Race Relations (in Faerun).
Time for more D&D lore questions/discussions!
It has occurred to me that there's a lot of mix-race lovin' in Faerun, and Half-Elves in particularly seem pretty common. Which is pretty weird for me to imagine cos ... well... you'd don't wanna be a Warhammer Fantasy Half-Orc.
My question is how are such relationships viewed by their respective communities in general? And more specifically, how do humans and elves view relationships between the two groups?
It seems odd that elves would willing form unions with humans, whose much shorter lifespan means that they'd be a widow or widower in a fairly short period of time for an elf, but a lifetime for a human.
Also, do elves have any concept of polygamy? It is fairly common in ancient/medieval eastern cultures, but I wonder if an elven maiden would ever willing become 'one of the wives/concubine' of a human man, no matter how rich or powerful.
It has occurred to me that there's a lot of mix-race lovin' in Faerun, and Half-Elves in particularly seem pretty common. Which is pretty weird for me to imagine cos ... well... you'd don't wanna be a Warhammer Fantasy Half-Orc.
My question is how are such relationships viewed by their respective communities in general? And more specifically, how do humans and elves view relationships between the two groups?
It seems odd that elves would willing form unions with humans, whose much shorter lifespan means that they'd be a widow or widower in a fairly short period of time for an elf, but a lifetime for a human.
Also, do elves have any concept of polygamy? It is fairly common in ancient/medieval eastern cultures, but I wonder if an elven maiden would ever willing become 'one of the wives/concubine' of a human man, no matter how rich or powerful.
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the backstory, iirc (only read the comics), was that his mother lied and said she was raped to protect her son, since she was actually married to an Elven prince at the time. So for many years he thought he was the product of rape, and that may have factored in to how he was viewed.
That being said, it really depends which kind of half-elf the offspring is part of: moon/wood/aquatic/wild/sun half-elves are of course more tolerated on the surface world than half-drow (and vice versa within the Underdark). Fey'ri on the other hand, which are basically winged sun elf tieflings, are nowhere tolerated.
Now, half-orcs have really drawn the short end of the stick here. Many humans in the North would outright kill any unlucky half-orc they encounter out of sheer hatred. The fact that most such unions are the result of rape doesn't make things any better for them as well. However, there exist a city in Thesk called Phsant where thousands of gray orcs and half-orcs citizens alike live an honest and civilized life.
OMG believe it or not, despite being a D&D lore noobie, I randomly know about the city of Phsant! (Though not about its Half-Orc population.) And it is actually related to my original question...
I was creating a background for some characters for my Black Pits party, and I decided two of them were brothers, who were the sons of a refugee from Shou Lung, who fled to Faerun to escape the Tuigan invasion of 1359, which is the most obvious (and only) reference I have seen for Shou characters to be seen in Faerun.
So naturally I found the huge map of Faerun online and tried to find a suitable hometown for the brothers... somewhere in eastern Faerun would make more sense, since there's no reason for refugees to flee all the way to the Sword Coast. Pretty soon I noticed the Golden Way, which was clearly inspired by the Silk Road, and found that Telflamm was the western end of the trade route, which would make an ideal hometown... if it wasn't evil.
So I looked a bit more, and in reading about Thesk, I found out that the Tuigan Horde was in fact halted at Phsant, which in 1453 was ruled by a Shou hero, which implies a significant Shou population within the city. Thus I chose Phsant as my characters' hometown.
Anyway because I wanted one of the brothers to be a sorcerer, I thought I'd explain his magical lineage via a maternal inheritance, and so decided that the brothers would have to be half-brothers. This is when the issue of the Shou man having a second wife, possibly of elven origin, arose, as I pondered the likelihood of an elf willingly marrying a human, let alone sharing him with another woman.
I think Elves take time to date, marry and reproduce off-spring with other Elves... A date can last a year for example as they are so long lived... Half-Elves, in my head, are products of elven males and human females mostly, as any human lady would swoon at the overlong affection an elf would probably give, whilst the elven males probably think human females are easy (Went to last base in only a year! WOW I'm a stud!)
As we all know, the dwarf Cassanunda, romanced many a lady, but I think the short races mostly mate with each other, due to a psychological mindset that causes size issues, that the Male shorties always carry around... Maybe the male tallies would romance the lady smallies every now and a while, but I don't think the male smallies would put up with it for long...
Actually I guess the NPC companions are supposed to be really unique and 'special' individuals. In a world where most nations have 80%+ human populations, I almost wish Khalid and Jaheira were Human, since they are canon party members, and would make the tale more 'realistic', if less 'classic fantasy'. In fact I am surprised there is no dwarf in the canon party...
Half-orcs tend to have a human mother and an orcish father, I'm very sure that the woman didn't want to have a half-orc as son/daughter at all so I suspect that it wasn't by love that the orc left her pregnant.
Half-orcs are (on the sword coast and northwest) tolerated but unwelcome. Likely to be treated like dirt and suffer a lot of casual racism (and likely violence before they outgrow their human neighbours). Often ostracised or cast out as soon as they they reach adulthood (or earlier, if their family lacks even the tiniest bit of heart, which of course often leads to their deaths), half-orcs commonly have to form their own communities to be accepted or join up with less picky comrades who appreciate their strength. And those parts are generally the ones considered the most accepting of half-orcs (Besides the ones where Gray Orcs are the dominant orcish race).
As for your characters, OP, there is no reason why a female elf and male human (or vice versa) wouldn't fall in love with each other. Whether they would be willing to become a second wife or concubine would be up to their individual personality and cultural background more than anything else, and I'm not very familiar with the Kara-Tur setting. On the other hand, there's really no reason the half-elf couldn't he the bastard of a temporary romantic fling either.
On the third hand, even if they shared both parents it's not unlikely that the supernatural heritage only manifested in one of the brothers. Lineages such as these are things that can skip generations or go completely unnoticed for ages before randomly showing up in a descendant.
Unless I am mistaken, there is very little detailed official lore on Kara-tur, and what there is is massively focused on Wa and Kozakura, the two nations inspired by Japan (i.e. Samurai and Ninja). So I base my Shou culture based on ancient/traditional Chinese culture, where polygamy was relatively common, and considered the norm amongst the ruling class. Obviously the complicating factor is that there were no elves in ancient China
@CrevsDaak
It's kinda disturbing to think that there's thousands (or maybe more) Half-Orcs in Faerun, enough for large communities to apparently exist... and yet most of you think the primary mode of conception is rape. -.-
Games Workshop used to have a monster race in Warhammer Fantasy called the Fimir, who reproduced via rape. This was later ret-conned and more or less wiped from the lore, presumably because they felt it was inappropriate, even in a dark fantasy setting.
Actually Games Workshop have a habit of killing off races and just explaining it as extinction. (No 'Space Dwarves' AKA Squats in Warhammer 40K)
Half-elves do have problems fitting in with strictly human or elvish communities. Their long lives, compared to humans, mean they come to puberty slower, and therefore are still interested in "childish" interests long after their human friends are moving on. Among elves, it's the other way around. Half-elves mature quicker, and quickly outpace their elven friends in more adult interests. Adult elves might also treat them as kids for far longer than they would feel comfortable with (Imagine being treated as a child when you are a young teen or mid-teen and how much that would irk you). Also, elves have a real sense that their race is being outcompeted for living space and offspring by humans, so some want to keep the elven race as "pure" as possible. If you are looking for a real-world analogue, check out the way race bigots think that "brown people" are taking over from whites, and how "we"/they should keep the white race pure and unsullied (albeit generally without the violence in the real world). Other elves, just as people in the real world do, don't make snap judgements on humans as a whole, but on a case-by-case basis. "This humans ia a friend and someone I wouldn't mind hanging out with, while as that human is sour and suspicious and I'd rather avoid him/her if I have a choice."
In short, humans and other races in the Forgotten Realms are adaptable. Some of them are prejudiced, many of them are not. A smaller subset are extremely prejudiced. I am sure that there are humans who are "wannabes" for certain races, like humans who idolize film stars, there are humans who want to be elves and treat all elves like we do movie stars. And there are members of every race who are good, evil and neutral. And how people react to prejudice is different, too. Some people who are subjected to prejudice try not to be prejudiced towards others. While others can pull an attitude of "I may be rejected because I am X, but at least I'm not Y (Half-orc, or Rashemi, or what have you)!"
TL;DR "It's complicated".
It does make sense to have isolated human ethnicities in places such as Thaymount (Thayan Racists) or Deep Imaskar (Imaskari have been isolated for millenia and show significant unique features (affinity to magic, adaptations to the underdark, higher intellect), which are curiously gone as of 4e, where they are treated as normal humans (albeit ones having very pale skin, hair and eye colors (as well as a fashion sense nothing short of bizarre), which is to be expected given their lack of need for melanin in the underdark)), but in places like the sword coast? Seems to be a bit of a stretch that people do not claim various ethnicities on their heritage, given the trade routes and relatively easy traveling between the regions.
Although I must agree that offspring from unions where the other belongs to an evil race is likely not conceived with concent. And yes, it is possible for a woman to rape a man, just think of your own chances with a drow priestess.
Red Tiger's story in NWN follows that line of storytelling.
I also don't find it hard to imagine it possible that some random male human "hero" had some kind of weird fetish, and was "turned on" by orcish females, had an opportunity, and took it. The story of *this* half-orc's parentage could have been based in either love or lust. There's a potential "Romeo and Juliet" story possible in the story of the parents, or it could have been a human male on orc female brutalization.
As for the child of this union, he or she could have either been raised by the mother among orcs, likely becoming the stereotypical brutish half-orc barbarian, or, he or she could have been taken to human lands and raised by his or her human father with human values, after the tragic death of the orcish mother.
There is a huge amount of good storytelling possible with all the "half" races.
As for that drow mistress, I rather think she'd get very frustrated dealing with the likes of *me*, and I'd be in a world of pain. Sure, she could break me, but she'd never get a "rise" out of me, if you know what I mean. I don't think much of my chances for survival in that case, since I don't think she'd find me very amusing.
That's why most people *don't* consider it possible for a woman to truly "rape" a man. If he can do it, he's into it, whether he wants to be or not. She can brutalize and torture him, of course, but not in any way that's going to produce an offspring.
There are inspiring and heroic ways to tell the backstory of a half-orc or half-elf, and then there's just going really, really dark. Most people prefer to stay away from "dark" in their high-fantasy swords and sorcery roleplaying games, I think. Not all, but probably most.
*ahem*
Anyway, what I'm trying to say here is that there are numberless possible occasions, where two people of different species can get some much needed privacy together.
Like quarter-orcs, quarter elves, half humans; Tiefling-Aasimar crossbreeds; Half-X genasi, half-Y genasi; half-orc/elf tieflings; children of night-hagspawn (or even night-hagspawn for that matter) (it is a bit complicated, but due to the fact that night hags are fiends and not monstrous humanoids, their children are neither born hags (females) nor ugly (males), but more akin to tieflings. These "female hagspawn" are only identified as such by their hair and mismatched eyes, and only become hags after completing 12 rituals which have to be performed by their mother, which can be interrupted or not carried out at all, thus preventing them from turning); and half-gnomes and/or half-halflings (discounting wisplings).
"Hey, handsome! Would ya like to take a look at me diddies?"
Just a bit of a thing.
I mean, think of all the brothels in Baldur's Gate, and the many different races that saunter in looking for some sweet lovin'. I'd assume they get a very wide client base, and while I'm sure some kind of contraception would be recommended for use in the business, it's likely not 100% effective.
I actually own a copy of "The Book of Erotic Fantasy", and they do have rules for that, but then again, the book is third party and tends to contradict lore a little bit, but it's better than nothing.
Let me just dig through my many, many books (they are an unorganized mess, encompassing things from 1000 pages-long Physics Books, 1500 pages-long Oxford Dictionaries ("Bibles" as my professors call them), the complete Jane Austen anthology (including early and unfinished works) in both Portuguese and English (as well as 2 copies each of "Pride and Prejudice and Zombies" and "Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters", one for each language), the complete Clarice Lispector anthology, the entire unabridged work of Joaquim Maria Machado de Assis, and literary classics such as "1001 Nights" and "The Great Gatsby") to find it. Yes, my bookcase is stacked full. And my room is a mess.
Will return to you soon.
Edit: Here you go:
Table of Birth Control methods (birth control method/chance to prevent conception):
Sexual contact without intercourse (100%)
Block the seed* (100%)
Birth shield (95%)
Barriers (cervical cap, condoms, diaphragms, pessaries) (90% superior masterwork, 80% masterwork, 70% normal)
Rhythm method (20%)
Coitus interruptus (10%)
* New spell introduced by the book
This is then contrasted with a score introduced in another table. Since it is large and boring, I'll just list things normal people would agree to mate with.
Race/chance of conception:
Celestial (100%)
Dryad (100%)
Dwarf (10%)
Elf (5%)
Fiend (100%)
Gnome (15%)
Halfling (20%)
Human (20%)
Merfolk (20%)
Nymph (100%)
Orc (40%)
Satyr (100%)
Man, I wish I had magic thou-shalt-not-impregnate-me-powers...
Fantasy worlds just have an answer for everything. *sigh...*
Abjuration [Sexual]
Level: Body 1, Brd 1, Clr 1, Sor/Wiz 1
Components: V, S, M
Casting Time: 1 action
Range: Personal
Target: You
Duration: 1 day/level
"Act responsibly"
You are incapable of getting someone pregnant or becoming impregnated for the duration of this spell. You are still vulnerable to sexually transmitted diseases unless protective measures are taken.
Material Component: A lemon rind.
Perhaps the internet really is for porn.
lol well to be fair, it is kinda related, and this is my own thread, so I am less bothered about a little de-railment. Besides some of the above was pretty amusing. Who knew AD&D was so... 'advanced'.
That said, it would not be okay if this thread then became a discussion about porn. I don't care if it's in Faerun. :P
@BelgarathMTH
You know, given the commonly accepted mode of Half-Orc conception. I am surprised that WotC allowed Half-Orcs to become such a staple of D&D lore, and that there hasn't been greater controversy (as far as I know). I mean clearly Games Workshop decided they couldn't risk it with the Fimir, even though Warhammer Fantasy is not exactly sunshine and roses either.
Having thought about this topic a bit more, and building on from what I said regarding AD&D 4th Ed, I think I am going to stop bothering too much about being particularly accurate about D&D lore. I mean I do love the richness, depth and sheer amount of content. I love how I could find a massive map of Faerun online, find any random named city like Phsant, and be able to find out some lore and history about it.
But there's also some things about the lore that I don't like, and I am going to take the liberty of interpreting it my own way, or just ignoring it. I think all players, to an extent, create their own versions of Faerun and its characters in their minds anyway, so I don't think it's important to fully understand the 'canon Faerun' as dictated by WotC and their writers. I am also certain that given the long history of D&D, there's probably loads of inconsistencies, retcons and contradictions, so there is no one 'undeniable' canon version of Forgotten Realms anyway.
"Half-Dragons Are Even Worse"
http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0555.html
As for "quarter-Genasi/Tieflings/Aasimar" you have the issue that these generally aren't "half-elemental/demon/celestial" as much as they are people with an elemental/demon/celestial in their ancestry (a "Lineage" breaking through and showing) or the child/descendant of someone who spent a lot of time in the respective plane. Thus they tend to stem directly from two humans and will very likely have completely ordinary human children of their own. If any one Genasi/Tiefling/Aasimar is the direct result of an "over-plane-bridging romance", they should generally count themselves lucky that their supernatural parentage only manifested in them in such small and comparably subtle ways. 4th Edition Tieflings don't count because they're bland and suck.
In 3rd Ed, otherworldly actual "half-Xs" ("actual" = offspring of one ordinary and one otherworldly parent) were generally handled by "Templates" that could be added unto any creature. So you could have both half-Celestial Humans and half-Celestial Halflings. Or Half-Fiend Honey Badgers, but who are we kidding - those things are practically fiendish to begin with.
Aside from that, 3rd Ed also had both Lineage (mostly for Sorcerers - to tailor their powers a bit to where they come from) and Heritage (to give characters supernatural abilities based on a supernatural bloodline) feats to help customize characters further.