Tieflings, derived from human bloodlines, have a unique appearance with large horns in various shapes. They are well-suited for Bards due to their strong CHA and good spells. The Bloodline of Asmodeus has +2 CHA, while the MToF Bloodline of Baalzebul has +2 CHA but with less. The Tiefling class offers an advantage on intimidation checks if used effectively and uses no spell slots or Concentration.
Two variants of the Tiefling are Feral and Feral. Feral Tieflings use Charisma for their Spellcasting trait, while Feral Tieflings can be used to summon, conjure, and evocation spells. Tieflings also possess supernatural abilities, which vary by bloodline and individual level. Darkvision is a common ability that allows them to cast all upcast spells as level 2 spells.
Twilight is an innate ability that can be seen and countered by a normal guard. Tieflings have powers that can be turned to evil, and their reception by society is influenced by their bloodline. Their selection of resource-free spells can be useful in emergencies, especially when Warlocks can’t. Hellish Rebuke is a reaction taken on someone else’s turn, and you can cast a spell when it reaches your turn again.
Twilights can be born of Devils or Demons, and they are known for their chaotic nature. Some tieflings may have a shark-like tail, an axolotl tail, or even a dragon tail. The DnD Tiefling is a unique species that is unique to the world of Dungeons and Dragons, with horned, hellish, and charismatic traits.
📹 What If Tieflings… Were BETTER?
In this video, I look over tieflings for Dungeons and Dragons 5e and make them better. ──── ▷ Discord: …
Can tieflings be hurt by fire?
Tieflings, also known as devilkin or infernals, are humanoids with devilish ancestry, known for their charismatic nature and resistance to fire. They are distinguished by their large horns on their heads and their extravagant appearance. Their diabolic origins result in an array of fiendish features, such as horns, tails, hooves, fangs, and wings. However, their appearance and ancestry do not necessarily mean they are evil themselves. They have a wide array of skin tones, most commonly deep crimson, purple, blue, green, and even yellow and pink.
Tieflings are believed to have been created in Issylra during the Age of Arcanum by a cabal of warlocks seeking more otherworldly power. Their children were marked with the fiendish influence of their masters. An alternative theory suggests that the first tieflings were created in the city of Ghor Dranas in Wildemount, as the inhabitants tied their bloodlines to Asmodeus in exchange for magical knowledge. Although these were not the first tieflings, there might be some truth in their origin myth in the city of the Betrayer Gods, as tieflings from Rosohna tend to share the Father of Lies’ red skin.
What is the spellcasting ability of tiefling?
The Infernal Legacy trait enables players to cast hellish rebuke and darkness spells at the 3rd and 5th level, respectively. Following a period of rest, the player may regain the ability to cast these spells. The ability to cast these spells is dependent on the character’s Charisma score. Additionally, players may communicate in Common and Infernal languages.
Can tieflings cry?
Tiefling is a condition that results in the inability to blink or shed tears.
Can tieflings get pregnant?
Tieflings can be born through simple mating, live birth, or mating with humans with devilish blood. They are infernal-cursed humanoids from the world of Godsen. Tiefling names can be derived from their culture, their fiendish heritage, or from a virtue or concept they adopt. Male infernal names include Akmenos, Amnon, Barakas, Damakos, Ekemon, Iados, Kairon, Leucis, Melech, Mordai, Morthos, Pelaios, Skamos, and Therai. Female infernal names include Akta, Anakis, Bryseis, Criella, Damaia, Ea, Kallista, Lerissa, Makaria, Nemeia, Orianna, Phelaia, and Rieta.
Tieflings tend to have the ideals of a Sinner, seeking men and women with larger features. They can be born into another culture, adopt a name reflecting their fiendish heritage, or adopt a name that signifies a virtue or concept.
Do tieflings have spells?
The spells that Tieflings gain at the third level are, in fact, first-level spells. This includes such spells as hellish rebuke, ray of sickness, disguise self, charm person, disguise self (again), armor of Agathys, Tenser’s floating disk, burning hands, and searing smite. In the event that JavaScript is disabled or blocked by extensions, the following message will be displayed.
Do tieflings know magic?
Darkvision is a common trait among Asmodeans, who can see in complete darkness but cannot discern color. They can innately cast various magical abilities, such as thaumaturgy and darkness. Some less common bloodlines cast spells like vicious mockery, charm person, enthrall, and more. Some are born with the Infernal language and have an innate resistance to elements, such as fire, cold, and electricity. Some bloodlines also possess the ability to understand languages and manipulate objects.
Do tieflings have fire magic?
Tieflings, also known as devilkin or infernals, are humanoids with devilish ancestry and are distinguished by their large horns on their heads. They are known for their extravagant appearance and carefree attitude. Their diabolic origins result in an array of fiendish features, such as horns, tails, hooves, fangs, and wings. However, their appearance and ancestry do not necessarily mean they are evil themselves. They have a wide array of skin tones, most commonly deep crimson, purple, blue, green, and even yellow and pink.
Tieflings are believed to have been created in Issylra during the Age of Arcanum by a cabal of warlocks seeking more otherworldly power. Their children were marked with the fiendish influence of their masters. An alternative theory suggests that the first tieflings were created in the city of Ghor Dranas in Wildemount, as the inhabitants tying their bloodlines to Asmodeus in exchange for magical knowledge. There might be some truth in their origin myth in the city of the Betrayer Gods, as nowadays tieflings from Rosohna tend to share the Father of Lies’ red skin.
What are tieflings afraid of?
Tieflings were generally untrustworthy and had a deep animosity towards other races, particularly aasimar and Devas. They felt the most kinship with half-orcs, who were also targets of revulsion and hate. Religiously, tieflings had a variety of gods, with Beshaba, the goddess of bad luck, appealing to many due to their collective sense of misfortune. Many evil tieflings channeled their dark emotions into aggression, often serving Cyric. Gargauth, Mask, and Shar also attracted worshipers seeking vengeance.
Ecology was also a concern for tieflings, as they were carnivores, eating blood, blubber, bone, gristle, and meat. They even roasted insects and considered raw bone marrow a delicacy. The Spellplague and the god’s disappearance led to the influx of tiefling thieves to Gargauth’s church. Overall, tieflings were a diverse group of people with diverse religious beliefs and beliefs.
Do tieflings have to be evil?
In the 5th edition, tieflings are not innately evil but often end up in chaotic situations due to prejudice. They have a fierce independent streak and are more common in the Forgotten Realms campaign setting, with elven and orc counterparts. In the 3rd Edition of Dungeons and Dragons, less common tiefling varieties were introduced, including the Maeluth, a dwarven counterpart, and the Wispling, a halfling counterpart.
What magic class is best for Tiefling?
The warlock class is ideal for tieflings due to its flavor and gameplay stats. These CHA-based characters can cast powerful magic, use traits like wings, fire resistance, and innate Armor of Agathys and Darkness to stay alive. The Hexblade warlock is popular for tieflings with the right combo, as it can innately cast Darkness and attack enemies within that darkness with a heavy blow, making enemies disadvantageized when attacking the fragile Hexblade tiefling.
What race hates tieflings?
Tieflings are a race of humans who are known for their animosity towards other races, particularly aasimar and Devas. They have no true homelands and are found throughout Toril, but were particularly common in Mulhorand and Unther before the Spellplague. They were also present in Thay, where many were slaves and served as assassins, thieves, and spies. However, the takeover by Szass Tam drove many out of the region. Today, tieflings are most commonly found in Narfell and High Imaskar, but they are also welcome in Tymanther due to the dragonborns’ racial tolerance policy.
They have allied with the genasi servants of Memnon in Calimshan, where they are a valued addition to the efreet’s war against his rival Calim. They are also found along the Sword Coast, particularly Baldur’s Gate, and parts of the Dragon Coast. In Aglarond, the race is only begrudgingly tolerated as enemies of Thay. The animosity between tieflings and other races is exemplified by their fear of aasimar and Devas.
📹 D&D sent me the New Tiefling (and I have thoughts)
The tiefling has risen in popularity in D&D lately. Tieflings are so popular that the next iteration of DnD has them as a core option …
One time, I DMed a game where this robot AI dude was following the characters around via a screen on the Warforged’s chest. They came to a massive creature that spoke Abyssal, and I figured that, in order to make the party hate this AI more, he would be racist and assume that the Tiefling knew Abyssal. When I told the Tiefling to “try and talk to it” in character, they said “oh, sure!”, and I had to remind them that their character could, in fact, not speak Abyssal.
I know it’s rare but I actuallu once used the fact of dark vision not showing the colours. I’ve had a party made out of only dark vision races(typical for 5e) and due to that they did not carry any torches. So in one of my dungeons i made a puzzle based around pulling the levers with right colours. It took them like like half an hour but finally they made a torch with a mace and peaces of ripped cloths ant lit it up with fire ball (yes my players are very creative)
Instead of the scents thing, how about perceived temperature changes? In the presence of Abyssal Tieflings, the room seems to grow colder and breath becomes visible, despite no actual change in temperature. For Infernal Tieflings, some creatures nearby may begin panting or exhibiting signs of dehydration, despite the temperature remaining unchanged. If Cthonic Tieflings smell weird they can keep that in my opinion, I think that’s funny.
I found Pointy Hat at the beginning of last week and now have binged all of his articles. Genuinely the most creative dnd stuff I’ve ever seen, including official material. I can’t get over how cool each twist is. I genuinely haven’t disliked a single one and so many of them have made me actually want to play races/classes/in locations that I never had any interest in before. I am a relatively new dm, but I am planning to include so many of Pointy Hat’s creations in my campaign going forward. Not only are the stat locks interesting and dynamic, but each twist provides so many story hooks that makes it practically impossible to not find a way to work them into your story. The Tips of the Hat have also really helped me and given me so many ideas on how to be a better dm. All this to say, thank you so much for all you do. I can’t imagine having to make all this, especially for free. Each article doesn’t just have amazing dnd stuff, but each is just so funny and entertaining that I would watch them anyway even if they didn’t have any dnd stuff. It would be awesome to see a kickstarter project or dnd home brew book one day from you. I hope you have a wonderful day, and thank you again!
Hello, hopefully I’m not the bad guy, but I don’t understand the dislike of species based attribute bonuses and decreases. Different species evolve differently and have different strengths and weaknesses. For instance an elephant is larger, stronger, and tougher than any human, but a Loxodon is meant to have the same base stats as a human or a halfling? I guess I understand it for balance reasons, but it makes all species feel fundamentally identical, which is the exact opposite reason why other species in fantasy and sci-fi are so cool. He mentioned it odd that elves have higher intelligence than other species. This is something I agree with in part, depending on the setting. I always understood the bonus to intelligence to reflect their old age, an elf reaches adulthood at 100, they have lived an entire lifetime before they even begin adventuring. It makes sense to reflect 100 years of education, experience, and accumulated knowledge mechanically right? Intelligence for the longest time reflected the number of skills you had, which is reflective of your life experiences and knowledge. You still roll for attributes, or use point buy, so you still pick which attributes are low and high only with bonuses to reflect your species. I suppose picking where to put bonuses makes it easier to power game, but I feel like conceding interesting differences between species for that is a heavy downgrade for mechanical storytelling. I’m not trying to fight here or anything, I just don’t think I’ve ever heard an explanation for why it’s a bad thing.
Btw, allowing players to put their ASIs literally wherever they want is part of the custom background mechanic available to DMs in the new DMG, so if you want to let your players have literally whatever background they want, you are allowed to allow that, of course you are allowed to do anything, but you are encouraged to work with a player to make their own unique custom background which makes sense for your campaign setting (maybe there is a band of librarian pirates in your setting, plundering the booty of knowledge, I am playing a pirate wizard in a campaign literally right now)
I’ve stuck with the concept of inherent proficiencies/ASIs in the original 5e rules for my modern game, which may seem strange but it makes sense in the lore. In this setting all non-humans are “living stories,” literally folklore, narrative, etc., archetypes come to live in an extradimensional realm. They’re normally not actually sapient (any more than a character in a book is sapient) unless an actual human interacts with them for an extended period of time in such a way that they’re treated as a person (despite explicitly and obviously not being one) and forced to break out of the narrative concept that gave birth to them. But they still retain some of the skills that they had. An elf speaks Elvish (or Gaelic or Norse — it’s a modern setting) and knows how to use a longbow because the popular concept of an elf involves speaking those languages and wielding that weapon. Same for being stronger or smarter — I have a species that’s a standard Ufology “grey alien” that gets an inherent +2 bonus to INT because its whole folklore concept, the thing that caused it to exist, is “superintelligent alien” and making it not intelligent wouldn’t work. In a way it’s really meta, where what made it exist out of universe is also what did it in-universe. (Planetouched are different — they didn’t go through this process, they’re just people who were affected by some form of planar power, but that still affects people in odd ways. Also, I love tieflings having Infernal inherently, since I like the idea of extraplanar languages not just being normal languages that are spoken, but the actual tongue of the plane of existence, with some factors that make it difficult or impossible to learn normally, like constantly changing of its own accord on a day-to-day basis.
#1: Backgrounds had features, just most DM’s didnt use them well. As example, Acolytes can get free care at temples, including casting Revive spells as long as you have the component. There ones for getting around towns faster, and a few that even did have feats. #2: No one will use the background stats. Everyone since Tasha’s has placed 2 in one score and 1 in another score, and you just choose. #3: The feats are a bit weak and dont function with traditional 5e, so if you do use them you need to use ALL of the 2024 rules, and get rid of the old stuff, allowing you to play old 5e characters but in this new rule system. OG 5e can work with 2024, but not the other way.
Cthonic tieflings feels so damn good conceptwise. I already have so many ideas on how I can illustrate multiple variants based on the descriptive alone, since it refers to the word used to associate greek deities to the underworld and the earth in general. For example: imagine a cthonic tiefling venerated in an isolated tribe with an earth based cult, they value nature but have the wisdom to care for all aspects in it, not only life but the return of said life to the soil, the death aspect of the thing being seen as a fountain of life in the cycle. Then, this character is pressured by their traditions since their birth to become their sage in that matter(As a class, we can make they a spores druid or grave domain cleric, for example). What happens when something considered “unnatural” by them starts to damage the local nature and they discover that the source is in other lands? Will the character take the mission to adventure in unknown foreign lands to save their people? Will they flee because they cannot hold those responsibilities that they never asked for anymore? How the outside world will view they and how they will react to it? Maybe they’re able to teach things about death that leave people in piece with it, maybe they will be seen as some bad omen that brings disease because bigotry about those isolated tribes, SO MANY BRANCHES!
I could maybe see the bard changin to Eloquence instead of whispers (Spell choice would make up for some of the class features) and maybe Grave domain cleric instead of necromancer. All options for changing them up but I love all these ideas. They’re sweet yet tragic but with defined goals that make them great.
my first long dnd character. Druscylla was a dhamphir born of a tiefling father and a vampire elf mother and basically was a lilac skin white haired tiefling, she inherited the unique trait to eat pain and suffering instead of blood, which helped as her parents were healers in the kingdom she grew up in. She went on a long adventure in a spelljammer type world but returned to her home realm to become a great doctor type being a circle of the stars druid to heal and start a charity to reincarnate terminally ill children. that’s her story for now, but her home is like the Xmansion of a gothic refugee for monsters who don’t want to be evil
Dude, your first article is the first one I ever saw from your website, and I’ve been following you ever since. It was such a well-made article that I didn’t realize until a year later when I went back to look for it that you were new. You’ve been doing a great job, man. And as a Hispanic Tiefling enjoyed myself, gotta say I’m pretty sure your opinions are just objective truth
Oh. I just realised what is missing from what you describe. My favourite character is a winged tiefling (I know some people think that wings are OP but frankly if a DM can’t make an adventure that isn’t broken by flight then they’re going to struggle when players get access to common magic items – flying broom is super cheap and faster than most PCs). She’s also a pale pastel pink but with bony horns… so somewhere between abyssal and cthonic, but her background has her as the daughter of a succubus (the mother that dreams of dominating a plane of hell and wants evil minions) but is just too nice and naive to be taken seriously in the hells so is sent out to learn how people are – but she’s having none of it and is just a happy-go-lucky ball of chaos casually mage-handing a necklace out of a window because it was shiny, or fire-bolting the creepy undead rabbits that the GM then informs us that they emit flamable gas, and as this one is by the warren of hundreds of them that my PC just blew up 2/3 of the farm we’re here to save… before pulling a chicken from her pack of seemingly endless chickens and taking a big bite oblivious to the looks she gets while worried onlookers try to block out the panicked clucking. But that aside she’s meant to resemble her mother pretty, elegant and winged. Hmm. Going to have to hope there’s wiggle room for character creation in this new version if we’re asked to remake things for the new edition
Your Tiefling article was the first Pointy Hat article I ever watched. I was in the aftermath of a hellish breakup where the ex would. not. leave. It was funny (not the ex – your article), got me out of my head, made me smile for the first time in a few weeks, and reminded me of this game I love and almost forgot. About 5 articles later, the ex finally left, but I was already reminded I had better things to do. You and I were born different and that is a good thing, no matter how many people demand we “should” have been born differently (I mean, what does that even mean? Who am I supposed to sue? God, my parents? The purple Tele-Tubby?). You never even met me, and you helped me through a really rough time. I think all the different, rare, and beautiful ways you are – these are things you should feel good about being – because you are good, and you were made right exactly the way you are. That’s why so many people enjoy perusal what you make on this website. We are Tieflings, and proud of it, so let our horns soar with pride. Those people who are so caught up in something about you that has nothing to do with them are just a bunch of lousy dragons: bad dragons, really bad dragons.
I really like the fact they gave tiefling lineages actually useful spells. In MToF the 2nd level spell you got for reaching level 3 was a 1st level that was considered upcast, even when the spell itself didn’t specify anything about upcasting (i’m looking at you disguise self). Although i think a lot of players, mine included, also like the illusionist or charmer side of tieflings, and i hope they come up with an option for those styles of play (like bloodline of glaysya or fierna). I thought that’s what they were gonna do with the chtonic one, since it’s related to hags. right now the three options seem to be focused mainly on damage output, which can be limitating
The Chthonic Legacy is perfect for my oldest character concept: Adopted off the streets by a local thieves guild as a child, Grentilda Cackle (“Gren” to her friends) has always been a bit odd. Her mannerisms and hobbies have always seemed more like those of an old grandmother than a young lady. She also has no memories of her life before she wandered into the city. However, she grew up as a cheerful girl who treated the guild like a family. As she grew older, Gren was plagued by horrible nightmares. In these nightmares, she recalled a terrible Night Hag and her young daughter, who was fated to also become a Hag on her thirteenth birthday. Gren also discovered that she had access to magic beyond that of a typical Tiefling; blasts of eldritch energy, bursts of flame from her fingertips and the ability to compel others to obey simple commands. Fearing that the Hag from her nightmares would hunt her down and destroy her family, Gren sets out to confront them. However, she may not have fully understood who, or what, she really is.
I have a teifling druid character with dragon like horns and a pale pink/white color scheme, and I am so excited to think she could fit well into the Cthonic or Demonic Lineages! 🥰 I made her at the time where the teifling bloodline wasnt explicitly fiendish, and went with a god-level, neutral, dragon being like, her great (×3) grandparent.
Yeah, the whole changing it to species thing is a bit questionable choice, in my opinion. I get that race can be a loaded term for some people, and they wanted to avoid that, but idk if species was the best alternative, since it implies more of an divide between different people, and that they are fundamentally different. It also makes it seem that they are afraid of the term race and things like interracial couples (not saying that they are, but it does make it seem that way) Personally I think it’s not too big of a deal, and most people won’t care, but they should probably have thought twice about it. Personally i would have just done the pathfinder thing and picked something like ancestry, since it sounds better, but it’s honestly not a big deal, and i like the legacies for the tieflings, with the three types of fiends.
I dont even understand the old “they tend towards chaos” when MOST tieflings were/are infernal in heritage. Which would make them lean towards lawful evil IF ANYTHING. But then all the plotlines about them had them leaning towards chaotic neutral/chaotic good/chaotic evil. Which makes NO SENSE. UNLESS. ALIGNMENTS ARE STUPID? Lmao. It actually makes more sense for discriminated species to be pushed towards crime and chaotic behavior. BUT if your tiefling embraces their infernal heritage they might actually be a ruthless lawful evil character. Its not strict tho. Cause strict alignments be dummy.
Im not sure how I feel about the new origins for tieflings. All the lore I have read has made it sound like associating with demons would sooner get you dismembered and turned into paste rather than produce a tiefling. I like the yugoloth one, but that still doesnt feel quite right either, though I do love the characrer you came up with using it. With a lot of the stuff I’ve seen so far for the new books, I dont know how to feel. In some cases, there are some great and much-needed changes, but on the other hand, the retcons and lore implications being made are rough on people that actually enjoy the cosmology and lore of D&D, and I can’t say I’m a fan of the pandering WOTC has been doing as of late towards certain groups. The new tiefling art is sick, and some of the new stuff sounds cool, but I think I’ll stick with older 5E rather than this pre-One D&D book set.
The only tieflings I have had in the works are a large bone white tiefling with black horns, hands, feet, hair, and tail (in a gradient from the white body), and a violet tiefling with lavender hair and gold eyes and horns that was to be a rich boy wizard disowned by his family for being too horny with commoners. I tend to play characters differently than how the books say I should, and often wonder when/if they will ever make even some monsters playable as characters. A knoll left alone after an adventuring party slaid his whole clan, only to be shown mercy by another party and faithfully follows them on their adventures. Or a lamia/naga that uses her foreign sex appeal and belly dancer background to work as a deadly assassin by brewing a poison that basically acts as power word kill that takes months to make just a single vial. I actually enjoy many of the things others distain when wanting to play D&D. Please, give me a week’s travel to the next town, and even if literally nothing happens the fourth and fifth days of the journey, I will still love to hear about the vast endless fields of wheat as far as the eye can see.
Re: Dark vision shades of grey. I made a point of using this in my game – only commenting because it felt like my own “with a twist” that I was kinda proud of and thought you might like. Whenever players were underground with DV I would always very intentionally (heavy-handedly) describe things in greyscale, even using a few puzzles that relied on color and forced players to light torches. This went on until they encountered a gem in a dungeon, a bright shining gem that glowed an indescribable color … sort of purple, but a yellowish-purple? or maybe a bright reddish-green but also no color you’d ever seen above ground? … it was Radiant and Beguiling – literally, it would immediately add a point of madness if observed in the light. Shades of Lovecraft, “The Colour Out of Space” Players just wrapped it in a shirt and disappeared it into the bottom of a Bag of Holding. Campaign fell apart before I could reveal but I was going to tie it into “bee-purple” and have them meet a hive of dire-bees that used it as a … I hadn’t actually got to that part yet, but would have probably been cool
Let’s be entirely clear: A +2 to a stat is a minor deviation from the average human. An average elf is more dexterous than an average human. That’s just a culturally known fact – from one tiny adjustment to stats. Often they are substantially more dexterous, because when you’ve got a strength, you tend to play into it. Due to this, elves are often flourishing dervishes, or impressive archers. But the overwhelming majority of your actual bonus comes from your “background” already – ie your stat distribution. Completely erasing any “species” difference in stats, even as small as they were, means that it’s just a dress your character puts on. And the powers have to do all of the work for characterizing any of the “species,” or mountains of flavor text that used to take up 5 letters/numbers. If a 12-year-old half-orc is literally just as good at being a wizard as a 100-year-old elf, you lose a lot of cultural short hand that makes your typical fantasy world understandable without detailed, specific knowledge of your specific world.
Not directly related to Tieflings, but I have seen/written some house rules house rules that rationalized any INT/WIS/CHA Racial modifiers as either having to do with how long the race lived; their starting ages/life expectancy, and/or how socially inclusive their homeland’s cultures were. Goblins, for examples, gave no farts about book smarts, so they’d begin play with -1 INT. Humans, being some of the best wheeler and dealers in the know world, on the other hand, could start with +2 CHA. More, for the curious: A sample from one of my more developed sets. Each Race had 2 fixed modifiers, and a set of modifiers the player could choose between. Dwarves: +1 CON, -1 DEX, +2 STR or INT Elves: +1 INT, -1 CON, +2 DEX or WIS Goblins: +1 CON, -1 INT, +2 STR or DEX Humans: +1 CON, -1 WIS, +2 STR or CHA etc I feel if it’s a fantasy setting where the world is populated with very physiologically different races/species, then it’s logical (imo: preferable) for them to have mechanically distinct physiological capabilities, and if they live for very different amounts of time, have very different life/maturity processes, or come from drastically different cultures which may not assign the same cultural value to things like: history, record keeping, critical processes, etc, then it also stands to reason that there would be some disparity or variation between the general education/worldliness/exposure/logical-values between members of those races/species/cultures. But then, again just logically, if their propensity for like-minded rationality is equally or more-so determined by where and how they are raised, then you start having to differentiate their hereditary origins and their cultural background, which you could do by having a set of choices for each, but you we’re already in the weeds with this, and it just goes deeper form there.
My two favorite Tieflingcharakters are both Warlocks. One of a Genie and one of an Archfey. Both have wings. Because it makes fun to snipe the enemy from 300 ft away. But I really like that there are now demonic Tieflings. Makes my mind go wild with tentacles in the hair that move independently from the strands of hair. All of my Tieflings have kind of loving parents… My One Shot Tiefling (Circle of the Spores Druid) was a hexblood because her real father (a devil wanted her, a Deal made by her mother) and Hags wanted her (A Deal made by her father). The hags wonXD But I am talking again. I kinda like the new concept of the Tieflings. But I have a biiiig question: Can I still have wings? I want my wings😂
i’m one of those players/dm’s that thinks there still should be some in world hesitation around tieflings, they are conected and kinda look like beings from the lower planes who have quite a bad reputation for a good reason. i think there should be prejudices in a medieval fantasy setting towards certain groups (may that be justified (which is rarely) or not) it shouldn’t be like our own modern day world, where we had centuries to get to the level of social exceptance that we have nowadays. if there is not it feels kinda weird for me atleast.
10:12 I actually LIKE that Alignments are A Thing. I LIKE that Good and Evil and Order and Chaos are actual real tangible concepts in the game that can be measured and detected. It’s a bit of FANTASY for my fantasy role playing game that if someone does terrible things they can be called out as capital e Evil and their wickedness can literally be detected with the right tools. Do Alignments work As Written? Not really. But that’s fine, they just need a little homebrew is all. I totally agree that no Race Species should have “Alignment” as part of their stat blocks but I push back against people that want to remove Alignments from the game altogether. Denizens of the so called Outer Planes that are of a particular Alignment or Alignments could maybe still have it or “Alignment” could just removed from all stat blocks and there is a bit in descriptions that they “typically match” their home planes. Thanks for the article.
ooooh i love tieflings i’m glad that they’ve stayed in spirit and have done some really cool stuff with them. i’m loving the legacies and the ideas that can stem from them. they actually fit my current tiefling characters really well, i love giving my tiefs more odd traits so i’m really liking how the abyssal legacy makes it not just a kind of weird design choice on my end, i look forward to seeing what else can be done with them 🙂
I think people are sleeping on the Turathi tieflings from 4th edition. A race of ex-human nobles that made a deal with Asmodeus to gain power, in a long forgotten war with the dragonborn empire, resulting in the eventual destruction of both empires. There’s so much there and I’ve never heard about anyone else using that lore.
My largest problem with 5th’s tiefling was that it was 4th’s tiefling with a pretty Faerunian bow on it. It wasn’t until the Sword Coast Guide that we got a nod (via a sidebar) of tieflings that didn’t have the same origin as 4th’s tiefling. For me tieflings were only properly represented in the original Planescape set and that’s how I run them for my characters.
Yeay! Yugoloth Tieflings at last! Also, love that most of the technicolor Tieflings are having a great time, except two who appear to be questioning their life choices… XD For what it’s worth I actually already had an Abyssal and a two Yugoluth Tieflings as NPCs in my campaign, but I hadn’t decided what sorts of abilities to give the two Yugoluth descent ladies do to there LITERALLY being NOTHING on those. The Abyssal Tiefling is a Wildmagic Sorcerer and the grandaughter of the Demon Lord Graz’zt (who is basically considered “the hot one” of the 5e Demon Lords) who is currently working as a courtesan to pay for her tuition to one of the setting’s magic schools where she hopes to gain more control over her abilities and not have to worry about causing some sort of horrible disaster when she casts spells. She’s the primary witness of an incident where a Fey showed up at the establishment she works at, and tricked several courtesans into giving him their names, and was the only one who escaped because she thought he was annoying and responded “Pudding and tame” when he asked her what her name was, which he mistook as being a Virtue name rather than her trying to get him to leave her alone. She’s understandably outraged about what happened to her coworkers, and as a magic user herself, is willing to help the party fight the fey to get them back. She is also going by “Pudding” for the time being as she’s kinda paranoid about names at the moment. One of the Yugoluth Tieflings is the grandmother of Todd, the human Wizard NPC the party recruited.
The new 3 different types of tieflings is a return to form, 3rd edition tieflings could be from any fiend and demons seemed to be more common. They had a lore change in 4th edition where even the non devil tieflings were now devil tieflings because of some cosmic changes in the forgotten realms. In my opinion this is a good choice because it allows a new player to be more able to customise their fiendish aesthetic which was honestly lacking in 5th edition.
Here’s the thing about Ability changes based on Species vs Background: Different Species of the Genus Panthera have naturally differing builds and thus naturally different capabilities in regards to speed, strength, eyesight, what their stomachs are capable of breaking down, and so on. I doubt that anyone would argue that for example the Species Tiger is generally stronger than the Species Jaguar, nor would anyone argue that the Species Jaguar is generally faster than the Species Tiger. There might be exceptionally fast Tigers out there which potentially are faster than exceptionally slow Jaguars, while there also might be exceptionally strong Jaguars which are stronger than exceptionally weak Tigers, but over all we accept that one Species is able to have different capabilities than another, and that the Species will impact the individuals tendencies of capabilities they develop. Yet in D&D we get told that this shouldn’t be the case. Personally I don’t have anything against the Background having some impact on the abilities of the character. If you’re comming from a studious background, then sure, you’ll likely have trained your brains more than your brawn, but I always felt like that was where your decisions for putting your ability points came from. You wanted to make a studious character so you put points into your intelligence, reflecting your life of studying. On the other hand, you could have also picked a studious background, but decided to put your ability points elsewhere, reflecting that while you got some kind of basic training (i.
… Okay I’m gonna be THAT I guy, I don’t like the speices thing. Not really that I have an issue with them dropping the Race terminology, I think getting you pants all in a twist over that is silly, but I just HATE that the replacement they went with was Species. It’s just so… dull, and honestly not all that fantasyie feeling. Ancestory, or Bloodline, or Kin, or literally ANYTHING else would of been more interesting. I feel like if you really wanna phase out Race as a terminology for the type of creature your playing in a fantasy setting, you gotta go with something that a least sounds a little interesting and a little bit more… I dunno less clinical. You already slip up a few times (or maybe not iduno) but I feel like the way it is now people will try and do species for like, a month, then just default back to calling it Race in most nonofficial capacities. I’m genuinely shocked no one in all of play testing thought, “Maybe we should use a bit more flavorful term to replace Race.” Don’t get me wrong, Race on it’s own isn’t all that flavorfully, but it’s got 50 years of history (more if you bring into the fact it’s lifted from Tolkin) and has a distinctly more archaic and historic feel to it than Species. It just feels more proper in a medieval setting, so if you wanna replace it you gotta have a sort of “Cool” factor that makes the other option feel more instreasting. TLDR: species sounds like HR speak and I wish they had found a cooler replacement for the term Race.
Tiefling in my homebrew setting are almost always born to human parents. The way it works is that if a human sleeps with a fiend then their child will be human and magically appear like their mothers husband. But if a child ends up with more than 50% fiendish DNA they are a tiefling, and fiendish DNA is magically more likely to be passed on. So the child or grandchild, and occasionally great grandchild might end up having a tiefling. Because human culture in my homebrew setting truly toxic the parents typically send the child off to live with another tiefling, usually a great uncle or older second cousin.
I never thought this was a hot take, but I like ability scores being tied to race. It gives the races personality and identity, and of course the average goliath is going to be stronger than the average gnome, because… duh. As for your background influencing your abilities, it does make sense, but you ALREADY do this, when you roll and assign your ability scores.
Hat, Dude, I love you and you make some amazing content, but I can’t in good conscious support WotC or any of their upcoming projects after everything they did, (and continue to do), including trying to basically destroy the tabletop hobby unless they could directly control it. I know they’re trying to market 6.0 or whatever it is that they’re calling it as the next best thing, and I know they’re paying you for it, but please weigh it against your integrity. We need to just keep hands off 6.0 (or whatever it’s called), and let it die. It’s ironic for the topic of the article, but you’re sleeping with the devil, man.
Changing races to species would heavily imply that there will be no half races. Rn, elves and humans can have children(most probably fertile too), since they are the same species but different races. If they were different species altogether, then they couldn’t have fertile offspring, which I feel could be a pain for backstory purposes. You no longer can have an old draconian ancestor that gave your bloodline inherent magical powers, no. Now you have to be the direct child of a dragon love affair.
Pathfinder isn’t scared to have ability scores tied to your race/species/ancestry (including *gasp*, INTELLIGENCE) They also have ability score increases from your background and class. 5e has become so “inclusive” that it has no target audience and appeals to no one. Its the lowest common denominator of TTRPGs.
1. Race is actually more accurate because they can interbreed. How you define species (Speciation) is entirely decided by what is able to interbreed (polymorphing wouldn’t count). 2. It’s fiction, elves being smarter isn’t “yikes” the same way Orcs being brutish and ugly isn’t “yikes”. It’s a defining characteristic them, without those everything would be just a homogenous grey blobs.
I totally see why some folks have problems with using the term race in D&D, but for many of the options species is actually also wrong. Humans, elves, orcs, tieflings, aasimars, dragons, various demons, devils, and celestials would all essentially count as the same species, as they are all capable of producing fertile offspring together. As a sidenote, tieflings (and aasimars, and genasi) are still technically human anyway tho. They’re literally humans with a twist. Granted, that never made a ton of sense, since devils and demons (and other extraplanar entities) can usually breed with whatever so the various planetouched should come in many varieties.
I’ve always liked Tieflings, but I’ve always felt odd about them being “human only”. Most of the time their origins are from deals with the hells their ancestors made – so why can only humans make those deals? Why don’t we have slightly altered stat blocks for Tiefling variants of other species? Imagine a Tiefling-Goliath Barbarian bull rushing the enemy, or a Tiefling-Elf exiled for not being “beautiful” thanks to having horns. I’d love it if they pull back on “2/3 of the species and legacies have darkvision”, and if they evened out the monster resistances and such. Just as everyone knows and you mention in this article, Poison as a damage type has been awful because so many enemies resist or immune it, even things that logically shouldn’t. Having bludgeoning, force, and thunder be separated feels really weird since they’re all physical percussive force; and to a lesser degree same with acid and poison being separate. Meanwhile, there’s next to nothing resistant to or immune to lightning, and if it’s a physical entity you can make it wet to give it a temporary weakness instead of a resistance. And I know this last one is a forever pipe dream, but I wish they’d loosen up on Sizes. Make the species that make sense be Large, like Goliaths or Loxodons. Let players play something weird, like a Centaur that takes up two squares, and another party member (or even an enemy seizing an opportunity) can ride them on the second square. Let some races have different move speeds, more than just “everyone gets 30 ft default, except short species get 25 ft”.
Honestly, it’s obvious how this article is just an ad for the new D&D edition. Mr. Hat, I’m a fan of your other articles. But here, all you do is talk about how great all of the changes in The New edition are, and how they are all correct. I do not think I heard a single critical opinion this entire article. Just singing WOTC’s praises for their unwanted and unnecessary changes
I still think races should give some ability score adjustments. A Goliath is build huge. Even a weak Goliath is gonna be naturally more inclined to strength than a gnome. Now maybe your Goliath isn’t strong, so just put your lowest score in strength. But to have it have no ability impact? To say a rabbit and a turtle have equal natural tendency towards dexterity and constitution
I don’t like these changes, being a specific race should come with special attributes because all of them are different, a tiny gnome shouldn’t be able to be stronger than a dwarf right off the bat just because the gnome’s background. If all races or “species” are the same fundamentally they lose much of their characteristics. WotC are mad.
For me, the race/or species giving values in wisdom, or intelligence makes a certain sense if the race is of the magical type and has a natural facility in intellectual matters or that involve wisdom like elves who are naturally wise and intelligent and beautiful beings regardless of story but it’s just a gift, not something that could be invested in if your character didn’t focus on it
5:45 Waffle House employees get the Interception Fighting Style for free from their background 🪑 6:12 They’re not biological species, though, since creatures like half-elves exist (I don’t know why they didn’t just use the term “lineage”, which was already introduced in Tasha’s with the Custom Lineage).
I hated the 4e changes to tieflings. Where we went from a wide variety of ways your tiefling could look from 3.5 to “Everyone is now hellboy.” This didn’t go back far enough to expand the looks of tieflings imo. Still have huge horns coming out of the eyebrows pretty much in all three of them. I’d want to see some tieflings that look more like the fox lady, or the standard man with goat legs and tiny horns.
I was already resolved not to give into WotC’s cash grab with a needless reshuffle of the books and this makes me doubly certain as they make backgrounds mor important? for people just starting out? this will make it even harder for FNG’s and the whole idea of L1 characters s you’re discovering hwo you are, not 6 volumes into your back story
2:33 – mostly wrong, literally same book in every place references tieflings with other evil outsiders or evil outsider kin (including the now quite forgotten alu-fiends) except for when in sigil, which along with fire in their eyes and racials (half from cold, a +2 bonus to all saving throws vs. fire, electricity or poison, aka the devil, demon and demodand + their halfspawn bonus) makes it clear for 80% of PSCS readers that its some form of evil outsiders. 2:59 – wrong again, it are people influenced by planar energies. Bariaur (and later on aasimar in the next appearance of tieflings) are the same and even appear in the same sourcebooks. Outsider is the term for someone bound to a plane other than the one the creature is on right now. Its half a chapter up and then 3 chapters later were it describes the difference between planar races vs prime races (for campaign type) vs petitioners vs outsiders (and vs what would be native outsiders for the sake of spells that effect creatures different when not on their home plane) vs proxies of powers. 3:35 – no it cant, tiefling is the human based lower planes planetouch, tanarukk is the orcish lower planes planetouched, feyri is the elf based, etc. They are their own races just as Azer arent fire Genasi.
We don’t have anything similar to the D&D species in our world, so there isn’t really a word that is “the” correct word. The D&D species are not really different species, at least what we normally understand species. The definition a species is a group of living organisms capable of interbreeding. Since there is half-elves, human and elves would be the same species and not two different species. I just think they chose species to avoid talking about races, because race is a word that carries a lot of baggage and keep calling them races wouldn’t be 100% correct either.
Why are they species and not races? I seem to be missing the part of dnd lore related to breeding possibilities. In biology for something to be a different species it has to not be able to produce fertil offspring with the other species or other hybrids. If it does, but they look significantly different, it’s a race.