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So, let me just say that I am so happy Jadwiga is a Human Ethnicity and not a race. And that it's allowed in PFS. I feel like this makes it so much easier on PC Winter Witches across the board. That said...
I have A Level 7 Winter Witch (Base Class)/Winter Witch (PrC). I have intentionally left her ethnicity vague, both due to some conflicting source material defining canon Winter Witches (like Elvanna) as Kellid and at other times Jadwiga and out of hopes that it would turn out to be an Ethnicity.
So here's the question: Can I go ahead and switch the character from Human (Unspecified) to Human (Jadwiga)? There's no real mechanical benefit from doing so and it isn't like I haven't role-played her as an actual Irresini Winter Witch prior to this. The only thing I stand to gain is getting Jadwiga Scion via the Additional Traits feat at some later point.
EDIT: Adjusted a grammar issue.
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So, let me just say that I am so happy Jadwiga is a Human Ethnicity and not a race. And that's it's allowed in PFS. I feel like this makes it so much easier on PC Winter Witches across the board. That said...
I have Level 7 Winter Witch (Base Class)/Winter Witch (PrC). I have intentionally left her ethnicity vague, both due to some conflicting source material defining canon Winter Witches (like Elvanna) as Kellid and at other times Jadwiga and out of hopes that it would turn out to be an Ethnicity.
So here's the question: Can I go ahead and switch the character from Human (Unspecified) to Human (Jadwiga)? There's no real mechanical benefit from doing so and it isn't like I haven't role-played her as an actual Irresini Winter Witch prior to this. The only thing I stand to gain is getting Jadwiga Scion via the Additional Traits feat at some later point.
bdk - There is no problem making such changes to a character, unless that PC has reached level 2. Yours is level 7. I would rule that no such change is possible.
Having said that I don't think there would be a problem running this by your local Venture Captain or Venture Lieutenant. I read the book (Winter Witch?) a while back but what I remember is "Jadwiga" was an epithet for "witch". Hence your PC already qualifies for your scion bonus. There may be room to wiggle. I really do not see it is a big deal, especially since the PC may have been created before the bonus you mentioned existed.
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I'm aware of the Level 2 rebuild rules.
And I'm not speaking of Winter Witch; I'm talking about People of the North, which was released this past week. The Scion bonus is a Trait like any other trait, which at this point can only be taken via Additional Traits (as they are above Level 1).
The only benefit I can see at this point is codifying something that's already been role-played up until now.
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I personally don't see a problem with it, as ethnicity really doesn't have any mechanical effect.
You could get the Jadwiga Scion trait if you chose Additional Traits feat (something I think is often a waste of a feat). But a +1 to Intimidate and +1 to Knowledge (nobility) vs. Irrisen nobility doesn't seem like a huge deal to me.
You also would then get another starting language based on your ethnicity (isn't clear on whether it is Hallit or Skald).
Otherwise, I think I don't care. Go for it.
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bdk86. Can a human of any ethnicity take the Jadwiga Scion trait with the Additional Traits feat? I'm not sure, but I don't think so. So there is a mechanical benefit.
Every time a new book comes out, there are new opportunities to fine-tune a PC. When Blood of Angels came out, there were a lot of people who'd been role-playing their aasimar PCs' angelic ancestor as being one or another type of celestial. Suddenly, there were rules for that. So far as I know, aasimar PCs weren't allowed a rebuild.
I'd say the same applies here.
--+--
Put another way, let's say somebody was playing a vuldrani sorcerer with the Boreal bloodline, saw the Jadwiga Scion feat, and thought that it would be a nice little power-up for his character. So he throws aside the vuldrani ethnicity, which never provided a mechanical boost anyway, revises his PC to be a Jadwiga and takes the trait with the Additional Traits feat.
Got any problem with that?
Venture-Captain, Michigan—Mt. Pleasant
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Except that Chris' example isn't what's happening. He's not dropping one ethnicity for another, he never had one to begin with. A better example would be:
--+--
Player was roleplaying a generic human sorcerer with the Destined bloodline (never knew about Vudran) but had been playing the sorcerer as a yogi mystic/psion type (complete with cheesy Indian accent (the country, not Native Americans)). Said player then finds out about Vudran and the Vudrani from Humans of Golarion and realizes he should have been Vudrani all along since it fit how he was playing the character. The fact that he now qualifies for Voice of Velvet is merely icing on the cake.
EDIT: Damn... Ninja'd by the Brock...
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That said, I would personally have no problem with you making use of the ethnicity, taking a point of Linguistics for the language, and NOT taking a trait that depends on that ethnicity. If it confers no mechanical advantage and only lets you better describe where you knew your character came from anyway, I don't see an issue.
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I'm with Eric on this one. He's not asking to change something that already existed on his character. He's asking if he can add something that was never specified before. He was playing a human with no ethnicity specified. Now, he wants this ethnicity. There's a blank spot on his character sheet that he didn't fill in until level 7. I'd allow it.
To me, it's similar to noticing that someone forgot to take a feat when leveling a character. Not hypothetical, btw - a friend of mine actually did this. Apparently, in 3.5, you got a feat at level 6 instead of level 5 like in Pathfinder, so she never took a feat at level 5. Her PC was level 6 when it came up in conversation, and she realized her mistake. Is it against PFS rules for her to go back and assign her level 5 feat that had not previously been specified?
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I'm with Eric on this one. He's not asking to change something that already existed on his character. He's asking if he can add something that was never specified before. He was playing a human with no ethnicity specified. Now, he wants this ethnicity. There's a blank spot on his character sheet that he didn't fill in until level 7. I'd allow it.
To me, it's similar to noticing that someone forgot to take a feat when leveling a character. Not hypothetical, btw - a friend of mine actually did this. Apparently, in 3.5, you got a feat at level 6 instead of level 5 like in Pathfinder, so she never took a feat at level 5. Her PC was level 6 when it came up in conversation, and she realized her mistake. Is it against PFS rules for her to go back and assign her level 5 feat that had not previously been specified?
Two different examples tho Fromper ... in yours, your friend made a mistake... she forgot/didn't read/whatever. In the original post, it was stated that he intentionally left the ethnicity blank and now that he wants to change it oooohhhhhh he has access to a trait..
While I realize traits aren't all that gamebreaking in the grand scheme... Mike did already answer this :)
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I'm with Eric on this one. He's not asking to change something that already existed on his character. He's asking if he can add something that was never specified before. He was playing a human with no ethnicity specified. Now, he wants this ethnicity. There's a blank spot on his character sheet that he didn't fill in until level 7. I'd allow it.
To me, it's similar to noticing that someone forgot to take a feat when leveling a character. Not hypothetical, btw - a friend of mine actually did this. Apparently, in 3.5, you got a feat at level 6 instead of level 5 like in Pathfinder, so she never took a feat at level 5. Her PC was level 6 when it came up in conversation, and she realized her mistake. Is it against PFS rules for her to go back and assign her level 5 feat that had not previously been specified?
Everyone makes mistakes. That was a mistake. This is intentionally keeping something vague, which is a different matter.
Let's say I put ten ranks into Linguistics, but I don't know what languages to pick yet. Can I leave them blank and just learn a language when it comes up? This is the kind of thing some players would come up with if we allowed people to leave parts of their sheet blank until the right option came up.
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Ok, so follow up question: Human (Tian) prior to Dragon Empires content. Were they allowed to clarify their ethnicity to something beyond 'Tian'? If so, how is this different?
I generally agree with the 'slippery slope' arguments; but the Tian question specifically is part of why I asked the question as I couldn't find any discussion from that particular set of resources being added.
As for 'vague', I chose to simply not select an Ethnicity because I kept finding conflicting information (Kellid, Ulfen, and Jadwiga). This wasn't willfully failing to choose a class or racial feature; selecting a human ethnicity is not required at character creation in Pathfinder Society.
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bdk86.. Unfortunately, while you make excellent arguements all in your favor, as Mike and Chris point out above, this wouldn't be something that an exception would be made on. Campaign managment simply cannot allow for rebuilds each time a book/new shiney comes out.
I know it sucks, but that's the answer we've been given.
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I still disagree with this ruling.
Let's give a hypothetical scenario. New player shows up who knows nothing about Golarion. Maybe he's new to the game altogether, or maybe he's just used to playing home games. He makes a human character. He goes with a faction that's not tied to a geographic region, perhaps Grand Lodge or Silver Crusade. He's not playing a divine character, so he doesn't choose a deity to worship.
As he plays and learns about the game world, are you saying that he's not allowed to retroactively fill in his background? Once he's level 2, it's too late to select an ethnicity, nationality, and deity, because that would be changing his character? Even though he's just filling in blanks on the character sheet, and not changing things that were previously decided?
And yes, I'm aware that all of those things could open up possible traits if he takes the Additional Traits feat later on, or they might open up spells or magic items only available to worshipers of a particular deity. So these decisions could make a minor mechanical difference. I really don't have a problem with that.
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I still disagree with this ruling.
Let's give a hypothetical scenario. New player shows up who knows nothing about Golarion. Maybe he's new to the game altogether, or maybe he's just used to playing home games. He makes a human character. He goes with a faction that's not tied to a geographic region, perhaps Grand Lodge or Silver Crusade. He's not playing a divine character, so he doesn't choose a deity to worship.
As he plays and learns about the game world, are you saying that he's not allowed to retroactively fill in his background? Once he's level 2, it's too late to select an ethnicity, nationality, and deity, because that would be changing his character? Even though he's just filling in blanks on the character sheet, and not changing things that were previously decided?
And yes, I'm aware that all of those things could open up possible traits if he takes the Additional Traits feat later on, or they might open up spells or magic items only available to worshipers of a particular deity. So these decisions could make a minor mechanical difference. I really don't have a problem with that.
I think for most people it would just be filling in blanks and a fluff trait, however, there are those that would see this one thing as the green light to run amuck and change what they wanted. The campaign staff cannot make one exception (based on good faith) as there are so many others that would try to break the system with "minor" changes.
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I am learning.
What this comes down to is thus: If you made a mistake or similar, you ask your GM, quietly, who will probably thumbs up on it, and no one gets hurt.
If you come here, you will get the answer that must apply in the worst case scenario, which will be negative more often than not.
Is it right? Well, they have a loooottt of players and can't afford to make wishy washy rulings for the masses. Ask your GM. He or she is better equipped to make localized rulings.
This wasn't a mistake. This is a change from something that was fully intentional.
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I am learning.
What this comes down to is thus: If you made a mistake or similar, you ask your GM, quietly, who will probably thumbs up on it, and no one gets hurt.
If you come here, you will get the answer that must apply in the worst case scenario, which will be negative more often than not.
Is it right? Well, they have a loooottt of players and can't afford to make wishy washy rulings for the masses. Ask your GM. He or she is better equipped to make localized rulings.
The problem with this statement is that technically now that Mike has clarified it above in the thread, the GM should technically be giving the "fit for the masses ruling" which they should have been giving anyway.
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This wasn't a mistake. This is a change from something that was fully intentional.
He intentionally left his ethnicity blank because of conflicting references in Paizo books about which ethnicity was appropriate for his character concept. Now that a book has been published which gives a definite answer, he wants to use that answer. Again, he's not exactly "gaming the system".
Anyway, I'm done here. Mike Brock gave his answer, and I explained why I disagree. No point continuing to debate it.
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I think what Nuku was hinting at was what's to keep him from simply asking his GM and adding it with his permission, maybe even going so far as to change (or rather add) it to his character description on Paizo? Who would be the wiser, other than anyone reading this and remembering? Not saying that is necessarily the correct thing to do but it could be done and noone would know. It's not like that information is tracked on chronicle sheets.
I agree with Mike and others though. If you let one person do it, even though it had no real benefit, then others will find a way to make it beneficial.
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If, at first level, I only pick one trait, and at level seven a published sourcebook comes out with a trait in it that I want, can I then take that trait? I get two traits at start. I never used one, so I'm using it now.
Yes, I'm not supposed to leave one open. But wouldn't I want to fix that rules violation, rather than making it permanent?
(I'm assuming that humans are supposed to choose an ethnicity; I'm not aware of an option to not pick one. If that is a standard option, this metaphor is invalid.)
what if he had wrote in for ethnicity "jadwiga, the people from irrisen of undefined kellid/ulfen stock"?
what if he didn't know the name of vudrans, but wrote in a description more or less corresponding to them?
what exactly are "humans without an ethnicity" anyways? how are PCs and NPCs supposed to react to that? do they have belly buttons? :-)
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I would like to make one thing clear here, though, and that is that nobody is saying you can't add that as roleplaying fluff. People are saying you can't add it as a mechanical benefit, but there is absolutely nothing stopping you from making this an IC revelation at some point, so long as there is not a mechanical aspect to it.
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Just a point of order:
Player, say he's new, doesn't matter. He doesn't own any of the non-Core assumption books that give the Human Ethnicities. The Core Assumption also does not include any ethnicities for humans.
So, he builds a perfectly legal Human character, plays him to 3rd level, and buys the ISWG, which includes the human ethnicities.
Can he add an ethnicity to his PC, as it was NOT legal for the PC before, but would be now?
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Isn't it required in PFS for a human character to have an ethnicity?
If they never selected an ethnicity then shouldn't they be required to pick one now? Since their characters need to follow the rules.
So if this was not noticed as being a problem until the book with his ethnicity came out, couldn't he pick the ethnicity?
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Isn't it required in PFS for a human character to have an ethnicity?
If they never selected an ethnicity then shouldn't they be required to pick one now? Since their characters need to follow the rules.
So if this was not noticed as being a problem until the book with his ethnicity came out, couldn't he pick the ethnicity?
It isn't required .... and per his original post, he intentionally left it blank ... he can use the fluff portion, but not the trait gain.
are you fluff-wise supposed to be an amnesiac if you don't know who your own people are?
what is the result of a know:local(humanoid) or know:geography check to determine your ethnicity? (if blank)
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Ah well that is unfortunate for him.
A related question. What if a person had selected Jadwiga as their ethnicity knowing full well there were no mechanics or stats for it. They received no mechanical benefit for being Jadwiga. They had simply learned about the ethnicity in the Irrisen campaign setting book.
Would they be able to take the mechanical advantages of being a Jadwiga now because their character was a Jadwiga before the ethnicity was fully fleshed out?
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Yes because Jadwiga was their ethnicity the whole time, even before it was a detailed option.
Unless you are of the opinion that since it was not in a legal additional resource at the time it was an illegal fluff option. I strongly disagree with saying that fluff is illegal but it is the sort of thing you hear sometimes is PFS unfortunately.