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mgshamster wrote:

Your knowledge of the Tiefling history is weak. (I don't suppose that's like being weak in the force, is it?) They used to have +1 Int, +1 Cha, -1 Str, -1 Wis.  They came from 2nd ed. Planescape. 3rd edition was the oddity. They weren't social outcasts, they were just mistrusted, but only to those who dealt with them regulraly.  They were deceivers and manipulators, easily able to gain the trust of some unfortunate.  They had the charisma bonus because they had to rely on themselves, and were fully confident with themselves. These show a direct correlation to a cha bonus.

No. It shows a direct correlation to a bluff bonus.

mgshamster wrote:

As I've mentioned before (on the previous page, I think. Don't get me wrong, though, I don't expect anyone to have to read through all those posts. Gah!), the world that distrusts Tieflings is that world only.  Other worlds may like them, or not.  It's a social stigma.  Why in the world would a social stigma reduce a races natural charisma?  It doesn't make them less charasmatic, only not well trusted.  If they were to meet someone who had no clue who they were, would that make them less or more charismatic?  The only proper answer is neither.

You are right that social prejudices do not and should not effect a charisma modifier. However, how a race reacts to that position is. Drow are mistrusted too, but drow decided to embrace the fear they project and are empowered by it. When a drow goes to the surface, he makes an impression.

Tieflings are not like that. Maybe they were in 2e, I didn’t play planescape so I don’t know. But the tieflings of today are not filled with pride in the fear that they inspire. They are reclusive, withdrawn, and fiercely independent; essentially a race of emos. Being emo should not give a plus to charisma.

mgshamster wrote:

…
Also, by saying that elves make good wizards, and have a strong history of wizardry and magic, is a flavor towards the race, not a PC.  Even if no PC ever plays an elven wizard based on the 3E rules, how does this take away from the culture of the elves?

In the same way that so many good and neutral aligned drow PCs running amok deteriorated the perceptions that drow were to be feared. When players started playing good-aligned drow, it had a profound influence on how drow were perceived in future books. It started with the unfortunate decision to make a goddess of good drow, so PCs would have someone they could worship. This snowballed into whole communities of renegade drow, to the point that many DMs let drow PCs walk among the surface cities without reprisal, since they were given the benefit of the doubt.

Also, look at Halflings. Halflings were modeled after hobbits, so they were supposed to be simple quiet lawful-good folk who liked to smoke their pipes and not get into any trouble. However, as Pcs, thieves were the best fit. So most people played Halflings as roguish and daring, and today the entire Halfling race has been redesigned to fit with the kind of characters players chose to play.

PCs do shape the game’s notions of each race. They probably shouldn’t, but they do.

mgshamster wrote:

This also comes from a much deeper rooted problem: players playing characters for character power and advancement, instead of as a social gathering and role-playing game, which it is.  When 3rd ed first came out, I had already been playing D&D for 10 years.  I tried it, even involved myself in several campaigns for several years.  From my experiences, the differences between 2nd and 3rd are thus:

In 2nd, you role-played, and if you knew the rules well enough, you could min-max.
In 3rd, you min-maxed, and if you knew the rules well enough, you could role-play.
I've yet to see how 4th looks, but so far, it's promising.

Hmm.. sorry for going off on a tangent.

This is about the single best description I have ever seen of 2e v. 3e. You wouldn’t know it from my previous posts, but I actually skipped most of 3e for that reason. In 2e, there weren’t all the feats and racial powers that consumed people’s time. If you decided to play a human fighter, that was it. You weren’t going to have to retool your character ever again, so all that you had left to do was enjoy roleplaying. Racial traits didn’t matter much either, as after about level 4 you didn’t even notice them anymore, you just chose a race based on one you wanted to roleplay.

Unfortunately, racial traits do matter now, a lot. It can be fun to play a halfling fighter, but it isn’t fun to suck so hard. But it is what it is.