Evolution in Fantasy

I'll share my autism.

The first sapients were random aberrations, who were eventually conquered by the titans, who degenerated to Giants. The common link between Elves and Dwarves were called the Eldar. I hadn't statted them but Duergar and Drow are actually closer to the Eldar and not under any sort of curse in my world. Humans are relative latecomers, but are the only species to evolve sentience (the others were brought about by magic, technology, or spontaneously came into being in dark places in the world)

Dragons are the newest race, they were servants of the Humans (who were the first people to develop Divine magic and had the first multicultural empire when their clerics and dragon allies ran roughshod over everyone). Although true dragons are extinct, Draconic is the common language, humans worship dragon gods, etc.

>>53843094
Presumably, they would share a common ancestor. The ur-sapient would likely have a mixture of traits of the separate species in that clade. Speciation would occur by populations becoming isolated, and selective pressure encouraging different specialization.

So this means that the original would probably look most similar to modern humans, though it would not likely be identical.

It would also explain why half-elves, half-orcs, and half-dwarves might be possible, but not necessarily elves having children with dwarves.

This would make all of the fantasy races merely subclades of the general human clade. Extreme isolation and long time scales would be necessary: human populations in the New World had no gene exchange with old world populations for around 12,000 years, and speciation did not occur.

Time scales on the order of ~100,000 years or more might be necessary, and even then the over hundred thousand years of isolation did not prevent neanderthals and early modern humans from producing viable offspring.

Or you could just have magic involved somehow. Usually makes the setting building easier

a human is just a half-elf, half-dwarf.

>>53843094
I love Glorantha but Uz only kinda have a common ancestor with Men.
They are basically made of the Darkness and Man Runes and the common trolls become men in a few generations if their connection to Kyger Litor is severed / non-renewed. (But it's not clear what does it means about the original race and both the Mostali and Aldrayami have created lesser versions of themselves on a more specifically more human template to survive in Time so maybe the common Uz are technically humans but the Master Race probably isn't)

>>53843094
Elves, dwarves and orcs are certainly subspecies of the same species as they are very similar yet a lot more than human populations are from each other.
In most fantasy settings dwarves cannot reproduce with humans, orcs or elves and they are more the anatomically distinct of the bunch so I think they could be considered a different species.
The Elves are generally the first to become civilized so they are probably the ones making taxonomy or at least the first versions, so we are a bit more likely to be Elvis Sapiens Humanis than Homo Sapiens Elvis but it could be otherwise in human cultures or the Elves could have done otherwise for cultural reasons. (Not admiting being related to other races at all for example)

>>53843094
From the Arcanum: of steamworks and magic obscura manual

"Roughly 900,000 before the present day, the fossil record shows us a wild outburst of magickal activity, an unprecedented surge of sorcery which affected life on Arcanum for millennia after. What caused this sudden cataclysmic storm of Supernatural Selection, we may never know for certain; all that we can say now is that the magickal agencies at work at that time were enormously strong, far more powerful than the forces which any modern-day mage can command. A great many organisms were created then which survive to this day, albeit in small numbers.

In this distant Epoch of Enchantment we find the origins of many legendary species, including the kraken, hydra and sea serpent; Wyrms, dragons and drakes were brought forth at roughly the same time. Many pre-existing species were substantially altered, as in the case of the unicorn and the firebird; others were merged into chimeric organisms like the centaur and manticore, for reasons unknown. Humans, which pre-date this Epoch by some two hundred thousand years, were not left untouched by the general pandemonium; although the majority of our forebears went on unchanged, some of them were vastly transformed by magick. When the fantastic whirlwind of Supernatural Selection died down some four thousand years later, two new species had emerged, and thereafter co-existed with ordinary humanity: these being the elves and the giants. "
There is a bit more in some descriptions of the races but basically dwarves are a lot further removed from the other humanoid races, ogres are giants who lost most of the magic making them gigantic with time.
Gnomes are an offshot of the dwarves created by natural selection while halflings are a magically altered offshot of the proto-gnomes.
Orcs are probably a magically engineered race of soldiers from a very old magical civilization altough they are probably from an human stock.

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Long ago, when the gods were just starting to figure out how the whole god thing worked, they made creatures, lots of creatures. Usually, these creatures were just toys, things created for a brief moment of entertainment and then destroyed. One of the gods took pity on these creatures, however, and shared with them the power to think and create. The other gods, furious that the creatures were now wrecking all their stuff and praising the pitier god, bestowed mortality upon the creatures and made the pitier god the lord of Death.

They wanted them to destroy the creatures, but Death instead offered a game: a battle of wits between the creatures and the gods. If the creatures won, the gods had to permit their existence, if the creatures won, Death would take back power from the creatures and give it to the other gods, effectively ending his existence in the process. The other gods, always wanting more power and eager to be rid of Death, accepted. They came to the creatures and warned them that one day a great calamity would befall them, and if they did not prepare they would be destroyed. After much arguing, the creatures that were to heed the warning split into several groups and migrated to lands near and far. As they became more adapted to the lands they settled, they slowly morphed into the races we know today.

Finally, the day of reckoning came, and the gods had chosen their calamity, a perfect mockery that would combine the best features of all races and show Death his pet project would only destroy itself in the end. They were called humans.

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>>53845048
And so the gods' humans were set upon the world.Many of the races were destroyed, and all was going well for the gods, and they talked of how they were going to divide Death's power. Death chimed in, saying it would only be fair if power went according to who was most responsible for the destruction of the races. The gods publicly agreed, and each then secretly went down to convince the humans to fight in their honor, making the god in question the sole destroyer of the races. The humans, unable to agree on which god to follow, turned on each other. This disarray allowed the remaining races to repel the humans and, just like that, Death had won.

Now that the races weren't going anywhere, many of the gods came to accept this and became patrons to various aspects of life. Many minor gods also arose to snatch up some things the races created that the gods hadn't accounted for. Death, in gratitude to the humans who had inadvertently been the saviors of life everywhere, granted them a Redeemer to help absolve them of the sins instilled in them by their creators. It was quickly forgotten that Death had done this, as a minor god cleverly took up the mantle of Redemption and quickly rose to prominence as a result. And that is how the races as we know them came to be.

Or something like that.

>>53843094
Human - Humanity
Dwarf - ?
Elf - ?
Halfling/Hobbit - ?

>>53845294
Dwarvery
Elvenkind
Hobbithood

>>53843094
Been a while since I tried to do something like this, and I don't have the notes, but I remember trying to use our taxonomy tree and try to place some fantasy races within it for a setting.

IIRC I wanted halflings to just be another primate, they would be our closest tool using sapient relative.
Orcs are pigs, somewhere in the suidae family, not the tusks.
Not just because orc rhymes with pork.

I couldn't place all of them with any satisfaction in the standard tree of life.
So others would have divine origins, with gods creating them, dwarves made out of rocks, gnomes made out of gem rich rocks.
Elves were made out of a deity who looked into the future and saw a vague vision of humans, and tried to create them, so that's why humans and elves are so similar.

Maybe later on other deities made the dwarves and gnomes trying to mimick the elves, to explain why they are so similar.

>>53845367
>Dwarvery
nice
>Elvenkind
meh

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Humans say that the High God made them in his image, and that all other sapients are abominations made to mock the Highfather's works after he was imprisoned in the sun. Other sapients take issue with this characterization.

Dwarves say that Shamazh the Sun-King sifted among the ancient peoples of the world and found the cleverest, most skilled and most sturdy creatures in his creation. The Sun-King then remade them into the priestly caste that became the leaders of an ancient empire that has long since fallen into ruin.

Orcs believe that they do not share a common ancestor with humanity, and that crossbreeding is possible purely through the virility the Blue Expanse has given them. Long ago, the steppe and the Sea of Seven Grasses were covered in forests inhabited by hateful elves and decadent humans. Their sins were so great that the Blue Expanse kindled a great fire that swept through the forest, burning all before it. When the fires cleared that night, the only thing left behind were orcs and the grass they alone could eat. Orcs believe they are the natural counterbalance and correction to decadent western civilization. One day, all there is will be orc and grass.

The catfolk believe that God made them to keep the other races on their toes. They're not far wrong.

Elves keep excellent records, even as their civilizations collapsed around them. Their oldest records -- ritualized dance, primarily -- tell of beings from beyond the stars that demanded the obeisance of the primitive Dawn Men. Through selective breeding and experimentation, the noblest of the Dawn Men were transformed from hairy near-apes into the beautiful and perfect elven race -- the race that was destined to rule the world in the name of the Star Men. Some betrayed this covenant in the name of Chaos, and condemned their brothers and sisters to the deep parts of the world. The war shattered their ten thousand year rule over the races of men, and destroyed both civilizations.

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>>53843094
The only idea I have is that dragons went full Man After Man and wound up creating an entirely reptilian ecology.

I have no idea what to do with this that isn't just a poor explanation for dinosaurs

>>53843094
The problem with Fantasy taxonomy is that "A crazy god/wizard/outsider poofed this species into existence for no real reason a long time ago" is a completely valid explanation for nearly every form of life.

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Here's one I mocked up for an earlier thread where it was discussed.

>>53846415
That one can choose to include or not. Don't really see why this is a problem. And a wizard adding individual species doesn't automatically turn off the process of evolution.

>>53846500
Reminds me a bit of Dark Sun.

>>53846533
Because of the Halflings?

I was thinking of the early mammals with them. The halflings first emerging into the world when Giants and Dragons ruled it, while they scamper about in their holes, trying to survive.

When the empires of dragons and giants fall, they start to move out into the open, diversify, and speciation happens.

>>53843340
I'm gonna elaborate on this because that's exactly how I see it.

First, we've got one distinguishing trait: magic users (elves, gnomes) vs non magic users (humans, dwarves, halflings, orcs).

Between the magic users, they're either tall-sized (elves) or short-sized (gnomes).

Between the non magic users, they're either tall-sized (humans, orcs) or short-sized (dwarves, halflings). Between the tall-sized ones, they're either more sapient and with less muscular mass (humans) or less sapient with more muscular mass (orcs), among other physical features. Between the short-sized ones, they're either bigger and stouter (dwarves) or shorter and nimbler (halflings).

Does this sound right?

>>53846500
>Modern species evolving from moden species
Nigga that's not how evolution works.

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>>53846661
It depends on how long the original species has been around.

>>53846616
Mostly yes.
But it should be considered that size is one of the easiest things to change evolutionary speaking.

In my setting, most vertebrates that have 4 limbs are naturally evolved, but vertebrates with more limps, or those that appear as mixes of creatures were tampered with, but you can still generally trace when and where.

Additionally, a concept I'm using is that magic enables a form of subconscious orthogenesis in sapient beings. Basically when a group of sapient creatures subconsciously decides they want some trait (by admiring an animal or liking darkness or whatever), as a society, they tend to evolve towards that goal much more quickly than normal, on scale of hundreds of thousands of years as opposed to millions, That's how elves and dwarves and other subspecies of Homo Sapiens came about in my setting. This generally stops or slows when civilization develops, since people tend to interact with nature a bit less and are also more safe and secure in their houses, so tribal savage elves could be a lot of different shapes, but civilized elves would be a bit more uniform.

>Who was the first sapient?
Dragons, but their thought patters and different and alien, so in our terms, it would be whatever Homo is the first sapient here, Homo habilis, maybe? Not sure what's the consensus on that one.
>Where is the missing link between Elf and Dwarf?
Evolved in parallel together with modern humans from a common Homo Sapiens ancestor.
>Does your Orc have a pedigree?
No orcs yet, they're a future wizard project based on a mix of goblins and half elves.

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>>53846616
Useful thing to note. Halflings are divided into three main species: The hairfoot/lightfoot, the tallfellow, and the stout.

While the hairfoot/lightfoot are the most common, the two subraces have much in common with elves and dwarves respectively.

Any connection between these three kinds of halflings and the three kinds of hobbits (harfoot, fallohide, and stoor) are purely spurious, and absolutely nothing to concern ourselves with. Anything else could imply halflings were some kind of knock off!

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>>53843231
Dude, dragons are extraterrestrial. Hexapodal skeleton unlike all Earth vertebrates.

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>>53843094
Though these charts aren't all that convincing as a TE chart, it still gave me an idea. Imagine: an antedilluvian world in which all hominin species starting with sahelanthropus as the "Adam" of this land (who would be rumored to still be among the living), and ending with a homo sp sapiens "Noah," despite there being no flood narrative. Technology is still in the plaeolithic for more primitive species, but others have ascended to mesolithic and neolithic tool use.

Nomadic tribes of ape-men (most of australopithecus/paranthropus) are the norm in the southern territories, as no true farms can exist in the harsh savanna. In the jungles and woodlands, the first of the Adamic species (sahel, orrorin, ardi, and anam) still roam as they did when the earth was younger.
In the northeastern territories, some of the erectines (heidelberg, ceprano, antecessor) have moved further north with the herds, some going even further north, to become the Neanderthals and Denisovans. Also of note, some have been known to openly practice cannibalism, though most likely after their kin have died (not killed).
Across all territories, the sapiens (idaltu, sapiens, and balangodensis) subsist in larger sedentary tribes due to settling within the rare fertile land which is present in only certain locations.

>>53846759
>While the hairfoot/lightfoot are the most common, the two subraces have much in common with elves and dwarves respectively.
This makes no sense because then they would be evolutionary closer to elves and dwarves than halflings. And halflings are a distinct species.

Maybe this means they've undergone evolutionary convergence, not that they're literally related to them.

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>>53846855
To add, the hobbits (floresiensis) are most likely derived from the erectines, but act like a mixture of the erectines and early Adamic species.
The Naledi people most likely act more like the nomadic ape-men, though rely on a more woodland diet.
Habilis/Rudolfensis also fall within the category of ape-men, though do have striking similarities to the erectines (of which Ergaster is a part).

>>53844247
>Supernatural Selection
I like this.

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>>53846500
> Orcs not from elves

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>>53846855
>>53846996
A rough geogrpahical reference.

>>53845458
Try Elfkin instead

>>53848369
humankind - humankin - humanity - oh the humanity
dwarvenkind - dwarfkin - dwarvery - oh the dwarvery
hobbitkind - hobbitkin - ? - oh the
elvenkind - elfkin - ? - oh the

hobbitry kinda works, elvery seems like a stretch

Speaking of words for masses, what's a good word to call all sapient races together?

Right now, we use humankind because there's only humans, but if there were elves, dwarves, orcs, dragons, intelligent spiders, whatever else, what's a good word for all of them together?

I'm thinking maybe "spoken" but it sounds too pretentious.

>>53843094
Beer. And other alcoholic beverages.

After gods created the world, gave themselves bodies and populated the world with accurately planned creatures they decided to have a little holiday. Though god of trickery somewhat overdid it with drinks and by the time holiday ended number of species, subspecies and races in the world jumped by at least three orders of magnitude.

>>53846388
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Dragon_Masters

>>53843094
Human were created by one God
Dwarf were created by another God
Orc and goblin were made by an evil God from Human and Dwarf
The Elves were always here

>>53843094
Humanoids are separated into 3 groups with common ancestry:

The earliest humanoids were the titans who slowly split of into different groups.

The giant kin.
-Giants, Goliaths, Firblogs.

The Human kin.
- Humans, Elves and Orcs.

The Dwarf kin.
-Dwarves, Gnomes and Halflings.

The Goblin kin.
-Goblins , hobgoblins and bugbears.

Each species developed in specific enviroments which may or may not make them able to interbreed within the same group.
Giant kin can interbreed with humankin of the same environment but the offspring is usually just a taller version of the humankin parent.

General environment species are adabtable and can breed with anything in their group.

Humans, Halflings, Goliath.

Fey species developed in areas of concentrated magical powers.

Elves , Firblog.

Demonic species developed under the effects of demonic magic.

Orcs and goblinoids.

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>>53849315

>>53848952
I call them "mortals," but that (deliberately) separates them from intelligent spiritual entities like demons and nature spirits and so on.

>>53849731
What if you want to include those entities?

>>53849745
"People," I suppose?

>>53849745
Sophonts?

>>53845458
Elfdom?

>>53849745
Make it poetic and just say mortals and inmortals. It's taken for granted that you're not including animals.

>>53843094
All humanoids races were made of the same mold, each god using it to create its own race.
A few more exotic good races were created by other benevolent gods not wanting the use the same basic template.
After all other races were created, a trickster goddess without a chosen race thought it would be funny to give life to the mold itself.
The First Man was lonely so he asked for company and the Trickster Goddess created a copy of him in her own image, unknowingly becoming the elusive goddess of humanity and the human godess of trickery, beauty and women.
The First Man had a spark of the divine power of all the gods that used the mold and so him and his descendants were long-lived and semi-divine but the First Man forbade incest and they married with the other humanoid races and their power and longevity were reduced with each generation until Men lost the capacity to interbred with other races while remaining fully human.

>>53850264
I appreciate the suggestion and help

>>53843094
All humanoids (except elves obviously) are the results of elven genetic experiments to create slave species. And elves are actually humans, from our world that is, that found ways to eradicate disease and have eternal life through genetics.

>>53843094
I really liked how arcanum did it.

>>53853206
Glorantha and the Ducks?

>>53854366
Yes

>>53852219
Me too.

>>53850678
M&M2 best orcs

>>53850678
more of this?

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>>53857559

>>53843094
They were all made at once by god. None of them can interbreed.

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>>53858490
There's even weirder possibities with that.

>>53858510
What is that image supposed to tell us?

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>>53858696
Some weird-ass creationist pseudoscience. Basically, it's grouping sediba in with humans, and chimpanzees with Lucy's kin, while there's one of its own kind, and there are the robusts.
This is when fundies try their hand at paleoanthropology.

>>53858745
And it basically boils down to whether it looks like an ape or a human. No genetics, no actual study of the fine features of the skull, nada. Just whether it looks like a modern chimp or not.

Fuck them, but their pseudoscience is good for stealing weird ideas from.

>>53843231
>Humans are relative latecomers, but are the only species to evolve sentience
Hey, mine's kind of similar to that. In my setting, natural selection works through a nature goddess who causes defiations from the norm and causes heritability. There's no end goal to her guidance, or even method to the "mutations", she's more the embodiment of the blind watchmaker concept. The other sentient races were deviated from the proto-human stock to serve various purposes, their development guided with an end goal in mind, but humans, like the beasts, were only guided by the nature goddess to survive.

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>>53858853
Nah, thr guy who did it actually used a very large sample size, and tried to look at the tiniest cranial details to determine it. How else do you think this got in thr human line?
https://answersingenesis.org/creation-science/baraminology/homo-habilis-homo-rudolfensis-and-australopithecus-sediba/

>>53858948
You can see them attempting to do serious science, and they sort of replicate real science but get it all screwed up with their a priori conclusions of baramins (otherwise known as kinds, or how creationists attempt to cover the vast number of species by reducing them to specific groups and fiatly decrying them as not having common ancestors).

>>53859151
He's also addressed that on his blog. If I'm not mistaken, he only thinks the earrh is young because the Bible (or one interpretation of it) says so, but he acknowledges that evolution is one of the single most important concepts in biology. Trust me, this guy's gotten a lot of flak for including Sediba, to the point of others claiming he fudged the calculations.

>>53846759
There a hardcore Tolkien person around who can explain the point of the three kinds of Hobbitses? Never did get that myself.

>>53859380
Now I'm not a ToIkien nut, but I think it is simply consistency in applying ethnicities. He has the same separation of groups among men and elves. Logically there would be tribes of Hobbits who would share some traits to identify them by as a group. Especially when they have been living in separate groups in different territories, like those from the other side of the misty mountains for example.
He had chosen his resolution, so to speak, and was sticking to it. And of course it would serve to characterize the provincial hobbits. They knew eachother in their community and of course could track who was from what familly and larger group by extension. An intimate friendly gossipy thing. Talking about large extended families, keeping up with eachother etc.

>>53850678
>>53857968
The job of M&M has always been to kinda ape what everyone else in fantasy gaming is doing, but (sometimes, when they're good) put their own spin on it.
Applies to aesthetics as much as anything else.

>>53858853
I believe it was Ken Hite who said that bad science makes for great gaming.
Pseudoscience, crank theories, 'Hidden History'...all fun stuff.
(If you really want some fun, crack open Velikovsky...it's like he was trying to be bad at as many scientific fields as possible!)

>>53859380
He just avoided race being culture.
The Hobbits are the descendants of three different cultures and technically they are all Men but the Men and Elves had both a ton of cultures and ethnicities.

>>53859567
My current favorite for explaining polymorph spells, lycanthropy, and half dragons is Rupert Sheldrake's Morphogenic Field Theory.

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>>53843094
Humans are descended from apes. Our actual evolution applies here. Each other race is an example of convergent evolution, all branching off of a different ancestor.
Orcs and other goblinoids are descended from pigs.
Elves are descended from deer.
Dwarves are descended from moles.
Lizardfolk and Avids are pretty self explanatory, but closer to one another than most would think.
And Halflings are descended from badgers of course.

>>53859878
What about Gnomes?
Does this mean all Gnomes can inherently communicate with Halflings, despite any language barrier?

So...
Time is circular in that world. Consider it as an experiment put in place by outer beings.
What is, was, and will be. The world's history is a loop between a period of highly magical fantasy wars, and a post-apocalyptic fallout period, caused by these wars. Most civilized races live underground during this period.

So the species do not really evolve in the common sense. They're always there. But they're not always the same depending on where you're sampling the timeline.

Three groups :
-Humans (which also includes elves and orcs)
-Dwarves
-Gnomes (which also includes goblins)

Orcs are the result of humanity's exposure to magically-irradiated wastelands over the course of a few centuries. They're stronger and breed faster, but pretty primitive, and die off as soon as the other races get good enough at magic.

Elves are the result of a particularly isolationist and technically advanced human culture trying to recreate the "perfect" human from the "past", by way of eugenism and genetic modifications. They rise as the strongest magical race, only to be completely wiped out by magical overcharges during the apocalypse.

"Regular" humans are always present, but during the post-apocalyptic part they are mostly underground gypsies.

Dwarves do not really evolve biologically, since they live underground during the whole course of the loop. Even other dwarf cultures are pretty isolated, and any biological change is very minor.

Gnomes are something like a middle child, always living in the shadow of the other races, but always managing to be useful in their societies. Just like orcs, surface gnomes evolve into goblins due to magic exposure, only to be wiped out during the wars.

>>53859988
Hmm...I like it. Kinda like the Shannara explanation, but without the 'Elves are totally always special!' bit.

>>53843094
I have an idea for how vampires evolved. From the original that I have dubbed "Cain". Hundreds of different strains have evolved to plague the world.

>>53859981
To be honest I haven't thought too much about gnomes. Perhaps an offshoot of either the elves or the halflings. They wouldn't likely be able to innately communicate.
I like this because it lets me use Orc as a derivative insult stemming from Pork, and pig orcs have always been enjoyable to me. Elves with antlers is another little thing I enjoy. And dwarves with whiskery beards and bad eyesight is also fun for a fantasy setting.

In my world mankind & dragons are the oldest races chronologically. Elves & dwarves & such are all specialty humans shaped by the gods, basically a bunch of humans would worship say the sun God, & over time the humans generation after generation would slowly change, gaining traits that the god favors. So primordial humans that worshiped the Sun God eventually became the Sun elves.

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>>53858745
I was bored and decided to make this.

>>53863568
Do not bump shit threads

Humans evolved from Chimpanzees (they are ugly)
Orcs evolved from Boars (they are savages)
Elves evolved from Deers. (they are majestic)
Dwarves evolved from Mushrooms. (They are resilient)

Done.

>>53848952
There's the sci-fi term "sophont".

>>53848952
people, sapients, humankind because fuck elves fuck dwarves fuck you

>>53864455
There's a fantasy term as well.
In the 90s I wrote a book(never published) where the word for the masses of sapients for Blarschwuarbs.

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>>53863655
>Dwarves evolved from Mushrooms. (They are resilient)

>>53848952
"Humans and their kin"

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>>53859878
oh hey it's this pic

>>53863655
...Not bad.

>>53843094
bimp

>>53843094
The oldest known race is simply known as the Old Ones, and nothing is really known of they went extinct long before any living race arose. Elder dragons probably know, but good luck finding one and asking questions from it. It is unlikely that they are in any wya related to existing sapient races. The oldest still living race are the serpent-men, also known as yuan-ti, who predate humanity by several millenia.
Humans, elves, and orcs all split from a common proto-human ancestor relatively recently (in geological terms, so still several hundreds of thousands of years ago), and are closely related enough that humans can interbreed with the other two (elves and orcs theoretically could as well, but the differences in physiology make it practically impossible). Dwarves and gnomes are closely related to each other, but more distantly related to humans, having split off from the last common ancestor earlier then humans did from elves and orcs. As an aide, merfolk are highly divergent elves (elves have a magical connection to nature which allows them to rapidly adapt to their environment. Merfolk are the most extreme example of this, representing elves completely adapted to aquatic life).

>>53859878
So in terms of relations to hoomuns, Orcs are the most closely related? Followed by Elves, then Dwarves, then [Lizardfolk and Avids]? Is there still a racial hatred between Orcs and Elves / Dwarves and Elves? Why?

>>53843094
>Who was the first sapient?
Presumably an extinct primordial ancestor of all modern sentient species.
>Where is the missing link between Elf and Dwarf?
I would say dwarves, humans, and elves had a common ancestor over 100k years ago, but it split into two lines, one would evolve into dwarves and the other would later split into humans and Dwarves.
>Does your Orc have a pedigree?
I doubt Orcs would be concerned about pedigree. However with their caste system I could easily imagine goblins caring about their pedigree. A hobgoblin of high standing would be humiliated if it was discovered that his great great grandmother was a regular goblin or his great uncle was a bugbear.

Essentially if I was to make a sort of sentient family tree I would work from the top down. First look at who can interbeed and produce fertile offspring, throw them into the same genus most likely, consider sub-races and if they might just be minor deviations or entirely different subspecies. After that compare traits to decide how species should relate into sub-families and finally families. Dwarves may not look much like elves but they look more like elves and humans than goblins do.

>>53859981
Gnomes are from the Feywild, and therefore lack ancestors before coming to the Material Plane. Their change into humanoid comes from the loss of the First World environment. and there their adaptation changed them into what they are, subraces and all.

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>>53866644
Left column, lowest.
Johj

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>"Fig. 2 (left) Here we have the composite fossil of a species that straddles the line between troll and orc. Due to its rather stout size yet robust bones, it has been labeled a male." -Professor Shardin Jotunbach, "On Trolls and Associated Races"

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bump

>>53877408
>all tomorrows
yawn

>Who was the first sapient?
Orcs. They were the proto-god's first cracks at making a servitor race. Didn't work out too well for most of them.
In my setting you basically have seven different creation events by seven different councils of Ur-deities, with different ideals in mind and different traits to prioritize. Nearly every sentient being is a descendant of one of those original species. The main exception is elves, but it's also a pretty hot button issue whether or not elves are sentient.

>Where is the missing link between Elf and Dwarf?
Eh. Don't really have one. There is something of a missing link between dwarves and humans, though, but it's an ongoing process and an engineered one to boot. Instead of the two splitting off from a common ancestor the dwarves are basically inserting their own genes into humanity's pool to curb them towards Law.
You could also probably make a case for Elves and Orcs being related, but it'd be a bit iffy seeing as the "common ancestor" in this case would be the undefined primordial narrative-spirits both got hammered out of


>Does your Orc have a pedigree?
Nah. But our Trolls do. Is it called a pedigree when it's a fungus? Regardless, breeding new cultivars and subspecies for labor, war, and aesthetics is pretty popular among certain subsets of the nobility .

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>>53846855
>>53846996
>>53848177
I just had a rather disturbing thought about the world I have created. Would slavery of different species be justified?

>>53879575
You can justify just about anything if you try hard enough. Humans are good at that.

>>53879575
Or people from you world could just do things you personaly think are not justified?

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>>53879627
>>53879687
I know that, but I was asking more from a logical rather than an emotional standpoint, considering I'm dealing with several separate species rather than variants of just one.

>>53846500
Orcs are Goblinoids.

>>53846859
The innate Elfiness and Dwarfiness rubbed off on them, polluting the halflingses gene pools.

>>53843094
Unfortunately my fantasy worlds have strong divine influence, so evolution is all driven by the gods.

>>53879940
This was based primarily off D&D, with their branches being based primarily on hybridization.

So orcs and ogres can interbreed with humans and each other, but not elves. So they're likely evolved from the same ancestor, while elves diverged earlier.

I'd not heard of any inter-fertility between goblinoids and orcs, hence me putting them on different branches.

(The presence of trolls as related to Hobgoblins is an error. Their hybrids are a magical thing, not simple biology. Gnomes may be further away from Dwarves as well. They are cousins, but there's no sources for hybrids that I can find)

>>53878808
these wounds, they will not heal

>>53880407
3e isn't the only version of D&D.

>>53880806
I never said it was, I was going more off 1 and 2e to be honest.

>>53852092

This.

Elves are magical transhumanism. As humans their ancient magical empire mastered the highest sorceries. The greatest figures in these families altered and blessed their lineages. That's where elves and other higher races come from: people enchanting their children to be immortal, healthy, graceful, intelligent, and good looking. Oh, and to have magical aptitude. Each family tweaked the formula to fit fashion and individual preferences, which is why there are so many flavors of elves despite them being so slow to reproduce.

Dragons got their start as wizards who took their biothaumaturgical experiments to the extreme. While they can breed and sometimes do, they're originally an artificial species made up of the most powerful wizards transformed into an immortal form for the same reasons but without many of the limitations of lichdom. Some dragons are survivors from this unspeakably ancient empire. A few other very powerful and sometimes unique beings originate this way.

Servants got lesser blessings, or mixed blessings which were better than nothing and helped them in their jobs as servants to the nobility. Dwarves, gnomes, minotaurs, centaurs.

Some were slave races created the way they were against their will.

During the Fall, a massive civil war, desperate abuse of magic, failed experiments, curses thrown at enemy bloodlines, and the creation of soldier races all lead to the menagerie of fringe and monster races. Records are sketchy at best, so it's hard to know if orcs for example were intentionally or accidentally created. Are they a soldier race or a cursed bloodline or humans or elves? Or what? Nobody knows.

To this day, a lot of weird, wonderful, and horrible creatures lurk at the fringes of the world. Descendants of the survivors of the Fall, they just barely hang on. Many have accumulated a mix of blessings and curses that are impossible to untangle. Many undead originated as necromantic weapons.

>>53859380

Tribal distinctions, basically. We don't know where they came from, and they're all but gone now, but it's part of hobbit history and explains many familial and regional differences in hobbit culture. It also let Tolkien bring in seemingly contradictory influences and yet mix them via these tribes.

>>53846500
The biggest issue I have with this is that Ogres in D&D are Giants, not Humanoids, but still can have viable offspring with humans and orcs, be it plain old Half-Ogre, Ogrillon or Orog (as in 3.5).
Now it's either that Giants are cousin species to humanoids with Ogres being remnants of the closest common ancestor; or that Ogres are direct descendants/close relatives of humans and/or orcs, but also are ancestor species of all giants.

But then I remember that Half-Giants are also a thing. That's why we can't have nice things (such as a semi-plausible evolutionary theory for a generic D&D world)

>>53881824
Half-Giants were mostly a Dark Sun thing, IIRC. And were magical.

Also, checking things out, the old 2e MM muddies the water further. It turns out orcs can crossbreed with goblinoids. The ogres can breed with them and humans, not because of shared heritage, but because of genetic adaptability. (Of course, it also contradicts itself with its own text, which is even more confusing)

>>53881824
What if humanoids are a subgroups of giants but only ogres are genetically close to reproduce with some of them?
Maybe they just have the same number of chromosomes unlike other giants who have more or less than humanoids.

so Orcs, Goblins, and Trolls(and other "Monstrous Humanoids"), do you prefer them to be closely related, only somewhat related, or completely unrelated?

>>53882978
Orcs and goblins are closely related. Trolls are a completely unrelated sort of creature, though this may or may not make interbreeding any less successful.

>>53882041
Equal number of chromosomes is not necessary to make hybrids, AFAIK, not sure about viable offspring. But humanoids being a subgroup could work, even without breaking down d&d magic mechanics and shit.

However, chains of ancestry kinda break down for that case - if we consider all humanoid species to be related to each other and say, Ogres being closest still-Giant relative to all of them - why are they only able to mate with humans and orcs then? Only reasonable explanation in my eyes then is that humans and orcs are ancestors to all of humanoids - Orcs for Goblinoids, Humans for Halflings, Elves and others. The other possible explanation is that humans, orcs and ogres are ancient species that evolved (or stayed the same) in parallel, when other species with the same common ancestor

And don't fuckin' mention convergent evolution or some other shit - if elves are actual deer-people, then why can they mate with ape/giant/whatever-derived humans and fall into the same category for purposes of anatomy and psychology when effects of magic are concerned?

>>53883248
Maybe humanoids are a subgroup of giants and elves, orcs and humans are closely related because they can interbred while gnomes and dwarves are a slightly more distant subgroup of humanoids?
Ogres could be technically humanoid but with enough "primitive" giant traits to be giants for all practical purposes.
The only thing that really can't make sense is orcs being able to interbred with goblinoids, goblinoids are a lot more different from humans than all other humanoids even ogres.

>>53883352
Goblinoids are probably related to giants but probably not directly related to humanoids.

>>53880067
That makes it no less valid. Surely the gods have changed the appearance of the races of their domain over the millenia as their tastes altered, much like the way an i-phone changes each year in spite of the lack of obvious functional gain.

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>>53883352
>>53883364

>>53883248
>>53883433
I think you are right with avoiding convergent evolution as much as possible. And this could perhaps be taken further to include as many humanoids as possible, e.g. kobolds, lizardfolk, gnolls. "Ringworld" even tried to get vampires as just another human offshoot.

>>53883552
>e.g. kobolds, lizardfolk, gnolls.
I don't think these are closely related to humanoids or giants at all.
Giants are close enough to obviously be related to them but reptilian or feline humanoids are not going to be evolved from humanoids or giants so some form of convergent evolution is unavoidable for these ones as they probably evolved from felines and reptiles.

>>53843094
No evolution in my fantasy. A multitude of gods came into being from primal chaos and elder gods, and they in turn created a multitude of animals and sapient species. The commonalities of unrelated sapient species, namely a roughly humanoid shape, opposable thumbs etc. are because that is a sort of "platonic ideal" of a thinking being, which is also why gods look like this.

And which is why there is something seriously wrong with aberrations, and why everyone is terrified of them.

>>53883552
Well, despite speaking against convergent evolution before I would argue that outright monstrous humanoids are either exactly that or are result of magic meddling with gene pool. 5e, for example, goes out of it's way to explain how lizardfolk have alien minds and life attitude, but still form recognizable societies and stuff. And Gnolls are postulated to be demon-influenced and not natural - basically, what's called 'uplifts' in sci-fi, dogs that were brought to some semblance of sentience by higher powers.
Kobolds, Lizardfolk, and if a particular DM wants it, Dragonborns might be related and descended from Dragons, though, in the same way as our model for Giants and Humanoids.
Vampirism and Lycanthropy would definitely be gene-altering viruses (latter with ability to transfer in utero between mother and fetus)

>>53883433
I would add Halflings as a distinct subset of H Subgroup 1 as, as far as I remember my lore, they don't interbreed with the mentioned 4 races. Then put Goliaths and Firbolg as a small, yet separate group on the same level as Goblinoids and Humanoids (call them, say, Sub-Giants) with some probability of interbreeding, but no known occurrences.
Gnomes and Elves have 'Fey Heritage' - let's throw that into the common category with all the planetouched and amobinated races, tieflings, aasimar, genasi, yuan-ti - the whole lot. However, gnomes and elves are distinct races with significant fey influence on respective ancestor populations down the line. They have their ancestor species and fall within the whole structure. The other planetouched would be examples of common mutations exhibited by a number of humanoid species under the effects of respective planes and creatures.

>>53883774
Gnomes are also cousins to dwarves, an important thing to note.

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>>53883433
>>53883552
>>53883774
What do you think of that?

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>>53879854

>>53883998
Looking pretty damn good.

>>53884125
Thanks

>>53883998
Nice one, mate. I think I'll give your chart a makeover with some campaign notes of my own, and post it here if the thread isn't off the board in 20 hours or so. Will probably make a separate version with all playable races for 5e.

>>53884117
That picture doesn't make any sense, tolerance is a social idea of how we should interact with each other whereas evolution is a scientific explanation for the diversity of species. The two concepts aren't really comparable at all

>>53879854
What are you asking anon? Do you mean is it morally justified? because in that case the answer is obviously no. Or do you mean logically justified, like would these people enslave each other? In that case the answer is yes, yes they would

>>53885776
It's a racist joke, the implications being that non-whites are less evolved, that more evolved species should be "ahead" of lesser ones, and that people who preach tolerance are in effect going against evolution

>>53885839
>less evolved
poor ignorant racists, I guess they saw that monkey to man pictures once and didn't bother to look into it more than that

>>53883998
I prefer to have orcs in the Suidae family.

>>53843391
simple but elegant
nice

>>53881361
Neat mate, I have something like that too.

Basically the same thing but elves weren't uplifted by humans. Sure, they were from a human stock, but the race that uplifted them were dwarves to fight against humanity.

In the beginning of time, the incredible soul sorcery of the human precursors started to put increasing strain on the fabric of reality. To fight against that most foul magic, the dwarves, master of elementalism, developed elemental essences able to fuse with a living body for a time, granting great powers to their most fearsome warrior for the meager cost of their life. It wasn't enough.

They refined the process and developed the Elven Fire in their forge, a lesser, kinder, more stable form of elemental empowering, one self-sustaining. They then took human stock from ex-slaves of the empire, empowered them, and started to use them as ground soldiers in the war.

The elves were born. The Elven Fire grants them immortality, and only increases in strength as they age, but they must develop a stronger and stronger meditative grip if they don't want to die by elven fever as their fire grows too hot for their soul. Rare are the elves that survives 600/700 years: the one that survives their first millennium are called high elves.

>>53880584
?

>>53887756
fear is how I fall

>>53888128
I really don't understand. Are you calling my stuff edgy? If you are I don't get what you're finding edgy about it.

>>53888153
confusing what is real

>>53888153
I don't understand what's edgy about your comment either, ignore him, he might be having a stroke.

>>53883586
>>53883774
>>53883998
They have so many features like humans. Convergent evolution is usually just one trait. Plus the distance of their ancestors is usually closer than synapsid and diapsid.

I mean, what shapes get repeated evolved? Snake-like things have evolved a few times. Sharks, ichthyosaurs, and dolphins are pretty similar. But the former are because of the requirements of burrowing and the latter because of water. Why did a two-legged, tailless, sapient with hands keep evolving?

Seems far more likely that gnolls, kobolds and whatever came from the human base. Maybe they were selectively breed by an ancient civilization? Or some random atavistic characteristic showed up in a population that found it very useful (or sexy, if you magical realm)

>>53891102
Honestly I think it would be more credible if beast races are just the result of magic otherwise I don't think you can avoid a bad case of incredible convergent evolution.

>>53891176
How so? Because gnolls look kind of like dogs? Or kobolds are dragon-esque? And so forth? Maybe they both speciated from an basal long-muzzled homo ancestor a million years ago.

>>53843094
>Where is the missing link between Elf and Dwarf?
Elves are the descendants of some of the first Human magic civilizations. They and Dwarves had a proto-Eloi/Morlock relationship. The Dwarves eventually rebelled, and that's where their current enmity comes from.
>Does your Orc have a pedigree?
Sure, why not? Though "Orcs" are just Dark Elves or Dwarves. The maggots that feast upon the corpse of the old Elven empire have many names. You could call them "Goblins" too.

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>>53883998
From what I can tell, dragons have the skeletal structure of a synapsid, making them and their kin closer to mammals than lizardmen.

Which could explain the hairier variants of kobolds.

plumb

>>53897648
neat

>>53889498
>ape-like dinosaurs

...What?

>>53900026
Came with the pic, I have no idea.

>>53893869
Oh goodness, there are at least 45 humanoids that would need to be categorized.

>>53893869
Let's say dragons were created as trans-something "perfect bodies" for some declining precursor race that couldn't survive climate change in their current ones.

>>53883998
Ogres should be proto-giant remnants, brutish and primitive while giants and humans are a bit more "evolved" (i.e., noble/civilized)

>>53843094
Humans.

Humans. Elfs and Dwarfs are simply splinters of humanity that evolved into something else during the thousands of years of isolation, while the normal humans are the ones that changed the least, because they were lucky to not get splintered off in the galactic cataclysm and thus managed to keep their genepool diverse.

Orcs are also just humans who were located in the ground zero of the cataclysm and were isolated for thousand of years in a system that is continuously bombarded by intense radiation. They managed to survive by genetically engineering themselves into different radiation resistant animals, to make up for the completely sterile system they were now isolated in and then quickly devolved into primates.

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http://kofh2u.tripod.com/id31.html
More weird shit.

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I've got two branches. Natural hominids and magical mutations.
I'll move from the first left column down, and then move down the right column.

First up are humans. Nothing extraordinary.

Then we have Neanderthals taking the role of dwarves. Tough strong motherfuckers, but they aren't very creative or inventive.

Floriensis takes a dual role of hobbits/halflings and goblins, depending on whether you piss them off or give them booze.

Next up are carnivorous giant cavemen. Think ogres, Grendel, Neanderthals on steroids, Homo Hulkmania.

And now from the right column we get mutations.

First up is the Elf mutation. Theoretically, any humanoid that practices magic for long enough and reaches some deep understanding of it (before they die), will eventually transform in an elf. Nothing too fancy, their bodies de-age and they get elf ears. In practice, only humans achieve this.

Second is the Tolkien orc mutation. If someone gets enthralled/mindcontrolled/voodoo zombie'd for too long, they turn in some mutant creature, a fucked up creature that's 100% evil all the time.

Third is the Troll mutation. It's caused by sudden bursts of mutagenic energies. You might turn in a tree sized two-headed man-eater with treebark for skin, or into a horrid fanged and clawed furry monster with goat horns, or you'll turn in a supremely sexy person with a cowtail. The mutation process doesn't effect the mind like the Tolkien orc mutation, so Trolls often have severe mental baggage from suddenly mutating out of the blue with no idea what is going on.

And the fourth mutation is very very bad. Very. Bad.

>>53843094
>Who was the first sapient?
Gods, but they were not living but rather pure energy beings or more like forces of nature with a will and ability to think. Being the first to think and also having the power and ability to basically be a sentient version of evolution.
The first creature would probably be a sentient amoeba, some god was probably to impatient to wait for actual fitting sapients to form.
>Where is the missing link between Elf and Dwarf?
Elves are basically the freeware humanoid beta program, they are created with poor understanding of how godly fate affects the species (which explains their poor luck mating wise and why they are "dying out") and were created with pure perfection in mind. They come in many flavors to suit their primal gods to a letter, even a elven child barely able to speak can site the laws of the god and this connection gives them their aloof and alien mindset, as they are the closest to the eternal primal beings.

The link would be the god that formed them, "improving" upon the faulty elven design.
>Does your Orc have a pedigree?
Yes, though they are given the worst fate of all thanks to the kind hearted meddling of an idiot god. They are conceived trough a very efficient stork brings the baby way where an orc baby simply appears for the mother to care for. Perfect at first thought but when you realize that fate mindlessly punishes unchallenged efficiency and perfection its a terrible idea.

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>>53843391
A dolf?

>>53844247
I fucking love the lore in Arcanum.

>>53844247
I liked Arcanum's take too.

Mostly that elves weren't the oldest race, but make the claim that they are since they had the first civilization.

>>53913899
They also like to think of themselves as all high and mighty and in tune with nature and all that, which is neither completely false nor completely true.

>>53863655
So that's why I desire to kill and eat elves.

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>>53914040
If /k/ found it, they'd have other intentions...

>>53859702
This, really. It's primarily a family and culture thing, although I wonder if there was meant to be a connection to the Three Houses of the Edain. But it is interesting to note that the Edain, the Eldar, and the Hobbits are all divided into three groups each.

>>53846855
As a moderately religious, Orthodox-raised Jew who believes in evolution I can say with some certainty that the chart there is fucking idiotic.

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>>53914598
Pretty much, just look at the website it came from.
>>53908932

>>53848952
People, talkers, folk, mortals, Children 0f [Overgod name], sophonts, humans (having man/mankind refers to homo sapiens).

>>53914691
>>53908932
My brain hurts now.

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>>53915907
I know, it's pretty bad. The guy who amde them apparently become rather infamous on the evc forums.

Now the image on >>53914691 was me, but I know it ain't linear.

>>53846825
Pegasuses/gryphons/chimeras/hippogriffs?

>>53911899
interesting

>>53843094
>Who was the first sapient?

A hexapodal species that was magic knowing itself in physical form.

It evolved into two species, Gargoyles, and Dragons

>Where is the missing link between Elf and Dwarf?

Same species, though some Dwarves are 'elvish' offspring. Oberon's Children are shapeshifters with varied preferences, and can sometimes reproduce simply by hanging around in an area for too long.

>>Nap under a tree for a few years
>>Some seeds turn dryad

>Does your Orc have a pedigree?

Not really? They are either enchanted creatures made up whole cloth or halflings.

>>53911183
Ok first, Hominidae is a family and Homo is the genus. How do you even create a cladogram like that but not know where Homo goes?

Also, I still disagree with this whole orcs/gnolls/whatever just happened to be exactly like ugly/furry humans because of unexplained convergent evolution reasons. Although multichamber-stomach hippo-orcs is kind of funny.

>>53921141
>Hominidae is a family and Homo is the genus
As they are listed.

>>53921168
What? Oh this is a color thing isn't it. Stupid colors.

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>>53921203
Yep a color thing.
Family and Hominidae are in Yellow.
Genus and Homo are in a light orange.

>>53921331
Ah, cool. What software are you using for that?

Why hippo orcs? Also, do they still have hooves and fancy stomachs?

>>53921488
Xmind

>Why hippo orcs?
I started by thinking of orcs.

I thought the pigmen and orcs looked similar in warcraft, so thought it could make sense that they were more closely related to some kind of pig like animal.
When revisiting that idea I thought of the "killer pig" from one of those cgi documentaries about extinct animals, later while looking it up I saw that that killer pig was more closely related to hippos than pigs.
They all have the tusks, and I think something from that area could make sense for orc origin.

>>53921576
>I started by thinking of orcs.
Ignore that part.

>>53921576
The killer pigs does seem a reasonable fit for orcs. Plenty of the lore describes them as violent and porcine. But even if convergence can explain there being similar two-legged tailless humanoids, their internals (and hands and feet) should be surprisingly different.

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>>53885823
>yfw "human supremacists" start to pick fights with roving bands of ape-men
>some even begin to enslave them, for hard labor and sex
>the few tribes of free ape-men that are left gang up and whoop their collective asses, 10,000 BC style
>humans give a fraction of their farmland to the ape-men as a sign of peace

>>53921576
>hippo orcs

"Laddie, lemme tell ya. NEVER stand between a thirsty orc and the bar. That's asking to get bulldozered."

>>53846500
Why are trolls in the goblinoid branch?

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>>53923693
not him but Trolls & Goblins do fit together pretty well, a friend of mine does something similar for his fantasy setting, although his Goblins and Trolls are of amphibian descent rather than hominid*

*well most Goblins, it gets a bit complicated since Goblin is both a race and a culture, so there are cultural Goblins that aren't genetic Goblins, and similarly it gets a bit murky on the genetic since magical hybridization is fairly common in his setting as well, for example his world's equivalent of Grendel and his Mother are members of a sub-species of Troll that have been hybridized with Dragons(which in his setting are descended from the same branch of lizards that both Monitor Lizards and Snakes evolved from)

>>53924511
Interesting

>>53843094
bump for fantasy science

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>>53927295
The distinguished gentlemen has run afoul of their own presumptions. This is clearly the more enlightened representation.

>>53927998
impossible outside a sci fi setting

>>53928235
I don't understand why it has to be scifi. Unless, it is an objection to Morlock and Eloi. Which I just meant them as colorfully descriptive terms, not actual reference to The Time Machine. The Morlocks are brutish and heavy boned. The Eloi are gracile and far more similar facial features.

>>53928300
>Unless, it is an objection to Morlock and Eloi.
No not that.
The reason it is impossible outside a fantasy setting is that there are long lines of evolution that, where they're all sapient and it suggests that their sapience is a homologous trait, which means that back in homo ergaster times you would've already had a civilization that would've have advanced so long that it can't be anything other than scifi.
Convergent may be improbable, but for other traits it as at least been shown in nature and it wouldn't be impossible in a medieval fantasy setting.

>>53846616
It would make more sense if species were separated according to habitat rather than "role", since humanoid species would pretty much always occupy a similar role.

>>53928400
Sapience by no means assures civilization. Modern humans began to develop 200,000 years ago. Which is long enough back to include another interglacial period of tens of thousands of years. Why did civilization only develop in the last few thousand years?

Of that list, only a few races have truly developed to a civilized state. Some have clearly borrowed developments from other groups. It is quite possible, likely even, that only one (dwarves most likely) developed advanced technology.

That knowledge might only have developed recently. Or at least only escaped the secretive dwarves recently.

This thread is ass backwards, it's saying X comes from Y because they exist rather than asking why they exist.

What environment makes an elf a viable life form as opposed to an Orc? Elves excel at magic, nature and have long life spans so maybe elves come from a place with magic ley lines but poor farm land, as such they use magic to enhance the farm land and so adapted to that environment. The magic enabled them to use healing magic better so they naturally lived longer, bred longer and longer life spans were selected for.

Orcs maybe evolved in an environment where there's a lot of predators. Only the most brutal survived and so they became larger and more brutal. Maybe some where like a volcanic region full of armoured wild life you have to kill with brute force.

Stop trying to make evolution into Pokemon or Digimon. Elves don't just appear from humans, the world needs to have environments that support Elven traits the best.

>>53929033
>Why did civilization only develop in the last few thousand years?
Because it took about 190k years to develop it. Shaping the environment, culture, learning what to hunt.
Which is a much much shorter than going from ergaster to gnome.

>>53929322
These phylogenetic trees don't take why speciation happens into account. Mainly because that's not what phylogenetic trees do.

They're designed to show the common ancestors of different kinds of humanoids, not why they diverged from them.

Do you complain when you look at an atlas that it doesn't show the traffic?

>>53929870
You're designing something retard. Completely different thing

>>53929919
Yeah, but we have the end result, the various humanoid races. We're then trying to figure out what their closest relatives and ancestors were.

We're not here to figure out what biomes they adapted to. That's a completely different subject.

>>53929975
That is exactly the same subject if you understand evolution in the slightest. Other wise you have Pokemon.

Why are Elves adapted from humans? What environment forces those changes? If you don't have that answer then you don't have evolution, you have hitting level 22 and turning into a metal goat

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>>53930050
So I guess this is a picture of pokemon, because it doesn't contain a record of why they diverged?

>>53843094
>Who was the first sapient?
Humans and Halflings.

All other magical races are attempts by the Gods to create their own versions, using one or both as a template of sorts. With mixed results; For example, Elves wre created by the god of Knowledge and magic, improving on the human creature by giving HIS Elves longer lives and a stronger connection to magic, but in his rush forgot to endow them with the patience of a long-lived race. The result is that all Elves have short attention spans and unfocused minds. in effect, every Elf has some kind of ADD or ADHD, but the severity varies from Elf to Elf

>Where is the missing link between Elf and Dwarf?
They were both made by the Gods based on Human physiology.

>Does your Orc have a pedigree?
no because Orcs don't breed. They are the product of Goblins meddling in alchemy. Orcs are Homunculus created by Goblin Alchemists combining Goblin and Boar blood.

For the guys who do wacky shit like Orcs with being descendants from pigs or whatever, they indeed look like pigs and can't reproduce with humans right?

>>53930105
>they indeed look like pigs and
maybe

>can't reproduce with humans right?
of course they can't

>>53843340
>This would make all of the fantasy races merely subclades of the general human clade. Extreme isolation and long time scales would be necessary: human populations in the New World had no gene exchange with old world populations for around 12,000 years, and speciation did not occur.
This is likely also due to the relatively large genepool of the original immigrants, also it's quite likely that other groups kept traveling there and ended up staying.
Also, there wasn't all that much evolutionary pressure. Life in the Americas 10k years ago was not really all that different from life in Eurasia 10k years ago.

What's needed are varying environments that put different pressures on the populations, and they need to be isolated from each other.

a lot of people seem to be trying to make these as mundane as possible, when it works best when there's at least a little magic involved

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>>53934556
>a lot of people seem to be trying to make these as mundane as possible,
what about >>53930092 ?

>>53843094
Humans, halfling, goblins, and orcs are from the hot, red flame. They burn through their lives quickly and have incredible passions. They are prone to chaos and desire and are ill at ease, though humans, whose flame is smaller and weaker, are less so. They are dynamic and changeable, prone to mutation, and adapt quickly to new places and environments, resulting in many races and subspecies. They must constantly feed their ever-guttering flame with wants and needs, and can never truly be sated. Most burn too fast to channel their flame into magic, the mere act of living taking up most of its energy, but those that do often have strange and unique arts.

Elves, gnomes, and dwarves are of the white, cold flame. They burn cooler and slower and therefore live longer, but their passions are softer and their yearnings strike them with a lesser ferocity, making them less prone to ambition and actively desiring to shape the cosmos. They naturally err toward law and stability, and have an in-built patience toward the world and the things in it. Their slow-burning flame is well suited to the harnessing of magic, and these beings often have well-storied and disciplined magical traditions.

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>>53934768

>>53934770
that's why I said a lot, not all

No love for arthropodal species?

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>>53936295

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>>53936295
thought these were pretty neat

>>53928400
>>53934747
Thinking about it more, modern industrialization is but a few hundred years from the middle ages. You have five unrelated but all sapient orders. Did they just happen to develop sapience at the exact same time? Even though sapience appears on Earth to be unique and complicated? Or did most of them exist for a millions of years without ever developing technologically?

The answer is a single source, (homo erectus or such). Either environmental collapse leading to very rapid radiation or selective breeding. As the chihuahua and a St. Bernard are only a thousand years or so apart.

Considering the similarity of many beast races with so many other animals. Perhaps a thousand or more years ago some mad wizard or magical disease (related to lycanthrope?) began combining DNA from a number of unrelated species. Perhaps a recombinant virus like HIV?

>>53929800
I think it is more likely something to do with climate stress forcing agriculture. Plus those crops being havested, stored and ready for transport by the taxman.

>>53936779
>You have five unrelated but all sapient orders.
Primates, Carnivora, Perissodactyla, Artiodactyla, Saurischia?

Dragons are created out of a dinosaur with magic.
Centaurs are created out of horses and probably humans out of magic.
I don't need to explain primates.

That leaves two monsters races in Carnivora and Artiodactyla. Gnolls may be "closer to animal than man" than an orc, but they both use tools and language like other animals, like crows.

One must account for the known human hybrids:
Half-elf
Half-orc
Mul (half-dwarf) (The only infertile hybrids? Making dwarves further relations than most everything else?)
Orog (half-ogre) (or orc instead of human?)
Tiefling (If not truly demons, then beastmen or other monsterous humanoid ancestors?)

>>53941257
Orogs and Ogrillons are half-orc/half-ogre. I forget the difference.

>>53944413
It seems like the lore is inconsistent between editions.

>>53944413
Orogs are from male orcs and female ogres.
Ogrillons are the other way round.

>>53843094
Are we really going to just ignore "Midget Slashers"? This thread is sitting on literal gold and no one has done anything about it?

>>53843094
Since I run a Godbound game which heavily skirt the fantasy/science-fiction line (in that the ancient, long-lost empires were very heavily into what you'd call or liken 'magitek' and genetic engineering), a concept which is already in the setting to begin with most sentient humanoid races...are all posthuman offshoot or descendant of them. In some cases it may have been deliberate crafting and in others its random mutation from all the cosmic fuckery. Because of how much time passed and just how different these beings are it can be hard to recognize them as 'human' since we're talking the equivalent of millions of years of evolution in the span of centuries.

This range from the classical fantasy humanoid which are almost-human to truly alien creatures whose biology is barely similar to us do to being built for a different environment. Even the orc stand-in are more alien than just being big, ugly humans: everything which define what you'd expect of 'orcs' in a fantasy setting is due to deliberate engineering. They are bigger and stronger than humans to meet battlefield needs. They are scary for intimidation purpose. They breed fast to replenish ranks. As for them being dumb? Well they aren't operating at peak efficiency and modern orcs lack the bio-magitek maintenance needed, making them these misshapen, twisted dumb brutes who have retained the strength and aggression of their ancestors.

>>53946871
Makes sense, like mules and hinnies.

>>53914598
Oy vey, you're just saying this to hide the truth, don't (((you)))?

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>>53927998
>>53934747
>>53937122
Ok, this suggests the beastmen are from an ancient disease, but it could also be an ancient selective breeder, possibly named Slaanesh?

>>53948786
What do you mean?

>>53953517
It's in the original image. One of the species descended from the ancestral trolls is Midget Slashers.

They're small, pretty dumb, and mostly hunt by running alongside Rhinos and Titanotheres and ripping off meat while they still live.

>>53951867
Yes, that must be it. The International Zionist Jewish Conspiracy is hiding the truth, that we're too stupid to read our own holy books in our own language. Oy vey!
>>53953517
Midget slashers is a funny name that bringd a tiny Jason Voorhees to mind.

>>53956206
brings*. Phoneposting is a pain in the ass.
Anyway, on topic: in my setting, humans are actually the Dwarfs' creations vis genemodding. The Elves and Dwarfs are descended from a common ancestral humanoid, which differentiated into deep forest- and cave-dwelling forms as a result of a supernatural disaster that rendered their original grassland biome uninhabitable (it basically turned into a giant desert).

>>53934768
This is actually better art than Man After Man, but the Abe Sapien out of nowhere is jarring.

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Boump

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>>53850678
Nu orcs look shitty.

>>53962750
They're literally WoW ripoffs.

>>53850678
2007 Orc is god tier, the more rounded shoulders and stumpy legs are 10/10 Orc physique. 2011 Orc isn't as interesting.

I really like Orcs as sort of ape-like in proportions.

>>53872849
Just now you realize that Terraformars is actually a story of people trying to recolonize Detroit. There's even a pyramid there.

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>>53965074
>that goblin

>>53843094
X denotes extinct
Human -> Elf (From long period in forests and exposure to magic) -> Orc (From exposure of early elves to evil magic, before tolerance developed)
Neanderthal X -<
Halfling (From isolation on island, this happened in real life, but they died out) -> Dwarf (Adaptions to the underground)
Subraces are treated as "Breeds"

>>53973290
Ok /pol/ you don't even know your own racism. There are five races*, Caucasoid, Congoid, Capoid, Mongoloid, Australoid.

*- you know, if the idea wasn't a bunch of Victorian nonsense. Sheesh, you'd think a racist would at least know their own Coon.

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>>53973636
That's actually what creationists believe, and they think it isn't racist.

>>53973688
Well, it is clearly racist, but they might not think racism is bad. Which could be reasonable if it was actually based on the most recent science, rather than weird distortions of the political needs of the 1850s.

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>>53973798
This the closest approximation I can find to one of their charts.

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>>53974897
And this is how they depict the opposing side (evolution).

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>>53843094
OC from world building

Not to be a party pooper, but how can this be of any use in standard fantasy game?

I mean, do wizards and sages have means of studying scientifically something like that when literally a wizard could have done it and invented a new race?

>>53980498
Nice and consistent worldbuilding helps with immersion and makes for a more interesting world.

For me, for example, hearing "a wizard did it" or "the gods did it" as an explanation puts me off a game, because why should I take it seriously if the GM didn't take it seriously?

Granted, all of this is probably not necessary at all for a simple run of the mill high fantasy dungeon crawling game, but not all games are like that, and if players are willing to invest time into getting immersed and want a more serious and down to earth game, then worldbuilding is absolutely worth it.

Additionally, worldbuilding is fun in and of itself.

>>53980601

Let's just that I don't buy the idea that the players can think about SCIENCE! when science doesn't exisist and is actively contradicted by magic.

>For me, for example, hearing "a wizard did it" or "the gods did it" as an explanation puts me off a game, because why should I take it seriously if the GM didn't take it seriously?

Dind't mean that, anyway. "A wizard could have done with this and that ritual" is a problem to a scientifical taxonomy as well as handwaving it.

>>53980645
You are making a lot of assumptions that don't hold up outside of D&D-like high fantasy worlds. You also have a fundamental misunderstanding of what science is.

Another thing to consider is that worldbuilding is largely for the GM, to aid him in crafting a compelling story, not for the players. The players only interact with the world through the GM.

>>53980668

Well, science is or should be if not experimental falsifiable. If a wizard, a god, whatever, can basically wind it up, you can't really have a scientifcal taxonomy.

Also, no story can be aided by an hypotetical taxonomy. At most if race A believes they descend from something and B denies it, something like. But that' what the people believe, not what is real, that is at stake.

>if this is a) a GMfull game and b) the GM doesn't share the worldbuilding, and b) is generally bullshit

>>53980737
Science is just a systematic method for obtaining knowledge and making predictions using that knowledge. If the gods exist and the world runs at their whims, it is entirely believable that a scientist would study the mood of gods and what drives their psyche, while another scientist tries to figure out how the gods do what they do. "Magic" and "science" are not opposites. They're not even the same kind of thing.

That aside, unless your players are playing fantasy Charles Darwin, they're not going to give a fuck where the lizardmen came from, but I as a GM can use information on how the lizardmen evolved to make informed decisions about how they interact with the players. Maybe the players need to obtain reinforcements for a war, but the lizardmen are reluctant to move in winter because they're cold blooded and the cold makes them lazy and inactive, for example.

As I said, worldbuilding is mostly for the GM, to be able to craft a story thats consistent and interesting when the players interact with the world. Adding small worldbuilding details is also a reward for players who are paying attention, while players who don't care can just go ahead and ignore them.

>>53980781

Science needs predictable phenomenons, basically. Are the gods predictable? Or at least their interventions recognizable as such? I guess in that case you could start hypothesizing something.

I see your point on the lizardmen, but what I'ma saying is that you probably can't really have usual DND magic and a real taxonomy. I mean, i LOVED that tidbit about dragons needing metals to cool them off that I read here sometime ago, but...

>>53980910
Look, in the end, not everyone plays D&D or D&D-style games, so stop filtering everything through a D&D lens.

If you don't think that detailed worldbuilding is something you're going to use or enjoy, then don't do it, nothing wrong with that.

Other people enjoy different kind of games and settings, more rational, with more limited magic and more reasonable laws of nature. Some of those people also like to think how the races in their world came about, and some of those people participated in this thread.

>>53980938

True, but I said:

>Not to be a party pooper, but how can this be of any use in standard fantasy game?

>>53980970
I explained how in one of my previous posts. You use the information to make decisions about the story as the players interact with the world.

It's up to you if you actually want to use it or not in your own setting.

>>53980984
>>53980984

I meant to stress that all this was about standard fantasy games.

>>53981020
low magic is a perfectly cromulent fantasy setting.

>>53843094
bump

>>53843094
There are actually two species that can claim the title of being the first sapients. The first is humans, the base species from which the gods derived all of the other Old World species - elves, orcs, dwarves, centaurs, basically any mammalian species on the super-continent.

Then the gods had a schism, and the second group fucked off, made the New World on the other side of the planet, and populated it with those based off of a new template, the lizardfolk. There you have the saurii, naga, tortoisefolk, etc, etc.

There isn't quite a missing link between the elven subraces and the dwarven subraces, aside from the link to humanity which all Old World races share, and they have a very low chance of producing off-spring. Elves are more likely to be able to breed with, in order of viability and excluding other Elves: the humans to the south (as all races are based off of them), the fey to the north-east (as they are their closest genetic cousins), and the goblinoids to the north and west (due to the gods responsible for making those two pan-ethnic groups being into that kind of shit).

And yes, the Orc has a pedigree. He can trace his lineage back over 800 years, to the time before the Blessed Reman Empire was formed.

>>53980498
Worldbuilding is fun by itself

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>>53843094
Oh man this is actually something I really enjoy.

Avianfolk were the first sentient species, but they had a slower tech advancement because they didn't really need it. Right after them came the Prehistoric Elf, who then split into the now modern Wood, High, Night Elves and Orcs. Later around Bronze Age horned elves, Caprics, emerged mostly because of a curse.
Dwarves showed up not soon after, and Centaurs were around as well.
Humans started civilization slightly behind everyone else, but there are species that came from the evolution of man, namely the Halflings, and the Catfolk

Dwarves and Elves don't have a lot in common genetically. They can't produce offspring, but there was an Adam humanoid species a very long time ago that gave birth to the other species. That's the general assumption anyways

Orcs are just another flavor of elf, honestly. No corruption or anything, they exist as god intended

>>53987790
You're fun by yourself

>>53934747
I think I will read up more on bipedialism.
See if I can get an idea of how long it would take to go from walking on 4 legs and 2 legs, so many factor,s but maybe I can get a rought idea.

Might have to include more magic in the origins.

>>53991887
Humans diverged from our chimp ancestors ~7 million years ago. Best evidence for full bipedalism is Australopithecus afarensis at ~3.6 million. The forward facing eyes and grasping hands that would let you accurately throw a spear evolved long before that.

You also need to answer why the bipedal form kept evolving. Tailless bipedalism is unique and a kind of hard way to get around. Maybe the others converged because they also needed to be super good long distance runners? Hmm, like I don't know, all the prey developed psychic powers which could always detect an ambush.

>>53992780
>You also need to answer why the bipedal form kept evolving.
not really a concern

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>>53859878
I have things set up quite close except that halflings are a subspecies of human and goblins are descended from bats

>>53992887
If you are trying to incorporate that >>53934747 document it is. If you are just handwaving everything away with 'magic did it', then sure make up whatever you want.

>>53980498
I don't even play tabletop RPGs, I just like worldbuilding.

>>53993101
>descended from bats
Via what series of alchemical bestial fuckery?

>>53993373
No it really isn't.
You don't need to handwave it with magic either, I can handwave it differently.
I can just have it go through to equivalent struggles that we went through.
I don't need to explain why nut allergies or whatever evolved either.
The question is time though. It is more plausible for something related to hippo to become bipedal the further back they share their ancestry, since there's more time for the adaptions you make up to take place.

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This is what I use for my campaigns. Humans have sorta intermingled in a lot of other races, which is both the result and cause of them being so common, if that makes sense? Dwarves are related, but have been split off for longer. Halflings are the midpoint between dwarf and human, though halflings are rarely able to breed with dwarves

>>53900026
I agree with this anon... wut?

>>53936295
Not in fantasy. One of the prominent species in a science fiction setting I've come up with (but probably never get to use since people I know either play DnD or Dark Heresy) are arthropod-equivalent (six-limbed uniramids with one pair of antennae and three pairs of feeding limbs), but for fantasy I wanted to avoid the issue I have with a lot of fantasy settings that just dump in a huge amount of sentient races, so I just stuck to the standard humans/elves/dwarves/orcs, and kept the more exotic races limited to serpent-men, fae, and merfolk.

>>53998045
I'm more partial to humans as an offshoot of elves as opposed to the other way around. I like the concept nonetheless