Non Human Knights

Non Human Knights

 Introduction

The Players hand book says quite unequivocally that Knight hood is a human cultural concept and on this basis prohibits non human knights.

The Proposition

However the exact wording used got me to thinking, so there are no dwarven or elven or halfling knights fine with that, but what about human raised Hall Hobgoblins and Half Elves who are  culturally human, I exclude half orks form this as to be honest they are never going to be able to get the "stat" line required and even if they did the most loathed human cross breed is never going to get knighted even then as the prejudice against them is just too strong  Granted the prejudice against Half Hobgoblins runs almost as deep, but they are at least perceived as being basically lawful and honourable if evil and that might be enough if they make the other requirements to at least get them a shot at knighthood in some of the evil orders.

Half elves may also in societies who are normally tolerant of demi humans might get a look in in the appropriate orders, so we would be talking about Cosdol or one of the more cosmopolitan young kingdoms rather then Elador or even Kalamar where there is a considerable preference for native Kalamarians over even other human ethnicities even if its not as extreme as it is in Elador and even Mendar.

Where is going in game terms 

Well after some careful consideration be tempted to allow a human raised half elf fighter player character to become a knight on the same terms as a human if they met the other requirements and hailed from and operated in a relatively elf friendly culture. I would not allow further progression to Paladin on the grounds Paladins are very rare and if they wanted to be a Paladin they should have chosen to be a human at character generation as to be honest the sort of set of rolls that is that good screams paladin at you form the paper in the same way as a set of really bad ones screams shop keeper or street sweeper or similar.

I would not allow a player character half hobgoblin knight as its my personal feeling that player characters are basically hero's or at least heading that way and I expect with some exceptions them to be good or neutral as a result or  to end up that way having been redeemed from the evil they formerly embraced. I expect any Half Hobgoblin Knights to be members of evil orders of knight hood and therefore NPC's all be it personality ones and the main or amongst the main enemies the players contend against.

From a rules point of view they would hail form an area relatively friendly to Hobgoblins or which didn't really discriminate against them and I can only think of one of them off hand but will leave you to guess.

They would suffer from delayed entry to knight hood to at the minimum the transition from 7th to 8th level and be considered ineligible if they had not entered knight hood by the transition from 9th to 10th level as a human would. That apart they would be subject to the same requirements as a human would be and receive the same benefits

I hope as with most of these rules articles it makes you think and that you find it useful