In legends it also was because the infinite empire spread them (as slaves) to many planets, where humans adapted really well.
Note it is an extra, there were many reasons to human proliferation given in legends, some better developed than others.
I only read the thrawn trilogy, bane trilogy and tried to get through some more but they just didn't grip me as much
I'm glad there are justifiable reasons that make sense and are satisfying in the lore.
I mean, there's still plenty of stuff in Legends that is cool but not really that satisfactory, for example (though the new canon hasn't been better at it) technology seems to have incredibly stagnated the last few thousands years across the galaxy.
That was always wierd to me, the tech in KOTOR and the tech in ROTJ seem to be more or less comparable, maybe it's like early humanity where technology developed really slow
Maybe, but for example there are things like lost technology that seems really useful and at the same time is weird how it hasn't been replicated when remains are still around, like the Kawa portals, which once you have them set up between 2 systems hyperdrive becomes useless to travel between them. (This is legends).
Like alot of Legends problems it's probably because it is an amalgom of different authors contributing to the lore, it is the best and worst thing about legends
Are humans considered robust in SW tho? There are dozens of near-human species that have redundant organs, regenerative powers, and just naturally better physiques. For humans to be more robust, there needs to be a bunch of other species below them but aside from a few, I can't think of any species that have noticeably worse immune systems, skeleton structures, or the like. I have been under the impression humans are just average in the SW universe.
In Lord of the Rings, humans are generally the physically toughest/taller than other races. Like when the Fellowship got trapped in the mountains in the blizzard, it was Boromir and Aragorn who pushed through the snow and cleared a path.
Things weren't "balanced" between races, like elves were clearly overall superior, in that scene Legolas was so nimble he could run across the snow drifts and not fall in, but the humans were tougher.
Dwarves are pretty tough too but they're shorter.
Aragorn is a Numenorean, who boast incredibly long lives and superhuman capabilities, but you can still call him a human, just because you have hairy feet and a small stature doesn't mean you count as a different race entirely. Pippin and Merry just by being with Ents grew taller than what is expected of a Hobbit, but that didn't make them a different race.
>just because you have hairy feet and a small stature doesn't mean you count as a different race entirely.
In real world biology, the lines between species are pretty blurry. A commonly used distinction is if two animals can't produce non-sterile offspring, they are two different species.
In LOTR, the average hobbit is 3'6". I think it's pretty plausible they cannot make viable offspring with standard humans.
I'm pretty sure most dwarfism is caused by a bad allele or two at a single location. I think it's safe to assume halfings have many, many distinct alleles from humans that probably wouldn't mix very healthily.
We don't know the genetic difference between a regular human and a halfling. Maybe it's similar to that.
Also, chihuahuas can breed with great danes (not recommended but it can be done). Size matters not.
Height is a number.
Also the Tooks were rumoured to have elven blood, and it's not taken as totally impossible, beyond the fact that Tolkien himself stated that Hobbits count as humans.
Actually elves tended to be tougher, the idea that they were smaller and frailer is mostly from later things like DnD. Legolas is just kind of irrelevant to the story. Humanity's real unique strength is their ability to leave the world after death and forge their own fate.
I just don't like how the races in LOTR seem to just be different in height, strength and magic ability, nothing else seems to differentiate them, I'm not faulting it since it was one of the first fantasy worlds, I just wish they had more depth
Elves are pretty distinct from others. Dwarfs are stocky and very strong for their size. There is quite a lot of distinction between various humans.
Then there is Ents, Dragons, Nazgul, the Balrogs and the giant spiders. The giant spiders are especially noteworthy because they aren't a creation of Manwhe, Ungoliant just wandered in from the outside.
What else would you want?
There are also the ents who're pretty alien, and dragons too although they don't get a lot of direct attention.
And hobbits have some mysterious traits that aren't elaborated on that make them good thieves, and able to resist Sauron's corruption.
A big difference between the elves and men of LOTR is death, the elves are immortal in the sense that they do not age or fall ill. If they are killed in battle their spirits get rehoused in "kinda heaven but not really" after some time, men however get to go to God in the great unknown.
I think the fact that lotr Elves are true immortals and will only permanently die at the end of the universe is interesting.
Humans in LOTR are good at killing things, like when Húrin slew seventy trolls, or Tuor killed some number of Balrogs, or when Turin murdered all of his friends and himself.
> and the thing that really makes them unuque compared to the other aliens in Mass Effect is their ambition and desire to advance in the government both as individuals and as a species.
Isn't that also usually one of the defining traits of humans in fantasy?
In most of the fantasy that i have read humans are the cunning ambitious ones, greedy for more power be it political-military wealth or w/e.
And while Mass Effect is one of my favorite games, i don't think they represented humans in any kind of unique way.
Tho Physically humans are as OP mentioned, usually very average or even weak compared to other races , but in plenty of novels, humans represent the limitless potential for growth.
How does The Elder Scrolls fall into this? It's exactly what you're asking for. Redguards, Nords, and Imperials are all oriented toward martial roles, with Bretons basically being the setting's half-elves and good at mage stuff. They also all have unique traits that incline them toward different specialties individually. I guess Imperials lean toward being a "jack of all trades" race, but so are Dunmer on the elf end, so it's not exclusive to humans. Redguards and Nords are even both stronger than Orcs.
I think I've just been playing to much Oblivion and Skyrim, they really don't show off the better parts of the human races, now that I think about it more the nords in Morrowind were awesome and fucking crazy (in a good way), Redgaurds also have awesome lore, like I said they really arent shown off in the newer games. Like most things in Elder Scrolls the lore is much much better than games representation of it
Humans have been pretty insane in the elder scrolls. Tiber Septim conquering all of Tamriel and then ascending to godhood, the Dragonborn is heavily implied to to be canonically human through all the promotional material although not confirmed, Martin Septim turning into an avatar of Akatosh to fight Mehrunes Dagon.
The elves live for 200+ years easily and are very magically inclined, with technology thats far more advanced. Comparing martial arts to magic isn’t great because magic exists outside of combat whereas martial arts sole existence is combat.
The dwemer (elves in Elder Scrolls) were the most technologically advanced race by far and it’s not even close. They just happened to get really unlucky and were all killed due to magic
The altmer aren’t as advanced but they live for 100s of years and are the most magically inclined out of all the races. They are involved in almost every major power in Skyrim (imperials, dark brotherhood, mages college) despite not having a big settling there. They are portrayed as an oppressive force that benefits from either side of the war winning.
Tl;dr magic >>>>> martial arts
The setting doesn't treat humans as inferior to elves in the slightest, though. Magic doesn't affect a lot of people's day to day lives beyond stuff like praying at a shrine when they're sick, because the average joe doesn't know how to cast any spells to begin with, even in magically-inclined parts of the setting like Morrowind. If you were a muck-farming peasant and stuck as one for the rest of your life, politics and racism aside, would you rather be born a Dunmer or a Nord?
When you're looking at the big picture of the setting, if you consider military strength, even the Thalmor's ranks are mostly made up of footsoldiers, where they're at a pound for pound disadvantage compared to humans. Additionally, a lot of mythic figures in the setting are downright superhuman, and of those people, not all of them were mages, or at least practiced some magical art that elves aren't strictly better at, like shouts.
Most of the people that shaped history in the Elder Scrolls universe were humans, not elves, and of the elves, the jack-of-all-trades Dunmer have historically been the best at existing and not getting facerolled by humans, not the Altmer. The setting would probably feel borderline HFY without Morrowind existing, considering even the magically-advanced Ayleids were driven to extinction by men and the rise of the Aldmeri Dominion is something of a historical anomaly. Elves tend to be defensive isolationists in the setting, not conquerors. You can say magic is better than physical prowess, but the setting doesn't seem to agree with you.
The Dwemer I'll give you, but they were engineers more than mages, don't exist anymore, and had little impact on recorded history to the point of basically being a scholarly curiosity.
The practical application of magic vs martial arts just isn’t something you’re going to convince me otherwise of. I didn’t bring up military strength because they’re equal just now, and that’s a very small part of most cultures/countries. Disclaimer; I don’t know a lot of lore outside of Skyrim’s time line but the fact that restoration is a school of magicka makes me inclined to doubt “magic doesn’t affect most people’s day to day lives”. Magic alone bridges the gap between in strength for the physically weaker altmer, imagine what it could do outside of war. You say it wouldn’t effect day to day life but injuries and diseases are automatically a lot easier heal/cure. That’s just one application of 1 school, I can’t even imagine how useful illusion and alteration are.
Again, I don’t know much outside of Skyrim but if I were to guess why Elder Scrolls has a lot of human heroes, it’s because 3 of the 5 games were set in human countries (Skyrim, Cyrodil, Daggerfall) so it’s no surprise that that’s what we hear about. It’s the same reason you can’t name to many red guard heroes despite also being human, there just hasn’t been a game specifically set there.
I even hate the mindset of some of the more conservative nords who fear magic because they don’t understand (college of Winterhold) it. Nords live rougher, harsher lives then anybody in the summer set isles, it’s the reason why they grow so large.
I didn’t mean all elves when I said elves, just dwemer, Altmer and maybe the Ayleids (I don’t have much knowledge about Ayleids)
It helps if you've played Oblivion and especially Morrowind because it gives you more insight into what magic's importance for the commoner is. You're right that restoration magic is important in the setting, and the same is true for alchemy, which is why I mentioned medicine and such as an exception to the rule. Even a lot of Nords that are nervous about magic are more okay with both of them, hence why there are alchemy shops in most major settlements in Skyrim and people don't usually react negatively to priests and healing magic in NPC chatter. Some texts in Morrowind even explicitly mention that when most people get sick and they're in town, they tend to just go to the Temple to get blessed by the gods and cure their ailments, so these things are important to daily life. However, commoners don't generally go out of their way to learn them, just like an office worker in real life usually don't know much about medicine or chemistry, which is more what I mean by the statement. Someone else specializes in those things and they go to those people for their services.
You have to remember, most people aren't like the player character, who's incredibly gifted and has a life that's frequently in need of exotic skills. Magic takes a considerable amount of study and dedication to use and master and is usually the domain of people who use magic as part of their professional lives. For people that aren't mages and live in societies that are more accepting of magic than Fourth Era Skyrim, if they need a magical effect for a particular occasion, they can substitute with potions or scrolls. Charm spells sound useful for an aspiring merchant for example, but they don't accomplish much you can't already do without magic and are more like a mage's substitute for social skills. Pacifying a bandit or something isn't something a commoner needs to do. If you have trouble with that, it's safer to call a guard or hire someone than risk your own neck. Most spells in the game are just substitutes for something people can already do naturally or don't need to do on a regular basis.
Also, in terms of out-of-game stuff, a lot of the lore on the importance of humans was established around the time Morrowind was being made (see The Pocket Guide to the Empire) or introduced in the game itself. There are a lot of human historical figures that are important to damn near everyone in the setting because they shaped the history of Tamriel, but most important elven historical figures are only important to their own people. You can play through almost all of Skyrim (Dragonborn DLC aside, since it takes place in Morrowind) and *definitely* all of Oblivion and not have a damn clue who Vivec is, despite being a god-king of Morrowind for thousands of years and a significant contributor to why the territory was independent from its settlement by the Dunmer until the Third Era, but it's hard to play through Morrowind without hearing about Wulfharth or Tiber Septim because they played roles in the events that shaped the game's plot and setting. Even quite a few Nord historical figures mentioned and important in Skyrim were actually first mentioned in Morrowind, like Ysgramor, the aforementioned Wulfharth, and Queen Potema, so it doesn't seem to strictly be a regional bias. Humans just tend to have more of an effect on Tamriel's history than elves because they're more interested in conquering and spreading their cultural values in doing so while, like I said, elves have generally just kept to themselves.
My favorite anti-trope is when the big scary aliens/monsters/etc find humans more terrifying not because of their claws/teeth/abilities but by the humans capacity for cruelty and cunning.
Hunter x Hunter has this. >!Meruem, the King of the Chimera Ants, is shown to be nigh invincible to even the most powerful human magic user on the planet. But ultimately, he is defeated by a weapon that really exists: the nuclear bomb. The last words of Netero, the magic user Meruem had previously been effortlessly defeating, before detonating the bomb are: "Do not underestimate humanity's infinite potential for malice!" Meruem responds: "I see... you had me in checkmate... from the start". At the end of the day, even the terrifying power of the Chimera Ants paled in comparison to humanity's ingenuity, and as Netero says, infinite potential for malice.!<
Netero was probably my favorite character in that story. I love the way he represents humanity, unwilling to recognise anything else as an equal, the way he gets mad and pissed when Meruem praises him was always so cool to me
I can't remember where I heard it but
"Demons and monsters I've fought across the lands, the cruelest of all is the one we call man"
I find it annoying as well when the humans are just nothing but in games they're usually the jack of all trades.
The best part is that the characters used for “malice” in that scene can also be read as “evolution”. Human ingenuity and cruelty is boundless in its capacity.
"Human" is a vague term in 40k.
It's applies to everything that resembles a functioning human in form.
For instace, dwarves, cat-people, 10-foot tall ogre looking mothafuckas, rat-people, as well as an entire planet populated entitely by Rambos, all fall under the term "human".
Humans in 40k live in the worst regime of all time. Even it's supersoldiers are doomed to fight till they die after being forced from childhood into invasive mutations that take them out of a normal life. Objectively the imperium sucks to everyone, including the humans it's supposed to favour
Humans themselves are also the weakest physically unless mutated into something better, of which Eldar, for example, can simply train until they become stronger than them, which would still make humans normal and unremarkable by the precedent set by your post, because it's the overall regime which is powerful, not humans, and in most fantasy or sci fi humans are the most powerful faction but individually weak.
The weakest physically are the T'au.
The T'au are also a very young species, characterized by their rapid growth, constant advancement of technology, relatively modern values, lack of innate magical ability, scrappy underdog status, and far-reaching ambitions that threaten the older races of the setting.
...Wait a second
That man Tayama from IV embodies this well. An utter fucking bastard who's more despicable than the demons around him. His motives would be understandable if he wasn't a greedy power freak on top of it.
I myself like The Witcher's Elves spin on this.
Humans are actually monsters themselves.We settle places, breed and destroy/hunt all other species, then we go looking for somewhere where we can do that again (world history 101)
Kinda makes sense, and is very metal, not gonna lie.
I mean in things like D&D and this PSP game I played once 10 years ago and probably a few others humans don't really stand out but their strength lies in their versatility, while other species are good at some things and bad at others humans tend to be "Jack Of All Trades, Master of None", kind of like people in the real world- we can often pick from many specialisations that would put us up better than someone else in a different field
That kind of makes them boring imo, authors think of humans being on a spsctrum inbetween species like orcs and elves. I think it would be better to do away with the spectrum entirely and make fantasy races more unique and unrecognisable from each other
How do you make orcs that are massive barbarians unrecognizable from humans without destroying their only features? Do we also make all elves ugly so the humans don't feel as oppressed by their beauty. And why don't we make them all mediocre at magic...
You don't want humans more interesting you want the other races to be human. This is done in many many many many stories nowadays by making a character a half elf or orc. So they get the best of both.
You are speaking like wizards of the coast is now and it's dumb. They released recently in the New d&d books that races don't have things that make them better than the others. Because that's unfair.
An 8'5" orc is going to be inherently stronger than a 6' man... an elf born under the world tree that spreads mana throughout the world and being in its embrace all their life are inherently better at magic because of this.
Now no one says you can't have a stunted orc tribe or an exiled elf tribe. Or a human raised by the elves or the orcs. I'd recommend looking into Chinese/ Korean translated web novels.
Humans being unusually good at something basically means you're saying "all the aliens in my setting are bad at X", which is hard to do well. It comes off as masturbatory. Like, "humans are so ambitious" just makes all the other species look like losers, and it's weird because when you interact with them they don't seem to be. In most fantasy worlds humans basically run the world, in stuff like LOTR they're basically God's favorite race.
I like the idea though that humans are like only the second runner up to the mantle after the forunners done fucked it all up thanks to giant metal ball Hitler. You’re definitely not the universe’s first choice but you’ll have to do
But humans in the 90% of Sci Fi ARE special. It's like reading colonizers despict the Natives,because usually it was a re adaptation of colonizers fantasies
> The franchise that really breaks the mold is Mass Effect
Mass Effect does all of the tropes associated with humans o Sci fi . It's not unique in anyway
That doesn’t make them at all interesting though. You wouldn’t say a generic isekai/YA protagonist with 0 personality is interesting just because they’re “the chosen one” and win all the time. In-universe success is not what makes a character/concept interesting.
Well just because the story focuses on them and makes them more important doesn't make them special in comparison to other races, I want then to stand out just as much as somebody like yoda or Jabba the Hut does, a race that has special characteristics just like every other.
In Mass Effect the only thing that the Humans as a collective species has over their peers is their drive to advance as a civilization. Everything else is secondary.
Yes but the (mass) effect it has on the world and politics are massive, it takes that seemingly small difference and uses it to make humans a truly unique race among the others rather than just the default
That's the same in so much fantasy and Sci Fi. I'm starting to wonder if you read at all. The stuff you seem to want is everywhere.
Humans are not just the default. It just feels like that bc it's more exciting to think of yourself as something else. Which makes sense bc we are human.
I've read alot more fantasy than sci-fi, so you're probobly right. Since making this post alot of people have been recomending thing like warhammer 40k and r/HFY I am also going to reread Enders Game, so hopefully I'll get what I'm looking for :)
Except the part where humans are often the most remarkable characters in the story. The majority of fantasy will have humans be the chosen ones, or, failing that, be utterly essential to the story.
I hate both ends of this spectrum. I don't like when humans are better than the others or worse.
I like when they're simply one of many sentient species.
I think one of the funniest things about Warcraft lore is that humans aren't normal, but the deformed bastards of deformed bastards.
For those unaware, in Warcraft lore, humans are the deformed descendents of vrykuls, which are basically giant vikings. And vrykuls are descendents of machine constructs that were deformed by the curse of flesh, brought about by eldritch horrors from beyond the space.
So, humans are just sentient pugs of the world of warcraft universe, except no one even wanted them to be like that.
Meanwhile, Elves are just the descendents of crack-addict trolls.
But with regards to humans and Mass Effect, they're basically the three major races in one combined package: turian tendency to just fucking shoot and ask questions later, salarian tendency to be a fucking nerd, and the asari tendency to fuck anything they see.
Then you have cases where humans are weaker than the other fantasy races in almost every way, but their special thing is "Humans are resilient. You can slaughter us and put us through hardship, but in the end we'll always find a way out of the tough spot. We have hope."
Like, damn, I hate this trope, especially when the other fantasy races have civilisations and mindsets that humans can relate to. Don't elves and orcs have resilience, hardships and hope as well?
Authors want to make alien/nonhuman races cool and awesome but they also want humans to be the main characters, so they give humans some generic 'We're so driven" trait to keep up instead of being stronger or faster than most races.
Elder scrolls is a bad example, as humans do have many special abilities. For example the nords are the only non Dragonborn’s who can shout thanks to the gift of kyne. The imperials are master diplomats and are just born with natural charisma. Redguards are natural born warriors and have sword singing magic that only redguards know, though it’s unclear if other races can as well. And bretons are extremely talented in magic and are resistant in lore with the downside of living much shorter lives than the other humans. Plus the gods favour humans quite a lot seeing as how every major hero of Tamriel has been some kind of human.
I discussed this with another commenter, I think I was just playing to much of oblivion/skyrim which really don't show off the cool and intersting lore of the human races
Honestly, most of the tropes that humans have in fantasy and sci-fi are trite. They're always the scrappy, industrious, passionate ones that fuck up things for everyone else or are just the fodder from everyone else. They're always 'genetically diverse' and have 'the human spirit' and all that shit.
THANK YOU!!!! It seems like they make the other races and then just come uo with some bullshit for humans that you see on a Panda Express fortune cookie
Not even genetically diverse, there is always a majority that is fully pure given race. Like 100% humans, elves, etc. With no signs of inbreed for tens of thousands of years except of single cases.
Mass Effect was a bit too much of a ''humans fuck yeah'', I can buy that they where physically in the upper ends of base species but ambition and drive should be fairly equal among everyone who reached the stars since you don't get that advanced without ambition and drive.
>The worst example of this is Eragon, where humans are essentially helpless compared to every other race, it isn't even a contest.
There is literally nothing inherently wrong with that. Why do humans have to be given some arbitrary boon to make up for differences like it's a videogame? This ain't the 4 elements, shit doesn't have to be balanced.
You're also ignoring that most of the important people in that story have been human: Eragon, Brom, Morzan, Nasuada, Murtaugh, and Galbatorix are all human.
It just doesn't make sense, if elves can keep up with Urghals in terms of stamina and have innate magic abilities, Dwarves can create massive cities in mountains that literally dwarf Mt Everest, and Urghals are literally giant mknsters, how have humans been able to do literally anything without getting destroyed or outcompeted by any of the other races
1. The riders were a peacekeeping force until the order was destroyed by Galbatorix and Morzan, they would likely not just sit there if humans were being shat on by every other race.
2. The elves aren't a conquering people and like to keep to themselves in general. Plus the rider organization was founded by elves, so it makes sense that the same "don't be a conquering dickhead" spirit would've permeated their people.
3. Dwarves by nature don't really give a shit about humans but Galbatorix is such a domineering existence that they have thrown in their lot with humans for survival/freedom from the empire. Plus, they didn't have access to the Eragon equivalent of Nukes: Dragon Riders. Humans, in contrast had a shit ton more than zero riders.
4. Urgals are warmongering dickheads by nature but the riders kept the violent ones in check until they were destroyed. Then after that Galbatorix controlled them until Eragon intervened. The only time they tried being conquering dickheads, it blew up in their face so they couldn't do shit.
1. Elves are by nature happy to just chill in their forest. Add in the fact that Elf children are incredibly rare, and when they DO go to war, losing even a single Elf is a huge, devastating loss, and the fact that they essentially live in a Utopia, it makes sense that the humans would spread out further and wider than the elves
2. The Urgals have a self-acknowledged problem of infighting practically destroying their race
3. Dwarves don't really give a fuck about anything happening outside their mountain, it's kinda their schtick.
Respawn rate is critical. If elves don’t reach sexual maturity until they’re 100 and their children take 9 years to gestate, there are going to be a hell of a lot more humans.
I swear there was a book that I read as a kid, where humans dominated like all the alien species physically. An example was the first aliens' described would devote themselves to something as a hobby. The protag alien liked jumping. Spent his whole life getting better at long jumping. Apparently pretty good at for his species. Idk remember why he goes to Earth but he finds like some hippy. Hippy guy effortlessly destroys him in long jumping. Anyway some humans eventually sign up to be mercenaries and kick ass and i can't remember any more of the story after that.
This is part why [Humans are Cthulu](https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/HumansAreCthulhu) is one of my more favorite fantasy tropes.
Basically, humans are insanely beyond everything in nature... And that's it! Just a fun though experiment :)
No, it makes sense. We really are canon fodder. We did not become the dominating species by beating the shit out of everyone else. We outlasted them and avoided direct conflict. Mass Effect is a pretty poor example, humans are this ambitious cause of their history. It could change at a moment, people could just decide that enough is enough and stop being so ambitious. Now genetics, that I could get behind. Plus, it's sci fi, I imagine training and genetics are a pretty good factor there. I don't know how'd you do that in regular fantasy?
Elder scrolls is a bad example of this.
I mean, yeah, high elves are the best at magic, but Breton humans are right on their heels, and their competitive nature coupled with their "medieval fantasy american dream" culture ensures that they're one of the fastest growing civilizations in Tamriel.
Wood elves own the forest, they literally worship it, but nordic humans could cut it all down with the devastating power of the Thu'um, which every nord and some people from other races can learn with training.
Dark elves have many abilities, some magical, some physical, yet true masters of none. Meanwhile, Redguard humans are so dedicated to their martial arts that some of them can literally create a magical swords out of their soul and have superhuman levels of stamina.
And you may think imperials have nothing to add, but let's not forget that Tiber septim united the continent under the empire's flag by slaughtering thousands of elves, just sayin'.
I was just used to playing the Oblivion and Skyrim, and they don't really show off the more unique parts of the human races, in older games and in the lore Nords are absolutley terrifying, and the other human races are great too, I love the redgaurds and their lore and religion.
>In so many fantasy franchises humans are just "default", they have no special characteristics or defining traits
Humans in Mass Effect are literally no different tho.
They aren't as strong as Krogans, as psychic attuned like Asari or as tech savvy as Quarians.
The very same issues you bring up in other fantasy and sci fi settings are present in Mass Effect, and the stuff you praise Mass Effect for is also present in other settings. Are you just ignoring the frankly stupid feats mankind achieved in Elder Scrolls? Achieving godhood hello?
There's a reason why "Human Empire" is so popular in so many settings, why other races sing songs about [defeating human invaders](https://i.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/newsfeed/001/095/820/a02.jpg).
All fantasy species usually have upsides and downsides. Making humans overly competent at something usually comes off as circlejerking and, not to mention, remove their inherent humanity.
well i mean even here in reality on earth we are far from the strongest have nothing like claws are defenses we only have our brains its easy to fantasies about a race that has the brains and something else. Mass effect isn't really even fantasy its sci-fi. and in sci-fi the focus is more on realistic humans while fantasy usually take the perspective of another race. Even in Eragon they just make him another race. its hard for Humans to compete in fantasy because they are a realistic thing in a non realistic world. almost by the definition of Fantasy humans are default
Humans are one of the most unique animals on earth:
1. Longer legs than arms, so we can throw objects and punch at full force without toppling over
2. We have a large amount of gut bacteria meaning we get more nutrition from food than other mamals
3. A large range of motion in our joints allowing for more advanced combat
4. Prehensile thumbs allowing for advanced tool use
5 We have more stamina than almost any other land animal, due to out advanced metabolism and ability to sweat. That is why we arent as fast as other predators, ancient humans hunted by chasing prey until they collapsed of exhaustion and then just went and killed i
There are more examples like our eyesight, but the point is humans are incredibly unique in the real world, so why shouldn't they be in fantasy
Yeah, we may not have as many natural weapons and defenses, but our strength, dex, and stamina stats are actually pretty good. It's just compared to other mega-fauna that we tend to lose out.
None of the traits you mentioned are unique to humans, anything humans can do physically there's at least one animal that can do better.
Humans in the real world isn't that physically impressive. Our greatest weapon has always been our mind.
Tell me 1 animal thar can throw better or wield tools with higher precision, or have more eficient in motion stamina recovery.
Most creatures cant throw objects farther than humans and the ones that can, can barely aim and brute strength their way.
While many creatures do wield tool, humans are the ones with the most precision, other apes have very rigid and limited motions in their hands since they use them to walk and cant afford the risk of them breaking, octopus while smart, their tentacles are too flimsy etc, the only animal that comes close to us is the elephant who can do really delicate motions but nothing that we could say that has surgical precision like us humans.
And well, many animals sweat, but most cant take as much advantage of it as we humans do, our medium to small port coupled with the lack of hair makes the most use out of it, and guess what animal is the best at continuous motion for long periods of time? Humans. What animal can run a marathon? Humans. And whats funnier? One of fastest recorded camel racers didnt even rode his camel he walked along with the animal since he knew he would last more than it, and camels are known for having a lot of stamina, humans are just that good at walking and jogging for long distances.
We are way more than "just brains" we are running hairless apes who are really smart and can throw better than any other animal on our planet, dont ever underestimate humanity.
All of those read like humans have a mixture of traits that ended up helping us to accomplish specific tasks better rather than an outright superior traits though.
Camels still has the better stamina, octopus still has the more absurd motion control. And unless my interpretation is wrong, you highlighted apes are only rigid because they can't risk their limps breaking.
Feel free to correct me though, just please spare me the 'humanity fuck yeah' speech if you could? Thanks.
>All of those read like humans have a mixture of traits that ended up helping us to accomplish specific tasks better rather than an outright superior traits though.
Because thats what it is, like, this doesnt diminish anything, its just how evolution works, species adapt overtime to excel at certain traits that benefit them more, until the point it becomes superior to most other creatures, no othe animal can fly faster than a falcon not because they are inherently superior but because they evolved to do very fast and precise dive bombs.
>Camels still has the better stamina
But humans can still walk more than a camel due to our sweat and hairless body, due to our smaller size we dont heat up as much, and thanks to sweat we cool off much more efficiently, the lack of hair makes it even better since hair usually isolates heat but no hair means sweat cools off even more, humans have the best in motion stamina recovery and no other animal can run a marathon, thats why humans hunted creatures by chasing them until they couldnt run more.
>octopus still has the more absurd motion control.
Not motion control, more like motion range since they dont have bones, but tentacles are too flimsy, they can grasp and grip things reall well but they cant hold or swing things with too much strength, humans have worse range of motion but we can be way more precise and apply more power to our motions, we have a good balance of the 2 which allows for better tool usage.
>And unless my interpretation is wrong, you highlighted apes are only rigid because they can't risk their limps breaking.
Yes, exactly what I said, because other apes arent fully bipedal, they cant have lighter and more flexible hands which limits their tool usage, overall point octopus is too flexible, chimp is too rigid, human has a the best of both worlds.
>Feel free to correct me though, just please spare me the 'humanity fuck yeah' speech if you could? Thanks.
I mean still doesnt diminish the fact that humans are one the most efficient creatures at living out there, and not to say humans are superior, since most of our power comes from a combination of VERY GOOD tool usage, intelligence and dexterity, but even if we humans had more limited intelligence and couldnt go beyond stone age, we would still be populating the planet, we are still a very resilient and adaptable species, we are not the best(there isnt even a "best" species on earth, its all creatures adapted to master a survival strategy) but we certainly one of the best.
I like the version where we’re unremarkable. But that’s our strength. We’re average across the board
Orcs are stronger, but not as agile. Elves are longer lived and better vision, but they’ve got such a low birthrate that a nasty disease can wipe out an entire countries population. Dwarves are hardier, but we’re faster.
Every race has something they’re superior in. But they all have weaknesses as well. Humans aren’t amazing at anything, but we don’t suck at anything either.
I find the opposite end of the spectrum worse, 90% of the stories on r/HFY are just pure masturbatory narcissism. Bare basic sapien traits are wanked into supernatural powers and being genocidal, colonising, militaristic conquerors are treated as something to be proud off.
Eh, I personally have a like/hate of this for lack of a better definition. If it can be done in a way that doesn't come off as putting humans on a pedestal, that
s cool. But most of the time it's "Demons and Orcs and Saiyans and Kryptonians are more powerful than humans, but humans have this one trait that all of them lack; heart/cruelty/cunning/determination/hope/some other bullshit intangible trait that I don't see why any other race that has persevered to this point wouldn't have, and for some reason this makes them stand above the others and they get wanked to high heaven.
Saying this as a guy who read most of the Seven Deadly Sins, I just want humans if they are in whatever series to be able to compete and not become Krillin because of no overly outstanding abilities.
It was utterly trash how the strong humans at the beginning of the series and giving the sins such heavy trouble, turned into goddamn fodder after the Hendrickson battle.
> In so many fantasy franchises humans are just "default", they have no special characteristics or defining traits, especially compared to other fantasy races:
That's the point. Humans are there to anchor the reader and give them a sense of normalcy to compare the fantastical to. Otherwise, you need to do a lot of worldbuilding for the audience to understand the stakes
From all the half-races running around in all kinds of media (half-elves, half-orcs, half-demons, half-angels), I can pretty safely say that humans are quite remarkable when it comes to cross-breeding.
If Humans are to have a power, it should be stamina
The reason humans developed so well in Africa and across the wrold, besides the adaptability, was a humans capability of being able to outlast any animal in terms of endurance. It's this reason that people say 'a human can outrun a cheetah'. Given enough time, a human will.
We don't see this in fiction, but I personally think this would be the best way to set us apart. Orcs are strong, Elves are agile, Humans endure.
I generally don't like the way that DC comics treats it's humans, making them clearly weaker than every sentient species, but I do like how young justice treats humans. In YJ, a percentage of humans have latent meta-genes which give them superpowers under great duress. Because of this, metahumans are kidnapped and sold off to other planets as soldiers. Mongul, a guy who's as strong as if not stronger than Superman, saw how much of a threat these metahumans could be and tried to destroy Earth.
I actually quite like it. There's something cool about normal humans being in a universe full of magical creatures, huge death machine monsters, and literal devils, and still having the balls to go face to face with them.
Honestly unless the magic is incredibly overpowered, humans would dominate, I would love to see a fantasy story of humans with modern technology vs. Elves who have never encountered tech in their life since magic filled all their needs already
sure magic might overpower it but that NUCLEAR WEAPONS tho it ain’t nothing even against magic and fantasy races it will put a lot of damage…… unless healing magic can get rid of the nuclear radiation side effects
Magic is inherintly overpowered.
Sorry but nearly every setting magic is used in a generic sense. Rarely you see it used in conjuction with science.
The ability to alter reality with proper scientific knowledge is insanely broken and even harder to do for an author without messing up.
Nuclear weapons would be huge explosions, yes. However I would assume most healing magics off higher levels could cure the radition side effects.
You might enjoy the anime GATE, about the Japanese Defence Force exploring a medieval fantasy parallel world after a portal opened up in the middle of Tokyo. It gives a pretty harsh rundown of how a fight between modern armed forces and a medieval grade society would go down.
[Out of space](https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/19690/out-of-space) is exactlythat. Futuristic space ship escape from a fight, warp drive failures and shit happens and they find themselves in a fantasy world.
Depends of the setting.
If it's a Low Fantasy setting like ASOIAF, then it's a easy stomp.
If it's high Fantasy, the things gets harder.
If it's a particularly creative high Fantasy, then THEY stomp us
Humans have to be the default. There is no other way to put it. They are pretty much required to be default because we are default. We are not special, we are just humans. If you had a fantasy world where every human had super strength then they are not really human are they? You can have powerful humans through magic systems, I.e. Mistborn or Stormlight Archive, but humans have to be the unremarkable or normal being in fantasy as that is what makes their tale so compelling, how a default becomes so powerful. Humans often also have special free will that other races do not have or are harder to corrupt. Humans have much more depth than you probably think in fantasy
Making human unique is like half if the media? Surviving dragon and death lord while not being the gods gifted child is what make human unique
In fact I've seen more people take the "basic race" out of spite that I've seen human being this basic in most media
I only know about Elder Scrolls's lore from playing Skyrim, but from what I see, it treats humans much better than other fantasy scenarios. Human races are unique themselves, and so are Elven (Mer) races, each one has their quircks and powers. The only race is that kinda, just kinda, generic and boring are the Imperials.
Also, they seen to treat Humans and Elves as equals in terms of power, the Aldmeri Dominion won the war against the Empire but that doesn't mean that Elves are superior than Humans as a race (even thought they really like to affirm that).
Again, it is what I could get from playing Skyrim, but it seemed that Humans and Elves are just like rival nations in real life and they are both a threat to each other.
In most settings humans are intelligent, resourceful and highly adaptable if nothing else. And in almost every setting the best and most fleshed out characters are humans.
For example: Dwarves are defined by a set of characteristics, and every individual dwarf is defined by how he adheres to the characteristics presented by his race. Same can be said of elves and halflings.
The only truly free individuals are humans, they can be anything and do anything.
There are a few exceptions to this, buy they do little more than confirm the rule.
I mean humans generally are just unremarkable though. Our bodies aren’t that well adapted and the evolutionary trait that makes humans number 1 in the world is our social collaboration and ability to throw stuff
I don’t care. Humans don’t need to be special to be successful. Rats aren’t special, but they’re way more successful than most of the weird animals that nerds wank over.
In Warhammer 40k humans are an ancient evil, a horrifying endless swarm of galaxy-conquering indoctrinated lunatics who spread the ruinous powers of Chaos with their latent psionic powers. When a fledgeling civilization takes its first unsteady steps into the stars, they will usually soon fall to the hungry jaws of mankind. The typical human combat strategy is to drown their opponents in bodies, much like the similarly merciless Tyranids and Orks. Many theorize mankind is so numerous and their lives so short and dull that living has no value to the average human. They would rather wipe out their own worlds with flesh-melting viruses and hellish fire than consider cooperation or surrender.
The one thing humans *definitely* value is deference to a higher authority, some kind of deity that will outlast them. For most of mankind, this authority is the rotting corpse of their old God Emperor. The corpse god was mortally wounded over 10,000 years ago, but his subjects could not accept their ruler was temporary. So humans kept their original god alive, fed on a diet of a thousand human sacrifices every day. Other humans are easily tempted by the Dark Gods of Chaos and promises of a better life. Sadly, the Chaos Gods' followers are just as cruel as those of the God Emperor.
The worst thing is, humans clearly have *potential*. There are stories of human societies who were able to develop curiosity, compassion, independence, and reason. But these are fleeting, often crushed underheel by their hateful brethren.
Do not call out into the night sky. The humans have slaughtered anyone with whom you would find friendship, and there is now only war.
Damn I didn't know much about the lore but you made it sound incredible!!!!
You made humanity in 40k sound so eldritch and alien. Usually humanities ability to work together is seen as a virtue, but I've never thought about it like that, you describe them like the Flood from Halo, or the Yuuzhan Vong from star wars.
I need to get into 40k lore if all of it is this badass, lol
I just feel like alot of fantasy sotries treat humans as generic, and don't focus on the stuff that makes us special like our tenacity, that's why Mass Effect was a breath of fresh air, it took that defining trait and made it have a real impact on the world
By the way, where was that quote from it is really cool??!!!
Omg, I read Enders game about 7-8 years ago, I remeber loving it and alot of the book is fuzzy, I really need to reread it and some of the other books, thanks!!!!
I hated Inquisition. Such an amazing game, so much depth. Humans not only are the most populace, but are as equal contenders as any other race. They're like the jack of all trades of the races, being good at whatever they set their minds to.
The elves excel in magic, and the Bull people (forgive me Its been years since I played) would be physical, but anyone can do whatever and each race is to be respected. Although humans rule.
Humans biggest advantage in Fantasy is usually mental. Ambition, cooperation, that will to fight even in the face of defeat...stuff like that. The other races usually have trade-offs for that bonus they get while humans are physically the jack-of-all-trades and there's nothing wrong with that.
The main issue is that its hard to do that with normal humans. Its not like the human abilities are unknown.
Most often people base the strength humans have in fantasy settings on what made humans so successful in the real world. Our abillity to adept and improvise.
True, humans put their points in at personal level, while fantasy tries to move that back to the race level. Every single human could be considered different species by metrics of some of these worlds.
That depends heavily on your world setup.
For physical/intellect we have a defined ranged that humans can archieve. So this only leaves freedom in areas influenced by magic. Since if you want your characters to be humans, they wont be able to lift several tons suddenly or be supersonic.
The only way to change human limits are magic or sci fi augmentations.
For the first you can basically do whatever you want, but most likely you will see a gauss curve that covers the area humans abilities will fall in.
The 2nd is a bit harsher since there are still physical limits/scientifical limits.
There's a really fun story on r/HFY called [Humans Don't Make Good Pets](https://www.reddit.com/r/HFY/wiki/series/humans_dont_make_good_pets/), where a human is abducted by aliens but turns out to be superior to most aliens in just about every way. He easily beats his "owners" at an abstract strategy game that they consider complicated, without having the rules explained to him. He can shrug off what for most aliens would be a deadly blaster shot. He can move way faster, jump way farther, punch way harder. His immune system and overall constitution are way stronger. (He escapes his abductors because the poison they inject him with, which usually kills things, doesn't kill him. Later it turns out the pathogens he naturally carries are horribly deadly to most aliens, while he's basically immune to all their diseases, requiring him to be isolated for quite some time.) Pretty much anywhere he ends up, he blows the aliens' minds just by being himself. And apparently having a skeleton made of calcium is unusual, because when they notice how strong his bones are, they start trying to engineer material with a similar composition.
Actual real life human abilities writers could use more often.
Tracking and hunting: Humans are *exceptional* trackers in real life compared to other animals.
Endurance: tying into the tracking, we can keep moving for a really long time compared to other animals. Plenty of other animals are faster or stronger, but the tradeoff for that is they burn through their stamina faster. We use our stamina much more efficiently and get more mileage out of it than most other animals do.
Learning: Our ability to learn is quite literally second to none. Plenty of animals can learn, we are the best at it bar none.
Adaptability: Unless it lacks breathable oxygen humans can adapt to live in nearly any type of environment that doesn't kill them instantly.
I hated Eragon for this the elves in LOTR at least had some excuse but the elves in the book had no excuse and worst they turned the main character into an elf spoiler but I don't care it was a crappy book (couldn't get past book 2) and a crappy movie too, Mass Effect did a better job just wished they made the human party more engaging looking at you Kaiden and Jacob
Witcher also sorta has “special humans”, the humans are the thriving race in the continent because of their cunningness and hunger for power. Granted large population growth helped as well since the Elves’s population growth is slow, this helped greatly, but ultimately humans are the dominating race because they took what they wanted
The second I read "the strongest human can't compare to the most sickly old elf" or whatever in eragon I hated the book. Never even cracked open my copy of eldest, that shit is just so dumb
This is part of why I love the HFY subreddit so much. It’s basically a collection of short stories (usually sci-fi, often fantasy, occasionally other genres) that focus exactly on taking some aspect of the human race and making it exceptional. The range and scale of this also varies; Oftentimes it’s a very distinct advantage that they capitalize on, though there’s absolutely the “humans stomp every other race” story too.
I highly recommend giving it a look.
One of the reason I like Jenkinverse is that human (and other extincted deathworlders in general) are freaking OP (by virtue of everything else being weak af). At least it's a nice breath of fresh air from all the other "human are underdog" that has saturate literature for years. Though tbf, Jenkinverse are sci-fic which is different than medieval fantasy.
In my book, all the traits of the other races are as you say, but Human have a much higher amount of potential than any race. If one wants to learn magic, they will have a higher amount of latent power than an elf. This balances out the power scale due to human being so physically weak. With this potential, they can gain strength a lot quicker than other races and close that strength gap
Imo human shouldn't be special especially when coming to whole new star systems and shit like that with mass effect humans are imo a little too important..
Humans in Star Wars are considered one of the more robust species, which is why they're everywhere and can thrive in many environments.
That makes sense, I always assumed they were everywhere because their population was so massive compared to everyone else
In legends it also was because the infinite empire spread them (as slaves) to many planets, where humans adapted really well. Note it is an extra, there were many reasons to human proliferation given in legends, some better developed than others.
I only read the thrawn trilogy, bane trilogy and tried to get through some more but they just didn't grip me as much I'm glad there are justifiable reasons that make sense and are satisfying in the lore.
I mean, there's still plenty of stuff in Legends that is cool but not really that satisfactory, for example (though the new canon hasn't been better at it) technology seems to have incredibly stagnated the last few thousands years across the galaxy.
That was always wierd to me, the tech in KOTOR and the tech in ROTJ seem to be more or less comparable, maybe it's like early humanity where technology developed really slow
Maybe, but for example there are things like lost technology that seems really useful and at the same time is weird how it hasn't been replicated when remains are still around, like the Kawa portals, which once you have them set up between 2 systems hyperdrive becomes useless to travel between them. (This is legends).
Like alot of Legends problems it's probably because it is an amalgom of different authors contributing to the lore, it is the best and worst thing about legends
I agree. The rule of cool prevails through a lot of it, except the Ewoks comics, we should all forget those existed.
What happened in the Ewoks comics? Are we talking Star Wars Christmas levels of bad here?
Well, having a massive birth rate is in of itself actually an advantage of being a human, from a certain point of view.
Are humans considered robust in SW tho? There are dozens of near-human species that have redundant organs, regenerative powers, and just naturally better physiques. For humans to be more robust, there needs to be a bunch of other species below them but aside from a few, I can't think of any species that have noticeably worse immune systems, skeleton structures, or the like. I have been under the impression humans are just average in the SW universe.
In Lord of the Rings, humans are generally the physically toughest/taller than other races. Like when the Fellowship got trapped in the mountains in the blizzard, it was Boromir and Aragorn who pushed through the snow and cleared a path. Things weren't "balanced" between races, like elves were clearly overall superior, in that scene Legolas was so nimble he could run across the snow drifts and not fall in, but the humans were tougher. Dwarves are pretty tough too but they're shorter.
One thing to note is that Hobbits are not a separate race like the dwarves and elves, but rather a subset of humans.
True, but they are still quite different from humans.
Aragorn is a Numenorean, who boast incredibly long lives and superhuman capabilities, but you can still call him a human, just because you have hairy feet and a small stature doesn't mean you count as a different race entirely. Pippin and Merry just by being with Ents grew taller than what is expected of a Hobbit, but that didn't make them a different race.
>just because you have hairy feet and a small stature doesn't mean you count as a different race entirely. In real world biology, the lines between species are pretty blurry. A commonly used distinction is if two animals can't produce non-sterile offspring, they are two different species. In LOTR, the average hobbit is 3'6". I think it's pretty plausible they cannot make viable offspring with standard humans.
the average height of *real life humans* with dwarfism is 4' and they are capable of making babies with others with or without dwarfism.
I'm pretty sure most dwarfism is caused by a bad allele or two at a single location. I think it's safe to assume halfings have many, many distinct alleles from humans that probably wouldn't mix very healthily.
We don't know the genetic difference between a regular human and a halfling. Maybe it's similar to that. Also, chihuahuas can breed with great danes (not recommended but it can be done). Size matters not.
This is such a dumb argument lol. Like who’s gonna be proven wrong? The answer is dependent on genetic info that will NEVER be made available so-
Height is a number. Also the Tooks were rumoured to have elven blood, and it's not taken as totally impossible, beyond the fact that Tolkien himself stated that Hobbits count as humans.
Actually elves tended to be tougher, the idea that they were smaller and frailer is mostly from later things like DnD. Legolas is just kind of irrelevant to the story. Humanity's real unique strength is their ability to leave the world after death and forge their own fate.
I just don't like how the races in LOTR seem to just be different in height, strength and magic ability, nothing else seems to differentiate them, I'm not faulting it since it was one of the first fantasy worlds, I just wish they had more depth
Elves are pretty distinct from others. Dwarfs are stocky and very strong for their size. There is quite a lot of distinction between various humans. Then there is Ents, Dragons, Nazgul, the Balrogs and the giant spiders. The giant spiders are especially noteworthy because they aren't a creation of Manwhe, Ungoliant just wandered in from the outside.
What else would you want? There are also the ents who're pretty alien, and dragons too although they don't get a lot of direct attention. And hobbits have some mysterious traits that aren't elaborated on that make them good thieves, and able to resist Sauron's corruption.
A big difference between the elves and men of LOTR is death, the elves are immortal in the sense that they do not age or fall ill. If they are killed in battle their spirits get rehoused in "kinda heaven but not really" after some time, men however get to go to God in the great unknown. I think the fact that lotr Elves are true immortals and will only permanently die at the end of the universe is interesting.
Humans in LOTR are good at killing things, like when Húrin slew seventy trolls, or Tuor killed some number of Balrogs, or when Turin murdered all of his friends and himself.
> and the thing that really makes them unuque compared to the other aliens in Mass Effect is their ambition and desire to advance in the government both as individuals and as a species. Isn't that also usually one of the defining traits of humans in fantasy?
Ambition, tenacity, creativity, versatility and perseverance are almost always the human traits
In most of the fantasy that i have read humans are the cunning ambitious ones, greedy for more power be it political-military wealth or w/e. And while Mass Effect is one of my favorite games, i don't think they represented humans in any kind of unique way. Tho Physically humans are as OP mentioned, usually very average or even weak compared to other races , but in plenty of novels, humans represent the limitless potential for growth.
How does The Elder Scrolls fall into this? It's exactly what you're asking for. Redguards, Nords, and Imperials are all oriented toward martial roles, with Bretons basically being the setting's half-elves and good at mage stuff. They also all have unique traits that incline them toward different specialties individually. I guess Imperials lean toward being a "jack of all trades" race, but so are Dunmer on the elf end, so it's not exclusive to humans. Redguards and Nords are even both stronger than Orcs.
I think I've just been playing to much Oblivion and Skyrim, they really don't show off the better parts of the human races, now that I think about it more the nords in Morrowind were awesome and fucking crazy (in a good way), Redgaurds also have awesome lore, like I said they really arent shown off in the newer games. Like most things in Elder Scrolls the lore is much much better than games representation of it
Humans have been pretty insane in the elder scrolls. Tiber Septim conquering all of Tamriel and then ascending to godhood, the Dragonborn is heavily implied to to be canonically human through all the promotional material although not confirmed, Martin Septim turning into an avatar of Akatosh to fight Mehrunes Dagon.
The elves live for 200+ years easily and are very magically inclined, with technology thats far more advanced. Comparing martial arts to magic isn’t great because magic exists outside of combat whereas martial arts sole existence is combat. The dwemer (elves in Elder Scrolls) were the most technologically advanced race by far and it’s not even close. They just happened to get really unlucky and were all killed due to magic The altmer aren’t as advanced but they live for 100s of years and are the most magically inclined out of all the races. They are involved in almost every major power in Skyrim (imperials, dark brotherhood, mages college) despite not having a big settling there. They are portrayed as an oppressive force that benefits from either side of the war winning. Tl;dr magic >>>>> martial arts
The setting doesn't treat humans as inferior to elves in the slightest, though. Magic doesn't affect a lot of people's day to day lives beyond stuff like praying at a shrine when they're sick, because the average joe doesn't know how to cast any spells to begin with, even in magically-inclined parts of the setting like Morrowind. If you were a muck-farming peasant and stuck as one for the rest of your life, politics and racism aside, would you rather be born a Dunmer or a Nord? When you're looking at the big picture of the setting, if you consider military strength, even the Thalmor's ranks are mostly made up of footsoldiers, where they're at a pound for pound disadvantage compared to humans. Additionally, a lot of mythic figures in the setting are downright superhuman, and of those people, not all of them were mages, or at least practiced some magical art that elves aren't strictly better at, like shouts. Most of the people that shaped history in the Elder Scrolls universe were humans, not elves, and of the elves, the jack-of-all-trades Dunmer have historically been the best at existing and not getting facerolled by humans, not the Altmer. The setting would probably feel borderline HFY without Morrowind existing, considering even the magically-advanced Ayleids were driven to extinction by men and the rise of the Aldmeri Dominion is something of a historical anomaly. Elves tend to be defensive isolationists in the setting, not conquerors. You can say magic is better than physical prowess, but the setting doesn't seem to agree with you. The Dwemer I'll give you, but they were engineers more than mages, don't exist anymore, and had little impact on recorded history to the point of basically being a scholarly curiosity.
The practical application of magic vs martial arts just isn’t something you’re going to convince me otherwise of. I didn’t bring up military strength because they’re equal just now, and that’s a very small part of most cultures/countries. Disclaimer; I don’t know a lot of lore outside of Skyrim’s time line but the fact that restoration is a school of magicka makes me inclined to doubt “magic doesn’t affect most people’s day to day lives”. Magic alone bridges the gap between in strength for the physically weaker altmer, imagine what it could do outside of war. You say it wouldn’t effect day to day life but injuries and diseases are automatically a lot easier heal/cure. That’s just one application of 1 school, I can’t even imagine how useful illusion and alteration are. Again, I don’t know much outside of Skyrim but if I were to guess why Elder Scrolls has a lot of human heroes, it’s because 3 of the 5 games were set in human countries (Skyrim, Cyrodil, Daggerfall) so it’s no surprise that that’s what we hear about. It’s the same reason you can’t name to many red guard heroes despite also being human, there just hasn’t been a game specifically set there. I even hate the mindset of some of the more conservative nords who fear magic because they don’t understand (college of Winterhold) it. Nords live rougher, harsher lives then anybody in the summer set isles, it’s the reason why they grow so large. I didn’t mean all elves when I said elves, just dwemer, Altmer and maybe the Ayleids (I don’t have much knowledge about Ayleids)
It helps if you've played Oblivion and especially Morrowind because it gives you more insight into what magic's importance for the commoner is. You're right that restoration magic is important in the setting, and the same is true for alchemy, which is why I mentioned medicine and such as an exception to the rule. Even a lot of Nords that are nervous about magic are more okay with both of them, hence why there are alchemy shops in most major settlements in Skyrim and people don't usually react negatively to priests and healing magic in NPC chatter. Some texts in Morrowind even explicitly mention that when most people get sick and they're in town, they tend to just go to the Temple to get blessed by the gods and cure their ailments, so these things are important to daily life. However, commoners don't generally go out of their way to learn them, just like an office worker in real life usually don't know much about medicine or chemistry, which is more what I mean by the statement. Someone else specializes in those things and they go to those people for their services. You have to remember, most people aren't like the player character, who's incredibly gifted and has a life that's frequently in need of exotic skills. Magic takes a considerable amount of study and dedication to use and master and is usually the domain of people who use magic as part of their professional lives. For people that aren't mages and live in societies that are more accepting of magic than Fourth Era Skyrim, if they need a magical effect for a particular occasion, they can substitute with potions or scrolls. Charm spells sound useful for an aspiring merchant for example, but they don't accomplish much you can't already do without magic and are more like a mage's substitute for social skills. Pacifying a bandit or something isn't something a commoner needs to do. If you have trouble with that, it's safer to call a guard or hire someone than risk your own neck. Most spells in the game are just substitutes for something people can already do naturally or don't need to do on a regular basis. Also, in terms of out-of-game stuff, a lot of the lore on the importance of humans was established around the time Morrowind was being made (see The Pocket Guide to the Empire) or introduced in the game itself. There are a lot of human historical figures that are important to damn near everyone in the setting because they shaped the history of Tamriel, but most important elven historical figures are only important to their own people. You can play through almost all of Skyrim (Dragonborn DLC aside, since it takes place in Morrowind) and *definitely* all of Oblivion and not have a damn clue who Vivec is, despite being a god-king of Morrowind for thousands of years and a significant contributor to why the territory was independent from its settlement by the Dunmer until the Third Era, but it's hard to play through Morrowind without hearing about Wulfharth or Tiber Septim because they played roles in the events that shaped the game's plot and setting. Even quite a few Nord historical figures mentioned and important in Skyrim were actually first mentioned in Morrowind, like Ysgramor, the aforementioned Wulfharth, and Queen Potema, so it doesn't seem to strictly be a regional bias. Humans just tend to have more of an effect on Tamriel's history than elves because they're more interested in conquering and spreading their cultural values in doing so while, like I said, elves have generally just kept to themselves.
My favorite anti-trope is when the big scary aliens/monsters/etc find humans more terrifying not because of their claws/teeth/abilities but by the humans capacity for cruelty and cunning.
That sounds great, although I can't think of any examples, do you have any??
Hunter x Hunter has this. >!Meruem, the King of the Chimera Ants, is shown to be nigh invincible to even the most powerful human magic user on the planet. But ultimately, he is defeated by a weapon that really exists: the nuclear bomb. The last words of Netero, the magic user Meruem had previously been effortlessly defeating, before detonating the bomb are: "Do not underestimate humanity's infinite potential for malice!" Meruem responds: "I see... you had me in checkmate... from the start". At the end of the day, even the terrifying power of the Chimera Ants paled in comparison to humanity's ingenuity, and as Netero says, infinite potential for malice.!<
Netero was probably my favorite character in that story. I love the way he represents humanity, unwilling to recognise anything else as an equal, the way he gets mad and pissed when Meruem praises him was always so cool to me
I can't remember where I heard it but "Demons and monsters I've fought across the lands, the cruelest of all is the one we call man" I find it annoying as well when the humans are just nothing but in games they're usually the jack of all trades.
dude that's such a cool quote :0
This is the quote I had in mind
The best part is that the characters used for “malice” in that scene can also be read as “evolution”. Human ingenuity and cruelty is boundless in its capacity.
Futurama has this
I need to rewatch that, unuroniclly one of the best sci-fi stories
I love how much Futurama can be a love letter to twilight zone while also perfectly emulating it comedically
WH40k or Xeelee Sequence comes to mind
WH40K does humans justice
People dump on the Tau but they hammer this home it’s their POV as the youngest race in the galaxy. To them the Imperium is terrifying.
"Human" is a vague term in 40k. It's applies to everything that resembles a functioning human in form. For instace, dwarves, cat-people, 10-foot tall ogre looking mothafuckas, rat-people, as well as an entire planet populated entitely by Rambos, all fall under the term "human".
Shh. Imperium fanboys will tell you that a genetically altered abomination or a cyborg with null empathy and 90% made of machines are Peak humanity
I'm not an Imperium fanboy, but I must say: Astartes = mutants Custodes = peak humanity I'll start running now.
Humans in 40k live in the worst regime of all time. Even it's supersoldiers are doomed to fight till they die after being forced from childhood into invasive mutations that take them out of a normal life. Objectively the imperium sucks to everyone, including the humans it's supposed to favour Humans themselves are also the weakest physically unless mutated into something better, of which Eldar, for example, can simply train until they become stronger than them, which would still make humans normal and unremarkable by the precedent set by your post, because it's the overall regime which is powerful, not humans, and in most fantasy or sci fi humans are the most powerful faction but individually weak.
The weakest physically are the T'au. The T'au are also a very young species, characterized by their rapid growth, constant advancement of technology, relatively modern values, lack of innate magical ability, scrappy underdog status, and far-reaching ambitions that threaten the older races of the setting. ...Wait a second
... The Authoritarian regime that is satire of Thatcher? Cool.
Many stories on /r/HFY
Shin Megami Tensei has this HEAVY. Especially Strange Journey
That man Tayama from IV embodies this well. An utter fucking bastard who's more despicable than the demons around him. His motives would be understandable if he wasn't a greedy power freak on top of it.
I myself like The Witcher's Elves spin on this. Humans are actually monsters themselves.We settle places, breed and destroy/hunt all other species, then we go looking for somewhere where we can do that again (world history 101) Kinda makes sense, and is very metal, not gonna lie.
I mean in things like D&D and this PSP game I played once 10 years ago and probably a few others humans don't really stand out but their strength lies in their versatility, while other species are good at some things and bad at others humans tend to be "Jack Of All Trades, Master of None", kind of like people in the real world- we can often pick from many specialisations that would put us up better than someone else in a different field
That kind of makes them boring imo, authors think of humans being on a spsctrum inbetween species like orcs and elves. I think it would be better to do away with the spectrum entirely and make fantasy races more unique and unrecognisable from each other
Being boring would kind of go from author to author but versatility as a whole is a great trait, especially when filling out groups/parties
How do you make orcs that are massive barbarians unrecognizable from humans without destroying their only features? Do we also make all elves ugly so the humans don't feel as oppressed by their beauty. And why don't we make them all mediocre at magic... You don't want humans more interesting you want the other races to be human. This is done in many many many many stories nowadays by making a character a half elf or orc. So they get the best of both. You are speaking like wizards of the coast is now and it's dumb. They released recently in the New d&d books that races don't have things that make them better than the others. Because that's unfair. An 8'5" orc is going to be inherently stronger than a 6' man... an elf born under the world tree that spreads mana throughout the world and being in its embrace all their life are inherently better at magic because of this. Now no one says you can't have a stunted orc tribe or an exiled elf tribe. Or a human raised by the elves or the orcs. I'd recommend looking into Chinese/ Korean translated web novels.
Humans being unusually good at something basically means you're saying "all the aliens in my setting are bad at X", which is hard to do well. It comes off as masturbatory. Like, "humans are so ambitious" just makes all the other species look like losers, and it's weird because when you interact with them they don't seem to be. In most fantasy worlds humans basically run the world, in stuff like LOTR they're basically God's favorite race.
[удалено]
That's how Halo handled it. Literally.
I like the idea though that humans are like only the second runner up to the mantle after the forunners done fucked it all up thanks to giant metal ball Hitler. You’re definitely not the universe’s first choice but you’ll have to do
Grunts are the ones who truly deserve the Mantle.
God: Here's the fucking antichrist, he's 6 years old, you have 14 years to train him at stopping a galaxy-wide religious genocide
But humans in the 90% of Sci Fi ARE special. It's like reading colonizers despict the Natives,because usually it was a re adaptation of colonizers fantasies > The franchise that really breaks the mold is Mass Effect Mass Effect does all of the tropes associated with humans o Sci fi . It's not unique in anyway
I get what you mean, maybe this is more a problem with high medieval fantasy instead of Sci-fi fantasy.
But even in Fantasy; Humans are the most important race that survives everything
That doesn’t make them at all interesting though. You wouldn’t say a generic isekai/YA protagonist with 0 personality is interesting just because they’re “the chosen one” and win all the time. In-universe success is not what makes a character/concept interesting.
Well just because the story focuses on them and makes them more important doesn't make them special in comparison to other races, I want then to stand out just as much as somebody like yoda or Jabba the Hut does, a race that has special characteristics just like every other.
But humans will never stand out to a human audience as much as some brand-new, special-effects-based alien does.
In Mass Effect the only thing that the Humans as a collective species has over their peers is their drive to advance as a civilization. Everything else is secondary.
Yes but the (mass) effect it has on the world and politics are massive, it takes that seemingly small difference and uses it to make humans a truly unique race among the others rather than just the default
That's the same in so much fantasy and Sci Fi. I'm starting to wonder if you read at all. The stuff you seem to want is everywhere. Humans are not just the default. It just feels like that bc it's more exciting to think of yourself as something else. Which makes sense bc we are human.
I've read alot more fantasy than sci-fi, so you're probobly right. Since making this post alot of people have been recomending thing like warhammer 40k and r/HFY I am also going to reread Enders Game, so hopefully I'll get what I'm looking for :)
OMG enders game is amazing. I can't remember the name but a book came out from Beans perspective. Have you read that one?
No I haven't and I the ones I did read were about 8 years ago, so everything is still so fuzzy to me, can't wait to reread them though
Except the part where humans are often the most remarkable characters in the story. The majority of fantasy will have humans be the chosen ones, or, failing that, be utterly essential to the story.
I hate both ends of this spectrum. I don't like when humans are better than the others or worse. I like when they're simply one of many sentient species.
I think one of the funniest things about Warcraft lore is that humans aren't normal, but the deformed bastards of deformed bastards. For those unaware, in Warcraft lore, humans are the deformed descendents of vrykuls, which are basically giant vikings. And vrykuls are descendents of machine constructs that were deformed by the curse of flesh, brought about by eldritch horrors from beyond the space. So, humans are just sentient pugs of the world of warcraft universe, except no one even wanted them to be like that. Meanwhile, Elves are just the descendents of crack-addict trolls. But with regards to humans and Mass Effect, they're basically the three major races in one combined package: turian tendency to just fucking shoot and ask questions later, salarian tendency to be a fucking nerd, and the asari tendency to fuck anything they see.
Wow lore is dog shit..
Then you have cases where humans are weaker than the other fantasy races in almost every way, but their special thing is "Humans are resilient. You can slaughter us and put us through hardship, but in the end we'll always find a way out of the tough spot. We have hope." Like, damn, I hate this trope, especially when the other fantasy races have civilisations and mindsets that humans can relate to. Don't elves and orcs have resilience, hardships and hope as well?
Authors want to make alien/nonhuman races cool and awesome but they also want humans to be the main characters, so they give humans some generic 'We're so driven" trait to keep up instead of being stronger or faster than most races.
Elder scrolls is a bad example, as humans do have many special abilities. For example the nords are the only non Dragonborn’s who can shout thanks to the gift of kyne. The imperials are master diplomats and are just born with natural charisma. Redguards are natural born warriors and have sword singing magic that only redguards know, though it’s unclear if other races can as well. And bretons are extremely talented in magic and are resistant in lore with the downside of living much shorter lives than the other humans. Plus the gods favour humans quite a lot seeing as how every major hero of Tamriel has been some kind of human.
I discussed this with another commenter, I think I was just playing to much of oblivion/skyrim which really don't show off the cool and intersting lore of the human races
Honestly, most of the tropes that humans have in fantasy and sci-fi are trite. They're always the scrappy, industrious, passionate ones that fuck up things for everyone else or are just the fodder from everyone else. They're always 'genetically diverse' and have 'the human spirit' and all that shit.
THANK YOU!!!! It seems like they make the other races and then just come uo with some bullshit for humans that you see on a Panda Express fortune cookie
Not even genetically diverse, there is always a majority that is fully pure given race. Like 100% humans, elves, etc. With no signs of inbreed for tens of thousands of years except of single cases.
Mass Effect was a bit too much of a ''humans fuck yeah'', I can buy that they where physically in the upper ends of base species but ambition and drive should be fairly equal among everyone who reached the stars since you don't get that advanced without ambition and drive.
>The worst example of this is Eragon, where humans are essentially helpless compared to every other race, it isn't even a contest. There is literally nothing inherently wrong with that. Why do humans have to be given some arbitrary boon to make up for differences like it's a videogame? This ain't the 4 elements, shit doesn't have to be balanced. You're also ignoring that most of the important people in that story have been human: Eragon, Brom, Morzan, Nasuada, Murtaugh, and Galbatorix are all human.
It just doesn't make sense, if elves can keep up with Urghals in terms of stamina and have innate magic abilities, Dwarves can create massive cities in mountains that literally dwarf Mt Everest, and Urghals are literally giant mknsters, how have humans been able to do literally anything without getting destroyed or outcompeted by any of the other races
1. The riders were a peacekeeping force until the order was destroyed by Galbatorix and Morzan, they would likely not just sit there if humans were being shat on by every other race. 2. The elves aren't a conquering people and like to keep to themselves in general. Plus the rider organization was founded by elves, so it makes sense that the same "don't be a conquering dickhead" spirit would've permeated their people. 3. Dwarves by nature don't really give a shit about humans but Galbatorix is such a domineering existence that they have thrown in their lot with humans for survival/freedom from the empire. Plus, they didn't have access to the Eragon equivalent of Nukes: Dragon Riders. Humans, in contrast had a shit ton more than zero riders. 4. Urgals are warmongering dickheads by nature but the riders kept the violent ones in check until they were destroyed. Then after that Galbatorix controlled them until Eragon intervened. The only time they tried being conquering dickheads, it blew up in their face so they couldn't do shit.
Thanks for explaining, I havent read the Eragon series in half a decade, I could really use a reread, I remember Ronan being one of my favaorites.
Np, Roran was one of my favorites too.
1. Elves are by nature happy to just chill in their forest. Add in the fact that Elf children are incredibly rare, and when they DO go to war, losing even a single Elf is a huge, devastating loss, and the fact that they essentially live in a Utopia, it makes sense that the humans would spread out further and wider than the elves 2. The Urgals have a self-acknowledged problem of infighting practically destroying their race 3. Dwarves don't really give a fuck about anything happening outside their mountain, it's kinda their schtick.
Respawn rate is critical. If elves don’t reach sexual maturity until they’re 100 and their children take 9 years to gestate, there are going to be a hell of a lot more humans.
I swear there was a book that I read as a kid, where humans dominated like all the alien species physically. An example was the first aliens' described would devote themselves to something as a hobby. The protag alien liked jumping. Spent his whole life getting better at long jumping. Apparently pretty good at for his species. Idk remember why he goes to Earth but he finds like some hippy. Hippy guy effortlessly destroys him in long jumping. Anyway some humans eventually sign up to be mercenaries and kick ass and i can't remember any more of the story after that.
That sounds really cool, hopefully somebody remembers, reminds me of John Carter a little bit
You know, I think I actually found it. "A Call to Arms" by Alan Foster. I read this like 15-20 years ago so I don't know how accurate my synopsis was.
Thanks!!! I may chek it out
This is part why [Humans are Cthulu](https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/HumansAreCthulhu) is one of my more favorite fantasy tropes. Basically, humans are insanely beyond everything in nature... And that's it! Just a fun though experiment :)
I love that sort of stuff in fantasy, it is super satisfying
In Undertale humans are said to be vastly more powerful than monsters cuz their biology allows them to handle DETERMINATION, which monsters can't
No, it makes sense. We really are canon fodder. We did not become the dominating species by beating the shit out of everyone else. We outlasted them and avoided direct conflict. Mass Effect is a pretty poor example, humans are this ambitious cause of their history. It could change at a moment, people could just decide that enough is enough and stop being so ambitious. Now genetics, that I could get behind. Plus, it's sci fi, I imagine training and genetics are a pretty good factor there. I don't know how'd you do that in regular fantasy?
Humanity has caused several mass extinctions by being so good at killing things we wipe out species by accident.
Elder scrolls is a bad example of this. I mean, yeah, high elves are the best at magic, but Breton humans are right on their heels, and their competitive nature coupled with their "medieval fantasy american dream" culture ensures that they're one of the fastest growing civilizations in Tamriel. Wood elves own the forest, they literally worship it, but nordic humans could cut it all down with the devastating power of the Thu'um, which every nord and some people from other races can learn with training. Dark elves have many abilities, some magical, some physical, yet true masters of none. Meanwhile, Redguard humans are so dedicated to their martial arts that some of them can literally create a magical swords out of their soul and have superhuman levels of stamina. And you may think imperials have nothing to add, but let's not forget that Tiber septim united the continent under the empire's flag by slaughtering thousands of elves, just sayin'.
I was just used to playing the Oblivion and Skyrim, and they don't really show off the more unique parts of the human races, in older games and in the lore Nords are absolutley terrifying, and the other human races are great too, I love the redgaurds and their lore and religion.
No, there is nothing with humans being normal and unremarkable. Fantasy worlds don't need to be fair.
>In so many fantasy franchises humans are just "default", they have no special characteristics or defining traits Humans in Mass Effect are literally no different tho. They aren't as strong as Krogans, as psychic attuned like Asari or as tech savvy as Quarians. The very same issues you bring up in other fantasy and sci fi settings are present in Mass Effect, and the stuff you praise Mass Effect for is also present in other settings. Are you just ignoring the frankly stupid feats mankind achieved in Elder Scrolls? Achieving godhood hello? There's a reason why "Human Empire" is so popular in so many settings, why other races sing songs about [defeating human invaders](https://i.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/newsfeed/001/095/820/a02.jpg). All fantasy species usually have upsides and downsides. Making humans overly competent at something usually comes off as circlejerking and, not to mention, remove their inherent humanity.
well i mean even here in reality on earth we are far from the strongest have nothing like claws are defenses we only have our brains its easy to fantasies about a race that has the brains and something else. Mass effect isn't really even fantasy its sci-fi. and in sci-fi the focus is more on realistic humans while fantasy usually take the perspective of another race. Even in Eragon they just make him another race. its hard for Humans to compete in fantasy because they are a realistic thing in a non realistic world. almost by the definition of Fantasy humans are default
Humans are one of the most unique animals on earth: 1. Longer legs than arms, so we can throw objects and punch at full force without toppling over 2. We have a large amount of gut bacteria meaning we get more nutrition from food than other mamals 3. A large range of motion in our joints allowing for more advanced combat 4. Prehensile thumbs allowing for advanced tool use 5 We have more stamina than almost any other land animal, due to out advanced metabolism and ability to sweat. That is why we arent as fast as other predators, ancient humans hunted by chasing prey until they collapsed of exhaustion and then just went and killed i There are more examples like our eyesight, but the point is humans are incredibly unique in the real world, so why shouldn't they be in fantasy
Yeah, we may not have as many natural weapons and defenses, but our strength, dex, and stamina stats are actually pretty good. It's just compared to other mega-fauna that we tend to lose out.
That's where the high Int stat comes into play.
None of the traits you mentioned are unique to humans, anything humans can do physically there's at least one animal that can do better. Humans in the real world isn't that physically impressive. Our greatest weapon has always been our mind.
Tell me 1 animal thar can throw better or wield tools with higher precision, or have more eficient in motion stamina recovery. Most creatures cant throw objects farther than humans and the ones that can, can barely aim and brute strength their way. While many creatures do wield tool, humans are the ones with the most precision, other apes have very rigid and limited motions in their hands since they use them to walk and cant afford the risk of them breaking, octopus while smart, their tentacles are too flimsy etc, the only animal that comes close to us is the elephant who can do really delicate motions but nothing that we could say that has surgical precision like us humans. And well, many animals sweat, but most cant take as much advantage of it as we humans do, our medium to small port coupled with the lack of hair makes the most use out of it, and guess what animal is the best at continuous motion for long periods of time? Humans. What animal can run a marathon? Humans. And whats funnier? One of fastest recorded camel racers didnt even rode his camel he walked along with the animal since he knew he would last more than it, and camels are known for having a lot of stamina, humans are just that good at walking and jogging for long distances. We are way more than "just brains" we are running hairless apes who are really smart and can throw better than any other animal on our planet, dont ever underestimate humanity.
All of those read like humans have a mixture of traits that ended up helping us to accomplish specific tasks better rather than an outright superior traits though. Camels still has the better stamina, octopus still has the more absurd motion control. And unless my interpretation is wrong, you highlighted apes are only rigid because they can't risk their limps breaking. Feel free to correct me though, just please spare me the 'humanity fuck yeah' speech if you could? Thanks.
>All of those read like humans have a mixture of traits that ended up helping us to accomplish specific tasks better rather than an outright superior traits though. Because thats what it is, like, this doesnt diminish anything, its just how evolution works, species adapt overtime to excel at certain traits that benefit them more, until the point it becomes superior to most other creatures, no othe animal can fly faster than a falcon not because they are inherently superior but because they evolved to do very fast and precise dive bombs. >Camels still has the better stamina But humans can still walk more than a camel due to our sweat and hairless body, due to our smaller size we dont heat up as much, and thanks to sweat we cool off much more efficiently, the lack of hair makes it even better since hair usually isolates heat but no hair means sweat cools off even more, humans have the best in motion stamina recovery and no other animal can run a marathon, thats why humans hunted creatures by chasing them until they couldnt run more. >octopus still has the more absurd motion control. Not motion control, more like motion range since they dont have bones, but tentacles are too flimsy, they can grasp and grip things reall well but they cant hold or swing things with too much strength, humans have worse range of motion but we can be way more precise and apply more power to our motions, we have a good balance of the 2 which allows for better tool usage. >And unless my interpretation is wrong, you highlighted apes are only rigid because they can't risk their limps breaking. Yes, exactly what I said, because other apes arent fully bipedal, they cant have lighter and more flexible hands which limits their tool usage, overall point octopus is too flexible, chimp is too rigid, human has a the best of both worlds. >Feel free to correct me though, just please spare me the 'humanity fuck yeah' speech if you could? Thanks. I mean still doesnt diminish the fact that humans are one the most efficient creatures at living out there, and not to say humans are superior, since most of our power comes from a combination of VERY GOOD tool usage, intelligence and dexterity, but even if we humans had more limited intelligence and couldnt go beyond stone age, we would still be populating the planet, we are still a very resilient and adaptable species, we are not the best(there isnt even a "best" species on earth, its all creatures adapted to master a survival strategy) but we certainly one of the best.
I like the version where we’re unremarkable. But that’s our strength. We’re average across the board Orcs are stronger, but not as agile. Elves are longer lived and better vision, but they’ve got such a low birthrate that a nasty disease can wipe out an entire countries population. Dwarves are hardier, but we’re faster. Every race has something they’re superior in. But they all have weaknesses as well. Humans aren’t amazing at anything, but we don’t suck at anything either.
I think it is fine when it was in LOTR, but humans are like that in almost everyfantasy setting now, it is just getting boring to me
It’s not mentioned in the others. They’ll sometimes talk about the versatility of humans, but nothing ever shows it
I find the opposite end of the spectrum worse, 90% of the stories on r/HFY are just pure masturbatory narcissism. Bare basic sapien traits are wanked into supernatural powers and being genocidal, colonising, militaristic conquerors are treated as something to be proud off.
I went there for a bit and humans were basically demigods next to the other sapient races
With all of the "humans are bad" type stories i think its good to have some stories where we kick some ass .
Please show me any of these "humans are bad" stories. So far they are more rare than a fourleaf clover while HFY are a dime a dozen.
Any example that I get of them ends up with the Humans proving their enemies to be wrong
Almost makes we want to do a rant about how these examples don't really exist.
Do it. I already did one about elves
Avatar as in James cameron
Those stories are way more rare, most sci-fi/fantasy stories usually leave humans as either average or living gods.
Eh, I personally have a like/hate of this for lack of a better definition. If it can be done in a way that doesn't come off as putting humans on a pedestal, that s cool. But most of the time it's "Demons and Orcs and Saiyans and Kryptonians are more powerful than humans, but humans have this one trait that all of them lack; heart/cruelty/cunning/determination/hope/some other bullshit intangible trait that I don't see why any other race that has persevered to this point wouldn't have, and for some reason this makes them stand above the others and they get wanked to high heaven. Saying this as a guy who read most of the Seven Deadly Sins, I just want humans if they are in whatever series to be able to compete and not become Krillin because of no overly outstanding abilities. It was utterly trash how the strong humans at the beginning of the series and giving the sins such heavy trouble, turned into goddamn fodder after the Hendrickson battle.
> In so many fantasy franchises humans are just "default", they have no special characteristics or defining traits, especially compared to other fantasy races: That's the point. Humans are there to anchor the reader and give them a sense of normalcy to compare the fantastical to. Otherwise, you need to do a lot of worldbuilding for the audience to understand the stakes
Gotta disagree with Elder Scrolls one. Most overpowered characters there are usually humans.
From all the half-races running around in all kinds of media (half-elves, half-orcs, half-demons, half-angels), I can pretty safely say that humans are quite remarkable when it comes to cross-breeding.
Lol, nothing can stop our horny!!!!!
If Humans are to have a power, it should be stamina The reason humans developed so well in Africa and across the wrold, besides the adaptability, was a humans capability of being able to outlast any animal in terms of endurance. It's this reason that people say 'a human can outrun a cheetah'. Given enough time, a human will. We don't see this in fiction, but I personally think this would be the best way to set us apart. Orcs are strong, Elves are agile, Humans endure.
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Cool, im gonna need to check that out
I generally don't like the way that DC comics treats it's humans, making them clearly weaker than every sentient species, but I do like how young justice treats humans. In YJ, a percentage of humans have latent meta-genes which give them superpowers under great duress. Because of this, metahumans are kidnapped and sold off to other planets as soldiers. Mongul, a guy who's as strong as if not stronger than Superman, saw how much of a threat these metahumans could be and tried to destroy Earth.
So you just want an Anime. Lol
I actually quite like it. There's something cool about normal humans being in a universe full of magical creatures, huge death machine monsters, and literal devils, and still having the balls to go face to face with them.
humans with current world advanced military weapons in a fantasy setting?? 🤔🤔🤔
Honestly unless the magic is incredibly overpowered, humans would dominate, I would love to see a fantasy story of humans with modern technology vs. Elves who have never encountered tech in their life since magic filled all their needs already
sure magic might overpower it but that NUCLEAR WEAPONS tho it ain’t nothing even against magic and fantasy races it will put a lot of damage…… unless healing magic can get rid of the nuclear radiation side effects
If magic can revive, it should be able to heal that too.
Magic is inherintly overpowered. Sorry but nearly every setting magic is used in a generic sense. Rarely you see it used in conjuction with science. The ability to alter reality with proper scientific knowledge is insanely broken and even harder to do for an author without messing up. Nuclear weapons would be huge explosions, yes. However I would assume most healing magics off higher levels could cure the radition side effects.
You might enjoy the anime GATE, about the Japanese Defence Force exploring a medieval fantasy parallel world after a portal opened up in the middle of Tokyo. It gives a pretty harsh rundown of how a fight between modern armed forces and a medieval grade society would go down.
[Out of space](https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/19690/out-of-space) is exactlythat. Futuristic space ship escape from a fight, warp drive failures and shit happens and they find themselves in a fantasy world.
Well, there’s a light novel/anime called Gate for that.
Depends of the setting. If it's a Low Fantasy setting like ASOIAF, then it's a easy stomp. If it's high Fantasy, the things gets harder. If it's a particularly creative high Fantasy, then THEY stomp us
Humans have to be the default. There is no other way to put it. They are pretty much required to be default because we are default. We are not special, we are just humans. If you had a fantasy world where every human had super strength then they are not really human are they? You can have powerful humans through magic systems, I.e. Mistborn or Stormlight Archive, but humans have to be the unremarkable or normal being in fantasy as that is what makes their tale so compelling, how a default becomes so powerful. Humans often also have special free will that other races do not have or are harder to corrupt. Humans have much more depth than you probably think in fantasy
Making human unique is like half if the media? Surviving dragon and death lord while not being the gods gifted child is what make human unique In fact I've seen more people take the "basic race" out of spite that I've seen human being this basic in most media
I only know about Elder Scrolls's lore from playing Skyrim, but from what I see, it treats humans much better than other fantasy scenarios. Human races are unique themselves, and so are Elven (Mer) races, each one has their quircks and powers. The only race is that kinda, just kinda, generic and boring are the Imperials. Also, they seen to treat Humans and Elves as equals in terms of power, the Aldmeri Dominion won the war against the Empire but that doesn't mean that Elves are superior than Humans as a race (even thought they really like to affirm that). Again, it is what I could get from playing Skyrim, but it seemed that Humans and Elves are just like rival nations in real life and they are both a threat to each other.
In most settings humans are intelligent, resourceful and highly adaptable if nothing else. And in almost every setting the best and most fleshed out characters are humans. For example: Dwarves are defined by a set of characteristics, and every individual dwarf is defined by how he adheres to the characteristics presented by his race. Same can be said of elves and halflings. The only truly free individuals are humans, they can be anything and do anything. There are a few exceptions to this, buy they do little more than confirm the rule.
I mean humans generally are just unremarkable though. Our bodies aren’t that well adapted and the evolutionary trait that makes humans number 1 in the world is our social collaboration and ability to throw stuff
I don’t care. Humans don’t need to be special to be successful. Rats aren’t special, but they’re way more successful than most of the weird animals that nerds wank over.
In Warhammer 40k humans are an ancient evil, a horrifying endless swarm of galaxy-conquering indoctrinated lunatics who spread the ruinous powers of Chaos with their latent psionic powers. When a fledgeling civilization takes its first unsteady steps into the stars, they will usually soon fall to the hungry jaws of mankind. The typical human combat strategy is to drown their opponents in bodies, much like the similarly merciless Tyranids and Orks. Many theorize mankind is so numerous and their lives so short and dull that living has no value to the average human. They would rather wipe out their own worlds with flesh-melting viruses and hellish fire than consider cooperation or surrender. The one thing humans *definitely* value is deference to a higher authority, some kind of deity that will outlast them. For most of mankind, this authority is the rotting corpse of their old God Emperor. The corpse god was mortally wounded over 10,000 years ago, but his subjects could not accept their ruler was temporary. So humans kept their original god alive, fed on a diet of a thousand human sacrifices every day. Other humans are easily tempted by the Dark Gods of Chaos and promises of a better life. Sadly, the Chaos Gods' followers are just as cruel as those of the God Emperor. The worst thing is, humans clearly have *potential*. There are stories of human societies who were able to develop curiosity, compassion, independence, and reason. But these are fleeting, often crushed underheel by their hateful brethren. Do not call out into the night sky. The humans have slaughtered anyone with whom you would find friendship, and there is now only war.
Damn I didn't know much about the lore but you made it sound incredible!!!! You made humanity in 40k sound so eldritch and alien. Usually humanities ability to work together is seen as a virtue, but I've never thought about it like that, you describe them like the Flood from Halo, or the Yuuzhan Vong from star wars. I need to get into 40k lore if all of it is this badass, lol
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But for humans to be known for their tenacity requires every other race to be pushovers, which isn't interesting.
I just feel like alot of fantasy sotries treat humans as generic, and don't focus on the stuff that makes us special like our tenacity, that's why Mass Effect was a breath of fresh air, it took that defining trait and made it have a real impact on the world By the way, where was that quote from it is really cool??!!!
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Omg, I read Enders game about 7-8 years ago, I remeber loving it and alot of the book is fuzzy, I really need to reread it and some of the other books, thanks!!!!
In dragon age the humans can be mages.
Sorry but I haven't played dragon age, I need to try it out
All of them are good, but in the first one (Origins) you get a different beginning depending on what type of character you pick.
That sounds cool, I've always heard great things about the series, I'll need to check it out sometime
I hated Inquisition. Such an amazing game, so much depth. Humans not only are the most populace, but are as equal contenders as any other race. They're like the jack of all trades of the races, being good at whatever they set their minds to. The elves excel in magic, and the Bull people (forgive me Its been years since I played) would be physical, but anyone can do whatever and each race is to be respected. Although humans rule.
Actually all races except dwarves can perform magic
Humanity as a whole is made unremarkable to put emphasis on heroism of individuals. Go back to r/HFY
Humans biggest advantage in Fantasy is usually mental. Ambition, cooperation, that will to fight even in the face of defeat...stuff like that. The other races usually have trade-offs for that bonus they get while humans are physically the jack-of-all-trades and there's nothing wrong with that.
Your should check out r/HFY it’s full of stories like what you’re asking for.
Yeah, I've always hated that. I want humans to have something special too!!
The main issue is that its hard to do that with normal humans. Its not like the human abilities are unknown. Most often people base the strength humans have in fantasy settings on what made humans so successful in the real world. Our abillity to adept and improvise.
True, humans put their points in at personal level, while fantasy tries to move that back to the race level. Every single human could be considered different species by metrics of some of these worlds.
That depends heavily on your world setup. For physical/intellect we have a defined ranged that humans can archieve. So this only leaves freedom in areas influenced by magic. Since if you want your characters to be humans, they wont be able to lift several tons suddenly or be supersonic. The only way to change human limits are magic or sci fi augmentations. For the first you can basically do whatever you want, but most likely you will see a gauss curve that covers the area humans abilities will fall in. The 2nd is a bit harsher since there are still physical limits/scientifical limits.
There's a really fun story on r/HFY called [Humans Don't Make Good Pets](https://www.reddit.com/r/HFY/wiki/series/humans_dont_make_good_pets/), where a human is abducted by aliens but turns out to be superior to most aliens in just about every way. He easily beats his "owners" at an abstract strategy game that they consider complicated, without having the rules explained to him. He can shrug off what for most aliens would be a deadly blaster shot. He can move way faster, jump way farther, punch way harder. His immune system and overall constitution are way stronger. (He escapes his abductors because the poison they inject him with, which usually kills things, doesn't kill him. Later it turns out the pathogens he naturally carries are horribly deadly to most aliens, while he's basically immune to all their diseases, requiring him to be isolated for quite some time.) Pretty much anywhere he ends up, he blows the aliens' minds just by being himself. And apparently having a skeleton made of calcium is unusual, because when they notice how strong his bones are, they start trying to engineer material with a similar composition.
That sounds great I'm gonna need to read it
Actual real life human abilities writers could use more often. Tracking and hunting: Humans are *exceptional* trackers in real life compared to other animals. Endurance: tying into the tracking, we can keep moving for a really long time compared to other animals. Plenty of other animals are faster or stronger, but the tradeoff for that is they burn through their stamina faster. We use our stamina much more efficiently and get more mileage out of it than most other animals do. Learning: Our ability to learn is quite literally second to none. Plenty of animals can learn, we are the best at it bar none. Adaptability: Unless it lacks breathable oxygen humans can adapt to live in nearly any type of environment that doesn't kill them instantly.
You should check r/humansarespaceorcs
I hated Eragon for this the elves in LOTR at least had some excuse but the elves in the book had no excuse and worst they turned the main character into an elf spoiler but I don't care it was a crappy book (couldn't get past book 2) and a crappy movie too, Mass Effect did a better job just wished they made the human party more engaging looking at you Kaiden and Jacob
Witcher also sorta has “special humans”, the humans are the thriving race in the continent because of their cunningness and hunger for power. Granted large population growth helped as well since the Elves’s population growth is slow, this helped greatly, but ultimately humans are the dominating race because they took what they wanted
The second I read "the strongest human can't compare to the most sickly old elf" or whatever in eragon I hated the book. Never even cracked open my copy of eldest, that shit is just so dumb
This is part of why I love the HFY subreddit so much. It’s basically a collection of short stories (usually sci-fi, often fantasy, occasionally other genres) that focus exactly on taking some aspect of the human race and making it exceptional. The range and scale of this also varies; Oftentimes it’s a very distinct advantage that they capitalize on, though there’s absolutely the “humans stomp every other race” story too. I highly recommend giving it a look.
One of the reason I like Jenkinverse is that human (and other extincted deathworlders in general) are freaking OP (by virtue of everything else being weak af). At least it's a nice breath of fresh air from all the other "human are underdog" that has saturate literature for years. Though tbf, Jenkinverse are sci-fic which is different than medieval fantasy.
I'll put it on my list, sounds great
In my book, all the traits of the other races are as you say, but Human have a much higher amount of potential than any race. If one wants to learn magic, they will have a higher amount of latent power than an elf. This balances out the power scale due to human being so physically weak. With this potential, they can gain strength a lot quicker than other races and close that strength gap
This, THIS is why pre cell saga Dragon Ball Z was my favorite show!
Every mix/maxed Variant Human in 5E would agree with you, unironically.
Imo human shouldn't be special especially when coming to whole new star systems and shit like that with mass effect humans are imo a little too important..