I don't care if Paizo changed happy to glad (race to ancestry). But if it can cut down on confusion (like race/racial traits) by using separate words for separate things then I am all for it.
generally means cultural and ethnic type, something that should never be represented in game stats, IMHO.
That depends what the stats are meant to represent.
For instance while Attributes seems to be more biological in Pathfinder (and we have only differences on level of species, rarely on interspecies one - the exceptions came to mind are drows and duergars), some skill bonuses could definitely be linked to culture traits.Like for instance - Education stat in Call of Cthulhu is quite strongly link to possibilities of education you could get.
If you were raised among secluded Shoanti tribes for instance it should be quite rational that even if you have 18 intelligence, you could have a problem to access some branches of knowledge, citizen of big city with average intelligence could.
If ancestry is meant to mix race, culture, ethnicity - then you can simulate it on various levels.
I mean, it's weird AF to think that "Dwarves hate goblins" is somehow genetic.
Weird, but impossible? Certainly not.
I read once that human fear of spiders is genetic inheritance somehow.Maybe dwarven immediate agression when seeing something with wide toothy maw is simmilar. Just apply it to all beings with goblin like heads and mouths.
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Narratively, in pathfinder, the idea of "race" only ever really applied to non-humans. Ancestry is what was always present for humans because humans could be unique and different based upon many different cultural and social factors. Moving away from race and towards ancestry makes this easier across the board and doesn't need political justification to make sense (even though it also does make sense politically).
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Alright. Clearly there are indeed people who object to the term Ancestry.
For people who don't object, refer to my previous post.
For people who do object to Ancestry as a term, I'd posit the following non-political arguments as to it being a good decision:
I'd argue that race is imprecise and confusing, as well as awkward, when dealing with new players. This is especially true because Pathfinder is a diverse setting and race in the colloquial sense used in the real world is definitely something human characters have. It's not the end of the world, but it's a moment of awkwardness these days. So changing it may well help get new gamers. New gamers are good. Species might also work for this one, but does have a sci-fi vibe, which is a bit of a downside.
Also, as I mentioned, it lets them refer to Ancestry, Background, and Class as the ABCs of character creation. Which is great, as a memetic tool, and also amusing. No word not beginning with A would have this benefit, which is quite real.
And finally, as others have mentioned, it opens up design space by allowing things other than new races/species to be defined as an Ancestry. You could have different Ancestry Feats for Ulfen and Chelish cultures in Golarion, for example. Which is cool and useful. Neither Race nor Species opens up this useful mechanical space.
I mean, a big issue with "race" is if you have a party of four human characters who are Tien, Vudrani, Garundi, and Kellid. Well, those people's skin colors likely map pretty naturally to analogues of what people call "races" in the real world, but everybody just writes "human" on their character sheet.
It's a much more natural way to refer to the difference between Keleshites and Varisians through "they had different parents and grew up in different contexts" than to say they are different "races". Ancestry lets us put "I grew up among Humans in Absalom" and "I grew up among Dwarves in Dongon Hold" on roughly equal footing.
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My main issue with Ancestry now (and I don't mean the name) is Ancestry feats. I think they're a bad idea. It reminds me too much of earlier editions of D&D where some Races where Classes (Dwarf, Elf, Halfling).
Why is my character getting more human as they advance in levels? Or more elf-like? Or dwarf-like? Or Ulfen or Vudrani or whatever?
And if Ancestry feats don't represent that....then what do they represent, and why are they gated behind Ancestry?
Can I not make a human with "Burn It!"? Is moving 5 foot faster when sneaking somehow only something Goblins can do?
That's what I don't like about Ancestries.
I take some issue of former racial traits/feats being called munchkin items. We dont know what ancestry has in-store mechanically yet. Many folks seem to think it implies multi-ancestry classing which could be vulnerable to min/max abuse.
Can I not make a human with "Burn It!"? Is moving 5 foot faster when sneaking somehow only something Goblins can do?
That's what I don't like about Ancestries.
I am hoping that the gate for ancestry feats is one that other rancestries can get through at a slightly increased cost -- for example, if you aren't a goblin, you might have to take one feat to count as a goblin for prerequisites and then you could access the goblin racial feats.
It would probably be fine to let people take ancestry feats from other ancestries as general feats, to represent time spent learning the ways of people not your own. In PF1 "racial feats" were seldom worth taking because of the opportunity cost, and the exciting thing about ancestry feats is that you can't trade them out for non-ancestry feats.
I do wonder how they will handle adopted characters.
My main issue with Ancestry now (and I don't mean the name) is Ancestry feats. I think they're a bad idea. It reminds me too much of earlier editions of D&D where some Races where Classes (Dwarf, Elf, Halfling).
Why is my character getting more human as they advance in levels? Or more elf-like? Or dwarf-like? Or Ulfen or Vudrani or whatever?
That's what I don't like about Ancestries.
What if every character gets to pick two or three of these at creation and the vast majority of these basic feats are the ones that do feat chain into things that make sense for future development. Things like you have short wings that could eventually grow into something that gives you full flight, or improving darkvision as your character develops?
I imagine that a play test is the perfect place to say, "hey I need x number of these feats at level 1 to make my character feel connected enough to this ancestry," and then that can be balanced with other ancestries.
I mean this should really show everyone that Paizo doesn't care if this term hurts your feelings.
It's probably safe to assume it wasn't changed for that reason either.
My main issue with Ancestry now (and I don't mean the name) is Ancestry feats. I think they're a bad idea. It reminds me too much of earlier editions of D&D where some Races where Classes (Dwarf, Elf, Halfling).
Why is my character getting more human as they advance in levels? Or more elf-like? Or dwarf-like? Or Ulfen or Vudrani or whatever?
That's what I don't like about Ancestries.
What if every character gets to pick two or three of these at creation and the vast majority of these basic feats are the ones that do feat chain into things that make sense for future development. Things like you have short wings that could eventually grow into something that gives you full flight, or improving darkvision as your character develops?
I imagine that a play test is the perfect place to say, "hey I need x number of these feats at level 1 to make my character feel connected enough to this ancestry," and then that can be balanced with other ancestries.
It still rankles, but I can see that working better than "Oh, suddenly you can use fire better because you're a goblin!" when you take Burn It! at whatever level you get Ancestry feats.
But as I said, we'll see.
Folks might be getting caught up on thinking race and ancestry is a straight up swap. Its not. The ideas are different and will work differently mechanically. Hopefully, a blog is around the corner to shed further light.
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I mean, a big issue with "race" is if you have a party of four human characters who are Tien, Vudrani, Garundi, and Kellid. Well, those people's skin colors likely map pretty naturally to analogues of what people call "races" in the real world, but everybody just writes "human" on their character sheet.
It's a much more natural way to refer to the difference between Keleshites and Varisians through "they had different parents and grew up in different contexts" than to say they are different "races". Ancestry lets us put "I grew up among Humans in Absalom" and "I grew up among Dwarves in Dongon Hold" on roughly equal footing.
And yet "Human" is going to be put down on the sheet, "human" is going to be the description, and "human" is going to be how the world will view them.
And if it wasn't taken into acount of just what ethicality human(or where you were raised period), I won't say bad GM, but missed oppertunty. Example, if a human was raised by the dwarves of Such and Such, and meets a Dwarf from that same clan but doesn't believe this human, human player should be allowed to come up with some sort of culture idea or saying or something to prove he was. Dwarf now sees Human as Kin and gives aid to the party.
Problem with "species" is that in addition to sounding more Sci-Fi than Fantasy (and accuracy issues- are half-elves really a separate species?) is that the word "Racial" is all over Pathfinder 1st edition.
So we need an adjective form of whatever word we're using, and the adjective form of "Species"? It's "Special".
Swapping "Racial traits" for "Special traits" is bound to mislead people.
Problem with "species" is that in addition to sounding more Sci-Fi than Fantasy (and accuracy issues- are half-elves really a separate species?) is that the word "Racial" is all over Pathfinder 1st edition.
So we need an adjective form of whatever word we're using, and the adjective form of "Species"? It's "Special".
Swapping "Racial traits" for "Special traits" is bound to mislead people.
I mean, People confuse Racial trait with Race Trait now so swapping to Special Trait can't be too much worse.
Though the whole double trait name is a good enough reason to swap to Ancestry or anything else.
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Problem with "species" is that in addition to sounding more Sci-Fi than Fantasy (and accuracy issues- are half-elves really a separate species?) is that the word "Racial" is all over Pathfinder 1st edition.
So we need an adjective form of whatever word we're using, and the adjective form of "Species"? It's "Special".
Swapping "Racial traits" for "Special traits" is bound to mislead people.
Half-elves are a species: they can reproduce, and not only that, they breed true. IE: they have half-elf offspring, not human or elf.
Species would be fine, honestly. But if they wanna go with Ancestry it won't be a problem.
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Personally I would like to either see what they are thinking of doing with humans, and what backgrounds are actually like. It's hard for me to think of human ancestry traits that are not cultural in nature, but then part of me wonder how that would be distinct from background.
Like, would a Ulfen ancestry get you access to a bunch of viking styled things? Would a Cheliax ancestry have some devil related stuff? Like I get goblins getting more gobliny, and but what does it mean when a Garundi get uh...more Garundi?
Or is the human just the ancestry, and you can pick different feats relating to these cultures? But then what is to stop someone from picking wildly different feats representing different regions. So yeah...Kind of feel I need more info for this to be useful
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In terms of 'nothing will ever be perfectly inoffensive because games contain offensive things' this is true, but there are two things:
#1: There's a distinction to be made between awful and offensive things happening in-universe and the game rules/texts themselves endorsing something offensive. Like, take sexism, a game having in-universe sexism is fine (especially if called out as unacceptable out-of-character). The game rules giving women and Int penalty is not fine.
#2: Even the game text being completely inoffensive is impossible. However, that doesn't in any way make it inappropriate to reduce such offensiveness when you can do so easily. Trying to be a bit less offensive when it costs you nothing is just good manners.
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Oh, and for the record, I don't find Thievery offensive absent context. Robin Hood, while a thief, is not offensive. Stealing from your employees pension fund is
I hope there are options to pass on ancestry feats for something else (like low-power skill feats). I like the idea that any dwarf I make could be an especially dwarfy dwarf but also like the idea that I could make the greatest swordsman (or whatever) who happens to be a dwarf. Sometimes I prefer to have ancestry simply an observable quality and have any actions or recognizable attacks/defenses be a result of training covered by classes/proficiency.
In PF1 this is not really a problem. At first level a smattering of abilities to differentiate you from a human are handed out, then you can take racial feats if you want to focus on your lineage or you can ignore those abilities except in the few cases they come up. I'd like something similar to be available.
Nobody thinks of their human character as just a human. Not in Golarion. Ancestry is a combination of nationality, ethnicity and socially constructed ideas about race. Even two ethnically Taldan humans could have radically different cultural upbringings if one has been born and raised in Taldor's noble society and the other in Cheliax. The idea of distinctly human traits is nearly inconceivable outside of the inclusion of all of these factors. There is a wide range of physical descriptors that apply to humans, but otherwise they are open and flexible and new groups of them can be introduced that worship different gods, have different customs and nobody bats an eye.
It is to the advantage of everyone playing in Golarion for the developers to break open the categories of race and let ancestries be more rich and complex for everyone, not just humans. Does it really make sense that Drow are basically considered their own "race" of elves? Are they any more different form other elves than the Azlanti are from other humans? The existing racial terminology of pathfinder is not consistent and Ancestry is actually a very elegant way of increasing options, unifying mechanics, and dropping a needless controversy. It already exists in essence for one "race" in the current game and will increase the kinds of characters available for you to play when it is applied more consistently across the game.
I really do not understand resistance to it unless you are a huge fan of players basically seeing everyone who is not human as basically just the essence of their racial identity. That is a flat and boring system (not to mention world view).
I am looking forward to a preview of the elf ancestry. I am curious how close to an optimized evoker I can get with the new rules.
Or is the human just the ancestry, and you can pick different feats relating to these cultures? But then what is to stop someone from picking wildly different feats representing different regions. So yeah...Kind of feel I need more info for this to be useful
More info indeed. Ancestry is starting to sound like a whole new level of min/max.
What?
White people have more problems with the term race than any other group.
Also this post can come off as "anyone who has a problem with the term ancestry is racist" or at least that is what is being merely hinted at or outright stated by certain posters.
The purpose of this thread was to thank the developers for addressing the narrative and mechanical issue that "race" as a loaded and misrepresentative term played in the first edition of pathfinder with a system that looks to be much simpler, open and encouraging of more of what makes pathfinder great, the ability to play the broadest range of characters imaginable in fun ways that fit into the impressive world building that the developers have done. Neither race nor species feels mechanically necessary in a high fantasy setting where magic, and not science, is the primary causality of everything that exists.
I don't understand why acknowledging that the idea of a broad and diverse "ancestry" is what makes the humans of Golarion so much more compelling than humans in other fantasy settings and wanting to see that more broadly applied to other races is even such a controversial issue.
I see people getting into hotly contested debates about whether the world of Golarion is obliged to look at every goblin, or half-orc, or elf or dwarf in a specific light, and a lot of that arguing seems to stem from the fact that the term "race" tends to create straight jackets for attitudes about the groups it applies to that ancestry does not, and that humans have been freed from that straight jacket from the games inception because nobody really sees all humans as belonging to just one group.
A couple of posters have posted mechanical and narrative issues with ancestry that have been interesting and enlightening to discuss, but very few of them really seem to boil down to the terms themselves, more than just "why is pathfinder changing?"
When good, narrative, and mechanical reasons to defend that change are being presented, there is almost no discussion of those causes, and instead the response has largely been, "you all are just being too PC." That is not a very productive counter opinion to present, especially not in a tone that feels hostile and dismissive.
Is there anyone here arguing that ancestry is not already the system that is being applied to humans in the current system of pathfinder? What is lost by making that system more accessible to other groups?
More info indeed. Ancestry is starting to sound like a whole new level of min/max.
Or is the human just the ancestry, and you can pick different feats relating to these cultures? But then what is to stop someone from picking wildly different feats representing different regions. So yeah...Kind of feel I need more info for this to be useful
The difference now is that racial traits (the things like darkvision, bonus feats/skills, etc.) are all front loaded on to characters and incredibly hard to balance, giving rise to a large number of "niche" mechanical character concepts that are only feasible by picking and choosing from a long list of options presented in the different races of Golarion books. This system, like class abilities or talents, was not well balanced against what other groups got access to, because there was not a unified system mechanic in play from the start of 3.0. Pathfinder tried to create a scale for comparing these against each other, but it was trying to slap order on a chaotic range of possibilities, and it made adding new PC races difficult because there was such a wide range of what attributes and abilities a character could get from each get from race. Ancestry is about contextualizing this diversity from system design forward. Lets make the extent of what a first level character gets from ancestry definable as a set number of attribute modifiers, feats and bonuses, and be paying attention to that as we introduce new material.
Every variable, by default, can and will be tweaked for desired outcomes. That is only a problem for a game when there are clear and present "better" options, which happens more when power balance is not considered from the onset.| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
More info indeed. Ancestry is starting to sound like a whole new level of min/max.
Or is the human just the ancestry, and you can pick different feats relating to these cultures? But then what is to stop someone from picking wildly different feats representing different regions. So yeah...Kind of feel I need more info for this to be useful
The difference now is that racial traits (the things like darkvision, bonus feats/skills, etc.) are all front loaded on to characters and incredibly hard to balance, giving rise to a large number of "niche" mechanical character concepts that are only feasible by picking and choosing from a long list of options presented in the different races of Golarion books. This system, like class abilities or talents, was not well balanced against what other groups got access to, because there was not a unified system mechanic in play from the start of 3.0. Pathfinder tried to create a scale for comparing these against each other, but it was trying to slap order on a chaotic range of possibilities, and it made adding new PC races difficult because there was such a wide range of what attributes and abilities a character could get from each get from race. Ancestry is about contextualizing this diversity from system design forward. Lets make the extent of what a first level character gets from ancestry definable as a set number of attribute modifiers, feats and bonuses, and be paying attention to that as we introduce new material.
Every variable, by default, can and will be tweaked for desired outcomes. That is only a problem for a game when there are clear and present "better" options, which happens more when power balance is not considered from the onset.
Well, personally I don't see this changing. The problems you espouse came after Core was released (most importantly in the form of the Advanced Race Guide).
Before that, what was most important when picking a Race/Class combination? Attribute Modifiers, any extra Feats, and as a distant third, vision modes (particularly for Rogues and other SA dependent classes).
They may have removed the second (and I say may, because we don't know), but the other two are alive and kicking, going by the Goblin Blog.
I fully expect we'll run into the same situation as PF1 if Paizo continues their normal publication schedule, but only time will tell.
...Well, personally I don't see this changing. The problems you espouse came after Core was released (most importantly in the form of the Advanced Race Guide).Before that, what was most important when picking a Race/Class combination? Attribute Modifiers, any extra Feats, and as a distant third, vision modes (particularly for Rogues and other SA dependent classes)...
I agree with you that it will be easy for things to get out of hand with the addition of more options, but the more modular it is, the easier it is for GMs to house rule out specific options that feel unbalanced without having to toss out everything attached to those options if future material gets too unbalanced.
As far as attributes go, if the Goblin's flexible attribute modifiers are indicative of the ancestry system, and no one is going to get more than a +2 to any one attribute from race, and every race has a floating +2, then there is going to be a lot more ways for characters to get at least 2 attribute modifiers in relevant stats for their builds and less "every Elf has to be a wizard."
And if no one is just getting blanket extra feats from any category, but ones specifically balanced against each other as ancestry feats, it will be a lot more open of a system.
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I like ancestry because that can accommodate race/species with culture.
Human is one race/species, but there's lot of different cultures that can be accounted for with ancestry.
And if I want to grow more like my ancestors, I can take those ancestry feats to become more like my forebears.
From there, it would be even more cool if we started showcasing the different cultures or other races/species. Different cultures of elves, different cultures of dwarves, different cultures of goblins. That would be something truly unique.
What?
White people have more problems with the term race than any other group.
Also this post can come off as "anyone who has a problem with the term ancestry is racist" or at least that is what is being merely hinted at or outright stated by certain posters.
The purpose of this thread was to thank the developers for addressing the narrative and mechanical issue that "race" as a loaded and misrepresentative term played in the first edition of pathfinder with a system that looks to be much simpler, open and encouraging of more of what makes pathfinder great, the ability to play the broadest range of characters imaginable in fun ways that fit into the impressive world building that the developers have done. Neither race nor species feels mechanically necessary in a high fantasy setting where magic, and not science, is the primary causality of everything that exists.
I don't understand why acknowledging that the idea of a broad and diverse "ancestry" is what makes the humans of Golarion so much more compelling than humans in other fantasy settings and wanting to see that more...
I would clarify. I don't have any problems with the term ancestry. I see no sound logical reason to support or detract the term. In my opinion, arguments about word definitions are fun but pointless. Whatever word they use means whatever it means as a game term. I couldn't care less what term they use here.
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Wow, I did not expect this tread to be so volatile when I clicked on it.
I think the term change is good, as long as it is used consistently. I really like the mechanical change. It always bugged me that humans have numerous ethnicities all over the world, but all (insert nonhuman race here) speak the same language and have the same culture even if they are from opposite sides of the world. The ancestry idea sounds like it will add both to customization and to immersion, so two thumbs up from me.
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Who exactly among us here even plans to stop using terms like "race" anyway? Cause i have used since forever and will keep using it. A goblin is a certain race, a human another, so on and on. The term in the game is still there, for me atleast it will always be.
Anyway, the change isnt for the worse, since like others said it allows for regional or parenting and so on things to be added while making it much easier to follow by locking them in packs. Which PF1 already kinda of does with the trait types, but could probably be done better, if it will be here it remains to be seen.
There is a point to be made about how this locks customization depending on how they go about it, like if you are an orphan garundi who was raised by elves in Varisia. I imagine something like simple open traits would make it an easier fit than these ancestries, but lets see.