Favourite Race?

[cbrunish]

We've had some comments on favourite classes and such. But I was wondering what people out there thought of the different races in Conan. What do you like to play? And why? I hope to get great responses!!!

I have two that I really have enjoyed playing. One was a Zamorian Scholar (with the Spawn of Dagoth Hill template) and the other was a Ghanta Nomad.

For the Zamorian, I just love this race. And I feel that any race this ancient would make great scholars. The only problem, is that if you take just strait Zamorian then you lose the bonus feats. And taking the SDH template you start out with corruption. I had to use fate points to drop the corruption.

The Ghanta make excellent nomads!! This dude was a bad ass. Using a scimitar and ghanta knife combined. And he had the strength to back it up! I just feel that the Ghanta have the best traits for the nomad.

I also had a Hyborian Border from the Westmark. Not bad at all.

 

[Clovenhoof]

Personally, I'll play a Cimmerian Barbarian any time. It's the only really good Barbarian race, too. The others have either piddly bonuses or nonsynergistic features, like the Dex penalty for Nordheimir.

For most other classes, Hyborian is the best race, bar none.
We've also had several Zamorans in the group, usually Thieves, also a Bacharan Pirate, a Tauran Borderer, a Khitan Scholar, and whatnot.

 

[Malcadon]

The Vanir are my favorite barbarian race, as I like the look of of red-headed barbarians.

My favorite civilized race are the Stygians - I always like their Egyptian theme.

And my favorite roguish race are the Zamorians, as they are a truly wicked people - a good sort of wicked!

 

[Teriudin]

Favorite Race:

Darfuri - Ok, they are sick cannibals, but they actually elicit emotion out of their description. Though I'd not want to play them, they have a really excellent feel. Scary as heck to fight against too - Left for Dead is worthless! Also another way to get a red-headed barbarian!

Stygian - Again, another good "Feel" but this one actually is intriging enough to play. The bow feat + scholar goodness means I can have fun wtih a scholar both early and late - supporting in archery at low levels and being a powerful scholar past level 6 or so.

Zamoran - Clearly the "thief race" but a darn good one at that. I chose this one becuase of stats, but it is so head and shoulders above other races for being a thief that it has to be done.

Honorable Mention: Khitan - lots of good feel, some good starting stats, but it is just missing something to take this race over the edge and be something I'd want to play.

 

[treeplanter]

Zingaran: 3 favored class, sneak attack bonus is cool + bonus to broadsword. They also make decent noble.

Bossnian: 2 favored class, figtning defensivly bonus, bossnian longbow kick ass.

And As for the concept, I love all off the frontier aquilonia character. I really like the civilised living on the edge of civilisation theme.

Hyrkanian/turanian: Decent bonus. You can play with the variant that turanian are favored soldier. Also make cool noble as the regional feature pretty good.

Also like Argossean, Corinthian.

 

[DimitriX]

I usually prefer to play thieves or temptresses, so the Zamoran race is probably my favorite.

 

[Ichabod]

Like to play? I guess Zingaran. I suppose it's good that thief isn't a favored class for them as it would be too attractive; I like the Spanish flavor. I want to play a Vendhyan with a caste with scholar and/or thief as favored classes as there are hardly any other games I'd be interested in playing an Indian. I'd be fine with Khitan if it fit the campaign which wouldn't be as big of a stretch for me.

But, most characters I produce end up Hyborian. Reason #1 for this is that races are limited in our campaign. Hyborians and neighbors - Zamorians, Zingarans, Shemites, Cimmerians - are encouraged. I think I've changed my thinking somewhat on this. I was resistant to it at first as my view is that protagonists much be unique and what's more unique than being of a different race than everyone around you? But, I realized that the interest in picking a different race was solely to stand out and not based on any actual desire to roleplay a different race, nevermind that constantly standing out is problematic. Much as I've tried to develop the Brythunian character to some slight degree through my primary character, I think there's plenty of ability to find uniqueness with Hyborian characters and putting some effort into distinguishing the Hyborian races from each other adds something to a campaign.

Reason #2 is that we haven't ditched the favored class rule and Hyborian is one of a very few races with thief as a favored class, nevermind the ability to choose K: Zingaran Fencing School with adaptability.

Next most is Shemite. Nation is well-situated and the flavor is good, but as I said in the other thread, I realized just how awful -1 to saves is and lost interest.

Stygian would probably be fine mechanically, but I don't have much interest as you run into too much stereotyping. I would likely play a Stygian thief, except for the favored class rule, if I played one at all.

Acheronian, half-demon, et al would all be worth considering if they were options.

What I find notable is how many races I have no interest in playing, often because they suck mechanically. I vaguely recall saying pretty much this exact line years ago ...

As to not being interested in Zamorian, since I prefer thief to any other class, a Zamorian thief would be too mundane.

One of the exceedingly simple changes I'd make to the rules to make character creation more interesting and because it makes sense within the fantasy genre is to have all classes be favored for PCs.

 

[treeplanter]

"One of the exceedingly simple changes I'd make to the rules to make character creation more interesting and because it makes sense within the fantasy genre is to have all classes be favored for PCs."

I tough about it too, the problem I had is it is the BIG advantage of chosing Hyborian, so I feel it would make all race plainly better than hyborian don't you think? On the other hand I felt like it would be cool so PC would really play the character they want wich I wound logical because not every member of a race are their favoured class so it clearly add flavlour to the game.

So I was a bit thorn apart... I guess a compromise would give every PC a bonus feat at 1st level no matter the race then keep favoured class feat for 5th and 10th level (when it is less of a big deal anyway) dunno

 

[Ichabod]

I recall one variant I considered being that there's only one favored class feat - 5th, everyone gets bonus feats at 1st and 10th. So, if you completely ignore your racial bias, you lose one feat that you would have gotten in the middle of your career. If you embrace it partially but not trivially, you get everything everyone else would get. I recall this being a general rule for all characters since it's effort to remember for only some whereas the "PC exception" was exactly that.

 

[Clovenhoof]

I'm not sure. On the one hand I like it that the FC rule gives you a real substantial benefit. On the other hand, it gets a bit boring that this effectively results in _all_ Thieves being Zamoran, except maybe a few Hyborian jack-of-all-trades. So far we've had 3 Zamoran Thieves in our game and zero non-Zamoran Thieves. The FC bonus is simply too good to pass on.

In that light, even D&D was less awkward with the FC rules because you lost nothing if you made a single-class Elven Ranger or Dwarven Cleric.

 

[Ichabod]

I don't recall ever stating this on the forum explicitly, so ...

I'm perfectly fine with reinforcing racial norms ... for NPCs. Doing so provides a context for the PCs to operate in, establishes a world with some sort of consistency.

But, PCs aren't normal. Where in fiction do you find normal people as the protagonists? Normal is for people who care more about playing a tactical wargame than in playing a RPG.

Protagonists in fiction are special. They break the rules. They stand out. They get rewarded for their differences not punished.

Of course, NPCs get to break rules in other ways, but that's a different topic.

 

[cbrunish]

In that light, even D&D was less awkward with the FC rules because you lost nothing if you made a single-class Elven Ranger or Dwarven Cleric.

Not true. Humans got an extra feat at 1st lvl and a bonus skill point every level (meaning 4 at 1st). Not too many played a demi-human in our campaign. The extra feat and bonus skill points were too much to pass up.

 

[Clovenhoof]

What you say is true, but has nothing to do with what I said. We're talking about Favoured Classes here. An Elf's FC is Wizard, which means he ignores his Wizard level when calculating his XP penalty for multiclassing. But if he doesn't multiclass different core classes at all, he doesn't get an XP penalty no matter if he's a ranger or bard or whatever.
That's all I was saying.

(BTW, in the big dungeon crawl where I started my current D&D character, mine was the only human in a group of 9 or so adventurers. Chap is a Level 10 Cleric/Radiant Servant now and still going strong.)

 

[treeplanter]

I'm not sure. On the one hand I like it that the FC rule gives you a real substantial benefit. On the other hand, it gets a bit boring that this effectively results in _all_ Thieves being Zamoran, except maybe a few Hyborian jack-of-all-trades. So far we've had 3 Zamoran Thieves in our game and zero non-Zamoran Thieves. The FC bonus is simply too good to pass on.

In that light, even D&D was less awkward with the FC rules because you lost nothing if you made a single-class Elven Ranger or Dwarven Cleric.

I aggree and I disagree. I think the bonus feat at first level is quite important but as you go up in level I think it become less of a concern. 5th level feat is nice but it is not the end of the world and 10th level is so high (if you multiclass it will come between 11 and 15 level) that at this point I don t think it make much more of a difference. I also feel that feat are really important to combat oriented character but less important for the rest.

I don t know nowday it look I really care less for power but I care lot more for history and background.

You could also replace the bonus feat for FC by a 1 skill point bonus

 

[tarkhan bey]

The only Conan character I have played was a Zingaran buccaneer by the name of Escobar da Kordova Alonso. A thoroughly disreputable sort with a penchant for finery,passing himself off as a disinherited nobleman and a self preservation streak more than a mile wide.
I suppose he was a cross between Black Zarono and Basil Rathbone's character in the movie "Captain Blood". 8)
So, to sum it all up, I like Zingaran's because of the roleplaying opportunities and despite the racial negative to Con.(Does this still exist in 2ed?)

 

[Stygian Devout]

and despite the racial negative to Con.(Does this still exist in 2ed?)

yep

 

[Lord Jolly the Scribe]

I think some of my favorite races are the Picts, the Cimmerians, and the Zamorians. I would like to try a Shemite or a Argossean sometime and I have a new player who is going with the idea of playing a Gunderman pike and shield soldier. In fact, a couple of players wanted to get together and do the formation combat thing too.

My gf who plays with us is going with a temptress. I think she should go with either a Zamorian or Stygian one.

I would like to try to make a Pict "semi-civilized" scout for a game I may run in the future but I don't know how it would fly.