Sneak Peek: Stars of the Sea Ancestries & Cultures Playtest

Hello secret door folks!

We want to start taking steps to move away from using the term race in the player options we publish for our adventures. This is no small task, and we've been contemplating how to go about it for a while. Recently we found Ancestry & Culture, an alternative to race in 5e by Arcanist Press, and we really like the method presented in that.

The Ancestry & Culture method breaks Race as presented in 5e up into two different parts: Ancestry, or traits a character inherited from their parents genes, and Culture, or traits that a character has learned from their parents growing up. This provides a more solid foundation for diverse character creation, and allows us to fight harmful racial stereotyping by removing things like Alignment and Ability Score Increases from a character's in-born traits.

In addition, this particular approach can be used as a direct replacement for the race option in traditional character creation, without having to make any other changes!

This playtest document includes:

Ancestries*:

• Cawmac, a colorful bird people that resemble parrots, toucans & birds of paradise.
• Rattin, a short-lived but tenacious people that resemble gnome-sized rats.

Cultures:

• Seasong, a music-centric culture from the Seasong Islands.
• Middener, scavengers & tinkers from the Middens.
• Spirian, the privileged inhabitants of Silver Spires.

Variant Rules:

• Ability Score Increase Variant.

* Playtest also includes the Gnomish, Elven & Human Ancestries from Ancestry & Culture, an alternative to race in 5e ~ these have been included because they are common ancestries found in Elvin Bay.

** These player options are still in their draft stage, and may be subject to change. 

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We're excited to try out this method, and we hope you'll give the playtest material a look. We'd love to hear your suggestions on how we can improve, or the results of any playtests you may have after you create a character using these options!

Cheers,
- Niels & Rose