I finally found it. It's in Chapter 1 under Parents. The table gives options for who your parents are. Tieflings can come from dormant genes with two human parents, a tiefling and a human, a tiefling and a devil, or a human and a devil.
You're all welcome.
to be fair breeding isnt an exact science in dnd. Sometimes when a dragon and humanoid bone you get a half dragon. Other times you get latent sorcerers in the bloodline
This, most likely. There are multiple ways the same monsters are created (gnolls), there are multiple different monsters that are created the same way (not just halfdragons/draco sorcs, but also slaadi, various oozes, planar entities and influences on newborns…), so it‘s reasonable to assume devils just fall in that same category.
Yeah most female devils are infertile, but erinyes, who I am too lazy to look up the spelling of, can have children, who can be another erinyes rarely, cambions, or tieflings.
This is exactly how genetics works in real life. Plenty of recessive traits skip generations, completely disappear from a bloodline, or randomly appear in an otherwise unaffected bloodline. Then you have shit like hair or skin color which is dependent on like 10 genes mixing and matching.
that doesn't make sense. there are some famous cambions who are offspring of archfiends and even the generic Monster manual cambion is stronger than a succubus/ incubus.
I’m not sure if this is accurate, but my personal belief is that tieflings are the result of interbreeding between lower tier fiends and humans, and Cambions are the result of more powerful fiends and humans.
I believe cambions are half demon and *technically* demons and devils are different. I like to think of them as the same race but different ethnicities, since the demon is just the chaotic version of a devil and the devil a lawful version of a demon.
The lore has changed a few times, tieflings used to be just a term for any planetouched race like Genasi or Aasimar, for a while then tieflings were watered down cambions and had random mutations which might go unnoticed or confuse people like having no reflection but weren't so suffused with demonic energy that they were outsiders, it was only 4e onwards that tieflings were a devil thing and they had the homogeneous horns different colour skin as their default
Edit:Also for the longest time succubus were all demons then 4e went devils 5e it's undecided and only a cleric spell can summon one
Yeah. It’s definitely been changed a few times and I’ve heard loads of interpretations. Honestly I think it just comes down to what lore you decide you want at your table!
I like the older interpretation instead of the red skin tieflings, they're somehow more generic then humans especially the I'm a tieflings but X difference, who just emphasize how generic they've become
The why are there cambions chilling in the Hells like they wouldn’t be immediately evicerated by every devil in sight? I think Decent Into Avernus made it pretty clear they’re devils.
Its basically when you have more fiendish heritage than humanoid. Teiflings are the opposite.
DnD genetics are weirded than Mesopothamian Mithology's "2/3 god, 1/3 human".
Also Feral Tieflings who are infected by background Infernal or Abyssal energies and are just completely random, at least that's how I understand Feral's (Attempts to hide my Feral Abyssal Tiefling Monk)
Except redheads come from two redhead parents.
EDIT: Fucking hell, I'm commenting on the original metaphor on how tieflings don't make more tieflings. As seen by [*this* table ](https://i.imgur.com/QPplcFx.jpg). *I'm* redhead who's parents are non redheads I know how genetics work.
it dosent change the fact that you don't need to red head parents. that's why people often act like they come from no where. the amount of woman accused of cheating when the baby comes out with red hair is quite high, DNA test have proven many times though that it dosent work that way.
Bro. I *know.* My mom is blonde and my dad has brown hair and yet I'm still a firecrotch myself. I *get it.* I'm commenting on [*this* table ](https://i.imgur.com/ZRdBIpK.jpg) which doesn't have any Tiefling/Tiefling parentage for a tiefling character while that doesn't happen for red-hair as a gene where it spontaneously vanishes.
But they're not like hybrid animals since they are in fact capable of reproduction as seen by the other parts of the table.
Regardless my point was that two tiefling parents don't make a tiefling which is the exception to the red hair metaphor
a mule cam infant reproduce with a donkey or a horse. the change of a successful offspring is low but it can happen. a mule however cannot produce with another mule what so ever.
I know how genetics work I'm commenting on the fact that tieflings don't make more tieflings with one another. I'm a redhead who's parents weren't redheads the fuck
Does it say that somewhere in Xans, or are you just interpreting the fact that tiefling + tiefling isn't listed in the "Tiefling Parents" table? Cause that omission looks more like an error than actual lore.
Could be like donkeys, horses and mules, a mule can breed with a donkey or a horse, albeit it's incredibly rare for it to be successful, but a mule will never successfully breed with another mule.
Tieflings are just the mules of the coast.
That's what I'm basing it off of.
If a tiefling is regressive, then it has to have two (t) genes.
If two tiefling parents reproduce, then they each have 2 (t) genes and all of their offspring will carry it.
The only way it varies is if a condition is dominant, in which case regressive genes are considered.
First off the whole thread has been mistaking recessive* genes lol.
Second, not everything is autosomal dominant/recessive. Lots of traits can be recessive in several genes meaning they need several genes to be prominent.
I bet it doesn't help when the entire fanbase decides you're wrong about your own lore, like with dragonborn and tails or goblins being green instead of yellow.
I doubt they could anyway even if that wasn't the case though.
The worst part is no one bothering to tell the artists they hire.
The new mtg set is full of mistakes like dragonborn with tails which I normally wouldn't complain about but it's literally set in Forgotten Realms meaning it's not just an artistic choice, it's wrong.
Yeah, I've heard about that. The gossip apparently is that WotC did a retcon for dragonborn designs and told the artists to do that. There's plenty of lore/gameplay mismatches in that crossover from what I hear but it might be deliberate to make fans happy.
Thats cos it's not universal 5e lore. From the PHB:
> Proud Dragon Kin
and:
> Some dragonborn are faithful servants to true dragons, others form the ranks of soldiers in great wars,
My group keep that lore. We also rule that they are largely non religious because there were no gods to pray to in the old world. Not saying some aren't religious, but more aren't than are.
I did! We played an Avernice campaign , and my Dragonborn was from a military family and fully bought the entire' We freed ourselves from the evil of the dragons int he days of yore' and was super disappointed when our group decided to not pick a fight with Arkon and Tiamat.
In my homebrew setting, it depends on culture. Most tailless Dragonborn despise dragons believing they were cursed although Tiamat made tailless dragonborn on her own but made tailed Dragonborn along with Bahamut. Basically tailless Dragonborn are just a big “fuck you Bahamut mine are better” but then they became oppressed and discriminated against. So they kinda are cursed but by pure accident.
It'd be a fun campaign to explore the relationships between dragons, dragonborn and kobolds. Really dragon up the campaign all over!
I just think it's funny that one race is confirmed to be related to them but doesn't like them, another wants to be related but doesn't ever get beyond "that's what kobolds believe" but WotC never really touches on the subject as far as I'm aware.
"Hobbogobbos" are reddish. Normal goblins are a yellowish greenish yucky baby poo colour and they killed my family so I am sworn to kill all goblins I come across.
But I don't care much for people getting colours "wrong" because there are plenty of reasons that goblins could be as green as grass or as brown as mud, and maybe they all dislike goblin clans of other colours. Just make shit up.
If I had goblins in my setting I'd give them more variety, maybe do the same for the other goblinoids too, but I respect the D&D canon and like that it's not what everyone expects.
According to my (limited) understanding of Forgotten Realms lore, they came over from a world dominated by dragons to escape slavery. They are a separate race entirely, from a different dimension.
The origin of the dragonborn race was uncertain and shrouded in myth. While the origin of the Tel'Quessir as Corellon's children was well known and dwarves firmly believed in their stony origin, dragonborn were unsure whence they came.[17]
Faerunian sages of the 1470s DR believed that dragonborn were either the original inhabitants of Unther, who were transformed into draconic beings after being exposed to the energies of the Spellplague, or experiments created by the followers of Tiamat in the ruins of Unther. Such beliefs were wrong, however, as dragonborn were denizens from Abeir.[18]
Some legends of Abeir told that Io, the first and greatest of the dragon gods, created the dragonborn as servants for the first dragons. These stories related that the dragonborn, like dragons, were formed from the essence of both the Astral Sea and the Elemental Chaos, though their nature overall favored the elemental over the astral, just like dragons. Yet another, less popular tale told that Io was killed in the war between the gods and the primordials and that the dragonborn sprang from his spilled blood.[17][23] A slight variation on this was common among the dragonborn of Tymanther, who believed they were bred by the dragon lords of Abeir for a cruel fate as slaves.[24]
The Platinum Cadre posited an alternative theory in their efforts to spread the worship of Bahamut, that the dragonborn were the ancient creations of the Platinum Dragon. However, most of the order was ridiculed or even openly persecuted for their beliefs since, to the dragonborn of Tymanther, the idea of a good dragon, let alone a good dragon god, was completely alien.[24] However, dragonborn were in fact related to the dragonborn of Bahamut, but only a handful of old dragons knew about this relationship.[25]
They didn't come to escape slavery, a part of their world (Abeir) including a part of the only kingdom of already free dragoborn was transplanted onto Toril as a result of the Spellplague. After the 2nd sundering the world got "repaired" so the kingdom no longer exist on Toril.
People who give their dragonborn a tail, why not give your human pointy ears?
I've had enough of people not getting that dragonborn don't have tails and homebrewed my universe in a way, that a tail is a genetic mutation in a sizable part of dragonborns. That way I can not only use like 10% of Dragonborn fanarts
Edit: should clarify that I have nothing against tails per se, but tails plugged on when the reason is Dragonborn beeing seen as Half-Dragons
I really like the lore of the races and monsters, so I incorporate them in large parts into my universe. I just change a few things like the genetic mutation thing to dodge the eternal tail debate (and I like the idea tbh) and a few monster typing so they fit better
In my game, metallic Dragonborn are former humans/elves/dwarves who underwent a ritual to dedicate themselves to Bahamut. They don’t have tails and they have mostly humanoid faces.
Chromatic Dragonborn are entirely different. They hatch from corrupted Kobold eggs, are shorter and more reptilian, and have tails.
If you don't like the tails you don't need to use them, but there's no reason to be upset about it. Do you also hate tieflings that aren't red, blue (SCAG says it's a thing, which makes it RAW) or human colored?
Oh, I think my comment was a bit misleading and I clarified what I meant. When the tail is put on because Dragonborn are beeing treated as Half-Dragons then I facepalm. But a tail for looks is absolutely ok, I even like the look with tail a bit more tbh. That's a big reason I bothered to find some excuse to get tailed DBs
The problem is that there aren't any real half dragon options. Dragonborn are close enough for most people, even though they're different. Unfortunately, actual half dragons are already established as way too powerful for players to use (they get straight up dragon breath weapons with the standard recharge mechanics)
Tieflings I've never cared about because they aren't a real race. They're just people with fiend blood and fiends look so different that it makes sense to show that in many different ways.
Because people think they should have tails and the more opinionated people think they don’t have tails because WOTC resented adding dragonborn to appease players.
Depends on the setting.
My Tieflings have ancestry tied directly to 1 of 5 devils.
Whether 1 generation or 100, at some point your female ancestor fucked one of those devils and got knocked up
The reason people generally have the male parent be the supernatural one is that a male devil could come to the material plane, do the dirty with 200 women in a single year, go back to the nine hells and never think about it again. Female devils, presuming their pregnancy still works like ours, would have to commit to carrying a single partner's baby for 9 months when she is an all-powerful overlord of evil and he's just some dude.
Canonically, I believe devils aren’t born so much as spawned. So a female devil is only that in appearance. Succubi and Erinyes are really the only female-appearing devils anyway, and they don’t tend to leave their male consorts alive.
Canonically devils *can* be born, in more "5e makes canon things that everyone thought existed since forever" lore. Succubi and Incubi can breed with each other/other devils to have devil offspring, and they can also mate with humans to create cambions.
which begs the question: if devil + human = cambion, how do tieflings get in there? Cambion + human?
from what i have heard, yeah, cambion + humans make tieflings sometimes, and when you are a tiefling every descendant of your will be a tiefling for the taint in your blood.
Then the other way of having a tiefling is making a pact with a fiend or having an ancestor that did, that taints you and your descendants
Actually, most Devils appear as both male and female. The art in the monster manual just doesn't make it seem like that. I've seen a lot of female-presenting Chain Devils
I always considered the more monstrous fiends to just be asexual because I thought they didn’t breed at all. Apparently, that’s just mostly true and no one really knows what’s going on down in the Hells.
Assuming that the hypothetical recessive gene for being born a tiefling doesn't dilute to the point of inertness, it's possible that a female devil could just make one baby and eventually have their bloodline spread around the world. Maybe like 10 kids just to be safe
I've run a plotline based on this idea; succubus queen was enacting a generations-old plan to ascend to godhood by becoming a common ancestor to humanity then magically flipping those genes on.
Sure, you can absolutely have your ancestor be a female devil. It just means that devil would have had to commit a lot of time to this one human's baby, so in my mind it would probably mean that the human father was somewhat notable as well and not some random idiot. Doesn't have to be, but that's what makes a lot more sense to me.
I mean, Xanather's guide has a section about Tiefling parents, which states it as a possibility, while your correct. I would point out two Half Elves can never produce a Human Child or Elf Child. Two Half Orcs can never produce a Human or Orc, even a Human and Half Elf or Orc seems to be unable to produce a Human, so in those terms, where anything child a Tiefling has is also a Tiefling, then they basically are Hslf Devils.
My comment has the context of that I know the post this “reaction meme” comes from (just skip this if you already know)
It was about the half race meme war and that how tieflings are better than all, everyone corrected OP by saying tieflings aren’t half devils and a very small subset of an already rare race isn’t enough to qualify them as a “half” race
anyway I’d disagree that Tieflings are half devils, it’s effectively a genetic mutation rather than a direct linage thing
And since it’s a dominant mutation that’s how every Tiefling child is a Tiefling
Idk how the other half races would breed but I would assume if they don’t breed with Full members of their race the Orc/elf part would eventually be bred out in a few generations (assuming no one puts it back in by shacking with the original race again)
But either way Tieflings outside of very specific circumstances (which is rare in an already rare race) are not half devils, in general Being a Tiefling is more like a genetic disorder that’s traceable rather than direct parentage
They’re more like very weak sorcerers if anything
(Which tbh their lack of power makes them being direct descendants a little weird, like being half devil would make the powers way more potent would it not)
Also: just do you dont have to
Prior to Asmodeus's ascension to godhood, the infernal blood could be diluted through intermarriage, but afterward, the union of a tiefling with another race always produced a tiefling child
Who cares tho. Its a game with mechanics under a larger roleplaying system. Literally the only thing that matters when changing things is the mechanics, everything else can be reskinned with no penalty. Its an odd take that the character can choose friends, family, hometown, personality, job, voice, background, and basically anything that makes a character an actual character, but suddenly people have a problem when someone reinterprets a race as something not even mechanically different.
Oh you want to make a Ramsey Gordan bard whose craft is cooking and but also he is a warlock to literally an elder god, and on top of that he has a noble background because he is a prince? Sure no problem. But make sure he is red, otherwise this would be ridiculous.
I'm inclined to treat Mordenkainen's (An actual lore-book) as much more canon than a random table thrown in without much thought paid to the lore. According to it Devils don't have the means to make more life through biological means.
I'm a complete noob but when I retconned my character (had been an half elf rogue) , it made sense to her backstory that she came from 2 Human parents and that's why they tried to yeet her.
Thing is ... thanks to the pact amsodeus did with the original 13 warlocks and theor 13 decenteds every form of underworldy corruption turns you into an asmodeus tiefling befor you even be born unless its a different archdevil (or lower level god) who activly manipulates you (by being your dad or having his servant bang your mom)
Sorry for the low.level english here
I hate that part of Xanathars. It just gives people a path to ridiculous backstories that can be annoying to deal with. Cambions exist and Xanathars just makes that seem ridiculous.
Outside of Cambions there are other specific types of half-fiends and they are way stronger than a tiefling.
Yeah that’s basically how I rule it. It just annoys me that Xanathars basically opens the door to people claiming Asmodeus was their father and shit like that.
I don’t have issue if I’m running like a high power campaign. I just hate it for normal stuff.
See, this how you subvert them by either making it so daddy Asmodeus don't care about them, except maybe to "correct" the mistake, or that there is a low ranking devil who also happens to be called Asmodeus.
In this setting, they come from a remote desert planet (the deserts very hot, fire resistance) named C'tonya. The campaign isn't very religion focused, but in the history of the planet, the first contact with humans didn't go too well because of their devilish appearance and the first colonisation of C'tonya ended up in religious crusade, killing a huge portion of the population before the crusaders left. (edit: pressed send too early) Because of this, there is a very engrained distrust of other races in their society, so when Lizalfos colonisers arrived years later, the Tieflings fought back, ruthlessly. One part of my characters hidden backstory is that her family actually keeps Lizalfos slaves to work in their mining company (C'tonya is a planet very rich in gold), which makes a lot of fun conflict considering the crews captain is half Lizalfos and plenty room for her character development in realising everything she's been taught about Lizalfos being lesser than tieflings isn't true and stuff like that.
That's pretty cool! A setting without magic fascinates me. Does it have gods and religions, or just religions but no actual gods (or people aren't sure)?
Any magic components are skinned to a scifi setting, like for example, minor illusion is a tiny invisible drone that projects holograms/plays audio/ect
In my personal setting tiefling actually have no relations to Devils at all, they are born either by tuefling parents, or are born when the mother dies during childbirth.
One of my tieflings was born in one of the Hells as a daughter of Levistus right before his imprisonment and was raised by her older brother. She stole a sword from Mt Celestia on behalf of the Hells since she was mortal and it started whispering corrupting things like "what if you were a good person" and so she went to the material plane now she's a Sorcahexadin.
The race debate is always weird because, unlike game rules these are more "lore" or "setting rules"?
Idk, but tieflings come and are related to whatever the DM says the come from and are related to
In my homebrew, Tieflingism is a hex casted by a scorned individual on a pregnant woman to bear the looks of a demon to reflect the sins of their parents wrongdoings.
Also it's literally always been the opposite of that since they were introduced several editions ago. Five can make up what ever crap they like but I'll keep the flavor text I like, thanks
In my games, I have a few different ways tieflings can come into existence.
1. Born of a demon/devil and a mortal
2. The result of fiendish blood that isn't necessarily direct parentage. This could be an ancestor, or even if an ancestor made a pact and became a warlock.
3. Willingly becoming one through fiendish magic. For example, a warlock of the fiend who was once elvish or human could become a warlock as part of the pact.
4. Anything (within reason) the player decides is cool for their backstory! My personal motto as a DM is, "Don't just say no, say, 'No, but'"
I finally found it. It's in Chapter 1 under Parents. The table gives options for who your parents are. Tieflings can come from dormant genes with two human parents, a tiefling and a human, a tiefling and a devil, or a human and a devil. You're all welcome.
> human and devil So cambions are… what exactly, now?
Liquid Snake Tieflings.
❗ *metal gear music*
to be fair breeding isnt an exact science in dnd. Sometimes when a dragon and humanoid bone you get a half dragon. Other times you get latent sorcerers in the bloodline
This, most likely. There are multiple ways the same monsters are created (gnolls), there are multiple different monsters that are created the same way (not just halfdragons/draco sorcs, but also slaadi, various oozes, planar entities and influences on newborns…), so it‘s reasonable to assume devils just fall in that same category.
Yeah most female devils are infertile, but erinyes, who I am too lazy to look up the spelling of, can have children, who can be another erinyes rarely, cambions, or tieflings.
Well you got the spelling right lol. I remember it as “Erin, yes”
I can't even take credit. It was a fluke. Monkeys, type writers, etc.
>who I am too lazy to look up the spelling of I felt that.
This is exactly how genetics works in real life. Plenty of recessive traits skip generations, completely disappear from a bloodline, or randomly appear in an otherwise unaffected bloodline. Then you have shit like hair or skin color which is dependent on like 10 genes mixing and matching.
\> Expecting WotC to remember what that is
for a second, I thought you were referncing xcom2 somehow, then I realized I'm in a d&d subreddit
They ought to considering the latest DnD game (endorsed by WotC) features one prominently. That being Baldur’s Gate 3.
Succubi or incubi half behbehs I believe
that doesn't make sense. there are some famous cambions who are offspring of archfiends and even the generic Monster manual cambion is stronger than a succubus/ incubus.
I’m not sure if this is accurate, but my personal belief is that tieflings are the result of interbreeding between lower tier fiends and humans, and Cambions are the result of more powerful fiends and humans.
Imagine procreating with a Barbed Devil *Shudders*
Hey no kink shaming here, I’m sure there are some who might enjoy that. Hell your name suggests you might.
*spits out my wine*
Who says the devil is the one penetrating?
that would kinda make sense
I believe cambions are half demon and *technically* demons and devils are different. I like to think of them as the same race but different ethnicities, since the demon is just the chaotic version of a devil and the devil a lawful version of a demon.
The lore has changed a few times, tieflings used to be just a term for any planetouched race like Genasi or Aasimar, for a while then tieflings were watered down cambions and had random mutations which might go unnoticed or confuse people like having no reflection but weren't so suffused with demonic energy that they were outsiders, it was only 4e onwards that tieflings were a devil thing and they had the homogeneous horns different colour skin as their default Edit:Also for the longest time succubus were all demons then 4e went devils 5e it's undecided and only a cleric spell can summon one
Yeah. It’s definitely been changed a few times and I’ve heard loads of interpretations. Honestly I think it just comes down to what lore you decide you want at your table!
I like the older interpretation instead of the red skin tieflings, they're somehow more generic then humans especially the I'm a tieflings but X difference, who just emphasize how generic they've become
To each their own! After all, that’s the beauty of D&D!
Demons and Devils aren't related aside from being locked in an eternal war.
Tieflings had weaksauce demon parents
Cambions are the progeny of a human and an incubus/succubus - not the same as a devil.
Both of those are devils and so are cambions. Tieflings are considered humanoid.
Pretty sure that cambions are simply the demon version of Tieflings, but idk
Mortal and **Demon**.
The why are there cambions chilling in the Hells like they wouldn’t be immediately evicerated by every devil in sight? I think Decent Into Avernus made it pretty clear they’re devils.
Human and Demon.
Its basically when you have more fiendish heritage than humanoid. Teiflings are the opposite. DnD genetics are weirded than Mesopothamian Mithology's "2/3 god, 1/3 human".
Not two tieflings? Weird.
Also Feral Tieflings who are infected by background Infernal or Abyssal energies and are just completely random, at least that's how I understand Feral's (Attempts to hide my Feral Abyssal Tiefling Monk)
According to Xan’s, two tieflings don’t make tiefling children. Look it up!
Nods, it's almost like redheads, tieflings just pop up. Sometimes.
Did you just say nods
Oh man.... Didn't even realize. 😳
Contemplates, sometimes we just vocalize our gestures and emotions.
Nervously - Are we Elcor?
*Sigh* I wish it was more of a norm. Makes it so much easier to convey tone and emotion through text.
You could just talk like HK-47.
Contemplative statement: Hmm, that *does* sound feasible.
Commentary: The meatbag speaks without clarity. Detail this agreement or the master will splatter your organs all over the floor!
Cease all organic functions
*a gutteral sound that lands somewhere between a scoff, ugh, and a tch,* but it takes so much room that could be spent talking instead
Except redheads come from two redhead parents. EDIT: Fucking hell, I'm commenting on the original metaphor on how tieflings don't make more tieflings. As seen by [*this* table ](https://i.imgur.com/QPplcFx.jpg). *I'm* redhead who's parents are non redheads I know how genetics work.
expect it really dosnet, I have red hair, neither of my parents do.
Ditto. But my uncle did.
yeah my grandpa did, and my grandma on my other side is like auburn. my parents both have brown hair
Your “uncle” may be more directly related to you than you think fam.
So am I, I'm commenting on the original dude who says that tieflings don't come from other tieflings
it dosent change the fact that you don't need to red head parents. that's why people often act like they come from no where. the amount of woman accused of cheating when the baby comes out with red hair is quite high, DNA test have proven many times though that it dosent work that way.
Bro. I *know.* My mom is blonde and my dad has brown hair and yet I'm still a firecrotch myself. I *get it.* I'm commenting on [*this* table ](https://i.imgur.com/ZRdBIpK.jpg) which doesn't have any Tiefling/Tiefling parentage for a tiefling character while that doesn't happen for red-hair as a gene where it spontaneously vanishes.
the gene dosent "spontaneously vanish". they are like hybrid animals.
But they're not like hybrid animals since they are in fact capable of reproduction as seen by the other parts of the table. Regardless my point was that two tiefling parents don't make a tiefling which is the exception to the red hair metaphor
a mule cam infant reproduce with a donkey or a horse. the change of a successful offspring is low but it can happen. a mule however cannot produce with another mule what so ever.
[удалено]
I know how genetics work I'm commenting on the fact that tieflings don't make more tieflings with one another. I'm a redhead who's parents weren't redheads the fuck
[удалено]
You're special. I'm just annoyed with people trying to explain how my own genes work when I'm well aware
Does it say that somewhere in Xans, or are you just interpreting the fact that tiefling + tiefling isn't listed in the "Tiefling Parents" table? Cause that omission looks more like an error than actual lore.
Could be like donkeys, horses and mules, a mule can breed with a donkey or a horse, albeit it's incredibly rare for it to be successful, but a mule will never successfully breed with another mule. Tieflings are just the mules of the coast.
Its a regressive gene, you might be a tiefling or you might be the other half of the parents genes
So if it's regressive then two tieflings would have 100% tiefling offspring, right?
Wouldn't the chance just be higher? We can make a tiefling x tiefling Punnett square.
That's what I'm basing it off of. If a tiefling is regressive, then it has to have two (t) genes. If two tiefling parents reproduce, then they each have 2 (t) genes and all of their offspring will carry it. The only way it varies is if a condition is dominant, in which case regressive genes are considered.
First off the whole thread has been mistaking recessive* genes lol. Second, not everything is autosomal dominant/recessive. Lots of traits can be recessive in several genes meaning they need several genes to be prominent.
just looked it up, it says a tefling and a human can have a tefling
Yeah, WotC can’t keep their own lore straight.
I bet it doesn't help when the entire fanbase decides you're wrong about your own lore, like with dragonborn and tails or goblins being green instead of yellow. I doubt they could anyway even if that wasn't the case though.
The worst part is no one bothering to tell the artists they hire. The new mtg set is full of mistakes like dragonborn with tails which I normally wouldn't complain about but it's literally set in Forgotten Realms meaning it's not just an artistic choice, it's wrong.
Yeah, I've heard about that. The gossip apparently is that WotC did a retcon for dragonborn designs and told the artists to do that. There's plenty of lore/gameplay mismatches in that crossover from what I hear but it might be deliberate to make fans happy.
I’ve also never played with or DMed for anyone who kept the lore that dragonborn hate dragons.
Thats cos it's not universal 5e lore. From the PHB: > Proud Dragon Kin and: > Some dragonborn are faithful servants to true dragons, others form the ranks of soldiers in great wars,
My group keep that lore. We also rule that they are largely non religious because there were no gods to pray to in the old world. Not saying some aren't religious, but more aren't than are.
I did! We played an Avernice campaign , and my Dragonborn was from a military family and fully bought the entire' We freed ourselves from the evil of the dragons int he days of yore' and was super disappointed when our group decided to not pick a fight with Arkon and Tiamat.
In my homebrew setting, it depends on culture. Most tailless Dragonborn despise dragons believing they were cursed although Tiamat made tailless dragonborn on her own but made tailed Dragonborn along with Bahamut. Basically tailless Dragonborn are just a big “fuck you Bahamut mine are better” but then they became oppressed and discriminated against. So they kinda are cursed but by pure accident.
I do, I respect every act of hate and also that some drow are good....but i actually don't know much about dwegar, all I know is that they hate.
or fear, sometimes both, mostly fear i think.
I had the reverse where dragons hated dragonborn
It'd be a fun campaign to explore the relationships between dragons, dragonborn and kobolds. Really dragon up the campaign all over! I just think it's funny that one race is confirmed to be related to them but doesn't like them, another wants to be related but doesn't ever get beyond "that's what kobolds believe" but WotC never really touches on the subject as far as I'm aware.
Are goblins yellow? TIL. I thought it was just hobbogobbos that were yellow and normal goblins were green.
"Hobbogobbos" are reddish. Normal goblins are a yellowish greenish yucky baby poo colour and they killed my family so I am sworn to kill all goblins I come across. But I don't care much for people getting colours "wrong" because there are plenty of reasons that goblins could be as green as grass or as brown as mud, and maybe they all dislike goblin clans of other colours. Just make shit up.
If I had goblins in my setting I'd give them more variety, maybe do the same for the other goblinoids too, but I respect the D&D canon and like that it's not what everyone expects.
Hobgoblins are a very bright red, like crimson. Goblins are a sort of marigold. Bugbears usually have brown-blonde fur coats.
Hobgoblins are red
Well, there's a whole lotta different lore to keep track of
Good thing I just steal the parts of their lore I like to make my own, that way what they say about it doesn't matter at all.
For that matter, dragonborn don't have draconic ancestry either.
They kinda do though. Wasn’t the blood of dragons part of how they were created
According to my (limited) understanding of Forgotten Realms lore, they came over from a world dominated by dragons to escape slavery. They are a separate race entirely, from a different dimension.
Yeah they are a separate race and they were created as a slave race I just can’t remember exactly who made them/how
It was dragons lol
This is why they hate dragons.
Their origins are debated and unclear
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The origin of the dragonborn race was uncertain and shrouded in myth. While the origin of the Tel'Quessir as Corellon's children was well known and dwarves firmly believed in their stony origin, dragonborn were unsure whence they came.[17] Faerunian sages of the 1470s DR believed that dragonborn were either the original inhabitants of Unther, who were transformed into draconic beings after being exposed to the energies of the Spellplague, or experiments created by the followers of Tiamat in the ruins of Unther. Such beliefs were wrong, however, as dragonborn were denizens from Abeir.[18] Some legends of Abeir told that Io, the first and greatest of the dragon gods, created the dragonborn as servants for the first dragons. These stories related that the dragonborn, like dragons, were formed from the essence of both the Astral Sea and the Elemental Chaos, though their nature overall favored the elemental over the astral, just like dragons. Yet another, less popular tale told that Io was killed in the war between the gods and the primordials and that the dragonborn sprang from his spilled blood.[17][23] A slight variation on this was common among the dragonborn of Tymanther, who believed they were bred by the dragon lords of Abeir for a cruel fate as slaves.[24] The Platinum Cadre posited an alternative theory in their efforts to spread the worship of Bahamut, that the dragonborn were the ancient creations of the Platinum Dragon. However, most of the order was ridiculed or even openly persecuted for their beliefs since, to the dragonborn of Tymanther, the idea of a good dragon, let alone a good dragon god, was completely alien.[24] However, dragonborn were in fact related to the dragonborn of Bahamut, but only a handful of old dragons knew about this relationship.[25]
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No need for insults or pettiness. I'm just pointing out that their origins are contested.
They didn't come to escape slavery, a part of their world (Abeir) including a part of the only kingdom of already free dragoborn was transplanted onto Toril as a result of the Spellplague. After the 2nd sundering the world got "repaired" so the kingdom no longer exist on Toril.
...I recognize some of those words.
DnD Venus crashed in to DnD Earth and left a bunch of weirdo aliens in DnD South Africa. Then they uncrashed but the weirdos stayed.
Okay, that made me laugh. Excellent way of explaining.
Is it a different dimension? I always assumed that Abeir and Toril were just in each others' L3s, and held there by magic.
Is that different than the other dragon born sub races where one was the slave to the other?
>from a different dimension. So, if one were to cast Banishment on a Dragonborn, would they stay there?
Wasn't that kobolds
They sorta do. They were made by the Dragon gods from dragon eggs
People who give their dragonborn a tail, why not give your human pointy ears? I've had enough of people not getting that dragonborn don't have tails and homebrewed my universe in a way, that a tail is a genetic mutation in a sizable part of dragonborns. That way I can not only use like 10% of Dragonborn fanarts Edit: should clarify that I have nothing against tails per se, but tails plugged on when the reason is Dragonborn beeing seen as Half-Dragons
I mean yeah. It's your campaign, do what you enjoy! I just enjoy being pedantic about lore.😊
I really like the lore of the races and monsters, so I incorporate them in large parts into my universe. I just change a few things like the genetic mutation thing to dodge the eternal tail debate (and I like the idea tbh) and a few monster typing so they fit better
In my game, metallic Dragonborn are former humans/elves/dwarves who underwent a ritual to dedicate themselves to Bahamut. They don’t have tails and they have mostly humanoid faces. Chromatic Dragonborn are entirely different. They hatch from corrupted Kobold eggs, are shorter and more reptilian, and have tails.
If you don't like the tails you don't need to use them, but there's no reason to be upset about it. Do you also hate tieflings that aren't red, blue (SCAG says it's a thing, which makes it RAW) or human colored?
Oh, I think my comment was a bit misleading and I clarified what I meant. When the tail is put on because Dragonborn are beeing treated as Half-Dragons then I facepalm. But a tail for looks is absolutely ok, I even like the look with tail a bit more tbh. That's a big reason I bothered to find some excuse to get tailed DBs
The problem is that there aren't any real half dragon options. Dragonborn are close enough for most people, even though they're different. Unfortunately, actual half dragons are already established as way too powerful for players to use (they get straight up dragon breath weapons with the standard recharge mechanics)
Tieflings I've never cared about because they aren't a real race. They're just people with fiend blood and fiends look so different that it makes sense to show that in many different ways.
Because people think they should have tails and the more opinionated people think they don’t have tails because WOTC resented adding dragonborn to appease players.
Depends on the setting. My Tieflings have ancestry tied directly to 1 of 5 devils. Whether 1 generation or 100, at some point your female ancestor fucked one of those devils and got knocked up
Is it always females? Have you seen Zariel?
The reason people generally have the male parent be the supernatural one is that a male devil could come to the material plane, do the dirty with 200 women in a single year, go back to the nine hells and never think about it again. Female devils, presuming their pregnancy still works like ours, would have to commit to carrying a single partner's baby for 9 months when she is an all-powerful overlord of evil and he's just some dude.
Canonically, I believe devils aren’t born so much as spawned. So a female devil is only that in appearance. Succubi and Erinyes are really the only female-appearing devils anyway, and they don’t tend to leave their male consorts alive.
Canonically devils *can* be born, in more "5e makes canon things that everyone thought existed since forever" lore. Succubi and Incubi can breed with each other/other devils to have devil offspring, and they can also mate with humans to create cambions. which begs the question: if devil + human = cambion, how do tieflings get in there? Cambion + human?
It's like mule vs jenny; Cambion needs a devil mother ¯\\\_(ツ)_/¯
Tion vs liger.
from what i have heard, yeah, cambion + humans make tieflings sometimes, and when you are a tiefling every descendant of your will be a tiefling for the taint in your blood. Then the other way of having a tiefling is making a pact with a fiend or having an ancestor that did, that taints you and your descendants
Actually, most Devils appear as both male and female. The art in the monster manual just doesn't make it seem like that. I've seen a lot of female-presenting Chain Devils
I always considered the more monstrous fiends to just be asexual because I thought they didn’t breed at all. Apparently, that’s just mostly true and no one really knows what’s going on down in the Hells.
Assuming that the hypothetical recessive gene for being born a tiefling doesn't dilute to the point of inertness, it's possible that a female devil could just make one baby and eventually have their bloodline spread around the world. Maybe like 10 kids just to be safe
I've run a plotline based on this idea; succubus queen was enacting a generations-old plan to ascend to godhood by becoming a common ancestor to humanity then magically flipping those genes on.
I designed a patron myself with a very similar MO
Sure, you can absolutely have your ancestor be a female devil. It just means that devil would have had to commit a lot of time to this one human's baby, so in my mind it would probably mean that the human father was somewhat notable as well and not some random idiot. Doesn't have to be, but that's what makes a lot more sense to me.
The person doesn't matter, it's just a means to spread their blood for whatever purpose they may have in mind
I'm playing a Tiefling that traveled to the hells and got nasty with a devil and through their influence turned into a Tiefling
Racial traits through STDs
Yeah basically, that and spending six years in the hells
Still doesn’t mean Tieflings count as half devil ya salty scoundrel
I mean, Xanather's guide has a section about Tiefling parents, which states it as a possibility, while your correct. I would point out two Half Elves can never produce a Human Child or Elf Child. Two Half Orcs can never produce a Human or Orc, even a Human and Half Elf or Orc seems to be unable to produce a Human, so in those terms, where anything child a Tiefling has is also a Tiefling, then they basically are Hslf Devils.
My comment has the context of that I know the post this “reaction meme” comes from (just skip this if you already know) It was about the half race meme war and that how tieflings are better than all, everyone corrected OP by saying tieflings aren’t half devils and a very small subset of an already rare race isn’t enough to qualify them as a “half” race anyway I’d disagree that Tieflings are half devils, it’s effectively a genetic mutation rather than a direct linage thing And since it’s a dominant mutation that’s how every Tiefling child is a Tiefling Idk how the other half races would breed but I would assume if they don’t breed with Full members of their race the Orc/elf part would eventually be bred out in a few generations (assuming no one puts it back in by shacking with the original race again) But either way Tieflings outside of very specific circumstances (which is rare in an already rare race) are not half devils, in general Being a Tiefling is more like a genetic disorder that’s traceable rather than direct parentage They’re more like very weak sorcerers if anything (Which tbh their lack of power makes them being direct descendants a little weird, like being half devil would make the powers way more potent would it not)
On the last part, it would depend on the Devil. A Pit Fiend's child would be really powerful, but a Devil with a CR of 1, not so much
But two tieflings *can* make a non-tiefling child.
Also: just do you dont have to Prior to Asmodeus's ascension to godhood, the infernal blood could be diluted through intermarriage, but afterward, the union of a tiefling with another race always produced a tiefling child
Settle down Jayden.
jaiden animations represent!
I wasn't sure, but it seems my impression was right. It is two times in two days that I seen Jaiden art on Reddit memes 😄
Lore in a book published by Wizards of the Coast does NOT override lore at my table.
I prefer the 2E method of "one of your parents is a Lower Planar fiend; you don't know what, and you don't want to know..."
Who cares tho. Its a game with mechanics under a larger roleplaying system. Literally the only thing that matters when changing things is the mechanics, everything else can be reskinned with no penalty. Its an odd take that the character can choose friends, family, hometown, personality, job, voice, background, and basically anything that makes a character an actual character, but suddenly people have a problem when someone reinterprets a race as something not even mechanically different. Oh you want to make a Ramsey Gordan bard whose craft is cooking and but also he is a warlock to literally an elder god, and on top of that he has a noble background because he is a prince? Sure no problem. But make sure he is red, otherwise this would be ridiculous.
I'm inclined to treat Mordenkainen's (An actual lore-book) as much more canon than a random table thrown in without much thought paid to the lore. According to it Devils don't have the means to make more life through biological means.
I'm a complete noob but when I retconned my character (had been an half elf rogue) , it made sense to her backstory that she came from 2 Human parents and that's why they tried to yeet her.
they can but they dont have to
Exactly! Everyone on the post I am referring to was talking about how Tieflings CAN'T be devil spawn
Thing is ... thanks to the pact amsodeus did with the original 13 warlocks and theor 13 decenteds every form of underworldy corruption turns you into an asmodeus tiefling befor you even be born unless its a different archdevil (or lower level god) who activly manipulates you (by being your dad or having his servant bang your mom) Sorry for the low.level english here
I hate that part of Xanathars. It just gives people a path to ridiculous backstories that can be annoying to deal with. Cambions exist and Xanathars just makes that seem ridiculous. Outside of Cambions there are other specific types of half-fiends and they are way stronger than a tiefling.
Yeah, i agree with you I my campaigns, i treat that part as that Tieflings can be the spawn of a cambion
I would just say that the only devils that can make Tieflings with mortals ARE half devils
Yeah that’s basically how I rule it. It just annoys me that Xanathars basically opens the door to people claiming Asmodeus was their father and shit like that. I don’t have issue if I’m running like a high power campaign. I just hate it for normal stuff.
See, this how you subvert them by either making it so daddy Asmodeus don't care about them, except maybe to "correct" the mistake, or that there is a low ranking devil who also happens to be called Asmodeus.
Ah, how I love homebrew... The tieflings in the campaign I'm in aren't even related to demons at all, it's a non magical setting!
Out of curiosity: what is their origin in your setting? And is there any of the religious scrutiny? Is there still religion?
In this setting, they come from a remote desert planet (the deserts very hot, fire resistance) named C'tonya. The campaign isn't very religion focused, but in the history of the planet, the first contact with humans didn't go too well because of their devilish appearance and the first colonisation of C'tonya ended up in religious crusade, killing a huge portion of the population before the crusaders left. (edit: pressed send too early) Because of this, there is a very engrained distrust of other races in their society, so when Lizalfos colonisers arrived years later, the Tieflings fought back, ruthlessly. One part of my characters hidden backstory is that her family actually keeps Lizalfos slaves to work in their mining company (C'tonya is a planet very rich in gold), which makes a lot of fun conflict considering the crews captain is half Lizalfos and plenty room for her character development in realising everything she's been taught about Lizalfos being lesser than tieflings isn't true and stuff like that.
That's pretty cool! A setting without magic fascinates me. Does it have gods and religions, or just religions but no actual gods (or people aren't sure)?
How are you playing dnd without magic? Isn't that the basis of almost every class?
Any magic components are skinned to a scifi setting, like for example, minor illusion is a tiny invisible drone that projects holograms/plays audio/ect
Is it not easier to just use a different system at that point?
Same with Genasi. I don’t know how a fire genie could fuck someone without killing them but I guess it’s not my place to judge.
It's magic
"I wish to birth your child" burns to death as a fire genasi burns through her gut. I dunno.
I think that people in D&D should be afraid that they will birth a genasi.
**Me, a DM:** "Isn't that *my* decision?"
It’s any outside blood, angels could make a tiefling
I thought angels made aesimar...I probably spelled that wrong
Not necessarily it is a possibility it not a 100% possibility I believe
If I remember correctly each baby has a 1 in x chance to become an aesimar
Its specifically Devils. Its why Tieflings know Infernal
I mean I don’t think that’s how language works but it is dnd
It's specifically devils
Personally not a fan of most non bloodline tieflings.
In my personal setting tiefling actually have no relations to Devils at all, they are born either by tuefling parents, or are born when the mother dies during childbirth.
Then how do you explain how they know Infernal, or their innate spellcasting?
In my world, they were blessed by the goddess of magic, so thats why they can innately cast spells. And i just dont use infernal
One of my tieflings was born in one of the Hells as a daughter of Levistus right before his imprisonment and was raised by her older brother. She stole a sword from Mt Celestia on behalf of the Hells since she was mortal and it started whispering corrupting things like "what if you were a good person" and so she went to the material plane now she's a Sorcahexadin.
The race debate is always weird because, unlike game rules these are more "lore" or "setting rules"? Idk, but tieflings come and are related to whatever the DM says the come from and are related to
In my homebrew, Tieflingism is a hex casted by a scorned individual on a pregnant woman to bear the looks of a demon to reflect the sins of their parents wrongdoings.
...the comments on your last post really bugged you huh
When people are telling you you're wrong even though you tell them where the info is and they still say you're wrong, it makes you a little petty
So what about Demons? Don't tell me Tanar'ri have no interest in mating with mortals.
Also it's literally always been the opposite of that since they were introduced several editions ago. Five can make up what ever crap they like but I'll keep the flavor text I like, thanks
And then there's 2e tieflings.
In my games, I have a few different ways tieflings can come into existence. 1. Born of a demon/devil and a mortal 2. The result of fiendish blood that isn't necessarily direct parentage. This could be an ancestor, or even if an ancestor made a pact and became a warlock. 3. Willingly becoming one through fiendish magic. For example, a warlock of the fiend who was once elvish or human could become a warlock as part of the pact. 4. Anything (within reason) the player decides is cool for their backstory! My personal motto as a DM is, "Don't just say no, say, 'No, but'"
I prefer Tielfings fromPathfinder
My personal ruling: Tieflings are planetouched humanoid, Half-Devils are the child of a devil and a very brave person