Tashas Cauldron now includes full rules for full character customization so a lot of this is possible but, comes ata cost.
In summary the rules are now that whatever racial and I think profession bonus you get you can then swap out for a different thing. So +1 charisma can be swapped for +1 int, star dex etc. proficiency in history could become arcana, or nature or deception.
If you get +2 you may swap it for +2 in one or +1 in 2. So now your player can be a tiefling barbarian, or a Goliath wizard and not be at a disadvantage.
I take this a step further so if a character has a racial ability then talk with them about swapping it out for something that fits background. I have just had a player effectively build a tiefling with half orc stats and abilities.
If it is a tiefling with half-orc stats and abilities, why not play a half-orc in the first place?
Because they want to be a tiefling. It's not about having half-orc stats, it's about having stats that go with their class. As opposed to feeling forced to play a certain race only because it has the +2 that matches your class choice. Just because they want to be a barbarian shouldn't mean they have to be a half-orc to get that +2 str
You just said that this char has half-orc stats and abilities. What, precisely, is left that defines it as a Tiefling? Outside of how it looks, how is it different than a true Half-Orc? This is not a rhetorical question.
Well firstly it wasn't me you replied to the first time. But anyhow it's the lore that defines the tiefling. Not just skin color and "has horns", and certainly not it's mechanical traits. The player wants to play as the race with an infernal bloodline.
They want to play as the race that gets this description: "To be greeted with stares and whispers, to suffer violence and insult on the street, to see mistrust and fear in every eye: this is the lot of the tiefling. And to twist the knife, tieflings know that this is because a pact struck generations ago infused the essence of Asmodeus—overlord of the Nine Hells—into their bloodline. Their appearance and their nature are not their fault but the result of an ancient sin, for which they and their children and their children’s children will always be held accountable. Tieflings subsist in small minorities found mostly in human cities or towns, often in the roughest quarters of those places, where they grow up to be swindlers, thieves, or crime lords. Sometimes they live among other minority populations in enclaves where they are treated with more respect. Lacking a homeland, tieflings know that they have to make their own way in the world and that they have to be strong to survive. They are not quick to trust anyone who claims to be a friend, but when a tiefling’s companions demonstrate that they trust him or her, the tiefling learns to extend the same trust to them. And once a tiefling gives someone loyalty, the tiefling is a firm friend or ally for life."
They want to play as that race, while playing the Barbarian class, and get the +2 str that goes with being a barbarian instead of having a +2 cha that is useless for their class. The same applies for any abilities that were changed. You ask what's left to define tiefling besides appearance but appearance is the 2nd most important part of selecting a race, right after lore. Stats and abilities are tertiary, also phrasable as "least important". They want to play as a Barbarian and not automatically be worse than other barbarians just because the didn't choose the race most predefined as barbarian style.
This is literally the point of the changes in Tasha's, to let players be whatever race/class combo they want without feeling like they hindered themselves instead of having to specifically match certain races and classes to have a "properly" designed character.
In short, the race selection is just flavor text, existing only for backstory and roleplay. Players shouldn't be mechanically limited by it. So if a player says to a DM "I want to play as this race, but use that race's mechanics." There's really no reason to say no.
So, his char looks like a Tiefling, has the background of a Tiefling, but in all other aspects is a Half-Orc? What about all the species specific stuff like Resistance to Fire. Does this Barbarian have Resistance to Fire, and have access to Hellish Rebuke and Darkness at certain levels?
Disappear offline for a few days so sorry for the delayed response.
I view Tasha's Cauldron as a great way to add flavour to a character during creation, My players don't all take stats to maximise abilities and class but in this case I sat down with my player working on a new character around about the time Tashas Cauldron came out. He had a fantastic background idea of a hell created creature that was made for the blood war, but due to "fluff" had developed a soul and escaped the war trying to find its role as a being in the material plane. It is being hunted by its creator but still loses itself in moments of rage, which it has managed to control in such a way to be useful more than a problem. Once the backstory was created we sat down to determine the best race and class to fit this story.
For race Tiefling made sense, except that the stats and abilities of Half Orc kind of also made sense, I had considered swapping stats about to create my own version of Tiefling but then tashas cauldron came out so we sat down and had a play. The whole thing is a work in progress and we will balance it as the game continues but the main flavour is note these decisions where all made Before dice where rolled. Barbarian made the most sense for class and we decided to leave the class details unchanged.
Tiefling race, swapped out ability scores for half orc so +2 strength and +1 constitution Gets Thaurmatergy I gave the following choices Menacing (+1 intimidation) or Hellish Resistance (resistance to fire damage) Player took Menacing because it better suited the fluff of the character. Relentless Endurance or savage attacks or Hellish rebuke or darkness. The player took Relentless Endurance and Hellish Rebuke again they made sense, for the fluff. The player was shaped to be able to fight back even on the moment of death against the demons of the blood war, Hellish Rebuke fitted in to the infernal past of the character and that it had been shaped from an infernal type creature.
For Background we worked on Outlander for a base and made some minor tweaks, so musical instrument was swapped out for an additional language.
So far this has not resulted in a horribly unbalanced character and fits in very nicely with what is a really interesting background for me as a DM to fit into the story I want to tell with my players.
Getting to the question though I have also in the past allowed small buffs to characters at creation for fluff, a dragonborn with wings based off the old UA racial feat that never got published officially, a War Forged created by the Gith for the great war against the Mind Flayers was given advantage for saves against psychic attacks, or efforts to charm him or read his thoughts, a pair of Tabaxi Twins had Twintuition, once per long rest they could communicate to each other as if casting the spell sending. This was in the form of emotions, shapes, colours and images rather then words so I had it that based on factors like distance, strength of the emotion (danger, pain, etc) and just story there was a % chance the message would fail to be received or misunderstood, this is done to accentuate the character for story not for max advantage to "win" the game, I generally don't DM for players who approach the game like that.
So in essence, you let the player choose the species specific features that they wanted, between Teifling and Half-Orc, all based supposedly on the player's uniquely written background. Yeah, we may use the same vocabulary, but we are most certainly not speaking the same language, nor playing the same game.
The very first line of DnD going back through every edition, the rules are there to be broken and remade and changed and messed with so that you and your friends layers can have fun. Although now Tashas Cauldron, an official sourcebook with real official rules, basically allows players to do what I did. This is DnD a framework to have fun and tell a story, not a rigid set of rules that everyone has to stick rigidly to as written and defined in the books. I sat down and talked with my player about a variety of options, Including homebrewing my own race, in the end we decided this was the most straightforward and balanced of the approach’s we discussed. If you don’t allow your players to have this freedom in character creation, that’s your right as a DM personally when a player comes up with a really interesting narrative idea for a character and puts the thought into that backstory I am happy to tweak and play with the rules to help work with them to create a character that matches that background without being horribly overpowered. If he was trying to min Max he prob should taken resistance to fire, savage attack and relentless endurance. His charisma is low (8) so his hellish rebuke is actually pretty useless. This isn’t about making a min Max character it is about making an interesting character who really allows for some fun storytelling moments. Do I allow every player to do this combination, no, it is to fit the story, but all the players I play with generally approach character creation making an interesting story and background for a character and then picking race, class and background that best suit this story. In the past I have had a “Warlock” who actually used the bard class rules in entirety, but, also had a patron who gave them this power instead of it being bardic based.
Now someone trying to say they worked at a zoo as a circle of moon druid is just trying to get more options for wild shape, and someone who tries to get a feat or an item due to a backstory is also just reaching. But knowledge due to a specific trait in your backstory i am all but ok with.
But again only if you hate this type of thing frankly. I mean in a world of fantasy it make logical sense that Druids would work closely in places with animals, especially if that druid is in a setting where the wild is overtaken by cities.
Are some people trying to game a system sure, but thinking anyone doing things that might hold an advantage as being nefarious and trying to gain more is silly. And frankly if that is the way you believe your players are working you need to talk with them.
Specifically the example used in that one was so that they could have seen every animal so they have all the options available for wildshape. That player was not in my game but in a friends game and he had to talk to that player about it.
Which ones in particular do you think necessitate the fighting of powerful monsters solo? I had a quick look through them and I didn't notice any, although admittedly I did not read them all or even half. Just some of the ones I thought most likely.
I don't think any necessitate fighting solo, but folk hero and gladiator certainly cause that sort of imagery to pop up, and folk hero in particular has "I stood alone against a terrible monster" as one of the possibilities. Others cause less imagery of single combat, but still suggest significant amounts of combat, such as knight, soldier, pirate, etc. and given the lack of interesting low end opponents, people writing their own backgrounds are likely to pick enemies that would have killed them.
The problem isn't that they require that people have done things that a sub level 1 character couldn't do, the problem is that they spark the imagination for backstories that a sub level 1 character couldn't do.
Which ones in particular do you think necessitate the fighting of powerful monsters solo? I had a quick look through them and I didn't notice any, although admittedly I did not read them all or even half. Just some of the ones I thought most likely.
I don't think any necessitate fighting solo, but folk hero and gladiator certainly cause that sort of imagery to pop up, and folk hero in particular has "I stood alone against a terrible monster" as one of the possibilities. Others cause less imagery of single combat, but still suggest significant amounts of combat, such as knight, soldier, pirate, etc. and given the lack of interesting low end opponents, people writing their own backgrounds are likely to pick enemies that would have killed them.
The problem isn't that they require that people have done things that a sub level 1 character couldn't do, the problem is that they spark the imagination for backstories that a sub level 1 character couldn't do.
It's also worth making the distinction between characters in backstories that just get statblocks vs ones that use the PC leveling system, whether that's an actual PC or one of those occcasional PC leveled NPCs. So we don't need to talk about how war effects the leveling of standard npcs because commoner and soldier statblocks both exist.
Now then, just off the top of my head:
A gladiator leaving the arena to become an adventurer has no business being level 1. Someone who's spent such a portion of their life in the arena fighting and training to fight better should come out of that with bear minimum 2 levels in fighter for action surge, more likely 3-5 for an archetype or extra attack.
The faceless background has been running around being a hero, meaning fighting bandits or what have you, already. The idea that a character as a *background* of already doing this would suggest they done it enough to have leveled up an amount of times based on how long they were at it before the campaign start date. If said amount of times is "none" then it wouldn't be their background, as they haven't started yet.
Soldier. Nobody should come out of war still level 1. That's a little bonkers. Strictly speaking you could make a soldier who never went to war, having been enlisted during peacetimes or something, but so long as their was war they were part of they should have leveled up in it. Even noncombatants, reasonably. An "engineer" who just made the siege weapons and gear that they just handed off to actual combatants would get enough experience doing so to gain levels. For example, an artificer who never actually used any of their tools themselves, giving their infused weapons and whatnot to the frontline soldiers, but still leveled up just from making so much stuff. Theoretically they've have supporting cantrips like mending, and mostly just be used to casting healing, but while they wouldn't have experience personally utilizing their engineered equivalents to casting offensive spells, they'd sure know how to make them. Then there's the mercenary background, which is basically the same thing.
I could probably think of more but that's the ones I got without putting thought to it.
If you're playing with a largely non-roleplay group focused just on power, item accumulation, combat, monsters and "gimme this buff coz I have xy background from Z book", and you as DM, enjoy running exciting combats and adventures that utilise such player choices, then the game is fun for you and that's the way to play. But it seems to me you are looking for more justification for PC backgrounds / Buffs. In this case, role-playing needs to be part of the adventures. The PC background needs to be fully-fleshed out and realised and discussed PRIOR to the D&D campaign. In this way, no player can surprise you with some new buff they didn't tell you about because there's a mysterious part of their background they only realised, like just now. :) -- and somehow that a get buff from it.
Any buff needs to be consistent with the character. If it's a power-grab then it shouldn't be allowed. Player character backgrounds should not be changed mid-game, but be set from the start. Only actions, events, development of a PC over adventures can possibly alter what they could have access to. It needs to make sense. You control the adventuring milieu. If you don't want players buffing with ninja stars, don't allow them in the game. If there's some thing the PC joins to get some cool buff (a certain kind of guild), then that guild doesn't exist. Most importantly, the player needs to be able to show HOW by joining said guild or whatever, he/she demonstrates this feature in the game. If they can't or won't, then they don't get the buff. For instance, joining that guild means it features in play, and the player will be role-playing etc in or with that guild, members, associates -- and now the buff makes sense, but it can't be "join guild X, get buff Y", for that is just seeking a buff without doing anything.
Player here my dm told us he would review each of our character sheets and basically my backatory was a generic of demons raided my village and charmed the non killed ones and my dm actually ended up suggesting that I get advantage on charm saves but only against ssuccubi so maybe someone could run it like that where they get advantage on one thing if it directly involves their backstory I do understand this is completely subjective to who the dm is and how they like to play but this is more so a suggestion if you would like to allow something like this
The very first line of DnD going back through every edition, the rules are there to be broken and remade and changed and messed with so that you and your friends layers can have fun. Although now Tashas Cauldron, an official sourcebook with real official rules, basically allows players to do what I did. This is DnD a framework to have fun and tell a story, not a rigid set of rules that everyone has to stick rigidly to as written and defined in the books. I sat down and talked with my player about a variety of options, Including homebrewing my own race, in the end we decided this was the most straightforward and balanced of the approach’s we discussed. If you don’t allow your players to have this freedom in character creation, that’s your right as a DM personally when a player comes up with a really interesting narrative idea for a character and puts the thought into that backstory I am happy to tweak and play with the rules to help work with them to create a character that matches that background without being horribly overpowered. If he was trying to min Max he prob should taken resistance to fire, savage attack and relentless endurance. His charisma is low (8) so his hellish rebuke is actually pretty useless. This isn’t about making a min Max character it is about making an interesting character who really allows for some fun storytelling moments. Do I allow every player to do this combination, no, it is to fit the story, but all the players I play with generally approach character creation making an interesting story and background for a character and then picking race, class and background that best suit this story. In the past I have had a “Warlock” who actually used the bard class rules in entirety, but, also had a patron who gave them this power instead of it being bardic based.
Specifically the example used in that one was so that they could have seen every animal so they have all the options available for wildshape. That player was not in my game but in a friends game and he had to talk to that player about it.
|| Sol Night-Arrow, Tabaxi Ranger ||
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Guides or Important Threads of Mine ----- || List of ALL Official Familiars || My Homebrew Monsters ||
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I don't think any necessitate fighting solo, but folk hero and gladiator certainly cause that sort of imagery to pop up, and folk hero in particular has "I stood alone against a terrible monster" as one of the possibilities. Others cause less imagery of single combat, but still suggest significant amounts of combat, such as knight, soldier, pirate, etc. and given the lack of interesting low end opponents, people writing their own backgrounds are likely to pick enemies that would have killed them.
The problem isn't that they require that people have done things that a sub level 1 character couldn't do, the problem is that they spark the imagination for backstories that a sub level 1 character couldn't do.
It's also worth making the distinction between characters in backstories that just get statblocks vs ones that use the PC leveling system, whether that's an actual PC or one of those occcasional PC leveled NPCs. So we don't need to talk about how war effects the leveling of standard npcs because commoner and soldier statblocks both exist.
Now then, just off the top of my head:
A gladiator leaving the arena to become an adventurer has no business being level 1. Someone who's spent such a portion of their life in the arena fighting and training to fight better should come out of that with bear minimum 2 levels in fighter for action surge, more likely 3-5 for an archetype or extra attack.
The faceless background has been running around being a hero, meaning fighting bandits or what have you, already. The idea that a character as a *background* of already doing this would suggest they done it enough to have leveled up an amount of times based on how long they were at it before the campaign start date. If said amount of times is "none" then it wouldn't be their background, as they haven't started yet.
Soldier. Nobody should come out of war still level 1. That's a little bonkers. Strictly speaking you could make a soldier who never went to war, having been enlisted during peacetimes or something, but so long as their was war they were part of they should have leveled up in it. Even noncombatants, reasonably. An "engineer" who just made the siege weapons and gear that they just handed off to actual combatants would get enough experience doing so to gain levels. For example, an artificer who never actually used any of their tools themselves, giving their infused weapons and whatnot to the frontline soldiers, but still leveled up just from making so much stuff. Theoretically they've have supporting cantrips like mending, and mostly just be used to casting healing, but while they wouldn't have experience personally utilizing their engineered equivalents to casting offensive spells, they'd sure know how to make them. Then there's the mercenary background, which is basically the same thing.
I could probably think of more but that's the ones I got without putting thought to it.
If you're playing with a largely non-roleplay group focused just on power, item accumulation, combat, monsters and "gimme this buff coz I have xy background from Z book", and you as DM, enjoy running exciting combats and adventures that utilise such player choices, then the game is fun for you and that's the way to play. But it seems to me you are looking for more justification for PC backgrounds / Buffs. In this case, role-playing needs to be part of the adventures. The PC background needs to be fully-fleshed out and realised and discussed PRIOR to the D&D campaign. In this way, no player can surprise you with some new buff they didn't tell you about because there's a mysterious part of their background they only realised, like just now. :) -- and somehow that a get buff from it.
Any buff needs to be consistent with the character. If it's a power-grab then it shouldn't be allowed. Player character backgrounds should not be changed mid-game, but be set from the start. Only actions, events, development of a PC over adventures can possibly alter what they could have access to. It needs to make sense. You control the adventuring milieu. If you don't want players buffing with ninja stars, don't allow them in the game. If there's some thing the PC joins to get some cool buff (a certain kind of guild), then that guild doesn't exist. Most importantly, the player needs to be able to show HOW by joining said guild or whatever, he/she demonstrates this feature in the game. If they can't or won't, then they don't get the buff. For instance, joining that guild means it features in play, and the player will be role-playing etc in or with that guild, members, associates -- and now the buff makes sense, but it can't be "join guild X, get buff Y", for that is just seeking a buff without doing anything.
:)
Player here my dm told us he would review each of our character sheets and basically my backatory was a generic of demons raided my village and charmed the non killed ones and my dm actually ended up suggesting that I get advantage on charm saves but only against ssuccubi so maybe someone could run it like that where they get advantage on one thing if it directly involves their backstory I do understand this is completely subjective to who the dm is and how they like to play but this is more so a suggestion if you would like to allow something like this