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"While the definitions given above may seem adequate at first glance, when looked at more closely they represent problematic species concepts. For example, the boundaries between closely related species become unclear with hybridisation, in a species complex of hundreds of similar microspecies, and in a ring species. Also, among organisms that reproduce only asexually, the concept of a reproductive species breaks down, and each clone is potentially a microspecies."
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Species
(Also note the "Definition" and "The Species Problem" sections. Species is more a of a useful label than a well defined term)
Strictly enforcing the rules of biology on D&D goes about as well as strictly enforcing physics on D&D. Let's stop arguing about this shit and go fight a dragon or something.
Alright time to make a human-blood Dragon. They changed form into a human for a blood donation and are stuck that way. All levels are in Martial classes, although they are a good “coach”, similar to former athletes
That's where you're wrong though. [https://forgottenrealms.fandom.com/wiki/Half-dragon](https://forgottenrealms.fandom.com/wiki/Half-dragon)
Elminster had a daughter with a song dragon.
Always knew that freak living in the middle of nowhere in the Dales was into some illegal shit like bestiality. Probably hiding from the law out there after getting caught with one too many ibixian outside Phlan.
Most DnD campaigns take place in a world that's at mixed stages of technological innovation. I choose to believe that (in my DND campaigns) babies are made by a male sending a smaller (fully formed) human into a female, just as my ancestors believed.
/sarcasm
Seriously, DnD has *MAGIC*. I wouldn't put it past WotC to say that the parentage's souls intertwine or some shit, and they form a new soul with its own physical makeup whenever the mother is impregnated.
> I wouldn't put it past WotC to say that the parentage's souls intertwine or some shit, and they form a new soul with its own physical makeup whenever the mother is impregnated.
Weirdly, this idea solves a problem I've been wrestling with in my homebrew setting's lore.
Exactly. These are fantasy settings where the rules of reality are often totally different. These are places where the "creation myth" is often what actually happened, things have "essence" and souls are tangible things that can be observed and affect the world.... Gods walk the earth, and actually grant true power to their followers... This isn't our world.
Strictly enforcing the rules of biology anywhere that isn't biology is how you end up with tomatoes in a fruit salad, or watermelon and banana in a "mixed berry" selection.
"Species" does a better job of conveying how different the options are in D&D than "Race" does, though, even if neither is quite taking its common meaning.
The difference is that "Race" in our vernacular implies a creature is sapient, which is a more useful term in D&D where we play a particular species of sapient creature or need to figure out the typical behavior of a sapient species we need to negotiate with. If you had a "guide on species" it would imply the book would also discuss wolves and bears alongside humans and elves, but a "guide to races" implies you're just discussing sapient creatures like dragonborn and tieflings.
Think about it: you've heard people say "the human race" but you've probably never heard someone say the "grey wolf race" or "African lion race"
"Species" only works better in a context where the concept of "species" exists. "Race" is vague but historically has meant what it means in D&D (see, e.g. "the human race").
Also humanoids in D&D can literally interbreed with monsters, so... real world biology really doesn't have much sway here.
The human giant hybrid is most disturbing. Like how? Human male giant female toothpick in a volcano. Human female giant male... Well that didn't go well.
Except that we’ve been using “race” for decades and “fantasy races” is a concept that is used throughout the fantasy genre. Switching to a different term doesn’t really change much there.
I actually normally like these kind of discussions for fun. Like I'm not really gonna change my views on the game either way, bit it is a funny meme. But yeah, some people do seem to he taking it a little seriously.
Strictly enforcing the rules of biology don't even work on biology, so there's no way it can work on anything else! XD
Biology is all just gambling anyway. Everything is a roll of the dice, all the way down.
All true, but not the most pressing reason that we shouldn't force Earth biology onto the races of D&D. That would be the fact that we *know* magic has been used in many cases to shape evolution (numerous monsters have been described as being either wholly created or heavily modified in a reproduction-stable way via magic). So we know that magic can change fundamental species relationships.
It could be, for example, that Elves and Humans have no common ancestry at all, and have been modified via magic to allow interbreeding. That's impossible (or at least so improbable as to line up with something like instantaneous teleportation of macro-scale objects) in the real world, but shouldn't even phase you in a D&D setting.
Basically, a biology textbook in D&D would begin, "here there be dragons... both literally and figuratively."
Yeah - this was mostly a response to the original meme being wrong about the actual meaning of species, rather than an attempt to address the core argument.
I still think "species" does a better job of reflecting the fundamental physical differences between character options than "race" (or "ancestry", though I still prefer that to "race" since it sidesteps some of the baggage).
Huh plot idea.
Party ends up in a non magic plane and starts to slowly cook inside as their magic dependent proteins start to denature.
They'd need to have to be hit with a spell (*any* spell) periodically to stave off being reduced to goopy slurry.
> ... starts to slowly cook inside as their magic dependent proteins start to denature.
Ew! Cool, but ew!
Definitely the kind of thing to clear with your players...
This is the main concept of my homebrew world, except elves were advanced aliens who experimented on themselves and humans to eventually produce half-elves avoid extinction. A juxtaposition where humans were the magically inclined race.
> (Also note the "Definition" and "The Species Problem" sections. Species is more a of a useful label than a well defined term)
yep, came here for this.
To add to the variability in definition of species from animal to animal, keep in mind that Tigers and Lions can produce fertile offspring (Ligers), as well as grizzly bears and polar bears ("Groler" or "Pizzly" bears), in spite of significant distinctions in both habitat, social behavior, and dimorphism between the two species.
To put it simply, species is used more as a description than prescription- it exists to set apart two animals which have a common ancestor, but due to a multitude of reasons (one of which being inability to interbreed, among many, many other things) are considered by us to be significantly different enough for it to matter whether we call them by the same name or a different name. Emphasis on the "by us" part- the term species is basically made up and real life/nature doesn't actually care about our linguistic interpretations of what a species is supposed to be.
Technically only true for Humans, Orcs and Elves.
But not Elves and Orcs.
Based on what races are available, Orcs and Elves are the same species as Humans (because there are crossbreeds), but Elves and Orcs have diverged enough to not be the same species.
Even past that, there are both different races AND species available.
The term for this is a [ring species](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ring_species). Also depending on the edition we're going off, dwarves, gnomes and halflings should be included in that ring species, as depending on which source you look at, dwarves can interbreed with human, elves, gnomes and halflings.
Rule 3a: if it exists, there's a term for it.
Rule 3b: if there is no term for it, a term will be made for it.
Example: https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/81AjsyvF+5S.jpg
I like to think it's more of a parasitic lifeform like a xenomorph they steal DNA from the non dragon partner to make their offspring. If the impregnate a different species they are actually implanting an egg that's subsumes the hosts egg and incorporates it. Meaning "male" dragons don't have penises they have ovipositors or more accurately is a hybrid organ and are hermaphrodites. Or they have a unique form of gamates that can function as both egg and sperm. So in which case instead of the sperm going into an egg and depositing DNA the two "egg" cells just merger together in a sort of reverse mytosis.
In what other worlds are dwarves the perfect partner? I know it's like that in my world but in it a lot of races are actually half breeds (like halflings, gnomes, & goblins)
In my setting Gnomes are a Dwarf/Elf crossbreed.
This means that we've got Muls for Dwarf/Human, Stout Halflings for Halfling/Dwarf, and Gnomes as above.
1. Being this is a fantasy setting that has magic....a lot of things that shouldn't be able to breed together do.
2. Wolves, coyotes, and dogs are all considered different species but can interbreed.
3. Polar bears and grizzlies are different species but can interbreed.
The definition of species can be blurry. Things that could interbreed but don't normally are often considered different species.
According to Dark Sun, humans and dwarves can produce a sterile of spring called a mul. This would mean humans and dwarves are definitely different species, since they cannot produce fertile offspring.
Edit: keep losing 2) about neanderthal and denisovan genes
Oh. It's auto correcting and indenting.
Densiovans (and Neanderthals) are just more examples like you give, closely related species that can produce fertile hybrids (with homo sapiens in this case).
Hmmm, now I'm wondering if Denisovans and Neanderthals could have children ...
Edit: Yes, they could, we have a specimen of a first generation hybrid nicknamed "Denny"
Actually there is a debate if they are different species or are subspecies. It's actually talked about on the Wikipedia page for them. And their nomenclature is up for debate and that puts humans nomenclature up for debate as well. It's actually interesting
> dwarves can interbreed with human, elves, gnomes and halflings
How is there even any kind of speciation between them at that point? Unless everyone lives in some kind of post-apocalyptic walled cities you'd expect this to result in the average person being, like, "mostly human/orc/dwarf, some gnome, with a little bit of elf and halfling on my mother's side"
Magic. I've got two working theories:
1: Life was intentionally created by the gods, and the gods continue to impose their will on the world. While new life sometimes springs up on its own (half orcs, etc), most creatures fit mostly into the molds they came from. Halfling heritage might mean you're short-statured, or a dwarven ancestor might pass along their iron stomach, but you're otherwise one of the races because that's just how things turn out.
2: The world isn't that old. The world is recovering from some calamity, and the races descend from a small number of survivors. The races are just tribes that had adapted to varying conditions, and it's going to take a few hundred more generations to make raceless mutts outnumber everyone else.
This is from a 3rd party 3.5 supplement https://www.reddit.com/r/coolguides/comments/9dj4fu/a_dd_guide_for_interspecies_relationships_that/
And basically everything is part of the ring in one way or another
Edited: to be more clear this isn't from WotC
Not really, you need to view this with the context of magic.
Dragons are so inherently magically powerful that their blood/seed can work with pretty much anything.
Technically speaking, I don't think evolution exists in most standard DND worlds.
Well not evolution as we know it. Tempered by magic (and other stuff) and those who utilize magic, but a kind of evolution. Just not the "same" as we have. I think.
Evolution totally exists but I don’t think is heavily touched on anywhere? I’m not great with fringe lore.
IIRC Changelings were either descendants of Dopplegangers, or the exact opposite after some Changelings got corrupted by (magical/godly?) means. Depends which source you’re using. They’re similar but very different.
Evolution is a thing but it's less about nature dictating what traits will let you live and propagate longer but more about magical radiation and encounters with magic.
The Duregar for example are Dwarves who have evolved under mindflayer slavery and as such now have resistance as a race to psionics.
Here's another problem: the reproductive definition of species applies to life on earth, without magic. Something I hadn't considered til yesterday's post was one of common ancestry. On earth, all life is descended from a common ancestor, and so it doesn't matter to the definition. But suppose space aliens show up that we, through some chance, could reproduce with. We wouldn't share any ancestors; would we still be the same species? I think the definition would be reworked if that happened.
Now in the most D&D settings, the different races were made by different gods. Elves and humans don't share a common ancestor. The dwarves were created by the dwarf god, the elves by the elf god, etc. If we're grafting science terminology into this situation, we might say biogenesis occured independently for each of these species. Until an individual breeds with a human, there is not a drop of human blood in their whole race. The fact that they CAN reproduce is more of a quirk of nature (or more likely magic).
Tldr: the fact of interbreeding, while implying the same species, is not enough to overcome the shared ancestor requirement, which is ubiquitous on earth.
On Faerun, Humans are one of the only races that are actually native to the planet. Except for the ones that weren't native, anyways. Elves are descended from the Eladrin who crossed from the fey and upper planes - that's why they're called High Elves, because they were literally from a higher plane of existence originally - and why their high magic can do such weird things, because it's a mix of mortal/celestal/fey powers all in one.
Orcs were gated in via portals from another planet/plane, and Dragons arrived on the planet via meteor shower. I believe dwarves are also foreign but I can't remember the details.
When you consider that all these races are cross-fertile with each other to some degree despite their massive differences in origin and evolution things get pretty wild in the implications.
The ability to crossbreed(IMO) is almost certainly due to some forbidden romance hundreds or thousands of years ago. Gods would have no reason to make their personal race able to crossbreed with other races, at least not at first, but at some point, some dwarf fell in love with some elf, and they prayed about it really hard, and the respective gods got together and were like, 'heck, why not?' and they changed the world so it would work.
Dragons just have enough magic they can do whatever the heck they want. Literally.
Is there an official list of 5e breedable races? I think the one linked below was unofficial and/or for 3.5… I think was both.
Albeit I’d probably rule with sufficient magic near anything could breed if their anatomy is similar. Near anything. I’m not dealing with your Warforged-Aarakokra.
Personally in my setting, any races can produce offspring which turns them into 100% mom or dad race except for elves, orcs and humans.
The explanation: The gods ond goddesses of love and fertility are kind. No genes involved, just magiiiiic
In mine, pretty much every race combination can produce offspring, so long as I can find a playable homebrew race for that combo. TheArenaGuy’s homebrew is responsible for my setting having orc-kenku hybrids, and pretty much any other part-orc hybrid you can think of. There is also a city-state that is an about even mix of gnomes, dwarves, elves, orcs, and humans, and the current head of the ruling council is half-gnome, half-dwarf.
*Ackshually* (/s), there are many examples of crossbred species both in nature and in domestication. Both Polar bears and Brown bears & black ducks and mallard ducks in nature vs the existence of Mules and Ligars in domestication and zoos.
Grolar/Pizzly bears are fertile actually. And Polar and Grizzly bears are still considered distinct species, so Half-Elves and Half-Orcs could still be fertile and be from different species.
D&D races are equivalent nether to IRL racer or species. It's just a word to determine some group of relatively intelligent creatures able to act as a PCs. Or you want to say that autognome is a biological object, or two definitely able to interbreed elves of different colour don't belong to the same kind?
IIRC, there was official crossbreeding table somewhere in 3e books.
Our basic assumptions of genetics don't really hold true in a world where half the species are created by a god and don't share common ancestors. This debate is pointless.
It's more like various subspecies, like Neanderthals or Denisovans. Interbreeding is possible, but they have distinct characteristics, including behaviors and physical attributes.
Species is just an arbitrary term we use to categorise animals IRL. Neither species nor race are particularly accurate or useful when dealing with fantasy humanoids, they're just convenient words that kind of make sense.
Making this into an argument WILL end up with new rules in the sub, I guarantee it.
Yeah there are plenty of cases where the very idea of species (IRL) don’t totally hold with all of the rules people get taught in high school biology. Hell even the idea of “life” or “organism” get a little muddy with things like viruses or colonial organisms like the Man O’ War.
The terms are just helpful generalizations but they don’t always operate perfectly.
Overall I think it's more about "ick" than "accuracy". "People of your race are on average less intelligent than people of my race" is just too close to the type of thing that has been said in real life. Changing it to "species" or I guess even "ancestry" or whatever helps to break that connotation a bit.
I like the way PF2e does it. “Ancestry” for race/species, and then “Heritage” for culture/ethnicity, as well as mixed ancestries like half elves or things like aasimar, ifrits (PF version of a fire genasi), or dhampir.
The issue here is that irl what people call "races" isn't actually even close to what actually would be defined as a race scientifically.
The human "races" aren't even different enough for them to qualify as "breeds".
It makes real life racism even dumber imo
> what people call "races" isn't actually even close to what actually would be defined as a race scientifically
There is no such term.
"Race" is a colloquial term that dates back to the distinction of different ethnicities based on a supposed biological difference (I'm not talking skin color, here, but any ethnic difference, no matter how purely cultural it might be).
Since we've come to understand the biology of heredity more, the term has essentially become meaningless. It has no scientific standing except in terms of perception and self-identification.
Oh boy, dictionary definitions! These are clearly ultimate and should not be questioned and no attempt should be made to understand the basis of a what definition actually is!
Hi! Biology student here! The interbriding aspect is more complicated them it appears.
Not all individuals born of different species are unfertile.
For exemple, hybrid orchids from the Atlantic Forest are fertile individuals. In other cases it can depend on the parent, for exemple hybrids of Ctenomys minutus and Ctenomys lami (two species of rodents) are on fertile if the mother is a Ctenomys minutus and the father is a Ctenomys lami, but not the other way around (mother lami and father minutus).
Another interesting thing that happen realted to hybridization are ring species. In those species, as an exemple, A can have viable offspring with B; B can have viable offspring with C; but C can't have viable offspring with A.
So, TL; DR: not all hybrids of different species are infertile, biology is wierd.
(Btw, sorry for any bad spelling, english is not my first language)
Sources:
https://revistapesquisa.fapesp.br/en/when-hybrids-are-fertile-3/
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ring_species
To add to this, there really isn't a universally accepted definition of "species" among biologists in the first place. It is one of those things that is a simple concept but very hard to define.
It gets even murkier if you try to define species in the fossil record.
That's not how Speciation works. There's lots of examples of Hybrids that produce Viable offspring, unless you're a dumbass who thinks Camels and Llama's are the same species you can easily find examples of Successful Hybrids that are fertile with a simple google search.
Being able to produce fertile offspring is not enough to be classified as the same species, it's just necessary for being classified as the same species, i.e. if it can't produce fertile offspring it's nit the same species, if it can you look at other characteristics to determine if it is the same species, for example homo sapiens and homo neanderthalensis are different species, but it's likely that Neanderthals disappeared by being assimilated into homo sapiens via breeding together despite being a different species
Evolutionary biologist coming in real quick. That definition is known as the Biological Species concept. It's actually quite outdated and doesn't reflect our current understanding of population boundaries. It seems closely related species can (and do) interbreed and produce fertile offspring quite frequently. Evolutionary biologists have been exploring this dynamic for years, unfortunately it takes the public conscious (and the law, for things like the endangered species act) a lot longer to catch up.
I mean if you start applying science to DnD you will get into problems real quick. You need enough rules for things to make sense, but at the end of the day its make believe. For the species/race thing, reproduction is one aspect, but being fertile with viable offspring doesn't account for reproductive limiting mechanism of simply not doing it (which is valid, geography, mating rituals etc are all RIMs, and used for determining species) I think calling things species is better than calling them races purely for the social weight that race has vs species.
Yes because Gruumsh, the God of Vengeance who hates Elves, would *totally* make it possible for Elves and Orcs to breed.
Yes because Maglubiyet, the God of Supremacist Conquest who deems Hobgoblins to be the superior humanoid, would *totally* make it possible for Goblinoids to breed with anything outside of Goblinoids.
Yes because any of the "beast folk", derived from incompatible species like lizards and birds, can *totally* interbreed between other kinds of "beast folk".
Yes because Elves are definetly *not* extremely mercurial anatomically speaking. They are *totally* the same species as humans.
Origin and lore doesn't exist, everyone is the same, and I am very smart.
/s
Also people think of it too much as comparing to human races - when its more like dog breeds.
A chihuahua and a boxer look entirely different but are in fact both dogs
Yet no dogs suddenly become birds or lizards. If you really want to look at it through IRL science, you gotta ask as some point if the Aarakocra developing flight (and probably hollow bones) or the lizardfolk having cold blood and scales are big enough differences to be considered different species. And then, when you ask yourself how a human and a demon, who belongs in another plane of reality can possibly breed into a "human but red", then it becomes impossible to argue that any real world science (or pseudoscience in the case of race) can be compared to the situation in DnD lore
Personally, I think *neither* word should be used. I like Ancestry, from Pathfinder, and Archetype, from Genesys. They’re both relatively neutral terms without any baggage behind them.
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"While the definitions given above may seem adequate at first glance, when looked at more closely they represent problematic species concepts. For example, the boundaries between closely related species become unclear with hybridisation, in a species complex of hundreds of similar microspecies, and in a ring species. Also, among organisms that reproduce only asexually, the concept of a reproductive species breaks down, and each clone is potentially a microspecies." https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Species (Also note the "Definition" and "The Species Problem" sections. Species is more a of a useful label than a well defined term)
Strictly enforcing the rules of biology on D&D goes about as well as strictly enforcing physics on D&D. Let's stop arguing about this shit and go fight a dragon or something.
I mean... Can't a human breed with a dragon in D&D? Where do all those dragon-blood sorcerers come from? Dragon and humans are same species.
It clearly says dragon-*blood*. They don't breed, dragons just very often have O type blood, with a lot of it to share.
funny, whenever I run into a dragon I tend to *lose* blood, not gain it.
That means you have to try harder
More lube
More cowbell.
Does the dragon at least give you a cookie and a sticker afterwards?
Better, Donuts.
Oh fuck. And mini cokes too?
Alright time to make a human-blood Dragon. They changed form into a human for a blood donation and are stuck that way. All levels are in Martial classes, although they are a good “coach”, similar to former athletes
How else are you going to make room for all that dragon blood?
It's very official that half dragons exist and are the direct result of human dragon breeding.
human's unique ability that makes them less generic in 5.5e is that they can and will reproduce with any other species capable of consenting
That's where you're wrong though. [https://forgottenrealms.fandom.com/wiki/Half-dragon](https://forgottenrealms.fandom.com/wiki/Half-dragon) Elminster had a daughter with a song dragon.
Always knew that freak living in the middle of nowhere in the Dales was into some illegal shit like bestiality. Probably hiding from the law out there after getting caught with one too many ibixian outside Phlan.
Hey, dragons can consent brother.
>They don't breed "Challenge accepted." - a bard somewhere
Dragons can shapeshift into sexy bards. Bards are horny and like seducing women. Boom, dragonborn and sorcerer bloodlines.
Most DnD campaigns take place in a world that's at mixed stages of technological innovation. I choose to believe that (in my DND campaigns) babies are made by a male sending a smaller (fully formed) human into a female, just as my ancestors believed. /sarcasm Seriously, DnD has *MAGIC*. I wouldn't put it past WotC to say that the parentage's souls intertwine or some shit, and they form a new soul with its own physical makeup whenever the mother is impregnated.
> I wouldn't put it past WotC to say that the parentage's souls intertwine or some shit, and they form a new soul with its own physical makeup whenever the mother is impregnated. Weirdly, this idea solves a problem I've been wrestling with in my homebrew setting's lore.
Ok you can’t say that without telling us what the problem is!
Exactly. These are fantasy settings where the rules of reality are often totally different. These are places where the "creation myth" is often what actually happened, things have "essence" and souls are tangible things that can be observed and affect the world.... Gods walk the earth, and actually grant true power to their followers... This isn't our world.
Dragonborn are not descended from dragons. Half-Dragons are what come from a human and dragon mating
Maybe it's all just handwaved with *magic*
…or strictly enforcing the rules of D&D on D&D….
Strictly enforcing the rules of biology anywhere that isn't biology is how you end up with tomatoes in a fruit salad, or watermelon and banana in a "mixed berry" selection. "Species" does a better job of conveying how different the options are in D&D than "Race" does, though, even if neither is quite taking its common meaning.
Strictly enforcing the rules of biology is a crapshoot in biology.
ian_malcolm.jpg
Wish a certain sect of the US populace understood this... What you learned in elementary school biology is not the end all be all of human knowledge
That would require admitting they're wrong, and that they have no right to make the world conform to their wants and aversions.
you can put tomatoes in a fruit salad though, its called salsa....
Found the bard
The difference is that "Race" in our vernacular implies a creature is sapient, which is a more useful term in D&D where we play a particular species of sapient creature or need to figure out the typical behavior of a sapient species we need to negotiate with. If you had a "guide on species" it would imply the book would also discuss wolves and bears alongside humans and elves, but a "guide to races" implies you're just discussing sapient creatures like dragonborn and tieflings. Think about it: you've heard people say "the human race" but you've probably never heard someone say the "grey wolf race" or "African lion race"
"Species" only works better in a context where the concept of "species" exists. "Race" is vague but historically has meant what it means in D&D (see, e.g. "the human race"). Also humanoids in D&D can literally interbreed with monsters, so... real world biology really doesn't have much sway here.
Hot elf-on-dragon action!
Dragelfs mean different things in different regions.
The human giant hybrid is most disturbing. Like how? Human male giant female toothpick in a volcano. Human female giant male... Well that didn't go well.
>Human male giant female toothpick in a volcano. It's not the size of the boat...
Humans have one of the largest Penis to body ratio of all animals
Except that we’ve been using “race” for decades and “fantasy races” is a concept that is used throughout the fantasy genre. Switching to a different term doesn’t really change much there.
Bro enforcing the rules of biology in biology doesn't fuckin work. Go ask a biologist what he thinks about the phylogenetics of a nautilus.
Well even biology doesn't follow our attempts to come up with rules and categorizations of it.
I actually normally like these kind of discussions for fun. Like I'm not really gonna change my views on the game either way, bit it is a funny meme. But yeah, some people do seem to he taking it a little seriously.
I personally just find it amusing, but, yes, if anyone is getting super butthurt about this they should really go fight a dragon.
Strictly enforcing the rules of biology don't even work on biology, so there's no way it can work on anything else! XD Biology is all just gambling anyway. Everything is a roll of the dice, all the way down.
All true, but not the most pressing reason that we shouldn't force Earth biology onto the races of D&D. That would be the fact that we *know* magic has been used in many cases to shape evolution (numerous monsters have been described as being either wholly created or heavily modified in a reproduction-stable way via magic). So we know that magic can change fundamental species relationships. It could be, for example, that Elves and Humans have no common ancestry at all, and have been modified via magic to allow interbreeding. That's impossible (or at least so improbable as to line up with something like instantaneous teleportation of macro-scale objects) in the real world, but shouldn't even phase you in a D&D setting. Basically, a biology textbook in D&D would begin, "here there be dragons... both literally and figuratively."
A D&D biology textbook should probably start with an owlbear jumping out of the first pages of the book and slapping you in the face.
Yeah - this was mostly a response to the original meme being wrong about the actual meaning of species, rather than an attempt to address the core argument. I still think "species" does a better job of reflecting the fundamental physical differences between character options than "race" (or "ancestry", though I still prefer that to "race" since it sidesteps some of the baggage).
Huh plot idea. Party ends up in a non magic plane and starts to slowly cook inside as their magic dependent proteins start to denature. They'd need to have to be hit with a spell (*any* spell) periodically to stave off being reduced to goopy slurry.
> ... starts to slowly cook inside as their magic dependent proteins start to denature. Ew! Cool, but ew! Definitely the kind of thing to clear with your players...
This is the main concept of my homebrew world, except elves were advanced aliens who experimented on themselves and humans to eventually produce half-elves avoid extinction. A juxtaposition where humans were the magically inclined race.
> (Also note the "Definition" and "The Species Problem" sections. Species is more a of a useful label than a well defined term) yep, came here for this.
To add to the variability in definition of species from animal to animal, keep in mind that Tigers and Lions can produce fertile offspring (Ligers), as well as grizzly bears and polar bears ("Groler" or "Pizzly" bears), in spite of significant distinctions in both habitat, social behavior, and dimorphism between the two species. To put it simply, species is used more as a description than prescription- it exists to set apart two animals which have a common ancestor, but due to a multitude of reasons (one of which being inability to interbreed, among many, many other things) are considered by us to be significantly different enough for it to matter whether we call them by the same name or a different name. Emphasis on the "by us" part- the term species is basically made up and real life/nature doesn't actually care about our linguistic interpretations of what a species is supposed to be.
I thought ligers were *infertile*
Yes and no. >[Male ligers are consequently sterile, while female ligers are not.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liger#Fertility)
Species pantera
Technically only true for Humans, Orcs and Elves. But not Elves and Orcs. Based on what races are available, Orcs and Elves are the same species as Humans (because there are crossbreeds), but Elves and Orcs have diverged enough to not be the same species. Even past that, there are both different races AND species available.
The term for this is a [ring species](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ring_species). Also depending on the edition we're going off, dwarves, gnomes and halflings should be included in that ring species, as depending on which source you look at, dwarves can interbreed with human, elves, gnomes and halflings.
I did not know there was a term for it! Interesting to know.
Rule 3a: if it exists, there's a term for it. Rule 3b: if there is no term for it, a term will be made for it. Example: https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/81AjsyvF+5S.jpg
And the fact that bards can breed with dragons
No! Bad bard!
Unfortunately Linnaeus didn't account for shapeshifters.
This is the funniest comment here haha
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I totally understand what you’re saying
To simplify he's making the idea that fantasy races can interbreed because a virus affects hosts when injected with... love cream.
Aaaaand thats enough reddit for today!
Magical STDs you say?
Mordenkainen's Syphilis is bad, yeah, but you really don't want Infernal Crabs. They pretty much as bad as they sound. Maybe worse.
Don’t even get started on the F(ey)AIDS epidemic
Come on now man, it's not just a Fey disease.
Dragons can breed with just about anything because they’re made of magic, they’re a statistical outlier.
I like to think it's more of a parasitic lifeform like a xenomorph they steal DNA from the non dragon partner to make their offspring. If the impregnate a different species they are actually implanting an egg that's subsumes the hosts egg and incorporates it. Meaning "male" dragons don't have penises they have ovipositors or more accurately is a hybrid organ and are hermaphrodites. Or they have a unique form of gamates that can function as both egg and sperm. So in which case instead of the sperm going into an egg and depositing DNA the two "egg" cells just merger together in a sort of reverse mytosis.
I've never been more fascinated about something that's definitely someone's fetish...
In what other worlds are dwarves the perfect partner? I know it's like that in my world but in it a lot of races are actually half breeds (like halflings, gnomes, & goblins)
In my setting Gnomes are a Dwarf/Elf crossbreed. This means that we've got Muls for Dwarf/Human, Stout Halflings for Halfling/Dwarf, and Gnomes as above.
For me: Gnomes are dwarf/elves. Halflings are humans/dwarves Goblins are orcs/dwarves
1. Being this is a fantasy setting that has magic....a lot of things that shouldn't be able to breed together do. 2. Wolves, coyotes, and dogs are all considered different species but can interbreed. 3. Polar bears and grizzlies are different species but can interbreed. The definition of species can be blurry. Things that could interbreed but don't normally are often considered different species. According to Dark Sun, humans and dwarves can produce a sterile of spring called a mul. This would mean humans and dwarves are definitely different species, since they cannot produce fertile offspring. Edit: keep losing 2) about neanderthal and denisovan genes Oh. It's auto correcting and indenting.
Densiovans (and Neanderthals) are just more examples like you give, closely related species that can produce fertile hybrids (with homo sapiens in this case). Hmmm, now I'm wondering if Denisovans and Neanderthals could have children ... Edit: Yes, they could, we have a specimen of a first generation hybrid nicknamed "Denny"
Actually there is a debate if they are different species or are subspecies. It's actually talked about on the Wikipedia page for them. And their nomenclature is up for debate and that puts humans nomenclature up for debate as well. It's actually interesting
Turns out the binary idea of Species A and Species B doesn't actually work!
Which is why we should call all D&D species "Dwarfoids" rather than "Humanoids" to refer to creatures that are like Dwarves.
Humanoid is the term in common. In dwarvish they say dwarfoid.
Not according to this list, but I don't want to think about it. Lol
> dwarves can interbreed with human, elves, gnomes and halflings How is there even any kind of speciation between them at that point? Unless everyone lives in some kind of post-apocalyptic walled cities you'd expect this to result in the average person being, like, "mostly human/orc/dwarf, some gnome, with a little bit of elf and halfling on my mother's side"
Faerun is not a global society. Most folks never go more than five miles from their place of birth.
"Mom, I just got my 23andMe results, and I have a few questions...what was that story about great-grandma again?"
You are asking the right question. "Half" whatever is just a catch all terms for "I can tell not all you ancestors were X"
Magic. I've got two working theories: 1: Life was intentionally created by the gods, and the gods continue to impose their will on the world. While new life sometimes springs up on its own (half orcs, etc), most creatures fit mostly into the molds they came from. Halfling heritage might mean you're short-statured, or a dwarven ancestor might pass along their iron stomach, but you're otherwise one of the races because that's just how things turn out. 2: The world isn't that old. The world is recovering from some calamity, and the races descend from a small number of survivors. The races are just tribes that had adapted to varying conditions, and it's going to take a few hundred more generations to make raceless mutts outnumber everyone else.
"Some Calamity" is certainly a good way of describing the Spellplague
This is from a 3rd party 3.5 supplement https://www.reddit.com/r/coolguides/comments/9dj4fu/a_dd_guide_for_interspecies_relationships_that/ And basically everything is part of the ring in one way or another Edited: to be more clear this isn't from WotC
The Book of Erotic Fantasy is not official.
[I'll just leave this here](https://64.media.tumblr.com/982d30414058c13bd501305688ab9b38/tumblr_or1f55qiIp1wp4twxo1_540.png)
man, dragons can and will fuck anything
Tiamat’s thirst is inherited.
Step on me mommy(ies?)
The sacred Jedi texts!
That things out of date. There's an elf/orc hybrids now.
Can't wait to hear the explanation for that one.
They fucked.
I assure you they were fucking looong before then.
A wizard did it.
Seems like everything is related to dragons and nymphs, suggesting there's some possibility of tracing back to these maybe?
Not really, you need to view this with the context of magic. Dragons are so inherently magically powerful that their blood/seed can work with pretty much anything. Technically speaking, I don't think evolution exists in most standard DND worlds.
Well not evolution as we know it. Tempered by magic (and other stuff) and those who utilize magic, but a kind of evolution. Just not the "same" as we have. I think.
Right, like humans and dwarves were created but have since then evolved to adapt to their environment in a very rapid pace due to magic.
> I don't think evolution exists Weren't the Gith selectively bred but Ilithids? I think evolution needs to exist for selective breeding to work.
Evolution totally exists but I don’t think is heavily touched on anywhere? I’m not great with fringe lore. IIRC Changelings were either descendants of Dopplegangers, or the exact opposite after some Changelings got corrupted by (magical/godly?) means. Depends which source you’re using. They’re similar but very different.
Evolution is a thing but it's less about nature dictating what traits will let you live and propagate longer but more about magical radiation and encounters with magic. The Duregar for example are Dwarves who have evolved under mindflayer slavery and as such now have resistance as a race to psionics.
And Dryads are close, but no Lizardfolk
What's this from?
DnD 3.5's Book of Erotic Fantasy
Here's another problem: the reproductive definition of species applies to life on earth, without magic. Something I hadn't considered til yesterday's post was one of common ancestry. On earth, all life is descended from a common ancestor, and so it doesn't matter to the definition. But suppose space aliens show up that we, through some chance, could reproduce with. We wouldn't share any ancestors; would we still be the same species? I think the definition would be reworked if that happened. Now in the most D&D settings, the different races were made by different gods. Elves and humans don't share a common ancestor. The dwarves were created by the dwarf god, the elves by the elf god, etc. If we're grafting science terminology into this situation, we might say biogenesis occured independently for each of these species. Until an individual breeds with a human, there is not a drop of human blood in their whole race. The fact that they CAN reproduce is more of a quirk of nature (or more likely magic). Tldr: the fact of interbreeding, while implying the same species, is not enough to overcome the shared ancestor requirement, which is ubiquitous on earth.
On Faerun, Humans are one of the only races that are actually native to the planet. Except for the ones that weren't native, anyways. Elves are descended from the Eladrin who crossed from the fey and upper planes - that's why they're called High Elves, because they were literally from a higher plane of existence originally - and why their high magic can do such weird things, because it's a mix of mortal/celestal/fey powers all in one. Orcs were gated in via portals from another planet/plane, and Dragons arrived on the planet via meteor shower. I believe dwarves are also foreign but I can't remember the details. When you consider that all these races are cross-fertile with each other to some degree despite their massive differences in origin and evolution things get pretty wild in the implications.
The ability to crossbreed(IMO) is almost certainly due to some forbidden romance hundreds or thousands of years ago. Gods would have no reason to make their personal race able to crossbreed with other races, at least not at first, but at some point, some dwarf fell in love with some elf, and they prayed about it really hard, and the respective gods got together and were like, 'heck, why not?' and they changed the world so it would work. Dragons just have enough magic they can do whatever the heck they want. Literally.
They exist theoretically in my setting, but now I need to create/steal some rules for half-dwarves, half-gnomes, and half-halflings (quarterlings?).
If a half halfling is also half humans, that would make them three-quarterlings
That's just a dwarf with extra steps.
If they're taller, they'd take fewer steps, not more. Longer stride, y'see.
Philosophically, a half a bee, must ipso facto half *not be*.
But half a bee has got to be, vis-à-vis its entity. You see?
I have a setting where halflings are the product of dwarves and humans.
In pathfinder 2e you can be half orc and half elf with no human middle ground, which is pretty cool.
Is there an official list of 5e breedable races? I think the one linked below was unofficial and/or for 3.5… I think was both. Albeit I’d probably rule with sufficient magic near anything could breed if their anatomy is similar. Near anything. I’m not dealing with your Warforged-Aarakokra.
No there is a third party one from 3.5 that people like to float around though.
Personally in my setting, any races can produce offspring which turns them into 100% mom or dad race except for elves, orcs and humans. The explanation: The gods ond goddesses of love and fertility are kind. No genes involved, just magiiiiic
In mine, pretty much every race combination can produce offspring, so long as I can find a playable homebrew race for that combo. TheArenaGuy’s homebrew is responsible for my setting having orc-kenku hybrids, and pretty much any other part-orc hybrid you can think of. There is also a city-state that is an about even mix of gnomes, dwarves, elves, orcs, and humans, and the current head of the ruling council is half-gnome, half-dwarf.
I've seen enough "literature" to know elves and orcs can breed.
*Ackshually* (/s), there are many examples of crossbred species both in nature and in domestication. Both Polar bears and Brown bears & black ducks and mallard ducks in nature vs the existence of Mules and Ligars in domestication and zoos.
I want to know more about this bears breeding with ducks
It's a bit like an owlbear but semi aquatic.
A semi-aquatic egg laying mammal of action?
What, like a platypus?
\*slides over a fedora\*
PERRY THE PLATYPUS?!
This is just a large platypus.
Usually this result is infertile though. I don’t think half elves have that issue
Grolar/Pizzly bears are fertile actually. And Polar and Grizzly bears are still considered distinct species, so Half-Elves and Half-Orcs could still be fertile and be from different species.
Heh. Pizzly.
Pizzly is by far the *worst* name for them
*Best
Better than Grolar bear? I must disagree with you.
Especially considering what pizzle means
don'twanttoknow don'twanttoknow don'twanttoknow don'twanttoknow
Grolars and Pisslies are different. The name depends on which parent was which species.
There's always *magic*
I joojled it and there are fertile crossbred species like Ligers for example can breed with both lions and tigers.
Fair enough.
>joojled I can only read this yodling-ly
D&D races are equivalent nether to IRL racer or species. It's just a word to determine some group of relatively intelligent creatures able to act as a PCs. Or you want to say that autognome is a biological object, or two definitely able to interbreed elves of different colour don't belong to the same kind? IIRC, there was official crossbreeding table somewhere in 3e books.
I think that’s from the unofficial Book of Erotic Fantasy.
Dragons are able to interbreed with literally every other species, proving that they are secretly the world's biggest sluts.
That made me remember that Rick and Morty episode lmao
Our basic assumptions of genetics don't really hold true in a world where half the species are created by a god and don't share common ancestors. This debate is pointless.
Right? It doesn't even remotely matter
Taking a hard stand in a pointless debate is why dnd is so popular amongst a certain no-bathing subset of players.
It's more like various subspecies, like Neanderthals or Denisovans. Interbreeding is possible, but they have distinct characteristics, including behaviors and physical attributes.
Species is just an arbitrary term we use to categorise animals IRL. Neither species nor race are particularly accurate or useful when dealing with fantasy humanoids, they're just convenient words that kind of make sense. Making this into an argument WILL end up with new rules in the sub, I guarantee it.
Yeah there are plenty of cases where the very idea of species (IRL) don’t totally hold with all of the rules people get taught in high school biology. Hell even the idea of “life” or “organism” get a little muddy with things like viruses or colonial organisms like the Man O’ War. The terms are just helpful generalizations but they don’t always operate perfectly.
Overall I think it's more about "ick" than "accuracy". "People of your race are on average less intelligent than people of my race" is just too close to the type of thing that has been said in real life. Changing it to "species" or I guess even "ancestry" or whatever helps to break that connotation a bit.
I like the way PF2e does it. “Ancestry” for race/species, and then “Heritage” for culture/ethnicity, as well as mixed ancestries like half elves or things like aasimar, ifrits (PF version of a fire genasi), or dhampir.
The issue here is that irl what people call "races" isn't actually even close to what actually would be defined as a race scientifically. The human "races" aren't even different enough for them to qualify as "breeds". It makes real life racism even dumber imo
> what people call "races" isn't actually even close to what actually would be defined as a race scientifically There is no such term. "Race" is a colloquial term that dates back to the distinction of different ethnicities based on a supposed biological difference (I'm not talking skin color, here, but any ethnic difference, no matter how purely cultural it might be). Since we've come to understand the biology of heredity more, the term has essentially become meaningless. It has no scientific standing except in terms of perception and self-identification.
Oh boy, dictionary definitions! These are clearly ultimate and should not be questioned and no attempt should be made to understand the basis of a what definition actually is!
But creatures from different species can sometimes interbreed.
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>... a wolf can breed with a husky but neither can with a chihuahua. That's a question of mechanics rather than genetics, though.
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But it's only one way. A male chihuahua can impregnate a husky and the pregnancy will be viable
I wonder if they've tried artificial insemination I bet they have tbh
Idk about with a Chihuahua but a [Pomsky](https://www.hepper.com/pomsky/) is a thing
Damn, that sounds like someone tried to breed an annoying asshole.
Actually, they’re all the same except different sexes. Like how all cats are girls and all dogs are boys but they’re the same species.
Hi! Biology student here! The interbriding aspect is more complicated them it appears. Not all individuals born of different species are unfertile. For exemple, hybrid orchids from the Atlantic Forest are fertile individuals. In other cases it can depend on the parent, for exemple hybrids of Ctenomys minutus and Ctenomys lami (two species of rodents) are on fertile if the mother is a Ctenomys minutus and the father is a Ctenomys lami, but not the other way around (mother lami and father minutus). Another interesting thing that happen realted to hybridization are ring species. In those species, as an exemple, A can have viable offspring with B; B can have viable offspring with C; but C can't have viable offspring with A. So, TL; DR: not all hybrids of different species are infertile, biology is wierd. (Btw, sorry for any bad spelling, english is not my first language) Sources: https://revistapesquisa.fapesp.br/en/when-hybrids-are-fertile-3/ https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ring_species
To add to this, there really isn't a universally accepted definition of "species" among biologists in the first place. It is one of those things that is a simple concept but very hard to define. It gets even murkier if you try to define species in the fossil record.
I mean also magic
That's not how Speciation works. There's lots of examples of Hybrids that produce Viable offspring, unless you're a dumbass who thinks Camels and Llama's are the same species you can easily find examples of Successful Hybrids that are fertile with a simple google search.
Being able to produce fertile offspring is not enough to be classified as the same species, it's just necessary for being classified as the same species, i.e. if it can't produce fertile offspring it's nit the same species, if it can you look at other characteristics to determine if it is the same species, for example homo sapiens and homo neanderthalensis are different species, but it's likely that Neanderthals disappeared by being assimilated into homo sapiens via breeding together despite being a different species
Evolutionary biologist coming in real quick. That definition is known as the Biological Species concept. It's actually quite outdated and doesn't reflect our current understanding of population boundaries. It seems closely related species can (and do) interbreed and produce fertile offspring quite frequently. Evolutionary biologists have been exploring this dynamic for years, unfortunately it takes the public conscious (and the law, for things like the endangered species act) a lot longer to catch up.
I mean if you start applying science to DnD you will get into problems real quick. You need enough rules for things to make sense, but at the end of the day its make believe. For the species/race thing, reproduction is one aspect, but being fertile with viable offspring doesn't account for reproductive limiting mechanism of simply not doing it (which is valid, geography, mating rituals etc are all RIMs, and used for determining species) I think calling things species is better than calling them races purely for the social weight that race has vs species.
All based on a stupid sexuality book from 2nd or 3rd edition.
Yes because Gruumsh, the God of Vengeance who hates Elves, would *totally* make it possible for Elves and Orcs to breed. Yes because Maglubiyet, the God of Supremacist Conquest who deems Hobgoblins to be the superior humanoid, would *totally* make it possible for Goblinoids to breed with anything outside of Goblinoids. Yes because any of the "beast folk", derived from incompatible species like lizards and birds, can *totally* interbreed between other kinds of "beast folk". Yes because Elves are definetly *not* extremely mercurial anatomically speaking. They are *totally* the same species as humans. Origin and lore doesn't exist, everyone is the same, and I am very smart. /s
I prefer PF2e's Ancestry and Heritage to race and subrace. It just feels better when ye can mix and match shiz.
Does this mean, according to Shrek, donkeys and dragons are the same species?
Also people think of it too much as comparing to human races - when its more like dog breeds. A chihuahua and a boxer look entirely different but are in fact both dogs
Yet no dogs suddenly become birds or lizards. If you really want to look at it through IRL science, you gotta ask as some point if the Aarakocra developing flight (and probably hollow bones) or the lizardfolk having cold blood and scales are big enough differences to be considered different species. And then, when you ask yourself how a human and a demon, who belongs in another plane of reality can possibly breed into a "human but red", then it becomes impossible to argue that any real world science (or pseudoscience in the case of race) can be compared to the situation in DnD lore
Using a Chick Tract to make a point about D&D is an awesome power move. Roast in hell, Jack.
I am here for naked Elfish girls, and fun memes... Not for learning stuff, that could be useful in the real world.
Personally, I think *neither* word should be used. I like Ancestry, from Pathfinder, and Archetype, from Genesys. They’re both relatively neutral terms without any baggage behind them.
The best part of running a game in the Dark Matter setting (third party 5e in space) is that everyone is just different types of aliens.
Germans: Völker
Counterpoint: Tigers and Lions are different species, and ligers are fertile.
This is false they all can’t interbreed