D&D 5E Ability Score Increases (I've changed my mind.)

[Scribe]

So I'm kind of with @dave2008 here. I can't feel too bad because we've had it your way for nearly 50 years. Now you can learn to adapt the same way we always had to adapt.

So spite then, got it.

 

[Scribe]

And not having that floating ASI is a loss to other people.

You have that. Have since Tasha's, officially in print. So...

 

[abirdcall]

You have that. Have since Tasha's, officially in print. So...

Yeah I don't get it.

Why are people against both options going forward?

If your table wants to play with Tasha's they can.

If they stop having racial ASIs that option is no longer there for the tables that want it.

Both groups can win or only one. Why not just have a win for everyone

 

[Faolyn]

Im trying to get a sense of where you are coming from. In what sense would Tashas be making you "lose" something?

If you want your elf to have the +2 in Dexterity, you can still choose to put it there.

If I want my elf to have the +2 in Charisma, I can choose to put there.

Neither of us have lost the elf we want.

I wasn't talking about Tasha's. I was talking about fixed racial ASIs.

 

[Faolyn]

You have that. Have since Tasha's, officially in print. So...

Yep. And that's almost certainly what's going to be the way it's going from now on. Have you really felt a great loss because of it?

So spite then, got it.

Should've know, what with your Me. Mine. I. statements, that would be the only part you would respond to. Should I assume that you're being spiteful towards everyone else when you insist on certain things remain exactly the way because of how they affect you?

 

[Micah Sweet]

Except that it was never actually "literally always possible."

Sure, I could always say "in my world, goblins are any alignment but all dragons, even the metallic ones, are evil." But not a single official source would ever include anything like that, because goblins are evil and metallic dragons are good. And if they did introduce creatures from an evil race that had become good, those creatures were always an anomaly. The only excepts are for settings like Eberron, which very specifically chose to ignore racial alignments. And because of that, it would be difficult or even impossible to convince some players that no, "in my world" things are different, because officially goblins are evil and metallic dragons are good.

So I'm kind of with @dave2008 here. I can't feel too bad because we've had it your way for nearly 50 years. Now you can learn to adapt the same way we always had to adapt.

So instead of equality of options, you'd rather just have things your way because, "we've had it our way for nearly 50 years"? Are we taking turns now, or can we try to work out something where both sides get what they want?

 

[Scribe]

Yep. And that's almost certainly what's going to be the way it's going from now on. Have you really felt a great loss because of it?


Should've know, what with your Me. Mine. I. statements, that would be the only part you would respond to. Should I assume that you're being spiteful towards everyone else when you insist on certain things remain exactly the way because of how they affect you?

Make Tasha's official, with racial ASI the option for all I care.

Would that satisfy you, or do people who prefer how 5e was delivered need a few decades of dissatisfaction first?

I've consistently said, there is no issue with having both as official options. So... nope.

 

[FrogReaver]

So instead of equality of options, you'd rather just have things your way because, "we've had it our way for nearly 50 years"? Are we taking turns now, or can we try to work out something where both sides get what they want?

Sometimes both sides cannot get what they want

 

[Bill Zebub]

Sometimes both sides cannot get what they want

But if you try some time...you just might find...YOU GET WHAT YOU NEED....

 

[Bill Zebub]

That's not entirely true. If whatever comes next just covers the floating bonuses, then we lose an aspect of the elf archetype that has been represented in the system since at least 1e AD&D. From my perspective, since it took all of 1.5 pages of Tasha's to describe how groups can follow the archetypes or not and offer some guidance to trade-off the archetypical characteristics, I don't see why they couldn't keep the archetype and incorporate Tasha's suggestions in whatever exists going forward. That really would be a case where we both do get the elf we want.

So, after reading this whole thread, I guess I'm still struggling to understand what anybody is "losing". Presumably the entries for NPC elves will still have high dexterity. And presumably people who care about this particular archetype will continue to put the +2 into dexterity. Other people at the table might put the +2 somewhere else, but even now nothing is forcing anybody to put their highest attribute into Dex (before the ASI) so not all PC elves have high dexterity anyway. I mean, if somebody showed up with an Elf PC with an 8 dex, and you knew that it was created with Point Buy or Standard Array, you might say, "Aha! That wasn't even possible before!" But I really doubt that's what you are worried about.

Can you help me understand what you think will be lost?