Balance bwtween Class, Race, and Background

[Sunseeker]

Doesn't that lead to a very chaotic "implied setting"? If you limit it to only worlds that are at least somewhat compatible the content should be more coherent.

I don't believe so no. But as they say the proof is in the pudding. Wizards wants to capture older players and in part recognizing the worlds they love will go a long way in that regard. It's my opinion that 5e should have it's own, original world that draws inspiration from previous ones. But racial entries should also note that many worlds have various populations of the same species, so in 5e's New World or in your own campaign, there's no reason to say something CANT exist other than DM discretion.

I mean, there seem to be humans, elves(in at least two varities) and dwarves in almost every setting ever imagined. I don't find it unreasonable at all there there could be large settlements or at least a smattering of numerous other races there as well. Inter-planar travel is hardly unusual.

I think that the vast majority of existing settings are reasonably compatible. And of course, what is life without a little chaos?

 

[tuxgeo]

I don't think it's a bad idea, but why does it matter whether it's a theme or a feat? Both "modules" should IMO be as "optional".

WotC has been talking as though the three central, basic components of character creation for D&D Next will be class, race, and theme. If that is so, then themes will be as core as classes are, but feats won't be.

 

[Starfox]

...drawing from a diverse background of worlds instead of a singular one we could spread the love around [...] I do expect my PHB to be significantly more comprehensive.

Doesn't that lead to a very chaotic "implied setting"? If you limit it to only worlds that are at least somewhat compatible the content should be more coherent.

I feel 4E went this way, with many more races in their core books than any one setting should contain. I quite liked it - its like a smorgosboard, you get to pick and choose when building your world. The problem in 4E was that the advice was to permit everything in every campaign, easily dismissed by a veteran DM but making a newbie DMs campaing very chaotic - which perhaps doesn't matter so much.

 

[Sunseeker]

I feel 4E went this way, with many more races in their core books than any one setting should contain. I quite liked it - its like a smorgosboard, you get to pick and choose when building your world. The problem in 4E was that the advice was to permit everything in every campaign, easily dismissed by a veteran DM but making a newbie DMs campaing very chaotic - which perhaps doesn't matter so much.

Exactly, the DMG or PHB just needed to be a little more explicit in the section before character creation or talking about player characters that the the player should always ask their DM what's allowed, that the DM should always make it clear what they want to allow, and that they DO have the power to do so.

I think this might go along the lines to earlier discussions about "empowering the DM".

 

[Andor]

On the original topic, I think a 33%/33%/33% balance would be fine at first level.

But as your character grows the class levels should be the predominant influence. Feats (if you are using feats) or powers (if you are using the powers module) might have a few options drawn from race or theme sets, but the bulk of a 10th level characters resources should be drawn from class levels even if they do have all three of the 'elvish haberdasher' feat chain.