I wanted to ask if the new Dhampir, Hexblood, and Reborn lineages are only meant for Human characters, or if there’s some way to add Racial Traits to them on the sheet. Like if I wanted a Dragonborn Dhampir, is there a way to add the dragonborn’s breath attack and AC to my Hexblood, or are they purely meant to be used for Human?
They aren't specifically for humans, but they also don't 'combine' with the other races either. The lineages are supposed to replace the race not go on top of it, which is why you pick a character size when using them. So in your dragonborn example you could flavour a dragonborn hexblood that has aesthetic features of both but it wouldn't be using its dragonborn abilities anymore it would have the hexblood abilities because from a lore perspective the creature has changed fundamentally. Its also done this way from a balancing perspective else per your example Dragonborn Hexblood with Breath Weapon, Damage Resistance, Darkvision, Fey Resilience, Hex Magic, Magic Token and bonus languages would be an insane amount of things to give to a character based on their race, it would make all non-gothic origins entirely redundant.
You could homebrew a feat or something to do the same things if your DM isn't too bothered about balancing etc though.
They aren't specifically for humans, but they also don't 'combine' with the other races either. The lineages are supposed to replace the race not go on top of it, which is why you pick a character size when using them. So in your dragonborn example you could flavour a dragonborn hexblood that has aesthetic features of both but it wouldn't be using its dragonborn abilities anymore it would have the hexblood abilities because from a lore perspective the creature has changed fundamentally. Its also done this way from a balancing perspective else per your example Dragonborn Hexblood with Breath Weapon, Damage Resistance, Darkvision, Fey Resilience, Hex Magic, Magic Token and bonus languages would be an insane amount of things to give to a character based on their race, it would make all non-gothic origins entirely redundant.
You could homebrew a feat or something to do the same things if your DM isn't too bothered about balancing etc though.
Agree with this, with one exception. In the new book they say this about it:
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.
I cant figure out how to actually implement this if you "replace a race though"...i.e. keep the climbing, flying or swimming speed. Any ideas?
I cant figure out how to actually implement this if you "replace a race though"...i.e. keep the climbing, flying or swimming speed. Any ideas?
For instance, if you take a Lizardfolk and use ancestral legacy to replace its race with the Dhampir lineage, you get a character with all the Dhampir qualities and also the swimming speed of 30 and proficiency in two of Animal Handling, Nature, Perception, Stealth and Survival.
It's exactly what it says - you look at the regular race you want to start from, check if it has any climbing, flying, or swimming speed and/or skill proficiencies, and tack those onto the lineage. If you don't want to do that, you take any two skill proficiencies instead.
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Want to start playing but don't have anyone to play with? You can try these options: [link].
I cant figure out how to actually implement this if you "replace a race though"...i.e. keep the climbing, flying or swimming speed. Any ideas?
I think this would be in the case that your character, which you had been playing for a time, was somehow transformed. For instance, you make a deal with a Hag and she transforms you into a Hexblood.
Thanks for the responses! I think I wasn't clear though. I understand what it means...I just meant from a technical standpoint in DND Beyond character sheet I cant figure out how to do it...maybe just something you have to manually type in?
I'm actually also looking for how to do that on the Sheet itself, would i just manually add my previous traits (like flying or climbing) as bonus traits?
I wanted to ask if the new Dhampir, Hexblood, and Reborn lineages are only meant for Human characters, or if there’s some way to add Racial Traits to them on the sheet. Like if I wanted a Dragonborn Dhampir, is there a way to add the dragonborn’s breath attack and AC to my Hexblood, or are they purely meant to be used for Human?
Lineages mix "best" with races with a racial speed or many languages. Two of the strongest examples are Lizardfolk and Locathah, but also Tabaxi, Winged Tieflings, and Aarakocra do quite well.
how do you get the dndbeyond builder to flag the race for the purpose of racial feats. you currently appear to not be able to use even the generic custom linage to flag the base race for the purpose of race specific feats.
how do you get the dndbeyond builder to flag the race for the purpose of racial feats. you currently appear to not be able to use even the generic custom linage to flag the base race for the purpose of race specific feats.
It's right there under the prereqs?
Create a feat with the basics, save. Then click Add Prerequisite, enter a description, save again. Then you'll be able to indicate the type of prerequisite, in this case "race"; as soon as you've entered that you'll be presented with a list of races to pick from. Custom Lineage is not on that list (all "real" races should be, though I can't check the ones I don't have access to) presumably because that's not meant to create a race as much as a unique individual, but you should be able to work around that by making a homebrew race instead of using CL.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Want to start playing but don't have anyone to play with? You can try these options: [link].
how do you get the dndbeyond builder to flag the race for the purpose of racial feats. you currently appear to not be able to use even the generic custom linage to flag the base race for the purpose of race specific feats.
You aren't that race with a custom lineage. I asked Crawford this question myself on Twitter, the response is since you aren't specifically an elf or whatever, you don't qualify for that races feats. If your DM wants to allow it of course, then you can just manually add the feat in on the character sheet but rules as written? You can't custom lineage a high elf with special qualities and get Elven Accuracy, for instance.
For the three hundred and seventeen thousand, five hundred and sixty-eight time...
"Custom Lineage", and the VRG gothic lineages, do not qualify for species feats. if you started life as a tiffle and got yourself dhampir'd in a game of Ravneloft, you are a dhampir now, not a tiffle, and you no longer qualify for tiffle racial feats. Ditto Custom Lineage - it is for creating a creature of a species/race/origin that is not otherwise available in D&D, not "i created an elf, but I wanted a feat at level 1 and none of the elven junk so I used Custom Lineage instead of the elf statblock."
If a specific DM rules otherwise? Cool. But that's gonna be homebrew and will involve either brewing up a custom species stat block, or using the controls on your character sheet to add things like alternate movement speeds, extra skills, bonus feats, and other such stuff that doesn't fall within the purview of various lineages.
If a specific DM rules otherwise? Cool. But that's gonna be homebrew and will involve either brewing up a custom species stat block, or using the controls on your character sheet to add things like alternate movement speeds, extra skills, bonus feats, and other such stuff that doesn't fall within the purview of various lineages.
Easier than that. From "Character Settings," the "Use Prequisites" section, you can turn off prequisites for Feats.
Does this change strip you of racial feats? Do you pick new feats?
Say a Drow or Half-Elf: Drow, Level 5, with Drow High Magic. Gets turned into a Dhampir, are feats a "you have to be 'x' to take this" or "you have to be 'x' to have this" mechanic. Are prerequisites constantly checking if you are meeting them or is it meet this criteria once and its yours?
It's like reincarnation and Elven Acuracy, you are still as accurate as an elf Despite no longer being an Elf. Your race changes but things you can do because you were that race at one point stay a part of you.
By the letter of RAW, if a character has a racial feat and is then later converted into a different race, the feat remains but you lose access to its abilities until you once again fulfill the prerequisite condition, i.e. being-the-species. If you took Drow High Magic at 4 and then were turned into a dhampir at 5, you still have DHM, but you cannot use it until you are once again a drow.
It's almost like the Gothic lineages aren't supposed to be a reward, but are instead supposed to represent a wrenching, fundamental shift in your character's very nature that many people would find maddening or horrifying rather than highly desirable, and that all of the people who keep asking why they can't just acquire a set of Gothic superpowers for total freebies while retaining every last trait of their existing species are not only being greedy jackholes but are also completely missing the entire point of the Gothic lineages in the first place.
Does this change stip you of racial feats? Do you pick new feats?
Say a Drow or Half-Elf: Drow, Level 5, with Drow High Magic. Gets turned into a Dhampir, are feats a "you have to be 'x' to take this" or "you have to be 'x' to have this" mechanic. Are prerequisites constantly checking if you are meeting them or is it meet this criteria once and its yours?
It's like reincarnation and Elven Acuracy, you are still as accurate as an elf Despite no longer being an Elf. Your race changes but things you can do because you were that race at one point stay a part of you.
"You must meet any prerequisite specified in a feat to take that feat. If you ever lose a feat’s prerequisite, you can’t use that feat until you regain the prerequisite. For example, the Grappler feat requires you to have a Strength of 13 or higher. If your Strength is reduced below 13 somehow — perhaps by a withering curse — you can’t benefit from the Grappler feat until your Strength is restored."
So by RAW, you no longer benefit from racial feats if your race changes. You keep the feat, it just doesn't do anything anymore. In practice I'd expect a DM to use some discretion depending on circumstances, but that's not a given.
For the three hundred and seventeen thousand, five hundred and sixty-eight time...
"Custom Lineage", and the VRG gothic lineages, do not qualify for species feats. if you started life as a tiffle and got yourself dhampir'd in a game of Ravneloft, you are a dhampir now, not a tiffle, and you no longer qualify for tiffle racial feats. Ditto Custom Lineage - it is for creating a creature of a species/race/origin that is not otherwise available in D&D, not "i created an elf, but I wanted a feat at level 1 and none of the elven junk so I used Custom Lineage instead of the elf statblock."
If a specific DM rules otherwise? Cool. But that's gonna be homebrew and will involve either brewing up a custom species stat block, or using the controls on your character sheet to add things like alternate movement speeds, extra skills, bonus feats, and other such stuff that doesn't fall within the purview of various lineages.
Thank you, I didnt know it had been covered elsewhere and indeed was ment to remove the qualifications for racial feats. it had seemed to me (incorrectly it appears) that it was ment to offer the flexability of the Elf with a feat or whatever you wanted flexiability.
If your specific DM wants Custom Lineage to work differently they're fully entitled to, but it is explicitly not intended RAW and a lot of people are very not okay with jettisoning your species without actually jettisoning your species.
That said, if your DM is okay with letting Custom Lineage count as whatever you feel like, then simply disable the prereqs for feats in your character's Setting's menu on their character sheet. Then you can attach any feat you like to the character regardless of whatever, be the elf with no elven qualitative traits at all but who has Elven Accuracy at level 1 to score that 18 starting Dex.
I believe I already know the answer (and I suspect I won't be satisfied with it) but, has retention of natural armor/weapons been clarified anywhere? For example, I suspect that a Tortle that becomes Reborn after character creation loses Claws, Hold Breath, Natural Armor, and Shell Defense and only gains Deathless Nature and Knowledge from a Past Life.
If I am correct, WOTC has incentivized people to pick races with good movement options (e.g., Tiefling (Winged), Fairy, Owlin, Aarakocra, Triton, etc.) and avoid races with strong inherent features (that they just lose anyway.)
The Grung is another interesting case. Do they lose Water Dependency and Standing Leap along with Amphibious, Poison Immunity, and Poisonous Skin once transitioned to a Lineage? Dhampir and Hexblood would be straight downgrades; Reborn would be either a slightly negative or positive trade, depending on how the Player values each feature.
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I wanted to ask if the new Dhampir, Hexblood, and Reborn lineages are only meant for Human characters, or if there’s some way to add Racial Traits to them on the sheet. Like if I wanted a Dragonborn Dhampir, is there a way to add the dragonborn’s breath attack and AC to my Hexblood, or are they purely meant to be used for Human?
They aren't specifically for humans, but they also don't 'combine' with the other races either. The lineages are supposed to replace the race not go on top of it, which is why you pick a character size when using them. So in your dragonborn example you could flavour a dragonborn hexblood that has aesthetic features of both but it wouldn't be using its dragonborn abilities anymore it would have the hexblood abilities because from a lore perspective the creature has changed fundamentally. Its also done this way from a balancing perspective else per your example Dragonborn Hexblood with Breath Weapon, Damage Resistance, Darkvision, Fey Resilience, Hex Magic, Magic Token and bonus languages would be an insane amount of things to give to a character based on their race, it would make all non-gothic origins entirely redundant.
You could homebrew a feat or something to do the same things if your DM isn't too bothered about balancing etc though.
Agree with this, with one exception. In the new book they say this about it:
I cant figure out how to actually implement this if you "replace a race though"...i.e. keep the climbing, flying or swimming speed. Any ideas?
For instance, if you take a Lizardfolk and use ancestral legacy to replace its race with the Dhampir lineage, you get a character with all the Dhampir qualities and also the swimming speed of 30 and proficiency in two of Animal Handling, Nature, Perception, Stealth and Survival.
It's exactly what it says - you look at the regular race you want to start from, check if it has any climbing, flying, or swimming speed and/or skill proficiencies, and tack those onto the lineage. If you don't want to do that, you take any two skill proficiencies instead.
Want to start playing but don't have anyone to play with? You can try these options: [link].
I think this would be in the case that your character, which you had been playing for a time, was somehow transformed. For instance, you make a deal with a Hag and she transforms you into a Hexblood.
Thanks for the responses! I think I wasn't clear though. I understand what it means...I just meant from a technical standpoint in DND Beyond character sheet I cant figure out how to do it...maybe just something you have to manually type in?
I'm actually also looking for how to do that on the Sheet itself, would i just manually add my previous traits (like flying or climbing) as bonus traits?
I assume this is something DDB may still need to implement in the character builder, what with the book only being out for a day or so.
Want to start playing but don't have anyone to play with? You can try these options: [link].
Lineages mix "best" with races with a racial speed or many languages. Two of the strongest examples are Lizardfolk and Locathah, but also Tabaxi, Winged Tieflings, and Aarakocra do quite well.
how do you get the dndbeyond builder to flag the race for the purpose of racial feats. you currently appear to not be able to use even the generic custom linage to flag the base race for the purpose of race specific feats.
-Matthew Mosher
It's right there under the prereqs?
Create a feat with the basics, save. Then click Add Prerequisite, enter a description, save again. Then you'll be able to indicate the type of prerequisite, in this case "race"; as soon as you've entered that you'll be presented with a list of races to pick from. Custom Lineage is not on that list (all "real" races should be, though I can't check the ones I don't have access to) presumably because that's not meant to create a race as much as a unique individual, but you should be able to work around that by making a homebrew race instead of using CL.
Want to start playing but don't have anyone to play with? You can try these options: [link].
You aren't that race with a custom lineage. I asked Crawford this question myself on Twitter, the response is since you aren't specifically an elf or whatever, you don't qualify for that races feats. If your DM wants to allow it of course, then you can just manually add the feat in on the character sheet but rules as written? You can't custom lineage a high elf with special qualities and get Elven Accuracy, for instance.
For the three hundred and seventeen thousand, five hundred and sixty-eight time...
"Custom Lineage", and the VRG gothic lineages, do not qualify for species feats. if you started life as a tiffle and got yourself dhampir'd in a game of Ravneloft, you are a dhampir now, not a tiffle, and you no longer qualify for tiffle racial feats. Ditto Custom Lineage - it is for creating a creature of a species/race/origin that is not otherwise available in D&D, not "i created an elf, but I wanted a feat at level 1 and none of the elven junk so I used Custom Lineage instead of the elf statblock."
If a specific DM rules otherwise? Cool. But that's gonna be homebrew and will involve either brewing up a custom species stat block, or using the controls on your character sheet to add things like alternate movement speeds, extra skills, bonus feats, and other such stuff that doesn't fall within the purview of various lineages.
Please do not contact or message me.
Easier than that. From "Character Settings," the "Use Prequisites" section, you can turn off prequisites for Feats.
Does this change strip you of racial feats? Do you pick new feats?
Say a Drow or Half-Elf: Drow, Level 5, with Drow High Magic. Gets turned into a Dhampir, are feats a "you have to be 'x' to take this" or "you have to be 'x' to have this" mechanic. Are prerequisites constantly checking if you are meeting them or is it meet this criteria once and its yours?
It's like reincarnation and Elven Acuracy, you are still as accurate as an elf Despite no longer being an Elf. Your race changes but things you can do because you were that race at one point stay a part of you.
By the letter of RAW, if a character has a racial feat and is then later converted into a different race, the feat remains but you lose access to its abilities until you once again fulfill the prerequisite condition, i.e. being-the-species. If you took Drow High Magic at 4 and then were turned into a dhampir at 5, you still have DHM, but you cannot use it until you are once again a drow.
It's almost like the Gothic lineages aren't supposed to be a reward, but are instead supposed to represent a wrenching, fundamental shift in your character's very nature that many people would find maddening or horrifying rather than highly desirable, and that all of the people who keep asking why they can't just acquire a set of Gothic superpowers for total freebies while retaining every last trait of their existing species are not only being greedy jackholes but are also completely missing the entire point of the Gothic lineages in the first place.
Please do not contact or message me.
"You must meet any prerequisite specified in a feat to take that feat. If you ever lose a feat’s prerequisite, you can’t use that feat until you regain the prerequisite. For example, the Grappler feat requires you to have a Strength of 13 or higher. If your Strength is reduced below 13 somehow — perhaps by a withering curse — you can’t benefit from the Grappler feat until your Strength is restored."
So by RAW, you no longer benefit from racial feats if your race changes. You keep the feat, it just doesn't do anything anymore. In practice I'd expect a DM to use some discretion depending on circumstances, but that's not a given.
Want to start playing but don't have anyone to play with? You can try these options: [link].
Thank you, I didnt know it had been covered elsewhere and indeed was ment to remove the qualifications for racial feats. it had seemed to me (incorrectly it appears) that it was ment to offer the flexability of the Elf with a feat or whatever you wanted flexiability.
-Matthew Mosher
If your specific DM wants Custom Lineage to work differently they're fully entitled to, but it is explicitly not intended RAW and a lot of people are very not okay with jettisoning your species without actually jettisoning your species.
That said, if your DM is okay with letting Custom Lineage count as whatever you feel like, then simply disable the prereqs for feats in your character's Setting's menu on their character sheet. Then you can attach any feat you like to the character regardless of whatever, be the elf with no elven qualitative traits at all but who has Elven Accuracy at level 1 to score that 18 starting Dex.
Please do not contact or message me.
I believe I already know the answer (and I suspect I won't be satisfied with it) but, has retention of natural armor/weapons been clarified anywhere? For example, I suspect that a Tortle that becomes Reborn after character creation loses Claws, Hold Breath, Natural Armor, and Shell Defense and only gains Deathless Nature and Knowledge from a Past Life.
If I am correct, WOTC has incentivized people to pick races with good movement options (e.g., Tiefling (Winged), Fairy, Owlin, Aarakocra, Triton, etc.) and avoid races with strong inherent features (that they just lose anyway.)
The Grung is another interesting case. Do they lose Water Dependency and Standing Leap along with Amphibious, Poison Immunity, and Poisonous Skin once transitioned to a Lineage? Dhampir and Hexblood would be straight downgrades; Reborn would be either a slightly negative or positive trade, depending on how the Player values each feature.