D&D 5E Unearthed Arcana: Gothic Lineages & New Race/Culture Distinction

The latest Unearthed Arcana contains the Dhampir, Reborn, and Hexblood races. The Dhampir is a half-vampire; the Hexblood is a character which has made a pact with a hag; and the Reborn is somebody brought back to life.

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Perhaps the bigger news is this declaration on how race is to be handled in future D&D books as it joins other games by stating that:

"...the race options in this article and in future D&D books lack the Ability Score Increase trait, the Language trait, the Alignment trait, and any other trait that is purely cultural. Racial traits henceforth reflect only the physical or magical realities of being a player character who’s a member of a particular lineage. Such traits include things like darkvision, a breath weapon (as in the dragonborn), or innate magical ability (as in the forest gnome). Such traits don’t include cultural characteristics, like language or training with a weapon or a tool, and the traits also don’t include an alignment suggestion, since alignment is a choice for each individual, not a characteristic shared by a lineage."

 

[Micah Sweet]

I remember in an earlier iteration of this same argument someone proposed a version of the dwarf with such features in place of ASIs that was pretty cool. I don’t remember what all it had, but I think Tremorsense and a burrow speed were among them. Also, check out the A5e race playtest packets.

A5e gives some good examples of how this situation should have been handled by WotC.

 

[Kannik]

Ability Scores are not cultural. They are inherent traits that are supposed to represent the character's race natural, raw, inborn nature.

That does not make sense. If they are inherent and inborn, then how can they change during play? What is an ASI? How can each PC have a max of 20 in every attribute, no matter what their ancestry?

Decoupling racial ability score mods from the race itself is one way of stripping away from what truly defines the race as that race.

Hard disagree. There are plenty of ways available to distinguish the different races, most of which are far more evocative, impactful, meaningful, and flavourful than attribute bonuses. Removing ability modifiers strips little away.

These changes in D&D are disrespectful to the game, disrespectful to the history of D&D, and to all designers who worked on the earlier editions of the game.

5e is not D&D anymore.

Is it possible to go beyond a hard disagree? Because this is over the top. And it's nothing more than an Appeal to Purity (aka No True Scotsman) logical fallacy. Nor is this the first time we've seen this kind of thing trotted out.

As someone who cut their teeth on 1e, and has played every e since then over the past decades, I fully assert this change does not, in any shape, form, size, or colour, disrespect the game, the people playing it, or the people who made it.

 

[Minigiant]

One thing this evolves to is actual lists of cultural proficiency that DM, players, and worldbuilder can refer to

Dragonborn Weapon Training
Drow Weapon Training
Dwarf Weapon Training
Elf Weapon Training
Gnome Weapon Training
Gnoll Weapon Training
Halfling Weapon Training
Hobgoblin Weapon Training
Orc Weapon Training
Arabic Weapon Training
Celtic Weapon Training
Chinese Weapon Training
Egyptian Weapon Training
Mesoamerican Weapon Training
Niger-Congo Weapon Training
Polynesian Weapon Training
Berserker Weapon Training
Hoplite Weapon Training
Knight Weapon Training
Samurai Weapon Training

You know. List the stuff. And maybe we can back into official exotic weapons

 

[Umbran]

A5e gives some good examples of how this situation should have been handled by WotC.

I am pretty sure that the fact that A5E isn't "official" makes a large difference in how it is taken by the audience. Morrus can do whatever he wants, because he's 3rd party. WotC is stuck with the entitlement of the fans that A5E doesn't have to deal with.

Meaning, if they did handle it like A5E, folks would still be up in arms over it.

 

[Levistus's_Leviathan]

You know. List the stuff. And maybe we can back into official exotic weapons

I would love the Thri-Kreen weapons to be official for players.

 

[mockman1890]

Easily? I’m not really sure how to answer this. I think you and I must have such fundamentally different understandings of what a fantasy race is that we’re going to have a hard time communicating here...

It's a fair question. Possibly...!

Even in a very small setting, I find the idea that no dwarf ever has been or could be born outside of a particular ethnically homogenous community to strain suspension of disbelief, to the point I might not be able to take such a setting seriously.

It is kind of unfair how humans get all the (Forgotten Realms) 'cultures' in the 5e PHB and the other races usually are monocultures (or 2- or 3-cultures if we consider, say, different kinds of halflings to be cultural distinctions).

With regard to the "races /=/ monoculture" thing, though, it kinda depends on how close-up you look at a fantasy/SF 'race', doesn't it? I mean, I can think of several games and settings that generalize about a 'human racial culture', generally either something like "they're rapacious capitalists!" (some SF settings) or "they're the new exciting adventuresome race on the block!" (D&D). Humans can 'be' whatever generalization is necessary for the theme of the setting/story, and this could apply to any other fantasy race too. Who wants to be the person who sees a movie where the message is "humans are terrible destroyers of the environment" (or whatever) and is there nitpicking "#notallhumans"

I disagree that cultural stereotypes are what attract most players to races, and I can’t get behind the notion that races are made up only of appearance and cultural stereotypes. Again looking to the dragon age example, dwarves have inherent traits that distinguish them from humans other than just their appearance. They have different bone structure, different muscle structure, they don’t dream, and consequently can’t use magic (because of the way magic works in the setting). They are naturally immune to the toxicity of the magical mineral lyrium. They have an inherent sense of direction underground called stone sense (although admittedly surface dwarves lose this sense). These things are not cultural, they are, for lack of a better word in a fantasy context, biological.

I mean, I would call that a flaw in the writing of Star Trek. An alien species that is only biologically different from humans in that their ears are pointed? Talk about uninspired. Though, if you really care to get into the reeds here, that isn’t actually the only biological difference between Vulcans and Humans. Vulcans also experience emotions far more intensely than humans do, and they have some low-level psychic ability in the mind meld.

So you're acknowledging dwarves and Vulcans (and other fantasy/SF races) can have minds that are fundamentally different from human beings... (which I would agree with). But yet it's not OK to give them different INT or WIS stats? > _ <;; And it's not OK to suggest that they'd have general 'racial cultural tendencies' as a result of differences that aren't merely historic but fundamentally biological/'racial'?

I mean... this isn't intended as some big 'gotcha' but.... you literally just referred to how dwarves have "different muscle structure, different bone structure"! My point being, like I said -- it's impossible to talk about 'fantasy races' like you would responsibly talk about real races. If you can accept that it's OK to imagine creatures with different bodies, then it's OK to imagine them with different cultural tendencies, different aptitudes, etc.

 

[Minigiant]

I would love the Thri-Kreen weapons to be official for players.

Thri-Kreen Weapon Training: You have proficiency with the gythka and chatkcha

Bring back the silly double weapons!

 

[CasvalRemDeikun]

I was just thinking. I think I am actually fine with this development, but I think I am going to change the Point Buy system to have 16(12 pt) and 17 (14 pt), and give players players 32 pts for Point Buy. It should even out a fair amount compared to the current system, but open up a lot more options for players. Thoughts?

 

[Charlaquin]

So you're acknowledging dwarves and Vulcans (and other fantasy/SF races) can have minds that are fundamentally different from human beings... (which I would agree with). But yet it's not OK to give them different INT or WIS stats? > _ <;;

Again, my grievances with racial ASIs are at best tangentially related to my desire to separate race from culture. Yes, I acknowledge that different fantasy peoples could have different minds. I also don’t want different races to have different INT and WIS stats because I don’t want players who want to play, for example, dwarf wizards to be at a disadvantage compared to, say, elf wizards.

And it's not OK to suggest that they'd have general 'racial cultural tendencies' as a result of differences that aren't merely historic but fundamentally biological/'racial'?

I think the idea of “racial cultural tendencies” has uncomfortable implications, and would prefer characters of any race be able to belong to any culture.

I mean... this isn't intended as some big 'gotcha' but.... you literally just referred to how dwarves have "different muscle structure, different bone structure"! My point being, like I said -- it's impossible to talk about 'fantasy races' like you would responsibly talk about real races.

Right, which, again, isn’t a thing I’m suggesting we do, so this wouldn’t be a “gotcha,” even if you had meant it to be.

If you can accept that it's OK to imagine creatures with different bodies, then it's OK to imagine them with different cultural tendencies, different aptitudes, etc.

Well, first of all I don’t think B necessarily follows A there. But second of all, I’m fine with fantasy races being different from each other. Where it gets iffy for me is when you start conflating culture and biology. When you start saying that, for instance, Dwarven conservatism is a product of some inherent quality of their dwarvishness, rather than being a product of the social and material conditions in which most dwarves live.

 

[Charlaquin]

I was just thinking. I think I am actually fine with this development, but I think I am going to change the Point Buy system to have 16(12 pt) and 17 (14 pt), and give players players 32 pts for Point Buy. It should even out a fair amount compared to the current system, but open up a lot more options for players. Thoughts?

Yeah, since the release of Tasha’s I’ve been planning to ditch racial ASIs (be they fixed or floating) in favor of improved ability score generation. Specifically, my plan is to boost point buy to 32 points, allow you to buy up to 16, allow you to buy a starting feat for 5 points, and change the standard array to your choice of 16, 14, 13, 12, 11, 10 or 15, 14, 13, 12, 10, 8, and a feat. I don’t anticipate my players wanting to roll ability scores, but if I did I’d allow them to roll a 7th score and choose to either replace one of their 6 with it, or take a feat.