1. Stop referring to anything as 5.5e! There was exactly one edition that did this. ONE. There's not going to be a .5 edition so just stop it.
Each edition basically has had a half-way point where they effectively revised stuff. In 1e, it was the AD&D books. 2e had Revised books that came out six years into the run. In 3e, it was the 3.5 books. In 4e, it was the Essentials line. In 5e, its now post-Tasha. Calling it 5.5 is a simple way to get a point across that most people are familiar with.
5.5, just like 3.5, gives a sense of "half measure" or "patched" and forces the presumption "well, when's there going to be a 6?". As mentioned there's some folks who want to full throated embrace the post Tasha's lineage future possibly represented in the UA as well as make core class features something much more subject to player customization. There are others who prefer to play races presented in the style that they are in the PHB, like the classes, pick and choose among the subclasses etc. There are, I think, many more players than either camp who like both.
The 50th Anniversary of product isn't the best time to do "ta-da HALF STEP", especially when work is possible to reconcile the 5e core with the Tasha innovations. A Golden Edition would give you the systems needed to customize lineage and maybe even class. But for players who don't want to put that work in, the old core book presentations of relatively static races and classes will be available for something closer to "out of the box" play. The challenge right now would be make it possible to build the PHB races completely through the lineage system, I don't think that can be done yet, but I don't think it's a hard hurdle in three year time frame.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
Still salty I didn't get a chance to reply to the dude who literally tried to 'prove me wrong' with a thing I had addressed in the exact same post he quoted.
But moving on from that.
I'd love to see a sort of mix. There can be lore about particular races and groups, like it tells about Orc/Elf/whatever society in said setting, and can mention how other groups stereotype said group, but there's no official "You get +2 this" for all characters of said group.
From a new player, so my opinion is just that and probably doesn't matter....
Anyways why would more player choice be a problem.... The create your own character anyway you want is awesome, if people want to min/max they are going to min/max.... I think this opens even more creativity to the player itself...
2. Just because something has been done a certain way for x amount of time didn't mean it shouldn't change. That's really the crux of this entire argument. Detractors of the lineage system will trot ridiculous examples of why it's flawed, scroll a few posts up and you'll see an example. This is a game at the end of the day. A game about creativity to boot. And yet there's a very vocal group of people basically saying creativity for races is bad. I just don't get it.
I'm going to assume, you were talking about my post. If you were, well, read the spoiler. If you weren't, well the spoiler is a lengthy piece defending myself from things I assumed you meant, but I might be wrong about, so read it if you want, but it has no meaning.
I don't dislike the Lineage system. I think it's great! I'm just worried that most will just play humans. I'm sure, a lot of DMs, will tell the Hexblood centaur, that they still can't climb up walls. Or a DM would tell the reborn Kenku that they still can only mimic others speech. If I were playing the centaur or Kenku, I would be fine and keep playing it. Others, though, might not. Leading to more people playing only humans when they are playing with a lineage. I would not only play human lineage characters. As a DM, I would not enforce that. My DM's probably wouldn't either. Some Dm's might.
You're right about this game being about creativity, and I guess I could be more creative. I could say that, since the Tortle died and got reborn, magic twisted his shell so it would be softer and wouldn't give any protection. I still want Wotc to tell me why ever reborn is like that.
Here's the thing. I don't work at Wotc. I don't have inside knowledge of Wotc. Everything I know, is based on a little text blurb in a prototype for this system. Wotc might be developing something like that. Wotc might not but make something else that replaces it. This is all speculation based upon what I know, which is very little.
One last thing. Reading this over again, it sounds a little, rude or mean. I'm sorry, if you got that too.
Putting that aside, I really hope that with the lineage system, you could have more half and half races, that are not just half humans. I suppose you could do that already by just homebrewing it, but not everybody can, has the time, or wants to do that. Wouldn't a Aasimar-Tiefling be real cool? With a lineage system it might be possible (without extensive homebrewing.) Most of these, can be done already. You just say that your character took after one side more than the other. Though, wouldn't it be cool to have traits from both sides?
A Kenku-Aarakocra, trying to give the rest of his kin the gift of flight?
The Aasimar-Tiefling, her great grandfathers devil that he made a pact with, is now trying to "recruit" her, while a celestial who made a pact with her great grandmother's side also trying to at the same time?
Or a Githyanki-Githzerai, trying to unite the gith?
A Goblin-Kobold, trying to unite the two races in hopes of proving their superiority over the hobgoblins, bugbears and even, dragons?
I mean the possibilities are endless, and with a good lineage system, this could happen.
but what does it mean for this website? i mean they change the site to adjust towards the newest rules. if DnD moves towards 5.5E...what does that mean for those of us that prefer to use this site to help run our games?
From a new player, so my opinion is just that and probably doesn't matter....
Despite what some people say, your opinion matters just as much as the rest of us. No matter how long you've played, or what. If you sit down to play, you matter.
but what does it mean for this website? i mean they change the site to adjust towards the newest rules. if DnD moves towards 5.5E...what does that mean for those of us that prefer to use this site to help run our games?
I'm assuming you mean "what does this mean for people that use the site and prefer pre-Tasha stuff," so I will speak in that manner.
Well, there's several ways this could go about. They could simply make it a subrace option, much like we have with alternative tieflings and half-elves from SCAG. They could have a toggle switch at the beginning of character generation "Do you want Tasha options enabled?" Just like we have "Use Homebrew?" and "Use Critical Role?" options. We will have to wait and see how things are implemented - right now, it could go in any number of ways.
Or, you could just eyeball it - with standard array, its not difficult to eyeball the stats and make sure they're placed correctly. A bit longer with rolled, but still pretty easy. I find I have to check that anyways, just in case someone fudged the numbers.
In the end, the biggest issue will be for gathering people to play and agreeing on the same rules.
I think what needs to happen (though unfortunately it’ll have to wait for next edition) is eliminate all ability score bonuses period, whether tied to race or tied to background. They don’t honestly have much bearing on the game anyway, and the only reason people want to tie them to background is because they’re so baked into the system they can’t be cut outright. I think the whole situation would be improved if we just admitted that race is solely thematic now and let stats just be what you roll. While I’m not a huge fan of the way they made the changes, I also don’t really care for the race-specific traits, and I’d be happy to divorce race and stats entirely. Plus, I could finally run a elves/dwarves/hobbits/orcs only world without anyone complaining too much!
It is possible for future products to be both Custom Lineage and new races. Simply, new races use Custom Lineage as the template. Thus the difference between one race and an other is the choice of feat (or something designed to be equivalent to a feat unit) plus whether it has darkvision or not.
I think what needs to happen (though unfortunately it’ll have to wait for next edition) is eliminate all ability score bonuses period.
I read the UA Gothic Lineages, to mean just that. Ability scores bonuses are now completely removed from choice of lineage, and are now a normal part of generating ability scores, whether by point-buy or by random dice.
From a new player, so my opinion is just that and probably doesn't matter....
Despite what some people say, your opinion matters just as much as the rest of us. No matter how long you've played, or what. If you sit down to play, you matter.
I guess old players and new players are equally important. For old players, WotC wants continuity and brand recognition. For new players, WotC cares very much where the trends are moving, and the new interests that are emerging.
The old school races aren't going anywhere - you can just now choose to have your stat boosts in whichever stat you want them in. It just means you have a more control over what you want to do. If you want to be an Elf Warlock well you can swap that +2 DEX to a +2 CHA, which makes sense to me.
It isn't getting rid of the old means of doing it, and you still can if that's what you choose - the character builder by default keeps the original stat increases - but you can mould your characters background to suit that you want it to be. Which for me is a good thing
I really hope that with the lineage system, you could have more half and half races, that are not just half humans.
Multiple creature types are explicitly legal.
The UA dhampir is BOTH humanoid AND undead. The reborn can be BOTH humanoid AND construct.
I infer, you can create a Custom Lineage elf that is BOTH humanoid AND fey.
The creature types are "tags", and other kinds of "tags" can also be multiple.
So the multiplicity allows Custom Lineage to be a humanoid that is both fey (elf lineage) and giant (storm giant lineage). You have total control over your characters "origin". Pick a feat that makes the most sense for the character concept.
2. Just because something has been done a certain way for x amount of time didn't mean it shouldn't change. That's really the crux of this entire argument. Detractors of the lineage system will trot ridiculous examples of why it's flawed, scroll a few posts up and you'll see an example. This is a game at the end of the day. A game about creativity to boot. And yet there's a very vocal group of people basically saying creativity for races is bad. I just don't get it.
I'm going to assume, you were talking about my post. If you were, well, read the spoiler. If you weren't, well the spoiler is a lengthy piece defending myself from things I assumed you meant, but I might be wrong about, so read it if you want, but it has no meaning.
I don't dislike the Lineage system. I think it's great! I'm just worried that most will just play humans. I'm sure, a lot of DMs, will tell the Hexblood centaur, that they still can't climb up walls. Or a DM would tell the reborn Kenku that they still can only mimic others speech. If I were playing the centaur or Kenku, I would be fine and keep playing it. Others, though, might not. Leading to more people playing only humans when they are playing with a lineage. I would not only play human lineage characters. As a DM, I would not enforce that. My DM's probably wouldn't either. Some Dm's might.
You're right about this game being about creativity, and I guess I could be more creative. I could say that, since the Tortle died and got reborn, magic twisted his shell so it would be softer and wouldn't give any protection. I still want Wotc to tell me why ever reborn is like that.
Here's the thing. I don't work at Wotc. I don't have inside knowledge of Wotc. Everything I know, is based on a little text blurb in a prototype for this system. Wotc might be developing something like that. Wotc might not but make something else that replaces it. This is all speculation based upon what I know, which is very little.
One last thing. Reading this over again, it sounds a little, rude or mean. I'm sorry, if you got that too.
Putting that aside, I really hope that with the lineage system, you could have more half and half races, that are not just half humans. I suppose you could do that already by just homebrewing it, but not everybody can, has the time, or wants to do that. Wouldn't a Aasimar-Tiefling be real cool? With a lineage system it might be possible (without extensive homebrewing.) Most of these, can be done already. You just say that your character took after one side more than the other. Though, wouldn't it be cool to have traits from both sides?
A Kenku-Aarakocra, trying to give the rest of his kin the gift of flight?
The Aasimar-Tiefling, her great grandfathers devil that he made a pact with, is now trying to "recruit" her, while a celestial who made a pact with her great grandmother's side also trying to at the same time?
Or a Githyanki-Githzerai, trying to unite the gith?
A Goblin-Kobold, trying to unite the two races in hopes of proving their superiority over the hobgoblins, bugbears and even, dragons?
I mean the possibilities are endless, and with a good lineage system, this could happen.
That is not how lineages seem to work as currently presented though. If a character has a specific lineage, it doesn’t belong to any given race anymore - it only has the lineage. Maybe it’ll get broadened to something that does let you combine two races, but as is that’s not the direction it appears to be going.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Want to start playing but don't have anyone to play with? You can try these options: [link].
I think what needs to happen (though unfortunately it’ll have to wait for next edition) is eliminate all ability score bonuses period, whether tied to race or tied to background. They don’t honestly have much bearing on the game anyway, and the only reason people want to tie them to background is because they’re so baked into the system they can’t be cut outright. I think the whole situation would be improved if we just admitted that race is solely thematic now and let stats just be what you roll. While I’m not a huge fan of the way they made the changes, I also don’t really care for the race-specific traits, and I’d be happy to divorce race and stats entirely. Plus, I could finally run a elves/dwarves/hobbits/orcs only world without anyone complaining too much!
I would have no problem with this. Many people won't like it because it is "nerfing" them... but there is a solution:
For the standard array, change from 15, 14, 13, 12, 10, 8 to 17, 15, 13, 12, 10, 8.
For point buy, adjust the points available upward to allow someone to replicate the Standard Array (I'm not going to bother to figure it out, but I'm sure it would be trivially easy -- there is an algorithm for it after all).
For die rolling, someone clever would need to come up with a way to replicate the performance of the standard array on average, but you could do something simple like, roll 4d6-drop-1 seven times, take the highest 6.
This would do what people want in the first place with the +2/+1, which is to adjust their ability scores upwards. Everyone gets a couple of points to adjust it upwards anyway, whatever system you use (either racially based or not, you still get the bonuses). So why not just bake them right into the available stats and get rid of the "bonuses?"
I am in favor of this change. I don't think it'll happen.... because you could give some people an array of 20-20-20-20-19-18 and they'd say "where's my +2/+1 so I can have all 20s?" -- and consider their character "unplayable" without straight 20s. But I think the majority of people would be reasonably satisfied with just baking the points in.
Alternatively, leave everything as is, and give an extra ASI at level 2.
Technically, all "races" are "lineages". A "race" only refers to a set of player character mechanics, that an NPC of the same lineage might not have.
In other words, an NPC elf belongs to the "elf lineage", but doesnt belong to the "elf race".
I don’t think NPCs are the concern here. NPCs have had stat blocks that don’t follow the same rules PCs do since the edition was released. My point is, as far as player characters are concerned lineages, as it stands now, aren’t used for half-something templates to be applied to or combined with something else. They are something separate and unique. A Dhampir isn’t half vampire half something else, it’s a full Dhampir and only that.
Which makes sense, if the designers intend to keep 5E simple and streamlined. Translating existing races into templates that allow you to combine some but not all of the parent races’ abilities into a hybrid is messy, if it has to be done in a formal way that allows full customization. Simpler to represent this by taking one or the other parent races and reskinning it with (I guess, for lack of a better term) cultural qualities from the other parent that either don’t bestow a mechanical advantage or are provided by a class or background feature.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Want to start playing but don't have anyone to play with? You can try these options: [link].
I think what needs to happen (though unfortunately it’ll have to wait for next edition) is eliminate all ability score bonuses period.
I read the UA Gothic Lineages, to mean just that. Ability scores bonuses are now completely removed from choice of lineage, and are now a normal part of generating ability scores, whether by point-buy or by random dice.
A lot of games outside of D&D seem to be putting some ability score bumps tied to class. So, all wizards would get +2 INT, all bards get +CHA, all rogues would get +DEX, etc.
I think that's kind of the direction that the team is leaning towards, but such a shift would require revamping the class system rather than just upgrading.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
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Each edition basically has had a half-way point where they effectively revised stuff. In 1e, it was the AD&D books. 2e had Revised books that came out six years into the run. In 3e, it was the 3.5 books. In 4e, it was the Essentials line. In 5e, its now post-Tasha. Calling it 5.5 is a simple way to get a point across that most people are familiar with.
5.5, just like 3.5, gives a sense of "half measure" or "patched" and forces the presumption "well, when's there going to be a 6?". As mentioned there's some folks who want to full throated embrace the post Tasha's lineage future possibly represented in the UA as well as make core class features something much more subject to player customization. There are others who prefer to play races presented in the style that they are in the PHB, like the classes, pick and choose among the subclasses etc. There are, I think, many more players than either camp who like both.
The 50th Anniversary of product isn't the best time to do "ta-da HALF STEP", especially when work is possible to reconcile the 5e core with the Tasha innovations. A Golden Edition would give you the systems needed to customize lineage and maybe even class. But for players who don't want to put that work in, the old core book presentations of relatively static races and classes will be available for something closer to "out of the box" play. The challenge right now would be make it possible to build the PHB races completely through the lineage system, I don't think that can be done yet, but I don't think it's a hard hurdle in three year time frame.
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
Still salty I didn't get a chance to reply to the dude who literally tried to 'prove me wrong' with a thing I had addressed in the exact same post he quoted.
But moving on from that.
I'd love to see a sort of mix.
There can be lore about particular races and groups, like it tells about Orc/Elf/whatever society in said setting, and can mention how other groups stereotype said group, but there's no official "You get +2 this" for all characters of said group.
From a new player, so my opinion is just that and probably doesn't matter....
Anyways why would more player choice be a problem.... The create your own character anyway you want is awesome, if people want to min/max they are going to min/max.... I think this opens even more creativity to the player itself...
But, I've only played since COVID......
I'm going to assume, you were talking about my post. If you were, well, read the spoiler. If you weren't, well the spoiler is a lengthy piece defending myself from things I assumed you meant, but I might be wrong about, so read it if you want, but it has no meaning.
I don't dislike the Lineage system. I think it's great! I'm just worried that most will just play humans. I'm sure, a lot of DMs, will tell the Hexblood centaur, that they still can't climb up walls. Or a DM would tell the reborn Kenku that they still can only mimic others speech. If I were playing the centaur or Kenku, I would be fine and keep playing it. Others, though, might not. Leading to more people playing only humans when they are playing with a lineage. I would not only play human lineage characters. As a DM, I would not enforce that. My DM's probably wouldn't either. Some Dm's might.
You're right about this game being about creativity, and I guess I could be more creative. I could say that, since the Tortle died and got reborn, magic twisted his shell so it would be softer and wouldn't give any protection. I still want Wotc to tell me why ever reborn is like that.
Here's the thing. I don't work at Wotc. I don't have inside knowledge of Wotc. Everything I know, is based on a little text blurb in a prototype for this system. Wotc might be developing something like that. Wotc might not but make something else that replaces it. This is all speculation based upon what I know, which is very little.
One last thing. Reading this over again, it sounds a little, rude or mean. I'm sorry, if you got that too.
Putting that aside, I really hope that with the lineage system, you could have more half and half races, that are not just half humans. I suppose you could do that already by just homebrewing it, but not everybody can, has the time, or wants to do that. Wouldn't a Aasimar-Tiefling be real cool? With a lineage system it might be possible (without extensive homebrewing.) Most of these, can be done already. You just say that your character took after one side more than the other. Though, wouldn't it be cool to have traits from both sides?
A Kenku-Aarakocra, trying to give the rest of his kin the gift of flight?
The Aasimar-Tiefling, her great grandfathers devil that he made a pact with, is now trying to "recruit" her, while a celestial who made a pact with her great grandmother's side also trying to at the same time?
Or a Githyanki-Githzerai, trying to unite the gith?
A Goblin-Kobold, trying to unite the two races in hopes of proving their superiority over the hobgoblins, bugbears and even, dragons?
I mean the possibilities are endless, and with a good lineage system, this could happen.
When players get creative.
but what does it mean for this website? i mean they change the site to adjust towards the newest rules. if DnD moves towards 5.5E...what does that mean for those of us that prefer to use this site to help run our games?
Despite what some people say, your opinion matters just as much as the rest of us. No matter how long you've played, or what. If you sit down to play, you matter.
I'm assuming you mean "what does this mean for people that use the site and prefer pre-Tasha stuff," so I will speak in that manner.
Well, there's several ways this could go about. They could simply make it a subrace option, much like we have with alternative tieflings and half-elves from SCAG. They could have a toggle switch at the beginning of character generation "Do you want Tasha options enabled?" Just like we have "Use Homebrew?" and "Use Critical Role?" options. We will have to wait and see how things are implemented - right now, it could go in any number of ways.
Or, you could just eyeball it - with standard array, its not difficult to eyeball the stats and make sure they're placed correctly. A bit longer with rolled, but still pretty easy. I find I have to check that anyways, just in case someone fudged the numbers.
In the end, the biggest issue will be for gathering people to play and agreeing on the same rules.
I think what needs to happen (though unfortunately it’ll have to wait for next edition) is eliminate all ability score bonuses period, whether tied to race or tied to background. They don’t honestly have much bearing on the game anyway, and the only reason people want to tie them to background is because they’re so baked into the system they can’t be cut outright. I think the whole situation would be improved if we just admitted that race is solely thematic now and let stats just be what you roll. While I’m not a huge fan of the way they made the changes, I also don’t really care for the race-specific traits, and I’d be happy to divorce race and stats entirely. Plus, I could finally run a elves/dwarves/hobbits/orcs only world without anyone complaining too much!
Wizard (Gandalf) of the Tolkien Club
It is possible for future products to be both Custom Lineage and new races. Simply, new races use Custom Lineage as the template. Thus the difference between one race and an other is the choice of feat (or something designed to be equivalent to a feat unit) plus whether it has darkvision or not.
he / him
I read the UA Gothic Lineages, to mean just that. Ability scores bonuses are now completely removed from choice of lineage, and are now a normal part of generating ability scores, whether by point-buy or by random dice.
he / him
I guess old players and new players are equally important. For old players, WotC wants continuity and brand recognition. For new players, WotC cares very much where the trends are moving, and the new interests that are emerging.
he / him
The old school races aren't going anywhere - you can just now choose to have your stat boosts in whichever stat you want them in. It just means you have a more control over what you want to do. If you want to be an Elf Warlock well you can swap that +2 DEX to a +2 CHA, which makes sense to me.
It isn't getting rid of the old means of doing it, and you still can if that's what you choose - the character builder by default keeps the original stat increases - but you can mould your characters background to suit that you want it to be. Which for me is a good thing
Multiple creature types are explicitly legal.
The UA dhampir is BOTH humanoid AND undead. The reborn can be BOTH humanoid AND construct.
I infer, you can create a Custom Lineage elf that is BOTH humanoid AND fey.
The creature types are "tags", and other kinds of "tags" can also be multiple.
So the multiplicity allows Custom Lineage to be a humanoid that is both fey (elf lineage) and giant (storm giant lineage). You have total control over your characters "origin". Pick a feat that makes the most sense for the character concept.
he / him
That is not how lineages seem to work as currently presented though. If a character has a specific lineage, it doesn’t belong to any given race anymore - it only has the lineage. Maybe it’ll get broadened to something that does let you combine two races, but as is that’s not the direction it appears to be going.
Want to start playing but don't have anyone to play with? You can try these options: [link].
Technically, all "races" are "lineages". A "race" only refers to a set of player character mechanics, that an NPC of the same lineage might not have.
In other words, an NPC elf belongs to the "elf lineage", but doesnt belong to the "elf race".
he / him
I would have no problem with this. Many people won't like it because it is "nerfing" them... but there is a solution:
For the standard array, change from 15, 14, 13, 12, 10, 8 to 17, 15, 13, 12, 10, 8.
For point buy, adjust the points available upward to allow someone to replicate the Standard Array (I'm not going to bother to figure it out, but I'm sure it would be trivially easy -- there is an algorithm for it after all).
For die rolling, someone clever would need to come up with a way to replicate the performance of the standard array on average, but you could do something simple like, roll 4d6-drop-1 seven times, take the highest 6.
This would do what people want in the first place with the +2/+1, which is to adjust their ability scores upwards. Everyone gets a couple of points to adjust it upwards anyway, whatever system you use (either racially based or not, you still get the bonuses). So why not just bake them right into the available stats and get rid of the "bonuses?"
I am in favor of this change. I don't think it'll happen.... because you could give some people an array of 20-20-20-20-19-18 and they'd say "where's my +2/+1 so I can have all 20s?" -- and consider their character "unplayable" without straight 20s. But I think the majority of people would be reasonably satisfied with just baking the points in.
Alternatively, leave everything as is, and give an extra ASI at level 2.
WOTC lies. We know that WOTC lies. WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. We know that WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. And still they lie.
Because of the above (a paraphrase from Orwell) I no longer post to the forums -- PM me if you need help or anything.
I don’t think NPCs are the concern here. NPCs have had stat blocks that don’t follow the same rules PCs do since the edition was released. My point is, as far as player characters are concerned lineages, as it stands now, aren’t used for half-something templates to be applied to or combined with something else. They are something separate and unique. A Dhampir isn’t half vampire half something else, it’s a full Dhampir and only that.
Which makes sense, if the designers intend to keep 5E simple and streamlined. Translating existing races into templates that allow you to combine some but not all of the parent races’ abilities into a hybrid is messy, if it has to be done in a formal way that allows full customization. Simpler to represent this by taking one or the other parent races and reskinning it with (I guess, for lack of a better term) cultural qualities from the other parent that either don’t bestow a mechanical advantage or are provided by a class or background feature.
Want to start playing but don't have anyone to play with? You can try these options: [link].
The fact that NPCs have monster stat blocks that are different from the PCs in the Player Handbook, is now the technical definition for "race".
Both the NPC and the PC can belong to the same "lineage", such as the elf lineage. But only the PC elf is an elf "race".
Now, the technical definition of "race" is whatever the MECHANICS are that a player can legally use when playing a character of a certain lineage.
So, a pregenerated list of lineage traits as found in the Players Handbook, is considered a "race" − because − a player can play it.
Technically, since Custom Lineage results in mechanics that a player can play, the Custom Lineage is a method of generating the mechanics of a "race".
Custom Lineage gives the player total control over the lineage, then uses the choice of feat to define the mechanics for that lineage.
You can create an Elf lineage using the feat to define its traits. It is ok for your elf to have different mechanics from the Players Handbook elf.
he / him
A lot of games outside of D&D seem to be putting some ability score bumps tied to class. So, all wizards would get +2 INT, all bards get +CHA, all rogues would get +DEX, etc.
I think that's kind of the direction that the team is leaning towards, but such a shift would require revamping the class system rather than just upgrading.