What's with the Gnome Hate?

[DrunkonDuty]

I love gnomes. But I couldn't eat a whole one.

But seriously, put me down for a bit of 'gnome hate.' Although hate is a strong word. As many folks have said: there's just not enough flavour to them. I don't hate pasta, but it goes much better with a rich sauce of tomato, olives and anchovies. Now gnome served with a rich tomato sauce... mmmm.

Whizbang: Your gnomes do actually sound fun and interesting. I might have to steal the general vibe for my homebrews in future. And maybe if DnD in general had played up that hidden trickster style Gnomes would still be in the core races. End of the day I think Gnome 'hate' stems from them never being well developed as an interesting archetype by anyone. It might be your time to strike!

Fenes wrote (all the way back on page 1 and I have had to read a lot of thread to get to the end in order to post this lame and very late joke):

Gnomes, munchkins, drizzt-clones, nymphomanic lesbian elven bladesigners, kleptomanic kenders - everything rubs someone the wrong way.

There's a bad way to be rubbed by nymphomaniac lesbian elven bladesingers?
(God, I've been dying to get that out.)

 

[DrunkonDuty]

Kzach wrote:
http://gnomesarefood.com/

Thunderfoot wrote:
And the only good kender is lightly toasted kender rotating on a spit for 2 hours and 45 minutes until golden brown and covered in a light honey glaze; preferably served with a cold stein of dwarven ale.

Now I'm hungry.

 

[Orius]

There are fewer and fewer gnome haters all the time.

Quickly hides the knife.

What?

I knew it wouldn't take ENWorld's greatest gnome defender long to find this thread.

You got to understand the history of gnomes to understand why they weren't that popular.

In 1e/2e, the gnome "niche" was that it was a spellcasting dwarf. [snip] Now, this wouldn't be so bad but there's one thing that really turned gamers off. While Dwarves prided themselves on their beard, gnomes prided themselves on the size of the NOSE. Needless to say, you're not going to get many gamers running around wanting to play it.

When 3E lifted the class race restriction, it actually helped kill off gnomes even faster. If you wanted a spellcasting dwarf, why play the gnome just play the real thing.

Again, the gnome was pretty much ignored in 2E, got screwed over by 3E and I think 4E finally said, "ok, let's go back to the drawing board and try to get it right"

Yeah, I kind of agree with what you're saying. Gnomes rarely had any place they really fit in the game, and most of the time they just looked like little dwarves. Dropping class restrictions in 3e hurt them, and it didn't help that the old 1e illusionist had long since been supplanted by 2e's schools of magic. Really, what could have worked was give wizard to the gnome, since theye're supposed to be magically inclined and scholarly, and give sorcerer to the elf instead of wizard, since the inborn magic of the sorcerer works well with the innate magical-ness of the typical elf.

I never had a problem with the big-nosed gnomes. I always thought it gave them character. IMC, they still have huge noses.

Gnomes, munchkins, drizzt-clones, nymphomanic lesbian elven bladesigners, kleptomanic kenders - everything rubs someone the wrong way. That doesn't make them boring, or wrong, it just means they have different tastes.

How could gnomes be as bad as any of the rest?

Dragonlance (and Spelljammer) used the atrocious Tinker gnome concept a.k.a "we blow ourselves up more than we blow the other guy up"

Planescape, Al-qadim and Ravenloft pretty much ignored them. I seriously can't even remember one gnomish NPC from those campaign settings (and yeah, I know someone is going to prove me wrong...)

Tinker gnomes were just a bad idea, unfortunately it was a bad idea that got out of hand.

As for gnomes in Planescape, none of the Tolkienesque races were standard PS races, though elf and dwarf NPCs started showing up as the setting developed. There was a gnomish bookseller NPC described in Uncaged: Faces of Sigil, but I can't remember any others. Then again, PS had dozens of NPCs, and many of them were of very stranges races, including various fiends and celestials.

 

[Urbannen]

Gnomes' problem is their name. Gnomes should have been the creatures that are called elves in a lot of fairy tales. That includes Santa's elves.

Seriously, do you remember Herbie, the elf who wanted to be a dentist? What race would he have been in D&D? Dwarf, no, halfling, no, elf, no, gnome, yes! All those elves in the Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer Christmas special - D&D gnomes. Santa's elves craft stuff, and in lots of movies and stories, they use magic to help them. They are even the correct size.

Also, there's the story of the Elves and the Shoemaker. The shoemaker is visited by helpful, magical beings who pop into the shoemaker's home and craft stuff for him.

I don't think gnomes should have been one of the base races, but as an additional race, they might have been OK. They should be small race of beings who are comfortable with magic, particularly illusion magic such as invisibility, who are good at crafting items (as opposed to mining), who normally stay hidden, and who are naturally helpful, i.e. good. Really, Basic D&D had them right.

 

[Fenes]

The Gnomes are coming!

 

[Maggan]

A gnome-pamphlet online would have taken little effort to appease some fans, instead they made... ::drumroll::
"I'm a monster, rawr".

While I'm aware of the fact that some gnome fans are very upset about that movie, for me, it made me look at gnomes as a viable race for the first time in my history of playing AD&D/D&D.

And if WotC marketing creating more gnome fans isn't appeasing some fans, than I'm sure they wouldn't be appeased by a mere online pamphlet either.

/M

 

[Vocenoctum]

While I'm aware of the fact that some gnome fans are very upset about that movie, for me, it made me look at gnomes as a viable race for the first time in my history of playing AD&D/D&D.

And if WotC marketing creating more gnome fans isn't appeasing some fans, than I'm sure they wouldn't be appeased by a mere online pamphlet either.

/M

Well, 4e has a habit of applying a name from previous editions onto something totally different. So, they made you a fan of Gnomeish, rather than true gnomes...

 

[Vocenoctum]

The Gnomes are coming!

They'll be here soon:
http://www.dccomics.com/dcunlimited/wow/?dcd=8454

 

[Maggan]

Well, 4e has a habit of applying a name from previous editions onto something totally different. So, they made you a fan of Gnomeish, rather than true gnomes...

That's great by me! I don't really fancy the true gnome ... at least not the one from Swedish folk lore. It wouldn't make a particularly exciting PC for me.

/M

 

[Steely Dan]

How come nobody comments on how gnomes were treated in 2E via the campaign settings by TSR?

I did earlier in this thread, I mentioned how bad-ass The Companions of the Dead (gnome death commando type) were from Taladas – from The Dragonlance Time of the Dragon boxed set (great 2nd Ed Dragonlance product).