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

[JiffyPopTart]

See, you say my point for me and then act like you don't get it.

You posted a picture of Wales, and that showed that the further away from the dangerous areas (the shore) the safer they were.

I posted a picture of Faerun, showing that there are so very very few "central areas" away from the border. Those red ares are where the monsters are reported to live, now maybe they do live in the center and only raid within that red area. Maybe they leave it and travel. Your picture of Wales was showing where vikings who lived weeks away by boat landed and attacked, why should I say that monsters can't travel a few days if Vikings could travel weeks?

And the bigger point was that people keep claiming I am making DnD a deathworld. That I am making monsters far more common than they would be. That I am making them attack far more than they would. But, I am not. A raid every three years is not unreasonable. Traveling a few days is not unreasonable. And the map shows, DnD worlds are designed stuffed with monsters. I am not creating this. I am just taking the information we are given and saying "given this, this is the problem I see."

At this point you are either not reading what I'm saying, are reading it but not comprehending it, or are just so caught up on "winning" a discussion on worldviews that you are in grudge don't budge mode. I'm not really interested in butting heads over it.

If nothing else pause for a moment to soak in the fact that YOUR view on how deadly the DnD world is only applies to your game. It's not a fact, it's not a universally held opinion, and it's even possible most tables don't share your view.

Also, pause for a moment to reflect on the fact that the flavortext in the official books is there as a guide for a game, not a written in stone always the case hard and fast rule.

I most certainly do not share the opinion that every square inch of my world is dangerous. I also don't share your opinion that every square inch of Faerun is dangerous.

When a manticore attacks a small village and carries off three children, for you that might be a Tuesday. For me that might be a story generations tell their children to get them to behave.

For you, a raid can mean travelling multiple days into enemy lands, sacking a target, then dragging out a full load of riches multiple days back to your borders. For me, that idea makes the raiders look like their planning committee has a collective intelligence of 7 when they could have just raided a border town and gotten the same load of riches without the 4 days of travel in enemy lands.

In my game halflings live just fine, fairly peacefully, in the lands between the human and elf kingdoms. They rule themselves. They serve as a waypoint for travelling merchants. They are known for their exquisite baked goods.

If they were to get attacked, they would defend themselves, or perhaps even promise passing adventurers lots of gold and baked goods to help them take out the threat. If the threat was REALLY bad, then both the humans and elves would come out to help because they all are trading partners.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

I'm very aware of the trope.

I am also aware of the counter to that power, which is to limit and lower variables. At a certain point probability becomes so certain that the outcome is inevitable, barring an ever increasingly powerful luck ability.

And, we know that halfling luck is not that powerful. Halfling adventures still get caught by traps, they still get caught in ambushes, they can still be hit by critical hits. Their Probability Manipulation on an individual level is not that impressive. So, even in the aggregate, it seems unlikely that it could stop something that doesn't have very many variables. Get a compass, say "travel north 1 day" and it would take some extreme probability manipulation to have that person not reach a point pretty close to exactly one day northward.

The average halfling is +5% lucky. Ergo, you only need 20 halflings to be 100% lucky.

 

[tetrasodium]

Must have been someone else. I said that they go unnoticed by even Rangers, per the lore.

That's not how roads work... especially ones used for things like trade &it doesn't even get into the idea that patrols wouldn't visit the village itself too

 

[Chaosmancer]

That's why it's good to have gods on your side.

Good thing they are the only ones in the world with the support of the gods... oh wait.

See, no other race is protected by their gods to this degree.

Either they will run and hide or they won't. If they will, then there was no point in you saying that that it isn't in the lore. If they won't, then you are suiciding them. Which is it? Will they run and hide against an overwhelming force or suicide?

sigh

"The Lore is written badly" is the summary of my position.

Why are you trying to force me into the choice between "Either I'm right and they run despite the lore or you suicide them because you are terrible" That isn't the debate, that is ancillary, and the very fact that you can present it as a legitimate choice again helps prove that this lore is poorly written, if we must make decisions like this.

 

[Chaosmancer]

Says who? Monsters =/= Vikings. They have different wants and desires. Why would they walk 3 days into a territory where they are more likely to die, than raid a border farm where they live?s

Because the border farm is gone?
Because they figured they'd get more gold and slaves hitting a place further in?
Because their gods told them to?

Do the specific reasons really matter to you that much? In 5e, some monsters don't care about living or dying. Gnolls would stop rampaging and retreat simply because they might die, they are going to go forth and kill. Ogres and trolls don't want to die, but they don't exactly fear the smaller races. We could argue the specifics all week, the point is, being three days from the border doesn't make you safe in these worlds.


Also, here is a funny idea. Those border farms are obviously not halfling shires, right? So they'd be human, dwarf and elven locations. Locations with walls, proper soldiers ect. A... ring of them if you will, protecting the shires who are in the center of the civilized lands, a.... wall perhaps? Made of other settlements?

 

[Chaosmancer]

At this point you are either not reading what I'm saying, are reading it but not comprehending it, or are just so caught up on "winning" a discussion on worldviews that you are in grudge don't budge mode. I'm not really interested in butting heads over it.

If nothing else pause for a moment to soak in the fact that YOUR view on how deadly the DnD world is only applies to your game. It's not a fact, it's not a universally held opinion, and it's even possible most tables don't share your view.

Also, pause for a moment to reflect on the fact that the flavortext in the official books is there as a guide for a game, not a written in stone always the case hard and fast rule.

I most certainly do not share the opinion that every square inch of my world is dangerous. I also don't share your opinion that every square inch of Faerun is dangerous.

When a manticore attacks a small village and carries off three children, for you that might be a Tuesday. For me that might be a story generations tell their children to get them to behave.

For you, a raid can mean travelling multiple days into enemy lands, sacking a target, then dragging out a full load of riches multiple days back to your borders. For me, that idea makes the raiders look like their planning committee has a collective intelligence of 7 when they could have just raided a border town and gotten the same load of riches without the 4 days of travel in enemy lands.

In my game halflings live just fine, fairly peacefully, in the lands between the human and elf kingdoms. They rule themselves. They serve as a waypoint for travelling merchants. They are known for their exquisite baked goods.

If they were to get attacked, they would defend themselves, or perhaps even promise passing adventurers lots of gold and baked goods to help them take out the threat. If the threat was REALLY bad, then both the humans and elves would come out to help because they all are trading partners.

I know that these rules only apply to the tables that adopt them. I don't even adopt them. I have chosen to change all of this. However, that doesn't make me blind to where those guidelines lead, to what those maps portray.

And. like in my response to Max, I am starting to see a picture here where the halflings are safe... because the other people are on the borders fighting and dying instead of them. Sure, if there is a border town that is just as rich, the raiders will hit there first. If those places act like a wall for the halflings, then they can live their idyllic lives, content in someone else protecting them.

Look, yes, anyone can rewrite the rules and create their own world and make halflings as safe and protected as they want because they are blessed by luck, the gods, and the power of muffins. That's fine. But, when you look at the canonical worlds for baseline DnD, like FR and Greyhawk... halflings don't fit as their own place. They can only fit as a protectorate, or integrated with the other three races. They have to be as far away from all possible danger as possible, because the lifestyle we are told they engage in can't protect them on the borders. People have to keep changing the rules presented, and then they act as though they didn't need to change anything, that it was all right there and I just refused to see it, because of course that is how it works. But it isn't, you have shifted things, added things where we were told fairly clearly they don't really exist... which ends up just forgiving the poor writing that went into the lore presented. The disconnect that some of us feel, because these people don't fit into the worlds we are presented with.

 

[Chaosmancer]

The average halfling is +5% lucky. Ergo, you only need 20 halflings to be 100% lucky.

That isn't how it works.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

That isn't how it works.

Oh? On what page number does it say that?

 

[LuisCarlos17f]

The halflings have got a lot of good vibes with the rest of the community. If the local priest needs the help by the collective for a sacred ritual then together can cast amazing effects, for example healing against a plague or the forest recovering faster after a summer fire.

Why a halfling could be an adventurer? Because the same reason of the youngest son of the miller in the fairy tale "the puss in boots", his inheritance was too poor, or he couldn't find a good job in the town, simple economic migration.

They are welcome in the richest feuds by the lords because these notice they are good subjects and practically a good luck amulet, almost a goose of golden eggs, and halfling pantheon has got enough influence and cotacts to avoid too high taxes, and halfling subjects also give a lot of prestige for those feudal lords. The halflings living in Westeros would go to the right places in the right time to avoid all thouse conflicts and troubles among the noble houses. If the bells of the temple ring warning a coming meance, (the divination magic against natural disasters only need low levels and temples help a lot for that) they go to the underground bunkers, with enough traps in the tunnel net against the intruders. Usally raiders attack the nearest populations in the border, or forgive halfling lives if they pay the "protection", and then the halfing luck cause evil tribes kill each other as mafiga gangs fighting for the territory (bizzare but possible in D&D).

 

[Maxperson]

The average halfling is +5% lucky. Ergo, you only need 20 halflings to be 100% lucky.

You joke, but it may work something like that. There may be a bit of additive group luck that kicks in when you get to village size. You wouldn't need individual Halflings to have crazy strong luck like some here have been saying.