What's with WotC avoiding Class bloat but not Race bloat?

[Mastikator]

There's a difference between mechanical asymmetry (PC and NPC stats are built differently) and fluff asymmetry (there's an actual in-world difference between PCs and NPCs).

For example, if you tell the PC wizard they can never create magic items -- even though plenty of wizards in the setting are known to have created magic items -- just because they're a PC, that's immersion-breaking and arbitrary. It's like a videogame.

It also doesn't solve the problem. If magic items exist and are created by mortals, the PCs will seek out and buy or steal the items they want.

The idea that magic items can only be gained as gifts from the DM and that PCs can't expect to get the ones they want doesn't really work outside of some specific setting assumptions that none of the default settings share. And I don't think it addresses the actual complaints people have about items in other editions.

Ok but then how do you deal with improved pact weapon, or the magic weapon spell, or sacred weapon from paladin of devotion? Or any other numerous class abilities that allow PCs to make magic weapons?

Also every official WotC setting has artificers and magic items crafted by mortals. What you do with your personal one is up to you and you can ban any class or race you want, but that's a you thing, not a general D&D thing.

[MoiMagnus]

If you look at FR or most well-known items in the game, they were created by mortals. Many even have the creator's name attached. If people can make magic items, PCs can.

You could create a setting where in the ancient past people could do this but no longer, but that's not the default assumption.

It's not that hard to justify with fluff a "PC can't but NPCs can". If NPCs literally take years to craft a single magical item no PC part of a standard campaign will ever do so, because the BBEG will destroy the world before. Or if it take a few decade of training to be able to start to learn how to make the simplest ones (training not included in any of the available PC classes and backgrounds) but once you have that training it doesn't takes a lot of time so NPC can create magic items reasonably fast but no PC will be able to do it except maybe in their epilogue at the end of the campaign.

(And you can add similar fluff to every NPC exclusive thing. Legendary actions and lair action? Sure, when your character return as a boss fight for the next campaign, he will have passed decades mastering the technics necessary to have legendary actions, and to magically link his lair to his soul allowing him to control the traps)

[KorvinStarmast]

Personally, I don't find it too difficult to flense Warforged of setting specific nature. Golems exist, questions of intelligence and soul are all up to opinion and craftsmanship. Plus, previous editions have plenty of creatures that are explicitly golems, but nonetheless posses intelligence.

Setting specific origins tend to feel/fit better. (I won't go on my "we need 5e Dark Sun" grumpiness though)

Look, noone's saying the DM has to memorize everything in every book. But at a certain point, you've gotta learn what your players have access to and just git gud at encounter design.

As with 3rd party content, dragon magazine 'good ideas' and UA that is just sloppy, the amount of what PhoenixPhyre refers to as "DM overhead" at some point becomes an obstacle. Each DM has their own threshold on that. (Example, in the game we have with Max Wilson, who is a very good and creative DM, Tasha's stuff simply isn't there. This is no way stops us from enjoying the game).

It's not that hard to justify with fluff a "PC can't but NPCs can". If NPCs literally take years to craft a single magical item no PC part of a standard campaign will ever do so, because the BBEG will destroy the world before. Or if it take a few decade of training to be able to start to learn how to make the simplest ones (training not included in any of the available PC classes and backgrounds) but once you have that training it doesn't takes a lot of time so NPC can create magic items reasonably fast but no PC will be able to do it except maybe in their epilogue at the end of the campaign.

Most of how I see it in terms of magic item creation, thanks for articulating that. With that said, depending on how you pace the campaign, you can have weeks and months of down time; that's very much linked to how one does world building and campaign implementation. (As an example, three and a half in-game years passed during my longest running Empire of the Petal throne game - there was quite a bit of travel on land and sea, and political things changing in various places (Not just in the Empire but in neighboring nations) during that campaign) and the characters were about 6th or 7th level when RL ended that group's cohesion: I got assigned half way across the country due to being in the Navy.

[Xervous]

Personally, I don't find it too difficult to flense Warforged of setting specific nature. Golems exist, questions of intelligence and soul are all up to opinion and craftsmanship. Plus, previous editions have plenty of creatures that are explicitly golems, but nonetheless posses intelligence.

Besides, what's wrong with a divine origin for warforged as opposed to a mundane one? A metal-god or a hepheastus expy sound cool.

Again, we’re assuming there’s a moderate deal of coherency being expected in these cases, disregard for silly D&D.

The question is not whether we can strip off setting specific details, it’s how much you need to warp the current setting to get a race of human sized living constructs that is recognized as being part of society. Some people want to play D&D, not act out Asimov scripts where humanity is conflicted over how to regard these intelligent entities it is capable of creating outside of the normal natural pathways.

If humanity is not capable of producing these constructs then you need a maker, and you know for sure that the setting will be asking why the constructs were made if it doesn’t readily supply an answer.

Eberron cheekily bypasses the question of warforged longevity by establishing them as a recent product. If they’re recent in your setting they need an obvious maker, which then necessitates the questions of “will there be more?” and “why were they made now?” If they’re ancient and relatively common that also puts a great burden on the setting.

The problem with warforged is when they are a species rather than individual mad science experiments. You can lock your Frankenstein creation up in a lab or a backstory, but place countless copies of them throughout the setting and it’s a totally different feel. One guy with a one of a kind blasting wand in medieval times has a different feel from Napoleonic Wars except with wands instead of guns. So too does unique vs ubiquitous warforged. Introduce a single warforged as an oddity in the party and the world can react as it normally would to the weird. Make the weird normal and you’ve got to redefine normal and weird for the whole setting.

[KorvinStarmast]

Again, we’re assuming there’s a moderate deal of coherency being expected in these cases, disregard for silly D&D.

Setting coherency is all that one asks for, which precludes FR unfortunately (IMO).

The question is not whether we can strip off setting specific details, it’s how much you need to warp the current setting to get a race of human sized living constructs that is recognized as being part of society. Some people want to play D&D, not act out Asimov scripts where humanity is conflicted over how to regard these intelligent entities it is capable of creating outside of the normal natural pathways. {snip rest of post}

That was a very nice post. Thanks for putting into words a good bit of what I am feeling about warforged.

[Psyren]

Again, we’re assuming there’s a moderate deal of coherency being expected in these cases, disregard for silly D&D.

The question is not whether we can strip off setting specific details, it’s how much you need to warp the current setting to get a race of human sized living constructs that is recognized as being part of society. Some people want to play D&D, not act out Asimov scripts where humanity is conflicted over how to regard these intelligent entities it is capable of creating outside of the normal natural pathways.

I don't disagree that transplanting a whole society from one setting to another can be a tall order. But it's not necessary to go to those lengths for a PC hero. Warforged are actually one of the easiest individuals to move to other D&D settings, because every single one already has golems and other constructs in it, and the vast majority of people in those settings are unlikely to think they know of every variety that exists. So long as the Warforged is accompanied by one or more of the other PCs, they're highly likely to be written off as a creation or attendant to one of them, even when they display signs of intelligence or being affected by things like psychic and poison effects. Someone from a mage guild or similar might take an interest but that's unlikely to come up often.

Ok but then how do you deal with improved pact weapon, or the magic weapon spell, or sacred weapon from paladin of devotion? Or any other numerous class abilities that allow PCs to make magic weapons?

Also every official WotC setting has artificers and magic items crafted by mortals. What you do with your personal one is up to you and you can ban any class or race you want, but that's a you thing, not a general D&D thing.

Agreed. And again, infusions aren't even magic item creation in the true sense, they are long-lasting but ultimately impermanent. You can allow that mechanic without opening the floodgates to PC crafting.

[Xervous]

I don't disagree that transplanting a whole society from one setting to another can be a tall order. But it's not necessary to go to those lengths for a PC hero. Warforged are actually one of the easiest individuals to move to other D&D settings, because every single one already has golems and other constructs in it, and the vast majority of people in those settings are unlikely to think they know of every variety that exists. So long as the Warforged is accompanied by one or more of the other PCs, they're highly likely to be written off as a creation or attendant to one of them, even when they display signs of intelligence or being affected by things like psychic and poison effects. Someone from a mage guild or similar might take an interest but that's unlikely to come up often.

So in other words a one-of snowflake that doesn’t warp the setting. Am I fine with a lone oddity that doesn’t bend the setting over with silicone and lube? Yes. I’ve already conceded that the existence of one thing with a warforged stat block and appearance comes down to basic matters of themes and taste. “Can I play a thri-kreen and where are the rest of my people?” has far simpler coherent answers than the same question posed for Warforged as a species. You’re better off asking the GM to play a warforged as if you were asking to play a one-of homebrewed creature, and that’s telling.

Why does my phone keep trying to suggest they-Karen

[Dr. Murgunstrum]

Again, we’re assuming there’s a moderate deal of coherency being expected in these cases, disregard for silly D&D.

The question is not whether we can strip off setting specific details, it’s how much you need to warp the current setting to get a race of human sized living constructs that is recognized as being part of society. Some people want to play D&D, not act out Asimov scripts where humanity is conflicted over how to regard these intelligent entities it is capable of creating outside of the normal natural pathways.

You don’t require an Asimovian level of exploration of this, however.

All D&D published settings have a degree of global cosmopolitanism: while exotic, in Faerun, Krynn, Oerth, Mystara, Athas, etc, it’s not considered terribly bizarre to have kobolds, goblins, 3 kinds of elves, 2 kinds of dwarves, orcs, halflings, merfolk, dryads and more cohabiting a region the size of France. Double that because most settings also assume an vertical mirror of that region in the under dark, triple that for the shadowfell.

That means even a sheltered peasant has likely heard tales of all sorts of different sapient beings: the same way someone from the British Isles may have heard of Brownies, Sprites, Fairies, Elves, Leprechauns, Red Caps, Goblins, etc.

A warforged is simply another one of these beings and could be received with wonder, xenophobia, disbelief, suspicion, casual indifference the exact same way a dwarf might be recieved.

If humanity is not capable of producing these constructs then you need a maker, and you know for sure that the setting will be asking why the constructs were made if it doesn’t readily supply an answer.

I agree, though the answers can be myriad and simple:

The two most obvious D&D answers would be “The Gods” or “The Ancients”. D&D often defaults to the notion of past Golden Ages possessing powers beyond the abilities of the present day. That’s all you need for any sapient people, really.

Eberron cheekily bypasses the question of warforged longevity by establishing them as a recent product. If they’re recent in your setting they need an obvious maker, which then necessitates the questions of “will there be more?” and “why were they made now?” If they’re ancient and relatively common that also puts a great burden on the setting.

I reject the premise that this is a great burden, nor that you require an immediate answer to either question.

When you discover a colony of Myconoids underground for the first time or a band of orc raiders or a caravan of halflings, do you demand these questions? I don’t think you do.

Will there be more Myconoids? Why are there Myconoids? A god or a Wizard made them.

This isn’t burdensome at all.

The problem with warforged is when they are a species rather than individual mad science experiments. You can lock your Frankenstein creation up in a lab or a backstory, but place countless copies of them throughout the setting and it’s a totally different feel. One guy with a one of a kind blasting wand in medieval times has a different feel from Napoleonic Wars except with wands instead of guns. So too does unique vs ubiquitous warforged. Introduce a single warforged as an oddity in the party and the world can react as it normally would to the weird. Make the weird normal and you’ve got to redefine normal and weird for the whole setting.

I’ll reiterate: all published settings are already weird: fungus people, centuries old beings travelling and living with some not even two decades old, beings from other dimensions, sapient undead, it’s all weird.

How a warforged colony or even several warforged colonies across the globe changes the setting differently from, say, a colony of vampires or a colony of tieflings in anything but a superficial way doesn’t seem clear to me.

Certainly you have to worldbuild, but that’s the burden of every non-human people you populate your world with. Dwarves and Elves demand explanations as detailed as a warforged.

And that sounds like a great thing: answering questions of ecology and origin is the fun part of world building. If you aren’t interested in that part of play, then don’t put colonies of warforged in your setting, or simply have a god turn a bunch of villagers into warforged and call it a day: gods require no explanation, they are whimsical and mysterious and their designs are beyond the minds of mortals.

Olidimarra simply finding them hilarious is enough.

[Psyren]

So in other words a one-of snowflake that doesn’t warp the setting. Am I fine with a lone oddity that doesn’t bend the setting over with silicone and lube? Yes. I’ve already conceded that the existence of one thing with a warforged stat block and appearance comes down to basic matters of themes and taste. “Can I play a thri-kreen and where are the rest of my people?” has far simpler coherent answers than the same question posed for Warforged as a species. You’re better off asking the GM to play a warforged as if you were asking to play a one-of homebrewed creature, and that’s telling.

Putting your... colorful... imagery aside, I don't see a warforged character as equivalent to a "one-off homebrewed creature." Being a published race, Warforged would have gone through a lot more mechanical balancing, playtesting, and outright being used at hundreds if not thousands more tables than any homebrew. And even on the fluff side, there have been theories and proposals to get them to fit in other settings for as long as they've existed, even going back to 3.5.

I reject the premise that this is a great burden, nor that you require an immediate answer to either question.

+1

[KorvinStarmast]

Being a published race, Warforged

For a particular setting... FWIW, I offered a "how did a warforged get here?" answer to that question, which folds into Xervous' point about a one off (I think) absent the winter-precipitation-descent reference.
There are a variety of ways to make it coherent even if warforged are not native to one's setting, check with your local world builder/DM.

[HPisBS]

Agreed. And again, infusions aren't even magic item creation in the true sense, they are long-lasting but ultimately impermanent. You can allow that mechanic without opening the floodgates to PC crafting.

So what would you give them at level 10 to make up for scrapping the feature that's specifically about letting them be good / efficient at crafting?

[Psyren]

So what would you give them at level 10 to make up for scrapping the feature that's specifically about making them good / efficient at crafting?

Nothing*. Not only is the other half of that ability (+1 attunement slot) still useful, Artificers play perfectly fine even at a table that doesn't allow magic item creation by PCs at all.

*Meaning, I wouldn't "scrap the feature." It would just be one bullet instead of two.

[Xervous]

Again, we’re assuming there’s a moderate deal of coherency being expected in these cases, disregard for silly D&D.

You don’t require an Asimovian level of exploration of this, however.
...
And that sounds like a great thing: answering questions of ecology and origin is the fun part of world building. If you aren’t interested in that part of play, then don’t put colonies of warforged in your setting, or simply have a god turn a bunch of villagers into warforged and call it a day: gods require no explanation, they are whimsical and mysterious and their designs are beyond the minds of mortals.

Olidimarra simply finding them hilarious is enough.

By all means disregard the scoping of the statement and agree with me.

You can play silly D&D. Most of the default settings are in the ballpark of silly D&D. For the given case of a world that is crafted under stricter requirements a request to implement something outside the norm demands more of the setting the further it stands from the norm, and again for how broad its influence may be. Remember, we’re not here to make a case for why they could be included. It’s about the limits of the setting to absorb the changes and still satisfy the players’ intents (counting GM as a player).

Kitchen sink it is, Faerun doesn’t even notice their introduction. A given setting will or won’t easily absorb a given new race, those matters are easily settled. When it comes to homebrew settings each nonstandard species presents some degree of difficulty for integrating into various settings. Warforged, in all their nonstandard peculiarities, have more points for potential conflict that reduces their chances of a successful integration into a randomly chosen setting. Again, this is specifically the subset of homebrew settings that has stricter requirements on coherency than the typical D&D setting. Yes there will be some whose narrow band of tolerance allows Warforged in without a ripple. All I’ve said is that Warforged are far more likely to distort such settings when forced in alongside the degree of justification said settings have for every species.

[Amnestic]

You can play silly D&D. Most of the default settings are in the ballpark of silly D&D.

Is it 'silly' if it's the standard?

[Psyren]

Is it 'silly' if it's the standard?

I think "Silly D&D" = "any form of D&D Xervous doesn't like."

[Xervous]

Is it 'silly' if it's the standard?

Do you have any other suggestions for succinctly highlighting the differences between the general kitchen sinks that D&D presents and player made settings crafted under stricter requirements on theme and composition?

I think "Silly D&D" = "any form of D&D Xervous doesn't like."

So spreadsheet business simulator is silly, dating simulator is silly, but murder mysteries are not? It seems I’ve merely chosen a term you don’t like and that’s led you to perceive malevolence in this faceless, soundless void that is the Internet.

[Amnestic]

Do you have any other suggestions for succinctly highlighting the differences between the general kitchen sinks that D&D presents and player made settings crafted under stricter requirements on theme and composition?

Standard vs. Restricted seems entirely reasonable to me.

[KorvinStarmast]

Standard vs. Restricted seems entirely reasonable to me.

Which fits into Incoherent vs Coherent

Spoiler: where did I get this?

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(to borrow from Ron Edwards/The Forge in a slightly out of context manner).

As a follow on to that thought, I found that AD&D 2e's attempts at making settings that fit a theme to be commendable.
(Dark Sun in particular, though I suppose Spelljammer was similar but not enough experience to affirm).

If Xervous is equating FR with silly I tend to agree.

(I find Dragonlance silly for different reasons, but that's as much to do with the novels as anything done in producing AD&D content).

[Amnestic]

Which fits into Incoherent vs Coherent

Seems pretty dismissive to state that all the official 5e settings are incoherent while only yours and other similarly restricted ones are 'coherent'. I do not think that such an assessment is accurate.

[MoiMagnus]

Seems pretty dismissive to state that all the official 5e settings are incoherent while only yours and other similarly restricted ones are 'coherent'. I do not think that such an assessment is accurate.

The "restrictive" you suggested was also reasonably dismissive. It's not the goal of those settings to be restricted, it's merely one of the means to obtain more coherence, both thematically and in term of internal consistency (and as such, not every kind of restriction would make sense).

I agree that putting a "incoherent VS coherent" is both kind of dismissive for one side and idealist for the other (we don't even have fully coherent models of our world, so as long as a fictive world tries to copy our world in some ways, there will be incoherences), and that it would be more truthful to have "standard coherence VS stricter coherence", but the scale of coherence is IMO not a bad one as it capture (one of) the goals of those settings.

[ProsecutorGodot]

Seems pretty dismissive to state that all the official 5e settings are incoherent while only yours and other similarly restricted ones are 'coherent'. I do not think that such an assessment is accurate.

To be fair, there can be some level of objectivity in this statement, if there's a general agreement on what a setting is aiming to be (or stated to be by its designers) you can make comparisons between what it does and what it aims to do. If it has aspects that are wildly out of line with its intended goals it could objectively be called incoherent.

With that said, I tend to see many arguments aren't all that objective or claim that a shift in design intention is blatantly incoherent rather than something changing. The latter is a fairly common complaint for settings that have been consistently maintained and they're compared to settings that have not and as such have not seen any recent change to be called "incoherent" for.

FR suffers from being a setting they choose to maintain, thus it will often see drastic change to match current design shifts. I don't think it's all that incoherent when viewed through the lens of 5e exclusively, but it's always inevitably met with "but it was like this in X edition" and it being different years later is labeled as inconsistency.

[KorvinStarmast]

Seems pretty dismissive to state that all the official 5e settings are incoherent while only yours and other similarly restricted ones are 'coherent'. I do not think that such an assessment is accurate.

Hardly. The FR problem, as a setting, is that it has become one of 'kitchen sink' additive stacking of stuff that don't grow from the ground up.
Granted, WoTC did try to make it all more coherent and a bit more organic with the 4e re set, but that's irrelevant to 5e.

If, for example, one runs a world based in Theros without just dumping stuff from Theros into FR the coherence improves.

[Amnestic]

Unclear why the focus is solely on FR when there's more than one 5e setting - sure, FR's the go-to for adventures, but since Eberron already came up re: artificer/warforged one could quite easily point at that, especially since it's (arguably) the second most prevalent setting this edition. Is it incoherent? I wouldn't say so, and I'd wager to say that it's probably more coherent than most homebrew settings, yes, including yours, whomever is reading this (including me, since I wrote it).

I don't have a problem calling FR incoherent. I have a problem with saying that the difference between "standard" 5e settings (that is, the official ones), and "homebrew" ones with restrictions is that of coherency vs. incoherency. Just as I had a problem with calling them "silly DnD".

Find a better word than 'restricted' if that tickles your sensibilities but branding the official settings globally as "silly" and "incoherent" is...well, silly.

[Dr. Murgunstrum]

By all means disregard the scoping of the statement and agree with me.

I haven’t, however.

I take all my suggestions seriously. Including a trickster god pulling a trick.

To reject trickster deities in “serious” D&D (by your vague standards) is to reject the majority of all fantasy and mythology. An interesting opinion, but not a serious one.

You can play silly D&D.

I certainly do. I also play “serious” D&D. What I’ve proposed is of the “serious” variety.

Most of the default settings are in the ballpark of silly D&D.

No, they aren’t. All of the default settings take themselves fairly seriously.

I now question what you mean by “silly” D&D. I fear, under scrutiny, no published D&D product, isn’t silly by your seemingly narrow standards.

For the given case of a world that is crafted under stricter requirements a request to implement something outside the norm demands more of the setting the further it stands from the norm, and again for how broad its influence may be. Remember, we’re not here to make a case for why they could be included. It’s about the limits of the setting to absorb the changes and still satisfy the players’ intents (counting GM as a player).

Precisely, which is why you must consider the nature of the world. No D&D world is founded in evolutionary biology. They are worlds of magically created creatures, created by Gods and Mortals, in a kaleidoscope of expressions.

Worlds which are incredibly coherent presentations of what a magically fashioned reality would likely entail.

These “requirements” you speak of are the requirements that permit gods, wizards and a multiverse of some fashion. These are serious requirements, and create serious settings that have been enjoyed and explored by players for decades.

Kitchen sink it is.

Not necessarily. I don’t consider Greek, Abrahamic or Norse mythology a kitchen sink setting, and they certainly tolerate beings like the warforged, and far stranger.

Nor would I consider Krynn or Athas kitchen sink settings, and they too can tolerate warforged without any burden.

When it comes to homebrew settings each nonstandard species presents some degree of difficulty for integrating

Perhaps your heartbreaker hack of D&D struggles. I’ve never had an issue integrating Warforged into my settings.

In one, they are cursed elves who used forbidden magics in a desperate last stand to become soldiers against the dwarven and orcish hordes that revolted within and collapsed the gnomish hegemony after their mechanical god ascended and left their integrated machines useless. Others can be cursed by this revenant magic as well. (This setting is sparsely populated, low magic setting, but once was a global society ruled by gnomes which presents most magic in ancient and dangerous ruins)

In another, they are like the dwarves of Tolkien, a forbidden species created by a god who values arts and crafts but permitted by the matriarch of the gods and now beloved as the makers of great and beautiful works, have their own nations and are members of most cosmopolitan societies. (This is a high magic global magic punk setting)

In a third, they are simply constructs with varying degrees of sapience and no coherent culture, though they can be found in small clusters cohabiting in different fashions. (This is a more classic sword and sorcery setting)

I take them all seriously and they are a coherent part of those settings, one of which existed prior to 3rd Ed.

Warforged, in all their nonstandard peculiarities, have more points for potential conflict that reduces their chances of a successful integration into a randomly chosen setting.

Warforged are no more peculiar than the sleepless, immortal, magical elves. If you can integrate elves, I don’t see why you can’t integrate Warforged.

Again, this is specifically the subset of homebrew settings that has stricter requirements on coherency than the typical D&D setting. Yes there will be some whose narrow band of tolerance allows Warforged in without a ripple. All I’ve said is that Warforged are far more likely to distort such settings when forced in alongside the degree of justification said settings have for every species.

It seems you’re discussing a very narrow band of Heartbreaker Hacks of D&D. This is such a corner case, I don’t think it warrants much consideration in the question being posed by OP.

In D&D, Warforged are quite coherent and do not strain the settings that have Wizards and Gods who make beings all the time.

[Anymage]

On the one hand, I'm a fan of narratively tight settings and throwing in whole kitchen sinks of mythology does wind up feeling sloppy. Even using wizards or gods as an excuse makes certain statements about how active they are at mucking about in the natural order of things, which makes certain campaign statements right there.

On the other hand it's vanishingly unlikely that I'll use every published monster, and published monsters say a lot more about the world's population than published PC races. Beholders and owlbears make certain implicit assumptions about the world, and they both come from the initial MM. What does or does not get used depends on what the group overall wants thematically, much more than what does or does not have published PC stats. If the group wants something narratively tighter and more grounded, they'll likely do that without many restrictions. If they want to do wacky and/or cosmopolitan, roll with that.

[Psyren]

Seems pretty dismissive to state that all the official 5e settings are incoherent while only yours and other similarly restricted ones are 'coherent'. I do not think that such an assessment is accurate.

This.

To be fair, there can be some level of objectivity in this statement, if there's a general agreement on what a setting is aiming to be (or stated to be by its designers) you can make comparisons between what it does and what it aims to do. If it has aspects that are wildly out of line with its intended goals it could objectively be called incoherent.

I can't think of a single published setting that is "wildly out of line with its intended goals" so this is academic at best. No, not even FR. Sure they make changes to things like the magic system when the edition changes, but the fundamentals of the setting (yay elves, boo orcs/drow, yay Harpers, boo Zhents et cetera) don't.

Hardly. The FR problem, as a setting, is that it has become one of 'kitchen sink' additive stacking of stuff that don't grow from the ground up.

Feature, not bug. Settings like Faerun and Golarion - high fantasy, high magic kitchen sinks that can accommodate most mechanical features of the game and tell a wide variety of stories and genres within a single world - are valuable in their own right. You may not like them, or see them as "problems," but plenty of WotC's audience disagree.

[ProsecutorGodot]

I can't think of a single published setting that is "wildly out of line with its intended goals" so this is academic at best. No, not even FR. Sure they make changes to things like the magic system when the edition changes, but the fundamentals of the setting (yay elves, boo orcs/drow, yay Harpers, boo Zhents et cetera) don't.

I didn't say that personally though there was either, it's just a way to view this in a way that could be objective. The general agreement seems to be "FR is kitchen sink DND" and broad design goals mean it's really hard to make something that has no justifiable reason to fit.

I think "coherence" is being substituted for "complex" or "nuanced" in this argument where some prefer for a setting to have a strict set of goals with precise details about why something is or isn't included and FR doesn't typically go for all those extra steps so it's "incoherent".

To borrow from the previous example, it's not that it can't make sense that a Warforged race showed up in FR*, it's that they want a complicated reason and nuanced wordlbuilding implications for it like Eberron has. One of these isn't any worse than the other until it becomes an elitism contest where those who prefer the former are playing "silly" dnd and the latter is playing "serious" or "coherent" dnd.

Spoiler: *How Warforged showed up in our tables FR setting

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A small handful came from Eberron in a magical anomaly and Gond and his faithful are working to replicate the creation process. Heck, it didn't have to be wildly complicated, Dragon Heist already has a sentient Nimblewright, it's not a stretch to assume they could be made sapient.

[Xervous]

Unclear why the focus is solely on FR when there's more than one 5e setting - sure, FR's the go-to for adventures, but since Eberron already came up re: artificer/warforged one could quite easily point at that, especially since it's (arguably) the second most prevalent setting this edition. Is it incoherent? I wouldn't say so, and I'd wager to say that it's probably more coherent than most homebrew settings, yes, including yours, whomever is reading this (including me, since I wrote it).

Eberron is a well structured setting that shines as an example of what you get when a single author writes towards a theme. The main slight I’ve seen directed at Eberron’s coherency and function is that they goofed on population numbers. Most other details exist to present simmering potential for conflicts or regions of uncertainty that invite GMs to decide what’s going on behind the curtains. Eberron is conscious of the particulars that warforged can demand of a setting and it addresses them. Though the one question that’s nagging me is whether or not people take Keith’s statement of “about 10k warforged exist” as gospel or a number distorted by the weird population numbers published in Eberron sourcebooks.

[KorvinStarmast]

Eberron is a well structured setting that shines as an example of what you get when a single author writes towards a theme. The main slight I’ve seen directed at Eberron’s coherency and function is that they goofed on population numbers.

FWIW, as I review World Without Number I find that the map (how big is a hex) is too small for the population numbers presented, but, as it's a post apocalyptic setting there may be more justification for that somewhere in the notes that the author has elsewhere. At least FR has lots of empty space between population centers.

[Xervous]

FWIW, as I review World Without Number I find that the map (how big is a hex) is too small for the population numbers presented, but, as it's a post apocalyptic setting there may be more justification for that somewhere in the notes that the author has elsewhere. At least FR has lots of empty space between population centers.

Further reading is hinting at WotC multiplying distances by 10 or so “to make it feel more epic.” Though even then 10k warforged is a small number with how frequently I was seeing them offed in various adventures.

When it comes to PC accessible species in a cosmopolitan setting, what bracket do people expect to see for minimum population? 10k, 100k, 1M?