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

[Yaarel]

Animals have darkvision. That’s why their eyes shine.

It is "lowlight" vision for nocturnal animals, including wolves that hunt at night and twilight. It isnt because of the forest.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

It is "lowlight" vision for nocturnal animals, including wolves that hunt at night and twilight. It isnt because of the forest.

Since 5e lumped everything together low light vision is darkvision.

 

[Yaarel]

Since 5e lumped everything together low light vision is darkvision.

Not exactly. For example, the 5e Wolf statblock lacks "Darkvision", even tho reallife wolves see well at night. Even the Cat statblock lacks Darkvision.

Likely the shining eyes of wolves is where the concept of nocturnal monsters with glowing eyes comes from?

5e picks and chooses which species have Darkvision. Too many 5e player species have Darkvision. Only a few merit it.

• Dwarves are subterranean.
• Orcs are nocturnal and monstrous.
• Tiefling are fiendish.
• The UA Dragonborn has Darkvision, as some reallife snakes actually have infravision, heatvision.

None of the other core species need Darkvision.

Aasimar dont need Darkvision. The concept is the angels can see what goes on in the dark. But even the Aasimar dont need it, since they can instead shine heavenly Light in dark places. The Ardling, a Celestial Guardinal Aasimar, didnt get Darkvision. Besides, the Aasimar species needs to free up the design space to make room for traits that are cool.

In British folkbelief, the fairy are nocturnal, which is probably where the idea of Elf infravision came from. But the 5e Fairy lacks Darkvision. The D&D High Elf culture does little or nothing relating to Darkvision. "Sun" Elf doesnt need it. Astral Elf doesnt need it. Etcetera. The Drow culture is subterranean and merits it, but can acquire it magically. The 3e Elf lacks Darkvision. Also 4e. The absence of Darkvision merits being the norm for most Elf cultures.

Gnome doesnt need it. Yes, they live underground but at the surface, and are normally outdoors.

Elsewhere there are too many species with Darkvision. Why would Air Genasi have Darkvision?

 

[Mind of tempest]

Animals have darkvision. That’s why their eyes shine.

that is not dark vision that is reflection also it is not hard for a human to see in the dark

 

[Hussar]

I had 3e Elf, in mind. The Elf lacks Darkvision.

4e Elf also lacks Darkvision.

Basically, 3e is the outlier here. Every other version had elves with infravision and even 3e gave them low light vision. 4e took darkvision from pretty much all the races AIR.

But, wasn't your argument that 5e is somehow changing the elf? Why talk about how elves were presented in the past as if something was being lost? Your argument is that elves having darkvision is the result of magic. That might be your own take on things, but, it's certainly not how D&D has presented elves.

 

[Yaarel]

Basically, 3e is the outlier here. Every other version had elves with infravision and even 3e gave them low light vision. 4e took darkvision from pretty much all the races AIR.

Well 3e and 4e, so that is 14 years of the D&D Elf clearly lacking Darkvision.


The main feeling is. There is too much Darkvision. Also, Darkvision is boring, but could be interesting if rare.

Most Elf cultures have nothing to do with Darkvision, and it is weird from them to have it.

Probably the ONLY elven cultures that would benefit from Darkvision are the Uda Drow culture (but not Aeven or Loren Drow cultures), and ... maybe ... the Wood culture if actually nocturnal hunters but seems they arent.

But, wasn't your argument that 5e is somehow changing the elf?

My argument is the Human-Elf lacks a need for special mechanics, when the 2024 method can reproduce the 2014 mechanics. I am in favor of the DMs Guide facilitating species trait swaps for various reasons, including multispecies characters. I would love for swaps to be in the Players Handbook but this requires rigorous balancing. (The Swordcoast setting Half-Elf swaps were laughably unbalanced.)

My argument is also that there would be no change in trait, only in the method of gaining the trait. Darkvision should be a 2024 cantrip, and for character concepts where Darkvision might make sense the player can use one of the Elf cantrips to have it. But other Elves shouldnt have it, and can pick a cantrip that makes more sense.

Why talk about how elves were presented in the past as if something was being lost?

The fact that the Elf of recent D&D editions lacks Darkvision emphasizes how unnecessary it is for the Elf species to have it.

 

[Mephista]

How about this then:

Personally, I honestly don't care about specific mechanics, I prefer to discus tropes, vibes, and the like. Because, if we're going to talk about the mechanics...

Then we have to address the elephant in the room. Mainly, the greatest mechanical appeal of the half-elf was the fact that they had +2 CHA and two floating +1s (total of 4, matched only by mountain dwarves). Not only did 5e have an abundance of CHA classes, but half-elf was seen as the bard-elf type (as opposed to high elf wizard, wood elf ranger/druid, and drow assassin). Thus the +2 CHA when most elves are surprsingly non-charisma. The skill versatility as well was a nod to bard being the half-elf signature class rather than human ancestry.

Now? You can't get a total of +4 stats on a species, and everyone has flexible stats. This immediate association with bard isn't a big deal anymore, given that 5.5e has moved away from molding their species into having a singular favored class direction. Immediately, what has proped up the half-elf's "mechanical identity," to borrow a term from elsewhere on these forums, has immediately dissolved. Darkvision and a resistance are common other species. Which means the only thing really of note about the half elf? Two extra skills. Ngl, nothing to sneer at, but nothing amazing either. And as I posted earlier, it's trivial to make a muggle elf that gets skills instead of spells.

Half-elf has dropped from being one of the best species options in the game... to potentially being the absolute worst, much as it was in 3e. Its much like the 5e sorcerer problem. If everyone is a flexible caster... then what is the sorcerer's gimmick? You need to reinvent them from the ground up.

So, that's where the half-elf is in 5.5e right now. In dire need of a reimagining, because mechanically its in pretty bad shape.

 

[Hussar]

The main feeling is. There is too much Darkvision. Also, Darkvision is boring, but could be interesting if rare.

Most Elf cultures have nothing to do with Darkvision, and it is weird from them to have it.

Probably the ONLY elven cultures that would benefit from Darkvision are the Uda Drow culture (but not Aeven or Loren Drow cultures), and ... maybe ... the Wood culture if actually nocturnal hunters but seems they arent.

That might be YOUR main feeling. But, again, that has nothing to do with D&D. After all, 3e elves still had Low Light Vision. It's not like they couldn't see in the dark.

My argument is the Human-Elf lacks a need for special mechanics, when the 2024 method can reproduce the 2014 mechanics. I am in favor of the DMs Guide facilitating species trait swaps for various reasons, including multispecies characters. I would love for swaps to be in the Players Handbook but this requires rigorous balancing. (The Swordcoast setting Half-Elf swaps were laughably unbalanced.)

My argument is also that there would be no change in trait, only in the method of gaining the trait. Darkvision should be a 2024 cantrip, and for character concepts where Darkvision might make sense the player can use one of the Elf cantrips to have it. But other Elves shouldnt have it, and can pick a cantrip that makes more sense.

The fact that the Elf of recent D&D editions lacks Darkvision emphasizes how unnecessary it is for the Elf species to have it.

Ok, yeah. Sorry, I stepped into a conversation that I have no business being in. You have a nice day now.

 

[Hussar]

So, that's where the half-elf is in 5.5e right now. In dire need of a reimagining, because mechanically its in pretty bad shape.

Wait, what? In the revision, you simply pick one parent or the other for mechanics. You are basically saying that either elves or humans are the worst mechanical choice. How does that make sense?

 

[Mephista]

With respect, this is incredibly not compelling.

The half-elf in the PHB has a huge amount of detail and identity to it. A description about them being from two worlds, their common roles in society as diplomats and wanderers, names lists, a differing age range and descriptions, they are all fey ancestry, they have a long list of variants like Aquatic, Drow. High, Mark variants, Wood, etc.. there is a full identity to the Half-elf.

Note that the first half is entirely cultural - diplomats and wanderers especially. The two worlds bit isn't literal, since the half-elf is not necessarily from the Feywild. But if instead we're talking just "the child of two peoples," that again is cultural - because its assuming those two peoples are culturally distinct. What if this was Ravnica, where elves and humans live side by side in the same culture? Then the bridge of two worlds isn't a thing. Name lists are cultural - a half-elf from the far parts of Toril will not pick the same name as one from the Sword Coast.

CULTURE IS NOT A WAY TO DESCRIBE SPECIES ANYMORE.

Age is meaningless in a ttrpg, since the game never lasts long for it to ever matter beyond the super abstract.

The aquatic, drow, high, wood, etc variants are taken from the elf parents. That's not a half-elf trait, that's a full elf trait that's being added in to make them feel more elvish. We're trying to argue about the half-elves deserving a distinct mechanical identity, not that they need to borrow more and more of Elf.