???
What does that mean?
Does it mean that if I (as DM) use set racial bonuses, it follows that because I don't allow halflings to move their +2 from Dex to Str...that I'm denying them +2 completely? Not even to Dex?
You're denying people the ability to put the +2 in any stat because you don't like the idea of strong halflings. You're denying smart halflings, wise halflings, etc. You can shrug and say "oh well, that's the game," but that's, quite frankly, bad.
You think it's stupid to have racial bonuses to match the concepts of that race, but I think it's sensible. My decision is not mindless, it is thoroughly thought through.
The concepts of "race" aren't set in stone. As I pointed out, they've changed, sometimes radically, from edition to edition.
I would be just as horrified if a player created a 1st level fighter and swapped Fighting Style for Spellcasting. Just because they are both abilities available to 1st level PCs, it is not appropriate to claim that you get spellcasting because you are a fighter.
Classes and races are very different things. They can be, and are, treated differently in the game. And they are balanced quite differently.
Presumably, when you say swapping a fighting style for spellcasting, you mean full-progression spellcasting, levels 1-9, just like a wizard or cleric. That's completely unbalanced. Full casting is
far more powerful than a fighting style. I know it, you know it, everyone knows it.
But it's fully possible to create a fighter with
limited spellcasting abilities. There are five such official archetypes already: the Eldritch Knight from the PH, the Arcane Archer from Xannies', the Rune Knight and Psi Warrior from Tasha's, and the Echo Knight from Wildemont. The Eldritch Knight is a third-caster with limited access to magical schools. The other four grant magical (or psionic) abilities but no spells. These are perfectly acceptable and more or less balanced archetypes. I also know of the Bone Knight from the 3pp Morgrave's Miscellany, that's a third caster with limited clerical spells. And a fighter can also spend one of their copious feats on Magic Initiate or Ritual Adept.
And here's the difference: removing a tiny ability to grant a huge ability is obviously unbalancing. But swapping a +2 in one attribute for a +2 in a different attribute is
not unbalancing in the slightest. After all, if a halfling isn't unbalanced for getting a +2 in Dexterity, then a goliath isn't unbalanced for swapping Strength for Dex either. If anything, it's a
weak trade, because the goliath lacks the halfling's Agile trait, won't get as big a benefit from using heavy weapons, and won't get as much use out of their Powerful Build. Ditto the other way around, where a +2 Strength halfling still can't use heavy weapons without a penalty.
But! here's the important thing--even if a Strength-based halfling or a Dex-based goliath isn't mechanically great,
people should have the option anyway. If someone wants a Strength-based halfling, or a Wis or Con or Int or Cha-based halfling, then there is not a single decent reason why they can't have it.
It's not unbalanced, it's not at all like switching out a tiny class ability in order to get a huge one from a different class, and it doesn't change the
race's flavor at all.
I cannot. I don't have access to that race. What book is it from?
Ravnica I told you the pertinent traits, but here's all of them: Con +2, Wis +1, Powerful Build, advantage on saves vs. charmed and frightened coz they're so zen, unarmored AC of 12 + Con, a trunk that can lift things that weigh up to 5 x Strength score but can't wield weapons or a shield, and Keen Smell. Here's a screen shot from dndbeyond.
And they're on
average 7'6" and 350 lbs. With no Strength bonus. Which means that even though a completely average loxodon can pick up a halfling with its trunk (Str 10 x 5 lbs), the loxodon and the halfling actually have the
same Strength.
This is one reason why I dislike racial ASIs. They are random, inconsistent, and often nonsensical. Why does the
elephant-folk, which has Powerful Build, get no Strength bonus, but the much shorter,
slender githyanki get a +2 Strength? Why are drow (traditionally portrayed as sadistic demon-worshipers) and tieflings (who are literally devil-blooded and are described in the PH as being hated and feared) so charismatic? Why are gnomes, who live like a cross between elves and halflings and either spend all their time talking to squirrels or making gadgets that might blow up in their face, so intelligent? Why do mountain dwarfs get a +2 to both Strength
and Con, but kobolds only get +2 Dex but no +1 to anything--even though they're known to be really good trapmakers and tricksters? Why do tritons get +1 to three stats? Why do goblins in VGM get a +1 bonus to Con when MM goblins have completely average Con, but grungs, minotaurs, and orcs
also get +1 Con but their monster entry give them Constitutions of 15 or higher? Edit: Why do DMG eladrin get +1 Int while Mordenkainen's eladrin get +1 Cha?
The answer is simple: the writers decided it would be that way. Thus, as a gamer, I can
rewrite it. The game actively encourages us to change rules we don't like, after all.
(BTW, you may want to look in the DMG on how to make races: they specifically say they created the aasimar with the goal that it should be a good cleric and paladin.)
But racial bonuses are not there to customise your character, they are there to reflect the concepts of that race in game mechanics that apply because that's what that race gives you.
Which is (a) a useless tautology: halflings are dexterous because halflings get a bonus to Dexterity because halflings are dexterous; and (b) therefore a good reason to get rid of
racial ASIs completely in favor of a non-racial floating ASI, so you
do have more opportunity to customize.
dnd.wizards.com
