Queering the Shit out of D&D
I’ve decided recently to try my hand at DMing. I acquired source books, a starting module, began imagining a world, altering that starting module to fit better into this world I imagined. I altered around the frequency of every playable race in D&D, creating my own unique world.
And then I had an idea. And then I adapted someone else’s idea. And then I had more ideas, and then someone basically challenged me to do this, and a couple days later I had queered the shit out of every playable race in Dungeons and Dragons Fifth Edition that I could find. (Sorry Tortle lovers, they just weren’t as interesting to me.)
I began to share, and people loved them. And I shared more, and more people loved them. And eventually someone suggested I post it on Tumblr.
So, here goes - my race-by-race notes on how I queered the shit out of my D&D world, in (roughly) the order they occurred to me.
While Firbolgs have what other races would consider to be genders, sexual orientations, romantic orientations, and more, the Firbolg culture doesn’t see the point in giving any of them labels. As such, Firbolgs aren’t male, female, nonbinary, agender, straight, gay, bi, ace, aro, pan, poly, or anything in between - they simply are. They like who they like, they are what they are, and that’s all that matters.
Gnomes are an absurdly androgynous race. Not even other gnomes can tell apart male and female gnomes on sight. As a result, gnomes traditionally wear very gendered outfits, enabling others to tell male gnomes and female gnomes apart. However, as a consequence, it is considered extremely rude to question a gnome’s gender presentation - even if they had a different gender presentation just weeks, days, or even hours before.
Kobolds, while not quite as androgynous as gnomes, are still androgynous enough that only kobolds can tell male and female kobolds apart on sight. As a result, many kobolds find it extremely funny to dress up as the ‘opposite sex’ in order to prank and fool those who cannot tell them apart. This is, among kobolds, considered good harmless fun for all.
Elves, though largely androgynous, have enough sexual dimorphism to tell male and female elves apart - usually. However, traditional elven dress is likewise extremely androgynous - about the only gendered garments are undergarments, and that’s merely to serve a practical purpose.
Goliaths are a strong, muscular race that - to virtually everyone - appear very masculine, male or female. While it is still easily possible to tell male and female goliaths apart, this race of butch women and bear men have more important things to do than worry about their gender presentation, and as a result simply wear what they find comfortable, regardless of whether you think it makes them look ‘girly’ or ‘mannish’.
Kenku, as a race of vocal mimics, incapable of producing sounds they haven’t heard before, are forced to borrow the voices of others they have heard. As a result, sometimes kenku will speak with a male voice, and sometimes they will speak with a female voice - sometimes even while expressing just one thought - and they find it weird that you find that weird.
Due to their nature as a flying race of bird-people, the aarakocra tend to have somewhat androgynous and slender builds. However, in traditional Aarakocra society, there are four genders, divided along the male-female axis, and along the risk-taking/risk-averse axis. While some extremely hard-line aarakocra insist that each coupling involve one male and one female, traditional aarakocra are far more concerned with each coupling involving one partner who is risk-prone, and one partner who is risk-averse, regardless of either partner’s position on the male/female axis.
Goblinoids - goblins, hobgoblins, and bugbears - are all hermaphroditic. While there are some ‘monosex’ individuals born, at about the same rate that intersex humans are, all three of these races are dominated by hermaphroditic individuals.
While lizardfolk do enjoy one another aesthetically, and find recreational enjoyment in sexual activity, almost the entire race is asexual - typically sex-positive, sometimes sex-neutral.
Halflings have literally no concept of the nuclear family. “The biggest tent houses the smallest people” is a common saying, and it shows - children are raised by the entire halfling community in a town or tribe, with no dedicated partners and little care for lineage, if any at all.
While the goliaths are a race of butch women and bear men, the tabaxi are a race that leans towards the feminine side - twinks and femmes, they are prone to communal grooming after group activities such as a hunt, and have no cultural institution of ‘toxic masculinity’ - male tabaxi are just as likely to cuddle up with their close male friends as their close female friends, and feel little compulsion to ‘defend a woman as being theirs’ or other such toxic masculine concepts.
Aasimar and genasi have an extreme predilection towards having intersex children, enough so that among these races, they are about one third male, one third female, and one third intersex.
Humans carry a cultural legend about an ancient human kingdom being overtaken by succubi and incubi, seducing and controlling powerful men and women before eventually controlling the entire country. However, a champion emerged that was immune to the romantic and the sexual charms of these demons, and defeated them, freeing the kingdom. As such, humans traditionally revere aro-ace people as chosen defenders of humanity, and in places with a large human population many such people are encouraged to take up the work of being guardians.
Tritons are the ‘traditionalists’ of this world - yet even they don’t practice marriage, keeping instead to ‘breeding contracts’ that serve as a written record of who is related to who.
Orcs value strength and martial prowess, and as such don’t have a traditional concept of a ‘sexual orientation’, instead feeling attracted to strong and capable people of any gender. Attempts to insult an orc by claiming they’re gay usually backfire horrifically, with the orc taking it as an insult to their chosen partner and defending their partner’s honor.
Tieflings, as a side effect of the demonic power in their lineage, have the ability to change their primary and secondary sexual characteristics at a whim, though the process takes up to eight hours to complete. However, they can be changed completely independently of one another, including acquiring both, or neither. Experts are unsure if this freedom has caused more tieflings to become genderfluid, or has simply increased the ability of genderfluid tieflings to express themselves as such.
Dwarves rarely feel attracted to a specific gender, instead feeling attraction to a specific occupation - a dwarf might be attracted to bakers, or smiths, or potters, or woodworkers, or any other occupation. As a result, many dwarves end up going into business specifically to be around people they are attracted to, resulting quite often in ‘family businesses’ that meet the name in more ways than one, with virtually every employee in a relationship with at least one other employee at the business, if not more.
Dragonborn are traditionally taught the split-attraction model, positing that romantic attraction, sexual attraction, sensual attraction, aesthetic attraction, and platonic attraction are not only distinct but can have completely different orientations. They see nothing wrong with being romantically involved with one person while being sexually involved with someone else.
Yuan-Ti, meanwhile, are rare to find outside their ancient cities - those that can be found, however, usually quickly mold themselves into whichever culture is kind enough to accept them as they reject the evils they were raised amongst. A yuan-ti taken in by halflings doesn’t care about a nuclear family, a yuan-ti raised by tabaxi will groom friends, a yuan-ti adopted by aarakocra grows up knowing four genders, while a yuan-ti amongst the firbolgs knows of none. They are the most malleable of the races in this regard.
anyways thank you for coming to my TED talk next week I’ll discuss the four planes of alignment and how they’re all each constantly arguing that no, they’re the plane of good.
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