D&D 5E Is Tasha's Broken?

[CreamCloud0]

More important for my fun are class features (admittedly few) that have a number of uses based on the ability score modifier.

But otherwise here’s how I see it. With fixed ASIs, certain races are optimized for certain classes. With floating ASIs, no race is optimized for a certain class (at least as far as ability scores are concerned). That leads to less concern with optimization, not more.

i might view things from the other direction, rather than no race being optimised for any class it's actually more any race can be optimised for any class, floating ASI just made it so easy to do that it doesn't even seem like you're doing anything to optimise in the first place, stereotypes of optimisation from older editions carries a certain implication that you need to be actively going out of your way to be doing it so if you're not having to try to because it's so easy to do it then you couldn't possibly be optimising your character, you're just using the character creation to it's maximum potential!

 

[Bill Zebub]

No, but pretty much every time, the conversation goes, "It's not about optimization, it's about making sure I have that +2 where I want it" (which is to say, where it's optimal). I honestly haven't seen a single argument that doesn't boil down to that.

I'm pretty sure that they are using some definition of optimization that this somehow doesn't fit, so it's not about bad faith, it's about perception. Those who are saying that it's not about optimization are seeing it differently than I am.

But I still haven't heard any argument that I perceive as anything other than about optimizing your character. "I want to be able to play a half-orc wizard" overlooks the fact that you can do so without a +2 Int, and that there have been half-orc wizards in the PH since 3e. "You have to be able to keep up" is about optimizing.

The thing about optimization is that everybody does some of it. Just because you put a 15…or a 14, or a 12…in your primary, and then took a race that didn’t boost your primary ASI, doesn’t mean you didn’t do some optimization.

So the criticism really becomes “the level of optimization I do is perfectly fine, but when you dirty power gamers would rather have a +3 than play a non-standard race/class combination, that’s going too far!”

Why? What distinguishes that particular threshold as the boundary between roleplaying and power gaming?

Its horse$#!¥.

 

[Amrûnril]

But it's also the old argument. The sole reason to want a +2 in your primary stat is so that 1 in 20 times you will succeed at something important to you that you would have otherwise failed. Dress it up how you like, but it is about optimization*. That doesn't mean that the person that wants that optimization is a power gamer. Or that power gamers are inherently bad for that matter.

*Unless someone can explain why it's not other than "it's just not true" or "somebody already explained it, so I'm not going to repeat or link to that explanation."

The argument goes in both directions. Wanting to limit optimization options is just as much an optimization-based concern as wanting to expand them.

My broader point, though, is that I don't think the label is adding anything useful to the discussion. ASI rules are inherently about small differences in ability scores, so they should be structured in a way that's fun for people who care about small differences in ability scores. Whether to call those people optimizers is beside the point, unless the goal is to discount people's opinions by using the term pejoratively.

 

[Bill Zebub]

The argument goes in both directions. Wanting to limit optimization options is just as much an optimization-based concern as wanting to expand them.

My broader point, though, is that I don't think the label is adding anything useful to the discussion. ASI rules are inherently about small differences in ability scores, so they should be structured in a way that's fun for people who care about small differences in ability scores. Whether to call those people optimizers is beside the point, unless the goal is to discount people's opinions by using the term pejoratively.

Beautifully said.

 

[Arilyn]

Why is making a halfling rogue with a +2 Dex fine and dandy but if I use floating ASIs to give my tiefling rogue a +2 I'm just being an optimizer?

I make my characters the way I picture them. Sometimes the +2 is in the primary stat, sometimes not. Floating ASIs give me a little more flexibility. It's not that big a deal though. I'm happy enough with the old way too but if for some weird reason, WoTC said, "You choose, Arilyn," I'd do the floating.

 

[Bill Zebub]

The thing about optimization is that everybody does some of it. Just because you put a 15…or a 14, or a 12…in your primary, and then took a race that didn’t boost your primary ASI, doesn’t mean you didn’t do some optimization.

So the criticism really becomes “the level of optimization I do is perfectly fine, but when you dirty power gamers would rather have a +3 than play a non-standard race/class combination, that’s going too far!”

Why? What distinguishes that particular threshold as the boundary between roleplaying and power gaming?

Its horse$#!¥.

And to answer my own question, I suspect it’s because that particular threshold is entangled with the question of racial ASIs, to which some folks feel very attached.

 

[Oofta]

The thing about optimization is that everybody does some of it. Just because you put a 15…or a 14, or a 12…in your primary, and then took a race that didn’t boost your primary ASI, doesn’t mean you didn’t do some optimization.

So the criticism really becomes “the level of optimization I do is perfectly fine, but when you dirty power gamers would rather have a +3 than play a non-standard race/class combination, that’s going too far!”

Why? What distinguishes that particular threshold as the boundary between roleplaying and power gaming?

Its horse$#!¥.

I can only speak for myself, but I have no problem with optimization. I don't even have problems with power gamers unless all they care about is combat effectiveness and/or bend rules to get that optimization. What I think is disingenuous is claiming that it's now okay to play that half-orc wizard because of the options that Tasha's gives you when it was not previously but that it has nothing to do with optimization.

Even my pre-Tashas mountain dwarf wizard was optimized in a sense. I had a 14 intelligence and otherwise fairly balanced ability scores because I wanted to to be useful for things outside of combat.

 

[Bill Zebub]

I can only speak for myself, but I have no problem with optimization. I don't even have problems with power gamers unless all they care about is combat effectiveness and/or bend rules to get that optimization. What I think is disingenuous is claiming that it's now okay to play that half-orc wizard because of the options that Tasha's gives you when it was not previously but that it has nothing to do with optimization.

Even my pre-Tashas mountain dwarf wizard was optimized in a sense. I had a 14 intelligence and otherwise fairly balanced ability scores because I wanted to to be useful for things outside of combat.

Again, anybody who told YOU that you shouldn’t have played a half-orc wizard pre-Tasha’s was wrong.

The overwhelming majority of posts I have seen have said “I don’t want to play that” not that somebody else shouldn’t. If the arguments for why the 16 is important carry a suggestion that other people should feel bad about going with less, that’s probably an artifact of the tenacity with which we have had to defend our choices.

 

[Oofta]

And to answer my own question, I suspect it’s because that particular threshold is entangled with the question of racial ASIs, to which some folks feel very attached.

I used to enjoy playing against type because I liked the challenge of making it work along with showing people that the +2 in your primary ability doesn't really matter as much as they think it does. I can't do that any more. Hardly the end of the world and if I write up another mountain dwarf wizard the +2 will go into intelligence.

Then again, I don't think anyone is saying optimization is bad. Some people just acknowledge that floating ASIs come at a cost. You may not care about or acknowledge that cost.

 

[Bill Zebub]

I used to enjoy playing against type because I liked the challenge of making it work along with showing people that the +2 in your primary ability doesn't really matter as much as they think it does. I can't do that any more.

But...you can! A half-orc wizard is still against type, and in any campaign you play in you might be literally the only one in that universe. Orc and half-orc NPCs can all have really low intelligence. And you can give your half-orc wizard as low of an Int score as you like.

The fact that all around the world, at other tables, in other campaigns, there are more players choosing half-orc wizard than there used to be doesn't change anything. Those characters are literally not in your character's universe.