D&D General How do you like your ASIs?

[Yaarel]

My vote would be for abolishing ability scores entirely, but since I know that won't happen, I'll settle for getting rid of ASIs.

What I like about the abilities is they represent an "aptitude", of things that the character will tend to be good at, even without training.

For example, a bookish Wizard will tend to be good at History, even if that isnt something one trained for.

 

[Yaarel]

You are literally pointing out that the class does not define culture.

Class = Job.

My job, does not define my culture.

Nobody would fill out a census and enter Police Officer, as their culture.

The other way around!

A "class" is something that a culture invented.

(But we do talk about things like a "systemic culture" within a police department and academic institutions, so these cultural constructs can have their own subculture. Likewise, depending on setting, each Paladin archetype can represent a formal order with its own culture and customs.)

 

[Dausuul]

What I like about the abilities is they represent an "aptitude", of things that the character will tend to be good at, even without training.

For example, a bookish Wizard will tend to be good at History, even if that isnt something one trained for.

There are many ways to represent that which are far less fiddly than ability scores and don't bleed over into a million other irrelevant areas of the game.

 

[Scribe]

The other way around!

A "class" is something that a culture invented.

Are we talking 4th wall break?

A fighter will have behaviors, beliefs, values, provided by their culture.

It is not that their culture is Fighter.

I suppose as with all things here for some reason, the critical step has not been performed.

Define Culture, within the context of creating a 5e D&D Character.

 

[Yaarel]

Are we talking 4th wall break?

A fighter will have behaviors, beliefs, values, provided by their culture.

It is not that their culture is Fighter.

I suppose as with all things here for some reason, the critical step has not been performed.

Define Culture, within the context of creating a 5e D&D Character.

There is a whole thread discussing the race design update and the role of culture. Things like languages and proficiencies are called out by designers as "cultural".

 

[Yaarel]

There are many ways to represent that which are far less fiddly than ability scores

Give me an example, of how to represent "aptitude" and "talent", without something like abilities.

and don't bleed over into a million other irrelevant areas of the game.

Heh, for me that is a feature, not a bug.

But if you have an idea that you like better, let me know. I might agree.

 

[Maxperson]

To have "tribes" is a reallife human cultural feature.

We use words, because we're human. So if I describe a tribe of whatever in the game, people know what that means. What it doesn't have is any connection whatsoever to any real world tribe. Period. End of story. No connection to native american tribes. No connection to tribes in the Amazon. None. You don't get to invent connections that don't exist.

 

[Scribe]

There is a whole thread discussing the race design update and the role of culture. Things like languages and proficiencies are called out by designers as "cultural".

Correct. Because they wouldn't want to say (anymore) that a race or class, defines ones culture.

Race is not culture.
Class is not culture.

___

Putting it simply.

My ancestry is Irish.
Going back 3 Generations, either Migrated, or born in North America.
Raised Christian.
Work in IT for near 20 years.

There is little in the way of cultural definition there.

My background, would define most everything we would call cultural, in any modern sense of the word.

Because nobody would call me Irish, and nobody would say I am from 'IT Culture.'

Bringing this back to D&D, where a race can now be from anywhere, and a class can be found anywhere?

Those are no longer culture defining aspects, and that is by design.

 

[Micah Sweet]

There is a whole thread discussing the race design update and the role of culture. Things like languages and proficiencies are called out by designers as "cultural".

You know what isn't called out by designers as "cultural"? Class.

 

[Dausuul]

Give me an example, of how to represent "aptitude" and "talent", without something like abilities.

An "aptitude" trait which applies to a group of related skills and provides the following benefits:

1. If you make a skill check from that group, and you aren't proficient, you get half your proficiency bonus*.
2. When you have the option to gain proficiency in a skill, you can instead gain two skills from that group.

This provides the following advantages over ability scores:

• A bunch of number-crunching at the start of chargen is totally eliminated.
• In play, you only need to know two numbers: Your proficiency bonus, and half your proficiency bonus. I can't tell you how many times I've watched novice players stumble over which numbers to add to a given roll.
• Independence at chargen. You can pay for aptitude without also paying for a lot of other stuff you may not want or care about (e.g., saving throws, attack and damage bonuses, the option to multiclass).
• Related to the previous, choosing a descriptor to flesh out your character concept ("educated/scholarly") no longer requires you to sacrifice combat effectiveness if you don't happen to belong to the right class (wizard).

*Proficiency bonus would be increased to compensate for the lack of ability mods.