>WOTC says evil races are no longer a thing>2025+>still no official Gnoll raceWhy? are they stupid and lazy? i need it to be official as a lot of DM's are allergic to anything homebrew (unless they do it to fuck over players)
It's more of a decision paralysis. WotC can't decide whether they want to keep expanding upon 5e (5.5) or move on to 6e. Transition from 4e to 5e was easy because 4e was universally despised, but now they don't want to take the leap but also don't want to keep piling more effort in something that will be abandoned soon-ish.
>>96573849>4e was universally despised>constantly best selling rpg line in the world for it's entire book release runOnly on this site full of 3.x holdouts is this provably false statement trotted out.
>>96573858False, you see it on sites like GiantITP too
Why did you make a new thread and bitch to everyone about shit we don't care about when you could've just gone to 5e general and bitched to other retards who care about that garbage?
>>965738584e failed so hard it was shitcanned after there years and D&D was just a dead brand for three more until 5e was released, who do you think you're going to fool with your revisionist bullshit?
>>96574142cuz its a botted thread the moment it goes off it comes back in 1 sec
>>96574046Except you don't.>>96573830Post proof
Gnolls aren't human looking, so the evil races thing probably isn't as much an issue here.
>>96575700It would be funny if we could get gnolls to be considered a facsimile of some race or indigenous tribe or whatever, in the same way that /pol/ got the OK hand gesture to signal white power. Orcs are already black to WotC - and are now converging on being Hispanic - why not have gnolls be... I don't know, Aztec or Asmut?Mind you, I don't want something like this to actually happen, but can gnolls really get any lower than what's been done to them in 5e?
>>96573830consider killing yourself furfag
>>96576419Didn't sjws try to retroactively condemn the hyenas from Lion King being racist cause they got Whoopi Goldberg to voice one of them?
>>96573858It wasn't UNIVERSALLY despised, but due to its immense divergence from the franchise norms and repeatedly screwing up campaign-layer mechanics to connect encounters in any kind of narrative had carry-over almost solely due to brand name, to such an extent that it actually LOST the "best selling RPG line" title for a bit (albeit in a sizable content draught) to PF1e. So when the brand moved on to 5e, there was almost zero residual playerbase because the "proper RPG community" had no deep interest and the normies followed the releases.
>>96573830Wasn't there a notion that having races with inherent mechanical bonuses (or penalties) is, well, "racist", and all PCs should follow the same stat array with race being just a cosmetic because "everyone has the same potential" or something along those lines.Also fem gnoll yeenis, yay or nay?
>>96573830Gnolls are fiends now, sort of material realm demons born from hyena's that ate Yeenoghu's flesh. So likely never going to be a PC race.
>>96576558That's mostly a cope/virtue signalling answer. The real reason is most casual people have always hated restrictions like that because it interferes with the kind of character they want to create.
>>96573830Even they know to keep your yiffing kind away.
>>96573830I thought 5e's gnolls were all hyper evil.
>>96573858shut up and hate with us
>>96573858it got rightfully shitter-shattered by PF1e my guy, 4e was an abortion of a system. The consequences of 4e continue to this day with PF continuing to drain DnD's market share little by little
Explain how something that looks like this can be good. Orcs have excuses due to shit like Wartcraft and their appearance changing over time in humanizing them as they look and act more human.
>>96577352
>>96577352Hyenas are vital to the ecosystems they live in as scavengers
>>965741524e lasted for 6 years tho?
>>96577075>it got rightfully shitter-shattered by PF1e my guy,It didn't.Paizofags took sales info from only specialty stores for a single quarter in a timeframe where wotc wasn't putting out anything and go "SEE! IT OUTSOLD D&D!"But I want you to pause and ask yourself something Anon: If Pathfinder was the number 1 selling RPG, do you think Paizo wouldn't have shouted that shit from the rooftops?
>>96577352Outward appearance does not reflect inner character.For example, you look like a human being when you clearly possess the soul of an ape.
>>96577352Explain why something that looks like that has to be inherently evil
I prefer 4e to 5e but unfortunately I’m in the minority.
>>96577442>>96577453You want complex characters then use humans and demihumans, beastmen are irredeemable devil-spawn meant to be killed.
>>96577508>Beast men are evil because uh.... they just are.Ape-souled subhuman.
>>96577536>in most media they are found in service to evil powers>if they aren't, they are still usually waging wars/attacks against humans, elves, etc.>realistically, as far as the imagined sensibilities of fantasy cultures based upon human, strictly or even loosely, go, the "civilized" races likely won't tolerate such beings so divergent and animalistic living among them. >Orcs, goblinoids, lizardfolk, and ogres are often established enemies of dwarves and elves, good races>Minotaurs, in the only setting which I am aware that they have civilization (dragonlance) have sargonnas, the god of conquest and consort of takhisis, the chief evil deity, as their tutelary deity, and they make war against humans regularly>The Minotaur of myth was born from a queen bewitched by a god to fuck a bull. It ate human flesh, was trapped in a labyrinth, and was slain by a human hero.>in the east, Yaoguai and Yokai which fill similar roles are often antagonistic and prey upon humansI'm sure there are many, many more examples.
>>96577433>Paizofags took sales info from only specialty stores for a single quarter in a timeframe where wotc wasn't putting out anything and go "SEE! IT OUTSOLD D&D!"Are you seriously trying to claim there were no DnD products in the store? As usual, the only way 4e fags can salvage their booty-blasted bitch feelings is to lie.
>>96573830Because wotc knows the only people who want gnolls are disgusting furry futa faggots.
>>96577672Holy shit I can't believe you don't understand this shit. You're genuinely trying so hard to miss the point because you've emotionally invested yourself in the idea that there was this mass rejection of 4e. It's fucking pathetic. But here we go.So first, let's talk about the scope of things. The data in question was about game stores specifically. Specialty retailers that largely cater to an enthusiast market, rather than to a general audience. Which means you were leaving out your larger chains like Barnes and Noble, Walmart, Target. It also did not include online sales, which at the time would be primarily but not entirely Amazon. It also excluded digital sales and subscriptions. Large chunks of the market just weren't included in the data because they were going through different distribution channels than the ones being asked. I'd also mention that ICv2's data was based on interviews, rather than numbers. Not to say that people were lying, just that it was a bit more vibes based.But then let's talk about the actual way that book publishing works. This applies to D&D as a whole, but it's really just true of all books (in fact it applies to most forms of media.) You are going to see the largest spike in sales around the initial release. Some things have longer tails than others, but it's very rare for something to see growth in sales after the initial release.So. With that in mind, let's try to put that atrophied brain of yours to work. You are dealing with specialty retailers, selling to an audience of primarily enthusiasts, and wizards of the coast is not releasing anything new for 4th edition at the time. Can you see why D&D might have taken a sales hit? The kind of people going into The Sorcerer's Game Palace and Comic Shop to buy things are the kind of people who wouldn't be buying a copy of the 4th edition core rulebooks 3 years after it came out. Those people already have the books.
>>96573830Theres many reasons I dont play 5e, this is one.You could always try playing PF2e, it has official "gnolls" (renamed to kholo) as a core race and they're pretty neat in the abilities they get. Theyre also a Str/Int race with a natural attack and darkvision. Also no stupid demonic zombie lore.>>96577352Hes a gladiator and that's his work wear. Outside of it he's a poet and kind soul who tends a small garden. Its remarkably easy to see the good in something "ugly" or "monstrous" if you put in even the smallest of effort.>>96576558> fem gnoll yeenis, yay or nay?Yay but it either is the full pseudo or a very large clit that's essentially a yeenis (with additional "pseudoscrutum" labia). Nothing else would be appropriate for a hyenafolk.
>>96577075The only thing 4e did wrong was have clear rules, and this was in direct response to the rules-lawyering cuntery that infested 3e (lmao drown up to zero HP, no rule says you can't act while dead, you can't take epic feats because attack bonus caps at 20, 1d43 damage whip because of a typo).
>>96577442Leave him alone, he just got done reading his first real book and he has a hard time understanding nuance.
>>96573849yeah hard to write D&D books when you are busy celebrating israel's assassination of charlie kirk on social media
>>96577433Your overall point is correct, but>one quarterIt was much longer than that. But the data still goes in the direction you want. All this data comes from ICv2. There's issues with it, but it's the best we have so we run with it.The first time pathfinder gets the #1 spot in in Q3 of 2010 (q3 is summer.) Where in Paizo tied with WoTC. Q3 for Pathfinder would have been the GM Guide, Advanced Player's Guide, the back half of the Kingmaker books and a handful of other books. Q3 for D&D was Monster Manual 3, Psionic Powers and Dark Sun. Plus, the other pathfinder core books are still pretty new. Speaking from anecdote - I knew plenty of people who did not buy Pathfinder until the GM Guide came out because they did not want to buy an "incomplete set." Go into Q4 for Autumn and D&D is back on top. This corresponds with the launch of Essentials. D&D remains at #1 in Q1 (winter) of 2011. Paizo only really unseats them come Q2 (spring) of 2011. In that time, wotc put out Heroes of Shadow and the monster Vault. Compared to Paizo putting out Ultimate Magic, The Carrion Crown, a couple adventure modules and a few smaller books.There's a pattern here. WotC is putting out a drip feed of books, while Paizo has their foot on the gas printing out all sorts of stuff. I'm not going to do quarter by quarter breakdowns.But here's the wild thing. The last 4e book comes out in q2 2012. D&D remains in the top 5 sellers until spring 2014, and it pops back up in summer of 2014 in the #2 spot. I want to make sure this is understood - these were 4e sales when wotc was not publishing books and actively telling people that the new edition was coming. 4e was in the top 5 without trying.But then the conversation stops there because fall of 2014 happens, D&D 5th edition comes out, and it runs rampant over the market. After that, all ICv2 information is paywalled and is harder to discuss.
>>96576419Hyenas are in fact African coded, since cave hyenas went extinct in Europe shortly after humans left Africa. Werehyenas are a feature of real African myths, such as the buda in Ethiopia.Admittedly they all have bad associations.
>>96578063So one thing that I always think about this is WotC's main product: magic the gathering.If you look at how 4th edition presented itself mechanically, you can see the influence of Magic on it. This isn't necessarily a bad thing. Magic is a fun game.But one thing that didn't make the jump over from Magic to D&D during 4th edition was the flavorful presentation. A lot of the abilities in 4e are clear and functional in what they do. Reading the card will explain the card. But they're often lacking a bit of the flavor that gets people excited.When people talk about 4th edition feeling like a video game, often world of warcraft, this is actually what they mean. What they ACTUALLY think it feels like is Magic the Gathering but without the flavor.They haven't had to play Magic with CW01, a 1W 2/2 with the set mechanic.
>>96578227Ironically 4e was the only D&D game to not get a rules-accurate videogame adaption.
>>96577352He could close his mouth and stop snarling.Most animals don't spend all day baring their teeth. That's why they have lips.
>>96573830>says evil races are no longer a thing>look inside>evil races are still a thing, they're just declared fundamentally different from proper humanoids so it's okay to consider them all evilGoblins are now evil fey. Gnolls are now evil fiends. If they'd done this shit before WC3, they'd have made orcs evil aberrations or some shit.
I just think they are cool conceptually as a race of irredeemably evil pirates, scavengers, and marauders that hunt innpacks and pose a threat despite their lack of intelligence and technology. They are like what orcs should have been and they fit the generic mid level bad guy role really well.
>>96578249Which is hilarious because that was 100% just corporate fuckery.
>>96578411>Hasbro's restructuring meant they couldn't use MtG money to pay D&D bills like they did before>Atari held the license and wouldn't scratch their balls with it unless WotC guaranteed them a bigger slice of the pie>The VTT/digital library plan that was supposed to make the edition profitable fell through because the project lead murdered his ex-wife in a parking lot and then shot himself, and his work was incomprehensible spaghetti code4e was in a rough place, videogame-wise.
>>965738584e sold well within non-RPG people. The old playerbase that liked 3.5 and even older editions despised it.
>>96578448The Atari rights thing got more complicated because Atari was trying to set up a deal with Bandai Namco, who are Hasbro's main competition. So it was a huge fucking thing.
>>96577629>be me >dorf>live in Joyous Wilds>chill with animal-people >mostly boar and lynx bros>but the parrot chick always has best jokes >when she shows up, and goat dude brings >weird new booze to try>hear human yelling >what in Urist's masterful rendition of an armok engraving is the longshank on about?>says animal people need to be butchered and >elfs are the capstone of good>think about pulling the lever>no...>no this calls for a new lever>give favorable trade to human and tell it to >"come back with friends next season"...>be dorf... there is always work to do.
>>96574152More specifically: 4e was received so badly and caused so many problems for WotC that they went running straight back to 3.5 and used it as the foundation for 5e, while actively avoiding everything people complained about 4e doing wrong.
>>96577629>>realistically, as far as the imagined sensibilities of fantasy cultures based upon human, strictly or even loosely, go, the "civilized" races likely won't tolerate such beings so divergent and animalistic living among them.Anon, people would go absolutely nuts for dogs that are also people. They might be treated as a lesser species, but they would have a place.
>>96578006>those horrible fucking legsJesus Christ
>>96578766Yeah. They completely removed any abilities from non-magical classes that were regained after taking a short or long rest. They also removed any mundane sources of healing, because it'd be silly if a Fighter could just take a few seconds to gain a second wind, or to just passively heal while under half health. And thank goodness they got rid of 'at-will' powers, letting wizards cast weak magic with secondary upsides all day long, or having fighters do shit like deal partial damage on a missed attack. Also very glad they finally brought back skill ranks and split up the skills into Spot/Listen instead of just having Perception, let alone Passive Perception. Thank goodness WotC didn't take any ideas from 4e. Who knows what sort of things might have ended up in 5e's rules otherwise?
>>96578844They ruined short rests by making them an hour long. The whole point of a short rest is that it's supposed to be a quick breather to get some energy back while still keeping the pace rolling.
>>96578844Stop! Stop! He's already dead!
>>96578844>any mundane sources of healingNever played D&D (okay okay i did play one session but that doesn't count), but don't you guys have medicine checks? Bandages?
>>96578844Also, how about casting something as a ritual. An idea completely original to 5th edition. Definitely, absolutely a thing that spawned from 5th edition fully formed.Also, healing surges. The thing that let anyone heal themselves during a short rest while also putting a limit on the amount of healing one can do, so that you can't just buy a wand of cure light wounds and press on indefinitely without rest.Oh uh. Did I say healing surges? I meant hit dice. Yes, the entirely, and completely 5th edition original idea of Hit Dice.
>>96578766Pure, 100% revisionism.So let's talk about what happened:And we'll start out with something you're kind of right about. As far as Hasbro is concerned, 4th edition failed to meet its goals. Did Hasbro have unrealistic demands? Did WotC overpromise and fail to deliver? We don't know and it also doesn't matter. From Hasbro's perspective, the B team of WotC took a bunch of money, promised they could hit certain growth goals for the brand, and did not deliver on those goals.Now, this has FUCK ALL to do how well liked 4e was. This has way more to do with the fact that WotC had plans, and then fumbled those plans. Turn D&D into what we would now call a live service? Failed to deliver on most features. Had some subscribers but not enough. Use D&D to launch a social media site? No one fucking used Gleemax, and the guy in charge did a murder suicide after it crashed and burned. Rake in a ton of money via GSL licensing? Almost all 3rd parties bail. You're going to notice something - none of this shit has to do with 4th edition. Because despite what the Brother Fens of the world will tell you, people played 4th edition. People enjoyed 4th edition.But making 4th edition is hard. There's a lot of stuff that needs to be done. Even the notorious under-supported Seeker class still has 124 powers and 12 feats, 6 paragon paths (which is also 54 more powers) and 1 epic destiny. I will remind you, this class is considered under-supported. Each of those things required time to design, time to write, time to revise, time to proofread. That's all labor you have to pay for. (Thankfully, a lot of your playtesters are doing it For Free)So you make essentials to make it easier, so you can lower costs and try to reach numbers. And when you're still not meeting your bosses' metrics, you decide to downsize the team and make a stripped down version.
>>965794434e has a lot of healing sources but LESS overall healing since there are no unlimited sources, unlike 3e where you can make an at-will CLW wand for a few thousand gold.As far as I remember healing in 4e is either a limited resource (like a daily power), requires a healing surge (which are limited), or requires you to be in the thick of battle.
>>96578766>>96579588So let's reflect on the situation.This edition is not meeting its unrealistic growth goals. It takes a lot of time to make things for it. And there's one more challenge - you're kinda running out of ideas here. You've made a bunch of classes. Wrote a lot of stuff. And you've been doing it at a fast pace. There was new content coming out every month. Literally every month. You were expect to have more content in Dragon Magazine every month. Don't look for the 2nd party guys. We fired them to bring this shit in house.So, it's late 2011. And a decision has been made. Directions are clear. Cut costs. Cut development time. Cut staff. You have 3 years to right the ship.It's untenable. Not made easier by the fact that there's been a revolving dear of leadership. There is one way out: new edition.But here's where the "4th edition sucked and no one liked it" kinda falls apart. Because they didn't call the thing they were working on "D&D 5th edition." They called in D&D Next. And while the general player base wasn't stupid enough to think this was anything other than 5th edition, the naming reflects something. WotC wanted the ability to bail on this. To pull the ripcord.So let's just talk practicality, friend. If 4e was so universally hated, so despised amongst players - why bother with obfuscation of 5e's development. If 4e sucked, people would be welcoming a new edition with open arms.From this, there is only one conclusion that can be reached - they were genuinely worried that 4e players might flat out reject the new system. This is not something you do if your product is universally despised. The New Coke didn't have any fucking shooters.
>>96579615Sounds reasonable (that's how 13th age works too). What's wrong with that?
>>96579659The problem is IT'S LIKE A VIDEOGAAAAME WAAAAAHHH WAAAAAHHHHH Nevermind that I've never seen such a mechanic in videogames, I've seen healing be restricted via MP and resource limits (herbs in RE, SP healing being a huge premium in Persona 4) but never "Nope, no more healing".
>>96573830You'd think all of the racial huffing and puffing WotC has been doing to pander to idiots on twitter would have been followed up with pandering to the most money-having demographic with a book of furry races. Gnolls, Minotaurs, etc. Are they retarded?
>>96581140They were originally planning to make angelic sparkledogs a core race to replace aasimar, but they chickened out late in development.
>the last actually normal employee in all of Wizards of the Coast putting his foot down and keeping Gnolls as demonic monsters and not self insert vehicles for perverts who should not be allowed within 50ft of a dog
>>96578289>it's not snarling so it's friendly!This retarded line of thinking is what gets people eaten alive by bearsKind of fitting that the low quality slop machine you use also completely fucked up the hyena's face and made it look more like an inbred bear
>>96577054I genuinely find it funny as hell how the animeslopper's artstyle is incapable of actually capturing what a hyena looks like so they just drew wolves
>>96578448Didn't Atari make an RTS very loosely based on Eberron called Dragonshard around that time?
>>96577432dndnext playtest started in mid 2012. 4e was released in 2008. they would have started to work on the initial release of the dndnext playtest while working on 4e products and attempted to scam people into buying more books with 4e essentials while they moved into 5e development
Anything that's bad for furfaggots is good for the rest of us
>>96581719>>it's not snarling so it's friendly!The person I was replying to said, "how can something that looks like this guy not be evil." The answer is, the artist is intentionally making it look maximally evil. Literally all you have to do to make it look vastly less evil is close its mouth.In conclusion, fuck off, retard.
>>96577054>>96581742That's what happens when one doesn't work on their art.
>>96581923>the artist is intentionally making it look maximally evilNo it isn't, that's what an aggressive hyena looks likeAlso what artist? it's blatant AI
>>96581960>No it isn't, that's what an aggressive hyena looks likeYes, snarling is a sign of aggression in animals.Like most animals, actual hyenas do not spend all day going full aggro, since they are not evil creatures that live only to destroy and despoil.
>>96581969Rats also don't build nukes and gatling guns powered by raw uranium but that didin't stop the people who designed the Skaven
>>96581977Nobody tell-tell him.
>>96581868Dragonshard came out in 2005, anon. 4e didn't drop until 2008.
Not a single "good" gnoll depiction i've seen ever actually acts in any way similiar to a hyena and the reason gnolls are evil by default is because every hyena behaviour is unafthomably cruel and disgusting the second it's applied to an intelligent humanoid instead of an amoral animal.>"yeah we have actual sex based segregation in our culture where the opposite sex is treated as a lower caste with literally no rights that we beat into a bleeding pulp for shits and giggles before they get exiled and forced to congregate in their own separate groups to not die in the wilderness, though sometimes we just eat them outright.">"speaking of eating, we rarely bother to actually kill our prey if we can because that's too much work, instead we'll usually just snap their legs with our jaws that crush bone and start eating them while they're still alive and squirming, ass first."The problem with DnD's gnolls is that outside of being brutal man eaters they were given nothing else probably because they realised they would be painting a female-led society as abhorrently evil and unfair
>>96582158People glorify lions yet they do the same shit.
>>96582463Most people who see lions as some honourable chad animal or even think those qualities can be applied to animals tend to be extremely fucking retarded
>>96581977Right because that's something the creator added to make them evil anon
>>96582158Anon all animals exhibit behaviors in the wild that would be horrible for humans to do. They're wild animals and something being feral is a negative perception
>>96582155The Lion King wasn't a documentary.
>>96582635>Wolves have cooperative packs with little to no segregation>Crows literally mob others who hurt their extended family>Antisocial animals like bears often avoid senseless, overly drawn-out killing>Unintelligent ones like groupers engage in cooperative hunting with other species>Even goddamn arthropods protect their young (centipedes), engage in non overly brutal competition (beetles) or behave socially (ants, bees)You're allowed to like hyenas. You're allowed to like anthro hyenas. You're allowed to like gnolls. But traditional gnolls are violent, sadistic, backwards, inhumans at times descended from literal hellspawn
>>96582886>>Antisocial animals like bears often avoid senseless, overly drawn-out killingCompletely wrong, bears do not give a shit and will eat their prey aliveAlso they tend to overhunt sometimes
>>96582886>violent, sadistic, backwards, inhumans at times descended from literal hellspawnThis same line of reasoning was attributed to Orcs and that made people climb up WotC's ass for being racist and implying that all black people are violent, sadistic, backwards, inhumans at times descended from literal hellspawn
>>96582463>apex predator known for going for quick kills on prey, such as biting necks, and strong pack dynamics of supportive social elementsno? pretty much nothing in that post about hyenas applies to lions>>96582515>gee why do humans admire an animal that defends its territory and packmates fiercely?dumbfuck mongoloid
>>96583224>an animal that defends its territory and packmates fiercely?So why aren't you on your knees grovelling over hyenas and worshipping them as gods? they do the exact same thing you subhuman tranny
>>96583224>unironic lionfag toddler in the wildHoly fucking shit lmao, i thought you retards were confined exclusively to the realms of Youtube Comment sections and Facebook, also>known for going for quick kills on preyTry looking at something other than Disney cartoons to actually inform yourself over wildlifehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LQrv_ocqsqQ&t=6s
>>96583129Hence the use of often. When they can, bears just break your spine with their paw or a bite. The fact they sometimes eat things alive doesn't take away from the fact they generally don't because that's impractical except for small animals. I relent on the overhunting bit>>96583149Except orcs are based on mongolian tribes and what makes them "problematic" is trying to take a real human cultural identity and paint it this way. Gnolls have no real cultural parallel besides the shit eurofags made up to justify their mistreatment of natives, and that's as I said made up
>>96578227Wut, I've always heard about MtG chasing in the context of 3E first and foremost, when MtG had destroyed the nerd community like crack cocaine.
>>96583289To clarify since if I'm gonna argue on the internet I'd like for both of us to leave this thread with more braincells than we started, I meant this:>Gnolls have no real cultural parallel besides the shit eurofags made up to justify their mistreatment of natives, and that's as I said made upAs: "european people characterised natives as savage and gnolls are also savage, which can be miscronstrued as a parallel, but this is a stretch as the characterisation imposed on natives is an agenda pushed by classist, xenophobic nobility with an interest in expansionism"
>>96573849This guy hit the nail in the head. OP might be doing a low effort bait, but fpbp for explaining why this even is a thing in such condensed way
>>96573858That explains why Pathfinder outsold it.That also explains why they pulled the plug on it after 3 years.It was just that good and so well-loved, they went into making another edition ASAP
>>96573849Fuck it, I'm saving this one
>>96583289>Except orcs are based on mongolian tribes and what makes them "problematic" is trying to take a real human cultural identity and paint it this way.Orcs are based on Germanic peoples.- Association with wolves- Association with axes- Berserker rages and bloodlust- Live for nothing more than to destroy all civilizationIn Tolkien, it's even more blatant, since they're stand-ins for the Huns.
Enough.What are your (favorite) ideas for fluff when gnolls can be a PC?Personally, I feel it would be a disservice to just completely wash away how gnolls have been depicted in TTRPGs in general, with Eberron and DnD 4e having most most favorable takes on them to my knowledge. With that in mind, I think for my setting I would like them to have been slavers that sometimes cannibalize, with the largest gnolls (based on the spotted hyena) being the only purely matriarchal one. But after an enormous 20 year war that spanned the continent against those who rose from the oceans, nearly all races had to band together to stop them.And so now there's this divide between those that have experienced war on a scale none of their kind has experienced before - along with the horrors that come with it, having lost untold numbers in their "pack", both gnoll and otherwise - versus those that stayed home, sticking to the traditional ways and generally making the more naturalized gnolls look awful by association by other races. The gap in experiences and shifts in culture leave a lot of possibilities for interpersonal, international, and intercultural conflict that I believe (nearly) every race should have in a setting.
>>96583224Lions are scumbags who get away with everything because they're pretty. Every carnivore scavenges, and hyenas hunt way more than lions too and will take care of pups that aren't their own for the sake of the pack while male lions just kill them and also steal kills more often. Look closely and you realize a lot of incorrect beliefs about animals are all superficial assumptions and not based on facts.
>>96583507>What are your (favorite) ideas for fluff when gnolls can be a PC?The women generally give birth by caesarian. This is in some Pathfinder supplement from their evil days, but it's a neat way of referencing the real world spotted hyena, reinterpreted through the lens of a fantasy humanoid (in real life, spotted hyenas have issues with birth because of needing to shove the baby through their pseudopenis).I don't mind the anthropophagy. I would just play it as more "waste not, want not" than "I love killing and eating humans because they scream louder! Gahaha!" Real world spotted hyenas have bone-cracking jaws so they can eat a body up to the bones. Use every part of the buffalo and all that.
>>96583505I. Completely forgot about germanic tribes. You're right. My point still stands, the problem with evil orcs is that you can draw a line starting at a real human civilisation and ending at orcs. With gnolls, first you'd have to buy into colonial stereotypes about "savage" cultures, THEN somehow connect those stereotypes to actual hyena behavior.
>>96582886wolves rarely if ever go after healthy adult animals instead choosing to target the young above all else. They also similarly don't care about killing their prey before they eat it, just making sure it's immobilized.crows have no issue killing and eating other crows, even going so far as raiding nests of crows unrelated to them when the opportunity arises.>>Antisocial animals like bears often avoid senseless, overly drawn-out killingThis is just straight up incorrect, bears rarely if ever seek to kill you, they just maim you and then leave you to bleed out assuming they're not hungry, in which cases they just hold you down instead of killing you before feasting. Cats both wild and domestic are also notorious for being the only species besides man that kills just for fun.>Unintelligent ones like groupers engage in cooperative hunting with other speciesWhich is notable since it's so rarely seen>>Even goddamn arthropods protect their young (centipedes), engage in non overly brutal competition (beetles) or behave socially (ants, bees)Protecting your own young is such a low bar that treating it like a sign of humanity is hilarious, beetles aren't holding back when they fight eachother, they've just evolved bodies that can handle it, and ants are fiercely territorial and will wipe out any other colonies they find. Bees also have a strict caste system where male bees that don't mate with the queen (which in doing so kills them) are expelled from the hive, which also kills them, just more slowly.
>>96583289>When they can, bears just break your spine with their paw or a bite. Which is worse
>>96583289They genuinely don't, bears are pretty much the most prone animals to just pin prey to the ground and start eatingFor instance Grizzly man was eaten alive and not once during the entire ordeal did the grizzly think of shutting him up my snapping his neck or something, he just kept him still and started chewing
>>96583149Listen if you look at a barbaric savage subhuman and instantly think of black people i think the problem's on you
>>96582158Everything youve said about hyenas is either exaggerated bullshit or fucking wrong.Hyena social structure is family and then matrilineal oriented, with nonfamily males being the lowest. Sons of the highest ranking female can become leaders of clans, as the supposed matriarchal structure of the hyena clan is overblown. While males are lower on the hierarchy, this is because they are generally outsider elements, much like your sister's new boyfriend who nobody trusts. Once the male is established within a clan, their rank will increase but never above the clan leaders direct family.Hyena clans are remarkably apelike (aka human) in nature.As for scavenging, this is purely a stereotype born of Striped Hyenas, true scavengers, and pasted onto Spotted. Spotted Hyenas are extremely successful hunters, getting most of their meat from new kills (a kill rate of over 50%), with only Painted Dogs vastly outdoing them (a ridiculous 90% kill rate). In fact, contrary to stereotypes, lions are pathetic hunters who scavenge meat from hyena kills (a truly pathetic 20% kill rate per hunt). Wolves hover around 40% kill rate for comparison.
>>96573830>Good furry lesbian material>The lipstick marks are those of a humanOne job. One fucking job
>>96583720>Hyena clans are remarkably apelikeChimpanzee troops are fucking brutal lord of the flies type shit so that doesn't really mean anything, though funnily enough they are an exact 1 to 1 match to the outdated ideas people had about wolf packs and hierarchiesAlso nowhere in that post is scavenging mentioned because it's a myth
>>96583507>What are your (favorite) ideas for fluff when gnolls can be a PC?1) It's a PC that's a gnoll2) There is no 2nd stepAnd I'm being 100% serious here. It's just a race. If your DM or GM allows playing as those, play and be happy. No point trying to philosophising on this
>>96583507I love PF2e "gnolls".Kholos have bad reputations as brutal raiders and demon-worshipers. Many believe that kholos are witches, cannibals, and worse. The truth is more complex. Kholos are eminently practical and pragmatic hunters and raiders. To them, honor is just another word for pointless risk. Any loss of a kholo affects not just the individual, but their packmates and kin as well. Wasting time on anything but victory, whether it's mercy or cruelty, is seen as little shy of immoral. Kholos are masters of ambushes, tactical feints, and psychological warfare. Equally misunderstood is the kholo practice of ancestor worship and endocannibalism. Kholos consume their dead as a sign of reverence, holding a grand feast and transforming the bones into art or weapons. Kholos extend this honor to respected foes, hoping to bring their enemy's cunning or strength into the clan.>SocietyKholos generally live in semi-nomadic clans of 10 to 20 family groups, containing between 100 to 200 members. They are ruled by a council of female kholos who are typically selected from the elders of each family. Bonekeepers focus on tending to the wishes of kholo ancestors and gods— they take their name from the ancestral bones that festoon their clothing and homes. Storytellers serve as teachers and sages, and are expected to have an encyclopedic knowledge of clan history, regional lore, and anything else relevant to the clan.>BeliefsKholos have an unsentimental, matter-of-fact approach to life and prioritize results over methods. They are usually loyal and generous to their people and ruthless toward outsiders—whether this behavior is considered acceptable varies depending on who they view as “their people.”Many kholos pay homage to Lamashtu, both as the originator of their people and a guide in a chaotic world. However, some kholos often give homage to Calistria and Shelyn. Nethys is the patron of bonekeepers.Hyena, gnoll but nuance, an actual people. Perfect.
>>96583750Hyena clans are more baboon than chimp. Also, I always find it funny that many people prefer us being related to cruel nasty chimps than our actually closest relative the fuck happy bonobo.And also I didn't finish reading the last sentence, it seemed close enough to another fucking reading of scavenging, I just assumed it was.But its still stupid for the way it categorizes hyenas as somehow unique or different from other predators, when the vast majority of them engage in eating their prey alive. Its how they kill it. Large animals take awhile to bleed to death by bite wounds, and you may as well help it along towards death by snacking on its fresh meat. Its just practical.Its bloody, its cruel, its the way life works for most animals in our world.
>>96583753This.I'm too happy with the fact I'm allowed to play something outside of the core set to try to explain anything to anyone, or else risking it being banned again from the table. People can think whatever the fuck they want, I don't need to tell or explain them, I've got my own literal headcanon and play according to it
>>96583507There was some /tg/ homebrew few years ago that incorporated various hyena species (spotted, striped, brown and aardwolf) into their creation myths and behavior. Avoided demonic origins and instead extrapolated natural into fantastical.
>>96583507>What are your (favorite) ideas for fluff when gnolls can be a PC?That I am allowed to play as one.Bonus points if nobody calls me a furry (even if I am and they know) and the girl penis jokes are at the appropriate minimum.Pretty much whatever they throw at me, I will take*. And if I'm the one that's supposed to provide the lore, I usually go for savanna nomadics or, for a change of pace, swamp dwellers, with well-earned reputation for violent cut-throats for hire. But as long as the pay is good and job not boring, anything goes. Gives the exact flexibility to have the character I want to have, without pigeonholing myself with random lore trivia.* Unless it's just a lot of girl penis jokes or someone's else gruff dommy fetish - not my thing, gonna skip that
Gnolls are fiends now so that means they can be evil.
>>96583811We are exactly as related to Bonobos as we are to Chimps
>>96584616They could do that before, though.
>>96582158>"yeah we have actual sex based segregation in our culture where the opposite sex is treated as a lower caste with literally no rights that we beat into a bleeding pulp for shits and giggles before they get exiled and forced to congregate in their own separate groups to not die in the wilderness, though sometimes we just eat them outright."Well isn't the first half just basically how Drow work?
>>96573830I dunno, ask /5eg/
>>96577054Work on your art
>>96577536>Ape-souled subhuman But I thought beastmen were le heckin gooderino?
>>96573830Gnolls are demons in 5e and demons/devils/angels can't change alignment. I think Eberron has playable gnolls, either way I'd allow it at my table. Who needs official shit?
>>96582158Anon this also describes the Drow.>highly matriarchal and sexist>super evil>sadisticAbout the only thing Drow don't do is cannibalise on the regular (though they're absolutely not bothered by it when food is low according to 2e lore and... be honest, don't you EXPECT that the Drow eat other sapients?)The Drow have also been a playable race in some form in literally every edition of D&D ever released and a non-evil Drow is one of the biggest D&D characters of all time. I'm honestly a little baffled that nobody drew this comparison before I got here.
>>96581969>actual hyenas do not spend all day going full aggroThey are pretty aggro overall though. Not maximum but their clan system makes them at each other's throats (or assholes) regularly. Really if you were making an anthro hyena race you'd make them LE. Instead of "le ebil scavenger" wanting to feast on the rotting corpse of the world they have extreme social autism and will eat your fingers for fucking up their hierarchy.
>>96573858the thermotrukoular high yield truth nuke is that the vast majority of people hating on 4e have never even read the rules, let alone played the game
>>96582886Wolves live in multigenerational families instead of giant clansCrows are basedLmao bears will happily eat you alive or drown other bears to eat them because the ease of fishing means they don't have to give a shit about getting hurtAnd arthropods fucking implant parasitic larvae in the still living hosts so their young can eat their way out.Hyenas attack from behind because its safer than charging the front of a 500lb wildebeest. They can end up eating shit while its still alive because they're still competing with each other for a meal even before its secured since clans are loosely knit groups with tense social dynamics instead of tight family units. And their hierarchy isn't actually sex based, its relationship based, males simply have a rougher time because they have to emigrate away from their birth clan and start over while also being generally weaker so its harder for them to contribute but a male can theoretically raise his status provided he's well enough supported. There are clans of hyenas who ended up being led by kind and passive matriarchs purely because they were well liked, there are hyenas who basically ignored their clan dynamics to be most independent and found more success that way.And every shitty thing you said about them shit like lions, animals commonly used to represent nobility, do far worse.
>>96583149So what, you want gay mexican gnolls? I assume so since you're a furry faggot, but that just sounds like a way to get gnolls even more disdain heaped on them.
>>96583507>Gnoll PCNot dissimilar from a Vampire. They're constantly battling an internal and endless hunger for human flesh, and if they're adventurers are probably completely understanding of why they're seen that way. Gnolls big thing is the cannibalism, so lean into it.The class should answer two things in one go: how do they control their hunger, and why did they want to do that and, moreover, leave their tribe and culture behind?A monk has mastered his desires with meditation and practise. He resented that his hunger stripped him of control of himself, but learned through imitation to gain it back. Now he refuses to even pick up a weapon, lest he return to old ways... but that isn't a vow of pacifism.A Cleric was on the receiving end of a far too kind-hearted Paladin finding them as a baby after killing the rest and choosing not to smite. They follow the faith of their 'parent', to the point their belief and devotion has granted them a semblance of control over themselves.A Barbarian is so at one with their hunger that they can keep it restrained... until it comes time to fight, and their rage and battle-hunger comes out. They don't shy away from eating corpses, the party is going to have to either be okay with that or keep them restrained until the rage ends. Their tribe threw them out for being the smallest and weakest of them. Better to try and ply one's trade as a savage mercenary than try to become a one-Gnoll warband.The Warlock met the face of some Eldritch God and got asked one question: what do you want? The PC responded that she wanted to be free from her matriarch - wish granted, she's the only survivor. But, of course, it's no quid pro quo. When the patron's task is finished, she fears her hunger will return. But, at least for now, she's more useful to it like this: 'civilised'.
>>96582155you were supposed to get your moms boyfriend his whisky and cigs an hour ago basement dwellerbetter get to it or you'll need to pay reparations to his black dick with your greasy italian asshole again
>>96582158
>furfaggot seething so bad he whipped out the ifunny watermark
>>96586088The bigger truth is that it has been thoroughly explained multiple times why people didn't like 4e and it's fans simply refuse to listen. 4e fans are like GURPS fans in that they 100% will dismiss every valid criticism of 4e.Don't get me wrong, I can fully understand liking an edition of a game that isn't liked by the fans of that game. For example, I think Warhammer Fantasy RP 3e is the best edition of that game, however, I COMPLETELY understand why most other people hated it with a passion and that hate is honestly well earned with just how shitty FFG handled it.
>>96581960art reference fornaturally aggressive creature for convenience of depiction in everyday situations
>>96586270didnt whip it out as hard as your uncle whipped you for telling your mom about the sodomy
>>96586275>furnigger is autistically obsesse with getting raped in the ass because that's how he became a furry in the first placeIt's like poetry, it rhymes
>>96586284>ree-tard is obsessed with faggots because what else would a faggot be obsessed with
>>96586289>says the nigger who literally started posting about assrape unprompted out of projectionYour mother will feel a weight come off her back once she hears the gunshot coming from your room
>>96586294> in the african animal furry thread> cant help but picture everyone in it as black gay furries> cant stay away from the abuse
is anyone other than this gaylord still in the thread and do you want to talk about fantasy stuff?
What the fuck is it even trying to say at this pointIt and everyone else sharing it's paraphilia need to be skinned alive
>>96586309Not much to talk about since furpedos will derail the thread the second you bring up how wanting to rape animals is morally wrong and that beast races have to be beastly
>>96586310hello my fellow gnoll UWU
>>96586311what no pussy does to a retard
seems like a nopeace out anons
>>96586311Hey there. What sort of weapon enchantments do you tend to like?
Need more gnoll and lion tits
>>96586135Bisexual Spaniard Gnolls. Orcs were already given the Gay Mexican identity.
The only evil race that’s allowed to exist in DnD anymore are capitalists and white men.
>>96576558Yeah, also everyone only gets stat bonuses because otherwise would be racist and "everyone is a winner" or some shit.>>96573830Find a game in a better edition.
>>96578249Even game designers got headaches looking at that shit
>>96581140>Are they retarded?If you feel the need to ask...
