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

[Scars Unseen]

Metaphorically, a half-elf shouldn't have to be a Fighter 10/Wizard 10 compared to a Fighter 20 or Wizard 20, they should be more like a bladesinger or an eldritch knight; bearing their own qualities beyond that of the parent classes.

I have something of an idea for that. A mix of ideas, really. Some people in the thread have floated the idea of racial features via feats (which isn't, in itself, a new idea). I think it would be interesting to have feats only available to half races. And if we were to use a system similar to what some others have described (major and minor traits), you could, for example, make half-elven racial feats that are only available to characters who didn't choose elf for the major trait of the pairing.

Just as a completely non-balanced, book inspired example, you could have a half-elf feat called Elfsong that allows the character to ignore the requirement for somatic casting components as well as material components for spells without a material component cost. Additionally, at level 5, the character may choose one metamagic feature from the sorcerer's class feature list. (basing this off the 5E PHB class).

but having only 2 out of 45 possible options out of the PHB only seems rather limiting.
So having a system that allows for more would be neat.

The problem is they didn't present a system that allows for more than that. They presented a non-system (mechanically speaking) and then gave us their blessing to describe our characters however we want, something no one needed WotC's permission for in the first place.

They have still time to correct this. I hope they do.
Being up in arms before anything is settled is premature, unreasonable and not helpful at all.
Reading the thread on twitter, it was a jumbled mess of misrepresentating statements and OGL hurt feelings and general WotC and everyone there is evil...

I really have no understanding for that kind of behavior, although I can understand why some people take offense in the current rule iterarion and want it changed.

If people had waited until things settled before getting up in arms about something they didn't like, we'd just now be complaining about the finalized and released OGL 1.1. The best time to complain about things is before they've settled. WotC is much more likely to change a playtest idea than to unpublish a new PHB.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

I have something of an idea for that. A mix of ideas, really. Some people in the thread have floated the idea of racial features via feats (which isn't, in itself, a new idea). I think it would be interesting to have feats only available to half races. And if we were to use a system similar to what some others have described (major and minor traits), you could, for example, make half-elven racial feats that are only available to characters who didn't choose elf for the major trait of the pairing.

Just as a completely non-balanced, book inspired example, you could have a half-elf feat called Elfsong that allows the character to ignore the requirement for somatic casting components as well as material components for spells without a material component cost. Additionally, at level 5, the character may choose one metamagic feature from the sorcerer's class feature list. (basing this off the 5E PHB class).



The problem is they didn't present a system that allows for more than that. They presented a non-system (mechanically speaking) and then gave us their blessing to describe our characters however we want, something no one needed WotC's permission for in the first place.


If people had waited until things settled before getting up in arms about something they didn't like, we'd just now be complaining about the finalized and released OGL 1.1. The best time to complain about things is before they've settled. WotC is much more likely to change a playtest idea than to unpublish a new PHB.

You really misunderstood me: I am not against voicing your concerns loidly and adamantly and so on. It is the way it is done. Being "up in arms" and calling WotC racist for a statement that was clearly not meant that way if you look at a minimum context around that statement is totally out of place.

And I am not speaking about OGL 1.1 whoch was a totally different beast.
Intermingling those two issues is also something they do in the twitter thread, which is also something I don't find in any way appropriate.

 

[Scars Unseen]

You really misunderstood me: I am not against voicing your concerns loidly and adamantly and so on. It is the way it is done. Being "up in arms" and calling WotC racist for a statement that was clearly not meant that way if you look at a minimum context around that statement is totally out of place.

And I am not speaking about OGL 1.1 whoch was a totally different beast.
Intermingling those two issues is also something they do in the twitter thread, which is also something I don't find in any way appropriate.

Oh, I'm definitely not going to claim they're racist (and to be fair, I don't think most people bringing this up are either). They're just horrible at messaging and probably should leave the majority of "the fight" as it were in the hands of the community and focus on game mechanics. WotC trying to champion inclusiveness so far has resembled the Simpsons "stepping on rakes" gag more than anything else.

Though to be fair to WotC, if they're going to try to stumble their way to a coherent end result, better done in a playtest than having to make apologies and retractions over a final published work (e.g. Spelljammer). Unfortunately, they're also undermined by...

And I am not speaking about OGL 1.1 whoch was a totally different beast.
Intermingling those two issues is also something they do in the twitter thread, which is also something I don't find in any way appropriate.

So setting aside that I only brought that up as a point of comparison for the effectiveness of speaking out, I absolutely disagree that they are different beasts. For one, it's the same organization, and it's not like this is ancient history we're talking about. But more to the point, the OGL fiasco also undermines any credibility I might be willing to give them as to their sincerity regarding inclusiveness. Oh don't get me wrong: a corporation contributing to progress to protect or enhance profits is better than a corporation not contributing to progress. But I'm not going to forget any time soon how they were perfectly willing to try to weaponize their progressive customers against their own interests by insisting that they had to demolish the old OGL in order to stop the racists.

So I don't believe they're sincere (as an organization) in their stated goals (regarding inclusiveness) because of the OGL fiasco, and I don't believe they're competent in pursuing them because of... well, just about everything else. I still think they could arrive at a decent result eventually, but I'm not sure this playtest is going to iterate enough on the concepts involved to do the job. For game mechanics, it's probably fine (even if it could be better), but for anything that's supposed to tackle potentially sensitive social dynamics, I just don't think the way they're going about it is the right format, and I believe the results are bearing that out.

Though of course the final result could be entirely different, and I could find myself eating my words. Lord knows the D&D Next playtest wasn't especially predictive of the end result.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

So I don't believe they're sincere (as an organization) in their stated goals (regardingi inclusiveness) because of the OGL fiasco

That logic is twisted.
I don't think we have common ground here.
Feel free to ignore me. Would us spare a lot of words.

 

[Hussar]

As the parent of a mixed ethnicity child, my wife and myself being different basic ethnicities, I can totally say it is not racist at all to use the term half, in fact that is how we all describe our son, him included. He is proudly half one thing and half another thing, total reality. Heck I'm mixed ethnicity just not as obvious as our son. I'm split into 1/4s, and yes I say my ethnic background is 1/4 this, 1/4 that etc...

And they killed all the cool stuff that made half unique, now it's just one thing mechanically with another made up description. So yeah they killed the fun and cool part. You should be able to pull from both races and mix them together, it starts getting racist to me when we say one is the dominant race over the other like they are proposing now, that sucks like wotc does in general these days.

See, look how that went...

And, as a parent of mixed heritage children, having complete strangers come up to them and comment to their face they are half children is incredibly racist. As in, "Half (haafu) children are just so cute". Or various other comments like, "You must not use your English name. You are Japanese, so, you must use your Japanese name." Or, having someone sit out their graduation ceremony because they are wearing corn rows. Or a million other daily bits of racism directed at anyone who isn't "pure" of blood.

Just because you don't happen to see it, doesn't mean that no one else does.

 

[Hussar]

It was a choice based in fear, so they have no strong motivation to change in the current social environment.

Yes, because acknowledging racism is based in fear. Not like anyone ever suffers from being called half breed after all. Oh, wait, yes they do and you know this because I know I've told you this before. But, hey, nice to be characterized as engaging in moral panic and being a member of hte unreasonable mob. Good to know that conversation can possibly be productive when the other half of the conversation considers me to be irrational.

 

[Hussar]

My reactions to this are, in order: It's an elegant solution that sidesteps the need for balancing mix-and-match traits between dozens of playable humanoids, I don't particularly like it, wait... it's essentially Mr. Spock (a Vulcan/human mix with the mechanics based one parent).

If it's like Star Trek, it must be good!

(with a few exceptions)

After all, how many human traits did Elrond have? If something works in both Star Trek AND Lord of the Rings, that's a pretty solid geek culture endorsement.

 

[Hussar]

This is where I think they are losing the interest of a lot of people

No, this is where they are losing your interest. It would be very helpful not to try to pretend that your interests represent anyone other than yourself.

 

[Aldarc]

I think that it's worth considering for WotC to develop new names for half-elves and half-orcs rather than simply throwing the baby out with the bathwater, much in the same manner as tieflings or aasimar. In Eberron, half-elves call themselves "Khoravar." That is obviously not applicable to all settings, but a similar idea could be found there. Or even have the mechanical representation of half-elves be "Feywild-touched" humans: e.g., "Feyborn."

 

[UngeheuerLich]

I think that it's worth considering for WotC to develop new names for half-elves and half-orcs rather than simply throwing the baby out with the bathwater, much in the same manner as tieflings or aasimar. In Eberron, half-elves call themselves "Khoravar." That is obviously not applicable to all settings, but a similar idea could be found there. Or even have the mechanical representation of half-elves be "Feywild-touched" humans: e.g., "Feyborn."

I am not sure touched by fey passes the sensitivity check...