D&D (2024) How did I miss this about the Half races/ancestries

[Chaosmancer]

Well the lore also said hobgoblins created common goblins and that process was magical. So it is also valid to think they did the same with half orcs.

And its not like anyone knows the true origin. There is no canon origin for 4e POL half orcs. They are just a race with a mix of orc and human traits.

But to WOTC, Half-orc were the PC orcs and Orcs the NPCs orcs. With the rules changes, WOTC has no idea how to differentiate them, refused to create one, and more or less gave up.

Or, they looked at their four options.

1) Point buy races that completely destroy the idea of consistent races and would be a nightmare to balance
2) Making over a thousand unique races for every single mixed race combination
3) Just keep things the same and say that only two types of mixed race people exist.
4) Make the mechanics not matter, and just keep it as simple as possible

And they picked the option they felt was best for the core game. Because options #1 and #2 are not great options. They are a massive undertaking, very likely to cause more problems, and far too easy to break.

 

[Mecheon]

With Orcs in the 2024 PHB and Racial ASI out, WotC just dropped half orcs rather than create or reuse lore and mechanics for them.

To be fair though, half-orcs being a core race whereas full orcs were relegated to monster book and bonus stuff was always an incredibly weird look. Like, especially in this universe where World of Warcraft and Warhammer exist, and "New player who is a fan of the Warcrafts and wants to play a thematically similar character" should be a simple ask, yet D&D made it incredibly DM dependant

Half-elves have their whole niches, but if you want to be an elf you always had the regular option there. If you want orcs? Sorry, all you had is half-orcs and having to deal with the potential problems therein. "They're just tribes who vibed and had kids" is the simplest way of making it easy not facing the issues D&D's historically shoved onto the race

Well isn't the intelligent orc, the orog?

I think they were the Underdark Orc role ever since 3E

 

[SteveC]

It absolutely impacts play to remove going to dungeons and wilderness, killing monsters and taking their stuff. Other things can be done, but this is like 80% of how people play the game. Again, I think framing it as "killing the native population" is just a way to connect it to colonialism, as killing monsters and taking their stuff can cover a broad range of situations.

Absolutely. If you're going to rule out dungeon and wilderness adventures, you're removing dungeon crawls and hex crawls from the game. That's a huge part of the game and what it's designed around.

This makes me wonder why you're wanting to play D&D. There are so many other games that are centered around other themes. Many of them are looking at me from my shelves as I'm writing this.

I'm never going to tell someone they're having badwrong fun but exploring other systems that just do different game concepts better seems like a good idea. I expect many people in this situation just think of D&D as the familiar rules set, but I can't help but think that other games are going to give them what they want and do it better.

I am not someone who believes that hexplore or dungeon crawl games are about colonialism, but I also want something different out of my games too. That's why I have several shelves full of games to do what I'm interested in.

 

[Justice and Rule]

It isn’t ancillary. It adds to the humor (especially with han’s rebuttal that follow). But the sound of the dialogue is very important. Like I said, writers choose words for a reason. Sometimes there are better choices, but here I don’t think something like Tauntaun is equal or better

Does it add to the humor? Han's rebuttal would work just as well with Tauntauns, with the added part that we know Tauntauns outwardly smell. You talk about "writers choose words for a reason", but it's way more common that they aren't being that specific and this is just your fandom making it overly essential to the film.

I said prior this line wasn’t essential to the movie. Just that the movie is diminished when you take out those kinds of line. In my post I said the movie would still work you would basically just ruin a part of it

I don't think it'd be diminished at all because nothing about the joke being about Wookies is essential to make the scene work. What matters is that Leia makes a joke to push Han off, and Han reacts the way that he does because he's angry that Leia won't acknowledge her feelings towards him.

 

[Guest 85555]

Does it add to the humor? Han's rebuttal would work just as well with Tauntauns, with the added part that we know Tauntauns outwardly smell. You talk about "writers choose words for a reason", but it's way more common that they aren't being that specific and this is just your fandom making it overly essential to the film.

I am not a big Star Wars fan

But it does add to it in my opinion. Him saying I can arrange that instantly clicks because we know his best friend chest is a wookie.

Yes sometimes words aren’t chosen for a reason but when I see a line that superficially sounds silly but actually has a nice flow and sounds, I see good reason to believe the word was chosen for a reason. Half of why we remember dialogue is the sound. The oo’s go nicely together and the K in kiss and wookie also adds to the sound.

 

[Justice and Rule]

Or, they looked at their four options.

1) Point buy races that completely destroy the idea of consistent races and would be a nightmare to balance
2) Making over a thousand unique races for every single mixed race combination
3) Just keep things the same and say that only two types of mixed race people exist.
4) Make the mechanics not matter, and just keep it as simple as possible

And they picked the option they felt was best for the core game. Because options #1 and #2 are not great options. They are a massive undertaking, very likely to cause more problems, and far too easy to break.

Alternatively, you could create "Lineage Feats" to allow you to customize your race and then have something like "_____ Ancestry", where you get an ability or abilities from the normal race. So someone with the "Elvish Blood" feat maybe gets lesser Longevity along with some version of an Elvish ability.

Really trying hard to not just straight-up copy PF2's Ancestry Feat system.

 

[Guest 85555]

I don't think it'd be diminished at all because nothing about the joke being about Wookies is essential to make the scene work. What matters is that Leia makes a joke to push Han off, and Han reacts the way that he does because he's angry that Leia won't acknowledge her feelings towards him.

it would still convey the dismissal but it would be less funny, sound worse to the ear, and not set up hab’s rebuttal as well. it is a small part of the movie. And it was just one example s poster gave to show wookie weren’t always viewed positively by humans. More broadly though the films have a lot of jokes about chewy being non-human. And they work. It also adds to the arc if chewy becoming friends with characters like Leila by the end

 

[Minigiant]

Or, they looked at their four options.

1) Point buy races that completely destroy the idea of consistent races and would be a nightmare to balance
2) Making over a thousand unique races for every single mixed race combination
3) Just keep things the same and say that only two types of mixed race people exist.
4) Make the mechanics not matter, and just keep it as simple as possible

And they picked the option they felt was best for the core game. Because options #1 and #2 are not great options. They are a massive undertaking, very likely to cause more problems, and far too easy to break.

There's a 5th and 6th

5) Convert the 2 races into their own things and allow mixed races be an option for them.
6) Create Layered lineages to layer traits of one race onto another.

Just thought of a 7th.
7) Create a Hybird version of each race and allow players to put any 2 together.

 

[Justice and Rule]

I am not a big Star Wars fan

But it does add to it in my opinion. Him saying I can arrange that instantly clicks because we know his best friend chest is a wookie.

No, and this is where I think your stretch starts to fall apart. It's fine as a joke because we know Wookies are hairy, not that it's Han's best friend. Further, the joke being about Wookies doesn't really have any weight on Leia (I don't think we're really meant to take her as being seen as racist here) nor do I think it feeds Han's reaction (he's not getting angry because his best friend's species is being used as the butt of a joke). It doesn't really comment on either of those things, nor are they followed up on at all in the movies, largely because it's not meant to be that.

Yes sometimes words aren’t chosen for a reason but when I see a line that superficially sounds silly but actually has a nice flow and sounds, I see good reason to believe the word was chosen for a reason. Half of why we remember dialogue is the sound. The oo’s go nicely together and the K in kiss and wookie also adds to the sound.

You're just really overstretching this sort of essentialism to the breaking point. It's not that important and you putting this much importance on its construction is almost certainly exceeding what the writers put on it by a factor of 10.

it would still convey the dismissal but it would be less funny, sound worse to the ear, and not set up hab’s rebuttal as well. it is a small part of the movie. And it was just one example s poster gave to show wookie weren’t always viewed positively by humans. More broadly though the films have a lot of jokes about chewy being non-human. And they work. It also adds to the arc if chewy becoming friends with characters like Leila by the end

No, because Han's rebuttal would work just as well with a Tauntaun because we literally just had scenes with them and he remarked on their stench. It also doesn't really work because if it was meant to be viewed as you say, then it makes Han look more like an unnecessary naughty word because he's not defending Chewie, which isn't the point of the scene.

Seriously, stop putting so much emphasis on a single joke. I'm into Star Wars and even I think this is way too much reading into it. This sort of reading put me off discussing the MCU because I find it obnoxious.

 

[Guest 85555]

Seriously, stop putting so much emphasis on a single joke. I'm into Star Wars and even I think this is way too much reading into it. This sort of reading put me off discussing the MCU because I find it obnoxious.

II am not trying to be pedantic. I just appreciate dialogue in movies and don't think you can swap out any word for another without affecting the flow of it and how it lands. Like I said I am not even that much of a star wars fan. I am just making the point that each time people try to work in these kinds of changes to media in order to make them more wholesome or less X, it can have an unintended impact on the way things work