The other big issue with not including half elves, and also with cutting so many subclasses from cleric and wizard, is that most of my table can’t cleanly adopt the new rules. As the DM, I’ll have to write a ton of house rules as workarounds that we all know will be officially released in a year or so. That‘s a bit frustrating. Of my 6 players, only one has both their class, subclass, and species in the new book.
The thing about half elf is that, really, you aren't losing anything of significance, because half-elves are totally vanilla. Their non-stat bonuses are.
Agree with y’all mechanics and min/max folks about half-elf not being that big of an exclusion.
I hear all sides of the above posters on the verbiage of the species and the representation or lack there of it represents.
What I’d like to add to the conversation is the je ne sais quoi, mise-en-scéne, and wholistic concept of having a book in front of you as a first time player with a breadth of character options to get your creative juices flowing, and there not being a stop gap between elf and human.
The other big issue with not including half elves, and also with cutting so many subclasses from cleric and wizard, is that most of my table can’t cleanly adopt the new rules. As the DM, I’ll have to write a ton of house rules as workarounds that we all know will be officially released in a year or so. That‘s a bit frustrating. Of my 6 players, only one has both their class, subclass, and species in the new book.
The thing about half elf is that, really, you aren't losing anything of significance, because half-elves are totally vanilla. Their non-stat bonuses are.
Agree with y’all mechanics and min/max folks about half-elf not being that big of an exclusion.
I hear all sides of the above posters on the verbiage of the species and the representation or lack there of it represents.
What I’d like to add to the conversation is the je ne sais quoi, mise-en-scéne, and wholistic concept of having a book in front of you as a first time player with a breadth of character options to get your creative juices flowing, and there not being a stop gap between elf and human.
That first time player will get over it just as fast as they get over there not being a stopgap between Orc and Gnome, or Tiefling and Dwarf, or Aasimar and Human. It's arbitrary.
What I’d like to add to the conversation is the je ne sais quoi, mise-en-scéne, and wholistic concept of having a book in front of you as a first time player with a breadth of character options to get your creative juices flowing, and there not being a stop gap between elf and human.
Why should there be one? Honestly, humans and elves are different enough that it's entirely reasonable to have them unable to reproduce at all, though that's a world building decision, and they're by no means the most similar to humans (the most similar to humans is halfling). Once you've decided to open the door to hybridization, there's a zillion mixes that make at least some sense.
Well... Tuesday I will have my copy of the Rules, and from what I'm hearing from D&D content creators who have access to the PHB. No halves. No Hybrid system for optional creations either. If you want to use Half-elf or Half-Ork use the (Legacy) race species.
For now, fine. I'm not happy with the direction, as I kind of saw myself in these options, being a Human born of two vastly different ethnic backgrounds, and growing up as a Half, I kind of liked the potential with the UA full hybrid system. I was very displeased with their wording in videos, and the rational behind the changes, but not the mechanics that were being opened up in UA.
As I would see my fathers Ancestry more the Goliath and my mum more the Elvish one. And I would have made a representation of myself with this combo. Oh well. Maybe in the DMG.
Well... Tuesday I will have my copy of the Rules, and from what I'm hearing from D&D content creators who have access to the PHB. No halves. No Hybrid system for optional creations either. If you want to use Half-elf or Half-Ork use the (Legacy) race species.
Correct. I have had the PHB in hand for about two weeks now (GenCon). No halves. No hybrids. I was surprised that there was also nothing about "importing" other races into the current PHB. I'd figured there would be a "drop ability scores, everything else stays the same" thing or something. I guess that will either be a DMG thing else a UA thing.
What I’d like to add to the conversation is the je ne sais quoi, mise-en-scéne, and wholistic concept of having a book in front of you as a first time player with a breadth of character options to get your creative juices flowing, and there not being a stop gap between elf and human.
Why should there be one? Honestly, humans and elves are different enough that it's entirely reasonable to have them unable to reproduce at all, though that's a world building decision, and they're by no means the most similar to humans (the most similar to humans is halfling). Once you've decided to open the door to hybridization, there's a zillion mixes that make at least some sense.
Again, I’m not talking about hybrid anything. I’m talking about a stand alone species option that is a magicalish human. Half-elf was that in the previous editions. It was one of the only ancestries that wasn’t associated with a culture. Like Aragorn in LotR is a human with a little magic from way back when, but not the son of mixed species parents. Players and DMs can write whatever story points they want or choose to play that species as literally being half human and half something else. Like has been said many times, the old rules are still valid and players can decide whatever they want for their personal backstory.
I think the game in general is now missing a baby step into playing a fantasy character that is a little more magical than than the human they are in real life but not something that involves taking on a whole cultural motif. Has no one else ever known a player who chose a half-elf because they were intimidated by the other options? I have a first time player who just joined our game this summer who was new to the whole fantasy genre and went half-elf for that very reason.
The species in the book now are all like a whole thing. I get that you can decide in your head that while the rules say human, you are actually a special human who’s a little more magic than other humans, but I think it was good for new players who have a thousand other first time concepts flying at them to have a diet high fantasy option right there in the book—that doesn’t require buying an older edition or learning what house rules are or having to roleplay any more out of their comfort zone than they already are. “I’m playing a dude, but they’re, like, more cooler and magical than the regular dudes. It says so on my sheet.”
What I’d like to add to the conversation is the je ne sais quoi, mise-en-scéne, and wholistic concept of having a book in front of you as a first time player with a breadth of character options to get your creative juices flowing, and there not being a stop gap between elf and human.
Why should there be one? Honestly, humans and elves are different enough that it's entirely reasonable to have them unable to reproduce at all, though that's a world building decision, and they're by no means the most similar to humans (the most similar to humans is halfling). Once you've decided to open the door to hybridization, there's a zillion mixes that make at least some sense.
Again, I’m not talking about hybrid anything. I’m talking about a stand alone species option that is a magicalish human. Half-elf was that in the previous editions. It was one of the only ancestries that wasn’t associated with a culture. Like Aragorn in LotR is a human with a little magic from way back when, but not the son of mixed species parents. Players and DMs can write whatever story points they want or choose to play that species as literally being half human and half something else. Like has been said many times, the old rules are still valid and players can decide whatever they want for their personal backstory.
I think the game in general is now missing a baby step into playing a fantasy character that is a little more magical than than the human they are in real life but not something that involves taking on a whole cultural motif. Has no one else ever known a player who chose a half-elf because they were intimidated by the other options? I have a first time player who just joined our game this summer who was new to the whole fantasy genre and went half-elf for that very reason.
The species in the book now are all like a whole thing. I get that you can decide in your head that while the rules say human, you are actually a special human who’s a little more magic than other humans, but I think it was good for new players who have a thousand other first time concepts flying at them to have a diet high fantasy option right there in the book—that doesn’t require buying an older edition or learning what house rules are or having to roleplay any more out of their comfort zone than they already are. “I’m playing a dude, but they’re, like, more cooler and magical than the regular dudes. It says so on my sheet.”
Well they have taken a bunch of the lore away, but two half races made it as species. However I doubt this counts as a baby step as the two that made the cut are Goliath (Half-Giants) who have a specific cultural heritage and are very clearly not Human. And the Dragonborn who have multiple lore creation myths, two of which boil down Humans made into dragon like beings by Wizards or Dragons. But once again clearly not human, and very clearly mostly dragon in culture, looks, and abilities.
Everyone else in the lore were made as is by their gods, ironic since the Green Orcs are all technically Half-Orcs in the Forgotten Realms, but the Orcs in the PHB are Grey Orcs who have the Warcraft start in the realms, ie Invaders from a dying world brought over by an Evil Wizard trying to make an "intern" army, only to loose control of them because they were entire nations of people trying to find a new home. (All that lore is skipped in the PHB apparently, but they do specify their skin tones see picture:
Classic Grey Orks being cool and wholesome... unlike the highly problematic Green Orcs.
I for one am extremely grateful that they got rid of them. I enjoy Humans and human like player characters, such as the Aasimar, Elf or even hafling. I have never cared for Dwarves, Gnomes, Half orcs and especially Half-Ogres. I'm scratching my head as to why they kept monsters, like Dragonborn, Tieflings and Orgres as player characters. Most likely because they scored well on the popularity list.
Aside from that I have always hated the term "race" when referring to these beings. Species is most appropriate as it is also has real world applications between humans and animals and between various animals.
But at the end of the day, I don't own the game so I don't make the rules, unless I want to House rule everything. In which case I might as well just create my own game.
For the most part I laud the changes Crawford's team has done by taking away the ability to min-max based on your species (although Humans get two origin Feats). I'm also satisfied at how they fixed or restructured the classes (eg Monk's Ki/Focus Points) and clamped down on abuse of mechanics (eg disallowing spell casting from Action Surge).
As I've said before, I think the way they could work in half-races as an option under the new paradigm is to work from the model we saw in Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft: you write a few lineages for "somewhere in your ancestry there's a connection to the eternal powers; perhaps one of your ancestors was a dwarf or elf, or perhaps they dwelled for a time in the Feywild or near another font of ancient magics. Or perhaps something in your own experiences has caused your being to be infused with this power. Regardless, you can now expect to live far beyond your typical span, and have gained other traits reflecting the source of this power". Call them "the Timeless" for basically half-elves, "the Enduring" for half-dwarves, and "the Innocent" or something like that for part halflings (saying it the other way sounds weird) or half-gnomes and you've pretty well covered the core options in a way that makes it just one possible interpretation of how the character ended up like that, rather than only about genetics.
Again, I’m not talking about hybrid anything. I’m talking about a stand alone species option that is a magicalish human. Half-elf was that in the previous editions.
No, it really wasn't, there's never been anything particularly magical about half elves other than the fact that in AD&D you could multiclass fighter/wizard. Generally the way you achieved it in 3.0 and above was an origin feat of some sort -- they should probably have made something like fey touched a first level feat in 2024. Or they could add a feat such as "hybrid lineage: copy one feature from a different species" (I can't think of any named features that are too strong for a feat, though a number are too weak).
Again, I’m not talking about hybrid anything. I’m talking about a stand alone species option that is a magicalish human. Half-elf was that in the previous editions.
No, it really wasn't, there's never been anything particularly magical about half elves other than the fact that in AD&D you could multiclass fighter/wizard. Generally the way you achieved it in 3.0 and above was an origin feat of some sort -- they should probably have made something like fey touched a first level feat in 2024. Or they could add a feat such as "hybrid lineage: copy one feature from a different species" (I can't think of any named features that are too strong for a feat, though a number are too weak).
Extending the lifespan was significant from a characterization perspective, as was the lack of trance for DMs who made use of existing lore. They weren't actively magical, but they did actualize a good "between two worlds" vibe. You can get a fair bit of that via the mixed lineages model outlined in the UA using human traits, but having darkvision and to a lesser extent Fey Ancestry also helped them clearly stand apart from the other end of the spectrum. It's not a grievous loss, but for people who like to build roleplay around traits, you can't really get the same vibe on that front from any of the upcoming options.
I'll start by saying I am not someone who is a member of a group who generally experiences prejudice or racism, nor do I have what would be considered mixed heritage, so my opinion here is totally academic and not the result of lived experience, so I try to have humility about it.
That being said, from my perspective I think the big elephant in the room is that WOTC deciding that using the word "species" to describe what was previously "race" in order to avoid previous uncomfortable or racist implications is....bizarre. And it makes conversations around it turn people into pretzels when making analogies to real-world examples of mixed heritage while avoiding the horrifically racist implication that people of different real world racial background are different species. I will likely avoid the word entirely at my table and use something like lineage or ancestry.
I'll start by saying I am not someone who is a member of a group who generally experiences prejudice or racism, nor do I have what would be considered mixed heritage, so my opinion here is totally academic and not the result of lived experience, so I try to have humility about it.
That being said, from my perspective I think the big elephant in the room is that WOTC deciding that using the word "species" to describe what was previously "race" in order to avoid previous uncomfortable or racist implications is....bizarre. And it makes conversations around it turn people into pretzels when making analogies to real-world examples of mixed heritage while avoiding the horrifically racist implication that people of different real world racial background are different species. I will likely avoid the word entirely at my table and use something like lineage or ancestry.
Yeah I mentioned in the playtest that I have heard people use species as a way of saying other groups aren't human. And it seems based on this thread that it creates an issue because WotC wants to treat the species like real world races, but without the terminology.
Though I imagine the half elf is going to be the most used race option from 2014.
Yeah I mentioned in the playtest that I have heard people use species as a way of saying other groups aren't human. And it seems based on this thread that it creates an issue because WotC wants to treat the species like real world races, but without the terminology.
That's the exact opposite. Wizards wants people to treat species as not like real world races, and changed the name to encourage that view.
Yeah I mentioned in the playtest that I have heard people use species as a way of saying other groups aren't human. And it seems based on this thread that it creates an issue because WotC wants to treat the species like real world races, but without the terminology.
That's the exact opposite. Wizards wants people to treat species as not like real world races, and changed the name to encourage that view.
Based on the responses from mods in this thread that doesn't seem to be true.
Yeah I mentioned in the playtest that I have heard people use species as a way of saying other groups aren't human. And it seems based on this thread that it creates an issue because WotC wants to treat the species like real world races, but without the terminology.
That's the exact opposite. Wizards wants people to treat species as not like real world races, and changed the name to encourage that view.
^ This. "Species" is a scientific term that indicates a substantial genetic/physiological gap even if certain segments are reproductively compatible. "Race" is a social construct built around perceivable differences within the human species.
Yeah I mentioned in the playtest that I have heard people use species as a way of saying other groups aren't human. And it seems based on this thread that it creates an issue because WotC wants to treat the species like real world races, but without the terminology.
That's the exact opposite. Wizards wants people to treat species as not like real world races, and changed the name to encourage that view.
^ This. "Species" is a scientific term that indicates a substantial genetic/physiological gap even if certain segments are reproductively compatible. "Race" is a social construct built around perceivable differences within the human species.
More than that: the modern (like last few centuries) meaning of "race" is an entirely fictional concept used to justify some terrible things. It's more correct to say "ethnicity" for people, and enthnicity is supremely more complicated and nuanced that "race" ever was. In the game, the "species" are supposed to be much more distinct than ethnicities (despite the fact that "races" in DnD have commonly been based on real-world stereotypes of ethnicities and such).
~ The UA replaced these with a sidebar entry which lets you mix two species when it comes to appearance, but you have to pick which species you 'really are' (yes they seriously went there).~
I agree the wording they used is for us IRL, problematic at best. but also mega corp Hasbro at the wheel, did you really expect better?
I'd point out for a game system(you know be systematic) where we are going to mechanically quantify everything that relates to in game actions/dice odds. This new system of no more uniquely quantified half species stats, is a very game mechanics rational design choice.
If the goal is to allow all species to have half anything in the Thirst Role Play. Then to make a unique stat block for every possible race combo of all available races, would not be reasonable to do.
As well the wording gets wonksy for half halfling dawrf and so on. SO we have no more printed quantified stat blocks for half anything. Simply pick any stat block you want that thre is. Then flavor your visual description however you want mixing and matching however you see fit between the two parent races you picked.
Like you can give yourself the stats for an Orc, and just look exactly like a halfling if you want to.
I think it is mechanically an elegant solution to wanting a game system that has unique species PC stats, but did not actually worry that visual flavor needed to bog down anything, if it is just the players personal flair rather than quantified game systems.
No need to mechanically emulate/simulate all minute, sweep a few things under the suspension of disbelief rug for smoother sailing.
~ The UA replaced these with a sidebar entry which lets you mix two species when it comes to appearance, but you have to pick which species you 'really are' (yes they seriously went there).~
I agree the wording they used is for us IRL, problematic at best. but also mega corp Hasbro at the wheel, did you really expect better?
I'd point out for a game system(you know be systematic) where we are going to mechanically quantify everything that relates to in game actions/dice odds. This new system of no more uniquely quantified half species stats, is a very game mechanics rational design choice.
If the goal is to allow all species to have half anything in the Thirst Role Play. Then to make a unique stat block for every possible race combo of all available races, would not be reasonable to do.
As well the wording gets wonksy for half halfling dawrf and so on. SO we have no more printed quantified stat blocks for half anything. Simply pick any stat block you want that thre is. Then flavor your visual description however you want mixing and matching however you see fit between the two parent races you picked.
Like you can give yourself the stats for an Orc, and just look exactly like a halfling if you want to.
I think it is mechanically an elegant solution to wanting a game system that has unique species PC stats, but did not actually worry that visual flavor needed to bog down anything, if it is just the players personal flair rather than quantified game systems.
No need to mechanically emulate/simulate all minute, sweep a few things under the suspension of disbelief rug for smoother sailing.
I wonder how many DMs would allow it. Like an entire party that looks human but has bugbear stats
I wonder how many DMs would allow it. Like an entire party that looks human but has bugbear stats
I'm a DM, and my group has built their characters using UA rules on this, specifically our tiefling has assamar traits. Since we are now nearing the end of the Avernus campaign no way am I going to change his character now. I'm disappointed it's not in the PHB, and I really hope this is in the DMG, because it's a great way to make hybrid characters.
Agree with y’all mechanics and min/max folks about half-elf not being that big of an exclusion.
I hear all sides of the above posters on the verbiage of the species and the representation or lack there of it represents.
What I’d like to add to the conversation is the je ne sais quoi, mise-en-scéne, and wholistic concept of having a book in front of you as a first time player with a breadth of character options to get your creative juices flowing, and there not being a stop gap between elf and human.
That first time player will get over it just as fast as they get over there not being a stopgap between Orc and Gnome, or Tiefling and Dwarf, or Aasimar and Human. It's arbitrary.
Why should there be one? Honestly, humans and elves are different enough that it's entirely reasonable to have them unable to reproduce at all, though that's a world building decision, and they're by no means the most similar to humans (the most similar to humans is halfling). Once you've decided to open the door to hybridization, there's a zillion mixes that make at least some sense.
Well... Tuesday I will have my copy of the Rules, and from what I'm hearing from D&D content creators who have access to the PHB. No halves. No Hybrid system for optional creations either. If you want to use Half-elf or Half-Ork use the (Legacy)
racespecies.For now, fine. I'm not happy with the direction, as I kind of saw myself in these options, being a Human born of two vastly different ethnic backgrounds, and growing up as a Half, I kind of liked the potential with the UA full hybrid system. I was very displeased with their wording in videos, and the rational behind the changes, but not the mechanics that were being opened up in UA.
As I would see my fathers Ancestry more the Goliath and my mum more the Elvish one. And I would have made a representation of myself with this combo. Oh well. Maybe in the DMG.
Correct. I have had the PHB in hand for about two weeks now (GenCon). No halves. No hybrids. I was surprised that there was also nothing about "importing" other races into the current PHB. I'd figured there would be a "drop ability scores, everything else stays the same" thing or something. I guess that will either be a DMG thing else a UA thing.
Again, I’m not talking about hybrid anything. I’m talking about a stand alone species option that is a magicalish human. Half-elf was that in the previous editions. It was one of the only ancestries that wasn’t associated with a culture. Like Aragorn in LotR is a human with a little magic from way back when, but not the son of mixed species parents. Players and DMs can write whatever story points they want or choose to play that species as literally being half human and half something else. Like has been said many times, the old rules are still valid and players can decide whatever they want for their personal backstory.
I think the game in general is now missing a baby step into playing a fantasy character that is a little more magical than than the human they are in real life but not something that involves taking on a whole cultural motif. Has no one else ever known a player who chose a half-elf because they were intimidated by the other options? I have a first time player who just joined our game this summer who was new to the whole fantasy genre and went half-elf for that very reason.
The species in the book now are all like a whole thing. I get that you can decide in your head that while the rules say human, you are actually a special human who’s a little more magic than other humans, but I think it was good for new players who have a thousand other first time concepts flying at them to have a diet high fantasy option right there in the book—that doesn’t require buying an older edition or learning what house rules are or having to roleplay any more out of their comfort zone than they already are. “I’m playing a dude, but they’re, like, more cooler and magical than the regular dudes. It says so on my sheet.”
Well they have taken a bunch of the lore away, but two half races made it as species. However I doubt this counts as a baby step as the two that made the cut are Goliath (Half-Giants) who have a specific cultural heritage and are very clearly not Human. And the Dragonborn who have multiple lore creation myths, two of which boil down Humans made into dragon like beings by Wizards or Dragons. But once again clearly not human, and very clearly mostly dragon in culture, looks, and abilities.
Everyone else in the lore were made as is by their gods, ironic since the Green Orcs are all technically Half-Orcs in the Forgotten Realms, but the Orcs in the PHB are Grey Orcs who have the Warcraft start in the realms, ie Invaders from a dying world brought over by an Evil Wizard trying to make an "intern" army, only to loose control of them because they were entire nations of people trying to find a new home. (All that lore is skipped in the PHB apparently, but they do specify their skin tones see picture:
Classic Grey Orks being cool and wholesome... unlike the highly problematic Green Orcs.
I for one am extremely grateful that they got rid of them. I enjoy Humans and human like player characters, such as the Aasimar, Elf or even hafling. I have never cared for Dwarves, Gnomes, Half orcs and especially Half-Ogres. I'm scratching my head as to why they kept monsters, like Dragonborn, Tieflings and Orgres as player characters. Most likely because they scored well on the popularity list.
Aside from that I have always hated the term "race" when referring to these beings. Species is most appropriate as it is also has real world applications between humans and animals and between various animals.
But at the end of the day, I don't own the game so I don't make the rules, unless I want to House rule everything. In which case I might as well just create my own game.
For the most part I laud the changes Crawford's team has done by taking away the ability to min-max based on your species (although Humans get two origin Feats). I'm also satisfied at how they fixed or restructured the classes (eg Monk's Ki/Focus Points) and clamped down on abuse of mechanics (eg disallowing spell casting from Action Surge).
As I've said before, I think the way they could work in half-races as an option under the new paradigm is to work from the model we saw in Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft: you write a few lineages for "somewhere in your ancestry there's a connection to the eternal powers; perhaps one of your ancestors was a dwarf or elf, or perhaps they dwelled for a time in the Feywild or near another font of ancient magics. Or perhaps something in your own experiences has caused your being to be infused with this power. Regardless, you can now expect to live far beyond your typical span, and have gained other traits reflecting the source of this power". Call them "the Timeless" for basically half-elves, "the Enduring" for half-dwarves, and "the Innocent" or something like that for part halflings (saying it the other way sounds weird) or half-gnomes and you've pretty well covered the core options in a way that makes it just one possible interpretation of how the character ended up like that, rather than only about genetics.
No, it really wasn't, there's never been anything particularly magical about half elves other than the fact that in AD&D you could multiclass fighter/wizard. Generally the way you achieved it in 3.0 and above was an origin feat of some sort -- they should probably have made something like fey touched a first level feat in 2024. Or they could add a feat such as "hybrid lineage: copy one feature from a different species" (I can't think of any named features that are too strong for a feat, though a number are too weak).
Extending the lifespan was significant from a characterization perspective, as was the lack of trance for DMs who made use of existing lore. They weren't actively magical, but they did actualize a good "between two worlds" vibe. You can get a fair bit of that via the mixed lineages model outlined in the UA using human traits, but having darkvision and to a lesser extent Fey Ancestry also helped them clearly stand apart from the other end of the spectrum. It's not a grievous loss, but for people who like to build roleplay around traits, you can't really get the same vibe on that front from any of the upcoming options.
I'll start by saying I am not someone who is a member of a group who generally experiences prejudice or racism, nor do I have what would be considered mixed heritage, so my opinion here is totally academic and not the result of lived experience, so I try to have humility about it.
That being said, from my perspective I think the big elephant in the room is that WOTC deciding that using the word "species" to describe what was previously "race" in order to avoid previous uncomfortable or racist implications is....bizarre. And it makes conversations around it turn people into pretzels when making analogies to real-world examples of mixed heritage while avoiding the horrifically racist implication that people of different real world racial background are different species. I will likely avoid the word entirely at my table and use something like lineage or ancestry.
Yeah I mentioned in the playtest that I have heard people use species as a way of saying other groups aren't human. And it seems based on this thread that it creates an issue because WotC wants to treat the species like real world races, but without the terminology.
Though I imagine the half elf is going to be the most used race option from 2014.
That's the exact opposite. Wizards wants people to treat species as not like real world races, and changed the name to encourage that view.
Based on the responses from mods in this thread that doesn't seem to be true.
^ This. "Species" is a scientific term that indicates a substantial genetic/physiological gap even if certain segments are reproductively compatible. "Race" is a social construct built around perceivable differences within the human species.
More than that: the modern (like last few centuries) meaning of "race" is an entirely fictional concept used to justify some terrible things. It's more correct to say "ethnicity" for people, and enthnicity is supremely more complicated and nuanced that "race" ever was. In the game, the "species" are supposed to be much more distinct than ethnicities (despite the fact that "races" in DnD have commonly been based on real-world stereotypes of ethnicities and such).
I agree the wording they used is for us IRL, problematic at best. but also mega corp Hasbro at the wheel, did you really expect better?
I'd point out for a game system(you know be systematic) where we are going to mechanically quantify everything that relates to in game actions/dice odds. This new system of no more uniquely quantified half species stats, is a very game mechanics rational design choice.
If the goal is to allow all species to have half anything in the Thirst Role Play. Then to make a unique stat block for every possible race combo of all available races, would not be reasonable to do.
As well the wording gets wonksy for half halfling dawrf and so on. SO we have no more printed quantified stat blocks for half anything. Simply pick any stat block you want that thre is. Then flavor your visual description however you want mixing and matching however you see fit between the two parent races you picked.
Like you can give yourself the stats for an Orc, and just look exactly like a halfling if you want to.
I think it is mechanically an elegant solution to wanting a game system that has unique species PC stats, but did not actually worry that visual flavor needed to bog down anything, if it is just the players personal flair rather than quantified game systems.
No need to mechanically emulate/simulate all minute, sweep a few things under the suspension of disbelief rug for smoother sailing.
I wonder how many DMs would allow it. Like an entire party that looks human but has bugbear stats
I'm a DM, and my group has built their characters using UA rules on this, specifically our tiefling has assamar traits. Since we are now nearing the end of the Avernus campaign no way am I going to change his character now. I'm disappointed it's not in the PHB, and I really hope this is in the DMG, because it's a great way to make hybrid characters.
Image is what he is using for Roll20 token.