Race As Character Class

[Punkrabbitt]

I really like the idea of race as character class. But it bugs me that humans get three separate classes while everyone else only gets one. I had first posted my thoughts on this at odd74.proboards.com/thread/11180/rolling-cleric-spells-magic-users but since then it has just been bothering me. In a more "historical fantasy" low magic setting it might be easy to limit humans to just Fighting Men, and leave the magic to the elves and drop clerics completely.

I realize that the game is designed to be human-centric, but that also rubs me the wrong way.

Or maybe I am just having a bad day?

[tkdco2]

You can always rule that elves can be fighting men or magic-users exclusively. But the historical fantasy idea sounds interesting. It's worth trying out for a few sessions to see how well it plays.

[Finarvyn]

tkdco2 has a good handle on the issue. When you throw in the thief class, demi-humans have moew options.

Elves: F, MU, F-MU, F-MU-T are clear. Maybe also T, F-T, MU-T.
Dwarves: F, T, F-T.
Hobbits: F, T, F-T.

[waysoftheearth]

"Elves can begin as either Fighting-Men or Magic-Users and freely switch class whenever they choose..." M&M p8.

Thus an Elf can, if you like, begin as either a F-M or a M-U and choose never to switch.

Also, you may notice there are no Hobbit Fighter/Thieves mentioned in Greyhawk.

[tkdco2]

I thought Hobbits already were thieves, those sneaky little devils! Can't trust any of 'em. 

[Porphyre]

Nasty little hobbit'ses! "gollum!". Stole us, yesss, stole the Precious "gollum, gollum!"

[howandwhy99]

All the classes in D&D (and AD&D) are human classes. Demi-humans take them up by joining human culture, hence the term demi-human.

However, I believe there is a way around this (even though roleplaying technically means learning to play a class, aka role).

Monsters in D&D advance as well, but as their racial advancement. So dragons gain XP as they age and become better dragons. So too could any other monster. Sticking with the already balanced 1st level/starting monsters:

Dwarves could advance primarily as fighters, still being capped in combat advancement - they aren't humans after all - but still gain "Dwarf" levels which are unlimited. The abilities would be unique to dwarven culture and aging.

Halflings could advance similarly as thieves.

And Elves could advance as multi-class characters in any two or three, splitting the XP as the DM judges appropriate per the types of actions taken in a session. There wouldn't be multiple classes, just "Elf", but abilities gained and from where would need some signifier.

[tkdco2]

I don't have too much of a problem if there are only 3 (or 4, if you include thieves) human classes to a single demi-human race. It's when all the other classes start coming in and are applied only to humans that it make the demi-humans look so cookie-cutter.

[howandwhy99]

All the other classes are NPC classes, and those not seen until AD&D listed under standard and expert hirelings.

The classes I believe you are referring to are sub-classes. Specializations within a larger class.

Even with Thieves (more of an NPC class than anything really), there are only 3 class systems in the game to master. So the game doesn't even support more than 3 classes for players to game and then only one at a time. The NPC ones are blunt abstractions without game systems and thieves are the mistake of trying to use "skills" instead of a game system.

Here's the thing. If a race is capable of performing a subclass, then they should be able to learn it. It may have come out of some human culture, whether it be something like ranger, paladin, or samari, but another creature acting like a human should be able to learn it too. At least to some degree.

Prohibitions on this stuff was simply Gary's choice. Without understanding his reasoning, it doesn't have to be that way in your campaigns. But you should have your own design for why these things are more or less possible.

[Punkrabbitt]

A lot of good ideas here. Thank you. I have a few more of my own, which I will post soon (of course, my idea of soon may differ from yours.)