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

[Oofta]

My point is that halflings get to buck many of the base systems and assumptionss that D&D uses to justify the existence and prevalence of adventurers and no real explanation is often given at the introduction of the race.

So it forces fans to willfully not think about it or create excuses that the other races of equal or lesser importance do not need.

I see nothing that says they "buck many of the base systems". They don't personally pursue kingdoms, gold, glory. There's nothing anywhere that says they ignore the laws of the land. In fact, they get along with other races.

They don't implement a feudal system, it's basically a gerontocracy according to MToF. As far as adventuring the default is a slightly different motivation, for the most part they do it because of wanderlust, curiosity to protect others. It's not like all PCs have the same motivational assumptions in all campaigns. So?

 

[Vaalingrade]

Or you could world build. The other most important skill of DMing.

1) There is no way anyone is going to be able to perfectly and accurately model the entire agricultural schema of every random town on the off chance one of their players is a Food Historian.

2) If you do try to be 100% accurate for some reason, what about the architecture? What about the dialect? What kind of disease do they have? What other minutia are you going to bury yourself in in your unstoppable hatred for halflings?

3) What about flora and fauna that doesn't exist on Earth? Or mutations of those that do? Our species punched the noble wolf into teacup poodles and random grass into corn before we knew what a gene was. How can people with magic and alchemy not make some crap that exists outside of the scope of making a setting 'Earth, only elves'?

And hell, the thing about corn? The native Mexicans didn't know they were using technology to make it edible; its was just a coincidence of their water supply and cookware. Why couldn't those rice growing halflings just happen to have stumbled upon a method of growing water-sipping rice?

4) Improv leads to the best worldbuilding. That's why there are no elephants on the World of Ere. There are mammoths, there are phiomia, but there are no elephants.

 

[Maxperson]

I am done trying to convince you on halflings, but I find the Triton thing interesting. I didn't know Fish needed Vitamin C. And when I found the answer, I found it interesting enough to share.

Fair enough. I actually saw that they can get it from seaweed as well.

Even if Tritons do need to consume Vitamin C, like I said, they can get enough to prevent scurvy by eating a lot of raw fish. Which, as an aquatic race, is likely their main source of food anyways.

As for the pressure issue, it would depend on some factors. I know sperm whales can dive as deep as 2,000 meters and surface fairly rapidly, because of reinforced structures in their lungs and relying on massive stores of oxygen in their blood instead of their lungs while that deep.

Size is a huge factor there. A human sized sperm whale wouldn't survive. The structures necessary wouldn't function to resist the huge pressures.

It could be assumed that Tritons have similar adaptions, and are more comfortable in more shallow waters, but can easily travel far deeper and survive the intense pressure without special equipment.

No. A triton would be limited to very shallow waters based on their size. Or maybe the game doesn't care about that level of realism and to heck with pressure, it's fun to dive deep!!

 

[Oofta]

I issue a challenge. Grab a stopwatch. Figure out how long it takes you to come up with a reasonable fits-in-your-world answer as to how halflings grow most of the spices they need for cooking in their own little farming village. Let us know how long it took you.

I did it myself. 12 seconds (took longer to type it up than think of it). A long time ago a friendly druid named Randalph passed by and gave a village of halflings a gift of a "Spice Bush". This little shrub grows all year round and each "pod" generates a random seasoning. While the pods generate a great amount of variety in the halflings spice cabinet, the randomness of the pods and great upkeep require to keep the plants alive makes the "Spice Bush" more of a family heirloom and less of an industrial crop.

Or ... like people have been doing for the majority of history they use whatever spices they have available. If they can trade for something interesting, cool. In the meantime they'll make food with whatever they have available like people have always done.

 

[TwoSix]

Or you could world build. The other most important skill of DMing.

Not even top 3.

 

[Mistwell]

How are we at post 1106 on this question?

 

[Maxperson]

How are we at post 1106 on this question?

Do your fish need vitamin C?

 

[JiffyPopTart]

Overrun in 951 and abandoned.

Firmly reestablished by 1491... 540 years of it being basically an abandoned ghost town where no one lived. All because of one "major security issue"

You are basically talking about an area abandoned since (in our time) 1481 AD

Think about that a little longer. That area was unsettled for longer than most modern countries have been around. In fact, if we go 540 years into our past, it is right around the end of the Hundred years war. The Ottoman Empire is still vibrant and fresh, the crusades are finishing up. It is the Rennaissance.

And not ten years later it is run by a gang and needs rescuing again as a goblin tribe is also moving into the area.

"Security issues" doesn't even begin to cover it. Also, if it was established by Neverwinter and Waterdeep... think maybe they were expecting trade? Or do powerful city-states just settle land for giggles and then abandon them. Well, I guess they did since the Red Brands took over, but most places tend to see their colonies as something to trade with an monitor,

I have this thing called reading comprehension. It says exactly this...

"Sometime in the 1400s DR, settlers from Neverwinter and Waterdeep resettled the ruins of Phandalin, and it was well-established by 1491 DR.

In the 15th century DR, a group of bandits known as the Redbrands, or the Redbrand Ruffians, settled in Phandalin, and made their lair under Tresendar Manor."

This gives us a time period of anywhere from 10 years (from 1490 to 1500) up to 199 years (from 1400 to 1599) depending on the nebulous "When did the first settlers move in and reclaim it" which is never said to "What year did the bandits move in?" which is also never said. In that 10-199 years the worst thing that happened was some bandits killed a townperson and kidnapped their family.

 

[JiffyPopTart]

Great, that is wonderful.

A homebrew solution for a single village.

How does that apply to the rest of the entire race of halflings? Did Randalph visit every single Shire? Obviously not.

But, I do have a solution that can fit every single halfling village. They trade for spices, just like the humans. Of course, trading means they are part of the wider world. And the wider world is dangerous, so they will need to have some form of defense against monster attacks.

I can homebrew that too. Didn't take me long. Of course, it is homebrew, which was kind of my point

The use of "long ago" was meant to imply "and now its commonplace", but I guess if your goal is to throw up roadblocks to anything regarding halflings (even through you breezed right through triton issues with little resistance) then no amount of anything anyone says is going to let you see how you are holding them to some sort of odd higher standard than every other group.

 

[Minigiant]

I see nothing that says they "buck many of the base systems". They don't personally pursue kingdoms, gold, glory. There's nothing anywhere that says they ignore the laws of the land. In fact, they get along with other races.

They don't implement a feudal system, it's basically a gerontocracy according to MToF. As far as adventuring the default is a slightly different motivation, for the most part they do it because of wanderlust, curiosity to protect others. It's not like all PCs have the same motivational assumptions in all campaigns. So?

The point is their idyllic and idealistic lifestyles and outlook with no real explanation for it clashes with the base presmises of the game of adventurers going out to fight evil or gather coin.

If child-size, nonmagical, happy commoner people who don't have to involve nor interact with the outside world are a staple, why is my nonhalfling fighter busting his butt to slay dark lords and sweep tombs for gold?