This is a combination of forced "balancing" and hamfisted attempts to address "problematic cultural stereotyping in the fantasy genre" as one commenter put it. It's basically "Intelligence penalties are racist".

I hate this direction overall, and it just reeks of "participation trophy" culture, were people losing cuz they're feeble and incompetent is not OK, so we have to undermine the accomplishments of capable individuals in order to make weak people feel good about themselves. Or, in terms of the game rules, no humanoid now gets a penalty and all the bonuses are seriously toned down and sameyfied, so that there's very little difference between character races, and no race is truly superior to any other. Just superficially different, with a minor edge at most.

And don't get me wrong, I can understand balance concerns and overpowered races can be an issue. I just wish that they could do that without reaping the guts out of stronger races and artificially deflating them to bring them down to a weaker race's level.

A better solution, is obviously to have your attribute bonuses be drawn from your character's backstory and their lived experiences, their truths if you will.   Gain points for having the emotionally moving backstory that gamers are all looking for these days.

Quote from: SavageSchemer;1134285I've always thought D&D's alignment system was downright idiotic, but that statement just seems so wrong!

Not so wrong once you consider that the druid's adherence a neutral alignment is a D&D invention to shoehorn them into the alignment system.

Quote from: oggsmash;1134297A better solution, is obviously to have your attribute bonuses be drawn from your character's backstory and their lived experiences, their truths if you will.   Gain points for having the emotionally moving backstory that gamers are all looking for these days.

This really isn't a solution at all. The entire point of having race as a separate choice is for that choice to be meaningful. If you are going to make race just a backstory, the most optimal solution is to completely race as an option. Just allow a player to design the character they want and then use race the same way we now use gender; as a thematic choice no different that whether or not the character is wearing a hat. IOW, just a skin applied to a set of numbers.

Quote from: hedgehobbit;1134300This really isn't a solution at all. The entire point of having race as a separate choice is for that choice to be meaningful. If you are going to make race just a backstory, the most optimal solution is to completely race as an option. Just allow a player to design the character they want and then use race the same way we now use gender; as a thematic choice no different that whether or not the character is wearing a hat. IOW, just a skin applied to a set of numbers.

  That seems to be the direction they are looking for.  But I was being sarcastic.

Quote from: GeekyBugle;1134269So glad I'm not buying any of their shit.

There's no reason whatsoever to support companies who hate you.

Doubly so when there are plenty of game designers who just want to make games.

And an entire lifetime of cool RPGs were published before the turn of this century.

If I am not wrong 3e was the first edition to allow you to play a Good Drow.  Especially if you play a Ranger that wields twin scimitars.

So welcome to the 21st Century Jeremy, glad to have you aboard.

Drow were like ninjas in the 80's:  every kid wanted to be one 'cause they were so cool.
Are tieflings passe now?  I can't keep track anymore.

Quote from: hedgehobbit;1134300This really isn't a solution at all. The entire point of having race as a separate choice is for that choice to be meaningful. If you are going to make race just a backstory, the most optimal solution is to completely race as an option. Just allow a player to design the character they want and then use race the same way we now use gender; as a thematic choice no different that whether or not the character is wearing a hat. IOW, just a skin applied to a set of numbers.

At the bare minimum I would bring back minimum score requirements if racial modifiers were no longer gonna be a thing and race is just going to be an "esthetic" (heck, I would bring them back regardless). But I suppose races having standards would also be racist.

Quote from: oggsmash;1134302That seems to be the direction they are looking for.  But I was being sarcastic.

Yup, they're even thinking of phasing out "race". Cuz all of two games or so changed the name used for "race" to "ancestry" or whatever, which apparently means that "race" is falling out of favor. Cuz two companies using an even less accurate term to describe that thing that characters physically are, for purely ideological reasons, now indicates a general trend.

My understanding is D&D 4e debacle was the result of the company listening to the squeaky wheel fans demands too much and assuming that they made a product that their fans would insta-buy.
Should be amusing to see how this experiment goes.

Quote from: Shasarak;1134318If I am not wrong 3e was the first edition to allow you to play a Good Drow.  Especially if you play a Ranger that wields twin scimitars.

So welcome to the 21st Century Jeremy, glad to have you aboard.

2e had supplements that allowed good Drow characters (Drow of the Underdark), even featured Eillistrae, goddess of the moon and good Drow. Though, the book specified that good drow were rare, and went to lengths to highlight how difficult to play those characters were supposed to be.

My main character back in the day was a non-scimitar wielding dark elf mage (witch kit) worshiper of Eillistrae (yes, I participated in this trend ).

Intelligence buffs will remain, right? Which indicates that the rules still support some races of creatures being inherently smarter.

The move concerning alignment seems to me to be another step in moving the literary background for the game from one tradition to another: less Appendix N and more... well, modern fantasy like that found in World of Warcraft's orcs and... I don't know I can't think of many examples.

Quote from: rocksfalleverybodydies;1134323My understanding is D&D 4e debacle was the result of the company listening to the squeaky wheel fans demands too much and assuming that they made a product that their fans would insta-buy.
Should be amusing to see how this experiment goes.

It was more the result of making the game intentionally compatible with video games during initial creation, and then a murder suicide (Joseph Batten) where all the data got locked encrypted and the entire plan dashed, with a tabletop-only emergency plan slapped on top of it to just get it out at all.

Perhaps the classic "race" has played itself out? I've been reading PF2 to get up to speed (analyzing it for potential publishing use), and that game has tweaked everything for maximum scores and wins. You WILL be awesome at whatever parts you choose to be awesome at. By 10th level and your second batch of FOUR (4!!!!) ability raises, you will be a godling. If you don't own a demiplane by 20th, you're not trying. They use "Ancestry" to replace "Race", but it's the same thing. Different name, same deal.

Maybe race should be rolled back into "role". Just a game with roles. One of those roles might be the typical Elf Bow Dual Sword Fighter of the High Forest. Another might be the Hardened Dwarf Warrior of the Stone Bear Clan. Or you're just a Witty Bard who might have a touch of Elf in their background. Focus on what each role does in the game, with choices focused on those roles. No races, no species, just "here are the choices of the part you play in this game".

I'm starting to see the benefits of ACKS/basic D&D's approach. When someone complains that the Orc is an evil archetype you point out that a) there are no Orc roles in the game and b) they were included as Bad Guys^tm, and NO you can't play one as the Paladin's nurse maid.

No one needs to be pin-holed into playing a "race" that represents a minority (if you're inclined to feel that way). If you want to be a strict fighter, you are a human fighter. If you want to play an Elf, you play the role that Elves (the society) in this world produce. No razor tightropes to tippy-toe across. It is what it is because #setting #game #fun #TheGMSaidSo.

Munchkin power-gamer optimize-geeks are just going to pick all the cool combos to get the best stats anyways. Why cloud all this build technique with stupid real-world equivalencies?

Quote from: hedgehobbit;1134267In older versions of D&D, demi-humans (elves, dwarves, etc) were the good guys and humanoids where evil. Being evil was the thing that separated the two groups. But players demanded that they be able to play the monster and are now demanding that the monsters aren't monsters anymore.

This is an old fallacy thats been around a while.

Actually in OD&D and B/BX nothing was inherintly allways evil or even allways good. You just leaned to law neutral or chaos. Orcs and Ogres originally were listed as Neutral or Chaos for example. Rocs were listed as Law or Neutral and Men were listed in all 3. Even in AD&D the alignment lists for monsters went right out the window pretty darn fast and you have pretty much anything popping up somewhere with whatever alignment someone wanted them to have. And some monsters have changed alignment from one edition to another.