Fine-tuning Ancestries

I'm just over here scratching my head why they're using Rules Language on things that should not have game mechanics attached, just replace Anathema with Taboo. Or something.

Every other instance of Anathema has mechanical repercussions attached, cultural taboos and stereotypes should not. What are you gonna penalize fem characters for wearing pants?

Minmax cheese and let Dwarf character auto-gain Hero Points for having "clan dagger" written on their character sheet?

Was I wrong to read Edicts and Anathemas as primarily a roleplay tool who can and typically does have a mechanics thing but that was really a small cinchpin to like give weight?

It feels reasonable to say "your character's got to care about something" and then you can pick from various rules to live by. But I do think it's weird to use the same language for "what will cause a cleric to lose spellcasting entirely" and "what will cause your relatives to not invite you to Dwarf-Thanksgiving this year."

Was I wrong to read Edicts and Anathemas as primarily a roleplay tool who can and typically does have a mechanics thing but that was really a small cinchpin to like give weight?

That's the thing, Edicts and Anathema was not a small thing, you lose your class abilities. So yeah there's major repercussions for it.

These Ancestry ones not having mechanical repercussions are an outlier, not the standard in that regard.

From a Mechanics standpoint Anathema is known in P2 as "you go against this, you face mechanical penalties". Using that term for other things in-game is a bad idea. Having a split mechanics and setting definition for a game term is a bad idea.

It feels reasonable to say "your character's got to care about something" and then you can pick from various rules to live by. But I do think it's weird to use the same language for "what will cause a cleric to lose spellcasting entirely" and "what will cause your relatives to not invite you to Dwarf-Thanksgiving this year."

Oh yeah I don't have nay complaint with there being cultural do's/don't/what other people may think/etc for helping form a character.

My issue is squarely with reusing mechanical language from something else.

A thing that I hope gets corrected in the chapter/rules about edicts/anathema is that previously characters seemed more driven to "avoid doing anathema" (because that's the thing that costs you your stuff) with little to no impetus to follow the edicts save for roleplaying.

Like I found it odd that a Cleric of the Lantern King lives in terrible fear of ever ruining a good joke because that's a hard and fast no-no, but is under no obligation to actually set up good jokes because that's just a suggestion.

It seems like characters should be more defined by what they affirmatively want to pursue rather than what they prefer to avoid.

My view is that the mechanics will be extra mechanical riders on the system going forward, much like alignment damage and cleric/champion restrictions were mechanical riders on alignment, which was otherwise more or less non-mechanical. So, I'm chill with the language being shared similarly.

I mean thats the thing, it has weight. But it at least to me, it was the same weight as well I guess, like if I am playing a sarenite I'm going to roleplay those traits, thats why i'm going the saranrae route.

And like to me the chance of falling is like low unless I chose to pursue a character arc like that, in which that case it is still primarily roleplay guidance. I guess just the idea of rolling in non mechanically affected edicts and anthemas seemed like an obvious one to me. So just surprised and wondering if I am the odd one out in this situation. Not like angry or like being sassy(I hope im not coming off this was) just genuine whiplash as I adjust to that.

PossibleCabbage wrote:

Ross TenEyck-McDowell wrote:

That being said, I would have liked it if Paizo had taken the opportunity to split "Ancestry" into physical and cultural components.

The physical components are just the stuff like "starting HP", "move speed", "any special senses", "any special attacks you get from your anatomy", etc. that are in the sidebar of the ancestry (or a trait, like the Azarketi being amphibious).

Also a bunch of feats like "You have a tail that you can beat people to death with", "you can fly with those wings" and "you are capable of transforming into a spider". Natural spellcasting is sometimes physical, sometimes cultural. Certain other aspects, even relatively rare ones, can also be lineage (like, say, the "Zon-Kuthon is watching you" feats from the human ancestry - he follows bloodlines).

That said... I look at where they would have had to make the split, and it really doesn't work well at this point. Like, it's a *huge* amount of churn, in ways that would have made people *very* unhappy (If nothing else, any attempt to balance it would have made at least some characters simply unbuildable). As far as Paizo is concerned, it woudl have been all lose, no win.

It... *might* be worth doing for PF3? Maybe? I'm not convinced it would be worthwhile even then. Like, somewhat more elegant, yeah, but if "Heritage" is "who you grew up with" then what do we do with the geniekin?

I think they could just add traits or labels/tags like “Cultural” and “Anatomical” to ancestry feats to better identify what feats can be taken with the Adopted Ancestry feat or not and it would work fine. That would not mess with the Versatile Heritages or Ancient Elf as they are now, right?

But, is that even necessary? Adopted Ancestry is already well explained enough to cover these character concepts, isn’t it?

The word popular is pretty key here IMO; I would assume that "hunt the enemies of your people" is a common edict for dwarves that are bad people. A heroic dwarf likely does not give this cultural norm much credence, or may choose to interpret it in a way that suits them, but do so and you may run the risk of being outcast for defending an outsider. That's not an uncommon tale for a budding adventurer.

I'm just over here scratching my head why they're using Rules Language on things that should not have game mechanics attached, just replace Anathema with Taboo. Or something.

Every other instance of Anathema has mechanical repercussions attached, cultural taboos and stereotypes should not. What are you gonna penalize fem characters for wearing pants?

Minmax cheese and let Dwarf character auto-gain Hero Points for having "clan dagger" written on their character sheet?

Breaking Anathema has consequences for clerics and champions only, not the vast majority of PCs.

IMHO is an advantage to using a unified set of terms to describe "do's and dont's" for roleplaying purposes.

I do understand the whole social aspect to anathemas and edicts. And of course there's nothing against someone taking an ancestral edict and rebelling against it. I can even imagine someone claiming to be evil and chaotic in-universe for doing this ... and really being a holy paladin because their ancestral edicts and anathemae are the kinds of thing that would make a qlippoth proud (and then disappointed when they find out their descendant is ... honourable and heroic! What will the neighbours say!)

Remember that deities have edicts and anathemae that apply (ish) to their followers. A devout Desnan who balks at going off to a new church in Varisia because they can't stand all those Varisians is probably going to get a talking-to from their local clergy. Show up at the local Caydenite pub with your new slave and you may be invited to leave just as quickly. And so on.

Was I wrong to read Edicts and Anathemas as primarily a roleplay tool who can and typically does have a mechanics thing but that was really a small cinchpin to like give weight?

Some of the most reluctant roleplayers are the more mechanically minded people who will respond to in game incentives. Like awarding hero points for navigating a tricky situation in accordance with your selected personality.

Breaking Anathema has consequences for

Every one of them that exist.

Cleric has Consequences.
Champion has consequences.
Druid has Consequences.
Barbarian has Consequences.

Those are all the Anathemas in the game. This Ancestry Anathema is an outlier, not the standard.

There are 18 other classes. If you choose to follow a faith of philosophy, such as Desna or the Laws of Mortality, and then violate an anathema, nothing happens. Breaking or ignoring anathema has zero consequences for the vast majority of PCs.

We're not talking about classes we're talking about Anathema.

Ummm isn't having "racial beliefs" suuuuuper problematic? Like it is the exact same reason why racial alignment is bad.

Plus this should really be sitting under culture and not ancestry. But it probably should not be there either.

Hell it would make more sense under background than ancestry. And it would still make no sense there.

Might want to check with a bunch of cultural consultants before you walk face first into this one. You have done a lot of good work Piazo. Don't ruin it.

Nowhere did they say it's a racial belief. It is an excerpt, not the whole page. This entry uses several lines from the existing "Alignment and Religion" subheading on the AON page.

Cultural norms are called that for a reason--because they are social standards and values that form the fabric of a society. Some cultures have higher rates of variance within those norms than others. Individual beliefs can differ from cultural norms, but that doesn't change the broader fabric of the culture.

Yes, Dongun Hold likely has different norms from a Darklands clan, but some broad strokes must be made to set guidelines. Emphasis on guidelines. The editing and writing costs of detailing the similarities and differences in Edicts from every single Dwarven settlement would be prohibitively monstrous, and even if Paizo did that, that would probably be seen as being too restrictive and not allowing room in Golarion's world for GM or player freedom.

These are examples. A baseline. Players and GMs can extrapolate from there, whether they want their characters to agree or disagree, because writing "every single person is unique, go wild" for every Ancestry's culture is not helpful from a worldbuilding perspective. All they're saying is "more often than not, they value clan daggers. More often than not, they are vindictive towards those that harm their communities. More often than not, they value fine craftsmanship." It's not a racial belief. They're literally describing the most common (not even the only!) cultural view.

I can guarantee they've put a lot more thought into this than you have.

To me, the new anathema system not having mechanical weight is not meaningfully different from business as usual because I already take for granted that the norm of edicts/anathema were faithful non-divine adherents of deities and philosophies--at least in-world if not necessarily the default for most gaming groups. Obviously, this isn't the universal experience of anathema, but I find myself having no trouble adapting to the assumption of role playing based anathema because I was already using them that way, with the exception of classes which do attach mechanical weight to their beliefs.

Minmax cheese and let Dwarf character auto-gain Hero Points for having "clan dagger" written on their character sheet?

Most of the mechanics I've seen in other systems that give out meta-currency for roleplaying restrictions only do so when it comes up in-game and runs counter to your goals. I don't know the specifics of the systems other people mentioned in here but I'd imagine they're similar; it feels kinda cynical to assume that they're asking for ways to tease out advantages for free.

Well, I'm going to duck that whole conversation.

I'm just here to say I'm glad to see the subtle mention that ancestries with flaws aren't completely going away in the Remaster; I was concerned the +3/-1 ancestries would get changed to +2, but I see the blog post still mentions flaws so that's good.

To me, the new anathema system not having mechanical weight is not meaningfully different from business as usual because I already take for granted that the norm of edicts/anathema were faithful non-divine adherents of deities and philosophies--at least in-world if not necessarily the default for most gaming groups. Obviously, this isn't the universal experience of anathema, but I find myself having no trouble adapting to the assumption of role playing based anathema because I was already using them that way, with the exception of classes which do attach mechanical weight to their beliefs.

This is what I've been getting at. Edicts & anathema will be the new alignment, but neither one drives game mechanics.

So long as Vengeful Hatred gets the boot, I can make my peace with this E&A list... but I do think that "hunt" one should be reworded.

The word popular is pretty key here IMO; I would assume that "hunt the enemies of your people" is a common edict for dwarves that are bad people. A heroic dwarf likely does not give this cultural norm much credence, or may choose to interpret it in a way that suits them, but do so and you may run the risk of being outcast for defending an outsider. That's not an uncommon tale for a budding adventurer.

Yeah, I see this as, like, "Here are some examples of personal anathemas that some dwarves connected to aspects of their cultures might hold." It's more a suggestion to prompt you than anything, not a species-wide code, or even necessarily a taboo that could get you shunned.

I don't mind there being flavor-only anathemas. I think it's fun, and I like how it integrates everyone's beliefs under the same umbrella--it makes it clear that anyone can have strongly-held beliefs and rules and codes of conduct, even if they don't have a deity holding a gun to their head. Anathemas are a great roleplaying prompt, and I'm already having fun with them with new characters.

I wouldn't have a problem with the name being changed, but "Taboo" wouldn't make a lot of sense. Optional anathemas aren't exclusively ancestry-based, after all.

Rysky wrote:

Minmax cheese and let Dwarf character auto-gain Hero Points for having "clan dagger" written on their character sheet?

Most of the mechanics I've seen in other systems that give out meta-currency for roleplaying restrictions only do so when it comes up in-game and runs counter to your goals. I don't know the specifics of the systems other people mentioned in here but I'd imagine they're similar; it feels kinda cynical to assume that they're asking for ways to tease out advantages for free.

That quip was hyperbolic I admit, I'm sour and just ruminating and what we have been given.

I just really don't want the cultural suggestions to have the same name as the ethos mechanics some classes adhere to.

Having cultural baggage of anathema/edicts tied to ancestry is definitely a little weird and feels rather essentialist.

Now, if it listed specific in-setting cultures and common edicts/anathema in those cultures, that'd make a little bit more sense.

Let me get this straight.

They are getting rid of the overly generic alignment system with very clear "this is generally how X alignment works" for an even more generic system that goes "well some creatures of Y species heavily believe in Z". How is this better again?

No mechanical incentive to justify following this "hard code" or punishing you for breaking it. No roleplay reason to make this code when people have been doing it for decades unprompted. No lore reason to make it because its just more for the "You might..." and "Society" section of the ancestry page.

I get wanting to remove alignement because "well mortals are too complex for alignment". I get adding edicts and anathema to gods because that's already what the Paladin's code was. But how exactly does this help make a rounded character? Wouldn't it be better to just expand the "You might..." section and use the saved word count for something more meaningful?

NECR0G1ANT wrote:

Breaking Anathema has consequences for

Every one of them that exist.

Cleric has Consequences.
Champion has consequences.
Druid has Consequences.
Barbarian has Consequences.

Those are all the Anathemas in the game. This Ancestry Anathema is an outlier, not the standard.

Clerics don't have anathemas, deities do. A cleric has consequences for breaking that anathema, but a Fighter can choose to adhere to it just as well without those consequences hanging over their head.

I'm honestly such a huge fan of this post, by the way. It's exactly what I was hoping for in the new Anathema system. I truly think it's going to nurture creativity and nuance a way that elevates the whole game in the long run.

After Paizo and much of the rest of the TTRPG industry made strides in getting away from racial stereotyping, linking edicts and anathemas to ancestry of all things feels like a major step backwards. What are the edicts of humanity, and who issued them? It's difficult to even make sense of those questions without turning each ancestry into a monoculture.

Rysky wrote:

NECR0G1ANT wrote:

Breaking Anathema has consequences for

Every one of them that exist.

Cleric has Consequences.
Champion has consequences.
Druid has Consequences.
Barbarian has Consequences.

Those are all the Anathemas in the game. This Ancestry Anathema is an outlier, not the standard.

Clerics don't have anathemas, deities do. A cleric has consequences for breaking that anathema, but a Fighter can choose to adhere to it just as well without those consequences hanging over their head.

Being a smidge pedantic there.

Not at all; it's an important distinction because it proves that anathemas that don't have mechanical consequences already exist. Deity anathemas already serve the purpose of a guideline for how a deity's follower should behave, whether they get powers from that behavior or not.

Arachnofiend actually has a good point, tbh. A fighter who worships Iomedae would look to her edicts as guidelines to follow in the same way our hypothetical dwarf might when considering how to live a good life.

The parallels are very strong, and the former is how the game is right now.

After Paizo and much of the rest of the TTRPG industry made strides in getting away from racial stereotyping, linking edicts and anathemas to ancestry of all things feels like a major step backwards. What are the edicts of humanity, and who issued them? It's difficult to even make sense of those questions without turning each ancestry into a monoculture.

In my personal opinion by saying: "Typical edicts are" they are not stereotyping the whole ancestry. Because they are not saying "every dwarf adheres to this!". But I think saying that some things are "typical cultural norms" for "Species A" in "Setting B" is not inherently bad. That helps to differentiate. What is the difference between a "typical Golarion dwarf" and "a typical golarion human" is a question that, for roleplay reasons, is valid. As well as the question: What is the difference between a typical Golarion dwarf and a typical Faerun dwarf, for example. And to answer that some things have to be defined as "typical for ancestry A in Setting B", imho.

Typical human edicts could center around being versatile communities for example. And edicts in this sense are nothing that is "issued". These are, as said, typical cultural norms.

edit: And maybe we will see heritage-ideas for edicts/anathemas as well.

Not at all; it's an important distinction because it proves that anathemas that don't have mechanical consequences already exist. Deity anathemas already serve the purpose of a guideline for how a deity's follower should behave, whether they get powers from that behavior or not.

As an afterthought, since when people think of Deity's Anathema the first thing that comes to mind is Clerics/Champion and falling.

"Oh well everyone can do self imposed rules on themselves" and?

Arachnofiend actually has a good point, tbh. A fighter who worships Iomedae would look to her edicts as guidelines to follow in the same way our hypothetical dwarf might when considering how to live a good life.

The parallels are very strong, and the former is how the game is right now.

This is very much reminding me of the "Fighter who worships"venerates" Cthuhlu/Socothbenoth" in PFS conversations from awhile back and now I'm even grumpier.

I think ultimately I'm wondering what "hunt your enemies" edict teaches the average tween or teen playing this game

I don't think that a game should actually be expected to teach anything to anyone, outside of the game rules themselves. Otherwise, we are back to the 'too much violence in videogames' and 'satanic panic' stuff.

Let me get this straight.

They are getting rid of the overly generic alignment system with very clear "this is generally how X alignment works" for an even more generic system that goes "well some creatures of Y species heavily believe in Z". How is this better again?

No mechanical incentive to justify following this "hard code" or punishing you for breaking it. No roleplay reason to make this code when people have been doing it for decades unprompted. No lore reason to make it because its just more for the "You might..." and "Society" section of the ancestry page.

I get wanting to remove alignement because "well mortals are too complex for alignment". I get adding edicts and anathema to gods because that's already what the Paladin's code was. But how exactly does this help make a rounded character? Wouldn't it be better to just expand the "You might..." section and use the saved word count for something more meaningful?

I get your argument, but that applies to any purely descriptive part of the game. Having a section under the Dwarf ancestry saying "Since you are a free-willed mortal, you can to believe and act in any way you like" wouldn't be too useful. So, the choice is between cutting it out entirely, or giving some non-binding examples of what a 'typical dwarf' believes. The latter certainly enriches the game setting, though of course one could prefer that wordcount going somewhere else instead.

Nah.

Less racism more queer stuff.

I just really don't want the cultural suggestions to have the same name as the ethos mechanics some classes adhere to.

I get that. There are pros and cons: introduce new trade terms for every new thing, the system becomes overly complex and murky. But reuse current trade terms in a new way and that can be confusing too.

Seems like a quibble though: the idea of providing additional 'what they often care about and how they often act' content since alignment is going away is, IMO, a good one.

No mechanical incentive to justify following this "hard code" or punishing you for breaking it. No roleplay reason to make this code when people have been doing it for decades unprompted.

The roleplay reason is to provide info to players and GMs about what Golarion's people are like, now that alignment is going away. You are right that a group can do this unprompted. However not everyone is good at world-building on their own, and splat text about cultures etc. helps people do that. Like all splat text, experienced GMs and players probably don't need it as much as newer players, with a big caveat: where Paizo wants Golarion to *not* follow standard fantasy tropes, it's very useful even for experienced players to be told that. This new text setting Dwarves up as artists and not merely craftsmen is a good example. So Golarion's Renoirs and Matisse's are often dwarves? Who knew? Would you have made that a dwarfish theme in your games without this text? I wouldn't have. (Also like other splat text, more 'storyteller' groups may get a lot more out of it than more 'tactical' groups.)

I do like this, it's kinda along the lines of the "You probably..." and "Others probably..." Sections on how the ancestries are typically seen. Will this be replacing that too?

I reckon it just replaces the 'Alignment and Society' section.

I do like this, it's kinda along the lines of the "You probably..." and "Others probably..." Sections on how the ancestries are typically seen. Will this be replacing that too?

I hope we get both! They're fun. :)

(Though it's "You Might...", just as a minor but important nitpick!)

Alignment itself often had mechanical impact, but people understood that it didn't really matter if a fighter broke her "alignment rules". People understood, too, that a chaotic dwarf might be less common, but wasn't going to lose his Dwarf Powers for violating the Dwarven Code. I think this system'll be fine when it hits actual play. All these Anathemas are is a set of suggestions and prompts.

The dwarf edicts look pretty weak sauce and mostly unusable. I have never thought of dwarves as an ancestry that hunts the enemies of its people. So does that mean they hunt elves?

I think the wording of "your people" is a bigger problem than "hunt", honestly--the designers have implied it wasn't meant to be specific to "the dwarven people", so I think "those dear to you" might work better.

Also, elves haven't been the enemies of dwarves since, like, Greyhawk/Forgotten Realms days. Honestly, dwarves and elves probably get along fairly well on a lot of fronts. They're both longlived and their cultures both value the arts. The chaotic dreaminess of elven culture might drive dwarves up a wall, though. Dwarven culture formed in tiny caves where you weren't really meant to wander off, and if you did, you got eaten. Elves, confronted with an apocalypse, largely decided to "take a gap year".

Are elves enemies? Active belligerents hey are at conflict with? Dangers to their community and families?

I admit it isn't a great one line statement, but it is what a player or character wants it to be. Traditional beliefs may be one thing or another, but I still think that there is room for a player to decide what they mean to the character.

Other terms that could be used to indicate it is Distinct from Anathema/Edicts:

Mores, Folkways, Taboos

Those are just off the top of my head from my high school Social Studies class far too long ago.

Why is there a reluctance to use a broader base of terms?

I think the wording is specific to elicit the questions:

- Who are "your people", it's probably not "all dwarves everywhere" since you haven't met most of them, and some of them might be jerks. Heck, a lot of the people you're really close to might not even be dwarves.

- Who are "their enemies?" Like it's probably not "the people your great grandfather fought with" because you aren't the same person as your great grandfather and his enemies great grandchildren are also going to be different people. So who is actually posing a threat to those I care about?

The thing a lot of people miss about Dwarves, I think, is that while they're stubborn, hidebound, and not the friendliest people they're also not fools. All the arguments about "well, what if you interpret the rule in this narrow way, that would be bad" are resolved by "Dwarves probably wouldn't interpret it in this way, because they're generally pretty shrewd. Like this is a people who have had a wisdom bonus forever.

Too many terms for the same thing isn't helpful either. Just like Alignment, some classes are going to care more about Beliefs than others, but they still look like they are going to be more personal and customizable than Alignment entries.

Too many terms for the same thing isn't helpful either. Just like Alignment, some classes are going to care more about Beliefs than others, but they still look like they are going to be more personal and customizable than Alignment entries.

Not enough terms is equally bad.

See: Removal of Spell Level, other 'Level'-based terminology which is apparently happening.

The word popular is pretty key here IMO; I would assume that "hunt the enemies of your people" is a common edict for dwarves that are bad people. A heroic dwarf likely does not give this cultural norm much credence, or may choose to interpret it in a way that suits them, but do so and you may run the risk of being outcast for defending an outsider. That's not an uncommon tale for a budding adventurer.

Aggressively defending your own tribe against those who threaten it is not what *I* would describe as "evil" or "for bad people". It's a pretty neutral principle, really, in a way that can bring you into conflict with both good and evil people and institutions... and neutral institutions on the other side, of other people who are defending their tribe against you.

...but yeah, having young heroes who have good precepts that bring them into significant conflict with the neutral precepts of the communities they were raised in *is* a pretty classic starting tale.

To put it another way, you might have two dwarf characters who are fairly traditional and hew to popular dwarven Beliefs. They both live by "hunt the enemies of your people" as edicts.

One of them thinks that th y should drive out all orcs and goblins from their lands as they have been enemies since the Quest for Sky.

The other just wants to take the fight to particular groups that there are current conflicts with to end a threat.

Both of them show to outsiders that Inner Sea Dwarves can be pretty militaristic, quick to fight or comfortable with violence, but the two of them are still pretty different characters.

But then you have other dwarves who are choosing other edicts to live by and would rather have peace in their day than go off on damn fool crusades like their forefathers.