Unearthed Arcana Unearthed Arcana October 2017: Fiendish Options

Hawk Diesel said:

I agree with you. I can sub in and out spells and cantrips like they did. That's lazy design and I expect a bit more from WotC. If tieflings have different subtypes, I'd like to see more change than a stat adjustment and a swapping of spells. Gimme something interesting. Different demons and devils are differentiated by more than just their magic. Some are big and brutish. Others are cunning and subtle. While still others are seductive and devious. Rather than give us new and interesting mechanics to differentiate them, they took the lazy way out and gave us new spell combos. -_-

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Except, yah know, if you read the rest of the UA. Where they give you something interesting to differentiate demons and devils by more than just magic.

Elfcrusher said:

Then you haven't been paying attention. UA isn't meant to do the work for home brewers, it's to test out new ideas that will eventually get baked into official rules for Adventurer's League.

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You seem to be needlessly condescending; just because someone doesn't have the same reaction to something as you, doesn't mean they aren't paying attention.

Most of the UA do have new ideas and features instead of just substitutions.
And where are you getting that UAs are only for AL?

Elon Tusk said:

And where are you getting that UAs are only for AL?

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Oh, that's not what I meant (and I admit it was poorly phrased). I was using AL as a notation for "official content". So meant for everybody, but also AL-legal.

Elon Tusk said:

You seem to be needlessly condescending

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So is the phrase "lazy design", which is what I was responding to. Just because MM and JC work for a big company doesn't mean it's ok to denigrate them.

Elfcrusher said:

So is the phrase "lazy design", which is what I was responding to. Just because MM and JC work for a big company doesn't mean it's ok to denigrate them.

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I see why you make that analogy, but I do think there is a difference.
One is a criticism of an idea while the other is directed more pointedly at the person.

MM and JC work for a company that we like to buy products from. They post ideas for us to test for them so they can try to keep us happily buying their products. Saying that one of the many things that they share in this way is "lazy design" because it mainly shuffles pieces around instead of adding in new pieces is criticism but something ultimately that they would want us to share.

Elfcrusher said:

Then you haven't been paying attention. UA isn't meant to do the work for home brewers, it's to test out new ideas that will eventually get baked into official rules for Adventurer's League.

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Hey, I have been paying attention and I know exactly what UA is meant to do. That doesn't give them a pass on putting out material that is boring and uninspired. They could have easily given us a paragraph about switching out tiefling spell-like abilities and giving a single example rather than trying to pass these off as unique subrace options. UA is meant for experimental mechanics like the adjusted ranger, the two different versions of the artificer, prestige classes such as the runesmith, and the new feats that have been previously presented. Those are new and interesting (even though they may not always work), and since they have established a pattern of putting out such content in UA I absolutely have the right and duty to call them out when they pad their page count and lead off their latest UA with garbage. Give us a paragraph, an example, and move on to the more interesting and new mechanics (or even better, lead off the article with THAT and label the tiefling stuff as tieflings options rather than subraces). And so yea, I am negatively criticising them, but I am also providing my argument and reasoning.

[MENTION=2525]Mistwell[/MENTION] I agree that is the most interesting part of the UA. They should have led with that rather than padding 2 pages of their UA and misleading us who thought we would get fleshed out subraces rather than simple substitution tiefling options.

Hawk Diesel said:

Hey, I have been paying attention and I know exactly what UA is meant to do. That doesn't give them a pass on putting out material that is boring and uninspired. They could have easily given us a paragraph about switching out tiefling spell-like abilities and giving a single example rather than trying to pass these off as unique subrace options. UA is meant for experimental mechanics like the adjusted ranger, the two different versions of the artificer, prestige classes such as the runesmith, and the new feats that have been previously presented. Those are new and interesting (even though they may not always work), and since they have established a pattern of putting out such content in UA I absolutely have the right and duty to call them out when they pad their page count and lead off their latest UA with garbage. Give us a paragraph, an example, and move on to the more interesting and new mechanics (or even better, lead off the article with THAT and label the tiefling stuff as tieflings options rather than subraces). And so yea, I am negatively criticising them, but I am also providing my argument and reasoning.

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The vibe I get from this argument (the part in bold just being the most clear example) is that UA is a product we are entitled to, or one that we paid for.

The Tiefling variants are not the most amazingly cool thing I've seen yet out of UA, but for people who prefer to strictly adhere to "official" rules they are a nice option.

userZynx_name said:

I disliked the Tiefling 'subraces' presented in this article. They felt like a lazy "Oh we need some player options for this UA or the people will probably riot. Oh I know: Tieflings are a player thing!" attachment to an otherwise good UA article.

IMO, the Tiefling subrace format presented in the That Old Black Magic UA article should have been used. The simple swapping out of spells and +1 ability felt quite cheap and lazy. Certainly, at least Levistus should have given cold resistance rather than fire resistance.

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Yea, there's so much for them to work with. If the bloodlines are based on specific demon/devil lords, then give us a mechanic for a tiefling of Demogorgon to have two heads or be able to act while under a mind influencing effect. Give us a subrace for Jubilex tieflings with somewhat amorphous anatomy or a power with acidic slime.

If we going with the types of demons/devils, give us a Balor tiefling that can summon a fire whip, a bone demon with a spiky carapace, or a Balgura tiefling that is really big and strong.

So to the haters above, this is another reason I call their design lazy with regards to these tiefling "subraces." With so much material to draw upon to create something new and experiment (what I thought was the whole purpose of these things) they give us a simple swap out formula that they pass off as related to the different demon/devil lords.

Elfcrusher said:

The vibe I get from this argument (the part in bold just being the most clear example) is that UA is a product we are entitled to, or one that we paid for.

The Tiefling variants are not the most amazingly cool thing I've seen yet out of UA, but for people who prefer to strictly adhere to "official" rules they are a nice option.

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We aren't entitled to it, and I don't perceive it as such. But when you put something out publicly and purposely to invite criticism, then they are I'm sure prepared to take it. And also, as a free product, they have no reason to put out any particular amount of material or pages. This is not like a pdf we pay for and expect a certain amount of bang for our buck. So why include it at all if it was lackluster to begin with? So yea, just because it's free does not give them a pass. They don't even need to release it at all. They don't need a certain page count or content quota. So why pad their page count at all? Either they think this is on par with the other stuff they've released (it isn't) or they believe they need to hit a specific word count and are not as concerned with the quality of the mechanics and options they release. Either of those is a concern to me, as someone that fiercely loves this game and hobby and 5e in particular. I believe this team can do better, and by not calling them out when I see that, then I invite the lackluster content bloat we've seen in previous editions.

Elfcrusher said:

So is the phrase "lazy design", which is what I was responding to. Just because MM and JC work for a big company doesn't mean it's ok to denigrate them.

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"Lazy" does appear to be the insult du jour for "a product not made exactly how I want it". It's used against movie-makers and manufacturers and TV studios and - it seems - game designers.

I agree; it's pretty condescending. Creating product requires the exact opposite of laziness.