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True. Destiny in Level Up is there to provide your character a reason for why they gave up their cushy job, strapped on some armor and decided to rough it in the wilderness. ;) "You gave it all up for that?!?"

True, like Folk Hero, which sounds more like a Destiny than a Background.

The designers of D&D purposefully made Background into another name for Profession. What you did for a living before circumstances propelled you into a life of adventure within a D&D setting. And to give Background some weight, they decided to use some game mechanics in order to give it some...

You can be a member of a Godbound culture without being an Acolyte and subsequently a member of a church or a temple's hierarchy of priests. Sages can be found within a Collegiate culture, teaching generalized or specialized knowledge to those who want to learn from them. And there are many...

The 5e24 Backgrounds also seem to favor some classes over others.

Could a person's background be considered to be a subculture? A culture within a culture. I ask this because of @Yaarel equating background and culture as being the same thing.

It's only a problem for you because you chose to see it as a problem rather an additional element to customize your character. I happen to like the level of customization Level Up offers in its' character origin section. The addition of culture IMO fixed an obvious issue that had existed in D&D...

A combination of lore and mechanical traits that best provides a window into what a species is like in terms of role-playing as a member of said species.

You're probably right about there being no such thing as culture as a standalone element in RL. There are an untold number of cultures and subcultures that had existed and continue to exist in RL society around the world today. However, in an RPG such as D&D and Level Up, we have to follow the...

When a character decides to become an adventurer by picking up a certain class, you're temporarily or permanently leaving a prior job behind. And your current and prior jobs don't have to be tied together at the hip. Remember when 3e had a Profession skill? ;) You are skilled at a specific...

Not likely. The 5.5e backgrounds are too rigid IMO. Culture is a bit more dynamic than that.

Exactly. I consider my RL job as a retail shift supervisor as a background. Not a culture since I wasn't raised to be one.

Do you think of your job in RL as a background or as a culture?

Twilight Step is simply the Level Up equivalent of the Misty Step spell. Only instead of being a spell being learned by sorcerers, warlocks and wizards, it's a cultural feature that any member of the Eladrin culture can now do, be they an Elf or a member of another heritage in Level Up. And it's...

True. But as others have pointed out already, they're two separate things. Level Up has it where some species and some monsters have more than one type. For instance, a faerie dragon is both a dragon and a fey creature. Its type is dragon (fey). Any game rules which apply to dragons, or which...

Well, if the Eberron setting was made using Level Up, Orc characters would get to choose from three distinct Orc cultures. The Ghaash'kala, the Jhorash'tar, and the Shadow Marches orcs. ;)

Level Up presents a more interesting take on Orc culture. The simple name “orc” often has the prejudice of thousands of years of conflict bearing down upon it. Many orcs are shackled to a simplistic portrayal of war and blood, and are used to hearing the title “orc” spat with the same venom as...

They and the elves already have Fey Ancestry. That's enough for some to make them different from Orcs.

RL Cultural representation. Those who play/GM D&D are almost a culture of their own making. Our cultural representation of the goblins appears to be saying something different than how they have been presented in RL. The 'Our Goblins Are Different' trope. ;)

Yeah. Hopefully someone did a homebrew on these Shadowfell Goblins.