D&D (2024) How did I miss this about the Half races/ancestries

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

May be the game doesn't need 50 gajillilon race options.

faints

 

[DarkCrisis]

May be the game doesn't need 50 gajillilon race options.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

But how am I going to be some obscure and difficult species to be difficult with if there aren't a gazillion options? I'd have to like, use creativity or something. Egads!

 

[Neonchameleon]

My son doesn't call himself half-white or half-black. He chooses himself who to identify as. And since racial modifiers are all the same now (floating), it doesn't really matter. If someone has a dwarf parent and an elf parent, they can choose to identify as dwarf, or elf, or neither if they want. It should be their choice.

Racial modifiers are one thing, racial traits another - and more important.

But. There's a real niche that half-elves (and to a lesser extent half orcs) were hitting; the second generation immigrant. The people who talk one language at home and another at school and with their friends. And they don't actually fit properly in either culture unless there are enough of them to be their own subculture; they've grown up in the country their parents immigrated to so they don't fit in their parents' birth country, but by the same token their parents keep home and frequently speak the language they grew up with at home and they pick a lot up from that. A child of two worlds.

In D&D that normally maps to half-elves and the like. Neither one thing nor the other but distinctively a mix.

 

[Emberashh]

The way I see it if you're going to make race matter mechanically, then you're going against that goal by trying to facilitate a billion different ones at once, as it dilutes how meaningfully different each option can be.

But then that has to be weighed against how you differentiate them.

Attribute differences have been the cliche for decades, and they're part and parcel to why race mechanics tend to ring alarm bells, because any negatives that get derived from attributes inherently cast the entire option in stereotypes.

It would be better to differentiate races with different boons that have nothing to do with rote ability, and/or celebrate a culture rather than denigrate it.

For instance, in my game's default setting, Goblins are so inherently brave that they can directly resist magical fear, and this is a boon they recieve because of their biology, being the literal seeds of trees, which makes death as most humanoids understand it effectively meaningless for them.

Thats very different from giving them, say, +2 dexterity and -2 intelligence, and having to deal with all the ridiculous stereotypes that come out of describing a goblin like that.

 

[dave2008]

I was thinking in broader terms about mixing and tracking all of the rule changes between the two versions, not just the species.
I should have specified that in my OP.

IDK, it doesn't seem like a problem to me. We already have houserules that change more of the game than anything planned for 2024 and it isn't hard to track. But I can make up a scenario how it could be for other groups.

 

[Sacrosanct]

Racial modifiers are one thing, racial traits another - and more important.

Which still exist with the current proposal. You choose which parentage is the dominant one. Just like I have blue eyes if my parents have brown and blue eyes.

But. There's a real niche that half-elves (and to a lesser extent half orcs) were hitting; the second generation immigrant. The people who talk one language at home and another at school and with their friends. And they don't actually fit properly in either culture unless there are enough of them to be their own subculture; they've grown up in the country their parents immigrated to so they don't fit in their parents' birth country, but by the same token their parents keep home and frequently speak the language they grew up with at home and they pick a lot up from that. A child of two worlds.

In D&D that normally maps to half-elves and the like. Neither one thing nor the other but distinctively a mix.

That can still be done, right? What's stopping a PC with a human dad and orc mother doing the same trope?

 

[The Myopic Sniper]

How about... ?

Dual Species: You get all the traits of your two ancestral species , but you lose the +2/+1 Ability Score Increases from your background.

I have no clue if this is balanced or not. Obviously, some combos will be better than others depending on how well the features synergize or how much redundancy each species has in its power budget.

 

[Bawylie]

How about

You are MORTAL. Mortals come in innumerable variations but all share a few common traits. All mortals are born, age, and will eventually die. They tend to have humanoid forms including (but not limited to) a head with a brain, a torso, a pair of arms and a pair of legs. Their appearances vary by geography, heritage, culture, and self-expression.

As a mortal, pick N number of the following traits that your particular character has. Then pick X number of traits off the next list.

 

[DarkCrisis]

How about

You are MORTAL. Mortals come in innumerable variations but all share a few common traits. All mortals are born, age, and will eventually die. They tend to have humanoid forms including (but not limited to) a head with a brain, a torso, a pair of arms and a pair of legs. Their appearances vary by geography, heritage, culture, and self-expression.

As a mortal, pick N number of the following traits that your particular character has. Then pick X number of traits off the next list.

Give it a few more editions er... revisions to sanitize things down and we can all play as the Greendale Human from the Community tv show.