What races are left for D&D to do?

[Jester David]

For a two armed being a feat is required to cast a spell whilst you have a weapon and shield (or 2H or off hand weapon) equipped. If you are going to give out the equivalent of free feats, you should at least mention it in the rules.

And duel wielding whilst benefiting from a shield?

Using a two handed weapon whilst benefitting from a shield?

If you want to allow it, you need to mention it. If you want to disallow it you still need to mention it. The rules as written are for two-armed characters.

The rules have that covered already.

But even if someone does have the feat that lets them cast spells while holding a shield or weapon, they can't cast a spell and attack at the same time. They don't get extra actions.
They can hold four weapons, but that doesn't mean they get extra bonus actions for offhand attacks.

Having four able arms just means they have more chooses for which weapon makes their offhand attack. And means they always have a hand free for casting spells. They don't need to state every benefit of having extra hands, they just need to say "you have extra hands".
(Also, that's the least benefit of War Caster, which primarily grants advantage on Concentration saves and the ability to cast spells as an opportunity attack. So it's not like they remotely get a feat for free.)

 

[Paul Farquhar]

No, there's not. The rules as written apply to any number of arms, even one. That's why they only ever talk of "free hand".

A feat? Hardly. The bit you mention is only half the feat, for a start. Second, the only new cases opened are while TWF or using a sword and shield. Third, that's still covered by the rules, you only need a free hand. Having four hands just makes that more likely.

Duel wielding requires you wield two light weapons. Nothing new needed there, regardless of what your other hands have in them.

Using a two handed weapon... requires two hands. Nothing new needed there, regardless of what your other hands have in them.

So you are quite happy to allow a shield to be used when using two handed weapons or dual wielding, for an effective +2 AC? Not to mention duel wielding two handed swords (with the Dual Wielder feat)?

Then what you need to include is a warning: THIS RACE IS MASSIVELY OVERPOWERED

 

[Yunru]

So you are quite happy to allow a shield to be used when using two handed weapons or dual wielding, for an effective +2 AC? Not to mention duel wielding two handed swords (with the Dual Wielder feat)?

Then what you need to include is a warning: THIS RACE IS MASSIVELY OVERPOWERED

So what your saying is, that the race is overpowered... because it has buffs?

+2.5 damage or +2 AC isn't an overpowered boon, if it's one of the only boons.

 

[Satyrn]

Not to mention duel wielding two handed swords (with the Dual Wielder feat)

It's probably wise not to mention that since the feat doesn't work that way.

(Dual Wielder explicitly lets you use one-handed weapons that aren't light.)

 

[Mistwell]

I think any race that was playable in 4E should be easily workable in 5E: Pixies, Thrikreen, Satyrs, Wilden (which are 4E Plant Men), Shardminds (please, a better name however), Hengyokai (furries), Hamadryads, Revenants. All interesting concepts and with interesting mechanics in 4E.

View attachment 100777

Oh yeah I forgot about Wilden. I liked them and was looking forward to playing a Wilden Warden once upon a time.

 

[Mistwell]

So you are quite happy to allow a shield to be used when using two handed weapons or dual wielding, for an effective +2 AC? Not to mention duel wielding two handed swords (with the Dual Wielder feat)?

Then what you need to include is a warning: THIS RACE IS MASSIVELY OVERPOWERED

It's not as powerful as it might seem at first, though I understand that initial reaction. First, you cannot dual wield two handed weapons as the rules require them to be one handed regardless of your number of arms. Second, yes it allows for a shield while dual wielding or while wielding a single weapon two-handed, and that's OK if it is their major "bonus" ability like a human getting a feat or Yuan-Ti Pureblood getting advantage on saves vs magic or any of the many bonus features different races get. Seems fine to me actually and not overpowered at all once you dig down into the details and compare them to other races.

Now if you add a lot more abilities, like darkvision and faster speed or something like that, then we have some issues with being overpowered. But if their major thing is just the four arms, it should be fine.

 

[gyor]

Looking at what is left of the second tier of races from the survey, MTOF Elves and aasimar seemed to have eaten the Devas lunch so I don't know what design space is left for the Deva. Most of the rest at 2nd tier are setting specificish aside from Gnolls and Pixies.

 

[Jester David]

So you are quite happy to allow a shield to be used when using two handed weapons or dual wielding, for an effective +2 AC? Not to mention duel wielding two handed swords (with the Dual Wielder feat)?

Then what you need to include is a warning: THIS RACE IS MASSIVELY OVERPOWERED

And yet, somehow, less broken than the warforged.
And only IF you allow feats.
And only IF want to play a character that fights with two weapons and wish to burn a feat on that. Which would not include the barbarian, druid, monk, sorcerer, wizard, warlock, most bards (only valor are proficient with shields), and even the rogue (not proficient with shields).

So, no, not broken, let alone the hyperbole "massively overpowered".

But, yeah, two functional arms could be a little much. But let's see what happens if we propose a fix instead of just arguing over if something being broken or not.
Let's start by looking at how 4e balanced the race. What if your extra arms with smaller and weaker? That makes the racial feature this:
Extra Limbs. You have a secondary pair of arms, which are smaller than your primary arms. Your secondary arms can pick-up and hold items normally as well as manipulate objects, but can't wield weapons or hold a shield.
BAM. Fixed. And with a single sentence.

This even opens up room for a racial feat (like the ones in Guide to Everything) that makes your arms fully functional.

 

[Parmandur]

And yet, somehow, less broken than the warforged.
And only IF you allow feats.
And only IF want to play a character that fights with two weapons and wish to burn a feat on that. Which would not include the barbarian, druid, monk, sorcerer, wizard, warlock, most bards (only valor are proficient with shields), and even the rogue (not proficient with shields).

So, no, not broken, let alone the hyperbole "massively overpowered".

But, yeah, two functional arms could be a little much. But let's see what happens if we propose a fix instead of just arguing over if something being broken or not.
Let's start by looking at how 4e balanced the race. What if your extra arms with smaller and weaker? That makes the racial feature this:
Extra Limbs. You have a secondary pair of arms, which are smaller than your primary arms. Your secondary arms can pick-up and hold items normally as well as manipulate objects, but can't wield weapons or hold a shield.
BAM. Fixed. And with a single sentence.

This even opens up room for a racial feat (like the ones in Guide to Everything) that makes your arms fully functional.

Honestly, WotC hasn't even proposed how they would do them, yet. Based on the MM block, though, being masters of two-weapon fighting seems legit, and being able to dual wield while using a shield doesn't seem overpowered compared to being a high dexterity Tortle dual-wielding with 20-22 AC naked.

 

[Parmandur]

I just double-checked, the MM Thri-Kreen is dual wielding polearms: but a Bugbear Fighter already has the equivalent damage and reach dual wielding axes.