Why do Halflings get damage bonuses?

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Halflings and slings goes back to BD&D, as I recall.

 

[Obryn]

They are not a warrior race,

Hobbits aren't a warrior race. D&D halflings are.

Hobbits don't go on adventures unless Gandalf drops by. D&D halflings are rogues, fighters, clerics, and wizards in an adventuring party, tromping through dungeons, killing monsters, and taking their stuff.

It's stereotyping that they (and Dwarves and Elves) are weighted towards particular weapons - what if someone wanted to play a rapier-wielding dwarf? Is it not a disadvantage that they miss out on the benefits of using an axe becausethey want to play something unusual too?

A rapier-wielding dwarf is every bit as good with rapiers as any other race, ability scores being equal. (Stat bonuses and penalties are stereotyping, too, btw.)

And I'm seeing a contradiction here. If you want to talk about punishing races for unconventional choices, why not talk about how hosed a Halfling Fighter is without such a rule? Halflings get the short end of the stick on weapons to start with. The die increase just basically says, "you don't have to suck at being a rogue or fighter."

-O

 

[TrippyHippy]

Hobbits aren't a warrior race. D&D halflings are.

Not according to their D&D Next playtest description they are not.

According to the playtest entree for Halflings:

"Most halflings have small, peaceful communities with large farms and well-kept groves. They have never built a kingdom of their own or even held much land beyond their quiet shires."

Not exactly Sparta.....and remakably similar to Tolkien's Hobbits....

Moreover, even if they were all a race of highly trained, pint-sized ninjas, they'd still have to overcome the physical disadvantage of smaller limbs providing less leverage to their attacks than bigger races.

A rapier-wielding dwarf is every bit as good with rapiers as any other race, ability scores being equal. (Stat bonuses and penalties are stereotyping, too, btw.)

But they are a disadvantage against other members of their own race, who stick with the conventional weapons their entire race have apparently been trained in.

And I'm seeing a contradiction here. If you want to talk about punishing races for unconventional choices, why not talk about how hosed a Halfling Fighter is without such a rule? Halflings get the short end of the stick on weapons to start with. The die increase just basically says, "you don't have to suck at being a rogue or fighter."

Again this is the notion of 'game balance' gone mad. Halflings are a people that are physically smaller than any other race and, as such, cannot weild large, heavy weapons which cause more damage. They have an advantage in terms of hiding and stealth over other races so it works both ways. But the idea that they should all get to do more damage than a large, seasoned Human Fighter with a short sword just because some gamer cries 'waah...it's not fair!!!' is pathetic. And unrealistic. And unnecessary.

 

[Mattachine]

This is a fantasy rpg race. They aren't small humans, or children.
They do whatever they need to for the purposes of the game.

Verisimilitude is needed, but not realism.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Again this is the notion of 'game balance' gone mad.

You really ought to review the mathematical breakdown people have posted. This is the equivalent of a +1 to damage with specific weapons. Save "gone mad" for something more offensive; you're going to use up your descriptors too quickly if you're not careful.

 

[FireLance]

Eh, halflings have always been good with slings. Their familiarity with daggers and short swords is a more recent development. Contemporary scholars agree that it was likely due to one of the halfling heroes of the last war who, it is said, teamed up with a female human warrior to destroy a powerful, ancient undead creature that supposedly could be defeated by "no man". Although accounts of the battle indicate that it was the woman who struck the final blow, it was the halfling who distracted it at a critical moment by stabbing it with a magical elven knife. That halfling subequently returned to his home village and was instrumental in rallying his fellow villagers to drive out a band of thugs who were exploiting the halflings' normally peaceful and non-combative nature.

In the years that followed, many young halflings devoted hours of practice with the dagger and short sword as well as the sling, both in memory of their racial hero, and to ensure that they will be able to defend their villages.

 

[DEFCON 1]

Not according to their D&D Next playtest description they are not.

According to the playtest entree for Halflings:

"Most halflings have small, peaceful communities with large farms and well-kept groves. They have never built a kingdom of their own or even held much land beyond their quiet shires."

Applicable part bolded for emphasis.

Halfling PCs do not fall into the "most" part. Thus they can be however militaristic they damn well please.

And this is simply the case that once the book gets released, if you don't like Halfllings having an advanced damage die for those specific weapons... then you can choose not to use it. But if it's been added to the game by the designers as a BALANCING MECHANISM for the "game" part of "roleplaying game"... then it should be there for those people who care about balancing the halfling melee classes against the other races.

And then folks like yourself who don't care about that balance can just choose to ignore them.

 

[Obryn]

Not according to their D&D Next playtest description they are not.

According to the playtest entree for Halflings:

"Most halflings have small, peaceful communities with large farms and well-kept groves. They have never built a kingdom of their own or even held much land beyond their quiet shires."

Not exactly Sparta.....and remakably similar to Tolkien's Hobbits....

Moreover, even if they were all a race of highly trained, pint-sized ninjas, they'd still have to overcome the physical disadvantage of smaller limbs providing less leverage to their attacks than bigger races.

And in what part of this does it say they never need to defend those homes from invading kobolds, goblins, orcs and the like? Do they not have sheriffs or other militias to defend their homes? This isn't the Shire.

Given a dangerous environment, training with slings, daggers and the like is only sensible. Just as dwarves train with hammers and axes, and elves train with bows and swords.

But they are a disadvantage against other members of their own race, who stick with the conventional weapons their entire race have apparently been trained in.

Again this is the notion of 'game balance' gone mad. Halflings are a people that are physically smaller than any other race and, as such, cannot weild large, heavy weapons which cause more damage. They have an advantage in terms of hiding and stealth over other races so it works both ways. But the idea that they should all get to do more damage than a large, seasoned Human Fighter with a short sword just because some gamer cries 'waah...it's not fair!!!' is pathetic. And unrealistic. And unnecessary.

I still don't know that you understand the contradiction here.

You're complaining on the one hand that dwarves using unconventional weapons are at a relative disadvantage when they aren't using the archetypal dwarven weapons. It sounds a lot like a balance concern, to me. That is, a rapier-wielding dwarf is not balanced with an axe-wielding one, and you find this distasteful.

And on the other hand you're saying that halflings using weapons for their stature - weapons that they may well have been trained in from a young age - should be bad at all weapons because to do so otherwise is "pathetic" adherence to balance. And you find this distasteful, too.

-O

 

[TrippyHippy]

This is a fantasy rpg race. They aren't small humans, or children.
They do whatever they need to for the purposes of the game.

Verisimilitude is needed, but not realism.

Seeing that verisimiltude is basically a posh word for 'realism' this is a non argument. Halflings are diminuitive people of an established height and weight in the game. It kills verisimiltude to have them all have an ability that defies physical reality.

 

[TrippyHippy]

You really ought to review the mathematical breakdown people have posted. This is the equivalent of a +1 to damage with specific weapons. Save "gone mad" for something more offensive; you're going to use up your descriptors too quickly if you're not careful.

The mathematical breakdown is irrelevant. The issue is that Halflings get bonuses to damage with selected weapons simply to create an artificial gaming 'balance'.

Why should, for example, a Halfling Wizard get to do d6 Damage with a dagger, when a Human Wizard only gets to roll D4? How is this fair? How is this realistic? How is this not ridiculous?