A Primer of D&D 5E’s Playable Races, Such as They Are (From Volo’s Guide To Monsters)

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Harken, adventurers! It is time for another edition of “introducing my D&D nerds-to-be to playable races in the ~~worst~~ ~~best~~ laziest possible way”! Today, I turn to the delightful races to be discovered in Volo’s Guide To Monsters – what furry, angelic fun awaits us! These races make for excellent divine crusaders, nefarious man-eating barbarians, and the fluffiest of house pets!

Aasimar

Remember how, with tieflings, some mortal probably thought, “This demon’s hot, I’d better go to town with them”? Well, the aasimar’s mommy and daddy thought the same, but with an angel. And where tieflings are feared for their ancestry, aasimar are celebrated for having a spark of divinity within them. Puts a bit of pressure on your average aasimar, doesn’t it? Such high expectations can really turn an angelic off-shoot rotten!

I like them, even if none of my players have played one – they have a great few story beats baked at the very core of the class, just as the tieflings do! This here image I found on google illustrates as much:

Furbolg

Is the furbolg an angry two-legged bear-adjacent bloke out there, wielding a stick to smack you on the head with?

Or are they dopey and charming, and still wielding sticks?

Ah! I think I got it! “Furbolg” is just another word for a person wielding a stick. Case solved!

P.S. There’s a third option, where you can be real mellow and pink-haired but only if you’re called Taliesin Jaffe.

Goliath

Bloody hell, do I love goliaths! Tribal and physically imposing, they make for excellent barbarians to threaten any decadent civilization. The tale of the outcast goliath is a great one but you can wild with the lot of them. I don’t have anything funny to say about the goliath race, they’re just insanely cool and I want to devise a whole tribe of them and see what happens when I push my players into it. And, oh, you can bet that I’ll try and convince one of my players to make themselves a goliath PC!

Kenku

Sure, give birds legs and brains big enough they can out-think you – that’s bound to go over well. I’ll be honest, some races engage with me on a deep level, and others…others you feel are judging you with their beady birb eyes.

That’s kenku for you.

Lizardfolk

Ever seen that movie that’s so popular with the kids, Jurassic Park? Ever thought, “I wanna be the t-rex!”? Lizardfolk make for another one of those races I’ve neither seen played nor used as NPCs in my world, but recent experience with Total War: Warhammer II has given me a few ideas. As has this meme: