Get my group to make characters and backstories before I tell them what the setting/campaign will be

>get my group to make characters and backstories before I tell them what the setting/campaign will be
>decide I'm just gonna do out of the abyss
>that's an underdark campaign
>I have 7 players, 4 of which made humans
>I tell them they'll have an annoying disadvantage most of the game and if they want to change race they can
>the first guy I work with to change his back story to fit a dark elf better, pretty satisfied with that
>the rest change to some form of elf
>the party is now 4.5/7 elf
>the reason they changed to elves specifically is because they want to remain as human as possible

My dilemma here is I just want more diversity in the party, what are some more humanoid races with heights more akin to regular humans that I can offer them?

Just tell that the average elf is noticeably shorter than the average human.

if you wanted diversity, you should have communicated it to your players before letting them make their characters and, more importantly, telling them what setting you want to play before they make them. Now they already commited to their characters, made up a story that fits humans, and can either half ass it onto another race or having to leave their initial idea behind after putting in the thoughts.
If I was a player I'd be pretty pissed if you told me to whatever I want and THEN make me change.

>Create your characters and backstory!
>Nope, won't tell you what campaign is.
>Ok, it's...
>Now change your characters and backstory to fit it
Dude fuck you.

Why would you try to force diversity on your players?
Playing human is good in setting where other races are something other than not!Vikings or not!druids but run on blue and orange morality.

Then playing human is safe option without having to learn different species rules of conduct.

>I tell them they'll have an annoying disadvantage most of the game and if they want to change race they can
They didn't have to change their race if they really didn't want to.
Also, the only backstory we had at that point was the basics.

Play a human
>muh diversity
Play a race pretty close to humans
>could have just played a human instead of a short/pointy-eared human
Play something other
>muh furry/scaly
>muh specul snowflake

As a player you can't satisfy a dm.

why do you need diversity? You have a quota to fill? HR coming down on you?
you sound like an ass hole

>I tell them they'll have an annoying disadvantage most of the game

But disadvantages are what stories are made out of!

Have your players roll up their characters and decide backstories and stuff, then choose a module that would give them the absolutely most difficult time. You did this, albeit accidentally, but then dropped the ball.

>I just want more diversity in the party
Oh fuck off. The characters can be plenrt diverse even if they're all humans. Unless you meant you literally want racial diversity, in which case fuck off that's stupid.

Would rather have all humans than have half the party be any other race, since they tend to be cookie-cutter characters

OP here, what I was trying to say by 'diversity' is that when you play a human you're pretty free to do whatever the hell you want with your character, but since I dropped the 'lol you can't see, wanna change?" they just threw that out for "k im gonna be an elf so i can see shit,"
I'm trying to give them more options so that they aren't stuck with elves

Have them play as kobolds

a whole team of kobolds, alone in the underdark

what could go wrong

>get my group to make characters and backstories before I tell them what the setting/campaign will be
Fuck you for this alone.

>get my group to make characters and backstories before I tell them what the setting/campaign will be
For God's sake, why? I always tell my group the basic campaign concept so they'll make something that actually fits it. Do you have a hard-on for random strangers meeting in a tavern or something?

>what are some more humanoid races with heights more akin to regular humans that I can offer them

When in doubt, gnoll. But they are right, you're also a faggot.

You know very well what OP meant. Stop going full ree.

No the reason they changed to elf is because you didn't tell then they spend the entire campaign in the fucking underdark.

If they had the choice no sensible low level human pc would walk into the underdark without dark vision goggles. Because fighting in the dark gets you killed.

Stop caring about diversity quotas.

That's racist!
It's called "Sentient Races and Sundry Resources" you insensitive genital.

Are you a fucking retard?

holy fuck you're a shitty DM jesus christ fuck right out of here

>the party is now 4.5/7 elf
>not going full dwarven delving party

Not only are you shitty for not giving your party basic guidelines for the campaign (so they make something that fits) your players are shitty for not jumping on the super fun hook they have there.

OI WHY YOU BE WANTIN TO BE A HUMIE WHEN YOU KULD BE AN ORK GIT?

WE GOT DA BEST CHOPPABOYZ

DA BEST WEIRDBOYZ

AND DA BEST PAINBOYZ TOO

>this entire post
I'm pretty sure this is bait, but then again, it has been known for people to be actually this stupid.
You don't sound like a shit passive-aggressive DM, so I'll give you the benefit of the doubt.

Why do you want more racial diversity, for fuck's sake? Character's personality strength doesn't depend on their fucking race.

And why did you tell the players to make their backstories before announcing what kind of campaign you want to run? That's just asking for a mish-mash pastiche of things that don't fit together.

>Why do you want more racial diversity, for fuck's sake? Character's personality strength doesn't depend on their fucking race.
Doesn't mean he still can't have something else than humans

Oy vey!

>Okay guys make up a story for your guy
>Right well mine is a gnome that...
>Oh sorry forgot to mention gnomes, your town, and the cultures, religions and technologies described dont exist in my campaign
See, this is why you have to describe the setting FIRST

Basically, you're picking a premade game that doesn't fit any of the characters after they were already made, so you tell your players "if you want to be able to do anything here, you'll have to change" instead of giving them some way to see in the dark, and then you're complaining that everyone that picked Human is picking the next closest thing?

Are you by any means retarded?

If you want muh diversity for the sake of diversity(as a band of elves is mechanically functional, so you want this just for fluff), why didn't you tell them "hey, it's underdark, let's make character of uncommon races".

>>the party is now 4.5/7 elf
What are the other 2.5 parts?

the .5 is a half elf, the other two is a half orc and a halfling

see

Clearly they should have played as Illithids or something since it appears the campaign will revolve around reading your fucking mind so they can please you, OP.

>My dilemma here is I just want more diversity in the party

Diversity's only good if it improves things for everybody, not just you

>what are some more humanoid races with heights more akin to regular humans that I can offer them?

Look in Volo's Guide. There's a slew of new player races in it, it should sate your cravings for 'diversity'

Ah, so now it's just the halfling who can't see shit. Did you explicitly say what the disadvantage would be and give them the option to change, too?

Yeah I gave them the option, but their back story was pretty rock solid so they didn't want to change

Still, I don't see what's wrong with them playing elves if they want to. Groups should consist of a majority race, and then maybe one or two token weirdos. If everyone is exotic then no-one is.

Yeah, I think this works better than a complete bunch of random misfits.