Ideas for Making Orks and Dwarves more Appealing to Players

Discussion on game mastering Earthdawn. May contain spoilers; caution is recommended!
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Tsarak
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Ideas for Making Orks and Dwarves more Appealing to Players

Postby Tsarak » Tue Aug 13, 2013 4:03 pm

It's been a long time since I played, but considering starting an Earthdawn group still has me feeling that, while as a GM, I love what the high presence of dwarves and orks bring to the setting, most players would still find them unappealing to play.

I've considered a few minor tweaks to the races, and would love some feedback or suggestions of other routes to make the two races that don't leap off the page at players like Obsidimen, T'skrang, and Windlings a little more appealing. My first thoughts on the matter would be to give both races twice the starting silver of other players-- Dwarves for being well-connected and Orks for a history of manipulating their intimidating presence/raiding. I would also give a 1 step modifier to all social interaction attempting to build trust, etc. for Dwarves and Orks a similar modifier to intimidation both where Namegivers are concerned.
Last edited by Tsarak on Tue Aug 13, 2013 8:04 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Flowswithdrek
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Re: Ideas for Making Orks and Dwarves more Appealing to Play

Postby Flowswithdrek » Tue Aug 13, 2013 6:26 pm

Perhaps a better way to entice players into trying the most neglected races, is to build an adventure around that race, rather than modifying the race. If I was to tell my players the next campaign was to be set in burgeoning nation of Cara Fahd I would be pretty confident at least a couple of player would choose to make their characters orks, which is likely to give them some in game advantage. The most underused races in my games are humans and obsidimen, but I wouldn't change them just to get my players to try them, my players regularly play dwarfs (no dwarves in Earthdawn) and orks . You should ask your players what they want to play first.

treorai
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Re: Ideas for Making Orks and Dwarves more Appealing to Play

Postby treorai » Tue Aug 13, 2013 11:23 pm

Yeah, I don't see a need to change any of the races in my home game. People in my games play dwarves relatively regularly, so there's no need there. With orks, no one in my home games play them, but it's not because of their mechanics. No one is interested in role playing their cultural quirks, so they don't play them, and no amount of mechanical jiggering is going to change that.
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Drall
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Re: Ideas for Making Orks and Dwarves more Appealing to Play

Postby Drall » Wed Aug 14, 2013 11:57 am

If you have players who would pick a race simply because it had twice the starting silver as the other races, I'd look for new players.

Tsarak
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Re: Ideas for Making Orks and Dwarves more Appealing to Play

Postby Tsarak » Wed Aug 14, 2013 6:46 pm

Granted, I'm not a fan of min-maxers, but players with limited exposure to the world (in my experience) take a lot of cues from racial abilities and starting stat modifiers (in EDs case, beginning stat spread) on what role certain races would have in the world. Glancing at the Namegiver Races chapter, the big takeaways are [Dwarf: shorter than most namegivers, cosmopolitan, builders, reasonably tough, biggest population in Barsaive -- Ork: impulsive, fairly physically strong, short lifespan, tribal, second largest population in Barsaive, Gahad (which is interesting or terrifying depending on level of familiarity with DM and trigger decided upon)]. My fear is that new players will see this chapter and the chapter on disciplines and draw the conclusion that if they wanted to play a discipline that is suited to the description of Orks or Dwarfs, they might as well just play that discipline as a Troll or Obsidiman (though as GM, I plan quite a few hurdles for those two races, usually).

I am just attempting to make the plot centrality of most of the goings-on of Barsaive to Dwarfs and Orks more apparent to players who may be focusing on mechanical edges and very brief descriptions during character creation for a brand new game/player group/campaign and might not have the context of Throal's role before, through, and after the Scourge and the burgeoning (reburgeoning, not that that's a word) nation of Cara Fahd and the Ork people's history of enslavement. I'm not interested necessarily in making the two races more "powerful", but I am considering ways of giving mechanical clues to what a player might be in for with these races -- hence none of the bonuses being too appealing from a stat maximization standpoint. Having marginally greater influence over namegivers and a little more spending money to be able to possibly afford one item at the start of the game that certainly isn't magical, but doesn't fall into standard weapon, rope, rations, or clothes categories are (in my eyes) measurable aides to understanding that race's role in Barsaive.

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ArcadianRefugee
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Re: Ideas for Making Orks and Dwarves more Appealing to Play

Postby ArcadianRefugee » Sun Aug 18, 2013 2:41 am

I've got four players in my group; one's an ork, another's a dwarf (a human and an elf round out the troupe).

Basically, I told them that if they wanted any of the less common races (obsidiman, windling, t'skrang), they'd have to have a darn good backstory (I'm big on backstories). That ism of course, unless they all wished to play the same race, in which case, sure, let's have a group of obsidimen stomping about. Would still need a good backstory, but at least they could share one :)

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Re: Ideas for Making Orks and Dwarves more Appealing to Play

Postby galafrone » Thu Aug 22, 2013 8:36 am

i love both races, and actually are the best races in ED (imho).

my wife plays 2 dorfettes in our campaign (1 wasnt enough..) and i am in love with my npc dwarf travelled scholar

the second campaign i run, wifey is playing a female orc swordmaster and the second girl that plays at that table is her sister :)

all in all orcs are fantastic for the pure sheer emotional power they have
live fast, die young but die epically, support your clan/family and fight for Cara Fahd (and do a lot of sex in the meanwhile) for the orks
live fast, die later, do a good business, support your family and fight for throal (and do a lot of money meanwhile) for the dwarves

all in all, dwarf race power (heat vision) is teh pro in game, if the GM helps you with night fights and such
obviously trolls can do that aswell, but trolls need larger bed, larger chairs, and since the majority of ppl in barsaive are dwarves, they are basically often out of good place to rest

yeah, these are all rp considerations, but meh, if one of your players play for power, tell him to play in the stock market :)

also, reasons for NOT playing anything else than dwarves ? because dwarves in barsaive are the "elite race".
the others are just... below
they have the ruling king, they have the majority of "economical" power in their hands
they have military power
yeah, they are small.. but they can do the same things as others
and stats in the end arent all that matters, you cant be bothered for a +1 step in str when you are a 7th lvl warrior.. mind me...


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