PH3 Playtest Race: Wilden

[Dire Bare]

Absolutely. You've got non-optional wacky PC races coming out every year that you're supposed to adapt your world to, of course it's hostile to worldbuilders. Yes, you can ban things, you can also add things to fix the system, but that doesn't get around that as written, the game is a step backwards for worldbuilding purposes.

I have a hard time seeing anything in 4e (or any version of D&D) "hostile" to world-building. It's guarunteed that at some point or other, some official "piece" of D&D lore is published that you won't like. Easy fix is not to use it. Or to change it to suit your tastes.

It goes back to an open GM style which encourages the DM to say "yes" and a closed GM style which encourages the DM to limit player choices.

Right now, in my home campaign, I don't have any plant races. And I'm not going to worry about it much until either, A) inspiration strikes and a plant-race like the Wilden suddenly find a reason to exist in my campaign, or B) a player asks to play a Wilden.

When I'm confronted with "B" above, I could get all angsty and shout, "NO! Silly plant people just don't belong in MY world." Or I could be open, say yes, and work the Wilden PC into my world. Wilden don't have to become major players in my campaign (or they could), all I need to do is be creative and find a reason why this one Wilden exists in my campaign. I can use the fluff from PHB3 unchanged, I can alter it, or I can throw it out altogether and come up with my own.

"Hostile" to world-building? No, it is a creative opportunity to expand my world.

 

[Klaus]

Here it is.

I think the race works best with a "natural" origin, as opposed to fey. I'd even pull a Swamp Thing on the race and say that Nature harvests (ha!) the consciousness of fallen humanoids to defend itself, building natural bodies for them. Hence the use of weapons and armor: it's a fading echo of their former lives.

 

[chronoplasm]

Don't you mean a Warforged Warlord|Warden/Warlock wielding a Warhammer? (| = Hybrid class, /= multi-class).

...played by Warwick Davis of Willow fame.

 

[Stogoe]

See, I find that as a good thing, since then "core" isn't an excuse. It means that the player and DM have to both discuss what they wish out of the game, including stuff like what races there is, how they may be refluffed, etc.

Yeah, "Core" is a cop out, and a player or DM who refuses to negotiate about setting expectations seems narrow-minded and not someone I care to play with at all.

 

[77IM]

See, I find that as a good thing, since then "core" isn't an excuse. It means that the player and DM have to both discuss what they wish out of the game, including stuff like what races there is, how they may be refluffed, etc.

The problem is that the PHB doesn't set up that expectation. Nowhere, in all the discussion about role-playing and how to make a character and how to play the game, does it mention this crucial negotiation step.

Other games clearly mention this explicitly, and some don't even work without it (toolkit games like Savage Worlds, True20, GURPS, etc.). I am very much in favor of a "toolkit" approach to D&D in which the designers pump out all sorts of weird races and classes and individual groups decide which to use. That would be awesome. Instead, the PHB presents the races, classes, pantheon, and historical elements within as being the races, classes, pantheon, and historical elements of D&D.

This poorly set expectation is going to cause a certain amount of friction whenever Wizards releases something new that impacts the setting ("wait, if wardens are all around protecting nature and stuff, how come we've never heard of one or run into any?"). It's not the end of the world but it does make a difference and so I think it's perfectly valid to criticize a race or class on the grounds that it will be difficult to integrate into existing settings. For example, the wilden.

-- 77IM

 

[CelticMutt]

1) They're not Fey: they're plant people, that's PRIMAL. Fey are Redcaps, Pixies, Nymphs, Satyrs, Eladrin, Drow, Fomorians, whatever. They're not plant people like the Wilden.

4) Driads/Nymphs would be a great FeyPC race for plant people. Mini-treants, another example. Lizard-like plant avengers vs. Cthulhu? wtf? How does that in any way compare or relate to the D&D level of Driads?
I mean, most of the players I get out are female; having a female race would be sweet.

1) Elves are Primal too ...

1) & 4) Dryad are plant people fey, and you're ok with that, but not with the Wilden as plant people fey? Huh?

Absolutely. You've got non-optional wacky PC races coming out every year that you're supposed to adapt your world to, of course it's hostile to worldbuilders. Yes, you can ban things, you can also add things to fix the system, but that doesn't get around that as written, the game is a step backwards for worldbuilding purposes.

If your world doesn't have mountains, you're clearly breaking a lot of assumptions. It's on an entirely different level to saying tieflings and dragonboobs have never had an empire.

Tieflings never had an empire in Forgotten Realms or Eberron. Dragonborn never had an empire in Dragonlance (Draconians) or Dark Sun (Dray), and they probably are servitors at best in the Eberron dragon empire. So why would your homebrew be required to have them have had an empire?

 

[rounser]

Tieflings never had an empire in Forgotten Realms or Eberron. Dragonborn never had an empire in Dragonlance (Draconians) or Dark Sun (Dray), and they probably are servitors at best in the Eberron dragon empire. So why would your homebrew be required to have them have had an empire?

I never said I considered 4E to be a legitimate version of D&D, not least because the implied setting doesn't fit D&D settings, and am unsurprised that it doesn't fit these D&D worlds without cataclysmic handwaves and awkward, easily disbelievable retcons (with the possible exception of Eberron, which is a kitchen sink "whatever exists in D&D" world anyway, and IMO unconvincing the first time around). We're coming from different sets of assumptions.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

It seems some people seem to assume that the fluff of every race is absolutely required in every game. It's not. It's just relevant if you want to use the "implied" setting - WotC Points of Light.

In any other game world, you can, as always, choose to mix, match, ignore and twist stuff. YOUR campaign world doesn't have a place for an Ancient Dragonborn Empire? Well, then change the Dragonborn story.

 

[rounser]

It seems some people seem to assume that the fluff of every race is absolutely required in every game. It's not. It's just relevant if you want to use the "implied" setting - WotC Points of Light.

I don't think you understand what an implied setting is. The implied setting is not POL. It's the setting that the rules imply. It just happens to fit POL - a specific setting.

The fact that the core implied setting is so specific that it doesn't fit almost anywhere else and lacks mythogical resonance due to it's use of contrived races (and at least one class) is IMO a reflection that the 4E implied setting is badly designed and doesn't do what a D&D implied setting is supposed to do - provide a generic and mythologically resonant baseline for worldbuilding across a thousand worlds. It's a fundamental failure of the new game IMO.

 

[Tallifer]

Well, they were called Sylvans in Dark Age of Camelot...

Now THAT was a great game!

I want to play a friar in 4th edition Dungeons and Dragons because of that game. So far my attempts to emulate him with a cleric and a homebrewed heavy shod staff have been unsuccessful.