Reskining races into humans

[Ogun]

I usually choose races based on the abilities I want.
Often the description of that races society gives me role playing prompts.
Recently "reskining" has become an explicitly spelled out rule.
Well kind of.
Racial mixes of any kind could be as simple as chosing the "skin" from one and the abilities from another.
With that as the premise a human/ giff hybrid becomes a "human" that is crazy strong for his size, hits like a mack truck ,very athletic and naturally good with guns.
You get to be Brendon Frasier in "The Mummy", and you haven't even chosen your class yet.

I've been looking to play very magical characters, people who can do "impossible" things, casually.
When a changling or a plasmoid change shape, it's very cool, but in DnD positively mundane.
When a "human" does it, it's kind of bananas.
This slight of hand isnt limited to "humans".
Imagine a simic hybrid that isnt.
A thri-kreen/human could fill that role nicely.

Are these naked power grabs?
I would say yes, but for me, race selection has always been that.
The negative social implications of being a giant bug man are not going to come up much at most tables that let you play thri-keen and that's OK.
Now you can have the abilities of a bug man without being one, so why not do it?
Explaining extra limbs on your human wizard is still a hook for character development(I'm going with conjoined twin for extra creep factor)


Anyway, what "human" skinned hybrids can you come up with?
Cool, ludicrous, a bit if bothbor otherwise?

[Psyren]

1) The 1DnD "half-breed" rule doesn't work with Thri-Kreen - it only lets you mix and match Humanoids, and TK are Monstrosities.

2) The assumption is that your cosmetic appearance needs to be suitable for the final product and approved by your DM. For example, not many DMs would let you be an Aarakocra Dwarf who can look indistinguishable from every other dwarf, yet fly around without needing any wings. Or a Human Lizardfolk with a bite attack despite having perfectly flat human teeth. More likely, the latter would look something closer to Prisoner Zero (https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/images/ic/976x549_b/p00nkgf6.jpg) from Doctor Who.

3) I don't see how this rule can be interpreted as a "power grab" in any event. Mechanically you will be no stronger than if you had just taken the base race your traits come from. If there's some kind of stigma against that particular race in your DM's world you might have an easier time hiding what you are, but if the stigma is that severe then half-breeds might have an even worse time of it (being rejected by both parent races), or may not even exist in your DM's world at all.

[Ogun]

I didn't catch the humanoid only rule.
That should keep a lid on some things.
The dwarf example certainly needs wings, or something obvious that provides flight and works like wings.
A flying carpet
A man with the attributes of lizardfolk could be a good fit for a Neanderthal, a Mr. Hyde type, or someone with heavy body modification.

There are a lot of humanoids with cool tricks .
Harengon and bugbears might be humans trained as monk and ninja.
I particularly like to think of melee reach extended via techniques like kicks and lunges.
You could lean into these and go on to be a rogue or monk or you could just uses it as the background for a character that becomes something else entirely.

[raygun goth]

In game design, this is called an "effects-based" approach. You're looking at the end result of the mechanics and choosing how to describe what people in-world are seeing. This is actually a very common approach for D&D, most people already treat classes as merely collections of mechanics. So, yeah, this is very doable, just something you'd want to clear with your group first.

[Ogun]

Makes sense.
I have been influenced by playing a lot of Hero system, so mechanics and flavor are easily divided in my mind.