Unearthed Arcana WOTC still can't get the backgrounds right in the new FR book.

[ECMO3]

Sure, but stat bonuses don't need to be changed to cater to a minority of people.

You are not answering me, why do they need to be there at all?

I also don't think it is a minority that want them open. This was the same exact thing we heard about racial bonuses and the majority certainly wanted to be free from those limits.

Theme. That's why. The bonuses mostly match the theme of background, where the stats that aren't given bonuses mostly fail to meet the theme of the background.

No they don't!

As I noted earlier there is nothing thematic about Constitution for a Sage or Strength for an Artisan and I will keep going ... no sense in Constitution for a Charleton, or Constitution for a Criminal, or Intelligence for a Criminal, or Strength for an Entertainer or Intelligence for a Guard or Charisma for a Hermit, or Constitution for a Merchant or Wisdom for a Wayfarer

Dexterity for a guard makes MORE thematic sense then these do. You actually have this backwards MOST backgrounds are not thematically connected to all the ASIs they offer. IF we were going to actually do thematics, those abilities mentioned above would be replaced with other abilities and that is over half the backgrounds in the PHB.

This is a rather blatant Strawman of what I have been saying. It's such a bizarre alteration of my argument, that it's more like a Strawarmy.

No it is not. You claim they are not significant, yet you also want to prevent people from taking them.

Why do you want to stop people from taking an ASI where they want to put an ASI, especially when it makes more sense thematically than the RAW version?

Min-maxers who want to use stats that don't make sense for the background are a very small minority of players.

But players who are NOT min maxers and want to use other statistics that DO make sense are not a minority.

Min Maxers already have RAW ways of getting any ASIs or Origin Feats they want. All they need to do is pick a 2014 background and they get any ASIs and any feat they want. The current rules dexplicitly allow for this. The DM has to houserule to not allow this.

The ONLY people this hurts is the people who care about story.

The overwhelming majority of people are casual players who aren't going to be trying to eek out small advances in power via bonuses that don't make sense for the background.

Exactly! So let them play the background they want with the ASIs they want.

Dex bonuses don't make sense for a guard background. Strength does. Constitution does. Wisdom does. Dexterity, charisma, and intelligence do not.

Well funny then that a Guard does not get to take a bonus to Constitution but does get to take an Intelligence bonus. Why is that when Intelligence does not make sense?

Thank you for making my point.

Any agile guard got that dexterity from something other than the guard background. Such as say you putting a 14 into dex.

When there is almost no mechanical difference shouldn't it be the player making these kind of story-focused decisions about their character?

 

[ECMO3]

There are millions of people playing this game. This forum by no means represents the majority. That's like me saying, "Most players I know like the 2024 rules more than the 2014. They agree the game is way better, especially character creation."

And your opinion does not represent most players either.

I said I don't think this works for most players. Maybe I am right, maybe I am wrong. It does not work for most players I play with and does not seem to work for most on this thread. They don't represent millions, but then neither do you.

What I say, and the people I know, does not make it correct. Same can be said for this forum.

Exactly!. That is why I said I don't think it works for most players. That statement is 100% factually true - I don't think it works for most players.

You just came out and stated it like it was a fact that most players are fine with this, without offering any sort of evidence to support that claim. Your opinion can be different than mine, that is OK, but it is an opinion with no more evidence than my opinion.

Sorry, but I am not feeling guilty about calling someone out. You literally said this was their actions:

And then you conveniently ignored all the questions and replies I placed in as to why this sounds very much like a child-like behavior.

Ok to start with plenty of children play D&D and children do typically exhibit child-like behavior, so I hardly think that is a valid criticism unless you don't ever play with children in your games.

That said the two players mentioned were adults. Note these are not the only players or even only adults who I have played with who have abandoned players. Just the two that abandoned them over magic weapons. I have played 5E with well over 100 different people and probably over 200.

To answer your other specific questions:

1. Pillars: Both these two particular games had emphasis on all three phases, but both the players in question built their PC intending to excel at combat and they did not excel at combat.

Again, I ask you: Are they willing to dump all their character's lore-knowledge, background info, NPC bonding, and most importantly, the connections they built to other PCs in the party?

2. Yes they were. They were not just willing, they were happy to do this.

Are they willing to throw all of the above away because they didn't get a +1 weapon, yet another PC did?

3. That is oversimplifying it, but at the end of the day yes. Do you need a more detailed answer (I gave some limited details in my original post, but I will expand if you really need to know).

If the answer is yes, then that is very child-like behavior, so my question stands - Are they a young teenager?

4. Not these two players no.

The simple fact that you had a player wanting to ditch their character, something I suppose they developed over time, due to a 5% difference is silly and ridiculous.

It is not a fact, again that is an opinion. Maybe it is silly and ridiculous to you, but you were not the one playing the character. And just because I wouldn't do this (and haven't) or you wouldn't do this does not mean others won't do this or that they are wrong when they do.

It also doesn't mean they are "playing wrong" if they want to abandon their character, and if that makes the game more enjoyable for them, then I would argue it is actually "right" regardless of how silly you think it is.

While we are talking about silly and ridiculous, maybe it is silly and ridiculous to some that they are offered Intelligence as an ASI instead of Dexterity when they take a Guard background?