> Gee, I always thought that was because they were close to unplayable
> except in very exceptional groups, or as parodies (like playing
> Paranoia as Mostali).
Maybe my bad -- I mean that in RQ, there was character information, but there's much less in HW. Now, sure, dragonewts and mostali are unplayable (well, unless you have a very specialized play style), the underwater races were a bit of an odd choice, grotarians and griffins -- notsomuch, and chaos critters like broo were useful only for exceptional groups and one-night campaigns.
But it still (in the RQ days) left uzko/enlo/uzdo, elves, ducks, ogres, newtlings, minotaurs, hsunchen, baboons, tusk riders, centaurs, etc. Sure, some were more narrow than others, many required some sort of "rootless" logic, but they were still *playable* (at least IMO), and Elder Secrets gave character creation for some of 'em, at least.
The HQ information *will* come out in time (knock on wood), but having a *minimum* introduction is useful in the meantime -- a 2-page "elf intro" (ala ILH), while an "elf book" is pending, etc. Even a "troll intro" or "Sartar intro" would be useful, so a new player doesn't have to slog through UTTOG or TR.
To refer to the SFB analogy, I dread "Well, yes, an entire book on that is coming out... well, it was supposed to be out a couple years ago, but... no, no, nothing official until then," which is one reason I gave up on SFB/FE. Even with an ambitious 4 books a year for HQ, a lot of info will just have to wait even without time overruns... : ( So having a teaser out ahead of time might be a nice thing.
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The point on motivations is well-taken, yes -- either the group does has to have a "solid core" ("We're Heortlings, but we have these two weird freaks in our clan..."), or adventures start to resemble basic dungeon-crawls. Which helps explain why Pavis was such a great location for campaigns... and a hope that HQ Pavis scenario projects will be high in the list!
After all, many players I know *like* dungeon crawls. Give 'em Karse and Pavis! Hell, even give 'em ducks.
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