D&D (2024) Learning to Love the Background System

[Parmandur]

Why they did it doesn't matter that much to me. It's more the being patient and waiting bit ... cos there's a lot riding on what's in the DMG.

Yeah, that's fair. I was mostly juat responding to the idea that the final version is different from the UA test 2 years ago: just because they changed it doesn't mean the early test was misleading. It might mean they leloatened to people as much as it could mean anything.

 

[Remathilis]

For Adventurers League, players will have to go with what’s in the PHB, I’m assuming. Stuff being in the DMG won’t matter. I never play AL anymore, but I keep my characters AL-legal for balance, so as a player I’ll be ignoring what’s in the DMG, at least with respect to these potential non-AL-legal options.

AL has not shied away from using variant rules before, such as variant humans. Further, if they intend to keep it compatible with previous edition backgrounds, they will end up using some customization anyway. I don't think this is as big a worry as it might seem on paper.

Though AL can surprise us, I guess.

 

[Yaarel]

The 2024 Players Handbook mentions the DM might offer different backgrounds. This is enough for each table to do whatever they want, for new backgrounds to arrive from other settings, and for the DMs Guide to assist the DM about updating and creating backgrounds.

Who knows, perhaps the Greyhawk setting in the DMs Guide might offer a few setting specific backgrounds.

 

[ECMO3]

So I am curious what inability to customize are you talking about?

Here are some from the last few weeks in game I am DMing:

Giving my players a vorpal shorts sword

Giving my players Kwalishes powered armor and having it actually work.

Letting my players have an attack option on their character sheet for the Imp Variant Familiar pet and their Flesh Golem they are controlling and getting all the bonuses to work right.

Giving my players a feat-like boon they got which is not a published feat

Giving the extra spells.

All these things take like 2 minutes or less on the Roll 20 character sheet or about that on paper, but some of them are either completely undoable or else a half-hour chore on DNDBeyond. As far as a computer sheet goes DNDBeyond offers me little.

I make custom backgrounds, custom subclasses, custom feats, custom magic items and custom monsters regularly.

I make custom monsters, but giving PCs control of any of that is near impossible (or I haven't figured it out yet). I have not figured out easy custom magic items. I can customize an item but getting it to use the right ability score or have the right bonuses is extremely difficult.

 

[ECMO3]

ASI even existing was the point of that exchange. The fact they are attached to background rather than species doesn't matter insofar as they even need to exist because that +2/+1 can't just be added to the point buy equvalent point pool.

Why can't it be? Statistically that is 6 points on point buy (admitedly I only gave 5 in my example)

Any array you can get with +1/+2 I can also get with 33 point buy assuming you lift the buy cap to 17. You can get few you could not get with point buy, but nothing that is objectively more powerful.

Edit: Based on a later post I might be misunderstanding you here.

As far as rolling, just add dice.

 

[MarkB]

I suspect the shifting of customized backgrounds into the DMG was an internal decision to focus the PHB on players and the DMG on DMs. It makes sense. It's just annoying what with the staggered release schedule. We all need to be patient and wait till November and then we'll have a fuller picture of the revised rules for both players and DMs.

Yeah, at this point I'm just not going to go into a full-blown campaign with this ruleset until I've read the DMG.

(The MM is not as important to that picture, I don't think.)

Except for druids. It's going to be interesting to see what they've done with beasts.

 

[GarrettKP]

I went ahead and used the backgrounds in the PHB as a template and made 13 backgrounds to fill in some holes and ensure each Origin feat has at least two backgrounds that provide them to players, making sure to avoid backgrounds giving both the same Origin Feat and Ability Score options.

I also went ahead and made Anthropologist and Archaeologist and updated Linguist and Dungeon Delver to work as Origin Feats. Feedback welcome.

 

[Mirrorrorrim]

I don’t think it does. The benefits are fixed. Every Acolyte is smart, wise, and charismatic, none are tough, strong or nimble, and they all learn to use the same skills and tools, and speak the same language. Saying “we’ll, you can be an Acolyte but say you’re actually a farmer” doesn’t really fix the problem, any more than saying you can play an orc but call yourself an elf would have fixed the problems with fixed species ASIs.

I don't think this accurately reflects the narrative of the world. Just char op for PCs.

Noncombat NPCs (let's say an Acolyte) are not naturally optimized or have ability scores of 15+ (unless the DM wants to do so). It makes sense to me that if your background is as an Acolyte, the character's focus would be on those three ability scores, because those are the most relevant scores to the background. Esoteric Knowledge, Spiritual Connection, and Force of Will and Influence.

A generic Acolyte isn't generally doing weight training. But a strong person who becomes an Acolyte can still start with a 15 Strength, and a Wisdom and Charisma of 13 each, but their Acolyte background is going to focus on enhancing relevant abilities. Maybe their Wisdom and Charisma becomes 15 and 14, respectively, and they still have their natural 15 strength. I WISH I had those stats as a human.

Honestly, for 0-1 level NPCs, I'll just give them a Background and no class levels. They get the abilities, skills, tools, and maybe the Feat that make sense for that background, and that is an easy, solid NPC.

The way it is built now makes total sense for a certain kind of gameplay (hard choices that matter), but we all also know the DMG it is going to blow it wide open for the veteran players and DMs. It's literally a non-issue. We'll still get to play the way we want to play. If you have a restrictive DM that wants something different than the players, that is a completely unrelated topic.

I would be more frustrated if there was a perfectly optimized background for each class. There is no choice in that scenario, and would make more sense to be part of the class if that was the case.

It's like people don't want flaws and only want perfection. Flaws make the story interesting to me.

 

[Parmandur]

The 2024 Players Handbook mentions the DM might offer different backgrounds. This is enough for each table to do whatever they want, for new backgrounds to arrive from other settings, and for the DMs Guide to assist the DM about updating and creating backgrounds.

Who knows, perhaps the Greyhawk setting in the DMs Guide might offer a few setting specific backgrounds.

I strongly suspect they are going to provide some examples of more Setting specific Backgrounds alongside the customization rules.

 

[pukunui]

Yeah, at this point I'm just not going to go into a full-blown campaign with this ruleset until I've read the DMG.

Same. My 3-year-long Mad Mage campaign is coming to an end this weekend, and we've agreed to play Wild Beyond the Witchlight next using the 2014 rules. By the time we've finished, all three 2024 books will be out, and we'll be able to decide whether we want to adopt them fully or go with a 2014/2024 hybrid.

Except for druids. It's going to be interesting to see what they've done with beasts.

Yeah, I guess. I mean, they did put more beasts in the PHB, so we can get some sense of how 2024 druids will play already.