PFS Regional Affinities: "ethnic groups"


Pathfinder Society

Shadow Lodge

2 people marked this as FAQ candidate.

So a disagreement about the Affinities rules seems to have popped up on the PFS Online Discord community.

Pathfinder Society Roleplaying Guild Guide, pg 42 wrote:
Affinity (regional affinity): Some feats, traits, or other mechanical items require an affinity with a specific country or region of Golarion. Others require membership in a certain ethnic group of people (e.g. a Shoanti tribe or Mammoth Lord following). All of these are considered regional affinities. Your PC may acquire any affinity you wish during Downtime, but may have only one regional affinity at any given time. Note any affinities gained, lost, or changed on your next Chronicle sheet after making such a change.

It's being put forth that "ethnic groups" includes the human ethnicities listed in the Inner Sea World Guide pages 12-23, such as Shoanti or Varisians, instead of something like a Shoanti tribe (one of the listed examples) or a Sczarni crime family.

What needs clarifying here is what exactly does "ethnic groups" mean. Is it meant to be as expansive as is being claimed, or is it meant to only extend to groups, as the examples indicate?

Particularly this discussion stemmed from the Harrow Born trait; specifically, it was claimed an Elf could declare their Affinity as Varisian, thus meet the "Varisian" prerequisite.

5/5 5/55/55/5

Sczarni crime family wouldn't be an ethnicity its an affiliation

Dark Archive 4/5

If an affinity with a country, for example, does not include the ability for non humans to be from such areas then what would be the explanation for this trait Cheap to Feed, which specifically requires you be both Halfling and Osirion or Varisian?

It also brings up the question that if, as you believe, human is the only option for these why would they need to specify further in such traits as these Practiced Gambler and Tattooed Focus that "Human - Varisian" is the requirement and not in traits such as the one you mentioned, Harrow Born, which simply lists "Varisian" as the requirement?

Shadow Lodge

BigNorseWolf wrote:
Sczarni crime family wouldn't be an ethnicity its an affiliation

That's exactly my point; I believe "ethnic group" covers things like memberships in tribes or other organizations, but it's been claimed (by a VO no less) that "ethnic groups" includes the full-blown ethnicities like Varisian or Shoanti, as listed in the ISWG (pages 12-23).

I disagree strenuously, but those supporting the claim continue to say "ethnic group" is just a synonym for "ethnicity", and that you thus use a regional affinity to claim that ethnicity and qualify for prerequisites as such. To my reading, you could only come to that conclusion by completely disregarding the clarifying examples of "a Shoanti tribe or Mammoth Lord following", which clearly illustrates what the phrase is supposed to cover.

Suthainn wrote:
If an affinity with a country, for example, does not include the ability for non humans to be from such areas then what would be the explanation for this trait Cheap to Feed, which specifically requires you be both Halfling and Osirion or Varisian?

Cheap to Feed is a region trait; the requirements listed in Cheap to Feed are region requirements (with the added Halfling racial requirement), as evidenced by it being a region trait. A halfling with a regional affinity for Varisia or Osirion would meet the requirements.

Harrow Born is a race trait, meaning the listed requirement is a racial one, indicating it's an ethnicity requirement (remember that the human ethnicities are listed in the Races chapter of the ISWG), not a regional one.

Suthainn wrote:
It also brings up the question that if, as you believe, human is the only option for these why would they need to specify further in such traits as these Practiced Gambler and Tattooed Focus that "Human - Varisian" is the requirement and not in traits such as the one you mentioned, Harrow Born, which simply lists "Varisian" as the requirement?

All three of those are race traits; Harrow Born is from Humans of Golarion, while Practiced Gambler and Tattooed Focus are from Inner Sea Races (the newer book). Consistent editing between books has never been Paizo's strong suit, but the fact that those are all race traits would again indicate that the one listed requirement is a racial one, not a regional one.

Grand Lodge 4/5 ** Venture-Agent, Colorado—Denver

It is all common sense, actually. Think about it from a real world perspective.

Does your Character really know what you know? Is he that well educated like you are? Does your PC carry a Smartphone while trudging through the dungeon?

Shadow Lodge

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Christian Dragos wrote:

It is all common sense, actually. Think about it from a real world perspective.

Does your Character really know what you know? Is he that well educated like you are? Does your PC carry a Smartphone while trudging through the dungeon?

That... that makes no sense. What does this comment have to do with anything in this thread? This is a complete non-sequitur.

3/5 **** Venture-Agent, Massachusetts—Boston Metro

SCPRedMage wrote:
BigNorseWolf wrote:
Sczarni crime family wouldn't be an ethnicity its an affiliation

That's exactly my point; I believe "ethnic group" covers things like memberships in tribes or other organizations, but it's been claimed (by a VO no less) that "ethnic groups" includes the full-blown ethnicities like Varisian or Shoanti, as listed in the ISWG (pages 12-23).

I disagree strenuously, but those supporting the claim continue to say "ethnic group" is just a synonym for "ethnicity", and that you thus use a regional affinity to claim that ethnicity and qualify for prerequisites as such. To my reading, you could only come to that conclusion by completely disregarding the clarifying examples of "a Shoanti tribe or Mammoth Lord following", which clearly illustrates what the phrase is supposed to cover.

The problem with their argument is that its actively called out in multiple places of additional resources that its human ethnicity. I think technically you could still get the trait if your human, half-elf, half-orc, and kitsune but other than that its a no-go.

Shadow Lodge

Adam Yakaboski wrote:
I think technically you could still get the trait if your human, half-elf, half-orc, and kitsune but other than that its a no-go.

That's something that's been argued on the forums before, and I'm pretty sure it's what led to the rules allowing the half-breed races to swap racial languages for human languages to be added to the later versions of the Guide.

That said, half-elves, half-orcs, and aasimar with Scion of Humanity are only said to count as human (and elf/orc/outsider, but that's not relevant here), and kitsunes can count as human with the Human Guise feat, but nothing ever says they can count as a specific ethnicity for prerequisites, so while this is certainly a super-reasonable house rule, I don't think you can actually do it in PFS.

Grand Lodge 4/5 ** Venture-Agent, Colorado—Denver

Sorry. Got threads mixed up. Ethnicities are, basically, racial groups. Elves, mammoth lords, and Varisians could have affinity.

Shadow Lodge

Christian Dragos wrote:
Ethnicities are, basically, racial groups. Elves, mammoth lords, and Varisians could have affinity.

And again, I believe that that reading can only be arrived at if you ignore the clarifying examples (note that it says "Shoanti tribe", not just "Shoanti"), and further would mean that you could change your ethnicity during Downtime, because the Affinity rules allows for exactly that.

Grand Lodge 4/5 ** Venture-Agent, Colorado—Denver

My interpretation would be that it is expansive. That's how I would rule it as a GM.

Oh! After re-reading your last post, I didn't realize you could change your ethnicity during downtime. That doesn't seem right. Interesting.

Shadow Lodge

And I've yet to see anyone who takes the "expansive" reading even attempt to address why the listed examples showing the limited reading should be ignored, or attempt to explain them away.

3/5 **** Venture-Agent, Massachusetts—Boston Metro

SCPRedMage wrote:


That said, half-elves, half-orcs, and aasimar with Scion of Humanity are only said to count as human (and elf/orc/outsider, but that's not relevant here), and kitsunes can count as human with the Human Guise feat, but nothing ever says they can count as a specific ethnicity for prerequisites, so while this is certainly a super-reasonable house rule, I don't think you can actually do it in PFS.

Aasimar are a weird case for plot reasons but the other three have specific racial traits which actively call them out as being other ethnicities than a generic half orc, half elf, and kitsune. Its why all my friendly cinnamon bun half orcs are technically Osirion.

Shadow Lodge

Adam Yakaboski wrote:
but the other three have specific racial traits which actively call them out as being other ethnicities than a generic half orc, half elf, and kitsune.

And what traits are those? Because Elf Blood and Orc Blood say nothing about ethnicities (Elf Blood only says "Half-elves count as both elves and humans for any effect related to race", and Orc blood just replaces "elves" with "orcs"), and to my understanding the closest kitsune gets to it is the description in Blood of the Beast, but it's questionable whether that would count as being that ethnicity for prerequisite purposes, but certainly not without the Human Guise feat, because they don't count as human without it.

But that's off-topic here; the question this thread is asking is "what does 'ethnic groups' in the Affinity rules cover?"

5/5 5/55/55/5

You re really making a finer distiction than tje rules usually do and i m not surprised the venture critter didn t crank the perssnicket meter so high that a shanti mammoth tribe isn t a shoanti.

If the requirement is mammal and i m a dog i qualify.

If the requirement is american and im a new yorker i qualify

Shanti mammoth guys are a subset of shoanti, not a different group.

3/5 **** Venture-Agent, Massachusetts—Boston Metro

SCPRedMage wrote:


But that's off-topic here; the question this thread is asking is "what does 'ethnic groups' in the Affinity rules cover?"

It's not. Those races are actively called out as having ethnicities whereas the others aren't. Any other example just falls under being really really really creepy and RAW against the refluffing rules. And yes NPCs do have tactics against specific ethnicities.

Shadow Lodge

BigNorseWolf wrote:

You re really making a finer distiction than tje rules usually do and i m not surprised the venture critter didn t crank the perssnicket meter so high that a shanti mammoth tribe isn t a shoanti.

If the requirement is mammal and i m a dog i qualify.

If the requirement is american and im a new yorker i qualify

Shanti mammoth guys are a subset of shoanti, not a different group.

It's not a finer distinction; there's a very big difference between being Shoanti and being a member of a Shoanti tribe. Anyone of any race or ethnicity can feasibly join a Shoanti tribe, but only a human with Shoanti parents can be Shoanti. It's a race vs tribe thing, and the claim I've seen put forth that I'm trying to get official clarification to disprove is that you can use the regional affinity rules to meet Ethnicity (in the racial sense) prerequisites with races that very much do not have these ethnicities.

Again, the specific claim was that a full-blooded Elf could use their regional affinity to take a race trait that lists "Varisian" as its requirements. The person making the claim directly admitted that under the standard PF rules that it wouldn't be legal, but that the PFS rules allow for it. It would basically open up anything that requires a human ethnicity to any race, so long as it didn't specifically say "human" in the requirements.

Shadow Lodge

Adam Yakaboski wrote:

It's not. Those races are actively called out as having ethnicities whereas the others aren't. Any other example just falls under being really really really creepy and RAW against the refluffing rules. And yes NPCs do have tactics against specific ethnicities.

It is off-topic, because the question has nothing to do with races that might actually qualify as having an ethnicity, the question I'm trying to get answered is whether the phrase "ethnic group" in the regional affinity rules allows any character of any race to count as having that a full-blown human ethnicity.

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