces Goliath, and they are extremely mutable in appearance and abilities. They can be quite monstrous looking or up to about 90% passable as human (they always have some slight inhuman feature)

Mageborn - offspring of human wizard couples, tend to have innate sorcerous blood.

Animalfolk - a fey race that covers just about any anthropomorphic race. Players might use Haregon, Kenku, Tabaxi or whatever rules/appearance, but they are considered to be Animalfolk stock of some kind.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I try to include all the options from the PHB, but right now I'm a little stuck on how/where to include Aasimar. I'm also open to other species from MotM.


Absolutely. I have a nation of elves and dwarves that have an fully integrated society that speak a creole of the dwarven and elven tongues. The elves mostly live above ground in an Incan/Andean fashion (I saw a picture of Machu Pichu and decided I need something like that in my setting). The dwarves mostly prefer the underground (and I draw inspiration from Petra and Cappadocia). They also have a syncretized religion.

I also have some not-drow that have no connection to Lolth or spiders that are descended from elves that were afflicted with a horrible disease that once afflicted the elves in ancient times and subsequently exiled from the original elven homeland. They do not like other elves, for obvious reasons) and don't like being called elves.

In my setting Aasimar were originally Humans on an island that spun off into the Upper Planes during a war between the gods and their Primordial predecessors. The Island eventually reconnected to the world through epic magic, but by then it's inhabitants had become infused with planar energies and become Aasimar. Later their island was destroyed in a war with the Serpent Kingdoms of the Yuan-ti, and the refugees that fled to the mainland are the Aasimar of today.

Basically the Atlantis/Numenor story, mixed with some history of the Marvel Universe stuff.

 

[cbwjm]

In my setting I have the following that definitely exist. Typically includes any subraces, though dragonborn are split by the subtypes of frost, flame, storm, stone, life, and death. With a rare few being chaos (traits from 2 types) or platinum (which never manifests as part of a chaos dragonborn).

• Humans, one of the oldest races in my setting.
• Dragonborn, created during the great war to swell the ranks of the dragon elder armies.
• Genasi, created during the great war from humanity to swell the ranks of the elemental armies.
• Giant-kin, created by the titan during the great war to swelll the ranks of the giant armies.
• Dwarves. Created when the gods preserved the world and set it aright.
• Elves and gnomes. Native to the fey wild, gnomes cluster around fey wild portals having a village that exists in both sides.
• Beastmen (orcs, trolls, goblins, hobgoblins, ogres). Created the destroyer during the righting of the world in order for him to sieze it for himself. Normally not player characters.
• Halflings.
• Half-elves and half-orcs.
• Tieflings (presumably aasimar, hasn't come up).

 

[Fifinjir]

Whenever I make a nation or region I find myself asking “is there any good reason to make these people non-human?” And the answer is usually no. I’lol work with players who pick something I don’t have planned out, but i can’t say I really have a role for most species options in the world itself. The main exceptions:
-Planetouched: seeing how they’re not really a separate thing.
-Goliaths: giants have a pretty important history and the goliaths tie into it.
-Dragonborn: dragons are supposed to sleep until their appointed time, something about dragonborn being their “caretakers” until that time tickles me.
And maybe either drow or dreugar, because I’m not letting the underground get away without having some mysterious people down there.

 

[el-remmen]

Specifically, players could choose a hometown and then choose from among the 3 or 4 common races/species there -or- leave it up to the dice weighted by the population of said hometown with a small chance of getting “Other” which allows the player to pick more obscure ones available in the setting (like Tortles or Goliaths).

I rolled the most open result in regards to choosing a species for my character in this game and could have choose nearly anything. I nearly did choose tortle. But I went human instead.

 

[Clint_L]

If I was starting a campaign from scratch today, I'd sit with the players, find out what species and classes they were interested in, and maybe some favorite monsters, and make all of those things the standard assumptions for the setting and go from there.

That's basically what I do at the start of the campaign - I like the players to feel free to be creative with their character concept, as long as it is balanced. I can work with them to make most ideas fit into the game.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

I don't currently run D&D, but it's very much a D&D-inspired world.

Humans, orcs, elves, and dwarves are the most common races in the general region the game is set. Many people have genie ancestry, so there's a meaningful sub-population of genasi. Tieflings are rare, but not non-existent. Dragonborn are about half as common as humans, so there's a meaningful minority population in most cities (mostly, they live in the forests to the south or the faraway Yuxia, the Jade Home, across the western sea.)

Most other sapient races exist and are part of society: minotaurs, ogres, firbolgs, etc., they're all considered part of civic society. Only truly monstrous beings that predate on people (such as were-hyenas, vampires, ghouls/nasnas, mindflayers, etc.) are excluded from society, for fairly obvious reasons. True dragons exist, but aren't native to this land, so there are very few in the game.

 

[Yaarel]

The main species are Elf, Dwarf, Giant, Gnome, and Human, plus Dragon. These correlate the flavors and themes of the setting. Any other species are within the framework of these six.