Personally, I always thought orcs were meant to be a kind of beast-kin race. That's why they always look like boars and pigs, or at least they did when I was growing up. WoW changed that, making them closer in appearance and attitude to giant-kin, but I always think of them as a type of anthropomorphic animal so resplendent in mythology.
Of course, the way that D&D historically treats beast-people isn't exactly good either - if anything, its worse, and still ongoing. Gnolls, lizardfolk, kobald, kuo-toa... with very few exceptions, beast-kin are treated the same as the "humans + bad magic" to mow down.
And don't get me started on japanese light novels - somehow, some way, someone came up with the idea of porc. Meat from killing an orc and serving it for food. Its literally killing a sapient being, carving them up for food, like we do with cattle. I wanted to puke the first time I heard of that.
In my homebrew world, orcs were created by the giants as their emissaries to interact with the 'small folk,' as they call them. The age of dragons and giants was drawing to a close, and the giants wanted some involvement in the age of humanoids. Unfortunately for the giants, the typical power-hungry humans saw them as a threat to their dominance of the continent and refused to make an alliance. However, many of the more open-minded and less ambitious humans accepted the orcs as fellow mortals and as friends. A nation of orcs, open-minded humans, and half-orcs was formed in the south. This nation created trade agreements with the elves and dwarves, and eventually the more ambitious nation of humans realized that refusing to trade with the orcs was a detriment, not a boon, and they entered into an alliance.
I believe that my portrayal of orcs isn't racist. If someone notices something that I didn't, please tell me.
All stars fade. Some stars forever fall. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Homebrew (Mostly Outdated):Magic Items,Monsters,Spells,Subclasses ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- If there was no light, people wouldn't fear the dark.
It's more like ... the idea of racial essentialism in general is the idea that certain peoples are the way they are because of inborn traits. This is an argument that, while applied to fictional peoples, has been used in this very discussion. It's also an argument that has been used in real life to the actual and real detriment of people in this discussion. Me among them. So when we hear those kinds of arguments applied to our fictional little fantasy escapist hobby it ruins the experience for us in a real and harmful way. I'm not talking about being offended, I'm talking about being traumatized. People will decry efforts to make our common hobby a safe play experience and say, "Oh we want to get away from the real world, not hear about it more!" Well yeah, so do we. We don't come to Faerun or Greyhawk or Eberron just to get retraumatized by things that hurt us in real life, we come to get away. The arts in general are awakening to the knowledge that what they do has actual effects on people and are acknowledging responsibility for it. Gaming is an exponentially more intimate experience than watching a movie, in my opinion, so I think the artists that create our rpg's are starting to do their due diligence in being aware and sensitive of these issues. It's not correctness it's freaking compassion.
If I have to choose between making the hobby safer for people and adhering to some arbitrary notion of genre purity or fictionally biological ideas of verisimilitude then I'm going to choose the former and I make no apology for it. Do you feel left behind because people are now writing and creating art that doesn't center your experience? That sounds like a you problem.
I have no problems with Jemisin, or the idea set forth in that blog post (I have two of her trilogies, I really like them). But I don't really see any meaningful connection between that idea on the one hand and what we're talking about here - if and how mechanical differences between various species in D&D should or could be implemented. Jemisin is opposed to the fantasy trope of orcs as üntermenschen, as a species that is inherently and irredeemibly evil, that is a waste of life. She doesn't oppose orcs as a species being different, she opposes them - as an entire species - being inferior in an absolute sense, a blight on the world, something better extinguished. I should point out that she has racial diversity in her works. The Inheritance trilogy has godly races, has a number of diverse human subgroups, and has demons. There are clear, objective differences between these races. I'm not talking about moral values or inherent worth or anything like that, I'm talking about physiological differences.
This tread (at least the original scope of the topic and some of the tangential subtopics that arose, like floating ASIs) is about something else. Nobody's suggesting that half-orcs being stronger than gnomes but also intellectually less developed infers one being superior to the other. Obviously half-orcs will be more suited to physical pursuits and gnomes more suited to intellectual ones, but that doesn't mean one is "bad" and the other "good". There is diversity, but there is no inequality.
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I am actually very intrigued by the idea of changing max possible ability scores per race...while also keeping Tasha's floating racial ASIs at creation.
But it's not even the source of my wrath here, it's the hypocrisy around the debate. Out of all the people who want the change, only one has had the courage to say that it basically allows him to create the character idea that he has but still being very much optimised.
Maybe the reason most people haven't said that is why they want it is because most of those discussing it don't want it for that reason.
There are plenty of options out there to minmax. If someone wants to optimize, they will do so. This rule, on the other hand, helps to stop people feeling excluded by eliminating (or at least reducing) something which is heavily linked to a painful part of their lives. I feel that it's more important to help those people than it is to stop people from optimising their characters.
Given that it is completely optional, I find it incredible to see how dead set against this some people are.
The game doesn't exclude people. People exclude themselves.
It's true that you don't need an optimized character to play the game. It's also true that the optional rules for shifting ability scores for, say, a Goliath Dawncaller (Bard) takes them from 12 14 14 8 12 15 to 12 14 14 8 12 16. The statistical difference is negligible.
I am actually very intrigued by the idea of changing max possible ability scores per race...while also keeping Tasha's floating racial ASIs at creation.
But it's not even the source of my wrath here, it's the hypocrisy around the debate. Out of all the people who want the change, only one has had the courage to say that it basically allows him to create the character idea that he has but still being very much optimised.
Maybe the reason most people haven't said that is why they want it is because most of those discussing it don't want it for that reason.
There are plenty of options out there to minmax. If someone wants to optimize, they will do so. This rule, on the other hand, helps to stop people feeling excluded by eliminating (or at least reducing) something which is heavily linked to a painful part of their lives. I feel that it's more important to help those people than it is to stop people from optimising their characters.
Given that it is completely optional, I find it incredible to see how dead set against this some people are.
The game doesn't exclude people. People exclude themselves.
Yes, people do exclude other people. Both stick-in-the-mud grognards and modern power gamers. If your aim was something profound, you missed the mark by a country mile.
I mean, that same twitter thread has people bringing up already that we're not comparing groups of humans, we're comparing different types of humanoids. And everyone, even those in favour of floating ASIs, moving more abilities towards backgrounds and/or lineages, seems to still be ok with certain qualities being inherently connected to race - Darkvision, Flight, Powerful Build, presumably things like resistances, claws, natural armour, maybe swim speed, and so on. What is so fundamentally different between getting +2 Str and getting Darkvision as a function of race that one is a no-no and the other doesn't raise any eyebrows?
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On Wanda: Old Comic Wanda would be Wild Magic for sure - Clockwork Soul would be too ordered for her I think. MCU Wanda? I have no idea. Where does Mind Manipulation cross over with Telekinesis?
On Max Racial Ability Scores: eehh? I'd go with it, but the current D&D is just not made for that I think. I'd do them for the "physical" stats but not for the "mental" ones. Humans have aptly demonstrated that there is a limit to what you can train a body to, but that the range that you can learn stuff/train your mind is MUCH much greater. We are not that much stronger than our ancestors, but we are WAY smarter!
I could also see a world where you get stat bonuses based on your Race + Background, like OptimusGrimus suggested. That was one of the things i hoped Tashas would do.
I'd also like it if you could PICK what bonuses your character got based on their Race. For example, a Dragonborn would pick 2 out of Wings, Breath Weapon, Armored Scales, Claws and Majestic Prescence. Racial Feats kinda did that already, but they introduced soooo many different Races that they just could not keep up with it. I believe Pathfinder does something similar? Boodline/Ancestor Feats? Another thing I hoped Tashas would do.
Honestly the easiest thing would have been to overhaul the whole system to +1/+1 to two predetermined scores to represent your "biological" origin, and a floating +2 to represent "the path that you choose to focus on".
But the thing that we have now? Looking at this and other discussions, Tashas was NOT a good idea i feel.
I am actually very intrigued by the idea of changing max possible ability scores per race...while also keeping Tasha's floating racial ASIs at creation.
But it's not even the source of my wrath here, it's the hypocrisy around the debate. Out of all the people who want the change, only one has had the courage to say that it basically allows him to create the character idea that he has but still being very much optimised.
Maybe the reason most people haven't said that is why they want it is because most of those discussing it don't want it for that reason.
There are plenty of options out there to minmax. If someone wants to optimize, they will do so. This rule, on the other hand, helps to stop people feeling excluded by eliminating (or at least reducing) something which is heavily linked to a painful part of their lives. I feel that it's more important to help those people than it is to stop people from optimising their characters.
Given that it is completely optional, I find it incredible to see how dead set against this some people are.
The game doesn't exclude people. People exclude themselves.
Yes, people do exclude other people. Both stick-in-the-mud grognards and modern power gamers. If your aim was something profound, you missed the mark by a country mile.
Well, aside from your passive-aggressive ad hominine attack and attempt to provoke me...
Perhaps you need to brush up on your reading comprehension. I said the GAME doesn't exclude people.
This rule, on the other hand, helps to stop people feeling excluded by eliminating (or at least reducing) something which is heavily linked to a painful part of their lives. I feel that it's more important to help those people than it is to stop people from optimising their characters.
Given that it is completely optional, I find it incredible to see how dead set against this some people are.
I like to think I'm wiling to be convinced, but I honestly don't understand this. If that means I'm not woke enough or not empathic enough or just plain too dumb to understand I'll own that, but can you explain how non-humans being innately different from humans and other non-humans is painful to some people?
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Check out Kenclary's posted Twitter thread on bioessentialism. I hate Twitter with a fiery passion, but in this specific case there's a pretty succinct summary of the issue there. But since I know it won't happen...
You're conflating species differentiation with bioessentialism. Dragonborn can breathe fire (a little bit). Tieflings have a pinch of fiendish magic. Goliaths have large, heavy frames good for moving heavy loads. These are indeed physiological differences. "All half-orcs are stupid", "all gnomes are scrawny twigmen", "all elves are graceful and wise and serene and just more perfect than you are" are not physiological differences, they are societal norms. Societal norms are not genetic. If it's not genetic (or a permanent magical twisting of your genetics, a'la the UA document that started this whole mess), it shouldn't be in your Lineage features.
People protest bioessentialism because The Majority has been using bioessential arguments to pigeonhole, categorize, and dismiss anyone who isn't part of The Majority for centuries. I won't point to real-life examples of where bioessential ideas caused centuries of strife, injustice, and misery, but I really shouldn't have to be explicit in my examples, should I?
Folks want bioessentialism out of their D&D game. If I want to be an orc who's every bit as intelligent as her wizard classmates, I can bloody well do that. I shouldn't have to accept being Twenty Percent Dumber just because I wasn't born to a pretty bloodline. If I want to be a barbarian woman who can crush a ribcage between her thighs, I can bloody well do that. I shouldn't have to accept being Twenty Percent Weaker just because I wasn't born with a crotchful of testosterone. My lineage can give me physical traits and capabilities people with other lineages don't have, but the stupid ******* numbers that determine whether I'm fundamentally capable of doing my job don't get to be decided by the whims of fate and which bard was feeling horny where that day. Not in my D&D.
EDIT: Stupid work slowing me down...
The problem, Pangurjan, is that the numbers actively, permanently determine whether you are good at your job. The orcish wizard that gets an absolutely meaningless +2 to their Strength (that doesn't even match their character history) and a +0 to their Intelligence is always going to be worse at being a wizard than the damned gnome. Yes, they can catch up if they dump every last ASI they ever get into Intelligence - but they're always at least one full ASI behind. They don't get to take cool feats, they don't get to explore the limits of their class. Under your rule, the orcish wizard is only really about eighty percent of a real wizard. The fact that the player chose to be an orc means they're actively sabotaging their wizardness. It is impossible for them to truly "catch up".
That's bioessentialism, and it is super poisonous to a lot of people. I've explained this about seven hundred times in seven hundred other threads, but people are still convinced that having the numbers that govern your skills, your training, your aptitudes and your life's work and effort not actually tied to your skills, training, aptitudes, and effort and instead being 100% derived purely based on what someone else thinks your given species "is just good and/or bad at" is somehow More Better Fun.
It is not. It is Less Worse Fun, and I'm glad Wizards is getting away from it.
You're right, you did. But you're wrong, it does. Just read the post by Ophidimancer above, and it explains very clearly why it does.
However, if you feel so strongly that it is people who exclude themselves, consider this: the new lineage rules are now a part of the game. They are not going away, and people will use them. If you don't like that, the game is not excluding you. The same goes for any new lineages which use the new system, and any new content which requires it. The game is not excluding you by growing and evolving with the world around it, or by trying to bring in new players with a different world view to yours. You should have no objections, therefore: you are always free to exclude yourself.
Check out Kenclary's posted Twitter thread on bioessentialism. I hate Twitter with a fiery passion, but in this specific case there's a pretty succinct summary of the issue there. But since I know it won't happen...
You're conflating species differentiation with bioessentialism. Dragonborn can breathe fire (a little bit). Tieflings have a pinch of fiendish magic. Goliaths have large, heavy frames good for moving heavy loads. These are indeed physiological differences. "All half-orcs are stupid", "all gnomes are scrawny twigmen", "all elves are graceful and wise and serene and just more perfect than you are" are not physiological differences, they are societal norms. Societal norms are not genetic. If it's not genetic (or a permanent magical twisting of your genetics, a'la the UA document that started this whole mess), it shouldn't be in your Lineage features.
People protest bioessentialism because The Majority has been using bioessential arguments to pigeonhole, categorize, and dismiss anyone who isn't part of The Majority for centuries. I won't point to real-life examples of where bioessential ideas caused centuries of strife, injustice, and misery, but I really shouldn't have to be explicit in my examples, should I?
Folks want bioessentialism out of their D&D game. If I want to be an orc who's every bit as intelligent as her wizard classmates, I can bloody well do that. I shouldn't have to accept being Twenty Percent Dumber just because I wasn't born to a pretty bloodline. If I want to be a barbarian woman who can crush a ribcage between her thighs, I can bloody well do that. I shouldn't have to accept being Twenty Percent Weaker just because I wasn't born with a crotchful of testosterone. My lineage can give me physical traits and capabilities people with other lineages don't have, but the stupid ****ing numbers that determine whether I'm fundamentally capable of doing my job don't get to be decided by the whims of fate and which bard was feeling horny where that day. Not in my D&D.
Females haven't had their strength limited since 1E.
I am actually very intrigued by the idea of changing max possible ability scores per race...while also keeping Tasha's floating racial ASIs at creation.
But it's not even the source of my wrath here, it's the hypocrisy around the debate. Out of all the people who want the change, only one has had the courage to say that it basically allows him to create the character idea that he has but still being very much optimised.
Maybe the reason most people haven't said that is why they want it is because most of those discussing it don't want it for that reason.
There are plenty of options out there to minmax. If someone wants to optimize, they will do so. This rule, on the other hand, helps to stop people feeling excluded by eliminating (or at least reducing) something which is heavily linked to a painful part of their lives. I feel that it's more important to help those people than it is to stop people from optimising their characters.
Given that it is completely optional, I find it incredible to see how dead set against this some people are.
The game doesn't exclude people. People exclude themselves.
Yes, people do exclude other people. Both stick-in-the-mud grognards and modern power gamers. If your aim was something profound, you missed the mark by a country mile.
Well, aside from your passive-aggressive ad hominine attack and attempt to provoke me...
Perhaps you need to brush up on your reading comprehension. I said the GAME doesn't exclude people.
How...? Look, I agreed with your general sentiment: people exclude other people. The esoterica of what constitutes a game of D&D aside, the system doesn't exclude. People do.
That said, what you meant by typing that out wasn't really clear. You've offered up some amazingly bad takes today. Ignorant, biased takes that are reminiscent of the worst gatekeepers and toxic people in the greater community. And, come on, all you did was state the obvious. Do you expect to get a cookie for that? Because...no.
People exclude people, both intentionally and incidentally. Examples of the former are intransigent gatekeepers who fight back tooth-and-nail against the slightest change. Because even though it doesn't have to affect them, they feel personally attacked by anyone else having fun that doesn't correspond with their ideal. And examples of the latter include well-intentioned authors who are blind to the implications of their work. D&D has ableist, colonial, and even racist language in its past. And the perspectives of potential minority players aren't always reflected in the work put out. The three biggest names at WotC for 5e are/were all white men. (Mearls has been AWOL for a while.) Dragon Talk is hosted by another white man. Builds Character is hosted by another white man, and it's two most frequent guests are also white. That is a limiting perspective that deserves to be challenged.
All this complaining is about players having more options; as if more options is somehow a bad thing. A new class or subclass is fine, but Mount Celestia forbid someone has non-standard Ability Score Increases for their character's race. The people who welcome these options aren't going to exclude someone else who doesn't want to use them. And maybe that player, if that person is a grognard, will exclude themselves. But you know what? If the DM is a grognard, they might end up alienating players. Yeah, the player could just "get with the program". But it's ultimately a harmless option to allow. And any DM willing to get confrontational over that isn't someone I want to play with. I imagine a lot of players wouldn't want to. The player base is huge now; bigger than it's been in 30 years. And those new players, new voices, deserve to be heard. Playing D&D is meant to be a collaborative experience, not a competitive one.
And you try to turn that back on me by accusing me of making an ad hominem (it wasn't) and insulting my reading comprehension (which was fine)? Please.
Females haven't had their strength limited since 1E.
And yet, people still think it's okay to limit orcs' intelligence, or gnomes' strength, or dwarves' dexterity, or whatever else someone decides a particular species is Simply Not Good At, Biologically. They canned gender-based statistical gaps decades ago and nobody's batted an eye in many years, but now that they're binning species-based statistical gaps people are flipping schitts. Hmmmmmmm.
Oh well. At least the gender thing proves that five or ten years from now, nobody will care that species-based stats are gone either. It'll just be another weird footnote in D&D history, like women being forced to sacrifice four points of Strength with absolutely nothing to show for it.
The problem, Pangurjan, is that the numbers actively, permanently determine whether you are good at your job. The orcish wizard that gets an absolutely meaningless +2 to their Strength (that doesn't even match their character history) and a +0 to their Intelligence is always going to be worse at being a wizard than the damned gnome.
Yup, sure. But by that same token a flying aaracokra or a gnome with Darkvision is always going to be better as a scouting ranger than a dragonborn. So what's the difference?
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You're right, you did. But you're wrong, it does. Just read the post by Ophidimancer above, and it explains very clearly why it does.
However, if you feel so strongly that it is people who exclude themselves, consider this: the new lineage rules are now a part of the game. They are not going away, and people will use them. If you don't like that, the game is not excluding you. The same goes for any new lineages which use the new system, and any new content which requires it. The game is not excluding you by growing and evolving with the world around it, or by trying to bring in new players with a different world view to yours. You should have no objections, therefore: you are always free to exclude yourself.
I will continue to play the game as I always have. I have no feelings of exclusion. My concern is that these changes were made to appease a vocal minority who have no long term interest in the game or the hobby.
Woof, there's at least three people who have made this entire site feel hostile to me, and all I wanted to talk about was how cool it might be to play a frankenstein.
I am thoroughly out of this one.
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In my homebrew world, orcs were created by the giants as their emissaries to interact with the 'small folk,' as they call them. The age of dragons and giants was drawing to a close, and the giants wanted some involvement in the age of humanoids. Unfortunately for the giants, the typical power-hungry humans saw them as a threat to their dominance of the continent and refused to make an alliance. However, many of the more open-minded and less ambitious humans accepted the orcs as fellow mortals and as friends. A nation of orcs, open-minded humans, and half-orcs was formed in the south. This nation created trade agreements with the elves and dwarves, and eventually the more ambitious nation of humans realized that refusing to trade with the orcs was a detriment, not a boon, and they entered into an alliance.
I believe that my portrayal of orcs isn't racist. If someone notices something that I didn't, please tell me.
All stars fade. Some stars forever fall.
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Homebrew (Mostly Outdated): Magic Items, Monsters, Spells, Subclasses
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If there was no light, people wouldn't fear the dark.
I have no problems with Jemisin, or the idea set forth in that blog post (I have two of her trilogies, I really like them). But I don't really see any meaningful connection between that idea on the one hand and what we're talking about here - if and how mechanical differences between various species in D&D should or could be implemented. Jemisin is opposed to the fantasy trope of orcs as üntermenschen, as a species that is inherently and irredeemibly evil, that is a waste of life. She doesn't oppose orcs as a species being different, she opposes them - as an entire species - being inferior in an absolute sense, a blight on the world, something better extinguished. I should point out that she has racial diversity in her works. The Inheritance trilogy has godly races, has a number of diverse human subgroups, and has demons. There are clear, objective differences between these races. I'm not talking about moral values or inherent worth or anything like that, I'm talking about physiological differences.
This tread (at least the original scope of the topic and some of the tangential subtopics that arose, like floating ASIs) is about something else. Nobody's suggesting that half-orcs being stronger than gnomes but also intellectually less developed infers one being superior to the other. Obviously half-orcs will be more suited to physical pursuits and gnomes more suited to intellectual ones, but that doesn't mean one is "bad" and the other "good". There is diversity, but there is no inequality.
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The game doesn't exclude people. People exclude themselves.
It's true that you don't need an optimized character to play the game. It's also true that the optional rules for shifting ability scores for, say, a Goliath Dawncaller (Bard) takes them from 12 14 14 8 12 15 to 12 14 14 8 12 16. The statistical difference is negligible.
Yes, people do exclude other people. Both stick-in-the-mud grognards and modern power gamers. If your aim was something profound, you missed the mark by a country mile.
I mean, that same twitter thread has people bringing up already that we're not comparing groups of humans, we're comparing different types of humanoids. And everyone, even those in favour of floating ASIs, moving more abilities towards backgrounds and/or lineages, seems to still be ok with certain qualities being inherently connected to race - Darkvision, Flight, Powerful Build, presumably things like resistances, claws, natural armour, maybe swim speed, and so on. What is so fundamentally different between getting +2 Str and getting Darkvision as a function of race that one is a no-no and the other doesn't raise any eyebrows?
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On Wanda: Old Comic Wanda would be Wild Magic for sure - Clockwork Soul would be too ordered for her I think. MCU Wanda? I have no idea. Where does Mind Manipulation cross over with Telekinesis?
On Max Racial Ability Scores: eehh? I'd go with it, but the current D&D is just not made for that I think. I'd do them for the "physical" stats but not for the "mental" ones. Humans have aptly demonstrated that there is a limit to what you can train a body to, but that the range that you can learn stuff/train your mind is MUCH much greater. We are not that much stronger than our ancestors, but we are WAY smarter!
I could also see a world where you get stat bonuses based on your Race + Background, like OptimusGrimus suggested. That was one of the things i hoped Tashas would do.
I'd also like it if you could PICK what bonuses your character got based on their Race. For example, a Dragonborn would pick 2 out of Wings, Breath Weapon, Armored Scales, Claws and Majestic Prescence. Racial Feats kinda did that already, but they introduced soooo many different Races that they just could not keep up with it. I believe Pathfinder does something similar? Boodline/Ancestor Feats? Another thing I hoped Tashas would do.
Honestly the easiest thing would have been to overhaul the whole system to +1/+1 to two predetermined scores to represent your "biological" origin, and a floating +2 to represent "the path that you choose to focus on".
But the thing that we have now? Looking at this and other discussions, Tashas was NOT a good idea i feel.
#OpenDnD
Well, aside from your passive-aggressive ad hominine attack and attempt to provoke me...
Perhaps you need to brush up on your reading comprehension. I said the GAME doesn't exclude people.
I like to think I'm wiling to be convinced, but I honestly don't understand this. If that means I'm not woke enough or not empathic enough or just plain too dumb to understand I'll own that, but can you explain how non-humans being innately different from humans and other non-humans is painful to some people?
Want to start playing but don't have anyone to play with? You can try these options: [link].
Check out Kenclary's posted Twitter thread on bioessentialism. I hate Twitter with a fiery passion, but in this specific case there's a pretty succinct summary of the issue there. But since I know it won't happen...
You're conflating species differentiation with bioessentialism. Dragonborn can breathe fire (a little bit). Tieflings have a pinch of fiendish magic. Goliaths have large, heavy frames good for moving heavy loads. These are indeed physiological differences. "All half-orcs are stupid", "all gnomes are scrawny twigmen", "all elves are graceful and wise and serene and just more perfect than you are" are not physiological differences, they are societal norms. Societal norms are not genetic. If it's not genetic (or a permanent magical twisting of your genetics, a'la the UA document that started this whole mess), it shouldn't be in your Lineage features.
People protest bioessentialism because The Majority has been using bioessential arguments to pigeonhole, categorize, and dismiss anyone who isn't part of The Majority for centuries. I won't point to real-life examples of where bioessential ideas caused centuries of strife, injustice, and misery, but I really shouldn't have to be explicit in my examples, should I?
Folks want bioessentialism out of their D&D game. If I want to be an orc who's every bit as intelligent as her wizard classmates, I can bloody well do that. I shouldn't have to accept being Twenty Percent Dumber just because I wasn't born to a pretty bloodline. If I want to be a barbarian woman who can crush a ribcage between her thighs, I can bloody well do that. I shouldn't have to accept being Twenty Percent Weaker just because I wasn't born with a crotchful of testosterone. My lineage can give me physical traits and capabilities people with other lineages don't have, but the stupid ******* numbers that determine whether I'm fundamentally capable of doing my job don't get to be decided by the whims of fate and which bard was feeling horny where that day. Not in my D&D.
EDIT: Stupid work slowing me down...
The problem, Pangurjan, is that the numbers actively, permanently determine whether you are good at your job. The orcish wizard that gets an absolutely meaningless +2 to their Strength (that doesn't even match their character history) and a +0 to their Intelligence is always going to be worse at being a wizard than the damned gnome. Yes, they can catch up if they dump every last ASI they ever get into Intelligence - but they're always at least one full ASI behind. They don't get to take cool feats, they don't get to explore the limits of their class. Under your rule, the orcish wizard is only really about eighty percent of a real wizard. The fact that the player chose to be an orc means they're actively sabotaging their wizardness. It is impossible for them to truly "catch up".
That's bioessentialism, and it is super poisonous to a lot of people. I've explained this about seven hundred times in seven hundred other threads, but people are still convinced that having the numbers that govern your skills, your training, your aptitudes and your life's work and effort not actually tied to your skills, training, aptitudes, and effort and instead being 100% derived purely based on what someone else thinks your given species "is just good and/or bad at" is somehow More Better Fun.
It is not. It is Less Worse Fun, and I'm glad Wizards is getting away from it.
Please do not contact or message me.
"I said the GAME doesn't exclude people"
You're right, you did. But you're wrong, it does. Just read the post by Ophidimancer above, and it explains very clearly why it does.
However, if you feel so strongly that it is people who exclude themselves, consider this: the new lineage rules are now a part of the game. They are not going away, and people will use them. If you don't like that, the game is not excluding you. The same goes for any new lineages which use the new system, and any new content which requires it. The game is not excluding you by growing and evolving with the world around it, or by trying to bring in new players with a different world view to yours. You should have no objections, therefore: you are always free to exclude yourself.
Females haven't had their strength limited since 1E.
> Bohemian Failure Monkeys
Thank you for introducing me to this useful term, kind person. I will use it from now on.
Er ek geng, þat er í þeim skóm er ek valda.
UwU
Well it's good that they changed that, right? March of progress, and all that. I wonder if any players complained when they changed it in 2e...
How...? Look, I agreed with your general sentiment: people exclude other people. The esoterica of what constitutes a game of D&D aside, the system doesn't exclude. People do.
That said, what you meant by typing that out wasn't really clear. You've offered up some amazingly bad takes today. Ignorant, biased takes that are reminiscent of the worst gatekeepers and toxic people in the greater community. And, come on, all you did was state the obvious. Do you expect to get a cookie for that? Because...no.
People exclude people, both intentionally and incidentally. Examples of the former are intransigent gatekeepers who fight back tooth-and-nail against the slightest change. Because even though it doesn't have to affect them, they feel personally attacked by anyone else having fun that doesn't correspond with their ideal. And examples of the latter include well-intentioned authors who are blind to the implications of their work. D&D has ableist, colonial, and even racist language in its past. And the perspectives of potential minority players aren't always reflected in the work put out. The three biggest names at WotC for 5e are/were all white men. (Mearls has been AWOL for a while.) Dragon Talk is hosted by another white man. Builds Character is hosted by another white man, and it's two most frequent guests are also white. That is a limiting perspective that deserves to be challenged.
All this complaining is about players having more options; as if more options is somehow a bad thing. A new class or subclass is fine, but Mount Celestia forbid someone has non-standard Ability Score Increases for their character's race. The people who welcome these options aren't going to exclude someone else who doesn't want to use them. And maybe that player, if that person is a grognard, will exclude themselves. But you know what? If the DM is a grognard, they might end up alienating players. Yeah, the player could just "get with the program". But it's ultimately a harmless option to allow. And any DM willing to get confrontational over that isn't someone I want to play with. I imagine a lot of players wouldn't want to. The player base is huge now; bigger than it's been in 30 years. And those new players, new voices, deserve to be heard. Playing D&D is meant to be a collaborative experience, not a competitive one.
And you try to turn that back on me by accusing me of making an ad hominem (it wasn't) and insulting my reading comprehension (which was fine)? Please.
Funny how that fact seems to have been forgotten in the rush to genuflect before the Twitter Outrage Mob....
And yet, people still think it's okay to limit orcs' intelligence, or gnomes' strength, or dwarves' dexterity, or whatever else someone decides a particular species is Simply Not Good At, Biologically. They canned gender-based statistical gaps decades ago and nobody's batted an eye in many years, but now that they're binning species-based statistical gaps people are flipping schitts. Hmmmmmmm.
Oh well. At least the gender thing proves that five or ten years from now, nobody will care that species-based stats are gone either. It'll just be another weird footnote in D&D history, like women being forced to sacrifice four points of Strength with absolutely nothing to show for it.
You are quite welcome. Go with my blessing, good person, and spread scorn of Bohemian Failure Monkeys far and wide.
Please do not contact or message me.
Yup, sure. But by that same token a flying aaracokra or a gnome with Darkvision is always going to be better as a scouting ranger than a dragonborn. So what's the difference?
Want to start playing but don't have anyone to play with? You can try these options: [link].
I will continue to play the game as I always have. I have no feelings of exclusion. My concern is that these changes were made to appease a vocal minority who have no long term interest in the game or the hobby.
Woof, there's at least three people who have made this entire site feel hostile to me, and all I wanted to talk about was how cool it might be to play a frankenstein.
I am thoroughly out of this one.