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.

[neo2157]

I used to play tiefling in older edition's of D&D, back then then some of the bloodlines were much more human looking then other's so you could kinda hand wave it in as they could probably blend in if they kept the horns and tail hidden. I don't really play them much anymore because they look much more infernal and I have a hard time suspending my disbelief when the party starts looking less humanoid. I will say though that tiefling's arn't quite that common and you only see allot of them act 1 of bg3 due to story related reasons, typically they prefer not to be seen.

[Hobocop]

Escrito originalmente por Lamiosa:

I think there is much space for interpretation how humans behave to Tieflings. Even the passages you marked leave lots of interpretation what "violence" and "blaming" means. Can be anything from just violating someone with words/insults to punching someone half dead. Same with blaming can be just telling rumours behind someone back or openly accusing someone trying to get a mob after them.
However I never ever have been in a D&D/FR Campaign where there was an open violent move of a mob against Tieflings where for other races like Drow there was (one popular is maybe Viconia from Baldurs Gate 2).

Exactly.

If you read 'violence' and immediately jump to public executions when there are myriad actions that fall under the 'violence' umbrella, you throw away huge swathes of storytelling potential.

[Pan Darius Cassandra]

Escrito originalmente por neo2157:

I used to play tiefling in older edition's of D&D, back then then some of the bloodlines were much more human looking then other's so you could kinda hand wave it in as they could probably blend in if they kept the horns and tail hidden. I don't really play them much anymore because they look much more infernal and I have a hard time suspending my disbelief when the party starts looking less humanoid. I will say though that tiefling's arn't quite that common and you only see allot of them act 1 of bg3 due to story related reasons, typically they prefer not to be seen.

In older editions, they could have a variety of traits, including horns or a tail (rarely), or glowing eyes, but they didn't all look the same.

My point about their look now, at least in BG3, is that their look has become standardized. It's a uniform that instantly tells anyone looking at them that they are devil spawn. There's no ambiguity left, and that sucks.

[Lamiosa]

Escrito originalmente por pandariuskairos:

Escrito originalmente por neo2157:

I used to play tiefling in older edition's of D&D, back then then some of the bloodlines were much more human looking then other's so you could kinda hand wave it in as they could probably blend in if they kept the horns and tail hidden. I don't really play them much anymore because they look much more infernal and I have a hard time suspending my disbelief when the party starts looking less humanoid. I will say though that tiefling's arn't quite that common and you only see allot of them act 1 of bg3 due to story related reasons, typically they prefer not to be seen.

In older editions, they could have a variety of traits, including horns or a tail (rarely), or glowing eyes, but they didn't all look the same.

My point about their look now, at least in BG3, is that their look has become standardized. It's a uniform that instantly tells anyone looking at them that they are devil spawn. There's no ambiguity left, and that sucks.

I guess I understand your point: The Tieflings have lost their "magic". But that happens to many things which were cool or mysterious in past. Vampires were also cool back at Vampire Dark Ages / Vampire the Masquerade P&P I had 20 years ago, but then all the twilight stuff came made it popular for "casuals" and the magic was gone. I guess at some point that happens to many stuff that gets "too popular". However a cool character can basically be of any race, so I do not care anymore.

[Pan Darius Cassandra]

Escrito originalmente por Lamiosa:

Escrito originalmente por pandariuskairos:

In older editions, they could have a variety of traits, including horns or a tail (rarely), or glowing eyes, but they didn't all look the same.

My point about their look now, at least in BG3, is that their look has become standardized. It's a uniform that instantly tells anyone looking at them that they are devil spawn. There's no ambiguity left, and that sucks.

I guess I understand your point: The Tieflings have lost their "magic". But that happens to many things which were cool or mysterious in past. Vampires were also cool back at Vampire Dark Ages / Vampire the Masquerade P&P I had 20 years ago, but then all the twilight stuff came made it popular for "casuals" and the magic was gone. I guess at some point that happens to many stuff that gets "too popular". However a cool character can basically be of any race, so I do not care anymore.

Not quite.

I don't mean how popular they are with players - that doesn't affect me in the slightest.

I mean how common they've become in the world of Faerun itself. They used to be a very rare sight. Teeflings were born of human parents typically, and inherited fiendish traits from an ancestor, much like how the Sorcerer inherits their magic. They weren't all running amok all over the place. There were a handful of them at most.

I don't care how many players want to play them, I only care that there's like an entire village of teeflings in BG3, and that feels like too much. Furthermore, they're portrayed as being no different from humans, except for their physical traits. They hold jobs as blacksmiths, have bratty little kids running around, get married, worry about their future prospects.

It's like the devil horns (which look like terrible, glued on props) are just there for show. There's nothing truly "fiendish" about them. They're just another "human, but with horns".

I think putting so many of them in the game was mistake.

[Beta Ray Shill]

I have to agree with the OP. This issue was nagging at me throughout every playthrough, especially when visiting the groove area with tiefling families.

I can supress my distaste for the sugary candy-fantasy of this new BG versus the more Witcher-esque older BG games. It’s entirely possible to not be sickened by it, with its freaks around every corner – because even though it is a DnD carnival, most of it kind of adds up.

The redcaps and the hag have to disguise themselves to ‘fit in’. The groove has a lot of goofy-looking stuff going on, like the elevator and the glowing magic circle of druids. Especially compared to the grittier Grymforge area, which has its elevators too – but they suit the steampunk nature of it. I can buy into the gnolls roaming in packs in the wilderness – and can also buy into an owlbear living in a cave.

But the tieflings look far too devilish: it smacks of World of Warcraft, really children’s-cartoon-level over the top.

Way back, I mentioned all of this on BG3 reddit, and also that Haer'Dalis was a much better creation for a tiefling, with his subtle oddness: the strange tint to the hair, the weird scar-like tattoos and the intense stare. But I could imagine him contriving some story around it and just about tricking the human towns and villages into believing it.
BG3 reddit is, of course, extremely sensitive to Larian criticism and I was immediately downvoted until it got to the point where I was kicked off the thing. But I stand by what I said on the matter, and obviously I’m not alone in my thinking.

Long gone are my dreams that this will have a Witcher-like maturity to the storytelling: we’re too far in, there’s no turning back. But ‘artistic licence’ will hopefully do away with most of the bizarre DnD nerdery from the current ‘handbook’, with its clear emphasis on a big love-in of dragonborns and devilmen and humans and every other sideshow going.

The aesthetics are winning the war on getting BG3 to look compelling and mature. So you’d think the talent there could come up with something a little more imaginative and evocative for the tieflings. Devil-types are overdone, let’s be honest.

Even the cambions in BG 2 were more imaginative: more toned down, evil-knight monstrosities that made you wonder what they really looked like.

In BG3, they’re again just batwings and horns.

In the TW2 and TW3, you really got a fantastic sense of the racism against elves. They were disgruntled and embittered, and massive chips on their shoulders – as you’d expect from folk trying to make a living among communities that mostly considered them abominations. It brings that touch of ‘real world’ into the otherwise nonsense fantasy trappings that made me respect the writers. There was no preachiness to it: it was all organically a part of the world.

BG3 tieflings are only vaguely outsiders in the groove. You’d think the humans would be going all out to oppress them: heavy-handed patrols in the tiefling areas, simmering tensions, stress and pressure on both sides.

Look at any modern-day refugee crisis and see how ugly it all is.

Sure, some will say they just want that candy-fantasy, where everything nonsensical can be explained away because of various made-up fantasy-rules in some handbook. To me, that’s as cheap as it gets. And we’re all entitled to our opinions.

I believe the thread is asking more for a ‘happy medium’ between candy-fantasy and mature fantasy – some kind of compromise, which also doesn’t get Larian studios bombed by some DnD zealot for mocking the name of Shar, or whoever else.

[God King 069]

Escrito originalmente por outofcontext:

I have to agree with the OP. This issue was nagging at me throughout every playthrough, especially when visiting the groove area with tiefling families.


I believe the thread is asking more for a ‘happy medium’ between candy-fantasy and mature fantasy – some kind of compromise, which also doesn’t get Larian studios bombed by some DnD zealot for mocking the name of Shar, or whoever else.

I can dig it. The only question I have is what does that happy medium look like to you. I can't get down with another human like race that exists just to make humans feel comfortable. Maybe humans need to be less comfortable. I am down for the mature fantasy over the candy-land fantasy if we're just talking about an aesthetic issue in terms of something like proportions (horns, tails, etc.) and less about adding to the already extremely diluted pool of human-esque characters.

And I completely agree about how these Tieflings would be treated in general society. Like where exactly are you going to receive that bonus from charisma? In what setting exactly?

[Ronin Gamer]

Escrito originalmente por pandariuskairos:

Escrito originalmente por Lamiosa:

I guess I understand your point: The Tieflings have lost their "magic". But that happens to many things which were cool or mysterious in past. Vampires were also cool back at Vampire Dark Ages / Vampire the Masquerade P&P I had 20 years ago, but then all the twilight stuff came made it popular for "casuals" and the magic was gone. I guess at some point that happens to many stuff that gets "too popular". However a cool character can basically be of any race, so I do not care anymore.

Not quite.

I don't mean how popular they are with players - that doesn't affect me in the slightest.

I mean how common they've become in the world of Faerun itself. They used to be a very rare sight. Teeflings were born of human parents typically, and inherited fiendish traits from an ancestor, much like how the Sorcerer inherits their magic. They weren't all running amok all over the place. There were a handful of them at most.

I don't care how many players want to play them, I only care that there's like an entire village of teeflings in BG3, and that feels like too much. Furthermore, they're portrayed as being no different from humans, except for their physical traits. They hold jobs as blacksmiths, have bratty little kids running around, get married, worry about their future prospects.

It's like the devil horns (which look like terrible, glued on props) are just there for show. There's nothing truly "fiendish" about them. They're just another "human, but with horns".

I think putting so many of them in the game was mistake.

You....guys do realize these characters are all from the same location, leaving together to get to Baldur's Gate after that city that I'm forgetting the name of got briefly dragged into the hells? Did that little story point just fly over your heads?
Just because there is a lot of them in this one location as they are trying to not all die while traveling doesn't mean the world is suddenly stuffed with them all over the place. Chill, christ.

[Pan Darius Cassandra]

Elturel.

[God King 069]

Escrito originalmente por Ronin Gamer:

Escrito originalmente por pandariuskairos:

Not quite.

I don't mean how popular they are with players - that doesn't affect me in the slightest.

I mean how common they've become in the world of Faerun itself. They used to be a very rare sight. Teeflings were born of human parents typically, and inherited fiendish traits from an ancestor, much like how the Sorcerer inherits their magic. They weren't all running amok all over the place. There were a handful of them at most.

I don't care how many players want to play them, I only care that there's like an entire village of teeflings in BG3, and that feels like too much. Furthermore, they're portrayed as being no different from humans, except for their physical traits. They hold jobs as blacksmiths, have bratty little kids running around, get married, worry about their future prospects.

It's like the devil horns (which look like terrible, glued on props) are just there for show. There's nothing truly "fiendish" about them. They're just another "human, but with horns".

I think putting so many of them in the game was mistake.

You....guys do realize these characters are all from the same location, leaving together to get to Baldur's Gate after that city that I'm forgetting the name of got briefly dragged into the hells? Did that little story point just fly over your heads?
Just because there is a lot of them in this one location as they are trying to not all die while traveling doesn't mean the world is suddenly stuffed with them all over the place. Chill, christ.

Heh you know when they get to one word responses you've got them.

Yeah there are story driven reasons for their being so many in one particular spot and Halsin seems like the type of person to figure things out before making judgements. And Baldur's Gate is known for it's inclusivity so it makes sense that that would be their destination and would be a general exception to many townships in terms of how outsiders particularly those of exotic races would be treated.

So I do get the OPs point, It's just that the story lends backbone to why it would be feasible.

[neo2157]

Escrito originalmente por pandariuskairos:

Escrito originalmente por neo2157:

I used to play tiefling in older edition's of D&D, back then then some of the bloodlines were much more human looking then other's so you could kinda hand wave it in as they could probably blend in if they kept the horns and tail hidden. I don't really play them much anymore because they look much more infernal and I have a hard time suspending my disbelief when the party starts looking less humanoid. I will say though that tiefling's arn't quite that common and you only see allot of them act 1 of bg3 due to story related reasons, typically they prefer not to be seen.

In older editions, they could have a variety of traits, including horns or a tail (rarely), or glowing eyes, but they didn't all look the same.

My point about their look now, at least in BG3, is that their look has become standardized. It's a uniform that instantly tells anyone looking at them that they are devil spawn. There's no ambiguity left, and that sucks.

They do give you the tools to make a make a less blatent looking tiefling as a player character though, I was able to make one that could pass for a human at a distance. its not just BG3 new offfical art for tieflings looks much less humanoid in general so i can't really fault larian for that, also to be fair there are MUCH worse things in d&d to be suspicious about then tiefling's (a lolth sworn drow for example is usually a sign bad for things to come for your town.)

[Pan Darius Cassandra]

Escrito originalmente por neo2157:

Escrito originalmente por pandariuskairos:

In older editions, they could have a variety of traits, including horns or a tail (rarely), or glowing eyes, but they didn't all look the same.

My point about their look now, at least in BG3, is that their look has become standardized. It's a uniform that instantly tells anyone looking at them that they are devil spawn. There's no ambiguity left, and that sucks.

They do give you the tools to make a make a less blatent looking tiefling as a player character though, I was able to make one that could pass for a human at a distance. its not just BG3 new offfical art for tieflings looks much less humanoid in general so i can't really fault larian for that.

But I'm not talking about the PC's, I'm talking about the teeflings in teh grove.

[Hobocop]

Escrito originalmente por Ronin Gamer:

You....guys do realize these characters are all from the same location, leaving together to get to Baldur's Gate after that city that I'm forgetting the name of got briefly dragged into the hells? Did that little story point just fly over your heads?
Just because there is a lot of them in this one location as they are trying to not all die while traveling doesn't mean the world is suddenly stuffed with them all over the place. Chill, christ.

It's almost as if there was some adventure module that came out fairly recently that features a certain eponymous city and fiendish incursions in and around said city or something, and BG3 is set after those events.

[Ronin Gamer]

Escrito originalmente por Hobocop:

Escrito originalmente por Ronin Gamer:

You....guys do realize these characters are all from the same location, leaving together to get to Baldur's Gate after that city that I'm forgetting the name of got briefly dragged into the hells? Did that little story point just fly over your heads?
Just because there is a lot of them in this one location as they are trying to not all die while traveling doesn't mean the world is suddenly stuffed with them all over the place. Chill, christ.

It's almost as if there was some adventure module that came out fairly recently that features a certain eponymous city and fiendish incursions in and around said city or something, and BG3 is set after those events.

......?
Yes, that is exactly what I was saying in my original post. What are you getting at?

[Hobocop]

Escrito originalmente por Ronin Gamer:

Escrito originalmente por Hobocop:

It's almost as if there was some adventure module that came out fairly recently that features a certain eponymous city and fiendish incursions in and around said city or something, and BG3 is set after those events.

......?
Yes, that is exactly what I was saying in my original post. What are you getting at?

I'm agreeing with you and riffing a bit on folks who think that the Forgotten Realms doesn't exist or have the state of the setting progress outside of the computer games.