One thing I like to keep in mind when writing non-humans is a line from one of the old Gurps splats: rp an (alien) character who says, "You want me to MISS MY LUNCH?!?" with the same passion a human would say, "You want me to MURDER A CHILD?!?" - this is, different priorities, different values. A lot of differences between humans and very humanlike "races" (species? depends on the writer) like dwarves and elves is more cultural than biological. Pratchett, for example, did some fun stuff with pushing it a little further. With his dwarves, for example, gender isn't so much a binary as it is with humans. A female dwarf is just sort of seen as a dwarf with a talent (bearing children) in the way a human who's really tall would seem to be a natural for playing basketball. Something that is fairly alien for humans to think of. I ran up against this years ago when I was designing centaur culture for one of my headworlds. I had them be matriarchal, with the center of social life being a herd/tribe of females and their children. Males, at adolescence, are sent away from the herd and while some strike it out alone, most gather in bachelor groups. Every couple of years all the tribes and groups gather together for a competition where the males show off, and negotiate contracts to hire on as a herd male for a few years, along with his group of support males. He doesn't lead the herd, his job is to protect it and to contribute genes - the contract only lasts a short while because the protection part is physically tough and they only want a male at his peak, and you don't want to have too many kids by the same father because of genetic issues. Ok, so good so far. I based this on how wild horse herds actually work. But I found a large number of my (I assume) human reads couldn't get past this detail: some centaur males voluntarily gelded themselves. Why? Some did it to remain with the herd all their lives, for various reasons. Others did it because they knew they didn't have it in them to win a breeding contract, and wanted to be the best "support" for another male (who might be a genetic relative). Intact males have a tendency to end up fighting each other, and that can damage their chances at a contract. In real life, of course, we geld horses because stallions are unbearable jerks and can't really be safely kept around other stallions or mares. Even though I laid out all the reasons why this would work for centaurs, and even though there are plenty of examples in both the animal kingdom and human societies of similar things, and I pointed out how it gave all kinds of opportunities for unique drama, some folks couldn't take themselves outside of their own perception and understand why anyone would do this. These are the sorts of people, I think, who would choose a human character, or play an elf as just a human with some cosmetic changes.
Okay. First: I LOVE YOUR CENTAURS! not only have you put a lot of thought into it, but you've based it on reality. The first thing I thought of were Elephants actually. The Matriarch, no longer able to bear children, but the leader because she knows how to get sh*t done! SO Kudos to you. People who are weirded out by what you wrote are the same people who would fail a culture studies class. They can't see beyond their own experience, and perhaps more important, they don't feel comfortable with anything that might be different from them. Second: I've not read Pratchett. I have a reverence for fantasy and somewhere along the line I got the idea that he made fun of it. However his take on dwarves is rather awesome. It's not uncommon to give "female" dwarves facial hair. To really challenge the gender norm though as you've described is friggin awesome. See what I mean: Humans are boring!
A tangent, but I just want to know how the hell a Draenei/Orc combo ends up looking like a hot green human woman?! *throws hands in Garona's direction* Like okay, I can see a bit of orc, but not a damn hint of space-goat!
That's actually a really cool take on centaurs and I totally love it. I'd definitely love to read about them and that's the kind of awesome lore/world-building I really enjoy personally. That actually gives me a random idea for the ranger I'm working on... A centaur ranger could be cool and it's interesting to think about what kind of challenges they would have living with more humanoid races. I mean, stairs would be a challenge. Can you imagine a dungeon crawl with a centaur? They likely would have to be super hunched over to deal with the low ceilings, not to mention traps would be near impossible to dodge... It gives a lot of cool options. Crap, plot bunnies ahoy! I may have to do a few series. Centaurs, elves, orcs...and more!
I believe movie Garona is half orc, half human. IIRC, there's a strong implication that Medihv is her father.
You could take inspiration from the mining ponies: Pit pony - Wikipedia - just use a smaller than average breed of centaur, maybe more like a dwarf/shetland than the typical human/riding horse. I imagine for all their disadvantages, in certain types of dungeons centaurs would have advantages over humans. Pit trap? Jump over it. Darkness? Horses have superior night vision, which centaurs could logically have as well. Shaft filling up with poisonous gas? A centaur has extra lung capacity and can hold their breath longer. In a collapsing tunnel? They're faster on the straightaway. Not to mention being able to carry more loot, equipment, and injured party members. Plus there's the element of surprise, whatever monsters dwell in the dungeon might never have seen or interacted with a centaur before. And horses can be surprisingly agile - especially with a human brain and visual capabilities piloting the horse body. You could also say centaurs only LOOK like a mix of human and horse, but are actually their own creature, and could have some anatomical similarities to other ungulates like goats, which are extremely agile.
I may have missed them implying that as I was only half-paying attention while watching it on Amazon. In the game lore, her latest rendition is Orc/Draenei and she ends up having a hybrid child with Medivh, whose a 1/2 human, 1/4 orc, 1/4 Draenei with super magical powers that also can call Shamanic and Holy powers. So that's a bit of a kerfluffle, but it's canon lore! At least in game. They might be doing a "movie version" of the universe, much like Avengers and X-Men have done.
You just reminded me of one of my favorite game versions of centaurs. The Horseborn of the Banner Sage series. They're an awesome Celtic-style rendition of centaurs that are based on Welsh ponies, I believe. So they're a bit taller than humans, but not as incredibly huge as some versions of centaurs. That goes well with the idea of Pit Ponies, as Welsh ponies were frequently used in the pits. Those are some very good points. Centaurs could have some really good advantages and disadvantages that would make them a very interesting concept in a dungeon. Heck, in any situation really! Melee with a centaur could involve some incredibly brutal kicks and body-checks, but then they also are a considerably larger target than most humans. Most shields wouldn't cover them as well. They'd need specialized armor. However, can you imagine a centaur in a mixture of heavy knight armor and barding? With a draft horse build they would literally be an intelligent, agile, and deadly tank. So many possibilities... EDITED TO ADD: A short little video of the Horseborn from the Banner Saga. Caution! Some spoilers but lovely art!
Well, I found Medivh the least interesting part of the movie, so I won't swear I was paying tons of attention, but the game lore is why I thought the movie lore was, umm...questionable, LOL. But I'm pretty sure the game has retconned Med'an anyway.
The Warcraft movie definitely did not follow game lore. Thrall wasn't born on Azeroth. That's completely not how Gul'dan taking over went. That's not how Ogrim was nor how Durotan or Draka died. Thrall didn't float down a river! And that's not even touching the mess of the human side of the movie! I believe they retconned Med'an being the new Guardian, but he still canonically exists? I could be wrong though. I don't play WoW much anymore and the game lore is such a mess I may be well behind the times.
I don't think they've confirmed whether he exists, just that he isn't the Guardian. There hasn't been any indication they intend to bring him into the game, but I guess someone could namedrop him in a novel or comic, if anyone at Blizz even still remembers him.
According to the WoW gamepedia, he's still "canon" but not all the stories about him are? Of course, next expansion, they could just completely rewrite or throw him out! Who knows? Blizzard has been unkind to lore in recent years! On another note, I blame @RauthrMystic & @Viergacht because I now have a centaur character on the brain and have been jotting down ideas all day and last night! Like I need more half-formed ideas racing around in my head!
I'm innocent...i just REALLY appreciate good world building!! so feel free to share lol I like cultural differences that happen in a non human race. It's especially interesting because they are still humanish. Their buildings, infrastructure, religious themes, I mean there are literally so many avenues of exploration!! *edit* And since this is a thread about different races/species this would be the perfect place to put up some ideas!
That is true! I'm working out some interesting thoughts on how a centaur's furniture, architecture, and such things could work compared to humans. I mean obviously they wouldn't have chairs, beds, stairs, and tons of other common human/humanoid conveniences. So what would they have? I personally don't think they'd treat themselves like farm animals and live in just a horse/donkey stable. So I'm pondering what they would use for those kinds of comforts instead.
Late to the thread, not even going to pretend I've read all of it. Now, why are the vast majority of LitRPG/Gamelit MCs humans? Because many of the authors of gamelit are gamers themselves. I'm a tabletop gamer, myself, and if you ask in any tabletop group, you'll find that even in games where you have multitudes of options for characters, somewhere like 80% of the player characters end up as humans or elves of some kind, unless they are specifically going for either a build that plays on a different race's strengths (troll barbarian) or subverts tropes as a gag (dwarf bard). And even in games like World of Warcraft, the overwhelming majority of characters are humans and elves. Don't believe me? Someone actually went and got statistics. On US servers, Humans, Blood Elves, and Night Elves combine to make up 43% of characters. Dwarves are 4.4%. World of Warcraft: character distribution by race 2018 | Statistic Basically, everyone really likes the 'idea' of nonhuman, nonelf characters, but when it comes down to making a character? Most gamers pick humans or elves. And since most gamelit authors are gamers...
I'm not sure "because they're gamers and play humans in the MMOs they play" really explains the why behind it, but it's a good start. The question then just morphs into, why do they play humans (and more human-like races) in World of Warcraft? I really think it comes down to familiarity. People play humans because they are human; they understand human motivations better than they do the motivations of, say, Draenei or Pandarens. There's a comfort factor involved in playing something you already know. This goes double for writing a character in a story. They say "familiarity breeds contempt," but the truth is that familiarity is what keeps our heads level.
You're right in some ways, but there's another way to look at it too! 43% like humans or elves, but the other 57% like something nonhuman and a little different. So there's definitely a market and an interest, I would think anyway, in characters that are a bit more outside the "normal human" ones. There's nothing wrong with either side; human MCs can be great and I think nonhumans can be too. For tabletop, it honestly depends on the game. For example with 5e D&D, humans and variant humans have some very strong advantages to the system. Most of the players I know pick them because humans give the best options to min-max for the classes and builds they want. Now I do agree that familiarity is part of it, but some people pick the race for other reasons. In Wow, for example, humans have some pretty damn fine racial bonuses, including 10% to reputations (a big thing in game), a free get-out-of-stun option, and 10% increase to all secondary stats. Those are damn fine and useful bonuses to have in game. So while I do think a lot of people play what they know because 1) it looks familiar and 2) if they're Rping, they don't have to pretend too hard to be human, I think a lot of them are picking them for logical reasons as well to maximize their efficiency and ability in game.
they might have chaise lounge type things. I mean horses do curl up on the ground sometimes. There would probably be 'dirt' or 'sand' pits for them to roll around in, Romanesque hot bath houses? see you've got my imagination go crazy
I will say, as an elf stuck in a human body, that being an elf and being a human have a discernible difference (stats, culture mostly). The problem in many LitRPG is that even if they do choose a non human race, it's mostly just a change to their avatar. It doesn't mean anything.
