D&D 5E Latest D&D Errata: Drow, Alignment, & More

Sage Advice is a series of articles in which Jeremy Crawford, one of the D&D Studio’s game design architects, talks about the design of the game’s rules and answers questions about them.

Book Updates | Sage Advice | Dungeons & Dragons

This Sage Advice provides updates and errata for a number of books, as well as answers to rules questions.

dnd.wizards.com

D&D books occasionally receive corrections and other updates to their rules and story. This Sage Advice installment presents updates to several books. I then answer a handful of rules questions, focusing on queries related to Fizban’s Treasury of Dragons and Strixhaven: A Curriculum of Chaos.

Official errata has been published for the following books:

• Curse of Strahd
• Dungeon Master’s Guide
• Player’s Handbook
• Storm King’s Thunder
• Sword Coast Adventurer’s Guide
• Tales from the Yawning Portal
• Tasha’s Cauldron of Everything
• Tomb of Annihilation
• Volo’s Guide to Monsters

Here's some of the highlights.

• Alignment is removed from the Racial Traits section of races.
• Drow have undergone lore changes which reflect the different types of drow. The 'darkness of the drow' sidebar which portrays them as only evil has been removed.
• Storm King's Thunder alters references to 'Savage Frontier' and 'barbarians'; Curse of Strahd alters references to the Vistani.
• The controversial Silvery Barbs spell has been clarified.

As a drow, you are infused with the magic of the Underdark, an underground realm of wonders and horrors rarely seen on the surface above. You are at home in shadows and, thanks to your innate magic, learn to con- jure forth both light and darkness. Your kin tend to have stark white hair and grayish skin of many hues.

The cult of the god Lolth, Queen of Spiders, has cor- rupted some of the oldest drow cities, especially in the worlds of Oerth and Toril. Eberron, Krynn, and other realms have escaped the cult’s influence—for now. Wherever the cult lurks, drow heroes stand on the front lines in the war against it, seeking to sunder Lolth’s web.

 

[John R Davis]

This presumes you're smarter than WotC's management, I should note.

I question whether that is the case.

Oh. I'm offended. Mod please.

 

[BrokenTwin]

I'm still salty about getting gnolls as a playable race in 4E only to have it snatched from me in 5E. As to the changes in general...

Non-evil mindflayers will never not be ridiculous to me. Vampires at least get the "I drink animal blood and/or small enough quantities of human blood to avoid affecting them" excuse, what's the mindflayer's excuse for literally surviving off of consuming the brains of still-living creatures?

In regards to the brothel removal... seems weird, but I guess I understand it. Most of my games feature sexuality at some level, this change isn't going to affect that (granted, most of my games aren't D&D anymore). I think the arguments that 'It's a kids' game" are just weird though. WotC's target audience is, like, teenagers at the absolute youngest. Teenagers know what sex is. And then there's America's weird hangups on sex vs violence that's already been covered.

With the direction they're going, I don't think I want to see them relaunch Dark Sun. I don't necessarily have anything against the direction they're taking the game, but Dark Sun is a setting where bad things are the norm.

 

[Staffan]

lol as I always ask, why does that matter?

If an Angel can fall, why cant a Demon ascend? If a being can think, why cant it be different than what it was 'made' to be?

The way I see it, alignment-based outsiders are basically made of good/evil/law/chaos. There is a remote possibility that an angel could fall or a demon ascend, but then they wouldn't be an angel/demon anymore.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

I disagree with the sole reason to call mindflayers evil being their biological imperative.

They're evil because they're poorly designed and don't want to die?

It'd be better to take away the imperative to eat sapient brains and a lot of them just don't want to chow down on cow or the Elder brains derive some power from sapient brains specifically.

Actual mindflayers are barely indipendant beings in 5e lore, IIRC. They're basically extensions of Elder Brains, which are ancient Illithid. Illithid young are parasites that kill their host in the process of transforming their body into an adult Illithid body.

IMO all aberrations should be Evil. They are inherently inimical to the life of the material plane, and are an invasive corruption.

 

[Scribe]

Have we seen any actual evidence that existing races will lose their size? Or that they won't describe any cultural norms?

Existing races (factions is the other thread)? No I dont think so, but from the DMG Errata we have now this new tidbit.

[New] Creating a New Race or Subrace (pg. 285). The third bullet has been removed. In the fifth bullet, “the race’s history and culture” is now “the race’s history.”

Wizards certainly seems to be getting out of the business of defining culture.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

The way I see it, alignment-based outsiders are basically made of good/evil/law/chaos. There is a remote possibility that an angel could fall or a demon ascend, but then they wouldn't be an angel/demon anymore.

Exactly. A demon is part of the Abyss. They're made of it. Chaotic Evil is no more a choice for them than fire is a choice for a fire elemental.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Existing races (factions is the other thread)? No I dont think so, but from the DMG Errata we have now this new tidbit.

[New] Creating a New Race or Subrace (pg. 285). The third bullet has been removed. In the fifth bullet, “the race’s history and culture” is now “the race’s history.”

Wizards certainly seems to be getting out of the business of defining culture.

Which isn't the same thing as what was claimed, far as I can tell.

 

[Scribe]

The way I see it, alignment-based outsiders are basically made of good/evil/law/chaos. There is a remote possibility that an angel could fall or a demon ascend, but then they wouldn't be an angel/demon anymore.

Thats assuming we accept Cosmic Evil/Good/Law/Chaos as the baseline.

Now, personally I do so, but I somehow doubt thats the path Wizards will cleave to.

 

[Umbran]

you are still saying that X being cannot think for themself, and has no free will.

So, that statement gets whipped around a lot, and it sounds awful, but it could use some unpacking.

First off, free will need not be digital - all on, or all off.

A radio-controlled to car, or a videogame avatar, has no free will. Every single action it takes comes from the controller. If you actually and literally have no free will, you cannot choose what to have for lunch, or what attack combinations to use in combat.

Now, it is possible for demons and angles to literally be extensions of some greater force, to be little bitty avatars - so they literally do not have a will of their own. But that's not usually how they are portrayed in the game. Instead, they have quite a bit of free will, but it happens that their will ultimately always bends towards the baneful.

But, that's not the same as having no free will at all.

 

[Umbran]

Thats assuming we accept Cosmic Evil/Good/Law/Chaos as the baseline.

Now, personally I do so, but I somehow doubt thats the path Wizards will cleave to.

Wizards wants to leave space for people to do their own thing, and so will not tie it to a particular metaphysic that may not hold in all worlds.