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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Chaosmancer" data-source="post: 8201227" data-attributes="member: 6801228">Well, that actually depends. If I am picking Firbolg in part because I want Wisdom, then I also picked my ASI, and picking wisdom greatly lowered the options I could pick for a race. There are very very few wisom races after all. And weirdly almost all of them also give you Con. And this gets into the difference between the types of decisions we are talking about. If I am wanting to play a paladin, then I look at the races that would work well for a paladin. Half orc can work, strength and con, and they get a good bonus to crits and the ability to stand back upHalf-Elf gives potentially con, cha and strength, and more skills Dragonborn give str and cha and their breath weapon as an optional AOE for clearing small fry. Changelings potentially give str, con and cha and their shapeshifting and extra skills are excellent for infiltration. Now, to make this decision I need to compare not only the balance of the scores I want, but also the abilities. Is losing out on the savage attacks, orcish resilience, and Con worth the gain to my spellcasting DC and an AOE? I could get all three stats, but that focuses me as a skill monkey, is that what I want? This is a complicated decision, and I know many people will say that this is the point of the game, and easy decisions spoil us and ruin the game, but think for a moment about splitting those decisions up. Do you want Str, Con, or Cha? Some of them will give an extra +1 still, but now if you feel like the orcish abilities are more your liking you are not also sacrificing your spellcasting DC. You can decide how you want your paladin's stats seperate from what suite of abilities you want to focus on. It is two easier decisions, since you separated factors out to decide in a different manner.Or you could not add those adjustments from the PHB and/or DMG and still have your NPC elf the exact same way. I mean, think about it like this. If you want the Dwarf Blacksmith to have a 16 strength, does he have an 18 Strength? You decided on a 16, but then are you forced to increase it by +2 and give him an 18?If you decide that the Dwarf Blacksmith has a 16 strength, and wizards removes racial ASIs, does he now have a 14 strength? Because the +2 is no longer there so he has to be lowered to a 14? No. He has a 16 strength. Whether or not Dwarves get a +2 strength does not matter. Because you weren't rolling his stats randomly, you were picking them directly.</blockquote>

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