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

[Mirrorrorrim]

I hope that this doesn't count as political because I think it has a direct impact on design, but I think Wizards is listening to their sensitivity readers who are likely educating them on how the term "half" can be triggering to some people, especially how it is often used in a racist manner, whether historically or in the modern era. They may have to to weigh that against the feelings of people who are comfortable claiming it for themselves, and identify so deeply with the concept of "half" that they feel they are being erased if it is removed from the rules.

Wizards has said they want to revise the language for an inclusive world going forward for the next 50 years. We're seeing it in not just D&D, but many games. I really hope Wizards finds a way to do honor to what some players love as "half-races." Like maybe create modular racial abilities that so many people have suggested, and use them to create a elf/human stat-block as an example in new Mixed-Peoples rules, to show how it can be done?

I don't have the answer, but I know that people with different perspectives are affected in real ways. It's a tricky needle to thread.

 

[Faolyn]

I'm not sure how it's segregationist to say that two completely different species can't reproduce. A dog can't reproduce with a cat, a fish can't reproduce with a bird, etc. Yes there are exceptions, and some very closely related species can reproduce despite not being the same species. But those are exceptions and not the norm.

And not being able to reproduce doesn't mean two species have to segregate either. People can form meaningful bonds and relationships even without offspring being involved.

Of course there will always be exceptions and flavourings for peoples characters they've thought of. A warforged/human might be a cyborg. A dragonborn/dwarf might be a half-dragon. Or someone's homebrew setting could simply say that anyone can reproduce with anyone regardless of species or gender.

D&D--as you yourself have noted, by saying half-dragons--has always ignored biology. None of the races have any weird allergies or dietary needs (like cats and dogs have), or have any strange reactions to magic; they've never even have elves and other creatures with fey ancestry be vulnerable to iron! The closest that they've gotten for even taking real-world biological weirdness into account is noting that kobolds are sequential hermaphrodites. So why bother caring about their reproductive abilities?

 

[Vaalingrade]

I feel like there's two issues here:

Having mechanical representation for the offspring of two largely disparate creatures (and also humans and pointy eared humans) and the writing around those characters encouraging in-character discrimination and harassment as a default on top of the attendant tropes an language that goes with it, up to and including the Half-X terminology.

Because you can be good with one part and not the other, it's causing more conflict than usual because they're being packaged together when they shouldn't.

I personally want a them to codify Tasha's as how you make mixed species folk of all combinations and not tell the DM to make a player's experience worse for their choice of character as the default.

 

[Bagpuss]

Until one of those "species" is a bit too similar to a real-world people, in which case you are applying the language used by bigots in the real world, which is a problem.

The only people similar to real world people in fantasy games are the same species, humans.

 

[Bagpuss]

Replace "species" with "heritage", "lineage" or "ancestry" and tell me that sentence is still not offensive.

Why would I replace it with a word that has a different meaning? Stop trying to take offence where none is intended.

 

[Remathilis]

It should come to no surprise that if you replace one word with another word that has a different definition that you will change the meaning of the sentence.

All of those terms have been used by various companies to replace "race" in D&D. The species argument about gorillas and dolphins falls apart when you use ancestry or lineage instead. To be honest, it sounds the most icky even if you use the original word (race).

IReally, WotC should just abandon any bonuses or negatives associated with a particular species. Are you an orc? Great. You stats and abilites are exactly the same as a human. Do you have an elven mother and a dwarf father? Great. Your stats and abilities are exactly the same as a human. You and the DM get to work out what being a dwarf or an elf means in your campaign world. It's boring, but it's safe because it won't cause any offense.

"If I can't have a half-orc, then nobody should get anything!"

I'm perfectly fine with my dwarf/elf (dwelf?) Using the stats of one or the other in order to keep mechanical balance. I'm leery about any system that just lets players mix and match to get the best traits of two species. I'm sure you could create a system where you can balance said choices, but I feel that is too much for the PHB. Either way, I'm fine with this as a placeholder system until a better one is done by WotC or a 3pp.

If I can overcome my disappointment for how psionic was handled, this should not be a problem.

 

[Frozen_Heart]

D&D--as you yourself have noted, by saying half-dragons--has always ignored biology. None of the races have any weird allergies or dietary needs (like cats and dogs have), or have any strange reactions to magic; they've never even have elves and other creatures with fey ancestry be vulnerable to iron! The closest that they've gotten for even taking real-world biological weirdness into account is noting that kobolds are sequential hermaphrodites. So why bother caring about their reproductive abilities?

I mean I'm not exactly going to expect the PHB to go into every quirk of the bodies and minds of every species. Irl there are only humans, and yet the information about humans fills more books then it's possible to read in a lifetime.

With exceptions such as magic, I like fantasy settings to have internal consistency and rules. The fact that only half-elves and half-orcs existed insinuates that there were consistent rules to how these things worked.

If course if I was dm'ing and a player came along asking for an exception, I'd always try to make something work.

 

[Vaalingrade]

Why would I replace it with a word that has a different meaning? Stop trying to take offence where none is intended.

Have you ever said something to someone that turned out to be bad for reasons you weren't aware of? Did you apologize to them anyway without berating them for 'being offended' like basic polite society expects?

 

[Kinematics]

I want a consistent set of guidelines for creating my own ancestries, not a list of what's "allowed" or even "typical."

I very much want this.

I made a yuki-onna character for a game a while back, and while it was fun, it was also a lot of work because there were no official guidelines on how to do something like that.

Even beyond mixed races, a generalized, "This is how you go about creating a reasonably-balanced player race to use in your own game" type of ruleset would be quite nice. It seems like a pure superset of rules for creating mixed races, which would obsolete the "Pick a parent race and a physical look, and go" type of rule.

Table 1's dwarf/dragonborn would likely be different than table 2's, but you could also just as easily create your own squidgirl or satyr or whatever, and any one of them would feel like your own creation.

Of course, all of this is still purely on the mechanical side of things, and still leaves the characterization stepping stones on the argument table. The PHB has to make things easy for new players and players who aren't creating 30-page backstories. (WotC does, after all, want to expand their playerbase, and hardcore players are only a small fraction of that.)

If they really want to simplify the race side of things, then they should compensate by expanding the backgrounds, putting more variable ideas in that area to help guide people in picking character concepts. (Level Up's cultures also work well, but I don't expect WotC to make that significant a change to their system.)

 

[Frozen_Heart]

The end point of the 'funny hats' path we have been on for some time.

If that happens, I'm picking options out of the monster manual which players can use if they want a mechanically different race/species/schmorp.