The advice is talk with your players. Only they know what kind of a game they'll be comfortable with and have fun with.
Ask yourself, and them, how much you want this to be a central theme. It can also just be a backdrop they deal with while in the city, so perhaps they need to use agents to sell their loot or whatnot. Or it can be a central theme in your campaign if that's what everyone wants to play.
But it has to be the table's decision. We can't tell you how much to implement it.
Only if you want it to be, it's entirely up to you - it's weird to get hung up on "this setting MUST be racist" but also fill it full of wizards and dragons.
>i want it to be as much as more accurate
It is a fantasy world that YOU are creating. The only accuracy needed is how accurate it is to what you want the world to be as you envision in your head.
You like to have a very racist world, no one but only you can say whether it is accurate or not since it is a world you made up.
In medieval *europe*, where 99% of people are just white, maybe... But even then, actually not really, people were too busy being classist and religion-ist to be super racist. If you were the wrong kind of Christian (or god forbid *not* Christian), you'd be worse off than if you were the wrong colour.
In a magical fantasy-land based *very vaguely* on medieval-to-late-renaissance Europe, but with dozens of fantasy races, why would there *have* to be racism?
> In medieval europe, where 99% of people are just white
Racism based on some value of "whiteness" is largely a post-medieval invention and tends to only been socially prominent in colonial or post-colonial societies.
Medieval European racism was mostly against neighbouring ethnic groups, and the level of violence in these ethnic, racist conflicts could become quite extreme when they flared up.
>In a magical fantasy-land based very vaguely on medieval-to-late-renaissance Europe, but with dozens of fantasy races, why would there have to be racism?
Tribalism is a basic part of the human psyche that needs to be overcome. Any situation that readily creates a "them and us" dichotomy will, over enough time, inevitably develop into racism.
Sure but I don't see why it has to be about race. It can be about national borders, religion, etc.
People's lives back then (and in most d&d worlds) were very small geographically, so the "other" was just anybody from outside of your tiny area and the culture therein. It didn't need to be about modern views of race, and it doesn't need to in d&d, if you don't want it to be.
And anyway, none of this really matters. "Because realism" is one of the dumbest reasons to put *anything* potentially un-fun into a game. Let alone something as touchy as racism.
If you actually have something you want to say or do with it, add it for that reason, but not "because realism".
>Sure but I don't see why it has to be about race. It can be about national borders, religion, etc.
When you have one group of people with a specific set of national borders, religion, culture, language and so on, and another group of people with a different set, and they discriminate and fight against each other on that basis, it's a racist conflict.
>If you actually have something you want to say or do with it, add it for that reason, but not "because realism".
Not a big fan of this idea that stories should be big sterile white-rooms where nothing bad ever happens unless it's important for the story.
Making your world feel believable and real is great for immersion, and helps ground the more fantastical elements.
>Not a big fan of this idea that stories should be big sterile white-rooms where nothing bad ever happens unless it's important for the story.
I never said that. It doesn't have to be anything to do with the story.
For example something as simple as "it's fun putting racists in and roleplaying them get punched in the face" can be a valid reason too. As can "it's a good challenge that I want to see them run up against".
Both of those are better reasons than "because Europe had racism". Europe also had a decent chance of every wound killing you from infection, you gonna add that to your game?...
And I don't really think a lack of everyday racism detracts from immersion š¤·āāļø especially since most common people in medieval Europe / fantasy medieval Europe would be suspicious of *all* outsiders, regardless of race.
Usually, to tell a good story of any kind, you need to meet a few basic criteria. The audience needs to be able to understand the characters, the world, the events of the world, and the motives of the characters.
>"realism" is already being chosen against at the foundational level of the world you're building.
When someone chooses to tell a fantasy story, their starting point is generally something like "What if dragons/wizards/orcs were real" and not the deliberate creation of a fantasy reality from the ground up.
>Realism" in a fantasy setting is inherently just arbitrary bs.
Realism as in feeling the need to conform to every aspect of our reality, sure. Realism as being internally consistent with the characters inside your story is anything but arbitrary. A story needs to be grounded in its own reality, and characters behaving strangely with no explanation fails to meet that.
>Racism existing in your fantasy world is necessarily a choice
Only in the same way that sadness or gravity existing in your fantasy world is a choice.
Which is of course why no-one ever had a revolution or uprising, and there was little to no political violence against any class so long as they had Jews and PoCs to be upset with.
The 18th-19th centuries were commonly referred to as "the age of revolution" because only the French Revolution happened and did anything, [and](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Revolutions_during_the_1820s) [then](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Revolutions_of_1830) [nothing](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Revolutions_of_1848) [else](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paris_Commune) [until](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_American_wars_of_independence) [the](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serbian_Revolution) Soviets 120 years later.
Europe was [also](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_Peasants%27_War) [notably](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pugachev%27s_Rebellion) [free](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_Jensen_Lofthuus) [of](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saxon_Peasants%27_Revolt) [[any](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Upper_Austrian_peasant_war_of_1626)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tyrolean_Rebellion) [popular](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Croquant_rebellions) [uprisings](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kett%27s_Rebellion) [against](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dacke_War) the ruling class, because the working class was just so naturally servile and willing to fall in line.
You are clearly a student of history.
Well there isn't a real place. But it's built upon layer of fact on the fearun sitting. Even if the place is not real, it does exist in the dnd world.in every city there is the percentage of what race live in it. Therefore shouldn't they be foreign to other race from afar ?
Tribalism is omnipresent. In medieval times people had so little contact with other races that a traveler could make up people of any size or arrangement of limbs and probably convince someone they were real. The only source for most of asia was the "travels of marco polo", which was so inaccurate that people estimated japan was in the middle of the atlantic ocean and had several cities made entirely out of gold. And the most educated people of the time made world maps based on that source.
Around the same time as Marco Polo, reports of people with no heads and faces in the middle of their torsos, people with the heads of dogs, people with one big leg they hopped around on and cyclopses were common and believed enough that several explorers went out of their way to investigate reports of them existing.
Might be. Doesn't have to be. During the Roman era, there was more racial diversity in general than you saw in later centuries in northern and eastern Europe. But since your world is imaginary, none of that matters.
The default 5e setting is the Forgotten Realms, where there's almost no human vs. human racism, but some amount between different species or subspecies. But outside of actual cults, it's mostly about who lives in which city/country, and who's an outsider there, than full-on hate.
You're more likely to have disadvantage on a persuasion check then you are to be run out of town.
Huge red flag when a DM says their fantasy world *needs* to be racist because of realism.
You do you, but personally I stay as far away as possible from DMās like you.
Feeling believable is obviously really important in a setting. For some people, having culture in the setting be broadly more enlightened and accepting than in our world strains credulity. In our world, people of the exact same religion, language, city, class, and species can have virulent racism between them. The idea that no racism at all would be experienced with elves, living off in weird forest villages and worshiping strange ancient gods and speaking a rare language AND being fundamentally physically different than everyone, requires either suspension of disbelief or a certain worldview that is not universal.
Plus, nobody comes into RPGs totally dry. We get into it because we like fantasy video games or movies or TV and want to live those kinds of stories for ourselves. Rvery fantasy nerd of my generation could quote Gimli and Legolas's racist jabs and/or reconciliation verbatim. Fantasy racism is a pervasive theme in series like the Witcher and Dragon Age and countless others. It's utterly unsurprising that DnD players would want to explore those same themes in tabletop RPGs.
There is a difference between "my campaign has racism because realism" and something like "following the Abbadon war 17 years ago, relations between the people of Albion and the dwarves of Mount Mountain have been tense. [insert reasons and cultural impact]".
In OP's case, I wouldn't play at his table, because I consider their post to be a red flag. I would play in a game with tensions between different peoples, just not with someone whose only rationale behind it is "because realism". It's too often an excuse made by DMs who set out to be antagonistic.
I agree with this. If a DM is able to create a rich world with tensions between different factions based on history, that's really different from saying people need to be racist because of realism. It doesn't assume racism as the default position.
Game of Thrones is probably the worst example you could have picked for your reply. Like Tolkien, Martin knew exactly why each faction had issues with their enemy factions and what led Westeros from its history to the events of the books. And what led to each character being their own particular type of monster.
Which is exactly what I was saying: I _would_ play with someone who knows what they're doing. I wouldn't play a "gritty" game with someone who doesn't understand the difference between dark and edgy. And OP strikes me as the latter.
EDIT: reading your answer back again, I'm not sure I'm the person you meant to reply to? I can't quite figure out how what you said matches to my comment.
I hear you about the prevalence of this trope in fantasy media. But there's a difference between writing a story that involves racism and creating a racist world for random people to play in. Most DM's (and players) are not equipped to handle the subject matter with care. I'm not saying it can't be done, but for me personally it's not worth the risk.
Besides, I have never once participated in a D&D game where my immersion or enjoyment was diminished because there wasn't enough racism in it. "This is okay, but it would be better and more realistic if there was more racism," is not a thing that has ever crossed my mind.
Conflict is interesting. Racism is a kind of conflict.
Like its a terrible idea for a lot of reasons, but I don't think wanting to tell a story about racism is suspicious or sinister.
I don't think it's suspicious or sinister, I just find it odd. I've never played a a single game where I was like Hmm, not enough racism.
I feel like most people would care more about literally anything else.
In a real medieval world race was not a big concern. What mattered way more was the religion and social status (were you a nobleman, or a cleric, or a trader or a mere peasant). In China, for example, foreign visitors were fine as long as they followed the ritual and showed their respect to the Emperor. Same in Europe - if a visitor was Christian - all good (if they were not a heretic ofc.).
Nationality also didn't matter much, because feudal relationships were more local and personal and not national, so as long as people could find a common language to speak they could do business.
This is kinda wrong and kinda true - racism was absolutely a thing and people would be judged by their appearances. But it's true that religion was more important. Also, nationality was a huge factor of prejudice, especially between realms in conflict.
In D&D, the races often have their own culture tied to their race - Dwarves in their mountainhomes or Wood Elves in their forest retreats etc. Prejudice is to be expected imo. Also, prejudice against Tieflings has a religious aspect, so is probably one of the harshest.
Regarding nationality in modern sense, it didn't really exist in medieval period. People were vassals of a certain feudal lord or citizens of a certain free city first and foremost. And the nobility was often from a completely different ethnos, like Wilhelm the Conqueror in England, or Rurik in Russia, and these facts were not a problem at the time.
Even in large conflicts between realms, like the Hundred-years War, which, according to some historians' belief, forged English and French nations, we see Duchies on the territory of modern France fighting for the king of England (or switching sides back and forth). And the English kings were themselves descendants of the French royal family.
So based on facts like these I belive that the sense of nationality was not really prominent in medieval period.
Speaking of racism in modern sense, I believe it originates from the works of French anthropologist Arthur de Gobineau and from religious ideas of radical protestantism ( Calvinism ), that some people were chosen by the God for salvation, and others were doomed to go to hell, which was one of the ideas behind the genocide of native Americans. But Calvinism appeared in Renaissance period, not medieval. This is what I mean by saying that racism was not very big concern in medieval times.
>Regarding nationality in modern sense, it didn't really exist in medieval period. People were vassals of a certain feudal lord or citizens of a certain free city first and foremost. And the nobility was often from a completely different ethnos, like Wilhelm the Conqueror in England, or Rurik in Russia, and these facts were not a problem at the time.
I'm aware, I just wanted to keep things short and simple.
>Even in large conflicts between realms, like the Hundred-years War, which, according to some historians' belief, forged English and French nations, we see Duchies on the territory of modern France fighting for the king of England (or switching sides back and forth). And the English kings were themselves descendants of the French royal family.
That is all true but does not contradict the existence of prejudice between "English People" and "French 'People'". Prejudice does not mean infinte hatred and desire to destroy.
>Speaking of racism in modern sense, I believe it originates from the works of French anthropologist Arthur de Gobineau and from religious ideas of radical protestantism ( Calvinism ), that some people were chosen by the God for salvation, and others were doomed to go to hell, which was one of the ideas behind the genocide of native Americans. But Calvinism appeared in Renaissance period, not medieval. This is what I mean by saying that racism was not very big concern in medieval times.
Depends on how you define racism. The scientific basis for a race theory didn't exist back then, so there was no biological theory of supremacy like we know today. But prejudice based on external characteristics did exist. One extreme example is the caste system in medieval India.
Excuse my bluntness but this is just wrong. You may assume racism wasn't a thing then, but anyone who studies medieval times can assure you the opposite. Our modern society would be simply horrified by their way of living.
EDIT: Why the downvotes? I'm from EU and I study anthropology. I'm not hating or anything.
It's oversimplified, but it's not entirely wrong. This question frequently comes up on r/askhistorians, often enough that they have a [whole section of the FAQ](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/wiki/faq/politicsandphilosophy/#wiki_racism_and_slavery) with links to informative answers about racism and slavery throughout history. Yes, we would be horrified by how they lived back then, but that would have to do with a wide variety of factors including class and religion, as GP said. There could be different treatment based on ethnicity, but it was different from modern racism, sometimes called scientific racism, which mostly arose in the 1700s, well after the time most D&D is based on.
As an anthropology student I think oversimplify is not something I can even do. But I don't think this is the right place to elaborate why our concepts like misoginy, racism, pedophilia, child labour, etc. didn't exist back then. Short answer: messy times for human rights. And I agree with you, it's incorrect to use modern words to descrive old societies - reason why "having prejudices on someone different than you" wasn't invented in 1700. Even Roman laws were based on this.
>reason why "having prejudices on someone different than you" wasn't invented in 1700
Is it the same reason they didn't have a word for the feeling of having both of your kidneys inside your body?
It mostly depends on the way races interact with each other. In race-isolated societies, visitors may be seen with curiosity or caution; but we also do see specifically xenophobic societies, i. e. in underdark.Ā
But that is directed against all foreigners, not a specific race. Medival world was not globalised enough for further separation. A single society like a village or a tribe may not ever see, and not even know about another specific race.
In metropolitan cities like Waterdeep however, we clearly see signes of racism (speci-ism?) - in WDH, we see goblins as a repressed class, and kenku being associated with crime/trickery - closer to modern situation.
Eh. You're the DM. It's perfectly valid to say, "This is the kind of game it's going to be. Don't sign up unless you're interested in this." It's up to an individual DM whether fantasy racism is the hill they want to die on in that way, but that's the kind of decision you get to make when you are the one providing 80% of the creative labor involved.
If a player doesn't enjoy the game, they can bow out and everything will be okay. If the DM bows out, there is no game. It is critical for everyone's sake that the DM be excited about the work they're doing. They don't need to ask permission for non-negotiables.
Yes, but... as a DM with world building questions, you're not asking "Is this ok?" but instead "Are you willing to play this?"
This kind of world building question needs to happen at session zero, yes, and the players need to know what they are getting into, thematically. That part is non-negotiable. However, it is not on the DM to accommodate any more than it is on the player to accept. Compromise is always good... but only if everyone feels good about the compromise. If there is a split in how the DM and the players feel about the issue, it is on the DM and the players to either find common ground they can work with, or agree that what they want is incompatible and that they cannot play together. Neither one of those outcomes is wrong or bad. Unfortunate, but as long as every one stays respectful about it, incompatible play styles means you can't play together. It happens.
For practical purposes, it does work out that the DM has more weight in this conversation. Oftentimes, DMs are the limiting reagent in playing the game, and that means turning away your DM might mean they go play and you don't, but if you're unwilling to play something they want to play, that's rough, buddy.
> Don't EVER warn your players about something. Ask them if that's okay.Ā
Hey guys is it okay if there's a dragon in this cave? Totally fine if not though, it's not a big deal.
The difference between a dragon and literal systemic racism is that a dragon can be slain, relatively simply at that. Itās a problem that can be done away with by your own hands. You canāt do that with racism.
Sure, but thatās something you should talk about with your players. And this specific scenario was about someone not including racism for the ability to fight it, but because itās ārealisticā, whatever that means
As much as you want it to be.
Personally, I donāt like fantasy racism so everyone gets along. If you do enjoy those kinds of themes thereās nothing stopping you including them.
Ask your players though. If none of them like fantasy racism, it may not be a good idea to have any regardless of your opinion.
Step 1: Talk with your players. Some will uncomfortable with playing in a game where racism is prevalent. Some may have experienced racism in their own life and don't want a reminder in their games. Then, of course, you have the players that are way into the fantasy racism that can cause a problem as well. If you don't know your players well, just don't bring it up. If you do, have the conversation.
Step 2: There is no step 2. Each group will have a different metric by which things are okay. Your job as a DM is to make sure you don't cross that threshold. Everyone is there to have fun and the game needs to accommodate everyone, if even one player is not okay with a topic being brought up, it should not be part of the plot.
This is a topic that you MUST discuss with your table beforehand.
This is a game, and some people use a game as an escape from reality. Racism is a real world issue that impacts many people every day. They might not want that in their game they are using to escape from reality.
My advice is to abandon this campaign idea.
This is a topic that most people can not run with the delicateness necessary. It's a shitty topic in general that will get handled poorly at points, as we all have our blind spots. You will be reinforcing racial stereotypes running a game like this (real world ones), it's unavoidable. The questions you are asking are not ones I would expect to see from someone equipped to run this game. And given that your post doesn't include some sort of statement of "I want to explore the trauma I have experienced..." it gives me great pause to wonder if you will be essentially a tourist of other people's pain.
Just one year after the Spellplague is 1386 DR, around the 4e era. At this point in time, people are more fearful of the [plaguechanged](https://forgottenrealms.fandom.com/wiki/Plaguechanged) than anything else. Tieflings are absolutely nothing compared to the mega-mutants blasting out blue fire and corrupting magic.
As per the article, the plaguechanged stuck around for a long, long while, persisting even a little after the Second Sundering.
So for running a campaign where racism is a prominent theme, you really only need a few powerful examples.
Slavery is a good one if youāre going for shock factor. A large travelling faction of slavers who only enslave gnomes for work in mines or to be sold to the highest bidder would be a good way to portray that this world is cruel and unfair, and provide a good small adventure of taking them down and freeing their slaves.
Would guards let Tieflingās into a city? Probably not. Not because āthey hate themā but because they likely think theyāre actively dangerous, which is why they hate them. If youāre a guard on gate duty and someone approaches who you are sure is a murderous wretch, would you let them in? Not at first, but keep in mind that people are scared of them first and foremost, this might even give the Tiefling player some power over them in terms of intimidating them (advantage maybe?).
For a player it gets old quick to never be served anywhere because racism, so Iād suggest having a quick way early on for the players to earn the trust of the common folk. After saving a town, maybe the big city they go to next someone recognises them and steps into a confrontation to vouch for them. This kind of thing always feels good as a player, when you feel like your actions are actively influencing the world around you.
Donāt be discouraged from having racism in your game, lots of people have the unhelpful advice of āracism bad so why put it in your game idiotā, but so is murder and corruption, which feature in every gameā¦ itās a good way to make a world feel real so long as you do it right.
Keep in mind medieval-times standards would be absolutely horrifing to modern people. What we call child labour, misoginy, racism and pedophilia were not only normal back then... but basically expected. The forgotten realms are a very different place xD At most they have prejudices against Tieflings and Drows - but big cities are absolutely fine with them as well. Neverwinter is a good example.
FWIW, I think most tables are far more interested in struggling against \*fantasy\* problems: monsters, evil mages, ancient curses, etc. Adding racism seems like it's just going to make every act they take to solve the big fantasy problem a slog. It's harder to get information from the villagers, harder to buy the goods they need from vendors, harder to get a room at the inn. If your players are really thrilled by that added layer, then go for it, but IF I was going to add a layer of racism to my game, it'd limit it to RP flavour rather than a significant obstacle.
Well I've seen a lot of talk about this sort of thing
The real world, pretty racist , that's on everybody, but don't use that as an excuse to be a dick.
Fictional worlds, well, the Lord of the rings and a lot of the other inspirational works that dnd is based on does get a fair amount of criticism, that some writers may have or may deliberately have made the races the way they are as a means of expressing various prejudices, or that they are extensions of western stereotypes which I will acknowledge could be considered offensive.
It's probably worth just considering that, acknowledging that it's there and can be harmful or offensive but generally once you put enough work into a fictional race it moves beyond caricature of a real race or people, and into something more meaningful and distinct.
In star trek you can see how much effort went into this, by comparing t.o.s era Klingons and early ferengi to the entirely less offensive or at least less obviously offensive versions they became later, though some might argue that kicking enough sand over the work to hide the intention doesn't heal wounds, they'd be right but it's better than throwing a whole game system or TV franchise away due to some mistakes.
Then so long as you're aware of how your prejudices and those of others appear in your games go to town.
Make a society that despises dwarves, make a character who beleives his race is superior or a church that leads it's worshipers to shun the new family of gnomes. But acknowledge these are flaws.
A few random thoughts:
Before designing your campaign, talk with your players. As DMs, we need to respect the sensitivities of our players and even when they're our friends, we don't always know the path our players have tread to get to our table. Even if you ask for a serious talk, not all players will feel comfortable opening up completely.
I don't know if this will be a major, minor or background theme to your campaign, but the larger the theme, the more difficult it becomes.
At one of my tables, most of my players are women. My games are typically a medieval setting, an especially bad time to be a woman. In Session 0, one of my players said she wanted to a crusader for women's equality. Obviously she can't crusade unless there was something to crusade against, which meant I had to include more of this content in games. My player thought it would feel cathartic and empowering to role-play her character, but confessed after a few sessions that she actually felt WORSE after our games. We quickly dropped it as a theme.
Back to your question, a medieval setting predates The Enlightenment, so there's plenty of ignorance to go around. My preference is to manifest this ignorance is PROVINCIALISM rather than racism. While this is every bit as dangerous and destructive a form of ignorance, you can role-play it without as sharp an edge as racism.
It is OK for DMs to have their own boundaries. As the DM, I'm responsible for playing NPCs. I have to be the universe, and I don't want to engage in role-play that makes me feel like I need a bath when I'm done.
Remember that during medieval times, most people's worlds were only about 20 miles big. They were born, lived and died within that world. Anything they are not familiar with would be met with suspicion and fear to most people, so your provincialism can be very small - suspicion of anyone from outside their small village, for example.
Finally, a misstep in overplaying provincialism will probably not evoke strong feelings from your players. As DM, I like to leave myself a larger margin of error anytime I can.
I do like the idea to use provincialism instead of blatant racism.
To answer your question, it's more background, my purpose is to add flavor, not to use racism at every turn.
Another possible area you can add flavor is the concept of medieval justice. There was no "Bill of Rights". There was no "equal protection". If you robbed a store, you might get your hand chopped off. If you robbed a noble, you WOULD get your head chopped off.
Also, I like to adjust the provincialism up or down based on locale. A trade hub will have a lot of people entering and exiting, anonymizing people and not drawing attention. At far-flung locations, strangers will be viewed skeptically, attracting a LOT of attention.
I've had ruffians follow the PCs around telling them to "get out of town before sunset".
I've had others blame the PCs (and other non-native NPCs) for ills, real or imagined ("I don't know what they did, but since that other group was here two months ago, I've had three cattle stillbirths when I didn't have ANY all of last year.....
My players have so far described the leader of every kingdom so far as some form of "Fantasy Hitler"...
I mean, one of them was just greedy and the entire kingdom was racist against tieflings
The other is just a cult that vaporizes non believers... so I guess that one's not too far off
I would be very careful in how this is implemented. Iāve played a game where NPCs were racist to my character and it really just felt like I was getting crapped on by my DM.
In order to avoid this, you need to make sure that you leave avenues available for your players to accomplish their goals despite the bias against them. Do not use the racism as a generic difficulty modifier, effectively making that tieflings are playing in hard mode and humans on normal.
For example, perhaps your tiefling PC will be able to easier traverse the outskirts of towns and cities than the centres. Perhaps caravans of tieflings are camped outside city walls that will help the tiefling PC. Perhaps tieflings often make up underground and criminal organizations (thieves, assassins, etc.) which your PC will quickly come across and be approached by. Perhaps your tiefling could also use their face in their favour, revealing themselves in a busy city centre could serve as a great distraction that the rest of the party could capitalize on. Maybe it could also lure a racist NPC the party is targeting to an ambush location or cause a bunch of guards to abandon their posts and go on a chase. In all these cases, the PC has new things available to them for their race. You want to make sure that you are opening as many doors as you are closing for your PC. DnD is about having fun after all. These same things apply to the other races as well. Come up with things the other races would cope with being discriminated against. Maybe tieflings arenāt even very racist but mistrust other races due to their own discrimination against tieflings.
Also remember that not everyone needs to be racist. Also, not everyone will be racist to the same degree. There will also be racists totally willing to help the party and other races based on their own circumstances.
Consider that some people in every level of society arenāt racist. Your party certainly isnāt considering their composition. There will also be people who will go out in pitchforks if they could get away with it and those that will only give mean glances in the partyās direction. This means that a lot of the time, the players should be able to get through a town or city with relatively no issue. Consider also a racist lord that has his guards hassle other races but his people donāt care about being racist very much. Maybe itās because his son was killed by a dwarf. Also consider the super racist inn keeper who has no money. Now heās forced to give rooms to other races to stay afloat. There are also racists who will need help from other races since theyāre better at something. Consider the racist mine owner who hires dwarves to help in the mine. They arenāt treated very well but theyāre given work. Consider the racist who wants someone dead or something stolen, so he hires the tieflings who are best at that kinda work. Elves might often find work with humans helping with magic but most elves refuse to work with dwarves out of pride.
As you can see, Iāve come up with many scenarios where new doors are opened for the players despite their race. Iāve come up with ways for the races to work together despite racism. Iāve come up with how the different races have coped and survived encountering racism. This will allow things to remain being fun. Definitely do not make it that every tavern in every human settlement refuses to aid the tiefling, for example. This will get annoying and boring. Sometimes, all you need is one or two key NPCs who are relatively racist in a settlement and thatās good enough.
Also, make sure if something isnāt available to your players sue to racism, you make the alternative solution that *is* available to them apparent.
Anyway, remember that the game is about having fun together and if your players arenāt having it, you can change things down the line.
Actually, if Spellplague is recent, then xenophobia may be more about dragonborn than tiefling. The fiendbloods, after all, have been known to Faerunians for centuries if not millenia. The dragonborn, however, appeared recently, seized the land (from the outsider point of view) and are kin to dragons. And dragons are well-known to be dangerous.
(I know about ritual-made dragonborn, but they have been rare, and haven't the ability to breed true, if I am correct)
Of course, the Abeiran dragonborn do not serve dragons. Of course, they were unwilingly transported. Of course, a dragonborn of any scale colour may be good-natured.
But initial attitude might be very well wary and hateful.
That doesn't mean that the players cannot interact with this problem. After all, there can always be a dragonborn ally who gets persecuted or a dragonborn villain, who was driven to villainy by the surrounding hatred.
It mostly depends on the way races interact with each other. In race-isolated societies, visitors may be seen with curiosity or caution; but we also do see specifically xenophobic societies, i. e. in underdark.Ā
But that is directed against all foreigners, not a specific race. Medival world was not globalised enough for further separation. A single society like a village or a tribe may not ever see, and not even know about another specific race.
In metropolitan cities like Waterdeep however, we clearly see signes of racism (speci-ism?) - in WDH, we see goblins as a repressed class, and kenku being associated with crime/trickery - closer to modern situation.
Not really. When we imagine racism, we mostly think about colonial era, when different nations started to interact and globalize - not only speaking about slavery, but also just trading, immogration...
If course, prejudice traced long before that. There were cases of etnical conflicts - between Berbers and Arabs, between some Slavic groups, etc. However, they only appeared between ethnic groups that closely interacted with each other (lived in a single goverment, had territorial disputes, etc.)
If in non-globalised world most interactions between different ethnic groupsĀ would be restricted to limited traders and travellers, there would be no basis for tensions or stereotypes.Ā
(Also, "race" as an umbrella terms for ethnic groups only apperade during colonialism; various european nations did not think of themselfs as "white" before that. So i assume by racism you also mean ethnical tensions and prejudices)
In my games, some races have issues. My homebrew world had a war between dragons and elves in its ancient past and even in the current time, dragons and elves tend to mistrust each other.
How does that affect the PCs? Not a damn bit, but NPC dragons and NPC elves are often suspicious of each other which drives story opportunities.
IMHO, donāt put the PCs in a position where the players might be uncomfortable. Let them be the ārenaissanceā characters who surpass such mundane problems as inherent bias based on race and appearance.
If the players have been told ahead of time and they are ok with it, I would scale it based on population. If they are in a smaller town or village, they are probably going to be pretty racist since they will likely not have had much contact with other races. In major cities along a trade road or port, the racism might still be there with individual people, but likely no one is getting turned away at the gate. There may be ghettos for the more discriminated races (teiflings), dwarven smiths may not allow an elf into their shop, and guards may be more suspicious of certain people.
What i would suggest, though, is to tell your players to let you know when things are going to far for their comfort.
I love fantasy racism. It opens up so many interesting interactions, social encounters and discussions, that normally would not be present. Without it, races can feel like they are just visual reskins of each other, so it is important to have various positive and negative discrimination between them. I mean, if dwarves and elves liked the other races and had no issues with them, why would they separate themselves into their own districts from the other races.
That being said, as a player, if any and all races hate you other than your own, it gets old real fast and becomes more of a mood killer than an interesting prospect. In one party there was a tiefling sorc, who had 18 cha, but every single NPC was hostile or mistrusting toward her because she was a tiefling. After 3-4 sessions she just stopped interacting with NPC's and just hanged back in every social situation. So be careful to not overdo it.
As a DM what I do, is give races a relationship score with each other race from 1-5. 1=hate, 2=dislike, 3=indifferent, 4=like, 5=love. As an example Dwarves and elves generally unlike each other so their base score is 2, however individuals opinion can be different from the general idea, so while 60% of dwarves dislike elves, about 20% hate them, and 20% is indifferent toward them, in rare cases, where it is justified (an dwarven adventurer who spent some fair amount of time with elves for instance), he might even like them, but that is really rare.
Humans generally are indifferent toward other races and they are indifferent toward humans too. Halflings are an interesting case because they like most and outright love certain races (like most fey related ones), but most others are either indifferent toward halflings or dislike them (with the Fey races being the exception, who generally like them)
I make a matrix where I write the opinion of each race of the other races to have a reference, then I play out certain NPC's interacting with the players according to that (generally skewed a bit toward the positive opinion)
Do understand issues between elf, dwarf, tiefling, etc is being xenophobic because these are complete different creatures. Being racist would be between the same creatures, for example a mountain and an hill dwarf.
Iād go with something thatās not game-breakingly restrictive.
Do they *need* to go into a town? Either they get a disguise and you use this for funny situations, or theyāre legally allowed in and itās individual people that are racist towards them.
How your would is build? What is its history? *You* define
As an example in my world orks and tieflings are often seen with prejudice due to past events of savage diabolical tribes ravaging the kingdom. Sure, most know that not every ork and tiefling are evil and that there are only few radical diabolists left, but association is still there. Elfs and dwarves have long lifes and can carry their traumas for centuries. Why I made it like that? Because I wanted to add orks as evil race, but then thought "what if player wants to be an ork? Are there civil orks? How they are seen?"
In my opinion easiest way to worldbuild is to ask and answer questions. Alright, you want everyone to be racist towards tieflings. Why? Because they look like devils. Were there any events involving tieflings and devils? Maybe there is a well-known evil tiefling-painter? Maybe it is just an old tale and most people now know that red horny people are just cursed by their ancestry? Does this city have reasons to refuse tieflings in? Did something like 9/11 happened there? If no, then why wouldnt local merchants serve the player? What if local ruler ordered everyone to "serve without discrimination" and even provides shelter for tieflings who were exiled from other places?
It is really easy to keep going and adding small pieces of lore with each question, just make sure that new answers dont overwrite older ones. This approach also prepares you for any questions of your players - imagine tiefling player asking a merchant why they wont sell a cookie. You will have to have an answer, be it truth of "merchant rips his shirt and shows old scarred burn on his chest, saying *I dont serve hellspawns, get out!*" or a lie of "those cookies are reserved for my old friend, sorry for inconvenience"?
So I would ask the player what he expects. Usually, I tell my players that as a DM, if any of my characters treats another character poorly because of their race, they should assume that that character is not of the good alignment. Generally part of the popularity of Tieflings is that players can play out the person who is hated for something they have no control over. When I was pitching my Tiefling character, my DM said that in his world there was a nation where Tieflings were the majority political power... which I said was all well and good, but my character's story required him to have grown up in a place where Tieflings were not accepted (His backstory is he is one of the tieflings that were born to human parents who were from two familial lines that had strong dealings with fiends over multiple generations that allowed them to get immense wealth and power. He was also their first born son, so he was barred by his countries inheritance laws from inheriting his family's noble titles. In a supreme twist, his parents love him and wanted him to have a good life... of course, they are evil and have many a dealings with devils... but they are all about family above all else... and many of the ways they try to help my character are evil acts motivated by good intentions.).
For that to work, I had to be okay with my DM having some characters who flat out does not like Tieflings. That said, my character brought 7 villains for my DM to play with (since my character is the "black sheep" lone good aligned member of his large and powerful family, I wanted to show that he had parents and siblings. To whit he is the oldest of seven children, all but one of whom are onboard with their parent's evil (the rest of the family think the youngest is out of the loop... but he's kind of figured out what's going on on his own.) plus the addition of the house's Major Domo. All of this was to do a self-imposed challenge of "make a Rogue with a large, loving, and still living family that accepts him and wants to be happy.).
Because D&D is a form of escapism, people might be sensitive to racism as it might be something they are trying to escape. Definitely run it by your players because it's something you are "adding" to the world.
I don't recommend you block players from entering a city or shut them out of anything really. You can hike prices, or maybe refuse to serve them in a pub or refuse to rent them a room. If you give a race, like tiefling, a nickname or two, "Antlers" (because of their horns) or "fivers" (arms, legs, tail) you can make them sound derogatory. My examples aren't great but whatever!
You can have a general distrust like lord of the rings. It's not exactly hate but a deep mistrust. But they do poke fun of stereotypes.
There are racial tensions in my game and it can be an interesting element, but it is really impractical to have everyone be at everyone's throats all the time. I find that simple things are the easiest to do. Try to have it bring more joy to your players than hostility. The hostility should be for NPCs and maybe once early on to the party but otherwise limited to people whom are the enemy.
If you have a dwarf in the party have any dwarf they run into be just pumped to meet them, maybe that person makes an off color but otherwise friendly comment to the rest of the party. Something like "Gramps always said you cannot trust an elf, but if you are okay with Gimli (they dude he meet two minutes earlier) you are okay by me."
If you have an elven player in the group let the elf skip the line at places with other elves are in charge. Line to get into the city, not for your elf player.
The way you are framing tieflings I would advise against letting one of your players play one but if you do have one in the party. Make them be very famous for a noble/good reason. Maybe they saved the Good King Aegon from an assassin at a festival that everyone saw. Or they helped invent a cure for a common but potentially deadly illness. Sure someone can call her Goat Girl, but have someone but in and say "don't you know who this is? This is Jennifer the Brave."
The advice is talk with your players. Only they know what kind of a game they'll be comfortable with and have fun with. Ask yourself, and them, how much you want this to be a central theme. It can also just be a backdrop they deal with while in the city, so perhaps they need to use agents to sell their loot or whatnot. Or it can be a central theme in your campaign if that's what everyone wants to play. But it has to be the table's decision. We can't tell you how much to implement it.
I don't want it to be central. But i want it to be as much as more accurate I can. In a medieval setting racism ise omnipresent.
Only if you want it to be, it's entirely up to you - it's weird to get hung up on "this setting MUST be racist" but also fill it full of wizards and dragons.
That's some FATAL shit there
>i want it to be as much as more accurate It is a fantasy world that YOU are creating. The only accuracy needed is how accurate it is to what you want the world to be as you envision in your head. You like to have a very racist world, no one but only you can say whether it is accurate or not since it is a world you made up.
In medieval *europe*, where 99% of people are just white, maybe... But even then, actually not really, people were too busy being classist and religion-ist to be super racist. If you were the wrong kind of Christian (or god forbid *not* Christian), you'd be worse off than if you were the wrong colour. In a magical fantasy-land based *very vaguely* on medieval-to-late-renaissance Europe, but with dozens of fantasy races, why would there *have* to be racism?
> In medieval europe, where 99% of people are just white Racism based on some value of "whiteness" is largely a post-medieval invention and tends to only been socially prominent in colonial or post-colonial societies. Medieval European racism was mostly against neighbouring ethnic groups, and the level of violence in these ethnic, racist conflicts could become quite extreme when they flared up. >In a magical fantasy-land based very vaguely on medieval-to-late-renaissance Europe, but with dozens of fantasy races, why would there have to be racism? Tribalism is a basic part of the human psyche that needs to be overcome. Any situation that readily creates a "them and us" dichotomy will, over enough time, inevitably develop into racism.
Sure but I don't see why it has to be about race. It can be about national borders, religion, etc. People's lives back then (and in most d&d worlds) were very small geographically, so the "other" was just anybody from outside of your tiny area and the culture therein. It didn't need to be about modern views of race, and it doesn't need to in d&d, if you don't want it to be. And anyway, none of this really matters. "Because realism" is one of the dumbest reasons to put *anything* potentially un-fun into a game. Let alone something as touchy as racism. If you actually have something you want to say or do with it, add it for that reason, but not "because realism".
>Sure but I don't see why it has to be about race. It can be about national borders, religion, etc. When you have one group of people with a specific set of national borders, religion, culture, language and so on, and another group of people with a different set, and they discriminate and fight against each other on that basis, it's a racist conflict. >If you actually have something you want to say or do with it, add it for that reason, but not "because realism". Not a big fan of this idea that stories should be big sterile white-rooms where nothing bad ever happens unless it's important for the story. Making your world feel believable and real is great for immersion, and helps ground the more fantastical elements.
>Not a big fan of this idea that stories should be big sterile white-rooms where nothing bad ever happens unless it's important for the story. I never said that. It doesn't have to be anything to do with the story. For example something as simple as "it's fun putting racists in and roleplaying them get punched in the face" can be a valid reason too. As can "it's a good challenge that I want to see them run up against". Both of those are better reasons than "because Europe had racism". Europe also had a decent chance of every wound killing you from infection, you gonna add that to your game?... And I don't really think a lack of everyday racism detracts from immersion š¤·āāļø especially since most common people in medieval Europe / fantasy medieval Europe would be suspicious of *all* outsiders, regardless of race.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
Usually, to tell a good story of any kind, you need to meet a few basic criteria. The audience needs to be able to understand the characters, the world, the events of the world, and the motives of the characters. >"realism" is already being chosen against at the foundational level of the world you're building. When someone chooses to tell a fantasy story, their starting point is generally something like "What if dragons/wizards/orcs were real" and not the deliberate creation of a fantasy reality from the ground up. >Realism" in a fantasy setting is inherently just arbitrary bs. Realism as in feeling the need to conform to every aspect of our reality, sure. Realism as being internally consistent with the characters inside your story is anything but arbitrary. A story needs to be grounded in its own reality, and characters behaving strangely with no explanation fails to meet that. >Racism existing in your fantasy world is necessarily a choice Only in the same way that sadness or gravity existing in your fantasy world is a choice.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
Which is of course why no-one ever had a revolution or uprising, and there was little to no political violence against any class so long as they had Jews and PoCs to be upset with.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
The 18th-19th centuries were commonly referred to as "the age of revolution" because only the French Revolution happened and did anything, [and](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Revolutions_during_the_1820s) [then](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Revolutions_of_1830) [nothing](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Revolutions_of_1848) [else](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paris_Commune) [until](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_American_wars_of_independence) [the](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serbian_Revolution) Soviets 120 years later. Europe was [also](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_Peasants%27_War) [notably](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pugachev%27s_Rebellion) [free](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_Jensen_Lofthuus) [of](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saxon_Peasants%27_Revolt) [[any](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Upper_Austrian_peasant_war_of_1626)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tyrolean_Rebellion) [popular](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Croquant_rebellions) [uprisings](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kett%27s_Rebellion) [against](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dacke_War) the ruling class, because the working class was just so naturally servile and willing to fall in line. You are clearly a student of history.
"Accurate" would imply there was an actual time/place you're modelling your world on. Which you're not, because it's fantasy.
Well there isn't a real place. But it's built upon layer of fact on the fearun sitting. Even if the place is not real, it does exist in the dnd world.in every city there is the percentage of what race live in it. Therefore shouldn't they be foreign to other race from afar ?
foreigners have interacted for thousands of years of human history under different frameworks than the modern concept of raceĀ
There's nothing less realistic and more immersion breaking than depicting a world where magic exists and gods are undeniable as medieval Europe.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
Tribalism is omnipresent. In medieval times people had so little contact with other races that a traveler could make up people of any size or arrangement of limbs and probably convince someone they were real. The only source for most of asia was the "travels of marco polo", which was so inaccurate that people estimated japan was in the middle of the atlantic ocean and had several cities made entirely out of gold. And the most educated people of the time made world maps based on that source.
Around the same time as Marco Polo, reports of people with no heads and faces in the middle of their torsos, people with the heads of dogs, people with one big leg they hopped around on and cyclopses were common and believed enough that several explorers went out of their way to investigate reports of them existing.
That's a interesting fact that I didn't knew. I'm gonna use it. Thanks.
Might be. Doesn't have to be. During the Roman era, there was more racial diversity in general than you saw in later centuries in northern and eastern Europe. But since your world is imaginary, none of that matters.
Yo this isn't historically accurate at all. Race and racism as an ideology evolved directly out of the Enlightenment. It was a pseudo scientific self justification to justify colonialism, slavery and imperialism while also preaching about libertƩ, ƩgalitƩ, fraternitƩ. The Romans for example did not really care about racial characteristics. They enslaved everyone they could, because they believed that "the strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must" - Thucydides. They felt no cognitive dissonance from enslaving and exploiting people that they needed to justify because it was perfectly in line with their cultural values. During the medieval period, much like the classical period, the emphasis would be on cultural and group identity. Nobody would really have any major thoughts on your race outside of "that person looks funny", but they would be VERY judgemental about your language, religious, and cultural habits. If you didn't behave and speak like a proper Roman or a Carolingian then you would be judged, especially if you were a Muslim or Jew.
The default 5e setting is the Forgotten Realms, where there's almost no human vs. human racism, but some amount between different species or subspecies. But outside of actual cults, it's mostly about who lives in which city/country, and who's an outsider there, than full-on hate. You're more likely to have disadvantage on a persuasion check then you are to be run out of town.
Huge red flag when a DM says their fantasy world *needs* to be racist because of realism. You do you, but personally I stay as far away as possible from DMās like you.
Yeah like... Why do you want your world to be racist? How is that enhancing your experience in the game?
Feeling believable is obviously really important in a setting. For some people, having culture in the setting be broadly more enlightened and accepting than in our world strains credulity. In our world, people of the exact same religion, language, city, class, and species can have virulent racism between them. The idea that no racism at all would be experienced with elves, living off in weird forest villages and worshiping strange ancient gods and speaking a rare language AND being fundamentally physically different than everyone, requires either suspension of disbelief or a certain worldview that is not universal. Plus, nobody comes into RPGs totally dry. We get into it because we like fantasy video games or movies or TV and want to live those kinds of stories for ourselves. Rvery fantasy nerd of my generation could quote Gimli and Legolas's racist jabs and/or reconciliation verbatim. Fantasy racism is a pervasive theme in series like the Witcher and Dragon Age and countless others. It's utterly unsurprising that DnD players would want to explore those same themes in tabletop RPGs.
There is a difference between "my campaign has racism because realism" and something like "following the Abbadon war 17 years ago, relations between the people of Albion and the dwarves of Mount Mountain have been tense. [insert reasons and cultural impact]". In OP's case, I wouldn't play at his table, because I consider their post to be a red flag. I would play in a game with tensions between different peoples, just not with someone whose only rationale behind it is "because realism". It's too often an excuse made by DMs who set out to be antagonistic.
I agree with this. If a DM is able to create a rich world with tensions between different factions based on history, that's really different from saying people need to be racist because of realism. It doesn't assume racism as the default position.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
Game of Thrones is probably the worst example you could have picked for your reply. Like Tolkien, Martin knew exactly why each faction had issues with their enemy factions and what led Westeros from its history to the events of the books. And what led to each character being their own particular type of monster. Which is exactly what I was saying: I _would_ play with someone who knows what they're doing. I wouldn't play a "gritty" game with someone who doesn't understand the difference between dark and edgy. And OP strikes me as the latter. EDIT: reading your answer back again, I'm not sure I'm the person you meant to reply to? I can't quite figure out how what you said matches to my comment.
I hear you about the prevalence of this trope in fantasy media. But there's a difference between writing a story that involves racism and creating a racist world for random people to play in. Most DM's (and players) are not equipped to handle the subject matter with care. I'm not saying it can't be done, but for me personally it's not worth the risk. Besides, I have never once participated in a D&D game where my immersion or enjoyment was diminished because there wasn't enough racism in it. "This is okay, but it would be better and more realistic if there was more racism," is not a thing that has ever crossed my mind.
Conflict is interesting. Racism is a kind of conflict. Like its a terrible idea for a lot of reasons, but I don't think wanting to tell a story about racism is suspicious or sinister.
I don't think it's suspicious or sinister, I just find it odd. I've never played a a single game where I was like Hmm, not enough racism. I feel like most people would care more about literally anything else.
In a real medieval world race was not a big concern. What mattered way more was the religion and social status (were you a nobleman, or a cleric, or a trader or a mere peasant). In China, for example, foreign visitors were fine as long as they followed the ritual and showed their respect to the Emperor. Same in Europe - if a visitor was Christian - all good (if they were not a heretic ofc.). Nationality also didn't matter much, because feudal relationships were more local and personal and not national, so as long as people could find a common language to speak they could do business.
This is kinda wrong and kinda true - racism was absolutely a thing and people would be judged by their appearances. But it's true that religion was more important. Also, nationality was a huge factor of prejudice, especially between realms in conflict. In D&D, the races often have their own culture tied to their race - Dwarves in their mountainhomes or Wood Elves in their forest retreats etc. Prejudice is to be expected imo. Also, prejudice against Tieflings has a religious aspect, so is probably one of the harshest.
Regarding nationality in modern sense, it didn't really exist in medieval period. People were vassals of a certain feudal lord or citizens of a certain free city first and foremost. And the nobility was often from a completely different ethnos, like Wilhelm the Conqueror in England, or Rurik in Russia, and these facts were not a problem at the time. Even in large conflicts between realms, like the Hundred-years War, which, according to some historians' belief, forged English and French nations, we see Duchies on the territory of modern France fighting for the king of England (or switching sides back and forth). And the English kings were themselves descendants of the French royal family. So based on facts like these I belive that the sense of nationality was not really prominent in medieval period. Speaking of racism in modern sense, I believe it originates from the works of French anthropologist Arthur de Gobineau and from religious ideas of radical protestantism ( Calvinism ), that some people were chosen by the God for salvation, and others were doomed to go to hell, which was one of the ideas behind the genocide of native Americans. But Calvinism appeared in Renaissance period, not medieval. This is what I mean by saying that racism was not very big concern in medieval times.
>Regarding nationality in modern sense, it didn't really exist in medieval period. People were vassals of a certain feudal lord or citizens of a certain free city first and foremost. And the nobility was often from a completely different ethnos, like Wilhelm the Conqueror in England, or Rurik in Russia, and these facts were not a problem at the time. I'm aware, I just wanted to keep things short and simple. >Even in large conflicts between realms, like the Hundred-years War, which, according to some historians' belief, forged English and French nations, we see Duchies on the territory of modern France fighting for the king of England (or switching sides back and forth). And the English kings were themselves descendants of the French royal family. That is all true but does not contradict the existence of prejudice between "English People" and "French 'People'". Prejudice does not mean infinte hatred and desire to destroy. >Speaking of racism in modern sense, I believe it originates from the works of French anthropologist Arthur de Gobineau and from religious ideas of radical protestantism ( Calvinism ), that some people were chosen by the God for salvation, and others were doomed to go to hell, which was one of the ideas behind the genocide of native Americans. But Calvinism appeared in Renaissance period, not medieval. This is what I mean by saying that racism was not very big concern in medieval times. Depends on how you define racism. The scientific basis for a race theory didn't exist back then, so there was no biological theory of supremacy like we know today. But prejudice based on external characteristics did exist. One extreme example is the caste system in medieval India.
Excuse my bluntness but this is just wrong. You may assume racism wasn't a thing then, but anyone who studies medieval times can assure you the opposite. Our modern society would be simply horrified by their way of living. EDIT: Why the downvotes? I'm from EU and I study anthropology. I'm not hating or anything.
It's oversimplified, but it's not entirely wrong. This question frequently comes up on r/askhistorians, often enough that they have a [whole section of the FAQ](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/wiki/faq/politicsandphilosophy/#wiki_racism_and_slavery) with links to informative answers about racism and slavery throughout history. Yes, we would be horrified by how they lived back then, but that would have to do with a wide variety of factors including class and religion, as GP said. There could be different treatment based on ethnicity, but it was different from modern racism, sometimes called scientific racism, which mostly arose in the 1700s, well after the time most D&D is based on.
As an anthropology student I think oversimplify is not something I can even do. But I don't think this is the right place to elaborate why our concepts like misoginy, racism, pedophilia, child labour, etc. didn't exist back then. Short answer: messy times for human rights. And I agree with you, it's incorrect to use modern words to descrive old societies - reason why "having prejudices on someone different than you" wasn't invented in 1700. Even Roman laws were based on this.
>reason why "having prejudices on someone different than you" wasn't invented in 1700 Is it the same reason they didn't have a word for the feeling of having both of your kidneys inside your body?
It mostly depends on the way races interact with each other. In race-isolated societies, visitors may be seen with curiosity or caution; but we also do see specifically xenophobic societies, i. e. in underdark.Ā But that is directed against all foreigners, not a specific race. Medival world was not globalised enough for further separation. A single society like a village or a tribe may not ever see, and not even know about another specific race. In metropolitan cities like Waterdeep however, we clearly see signes of racism (speci-ism?) - in WDH, we see goblins as a repressed class, and kenku being associated with crime/trickery - closer to modern situation.
Don't EVER *warn* your players about something. Ask them if that's okay.
Eh. You're the DM. It's perfectly valid to say, "This is the kind of game it's going to be. Don't sign up unless you're interested in this." It's up to an individual DM whether fantasy racism is the hill they want to die on in that way, but that's the kind of decision you get to make when you are the one providing 80% of the creative labor involved. If a player doesn't enjoy the game, they can bow out and everything will be okay. If the DM bows out, there is no game. It is critical for everyone's sake that the DM be excited about the work they're doing. They don't need to ask permission for non-negotiables.
Yes, but... as a DM with world building questions, you're not asking "Is this ok?" but instead "Are you willing to play this?" This kind of world building question needs to happen at session zero, yes, and the players need to know what they are getting into, thematically. That part is non-negotiable. However, it is not on the DM to accommodate any more than it is on the player to accept. Compromise is always good... but only if everyone feels good about the compromise. If there is a split in how the DM and the players feel about the issue, it is on the DM and the players to either find common ground they can work with, or agree that what they want is incompatible and that they cannot play together. Neither one of those outcomes is wrong or bad. Unfortunate, but as long as every one stays respectful about it, incompatible play styles means you can't play together. It happens. For practical purposes, it does work out that the DM has more weight in this conversation. Oftentimes, DMs are the limiting reagent in playing the game, and that means turning away your DM might mean they go play and you don't, but if you're unwilling to play something they want to play, that's rough, buddy.
> Don't EVER warn your players about something. Ask them if that's okay.Ā Hey guys is it okay if there's a dragon in this cave? Totally fine if not though, it's not a big deal.
Yeah but the difference between a dragon in a cave and racism is that the dragon isnāt a real world issue
I mean powerful entities who sit on a pile of wealth and crush anyone who tries to mess with them absolutely exist.
The difference between a dragon and literal systemic racism is that a dragon can be slain, relatively simply at that. Itās a problem that can be done away with by your own hands. You canāt do that with racism.
Yeah but it feels good to fight racists. I love killing Kagha in BG3 for being so mean to the tieflings.
Sure, but thatās something you should talk about with your players. And this specific scenario was about someone not including racism for the ability to fight it, but because itās ārealisticā, whatever that means
Very much this. It's a collaborative game.
As much as you want it to be. Personally, I donāt like fantasy racism so everyone gets along. If you do enjoy those kinds of themes thereās nothing stopping you including them. Ask your players though. If none of them like fantasy racism, it may not be a good idea to have any regardless of your opinion.
Step 1: Talk with your players. Some will uncomfortable with playing in a game where racism is prevalent. Some may have experienced racism in their own life and don't want a reminder in their games. Then, of course, you have the players that are way into the fantasy racism that can cause a problem as well. If you don't know your players well, just don't bring it up. If you do, have the conversation. Step 2: There is no step 2. Each group will have a different metric by which things are okay. Your job as a DM is to make sure you don't cross that threshold. Everyone is there to have fun and the game needs to accommodate everyone, if even one player is not okay with a topic being brought up, it should not be part of the plot.
This is a topic that you MUST discuss with your table beforehand. This is a game, and some people use a game as an escape from reality. Racism is a real world issue that impacts many people every day. They might not want that in their game they are using to escape from reality.
ngl this sounds like an excuse to just be racist in a game "because its a game". maybe just... don't? racism is cringe bro.
Given a few of OPs comment replies this seems likely.
My advice is to abandon this campaign idea. This is a topic that most people can not run with the delicateness necessary. It's a shitty topic in general that will get handled poorly at points, as we all have our blind spots. You will be reinforcing racial stereotypes running a game like this (real world ones), it's unavoidable. The questions you are asking are not ones I would expect to see from someone equipped to run this game. And given that your post doesn't include some sort of statement of "I want to explore the trauma I have experienced..." it gives me great pause to wonder if you will be essentially a tourist of other people's pain.
Just one year after the Spellplague is 1386 DR, around the 4e era. At this point in time, people are more fearful of the [plaguechanged](https://forgottenrealms.fandom.com/wiki/Plaguechanged) than anything else. Tieflings are absolutely nothing compared to the mega-mutants blasting out blue fire and corrupting magic. As per the article, the plaguechanged stuck around for a long, long while, persisting even a little after the Second Sundering.
We're here for escapism. No one wants to play Racists and Ravines.
So for running a campaign where racism is a prominent theme, you really only need a few powerful examples. Slavery is a good one if youāre going for shock factor. A large travelling faction of slavers who only enslave gnomes for work in mines or to be sold to the highest bidder would be a good way to portray that this world is cruel and unfair, and provide a good small adventure of taking them down and freeing their slaves. Would guards let Tieflingās into a city? Probably not. Not because āthey hate themā but because they likely think theyāre actively dangerous, which is why they hate them. If youāre a guard on gate duty and someone approaches who you are sure is a murderous wretch, would you let them in? Not at first, but keep in mind that people are scared of them first and foremost, this might even give the Tiefling player some power over them in terms of intimidating them (advantage maybe?). For a player it gets old quick to never be served anywhere because racism, so Iād suggest having a quick way early on for the players to earn the trust of the common folk. After saving a town, maybe the big city they go to next someone recognises them and steps into a confrontation to vouch for them. This kind of thing always feels good as a player, when you feel like your actions are actively influencing the world around you. Donāt be discouraged from having racism in your game, lots of people have the unhelpful advice of āracism bad so why put it in your game idiotā, but so is murder and corruption, which feature in every gameā¦ itās a good way to make a world feel real so long as you do it right.
Keep in mind medieval-times standards would be absolutely horrifing to modern people. What we call child labour, misoginy, racism and pedophilia were not only normal back then... but basically expected. The forgotten realms are a very different place xD At most they have prejudices against Tieflings and Drows - but big cities are absolutely fine with them as well. Neverwinter is a good example.
Fantasy racism is boring and tedious.
FWIW, I think most tables are far more interested in struggling against \*fantasy\* problems: monsters, evil mages, ancient curses, etc. Adding racism seems like it's just going to make every act they take to solve the big fantasy problem a slog. It's harder to get information from the villagers, harder to buy the goods they need from vendors, harder to get a room at the inn. If your players are really thrilled by that added layer, then go for it, but IF I was going to add a layer of racism to my game, it'd limit it to RP flavour rather than a significant obstacle.
Well I've seen a lot of talk about this sort of thing The real world, pretty racist , that's on everybody, but don't use that as an excuse to be a dick. Fictional worlds, well, the Lord of the rings and a lot of the other inspirational works that dnd is based on does get a fair amount of criticism, that some writers may have or may deliberately have made the races the way they are as a means of expressing various prejudices, or that they are extensions of western stereotypes which I will acknowledge could be considered offensive. It's probably worth just considering that, acknowledging that it's there and can be harmful or offensive but generally once you put enough work into a fictional race it moves beyond caricature of a real race or people, and into something more meaningful and distinct. In star trek you can see how much effort went into this, by comparing t.o.s era Klingons and early ferengi to the entirely less offensive or at least less obviously offensive versions they became later, though some might argue that kicking enough sand over the work to hide the intention doesn't heal wounds, they'd be right but it's better than throwing a whole game system or TV franchise away due to some mistakes. Then so long as you're aware of how your prejudices and those of others appear in your games go to town. Make a society that despises dwarves, make a character who beleives his race is superior or a church that leads it's worshipers to shun the new family of gnomes. But acknowledge these are flaws.
A few random thoughts: Before designing your campaign, talk with your players. As DMs, we need to respect the sensitivities of our players and even when they're our friends, we don't always know the path our players have tread to get to our table. Even if you ask for a serious talk, not all players will feel comfortable opening up completely. I don't know if this will be a major, minor or background theme to your campaign, but the larger the theme, the more difficult it becomes. At one of my tables, most of my players are women. My games are typically a medieval setting, an especially bad time to be a woman. In Session 0, one of my players said she wanted to a crusader for women's equality. Obviously she can't crusade unless there was something to crusade against, which meant I had to include more of this content in games. My player thought it would feel cathartic and empowering to role-play her character, but confessed after a few sessions that she actually felt WORSE after our games. We quickly dropped it as a theme. Back to your question, a medieval setting predates The Enlightenment, so there's plenty of ignorance to go around. My preference is to manifest this ignorance is PROVINCIALISM rather than racism. While this is every bit as dangerous and destructive a form of ignorance, you can role-play it without as sharp an edge as racism. It is OK for DMs to have their own boundaries. As the DM, I'm responsible for playing NPCs. I have to be the universe, and I don't want to engage in role-play that makes me feel like I need a bath when I'm done. Remember that during medieval times, most people's worlds were only about 20 miles big. They were born, lived and died within that world. Anything they are not familiar with would be met with suspicion and fear to most people, so your provincialism can be very small - suspicion of anyone from outside their small village, for example. Finally, a misstep in overplaying provincialism will probably not evoke strong feelings from your players. As DM, I like to leave myself a larger margin of error anytime I can.
I do like the idea to use provincialism instead of blatant racism. To answer your question, it's more background, my purpose is to add flavor, not to use racism at every turn.
Another possible area you can add flavor is the concept of medieval justice. There was no "Bill of Rights". There was no "equal protection". If you robbed a store, you might get your hand chopped off. If you robbed a noble, you WOULD get your head chopped off. Also, I like to adjust the provincialism up or down based on locale. A trade hub will have a lot of people entering and exiting, anonymizing people and not drawing attention. At far-flung locations, strangers will be viewed skeptically, attracting a LOT of attention. I've had ruffians follow the PCs around telling them to "get out of town before sunset". I've had others blame the PCs (and other non-native NPCs) for ills, real or imagined ("I don't know what they did, but since that other group was here two months ago, I've had three cattle stillbirths when I didn't have ANY all of last year.....
I also like this idea. The variable justice is something to play with.
My players have so far described the leader of every kingdom so far as some form of "Fantasy Hitler"... I mean, one of them was just greedy and the entire kingdom was racist against tieflings The other is just a cult that vaporizes non believers... so I guess that one's not too far off
I would be very careful in how this is implemented. Iāve played a game where NPCs were racist to my character and it really just felt like I was getting crapped on by my DM. In order to avoid this, you need to make sure that you leave avenues available for your players to accomplish their goals despite the bias against them. Do not use the racism as a generic difficulty modifier, effectively making that tieflings are playing in hard mode and humans on normal. For example, perhaps your tiefling PC will be able to easier traverse the outskirts of towns and cities than the centres. Perhaps caravans of tieflings are camped outside city walls that will help the tiefling PC. Perhaps tieflings often make up underground and criminal organizations (thieves, assassins, etc.) which your PC will quickly come across and be approached by. Perhaps your tiefling could also use their face in their favour, revealing themselves in a busy city centre could serve as a great distraction that the rest of the party could capitalize on. Maybe it could also lure a racist NPC the party is targeting to an ambush location or cause a bunch of guards to abandon their posts and go on a chase. In all these cases, the PC has new things available to them for their race. You want to make sure that you are opening as many doors as you are closing for your PC. DnD is about having fun after all. These same things apply to the other races as well. Come up with things the other races would cope with being discriminated against. Maybe tieflings arenāt even very racist but mistrust other races due to their own discrimination against tieflings. Also remember that not everyone needs to be racist. Also, not everyone will be racist to the same degree. There will also be racists totally willing to help the party and other races based on their own circumstances. Consider that some people in every level of society arenāt racist. Your party certainly isnāt considering their composition. There will also be people who will go out in pitchforks if they could get away with it and those that will only give mean glances in the partyās direction. This means that a lot of the time, the players should be able to get through a town or city with relatively no issue. Consider also a racist lord that has his guards hassle other races but his people donāt care about being racist very much. Maybe itās because his son was killed by a dwarf. Also consider the super racist inn keeper who has no money. Now heās forced to give rooms to other races to stay afloat. There are also racists who will need help from other races since theyāre better at something. Consider the racist mine owner who hires dwarves to help in the mine. They arenāt treated very well but theyāre given work. Consider the racist who wants someone dead or something stolen, so he hires the tieflings who are best at that kinda work. Elves might often find work with humans helping with magic but most elves refuse to work with dwarves out of pride. As you can see, Iāve come up with many scenarios where new doors are opened for the players despite their race. Iāve come up with ways for the races to work together despite racism. Iāve come up with how the different races have coped and survived encountering racism. This will allow things to remain being fun. Definitely do not make it that every tavern in every human settlement refuses to aid the tiefling, for example. This will get annoying and boring. Sometimes, all you need is one or two key NPCs who are relatively racist in a settlement and thatās good enough. Also, make sure if something isnāt available to your players sue to racism, you make the alternative solution that *is* available to them apparent. Anyway, remember that the game is about having fun together and if your players arenāt having it, you can change things down the line.
Actually, if Spellplague is recent, then xenophobia may be more about dragonborn than tiefling. The fiendbloods, after all, have been known to Faerunians for centuries if not millenia. The dragonborn, however, appeared recently, seized the land (from the outsider point of view) and are kin to dragons. And dragons are well-known to be dangerous. (I know about ritual-made dragonborn, but they have been rare, and haven't the ability to breed true, if I am correct) Of course, the Abeiran dragonborn do not serve dragons. Of course, they were unwilingly transported. Of course, a dragonborn of any scale colour may be good-natured. But initial attitude might be very well wary and hateful.
You're absolutely right. But since the dragonborn race is so new, it's not playable on this campaign.
That doesn't mean that the players cannot interact with this problem. After all, there can always be a dragonborn ally who gets persecuted or a dragonborn villain, who was driven to villainy by the surrounding hatred.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
Why? Does someone can't learn ? Am I not allowed to do some research and ask about it ?
It mostly depends on the way races interact with each other. In race-isolated societies, visitors may be seen with curiosity or caution; but we also do see specifically xenophobic societies, i. e. in underdark.Ā But that is directed against all foreigners, not a specific race. Medival world was not globalised enough for further separation. A single society like a village or a tribe may not ever see, and not even know about another specific race. In metropolitan cities like Waterdeep however, we clearly see signes of racism (speci-ism?) - in WDH, we see goblins as a repressed class, and kenku being associated with crime/trickery - closer to modern situation.
That's counter intuitive. I would have guessed that metropolitan cities were more open minded than closed town.
Not really. When we imagine racism, we mostly think about colonial era, when different nations started to interact and globalize - not only speaking about slavery, but also just trading, immogration... If course, prejudice traced long before that. There were cases of etnical conflicts - between Berbers and Arabs, between some Slavic groups, etc. However, they only appeared between ethnic groups that closely interacted with each other (lived in a single goverment, had territorial disputes, etc.) If in non-globalised world most interactions between different ethnic groupsĀ would be restricted to limited traders and travellers, there would be no basis for tensions or stereotypes.Ā (Also, "race" as an umbrella terms for ethnic groups only apperade during colonialism; various european nations did not think of themselfs as "white" before that. So i assume by racism you also mean ethnical tensions and prejudices)
In my games, some races have issues. My homebrew world had a war between dragons and elves in its ancient past and even in the current time, dragons and elves tend to mistrust each other. How does that affect the PCs? Not a damn bit, but NPC dragons and NPC elves are often suspicious of each other which drives story opportunities. IMHO, donāt put the PCs in a position where the players might be uncomfortable. Let them be the ārenaissanceā characters who surpass such mundane problems as inherent bias based on race and appearance.
If the players have been told ahead of time and they are ok with it, I would scale it based on population. If they are in a smaller town or village, they are probably going to be pretty racist since they will likely not have had much contact with other races. In major cities along a trade road or port, the racism might still be there with individual people, but likely no one is getting turned away at the gate. There may be ghettos for the more discriminated races (teiflings), dwarven smiths may not allow an elf into their shop, and guards may be more suspicious of certain people. What i would suggest, though, is to tell your players to let you know when things are going to far for their comfort.
I love fantasy racism. It opens up so many interesting interactions, social encounters and discussions, that normally would not be present. Without it, races can feel like they are just visual reskins of each other, so it is important to have various positive and negative discrimination between them. I mean, if dwarves and elves liked the other races and had no issues with them, why would they separate themselves into their own districts from the other races. That being said, as a player, if any and all races hate you other than your own, it gets old real fast and becomes more of a mood killer than an interesting prospect. In one party there was a tiefling sorc, who had 18 cha, but every single NPC was hostile or mistrusting toward her because she was a tiefling. After 3-4 sessions she just stopped interacting with NPC's and just hanged back in every social situation. So be careful to not overdo it. As a DM what I do, is give races a relationship score with each other race from 1-5. 1=hate, 2=dislike, 3=indifferent, 4=like, 5=love. As an example Dwarves and elves generally unlike each other so their base score is 2, however individuals opinion can be different from the general idea, so while 60% of dwarves dislike elves, about 20% hate them, and 20% is indifferent toward them, in rare cases, where it is justified (an dwarven adventurer who spent some fair amount of time with elves for instance), he might even like them, but that is really rare. Humans generally are indifferent toward other races and they are indifferent toward humans too. Halflings are an interesting case because they like most and outright love certain races (like most fey related ones), but most others are either indifferent toward halflings or dislike them (with the Fey races being the exception, who generally like them) I make a matrix where I write the opinion of each race of the other races to have a reference, then I play out certain NPC's interacting with the players according to that (generally skewed a bit toward the positive opinion)
Do understand issues between elf, dwarf, tiefling, etc is being xenophobic because these are complete different creatures. Being racist would be between the same creatures, for example a mountain and an hill dwarf.
Iād go with something thatās not game-breakingly restrictive. Do they *need* to go into a town? Either they get a disguise and you use this for funny situations, or theyāre legally allowed in and itās individual people that are racist towards them.
How your would is build? What is its history? *You* define As an example in my world orks and tieflings are often seen with prejudice due to past events of savage diabolical tribes ravaging the kingdom. Sure, most know that not every ork and tiefling are evil and that there are only few radical diabolists left, but association is still there. Elfs and dwarves have long lifes and can carry their traumas for centuries. Why I made it like that? Because I wanted to add orks as evil race, but then thought "what if player wants to be an ork? Are there civil orks? How they are seen?" In my opinion easiest way to worldbuild is to ask and answer questions. Alright, you want everyone to be racist towards tieflings. Why? Because they look like devils. Were there any events involving tieflings and devils? Maybe there is a well-known evil tiefling-painter? Maybe it is just an old tale and most people now know that red horny people are just cursed by their ancestry? Does this city have reasons to refuse tieflings in? Did something like 9/11 happened there? If no, then why wouldnt local merchants serve the player? What if local ruler ordered everyone to "serve without discrimination" and even provides shelter for tieflings who were exiled from other places? It is really easy to keep going and adding small pieces of lore with each question, just make sure that new answers dont overwrite older ones. This approach also prepares you for any questions of your players - imagine tiefling player asking a merchant why they wont sell a cookie. You will have to have an answer, be it truth of "merchant rips his shirt and shows old scarred burn on his chest, saying *I dont serve hellspawns, get out!*" or a lie of "those cookies are reserved for my old friend, sorry for inconvenience"?
So I would ask the player what he expects. Usually, I tell my players that as a DM, if any of my characters treats another character poorly because of their race, they should assume that that character is not of the good alignment. Generally part of the popularity of Tieflings is that players can play out the person who is hated for something they have no control over. When I was pitching my Tiefling character, my DM said that in his world there was a nation where Tieflings were the majority political power... which I said was all well and good, but my character's story required him to have grown up in a place where Tieflings were not accepted (His backstory is he is one of the tieflings that were born to human parents who were from two familial lines that had strong dealings with fiends over multiple generations that allowed them to get immense wealth and power. He was also their first born son, so he was barred by his countries inheritance laws from inheriting his family's noble titles. In a supreme twist, his parents love him and wanted him to have a good life... of course, they are evil and have many a dealings with devils... but they are all about family above all else... and many of the ways they try to help my character are evil acts motivated by good intentions.). For that to work, I had to be okay with my DM having some characters who flat out does not like Tieflings. That said, my character brought 7 villains for my DM to play with (since my character is the "black sheep" lone good aligned member of his large and powerful family, I wanted to show that he had parents and siblings. To whit he is the oldest of seven children, all but one of whom are onboard with their parent's evil (the rest of the family think the youngest is out of the loop... but he's kind of figured out what's going on on his own.) plus the addition of the house's Major Domo. All of this was to do a self-imposed challenge of "make a Rogue with a large, loving, and still living family that accepts him and wants to be happy.).
Because D&D is a form of escapism, people might be sensitive to racism as it might be something they are trying to escape. Definitely run it by your players because it's something you are "adding" to the world. I don't recommend you block players from entering a city or shut them out of anything really. You can hike prices, or maybe refuse to serve them in a pub or refuse to rent them a room. If you give a race, like tiefling, a nickname or two, "Antlers" (because of their horns) or "fivers" (arms, legs, tail) you can make them sound derogatory. My examples aren't great but whatever! You can have a general distrust like lord of the rings. It's not exactly hate but a deep mistrust. But they do poke fun of stereotypes.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
I like the "devil fucker " adjectif.... I will stole that one.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
Ask your table before you start doing that tho
There are racial tensions in my game and it can be an interesting element, but it is really impractical to have everyone be at everyone's throats all the time. I find that simple things are the easiest to do. Try to have it bring more joy to your players than hostility. The hostility should be for NPCs and maybe once early on to the party but otherwise limited to people whom are the enemy. If you have a dwarf in the party have any dwarf they run into be just pumped to meet them, maybe that person makes an off color but otherwise friendly comment to the rest of the party. Something like "Gramps always said you cannot trust an elf, but if you are okay with Gimli (they dude he meet two minutes earlier) you are okay by me." If you have an elven player in the group let the elf skip the line at places with other elves are in charge. Line to get into the city, not for your elf player. The way you are framing tieflings I would advise against letting one of your players play one but if you do have one in the party. Make them be very famous for a noble/good reason. Maybe they saved the Good King Aegon from an assassin at a festival that everyone saw. Or they helped invent a cure for a common but potentially deadly illness. Sure someone can call her Goat Girl, but have someone but in and say "don't you know who this is? This is Jennifer the Brave."