With the new Van Richten's Guide out now, I'm having a hard time wrapping my head around some parts of the Ancestral Legacy.
So it reads, for any of the new lineages:
Ancestral Legacy: If you replace a race with this lineage, you can keep the following elements of that race: any skill proficiencies you gained from it and any climbing, flying, or swimming speed you gained from it.
If you don’t keep any of those elements or you choose this lineage at character creation, you gain proficiency in two skills of your choice.
So the 2nd part I understand, if you use this lineage in character creation, you gain proficiency of two skills of your choice.
But I don't understand: If you replace a race with this lineage. What does replacing a race with a lineage mean? How is that different from using the lineage within character creation?
Probably has to do with the second and third sentences of that section:
The following lineages are races that characters might gain through remarkable events. These overshadow their original race, if any, becoming their new race.
The idea being that it is possible to turn into these lineages during the adventure.
With the new Van Richten's Guide out now, I'm having a hard time wrapping my head around some parts of the Ancestral Legacy.
So it reads, for any of the new lineages:
Ancestral Legacy: If you replace a race with this lineage, you can keep the following elements of that race: any skill proficiencies you gained from it and any climbing, flying, or swimming speed you gained from it.
If you don’t keep any of those elements or you choose this lineage at character creation, you gain proficiency in two skills of your choice.
So the 2nd part I understand, if you use this lineage in character creation, you gain proficiency of two skills of your choice.
But I don't understand: If you replace a race with this lineage. What does replacing a race with a lineage mean? How is that different from using the lineage within character creation?
You always replace a race with the lineage. You only gain two skills if you start with the lineage or if you pick up the lineage later and drop racial skills and speeds. So here is the matrix of options:
Start with lineage, keep racial skills and speeds, gain 2 skills.
Gain lineage later, keep racial skills and speeds, do not gain 2 skills.
Gain lineage later, give up racial skills and speeds, gain 2 skills.
In other words, it's best to start with the lineage if your race has skills and/or speeds. If it has neither, starting or picking it up later are identical.
EDIT: I believe I've misread, due to the wording on how lineages handle languages. I think the RAI might be that if you choose the lineage at character creation, you don't replace a race as well. That would lead to this matrix:
Start with lineage, give up racial skills and speeds, gain 2 skills. Languages: Common + Any, even if you're based on a race with 3 or more languages.
Gain lineage later, keep racial skills and speeds, do not gain 2 skills. Languages: Original Race
Gain lineage later, give up racial skills and speeds, gain 2 skills. Languages: Original Race
Under this second interpretation, starting with the lineage is actively worse if you'd rather keep racial skills and speeds, as you lack the option to do so, and gaining later is unrestricted. That means you should always ask your DM to count you as some other race and then inflict the lineage on you just before session 1, so you count as gaining it later.
With the new Van Richten's Guide out now, I'm having a hard time wrapping my head around some parts of the Ancestral Legacy.
So it reads, for any of the new lineages:
Ancestral Legacy: If you replace a race with this lineage, you can keep the following elements of that race: any skill proficiencies you gained from it and any climbing, flying, or swimming speed you gained from it.
If you don’t keep any of those elements or you choose this lineage at character creation, you gain proficiency in two skills of your choice.
So the 2nd part I understand, if you use this lineage in character creation, you gain proficiency of two skills of your choice.
But I don't understand: If you replace a race with this lineage. What does replacing a race with a lineage mean? How is that different from using the lineage within character creation?
You always replace a race with the lineage. You only gain two skills if you start with the lineage or if you pick up the lineage later and drop racial skills and speeds. So here is the matrix of options:
Start with lineage, keep racial skills and speeds, gain 2 skills.
Gain lineage later, keep racial skills and speeds, do not gain 2 skills.
Gain lineage later, give up racial skills and speeds, gain 2 skills.
In other words, it's best to start with the lineage if your race has skills and/or speeds. If it has neither, starting or picking it up later are identical.
I don't think that's accurate. As I'm reading it, you would not keep racial skills & speeds by starting with the lineage. It seems to be a zero-sum conditional: gaining the 2 skill proficiencies requires discarding racial skills & speeds.
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You don't know what fear is until you've witnessed a drunk bird divebombing you while carrying a screaming Kobold throwing fire anywhere and everywhere.
If you're gaining your lineage later, here are the races most impacted by these rules, not counting the weird Planeshift races or the UA races:
Sea Elves: 1 skill, swim speed 30, 3-4 languages depending on how you interpret Friend of the Sea.
Lizardfolk, Locathah: 2 skills, swim speed 30, 2 languages
Strictly worse than either Sea Elves or Lizardfolk, Tritons and Water Genasi are both swim speed 30, 2 languages.
Because you can't keep your walking speed or tool proficiencies, almost all races are strictly worse here than Lizardfolk, such as Orcs and Satyrs.
Tabaxi: 2 skills, climb speed 20, 2 languages
Grung: 1 skill, climb speed 25, 2 languages
Winged Tiefling: fly speed 30 when not in heavy armor, 2 languages
Aarakocra: fly speed 50 when not in heavy or medium armor, 2 languages
Half-Elves, Changelings: no speed to keep, but 2 skills and 3 languages
Kenku: special mention because their languages are mimicry only, and the lineage means you lose mimicry, so it's unclear what happens to languages.
Note: you can change size when you gain a Lineage, so all of the above can become Small if you want to for some reason.
Also, due to omitting all UA races, all races listed here gain the ability to adopt +1/+1/+1 racials, which is half-elf but worse, but still more flexible than +2/+1 only. I disregarded Variant Human or TCL, as I assume it's shenanigans to use the feat to pick up skills or languages, then switch to a lineage and claim your skills or languages are racial. In general, the Tasha's rules don't let you swap from 2/1 to 1/1/1, so the lineages are breaking new ground in terms of released races (as UAs aren't released properly yet). This can be particularly useful for playing a MAD class - using point buy, you can use a lineage to start at 16/16/16/8/8/8. Helps relax the stranglehold Half-Elves have on usually being just the best at being MAD - for a very direct comparison, swap from a half-elf paladin to a tabaxi reborn paladin.
You always replace a race with the lineage. You only gain two skills if you start with the lineage or if you pick up the lineage later and drop racial skills and speeds. So here is the matrix of options:
Start with lineage, keep racial skills and speeds, gain 2 skills.
Gain lineage later, keep racial skills and speeds, do not gain 2 skills.
Gain lineage later, give up racial skills and speeds, gain 2 skills.
In other words, it's best to start with the lineage if your race has skills and/or speeds. If it has neither, starting or picking it up later are identical.
EDIT: I believe I've misread, due to the wording on how lineages handle languages. I think the RAI might be that if you choose the lineage at character creation, you don't replace a race as well. That would lead to this matrix:
Start with lineage, give up racial skills and speeds, gain 2 skills. Languages: Common + Any, even if you're based on a race with 3 or more languages.
Gain lineage later, keep racial skills and speeds, do not gain 2 skills. Languages: Original Race
Gain lineage later, give up racial skills and speeds, gain 2 skills. Languages: Original Race
Under this second interpretation, starting with the lineage is actively worse if you'd rather keep racial skills and speeds, as you lack the option to do so, and gaining later is unrestricted. That means you should always ask your DM to count you as some other race and then inflict the lineage on you just before session 1, so you count as gaining it later.
Not to reopen a closed topic...but, if your character becomes a Hexblood, Returned or Dhampir, how do you actually implement your old racial features into your character in DND Beyond?
Not to reopen a closed topic...but, if your character becomes a Hexblood, Returned or Dhampir, how do you actually implement your old racial features into your character in DND Beyond?
Currently, D&D Beyond doesn’t have any appropriate way of doing this. Things like languages and speeds can be added to the character sheet as custom options pretty easily, at least (just click on your languages or speed to customize them).
Not to reopen a closed topic...but, if your character becomes a Hexblood, Returned or Dhampir, how do you actually implement your old racial features into your character in DND Beyond?
Currently, D&D Beyond doesn’t have any appropriate way of doing this. Things like languages and speeds can be added to the character sheet as custom options pretty easily, at least (just click on your languages or speed to customize them).
Proficiencies too, so... Really everything can be added via the character sheet.
Any chance you could explain to me how to add a speed to my character sheet? I've tried clicking on the speed part of the Features and Traits section, but the tab that opens up doesn't seem to include any way of adding a speed, it just says what my walking speed is again, and I can't seem to find any other area where speed is listed on the character sheet that I could try instead.
Any chance you could explain to me how to add a speed to my character sheet? I've tried clicking on the speed part of the Features and Traits section, but the tab that opens up doesn't seem to include any way of adding a speed, it just says what my walking speed is again, and I can't seem to find any other area where speed is listed on the character sheet that I could try instead.
I don’t know what you mean by the speed part of the features and traits section. Click on the speed on the main character sheet header, by your armor class and such. There’s a “customize” dropdown button.
Any chance you could explain to me how to add a speed to my character sheet? I've tried clicking on the speed part of the Features and Traits section, but the tab that opens up doesn't seem to include any way of adding a speed, it just says what my walking speed is again, and I can't seem to find any other area where speed is listed on the character sheet that I could try instead.
I don’t know what you mean by the speed part of the features and traits section. Click on the speed on the main character sheet header, by your armor class and such. There’s a “customize” dropdown button.
I managed to figure it out shortly before your response. I'm used to focusing on the large box that takes up the lower and middle right hand side of the character sheet, because the vast majority of character information is listed there in different tabs, one of those tabs being the Features and Traits tab. I'm so used to looking there for any given bit of character info besides proficiencies that I didn't even register the speed box, and looked for the speed in the Features and Traits tab of that larger everything-box instead. Thanks for the help regardless, though.
Can a Shifter-Dhampir still shift? Because they gain speed bonus or other minor buffs so I think it would be fair.
RAW, no. Dhampirs only get the traits and abilities listed for Dhampir's in the Lineages section. The only thing they keep from their original race is what it specifically says they keep.
With the new Van Richten's Guide out now, I'm having a hard time wrapping my head around some parts of the Ancestral Legacy.
So it reads, for any of the new lineages:
Ancestral Legacy: If you replace a race with this lineage, you can keep the following elements of that race: any skill proficiencies you gained from it and any climbing, flying, or swimming speed you gained from it.
If you don’t keep any of those elements or you choose this lineage at character creation, you gain proficiency in two skills of your choice.
So the 2nd part I understand, if you use this lineage in character creation, you gain proficiency of two skills of your choice.
But I don't understand: If you replace a race with this lineage. What does replacing a race with a lineage mean? How is that different from using the lineage within character creation?
Probably has to do with the second and third sentences of that section:
The idea being that it is possible to turn into these lineages during the adventure.
You always replace a race with the lineage. You only gain two skills if you start with the lineage or if you pick up the lineage later and drop racial skills and speeds. So here is the matrix of options:
In other words, it's best to start with the lineage if your race has skills and/or speeds. If it has neither, starting or picking it up later are identical.
EDIT: I believe I've misread, due to the wording on how lineages handle languages. I think the RAI might be that if you choose the lineage at character creation, you don't replace a race as well. That would lead to this matrix:
Under this second interpretation, starting with the lineage is actively worse if you'd rather keep racial skills and speeds, as you lack the option to do so, and gaining later is unrestricted. That means you should always ask your DM to count you as some other race and then inflict the lineage on you just before session 1, so you count as gaining it later.
I don't think that's accurate. As I'm reading it, you would not keep racial skills & speeds by starting with the lineage. It seems to be a zero-sum conditional: gaining the 2 skill proficiencies requires discarding racial skills & speeds.
You don't know what fear is until you've witnessed a drunk bird divebombing you while carrying a screaming Kobold throwing fire anywhere and everywhere.
If you're gaining your lineage later, here are the races most impacted by these rules, not counting the weird Planeshift races or the UA races:
Also, due to omitting all UA races, all races listed here gain the ability to adopt +1/+1/+1 racials, which is half-elf but worse, but still more flexible than +2/+1 only. I disregarded Variant Human or TCL, as I assume it's shenanigans to use the feat to pick up skills or languages, then switch to a lineage and claim your skills or languages are racial. In general, the Tasha's rules don't let you swap from 2/1 to 1/1/1, so the lineages are breaking new ground in terms of released races (as UAs aren't released properly yet). This can be particularly useful for playing a MAD class - using point buy, you can use a lineage to start at 16/16/16/8/8/8. Helps relax the stranglehold Half-Elves have on usually being just the best at being MAD - for a very direct comparison, swap from a half-elf paladin to a tabaxi reborn paladin.
I didn't see anything saying you kept racial languages, but it is new and I haven't read that closely yet. Where does it say that?
There is this line: “If you are replacing your race with a lineage, you retain any languages you had and gain no new languages.”
That's how I read it as well.
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I'm going to make this way harder than it needs to be.
Aha. Yeah, I missed that with first skim.
I see there is also an ASI section here. Good. Good.
Thank you all for the help. You have cleared the air completely for me.
Not to reopen a closed topic...but, if your character becomes a Hexblood, Returned or Dhampir, how do you actually implement your old racial features into your character in DND Beyond?
Currently, D&D Beyond doesn’t have any appropriate way of doing this. Things like languages and speeds can be added to the character sheet as custom options pretty easily, at least (just click on your languages or speed to customize them).
Proficiencies too, so... Really everything can be added via the character sheet.
Any chance you could explain to me how to add a speed to my character sheet? I've tried clicking on the speed part of the Features and Traits section, but the tab that opens up doesn't seem to include any way of adding a speed, it just says what my walking speed is again, and I can't seem to find any other area where speed is listed on the character sheet that I could try instead.
I don’t know what you mean by the speed part of the features and traits section. Click on the speed on the main character sheet header, by your armor class and such. There’s a “customize” dropdown button.
I managed to figure it out shortly before your response. I'm used to focusing on the large box that takes up the lower and middle right hand side of the character sheet, because the vast majority of character information is listed there in different tabs, one of those tabs being the Features and Traits tab. I'm so used to looking there for any given bit of character info besides proficiencies that I didn't even register the speed box, and looked for the speed in the Features and Traits tab of that larger everything-box instead. Thanks for the help regardless, though.
Can a Shifter-Dhampir still shift? Because they gain speed bonus or other minor buffs so I think it would be fair.
RAW, no. Dhampirs only get the traits and abilities listed for Dhampir's in the Lineages section. The only thing they keep from their original race is what it specifically says they keep.
Of course not. The character isn't a "Shifter-Dhampir", it is just a Dhampir and they cannot shift.