D&D General why do we have halflings and gnomes?

[Mind of tempest]

What's the point of dwarves, they're just short Scottish blacksmiths!

dwarves somehow have more sources to pull from even in the D&D descended media of much of modern fantasy they have more of an impact
why that is is a mystery to ask the dwarves loving people.

 

[Maxperson]

The bolded part is very meta and gamist. Designing a world around that logic just does not work well, usually.

It's not world design at all. It's game play. Monsters are rare or the PC races of the world are dead. PCs see a lot of them, because fun. It would be boring if there were nothing much to encounter and fight, so they see an abnormal number of monsters.

Ankhegs are based on Ants, they would destroy a town. And again, you are saying each individual thing is rare, but when you have dozens of rare things, one of them occurring is no longer a rare occurence.

Ankhegs don't have hives and come by the thousands. There are very few at a time. And ants don't destroy towns, so why would something based on them?

And, I don't know what kind of evil societies you are thinking of, but I was more referring to things like The Yuan-Ti Empire, the Drow Empire, The Hobgoblin Empire, you know, places known for conquering and taking dozens or hundreds of slaves.

I've never seen an empire by any of those races. Drow and Yuan-Ti make their homes away from PC race civilization, and Hobgoblins would live in the wild, so away from most of civilization

Cults would be more likely to kidnap a single person for a sacrifice, and they would summon a demon which... doesn't really need numbers. Three Balezau could wipe out a town with no real militia in no time. Sure, maybe people running and screaming might escape, but far far more would die.

Cool. There aren't 3 just wandering around, though. There's probably not even 1 wandering around.

I think you are far far underestimating how full of monsters your typical DnD world is presented as. Or how the lore we are given shows how often they attack "civilized" lands. And, you also seem to be under the impression that each threat has to destroy the town.

I think you are overestimating how many monsters are in the world. Perhaps because there are lots of monster books. If monsters were as common as you are making out, there would be no civilization left.

DnD worlds are full of large predators like that, and opposing groups that would assault these frontier towns on a regular basis. Them not having any defenses against those common attacks is... beyond bizarre.

No, it really isn't. It's not "full" of them at all. They have to be very rare near civilization in order for civilization to have survived.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

We are talking frontier towns.

Since when?

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Cool. There aren't 3 just wandering around, though. There's probably not even 1 wandering around.

Also, halflings, unlike humans, wouldn’t run away in terror, they’d use hit and run tactics without giving in to fear.

Because people are really losing sight of how powerful Brave is as a racial trait, in terms of worldbuilding.

Halfling shield walls don’t fear the charge. Halfling cavalry don’t fear the wall.
Fear is a huge part of whether people survive danger, whether townsfolk repel bandits, etc.

A lower level fiend that could wipe out a human village will have a harder time with a halfling village because the halflings aren’t going to panic, and they are extremely unlikely to flub anything they try to do, which means they are more likely to try ballsy tactics, and less likely to have Hail Marys blow up in their faces.

Also, 5e totally misunderstands the lethality of slings, as a tangential note. A village where everyone is reasonably skilled with one and not afraid to use them in defense of thier town is a place where the incentive to raid needs to be much higher.

 

[Mind of tempest]

Also, halflings, unlike humans, wouldn’t run away in terror, they’d use hit and run tactics without giving in to fear.

Because people are really losing sight of how powerful Brave is as a racial trait, in terms of worldbuilding.

Halfling shield walls don’t fear the charge. Halfling cavalry don’t fear the wall.
Fear is a huge part of whether people survive danger, whether townsfolk repel bandits, etc.

A lower level fiend that could wipe out a human village will have a harder time with a halfling village because the halflings aren’t going to panic, and they are extremely unlikely to flub anything they try to do, which means they are more likely to try ballsy tactics, and less likely to have Hail Marys blow up in their faces.

Also, 5e totally misunderstands the lethality of slings, as a tangential note. A village where everyone is reasonably skilled with one and not afraid to use them in defense of thier town is a place where the incentive to raid needs to be much higher.

I have not seen slings listed as a weapon in 5e secondly most fiends are immune to none magic weapons and a halfling villager has what 4 hp most fiends do that per round so it would still wipe out the village.

 

[Minigiant]

I think you might be thinking of 4e when they were about four feet tall. The 5e PH says "Halflings average about 3 feet tall"

I meant that in LOTR,the most numerous were the shortest tribe but opposite in D&D.

Source!?

Lol no. Halflings are not all farmers. Wtf!?

Of course all halflings aren't farmers.

My points is that D&D describes dwarven, human,and elven warriors, wizards, clerics, magic items, forts, and armies. It doesn't for halflings. It instead talks about halflings eating and telling stories and staying home. All in setting with a high rate of raiding, kidnapping, and monstering.

The differences in focus and imagery is obvious.

 

[Cap'n Kobold]

But, if we are using this lore, (which was disapproved of by @doctorbadwolf ) then we also have to acknowledge that "what to do" involves hitting them with sticks and throwing rocks at them.

Even if we assume slings, that gives the Halflings slings, that is a range of 30/120 vs the goblins 80/240 with bows and armor. Are we going to say that the halflings improvised barrel lids are as good as the Goblins actual shields? Sticks beat scimitars?

This is a very problematic fight to declare that the Halflings would win, based only on that, and ignoring the fact that since thesre are mostly commoner's they have about half the health of the goblin raiders.

We are talking raiders here?

While halflings may be willing to fight to the death to defend their families and friends, goblins and orcs who just want to snag some easy grub probably aren't.

I have a feeling that you may be trying to apply PC logic (encountering several life-threatening situations in a single day of travel, running into cults, fiends and raiding parties regularly, opponents fighting to the death etc) to all aspects of world-building.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

I have not seen slings listed as a weapon in 5e

PHB p 149.

secondly most fiends are immune to none magic weapons and a halfling villager has what 4 hp most fiends do that per round so it would still wipe out the village.

Same as a human commoner. But they are marginally more survivable than humans - higher AC, resistant to poison or fear. Humans would die quicker.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

So the complaints seems to be that halflings are farmers that don't always live in major cities? In a world where most humans would also be farmers that don't live in major cities? Because that is one thing that bugs me about a lot of fantasy - what do the people eat?

Elves and dwarves in particular. If all your dwarves are warriors, miners or smiths then all your dwarves have just starved to death.

 

[LuisCarlos17f]

Halflings are the blue-eyed boy of the noble houses, good citizens and as taxpayers the goose of golden eggs, not causing troubles. They are wellcome in the safe feuds where nobility don't allow attacks by raiders. They are relatively polite and submissive. If they don't like a zone they go away to a better zone, maybe a dwarf or an elf realm. Halflings as subjects are signs of prestige among the aristocracy.

I guess for the point of view by the most of halflings the adventures are almost crazy adrelaline addicts or fool thrill-seekers.

Other matter is if they live in dangerous zones of failed states, where are more unprotected/vulnerable against the occasional new warlord. Then a underground tunnels and refugess net may be a mortal traps for taller attackers.