I'm planning on using the 5.24 rules for my next game with previous content available. My plan is to follow the spirit of the customization rules from Tasha's and allow them to customize all aspects of their backgrounds from the beginning. Origin feat, stats, and proficiencies. 😁👍 I'm also planning on allowing anyone who takes an Origin Feat at level 4 or higher to add a +1 to a stat of their choice to bring them in line with General Feats for the rest of the game. 🤔🧐
I believe the goal behind these new background rules is to create a standardized way for players to justify having certain attributes and origin feats tied to their backstory. However, if one of my players presents a backstory that supports their mechanical choices, I would just create a custom background for them on the spot.
I think that part of the problem with the restriction is the idea that your character didn't just wake up one day and decide to be a fighter and magically gain proficiency in weapons and armor. They probably thought about it for a while then train from level 0 to level 1 and you get no stat boost for that effort.
It’s true that tying stat boosts to class would make at LEAST as much sense as tying it to species or background. Honestly I didn’t see a need from moving away from race choice providing your stat options, but I may be in the minority there. :)
@@DM-TimothyI didn't see the need either but then since the change in Tasha's where every race gets a +2/+1 ( or more. Looking at you 2014 mountain dwarf) then it's all up in the air, no need to tie it into anything just make it a separate step in chargen. I liked the fixed stat points by race to be honest, it was less flexible for sure but much more flavourful
@@Miggy19779 could splut the difference, make the +1 be racial, and the +2 be chosen, or the other way around, or something along those lines. slightly more complex for new players to learn but not by any real amount, adds flavor and restriction, but also the flexibility to be able to play anything as anything without worrying about stat optimisation
Stat bonuses tied to species was terrible, because it basically made every species only viable for a couple classes, resulting in serious typecasting, them being tied to backgrounds is much better because now you can play any species/class combination without handicapping yourself. And you can find any combination of two stats from among the backgrounds in the phb, so no matter what you want to play you are good. And none of the origin feats are really mandatory for any build, so it's not really that big deal which one you get.
Imagine for each background they would have given you 3 choices to pick from for Origin Feats instead of one... So many of the origin feats can thematically fit into many different backgrounds. For my games, I'm probably telling the group that if you can make it make sense for your background, you can switch your Origin feat
Ive been going back and forth with this. It will depend on the table, but Im inclined to say its better this way cause most new players make their choices based off stats (and thats totally fine). Ive been dming and playing for over 10y, and whenever i have restrictions on a setting (like, this species isnt allowed) and a player has told me they really wanted to play that one, it was mostly because of stats and skills, never about lore and the cool factor.
I'll be honest, I don't understand why picking species outside of human is being framed as the 'bad' thing. If D&D really is supposed to be 'human centric', then why would the system offer players options like dwarves, elves, dragonborn, tieflings, etc. in the first place? Why wouldn't they be all different flavors of humans if that's the the species everyone is SUPPOSED to be playing??? And if a DM really wants to run a humans only campaign, why not just tell their players that at character creation instead of leaving the system to try and 'bait' them with the 'most optimal kit'????? Not to mention that statistics on D&D Beyond (in 2023) show that human is the most commonly played race anyway! I don't understand this framing that suggests tables are overrun with only exotic species all the time, or how that is a 'problem' in the first place. At the end of the day, D&D is a cooperative fantasy game. If exotic species break that fantasy for some then that should be a discussion had at the table. Perhaps at Session 0....... just saying.
I don’t think it’s a bad thing, personally. My point was just that it might be a consequence of the system change. D&D isn’t human centric, but many established campaign settings are canonically populated by a majority of humans, is all. Play what you want and how, for sure!
i dont think most NEWE GEN DMs relaize this. The party is a reflection of the weorl.. Dont tell me its human centric GOT style game and then we show up and noone is playing a human and eveyrone is a caster.
@@umbreeunix options are good , the problem is the newer player thinks those options are entitlements and completely ignore campaign settings and themes
Humans have always been strong in 5e, but they were significantly nerfed in the 24 rules. Limiting the extra feat to one of the origin feats is significantly weaker than being able to pick any feat (including the various 'half' feats). They are still good and versatile, but less of a standout than before. Once the background customization becomes official that will become even more true.
I’d agree, if you’re not locking people in to the RAW rules for backgrounds and not allowing old backgrounds. If you are locking them in, humans are still the standouts in my opinion (which is just that, of course).
This is bad for the same reason tying stats to race was bad in 2014. It means there are right and wrong choices for most classes. What's worse is that for some characters, there's no "good" choice at all, if you had your heart set on a specific feat. You will often have to choose between the feat you want and the stats you want. I want to play a (nonhuman) wizard that grew up in the wilds and was therefore "tough". i.e. I wanted the tough feat. But the only way to get it is with the farmer background which doesn't let you choose intelligence or dexterity as your stat bumps - the two that are most important for my character. I can't imagine that most DMs will enforce choosing from among just these 16 backgrounds. If someone has a class and feat combination that are "non-traditional" why should they be punished? Would my wizard be too powerful with tough and stats in the right spot? Clearly not, because I could just be human and take whatever background and the tough feat. It's so dumb. I dont know what WotC was thinking. I bet this was a last minute change, like maybe they had to cut some pages and it worked out to cut the page with the "design your own custom background" rules in it and nobody actually looked at what that might do to character creation.
@@DM-Timothy I'd ask what you think about my situation - I would like to play a non-human wizard with the tough feat. It seems like I have to give up either my race (for human to get tough with some other background that increases intelligence) or my stat increase in intelligence (by staying nonhuman and taking the farmer background), or the feat I want (stay non-human and take some other background that has an intelligence buff and a different origin feat).
@@NateFinch if it was me in that situation, I’d take the race I wanted, and the farmer background, and a 15 Int wizard who leaned into a really high Con score to highlight the tough feats impact. But that’s just me.
Fantasy races used to be exotic and uncommon. Looking at the art in the new PHB, they are now just humans with horns, scales, or pointed ears. I think they should have kept ability bonuses with races or have races grant 2 different +1 and background +1 in one of three. I don't think every character needs to be or even should be optimized. One of the favorite characters one of my players ran was a half-orc sorcerer - even though the race wasn't optimal, he played against type as a burly and intimidating sorcerer who people often underestimated.
Are you talking about earlier editions? I thought in 5e PHB races always have been humans of different completion and/or exotic skin colour and weird ears
I agree…I have t played D&D, regularly, in over a decade, because of all the games out there, it feels like D&D encourages optimization. When I do play D&D, I always roll random and assign them straight, just going down the line, etc. I even roll class randomly. A lot more fun trying to figure out how this particular character is going to, not just, survive but thrive.
I'm loving the idea of being a human and getting two magic initiate feat. So many spells even if I'm not actually a spellcaster. Kinda weird though that any barbarian or fighter could just have up to 4 cantrips at level 1.
If you want to play Hulk Smash you must pick Goliath for Large Size as Barbarian and ask Sorcerer to cast Enlarge on to you so you can Rage as Huge Barbarian agains the red adult dragon!
Human always was a pretty good race for geting a bonus feat, since feats exist in d&d (ie 3rd edition). They should be a viable race to play, and there is nothing wrong with that.
As a Professional DM/GM who has already resigned myself to having to 'upgrade' to the new rules, I totally agree with what you have said so eloquently. I chaffed at the WOTC stance of 'we are going to remove the racial adjustments because of stereotype' only to stereotype professions (backgrounds), which limit the players much more than the previous racial bonuses. One of the things they miss and you pointed out is that players like to create characters which play against type. By removing this option for the players, they have negated the imagination and ingenuity of the players to create something which defies the stereotype. It says a lot about who and what they believe their audience is. Your point about driving people towards choosing humans is interesting. I looked at it more the other direction as WOTC making the other species to be more human with special traits and can certainly see the reverse in how you presented your case. Overall with the reviews and descriptions of the changes WOTC has made, it appears as though they have tossed much of the balance out the window in a number of cases. Just like programming, they fix an issue in the previous edition and create three more. In the end, I will withhold judgement until I actually get to play with the rules and see how they do affect the balance.
I think part of the problem is that Pathfinder 2e beat them to the punch on the "correct" way to do it. Ie. Give bonus based ancestry, background and class. I would have split it, give a +1 for background, choice of 3, +1 for class, primary attribute, choice if necessary, and +1 for ancestry, choices of 3. No score above 17 at creation. This is going to allow players to balance their ancestry with background. So if you are a halfling and want a 17 strength as a fighter, you need to have a background in doing something that would help you achieve the required muscle mass, like laboring or soldiering. A Goliath on the other hand, could have spent their life as a trader, but the genetic gift allows them to start with the same strength.
I'm down for creating restrictions, I agree with the take that stereotypes need to exist in order to break them, but tying origin feats and stats to backgrounds (especially with how limited they are in the 5.5e PHB) doesn't feel all that great to me
I preferred the old way of having them tied to species, and I like the idea of some suggestions in the comments section of tying 1 point to class, 1 to background, and 1 to species, with no more than 2 able to apply to 1 stat.
I gotta have darkvision and preferably some damage resistance aswell. If you are that into origin feats, just pick Warlock and spam Lessons of the first ones.
I got to think about the stat modifiers the other day, and thought really if you want to include species, background & training for the class to impact things there should be a +1 bonus from each, so maybe all elves get a +1 to DEX or INT, while farmers get a +1 to STR, CON or WIS & then because the character trained to be a fighter they can add a +1 to STR, DEX, or CON. Or even better the actual stat bumps are divorced from the 3 information ideas. The species, background & class allow for your character to add to the specified stats. Using the 3 entries above the 3 stat +1 bumps that character can be applied to STR, DEX, CON, INT or WIS because that is what is allowed based on the combination of Species, Background & Class and no more than 2 can be applied to the same stat. Just an idea that I kind of like now that I have talked about a bit.
Backgrounds are the 2014 races. We used to choose our race based on the stat increases. BT, before Tasha, if you wanted a barbarian or a melee fighter, you took half-orc or goliath or mountain dwarf for the Str and Con boosts. Elves and Halflings for the Dex boost. The racial traits were gravy. Until Tasha's COE. so despite getting 1st level feats, people will choose their background on stat increases and deal with the feat. Or be a human.
I already noticed in myself that it feels like human is the best choice especially since they took away my favorite half-elf. And a character idea i have already comes in conflict with the restrictive backgrounds.
It could be a thing. Many DMs will be willing to bend around it, I suspect. I'd always suggest talking to your dm about your concept before worrying too much about something like this :)
People will fix the game to suit how they want to play it. They always have and a new edition is not going to change that. I’m probably going to let players ignore the background restrictions and just take any feat they want because I use my own method of stat generation anyway. I give my players a pool of 75 to distribute how they want with the restriction that only one stat can be as high as 18 and no stat can go below 7. So if they want a particular origin feat they won’t feel forced to take the human species to get it.
My tables also have alternate ways for doing stats. About half my players are old school, pen and paper character sheets, and half my players are online dndbeyond characters. The problem we run into is the dndbeyone players have a much more difficult time with customization because they build their characters online. My online characters prefer to be online for the simplicity of character management, so I try to be accommodating, and as such, I would prefer customizing to be the norm and not the exception.
The backgrounds having the attribute bonus makes sense. After Tasha's or Xanathar's or whatever, you can pick which attributes to get a bonus. In a campaign I am running, the gnome barbarian got a bonus to Strength and Constitution. Having it bound to a background is a better mechanic.
The DMG will almost assuredly offer opportunities for custom backgrounds - and if they do not there will be products that release new backgrounds all the time. This is, at worst, a very short term problem.
I agree. Honestly, as I mentioned in the vid, the sidebar for backwards compatibility basically solves the "problem" (if it is one) for tables that want a way around it.
I would use them as written (if I ran games). Personally I think Elf is similar to taking Human with Magic Initiate meaning Human or Elf is all I am likely to play depending on the class I want. From what I have seen there looks to be enough option you can get Lucky or Alert to start for most classes. Then I take Magic Initiate or play an Elf with that. What I think it does do if push classes to a certain background. It looks as if all optimised Wizards will be Criminals and Optimised Bards will be Wayfarers and so on.
I like the fact that by picking Magic initiate Druid can remove the need for food and drink for the entire party by picking Goodberry and Elementalism. I also pick guidance, because who doesn't want an extra D4 for a skill check?
I already see a lot of humans because they were a powerful option in the previous edition. I think early on, we will see a lot of humans. I am hopeful that when the DMG comes out it has options to customize backgrounds like the playtest material does.
After Tasha, I was honestly expecting them to disconnect the +2 +1 stat bonuses from your origin and just roll it into your stat generation. Tying it to race can feel nice and immersive thematically at first, that's how I felt. But after the first character it starts to just feel limiting. You don't need to be a hyper optimizer to notice that if you want to play a certain race for flavour reasons, if it isn't compatible with your class primary stat it felt like you suffer a -1 penalty on most things you do, because of your choice. On the other hand, tying it to the background just feels redundant when generating stats. Tying too much mechanical benefit to a specific background (like is done in the new book) is problematic in any case, since what it will lead to is people choosing the background for the bonuses, and ignoring it in their actual backstory. It will happen if custom backgrounds are not allowed - "yeah i have a criminal background, but that's for the feat, im not actually a criminal in my backstory" - or, even more problematic, people feeling obligated to awkwardly fit the criminal or whatever plotline into their backstory where it doesn't belong. Flavour should be free, or at least cheap, and we shouldn't be punished for choosing it wrong.
I can definitely agree with that final point. Even if we stuck with these stats match with this origin feat, people should feel free to play the STORY they're building. I like restrictions and stereotypes, but I don't want people to lose out on story for it at all.
Species (race), backgrounds, and class are really just packets on boons and bonus. More recently, I have realized that you can, for example, take the Sage background and just call it whatever you want like "Guy who learns trivial from listening to bar patrons" Salior can also be "Bowling Alley Employee" or "sea Elf" because the name is not want is important but the packet of boons is what is importent. Also, why does Origin Feat matter? Why not let the player take what origin feat beat fits the proposed character?
Totally true about the flavor of a background. Change whatever narrative you want with the attribute, skill, and feat package. As to the feat, you could easily allow that to be customized too, the question is just if you do not, will that adjust how people play and create a restriction that causes them to find creative solutions.
I dunno... But, the ideas of background being a strong influence, I like it. In games like Vampire the Masquerade, who you were really IS what defines you as vampire!
I’m not happy my merchant lost his mule and cart . Which was an option in 2014 . I’m curious how all the customization from the older book can still apply.
Essentially you just drop features, bonds, flaws, and traits, and the the rest pretty much translates into the correct package. The rules for it can be found in the new PHB.
Some people don't really think about the fact that the most 'adaptable' race has always been able to place where they choose to put their plus 1, other plus 1, and the feat was around to get the third plus 1. Now with the change it is, plus 1, plus 2, origin feat, (and for humans) another origin feat. That makes the most adaptable race exactly what its known for, adaptability. Though I do think that people choosing where there stat bonuses go is fine, as adventurers are not the norm, generally farmers are strong, thieves are stealthy, charlatans are good at social intrigue, and so on. I am glad racial weapon training isn't around anymore, it was essentially the weapon training feat, on a race that already has darkvision, and proficiency in a skill. So basically the elves were originally shoe horned into few choices, but they had more features than the custom lineage, and they still do, they just don't have what is basically a feat tied to their race anymore, they now get spells, enough to be considered a feat such as fey touched. And the high elves now have access to the wizard cantrip ribbon feature. (Note:I am what they might call and elf-hater)
Thank you Tim. Great topic and one that has been bubbling on the back burner of my mind. You really nailed it when you asked the question of “Will it work that way?”. Personally I do not believe we will have all the answers until the release of the DMs Guide. As such my tables will have the access to all the options until a better reason to follow RAW presents itself. 😊
Thanks! You’re right for sure that more on the topic will come with the DMGs release. The sidebar for backwards background compatibility pretty much covers what I suspect will be the DMG option, but I’m sure it will be included and it’ll be interesting to see if they place any further advice or restriction there, or just take off the guidelines like they do for old content.
why is it GONE? why can you not still use it? it affect snothing mechianically, any SMART DM/Player cna eaisly use this to tool. These rules are govenrment law, the book is a colleciton of suggestions, NOTHING MORe, peopel nee dot stop acting like they are oging to get a ticket or prison time for homebrrewing lol, the whole book is jsut a collecti9on of suggestions
@@badmojo0777 I think it's more a matter of that removing it from the PHB means removing it from new players entirely. The skills are still possible, and can be learned and taught, of course, but they used to be right there to teach new players what it meant.
@@DM-Timothy I can understand that every one races about the art and it's amazing but I'd be cool with less of it for more substance. That being said they can't make everyone happy 😊
I think it would have been more complicated, but it should have been that 1 stat was tied to species, pick 1 out of 3, then 1 stat comes from background, 1 out of 3, then 1 more stat that's available from species or background. Then each species should get a list of origin feats it can pick from, and background gives another list of origin feats available, then you can pick 1 origin feat or 2 if you're a human, but one has to be from the human list.
Maybe even 1 from species, 1 from background, and 1 from class. Someone else suggested that. Could have been pretty cool, so long as you couldn't get a +3 to one statistic.
The inflexibility built into the 2024 background system in terms of feats and starting bonus is regressive after the freedom.of customisation in abilities and flavour in 2014 supplements. This 2024 rule is one of the biggest disincentives to me switching to 2024 rules and ill be homebrewing it immediately in games where i have a say.
Personally I found the movement toward freedom of customization to be a big negative of Tashas and other products, but to each their own for sure! Fortunately, this particular rule will be easy to homebrew, as the rules basically offer the "how to fix" for those that want their tables to feature restrictionless creation.
Short answer: no. Origin Feats aren't powerful enough to be worth passing up on the species in every case. I'd rather have concentration free 10 minute flight at level 5 and a breath attack on my fighter as a Dragonborn over an extra weaker feat
I would let them choose any background (from any 5e book) and the ability score bonus however they would like to assign them, with any origin feat they want
Those are actually the rules for any backgrounds except those in the new book. If you’re allowing other material, this issue (if it’s an issue) is easy to avoid. :)
@@DM-Timothy i meant that rule applies to the new backgrounds too, so any new background can have any ability upgrade+ any origin feat. I dont like that if you want to have a mechanicaly strong option, you have to force yourself to choose that background so that already restricts the character options for you.
I was gonna ask if it's really that uncommon to have more humans in the party, but then I remembered that it's just me that usually just makes human characters. In the Pathfinder 1e campaign I'm playing in everyone else in the party is one of the homebrew custom races, and the couple times I've DMed there's only been a couple human characters.
A think a lot of people are misunderstanding the ramifications of the new background system. Origin feats are being way over valued. I cant think of one that is an absolute must have. The potentially sub optimal stat spreads for back grounds is counter balanced by all feats giving an ability score improvement. From what I have seen the design emphasis has shifted away from characters that can do it all to a focus on team play. Characters in this new rule set are going to have mechanical flaws baked into them. This is going to cause a great deal of frustration for optimizers as they can no longer do it all with one character. Optimization is going to need to shift its perspective and embrace the additional challenges placed upon them. Characters can still be optimized to a degree, but its going to have to focus on a specific field of optimization. You can optimize your character for combat, but your going to loose out on social and exploration. As for race as long as people over value origin feats people will flock to humans as a choice. The first few rounds of characters are likely to be these funky human gish builds that try to do everything, but flop hard because the game no longer lets you do that as easily. What I feel is going to work better is optimizing around a play style. Lets say on want a super tanky character. Dwarf farmer would be the optimum choice as it gives you +1hp from being a dwarf and tough for a total of +3 extra hp a level. Elves and tieflings are going to be better mages and half casters. Goliaths and orcs much better at mobility and damage dealing. Human is actually the least optimized as your losing out on racial features that are much stronger than origin feats. People need to give their character more identity like building a control caster vs a blaster caster, Tanky marshals vs damage dealing marshals. weapon focused half casters vs magic focused half casters. My point is whats optimal has changed and is going to be more of a preference than a hard rule.
I want to build a character from a picture. Tabaxi with Staff and Shield Plan was a Paladin/Sorcer with Shillelagh going full charisma. But the Background Guid is the only with Initiat Druid -> Dex, Con, Wis would mean ST 8 Dex 17 (+2) Con 14 (+1) Int 10 Wis 10 Cha 15 vs 8,16,13,10,10,17 or 8,15,14,10,10,17 i would like. I ´am not really happy with the new restrictions.
I definitely agree with this but it is why I went straight towards having my players use the custom background rules. They can use these if they want, but I didn't want all Humans, and with that change I have 0 humans in that party starting in a couple weeks. Not that I hate Humans, but I do hate hamstringing choices for no real reason
Much as the “realist” side of my brain would prefer to see more humans in a group, I can’t disagree. I’m fine with people picking pretty much whatever species they want.
I enjoy working around the old species stat boosts, and in fact I even prefer not to use the stat switch rules from Tasha’s bc it just feels like a cheap and easy way to get the stats I want and have the racial features I want too. Having your cake and eating it doesn’t always equal more fun. The idea that a 3 foot halfling and a 6-7 foot elf can have the same stats, or making a fairy as strong as a hobgoblin doesn’t make a lot of sense. Of course it’s fantasy and such, but believability is what makes fantasy seem real. I love playing characters that weren’t physically built for their role and seeing them overcome that disadvantage in game. It never makes the most powerful build but it is always a powerful story beat. I kinda get the feeling that most tables using the point buy stat system would understand this sentiment more than others, as you can dump a racially boosted stat (dump Tabaxi’s +2 Dex) and use those extra points somewhere else. It sounds counter intuitive but it makes building and playing that character more fun, interesting and personal.
In my campaigns, if u r anything other than human, elf or dwarf u r considered a rarity by the npc population. Medieval fantasy towns are not 21st century London. There is no diversity but lots of prejudice and backward mentality. Much more fun to play!
I wanted the healing feat for my rogue to be able to dirty heal with cunnung action, but nope, only the hermit background has that feat and offers none of the rogue bonuses.
I will be customizing backgrounds with my players, if they don't want one of the backgrounds in the Players Handbook. I don't think we are going to play with anything from the old books other than subclasses . maybe a feat it there is one someone really want. It seems like the species choice will matter less in the 2024 rules that in the 2014 rules and the Human was already a good choice, so I don't think that we are going to see more humans.
People forget the reason why non-human playable races/species originally had ability score bonuses in AD&D 1E/2E (and B/X) - non-humans got special perks like +2 to Dex, infravision (now darkvision), and other racial traits because they had a class level cap (except for the thief class) but they could multiclass while humans didn't have a class limit (they couldn't multi-class but only dual-class (in order to take/use another class they had to "turn off" the original class (this was a gameplay mechanic balance since humans didn't have level caps))). 3E got rid of the level caps so they gave humans ASI and a bonus feat. Personally I would prefer racial ASI because it made each playable race unique. Now with a generic ASI everyone is just a human cosplayer... This is made worse with WotC not giving any history/lore to the race (see Owlin).
Will it take a long time for your friends to buy the new edition, but you too want to get good at D&D 2024? Maybe sign up for some games with DM Timothy? ;)
lol, I do have some seats open at tables that will be using the new rules when fully released. For now I'm testing them with my home-games in between paid games :)
They want the easiest way to go VTT and that is to make it more video game mechanics. That is all this is about, it's not about making the races/ Species better, it's about making it more compatible with the VTT Hasbro has decided to make so they can maximize the money they making by providing skins and such for purpose. This is destroying the table top role play Adventure. They are already forcing the new rules on ALL DND beyond characters. I will not be putting my money into DND beyond for any reason. I will stick with the books. And maps. I may use VTT for maps and such but nothing more. I want DND not a video game.
Interesting. I don't see how any of this can be tied to the VTT in any particularly specific way... I use a VTT that imports DDB content into it 5 nights a week and none of this seems any different than what we already had.
Getting two origin feats is strong, but it honestly doesn't feel stronger than Variant Human getting any feat in the game for free and other races get nothing. 1:0 is way stronger than 2:1. It does give humans a bit more versatility to get the stat boosts they want and the feats they want, though there is some versatility already built into the backgrounds since they let you choose from 3 stats.
@@DM-Timothy the only reason we have so many not humans this game is because we are in Theros so we have a Minotaur, Leonin, Saytr and one lowly human 😂😂 Otherwise it’s normally mostly human with 1 or maybe 2 common races. Elves, gnomes etc…. Oddly never a dwarf
Hmm. Good question. First, though--and I'm surprised the rulebooks, at least for the Forgotten Realms, didn't do more to encourage this--I always go out of my way to make background NPCs, and often major NPCs, be various species. So, Waterdeep isn't all human. (Actually, Dragon Heist DID write this way. All the neighbors around Trollskull Manor are not human!!!) I do wish more players played humans. After all, we did have Aragorn! But certainly not all. A mix is ideal. And some people are playing DnD specifically to be even further from who they are physically IRL. I've got two trans people in my playing group right now. I'm sure you've had / still have players of different identities and such. So I'm glad that there's some incentive to have a human in the party but I want them balanced to the other species. But, then, I cultivate a non-min-maxing table (it took about a year but I got there). So I guess I won't worry about people feeling free to play whatever they want. I can't wait to see the conversion rules. I'm sure those will be pretty popular.
I like various species, but I try not to overrepresent in FR the rarer species to the point where, like in Dragon Heist, it feels like there isn’t an 85% human population, even though I think that number is canon or close to it. Play what you want and all, for sure! A push toward human doesn’t have to be a human only club for sure. :)
@@DM-Timothy yeah, but that is because these races are already quit good with there racial feature, Goliath and Bugbear are still super good even without the feat
They will include the option to create custom backgrounds in the DG to force people to buy another $60 book or $30 DNDbeyond content to get the option. Just a money play for next quarter for the stock.
I’m sure they will include them there, but it won’t be enough to tip anyone over the line from not buy to buy. The rules in the PHB for using old backgrounds essentially already outline the system.
if you listen to some of the interviews with the people in charge , it sounds like the will fokus on dndbeyond so the can sell you virtuel skins for minis and maps etc. with this in mind i will bet that the will sell backgrounds for like 5-10 bucks for there VTT and for the real books it sounds like the will increase the prices too. i read at the beginning of the year in a interview that the thinking about rising the prices up to 25% on normal books. so you will pay like 70-75 than. with this i startet to get me all 5e books an could get ( startet dming like 2 1/2 years ago) and stick to it. have enough stuff for my group to play years and than try other games like cathullu or dark eye.
I don't see it as *forcing* but I can see how it makes humans finally be a race... er species worth playing. In the past they have been pretty lame compared to all of the other choices. In early D&D the elves were always the best mechanically-speaking. The 3e version was probably the best for human so far, but even then it was rare to see a PC human, at least for my groups.
I would wait until at least the DMs Guide is available. I personally am waiting until the Monster Manual is out because the 2014 monsters are going to be weak and out of date.
Definitely a fair stance. I think the DMG entry on custom backgrounds will be... disappointingly simple. The sidebar for backward compatible backgrounds in the PHB is what I expect to see essentially reprinted.
The first couple of editions of D&D pushed people towards humans as they generally were a more optimized option. The assumption was that most people would be humans and other races would be less common. WoTC has been headed away from that direction for years now so the fact that they are pushing people back towards human seems like an unintended accident in their new design. I prefer a human centric approach as the game worlds I design always tend to look more like Middle Earth and less like Zootopia but people should play the game the way they want to play it.
Easier to DM human parties. My solution as a DM if I wanted a human campaign I'd simply say, it's humans only, but feel free to pick any other race's template and write it in as your unique origin story. If they like the elf statistics, then they can simply justify it as a dexterous human blessed with agelessness, etc.
I'm a bit of an odd ball. I'm 53 years old and I've been playing for 40 years and I'm actually happy racial modifiers are gone. Most of us older players are the ones complaining about this change claiming racial modifiers add depth (they don't). However moving them to backgrounds, along with the new origin feat, was a horrible change. I've said the exact same thing you are saying in this video on the forums on DnDbeyond. In any group that the DM doesn't allow custom backgrounds, you're are almost forced to play human, unless by unlikely coincidence there is a background that just happens to give the exact stat bonuses you need and the feat you want. However I disagree that it's a good thing at all. Both racial modifiers and background modifiers don't add anything to the game they just take away options. You should be able to create a character with an interesting backstory that goes against stereotypes AND have them be effective in their class. With 5e's point buy system maxing out at 15, that just isn't possible, so every effective character has to be a stereotype if you attach stat mods to either race or background. Thankfully my DM has already said he will allow custom backgrounds but many newer DMs are afraid to allow optional rules and Adventurer's League generally doesn't allow any player content in the DMG where custom backgrounds are going to be burried.
Yes! Being able to customize characters is always a great choice. Making modifiers tied to species or backgrounds is really limiting and not that fun. I would easily allow my players to use the modifiers and feats they want not caring about species or background they choose. That can open up for a lot of creative characters/players to shine.
Thanks for sharing your thoughts here! Personally, I find it challenging to break a stereotype that doesn’t have a reason to exist, which is why I prefer racial modifiers. Also, while you can’t create an OPTIMAL character, I disagree that you can’t create an effective one when breaking the mold. Finding ways to do that is very satisfying and fun for me. Of course, what’s fun for me isn’t necessarily fun for others, and it’s important we make as many people happy as possible, so there’s that. :)
@@DM-Timothy I understand your point, but players will try to challenge stereotypes with or without this limitation when they want to, but these limitations tend to make them step back sometimes. Unfortunately roleplaying gets second when optimization is really crushed because of some random stats you don't get because of it. I'm one of the few in my circle that prioritizes roleplay instead of power, with my current character being an Wood Elf Alchemist focusing on investigation lol It's not flashy, but gets the job done and is different enough to stand out.
@@DM-Timothy For me any character that doesn't have at least a 16 in their primary stat isn't EFFECTIVE at their classes role. Classes like the monk that have 2 primary abilities need both to have a bonus. i.e. A monk that has a 15 Dex and 15 Wis would only have a 14 AC, + 4 to hit and a 12 save DC, you're going to go down constantly is combat , you're going to miss way more attacks and fail on your grapple & stun attempts, etc... a lot more often than a Monk with 16 in both of these. This isn't effective at all! Therefore you need to pick a race that will give you bonuses ideally to both Dex & Wis. Not many races offer that combo especially in the PHB. Also some stat bonuses are arbitrary. Read any lore on the Dwarf and they will rave about how legendary their engineers are. They built underground cities that have lasted for thousands of years, etc... So naturally they must have an Int bonus, right? I mean they're clearly the best engineers in the Forgotten Realms! But nope they get either Con & Str or Con & Wis. Why? Because way back in 1st edition AD&D Gary and company decided that Dwarves could only be Clerics, Fighters or Thieves (and maybe a few subclasses of these 3). They couldn't be Wizards for some reason. So their was no reason to give them an Int bonus. But the Lore strongly suggest they should have one! I'm not an extreme optimizer but I'm not going to play an ineffective character just to roleplay something interesting and not cliche. I don't like rules that force you to choose between fun & interesting role play and being effective (not optimal) at their class features. If 5e had 3rd editions point buy system then I'd be OK with racial modifiers, but it doesn't. 15 isn't effective, it's too low, and you'll never convince me otherwise. I've played a Sorcerer with a 16 cha at level 1 in a party with a Dwarf Wizard with a 15 int and it was amazing how much more often their spells missed and creatures succeeded on their saves compared to my character. He constantly complained about how bad his character was. Also even if stereotypes are based on facts adventurers are not average people. They are the professional athletes, rocket scientist and charismatic celebrities of their worlds. They are a cut above the ordinary people. I mean most humans are going to have a 10 in most if not all of their stats. Would you want to play that character? I wouldn't.
@@dabeef2112 Totally fair stance. I don’t find a 5% higher miss chance to be the difference between effective and ineffective, personally, but I acknowledge that’s just my personal opinion! :) I enjoy the growth arc of starting less effective, and the challenge of leaning into my other benefits. But everyone should totally do what they need to in order to be having fun at the table. :)
I still cannot get over that they made half elves a product of interspecies relationships (aka bestaility). This also makes slaughtering a tribe of Firbolg ok because it is just deer hunting. Yummy.
One my group used to have a character that was the child of a Minotaur and a Mermaid, but he had the human parts of his parents so he looked like a normal human.
Your cat has an intelligence of 18 at least! Perhaps expertise in Performance? Or has the Actor feat? Or all of the above?! Great ideas as always elevated to the next level by your cat! Awesome stuff!
While this was an interesting video, it really only discusses the fat that Humans get an extra Origin feat. Now if everything else was equal, this would be rather unfair. But all things are NOT equal. There is a reason that Humans have been given the extra feat option: Humans don't get anything else. Every other 'species' have species abilities. Darkvision, resist poison, flying, extra spells. Heck in many games, the first time it turns night, a Human Archer or spellcaster has their ranges reduced dramatically.; and that's assuming the have a torch r campfire. I can't relate how many times I played a sword and shield warrior type but could not use my shield because I had to use that hand to hold a torch or lantern. Even with Continual Light the problem persists throughout the game. "Oh but in the new game humans get Heroic Inspiration". Yeah, that and $1 will get me a can of pop. Heroic inspiration is going to be something that everyone gets, and they won't stack. So as a human if I have one, and we get another before I use it, basically have to give it away, mos likely to a player that has their own species ability. Most species abilities are reliable. They can be used at will, or recharge after a Short rest ( at least in the 2014 edition), so they are mechanically superior. even if they are once a day, most are more powerful than a single reroll. People used to say that giving a Human a Feat at 1st level was too powerful. Now everyone gets one. The Origin feats are not that strong to begin with; and allowing Humans an extra one does not exactly make them mechanically superior to other species. It simply helps level the playing field.
Well, you can just make your own background. They mean nothing. The species offer abilities that far exceed the extra origin feat. That all being said, humans should be the most prominent species, as they are the most common.
Often very true, though my limited experience with it so far (converting one table to the new rules in person) and anecdotal evidence from internet comments suggests that some of those feats are actually pretty important to people, and the only way to get those and your ability scores as you want them by RAW is being human. Allowing custom backgrounds will probably be the norm at a LOT of tables, and will drop humans to the bottom of the species pile again.
@DM-Timothy for a game that prides itself on customization, the backgrounds are very limiting. Custom backgrounds are going to be standard. Others they need out 50 new backgrounds to make it usable at most tables. I can't imagine a table not having an issue with the limited backgrounds.
At this point we might as well just play grey-skinned humanoid blobs if all of the playable races/species are generic with feats and backgrounds distinguishing each other (again with WotC moving away from having set lore tied to each race/species).
I think wotc is trying to move away largely in the generic setting to allow lore from different settings, but I could be being overly generous in my thoughts. The races definitely still define a lot of options for players, just not the same ones they used to.
I doubt it’ll push most players, but at a table only running RAW and 2024 material, I suspect it will push a solid percentage of the power gamers and optimizers. They’re definitely not everyone, or even close, but they’re a subset of the community worth noting. :)
I'm getting really tired of the designers saying "you have to do this" when it comes to mechanics that benefit them by forcing people to buy books but then when it comes to actually designing campaigns they give minimal design and say "oh your table can be as creative as you want." *grrr* cynical jaded grumpy noises. lol i hear myself.
Did you miss the part where Treantmonk said that the DMG will give directions for creating your own background just like 2014 specifically state you could create your own and told how?
So much this. It's in the DMG not in the PHB.... Complaining about premade origins is like complaining about the suggested spells they have for classes. Also you should definitely use Monsters of the Multiverce, 2024 Species are kind of Meh except for humans.
I doubt that people will play more humans now. The statistical benefit of the origin feats is negligible, sans specific builds that exploit them. To say nothing of the extreme bonuses some of them have gotten, like gnome now just having flat advantage on any mental saving throw, magical or otherwise. Rather, I think players will now just treat backgrounds as how they get their race to have the right stat spread, and we'll keep on seeing mostly non-humans.
I probably qont be moving over to one D&D because I dont want to support WotC Hasbro after all the junk they've pulled the last couple of years and their push to move D&D to an online exclusive product. With the racial stat modifiers I dont allow players to use tashas to reasign stats when playing in a base setting and in homebrew settings the racial stats are also predetermined. It doesnt make sense to have the stat modifiers be inconsistent since the D&D races are magically created by the gods to emphasise specific attributes and qualities, unlike our world they really didn't evolve and and gods still constantly intervine to prevent too much change.
Being that my campaigns are usually in Greyhawk, I would like to see more humans played. Many of the cities are mistrusting the non-human species. There needs to be a reason to play humans, as normally nobody wants to play them. I personally don't care about how they apply the stats whether it is is species or backgrounds. I'm in my 50s and started playing in the early 80s as really young kid, my brother was the DM and he is 7 years older than me. I quit playing in the 90s and came back to 5E in 2017. I don't understand all the anger about the species, background and all the other stuff. As a DM, I get to make those decisions. The book can show all it wants. It is still our table and we decide how things will occur.
@@godofzombi optimisers like treantmonk and dungeon dudes rate musician very highly, and alert as well. Magic initiate feats are also rated highly, esp Wizard one due to access to shield
@@Miggy19779 Yeah alert is good but it used to be better. I love what they did to Magic initiate: you can now tie them to your main spellcasting stat and you can cast the lvl 1 spell with spellslots aswel. if you take Druid with goodberry and elementalism and now you'll never run out of food and drink.
I feel like only dumb people would assume that , human is very good but there are a lot of factors. Assimar would still have better nova and Goliath are better grapplers
Eveyr table homebrews, eveyr table is different, most DMs are ogng to allow you to customize backgournds, it sno big deal, THAT being said i think i figured out why they put the rules for cusomization of backgournds in the DMG.. SALE more DMGs on DNDBeyond lol
It's possible. Though frankly, with the rules for converting old backgrounds in the PHB, I know I wouldn't bother buying the DMG if that was all I wanted it for. lol.
I'm not liking this direciton. I like my freedom and player agency and trying to essentially funnel players to play a 'certain' or 'right' way goes against that.
@@DM-TimothyTrue, but you shouldn’t feel punished for not deciding to play human. Though in fairness they have made the extra feat far less impactful than it used to be.
Because I'm already playing one! :D Seriously though, I love D&D, and am excited about D&D 2024. I know it's not everyone's jam, but it's a system I think is awesome, as much as other people think their preferred system is. To each their own and all that :)
@@euanthompson I’d lean toward bad humor myself, then. So far all the changes I’ve documented, I can see at least some rationale for, and the system seems to work better than ever.
This restriction doesn’t exist. There’s apparently a sidebar that says if you pick a 2014 background you just choose your stat picks and origin feat. Real tired of this think piece. It was a terrible discussion about races in 2014-2020 and it’s terrible now.
Nope. It only makes human the best option if you are one of those people who optimize a character build to win D&D. Those of us who build a character that is interesting and born of imagination will not be influenced by this at all.
People who optimize their characters are not necessarily looking to “win”, nor are optimizers necessarily lacking in imagination or interesting characters, but optimizers are definitely the ones most likely to be influenced by a rules change like this.
I like to have a powerfull character but I know D&D can't be won. Not when the DM can just drop Vecna riding the Taraque, suported by 6D12 Red dragons on your party and then follow it up by faling rocks just in case you somehow survived that encounter.
I think no one plays a human for two reasons: 1: we are humans playing this game so who wants to continue to be a plain human when you can be literally anything else and 2: Humans dont get dark vision. A few others dont either, but have more fun abilities to make up for it.
Interesting, I thought I sensationalized my stance quite nicely while still delivering on that exact statement. I apologize that you felt like you were baited and didn't receive what the title promised. Thank you for commenting on it, I never want to "bait and switch" (except as a battlemaster).
![BOWKYLION - วิงวอน (ex-change) [Official MV]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/cLdnZWDaO-w/mqdefault.jpg)
Timothy: ...none of them are cat folk.
Cat: *leaves
Seriously, right? They understand…
Or, cat pushes copy of PHB off of the table.
I'm planning on using the 5.24 rules for my next game with previous content available. My plan is to follow the spirit of the customization rules from Tasha's and allow them to customize all aspects of their backgrounds from the beginning. Origin feat, stats, and proficiencies. 😁👍
I'm also planning on allowing anyone who takes an Origin Feat at level 4 or higher to add a +1 to a stat of their choice to bring them in line with General Feats for the rest of the game. 🤔🧐
That last is an interesting house rule! I’d have to think on the consequences of that, but I can see it being pretty awesome
So now all races are pretty much the same in your game.
@MyKarva Uhhh... No? Races/Species aren't backgrounds. 🙄
I believe the goal behind these new background rules is to create a standardized way for players to justify having certain attributes and origin feats tied to their backstory. However, if one of my players presents a backstory that supports their mechanical choices, I would just create a custom background for them on the spot.
Solid stance.
At least we get one decent throw back to the best edition of D&D to date. Human Fighter has two feats. Just the way the God's intended. 😎
I think that part of the problem with the restriction is the idea that your character didn't just wake up one day and decide to be a fighter and magically gain proficiency in weapons and armor. They probably thought about it for a while then train from level 0 to level 1 and you get no stat boost for that effort.
It’s true that tying stat boosts to class would make at LEAST as much sense as tying it to species or background. Honestly I didn’t see a need from moving away from race choice providing your stat options, but I may be in the minority there. :)
@@DM-TimothyI didn't see the need either but then since the change in Tasha's where every race gets a +2/+1 ( or more. Looking at you 2014 mountain dwarf) then it's all up in the air, no need to tie it into anything just make it a separate step in chargen. I liked the fixed stat points by race to be honest, it was less flexible for sure but much more flavourful
@@Miggy19779 could splut the difference, make the +1 be racial, and the +2 be chosen, or the other way around, or something along those lines.
slightly more complex for new players to learn but not by any real amount, adds flavor and restriction, but also the flexibility to be able to play anything as anything without worrying about stat optimisation
Stat bonuses tied to species was terrible, because it basically made every species only viable for a couple classes, resulting in serious typecasting, them being tied to backgrounds is much better because now you can play any species/class combination without handicapping yourself. And you can find any combination of two stats from among the backgrounds in the phb, so no matter what you want to play you are good. And none of the origin feats are really mandatory for any build, so it's not really that big deal which one you get.
Imagine for each background they would have given you 3 choices to pick from for Origin Feats instead of one... So many of the origin feats can thematically fit into many different backgrounds. For my games, I'm probably telling the group that if you can make it make sense for your background, you can switch your Origin feat
Definitely a fair route to take. I honestly expect this to be one of the most houseruled portions of the new rules.
Ive been going back and forth with this. It will depend on the table, but Im inclined to say its better this way cause most new players make their choices based off stats (and thats totally fine). Ive been dming and playing for over 10y, and whenever i have restrictions on a setting (like, this species isnt allowed) and a player has told me they really wanted to play that one, it was mostly because of stats and skills, never about lore and the cool factor.
Love your content tim btw
I'll be honest, I don't understand why picking species outside of human is being framed as the 'bad' thing.
If D&D really is supposed to be 'human centric', then why would the system offer players options like dwarves, elves, dragonborn, tieflings, etc. in the first place? Why wouldn't they be all different flavors of humans if that's the the species everyone is SUPPOSED to be playing??? And if a DM really wants to run a humans only campaign, why not just tell their players that at character creation instead of leaving the system to try and 'bait' them with the 'most optimal kit'????? Not to mention that statistics on D&D Beyond (in 2023) show that human is the most commonly played race anyway! I don't understand this framing that suggests tables are overrun with only exotic species all the time, or how that is a 'problem' in the first place.
At the end of the day, D&D is a cooperative fantasy game. If exotic species break that fantasy for some then that should be a discussion had at the table. Perhaps at Session 0....... just saying.
I don’t think it’s a bad thing, personally. My point was just that it might be a consequence of the system change. D&D isn’t human centric, but many established campaign settings are canonically populated by a majority of humans, is all. Play what you want and how, for sure!
i dont think most NEWE GEN DMs relaize this. The party is a reflection of the weorl.. Dont tell me its human centric GOT style game and then we show up and noone is playing a human and eveyrone is a caster.
@@umbreeunix options are good , the problem is the newer player thinks those options are entitlements and completely ignore campaign settings and themes
Humans have always been strong in 5e, but they were significantly nerfed in the 24 rules. Limiting the extra feat to one of the origin feats is significantly weaker than being able to pick any feat (including the various 'half' feats). They are still good and versatile, but less of a standout than before. Once the background customization becomes official that will become even more true.
I’d agree, if you’re not locking people in to the RAW rules for backgrounds and not allowing old backgrounds. If you are locking them in, humans are still the standouts in my opinion (which is just that, of course).
This is bad for the same reason tying stats to race was bad in 2014. It means there are right and wrong choices for most classes. What's worse is that for some characters, there's no "good" choice at all, if you had your heart set on a specific feat. You will often have to choose between the feat you want and the stats you want.
I want to play a (nonhuman) wizard that grew up in the wilds and was therefore "tough". i.e. I wanted the tough feat. But the only way to get it is with the farmer background which doesn't let you choose intelligence or dexterity as your stat bumps - the two that are most important for my character.
I can't imagine that most DMs will enforce choosing from among just these 16 backgrounds. If someone has a class and feat combination that are "non-traditional" why should they be punished? Would my wizard be too powerful with tough and stats in the right spot? Clearly not, because I could just be human and take whatever background and the tough feat.
It's so dumb. I dont know what WotC was thinking. I bet this was a last minute change, like maybe they had to cut some pages and it worked out to cut the page with the "design your own custom background" rules in it and nobody actually looked at what that might do to character creation.
Totally fair stance. I disagree, incidentally, but that’s no big deal.
@@DM-Timothy I'd ask what you think about my situation - I would like to play a non-human wizard with the tough feat. It seems like I have to give up either my race (for human to get tough with some other background that increases intelligence) or my stat increase in intelligence (by staying nonhuman and taking the farmer background), or the feat I want (stay non-human and take some other background that has an intelligence buff and a different origin feat).
@@NateFinch if it was me in that situation, I’d take the race I wanted, and the farmer background, and a 15 Int wizard who leaned into a really high Con score to highlight the tough feats impact. But that’s just me.
Fantasy races used to be exotic and uncommon. Looking at the art in the new PHB, they are now just humans with horns, scales, or pointed ears. I think they should have kept ability bonuses with races or have races grant 2 different +1 and background +1 in one of three. I don't think every character needs to be or even should be optimized. One of the favorite characters one of my players ran was a half-orc sorcerer - even though the race wasn't optimal, he played against type as a burly and intimidating sorcerer who people often underestimated.
I concur on preferring attribute adjustments as a race feature. But that doesn’t mean I won’t make the switch and try it all out. :)
Are you talking about earlier editions? I thought in 5e PHB races always have been humans of different completion and/or exotic skin colour and weird ears
I agree…I have t played D&D, regularly, in over a decade, because of all the games out there, it feels like D&D encourages optimization. When I do play D&D, I always roll random and assign them straight, just going down the line, etc. I even roll class randomly. A lot more fun trying to figure out how this particular character is going to, not just, survive but thrive.
@@finderski I love that approach. Random character generation is one of my favorites!
I'm loving the idea of being a human and getting two magic initiate feat. So many spells even if I'm not actually a spellcaster. Kinda weird though that any barbarian or fighter could just have up to 4 cantrips at level 1.
If you want to play Hulk Smash you must pick Goliath for Large Size as Barbarian and ask Sorcerer to cast Enlarge on to you so you can Rage as Huge Barbarian agains the red adult dragon!
I mean, it's definitely an awesome option :D
I mean, presumably, we'll get more updated Backgrounds. I can't see them not updating Haunted One fairly soon, for example.
We definitely will. Agreed.
Human always was a pretty good race for geting a bonus feat, since feats exist in d&d (ie 3rd edition). They should be a viable race to play, and there is nothing wrong with that.
Totally! If anything, I’d prefer to see more humans in play.
As a Professional DM/GM who has already resigned myself to having to 'upgrade' to the new rules, I totally agree with what you have said so eloquently. I chaffed at the WOTC stance of 'we are going to remove the racial adjustments because of stereotype' only to stereotype professions (backgrounds), which limit the players much more than the previous racial bonuses.
One of the things they miss and you pointed out is that players like to create characters which play against type. By removing this option for the players, they have negated the imagination and ingenuity of the players to create something which defies the stereotype. It says a lot about who and what they believe their audience is.
Your point about driving people towards choosing humans is interesting. I looked at it more the other direction as WOTC making the other species to be more human with special traits and can certainly see the reverse in how you presented your case.
Overall with the reviews and descriptions of the changes WOTC has made, it appears as though they have tossed much of the balance out the window in a number of cases. Just like programming, they fix an issue in the previous edition and create three more. In the end, I will withhold judgement until I actually get to play with the rules and see how they do affect the balance.
I think part of the problem is that Pathfinder 2e beat them to the punch on the "correct" way to do it. Ie. Give bonus based ancestry, background and class.
I would have split it, give a +1 for background, choice of 3, +1 for class, primary attribute, choice if necessary, and +1 for ancestry, choices of 3.
No score above 17 at creation.
This is going to allow players to balance their ancestry with background. So if you are a halfling and want a 17 strength as a fighter, you need to have a background in doing something that would help you achieve the required muscle mass, like laboring or soldiering.
A Goliath on the other hand, could have spent their life as a trader, but the genetic gift allows them to start with the same strength.
Goliath is really strong because of topple
Also they are fast
Tbf most martials can do that pretty often so I wouldn't recommend it outside of maybe gishes which doesn't easily have access to it
I'm down for creating restrictions, I agree with the take that stereotypes need to exist in order to break them, but tying origin feats and stats to backgrounds (especially with how limited they are in the 5.5e PHB) doesn't feel all that great to me
I preferred the old way of having them tied to species, and I like the idea of some suggestions in the comments section of tying 1 point to class, 1 to background, and 1 to species, with no more than 2 able to apply to 1 stat.
I gotta have darkvision and preferably some damage resistance aswell. If you are that into origin feats, just pick Warlock and spam Lessons of the first ones.
I got to think about the stat modifiers the other day, and thought really if you want to include species, background & training for the class to impact things there should be a +1 bonus from each, so maybe all elves get a +1 to DEX or INT, while farmers get a +1 to STR, CON or WIS & then because the character trained to be a fighter they can add a +1 to STR, DEX, or CON. Or even better the actual stat bumps are divorced from the 3 information ideas. The species, background & class allow for your character to add to the specified stats. Using the 3 entries above the 3 stat +1 bumps that character can be applied to STR, DEX, CON, INT or WIS because that is what is allowed based on the combination of Species, Background & Class and no more than 2 can be applied to the same stat. Just an idea that I kind of like now that I have talked about a bit.
I think that could be really awesome.
Backgrounds are the 2014 races. We used to choose our race based on the stat increases. BT, before Tasha, if you wanted a barbarian or a melee fighter, you took half-orc or goliath or mountain dwarf for the Str and Con boosts. Elves and Halflings for the Dex boost. The racial traits were gravy. Until Tasha's COE. so despite getting 1st level feats, people will choose their background on stat increases and deal with the feat. Or be a human.
I concur.
I already noticed in myself that it feels like human is the best choice especially since they took away my favorite half-elf. And a character idea i have already comes in conflict with the restrictive backgrounds.
It could be a thing. Many DMs will be willing to bend around it, I suspect. I'd always suggest talking to your dm about your concept before worrying too much about something like this :)
People will fix the game to suit how they want to play it. They always have and a new edition is not going to change that. I’m probably going to let players ignore the background restrictions and just take any feat they want because I use my own method of stat generation anyway. I give my players a pool of 75 to distribute how they want with the restriction that only one stat can be as high as 18 and no stat can go below 7. So if they want a particular origin feat they won’t feel forced to take the human species to get it.
My tables also have alternate ways for doing stats. About half my players are old school, pen and paper character sheets, and half my players are online dndbeyond characters. The problem we run into is the dndbeyone players have a much more difficult time with customization because they build their characters online. My online characters prefer to be online for the simplicity of character management, so I try to be accommodating, and as such, I would prefer customizing to be the norm and not the exception.
The backgrounds having the attribute bonus makes sense. After Tasha's or Xanathar's or whatever, you can pick which attributes to get a bonus. In a campaign I am running, the gnome barbarian got a bonus to Strength and Constitution. Having it bound to a background is a better mechanic.
I think they’re both decent, honestly, just different perspectives.
The DMG will almost assuredly offer opportunities for custom backgrounds - and if they do not there will be products that release new backgrounds all the time. This is, at worst, a very short term problem.
I agree. Honestly, as I mentioned in the vid, the sidebar for backwards compatibility basically solves the "problem" (if it is one) for tables that want a way around it.
I would use them as written (if I ran games).
Personally I think Elf is similar to taking Human with Magic Initiate meaning Human or Elf is all I am likely to play depending on the class I want.
From what I have seen there looks to be enough option you can get Lucky or Alert to start for most classes. Then I take Magic Initiate or play an Elf with that.
What I think it does do if push classes to a certain background. It looks as if all optimised Wizards will be Criminals and Optimised Bards will be Wayfarers and so on.
I’d concur with that.
I like the fact that by picking Magic initiate Druid can remove the need for food and drink for the entire party by picking Goodberry and Elementalism. I also pick guidance, because who doesn't want an extra D4 for a skill check?
Dragon born get flight at lv 5 that’s better than some origin feats
Could definitely be, depending upon your build and character concept.
I already see a lot of humans because they were a powerful option in the previous edition. I think early on, we will see a lot of humans. I am hopeful that when the DMG comes out it has options to customize backgrounds like the playtest material does.
Supposedly that has been announced as coming, but it’s also pretty much already in existence by using the sidebar for converting old backgrounds.
After Tasha, I was honestly expecting them to disconnect the +2 +1 stat bonuses from your origin and just roll it into your stat generation.
Tying it to race can feel nice and immersive thematically at first, that's how I felt. But after the first character it starts to just feel limiting. You don't need to be a hyper optimizer to notice that if you want to play a certain race for flavour reasons, if it isn't compatible with your class primary stat it felt like you suffer a -1 penalty on most things you do, because of your choice.
On the other hand, tying it to the background just feels redundant when generating stats.
Tying too much mechanical benefit to a specific background (like is done in the new book) is problematic in any case, since what it will lead to is people choosing the background for the bonuses, and ignoring it in their actual backstory. It will happen if custom backgrounds are not allowed - "yeah i have a criminal background, but that's for the feat, im not actually a criminal in my backstory" - or, even more problematic, people feeling obligated to awkwardly fit the criminal or whatever plotline into their backstory where it doesn't belong. Flavour should be free, or at least cheap, and we shouldn't be punished for choosing it wrong.
I can definitely agree with that final point. Even if we stuck with these stats match with this origin feat, people should feel free to play the STORY they're building. I like restrictions and stereotypes, but I don't want people to lose out on story for it at all.
Species (race), backgrounds, and class are really just packets on boons and bonus.
More recently, I have realized that you can, for example, take the Sage background and just call it whatever you want like "Guy who learns trivial from listening to bar patrons"
Salior can also be "Bowling Alley Employee" or "sea Elf" because the name is not want is important but the packet of boons is what is importent.
Also, why does Origin Feat matter? Why not let the player take what origin feat beat fits the proposed character?
Totally true about the flavor of a background. Change whatever narrative you want with the attribute, skill, and feat package. As to the feat, you could easily allow that to be customized too, the question is just if you do not, will that adjust how people play and create a restriction that causes them to find creative solutions.
I dunno...
But, the ideas of background being a strong influence, I like it. In games like Vampire the Masquerade, who you were really IS what defines you as vampire!
I can totally understand the push toward background vs species being the motivator, especially for mental stats.
2:08 im calling it dnd 5.25 because i feel like everyone is going to have a Frankenstein mix and match of rules.
Plausible outcome, for sure!
I’m not happy my merchant lost his mule and cart . Which was an option in 2014 . I’m curious how all the customization from the older book can still apply.
Essentially you just drop features, bonds, flaws, and traits, and the the rest pretty much translates into the correct package. The rules for it can be found in the new PHB.
Some people don't really think about the fact that the most 'adaptable' race has always been able to place where they choose to put their plus 1, other plus 1, and the feat was around to get the third plus 1. Now with the change it is, plus 1, plus 2, origin feat, (and for humans) another origin feat. That makes the most adaptable race exactly what its known for, adaptability. Though I do think that people choosing where there stat bonuses go is fine, as adventurers are not the norm, generally farmers are strong, thieves are stealthy, charlatans are good at social intrigue, and so on. I am glad racial weapon training isn't around anymore, it was essentially the weapon training feat, on a race that already has darkvision, and proficiency in a skill. So basically the elves were originally shoe horned into few choices, but they had more features than the custom lineage, and they still do, they just don't have what is basically a feat tied to their race anymore, they now get spells, enough to be considered a feat such as fey touched. And the high elves now have access to the wizard cantrip ribbon feature. (Note:I am what they might call and elf-hater)
Fair points all. Except maybe being an elf hater… ;)
@@DM-Timothy lol, I am glad you see my original point. :D
Thank you Tim. Great topic and one that has been bubbling on the back burner of my mind. You really nailed it when you asked the question of “Will it work that way?”. Personally I do not believe we will have all the answers until the release of the DMs Guide. As such my tables will have the access to all the options until a better reason to follow RAW presents itself.
😊
Thanks! You’re right for sure that more on the topic will come with the DMGs release. The sidebar for backwards background compatibility pretty much covers what I suspect will be the DMG option, but I’m sure it will be included and it’ll be interesting to see if they place any further advice or restriction there, or just take off the guidelines like they do for old content.
I'm going to be pretty loose on the restrictions. My players know that generally if they can justify something, I'll allow.
I think Personality, Ideal, Bond, & Flaw were a good way for players to figure out who their character was. That crutch is gone now.
Yeah, it was nice. There IS a nice list of questions in the character creation section to help newcomers (and vets) though.
why is it GONE? why can you not still use it? it affect snothing mechianically, any SMART DM/Player cna eaisly use this to tool. These rules are govenrment law, the book is a colleciton of suggestions, NOTHING MORe, peopel nee dot stop acting like they are oging to get a ticket or prison time for homebrrewing lol, the whole book is jsut a collecti9on of suggestions
@@badmojo0777 I think it's more a matter of that removing it from the PHB means removing it from new players entirely. The skills are still possible, and can be learned and taught, of course, but they used to be right there to teach new players what it meant.
@@DM-Timothy I can understand that every one races about the art and it's amazing but I'd be cool with less of it for more substance. That being said they can't make everyone happy 😊
I think it would have been more complicated, but it should have been that 1 stat was tied to species, pick 1 out of 3, then 1 stat comes from background, 1 out of 3, then 1 more stat that's available from species or background. Then each species should get a list of origin feats it can pick from, and background gives another list of origin feats available, then you can pick 1 origin feat or 2 if you're a human, but one has to be from the human list.
Maybe even 1 from species, 1 from background, and 1 from class. Someone else suggested that. Could have been pretty cool, so long as you couldn't get a +3 to one statistic.
The inflexibility built into the 2024 background system in terms of feats and starting bonus is regressive after the freedom.of customisation in abilities and flavour in 2014 supplements.
This 2024 rule is one of the biggest disincentives to me switching to 2024 rules and ill be homebrewing it immediately in games where i have a say.
Personally I found the movement toward freedom of customization to be a big negative of Tashas and other products, but to each their own for sure! Fortunately, this particular rule will be easy to homebrew, as the rules basically offer the "how to fix" for those that want their tables to feature restrictionless creation.
Short answer: no.
Origin Feats aren't powerful enough to be worth passing up on the species in every case. I'd rather have concentration free 10 minute flight at level 5 and a breath attack on my fighter as a Dragonborn over an extra weaker feat
Fair stance. I think there will be many who feel as you do.
100% agree with you here, Timothy. Limitation breeds creativity in my eyes
Definitely. Without constraints, we can’t break the molds, either!
I would let them choose any background (from any 5e book) and the ability score bonus however they would like to assign them, with any origin feat they want
Those are actually the rules for any backgrounds except those in the new book. If you’re allowing other material, this issue (if it’s an issue) is easy to avoid. :)
@@DM-Timothy i meant that rule applies to the new backgrounds too, so any new background can have any ability upgrade+ any origin feat.
I dont like that if you want to have a mechanicaly strong option, you have to force yourself to choose that background so that already restricts the character options for you.
@@rehakadam5566 totally an option too, just gotta house rule it. :)
I was gonna ask if it's really that uncommon to have more humans in the party, but then I remembered that it's just me that usually just makes human characters. In the Pathfinder 1e campaign I'm playing in everyone else in the party is one of the homebrew custom races, and the couple times I've DMed there's only been a couple human characters.
Yeah, it's a thing! But some tables are obviously affected more than others. :)
A think a lot of people are misunderstanding the ramifications of the new background system. Origin feats are being way over valued. I cant think of one that is an absolute must have. The potentially sub optimal stat spreads for back grounds is counter balanced by all feats giving an ability score improvement. From what I have seen the design emphasis has shifted away from characters that can do it all to a focus on team play. Characters in this new rule set are going to have mechanical flaws baked into them. This is going to cause a great deal of frustration for optimizers as they can no longer do it all with one character. Optimization is going to need to shift its perspective and embrace the additional challenges placed upon them. Characters can still be optimized to a degree, but its going to have to focus on a specific field of optimization. You can optimize your character for combat, but your going to loose out on social and exploration.
As for race as long as people over value origin feats people will flock to humans as a choice. The first few rounds of characters are likely to be these funky human gish builds that try to do everything, but flop hard because the game no longer lets you do that as easily. What I feel is going to work better is optimizing around a play style. Lets say on want a super tanky character. Dwarf farmer would be the optimum choice as it gives you +1hp from being a dwarf and tough for a total of +3 extra hp a level. Elves and tieflings are going to be better mages and half casters. Goliaths and orcs much better at mobility and damage dealing. Human is actually the least optimized as your losing out on racial features that are much stronger than origin feats. People need to give their character more identity like building a control caster vs a blaster caster, Tanky marshals vs damage dealing marshals. weapon focused half casters vs magic focused half casters. My point is whats optimal has changed and is going to be more of a preference than a hard rule.
I want to build a character from a picture.
Tabaxi with Staff and Shield
Plan was a Paladin/Sorcer with Shillelagh going full charisma.
But the Background Guid is the only with Initiat Druid -> Dex, Con, Wis would mean
ST 8
Dex 17 (+2)
Con 14 (+1)
Int 10
Wis 10
Cha 15
vs
8,16,13,10,10,17 or 8,15,14,10,10,17 i would like.
I ´am not really happy with the new restrictions.
I can definitely understand the frustration.
being encouraged and incentivized to play humans is a good thing in any RPG setting. i just wish the incentive to play humans was stronger.
Why?
I definitely agree with this but it is why I went straight towards having my players use the custom background rules. They can use these if they want, but I didn't want all Humans, and with that change I have 0 humans in that party starting in a couple weeks. Not that I hate Humans, but I do hate hamstringing choices for no real reason
Much as the “realist” side of my brain would prefer to see more humans in a group, I can’t disagree. I’m fine with people picking pretty much whatever species they want.
I enjoy working around the old species stat boosts, and in fact I even prefer not to use the stat switch rules from Tasha’s bc it just feels like a cheap and easy way to get the stats I want and have the racial features I want too. Having your cake and eating it doesn’t always equal more fun. The idea that a 3 foot halfling and a 6-7 foot elf can have the same stats, or making a fairy as strong as a hobgoblin doesn’t make a lot of sense. Of course it’s fantasy and such, but believability is what makes fantasy seem real. I love playing characters that weren’t physically built for their role and seeing them overcome that disadvantage in game. It never makes the most powerful build but it is always a powerful story beat. I kinda get the feeling that most tables using the point buy stat system would understand this sentiment more than others, as you can dump a racially boosted stat (dump Tabaxi’s +2 Dex) and use those extra points somewhere else. It sounds counter intuitive but it makes building and playing that character more fun, interesting and personal.
I concur and agree with you completely!
In my campaigns, if u r anything other than human, elf or dwarf u r considered a rarity by the npc population. Medieval fantasy towns are not 21st century London. There is no diversity but lots of prejudice and backward mentality. Much more fun to play!
If my name was Timothy, I would go by Mothy
Legit. Lol
I wanted the healing feat for my rogue to be able to dirty heal with cunnung action, but nope, only the hermit background has that feat and offers none of the rogue bonuses.
Yep, its super tough to stick to the backgrounds as written while getting the feat you want. Unless you're human.
My group has Arcane trickster rogue with the Guide background so he can cast Healing word 3 times before long rest.
I will be customizing backgrounds with my players, if they don't want one of the backgrounds in the Players Handbook. I don't think we are going to play with anything from the old books other than subclasses . maybe a feat it there is one someone really want.
It seems like the species choice will matter less in the 2024 rules that in the 2014 rules and the Human was already a good choice, so I don't think that we are going to see more humans.
Totally fair stance.
People forget the reason why non-human playable races/species originally had ability score bonuses in AD&D 1E/2E (and B/X) - non-humans got special perks like +2 to Dex, infravision (now darkvision), and other racial traits because they had a class level cap (except for the thief class) but they could multiclass while humans didn't have a class limit (they couldn't multi-class but only dual-class (in order to take/use another class they had to "turn off" the original class (this was a gameplay mechanic balance since humans didn't have level caps))). 3E got rid of the level caps so they gave humans ASI and a bonus feat.
Personally I would prefer racial ASI because it made each playable race unique. Now with a generic ASI everyone is just a human cosplayer... This is made worse with WotC not giving any history/lore to the race (see Owlin).
I guess racial traits just don’t exist
Ability score bonuses being tied to background instead of species doesn't make sense to me. You already do that when you roll and assign your scores.
That’s a totally fair point and a good point actually that nurture and training can be represented by the choice of attribute layout.
Will it take a long time for your friends to buy the new edition, but you too want to get good at D&D 2024?
Maybe sign up for some games with DM Timothy? ;)
lol, I do have some seats open at tables that will be using the new rules when fully released. For now I'm testing them with my home-games in between paid games :)
They want the easiest way to go VTT and that is to make it more video game mechanics. That is all this is about, it's not about making the races/ Species better, it's about making it more compatible with the VTT Hasbro has decided to make so they can maximize the money they making by providing skins and such for purpose. This is destroying the table top role play Adventure. They are already forcing the new rules on ALL DND beyond characters. I will not be putting my money into DND beyond for any reason. I will stick with the books. And maps. I may use VTT for maps and such but nothing more. I want DND not a video game.
Interesting. I don't see how any of this can be tied to the VTT in any particularly specific way... I use a VTT that imports DDB content into it 5 nights a week and none of this seems any different than what we already had.
Getting two origin feats is strong, but it honestly doesn't feel stronger than Variant Human getting any feat in the game for free and other races get nothing. 1:0 is way stronger than 2:1. It does give humans a bit more versatility to get the stat boosts they want and the feats they want, though there is some versatility already built into the backgrounds since they let you choose from 3 stats.
Fair enough!
Oddly enough the most commonly played race at my table is human. Out of 3 multi year campaigns on this current one has but 1 human
Interesting! It's fun to hear about how different tables are like that.
@@DM-Timothy the only reason we have so many not humans this game is because we are in Theros so we have a Minotaur, Leonin, Saytr and one lowly human 😂😂
Otherwise it’s normally mostly human with 1 or maybe 2 common races. Elves, gnomes etc…. Oddly never a dwarf
@@johnnnysaint01 How interesting!!! My groups are almost always FULL of unusual options.
Hmm. Good question.
First, though--and I'm surprised the rulebooks, at least for the Forgotten Realms, didn't do more to encourage this--I always go out of my way to make background NPCs, and often major NPCs, be various species. So, Waterdeep isn't all human. (Actually, Dragon Heist DID write this way. All the neighbors around Trollskull Manor are not human!!!)
I do wish more players played humans. After all, we did have Aragorn! But certainly not all. A mix is ideal. And some people are playing DnD specifically to be even further from who they are physically IRL. I've got two trans people in my playing group right now. I'm sure you've had / still have players of different identities and such.
So I'm glad that there's some incentive to have a human in the party but I want them balanced to the other species.
But, then, I cultivate a non-min-maxing table (it took about a year but I got there). So I guess I won't worry about people feeling free to play whatever they want.
I can't wait to see the conversion rules. I'm sure those will be pretty popular.
I like various species, but I try not to overrepresent in FR the rarer species to the point where, like in Dragon Heist, it feels like there isn’t an 85% human population, even though I think that number is canon or close to it.
Play what you want and all, for sure! A push toward human doesn’t have to be a human only club for sure. :)
no, because origin feat sucks in comparison to a lot species (if we include old 5e species)
Some of them are very good tho
Old species could still be on the table, they just won’t provide a feat no matter what in the 2024 rules. Part of the conversion guide covers that.
@@DM-Timothy yeah, but that is because these races are already quit good with there racial feature, Goliath and Bugbear are still super good even without the feat
They will include the option to create custom backgrounds in the DG to force people to buy another $60 book or $30 DNDbeyond content to get the option. Just a money play for next quarter for the stock.
I’m sure they will include them there, but it won’t be enough to tip anyone over the line from not buy to buy. The rules in the PHB for using old backgrounds essentially already outline the system.
if you listen to some of the interviews with the people in charge , it sounds like the will fokus on dndbeyond so the can sell you virtuel skins for minis and maps etc. with this in mind i will bet that the will sell backgrounds for like 5-10 bucks for there VTT and for the real books it sounds like the will increase the prices too. i read at the beginning of the year in a interview that the thinking about rising the prices up to 25% on normal books. so you will pay like 70-75 than. with this i startet to get me all 5e books an could get ( startet dming like 2 1/2 years ago) and stick to it. have enough stuff for my group to play years and than try other games like cathullu or dark eye.
I don't see it as *forcing* but I can see how it makes humans finally be a race... er species worth playing. In the past they have been pretty lame compared to all of the other choices. In early D&D the elves were always the best mechanically-speaking. The 3e version was probably the best for human so far, but even then it was rare to see a PC human, at least for my groups.
I would wait until at least the DMs Guide is available. I personally am waiting until the Monster Manual is out because the 2014 monsters are going to be weak and out of date.
Definitely a fair stance. I think the DMG entry on custom backgrounds will be... disappointingly simple. The sidebar for backward compatible backgrounds in the PHB is what I expect to see essentially reprinted.
The first couple of editions of D&D pushed people towards humans as they generally were a more optimized option. The assumption was that most people would be humans and other races would be less common. WoTC has been headed away from that direction for years now so the fact that they are pushing people back towards human seems like an unintended accident in their new design. I prefer a human centric approach as the game worlds I design always tend to look more like Middle Earth and less like Zootopia but people should play the game the way they want to play it.
Could definitely be an unintended situation. Thanks for your comment, especially the last part!
Easier to DM human parties.
My solution as a DM if I wanted a human campaign I'd simply say, it's humans only, but feel free to pick any other race's template and write it in as your unique origin story.
If they like the elf statistics, then they can simply justify it as a dexterous human blessed with agelessness, etc.
Interesting solution!
I'm a bit of an odd ball. I'm 53 years old and I've been playing for 40 years and I'm actually happy racial modifiers are gone. Most of us older players are the ones complaining about this change claiming racial modifiers add depth (they don't). However moving them to backgrounds, along with the new origin feat, was a horrible change.
I've said the exact same thing you are saying in this video on the forums on DnDbeyond. In any group that the DM doesn't allow custom backgrounds, you're are almost forced to play human, unless by unlikely coincidence there is a background that just happens to give the exact stat bonuses you need and the feat you want.
However I disagree that it's a good thing at all. Both racial modifiers and background modifiers don't add anything to the game they just take away options. You should be able to create a character with an interesting backstory that goes against stereotypes AND have them be effective in their class. With 5e's point buy system maxing out at 15, that just isn't possible, so every effective character has to be a stereotype if you attach stat mods to either race or background.
Thankfully my DM has already said he will allow custom backgrounds but many newer DMs are afraid to allow optional rules and Adventurer's League generally doesn't allow any player content in the DMG where custom backgrounds are going to be burried.
Yes! Being able to customize characters is always a great choice. Making modifiers tied to species or backgrounds is really limiting and not that fun.
I would easily allow my players to use the modifiers and feats they want not caring about species or background they choose. That can open up for a lot of creative characters/players to shine.
Thanks for sharing your thoughts here! Personally, I find it challenging to break a stereotype that doesn’t have a reason to exist, which is why I prefer racial modifiers. Also, while you can’t create an OPTIMAL character, I disagree that you can’t create an effective one when breaking the mold. Finding ways to do that is very satisfying and fun for me. Of course, what’s fun for me isn’t necessarily fun for others, and it’s important we make as many people happy as possible, so there’s that. :)
@@DM-Timothy I understand your point, but players will try to challenge stereotypes with or without this limitation when they want to, but these limitations tend to make them step back sometimes. Unfortunately roleplaying gets second when optimization is really crushed because of some random stats you don't get because of it.
I'm one of the few in my circle that prioritizes roleplay instead of power, with my current character being an Wood Elf Alchemist focusing on investigation lol
It's not flashy, but gets the job done and is different enough to stand out.
@@DM-Timothy For me any character that doesn't have at least a 16 in their primary stat isn't EFFECTIVE at their classes role. Classes like the monk that have 2 primary abilities need both to have a bonus.
i.e. A monk that has a 15 Dex and 15 Wis would only have a 14 AC, + 4 to hit and a 12 save DC, you're going to go down constantly is combat , you're going to miss way more attacks and fail on your grapple & stun attempts, etc... a lot more often than a Monk with 16 in both of these. This isn't effective at all! Therefore you need to pick a race that will give you bonuses ideally to both Dex & Wis. Not many races offer that combo especially in the PHB.
Also some stat bonuses are arbitrary. Read any lore on the Dwarf and they will rave about how legendary their engineers are. They built underground cities that have lasted for thousands of years, etc... So naturally they must have an Int bonus, right? I mean they're clearly the best engineers in the Forgotten Realms! But nope they get either Con & Str or Con & Wis. Why? Because way back in 1st edition AD&D Gary and company decided that Dwarves could only be Clerics, Fighters or Thieves (and maybe a few subclasses of these 3). They couldn't be Wizards for some reason. So their was no reason to give them an Int bonus. But the Lore strongly suggest they should have one!
I'm not an extreme optimizer but I'm not going to play an ineffective character just to roleplay something interesting and not cliche. I don't like rules that force you to choose between fun & interesting role play and being effective (not optimal) at their class features. If 5e had 3rd editions point buy system then I'd be OK with racial modifiers, but it doesn't. 15 isn't effective, it's too low, and you'll never convince me otherwise. I've played a Sorcerer with a 16 cha at level 1 in a party with a Dwarf Wizard with a 15 int and it was amazing how much more often their spells missed and creatures succeeded on their saves compared to my character. He constantly complained about how bad his character was.
Also even if stereotypes are based on facts adventurers are not average people. They are the professional athletes, rocket scientist and charismatic celebrities of their worlds. They are a cut above the ordinary people. I mean most humans are going to have a 10 in most if not all of their stats. Would you want to play that character? I wouldn't.
@@dabeef2112 Totally fair stance. I don’t find a 5% higher miss chance to be the difference between effective and ineffective, personally, but I acknowledge that’s just my personal opinion! :) I enjoy the growth arc of starting less effective, and the challenge of leaning into my other benefits. But everyone should totally do what they need to in order to be having fun at the table. :)
I still cannot get over that they made half elves a product of interspecies relationships (aka bestaility). This also makes slaughtering a tribe of Firbolg ok because it is just deer hunting. Yummy.
I grew up on Star Trek, so I can’t do more than shrug over the idea of inter-species relationships, lol
@@DM-Timothy , it does make more sense why all the green ones want to eat humans though.
One my group used to have a character that was the child of a Minotaur and a Mermaid, but he had the human parts of his parents so he looked like a normal human.
Your cat has an intelligence of 18 at least! Perhaps expertise in Performance? Or has the Actor feat? Or all of the above?!
Great ideas as always elevated to the next level by your cat! Awesome stuff!
Thank you. I will give them extra pets from you!
While this was an interesting video, it really only discusses the fat that Humans get an extra Origin feat. Now if everything else was equal, this would be rather unfair. But all things are NOT equal. There is a reason that Humans have been given the extra feat option: Humans don't get anything else. Every other 'species' have species abilities. Darkvision, resist poison, flying, extra spells. Heck in many games, the first time it turns night, a Human Archer or spellcaster has their ranges reduced dramatically.; and that's assuming the have a torch r campfire. I can't relate how many times I played a sword and shield warrior type but could not use my shield because I had to use that hand to hold a torch or lantern. Even with Continual Light the problem persists throughout the game.
"Oh but in the new game humans get Heroic Inspiration". Yeah, that and $1 will get me a can of pop. Heroic inspiration is going to be something that everyone gets, and they won't stack. So as a human if I have one, and we get another before I use it, basically have to give it away, mos likely to a player that has their own species ability. Most species abilities are reliable. They can be used at will, or recharge after a Short rest ( at least in the 2014 edition), so they are mechanically superior. even if they are once a day, most are more powerful than a single reroll.
People used to say that giving a Human a Feat at 1st level was too powerful. Now everyone gets one. The Origin feats are not that strong to begin with; and allowing Humans an extra one does not exactly make them mechanically superior to other species. It simply helps level the playing field.
Definitely a fair stance. Thanks for your comment! :)
Well, you can just make your own background. They mean nothing. The species offer abilities that far exceed the extra origin feat. That all being said, humans should be the most prominent species, as they are the most common.
Often very true, though my limited experience with it so far (converting one table to the new rules in person) and anecdotal evidence from internet comments suggests that some of those feats are actually pretty important to people, and the only way to get those and your ability scores as you want them by RAW is being human. Allowing custom backgrounds will probably be the norm at a LOT of tables, and will drop humans to the bottom of the species pile again.
@DM-Timothy for a game that prides itself on customization, the backgrounds are very limiting. Custom backgrounds are going to be standard. Others they need out 50 new backgrounds to make it usable at most tables. I can't imagine a table not having an issue with the limited backgrounds.
At this point we might as well just play grey-skinned humanoid blobs if all of the playable races/species are generic with feats and backgrounds distinguishing each other (again with WotC moving away from having set lore tied to each race/species).
I think wotc is trying to move away largely in the generic setting to allow lore from different settings, but I could be being overly generous in my thoughts. The races definitely still define a lot of options for players, just not the same ones they used to.
Well its a really small powerloss and it definitively won't push anyone
I doubt it’ll push most players, but at a table only running RAW and 2024 material, I suspect it will push a solid percentage of the power gamers and optimizers. They’re definitely not everyone, or even close, but they’re a subset of the community worth noting. :)
I'm getting really tired of the designers saying "you have to do this" when it comes to mechanics that benefit them by forcing people to buy books but then when it comes to actually designing campaigns they give minimal design and say "oh your table can be as creative as you want." *grrr* cynical jaded grumpy noises. lol i hear myself.
Hehe, frustrations like that are pretty understandable in my mind. I try to give them benefit of the doubt so I don’t go all grognard rage. :D
Did you miss the part where Treantmonk said that the DMG will give directions for creating your own background just like 2014 specifically state you could create your own and told how?
No, I actually mentioned it in the video. :)
So much this. It's in the DMG not in the PHB.... Complaining about premade origins is like complaining about the suggested spells they have for classes.
Also you should definitely use Monsters of the Multiverce, 2024 Species are kind of Meh except for humans.
No, because Darkvision is such a boon to have.
It’s true. Though there are a number of ways to pick it up outside of species.
I doubt that people will play more humans now. The statistical benefit of the origin feats is negligible, sans specific builds that exploit them. To say nothing of the extreme bonuses some of them have gotten, like gnome now just having flat advantage on any mental saving throw, magical or otherwise. Rather, I think players will now just treat backgrounds as how they get their race to have the right stat spread, and we'll keep on seeing mostly non-humans.
Entirely plausible, though so far my tables that have converted have really felt the fight to get both the stats and feat they want.
@@DM-Timothy Well, it's pretty early into the games life, so I'm fair with waiting to see how it actually turns out.
I dont think its a big deal 5th edition was a big step back 4th edition was my favorite to run though
I enjoyed 4th Ed. It didn’t feel like dnd to me, but it was a super fun tactical game.
I probably qont be moving over to one D&D because I dont want to support WotC Hasbro after all the junk they've pulled the last couple of years and their push to move D&D to an online exclusive product.
With the racial stat modifiers I dont allow players to use tashas to reasign stats when playing in a base setting and in homebrew settings the racial stats are also predetermined. It doesnt make sense to have the stat modifiers be inconsistent since the D&D races are magically created by the gods to emphasise specific attributes and qualities, unlike our world they really didn't evolve and and gods still constantly intervine to prevent too much change.
Totally fair stance :)
Being that my campaigns are usually in Greyhawk, I would like to see more humans played. Many of the cities are mistrusting the non-human species. There needs to be a reason to play humans, as normally nobody wants to play them. I personally don't care about how they apply the stats whether it is is species or backgrounds. I'm in my 50s and started playing in the early 80s as really young kid, my brother was the DM and he is 7 years older than me. I quit playing in the 90s and came back to 5E in 2017. I don't understand all the anger about the species, background and all the other stuff. As a DM, I get to make those decisions. The book can show all it wants. It is still our table and we decide how things will occur.
Exactly there is no lore in the phb for a good reason
It is the dm’s choice
@@thomasquesada7248 Agreed.
If anything humans are weaker now. I loved getting war caster or resilient con on my bladesinger at lvl 1
It's true that origin feats are a far cry from some very specifically awesome feats that are out there. Good point :)
@@DM-Timothy I think the only real good origin fets are the Magic initiate ones.
@@godofzombi optimisers like treantmonk and dungeon dudes rate musician very highly, and alert as well. Magic initiate feats are also rated highly, esp Wizard one due to access to shield
@@Miggy19779 Yeah alert is good but it used to be better. I love what they did to Magic initiate: you can now tie them to your main spellcasting stat and you can cast the lvl 1 spell with spellslots aswel. if you take Druid with goodberry and elementalism and now you'll never run out of food and drink.
In other words, humans must be superior to all other species. And if there aren't, the game has to make them superior...aka, a solution species. Feh!
I feel like only dumb people would assume that , human is very good but there are a lot of factors. Assimar would still have better nova and Goliath are better grapplers
Fair enough stance. :)
Eveyr table homebrews, eveyr table is different, most DMs are ogng to allow you to customize backgournds, it sno big deal, THAT being said i think i figured out why they put the rules for cusomization of backgournds in the DMG.. SALE more DMGs on DNDBeyond lol
It's possible. Though frankly, with the rules for converting old backgrounds in the PHB, I know I wouldn't bother buying the DMG if that was all I wanted it for. lol.
@@DM-Timothy oh my agree
I'm not liking this direciton. I like my freedom and player agency and trying to essentially funnel players to play a 'certain' or 'right' way goes against that.
I can understand that standpoint.
I consider the backgrounds one of the worst parts of 5.5e
Fair stance. It is growing on me, but more like fungus than an acquired taste…
Humanity #1
Old custom lineage for the win lol.
I’d definitely recommend DMs not allow that, but yeah, that’s an option for those who prefer the 5e style.
@@DM-TimothyTrue, but you shouldn’t feel punished for not deciding to play human.
Though in fairness they have made the extra feat far less impactful than it used to be.
@@guardiantree8879 fair enough. I think of it as a trade off, rather than a punishment, but I’m kinda up beat that way. :D
6 min 20 sec to get to the point. Lordy.
Sorry! I'm a talker... lol
Why wouldn't you take the oportunity to switch to a game that is actually good and functional?
Because I'm already playing one! :D Seriously though, I love D&D, and am excited about D&D 2024. I know it's not everyone's jam, but it's a system I think is awesome, as much as other people think their preferred system is. To each their own and all that :)
@@DM-Timothy I hope you still enjoy it in a few months. Especially given they explicitly said they made it to make DMs live miserable.
@@euanthompson Yeah? Where did they say that? It doesn’t seem terribly credible…
@@DM-Timothy it was in one of the interviews they did. I'm hoping it was a joke, but the context and delivery didn't sound like it.
@@euanthompson I’d lean toward bad humor myself, then. So far all the changes I’ve documented, I can see at least some rationale for, and the system seems to work better than ever.
This restriction doesn’t exist. There’s apparently a sidebar that says if you pick a 2014 background you just choose your stat picks and origin feat.
Real tired of this think piece. It was a terrible discussion about races in 2014-2020 and it’s terrible now.
True, if you're allowing old content in the backgrounds, this is a non-issue, as I mentioned. :)
Nope. It only makes human the best option if you are one of those people who optimize a character build to win D&D. Those of us who build a character that is interesting and born of imagination will not be influenced by this at all.
People who optimize their characters are not necessarily looking to “win”, nor are optimizers necessarily lacking in imagination or interesting characters, but optimizers are definitely the ones most likely to be influenced by a rules change like this.
I like to have a powerfull character but I know D&D can't be won. Not when the DM can just drop Vecna riding the Taraque, suported by 6D12 Red dragons on your party and then follow it up by faling rocks just in case you somehow survived that encounter.
I think no one plays a human for two reasons: 1: we are humans playing this game so who wants to continue to be a plain human when you can be literally anything else and 2: Humans dont get dark vision. A few others dont either, but have more fun abilities to make up for it.
It is pretty crazy how often the darkvision thing is a determining factor, for sure. Solid points. Thanks! :)
Downvoted for the insulting, obvious outrage-bait / clickbait title.
Interesting, I thought I sensationalized my stance quite nicely while still delivering on that exact statement. I apologize that you felt like you were baited and didn't receive what the title promised. Thank you for commenting on it, I never want to "bait and switch" (except as a battlemaster).
Up voted to cancel out that jerk.
Also a comment to drive "engagement".
The title is fine.