Unpopular Opinion: Tieflings Are a Terrible PC Race

[Cameo]

So I get everyone likes to play the edgy demon-people.

Here's the problem.

If you know anything about how people actually are, with regards to fear and prejudice, you'd know what I know, which is that a tiefling would have an extremely difficult time surviving anywhere. Outside a very narrow, limited scope of possibilities (isolating under the protection of certain dark cults, living among evil intelligent species such as drow or orcs, or simply going full Les Stroud in the wilderness), actually having a life - even a wandering, adventurer's life - on the Prime Material Plane as a tiefling is only slightly safer than barebacking a two-copper berserking Rashemi prostitute.

If you strut around most places in the Prime as a tiefling, it's really, realistically, only a matter of time until you end up burned at the stake...especially if we're talking about these really deformed, flashy, obviously non-human tieflings as portrayed in Baldur's Gate 3. Magic I can suspend my disbelief for. Dragons, sure. But the fact that A LITERAL HORNED DEVIL PERSON is walking around and no one is even mentioning it is ridiculous. You'd be rounded up and burned alive at the stake faster than you can say "B-b-b-but my +2 to Charisma??!"

I can hear it now. "Oh but what if people are used to tieflings? All it means is they have some infernal lineage in their blood." Oh, really, is that all it means? You mean they're only *literally* descended from demons and devils? At various times in history, wild claims and accusations were made against certain ethnic and cultural groups to justify the extermination of entire communities, and THOSE accused people looked like everyone else. How much more severe would that hammer fall on tieflings?

"But this isn't Earth, this is Fae'run." Yeah, I know. But you need verisimilitude in order to make any fantasy setting believable. That's the whole point. You have to *believe* this is a place that could actually exist. People as a rule tend to be very savage. Dwarves? Forget about it; they'd be most retrograde, prejudiced, stuck in their ways race imaginable. Elves? Read the old German fairy tales about just some of the things traditional legends say the fae and their ilk are capable of. Hobb--sorry, Halflings? They care about their families and communities more than anything, they'd be running you off and shutting doors on you so fast it'd make your little horned head spin.

And humans, well, we all know what we're like. We are a tribal species that is literally terrifying when it comes to anything different, especially something that *looks* different.

This is all to say that Baldur's Gate 3, and 5th Edition Dungeons & Dragons in general, made a huge blunder when they included tieflings as a base playable race. It's just not believable. You would be exterminated as a threat in two seconds.

But, so would any drow elf. Same situation.

[God King 069]

Lena původně napsal:

I stopped taking it serious when you compared them to demons. There is a difference between devils and demons. Tieflings are Hells-tinged (the place of devils), not Abyss-tinged (the place of demons). As of 5E, it has become accepted on Swordcoast that tieflings are mostly just the unfortunate offspring of someone who got tempted by a devil and some people may feel nervous and make holy hand gestures over their chest, but they try to understand what the tiefling wants before jumping the sword. Read the player's handbook and maybe Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes about tieflings. Or maybe you don't care about 5E as a tabletop game as the basis of BG3 and just want a video game experience?

In fairness your last point is the default. Most people only want to care about 5e when it suits them. While I personally am not a fan of the race and agree with some of the OPs points being that regardless of how charismatic they may come across, in what setting would this even be the case as most humans would look at them the same as a well spoken ogre which would be that an ogre is still an ogre and anything that doesn't look human is scary. So I'd think that whatever charisma score would be at a huge disadvantage in most scenarios.

5e is my absolute favorite edition but I have to say in the cases of the races creating one that has that type of appearance and backstory theres just no way for it to exist without severely ruining the immersion or creating a setting where it makes sense.

[Vixziค็็็็็n]

8BallQue původně napsal:

Lena původně napsal:

I stopped taking it serious when you compared them to demons. There is a difference between devils and demons. Tieflings are Hells-tinged (the place of devils), not Abyss-tinged (the place of demons). As of 5E, it has become accepted on Swordcoast that tieflings are mostly just the unfortunate offspring of someone who got tempted by a devil and some people may feel nervous and make holy hand gestures over their chest, but they try to understand what the tiefling wants before jumping the sword. Read the player's handbook and maybe Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes about tieflings. Or maybe you don't care about 5E as a tabletop game as the basis of BG3 and just want a video game experience?

In fairness your last point is the default. Most people only want to care about 5e when it suits them. While I personally am not a fan of the race and agree with some of the OPs points being that regardless of how charismatic they may come across, in what setting would this even be the case as most humans would look at them the same as a well spoken ogre which would be that an ogre is still an ogre and anything that doesn't look human is scary. So I'd think that whatever charisma score would be at a huge disadvantage in most scenarios.

5e is my absolute favorite edition but I have to say in the cases of the races creating one that has that type of appearance and backstory theres just no way for it to exist without severely ruining the immersion or creating a setting where it makes sense.

While 5e is not my favorite edition I don't think the edition would really matter in this case. I have to agree in that I don't see a valid scenario where this would exist in the general societies of the Prime Material....and even if it did, I couldn't imagine the backlash and kind of life they would face and yes any bonus to charisma would be instantly washed out.

Drow have an established society where they can flourish among themselves. They don't generally try to incorporate themselves into above ground societies. I think 5e gets it very wrong here in that this race...the race with the horns and tails and crazy eyes and other attributes, is the race that 'shop keepers keep an eye on' while Drow and Orcs are basically run out of the city and there's no amount of time particularly considering their general nature that would somehow make them more acceptable. Need we remind anyone of the races within humans alone where there are places still today that they aren't welcome?

[Pan Darius Cassandra]

8BallQue původně napsal:

pandariuskairos původně napsal:

The idea of a half human, half fiend is a cool one - Merlin was said to be such a creature (I forget whether it was his mother or father that was rumored to be a demon).

The issue I have with it is how trivialized these things have become in the modern D&D setting.

They've removed the mystery from such things. They've removed the sense of awe. Everything is common, everything is trivial.

Would be his father (incubus). Not sure what your expecting though as everything becomes trivialized. So by you're own mention what do you think would be awe inspiring? And then what would be the point since it too would become trivial.

The first problem is that almost everything in these settings has human like features. Until we get away from that at least it's going to continue to be old and stale.

Yes, elfs are just humans with pointy ears, dwarfs are just shorter humans who drink too much and speak with a Scottish accent, and halflings are even shorter humans with hair feet.

A race is chosen more for it's stat block than any kind of mythology surrounding it.

[cl656]

I wish this game had that level of racism. It would do wonders for immersion while playing races like Tie-flings. Last fantasy game to have that level of racism was Dragon Age Origins.

The Elf, especially the city elf, was one oft he best play-throughs in the game, simply because you are discriminated by both the Dalish and pretty much everyone else. Very handy in character building.

[droggen]

pandariuskairos původně napsal:

There used to be this idea that non-human races (even Elfs and Dwarfs and Halfdinks) were rare, or at least somewhat uncommon. Players were given the option to play them so they could recreate Tolien-esque fantasies, but within the world itself even an Elf would receive stares of wonder and curiosity when walking about in a typical city or village. They were the stuff of legends, whether a playable 'race' or not.

Over the years D&D became increasingly dilute. People were not satisfied with just playing the traditional Tolkien-esque races, and they added more and more "half this" and "half that" until you could play anything and everything and the world just turned into a zoo of every possible combination of races and classes.

Magic used to be fairly uncommon as well, a Wizard was something that might be whispered about by the locals, regardless of whether the players could all be Wizards or not.

The Forgotten Realms have, in fact, become a little more like the Outer Planes in that the place is crawling with every kind of half-breed and Outlander now. Seeing an Elf or a Dwarf isn't mysterious and no one bats an eye, Half-Orcs walk down the promenade unmolested, and half-breed devil/demon children have about as much stigma attached to them as Half-Elfs used to (and Half-Elfs are now accepted and as common as anyone else).

Basically the game became more dilute to be more 'inclusive' and no one really bothers to have a proper fantasy world anymore where this kind of thing would stared at mouth agape by the local human peasants. People try to make it too much like the real, modern world, instead of the brutal, medieval like fantasy world it used to be, where the vast majority of civilization was human, and other wondrous races and people's were only hinted at.

It is what it is now, for better or worse.

I think the OP should mark this post as an answer, I think I get what the OP is saying now thanks to this post.

[Membi]

Sorry OP, but, wouldn't this go for all the less human-esqe races? Aarakocra, Yuan-ti etc.
Personally I would find the universe of Forgotten Realms extremely boring if we were only able to play humans as adventurers.

Verisimilitude is important but it's also subjective. Each of us has their own tolerance when it comes to suspension of disbelief.

Faerûn do have a multitude of races and societies. Some are more rare than others but most people, even down to illiterate peasants, have at least some time heard vague descriptions of the other races. Tieflings, lore-wise, are looked down upon by many and distrusted in general and I agree with cool-dude that it's something that should be portrayed in game. Not in the sense of being greeted by mob a la Beauty & The Beast in every town, more like people being generally rude, their trust being harder to gain etc.

Also, tieflings officially became playable in the 3rd edition already, and a core race in 4e so it's not like they are a new playable race..

That said. You are ofc entitled to have and voice your opinion :)

[Wyrlish]

So... do you have the same issues with Dragonborn as well? Creatures who literally bear resemblance to evil chromatic dragons and who are widely known to be related to them?
It's weird to me how you can have the opinion of one, but not talk about the other that would be equally distrusted right off the bat just based on appearance and history.

Also... can we take a moment to step back here and remember we haven't even hit the "Baldur's Gate" portion of the Baldur's Gate game yet? All we've seen is a bunch of Tiefling outcasts in what is realistically still the wilderness trying to collectively go for a new living in the biggest city on the Sword Coast. We have literally no way to predict what will happen to them once they arrive.

It's a bit early to cast aspersions as of yet me thinks.

Also... really don't see a lot of Tiefling npcs in the pnp games I play. Usually only pcs and even then they can be rare, due to the large amount of playable races.

Most tieflings I see in pnp and games are are very exotic and rely on that exoticness to survive by playing it up in some way. Either that or they live in the shadows as parts of some thiefy type lifestyle.

[UnholyDentist]

pandariuskairos původně napsal:

There used to be this idea that non-human races (even Elfs and Dwarfs and Halfdinks) were rare, or at least somewhat uncommon. Players were given the option to play them so they could recreate Tolien-esque fantasies, but within the world itself even an Elf would receive stares of wonder and curiosity when walking about in a typical city or village. They were the stuff of legends, whether a playable 'race' or not.

Over the years D&D became increasingly dilute. People were not satisfied with just playing the traditional Tolkien-esque races, and they added more and more "half this" and "half that" until you could play anything and everything and the world just turned into a zoo of every possible combination of races and classes.

Magic used to be fairly uncommon as well, a Wizard was something that might be whispered about by the locals, regardless of whether the players could all be Wizards or not.

The Forgotten Realms have, in fact, become a little more like the Outer Planes in that the place is crawling with every kind of half-breed and Outlander now. Seeing an Elf or a Dwarf isn't mysterious and no one bats an eye, Half-Orcs walk down the promenade unmolested, and half-breed devil/demon children have about as much stigma attached to them as Half-Elfs used to (and Half-Elfs are now accepted and as common as anyone else).

Basically the game became more dilute to be more 'inclusive' and no one really bothers to have a proper fantasy world anymore where this kind of thing would stared at mouth agape by the local human peasants. People try to make it too much like the real, modern world, instead of the brutal, medieval like fantasy world it used to be, where the vast majority of civilization was human, and other wondrous races and people's were only hinted at.

It is what it is now, for better or worse.

Anything that becomes popular, will attract more capitalism and eventually it will end up chasing more profits rather than the initial vision that made the franchise great. You can see how D&D went mainstream over the years, 5e is a perfect example of that. We lost D&D, it's not what it used to be, now millions enjoy it, and more will join. In the future, 6e will be even more mainstream and will generate even more profit to Hasbro. There's nothing we can do about it, this franchise was made by true innovators, artists, and those people are long gone, capitalists own it now and they will feed on it, make it more and more mainstream until the only original thing left is the title (maybe not even that). Let them cater to the bland, expansive void of human society that is pop culture and find other ways to entertain yourself.

[Yojo0o]

That's a pretty bleak view. I can respect if you personally don't like 5e as much as earlier editions, but I'm not on board with the idea that something can't be both popular and of high quality at the same time.

Having played 2e, 3e, 3.5e, and now 5e, 5e is my favorite edition.

[Lamiosa]

Tieflings are not the worse choice, Drow are. Usually Drow are hunt as soon as they enter the surface in most cases, because most of people on surface are enemies. While Tieflings are known not to be exactly devils and not equated to Tanar'ri/Baatezu, Drow are likely to be called evil more likely and get faster enemies.

That is also why it is very funny when people want to play a very very rare Elistraee Drow, because if they even manage to escape the Underdark, they often get hunt by humans on surface, as they do not know the difference between Elistraee and Lloth Drow, or do not care. Do not need to mention that Elistraee Drow also make a very small percentage, so playing one are people who often want be a special snowflake.

[Steve (Dawn's Hubby)]

droggen původně napsal:

pandariuskairos původně napsal:

There used to be this idea that non-human races (even Elfs and Dwarfs and Halfdinks) were rare, or at least somewhat uncommon. Players were given the option to play them so they could recreate Tolien-esque fantasies, but within the world itself even an Elf would receive stares of wonder and curiosity when walking about in a typical city or village. They were the stuff of legends, whether a playable 'race' or not.

Over the years D&D became increasingly dilute. People were not satisfied with just playing the traditional Tolkien-esque races, and they added more and more "half this" and "half that" until you could play anything and everything and the world just turned into a zoo of every possible combination of races and classes.

Magic used to be fairly uncommon as well, a Wizard was something that might be whispered about by the locals, regardless of whether the players could all be Wizards or not.

The Forgotten Realms have, in fact, become a little more like the Outer Planes in that the place is crawling with every kind of half-breed and Outlander now. Seeing an Elf or a Dwarf isn't mysterious and no one bats an eye, Half-Orcs walk down the promenade unmolested, and half-breed devil/demon children have about as much stigma attached to them as Half-Elfs used to (and Half-Elfs are now accepted and as common as anyone else).

Basically the game became more dilute to be more 'inclusive' and no one really bothers to have a proper fantasy world anymore where this kind of thing would stared at mouth agape by the local human peasants. People try to make it too much like the real, modern world, instead of the brutal, medieval like fantasy world it used to be, where the vast majority of civilization was human, and other wondrous races and people's were only hinted at.

It is what it is now, for better or worse.

I think the OP should mark this post as an answer, I think I get what the OP is saying now thanks to this post.

Except for the fact you can play Dungeons and Dragons however you wish. The guides tell you that they are just that, guides and not hard and fast rules. When it comes to the table top game nothing is lost unless you allow it to be lost. If memory serves the early Dungeonmaster's Guides tell you to keep what you want and discard the rest. In our games we modify the rules all the time to suit our needs and keep things fresh. If you don't like an aspect of the game then change it. It's really that simple. Admittedly, in a video game you cannot do that.

[Steve (Dawn's Hubby)]

Lena původně napsal:

I stopped taking it serious when you compared them to demons. There is a difference between devils and demons. Tieflings are Hells-tinged (the place of devils), not Abyss-tinged (the place of demons). As of 5E, it has become accepted on Swordcoast that tieflings are mostly just the unfortunate offspring of someone who got tempted by a devil and some people may feel nervous and make holy hand gestures over their chest, but they try to understand what the tiefling wants before jumping the sword. Read the player's handbook and maybe Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes about tieflings. Or maybe you don't care about 5E as a tabletop game as the basis of BG3 and just want a video game experience?

Thumbs up to a real gamer, thanks!

[Vixziค็็็็็n]

Steve (Dawn's Hubby) původně napsal:

droggen původně napsal:

I think the OP should mark this post as an answer, I think I get what the OP is saying now thanks to this post.

Except for the fact you can play Dungeons and Dragons however you wish. The guides tell you that they are just that, guides and not hard and fast rules. When it comes to the table top game nothing is lost unless you allow it to be lost. If memory serves the early Dungeonmaster's Guides tell you to keep what you want and discard the rest. In our games we modify the rules all the time to suit our needs and keep things fresh. If you don't like an aspect of the game then change it. It's really that simple. Admittedly, in a video game you cannot do that.

Sweet so we just eliminated any further need for conversation/debate...even the need for the forum at all for the most part!

[JinxTheWorld]

Meh i played a lolth-sworn Drow in BG3. Walked around with no f's given. Talked to a trio of spiders about the beauty of Lolth and her majesty. Convinced them that worship of Lolth will bring glory and happiness and they then scampered off with a renewed sense of purpose. I walked up to the gates of a fort, and was greeted as master.

Though as i gone through my play session, it did in fact occur to me. Isn't my character supposed to be hated by.... literally everyone? In fact, barely an inconvenience. I strode up upon the gates of refugees and outcasts who should clearly already have trust issues. Yet... me.... a damn Lolth-sworn Drow... is accepted as easily as a fancy pants human in a human town. The bloody only other drow in the evil guys fort in the currently available game had any semblance of doubt that i might be up to no good. Aside from others that clearly have trust issues with anything or anyone besides themselves and their weapon.

There... my rant... whatever...

[littlebunnylover]

Agsmfhpjsfdgbnj původně napsal:

Personally I don't think that's interesting or practical as a player character.

You've just addressed your own complaint. You personally aren't interested in playing a tiefling. Cool - you get the wonderful opportunity to NOT play as a tiefling! Problem solved.