That's how Planescape and 3e Tieflings were. What you're describing wasn't really a thing til 4e. It's even in the descriptor in Races of Faerun Tieflings look human except for one or two distinguishing features related to their unusual ancestor. Some examples of these features (and the ancestors that cause them) are: small horns on head (demon, devil, night hag) fangs or pointed teeth (any) forked tongue (demon, devil) glowing red eyes (demon, devil, night hag) cat eyes (rakshasa) more or less than 5 fingers (demon, devil) goatlike legs (devil) hooves (devil) non-prehensile tail (demon, devil) furry, leathery, or scaly skin (demon, devil, rakshasa) red skin (demon, devil) bruised blue skin (night hag) casts no shadow (demon, devil) throws no reflection (demon, devil) skin is hot to the touch (demon, devil) smell of brimstone (demon, devil) So a completely human looking girl with some little horns is perfectly in line with a Tieflings, just not a 4 or 5e Tiefling
Yeah, the movie is also playing fast and loose with druid wildshape since owlbears technically aren't animals/beasts but Doric is seen wildshaping into one in the trailer while Chris Pine's bard character is asking what the heck she is and discussing it with the rest of the party while she's going hogwild on some baddie mooks. Doric probably has an augmented feat or magical item or spell boost that let's her bend the wildshape rules a bit. DM house rules and all since the manuals are guidelines. I saw some posters and artwork promoting the D&D movie, and one of them has the heroes in silhouette with gold light in the background. Doric has her horns and a short tail for her silhouette so her having a tail is confirmed, in my view.
Well, I think 5E is playing fast and loose with Wild Shape and Animal Companions too, I heard about Druids with a pet T-rex, LOL. 2E used to be a lot more reserved with this. Interesting that we see an Aaracokra and a Yuan-Ti in the trailer too! I mean the former became a playeable race recently, but still they are rather obscure. Yeah, 4E sadly reimagined Tieflings are all looking the same, red with horns and a tail, and also they get no negative reactions anymore because there was some kingdom that made a deal with Asmodeus once and their descendants all look like this now, and I guess everyone is OK with that? I never cared for that explanation. Gone were the days when if you were born like this there was a good chance someone in your family line had sex with a Succubus or Incubus, or worshiped Demons/Devils. That was so in 2E, especially Planescape. Lucky ones could hide their traits by wearing say, a long skirt to hide the digitigrade legs or a cap to hide the horns. Some only got inhuman eyes. Red skin or such coloring was always optional, until 4E not all Tieflings looked like that. Y'know I am a D&D nerd when the first thing I thought of when I saw the poster was "Black Dragons don't have orange wing membranes, it's green or grey!" The second was "I wonder if Michelle Rodrigez will again play an unlikeable a-hole?" - that seems to be what she is typecast for.
I'm of the mid 80's, Frank Mentzer BECMI era, with the art of Larry Elmore...this looks like absolute trousers to me.
I'm guessing the black dragon's red wing coloration is to make it stand out more on screen / in promotional artwork. (Incidentally, I built a black dragon in Lego form for Lego's recent Dungeons & Dragons challenge Ideas contest so I've been studying up on black dragon design/anatomy. ) Film is a different medium from paperback artwork. According to the new Hasbro Dicelings line of transforming D&D monster dice toys, the black dragon has a name (Rakor, and hopefully plays an important part in the story) and has neon green wings.
There's still a good chance of that. But now there's been a dozen generations that've gone by where Tieflings are regular citizens and the Forgotten Realms populace has slowly grown to accept them, even if they might mistrust them on sight. I've restricted Tieflings as a race in my 5e campaign and there've been only a few NPCs at that. The same thing goes for Dragonborn. And there are no half-Tieflings. A person born of a Tiefling and a human are either born all one or the other. Right now, my players are two dwarves, a human and a lizardman (I allowed the latter because it made sense within the context of the story when the party befriends some lizardmen during Horde of the Dragon Queen). Maccath, from Rise of Tiamat, has fallen in love with the human ranger, so she's the one NPC tiefling the party encounters frequently after she moved her studies to Waterdeep as a rep for the Hosttower. She's fascinated by dragons and is basically a dracologist. But she's been left in possession of the Green Dragon Mask while riding on a silver dragon back to a Council of Metallic Dragons...and I'm wrestling with, left to her own devices and a deeply engrained member of the Arcane Brotherhood, whether she uses Misty Step to abandon the dragon mid-flight and haul ass back to Luskan (and possibly bring wrath upon the Hosttower) or if she'll go ahead and study the mask in the company of metallic dragons. I'm thinking she's smart enough to stick with the plan.
Annnnd now the OGL drama is starting to spill into a potential movie boycott. Dungeons & Dragons Fans Are Boycotting the Movie Amid WotC Controversy (msn.com) I feel like some people were just searching for a reason to bail on DnD to begin with. I get it. When Gundam model kits were exclusive to Diamond and comicbook shops back in the mid 90's, I kind of felt hip knowing I was partaking of some cool stuff that no one quite knew about or understood. Once Gundam became mainstream in the early 2000's, it lost some of its luster. I feel like something similar is happening right now with DnD. It's becoming MAINSTREAM, so time to bail and run to alternative systems that few people have heard of outside of gaming stores. The OGL drama is simply the perfect excuse.
You obviously don't understand why people are upset if you think it's about the hobby being mainstream.
I know exactly why SOME people are upset. 1. The big third party publishers are upset because Hasbro threatened to ask for royalties and were contemplating a clause that would allow them to assume propriety over third party content. 2. Players are upset because Hasbro plans to increase subscription rates (primarily impacts DMs). The fact of the matter is, though - this is Hasbro's company and they're trying to push the IP beyond just being a tabletop system. "Number 1" has to happen to some degree in order to protect the IP in court. Without it, anyone could theoretically make DnD content regardless of media without Hasbro's consent and the court would uphold them being unable to either monetize or shut the operation down thanks to the current OGL. It may not happen exactly the way the leaked OGL 1.1 was planning, but it will happen because it has to. I think more players understand this than they let on...they're just looking for a reason to bail. The PLAYER outrage for number 2 is more understandable compared to number 1. This will hit everyone where it hurts the most - the pocketbook. But as a Transformers collector who has seen dramatic price increases just within the past 15 years, I can tell you that the people who are truly playing DnD will continue to do so. The ones who are screaming that they're leaving or boycotting the DnD movie are mostly people who are looking for an excuse to bail on the system or not go to the theater (and probably weren't planning to anyway). The fact of the matter is the base is mostly: 1. introverts who tend to avoid the mainstream. 2. justice warriors who will white knight just about anything given the chance. With that in mind, Hasbro and WotC can't be surprised at the backlash, although I still think the third party publishers were part of the mob that was raising the loudest voices to make the mob larger. But my opinion stands. What we're seeing is the growing pains of DnD going full mulit-media IP. And there are a number of fans who don't want this.
Players are upset because they plan to turn it into a quasi-mmo and pretty much ditch books and pdfs.
Looks fun to me. Hopefully, this will help my players visualize Waterdeep a bit more along with what the wizards of Thay, since they're getting ready to have a major encounter with them.
I'm not gonna lie, been getting a bit into DnD stuff lately and I'm really looking forward to this movie. Probably one of my top 2 most anticipated movies for the year. Just seems like it'll be a really fun one to see.
No. You can't want to have fun and be excited because *insert OGL legal stuff* and HaSbRoBAd for wanting money... Kidding. But that's how it feels.
