How to make sensible racial reactivity that does not become repetitive?

[Val the Moofia Boss]

I am thinking of a scenario in which playing a highly unusual race to a region should turn the heads of every NPC you meet and cause them to be wary of you. ie, a Tolkien elf in Bree or Rohan or any non-Numenoran settlement, Drow outside the Underdark, Nerubian spiders in any two legged civilization, vanilla beastmen in any human civilization in Vana'diel or Eorzea, etc. This would be cool... at first, but I can see it quickly becoming tiresome (especially across a 30-60+ hour long game, even 100+ hours) that everyone you meet is wary of you, and your character has to then explain themselves to lower the NPC's guard so you can then get them to entrust you with missions or delicate business or even just trade or ask them questions. Or would part of the gameplay be that your character would simply just not be able to interact with most of those NPCs, period, and your character has to figure out how to survive out in the wilderness on the periphery of civilization, and the main story has to be written so it can be progressed this way/have an alternate campaign just for these pariah players?

[wndrbr]

Morrowind did it best. If you're not a Dunmer, every Dunmer in the game is going to hurl racial slurs at you, and have a lower disposition when bartering.

[Jordy]

[rusty_shackleford]

Race should be one of the biggest choices you make, it becoming cosmetic has been awful

[Tadeusz]

Maybe it is possible to do something along the lines of ATOM RPG - some characters may refuse to talk to you if your charisma is low. Same thing may be applied to race - some NPCs may refuse to talk to you, some may have higher difficulty checks. Maybe such different race players may have to go to extra length to mitigate these effects and earn some renown beforehand.

[Tweed]

In World of Xeen certain monsters will target specific classes and races in your party over other party members (I.E. the orcs in the Temple of Bark will go after any half-orcs).

Realms of Arkania: Star Trail the racial tensions between dwarves and elves means that in some places your elven party members will be denied service, entry, or outright attacked.

In Starflight the Elowan and Thrynn will attack your ship if either of the opposite species is part of your crew.

In Kenshi the Holy Nation kills skeletons on sight and generally hates everyone who isn't a human male. Most people treat hivers like ****, hivers hate outcasts, and hivers like trying to scam people with their lanterns.

[Val the Moofia Boss]

Morrowind did it best. If you're not a Dunmer, every Dunmer in the game is going to hurl racial slurs at you, and have a lower disposition when bartering.

I would consider that to be disgruntlement, but the Dunmer are still interacting and talking to you and handing out quests as if you are a person they expect, as opposed to running away into their houses and closing the door because you are a strange elf or being mindblown having never seen someone really weird like you before and pestering you with questions.

I suppose I should clarify. I thinking about walking in a region of the world where you would be considered a mythical or never before seen being that may cause fear or superstition (in LotR if elves were to pass through a non-Numenoran human village, people would flee into their homes, it's not a contenporary fantasy setting where humans and men interact). Or playing as a hated race like Drow or Beastmen, people's first instinct should be to astounded seeing a monster like you walk around their village, think you are going to eat them and shout for guards, etc. Maybe the TES equivalent would be if an actual Dwemer or Daedra were to be walking around town, as that would really turn heads and make it difficult to normally interact with most NPCs.

[Demonic Fate]

I suppose I should clarify. I thinking about walking in a region of the world where you would be considered a mythical or never before seen being that may cause fear or superstition (in LotR if elves were to pass through a non-Numenoran human village, people would flee into their homes, it's not a contenporary fantasy setting where humans and men interact). Or playing as a hated race like Drow or Beastmen, people's first instinct should be to astounded seeing a monster like you walk around their village, think you are going to eat them and shout for guards, etc. Maybe the TES equivalent would be if an actual Dwemer or Daedra were to be walking around town, as that would really turn heads and make it difficult to normally interact with most NPCs.

The game ought to to be designed with a viable pure murderhobo non-talking path, a la Fallout-2-with-Int-under-4 but worse - only specific people will be able to talk with you, each one for a specific reason. You can still be forced into suboptimal quest resolutions - eg. a quest's normal reward is having a smith improve your gear, but you can't do that; or, some temporary allies in a difficult battle are impossible to acquire - but you can still explore the area and discover the existence of those quests. Perhaps it can even help as a balance factor, allowing the "monster" race to be innately much stronger one way or another to compensate for the lack of support.

Also there can still be a decent amount of circumstances where a commoner will have to talk to you whether they want to or not. Like, you murderhobo your way into a dungeon and find a bunch of prisoners - they may be terrified of you, but they can't exactly run away if you want to make them an offer.

Once you do that, you can even have a game that spans multiple regions and where many races won't deal with each other at all - and depending on your race you may have a normal playthrough in some areas and be forced to murderhobo in some others, keeping things varied. Maybe you can add a race that's utterly harmless, like a pixie or something similar, and you can deal peacefully with everyone but you have zero ability to solve things through combat.

[Vaako]

Morrowind did it best. If you're not a Dunmer, every Dunmer in the game is going to hurl racial slurs at you, and have a lower disposition when bartering.

I would consider that to be disgruntlement, but the Dunmer are still interacting and talking to you and handing out quests as if you are a person they expect, as opposed to running away into their houses and closing the door because you are a strange elf or being mindblown having never seen someone really weird like you before and pestering you with questions.

I suppose I should clarify. I thinking about walking in a region of the world where you would be considered a mythical or never before seen being that may cause fear or superstition (in LotR if elves were to pass through a non-Numenoran human village, people would flee into their homes, it's not a contenporary fantasy setting where humans and men interact). Or playing as a hated race like Drow or Beastmen, people's first instinct should be to astounded seeing a monster like you walk around their village, think you are going to eat them and shout for guards, etc. Maybe the TES equivalent would be if an actual Dwemer or Daedra were to be walking around town, as that would really turn heads and make it difficult to normally interact with most NPCs.

So like a Vampire in Morrowind? Nobody talks to you except other vampires?

[Wretch]

[Norfleet]

I am thinking of a scenario in which playing a highly unusual race to a region should turn the heads of every NPC you meet and cause them to be wary of you. ie, a Tolkien elf in Bree or Rohan or any non-Numenoran settlement, Drow outside the Underdark, Nerubian spiders in any two legged civilization, vanilla beastmen in any human civilization in Vana'diel or Eorzea, etc.

The answer is that it should happen ONCE, per meaningful encounter. When someone sees a weird person the FIRST time, it's new. By the second time, it's "oh that guy again". More importantly, it should be subtle. Don't hamfistedly beat the player over the head with it with a lengthy diatribe from every NPC. You don't go on a racist rant to someone's face, after all. Like you said: Heads turn. NPCs will notice the odd person and look at them, maybe watch a bit. It's the LITTLE things. Maybe there's not a single dialogue line about it, but the player might notice the onlookers gawping. But it will eventually stop once they get used to seeing you. Or perhaps be replaced by some other kind of gawping if you're the hero now.

[ArcaneLurker]

I am thinking of a scenario in which playing a highly unusual race to a region should turn the heads of every NPC you meet and cause them to be wary of you. ie, a Tolkien elf in Bree or Rohan or any non-Numenoran settlement, Drow outside the Underdark, Nerubian spiders in any two legged civilization, vanilla beastmen in any human civilization in Vana'diel or Eorzea, etc. This would be cool... at first, but I can see it quickly becoming tiresome (especially across a 30-60+ hour long game, even 100+ hours) that everyone you meet is wary of you, and your character has to then explain themselves to lower the NPC's guard so you can then get them to entrust you with missions or delicate business or even just trade or ask them questions. Or would part of the gameplay be that your character would simply just not be able to interact with most of those NPCs, period, and your character has to figure out how to survive out in the wilderness on the periphery of civilization, and the main story has to be written so it can be progressed this way/have an alternate campaign just for these pariah players?

You'd think that what Morrowind accomplished wouldn't be too much to ask. Current trends are definitely a conscious choice to make race more of a cosmetic, and also, there are less stories where different races are at each others throats, they all have to get along and be blank slates that are individually evil or good. I don't think this is surprising considering how Leftwing past generations have gotten, but I'd hope that, in America, under Trump, there would be some good opportunities to set up a dev studio and make some games that place more importance on these kinds of interactions.

[maidenhaver]

[rusty_shackleford]

even morrowind was tame in how it portrayed race, at least in terms of actual gameplay elements
the only game I can think of off the top of my head where it's a significant factor is D&D Online where you get an entire talent tree for your race among other things like construct races being immune to various effects + not able to be healed normally and require being repaired, etc.,

[asf]

need an option to call ******* *******