Tiefling as a core race?

[mhacdebhandia]

Yes, I was talking to my wife last night about my hopes that Fourth Edition will, at least partially, revive the old "shopping list" of tiefling racial abilities from Planescape, rather than sticking to the "everyone gets darkness" schema of Third Edition.

 

[Sundragon2012]

Can we bury D&D's ugly Tolkien roots, too?

The Tolkien roots are rich and vibrant providing sustenance for the whole tree. Without the Tolkien roots which are as much a part of the classic root system as Robert E. Howard and Leiber. These roots are foundational and without them you have something unrecognizable like Dark Sun which I loved by the way though it could never be the baseline assumption of what D&D represents.

Once fantasy gets too far afield it becomes somewhat alien and that is fine for divergent D&D settings. Plus, races like Tieflings (HATE the name) are a more fantastic race than elves because they are built upon the assumption of strong extra-planer contact. The real danger of such fantastic races being commonplace is that there is an ever increasing escalation of te fantastic until nothing is fantastic anymore until is is entirely alien.


Sundragon

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

I really like tieflings... and yet, I cut my teeth on D&D Basic, where extraplanar thingies were a lot less common. I'm not quite down with the D&D-tavern-as-Mos-Eisley concept.

Me either, but racial choices are probably the most commonly tweaked element in games. In Midwood, the players got the choice of humans, dwarves and gnomes for their first (local) characters.

Depending on what other races are added, and what sort of fluff they wrap them in, I have no problem being equally draconian.

 

[mhacdebhandia]

The Tolkien roots are rich and vibrant providing sustenance for the whole tree.

I, on the other hand, consider Tolkien to be more like the Dutch elm disease of fantasy. The fact that it's widespread, and many people assume its effects are normal, doesn't mean that it's good or healthy.

 

[Olgar Shiverstone]

Maybe it's the iconic tiefling rogue from NWN2 ... though I'd hate to see them replace Lidda.

Personally I dislike tieflings (and most half-races, for that matter), and have never allowed planetouched or half-dragon races in any campaign I've run. I have a hard time seeing how you sell a half-demon as a core race in a heroic game (anti-heroes be damned -- do you think anti-paladins will be base classes?).

Have we actually confirmed, though, that tieflings are a core race in the 4E PHB?

 

[mhacdebhandia]

Both tieflings and non-Lawful Good paladins are confirmed for the core rules. Specifically, Chris Perkins mentioned a Lawful Evil paladin of Asmodeus as a possible character in his Gen Con blog, and tieflings in the core rules were mentioned everywhere - the ICv2 article, the InQuest article, sample artwork handed out on flash drives at the announcement, et cetera.

 

[Nifft]

Maybe it's the iconic tiefling rogue from NWN2 ... though I'd hate to see them replace Lidda.

What about the iconic tiefling from PS: Torment, eh?

Annah vs. Lidda. That's a tough call. I'd need some one-on-one time with each of them to firm up my judgement, if you know what I mean.

Decisions, decisions, -- N

 

[mhacdebhandia]

Lidda, pah. I'll take Annah - or Falls-From-Grace - any day.

 

[SHARK]

Greetings!

Tieflings as a core race?

Great. I would think they could come up with a better core race than the Tiefling.

It's good that they shaft the Gnome though. Gnomes have always been the ugly step-child, standing in the shadow of halflings and dwarves anyways. Gnomes aren't such a loss. They can get the full shaft, and be dropped into a upcoming Monster Manual or something--maybe a new "Complete Races Guide".

Poor Gnomes!

Semper Fidelis,

SHARK

 

[pawsplay]

Gnomes were awesome until 3e turned them into Uncle Chuckles, and then into bango players.