AL Season 9 Tieflings and Aasimar

[Constructman]

Between the kerfuffle over the character season lock change, I saw this:

https://i.imgur.com/hht1SXS.png

If you can't see the image, at Level 5:
- Tieflings have the option to replace their Infernal Legacy trait from their subrace with the Winged Tiefling's wings (fly speed of 30)
- Aasimar have the option to replace their innate Light Cantrip from Light Bearer and their Level 3 subrace ability with feathered wings (also fly speed of 30)

While the changes themselves are AL specific, I wonder if any home DMs would be interested in letting their Aasimar characters have permanent wings from the start?

[GreyBlack]

Between the kerfuffle over the character season lock change, I saw this:

https://i.imgur.com/hht1SXS.png

If you can't see the image, at Level 5:
- Tieflings have the option to replace their Infernal Legacy trait from their subrace with the Winged Tiefling's wings (fly speed of 30)
- Aasimar have the option to replace their innate Light Cantrip from Light Bearer and their Level 3 subrace ability with feathered wings (also fly speed of 30)

While the changes themselves are AL specific, I wonder if any home DMs would be interested in letting their Aasimar characters have permanent wings from the start?

Eh. Flight really isn't a problem in my opinion. If you're in the dungeon, you can only fly so high anyway. And, even then, what's to keep the enemy from trying to shoot you out of the sky?

[Dracoqwerty]

Personally, I wouldn't because it, just like the Aarakocra, creates a power balance issue between Aasimar/tiefling and non-aasimar/tiefling characters because now any aasimar/tiefling ranged character that benefits from keeping opponents at a distance now has easy access to that at a level where ranged weapons are often the only recourse to take down flying creatures, which can partially or fully invalidate many encounters. In addition, the out of combat uses of flight make most athletics checks irrelevant - why put points into a skill that lets you climb if you can just easily fly without any risk whatsoever. At 5th level, at least a wizard, sorcerer, or warlock can cast fly so it's slightly more balanced, however if I were to implement that change I would alter it so that you wouldn't gain the abilities in levels 1-4 whatsoever - it would be a decision between getting flight but being slightly weaker until then, or getting some spell-like abilities that help you in the short term but are (in some ways) less eventually powerful than flight

Draco

[OverLordOcelot]

Personally, I wouldn't because it, just like the Aarakocra, creates a power balance issue between Aasimar/tiefling and non-aasimar/tiefling characters because now any aasimar/tiefling ranged character that benefits from keeping opponents at a distance now has easy access to that at a level where ranged weapons are often the only recourse to take down flying creatures, which can partially or fully invalidate many encounters. In addition, the out of combat uses of flight make most athletics checks irrelevant - why put points into a skill that lets you climb if you can just easily fly without any risk whatsoever. At 5th level, at least a wizard, sorcerer, or warlock can cast fly so it's slightly more balanced, however if I were to implement that change I would alter it so that you wouldn't gain the abilities in levels 1-4 whatsoever - it would be a decision between getting flight but being slightly weaker until then, or getting some spell-like abilities that help you in the short term but are (in some ways) less eventually powerful than flight

Flight is not that big of a deal in AL, under AL rules it's easy to unlock winged boots or a broom of flying and you can afford one at level 5, so any fight that's going to be invalidated is likely to have another player invalidating it. Also, flight only covers a few out of combat athletics checks, it doesn't help against environmental hazards (if the winds are high enough to require athletics checks to walk, it's usually a higher DC or disadvantage if you're flying) or moving or opening objects. It also doesn't bypass the chase rules, so while you might get advantage, you're still going to have to make athletics or acrobatics checks when someone is trying to get away. Altering it so that you have to make the choice at level 1 instead of level 5 is pointless under AL rules, as you can completely rebuild a character as much as you want until you play a game as level 5.