So we looked at Ogres and Trolls here. And, the humanoid races in general here. But, I’m sure people are most interested in the playable races. Those races have their own racial preferences table.

I’m not going to recapitulate the analysis from those previous two posts, definitely take a look at them, though, to get an idea of how I’ve carried out this analysis. The numbers here should not surprise as, like with the previous humanoids, groups with similar alignments and preferences produce similar numbers.

It should be noted here that I used the alignments for the races given in the monster manual. And, where there is no entry, such as with half-orc and half-elf, I used the alignment from the entry that was in the monster manual. So, half-elves are CG just like elves and half-orcs are LE just like orcs. Things get more complicated for humans. There is an entry for humans, men, but each of the entries under men cover a variety of alignments. Dervishes are LG while Merchants are N and Brigands CE. Humans are all over the map. But it is notable that on the racial preferences table Humans fall mostly in the neutral category, so for alignment I also used neutral. But be aware that, for humans, this analysis is really for the typical run-of-the-mill villager rather than any of the groupings in the Monster Manual.

There is a little bit of a surprise here. While the half-orc is a playable race, the other races really don’t like them and, as lieges, dwarves, elves, and half-elves, won’t work with them at all. Odds for Gnomes and Halflings aren’t much better, and probably should just be rounded to zero. I guess that’s why the Player’s Handbook mentions that player character half-orcs are of the ten percent that can pass as human. Though, it’s good not to forget for the other races, as player characters, alignment can vary and can dramatically change these calculations.

Otherwise, the civilized races can be just as disagreeable with each other as the uncivilized humanoids. What it does show is, that under this system, you don’t have great odds of just going out and making friends. You have to bring more to the table. Something else must swing the odds, a gift, good pay, a shared goal, a plot, a conspiracy, a religion? Perhaps, a horrific ring that needs to be destroyed?