Brain Dump: Elemental Tieflings and Planar Physiology
When I first started this blog, I talked about how part of what I'd be using it for is as a place to "think out loud" regarding my attempts to create a campaign setting for D&D (or other fantasy RPG systems). Ironically, I've only been posting those thoughts if I've felt like I had "enough" for a post, or felt like I could tie it all into a topic or theme — if I could make it feel coherent.
But you know what? The times I need a "thinking space" the most is when it's not coherent, when my thoughts aren't nicely packed up into a complete and well-themed post. This is one of those times. Brain dump incoming.
Tieflings! Lots of people like them. I like them. They're cool, they're fun, they're colorful. Some folks play them as edgelords, some enjoy a sort of rebellious "I'm bad but not really" vibe, some people just wanna be purple. Interestingly, they have this built-in association with fiends, but I don't usually see people play into that; seems like I more often see them played either for their stats or for their flamboyant colorfulness. So, why not enrich tieflings by ditching the infernal angle altogether?
By default, tieflings usually have some amount of association with fire. For example, in 5th Edition D&D, they have resistance to fire damage and (at 3rd level) gain the ability to cast a specific fire spell once per day. Well, what if that affinity for fire came not from an infernal heritage, but from an elemental heritage? So maybe the "traditional" tieflings are the fire tieflings, and maybe there are also earth tieflings and water tieflings and air tieflings.
Well, that then leaves us needing to answer the question of where tieflings come from. Fiendish tieflings come from human bloodlines that are tainted by an ancestor who shagged a demon or formed a blood pact with devils or whatever. So where do elemental tieflings come from? Well, maybe it has to do with proximity to the elemental planes (or, to be less needlessly complex, maybe a single elemental plane)? Maybe at some point in the past there was a cataclysmic event during which the elemental plane intersected with the material plane in a specific region, and the survivors' bloodlines were forever touched by the elements; forever after, any descendants of those ancestors might give birth to a tiefling. So tieflings pop up among other races, but not because of an ancestor being naughty, but rather because of an ancestor having been present for this elemental cataclysm (whatever it was).
Speaking of intersecting planes, another random idea in my head right now is the idea that the material plane is not so much a true plane of its own, but rather a nexus, an intersection where all the other planes meet. The material world is what you get when you blend the elemental plane, the feywild, the shadowfell, and so forth.
This idea helps with the elemental tiefling idea, but it also gives us someplace to go with some of our other races as well. For example, elves are generally treated as being related to the fey in some way; perhaps they're the people who live in fey-heavy areas? That is, if a given forest is "closer" or more fully overlapping with the feywild, then maybe most of the children born there are elves, just because that's where they were born? That would explain the elven forest cities that fantasy gamers expect and love.
So we could have elemental tieflings as a result of historical contact with the elemental plane(s) and elves (and perhaps also gnomes?) as a result of planar contact with the feywild. But what about dwarves? Orcs? Dragonborn? Goblins? Giants? All the various anthropomorphic animals that serve as splatbook races? I guess I've still got a ways to go.
Anyway, I know this one was a bit shorter, but that's all for now. Getting these ideas written down is helpful for me; hopefully I'll have further developments later. In the meantime, take care of each other, okay?
But you know what? The times I need a "thinking space" the most is when it's not coherent, when my thoughts aren't nicely packed up into a complete and well-themed post. This is one of those times. Brain dump incoming.
Tieflings! Lots of people like them. I like them. They're cool, they're fun, they're colorful. Some folks play them as edgelords, some enjoy a sort of rebellious "I'm bad but not really" vibe, some people just wanna be purple. Interestingly, they have this built-in association with fiends, but I don't usually see people play into that; seems like I more often see them played either for their stats or for their flamboyant colorfulness. So, why not enrich tieflings by ditching the infernal angle altogether?
By default, tieflings usually have some amount of association with fire. For example, in 5th Edition D&D, they have resistance to fire damage and (at 3rd level) gain the ability to cast a specific fire spell once per day. Well, what if that affinity for fire came not from an infernal heritage, but from an elemental heritage? So maybe the "traditional" tieflings are the fire tieflings, and maybe there are also earth tieflings and water tieflings and air tieflings.
Well, that then leaves us needing to answer the question of where tieflings come from. Fiendish tieflings come from human bloodlines that are tainted by an ancestor who shagged a demon or formed a blood pact with devils or whatever. So where do elemental tieflings come from? Well, maybe it has to do with proximity to the elemental planes (or, to be less needlessly complex, maybe a single elemental plane)? Maybe at some point in the past there was a cataclysmic event during which the elemental plane intersected with the material plane in a specific region, and the survivors' bloodlines were forever touched by the elements; forever after, any descendants of those ancestors might give birth to a tiefling. So tieflings pop up among other races, but not because of an ancestor being naughty, but rather because of an ancestor having been present for this elemental cataclysm (whatever it was).
Speaking of intersecting planes, another random idea in my head right now is the idea that the material plane is not so much a true plane of its own, but rather a nexus, an intersection where all the other planes meet. The material world is what you get when you blend the elemental plane, the feywild, the shadowfell, and so forth.
This idea helps with the elemental tiefling idea, but it also gives us someplace to go with some of our other races as well. For example, elves are generally treated as being related to the fey in some way; perhaps they're the people who live in fey-heavy areas? That is, if a given forest is "closer" or more fully overlapping with the feywild, then maybe most of the children born there are elves, just because that's where they were born? That would explain the elven forest cities that fantasy gamers expect and love.
So we could have elemental tieflings as a result of historical contact with the elemental plane(s) and elves (and perhaps also gnomes?) as a result of planar contact with the feywild. But what about dwarves? Orcs? Dragonborn? Goblins? Giants? All the various anthropomorphic animals that serve as splatbook races? I guess I've still got a ways to go.
Anyway, I know this one was a bit shorter, but that's all for now. Getting these ideas written down is helpful for me; hopefully I'll have further developments later. In the meantime, take care of each other, okay?
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