If you take a background such as Criminal or Wayfarer and then Choose Rogue as your Class, both give you Thieves tools proficiency. Does it say anywhere that you can substitute a different tool proficiency if you already have that proficiency?
I think you should get a choice to either take a different proficiency or if you do take the same proficiecy twice you get expertise with that proficiency. Basically you sacrifice your choice of one proficiency to focus on one particular proficiency.
I know the 2014 PHB specifically let you swap like for like on backgrounds if you had a redundancy. I haven’t looked at the new backgrounds enough to recall if there’s the same rule, but I expect there is.
In the 2024 rules it looks like this option has been removed. This may have been a deliberate choice to prevent players from making such a background choice deliberately in an attempt to acquire a "free" (open-ended) proficiency choice.
Technically, it seems like you have to actually have a feature that grants you Expertise in order to have expertise in a skill, although upgrading such a redundancy into expertise seems like a totally reasonable house-rule to me.
Yes, this rule from 2014 is not present in the 2024 PHB:
If a character would gain the same proficiency from two different sources, he or she can choose a different proficiency of the same kind (skill or tool) instead.
There are some related threads about the same question:
Preventing players from having an open-ended proficiency choice makes no sense because both the Criminal and Wayfarer background are geared toward rogues because of the abilities and skills each include. Plus these backgrounds are even suggested for the rogue. It just seems like this was just overlooked or was on purpose for some unknown reason.
Preventing players from having an open-ended proficiency choice makes no sense because both the Criminal and Wayfarer background are geared toward rogues because of the abilities and skills each include. Plus these backgrounds are even suggested for the rogue. It just seems like this was just overlooked or was on purpose for some unknown reason.
There's a possibility it's part of guidelines found in the Dungeon Master Guide as well.
That would be a terrible place as this is a basic character creation issue and not a worldbuilding or rules adjudication issue (the rule needs to exist in order to adjudicate it).
I think you should get a choice to either take a different proficiency or if you do take the same proficiecy twice you get expertise with that proficiency. Basically you sacrifice your choice of one proficiency to focus on one particular proficiency.
I don't believe Expertise in a tool proficiency exists in the 2024 rules, because the text for Rogue's Expertise feature explicitly says it is for skills (whereas the 2014 text said skills or Thieves' Tools).
I said I think it let me choose a second proficiency because I created a Rogue with the Criminal background, which both give Thieves Tools, and I could select a tool proficiency... but I'm not entirely sure because I also later changed the background to custom. But I think once I got that sorted out, I chose the "2 tool proficiencies" option because it was the closest and picked something innocuous like Playing Cards for the extra custom background proficiency (which only exist in 2024 because custom is legacy).
I think you should get a choice to either take a different proficiency or if you do take the same proficiecy twice you get expertise with that proficiency. Basically you sacrifice your choice of one proficiency to focus on one particular proficiency.
I don't believe Expertise in a tool proficiency exists in the 2024 rules, because the text for Rogue's Expertise feature explicitly says it is for skills (whereas the 2014 text said skills or Thieves' Tools).
That's true. With the 2024 rules, Expertise applies only to skills, not tools.
I said I think it let me choose a second proficiency because I created a Rogue with the Criminal background, which both give Thieves Tools, and I could select a tool proficiency... but I'm not entirely sure because I also later changed the background to custom. [...]
They’ve already indicated that they’re putting rules for custom backgrounds in the DMG, so that should cover proficiency swaps.
We're not talking about custom backgrounds. In 2014, there was a core rule that you could freely replace a skill or tool proficiency that you were already proficient in with another of the same type (skill or tool). That was a core character creation rule from the PHB that was removed and does not make sense in the DMG. This should be a core rule on page 36 of the 2024 PHB because it is not about one background, it is about the interaction of all backgrounds and classes during character creation.
They’ve already indicated that they’re putting rules for custom backgrounds in the DMG, so that should cover proficiency swaps.
We're not talking about custom backgrounds. In 2014, there was a core rule that you could freely replace a skill or tool proficiency that you were already proficient in with another of the same type (skill or tool). That was a core character creation rule from the PHB that was removed and does not make sense in the DMG. This should be a core rule on page 36 of the 2024 PHB because it is not about one background, it is about the interaction of all backgrounds and classes during character creation.
But being able to customise backgrounds, whether building one from scratch or taking an existing one and swapping some features (which were both options in the first UA) would allow any proficiency duplications to be resolved. I would hope that any DM with those customisation rules in the DMG and a modicum of player-friendliness would allow a duplicate to be swapped. I appreciate that it might be an issue for Adventurers League games, though.
Well while custom backgrounds can solve it just creating variants (i.e. a Wayfarer getting another tool), we'd need a solution for the current time. I'd just let the character get another tool that is related, so for duplicated Thieves' Tools get another "criminal" one (Forgery?).
They’ve already indicated that they’re putting rules for custom backgrounds in the DMG, so that should cover proficiency swaps.
We're not talking about custom backgrounds. In 2014, there was a core rule that you could freely replace a skill or tool proficiency that you were already proficient in with another of the same type (skill or tool). That was a core character creation rule from the PHB that was removed and does not make sense in the DMG. This should be a core rule on page 36 of the 2024 PHB because it is not about one background, it is about the interaction of all backgrounds and classes during character creation.
But being able to customise backgrounds, whether building one from scratch or taking an existing one and swapping some features (which were both options in the first UA) would allow any proficiency duplications to be resolved. I would hope that any DM with those customisation rules in the DMG and a modicum of player-friendliness would allow a duplicate to be swapped. I appreciate that it might be an issue for Adventurers League games, though.
It's not just UA. The 2014 PHB had rules for that. However, moving those customization rules to the DMG makes sense since the non-standard options will require DM approval.
If you take a background such as Criminal or Wayfarer and then Choose Rogue as your Class, both give you Thieves tools proficiency. Does it say anywhere that you can substitute a different tool proficiency if you already have that proficiency?
I think it does let you substitute.
I think you should get a choice to either take a different proficiency or if you do take the same proficiecy twice you get expertise with that proficiency. Basically you sacrifice your choice of one proficiency to focus on one particular proficiency.
I know the 2014 PHB specifically let you swap like for like on backgrounds if you had a redundancy. I haven’t looked at the new backgrounds enough to recall if there’s the same rule, but I expect there is.
In the 2024 rules it looks like this option has been removed. This may have been a deliberate choice to prevent players from making such a background choice deliberately in an attempt to acquire a "free" (open-ended) proficiency choice.
Technically, it seems like you have to actually have a feature that grants you Expertise in order to have expertise in a skill, although upgrading such a redundancy into expertise seems like a totally reasonable house-rule to me.
Yes, this rule from 2014 is not present in the 2024 PHB:
There are some related threads about the same question:
Preventing players from having an open-ended proficiency choice makes no sense because both the Criminal and Wayfarer background are geared toward rogues because of the abilities and skills each include. Plus these backgrounds are even suggested for the rogue. It just seems like this was just overlooked or was on purpose for some unknown reason.
Yeah, maybe, and this topic might receive errata.
Honestly, I have a similar concern to you.
There's a possibility it's part of guidelines found in the Dungeon Master Guide as well.
That would be a terrible place as this is a basic character creation issue and not a worldbuilding or rules adjudication issue (the rule needs to exist in order to adjudicate it).
How to add Tooltips.
If WoTC wanted to not have such alternative in the core rules make sense for them to have optional guidelines in Dungeon Master Guide instead.
I don't believe Expertise in a tool proficiency exists in the 2024 rules, because the text for Rogue's Expertise feature explicitly says it is for skills (whereas the 2014 text said skills or Thieves' Tools).
I said I think it let me choose a second proficiency because I created a Rogue with the Criminal background, which both give Thieves Tools, and I could select a tool proficiency... but I'm not entirely sure because I also later changed the background to custom. But I think once I got that sorted out, I chose the "2 tool proficiencies" option because it was the closest and picked something innocuous like Playing Cards for the extra custom background proficiency (which only exist in 2024 because custom is legacy).
That's true. With the 2024 rules, Expertise applies only to skills, not tools.
DnD Beyond app is a generous DM :D
They’ve already indicated that they’re putting rules for custom backgrounds in the DMG, so that should cover proficiency swaps.
We're not talking about custom backgrounds. In 2014, there was a core rule that you could freely replace a skill or tool proficiency that you were already proficient in with another of the same type (skill or tool). That was a core character creation rule from the PHB that was removed and does not make sense in the DMG. This should be a core rule on page 36 of the 2024 PHB because it is not about one background, it is about the interaction of all backgrounds and classes during character creation.
How to add Tooltips.
But being able to customise backgrounds, whether building one from scratch or taking an existing one and swapping some features (which were both options in the first UA) would allow any proficiency duplications to be resolved. I would hope that any DM with those customisation rules in the DMG and a modicum of player-friendliness would allow a duplicate to be swapped. I appreciate that it might be an issue for Adventurers League games, though.
Well while custom backgrounds can solve it just creating variants (i.e. a Wayfarer getting another tool), we'd need a solution for the current time. I'd just let the character get another tool that is related, so for duplicated Thieves' Tools get another "criminal" one (Forgery?).
Yes, you can choose your Tool Proficiency.
I made a Rogue (legacy turned off) with the Criminal background, and it asked me to choose a Tool Proficiency. Try it for yourself.
It's not just UA. The 2014 PHB had rules for that. However, moving those customization rules to the DMG makes sense since the non-standard options will require DM approval.
That's cool for D&D Beyond users, but either it's a holdover from 2014 or the book needs an errata to match.
How to add Tooltips.