Astral wanders do age and do need food and drinks and sleep, when not in the astral sea. (And technically everything would catch up with you once you leave but it seems like they fixed that particular bug.)
Seems they changed the lore. Used to be you'd age as soon as you leave the astral. Otherwise astral elves would literally never leave because they'd die
I've noticed the trend of "feats" as a background feature in more of the recent material released. It makes me think that in the potential 5.5E / 6E they will have 2 categories of feats having Main feats and "Background feats" and making background feats some of the less flashy stuff that is more Roleplay / Useful but not like "build defining" (Things like Tough, Skilled, Durable ect ...)
Sure seams like it, and i think its good! The features that the older background have are so seldom used/might not fit with the setting or the DM's plans. Like either its a more survival type game and rations are counted and part of the challange -then the outlander feature becomes op. Ooor rations are barely even counted, and then the feature isnt used. Our groups have always had free feat at lvl one, but it seems reasonable to limit it to not include all of them.
I have to agree. We initially thought maybe some of the weaker feats would get a boost to match the other feats, such as Magic Initiate getting a boost to be more in line with Fey Touched, but if it's a free feat that everyone automatically gets, then they can afford to be on the weaker side.
I think that would be a good system. Everyone gets a feat at 1st level but they are chosen from a shorter list of ones that provide smaller or more situational benefits, then leave the major feats that can define a character build to be picked up as you play.
well you dont need to eat and drink there so no real rush to do things, kinda seems like it is explained by a case of why elves are so slow to begin their adventuring and growing up due to the long life.
@@Daggoth65 It's one of those things I never understood. "I'm an elderly wizard, I may have about 5 years left of my life. Let's get up and go adventuring. Of course I was studying magic all my life and I did learn 6 first level spells... Oh now that I killed 10 goblins on the second day of my adventuring I managed to learn an other 2." Yeah... Weird That's why when I play a wizard they're young and just left the academy or their teacher to explain their lack of knowledge
Astral drifter is like the perfect background for a cleric character i've been working on before spelljammer was even announced. It's not perfect 1:1 to what i envisioned but it's waaaaay closer than anything else wotc have released.
This opens for all DMs to give a free feat at level one, i fell like if a player choses one of this background and the others don't, they probably are gonna fell robbed
Luckily you can customize your background by choosing a trait so you still enjoy the free feat. So Astral drifter can become Acolyte, and Wildspacer could become a Pirate or something.
DMs should be careful though. Magic Initiate and Tough are decent feats, but by no means as powerful as some of the minmax ones (Fey touched, Polearm master, GWM, etc.). Giving out a powerful feat at level one for free is a huge power boost that's normally locked behind variant human.
There’s been UA about recommendations for starting feats for those who don’t get them - so far they only recommend skill expert and tough, which seems fair. Wouldn’t be surprised to see more ‘starter suitable’ feats with the new edition
I like backgrounds giving Feats. For the last year or so, I've been doing something similar for my group. In my homebrew, every character may now take a Feat at Lv 1, but what the feat is depends on the character's Race/Class/Background. For example, a Paladin, Cleric, or Warlock can now take the Eldritch Initiate or Cleric Initiate Feats (new/reworked Feats I made), as they all have gaining power from a magical patron in common. A Barbarian can take the Tough Feat, making them even more tanky, a Wizard can take Keen Mind, a Halfling can take Lucky, a Monk can take Mobile, the City Watch/Knight/Soldier Backgrounds can grant any of the Armor Proficiency or Armor Mastery Feats, etc. Starting from Lv 4 on, I let them take whatever Feat they want. This system has worked for me pretty well, and makes my players' characters even more customizable for them.
I actually prefer to not limit those feats to classes/races and instead ask players to explain in their background why certain feat makes sense for the character. I do not like those limits, because they specifically enchance strenghts of those classes/races - like Barbarians being even more tough, which is already their thing to begin with. I'd much rather have a barbarian who as a kid stumbled upon an old cultists book, read it and got an Eldritch Initiate out of it. Or a Wizard who was always late in school, so he kept on running to all his classes and gained Mobile feat etc. Or a sorcerer who was bullied all life, and grew "thick skin" from all the bruises, gaining Tough feat. I do think the list should be curated though by the DM and/or the feat choice be approved. For example, I'm currently making a monk/fighter character who was saved by a god's intervention. They become devoted to said god and wowed to act in accordance her teachings - gaining Magic Initiate: Cleric with spells that make sense for the god.
I really like that the background features are specific feat + something else small and unique to the feat. I was worried that the small ribbon abilities of backgrounds would be neglected in favor of feats but this pleases me and I think it makes backgrounds feel more impactful and real
Mixed feelings about background feats. I get that making players delay feats delays a fun part of the game to later levels, and delayed fun is not a good formula for a successful game product. But feats in 5e are so uneven that some are overused and some are never taken. From my DMs perspective the really popular feats have contributed to power creep that makes creating challenging encounters more difficult. The best illustration of this is that virtually every optimized build you see is built around being able to get certain feats early in the game.
They presented us with a good thing to balance feats in the background right here. Just give or take some effects of the feat in the background. Like how Wildspacer gives you an additional ability with a free feat, and how astral drifter limits you to cleric spell, which must use wisdom.
In the UA's they release there is only certain feats you are allowed to choose from for the other players if a player picks a background with a feat, which makes think that when the 5.5 / 6e come they are going to have some of the lesser chosen / roleplay feats be background feats for like fluff but the more powerful feats still be chosen as level ups. I think most of this is largely due to the fact that most background features from the PHB are heavily Role play centric and prob rarely come up for most tables or even Adventures league as they are kinda Vague and very heavily rely on DM fiat
@@Zertryx With that in mind, people can design background feats with a balanced mindset. Maybe there should be tiers for feats, or is that too confusing?
I’m not sure I like the background feature pretty much only being a feat. It seems a bit lazy. Depending on what feats get tied to which backgrounds, it’s going to start encouraging certain backgrounds for certain classes. I liked that the soldier background is pretty much just as handy for a wizard as it is for a fighter. It encourages picking non-standard choices without feeling like you’re missing out on a good feature for your class. But if we start seeing Acolyte given, like, Magic Initiate (Cleric), it’s going to start being an optimization choice rather than a character choice. How many fighters are going to be acolytes because “bless is a great concentration spell match for a fighter” rather than “it makes story sense for my character to have been an acolyte?” I’d rather see everyone get a feat at level 1, and leave backgrounds with interesting, unique features. Nobles getting three retainers is interesting; all nobles having Inspiring Leader isn’t.
@@Mr1991bbk It would be cool if they “feat-ified” the current background features into feats, and let those be selectable as background feats. I like the loose RP function of those features, but it could be nice to see them codified a little more so that they find use in more campaigns. For example, your entertainer feature probably isn’t so great in a wilderness campaign, so maybe it could function a little like song of rest plus the current uses.
I'm presuming they'll stay customizable, with DM permission, like in the PHB. So if a player wants to be an Astral Drifter but the Skilled feat makes more sense for them, they pick that feat instead.
It wouldn't surprise me when 5.5 comes out that they give feat options to the background like they do with languages. I still say only one feat per background but having 2 or 3 options would be nice. The main reason is that one probably could argue a certain background would fit well with more than one feat. These feats, probably get the name universal feats, would benefit some if not all characters like tough.
The feats UA suggested for free feats were Sentinel, Tough, Skilled, Alert, and War Caster (although it did originally say that three of those should be taken at 4th level). I'm okay with us making a list together and it being compiled into a Google Doc for everyone to see. Using the Astral Drifter as an example, Sage should be Magic Initiate with wizard spells being the automatic choice. Maybe the Soldier background is Tough or Athlete feat. And to keep it fair, the feats would have to be PHB feats. Also, we could work on the backgrounds outside of the PHB too. We have ones in Curse of Strahd, Acquisitions inc., Ravnica, all of the Plane Shift backgrounds, State of Hillsfar, Tomb of Annihilation, etc. We could even do the Ashari background from Critical Role.
Because of this I'm making it an official part of my games and homebrewed several feat lists already for my players' current backgrounds. I'm trying to keep it down to 3 for every background, but with a solider it's hard to keep that low. Went with an option from a list of 3 that includes choose one from 'Lightly armored, Medium armor master, OR Heavy Armor Master ' as I felt those were all underutilized feats and a soldier absolutely would have a couple of these.
Full tank Barbarian build with standard array: be a Hill Dwarf with the Wildspacer background. Using the alternative ability score improvement ruling from TCOE, start off with a 16 in Con and a 16 in Dex. Equip a shield and you'll have an AC of 18 and 18 hit points at Level 1. Then go Path of the Totem Warrior (Bear) for more tanking. And, if your DM allows it, make it a Werebear so that your Str becomes 19.
HOW COME NOBODY IS MENTIONING HOW THESE BACKGROUNDS DON'T HAVE PERSONALITY TRAITS, IDEALS, BONDS, ETC?!?! ITS REALLY BOTHERING ME HOW NOBODY IS TALKING ABOUT IT!!
I like these much more than Strixhaven honestly, and I'm really hoping the Heroes of Krynn stuff comes out of UA when they make the Dragonlance setting books...but I really hope they're longer and actually give details...the ship to ship combat thing should have been much more detailed than a single paragraph
I do not like the fact the new backgrounds have no Personality Trait/Ideals/Bonds/Flaws tables. Not only those are always flavorful and helpfull when making the character, requiring new players to either come up with those on the fly or look through other backgrounds for inspiration kinda sucks. I hope it's not a sign those might be going away - I love tables that help me come up with ideas to build upon, when thinking about CHARACTER, not only how the PC would work mechanically.
What I don't like is the fact that there are no characteristic traits for these backgrounds. But I can see 2 possibilities for Astral Drifter's characteristic traits. Acolyte and Hermit, just reworded to fit your character and the settings of the game.
So, wildspacer githyanki abberant mind sorcerer and autognome astral traveller battlesmith artificer (that free mending and guidance really will help!)
The idea to make the list of background feats is a great one. One that WotC should have done themselves. But, alas, they only had 64 page books instead of full length ones in the box set. They could have made one of the books 128 pages, and the other 2 64 pgs but I guess everything, including book length have to be the same ..
If I get a chance to play a character in Spelljammer, I'm definitely taking the Wildspacer background, because I pretty much always take the Tough Feat on my characters. Lmao
Still not a fan of this solution. While backgrounds could use a rebalancing touch to make them more equal to each other, I like the thematic nature of the features of the old backgrounds, like the Haunted one. If they move forward with this you'll be pushed to pick backgrounds based on the feat it gives and to pick the one that fits your build the most. Like I said in the unearthed arcana new backgrounds video, WotC should just concede on level 1 feat being one of the most common house rules and give it as a variant rule.
This ship rules from Saltmarsh were really bad. Descent into Avernus had better vehicle rules because party members actually all could feel like they were contributing.
I'm really disappointed they just threw out the social background feature stuff and replaced them with feats and - for the Wildspacer - a combat-specific benefit. The social abilities from backgrounds really made backgrounds interesting and distinct from class and race. Now it's just going to be another choice made to get a feat for a build.
I frankly i am very excited for players handbook2 electric bugaloo to give us revamped all the backrounds. As they took this fluff peice of charecter creation that was just a way of grabbing proficiencys be4 and made it a meaningful choice
@@NerdImmersion Not specifically for space ships but I feel like almost all of the ship to ship combat rules from Ghosts of Saltmarsh would apply to Spelljammers as well. Just add another dimension of movement and the weird gravity and you are pretty good to go.
With Strixhaven, I do think it's worth keeping in mind that yeah those backgrounds are particularly more potent, but they are designed to be used in that specific setting; you are going to magic school, and those backgrounds are giving you more magic, for specific use in that campaign. If you tried to use Strixhaven backgrounds in a non-Strixhaven game, your level 1 character would have more going for them than someone else's character. However, I do like the idea of backgrounds coming with feats. It DOES get more into front-loading characters early on with a lot of stuff to do, and I think that might be on purpose, as few games reach higher than say 10-12. So it's nice to have access to a bunch of abilities early on, because you probably won't get the chance to use the really high level stuff. The more you start off with and get a lower levels, the better. I plan on doing something similar when I run my campaign in the next couple of months, except picking out some feats that go well with my PCs' backgrounds and letting them pick one from that selection.
I like the backgrounds, though at this point I tend to restrict them because they are extremely setting specific (I came from Space to stop the Death Curse). Will see how this evolves. I think they saw DMs give players free feats and thoughts it'd be cool to build it into the rules.
About half of all of the backgrounds are pretty specific to the game your table is gonna be playing. All of the backgrounds from Ravnica, Strixhaven, Wildemount, Aqc Inc, SCAG, WGtE, and WBtWL before this were all setting specific backgrounds.
@@Hey-Its-Dingo True. I once allowed a custom version of the House Agent from ERLW, where instead of one of the Eberron houses they chose one of the Drow Houses from Menzonberanzan and got 2 proficiencies of their choice. Also if you know DotMM some of the Spelljammer backgrounds would actually apply X3>
Honestly, I don't really regret skipping the last D&D books... I play with a starting feature for each player anyway and allowing those backgrounds would put me in a position I wouldn't like tbh. A variant human could pick three starting features that way with the combination of background, race and the starting feat. I don't like where this is going and I only see this getting worse in the future.
I think it's sort of just WotC catching up to the rule you're using anyway, not something you'd need to use in addition. And I think you can customize these backgrounds just like the ones in the PhB. So even if a character chose Astral Drifter, if Skilled makes more sense for the character, they get that feat instead.
@@Anisozygoptera I disgree on that one. If i'd want to allow every background and still offer every player a starting feat, I'd had to deal with this. Sure, I could add a feat to every other background aswell, but thst would take away the "unique deal" Astral Drifter offers as a background. Alternatively I could exclude people from picking the starting feat if they pick stuff like Astral Drifter, but that would also punish a player for mixing RAW with my homebrew which isn't fair. And yes... I can customize every background and stuff, but I sometimes I just don't want to customize things. If I have to adapt them anyway, then I could homebrew them in the first place... Those changes simply don't resonate well with me. I mean, that's ok. You can't fulfill everyones design wishes at once...
Wait "starting feature" - you mean free feat at level 1? I believe that is a homebrew, not any variant rule. The Backgrounds giving feats is WotC's approach to that system. And in one (or two?) UA's that playtested backgrounds with feats they had additional rule that players that chose BG without feat could take one of few feats at lv 1. If you chose BG with a feat - you couldn't get the extra feat at start. That means that every character starts with 1 feat at 1st level and Variant Human starts with 2. Which should be exactly the same way you are playing now?
@@DemoBytom Starting feats are hombrew, yes. As far as I know, the current Spelljammers-Version does not have the addition that others could chose a feat, even if their background wouldn't provide one. This would equalize things since I could drop the homebrew version in favour of RAW, but currently as it stands, it does not (at least asfar as I know). And this rule also takes the uniqueness of those backgrounds with feat away which makes them ultimately pointless since you could choose any feat with any background. Dedicated features for certain backgrounds would make them more unique as you would have a mechanical reason to pick that one in particular.
Astral wanders do age and do need food and drinks and sleep, when not in the astral sea. (And technically everything would catch up with you once you leave but it seems like they fixed that particular bug.)
Ignore the fact that astral dragons don't age, and can conquer the world so long as they don't fail their madness roll
Seems they changed the lore. Used to be you'd age as soon as you leave the astral.
Otherwise astral elves would literally never leave because they'd die
I've noticed the trend of "feats" as a background feature in more of the recent material released. It makes me think that in the potential 5.5E / 6E they will have 2 categories of feats having Main feats and "Background feats" and making background feats some of the less flashy stuff that is more Roleplay / Useful but not like "build defining" (Things like Tough, Skilled, Durable ect ...)
Sure seams like it, and i think its good!
The features that the older background have are so seldom used/might not fit with the setting or the DM's plans. Like either its a more survival type game and rations are counted and part of the challange -then the outlander feature becomes op. Ooor rations are barely even counted, and then the feature isnt used.
Our groups have always had free feat at lvl one, but it seems reasonable to limit it to not include all of them.
I have to agree. We initially thought maybe some of the weaker feats would get a boost to match the other feats, such as Magic Initiate getting a boost to be more in line with Fey Touched, but if it's a free feat that everyone automatically gets, then they can afford to be on the weaker side.
I think that would be a good system. Everyone gets a feat at 1st level but they are chosen from a shorter list of ones that provide smaller or more situational benefits, then leave the major feats that can define a character build to be picked up as you play.
Hey, I'm from the astral plane with the lived experience of a 700 years old.
I'm still a level 1 adventurer
I love D&D
well you dont need to eat and drink there so no real rush to do things, kinda seems like it is explained by a case of why elves are so slow to begin their adventuring and growing up due to the long life.
@@Daggoth65 It's one of those things I never understood.
"I'm an elderly wizard, I may have about 5 years left of my life. Let's get up and go adventuring. Of course I was studying magic all my life and I did learn 6 first level spells...
Oh now that I killed 10 goblins on the second day of my adventuring I managed to learn an other 2."
Yeah... Weird
That's why when I play a wizard they're young and just left the academy or their teacher to explain their lack of knowledge
This is the one case where youre DM won't roll his eyes if you tell them your character has amnesia.
Hey i am professor oak. I have studied pokemon my whole life. Here take an empty pokedex.🤣
@@CaitSith87 That was just so he could get Ash out of his mom's house.
Astral drifter is like the perfect background for a cleric character i've been working on before spelljammer was even announced. It's not perfect 1:1 to what i envisioned but it's waaaaay closer than anything else wotc have released.
This opens for all DMs to give a free feat at level one, i fell like if a player choses one of this background and the others don't, they probably are gonna fell robbed
Luckily you can customize your background by choosing a trait so you still enjoy the free feat. So Astral drifter can become Acolyte, and Wildspacer could become a Pirate or something.
DMs should be careful though. Magic Initiate and Tough are decent feats, but by no means as powerful as some of the minmax ones (Fey touched, Polearm master, GWM, etc.). Giving out a powerful feat at level one for free is a huge power boost that's normally locked behind variant human.
There’s been UA about recommendations for starting feats for those who don’t get them - so far they only recommend skill expert and tough, which seems fair. Wouldn’t be surprised to see more ‘starter suitable’ feats with the new edition
I like backgrounds giving Feats. For the last year or so, I've been doing something similar for my group. In my homebrew, every character may now take a Feat at Lv 1, but what the feat is depends on the character's Race/Class/Background.
For example, a Paladin, Cleric, or Warlock can now take the Eldritch Initiate or Cleric Initiate Feats (new/reworked Feats I made), as they all have gaining power from a magical patron in common.
A Barbarian can take the Tough Feat, making them even more tanky, a Wizard can take Keen Mind, a Halfling can take Lucky, a Monk can take Mobile, the City Watch/Knight/Soldier Backgrounds can grant any of the Armor Proficiency or Armor Mastery Feats, etc.
Starting from Lv 4 on, I let them take whatever Feat they want. This system has worked for me pretty well, and makes my players' characters even more customizable for them.
I actually prefer to not limit those feats to classes/races and instead ask players to explain in their background why certain feat makes sense for the character. I do not like those limits, because they specifically enchance strenghts of those classes/races - like Barbarians being even more tough, which is already their thing to begin with. I'd much rather have a barbarian who as a kid stumbled upon an old cultists book, read it and got an Eldritch Initiate out of it. Or a Wizard who was always late in school, so he kept on running to all his classes and gained Mobile feat etc. Or a sorcerer who was bullied all life, and grew "thick skin" from all the bruises, gaining Tough feat.
I do think the list should be curated though by the DM and/or the feat choice be approved.
For example, I'm currently making a monk/fighter character who was saved by a god's intervention. They become devoted to said god and wowed to act in accordance her teachings - gaining Magic Initiate: Cleric with spells that make sense for the god.
the zero gravity melee disadvantage doesn't affect piecing weapons, so wildspace just expands viable weapons in zero G
Custom background I believe isnt even a variant rule it's core. I see no reason why one cant swap out the feat as well.
I really like that the background features are specific feat + something else small and unique to the feat. I was worried that the small ribbon abilities of backgrounds would be neglected in favor of feats but this pleases me and I think it makes backgrounds feel more impactful and real
I think the background is very interesting to characterize a character. The latter also give talents so even better.
Mixed feelings about background feats. I get that making players delay feats delays a fun part of the game to later levels, and delayed fun is not a good formula for a successful game product. But feats in 5e are so uneven that some are overused and some are never taken. From my DMs perspective the really popular feats have contributed to power creep that makes creating challenging encounters more difficult. The best illustration of this is that virtually every optimized build you see is built around being able to get certain feats early in the game.
They presented us with a good thing to balance feats in the background right here. Just give or take some effects of the feat in the background. Like how Wildspacer gives you an additional ability with a free feat, and how astral drifter limits you to cleric spell, which must use wisdom.
In the UA's they release there is only certain feats you are allowed to choose from for the other players if a player picks a background with a feat, which makes think that when the 5.5 / 6e come they are going to have some of the lesser chosen / roleplay feats be background feats for like fluff but the more powerful feats still be chosen as level ups. I think most of this is largely due to the fact that most background features from the PHB are heavily Role play centric and prob rarely come up for most tables or even Adventures league as they are kinda Vague and very heavily rely on DM fiat
@@Zertryx With that in mind, people can design background feats with a balanced mindset. Maybe there should be tiers for feats, or is that too confusing?
@@theargawalathing Tiers sounds like a good idea to me.
I’m not sure I like the background feature pretty much only being a feat. It seems a bit lazy. Depending on what feats get tied to which backgrounds, it’s going to start encouraging certain backgrounds for certain classes. I liked that the soldier background is pretty much just as handy for a wizard as it is for a fighter. It encourages picking non-standard choices without feeling like you’re missing out on a good feature for your class. But if we start seeing Acolyte given, like, Magic Initiate (Cleric), it’s going to start being an optimization choice rather than a character choice. How many fighters are going to be acolytes because “bless is a great concentration spell match for a fighter” rather than “it makes story sense for my character to have been an acolyte?”
I’d rather see everyone get a feat at level 1, and leave backgrounds with interesting, unique features. Nobles getting three retainers is interesting; all nobles having Inspiring Leader isn’t.
@@Mr1991bbk It would be cool if they “feat-ified” the current background features into feats, and let those be selectable as background feats. I like the loose RP function of those features, but it could be nice to see them codified a little more so that they find use in more campaigns. For example, your entertainer feature probably isn’t so great in a wilderness campaign, so maybe it could function a little like song of rest plus the current uses.
I'm presuming they'll stay customizable, with DM permission, like in the PHB. So if a player wants to be an Astral Drifter but the Skilled feat makes more sense for them, they pick that feat instead.
It wouldn't surprise me when 5.5 comes out that they give feat options to the background like they do with languages. I still say only one feat per background but having 2 or 3 options would be nice. The main reason is that one probably could argue a certain background would fit well with more than one feat. These feats, probably get the name universal feats, would benefit some if not all characters like tough.
The feats UA suggested for free feats were Sentinel, Tough, Skilled, Alert, and War Caster (although it did originally say that three of those should be taken at 4th level). I'm okay with us making a list together and it being compiled into a Google Doc for everyone to see. Using the Astral Drifter as an example, Sage should be Magic Initiate with wizard spells being the automatic choice. Maybe the Soldier background is Tough or Athlete feat. And to keep it fair, the feats would have to be PHB feats.
Also, we could work on the backgrounds outside of the PHB too. We have ones in Curse of Strahd, Acquisitions inc., Ravnica, all of the Plane Shift backgrounds, State of Hillsfar, Tomb of Annihilation, etc. We could even do the Ashari background from Critical Role.
Because of this I'm making it an official part of my games and homebrewed several feat lists already for my players' current backgrounds. I'm trying to keep it down to 3 for every background, but with a solider it's hard to keep that low.
Went with an option from a list of 3 that includes choose one from 'Lightly armored, Medium armor master, OR Heavy Armor Master ' as I felt those were all underutilized feats and a soldier absolutely would have a couple of these.
Full tank Barbarian build with standard array: be a Hill Dwarf with the Wildspacer background. Using the alternative ability score improvement ruling from TCOE, start off with a 16 in Con and a 16 in Dex. Equip a shield and you'll have an AC of 18 and 18 hit points at Level 1. Then go Path of the Totem Warrior (Bear) for more tanking. And, if your DM allows it, make it a Werebear so that your Str becomes 19.
Or emerald Dragonborn heck monk with tough feat help them a lot
HOW COME NOBODY IS MENTIONING HOW THESE BACKGROUNDS DON'T HAVE PERSONALITY TRAITS, IDEALS, BONDS, ETC?!?!
ITS REALLY BOTHERING ME HOW NOBODY IS TALKING ABOUT IT!!
I like these much more than Strixhaven honestly, and I'm really hoping the Heroes of Krynn stuff comes out of UA when they make the Dragonlance setting books...but I really hope they're longer and actually give details...the ship to ship combat thing should have been much more detailed than a single paragraph
First time I have seen '5 seconds ago' for a video coming out. Thank you for the content!
I do not like the fact the new backgrounds have no Personality Trait/Ideals/Bonds/Flaws tables. Not only those are always flavorful and helpfull when making the character, requiring new players to either come up with those on the fly or look through other backgrounds for inspiration kinda sucks. I hope it's not a sign those might be going away - I love tables that help me come up with ideas to build upon, when thinking about CHARACTER, not only how the PC would work mechanically.
Hey Ted please make sure you cover the gravity and air rules.
Yes Ted, here's hoping your Spelljammer coverage gets you to 100k subs!
Would have liked to see a few more, even if they were just reskins of stuff like Soldier and Pirate with a space theme.
Looking forward to the discussion about backgrounds and feats. When was the last time you did multiple polls?🤔
What I don't like is the fact that there are no characteristic traits for these backgrounds. But I can see 2 possibilities for Astral Drifter's characteristic traits. Acolyte and Hermit, just reworded to fit your character and the settings of the game.
So, wildspacer githyanki abberant mind sorcerer and autognome astral traveller battlesmith artificer (that free mending and guidance really will help!)
The idea to make the list of background feats is a great one. One that WotC should have done themselves. But, alas, they only had 64 page books instead of full length ones in the box set. They could have made one of the books 128 pages, and the other 2 64 pgs but I guess everything, including book length have to be the same ..
If I get a chance to play a character in Spelljammer, I'm definitely taking the Wildspacer background, because I pretty much always take the Tough Feat on my characters. Lmao
Clearly the Sage background should be paired with the Prodigy feat
This just makes me want to make my own Spelljammer content. Why not? I'm working on a nautical campaign. May as well make it half Spelljammer.
Still not a fan of this solution. While backgrounds could use a rebalancing touch to make them more equal to each other, I like the thematic nature of the features of the old backgrounds, like the Haunted one. If they move forward with this you'll be pushed to pick backgrounds based on the feat it gives and to pick the one that fits your build the most.
Like I said in the unearthed arcana new backgrounds video, WotC should just concede on level 1 feat being one of the most common house rules and give it as a variant rule.
I guess use the ship rules from the saltmarsh book, combined with the airship rules from Acquisitions Incorporated for space combat
This ship rules from Saltmarsh were really bad. Descent into Avernus had better vehicle rules because party members actually all could feel like they were contributing.
I'm really disappointed they just threw out the social background feature stuff and replaced them with feats and - for the Wildspacer - a combat-specific benefit. The social abilities from backgrounds really made backgrounds interesting and distinct from class and race. Now it's just going to be another choice made to get a feat for a build.
Didn't the custom race options also give you an extra feat? Does that mean the new standard will be you get two feats at level one?
If you choose custom lineage or variant human, yes it appears so
@@NerdImmersion Jeez, as a forever DM who hasn't built a non oneshot character since Out of the Abyss that's some nasty power creep.
I frankly i am very excited for players handbook2 electric bugaloo to give us revamped all the backrounds. As they took this fluff peice of charecter creation that was just a way of grabbing proficiencys be4 and made it a meaningful choice
Canonically the only gods you get (or used to get) in the astral sea are dead ones
So two feats at first level is a thing now?
We already have a book with extensive ship to ship combat rules. There isn't much reason to reprint all of that.
For space ships?
@@NerdImmersion Not specifically for space ships but I feel like almost all of the ship to ship combat rules from Ghosts of Saltmarsh would apply to Spelljammers as well. Just add another dimension of movement and the weird gravity and you are pretty good to go.
New backgrounds, IN SPAAACE
I guess too flesh out the rules we can use the war machine rules from DiA and just kit bash them together
Funny how feats are technically optional rules and backgrounds, now with feats, aren't.
With Strixhaven, I do think it's worth keeping in mind that yeah those backgrounds are particularly more potent, but they are designed to be used in that specific setting; you are going to magic school, and those backgrounds are giving you more magic, for specific use in that campaign. If you tried to use Strixhaven backgrounds in a non-Strixhaven game, your level 1 character would have more going for them than someone else's character.
However, I do like the idea of backgrounds coming with feats. It DOES get more into front-loading characters early on with a lot of stuff to do, and I think that might be on purpose, as few games reach higher than say 10-12. So it's nice to have access to a bunch of abilities early on, because you probably won't get the chance to use the really high level stuff. The more you start off with and get a lower levels, the better. I plan on doing something similar when I run my campaign in the next couple of months, except picking out some feats that go well with my PCs' backgrounds and letting them pick one from that selection.
I wanna play these so much
So melee combatants will be nerfed in spelljammer combat?
My main question when it comes to spelljammers
Will it still be pointless to play as a paladin ?
I like the backgrounds, though at this point I tend to restrict them because they are extremely setting specific (I came from Space to stop the Death Curse). Will see how this evolves. I think they saw DMs give players free feats and thoughts it'd be cool to build it into the rules.
About half of all of the backgrounds are pretty specific to the game your table is gonna be playing.
All of the backgrounds from Ravnica, Strixhaven, Wildemount, Aqc Inc, SCAG, WGtE, and WBtWL before this were all setting specific backgrounds.
@@Hey-Its-Dingo True. I once allowed a custom version of the House Agent from ERLW, where instead of one of the Eberron houses they chose one of the Drow Houses from Menzonberanzan and got 2 proficiencies of their choice.
Also if you know DotMM some of the Spelljammer backgrounds would actually apply X3>
You'd be forgiven forgetting Strixhaven. I think we all did.
So if backgrounds give you feats or at least specific ones then the variant human race is probably going out the window.
I dont know how I feel about backgrounds granting feats. Backgrounds are for fluff purposes.
Wotc marketing did amazing work warming people up to this weird setting. This might surpass Strahd, maybe
Frm the top of my head: Alert, Skilled and Tough are the generic feats for all other backgrounds.
Again only in the UA, so nothing official
@@NerdImmersion you are right, I had the afterthough about adding "suggested"
Woo I was looking forward to these videos. Also 13 mins
Dig it! 👍🏼👍🏼
👍🏻
8 minutes for me and 2nd comment! Can't wait for the follow on videos
Honestly I would rather they came up with meaningful unique features over giving out a feat. It just feels like WotC being lazy.
Monster video?
Not even a Crown of the Void.
i love it
Honestly, I don't really regret skipping the last D&D books... I play with a starting feature for each player anyway and allowing those backgrounds would put me in a position I wouldn't like tbh. A variant human could pick three starting features that way with the combination of background, race and the starting feat. I don't like where this is going and I only see this getting worse in the future.
I think it's sort of just WotC catching up to the rule you're using anyway, not something you'd need to use in addition. And I think you can customize these backgrounds just like the ones in the PhB. So even if a character chose Astral Drifter, if Skilled makes more sense for the character, they get that feat instead.
@@Anisozygoptera I disgree on that one. If i'd want to allow every background and still offer every player a starting feat, I'd had to deal with this. Sure, I could add a feat to every other background aswell, but thst would take away the "unique deal" Astral Drifter offers as a background. Alternatively I could exclude people from picking the starting feat if they pick stuff like Astral Drifter, but that would also punish a player for mixing RAW with my homebrew which isn't fair.
And yes... I can customize every background and stuff, but I sometimes I just don't want to customize things. If I have to adapt them anyway, then I could homebrew them in the first place...
Those changes simply don't resonate well with me. I mean, that's ok. You can't fulfill everyones design wishes at once...
Wait "starting feature" - you mean free feat at level 1? I believe that is a homebrew, not any variant rule.
The Backgrounds giving feats is WotC's approach to that system. And in one (or two?) UA's that playtested backgrounds with feats they had additional rule that players that chose BG without feat could take one of few feats at lv 1. If you chose BG with a feat - you couldn't get the extra feat at start.
That means that every character starts with 1 feat at 1st level and Variant Human starts with 2. Which should be exactly the same way you are playing now?
@@DemoBytom Starting feats are hombrew, yes. As far as I know, the current Spelljammers-Version does not have the addition that others could chose a feat, even if their background wouldn't provide one. This would equalize things since I could drop the homebrew version in favour of RAW, but currently as it stands, it does not (at least asfar as I know). And this rule also takes the uniqueness of those backgrounds with feat away which makes them ultimately pointless since you could choose any feat with any background. Dedicated features for certain backgrounds would make them more unique as you would have a mechanical reason to pick that one in particular.
@@Timbo_Boy Yeah the current Spelljammer lacks that UA addition of feats for other backgrounds, which is a massive shame IMHO.
Its funny watching yall complain about this meanwhile we have 8 "background" feats now.
Earliest i have ever been