In Unearthed Arcana: That Old Black Magic (2015), they playtested a Tiefling Variant with an Abyssal Tiefling subrace. The Abyssal Tiefling gets this Abyssal Arcana trait instead of the original Infernal Legacy trait:
Abyssal Arcana. Each time you finish a long rest, you gain the ability to cast cantrips and spells randomly determined from a short
list. At 1st level, you can cast a cantrip. When you reach 3rd level,
you can also cast a 1st-level spell. At 5th level, you can cast a
2nd-level spell.
You can cast a spell gained from this trait only once until you
complete your next long rest. You can cast a cantrip gained from this
trait at will, as normal. For 1st-level spells whose effect changes if
cast using a spell slot of 2nd level or higher, you cast the spell as
if using a 2nd-level slot. Spells of 2nd level are cast as if using a
2nd-level slot.
At the end of each long rest, you lose the cantrips and spells previously granted by this feature, even if you did not cast them. You replace those cantrips and spells by rolling for new ones on the Abyssal Arcana Spells table. Roll separately for each cantrip and spell. If you roll the same spell or cantrip you gained at the end of your previous long rest, roll again until you get a different result.
Abyssal Arcana Spells
d6 |
1st Level |
3rd Level |
5th Level |
1 |
Dancing lights |
Burning hands |
Alter self |
2 |
True strike |
Charm person |
Darkness |
3 |
Light |
Magic missile |
Invisibility |
4 |
Message |
Cure wounds |
Levitate |
5 |
Spare the dying |
Tasha’s hideous laughter |
Mirror image |
6 |
Prestidigitation |
Thunderwave |
Spider climb |
I would assume that homebrew could trust this list to be at least somewhat balanced as possible spell replacements, since it made it to UA. However, keep in mind that UA is not strictly canon, but rather playtest material from WotC game designers.
In that regard, the Infernal Legacy trait looks a lot like a Dragonmark (from Unearthed Arcana: Eberron (v1.1)) or the Magic Initiate feat (PHB, p. 168). You could also skin one of those feats into a racial ability, as a homebrew that wouldn't deviate too much from the rules.
And completely RAW, you could always do a Feral Tiefling with the Devil's Tongue trait (SCAG, p. 118), too.
OK so let's be honest - these "Virtue Names" are basically like choosing Smurf names, and tieflings are way more emo than Smurfs. So listed "Virtues" include normal positive things we'd normally think of as virtues, but also things we wouldn't necessarily pick for a brainstormed list of virtues IRL, like torment, weary, creed, and despair. And, as you noticed, "carrion."
In English a "carrion bird", for example, is shorthand for a "carrion-eating bird", not a dead rotting bird. So you might interpret Carrion as Carrion[-eating]. Though if you're emo enough, both are fine interpretations as a tiefling name. "Eating carrion" can be seen as a virtue in terms of cleaning up the world, not preying on the living, recycling needed things back into the ecosystem, etc. "Being carrion" can be seen as mortification of the flesh, not valuing your lives above others, being emotionless/needless, etc. Or it might be as simple as "I like to KILL and leave bodies lying around." Don't be literal, be artistic and channel the impression the name gives you, that's enough.
But in general these are left to the PC to get all philosophical about, there's no "right interpretation." In reality it's a list of Emo Smurf names to pick from (and to let you know you can pick pretty much anything as a Virtue Name) because you think it sounds cool for a devil person.
Best Answer
How the book presents the Tiefling options...
The so-called Feral Tiefling was introduced in a sidebar on page 118 of the Sword Coast Adventurers Guide. The term "Feral Tiefling" doesn't actually appear there. Rather, there are several variant options presented for the standard Tiefling. I've paraphrased the options below. You choose Option 1, Option 2, or both Options 1 & 2 as follows:
You can replace the Tiefling's Infernal Legacy trait with 1 of the following 3 sub-options:
a. Devil's Tongue, which changes all the racial cantrips and spells gained.
b. Hellfire, which changes one of the racial spells gained but keeps the others unchanged. (This technically modifies Infernal Legacy rather than replacing it entirely, but for simplicity I'm going to phrase it as a partial replacement.)
c. Winged, which grants a flying speed.
There are a total of 8 combinations available above depending on which options and sub-options you choose (including the standard Tiefling if you pick neither option).
How D&D Beyond implements them...
The buffet of choices presented in SCAG is pretty straightforward to manage on paper, but D&D Beyond uses a somewhat unorthodox representation that doesn't quite match SCAG's terminology.
Option 1 is implemented by choosing between the Tiefling base race (with the standard ASI) and the Feral Tiefling base race (which effectively replaces the ASI with the Feral trait but still calls it an ASI). Thus the only difference between the two top-level Tiefling races is in the Ability Score Increase, +2 to Charisma for the Tiefling versus +2 to Dexterity for the Feral Tiefling.
Option 2 is implemented by choosing the "variant" version of one of the two chosen base races, either Variant Tiefling or Variant Feral Tiefling. This replaces the Infernal Legacy trait with your choice of 1 of the 3 sub-options listed above, which are provided in a drop-down menu. Thus when you pick either "variant" you are only choosing an Infernal Legacy-replacement trait.
To summarize the available options...
The following 12 Tiefling options are available on D&D Beyond (as of the time of this posting) when you factor in all the options presented in SCAG as well as the devil-specific subraces later published in Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes: