Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback The reason I prefer half-elves

It's really a process of elimination.

1. I'm just not interested in the short races. There's a reason hobbits were unlikely heroes in the Lord of the Rings. I think trying to force them into the role of warriors and knights is antithetical to immersion. They should be running away from trouble, not directly into it.
2. Dragonborn look nice, but I can't imagine romancing someone as a dragonborn. They can't so much as kiss someone realistically so that's a whole aspect of the game that suffers for me.
3. I have the same issue with half-orcs. They're monsters with tusks coming out of their mouths. This monster isn't going to settle down one day with Shadowheart. That's just not the way the world works.
4. Tieflings don't work for me because of the refugees from the grove. I'd want to play into the devilish nature of the tiefling, but the tieflings in the grove are all so far removed from that. It ruins it.
5. A githyanki would be fine except Lae'zel sort of steals the show with all the attention from Vlaakith and Voss.
6. I could almost play an elf or drow but I always get turned off by the effeminate movements built into the races.
7. Humans would be great. Except all the male faces are bad, imo. I really have no interest in a character with any of those faces. And the idea of playing a female is weird to me. I don't get it when guys play females.

Which leaves half-elves.

You could have just said “Elves with Beards”

Once you go Dwarve you never go back!
Joking :P

Male players can play female characters and female players can play male characters.

Those who complain about that only prove they dont understand what the term "roleplaying" even means.

Its really the very same reason why you can pick races other than human.


About races:

Picked Lightfoot Halfling for my Bard for their OP racial. Stout Halfling would have been fine, too.

Picked Half-Orc for my Fighter for their OP warrior racial.

Picked Seldarine Drow for my Sorcerer for style.

Picked human for my Dark Urge Barbarian because only humans can be this bad, even Lolth-Sworn Drow will have some standards.


Generally not interested in / because:

Dragonborn / cant even have proper facial expressions

Dwarf / ugly as almost always

Gith / and here I thought Dwarf are ugly

Tiefling / look absolutely stupid with their horns attached to the most fragile part of the skull; they seem to be OP for Paladin though ?

Human / boring, but see special use Dark Urge

Gnome / male ones are intolerably ugly. Female ones are great though, and their racial is super awesome, too. so if I have an idea for a character, I'd go for female. Maybe an evil Cleric, I dont know.

Elf, Half-Elf / boring. Though maybe High-Elf for Paladin ? Because style.

I played a female character, and ended up with a personality that wouldn't really have worked nearly as well as a man. Besides, there are other obvious differences between me and my character that needed roleplaying; for example I'm not 3 feet tall, and I can't cast spells.

I've only done the one playthrough so far, but in D&D in general I prefer the races that look basically human-shaped (so most of the player's handbook, not the "you can play as any monster" books. I like some variety in race aesthetics and bonuses, but most of the variety I prefer to take from changing their personality and backstory, which is something I'm slowly getting better at.

Yeah, people say that. I still find it odd. I'm pretty sure I'm not alone. I think most people just sort of smile and nod when it happens to be polite. But who knows, maybe I'm wrong. Shrug. There's no law against it. Definitely not for me, though.

The half-elves look more elf-like/better than the elves, even humans look better than these characters and our companions too.
I hardly know anyone who plays the opposite sex in role playing games.

Gnomes and halflings are the best races. I love them.
I also love my gith mage, she is awesome.
Elves, humans and half elfs are kind of boring and bland. I make an exception for female half elf 1 , since she has a really interesting face, full of personality.

And I know a lot of role player, who play the opposite gender ( me included ), no problem at all. My air genasi bard Vayu is my favourite character at the moment and I made him as a minor character in our rpg at the beginning, but he just was awesome and great to play.

I'm a girl and I'm playing a male character. I love playing male characters. I don't associate myself with my character, but I look at the story from the outside, so there can be any races, any characters. No problem at all.
I admit, before, about 15 years ago, I liked playing only for a girl, because I was trying on a role? but a lot of time has passed since then, tastes and views have changed.

So true on both accounts. Literally never played a single video game where a woman is the controlling protagonist.
Irreparable immersion breaking, especially when you have to bizarrely pretend that women can match even an average male warrior.

It should be perfectly possible to compare role-playing preferences without lapsing into sexism or judginess about others’ choices, but not everyone in this thread is succeeding in that. Let’s be a bit more careful.

Yeah, I think having options is great, whether people want to play as someone who looks vaguely like themselves, or something completely different. I certainly wouldn't be against having more faces or bodies for existing races either.