D&D General Drow & Orcs Removed from the Monster Manual

[FrogReaver]

What word do you use to describe a people you primarily know for raiding your territory and the territories of your neighbors?

Orcs!

 

[Bae'zel]

The one thing I distinctly recall was that 2e math got harder the later into the night or more inebriated you became until you reached the singularity and the DM stopped caring. Then your attack hit or miss mostly based on "close enough" and "vibes".

d100 games like Mythras / RuneQuest especially became a lot more loose as the night went on. Percentile Penalties? P'ah.

 

[LazarusKane]

Why do we need this cap when it's a fantasy game, and maybe my female character has a giant in her bloodline, or was blessed by faeries at birth, and can thus carry as much as a man?

This argument killed the species modifiers

Then why should the other 99% of women who has no giant in your bloodline or wasn't blessed by a fairy should have the same ability? What about the man who was blessed by a giant?

Or why could every gnome be as strong as a goliath?
(Sorry, I'm on your side - but I'm still hurting about the normalized species...)

Why do we need this cap when there's going to be at most four to six women in a party, and of them maybe only one or two are going to rely on Strength, and the GM controls every single male NPC in the world and can make them as strong as they want them to be?

So let's be realistic. Give men a small penalty to certain saving throws and ability checks. Nothing big. Just something that that amounts to a -2 or so on some rolls based on the fact that they decided their character didn't have a vagina. It uses real-world facts, so it's fair, right? If they don't want that penalty, they just have to play a woman.

Somehow, if the game tried to be "realistic" by limiting men in this way, there would be an uproar, no matter how "realistic" it is. Somehow "realism" is only OK if it supports your (generic your) bigoted beliefs.

No.
D&D isn't realistic - and never was - and giving different genders different modifiers (again?) is not worth it - alone: How do we define "gender"? I think there are things we have to accept for playability - or change only for your group if it bothers you.

IMHO giving only a subgroup of characters (Females) a malus is bad game design because of balancing - but to be honest giving drow males less strength than the females was a gimmick in my eyes, a nod to the fact that many female spiders are (a lot) bigger than the males.

Is it "realisitic" to give females for example less carry capacity - Maybe! Is it worth the hassle? No.

 

[Azzy]

It isn't a minor change in my opinion. This is pretty central Lich lore. I get the change might not bother you and that is fine. I've already given the reasons why it had value for me and other posters. So you can check those posts if you didn't happen to see them.

It's the same thing, just with a different name. This is making mountains out of molehills.

 

[Dire Bare]

This argument killed the species modifiers

Then why should the other 99% of women who has no giant in your bloodline or wasn't blessed by a fairy should have the same ability? What about the man who was blessed by a giant?

Or why could every gnome be as strong as a goliath?
(Sorry, I'm on your side - but I'm still hurting about the normalized species...)


No.
D&D isn't realistic - and never was - and giving different genders different modifiers (again?) is not worth it - alone: How do we define "gender"? I think there are things we have to accept for playability - or change only for your group if it bothers you.

IMHO giving only a subgroup of characters (Females) a malus is bad game design because of balancing - but to be honest giving drow males less strength than the females was a gimmick in my eyes, a nod to the fact that many female spiders are (a lot) bigger than the males.

Is it "realisitic" to give females for example less carry capacity - Maybe! Is it worth the hassle? No.

Ability caps for female characters is a pretty awful idea, or any restrictions based on gender.

But I'm also glad the ability mods based on species have recently been yanked from the game.

The game is too abstract for any of that to make sense, and it leads to stereotyped thinking and limited character options.

 

[Remathilis]

Then why should the other 99% of women who has no giant in your bloodline or wasn't blessed by a fairy should have the same ability? What about the man who was blessed by a giant?

We call them NPCs and assign them scores based on their role in the game. Assuming player characters are not representative of the majority of the population, there is no reason to apply statistical averages on them.

 

[Azzy]

We can't all be excellent.

We can try, and that's one of the important parts—do better.

 

[billd91]

You are free to ignore my posts and responses anytime you wish.

Your wish is my command.

 

[Azzy]

I, for one, feel it is a shame that Englush flattened the second person pronoun to cover both singular and plural.

Pour one out for the fallen "Thee/Thou", y'all.

The "thee" and "thou" were the familial forms of "you", much like "tú" in Spanish

 

[LazarusKane]

Ability caps for female characters is a pretty awful idea, or any restrictions based on gender.

Yes.

But I'm also glad the ability mods based on species have recently been yanked from the game.

The game is too abstract for any of that to make sense,

Look at the Gnome. Then look at the (Half-)Orc. Then look again at the Gnome.
Explain how this can be "abstract"?!?


(Or don't. I don't want to derail this thread still more , but your argument baffles me... )

and it leads to stereotyped thinking and limited character options.

Or you could do a breakout character, a halfling paladin for example.

On the other hand: Stereotyping could establish general species job preferences - there are more elvish than (half-)orcish wizards, more orcish fighters then elvish.