Humans Are Average: Difference between revisions

If you see any fantastic setting involving Humans, they are highly likely to be average. Smart but not the smartest, strong but not the strongest, having ability to use magic but no affinity for it. They live longer than mayflies but shorter than elves. In other words, humans are the [[Jack of All Stats]]. They may be [[Humans Are the Real Monsters|bastards]] but not necessarily [[Always ChaoticExclusively Evil|chaotic evil]]. They don't have any special powers, but often their "power" is adaptability, and it is likely to put them on the fast-track on [[Abusing the Kardashev Scale For Fun Andand Profit|Kardashev's scale]].

Another common trait is to make humans more driven and adaptable than other races, which accounts for what they're able to accomplish in comparison to other races that have longer lifespans or greater skills in any given area. Humans might not be as good as magic as elves or as good at blacksmithing as dwarves, but they're still better than dwarves when it comes to magic and they may still be better blacksmiths than elves. As a result, humans in various types of tabletop or online games may end up getting more skill points to reflect their ability to master a variety of situations.

* ''[[The Lord of the Rings (Literature)|The Lord of the Rings]]'': Humans are average even in size.

* [[Diana Wynne Jones]] played with this trope in ''[[Power of Three (Literaturenovel)|Power of Three]]'', where the main protagonist race seem to be the human stand-ins in a world where there are also fairies and giants. They are 'normal', in-between the 'big people' and the 'little people'. {{spoiler|Turns that the world is actually our world, or one close enough to it, and the 'giants' are actually humans, whereas the race we ''thought'' were humans are more akin to the small, shy and secretive elves of folklore.}}

* ''[[The Hitchhikers Guide to The Galaxy (Literaturenovel)|The Hitchhikers Guide to The Galaxy]]'': As it turns out, Humans weren't even the smartest creature on Earth. Yet a [[Human Alien]] got elected as president of the galaxy...There are also examples of species [[Aliens Never Invented the Wheel|developing deodorant before the wheel]] and so forth. But when you think about it, almost all the creature in the universe are portrayed as pretty unimpressive.

* In [[Alan Dean Foster]]'s ''[[Literature/The Damned|The Damned]]'' trilogy, this is subverted in the fact that humans are both average in ability-- theyability—they can run, AND swim, AND climb, AND can adapt to climates wet and dry, hot and cold, etc.... yet this all forms a synergy with their psychology to make humans the deadliest damn warriors in the galaxy. (Of all the species in the universe, humans are the only ones who THRIVE in combat. To the other sentient races of the universe we are the equivalent of a Bengal tiger with tools.)

* Explicitly prohibited by [[John W. Campbell]], editor of ''[[Astounding Science Fiction]]''-slash-''Analog Science Fiction/Science Fact'' during the 40s-50s-60s, whose influence on SF cannot be understated. A bit of a chauvanist, he would reject any story in which humans weren't better than the aliens. (And by "humans" he meant "men of northern European descent", mostly, but that's another trope for another page.)

* ''[[Stargate SG-1 (TV)|Stargate SG-1]]'''s humans pretty much count. They use this to become a major power in the universe, more or less, after the Asgard begin to trust them.

* ''[[Dungeons and Dragons (Tabletop Game)|Dungeons and& Dragons]]'' is gradually getting away from the trope with each new edition.

** In 1st and 2nd, Humans don't get any special bonuses or penalties, but can be of any class and have no limits on what level they can achieve in any class.

* ''[[Warhammer (TabletopFantasy Game)|WarhammerBattle]]''.

* ''[[Warhammer 40 K (Tabletop Game),000|Warhammer 40 K]]'' either averts it because Imperial Guard are human and [[Puny Earthlings|more depend on numbers and/or support to beat their enemies in all situations (though they generally fare better utilizing these things at range)]], or plays it straight if you count Space Marines as human (who are [[Super Soldiers]] to the extreme). According to the fluff, this is because [[Justified Trope|any race weaker than humans gets annihilated by them]].

* In ''[[GURPS (Tabletop Game)|GURPS]]'' humans are the template that everything else is based on. By definition all other races (even ones functionally identical to humans) have some advantages and/or disadvantages relative to humans. A zero-point cost human in GURPS would have average-level basic stats and nothing else, not even skills. A [[Player Character]], even one without special powers, costs much more.

* In ''[[Rifts (Tabletop Game)|Rifts]]'', humans roll 3D6 for every attribute. Every other race has a different number of die for each attribute, so that their typical stats might diverge wildly from a typical human's. Humans do get one advantage over other races when rolling attributes: any time they roll a 16, 17, or 18 for an attribute, they get to roll an extra die.

* [[Enforced]] in ''[[Magic: theThe Gathering (Tabletop Game)|Magic the Gathering]]'', as Doug Beyer (of the team that oversees ''Magic'''s flavor and storyline) explains in [httphttps://web.archive.org/web/20130629095708/https://www.wizards.com/Magicmagic/Magazinemagazine/Article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/stf/129%2Fdaily%2Fstf%2F129 one of his columns] on the official website:

{{quote| From the behind-the-scenes point of view, the prevalence and variety of humans does a couple of good things for the game. First, it lets us put a human face on every color of Magic. That helps the look and feel of all the colors stay appealing to a wide variety of players. Our market research shows that [[Most Writers Are Human|we have a lot of human beings among our consumers]], and having human beings in the art gives those players a familiar face that they can identify with. [...]<br />

* ''[[Warcraft (Video Game)|Warcraft]]''

* ''[[Dragon Age (Video Game)|Dragon Age]]''.

* ''[[Arcanum: (VideoOf Game)Steamworks and Magick Obscura|Arcanum]]''.

* ''[[Mass Effect (Video Game)|Mass Effect]]'' has peaceful and warlike races, short-living and long-living, highly [[Clarke's Third Law|biotic]]-prone and unable to use it... Humans are average and adaptive, and they become highly respected thanks to it. While physically, they are normally average, they are lauded for their flexibility and perseverance, and are generally regarded as more creative than others. <br /><br />The asari have the best individual fighters, but can't stand up in a firestorm. The vorcha and krogans are incredibly biologically suited and disposed to physical conflict, but have to get technology from other races, who they're no good at negotiating with. The turians and batarians have strong senses of duty and collectivism, but aren't very good at economics (being reliant on other species, and destitute, respectively). The salarians are masters of technology and information, but are short lived and relatively fragile. Lacking [[Planet of Hats|the rigidity of other species]], humans can adapt on the fly to new situations, and employ new tactics and techniques quicker than anybody else.

* Played completely straight in ''[[Ever Quest (Video Game)|Ever QuestEverQuest]]''. Humans are "The race by which all others are judged by." They have completely average stats, excelling in nothing, but lacking in nothing either. Their strong sense of adaptability is the reason why the Gods chose the Human cities of Qeynos and Freeport to be [[Divine Intervention|spared from being destroyed by war, tectonic and geographical cataclysms, and even a Lunar Armageddon]] in [[Ever Quest II (Video Game)|Ever QuestEverQuest II]]. All the other races had to abandon their home cities for one reason or another over the last 500 years and flock to those two Human cities just to survive.

* ''[[SaGa (Video Game)|SaGa]]'' games (particularly the early ones) use this as part of their [[Class and Level System]]. Humans can equip anything they want, but have meh stats and are totally at the mercy of the RNG for getting stronger. All other races get awesome abilities at the sacrifice of something else equally useful.

* ''[[Final Fantasy Tactics Advance (Video Game)|Final Fantasy Tactics Advance]]'' mostly gives humans access to classes that at least one other species can access. Not counting slight variations like our Fighter and the [[Lizard Folk|Bangaa]] Gladiator, only unique classes are [[Mega Manning|Blue Mage]], [[Ninja]], and Hunter, and we can't take any of the classes that require exceptional speed, magical skill, or technological aptitude (though interestingly, our Paladin is a slightly-faster variant of the Bangaa [[Mighty Glacier|Defender]].) The sequel differentiates us a bit more with the [[Glass Cannon|Parivir]] and Seer classes, but we're still noticeably non-unique compared to, Bangaas or [[Fragile Speedster|Vieras]], the [[Useless Useful Spell|Moogles]], potentially lethal Seeqs<ref>The Ranger class can make items act in ''reverse''.</ref> or even the powerful Gria who can ''fly''. (Note that unlike most examples, this does ''not'' make us useless, since a): we're better at multiclassing, and b): Ninjas can [[Dual-Wielding|dual-wield]].) There are also human-unique classes, of course, which are good enough reasons for using them. Some classes do have similarities with others and are basically just the same class with different names.

* In ''[[Sword of the Stars (Video Game)|Sword of the Stars]]'', humanity has average industrial capacity, research ability, terraforming speed and population growth. They are almost in every respect the [[Jack of All Stats]], except for their unusual [[FTL]] drive that makes human fleets something of a [[Fragile Speedster]] on a strategic level, and also much more vulnerable to entrenchment. Humans also have a fairly high chance of getting most of the weapons techs, unlike most other races, who tend to favor one or two lines of weapons.

* ''[[World of Warcraft (Video Game)|World of Warcraft]]'' is kinda like this, taking its page from ''[[War CraftWarcraft]]''. Humans, instead of getting a few huge bonuses, get a lot of little bonuses like slightly increased stealth-detection, a little extra expertise with swords, and a small spirit boost.<br /><br />The Horde Version of the humans is typically either the undead (Former humans) or Darkspear Trolls (life-long rivals of humans), mostly due to the similar class-availability before Cataclysm. Instead, the "average" horde race is more Orcs.

* Averted in ''[[The Elder Scrolls (Video Game)|The Elder Scrolls]]'' due in part to the fact that there's more than one human ethnicity in the game world. Each has its own special perks, and none is truly the [[Jack of All Stats]] (instead it's the [[Our Elves Are Better|Dunmer]] who fill that role).

* In the ''[[X (Videovideo Gamegame)|X-Universe]]'' series, [[The Federation|Argon]] ships tend toward "jack of all trades, master of none". The Argon offering in a class is always a solid, well-rounded performer, but some players will stress that there's usually a better option depending on your flying style.

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[[Category:TropeTropes of Hats]]