D&D (2024) 2024 Player's Handbook Reveal: Feats/Backgrounds/Species

[Arilyn]

Great for you, but the current alternative is that NOBODY gets to play them anymore. Not in a meanignful way. Experience tells me that if something is in a sidebar on the DMG, I can expect to maaaaybee being able to use is at most once, and that is if I luck out.

And most important to me, there is just no halfelf lore anymore, just gone.

The disappearance of half-elves and half-orcs is going to seem odd in the 2024 books. Not seeing them in the art, not seeing them pop up as NPCs, but goliath and aasimar all over the place changes things. And since it's not a new edition, it'll especially feel like they just went poof.

 

[Staffan]

So Wayfarer is no name for Urchin?

Do we have any confirmation that Wayfarer is a replacement for Urchin? It might be because English isn't my native languages, but they don't sound like the same thing at all. Wayfarer sounds more like a nomadic type – think Roma, or herders, or something like that.

I think my biggest problem with "backgrounds" is that a lot of them don't really make sense to me. I guess in my head I usually picture the characters starting out as young adults.

So what does it mean to have "knight" or "soldier" as your background? Who should be better at fighting, a background of soldier who has started adventuring as a wizard or a background of sage who has started adventuring as a fighter? Should 't someone with background of soldier or knight and class of fighter be noticeably better than either of those at fightery things? If not, does that mean the sage background person was some sort of prodigy? Why can't the soldiery person also be a prodigy?

Your background is more about your environment growing up and spending your formative years rather than your specific training. A wizard with the soldier background spent time in the army, doing military exercises and stuff like that. They'll be trained in marching long distances and recognizing military signaling, and be familiar with military jargon, but they fundamentally still studied magic rather than sword/spear drills. And a fighter with the sage background probably learned their fightering in an academic context – either something like a military academy, or were someone who prefered physical pursuits over intellectual ones.

And then there's the whole "I failed at my previous job/training" angle. For example: I was a wizard apprentice but spent precious study hours partying with the locals instead. I'm taking a bonus in Charisma and Constitution (socializing and surviving heavy drinking and bar fights explain these stat bumps.) I did absorb some Arcana knowledge and maybe Persuasion or Acrobatics. I can also take the magicy background feat because I wasn't a total washout, or not, if I didn't even manage that much.

Remember that backgrounds give a stat bonus. They do not determine the whole stat. If you were a failed wizard apprentice who spent their time partying, put high values in Charisma and Constitution, and then let the Sage background buff Intelligence and whatever other stat it increases.

 

[Parmandur]

Do we have any confirmation that Wayfarer is a replacement for Urchin? It might be because English isn't my native languages, but they don't sound like the same thing at all. Wayfarer sounds more like a nomadic type – think Roma, or herders, or something like that.

It's not the name, it's the descriptive text that was shared in one of the influencer previews. The Wanderer is the "grew up on the mean streets" Vagabond.

 

[Epic Meepo]

It's not the name, it's the descriptive text that was shared in one of the influencer previews. The Wanderer is the "grew up on the mean streets" Vagabond.

Wanderer and Vagabond would both have been better names for it. But I'm pretty sure the influencers called it Wayfarer, which doesn't make all that much sense.

 

[Zeromaru X]

Am I the only one who is bummed that they used the standard dragon heads for the dragonborn, when they had those unique and cool head designs from Baldur's Gate 3?

 

[Parmandur]

Am I the only one who is bummed that they used the standard dragon heads for the dragonborn, when they had those unique and cool head designs from Baldur's Gate 3?

That's the way Dragonborn have been depicted in books since the change in art direction after the Forgotten Realms Magic set...so after BG3.

 

[OB1]

While I get why they moved custom backgrounds to the DMG (for ease of onboarding new players by providing some inspiration and guidance), I'll definitely be making custom backgrounds the default for my games, adding to my list of house rules from UA changes that didn't make it into the final version but that I think are great.

That said, I think a better implementation for the PHB would have been getting a +1 in your primary stat from class, and then have the background give you either +2 or +1/+1 chosen from three possibilities in the background. I may use that for new players in my games.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

While I get why they moved custom backgrounds to the DMG (for ease of onboarding new players by providing some inspiration and guidance), I'll definitely be making custom backgrounds the default for my games, adding to my list of house rules from UA changes that didn't make it into the final version but that I think are great.

That said, I think a better implementation for the PHB would have been getting a +1 in your primary stat from class, and then have the background give you either +2 or +1/+1 chosen from three possibilities in the background. I may use that for new players in my games.

Not a bad idea. Also the fixed feat is something I don't particular like. I really liked to have unlikely backgrounds. Maybebhaving the choice of twonfeats as a default would have been nicer.

Edit: treantmonk hinted that they left out something very important from backgrounds. Maybe that is the thing which adresses all our concerns... (one can hope).

 

[OB1]

Not a bad idea. Also the fixed feat is something I don't particular like. I really liked to have unlikely backgrounds. Maybebhaving the choice of twonfeats as a default would have been nicer.

Edit: treantmonk hinted that they left out something very important from backgrounds. Maybe that is the thing which adresses all our concerns... (one can hope).

Agreed, two feats to choose from would have been nice as well.

Also hit me that we probably won't see combos of Dex/Con/Cha, Dex/Con/Wis and Dex/Con/Int in the 16 backgrounds. I get the sense that a few stat/feat combos are so good at 1st level that they would have quickly become default. It doesn't bother me in the slightest if that's how my players want to build their character, but I understand the guardrails being there for newer DMs.

 

[MoonSong]

@OB1 The houserule is not bad. Indeed I see myself implementing something similar. But I see no point to buying into the new edition/ whatever if the books haven't come out of the shop yet and we see the need for houserules already. And also, because this does nothing for me as a player.