History InterspeciesRomance / DungeonsAndDragons

*** The article "From the Hands of Hags' in Magazine/DragonMagazine #300 also mentions the Head of the Loveless, a grisly fetish made from the ShrunkenHead of a green hag who fell in sincere and reciprocated love with an evil human druid, only to be captured, have her MouthStitchedShut, and be forced to watch as her sisters tortured him to death out of jealousy, after which they beheaded her. Appropriately enough, you activate the fetish's power by whispering the word "love" in any language into its ear, whereupon its mouth stretches open wide and it lets out a soul-rending shriek of grief capable of [[MakeMeWannaShout killing with its sheer volume]].

** Officially, TabletopGame/{{Pathfinder}} emphasizes this trope, as part of its DarkerAndEdgier set-up. Somewhat hypocritically, no important half-orc characters have yet been presented who have this origin. Irijmka, the iconic Inquisitor, was found as a MysteriousWaif orphan and raised by a Pharasman temple orphanage. Irabeth Tirablade, a female half-orc paladin from the Worldwound adventure path,was born when her orc father genuinely fell in love with, and subsequently married, her human mother. Tsadok Goldtooth, TheDragon to a major enemy late in the Skull & Shackles adventure path, was born due to the friendship between his human father and orc mother blossoming into love after they helped each other escape from the pirate ship they were slaves aboard. Oloch, the iconic Warpriest, was born of a consensual dalliance (his human mom was an adventurer who openly enjoyed coupling with orcs who were amicable) and has several half-siblings implied to at least include further half-orcs of the same manner of conception.

** [[HarpingOnAboutHarpies Harpies]], similarly, are often described as needing to abduct human men to have children (other settings imply they reproduce by parthenogenesis, or have rarer males hidden away). In TabletopGame/{{Pathfinder}}, this is explicitly the case... and it's also cultural tradition for the harpy to kill (and usually eat) her lover after the act. Especially if she gets pregnant by it.
** Hags are generally portrayed this way -- fortunately, they can shapechange and have CharmPerson type spells, since their natural forms are grotesquely ugly old women. In almost all settings, hags have daughters who go on to become hags, though the details differ from setting to setting; in TabletopGame/{{Ravenloft}} hag-daughters appear as sterile but normal women and become hags in their 40th year, whilst in TabletopGame/{{Forgotten Realms}} hags can rarely have male offspring known as hagspawn, and in TabletopGame/{{Pathfinder}} hags can have children known as changelings, who are generally beautiful but hit the UncannyValley and must be mystically transformed to become new hags. In First Edition only the hags' daughters are changelings, with their sons being ordinary humans that are generally eaten by the mother, but in Second Edition their sons are changelings as well and [[GenderBender can also become hags]], albeit more rarely.

* ''TabletopGame/{{Pathfinder}}'': Two Adventure Paths include modules where a romanceable "monster" appears; Undrella the [[HarpingOnAboutHarpies harpy]] (in ''Legacy of Fire'') and Greta the [[AnIcePerson winter]] [[SavageWolves wolf]] (in ''Reign of Winter''). Both characters are highly unusual in that they are, by default, Evil and malevolent, but can undergo a HeelFaceTurn [[LoveRedeems if a PC courts them sincerely]].

*** One Magazine/DragonMagazine article also mentions, as part of an article on magic items, a grisly fetish made from the ShrunkenHead of a green hag who fell in sincere and reciprocated love with an evil human ranger, only to be captured, have her MouthStitchedShut, and be forced to watch as her sisters tortured him to death out of jealousy, after which they beheaded her. Appropriately enough, you activate the fetish's power by whispering the word "love" in any language into its ear, whereupon its mouth stretches open wide and it lets out a soul-rending shriek of grief.

!!Humans

!!Elves

!!Orcs

!!General

* According to ''Magazine/{{Dragon}}'' #385, human royals have been known to accept [[FantasticSlur Glee-Born]], dragonborn with a more jovial, fun-loving nature than is normal for their taciturn race, as courtesans. [[DraconicHumanoid Dragonborn]], by the by, are humanoid in form, but have four fingers and three toes to a hand/foot (all of which are tipped with big, but blunt, claws), have scales for skin, "dreadlocks" for hair (actually a specialized form of scale), blunt-muzzled reptilian heads, fin-like ears, and grow close to seven feet tall. And typically have physically proportions like dwarves... meaning that some dragonborn women are bigger and buffer than most human ''men''. Of course, there are still relatively slender and feminine dragonborn, but still.

** Woodwose are produced when an treant falls in love with an elf who comes to reciprocate its feelings.

Where would we be without ''TabletopGame/DungeonsAndDragons'' and its half-whatevers? In fact, since there's a HalfHumanHybrid for pretty much everything in the Monster Manual (although it's commonly implied that [[RapeAsBackstory romance wasn't involved]] with the half-monsters), we've given D&D its own section.

** [[HarpingOnAboutHarpies Harpies]], similarly, are often described as needing to abduct human men to have children (other settings imply they reproduce by parthenogenesis, or have rarer males hidden away). In TabletopGame/{{Pathfinder}}, this is explicitly the case... and it's also cultural tradition [[DeathBySex for the harpy to kill (and usually eat) her lover after the act]]. Especially if she gets pregnant by it.

* Thanks to the anthropocentric nature of the earliest editions of the game, which has become a GrandfatherClause for subsequent editions, {{Half Human Hybrid}}s vastly outnumber {{Non Human Humanoid Hybrid}}s in D&D lore, with countless examples of species with "humans interbreeding with X" as a backstory and plenty of examples of humans courting, marrying or pining after non-human love interests in game lore, novelizations, videogames and other adaptations. Half-Elves and Half-Orcs have been examined in more detail in their own sections below.
** This has led to countless jokes amongst D&D players over the years about the human racial [[PlanetOfHats "Hat"]] being [[ReallyGetsAround "Will boink anything"]].

** {{Medusa}}s are like this too, in most editions; they are not truly AlwaysFemale, but males (called maedar) are so incredibly rare, that they have to use deception and disguise to seduce human males in order to conceive children; this almost always ends in the male's death after conception, usually by petrification. In the 4th Edition, however, male medusas are far more common, and no mention is made of the females doing this.
* Two ''TabletopGame/{{Pathfinder}}'' Adventure Paths include modules where a romanceable "monster" appears; Undrella the [[HarpingOnAboutHarpies harpy]] (in "Legacy of Fire") and Greta the [[AnIcePerson winter]] [[CanisMajor wolf]] (in "Reign of Winter"). Both characters are highly unusual in that they are, by default, Evil and malevolent, but can undergo a HeelFaceTurn [[LoveRedeems if a PC courts them sincerely]].
* Dragons are notoriously fertile and apparently sexually-adventurous, which has resulted in a number of dragon hybrid monsters that have gone on to breed true: dragonnes (part-lion), dragonnels (part-pegsus), dracolisks (part-basilisk), dracosphinxes (part-sphinx), and so forth. In 3rd Edition, this culminated in the "[[http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/halfDragon.htm Half-dragon]]" inherited template that can be added to any living, corporeal creature - there's even a canonical example of a half-dragon, half-[[BlobMonster ooze]].

* The ''TabletopGame/{{Midnight}}'' setting is home to the Dwarrow (dwarf/gnome) and Elfling (elf/halfling) races.

* In the ''TabletopGame/{{Midnight}}'' setting, dworgs--a race of dwarf/orc hybrids--replace the traditional half-orc, and are justified in that orcs in this setting are corrupted dwarves.

** In contrast, half-''drow'' are often explained as the result of male dark elves raping female slaves.

* ''TabletopGame/{{Ravenloft}}'' has the Half-Vistani, who are the mistrusted and mistreated results of unions (sometimes tragic love, sometimes brutal rape) between the native humans and the Vistani; a race of human-seeming [[FantasyCounterpartCulture fantasy]] [[UsefulNotes/{{Romani}} gypsy-]][[WitchSpecies witches]]. They've become an increasing embarrassment to many D&D players over time.

** For whatever reason, draconic ancestry as an explanation for sorcerers ''really'' took off. Possibly because the new lore of dragons being able to breed with anything fitted well with their traditionally high Charisma, racial proclivity towards [[PowerPerversionPotential shapeshifting abilities]], and the ''large'' amount of "part dragon" monsters in AD&D. This then led to the debut of the Spellscales; an emergent race caused by there being so many dragon-blooded sorcerers and half-dragons around that the dragon genes were being combined and recombined across species lines to produce a race defined more by its draconic lineage and its [[WitchSpecies inherent knack for sorcery]] than anything else.

* Sea Kin, from 3rd edition, are an obscure race who are probably an attempt to tweak the obscure ''Literature/{{Dragonlance}}'' race of "Children of the Sea" to a more generic background. They are the result of interbreeding between humans and various oceanic [[TheFairFolk fey]] races, such as [[EnthrallingSiren Sirines]] and [[SelkiesAndWereseals Selkies]], creating a human-seeming feyblooded being with an irresistible draw to the ocean.

* On ''TabletopGame/{{Greyhawk}}'', the derro, a race of malevolent dwarves, are the result of forced interbreeding between humans and dwarves by the Suloise Imperium to create a superior SlaveRace. This trait hasn't followed them into lother editions.

** Hags are generally portrayed this way -- fortunately, they can shapechange and have CharmPerson type spells, since their natural forms are grotesquely ugly old women. In almost all settings, hags have daughters who go on to become hags, though the details differ from setting to setting; in TabletopGame/{{Ravenloft}} hag-daughters appear as sterile but normal women and become hags in their 40th year, whilst in TabletopGame/{{Forgotten Realms}} hags can rarely have male offspring known as hagspawn, and in TabletopGame/{{Pathfinder}} hags can have children known as changelings, who are generally beautiful but hit the UncannyValley and must be mystically transformed to become new hags. In First Edition only the hags' daughters are changelings, with their sons being ordinary humans that are generally eaten by the mother, but in Second Edition their sons are changelings as well, and [[GenderBender can also become hags]], albeit more rarely.

** Hags are generally portrayed this way -- fortunately, they can shapechange and have CharmPerson type spells, since their natural forms are grotesquely ugly old women. In almost all settings, hags have daughters who go on to become hags, though the details differ from setting to setting; in TabletopGame/{{Ravenloft}} hag-daughters appear as sterile but normal women and become hags in their 40th year, whilst in TabletopGame/{{Forgotten Realms}} hags can rarely have male offspring known as hagspawn, and in TabletopGame/{{Pathfinder}} hags can have children known as changelings, who are generally beautiful but hit the UncannyValley and must be mystically transformed to become new hags. In First Edition only the hags' daughters can become changelings, but in Second Edition their sons are changelings as well, and [[GenderBender can also become hags]].

** Hags are generally portrayed this way -- fortunately, they can shapechange and have CharmPerson type spells, since their natural forms are grotesquely ugly old women. In almost all settings, hags have daughters who go on to become hags, though the details differ from setting to setting; in TabletopGame/{{Ravenloft}} hag-daughters appear as sterile but normal women and become hags in their 40th year, whilst in TabletopGame/{{Forgotten Realms}} hags can rarely have male offspring known as hagspawn, and in TabletopGame/{{Pathfinder}} hags can have children known as changelings, who are generally beautiful but hit the UncannyValley and must be mystically transformed to become new hags. In First Edition only the hags' daughters can become changelings, but in Second Edition their sons are changelings as well and [[GenderBender can become hags]].

** Hags are generally portrayed this way -- fortunately, they can shapechange and have CharmPerson type spells, since their natural forms are grotesquely ugly old women. In almost all settings, hags have daughters who go on to become hags, though the details differ from setting to setting; in TabletopGame/{{Ravenloft}} hag-daughters appear as sterile but normal women and become hags in their 40th year, whilst in TabletopGame/{{Forgotten Realms}} hags can rarely have male offspring known as hagspawn, and in TabletopGame/{{Pathfinder}} hags can have sons (though it happens rarely, and they are traditionally eaten by the mother), with daughters being entities known as changelings, who are beautiful but hit the UncannyValley and must be mystically transformed to become new hags.

* {{Dhampyr}}s are the result of a mortal race interbreeding with vampires. Due to humanocentrism, dhampyrs are almost always presented as originating from human base-stock; only 4th edition presents dhampyrs of other races on both a flavor and mechanical level.

* The River/Sea Spirit Folk of TabletopGame/KaraTur are descendants of love affairs between humans and oriental dragons.

* Thanks to the "humanocentric" nature of the earliest editions of the game, which has become a GrandfatherClause for subsequent editions, {{Half Human Hybrid}}s vastly outnumber {{Non Human Humanoid Hybrid}}s in D&D lore, with countless examples of species with "humans interbreeding with X" as a backstory and plenty of examples of humans courting, marrying or pining after non-human love interests in game lore, novelizations, videogames and other adaptations. Half-Elves and Half-Orcs have been examined in more detail in their own sections below.

*** Muls also exist in the ''TabletopGame/NentirVale'' setting, where the race was first bred as a SlaveRace by the drow, only to fight its way to freedome. They are explicitly a true-breeding race and currently trying to figureo ut their place in the world.

* The River/Sea Spirit Folk of Kara-tur are descendants of love affairs between humans and oriental dragons.

** Additionally, the Lupins, a race of default-benevolent [[BeastMan anthro wolves]] from the ''TabletopGame/{{Mystara}}'' setting, are believed by some to be the result of humans interbreeding with either gnolls or Hutaakans--a now-extinct (except not) race of anthro jackals who once reigned over a fantasy Egypt region.

* In ''TabletopGame/WarCraftTheRoleplayingGame'', due to the existence of this in the earlier videogames, some of the playable races include half-elves (High Elf, by default, but with support for Night Elf and Blood Elf variants), Half-Orcs (human/orc), Half-Ogres (human/ogre) and Mok'nathal (orc/ogre).