Unique demihuman stereotypes?

We've all heard that dwarves like beer and elves are fags. It's old news. What are some demihuman stereotypes or tendencies you toss into your games that are actually interesting? Is there any reasoning behind it?

I kinda like tinker gnomes, but they're too play out in dumb ways. Whenever I need someone to fill a slightly anachronistic position, I tend to toss a gnome in there since it seems fitting for a tinker with no gadgets.

For example, an overworked Adventure Society clerk ("I'm up to my nose in paperwork back here. I don't need more forms to fill out when you screw up,") and a stage-hardened stand-up comedian ("You gou talent, kid, but this business will chew you up and spit you out in the gutter.")

As a result, my gnomes tend to be frazzled and jaded workaholics more than anything.

tieflings are born to be gladiators, whores, or evil wizards

Dwarves are posh, British hypercapitalists.

I view most halflings being humble Shire types, but the ones caught up in wanderlust or living in cities, the ones your party actually meets, are all thieving rat-bastard scumbags.
Then again, if I need a nobleman to kick a puppy, I'll often have him harrassing halflings for being thieving rat-bastard scumbags by nature.

Ah, I run this too. Posh trade barons on top, salt-of-the-Earth proles on the bottom.

Dwarfs, though great with heights, are terribly agoraphobic. They cannot stand the feel of open sky and are prone to their own form of vertigo.

>elves are fags
Only to closetfags (ie Dwarf fanbois)

Naga are all lazy layabouts who do nothing but sunbathe all day.

Speaking of elves, I really hate trance, so I figure they do sleep, but the trance thing is a stereotype that they propogate themselves. "Oh yeah, I totally don't actually sleep, it's like, deep meditation and stuff."

Actually, I like to play into it. I like the idea that a lot of elves who spend time around humans or halflings are jealous of the ability to dream. They think about it a lot, never knowing what it's really like.

>elf mother raising half-elf child
>every morning child tells mother about his dreams
>something something mother is driven mad by her jealousy and becomes BBEG

Not depressing enough. The mother ends up killing herself because she'll never dream, then the BBEG is the kid who goes on a crusade to either end sleep or end dreams somehow.

wait, no

>elven village hidden deep in a secluded forest
>completely insular, villagers have never been farther than they need to for hunting and gathering materials, never been outside the forest
>group of adventurers passes through
>entire village curious and excited to see foreigners for the first time in hundreds of years
>local elven girl enamored with human fighter
>one thing leads to another
>adventuring group leaves the next day
>weeks later (or however long is appropriate for an elven gestation period) she notices she is pregnant
>child comes; is noticeably different than the other children
>grows up at an accelerated rate compared to all the other local children; no one knows what the fuck is going on
>mother believes her child is destined to be special; loves the child unconditionally
>sometimes in the morning the child tells the mother about seeing strange visions in the night
>mother has no idea what to make of this
>asks the village elder
>village elder manages to tie it to fiend possession/evil god warship/some other supersticious wackery
>child is declared cursed
>elder tells the mother to bring her child to him
>mother frantically gathers a few belongings and rations into a sack, flees town with the child
>villagers with torches and pitchforks come after them
>mother kisses her child goodbye and sends him off into the forest as she stays behind to hold the villagers back as long as she can

>playing half-elf ranger
>can't trust the rogue
>paladin is charisma machine
>wizard is perceptive as a rock
>happy to cover watch duty for them once I get Keep Watch
>dedicate a spell-slot to it from then on

Fast-forward to next year

>paladin is having plot-induced nightmares
>ranger wakes him, conversation is had, turns to general roleplay
>"Wait, why are you still awake? I thought it was Wizard's watch."
>"Oh, no, I feel fine. Old hunters' tricks and some magic, I guess. I've been covering for him. And Rogue."
GM: "No, really user, when was the last time your ranger slept?"
Me: "uh... I guess it would be.. back at [Town]?"
GM: "That's was five months ago. In game."
>Ranger-kun is now very, very tired
>Paladin can't sleep with nightmares, covers the rest of watch.
Jokes are had that ranger will still hear anything before the paladin
GM: "...roll me perception as you lay down."
>roll high
>add bonuses
>we're in a forest, so carry the one...
"42? 43? Somewhere mid-forties."
>"Yeah, no, you're kept awake by the sounds of grass growing."

And that's the story about how Ranger-kun didn't sleep for over a year.

>Child picked up on the road by a kindly old human in robes.
Ah, don't worry, you're dreams make you as unique as any other dreamer. You say you dream of adventures?
>Child enrolled in adventuring academy, graduates at the top of his class.
>Applies for a position in a group of murderhobos.
Yeah, I'm an orphan, whatevs.

Yeah, I think I'm just generally into nerfing the lore all around like trimming the lifespans. I suppose I could do true elves of legend who trance and live 800 years and common elves who may not mind the myths.

Elves as fucking UNSTOPPABLE MONSTERS.

They're smarter, live WAAAAY longer, are stronger, more magically adept, better craftsmen......what if they decided humans are cattle AT BEST? Mary Sue Elves portrayed as being just better at everything should be fucking scary to everything that isn't them if they're not goody-twoshoes. I'm working on a homebrew at the moment where such elves are basically only kept from wiping out or enslaving most of the world by several brutal crusades and the combined hatred of basically all other nations, races, and cultures. I'm trying to avoid it being edgelord material, but I still feel like going one-on-one with an elf should be a bad time.

>my gnomes tend to be frazzled and jaded workaholics more than anything
Interesting. I usually make my gnomes fairly happy bureaucrats.

I like to make orcs as a race be very into storytelling. It always made sense to me that the less civilized folks in a setting would maintain a somewhat strong oral tradition.

Huh, it does seem like they'd make good bookkeepers if you don't go the sillypants route with them. I wonder why.

Gnolls are among the most talented blacksmiths among the Monstrous Humanoids(indeed they rival the Dwarves and Elves at this)

based on an idea someone else here had after noting that witches in Africa are often thought to be able to shapeshift into Hyenas and work as blacksmiths in their civilian guise

Dwarfs actually find tedious, meticulous work pleasurable while multitasking, innovating and leisure time make them extremely uncomfortable. Dwarfs look forward to the work day and loathe the boring times when they have to eat or sleep.

Humans are seen as huge sluts since all the other races except elves have sex in the missionary position for the sole purpose of reproduction

All humans are whores. It works wonders given all the mongrels running around on the average fantasy setting.

Because they're happy and full of energy, lots of drive but also innocence.

They're interns

Hobgoblins are filthy barbarians who collect skulls and dabble in necromancy. That is based on how they reject the trappings of civilization itself due to being enslaved by an extinct one, and believing the soul lies in the head. Their berserkers trepanate themselves, they are fearless because their soul already has a way out if they die.

Dark elves are seen as lusty and even thought to somehow take the life out of people. That is because they were descended from rogue fey which wanted to experience life and death instead of the eternal stillness of the fairy lands. They were leanan sĂ­dhe-like fey which inspired humans in exchange for the vital force to acquire souls and bodies. They seek to experience feelings and thrilling sensations. That influences them to be explorers and sailors, but lust is what people remember the most (in- and off-game).

I'm not sure any of these may be "interesting", but they are what I have.

...

Harpies get the Jew treatment from their interest in shiny things. Everyone just assumes they're good with money to the point that they've started to live up the stereotype as a means of social mobility.

Speaking of lazy, I love 5e's take on bugbears. I've been playing a borderline narcoleptic bugbear fighter. His signature move is falling asleep somewhere conspicuous, and when an enemy approaches him, he'll wake up and full attack -> action surge -> full attack with a fistful of superiority dice, then groggily roll over and go back to sleep.

The party calls him Dozer.

That's an amazing name

This

I go off Dwarf Fortress for my stereotypes, so here's one: Goblins are the bravest bastards alive. They live in horrible evil wastelands where poisonous clouds sweep the land on a daily basis and the dead don't stay down - but they still manage to survive and even thrive.

Also, dwarves get viewed as drunks because alcohol is necessary for stable brain chemistry. The gods are bastards.

Sure. Here are mine:

>Humans (Yes, I consider humans a fantasy race.)
-Crazy about Corn. They're the only ones who know how to grow it and boy howdy do they love it.
-They're the only race with round ears. Elves especially love to squeeze, "fat, plump, chubby little human ears".
-RIDICULOUSLY Xenophobic towards all other non-humans... Except Centaurs. Centaurs and Humans often ally, marry, rape & pillage together- true friends.

>Orcs
-Credited as being the first race to domesticate the pig. They have since mastered pork as a culinary art.
-Orcish made equipment is shabby, ugly, and cheap, but it works damn it.
-Honest to god; if actually left all by themselves, they devolve to mud farmers and swineherds.

>Changelings
-Make for EXCELLENT Doctors, Sex Workers, and Performance artists and celebrated in all fields, so long as they're not getting into trouble.
-Shape shifting comes naturally, but acting does not: most changelings don't understand the social etiquette of beings incapable of shape shifting at will and are almost comically unconvincing.

>Dwarves
-Can eat obtain nourishment from eating soil. Dirt eating is very shameful though.
-Have a kind of sibling rivalry with Gnomes.
-Genuinely very skilled Carpenters and Woodworkers.

>Minotaurs
-Extremely devoutly religious; whether it's an evil or good god, religion is most important to them.
-Most Minotaurs people encounter are criminals, heretics, or undesirables exiled from civilized eastern minotaurian society.

>Elves
-Unapologetic Weaboos and Tourists; always coming down from the moon to take pictures, climb on statues, ruin local economies.
-Usually responsible for most anachronistic phenomena due to not picking up their garbage or giving the "poor, innocent, locals".. "hand outs".

>Cyclopes
-Extremely socially awkward and bashful due to small numbers.
-Possess OTHERWORLDLY almost AUTISTIC artisan skills in most trades/crafts/arts due to isolation.
-Absolutely Gorgeous.

Is funny, because owls are a metaphor for jews.
because they're dirty creatures

Elves have painful cancer and turn into trees upon death. Dwarves are Jews with sludgebeer like in ancient Sumeria.

By changeling you mean shapeshifters, or actual changelings as in humans who were changed at birth by the fae?

>By changeling you mean shapeshifters, or actual changelings as in humans who were changed at birth by the fae?

Shapeshifter Changelings.

I ended up using "Doppelganger" as their N-word in case you're wondering why I'm not using that as opposed to the more ambiguous troll baby changeling title.

My dwarves are hyper industrious workers kind of like post ww2 japanese. They brew super strong ephedra teas and drink them and get tweaked as shit and work in the mines or forges for 40 hours straight until they collapse and do it again the next day. The whole mountain hold is on a 44 hour work cycle with 6 hours of rest between. Anyone unfit to work is cast out of the society
I guess this is similar to traditional dwarves but a more hardcore expression of production=good

I like the one where more spiritual or aesthetic races get physical symptoms of abstract concepts or other things not directly connected to them.

Think of Illithid university professors who get violently ill when they encounter bad math or city planning department who judge the amount of parks needed on whether dryads start to wither or not

Dwarves split into two groups. Plains / hill dwarfs as Mongol-esque steppe nomads with incredibly durable ponies. While mountain dwarves are more Spring and Autumn Chinese in social structure and culture.

What exactly do they produce?
You'd imagine them to be an extremely wealthy civ unless all that labor just goes into digging tunnels.

Maybe they have communal treasure?

Traders would obviously be the bottom caste.

I have this. There are fortress dwarves and hillock dwarves. Fortress dwarves mine, work metal, and do other complex jobs. Hillock dwarves farm, hunt, and most importantly, raise dwarven horses. These bastards look like the devil fucked a Clydesdale, eat non-dwarves unless specially trained, and are nearly unstoppable. This is in a setting where horses are basically ponies.

Those are all really cool.

>Chubby little human ears

So they're dwarves in name only?

On the 5th ed. Trance is a ribbon. It does nothing and removing it don't break anything. So, we removed it.

I've been thinking about running a game called Fae, where all the players are elves, and elves are fucking superheroes compared to the other races. Like, you know how adventurers in D&D can be many times tougher and better than normal people, with little explanation other than that they're heroes? Well, in this game, the reason they're badasses is merely because they're fae, and they'd be feared because of it.

>Goliath are highly superstitious
They believe the markings on their skin tell their fate, so strongly that they organize into castes based on it. Consequentially, it's incredibly easy to get some of them to take any mystical nonsense dead seriously, to the point many outright refuse to cross or even look a halfling in the eye, due to another stereotype attached to them:

>halflings bring bad luck
This is due to ancient shit when the big bad evil empire of the time steamrolled over the halflings' homeland. The halflings themselves fled and became nomads, and made a big show of declaring undying enmity against their conquerors. A series of magical disasters and poor political moves lead to the empires rapid collapse years later. People still say the halflings did it. They were actually responsible for one of the disasters, but nobody remembers which or how they did it

Gnomes have always felt kind of redundant to dwarves to me. Maybe it's because I play too much Dwarf Fortress, but dwarves as a nimble, social, sometimes-hyperactive race of industrious craftsmen and artisans feels natural to me in any sufficiently flexible dwarven archetype.

This. Anything a gnome can do, a dwarf can do better.

there are different types of elves, different types of halflings, centaurs, minotaurs, fauns.

Why are dwarves not allowed to be worked on

Usually stuff that's not typically adressed but still makes sense. Most dwarves have poor hearing, elves have sensitive skin and won't be able to venture into a desert or marshland for extended periods of time, any insectoid creature literally doesn't give a shit about the sanctity of life, etc.

I agree entirely, despise gnomes and have threatened my friends with a bone-powdering frown if any show up on my empire's borders.
However, I am able to accept the idea that dwarves are the superior craftsmen and artisans, but gnomes are the inventors and experimenters.

Hard to hear through all that hair. Also, mining is loud.

Exactly. Most dwarves suffer hearing loss and tinnitus to some extent, highborns are exempt from this.

Awaken, my masters

Consider the karadrons in age of Sigmar. Sky pirate corporations who disregard ancestors and mine the sky instead of ground. If it deviates so much from the society-accepted definition of a dwarf, why call them dwarves?

Elves are similar. Most elf variants are color swaps. If I made Elves that lived short lives, hated nature, and tinkered with technology, for instance, it's not an elf anymore.

>not elves anymore
Tell that to Santa's Elves.

That isn't true

>Not using fey gnomes instead
It's like you're trying to set them up for redundancy

Centaurs are a nomadic people from !asia that frequently attack and destroy human settlements. Their culture revolves around war, pillage, and herding, and they have strong oral tradition. Once in a while a very powerful centaur rises and the world shivers. They fill the ork role but without being a meme race.

Casual centaurs are the worst, by the way.

I should clarify that I'm mainly talking about gnomes as a major race. As an entry in the monster manual, possibly as one of the classical elementals (gnomes, sylphs, undines, and salamanders) that's prefectly fine, but as soon as they become a major geopolitical presence in the setting the start stepping on the dwarves' turf.

The fuck is a meme race

>magically unstable illusionists with an affinity for forests and earthen biomes
>stepping on the dwarves' turf
You got some interesting dwarves then.

Seconding. I'm running a 5e game, and just declared that gnomes are basically changelings. God fuckery, faerie fuckery, fate fuckery, nobody can tell. One day you just notice your kid has pointy ears and doesn't grow anymore. They're benign, but sometimes rough upbringing turns them into arseholes. Also, sterile.

Rather than Gnomes being illusionists or tinkers or anything, my Gnomes are all shady businessmen and merchants.

In their history, they were almost wiped out by a nation of dwarves in a large conflict. After this particular nation of dwarves and it's allies were wiped out by a coalition of other nations, the gnomes were given a new homeland to settle that roughly coincided with their "ancestral" homeland according to ancient gnomish myth.

After they were settled, they began violently annexing land around their new nation and driving the native orcs and kobolds out and attacking them outright all to "protect their gnomish identity and nation"

It helps that they're backed by the largest empire in the setting. As a result, gnomes can be found all throughout the empire, mainly working as merchants and bankers.

Gnome samurai as per hagakure, complete with homosexuality and dying for their master at the drop of the hat.

One race as a single personality/social class is a really dull way to worldbuild

>Americans are all fat, uneducated slobs.
>Jews are all money grubbing shysters.
>French people are all baguette toting cowards.
>Chinese are all mindless drones with no empathy.
>Blacks are violent criminals.
>Swedish men love when their wife gets banged by muslims.

Racial stereotypes tend to exist for a reason. Sure, it's not true for everyone and there are always statistical outliers, but the majority of any racial, ethnic or national group tend to follow the same patterns. Otherwise there would be no sense of collective identity for any group. I just happen to think that gnomes being Jewish stereotypes is hilarious, and so that's how I do my gnomes.

>-Honest to god; if actually left all by themselves, they devolve to mud farmers and swineherds.
TFW the fucking humies and nig-nelves won't leave you alone to your pig farm.

Yeah but those are cultural stereotypes and it would be lazy to port them to different species as is.

There can be a stereotype about Dwarves being gold grubbing xenophobic misers but it would be cooler if they had actual reason for it. Like their reproduction being tied to having room and treasure. At least that would explain why dwarves always seem to stagnate but still have huge drive to conquer new (old) keeps and have the manpower to at least try to do so despite being a dying race.

What resources did the gnomes have to make them so prone to trade? Were there no farmer/warrior gnomes? How are a near genocided population of midget traders able to violently annex orc nations? Why would the dwarves allow this of their former enemies? Are you just going straight for the Israel analogy with no logic behind it?

It's just no fun if the culture doesn't actually make sense.

How unique are those? It's worth mentioning that I didn't strive to make them super unique, it's just what I'm comfortable with.

Humans: idealistic, naive, superficial
Elves: jaded, cynical, deadpan
Dwarves: egoistic, cold-blooded, pragmatic
Halflings: petty, clannish, narrow-minded
Goblins: pompous, narcissistic, duplicitous
Gnomes: competitive, passive-aggressive, overachievers
Orcs: fickle, restless, enthusiastic
Panotti: smug, self-confident, introverted
Blemmyes: individualistic, ambitious, determined
Arimaspi: vindictive, single-minded, merciless

Any reasons why they're like that?

Yes, though the explanations are light because I don't like to clutter my setting notes.

In my setting that's because half-humans are the only crossbreeds capable of producing their own children, all other crossbreeds can't reproduce.

>" After this particular nation of dwarves and it's allies were wiped out by a coalition of other nations, the gnomes were given a new homeland to settle that roughly coincided with their "ancestral" homeland according to ancient gnomish myth."

Did you just make Gnome Israel?

Humans are a very young and successful race who are still very drunk with their unexpected success and believe that they can make this world a better place, though they can't agree how exactly.
The ancient Elven empire is in shambles in spite of all their attempts to preserve it, and they simply can't find any inner resolve to care about anything any more.
Dwarves started out as oppressed slaves and their history is one of constant guerilla warfare against vastly superior forces. They learnt that nobody will help them if they don't help themselves.
Halflings are a race created with a very narrow and specific purpose. Their territory is protected by incredibly powerful magical wards, shielding them from any danger or foreign influences.
Goblins are a huge bundle of insecurities, stemming largely from their disgraceful origin as a race. They surround themselves with delusions of grandeur to suppress these insecurities.
Gnomes lived through an apocalypse that left their hi-tech empire a wasteland. They have to work super hard to restore their former glory, and they're very motivated.
Orcs wound up in this world fairly recently, and everything is still relatively new to them. Their ancestors were explorers and invaders, and their passionate spirit still lives on in their descendants.
Panotti are a highly magical race who guard the source of all magic in the world. This, coupled with their extensive knowledge about the world, gave them a bit of a messianic complex.
The current Blemmmian culture was created by an immortal god-dictator who was after world domination and needed a perfect elite army to do his bidding. He deliberately destroyed their older culture to make them his perfect warriors.
Arimaspi are the original owners of the world who were eventually driven to a tiny, horrible continent by the younger races. Their culture is full of hate, which is actually somewhat justified.

bretty kewl

I like the crazy gnome but I do away with any inherent goodness. Also mine look real weird with large heads and smaller disproportionate bodies.

humans

Massive public works for the king, all sorts of weapons and armor and jewelry, scrolls and magic and all sorts of stuff. They dont trade much: theyre like the Chinese pre-opium wars. No need or desire to trade with the lower races.

In one of my games the players had to travel to Cinderholme, the dwarven civilization allegedly built into the Smoking Mountain volcano. When they finally got into Cinderholme after all sorts of adventures, they realized it isnt built into a volcano at all. Cinderholme is built into the caldera at the top of the mountain, and the smoke is from the thousands of forges and blacksmiths constantly working in labor cycles.
It blew my players minds, since from the start of the game id always mention "and smoke is rising from the white peak of the Smoking Mountain" or "the Mountain is quiet this evening". The humans at the base of the mountain even take omens from the smoke from the "volcano" and put great mystical significance into when the Mountain is "active".
But it was just busy busy dorfs all along clocking into work

Post-Genocide Elvish Societies are horrifying.

Elves physically mature at the same rate as human, hitting an analogy to adulthood at 20-ish, but are culturally, socially, and psychologically not considered adults until around 100.

When someone occupies an elven forest and starts butchering the elves hard enough a larger and larger segment of the population ends up in this 'technically not an adult' phase. You eventually get a society dominated by these elves, still fully capable of having children but never reaching the age of adulthood according to other elvish societies.

Their psychologies...don't take it well. Especially if it gets bad enough that they don't realize that they have an extended lifespan. Even once the genocide stops they're dangerous to everyone around them for a few hundred years due to cultural trauma. A particularly bad instance of this created the Drow.

My take on humans is that they love most strongly above all other races. Rather than be gifted unique inherent magical traits like the others, they were created with purposefully shortened lifespans and an incredibly romantic nature. And secretly they have a single magical trait: genitals that let them reproduce with all sorts of stuff, which accounts for all the half-races. They're like the 100% cheese build of the races, designed to be the most successful species in the most obnoxious way.

Maybe it is because they are often portrayed as being extremely meticulous and invested in their work.

That is how I have gnomes spend their downtime.

Dwarves are all hunters. They hunt down huge animals, butcher them in the field and return to their cave-cities with their butchery.

Sometimes they hunt giants.

Are you the guy who made an entire setting where humans are seen as exotic by the other races and the only thing they can all agree about in regards to humanity is that they make corn?

If so I am glad to see you are still around. Does your setting have gnomes or a race of your own design?

>Halflings, in addition to lacking ambition, are absolutely terrible at naming things
>this is why all their towns have names like "Greenhill," "Underhill," Wheatfield," or the ever-so-exotic [name-that-translates-directly-to-"rice-paddy"]
>also why all their surnames are just their jobs or something about their hair, feet, or bellies

>lacking ambition
Tell me right now in front of everyone that you wouldn't love to live in a warm comfy hole and fish every day and eat cheese. They do have ambition—they just have the wisdom to work for a simple, happy life.

>filename

I recall that in the novel Orconomics by J. Zachary Pike made Gnome a kinda racial supertype with halflings, traditional gnomes, etc. as subtypes with their main defining feature being that they are about half the size of humans and shorter than dwarves.

I only use a few adjustments to the "standard" race definitions in my games:
Elves: speak very seldom and thus come off as aloof or haughty, but really they just socialize on a greater timescale. It takes a few centuries to get to know an elf, but in comfort among true friends they get borderline hedonistic.
Dwarves: men are asexual and it's Guys' Night Out all the time every day. Women, being the minority, have the pick of the litter and men dress fashionably to attract them.
Gnomes: Literally pointy-hat beardos. Their size is Tiny instead of Small.
Goblins: Give -1 shits and will shank you. They'll shank themselves if they happen to wonder one day what it feels like. Basically they have no concept of foresight or self-preservation and give birth to literal litters. I field them pretty much as chaotic animals that can speak, tool use optional. Also they burrow.
Orcs: I make big muscular orcs a subrace, along with old-school pig men and gangly, smaller ones that are sometimes mistaken for big goblins.

>all player races are major geopolitical presences in the setting
Why would you assume that?

>Dwarves: men are asexual and it's Guys' Night Out all the time every day. Women, being the minority, have the pick of the litter and men dress fashionably to attract them.

Doesn't this kind of contradict? If men are Asexual, wouldn't the women have to go through more effort to get a man to sex her? And since men would have no desire for sex, why do they work so hard to attract women? Aside from the obvious population stuff.

I like this. Stealing it!
>To convince the orc leader to let them go, the party have to spin a sufficiently good story to entertain the tribe for the evening

Humanity is mostly confined to one small continent, which is seen by the rest of the world the way that ancient China saw Britain: exotic, backwards and isolated.

>no satyruses or wildmen

Dwarf men are still romantic, but sex doesn't play a big role in their ideas of women. They all want a good, strong wife to make more little miners with, but 9/10 won't get that in their lives. So they participate in fashion and worry about their rings matching their circlets and the shine of their chainmail, but they also prefer Industry & Drink to sex.

In my setting, gnomes are the hippie druids and crazy "FOR SCIENCE" wizards/alchemists to the drunk fighter and taciturn smith dwarves
I think it gives them a nice niche

The god of earth and sand and his followers super shits on elves because they outright refused his help when he put pity on the early tribes of races in the world and taught them to survive his domains and handed out the rare gift of geomancy. They STILL refuse to pay homage when they travel through caves or across deserts and shit. It is very unlikely to find an elf in a barren rocky or desert climate

tl;dr hereditary curse.

I do have satyrs as a minor, non-playable race, but I don't really see the point in making Wild Men a race.