Originally Posted by mrfuji3
Originally Posted by Warlocke
Originally Posted by Leucrotta
And the way half elves and half orcs were?

Yes, [tieflings] are mechanically a unique race option. That's part of the point I was making. They are, in the lore of D&D though, hybrids between the lower plane and elves, humans, orcs etc. Very similar to Half Orcs and Half Elves in being descended from two or more species. Point being that they got to retain their mechanical uniqueness while Half Elves and Half Orcs were stripped of it. Tiefling players don't get 'just play a human and describe your character as having horns and a tail
I’m not talking mechanically. I’m taking lore. In the One DND play test material, ardlings and tieflings are not described as mixed races. They are presented as their own races. Not necessarily descended from of mix of two different species.

While the description of the races doesn’t preclude this, it seems that the way WotC is heading is that most tieflings are the offspring of two tiefling parents and ardlings are the offspring of two ardling parents.

That is different from somebody who has one human parent and one elf parent or is a mixed dwarf-gnome hybrid.
In the OD&D playtest material I've most recently read, tieflings are described as "born in the Lower Planes or having one or more fiendish ancestors who originated there." This effect can come from an ancestor (making it partially racial), but because it doesn't need to come from your parents directly, it's not equivalent to the other "half-X" races. Imo, it seems to be saying tieflings aren't their own "race" but more similar to a corruption to your base race. I.e., if you are part tiefling and part human, you're considered a full tiefling - there's no such thing as a "half-tiefling."

I don't agree that WotC is intending for tieflings to mostly be descended directly from tiefling parents. They specifically mention "fiendish ancestors," not "parents." Additionally, there's the "born in the Lower Planes" aspect -> two humans with 100% human ancestors can (will always?) produce a tiefling child if the child is born in the Lower Planes.

I see what you are saying. It’s a possibility.

Though by the rules, half tiefling is an option.

If you look at BG3, where there are tiefling parents who have tiefling children and they all live in a tiefling community, I do suspect this is what One D&D is going to look like.