Can fantasy races work outside of their assigned stereotypes? Could Elves be a proud warrior race...

Can fantasy races work outside of their assigned stereotypes? Could Elves be a proud warrior race, and Orcs a race of scholars and wizards?

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It depends on your gaming group. Are they traditional conservationalists, who cry if their dwarves aren't bearded and all talk in thick accents, or are they open-minded?

I've always liked the idea of Elves as not!japanese and orcs as not!amerindian

>Can fantasy races work outside of their assigned stereotypes?
They can, but why would you want that? If you want something different just use something different. Shallow subversions similar to what you've described are terrible and unoriginal. Better to create something with actual substance.

>Could Elves be a proud warrior race

Ever heard of Tolkien?
For the general question, sure, you could change stuff around with traditional fantasy races if you want, but if you do it it too much reaches the point where one has to wonder why you even cal them elves or orcs to begin with. Since the big defining traits of orcs are being strong and brutish I have to wonder what makes your scholary wizard race orcs?

As long as it isn't
>Could Elves be a proud warrior race, and Orcs a race of scholars and wizards?

If you have "[these dudes] are a race of [hat]" anywhere in your setting doc, your world is automatically shit.

It is pretty interesting that everyone think that Tolkien's elves were forest dwelling hippies when that shit was pretty much limited to hillbilly elves that had never left Middle-Earth and even they were far more warlike and xenophobic than most modern elves.

I've always been under the impression that the people who cry over non-traditional dwarves are not conservatives, but simply awful roleplayers.

Nobody has read Silmarillion
For a good reason

What's the point, you're just switching the names around.You're being contrarian for the sake of being contrarian and that's not nearly as clever as you think it is.

>big defining traits of orcs are being strong and brutish
So, completely unlike Tolkien's orcs, who were weak and industrial?

That Elf looks like he could use a glass of water.

Clearly he only ever drinks whey

Basically all fantasy settings have that though. It's just a general description of a race.
>drow are a race of matriarchal evil fanatics who live underground
Doesn't mean that they are all like that, just a huge majority of them. Or even
>Americans are a race of boisterous, religious warriors
Doesn't mean that they are all like that, just that their culture is dominated or largely influenced by those things

Could you at least pick a country you've actually been to?

Native Americans, dummy. Or do you mean that there's only a single race in the US?

>Could Elves be a proud warrior race
You could even do this without abandoning what elves traditionally are. They're stereotyped as being good archers, it's easy to turn that into a warrior society. They just become hunters who are more than willing to bring their proficiency with the bow to the field of battle. Perhaps even agressive forest assholes who have decided that "hunting" humans and looting their stuff is better than hunting boars and "looting" their flesh. Also, if the forest is in any way realistic it's full of shit that wants to kill you so elves would be pretty though.

>Orcs as scholars and wizards
Orcs are usually pretty big dudes (or if you wanna to gull Tolkien small but malevolent and broken/mindless) so you'll have a much harder time doing it. But if you think you can justify it, go for it! Maybe the average orc is dull, but they somehow managed to create a highly intelligent caste of wizards? Wasn't there some research in India that showed that the average IQ of dalits is in the 80s whereas the average IQ of the brahmin cast nears 120, which is roughly the average IQ of a university graduate?

>Native Americans
>single culture
>race of boisterous, religious warriors
The absolute retardedness.

My Elves already are, and I never considered it a subversion or anything. My orcs have sorcerers and scholars, though most are still hunters and warriors.

Many of them fit the bill exactly though, and that's why you can say it like that.

>the average IQ of dalits is in the 80s whereas the average IQ of the brahmin cast nears 120
I'm almost tempted to make a /pol/ comment about this.

I don't need to go to the US to know that its the most warmongering country of this day and age and that it has hundereds of heretical pseudo-christian cults that infiltrate other countries. Aggressive and religious are the first things that come to mind when people think of the US, if you exclude fat.

Being a good warrior is not about brute force, is about technique

>t. skinny manlet

Absolutely obsessed, lmao

It's about both, but mostly brute force. Fancy technique isn't worth a shit in medieval melee.

You know who were also skinny manlets? The Romans.

>people actually think like this

Lay off the internet

lol you could have at least chosen a period to reference that wasn't filled with armour that was nigh-invincible to "brute force" and needed technique to get around to make your dumbass mongoloid observation

Plate armor was quite possible to brute force if you used the right weapon.

Nice meme

Except it's not?

Plate armour was quite impossible to have if you weren't in the richest 1% of the combatants.

You described Warcraft.

As a side note it's amusing how everyone says Belfs are twinky bitches when all the men are fucking jacked, however are still the thinnest non-manlet race because everyone else is literally built like gorillas except maybe trolls.

Also if you didn't know WoW humans are descended from 12 ft tall metal vikings who kicked them out for being meatbag bitches who can't even bench press a mere 10 tons, which is amusing to me.

The Romans were degenerate civilised moralist sodomite childfuckers who got BTFO

>Could Elves be a proud warrior race,
But they already are?

Male Night Elves are the dumbest. They've been sleeping for 10k years and woke up more jacked than any other race. I want their roids.

>it's amusing how everyone says Belfs are twinky bitches when all the men are fucking jacked
Memes > actual lore. This is the state of Veeky Forums.

Yeah, AFTER they accepted Christianity

>They weren't sleeping
>Emerald Dream is just the name for the best Night Elven gym

why

Is that from Spelljammer? Because I remember Spelljammer elves used undead plant exoskeletons

D E L E T

Elves as not!japanese is also something I like.

was thinking the same thing

What would be the point? I don't mind characters acting out of stereotype, like a lone Orc wizard, but to reverse the tropes of their societies makes both classic orcs and magus orcs seem dull, so whats the point?

Sure they can. For elves that isn't much of a stretch in the first place, though.
Honestly, I'd say the only limitations come from the system you're using.
Like, in D&D 5e, I'd buy a society of halfling or elf monks, because both of those races get a Dex bonus and monks run on Wis and Dex. I'd also buy dwarf monks on account of their Wis bonus, but wood elves would be the most convincing imo.
They kinda have that hidden-elf-village thing going on, which I think synergizes with the Way of Shadow. You could very easily fluff hidden ninja clans of wood elves into a setting. Or assassin clans, if the word "ninja" isn't something you're comfortable with.

Pretty much, many people seem to forget how warlike elves tend to be.

Fantasy races cannot be used at all these days.
If you use the classic stereotypes, then you're shallow and boring.
If you use the same names but not the stereotypes up a bit here and there, then why did you use the same name?
If you actually use your own OC donut steel races you're just forcing your own shitty writing on your players.


TL,DR: You can do whatever, Veeky Forums will always complain about the same things with the same arguments.

You really messed things up here. Plate armor made it so knights could barely run, let alone display fancy swordsmanship. If you take a sword blow to the head, you will get hurt, although not cut. In medieval times killing enemy noblemen was not nearly as profitable as capturing them, so it was often even considered unfortunate to kill a knight. The French used to execute soldiers that killed enemy knights in combat.

Classic orcs are dull to begin with, so it's not a big deal

You get the point

>if the word "ninja" isn't something you're comfortable with
No, I'm not a delusional bong

He literally gives you the alternative and you still complain

Care to name one setting with warlike elves where they aren't the defending side?

Warhammer orcs with their illogical thinking and non-evil, but extremely destructive nature offer a lot of opportunities to get creative.

Reminder that a) IQ tests are pseudo-science and b)nature and nurture affect IQ scores

How much will you stretch the definition of "defender"? Because I can already tell you that much of the good guy factions will be on this side. But elves often also have evil guys that are much more agressive.

TES.

I'd just go with the classic shinobi or Chinese Mountain Man idea that is the root of it all.
1st Age Tolkien.
They literally crossed the world to make war.

elves are defending themselves in TES, read a lorebook

newscientist.com/article/dn1520-iq-is-inherited-suggests-twin-study/
When studying genetics it can't really get better than twin studies.

>defending themselves
>waging war on everyone in order to unmake reality and achieve godhood

Thalmor and Aldmiri Dominion.

Honestly I prefer orcs as not!japanese and elves as not!african.
But in general I prefer savage canabal elves in general.

Ebberon, LotRs

What's the point.

Yes, of course. Just be clear with your group and set expectations properly.

Thirding Jap elves. My orcs are French though.

>My orcs are French though
Do explain. I always believed elves were a better fit for Frenchies.

Isn’t a wizard king a pretty common thing as a leader of the orcs?

This is the most retarded thing I’ve read on Veeky Forums all week. Congratulations.

Not that user, buy orcs fit well with any sort of civilized but warmongering kind of people. Roman orcs and Napoleonesque orcs would be rad as fuck.

Up until the 20th century the French were seen as very warlike.

But stereotypical orcs aren't really civilized and have little respect for legal systems and citizenship.

True, but it would also imply such things as 19th century Paris being full of orc-artists and orc-bakers making orc-croissants. That sounds so hilarious I actually want to see this. I need someone to draw orc painters for me.

CLEARLY HE KNOWS DE WHEY, MAH BRUDDAHS!

A rose by any other name...

We're not talking about stereotypical orcs, though. I just feel like it fits them better to be more on the civilizised side.

Yes, provided you colour them with their racial traits. A proud warrior elf would be like a Bravo or Landsknecht. An artistry to their fighting. A wizard or scholarly dwarf will likely deal in runes or research spells carved on great stone tablets by their forebears.

No painters, I'm afraid, but I have a sculptor. Still, this is a lone artisan, not an atelier you'd see in 19th century France.

At that point, you might as well make something else up.

Not bad, I like it.

Post yfw you realize the French national anthem has a line about watering their fields with the blood of their enemies.

No. Never. Never ever no matter what you do. What the fuck kind of question is this you are playing a fantasy game, you could make it however the fuck you want. You could have literally anything be a wizard, rogue, fighter, whatever. This is a stupid thread

I've once made an Orcish race that was very intelligent in the ways of medicine and higher healing magic. Altho' not really scholarly because the reason they became so good at this was for the sake of getting back into the fight faster.

Healthy Mind + Healthy Body = Fight more

I feel like individuals of a race don't have to follow the stereotypes but I haven't seen races as a whole break tradition. I'm personally not opposed to the idea.

Middle-Earth and Noldors comes to mind.

...

>Could Elves be a proud warrior race
Yes
>Orcs a race of scholars and wizards
no

Yes. But you should only stretch an established trope so far, before it should be re-branded as something else.

Maybe more like Gaul?

Makes sense.
>Warrior Poets
>isolationists
>Get their shit pushed in my humans with better tech

Maybe not scholars, but more like druids/shamans/sorcerers.

Why do you need to assign them tolkien roles if you're not playing in a LOTR game?

Have you ever actually SEEN an Amerindian?

Go to bed Gibbons.

That's just your standard orcs though.

Gods... I hate Gauls.

I prefer Yuan-ti as not!Japanese, but then, I'm also a filthy skub-user.

If your jaded could be mined, you'd be rich.
But your post is right on the money. There's just no satisfying some people.