D&D General My Problem(s) With Halflings, and How To Create Engaging/Interesting Fantasy Races

[Chaosmancer]

Well if we're talking about D&D then if you're playing a wizard you're only allowed to be a Jack Vance character.

and Tolkien, I will give him this, he's definitely had more of a lasting impact than Jack Vance. I don't think I've ever seen Jack Vance mentioned in a context other than someone trying to explain where D&D's funky magic system comes from (or the related context of rattling off a laundry list of people who influenced Gary Gayax)

True, but I will also say that a good... 90% of the time I see Tolkien mentioned is also in the context of DnD. Outside of that, no one talks about Tolkien very much.

I mean, I know there are fan communities and sites dedicated to people speaking elvish and all that. But beyond the same type of hyper fandoms that you see with Harry Potter, Star Trek and Star Wars... Tolkien just isn't very prominent.

 

[Chaosmancer]

Wrong. 4e threw out a whole lot of stuff, and look at how well that went down. 5e realised history matters.

I see this argument come up so often, but you realize that part of 4e's problem was being too drastic a change because they did a lot very very fast, and the other part was that they created a game to utilize a digital tabletop space they never developed.

Just off the top of my head...

The Primal Power Source was a great edition
The change in gnomes was a great addition
New Dieties like the Raven Queen and the myth of the Dawn War are hugely popular
Many of the new classes and class concepts were massively popular
The change to Tielflings has been mostly met by positive response

I'm not going to say "history doesn't matter" but there were a lot of things gotten rid of between 3rd and 5th edition that deserve to be gone. Heck, 5e changed a major, core mechanical feature of the game and I have not heard a single person ever complaining that it should be changed back. I mean, "move action" has been standard in the game for the entire history of the game, this is the first and only edition to break from that pattern... and everyone loves it.

 

[Chaosmancer]

Computer fritz double post

 

[Mind of tempest]

I see this argument come up so often, but you realize that part of 4e's problem was being too drastic a change because they did a lot very very fast, and the other part was that they created a game to utilize a digital tabletop space they never developed.

Just off the top of my head...

The Primal Power Source was a great edition
The change in gnomes was a great addition
New Dieties like the Raven Queen and the myth of the Dawn War are hugely popular
Many of the new classes and class concepts were massively popular
The change to Tielflings has been mostly met by positive response

I'm not going to say "history doesn't matter" but there were a lot of things gotten rid of between 3rd and 5th edition that deserve to be gone. Heck, 5e changed a major, core mechanical feature of the game and I have not heard a single person ever complaining that it should be changed back. I mean, "move action" has been standard in the game for the entire history of the game, this is the first and only edition to break from that pattern... and everyone loves it.

I am fairly certain it had two main flaws to much obvious combat focus and the lack of open game licence as otherwise, most people would have just hacked the thing into something more familiar or to their tastes..

 

[Mind of tempest]

error double post.

 

[oreofox]

true but we end up with lots of forgotten things in dnd so what would one more do?

That's a WotC thing. They make all these extra things in other books (tabaxi, warforged, artificer, goblin, etc), and then forget they ever exist. I love the artificer, but it makes me sad that we will practically never see anything new with them. Because if it doesn't exist in the PHB, it doesn't exist to WotC. It's one of the things I loved about Paizo with Pathfinder. All those other classes introduced post-CRB still got extra things as they released more and more and more and more books.

WotC has been doing the create and forget thing since 3e. It really annoys the crap out of me.

 

[Mind of tempest]

That's a WotC thing. They make all these extra things in other books (tabaxi, warforged, artificer, goblin, etc), and then forget they ever exist. I love the artificer, but it makes me sad that we will practically never see anything new with them. Because if it doesn't exist in the PHB, it doesn't exist to WotC. It's one of the things I loved about Paizo with Pathfinder. All those other classes introduced post-CRB still got extra things as they released more and more and more and more books.

WotC has been doing the create and forget thing since 3e. It really annoys the crap out of me.

they added a new subclass for artificer in Tasha's that is not being forgotten, plus tsr made things that just sort of existed to fill out a book so they could sell it it was no different.

 

[Faolyn]

Nothing goes on forever. Why don't TV series just keep changing with the times and never end?

Like soap operas?

 

[Faolyn]

Nothing goes on forever. Why don't TV series just keep changing with the times and never end?

Like soap operas?

 

[Cadence]

That's a WotC thing. They make all these extra things in other books (tabaxi, warforged, artificer, goblin, etc), and then forget they ever exist. I love the artificer, but it makes me sad that we will practically never see anything new with them. Because if it doesn't exist in the PHB, it doesn't exist to WotC. It's one of the things I loved about Paizo with Pathfinder. All those other classes introduced post-CRB still got extra things as they released more and more and more and more books.

WotC has been doing the create and forget thing since 3e. It really annoys the crap out of me.

With PF everything was in the SRD, so you weren't gated off from material in any rule books. I thought 5e was different? Or is official access to all the rules free and it's just integrating with your DnD Beyond character sheet that isn't?