Heh. Obviously, species are problematic.
The question is. Does D&D need to drop them, or is it possible to rethink them?
Level Up (A5E) Changes to race (species?)
- Thread starter Waller
- Start date
Heh. Obviously, species are problematic.
The question is. Does D&D need to drop them, or is it possible to rethink them?
Crimson Longinus
Legend
To my satisfaction yes, to yours, probably not (at least if you're consistent with your premise.)
doctorbadwolf
Heretic of The Seventh Circle
That isn’t obvious, or even true, at all.
Kinematics
Hero
I want to take a closer look at the Culture mechanic idea.
First, do not conflate the Culture mechanic idea with the real term, 'culture'. A game mechanic is not the same as the real-life thing, even if we try to interpret it through that lens. It's the same as looking at Strength or Intelligence as reflective of their real-life counterparts. There are certainly similarities, and there's a broad parallel intent, but they are not the same thing. Making assertions based on the assumption that they are the same thing is arguing in bad faith.
First, what would be the purpose of Culture, as a mechanic?
Well, the preliminary idea was to split off subrace and other non-genetic bonuses from the Race selection. Background is another mechanic that also does this, in a vague, handwavey sort of way, but doesn't cover quite the same ideas, and would have an exponential explosion of options if it were to absorb the differences. That's not acceptable.
The set of genetic racial characteristics (height, speed, age, darkvision, etc) is fairly easy to establish, with the possible exception of racial stat bonuses (which are being argued elsewhere in this thread). This provides one boundary on the definition of Culture: It does not affect aspects of character design which are genetically intrinsic.
Background is less well-defined. However almost all backgrounds can be described as "a thing you chose to do in life, before you chose to develop [Class]". Soldier, Outlander, Criminal, Sailor, etc. Noble goes against this trend, as that's generally something you're born into, and Acolyte is ambiguous, as that could be an adult choice, or you could have been raised in that environment.
But largely we can consider a pretty reasonable boundary on the Background side of things as "a thing you chose to do once you were old enough to make your own choices". (Although there are exceptions even there, such as conscripted soldiers, it serves the purpose of defining the boundary.)
That leaves the window between when you were born, and when you were old enough to set out on your own, as the period where you developed based on the Culture you were a part of. This is not something that you (as a character) chose, but rather what was imposed upon you. This is the broad period of learning how to Social as you grow up.
As an abstract, that's fine. But how do you define individual instances? Dwarf culture vs Waterdeep culture vs nomadic culture?
For casual shorthand purposes, any of the above might work, but for the published rules you want to be as clean and abstract as possible. You don't want to reference Waterdeep, because what if you're running the campaign in Greyhawk? You don't want to reference dwarves, because what if your world doesn't have dwarves?
So you have to be able to name things in abstract ways, that can be applied to a broad variety of settings. And then each setting can detail what sorts of cultures can be used for each area. For example, you aren't likely to get a traditional noble culture in nomadic orc tribes.
In addition, what sort of benefits do you gain from choosing a given Culture? What does the Culture mechanic represent?
As a first pass at trying to define it, I'd say:
The social aspect of this I think is key to making Culture its own mechanic. D&D is horrible at managing social conflict. You have a handful of skills under Cha which basically do all the work. Otherwise, players tend to try to force their Class to be the barometer of how to deal with people, even though the classes have virtually no mechanical support for such.
Classes are almost exclusively designed for combat. Despite the stated intent that all classes be able to participate in the social pillar of the game, there's basically nothing that actually provides any such support. Instead, all social interaction relies on how much a given class can put into Cha as an attribute, along with its skills.
I would argue that Culture is first and foremost an expression of how a character learned how to interact socially, and that the inclusion of Culture as a mechanic opens the doorway to a much more robust social conflict system.
While the separation of Culture from Race is nice in a "tidy the game mechanics" sort of way, it does not provide enough mechanical lifting power for the game to be worth that separation if that's all you're going to do. However if it opens the doorway that allows every character to be more effective in participating with the social piller, that would absolutely be worth developing.
This might need its own thread.
First, do not conflate the Culture mechanic idea with the real term, 'culture'. A game mechanic is not the same as the real-life thing, even if we try to interpret it through that lens. It's the same as looking at Strength or Intelligence as reflective of their real-life counterparts. There are certainly similarities, and there's a broad parallel intent, but they are not the same thing. Making assertions based on the assumption that they are the same thing is arguing in bad faith.
First, what would be the purpose of Culture, as a mechanic?
Well, the preliminary idea was to split off subrace and other non-genetic bonuses from the Race selection. Background is another mechanic that also does this, in a vague, handwavey sort of way, but doesn't cover quite the same ideas, and would have an exponential explosion of options if it were to absorb the differences. That's not acceptable.
The set of genetic racial characteristics (height, speed, age, darkvision, etc) is fairly easy to establish, with the possible exception of racial stat bonuses (which are being argued elsewhere in this thread). This provides one boundary on the definition of Culture: It does not affect aspects of character design which are genetically intrinsic.
Background is less well-defined. However almost all backgrounds can be described as "a thing you chose to do in life, before you chose to develop [Class]". Soldier, Outlander, Criminal, Sailor, etc. Noble goes against this trend, as that's generally something you're born into, and Acolyte is ambiguous, as that could be an adult choice, or you could have been raised in that environment.
But largely we can consider a pretty reasonable boundary on the Background side of things as "a thing you chose to do once you were old enough to make your own choices". (Although there are exceptions even there, such as conscripted soldiers, it serves the purpose of defining the boundary.)
That leaves the window between when you were born, and when you were old enough to set out on your own, as the period where you developed based on the Culture you were a part of. This is not something that you (as a character) chose, but rather what was imposed upon you. This is the broad period of learning how to Social as you grow up.
As an abstract, that's fine. But how do you define individual instances? Dwarf culture vs Waterdeep culture vs nomadic culture?
For casual shorthand purposes, any of the above might work, but for the published rules you want to be as clean and abstract as possible. You don't want to reference Waterdeep, because what if you're running the campaign in Greyhawk? You don't want to reference dwarves, because what if your world doesn't have dwarves?
So you have to be able to name things in abstract ways, that can be applied to a broad variety of settings. And then each setting can detail what sorts of cultures can be used for each area. For example, you aren't likely to get a traditional noble culture in nomadic orc tribes.
In addition, what sort of benefits do you gain from choosing a given Culture? What does the Culture mechanic represent?
As a first pass at trying to define it, I'd say:
- Culture does not raise attributes. It is almost entirely about social integration. Your stats may develop during this period, but it's basically your core stats (rolled or bought), which means the Culture does not have an outside effect on them.
- Culture develops common skills and tools associated with a given cultural group, and perhaps some training in a subset of weapons or armor.
- Culture would form the foundation on how you interact socially. It is likely to define how you approach social conflict in game the majority of the time. (As opposed to Class, which tends to define how you approach physical conflict.)
The social aspect of this I think is key to making Culture its own mechanic. D&D is horrible at managing social conflict. You have a handful of skills under Cha which basically do all the work. Otherwise, players tend to try to force their Class to be the barometer of how to deal with people, even though the classes have virtually no mechanical support for such.
Classes are almost exclusively designed for combat. Despite the stated intent that all classes be able to participate in the social pillar of the game, there's basically nothing that actually provides any such support. Instead, all social interaction relies on how much a given class can put into Cha as an attribute, along with its skills.
I would argue that Culture is first and foremost an expression of how a character learned how to interact socially, and that the inclusion of Culture as a mechanic opens the doorway to a much more robust social conflict system.
While the separation of Culture from Race is nice in a "tidy the game mechanics" sort of way, it does not provide enough mechanical lifting power for the game to be worth that separation if that's all you're going to do. However if it opens the doorway that allows every character to be more effective in participating with the social piller, that would absolutely be worth developing.
This might need its own thread.
doctorbadwolf
Heretic of The Seventh Circle
IF there is a Agrarian Culture, which comes with training in a tool, choice of Nature or Animal Handling, and +1 to Strength, I genuinely can't see how anyone could see that as inherently problematic.
Why +1 Strength? Why are those people inherently stronger than others?
And before you come with "Because farmwork trains your muscles", not everyone in an agrarian society will be a farmer. So why are their clerks stronger too?
doctorbadwolf
Heretic of The Seventh Circle
An Urban Port culture might give a Language, +1 Cha, and Insight.
Again, why would a tanner or cobbler in a "urban port culture" be more charismatic than one from a different culture?
Kinematics
Hero
I think I agree with Derren's objection, even though the way he phrased the objection had me writing out a large rebuttal.
I can absolutely understand +1 Str to an agrarian society, for example, and the counterexample was disingenuous. However I don't want to include attribute bonuses in Culture, because I think that distracts from the real value that it can add to the social pillar of the game.
That doesn't mean I wouldn't consider it, but I would want to save it for its own discussion, as the other aspects need much more work to be realized.
I can absolutely understand +1 Str to an agrarian society, for example, and the counterexample was disingenuous. However I don't want to include attribute bonuses in Culture, because I think that distracts from the real value that it can add to the social pillar of the game.
That doesn't mean I wouldn't consider it, but I would want to save it for its own discussion, as the other aspects need much more work to be realized.
doctorbadwolf
Heretic of The Seventh Circle
I hadn’t seen their reply, because I don’t see their posts, but yeah I don’t think culture needs to be its own thing, but if it is you can easily work out any number of very simple benefits for being raised in a given culture.
