D&D 5E Racial restrictions on Dragonmarks in 5E?

[Ratinyourwalls]

In 3.5 when Eberron was first introduced each of the dragonmarks were initially limited to one (or two for one of them) race each. For example only Halflings could have the Dragonmark of Hospitality while Elves got the Shadow dragonmark and Humans got a metric ton of them.

In 4E they changed this and it's always puzzled me. Now every race, by the core rules, are able to have any dragonmark. The dragonmarked houses are really pivotal to the setting and yet...they basically just flipped a switch for no reason and messed with them.

I hope 5E will undo this change. I've never liked it and I hate feeling like a schmuck when I tell PC's that no they can't play a Tiefling with the mark of shadow even if the book doesn't restrict them...

Any thoughts?

 

[Vael]

I think I want Dragonmarks to be more racially limited, but I also want 4e's take that Dragonmarks make you better at what your mark does, rather than simply giving you a once-per-day spell-like ability.

 

[DEFCON 1]

I'm fine with either version.

The 4E version basically stated that anyone who had a dragonmark who was not a part of the race that normally had it, was a never-before-probably-never-again occurance that should be a major, major plot point of the entire campaign. The mark would be equivelant to a aberrant mark since it appeared on the wrong race, the house that controlled the mark would hunt down the PC so they could try and figure out how this happened, the Chamber would be interested in this random occurance and whether or not that had some impact on the prophecy, so on and so forth. While you could do it and allow it, it was not something to just do lightly.

The whole point of Eberron was a campaign world full of mysteries and exploration. And the dragonmarks were one mystery that was fully expected DMs would run wild with... whether it was the disappeared thirteenth Mark of Death, the differences between the Eberron, Siberys, and Khyber marks... and random marks appearing on random people (the module Eyes of the Lich Queen has an entire plotline of this happening.) So 4E telling folks that they can do it if they really wanted to was just make expressed the purpose that they were really there for... really cool and interesting McGuffins for the campaign.

 

[Hellcow]

I'm late to the party but just wanted to point out that Defcon has it right. The sourcebook removed racial restrictions for the simple reason that if you were playing a human fighter in Forgotten Realms and your DM was OK with it, you could take the Mark of Warding. For that matter, if your DM was OK with it, you could do it in Eberron. But if you do it in Eberron you're probably THE FIRST PERSON IN HISTORY to have such a mark and it should be a big, possibly very dangerous for you deal.

It's covered on pages 17-18 of the ECG. I wouldn't mind just going back to 3E's word; DMs can always let players break the rules if they want. But I'll not that in my 4E Eberron campaigns, no one ever saw an NPC or PC with an out-of-race mark.

 

[DEFCON 1]

It should be said that most of what I wrote about was pretty much a regurgitation of what I read from Hellcow on Hellcow's blog. So Keith is basically agreeing with himself.

 

[dkyle]

It's covered on pages 17-18 of the ECG. I wouldn't mind just going back to 3E's word; DMs can always let players break the rules if they want. But I'll not that in my 4E Eberron campaigns, no one ever saw an NPC or PC with an out-of-race mark.

Yes, a DM can always break the rules, but if the rules exist both for balance and for pure fluff reasons, then it makes the DM's job harder.

If the racial restriction is only in the setting fluff, then he knows that breaking that restriction is only a matter of breaking setting expectations, not breaking game mechanics.

If the racial restriction is codified into the rules, then the DM must play game designer, and suss out whether the restriction is there for the sake of balance or not. Perhaps the Dragonmark is racial restricted to help out a weaker race, or enable a race-class combo that doesn't ordinarily have a lot of synergy?

Case in point: a 4E Halfling is not especially well suited for playing Clerics. The healing dragonmark is very well suited for Clerics. If there was a "Race Required: Halfling" in 4E's Eberron, it might be balanced for Halflings, but not for, say, Dwarves, who make for great Clerics by default.

 

[grimslade]

I hope Dragonmarks utilize a theme in 5E and possibly a background too. 3.x racial restrictions too.

 

[john112364]

I hope Dragonmarks utilize a theme in 5E and possibly a background too. 3.x racial restrictions too.

I agree. Themes are tailor made for Dragonmarks.

 

[IanB]

Yes, a DM can always break the rules, but if the rules exist both for balance and for pure fluff reasons, then it makes the DM's job harder.

If the racial restriction is only in the setting fluff, then he knows that breaking that restriction is only a matter of breaking setting expectations, not breaking game mechanics.

If the racial restriction is codified into the rules, then the DM must play game designer, and suss out whether the restriction is there for the sake of balance or not. Perhaps the Dragonmark is racial restricted to help out a weaker race, or enable a race-class combo that doesn't ordinarily have a lot of synergy?

Case in point: a 4E Halfling is not especially well suited for playing Clerics. The healing dragonmark is very well suited for Clerics. If there was a "Race Required: Halfling" in 4E's Eberron, it might be balanced for Halflings, but not for, say, Dwarves, who make for great Clerics by default.

Just in case you weren't aware the guy you are replying to is the original designer of the Eberron setting.

I initially leaned towards 'it should be like 3.5' but really, there's no reason it has to be. There's no particular reason an aberrant dragonmark can't have a power that one of the standard ones offers, after all, and allowing all the races to take any of them lets you do that easily in an online character builder....

 

[herrozerro]

I like 4e's ebberon, it`s not like it just said "no consequences! play whatever you want!". Rather it told you that there were expectations and PCs could be exceptions and those exceptions might have extreme consequences.