D&D General What it means for a race to end up in the PHB, its has huge significance

[Frozen_Heart]

(What happens to Khoravar, Jhor'guntaal, and the three mixed Dragonmarked Houses the next time WotC visits Eberron?

Watch them do what they've done with Dark Sun, and declare Eberron to be a 'problematic' IP which will no longer get covered going forward.

Would also allow them to drop artificer in 5.5e, which they pretty clearly want to do.

 

[Clint_L]

... and what actual mixed ancestry players (current and future) who identify with "half-elves" and "half-orcs" will feel when it's hard-coded into the game system's core rules that only one portion of their character's ancestry is allowed to matter.

You've been trying to put on the virtue boots throughout this discussion and imply that WotC's steps to tackle actually problematic real world terminology has somehow actually been deeply insensitive to hypothetical "mixed ancestry players (current and future) who identify with "half-elves" and "half-orcs." I'm not buying it. I don't think mechanical distinctions have to be built into game rules for mixed ancestry options to be meaningful. This is a roleplaying game, first and foremost.

All of your character's ancestry is now allowed to matter in the story as much as you want it to. If you want to reduce things that matter about people to a couple of ability bonuses then that's your call, and the game permits you to keep doing so, but this new rule vastly expands the options for mixed ancestry from two, to almost infinity. To whatever combinations the player wants. It opens up all those gameplay choices for hypothetical mixed-ancestry players who want something other than those two options. It recognizes that diversity is actually diverse, and not reducible to a pair of options.

 

[Mecheon]

Watch them do what they've done with Dark Sun, and declare Eberron to be a 'problematic' IP which will no longer get covered going forward.

That's not gonna happen, Dark Sun has its. Actual issues, Eberron doesn't

 

[Kobold Avenger]

You've been trying to put on the virtue boots throughout this discussion and imply that WotC's steps to tackle actually problematic real world terminology has somehow actually been deeply insensitive to hypothetical "mixed ancestry players (current and future) who identify with "half-elves" and "half-orcs." I'm not buying it. I don't think mechanical distinctions have to be built into game rules for mixed ancestry options to be meaningful. This is a roleplaying game, first and foremost.

And there's still Tieflings and Aasimar who are potentially mixed ancestry (but not half mortal half whatever) they haven't gone away.

Though many are instead "mutants" in that parents living too close to a nexus of planar energies can result in a Tiefling or Aasimar being born.

 

[Remathilis]

Forgive me if this has been discussed.

I almost feel aasimar and orcs are the replacement for half-elf and half-orc, thematically.

So what is the story beat for a half-elf? Traditionally, its a person born between two worlds; human and elf. The human represents a common ancestry, the elf a more refined and elegant one. The elves want little to do with the half-breed, the humans fear his strange features and abilities. If you replace "human" with "mortal" and "elf" with celestial, the beats pretty much work the same. The mortal side either respects or fears the celestial origin of the aasimar, the celestial side looks down with pity on their mortal and imperfect offspring. They still end up children of two-worlds, never fitting in either, but the origin is now magical rather than biological.

Likewise, the story of the half-orc is that its a PC orc race with its savage and bloodthirsty tendencies tempered by a hearty dose of human DNA. An orc people still have prejudice about, but, is acceptable in more civil society. So PC orcs do the same, but without the need to breed out the bad genes with human genetics. Some orcs are just good people and don't need a human parent for that to be. They get the same reaction that most people have to half-orcs, be that good or ill.

Does that solve the problem? Not 100%, but I do think the two races can be use to more-or-less create similar storylines to the half-races without getting involved in Punnett squares. Aasimar are half-elves, but with aloof parents that truly are exemplary of goodness, beauty, and grace, while orcs can fill the role that half-orcs did but without having to breed the orc out of them first.

 

[FrozenNorth]

My concerns are the worldbuilding implications that "pick-a-parent" creates (What happens to Khoravar, Jhor'guntaal, and the three mixed Dragonmarked Houses the next time WotC visits Eberron? Or when we inevitably head into an actual 6e some 5-10 years down the road and the whole "you can still use legacy ancestries" option is no longer on the table?) and what actual mixed ancestry players (current and future) who identify with "half-elves" and "half-orcs" will feel when it's hard-coded into the game system's core rules that only one portion of their character's ancestry is allowed to matter.

I am an actual mixed-race player who occasionally like playing mixed race PCs (though I prefer half-orcs to half-elves). I like the change. I like the fact that I can now play a half-dwarf that doesn’t fit in the more strongly lawful dwarven society.

You don’t speak for all mixed-race players.

 

[Veltharis ap Rylix]

I am an actual mixed-race player who occasionally like playing mixed race PCs (though I prefer half-orcs to half-elves). I like the change. I like the fact that I can now play a half-dwarf that doesn’t fit in the more strongly lawful dwarven society.

You don’t speak for all mixed-race players.

I do not claim to do so. If I have ever given the impression that I think I do, then I wholeheartedly apologize.

The proposed "pick-a-parent" system works for you. Great! By all means, use it. I have no issue with WotC keeping it in as an option, even the default option.

What I take issue with is the prospect of it being the only option. There are people (both real and fictional) and worldbuilding scenarios that I think it fails to adequately serve. I want options that serve them too.

 

[Parmandur]

Ngl seeing them called 'half-breeds' is kinda nauseating.

Well, that's why they are gone.

 

[Yaarel]

I do not claim to do so. If I have ever given the impression that I think I do, then I wholeheartedly apologize.

The proposed "pick-a-parent" system works for you. Great! By all means, use it. I have no issue with WotC keeping it in as an option, even the default option.

What I take issue with is the prospect of it being the only option. There are people (both real and fictional) and worldbuilding scenarios that I think it fails to adequately serve. I want options that serve them too.

In the 2024 DMs Guide, it is easy to mention that the Elf can swap out the slot 1 and slot 2 spells for the Human trait feat. There would still be the two cantrips for a hint of elven magic (or the one cantrip and cantrip-like trait, such as Speed +5).

 

[Henadic Theologian]

Am I the only one who thinks that WotC saw the blow back to ditching the Half Elf and Half Orc and decided to actually put them in after all, even if they kind of renaming them?