D&D 5E What To Do With Racial ASIs?

[Remathilis]

I still think that rather than go through all the hoops of floating bonuses, bonuses by background or class, or a dozen other patches, just redo the point buy spread and give humans extra points as a racial trait.

 

[Chaosmancer]

No they don't.

I guess we need to prove that then

Yes, but that's not the only difference. The Wizard with lower int got someting else. Sure, that something else may not be quite as good as those two points of int would be, but that will make the build different and will probably inform some other character building choices as well thus resulting a character that plays differently.

3

No they did not. In this part of the example, they were both "null race". I was showing only the difference between the scores in this part of the example.

That is part of what I'm saying. The scores, by themselves, are not an interesting difference. A human wizard with 16 Int is just a straight better wizard than a human wizard with a 14 Int, and the difference between them is uninteresting and fully mechanical.

So, the claim that racial ASIs are interesting, seems to fall flat, because if that were true, then differences in ability score alone would be interesting.

Yes, but in the same world where no one chooses to make wizard without racial int bonus, no one will make tabaxi or dragonborn wizards even in absence of ability bonuses. They will all be making mountain dwarf wizards as that now is the mechanically strongest choice.

On the other hand in the world where everyone is not a min-maxer, people can already make tabaxi and dragonborn wizards, and they are even more different than ones you describe as their abilities are different (which in turn might lead them choosing different skills and other build option making them even more different.)

See, but this is not how my experience has ever played out. No one even looks at a non-Int Race for wizards, unless they have a very specific concept. And if they have that concept, why are we punishing them with a -1 to all their attacks?

And, in the world you inhabit, where a -1 is not a punishment and a 14 in the stat is perfectly viable... people are already saying most of their wizards are mountain dwarves, for armor and con. So, again, the aspect you are arguing against is already a statement of fact for your side.


And, an unspoken benefit here is that with the floating scores, people can choose the types of things they want to focus on. If they have a 16 INT already, and they want to be an entertainer wizard with performance, then they can choose to put their other scores in charisma. They can choose to have a charismatic wizard, or maybe they want to choose to have a 14 IN, so they can have a 16 Con and 14 Cha. But, it gives full power to make those decisions to the players, which will help prevent Cookie Cutter builds, because now every Tiefling isn't getting social skills, because if you have a +2 to Cha, you have to use it, otherwise you just wasted that bonus.

While you make some good points, there are aspects missing. First, sure a Dragonborn or Tabaxi Wizard might have INT 14 compared to a Gnome Wizard with INT 16, but those races make up for that in other ways those players find worth the one less spell, -1 to attacks/spell save DC. Depending on the spells you take, you might never have to worry much about making attack rolls or having a spell save DC made. Also, while those INTs are lower initially, others have already pointed out over the adventuring career all three are limited to INT 20.

I'll also add the downside of floating modifiers is people will often find a great race they love playing, and hardly ever branch out because now they can make a Dwarf Bard with +2 CHA, instead of maybe exploring a race that RAW offers CHA +2 instead. I think you are likely to see fewer races played by individuals even though they might be exploring other classes.

And FWIW, the first barbarian we had at our table was a Tiefling, the second a Dragonborn, and the third an High Elf.

But if you have a player who wants to play Dwarves no matter what, they already do that. They just never play bards. We also have people who always want to play bards, and so they only play races that have a + to Charisma.

And yes, the upper limit is still the same, so, why are we deciding that one player should have fewer feats and be mechanically weaker for the majority if not the entirety of the campaign? What are we gaining by denying people feats if they want to stay competitive?

See, this is sort of a catch-22.

Either the -1 to attacks, saves, ect is a big enough deal that it affects decision making, in whcih case we are leading people to never choose a non-Int race when playing wizards and making more cookie cutters.

Or

The -1 isn't a big deal and affects decision making, in which case allowing the other races to start with a 16 INT isn't a big deal and should be allowed.


Either direction points to floating ASI's being more versatile and allowing more interesting builds.

I've seen more elf barbarians than dwarf or human barbarians, and honestly I don't think I've seen half-orc or orc barbarians since we played 4e, and even then I saw more half-orc rangers, fighters, and paladins.

Only barbarians I've seen are human, goliath and half orc
Only Rogues Elves, half-elves, humans, halflings
Only warlocks half-elves, tieflings, Aasimar

I'd say easily 85% to 90% of all characters I've seen are optimized like that.

In fact, going off the top of my head, here are two parties that we've got.

Party 1
Wood Elf Ranger
Aasimar Sorcerer/cleric (1 level)
Halfing Rogue
Human Paladin
Half-Orc Barbarian
Half-Orc Cleric

Party 2
Half-Elf Rogue
Half Elf Druid
Human Warlock
Half-Orc Barbarian
Tielfing Cleric

11 characters, only 2 not optimized to have their ASIs set for their class.

I don't think this is system issue then, it is a player issue.

So the current tradeoff always leads to merciless min-maxing, but a marginally smaller tradeoff won't? This exact chance you want just happens to be the thing that makes min-maxers to stop caring about min-maxing? Sounds pretty questionable.

You are missing that numbers are easy. A higher INT is +1 to hit, +1 Spell DC, +1 Spell Known. It is tangibly making you a better wizard.

How do you measure the value of re-rolling 1's vs the ability to ignore being dropped to 0 hp 1/day?

Medium Armor and poison resistance vs the ability to fly, heal, and deal extra damage per hit 1/day?

These are hard things to optimize. They are legitimate trade-offs that are useful in different ways. +1 on every ability related to INT or DEX is an easy decision. That's why most guides recommend maxing your stats to 20 before taking feats, despite a wide array of useful feats that can do many different things, including giving better armor, or advantage on saves, the tangible benefits of +1 are too great to ignore.

The rules are supposed to reflect the lore. If they don't, they're disassociated. We usually don't fix such issues by 'just agreeing not to do it.' Illusionist not being able to cast healing spells does not depend on just agreeing not to take them.

But they already don't.

Goliath with 10 str, Halfing with 15 is already RAW. It exists and if you do point buy is trivial to create. So the mechanics are already dissociated. The only way to prevent this would be to have static scores, so that Goliaths always have a strength of 16 and Halflings always have a strength of 8. Otherwise, this issue exists and will always exist.

The dwarf is heartier than the elf. That's a real thing that actually exists in the game as you play it. It is very minor, but it's there, and it helps inform the characters created. That is completely different from "you're stronger than a human of the same background who puts the same work into strength" but doesn't actually do anything at all.

Like...what I at least am saying, is that the ability score bonuses help inform what the norms for that race are, in a way that feels real because it has an actual consequence, and it does so in the simplest way possible. Getting rid of that means either that the orc is no longer stronger (ie, has an easier time becoming very strong) than the human, or is stronger but in a noticeably more complex way that is suitable only for variant rules.

See, but even if you take out the abilities, and look solely at the racial traits, that can still be true.

Hill Dwarf gets +1 HP per level and Poison resistance. They are heartier than elves.

Wood Elves have +10 ft over dwarves and prof perception. They are fleeter of foot and more observant of the world

Dwarves get blacksmith tools and stone cunning. Elves can't sleep and have resistance to charm effect.


The real things that actually exist, still exist. We still have differences between the races.

 

[FrogReaver]

I still think that rather than go through all the hoops of floating bonuses, bonuses by background or class, or a dozen other patches, just redo the point buy spread and give humans extra points as a racial trait.

Same issues and Doesn’t work for rolling games.

 

[Remathilis]

Same issues and Doesn’t work for rolling games.

Rolling games have already tossed balance out the window, let the dice fall where they may.

 

[FrogReaver]

I guess we need to prove that then


3

No they did not. In this part of the example, they were both "null race". I was showing only the difference between the scores in this part of the example.

That is part of what I'm saying. The scores, by themselves, are not an interesting difference. A human wizard with 16 Int is just a straight better wizard than a human wizard with a 14 Int, and the difference between them is uninteresting and fully mechanical.

So, the claim that racial ASIs are interesting, seems to fall flat, because if that were true, then differences in ability score alone would be interesting.





See, but this is not how my experience has ever played out. No one even looks at a non-Int Race for wizards, unless they have a very specific concept. And if they have that concept, why are we punishing them with a -1 to all their attacks?

And, in the world you inhabit, where a -1 is not a punishment and a 14 in the stat is perfectly viable... people are already saying most of their wizards are mountain dwarves, for armor and con. So, again, the aspect you are arguing against is already a statement of fact for your side.


And, an unspoken benefit here is that with the floating scores, people can choose the types of things they want to focus on. If they have a 16 INT already, and they want to be an entertainer wizard with performance, then they can choose to put their other scores in charisma. They can choose to have a charismatic wizard, or maybe they want to choose to have a 14 IN, so they can have a 16 Con and 14 Cha. But, it gives full power to make those decisions to the players, which will help prevent Cookie Cutter builds, because now every Tiefling isn't getting social skills, because if you have a +2 to Cha, you have to use it, otherwise you just wasted that bonus.




But if you have a player who wants to play Dwarves no matter what, they already do that. They just never play bards. We also have people who always want to play bards, and so they only play races that have a + to Charisma.

And yes, the upper limit is still the same, so, why are we deciding that one player should have fewer feats and be mechanically weaker for the majority if not the entirety of the campaign? What are we gaining by denying people feats if they want to stay competitive?

See, this is sort of a catch-22.

Either the -1 to attacks, saves, ect is a big enough deal that it affects decision making, in whcih case we are leading people to never choose a non-Int race when playing wizards and making more cookie cutters.

Or

The -1 isn't a big deal and affects decision making, in which case allowing the other races to start with a 16 INT isn't a big deal and should be allowed.


Either direction points to floating ASI's being more versatile and allowing more interesting builds.






Only barbarians I've seen are human, goliath and half orc
Only Rogues Elves, half-elves, humans, halflings
Only warlocks half-elves, tieflings, Aasimar

I'd say easily 85% to 90% of all characters I've seen are optimized like that.

In fact, going off the top of my head, here are two parties that we've got.

Party 1
Wood Elf Ranger
Aasimar Sorcerer/cleric (1 level)
Halfing Rogue
Human Paladin
Half-Orc Barbarian
Half-Orc Cleric

Party 2
Half-Elf Rogue
Half Elf Druid
Human Warlock
Half-Orc Barbarian
Tielfing Cleric

11 characters, only 2 not optimized to have their ASIs set for their class.




You are missing that numbers are easy. A higher INT is +1 to hit, +1 Spell DC, +1 Spell Known. It is tangibly making you a better wizard.

How do you measure the value of re-rolling 1's vs the ability to ignore being dropped to 0 hp 1/day?

Medium Armor and poison resistance vs the ability to fly, heal, and deal extra damage per hit 1/day?

These are hard things to optimize. They are legitimate trade-offs that are useful in different ways. +1 on every ability related to INT or DEX is an easy decision. That's why most guides recommend maxing your stats to 20 before taking feats, despite a wide array of useful feats that can do many different things, including giving better armor, or advantage on saves, the tangible benefits of +1 are too great to ignore.





But they already don't.

Goliath with 10 str, Halfing with 15 is already RAW. It exists and if you do point buy is trivial to create. So the mechanics are already dissociated. The only way to prevent this would be to have static scores, so that Goliaths always have a strength of 16 and Halflings always have a strength of 8. Otherwise, this issue exists and will always exist.





See, but even if you take out the abilities, and look solely at the racial traits, that can still be true.

Hill Dwarf gets +1 HP per level and Poison resistance. They are heartier than elves.

Wood Elves have +10 ft over dwarves and prof perception. They are fleeter of foot and more observant of the world

Dwarves get blacksmith tools and stone cunning. Elves can't sleep and have resistance to charm effect.


The real things that actually exist, still exist. We still have differences between the races.

Almost sounds like you are making a case against ASI’s altogether rather than against racial asi’s...

 

[Charlaquin]

Why would I play test something I don’t think is a good idea and why would I do it to placate someone who will just dismiss my results if they are contrary to their expectations?

My friend, do whatever you want at your own table. If you don’t think it’s a good idea, don’t do it. I don’t care. My point was, when all you’ve got is “I don’t think this would work,” you don’t have anything. If someone wants to find out if it would work, they gotta try it.

 

[Guest 6801328]

IMO, in order for features that provide mechanical distinction, they will unavoidably favor some classes over others.

Yeah, we've talked about this. The question how minimal can it be, which at some point (fairly easy to attain) the imbalance is so hard to quantify that it's irrelevant. Is Relentless Endurance better for a character who gets hit more, or one who is squishier? I dunno. Pretty handy all around.

So, sure, it's impossible to have zero mechanical distinction. Red herring, imo.

They are objectively more complex during character creation. Maybe my meaning wasn't clear, though, based on your reply.

So, what I'm saying is that replacing ASI bumps with descriptive features makes choosing between races, and understanding how the choice of race effects the total character, is more complex than the ASI bumps.

Oh, I see what you mean. Complexity in understanding the impact of choices, not process complexity.

[deleted]

I started to contest the "objectively" part but, sure, whatever.

 

[FrogReaver]

My friend, do whatever you want at your own table. If you don’t think it’s a good idea, don’t do it. I don’t care. My point was, when all you’ve got is “I don’t think this would work,” you don’t have anything. If someone wants to find out if it would work, they gotta try it.

Funny how that goes both ways.

If all you have is “I think this will work” then neither do you. Have you tried the method you are proposing?

 

[Charlaquin]

Funny how that goes both ways.

If all you have is “I think this will work” then neither do you. Have you tried the method you are proposing?

Not yet. I’ve fiddled with the concept quite a bit, but I haven’t tested it. I plan to in my next campaign. I can let you know how it goes if you want. That was kind of my point, until we actually try it and see what happens, we’re just at an impasse.

 

[Scott Christian]

Who said anything about skill challenges not being needed???

Needed might be the wrong word, but your words imply that mechanics are combat-centric. Your words:
"As long as the game rules are disproportionately focused on resolving combat, discussion of the game’s design will be similarly focused on combat. Obviously DMs can compensate for this combat focus on their own tables, but we’re talking about the game’s design and mechanics here."

So I point out that skill checks are just as important as combat, and they are also intricate to the mechanics of the game. I mean, stealth is just as strong as a good armor class. The ability to nature check a creature could increase damage as much as a barbarian going into rage. So skills count. Yet, they are avoided in the discussion, because it is not a number added to a person's to hit, damage or spell dc. I find that to be a limited take, and not addressing the debate in its entirety.