Humanoids and Playable Species

 If we treat the 2024 D&D Core Rulebooks as a total fresh start for the game, like a full new edition, it works pretty well. Pretty much the only things I think are really missing from the game are the Booming Blade and Green-Flame Blade cantrips, the Gunner feat, and about twenty or forty more backgrounds that let you get the Origin Feat and ability score bonuses you really want. (Yes, the DMG has rules for making custom backgrounds, but it's not something that is immediately apparent to players.)

There's been some talk (including on this blog) about the sweeping creature-type changes in the 2024 Monster Manual. In an effort, I think, to emphasize that humanoid species can live any kind of lifestyle and be of any alignment, the entries on Orcs, Drow, Duergar, and Deep Gnomes (damn was the 2014 MM heavy on D-categories) were swept away entirely, with advice to use various other stat blocks to represent the creatures that might be referenced in previously-published adventures.

But, more controversially, many creatures that had been humanoid in the Monster Manual became, instead... well, other creature types. Goblinoids all became Fey, along with Centaurs (Satyrs I think were already - Centaurs I believe were originally monstrosities, so this one's a little unusual). Aarakocra, Merfolk, and Lizardfolk were all made elementals - vastly expanding what we even consider an elemental. Sahuagin and Gnolls were made into fiends. Kenku and Thri-Kreen were made into monstrosities. And the Gith (both -yanki and -zerai) were made aberrations.

The implication, I think, is that we're meant to look at these creatures as less the kind of free-willed people that Humans, Orcs, Wood Elves, and Drow all are, and instead are that more kind of alien, "natural force made manifest" that many fantasy creatures tend to represent.

And I think it's always a fine line to walk. One of the mainstays of fantasy fiction is the idea that of encountering beings that are very different and have a different way of seeing the world - like how Merry and Pippin struggle to emphasize the urgency of dealing with Saruman with the extremely long-lived Ents.

But, of course, there's certainly been cases in which other species - or, more typically, other "races," a term D&D used until 2024's PHB - carry with them some problematic characteristics. Whether these were specific parallels with existing real-world racial stereotypes or, more broadly, the inherent idea that "well, these people are smarter and these people are stronger" (and especially in the cases where you took a negative to Intelligence with some "monstrous" races,) there was an, I think, admirable desire to move away from such world-construction, most of which I feel was accomplished simply by divorcing ability score improvements from species in Tasha's Cauldron of Everything.

So, does this solve the problem? Or re-create it?

That's open for debate, and I think as players and DMs, we'll have to come up with our own ideas at the table.

But it also adds a curious mechanical wrinkle:

A lot of these are playable.

Monsters of the Multiverse revised and reprinted many playable species (and monsters) largely from Volo's Guide to Monsters and Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes, but also a bit from various setting books, like the Changeling and Shifters from Eberron, or the Minotaur and Centaur first made playable in Guildmaster's Guide to Ravnica.

And so, the weird thing here is that many of the creatures found in the Monster Manual are actually playable. Specifically, the list is:

Aarakocra, Bugbears, Centaurs, Githyanki, Githzerai, Goblins, Hobgoblins, Kenku, Kobolds, Lizardfolk, Minotaurs, Satyrs, Thri-Kreen, and Yuan-Ti.

Now, in fairness, the creature type had already shifted for many of these already. Since the Ravnica book, playable Fey have been the most common player-species creature type after humanoid. Centaurs and Satyrs, along with Changelings and Fairies, are already playable fey species. And Spelljammer added several playable species that were a lot of different creature types - Thri-kreen were made monstrosities there (having been humanoid in the 2014 MM) but you could also play an Ooze as a Plasmoid, or a Construct as an Autognome.

So, one thing we might expect, then, if they like this model going forward, is that if these species get re-published again, we might see their creature-types shift to reflect this. Much of 5th Edition really limited player characters to humanoid and a small number of fey, but Spelljammer kind of opened the flood gates (in a way that Van Richten's walked back from after their initial playtest - though I think Hexbloods remained fey. Just that Dhampir were not undead and Reborn were not either construct or undead).

So, perhaps we could see these species get updated, with even player Gith characters being aberrations.

But I do think it's funny: where exactly to we draw the line?

As an example, I've been playing a Triton Wizard for the last four or so years. Tritons, like merfolk, are tied to the elemental plane of water. In a lot of ways, they are just kind of the "playable merfolk," but does that distinction, then (not to mention their having legs instead of a fish tail) mean that they really are the humanoid version of a merfolk?

I think you could say the same about a lot of the playable species in the Player's Handbook. All of them are considered humanoid, but Goliaths are clearly the "playable giants," much as Dragonborn are playable dragons, Aasimar are playable celestials, and Tieflings are playable fiends. But at a certain point, don't we reach the stage where elves are playable fey? At one point are humans the only humanoids left?

I suppose we can thus say that there are playable species who are just humanoid enough to count as, well, humanoids, and that they are distinct from the monsters that are not so human. Tritons rather than Merfolk, Dragonborn rather than dragons. Genasi rather than genies. Dhampir rather than vampires. Warforged rather than golems.

But, then, does that mean that we need a kind of playable birdfolk who aren't aarakocra? (Someone has to beat the aasimar to the race for first species alphabetically!) Or do we take the Spelljammer approach and just not get hung up on creature type so much?

Honestly, it's kind of minor. The only real consequence is the weakening of things like Charm Person or other spells and features that only work on humanoids. I remember playing a Hexblade Warlock in Descent into Avernus, and I had only like two opportunities in the entire campaign to make a Specter out of a slain humanoid, and the first time, the character turned out to be undead (I think I was only able to actually use it in a weird pseudo-illusion flashback.)

I think we're always going to be debating exactly how we deal with non-humans in a fantasy setting. I guess it's just that WotC made a pretty bold choice with this core rulebook to their game.