Kind of wiry, with a big nose and glasses.
Seriously, though, we were talking about strength, not wisdom. Races with wisdom bonuses have the mental "body" for it.
You miss the point though.
Let us say that being tall is part of the body type of strength. Well, I can be tall and broad, and have a mind set up for intelligence and wisdom. Being big and tall ends up pushing out being intelligent or wise. But, being intelligent, wise or charismatic does not require any specific body type.
Any "body" can house any "mind" and yet because of Balance, DnD sets these in opposition to each other. And going forward with "I am tall, and broad, and heavy, therefore I have strength" ignores that part of it. There is nothing inherently wrong with a Wise Goliath. Nothing about their body precludes wisdom. They only lack it because of balance, you can't give bonuses to everything (unless you are a flexible race I suppose).
And this is what I am pushing back on. Trying to define being tall with strength just fails. It is what the designers did, but that leads to the situation where the bigger and more ripped your physical body, the stupider and dimmer you are portrayed as. So, I much prefer to think of it as being related to the class archetypes, rather than body types, because those are also true, and lead to fewer problems.
Yep. All very healthy or hardy or sturdy races. Con makes perfect sense.
So, Dragonborn are not healthy, hardy or sturdy? How about Firbolgs? I mean, a Firbolg is a big person, they live in the woods, traveling around a lot, living off the land. Sure sounds like they should be hardy. Why did they not get Con but the city-dwelling scientists and inventors like the Rock Gnomes did?
Not the only way, but stats are the easiest way to play against type You can also play against the RP type, like a LG Tiefling for example.
As has been noted by BOTH sides, stats are a very poor representation all by themselves. I'd rather have a new subrace, complete with both stats and abilities, than just stats.
A fair point on the them being a poor representation.
And, I agree that you can RP against type, so if stats are only the easiest way, why are they the ones everyone is focusing on? Why am I getting told that it will be impossible to play against type, when the truth is it will just be less possible to use the easiest method of playing against type?
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+1 Int represents the general average of a race being slightly brighter than other races. It does not indicate any sort of arcane tradition.
The fact that high elves have both a strong arcane tradition and a +1 Int bonus does not require every other +1 Int race to also have an equally strong arcane tradition.
Okay, but two things.
1) The poster I was responding to specifically called it out as being a result of traditions and culture.
2) Saying that Int is because of genetically superior intellect (even if only slightly) is a reallly dangerous and murky claim that I do not think we really want to make in our game. It leads to bad places.
Do you believe that a being's mental capabilities are reflected in their body in the same way that physical capabilities like strength might be reflected in a muscular or athletic build?
No, exactly the opposite.
So, why are we saying that Strength is being used to show mass, when it also would therefore by the nessecity of balance mean that they must be less intelligent? I mean take these two points together "Muscle Mass and Height correlate to strength" and "Intelligence is a genetic, inheritable trait" and you have suddenly created a system where a large person with broad-shoulders is necessarily less intelligent than a person born with a slimmer build.
We start making trends that were meant for showing favoritism in class choice (high elves were meant to be wizards) and making it a genetic determination (elves are now born smarter than other races who are born with stronger bodies)
This is not how things work. We know this is not how things work, and the last time claims like that were made seriously in the world, bad stuff happened. So, we do not want to stake the claim of DnD on that ground.
Why would Con be reflected in a single specific body type? Or is this one of those "what exactly to hit points represent" discussions?
If we assume that Strength and Dexterity are represented by body type, why not Con? All three are the physical stats. If we can point to a picture and say "because of their body, they should have these physical stats" then that applies to Con as much as it does to Strength.
In fact, some of the races with the tallest heights, heaviest masses, and bonuses to strength also have con mods.... except when they are the short, slight, non-strength people who have con mods.
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Technically they are Fey of the Shadowfell.
I am aware of what they are now, but I remember that in 4e they used to be descendants of humans who got caught in the Shadowfell.