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I think one of the problems is that humans should be the baseline. It doesn't make sense to give them a bonus that other races can't get. Why should a human's stats be better overall? Why should they know an extra skill? Why should a dwarf not? 

Another problem is that the demi-human races get bonuses that shoehorn you into being a stereotype. Why is every dwarf, regardless of where he or she was raised, trained in dungeoneering? Why is every elf better with swords and bows than other races? Do members of these races have a list of activities that they push onto every single person from a young age like some oppressive Jedi order? And why are halflings lucky??? That makes no sense at all.

Here's an idea: Each race has a list of things at which they can excel. Have a couple of skills that make sense, some traditional weapons, and some abilities (like immunities, resistances, vision types, and so on). Each player picks three (or however many) of those from the list. And instead of making races the way George Lucas makes planets, we can say, "Most dwarves I've met are good with an axe," and, "Many elves are gifted with keen eyesight," instead of, "All dwarves fight with axes," and, "Elves have better eyesight than all other races." For humans, you let them pick from all skills and weapons, and have a smaller, more generalized list of the "weird" abilities (to represent things like "He has some elf blood in him somewhere down the line," or, "I don't know why I can do that. I've just kind of been able to for as long as I can remember.")

And I really wish we could do away with ability score bonuses from race. That's just power creep baked into the system. Dwarves aren't tough because they are dwarves; they're tough because they work in mines and fight giants their whole lives. But not every dwarf does that. Elves don't have a high dexterity because they are elves; they have a high dex because they spend their lives hiding and scouting in the forest, jumping from limb to limb in trees, and training with ranged weapons. But not every elf does that. And any human could spend his life working in mines or scouting the forest for danger; and they should get any benefit from it demi-humans do. Ability score bonuses serve only to enforce stereotypical characters.

Same with class, but for a different reason. Being a fighter doesn't make you strong and tough; being strong and tough allows you to be a good fighter. The double dip is unnecessary.

Jan 11, 2013 -- 9:30PM, Saelorn wrote:

Jan 11, 2013 -- 9:02PM, Gazra wrote:

Another problem is that the demi-human races get bonuses that shoehorn you into being a stereotype. Why is every dwarf, regardless of where he or she was raised, trained in dungeoneering? Why is every elf better with swords and bows than other races?

In the default game setting, which is an entirely coherent place based heavily on Tolkien, race and culture are tied together very closely.  So yes, every dwarf was raised under the mountain, and every elf trains with swords and bows.  If that's not true for whatever world you play in, then feel free to change those traits.

Race and culture can be closely tied together without going to the level of forced stereotypes. Yes, I know D&D was influenced by Tolkien. We all know the races elf, dwarf and halfling really mean Legolas, Gimli and Bilbo. But the 'based on Tolkien' defense doesn't hold up when you consider that elves in Middle Earth were basically super-heroes. They are faster, wiser, more beautiful, more in tune with nature, more in tune with the spiritual, taller, live forever, can recover from great wounds that men would die from, can reincarnate, can see better, can hear better, can smell better, are more creative, can walk on top of snow, and so on. They are better than humans in most every way.

How can you balance a human against that? Hell, Aragorn was only as special as he was because he had elven ancestors. But that doesn't matter, because the D&D elf is not so much based on Tolkien's elves as they are based on Legolas alone. And I don't have a problem with someone playing an elf like Legolas, but I don't want anyone to be forced to go that route. Elrond was a great healer, but not every D&D elf has healing powers. So why is every elf inherently good with bows and swords? Because Legolas was, and he was cool.

I know this isn't as big a deal to most as it is to me, but it just rubs the wrong way. I can live with it if when it ends up being just the same in the final form of Next, though. It's not a deal-breaker; it's just that this is the perfect time to fix things like this that don't really work how they should. It's time to start treating elves and dwarves like people instead of clone armies.  

Jan 11, 2013 -- 9:30PM, Saelorn wrote:

Jan 11, 2013 -- 9:02PM, Gazra wrote:

Here's an idea: Each race has a list of things at which they can excel. Have a couple of skills that make sense, some traditional weapons, and some abilities (like immunities, resistances, vision types, and so on). Each player picks three (or however many) of those from the list.

This ends up just being just another area to min-max; the fighter types choose the +weapon damage traits and vision, and the caster types pick the traits that are most useful to casting.  Giving every race a mixture of various traits is the best way to make sure that individuals get any flavorful race abilities that aren't just pure min-max.

That's no different than just picking your race based on which class you're going to play. Any amount of choice is going to cause some degree of min-maxing in D&D. Just don't make the features too powerful. And do away with raising weapon dice to the next die. Especially if expertise dice are going to use your weapon's damage die like the podcast said. Just offer proficiency with those weapons instead. I don't want the game system telling me that for some ethereal reason a human fighter with an 18 strength can't deal as much damage with an axe as a dwarven fighter with an 18 strength can using the same exact axe. 

Jan 11, 2013 -- 9:30PM, Saelorn wrote:

Jan 11, 2013 -- 9:02PM, Gazra wrote:

Same with class, but for a different reason. Being a fighter doesn't make you strong and tough; being strong and tough allows you to be a good fighter. The double dip is unnecessary.

It's more like a feedback loop - if you're strong, then it helps you swing a sword more easily, but swinging a sword for hours on end is quite a workout and will get you in better shape.  That part is entirely reasonable.

It's not unreasonable as much as it is unnecessary. The way I see it, that high strength score you start the game with represents the training you underwent to become a fighter. You weren't born with a 16 strength; you got stronger over time by exercising your muscles. When you first started learning how to swing a sword, you probably had a 10 strength. Maybe you were drafted into the military and sent off for training, and then to fight in the Great Orc Wars. By the time you got back from the war, your strength had gone up to 16. And that's when you start the campaign as a 1st level fighter. Where does the extra +1 come in? It's not needed, as the points or high roll you put into your strength already explains everything that +1 is trying to.

Jan 12, 2013 -- 7:05AM, Knight_Marshal wrote:

One thing I think they need to go to is one static stat point for a race and one point the player can put wherever they like. That way the race give the flavor stat point, but doesn't lean players towards, well if I want to be a wizard I need to play a high elf or a human.

you don't -need- to be an elf or a human, you want to be an elf or a human because you want the stats as you have perceived them to be needed.

but they aren't, the point of a bounded acuracy system is to strip away such a strong desire for stats. in fact i would argue that being allowed to wear medium armour as a wizard would be an AMAZING boost for you, seeing how wizards come with no armour proficiency, that a difference of an AC max of 15 (provided your wizard has a 20 dex) and an AC max of 18 (provided your wizard has 14 dex). the numbers for a wizard with no dex are 10 and 16.

even a halfling wizard would have a grab bag of useful tricks like lucky and naturally stealthy

Jan 12, 2013 -- 8:38AM, Knight_Marshal wrote:

Where is bounded accuracy listed at? I haven't been able to find rules for it or opportunity attacks.

it's not listed, it's their design phiolosophy.

stats are bound to 20, you can't go any higher, meaning everything in the world is bound ito a scale of 1 to 20.