D&D General My Problem(s) With Halflings, and How To Create Engaging/Interesting Fantasy Races

[Chaosmancer]

No, not particularly.

Yes, as is plainly proven by...reading the PHB.

This is why people get irritated with you, throughout this thread. Stop trying to play rhetorical tricks and just engage in an honest discussion.

Well, no, but only because nomadic halflings aren't a new idea, having started in...maybe 3.5, at the latest?

Yes, I should totally engage in honest discussion... like asking a question... and then waiting for an answer.

Oh wait, I asked a question, then I was told to stop being ridiculous because the thing the person claimed wasn't true. Or was so self-evidently true that they couldn't be bothered to even state it. Man, I'm such a bad faith actor in expecting people to answer supposedly simply questions.

This is another example. Charitably, I'd say this comes across as if you didn't read the relevant text.

So, I'm going to quote the PHB, leaving out anything that I genuinely could see a strong argument for "can't do a lot of things that the phb claims halflings do", and present to you a nomadic halflings, using only the PHB.

And now I get to read your "edited" PHB entry. This should be "fun" gotta just quote multiple pages of text with pictures to answer a supposedly obvious question.

"Though some halflings live out their days in remote agricultural communities, others form nomadic bands that travel constantly, lured by the open road and the wide horizon to discover the wonders of new lands and peoples. But even these wanderers love peace, food, hearth, and home, though home might be a wagon jostling along an dirt road or a raft floating downriver.

Small and Practical​

The diminutive halflings survive in a world full of larger creatures by avoiding notice or, barring that, avoiding offense. Standing about 3 feet tall, they appear relatively harmless and so have managed to survive for centuries in the shadow of empires and on the edges of wars and political strife. They are inclined to be stout, weighing between 40 and 45 pounds.

Halflings’ skin ranges from tan to pale with a ruddy cast, and their hair is usually brown or sandy brown and wavy. They have brown or hazel eyes. Halfling men often sport long sideburns, but beards are rare among them and mustaches even more so. They like to wear simple, comfortable, and practical clothes, favoring bright colors.

Halfling practicality extends beyond their clothing. They’re concerned with basic needs and simple pleasures and have little use for ostentation. Even the wealthiest of halflings keep their treasures locked in a cellar rather than on display for all to see. They have a knack for finding the most straightforward solution to a problem, and have little patience for dithering.

Huh, I was going to read through and not comment. But this is weird. First of all, I really don't see how any of the stuff I crossed out has to do with culture. Seems like... a physical description of a halfling.

But then I find this line, so since you carefully removed anything that you could see a "Strong argument" for nomadic halflings being unable to do, I'm curious for you to tell me about these nomadic cellars.

Kind and Curious​

Halflings are an affable and cheerful people. They cherish the bonds of family and friendship as well as the comforts of hearth and home, harboring few dreams of gold or glory. Even adventurers among them usually venture into the world for reasons of community, friendship, wanderlust, or curiosity. They love discovering new things, even simple things, such as an exotic food or an unfamiliar style of clothing.

Halflings are easily moved to pity and hate to see any living thing suffer. They are generous, happily sharing what they have even in lean times.

Blend into the Crowd​

Halflings are adept at fitting into a community of humans, dwarves, or elves, making themselves valuable and welcome. The combination of their inherent stealth and their unassuming nature helps halflings to avoid unwanted attention.

Halflings work readily with others, and they are loyal to their friends, whether halfling or otherwise. They can display remarkable ferocity when their friends, families, or communities are threatened.

Hmm.. weird. None of this seems to be, oh what's the word I'm looking for.. different from an agrarian Halfling community.

You know, the thing I actually asked. All of this applies to all halflings. So, when I asked "what is the difference in culture between a nomadic halfling and an agrarian halfling" how is all of this material which is identical for both of them, relevant? It would be like asking what is the difference between lemonade and Kool-Aid and being told "well, they are both fluids that are made to be drank by humans"... that isn't a difference, that's a commonality.

Pastoral Pleasantries​

They rarely build kingdoms of their own or even hold much land beyond their quiet shires. They typically don’t recognize any sort of halfling nobility or royalty, instead looking to family elders to guide them. Families preserve their traditional ways despite the rise and fall of empires.

Some halfling communities travel as a way of life, driving wagons or guiding boats from place to place and maintaining no permanent home.

Huh. wonder why you left this in. Do the nomadic halflings hold land?

Exploring Opportunities​

Halflings usually set out on the adventurer’s path to defend their communities, support their friends, or explore a wide and wonder-filled world. For them, adventuring is less a career than an opportunity or sometimes a necessity.

Alignment. Most halflings are lawful good. As a rule, they are good-hearted and kind, hate to see others in pain, and have no tolerance for oppression. They are also very orderly and traditional, leaning heavily on the support of their community and the comfort of their old ways. (lol alignment. yeah, this does not read "lawful" to me, but okay dnd)

Languages. You can speak, read, and write Common and Halfling. The Halfling language isn’t secret, but halflings are loath to share it with others. They write very little, so they don’t have a rich body of literature. Their oral tradition, however, is very strong. Almost all halflings speak Common to converse with the people in whose lands they dwell or through which they are traveling.

Lightfoot​

As a lightfoot halfling, you can easily hide from notice, even using other people as cover. You’re inclined to be affable and get along well with others. In the Forgotten Realms, lightfoot halflings have spread the farthest and thus are the most common variety.

Lightfoots are more prone to wanderlust than other halflings, and often dwell alongside other races or take up a nomadic life. In the world of Greyhawk, these halflings are called hairfeet or tallfellows.

Stout​

As a stout halfling, you’re hardier than average and have some resistance to poison. Some say that stouts have dwarven blood. In the Forgotten Realms, these halflings are called stronghearts, and they’re most common in the south.

Huh... that is so weird. You probably noticed the bolded and purple text right? I'll be bringing that up in a bit.

Well, damn, how about that. Not counting the mechanics, and the "what do they think about other races" part that I didn't bother with, I deleted maybe...a small paragraph worth of text. Literally the entire writeup works for nomadic halflings, except for the explicit mentions of farms and stationary communities. I even cut out a couple statements about city halflings, just to be fair.

Do you get it, now, or is this even more fruitless than I feared? Several mentions of nomadic life, travel, wanderlust, etc, not one statement that conflicts with that life. Is it clear now what I meant by when I said that most folks don't have any issue extrapolating nomadic halflings from the PHB? Hell, rereading the writeup, "extrapolate" is hyperbolic!

What, do they needs to devote paragraphs to each race's material culture, music, summarise their most iconic and beloved stories? Do we need each race to get 6 pages in the PHB and a full "races of XYZ" chapter in a later book?

So, that bolded purple text. That was every single time that they explicitly mentioned nomadic halflings. It was a total of three times. Most of which were... "and some halflings are nomads".

Now, I think I understand what the confusion is. When I asked "What is the difference between nomadic halflings and agrarian halflings?" in my post, where I was responding to your direct claim that the PHB provided three different cultures, you didn't hear me asking that question. Because that isn't the question you just answered.

The question you just answered is closer to "what are the similarities between agrarian halflings and nomadic halflings?" Which is... sort of the opposite of the question I asked. You see, a difference is when something isn't the same. And you just posted nearly the entirety of the halfling entry to tell me... they are the same.

Really, you could have saved yourself a lot of time and effort by saying "really nothing, they are basically identical" Because you did not list a single, solitary difference beyond the absolute minimum of "some halflings live on farms, others are nomads" And, you can't really call that a different culture. Heck, nothing in the right up prevents a halfling shire from being picked up, packed up and moved every few decades. There are people that have mobile villages like that for farming purposes. So, they could be identical cultures, just at two different points in time.

But, thank you for putting in the time and effort to set this up. It really does help prove my point that they didn't list any differences between the two.

You've gotta be kidding.

No.

Do you think walking in DnD 5e is magical? How about thrown weapon ranges? Climbing, jumping, swimming? Vision in low light? If not, then why are you nitpicking the distance of this one thing that happens to challenge your position?

No, if you throw something then it is going to fall to the ground. It has a limited distance. Can you tell me the distance at which fear no longer affects you? I know many people were afraid of things thousands of miles away. Can't throw a dagger that far.

Climbing, jumping, and swimming? Well, that can go on forever... except that a round is why those numbers exist, and a round is a unit of time. A speed is a function of distance over time, ergo you need a distance. Does fear have a speed limit that you feel is applicable?

Vision in low light depends on the source, but I think you get my point. So, why am I focused on fear that only exists within 20 ft of a creature and disappears within six seconds or less if you are ever more than 20ft from it? Because that demonstrates a way that this ability works that natural fear doesn't.

 

[Don Durito]

At some point I think we all need to come to the realization that although we are speaking the same language we still can't effectively communicate with each other despite our efforts.

I think it's more that if you make an argument and it doesn't convince people, endlessly repeating that same argument over and over leads to endless failures over and over again to convince people.

At a certain point, you need to see accept you've made your point as clearly as you can and move on.

 

[JiffyPopTart]

I think it's more that if you make an argument and it doesn't convince people, endlessly repeating that same argument over and over leads to endless failures over and over again to convince people.

At a certain point, you need to see accept you've made your point as clearly as you can and move on.

It's kinda funny everyone here is thinking "Dude, this is so obvious why do I have to say this?" Then they say it anyway and are SHOCKED they don't get universal agreement.

 

[Chaosmancer]

I'm trying to figure out what your exact position actually is. I believe that I spelled that out specifically in my response.

To which you responded that I had misunderstood and then appeared to explain that your position was as I'd described and then brought up something I hadn't mentioned.

"It looks like you're saying the sky is blue"

"You misunderstand, what I'm actually saying is that the sky is blue...also l never said clouds weren't water vapor"

It's bizarre.

The thing is, you appear to be trying to summarize this conversation as if all accusations pointed your direction are unfounded. But again, the core issue you are seeing relentless pushback on is your stated position that:

As written, halflings are narratively/thematically objectively unsuitable for D&D as a game.

And specifically, the pushback is that your opinion/critical review/whatever does not represent some singular objective truth.

Are you disputing this understanding of your position?

I believe I already answered this.

Are halflings, the race, designed to nearly perfectly emulate hobbits, the race, a bad fit for DnD? Yes, because Hobbits were designed for a world where the major thematic goal was to reject power, and therefore defeat evil. Dungeons and Dragons is a game where the major thematic goal is to gather power and use that power to defeat evil. The things which made hobbits perfectly suited for Tolkien's purposes, do not apply in DnD, because DnD works in a very different manner. In fact, some of their actions when looked at critically undermine them as being good beings.

Are halflings, the individual people, bad player characters who shouldn't be in the game? No. They work perfectly fine as individuals. In fact, the thing that drug me into the quagmire that this debate is was someone posting that those of us who don't like halflings actually hate a list of character traits. There were also statements that halflings were the only race in the world to be kind. And other such nonsense. My major rebuttal to those has always been, I play those characters, I just use other races. So, therefore the issue is the race, not the character archetype.

This is also why I am baffled by people seeming to think that changing halflings, the race, means that I am taking away their ability to play halflings, the character. If I can play an elf with those character qualities, they can play a halfling with those qualities.

 

[Chaosmancer]

The kind of questions being discussed, eg: whether fear effects are magical or not, halflings place in worldbuilding etc are fundamentally unanswerable in 5e.

It's clear that WotC simply does not care about worldbuilding. It's not a priority of 5th edition at all.

What they obviously do care about is whether something is cool or fun in a game.

That may be an issue for those of us who care about worldbuilding, but clearly this is not an accident of design. They may have made the Forgotten Realms the default world, but at no point have they ever, even for a moment, appeared to let that constrain them in what options they put before player characters.

Is Dragonfear a magical effect? You'll have to decide yourself. The game doesn't care.
If Halfling luck an inherent quality of the halfling species or just a thing halfling characters have? You'll have to decide yourself. The game doesn't care.
How do halfling societies interact with their neighbours. You'll have to decide yourself. The game doesn't care.

You can criticise a company for making a hammer, when you would have preferred a screwdriver, but it's a bit silly to be criticisng a hammer for being bad at screwing in a Phillips head screw.

I'd say you are clearly wrong.

Eberrong Rising from the Last War has some tremendous World-building. Theros is a new setting that is exploding with flavor and beautifully built from the little I've read. I don't actually know if Ravnica was well built, I never read it, but it did have some very interesting lore. Wildemount is a WoTC product.

So, they do care about world-building. They just don't seem to care about it in the books that players use. I think they should. Though, there is also Volo's and Mordenkainen's that also did a lot of world-building. A lot of it wasn't great, but they did do it.

 

[JiffyPopTart]

@Chaosmancer

I'm interested to talk about that cellar line you mentioned from the PHB. I have some questions about you interpretation on it.

When I read that line I interpret it to mean that halflings as a general rule prefer to store away their riches humbly rather than showing them off and bragging. Like maybe Jimmy Football wins the MVP trophy and it is more likely the trophy ends up in a memories box than on the mantle or in a school trophy case.

Do you interpret that line to mean that halflings in general literally store their treasures in underground rooms? By that logic do you find it implausible they couldn't live out of wagons or boats because they wouldn't have access to underground rooms to store things in?

 

[Chaosmancer]

Maybe this will clear things up for you.

-Regarding what counts as magical for the purposes of magic resistance:



-Regarding what can and cannot be dispelled with dispel magic:



I don't think there's as much wiggle room here as you seem to think.

So... did you actually read the Sage Advice post? Here is the important bit.

"In D&D, the first type of magic is part of nature. It is no more dispellable than the wind. A monster like a dragon exists because of that magic-enhanced nature. The second type of magic is what the rules are concerned about. When a rule refers to something being magical, it’s referring to that second type."

That second type being, for reference "the concentrated magical energy that is contained in a magic item or channeled to create a spell or other focused magical effect"

So, dragons are magical, they exist because of their magic-enhanced nature. However they do not use "game tag magical" abilities that are concentrated magical energy used in items, spells or "other effects"

So, a dragon's fear... is magical. It just isn't concentrated magical energy. Which makes sense, it is an aura. Which is diffused. Same with a Pit Fiend. Magical, just not "#magical#gametag"

 

[Chaosmancer]

No, I don't need to justify halflings any more than I, and others, have.

Your opinion is no more valid than anyone else's.

And neither is yours. Yet you want to block minor changes just because you don't personally like them.

 

[Chaosmancer]

@Chaosmancer

I'm interested to talk about that cellar line you mentioned from the PHB. I have some questions about you interpretation on it.

When I read that line I interpret it to mean that halflings as a general rule prefer to store away their riches humbly rather than showing them off and bragging. Like maybe Jimmy Football wins the MVP trophy and it is more likely the trophy ends up in a memories box than on the mantle or in a school trophy case.

Do you interpret that line to mean that halflings in general literally store their treasures in underground rooms? By that logic do you find it implausible they couldn't live out of wagons or boats because they wouldn't have access to underground rooms to store things in?

Actually, I'll be honest, it was more of a cheap point because I'm getting irritated. Obviously it was just a copy/paste mistake.

Here is the actual issue with the idea though, nomads generally have limited storage space. I know I will be called to task for stating something as a fact, but houses (especially those with multiple levels) tend to be bigger than wagons or boats. Yes, houseboats are a thing, but you run into a lot of potential issues trying to steer a house down a river I'd imagine. So, they would be storing their wealth that they supposedly hide... alongside everything else. There just isn't the type of space to store away riches humbly when you are constantly on the move. And if you are just storing them and carrying them because... why?

How often has someone like "Jimmy Football" thrown away their trophy when moving, because transporting it is more of a hassle than it is worth to put back in a memory box and store it away for another few decades? I'd expect nomadic halflings to be much more likely to spend wealth early, or buy things that are easier to transport but have similar value.

 

[Umbran]

And you say that works for you, but you can't seem to accept that it doesn't make for good worldbuilding...

Mod Note:
... for you. Good worldbuilding for you.

If your argument depends on your personal opinion being objectively true, the discussion isn't going to go well, because eventually you'll find someone who doesn't agree, but is as stubborn as you. You have done so. You guys are going nowhere fast. So... maybe time to park it, hm?

Get over yourself.

Hey, can we not make this personal, please and thanks?

The two of you seem to be at an impasse. Butting heads isn't going to do either of you, or the boards, any favors. So please disengage from each other. Thanks.