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

[Crimson Longinus]

Official, but not binding.

What does that even mean?

 

[FrozenNorth]

We can add to Halflings all day, make up new cultures and the like, but the core of what makes many of us enjoy playing them, the reason they survived the first couple iterations of the game to even become a legacy element of the game, the reason more people play them than play 90% of published races for 5e, is exactly the above.

It definitely seems that the reason people play them more than tabaxi and aasimar is that in the sole poll comparing play usages, you had to pay to play aasimar and tabaxi.*

*That, and halflings were one of the 4 races included in the basic set, despite tieflings and dragonborn being more popular.

 

[FrozenNorth]

In 4e, a single fighter's power, Come and Get It was held up as everything wrong with 4e. How could you possibly have non-magical mind control? It made 4e the worst game ever written.

5e has the EXACT same thing, and everyone is falling over themselves to prove how it's non-magical. The times sure have changed.

…for the better.

The people who said that about 4e were wrong. Let’s not compound the mistake by attacking 5e for the same thing.

And I say that as a fan of 4e.

 

[Oofta]

The reasons I like halflings. Obviously there are exceptions, so I'm talking generalities here.

• Every race represents some aspect of people, usually some clique from high school. Elves are the back-to-nature types, goliaths are jocks, halflings are people that are just happy to go along with the crowd and never make much of an impression until they really need to.
• There have been studies on what makes certain countries rank higher on the happiness index. There are a couple of things like a strong safety net and access to health care, but one of the biggest factors is that people don't feel the need to compete with each other. Much like halflings, they're happy with what they have.
• Halflings are, from a general societal expectation, the unexpected adventurer.
• One of the reasons they get ignored is because they don't care about gathering wealth but also because they try to get by without being noticed. They aren't going to be that if they get involved in politics and bigger events. If you can raid a village where they have a temple full of gold, perhaps a mayor with significant wealth, or just weakens some important kingdom. Halflings may also be members of (and paying taxes to) that kingdom but they don't have the other benefits. Besides, halflings fight just as hard as anyone (or harder) but what little they have in material goods is too small to be used and logically they need half the food. If you're raiding for food and the targets are equally good at defending themselves, go for the bigger bang for the buck. That and halflings are supernaturally lucky, like some of the other races such as firbolgs.
• They still make more sense integrated into society at large than a lot of other races. Many of the races are explicitly rare, from "far off lands" or only care about their own clan. Halflings? Yeah, they have their villages. But they're also nomadic traders and city dwellers living with a variety of other races. A halfling bartender makes sense, but a dragonborn bartender? From a cultural expectation level, it seems to be kind of beneath them. How would it bring honor to their clan? Halflings? They're just happy they can enjoy the company and swap stories.
• Because of their nonchalant attitude towards life, they're interesting from a roleplaying perspective. It can come across as child-like but they can be serious when needed.
• Lucky comes up on a pretty regular basis, especially if you run a PC that has a lot of attacks. I just played (first time in a long time) my halfling monk last weekend and I rerolled multiple times.

So no, I don't want dramatic changes so that they have some of the same aspects of other races.

When it comes to representation in mods, I'm not sure why it matters. How many mods are there that center around a race other than humans? When it's dwarves it's usually because they have some old keep that's been overrun or because they're on the front lines of a fight against things that come up from the underdark. Are there any that the main focus is on dragonborn? Gnomes? Tieflings?

 

[FrozenNorth]

So, without googling, how many adventures of any kind can you name off the top of your head? With 50 years of the hobby, there's a zillion adventures, modules, and campaigns, plus Dungeon magazine, not to mention all the 3rd party stuff.

And then, how many of those adventures focus on any of the other main PC races besides humans? Sure, there's a few (by my count, only dwarfs, or at least only dwarfs mentioned in the title, which means elves shouldn't be a PC race either using your metric), but are there as many as you think there should be?

There are quite a few adventures that focus on drow, so yes, there are a ton of adventures that focus on both elves and dwarves.

 

[Oofta]

There are quite a few adventures that focus on drow, so yes, there are a ton of adventures that focus on both elves and dwarves.

Except that drow are underdark dwellers and usually the antagonists of the story.

 

[FrozenNorth]

Again, you guys seem to pick single issues and never look at the whole. It's not that there's no NPC's. There are halfling NPC's, of course. It's not that there's no information about halflings. There is. Obviously there is. It's right there in the PHB after all. But, what there isn't is a whole lot of it. There are no halfling magic items. No halfling stories. No halfling lore in the settings. Or, ok, yes, there is some, obviously, but, not very bloody much of it and certainly a heck of a lot less than there is for every other of the 4 main races.

I will point out that in Out of the Abyss, two prominent NPCs are deep gnomes and a section takes place in a deep gnome city. So in 5e published adventures, it seems that gnomes are more prominent than halflings.

 

[FrozenNorth]

I agree, the D&D Halfling is piggypacking off of the popularity of the Tolkien Hobbit.

The Halfling can still benefit from Tolkienism, even if it isnt one of the core-four lineages. If it is supposed to be Tolkien, then the lineage cannot be too well detailed for reallife legal reasons. But if the Halfling is nondescript and less developed, then that itself makes it more suitable for one of the background lineages.

Tolkienism or Tokenism?

 

[FrozenNorth]

Except that drow are underdark dwellers and usually the antagonists of the story.

Doesn’t matter. It is still elf lore and it is still prominent representation of elves in the world.

Also, it’s not always the case that they are antagonists. Out of the Abyss has several prominent drow (and a section taking place in Menzoberrazen) where the drow can be allies.

 

[Oofta]

Doesn’t matter. It is still elf lore and it is still prominent representation of elves in the world.

Also, it’s not always the case that they are antagonists. Out of the Abyss has several prominent drow (and a section taking place in Menzoberrazen) where the drow can be allies.

In most mods the majority of drow are the enemy distinct from elves even if a minority can be allies.

But I also don't see why it matters.