D&D 5E A First Look at Tasha’s Lineage System In AL Player’s Guide - Customizing Your Origin In D&D

The new player’s guide for the D&D Adventurers League has been released. Appendix 1 includes the new info from Tasha’s Cauldron on customizing your origin. It‘s a one-page appendix.

The D&D Adventurers League now uses this variant system from Tasha’s Cauldron of Everything since it allows for a greater degree of customization. For ease of reference, the relevant information is included as an appendix to this document and doesn’t count against the PH + 1 rule.

You can do any of the following (obviously the full document has more detail):

1. Move your race ability score increases wherever your want to. “...take any ability score increase you gain in your race or subrace and apply it to an ability score of your choice.”​

2. Replace each language from your race with any language from a set list.​

3. Swap each proficiency for another of the same type.​

4. Alter behaviour/personality race-based descriptions.​

Its not clear if that’s the whole Lineage system or just part of it. You can download the player’s guide here.

 

[thealmightyn]

nothing in there about assuming that someone’s choice is lesser, only that the group pandering is catering or exploiting something that someone wants.

I'm not trying to take sides in the overall back 'n' forth you two are having, but come on, dude. When you accuse someone of pandering to someone else, there's an implicit understanding there that you do not approve of the effect of the pandering. Nobody complains when someone panders to them. LOL

And that's not even accounting for the rest of your comments that explicitly bash the decisions and the company trying to give options to people who don't want to be penalized for playing a character they want to play.

To be clear, I agree with some of the general ideas you're putting forth. I'm also not a huge fan of the specific approach that Wizards has taken with this. I honestly think that the changes essentially make race a non-choice, kind of like how background is right now.

I personally think that if they're going down this route, they should just nix a mechanical race choice altogether. Give everyone a +2 to one ability score, a +1 to another ability score, and then some form of "budget" with which to choose from a selection of popular racial features. If the goal is for people to not feel penalized for playing a certain race/class combo, then just make class the meaningful mechanical choice and relegate race to fluff just like background is when you take the custom background approach (since once every character can just have whatever ASIs they want without having to make choices, like you said, it more or less does become fluff).

 

[Cadence]

It isn't badly balanced, the races are. If a dwarf wizard getting a +2 to Int and proficiency in medium armor is unbalanced, that isn't a problem with this feature, it's a balance issue with the race.

How is it the race that's unbalanced in favoring wizards too much, when the default write-up of the race isn't unbalanced in favoring them? If a new rule allows the making of an unbalanced character, how is that not the fault of the late added rule?

 

[MikalC]

I'm not trying to take sides in the overall back 'n' forth you two are having, but come on, dude. When you accuse someone of pandering to someone else, there's an implicit understanding there that you do not approve of the effect of the pandering. Nobody complains when someone panders to them. LOL

theres a difference between judging how a particular group plays the game and judging a company making decisions for the game itself.

im fine (even if I disagree with) the former. I’m more harsh on the latter.

And that's not even accounting for the rest of your comments that explicitly bash the decisions and the company trying to give options to people who don't want to be penalized for playing a character they want to play.

see above.

I personally think that if they're going down this route, they should just nix a mechanical race choice altogether. Give everyone a +2 to one ability score, a +1 to another ability score, and then some form of "budget" with which to choose from a selection of popular racial features. If the goal is for people to not feel penalized for playing a certain race/class combo, then just make class the meaningful mechanical choice and relegate race to fluff just like background is when you take the custom background approach (since once every character can just have whatever ASIs they want without having to make choices, like you said, it more or less does become fluff).

depending on how it was done I’d be more comfortable with that too, though for me such a system should also force players to again, actually have to potentially make choices that aren’t always going to be positive for their concept. Checks and balances. Give and take. Not just give give give.

my major gripe here is similar to those who complain about Hexblade (which I personally don’t complain about)- it’s a badly written rules patch, slapped on to pander to those who went more inclusivity in dnd and less “stereotypes”, while not actually addressing it.
If the system had been designed for this up front? Much less of a concern. Right now it’s a square peg in a round hole, being used as a means to get points for something it doesn’t actually do.

 

[Levistus's_Leviathan]

hint: when someone creates a half assed rule variant to at best superficially create inclusivity while not actually doing so, that’s pandering.

It's not pandering, it's telling being untruthful.

yeah cause god forbid that someone be forced to not start with a 17-20 starting out no matter what race or class they want. . Maybe if the player hadn’t closed their mind to you know, actually having to make a meaningful choice or potentially take a drawback to play a concept, it wouldn’t be an issue.

You don't need to insult my playstyle. Whether or not you like playing it has no relevance. I know it doesn't make sense to you, but its for the same reason I don't like football while others do. Its a matter of fun and opinion, and I don't try to convince people who like football that they shouldn't watch/play it.

Pander, noun: someone who caters to or exploits the weaknesses of others.

nothing in there about assuming that someone’s choice is lesser, only that the group pandering is catering or exploiting something that someone wants.
Sorry, before you make assumptions about what words mean you should... actually know what words mean? Just sayin.

This is what I found when I looked up the definition of pander: gratify or indulge (an immoral or distasteful desire, need, or habit or a person with such a desire, etc.).
See the part in parenthesis? That implies that you think powergaming is immoral or distasteful.

having to make meaningful choices which sometimes includes drawbacks isn’t unbalanced. Pandering so every race can do anything at any time with little to no differences is boring as naughty word, and trying to tack that into a system MEANT to have players make meaningful choices which sometimes includes drawbacks is.

but from what you’ve been posting I’m not surprised you’re missing that.

Again, this is a matter of playstyle. If you don't like playing optimal characters, that's fine. I do. There's absolutely nothing wrong with any way of playing the game if your table is having fun. There are still drawbacks to races, dwarves have a speed of 25 feet, tritons can breath underwater, and halflings are small.

don’t feel like you have to respond to me. If your quality of answer is going to be as factually correct as this I’m not really going to spend the time to respond and correct you.

No insult needed.

 

[DND_Reborn]

to people who don't want to be penalized for playing a character they want to play.

(emphasis mine)

But that's the thing as I see it, you aren't being penalized really. I'm just not getting this mindset. When you take a race, there are a lot of other traits besides the ASIs that can impact how good that race fits that class. Also, I prefer to think of it as "it isn't your race is inferior, it is just the other race is better suited because it is (smarter/stronger/faster/etc.)".

Remember, you aren't in competition with other PCs. If you want to play a Dragonborn (STR +2, CHA +1) Wizard for example, you can roll up to an 18 for INT or use the standard array or point-buy for a INT 15. Sure, the Gnome Wizard with INT +2 ASI can have an INT 20 (rolling an 18), or an INT 17 with the standard array or point-buy, but so what? -- You aren't competing against that Gnome PC.

If your spell attack and save DC are one lower than the gnome's, you are still effective as a character.

I've read about this so many times it boggles my mind, I just don't see it as a problem. Especially when you consider that in the end both PCs will have an INT 20 if they want it. Sure, it might take the dragonborn longer to get there, but he will if he wants to. Also, if you do roll scores (which as always been the default method) maybe you roll an 18 and the other player rolls a 15 as his highest. Now, even with the +2 INT ASI you are still better with your 18.

Anyway, I'll let it go because it has never been explained to me to the point I can agree with the idea that a "sub-optimal" race choice is really penalizing anyone. shrug

 

[SkidAce]

I hope that is the case. I guess the frequency of dwarf wizards will soon tell us how it is.

No such thing as dwarven wizards.*

Why? The dwarves don't speak of it, many might not know.

Probably a world ending reason, "IF" there was a dwarven wizard, they would likely be hunted down and...well....you know..



*dwarven runemasters, sure...tightly controlled and monitored for heresy proper spell casting...

 

[SkidAce]

Just checked the wording, and instead the basic human gets absolutely nothing. You can't move an ability bonus to another ability you already have a bonus to. So now the basic human (already the worst race in the game) is hot garbage. My statement about WotC being stands.

But you were incorrect....

 

[SkidAce]

I mean would it be too far fetched for dwarves to have spell casters in their culture?

Yes....






j/k....its a house rule of ours.

 

[Sacrosanct]

Allowing PCs to move around their racial modifiers won't ruin my game any more than rolling 3d6 did when the same class had wildly different ability scores at the same table

Y'all need to chill out. No one is being punished or penalized for not having the highest stat, and no one is ruining all races by allowing dwarves to get an INT bonus.

 

[Weiley31]

You can use one or the other. WoTC doesn't come to your house and kick your dog and cat out the window if you don't use the Lineage system.

Unless you roll a Nat 1 though: Then Lassie or Garfield have a One Way ticket on a first class flight out the window.