Player Races Leaks from Monsters of the Multiverse

Quote from Samedi_of_Orleans >>

Personally I've always found the Ship of Theseus paradox a little silly.
To me, the answer was always "Both"

What makes it the ship of Theseus? That Theseus and his crew are crewing it... :)

Frankly, the existence of floating ASIs makes more sense from a genetics, character creation stance than fixed ASIs.  Character creation is done on the micro level - you are not looking at the race as a whole, you are looking at one particular individual with his, her, or their own genetic markup.

Let’s step back and look at real life. A human is defined by four major characteristics: (1) the fact that they are human, which confers certain abilities other species might lack/does not confer certain abilities other species might have; (2) your generic propensity toward certain strengths and weaknesses; (3) what you have spent your life training and learning; and, for sapient creatures only, (4) what vocation they choose.

With fixed ASIs, you double count point one and either ignore point two or are trying to lump points two and thee together under point allocation. 

Floating ASIs better reflect the three part makeup of someone’s nature and nurture.  You have racial feats covering the first section - the macro level abilities of your race, such as dark vision or spider climb. Then you have your generic propensities - your floating ASI. These are the micro-level generic traits you are born with that differentiate you from other members of your species genetically. This way of thinking also groups all generic elements, micro and macro, in the part of creation governing your genetics.

Your chosen stat increases cover element three. These are what you focus on by nurture (represented by your being able to allocate them as you see fit), and your nurture is able to overcome genetic propensity - how you choose to train yourself can accounts for a buffer stat bonus over your generic ASI component.  Your class covers the vocation you enter to best utilise your abilities. 

Taken together, floating ASI is better from both a realism stance and an optimisation stance. Everyone wins - except those who think “but it always was this way!” is an actual argument against making things better.

Edit: I just saw Davyd's post about this not being the place to discuss "evolutionary biology" - I do not think the above qualifies as such, since it is not looking at the evolutionary trends, but just the fact that every person is different from a micro-level, non-"evolutionary" stance.  However, if someone disagrees with that interpretation, feel free to delete this post and any subsequent posts I make related to it!

Sigh.

Shoulda known better.  I really shoulda known better.

Look.  I'll say it.  You can even quote me on it out of context later: "Yurei believes it would've done more good than harm to offer 'Suggested' species ASIs with any given species, for people that want Wizards to assign ASIs instead of players."

Do I like the idea?  Not much, no.  Do I personally think it's necessary?  Not super specifically.  Am I perfectly willing to acknowledge that it'd help folks like Sposta out without causing undue ruckus elsewhere, save for ******* DMs who should stop being player-hating sauerkrauts and unclench a little?  Yes.  Would I complain if Wizards started backhacking that language into newer species like the fairy, harengon, or owlen and reintroduced it into books like M3?  No.

I was hoping to try and approach the issue from a newer angle and offer some illumination to folks who think anybody that wants floating ASIs only wants them because they're powermunchkin lore-hating buttmonkeys that want to Ruin D&D Forever.  For people who genuinely are not wired that way, it's difficult to understand how awful that feeling of waste can be.  It's a caltrop in the brain that catches at every fold and cranny and never stops bothering you.  I had to specifically train myself to ignore it; I can tolerate class/species mismatch now without much issue, but I've absolutely been there.  "This just feels off, I hate it.  I like this idea but it's not worth the constant mind itch; let's just switch to something normal..."

All that animosity, upset, and Not-Rightness you feel when you consider species not having built-in ability modifiers?  Imagine that, but throughout an entire campaign where you know - you KNOW - your character sucks, it's your fault, and there is literally nothing you can do about it.  Your brain may know better, but your gut cannot be convinced, and it'll give you indigestion the whole-ass campaign long. 

It stinks.  It stinks for you, it stinks for me, it stinks for everybody.

Quote from IamSposta >>

Quote from Samedi_of_Orleans >>

Quote from IamSposta >>

Quote from Samedi_of_Orleans >>

Quote from IamSposta >>

I’m not entirely sure, but I think it was something Colville said. I think someone had asked him what D&D was and he didn’t know how to answer at first. After a time he eventually landed upon the answer:

Start taking things away from D&D one at a time and whenever you take away something that makes it not D&D anymore, put it back. Keep doing that until all that’s left are the things that you have specifically put back, and whatever is left in that little pile is D&D.

The very first thing I ever put back was Racial ASIs.

Quite literally, one of the few things that I felt was most intrinsically D&D is being discarded from D&D.

 

So you decided the ship wasn't the one of Thesus when the first board you stepped on was placed.
Nevermind all the boards that had been taken out before that one, those where fine, just THAT one was the defining one to you.
So you have to have that specific little board to call it the Ship of Theseus.
And that's fine, for you.

Personally I've always found the Ship of Theseus paradox a little silly.
To me, the answer was always "Both" 

So the argument over "This is the TRUE Ship of Theseus because it still has the board I originally stepped on on it" when that board itself was kinda replacement, is really odd to me.

 

 
No. But certain things are D&D for me. (Racial ASIs, Classes, Levels, the 6 Ability scores, Hit Points & Hit Dice, Saving Throws, Spells with levels and leveled Spell Slots) To use your Ship of Theseus analogy, those are the Keel, and the Keel is the ship.

 
See, I can respect that those things are D&D for you, but I'd still say the first board you stepped on is a better analogy than the keel.
The ASI's are not the keel, I'm no D&D historian, but from what little I've tried to look up, those where not in the original version of D&D. 
If I'm wrong, please do correct me, I seek to be wrong about as few things as I can be before I die.

Not to get too nautical, but I'd really say if the ship will still run just fine for the majority of people on the ship, if tons of people won't even notice that part is gone, then it's hardly the 'keel', no matter how attached people who've been on the ship for ages are to that piece.

You can both have that piece be very important to you, define the entire thing for you, AND realize it's not some vitally important piece objectively.
I'll use a thing I'm a fan of.
I love the original comic Young Justice.
It had a cast of characters I loved, that defined that comic for me.
The cartoon Young Justice? 
It (at least originally) included literally none of those characters, very little of the tone and none of stuff I really loved about the comic.

It's still Young Justice, it's not MY Young Justice, but it's still Young Justice.

Because the real 'keel' of Young Justice is younger DC heroes, a team, maturing and having their friendships and lives shown.
Sure, it may not be "Young Justice" to me because it doesn't feature Tim Drake, Kon-El, and Bart as the founding members, or as many weird jokes about saving the world via baseball.
I will never be a fan of it, it will never be MY YJ, but it's still Young Justice.

and D&D without predetermined ASIs is still D&D, even if it's not yours.

 
I started in 2e, and they weren’t “ASIs,” but there were Racial Ability score adjustments, mostly both positive and negative.

And like I said, I don’t mind if people have floating ASIs, I’m upset because there won’t be official Racial ASIs. I want both as options, just like there are three options for generating base Ability scores, and an entire chapter of optional rules in the PHB regarding Multiclassing and Feats. I don’t mind that they’re adding the option other people want, I’m ticked off that they’re removing the other one entirely. Have your cake, leave me mine too. 

I can get that, but a friendly kinda counterpoint.

Haven't the ASI's changed since 2e? 
Going off what I found on via google search on 2e DND races.
High elves where +1Dex, -1Con.
Now they're +2Dex, +1Int.

In fact, if the source I found is accurate,  literally no race has the same racial ASIs as in 2e.
Some even now have pluses where they used to have minuses. According to the thing I'm looking at (please correct me if I found a bad source) Forest Gnomes had +1Dex & Wis, and -1Str and Int.
They've literally gone from having a -1 to a +2 in int.

I feel like if the races official rankings could vary that much between editions, that there where ALWAYS floating ASIs.
It's just who gets to do the floating has shuffled. 

The variability of what a race could be was inherent between editions.

Quote from kenclary >>

Quote from Samedi_of_Orleans >>

Personally I've always found the Ship of Theseus paradox a little silly.
To me, the answer was always "Both"

What makes it the ship of Theseus? That Theseus and his crew are crewing it... :)

 
I'll count that as the expanded answer. "It's either both, or whichever one Theseus is sailing at the moment." 

Quote from Yurei1453 >>

Now they don't have to feel bad, and they're going to resist efforts by Internet armchair DMs to force them to feel bad again.

With respect, "provide suggested racial ASIs as an option" is hardly forcing anyone to do anything. Now, you've indicated you feel that people can look at options as rules written in stone (despite the actual rule this would be an optional alternative to being right there in the text as the official standard) nonetheless, which would be tantamount to forcing. One issue with that is that we still have tons of other suggestions and flavour text and blurbs about this or that - if people take those as gospel and that's bad so WotC should remove them, we'd end up with no races and no lore and no settings. Similarly, there's still plenty left to feel bad about wasting: don't play a human, don't get that starting feat; don't play a half-elf, don't get those juicy extra proficiencies; play about half the official races, don't get darkvision. I get that players may subjectively attach more importance to a 5% better chance of success to rolls using their primary stat than to having one of the frankly overpowered feats from level 1 and essentially freeing up an ASI choice at level 4 or getting at least a 10% better chance of success in 3 more skills (not to mention that not being proficient might bar a character from making a check in the first place). However, that is definitely subjective though. Subjective is fine and I'm not dismissing it as having no value, but catering to it immediately implies not catering to anyone else who subjectively feels differently. It also doesn't mean what people subjectively care less about doesn't matter at all and isn't something that can be wasted.

I look at all this and I recall that I've thought that races felt washed down all through 5E already anyway, and this is just another step in that same direction. Most races feel just a little bit like humans with a veneer of whatever to me. There's some exceptions here and there, absolutely, but by and large halflings seem like short, affable humans and elves like long-lived snooty ones. I can play up racial identity, both as a DM and as a player. A lot of players and DMs do, and that's great. And a decent chunk of that could (should) be assigned to setting books rather than the core rules. But it'd be nice if the books were to offer something with a bit more meat on the bones, something to grab my interest and lean into or conversely create something in contrast to, and that has to include the PHB since that's where it starts for new players. I know there are issues pertaining to all this that are sensitive to a lot of people, and I want WotC to be sensitive about them, but I think it's gone a couple of steps too far and we've ended up with a bland, watery soup and the annoying discovery that somebody threw out the spice cabinet instead of having it right there next to the fire so everybody could flavour their bowl to their own liking.

I get. I really do. I even feel the same way at times. I dealt with it differently, but I've had the feeling. The problem is that there was always a logical compromise, one that I've advocated advocated and one that you either advocated for or agreed to (I can't remember which). And rather than people saying "yeah, I know how you feel and that sucks, until now we've had a similar situation. WotC dropped the ball again, they shouldnhave just taught the principle of Rule Zero much better", we've had 8 pages in this thread alone of those who are opposed to the removal of racial ASIs being told "You're wrong to want it that way".

You're not wrong to feel like you want to have your +2 to be for Strength rather than Dexterity despite playing as a High Elf, or whatever combination it is in any given game. WotC should have been clearer in explaining that the game should be adapted to what makes it more enjoyableEven if you genuinely were a power gamer, I wouldn't begrudge that. If you found that fun, then all power to you. 

Still, WotC has taken away other people's cookies for no reason. Why can't we just get on the same side and let everyone have it?

What I'm wondering, is that is everyone has the same choices of racial ASI's....

Why not just fold them into the normal rolled scores/point buy/standard array?

Quote from Comrade_Jenkens >>

What I'm wondering, is that is everyone has the same choices of racial ASI's....

Why not just fold them into the normal rolled scores/point buy/standard array?

 
If that isn't in the plans for the 2024 redux, I would be shocked.

Though the other answer is "because that outright nerfs all the people that roll for stats".  I would consider that to be an acceptable sacrifice as rolled stats are the wild heckin' west anyways and anybody who rolls for their stats is tacitly accepting that their character will very likely make no sense, but it's still a thing.  As it stands, species ability modifiers can tinge a rolled array slightly closer to what the player wants and occasionally nudge it over the line for something like a feat or multiclass prereq.  Fold ability modifiers entirely into statgen, with no species modifiers at all, and WYRIWYG.  That would cheese off quite a few rolly folks, I presume.

Quote from Yurei1453 >>

Quote from Comrade_Jenkens >>

What I'm wondering, is that is everyone has the same choices of racial ASI's....

Why not just fold them into the normal rolled scores/point buy/standard array?

 
If that isn't in the plans for the 2024 redux, I would be shocked.

Though the other answer is "because that outright nerfs all the people that roll for stats".  I would consider that to be an acceptable sacrifice as rolled stats are the wild heckin' west anyways and anybody who rolls for their stats is tacitly accepting that their character will very likely make no sense, but it's still a thing.  As it stands, species ability modifiers can tinge a rolled array slightly closer to what the player wants and occasionally nudge it over the line for something like a feat or multiclass prereq.  Fold ability modifiers entirely into statgen, with no species modifiers at all, and WYRIWYG.  That would cheese off quite a few rolly folks, I presume.

I don't think that will happen in 2024, as it looks like it's already being set up with the Tasha's method if you look at things like Fizban's and MotM. But I do think it will come at some point.

Then again I do have some pretty wild takes at what I'm honestly convinced will be coming later than 2024...

Quote from Caerwyn_Glyndwr >>

Let’s step back and look at real life. A human is defined by four major characteristics: (1) the fact that they are human, which confers certain abilities other species might lack/does not confer certain abilities other species might have; (2) your generic propensity toward certain strengths and weaknesses; (3) what you have spent your life training and learning; and, for sapient creatures only, (4) what vocation they choose.

With fixed ASIs, you double count point one and either ignore point two or are trying to lump points two and thee together under point allocation. 

Um, no. Point one would be stuff like having opposable thumbs and lacking a prehensile tail; it has nothing to do with ASIs. Point three is covered more by proficiency than attribute. So, fixed ASIs can't even count point one once, never mind twice. As for point two, the potential ranges of those strengths and weaknesses in areas common across species (we all have muscles that allow us to move, we all have brains that let us think, we all have a nervous system that lets us react to stimuli, and so on) are determined by the fact that you're human: you'll be able to lift more weight than your cat but your cat will sprint faster than you, because you're a human and your cat's a cat. That's fixed - the moment you were born a human and not a cat those things were determined. 

So, in D&D terms: 1) are physical, non-ASI racial qualities like Darkvision or having a big shell on your back or claws; 2) are ASIs, which are fixed by race; 3) are your attribute choices and proficiencies; and 4) is your background.

Quote from pangurjan >>

Quote from Caerwyn_Glyndwr >>

Let’s step back and look at real life. A human is defined by four major characteristics: (1) the fact that they are human, which confers certain abilities other species might lack/does not confer certain abilities other species might have; (2) your generic propensity toward certain strengths and weaknesses; (3) what you have spent your life training and learning; and, for sapient creatures only, (4) what vocation they choose.

With fixed ASIs, you double count point one and either ignore point two or are trying to lump points two and thee together under point allocation. 

Um, no. Point one would be stuff like having opposable thumbs and lacking a prehensile tail; it has nothing to do with ASIs. Point three is covered more by proficiency than attribute. So, fixed ASIs can't even count point one once, never mind twice. As for point two, the potential ranges of those strengths and weaknesses in areas common across species (we all have muscles that allow us to move, we all have brains that let us think, we all have a nervous system that lets us react to stimuli, and so on) are determined by the fact that you're human: you'll be able to lift more weight than your cat but your cat will sprint faster than you, because you're a human and your cat's a cat. That's fixed - the moment you were born a human and not a cat those things were determined. 

So, in D&D terms: 1) are physical, non-ASI racial qualities like Darkvision or having a big shell on your back or claws; 2) are ASIs, which are fixed by race; 3) are your attribute choices and proficiencies; and 4) is your background.

You have done a wonderful job demonstrating the exact problem I raised--that any justification of fixed ASIs fails to take into account the fact that you are looking at a micro level analysis of a single individual.  You double cover the traits from your species choice with point 1 and 2 and completely fail to take into account "micro level genetic differences between members of the same species."  

Floating ASIs allow you to cover a facet of one's identity that the fixed system does not.

Quote from Comrade_Jenkens >>

What I'm wondering, is that is everyone has the same choices of racial ASI's....

Why not just fold them into the normal rolled scores/point buy/standard array?

With respect to the standard array: players may in some cases prefer 3 15s for their high attributes to a 17, a 14 and a 13. Just saying, if getting to assign your ASIs just so rather than having them shoehorned by race matters to people, I think the standard array shoehorning them will likely matter as well.

Quote from Caerwyn_Glyndwr >>

Quote from pangurjan >>

Quote from Caerwyn_Glyndwr >>

Let’s step back and look at real life. A human is defined by four major characteristics: (1) the fact that they are human, which confers certain abilities other species might lack/does not confer certain abilities other species might have; (2) your generic propensity toward certain strengths and weaknesses; (3) what you have spent your life training and learning; and, for sapient creatures only, (4) what vocation they choose.

With fixed ASIs, you double count point one and either ignore point two or are trying to lump points two and thee together under point allocation. 

Um, no. Point one would be stuff like having opposable thumbs and lacking a prehensile tail; it has nothing to do with ASIs. Point three is covered more by proficiency than attribute. So, fixed ASIs can't even count point one once, never mind twice. As for point two, the potential ranges of those strengths and weaknesses in areas common across species (we all have muscles that allow us to move, we all have brains that let us think, we all have a nervous system that lets us react to stimuli, and so on) are determined by the fact that you're human: you'll be able to lift more weight than your cat but your cat will sprint faster than you, because you're a human and your cat's a cat. That's fixed - the moment you were born a human and not a cat those things were determined. 

So, in D&D terms: 1) are physical, non-ASI racial qualities like Darkvision or having a big shell on your back or claws; 2) are ASIs, which are fixed by race; 3) are your attribute choices and proficiencies; and 4) is your background.

 

You have done a wonderful job demonstrating the exact problem I raised--that any justification of fixed ASIs fails to take into account the fact that you are looking at a micro level analysis of a single individual.  You double cover the traits from your species choice with point 1 and 2 and completely fail to take into account "micro level genetic differences between members of the same species."  

Floating ASIs allow you to cover a facet of one's identity that the fixed system does not.

Have you ignored 90% of my post? :p

ASIs aren't relevant to point one. Whether they're floating or racially determined doesn't change that. As for point 2, floating ASIs ignore it altogether and as such don't fit the model. What they do is double up on point three, which was already covered by assigning your unmodified attribute scores.

So, it's the other way around: racially fixed ASIs allow us to cover all four major characteristics while floating ones do not.

I know that I am also guilty of getting swept up in these discussions, but I have to say that I absolutely hate that any topic that is started to talk about new features falls into the ASIs pit. The ASI thing isn't even new information.  Everyone knew for the past several months that Floating ASIs was the new norm. WotC put out a statement months ago that Floating ASIs are going the be the norm for all future products. All Races published since Tasha's has had Floating ASI's.  We could be talking about the multitude of changes to the Races and what the PHB Races could look like in 2024, but nope.  ASIs. Pages and pages of the same thing that has already been said with pages and pages of the same to come.

I don't know what to think about the Sub Races being their own thing.  I don't see any issues from a mechanical stand point. They are still Gnomes or Dwarves and qualify for the Feats for example. BUT, is this just a temporary measure to separate the races from their "parent" race as listed in the PHB, or is this the way things will be going forward?  Does it even really matter?

Quote from Golaryn >>

I am don't know what to think about the Sub Races being their own thing.  I don't see any issues from a mechanical stand point. They are still Gnomes or Dwarves and qualify for the Feats for example. BUT, is this just a temporary measure to separate the races from their "parent" race as listed in the PHB, or is this the way things will be going forward?  Does it even really matter?

Business wise it might matter. As Yurei pointed out, it can make all the difference in terms of implementation - for us specifically, in terms of how DDB gets to or has to implement M³. Other than that, probably not so much. Some of the ones that 5E had as a subrace originally that will now get a separate racial entry were a separate race in previous editions. To me that made sense, deep gnomes are sufficiently different from the other gnomes that they warrant their own entry IMO. On the other hand, there are a couple of others (sea elves, eladrin) were a similar treatment could be justified as well. Either way, I don't see it becoming a general policy - stout halflings are going to remain a halfling variant, and so on.  

Quote from Golaryn >>

I don't know what to think about the Sub Races being their own thing.  I don't see any issues from a mechanical stand point. They are still Gnomes or Dwarves and qualify for the Feats for example. BUT, is this just a temporary measure to separate the races from their "parent" race as listed in the PHB, or is this the way things will be going forward?  Does it even really matter?

I would guess this is how things will be moving forward.  It is closer to how other editions treated very distinct entities, such as Duergar and Dwarves, Drow and other Elves, Svirfneblin and Gnomes, etc.  It was never a problem in 4e to have these distinct races be their own category--and it made some thing easier on new players who were not intimately aware of all the subraces since they could see "dark elf" right from the character creation page rather than peruse subraces trying to see what options were available.   Overall, I only see a slight benefit from this change, and no actual drawback. 

I can see it being far easier for new players to understand.  I don't know how many times I had to correct a new player's sheet to include the core Elf abilities OR to include a Sub Race. I think that I just liked the concept itself more than the mechanics. 

The inconsistent implementation of subspecies is a stumbling block that trips a lot of players up.  I know Wizards was trying to avoid bloat by having certain critters fall under the overall blanket of an existing critter, but it really doesn't seem to've worked, and it sharply limits what new critters can do.  Really feels like "subspecies" is more trouble than it's worth in most cases; if you want to make a new critter, make a new critter.  Have an addendum to creature type, i.e "You are Humanoid, and you count as an elf for the purposes of abilities or items that interact with elves."  Donezoes