Do we know what skin tones humans can have in D&D lore?

Question

This question is inspired by What different skin colour can a tiefling officially have?

From the 5e Tiefling player race description, Infernal Bloodline section (PHB, p. 42):

Their skin tones cover the full range of human coloration, but also include various shades of red.

Emphasis mine.

It occurred to me, I don't think we have the full range of human skin colours described anywhere. D&D Beyond says:

humans of the Silver Marches have every possible variation of coloration and features.

But is it every possible variation from real life? If so, does it include blue, for example? Or is it every possible from existing lore?

Fifth edition rules and lore would be preferred, but given that data on this topic seems scarce, older editions or lore not tied to specific edition would be OK, too.

If rules or lore are world-specific, please specify what world is it. I'm mostly interested in most popular worlds, like Forgotten Realms, to keep answers useful for most "regular players".

Answer 1

Most of the same skin tones of real life modern humans appear in major D&D settings.

D&D 5e Player's Handbook p.29 says:

Human skin shades range from nearly black to very pale ...

Pages 30-31 describes nine ethnic groups of the Forgotten Realms, whose skin tones are variously described as dusky brown, tawny, fair, amber, yellowish-bronze, and dark mahogany.

The Sword Coast Adventurer's Guide, p.110-112, adds descriptors of tan, dark, olive, pale, tanned, bronze, and golden. This seems to cover most of the possible values of real-world modern humans.

The peoples of the World of Greyhawk are described in the D&D 3e Living Greyhawk Gazetteer as variously having golden, bronze, tan to olive, rich red-brown or dark brown, and fair. The Suel in particular have a higher than average rate of albino people.

I faintly recall Eberron's creator suggesting that humans born in unusual circumstances, such as during a planar confluence, might be born with rare skin tones, such as green or blue. However, I don't believe this was a canon article, and the official Eberron books tend to gloss over details of human skin tone.

Answer 2

The base rule of Dungeons & Dragons—any edition, except maybe 4th?—is that unless otherwise specified, things work like they do in real life. This is backed up explicitly, in this case, by the 5th-edition Player’s Handbook, which describes skin tones from pale to nearly black. Albinism isn’t mentioned explicitly, but there’s little reason to think it wouldn’t occur, too.

For more details, the 3.5-revised-edition Player’s Guide to Faerûn certainly describes the usual skin tones of each of the human ethnicities found in Faerûn, though personally I kind of find the list off-putting myself. Anyway, this is, of course, not expected to be an exhaustive list—Faerûn is just one continent on Toril, Toril is just one planet in Realmspace, and Realmspace is just one crystal sphere in the Material Plane, and the Material Plane is just one plane in the Multiverse. We know for a fact that other continents, planets, spheres, and planes exist and are populated, with wildly different cultures from those found in Faerûn, though we have less details on skin tone for most of them.

Calishite: [...] Calishites have dusky brown skin

Chondathans: [...] They are slender, tawny folk

Damarans: [...] with skin hues ranging from tawny to fair

Illuskans: [...] Illuskans are tall, fair-skinnned folk

Mulan: [...] Mulan are generally tall, slim, and sallow-skinned

Rashemin: [...] they have dusky skin

Tethyrians: [...] with dusky skin that grows fairer the farther north they dwell

Other Human Ethnicities: [no skin tones mentioned, but there is an explicit note here listing other ethnicities]

Answer 3

In the PHB entry for Human as a racial choice, including sub-races, the descriptions cover the entire range of human skin tones you'd see on Earth, from very pale (like a natural blonde or redhead) to nearly black, including various shades of brown. These cover sub-races for Forgotten Realms and Sword Coast, primarily, as that's the default setting for 5e.

Answer 4

I believe the answer to this is "every possible variation from real life".
Xanathar's Guide to Everything (pages 175 - 192) lists several real cultures as suggestions for coming up with human names, and I've never seen someone try to play a blue human or something along those lines.