So you're defining "powergamer" as "anyone who chooses something other than fixed ASIs."
No, I define "powergamer" as someone who insists on using an optin of the game purely because it creates a more powerful character.
So, because you think that stereotypes are good, anyone who chooses to go against them is a powergamer.
What ? Powergamers using floating ASIs are not going against stereotypes, they are creating new ones with their builds.
Really going against stereotype would be making an atypical character without using floating ASIs, just because it looks cool like our Orc Bard or Halfling Warlock.
Or it means you want to be effective in your chosen class. "Being effective" and "being a powergamer" are not the same thing at all.
As it has been proven that you don't need Floating ASIs to be effective, going beyond this is powergaming, especially since it's done purely for the bonus without any explanation other than "I'm different".
So, coming up with unique cultural aspects for different races, or coming up with unique, non-mechanical, biological quirks for different races is somehow bland, but a +2 bonus to a stat, and basing their cultural differences around thatbonus or on a mechanical trait, isn't bland--despite making the races all one-note.
If it makes the race significantly stronger and it's then part of its culture then yes, it's much better than just a quirk like a funny hat. My point it not that I want only the racial ASI, but it's certainly another string to my bow in making races distinctive. If it was up to me, I would keep both positive and negative racial ASIs, because it increases the range of the differences.
Once more, Runequest as extremely variable stats per race/species, which do not cause a problem because they are not only logical but also decorrelated from the earth ethnicities. Uzko (Dark Trolls) are called that not because their skin is dark but because they are linked to the Darkness Rune. They therefore have the special Dark Sense, superior sense of smell, but are infected with the Trollkin Curse. And their strength is rolled with 3d6+6 vs. 3d6 for humans...
How on earth does this make sense to you? Because right now, it sounds like you don't care about the race's culture or biology beyond what you can put on your character sheet--either that, or you don't want to bother thinking up any actual culture or biological quirks.
Because you want to start from cultural quirks instead of acknowledging that the real beginning is species/racial characteristics especially in a fantasy world where these characteristics can be extremely diversified and strong, and that these should be what shapes the culture.
Two: I haven't defended Tasha's. I said it was optional. I haven't even made any characters with it yet. My tiefling rogue, firbolg warlock, and kalashtar fighter were all built pre-Tasha's and haven't died yet, so no need for new characters.
And I'm not saying that you are a powergamer, but you are defending Tasha's (even if you have not applied it yet) Floating ASIs, which for me are a powergamer's option. Just have a look at the famous guides which create builds, they show the power drift and how the interest has shifted from some class/race combinations to others, "better" ones.
This may be shocking to you, but if you have a race that's actually fleshed out and interesting, and players who are interested in playing that race, then it literally doesn't matter where put the bonus. Because that bonus has nothing to do with the race; it's just a mechanical benefit.
And I'm still waiting to see an example of a character created with that in mind. Although it's not exactly true, on another forum, someone showed me an old half-orc "warlord" (Fighter based in 5e, so STR-based) who had put his floating ASI in charisma rather than strength. But still the player was unable to explain to me why he needed a 16 charisma in the game. His character would have been totally fine with a 14 or 15, it would still have conveyed everything that he wanted to convey in terms of role. Still, it looked like a great character.
So, if someone just wants to play a tiefling warlock because they have a cool idea for a tiefling who's a warlock, you would consider them to be powergamers who couldn't possibly have fun without that bonus. And you actively attempt to discredit other people's playstyles because you disagree with it. You sound charming.
I am not badwrongfunning anyone here, if people want to power game and have fun that way, it's a perfectly legitimate way of playing the game. However, our tables rules and understanding is that we are playing story orientated roleplaying games where everyone can have fun, in particular by sharing the spotlight and helping each other have fun. In that context, the ONLY type of problem that we've ever had (and the only player that we kicked out, twice actually as we are forgiving people and welcomed him back once despite some obvious munchkinism) were powergamers twisting the game to their own ends by increasing the power gap as much as possible, and using this to order other players around on the basis that they were less "skilled" (hence my rant on "skilled play" in another thread).
So I'm not discrediting that play style, I'm saying it's the most disruptive that I've encountered at tables where it's not the way the game is played. After that, people are free to play the game the way they want, in particular, a fully CaS table is hopefully a lot of fun for the people there, I'm not judging.
An elf fighter who chooses to put +2 in Strength is the same, from a dice-rolling perspective, as an orc fighter who was forced to put +2 in Strength, who is also the same, from a dice-rolling perspective, as an orc fighter who chooses to +2 in Strength.
And I'm not interested in the dice-rolling perspective. FYI, I'm playing as much as possible with the "Ignore the dice" option anyway.
Please tell me where the optimization is. Because I haven't seen an uptick in mountain dwarf wizards, which may literally be the only example of optimization due to a floating ASI I've ever seen.
Then there are some forums that you have not been watching (not here).
Which is even more of a reason why fixed ASIs are dumb. The average orc PC has an Int of 10.
Ah but PCs are exceptional, don't you know ? But this is why I would like to reinstate the negative racial ASIs, although I know that this would not happen. It would make the world more consistent.
This, however, strongly suggests that you aren't understanding what I wrote because I have never talked about floating ASIs affecting culture.
My conclusion there had nothing to do with that, it was just to show how well WotC are navigating the situation and the constraints imposed on them. But my point is that there should be racial ASIs, strong ones, negative ones, and that they should impact the culture. Do you disagree that they should impact it ?
