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

[lingual]

I prefer the elf prioritize Charisma for magic, charm, songs, arts, and bards. That leaves the halfling as the main contender for dexterity precision tasks, like aiming slings, stealth, and perhaps many other applications.

I suppose an argument could be made that Charisma would also help with performance art like dancing.

 

[Chaosmancer]

Don't halflings get a plus to to dexterity - the same as elves? I would think a blanket plus 2 would be pretty distinctive genetic trait.

I think you dwarf and elf characterizations are based on the "ideal". They are not really represented in the rules that well. Rules like that would be nice additions though. Like dwarves getting advantage on checks against being shoved, etc.

I have no idea why I would try to spell out "two" (and fail) and then use the numerical form in the next sentence.

I don't think the +2 would really be that distinctive. Even if it was... Well, +2 Dex is really common.

Aaracrockra
Elves
Halflings
Dhampir
Reborn
Hexblood
Goblin
Kobold
Kenku
Swiftstride Shifter
Tabaxi
x4 SCAG Tielflings (winged, hellfire, Infernal, and Devil's Tongue)

Two are birds, Two are cats, three are short, three are variable, then you have tielflings and elves


I do however agree that some better racial traits would be nice.

 

[lingual]

I don't think the +2 would really be that distinctive. Even if it was... Well, +2 Dex is really common.

Aaracrockra
Elves
Halflings
Dhampir
Reborn
Hexblood
Goblin
Kobold
Kenku
Swiftstride Shifter
Tabaxi
x4 SCAG Tielflings (winged, hellfire, Infernal, and Devil's Tongue)

Two are birds, Two are cats, three are short, three are variable, then you have tielflings and elves


I do however agree that some better racial traits would be nice.

With the direction it's going, maybe stuff like elves just automatically getting acrobatics and persuasion (or it's future equivalent) in the future - and they can get expertise if they use a slot. It would alleviate some of the min-maxing with race and class combinations.

Dwarves getting resistances to shove and grapples. Halflings getting something similar to stealth and maybe acrobatics, etc.

The blanket plus 2 is too tantalizing a fruit for optimization.

 

[Yaarel]

I don't think the +2 would really be that distinctive. Even if it was... Well, +2 Dex is really common.

Aaracrockra
Elves
Halflings
Dhampir
Reborn
Hexblood
Goblin
Kobold
Kenku
Swiftstride Shifter
Tabaxi
x4 SCAG Tielflings (winged, hellfire, Infernal, and Devil's Tongue)

Two are birds, Two are cats, three are short, three are variable, then you have tielflings and elves


I do however agree that some better racial traits would be nice.

Some of these dont make sense. Why would Hexblood be dexterous? Shouldnt the proritize a spellcasting ability? Or maybe be weirdly strong.

I guess the birds and the cats have it for balance and landings.

Undead dont exude dexterity, and speed is more a Strength thing.

Kobold deserves Dex as a rigger of contraptions.

Goblins are hard to stat because the folklore makes them magical and dangerous but dim and comical. Wisdom as physical senses and relentlessness kinda makes sense.

If the elf exits the Dex scene, the halfling is the main contender for humanlike Dex stuff.

 

[Gammadoodler]

And yet there have been a lot of people claiming "a glider is nothing like a plane, they are totally different" or "of course a glider is like a plane, so are spaceships and kites, everything is like a plane so it isn't special that gliders are like planes."

And in that additionaly context, there does seem to be some place for that claim, that doesn't involved saying that a glider is identical to a plane.

I believe there have been zero instances of "a glider is nothing like a plane" and the quoted authoritative literature would be equally unresponsive to the remaining ones.

 

[Gammadoodler]

We aren't in a thread discussing elves, or discussing dwarves.

See, the reason I didn't say "yes" or "no" is because it was a pointless question. Let us imagine that the PHB was written differently, would we still use the same text as evidence? Maybe, maybe not. It would depend on how it was written differently. What about Dragonborn are similar to halfligs for you? Do you find them incredibly similar? No? Then why would it be written that they were?

The only reason it would be written, in your mind, if to prove that the test isn't worth discussing, because it would be clearly wrong. But, to reach that conclusion you had to create a text you believe to be clearly wrong. You aren't proving anything, you are side-stepping the evidence by trying to bring into question my integrity.

But fine, you want the truth? If we were discussing halflings, and the PHB said that halflings and dragonborn are "a lot alike" especially the dragonborn commoners and farmers... then I'd acknowledge that as a fact. I'd be curious why halflings are living in Dragonborn lands and allowing Dragonborn to protect them. I'd question what the dragonborn get out of that arrangement. I would treat that evidence EXACTLY the same way I'm treating it now.

And you'd probably post and say "but what if it said tieflings? Would you still treat it the same then?"

No, what I would say is, should we make them a subrace of dragonborn then? After all, the PHB says they are a lot alike.

 

[Gammadoodler]

Halflings are no shorter or smaller than Kobolds, Goblins, Gnomes or Fairies. Who also are able to perform equivalent to the full-sized adult human in combat. I use it like that's "all it is" because it is something shared by many other races. It isn't more dramatic for a halfling than it is for any of those others.

Also, I have no idea what you are even trying to say with your point on "positive mental outlook". Yeah, a different outlook involves having different values. And if you have different values, you make different decisions. That's why I don't have any piercings, even though I have friends who do. Different decisions based on different values which arise from different outlooks on life.

Unless you think that the other races are incapable of having a positive mental outlook for the world, that there is not a single innocent soul amongst all the gnomes, humans, elves, ect ect ect.

Yes, none of whom are being nominated as adoptees of other races, unless that was a part of the conversation I missed.

And, that the halfling shares that characteristic with others does not change how different it makes them from humans. And it does not make "short human" any fairer of a characterization.

(/edit: this is an argument purely based on whataboutism. If we bring up the lifespan of an elf as a differentiator from humans, "gnomes live a long time too" doesn't make elves and humans any more similar)

It is in the same way that "positive attitude" is in no way a close approximation, of the general lack of a will to power or desire to accumulate wealth. Now you may say, "it's not supposed to do that", which is fine except that it only changes the argument from an oversimplification/mischaracterization to one that includes a "tactical" omission.

In either case, it is not a fair representation of the differences between humans and halflings.

 

[Yaarel]

With the direction it's going, maybe stuff like elves just automatically getting acrobatics and persuasion (or it's future equivalent) in the future - and they can get expertise if they use a slot. It would alleviate some of the min-maxing with race and class combinations.

Dwarves getting resistances to shove and grapples. Halflings getting something similar to stealth and maybe acrobatics, etc.

The blanket plus 2 is too tantalizing a fruit for optimization.

Athletics and Acobratics do well to merge into a single skill for gymnastics and swashbuckling, with choice of either Str or Dex as the key for all checks.

I can see the Halfling with Slight of Hand, Stealth, and probably "Gymnastics".

I can see the Elf with Arcana, Persuasion, and a choice of one skill or tool, to cover various Elf concepts like Gymnastics, History, Perception, magic item creation, or Performance.

There can also be backgrounds that are specific to the Halfling or Elf cultures, to flesh out these concepts.

Oh. And the Arcana skill should use whatever the casting ability is as the key.

 

[Hussar]

Curious how you cut off the feet in all of these pictures. I'm guessing that some of them had the traditional bare and furry feet. Maybe all of them did.

Would you like to take a bunch of pictures of elves and humans but not show us the ears and demand we tell the difference? Or maybe a bunch of gnomes and dwarfs, but none of them have beards?

Oh, hang on.

Funny no one questioned this as you folks are all about honesty and all that.

5e hailing's DON'T HAVE HAIRY FEET. They aren't hobbits. So, cutting off the feet makes perfect sense SINCE IN 5E they don't have that.

But, sure, if you choose images of elves that have thousands of positive reputation points and are considered among the top 20 or 30 of all images of elves on Reddit, then, sure, go ahead. Again, like I said, about 5 of those images are from Paizo (which does have hairy feet halflings). Not random Google image search stuff. I mean, I went to the r/ImaginaryHalflings site, clicked Top of All Time and picked from the top stuff, ignoring the stuff that was obviously pulled from The Hobbit and things that were too hard to crop.

We get taken to task for saying that halflings are too similar to humans. "NO THEY'RE NOT" is the oft repeated reply. "They at least as different from humans as any other race." Ok, prove it. You only had to pick two non-halflings out of 11 pictures. Many of which are held up as exemplars of what halflings look like in the game. Yet, everyone whines about "gotcha" and whatnot.

Heh, one thing I did notice though. The top image on imaginary halflings got 59 votes in a membership of just under 1000. The top elf pic on /imaginary elves, a community of 25.6 thousand, got 1300 votes.

But, I was told that halflings are so popular. Even Imaginary Dwarves have 12000 members and their top pic got 650 votes. All three reddits are about the same age. If halflings were so popular and being played so often, as often as dwarves according to some people in this thread, you'd think that the art communities would be closer. But, hey, what do I know? Apparently I'm just wrong.

 

[Neonchameleon]

We get taken to task for saying that halflings are too similar to humans. "NO THEY'RE NOT" is the oft repeated reply. "They at least as different from humans as any other race." Ok, prove it. You only had to pick two non-halflings out of 11 pictures. Many of which are held up as exemplars of what halflings look like in the game. Yet, everyone whines about "gotcha" and whatnot.

So by the Hussar Metric a race of humans with feathers where the description is "humans with feathers" is 100% different from humans despite literally every personality trait being the same.

And a big issue with the challenge is that it is very hard to tell halflings and their less popular imitators D&D gnomes apart by sight. Or are you now saying that there are no gnomes there because that's new information. Also it's not an especially useful challenge.

But, I was told that halflings are so popular. Even Imaginary Dwarves have 12000 members and their top pic got 650 votes. All three reddits are about the same age. If halflings were so popular and being played so often, as often as dwarves according to some people in this thread, you'd think that the art communities would be closer. But, hey, what do I know? Apparently I'm just wrong.

Who said that halflings are played as often as dwarves? Rather than the most popular subrace of halflings being as popular, by the data, as the most popular subrace of dwarves?

And no one is saying that halflings look cool. So of course reddits devoted to cool art aren't as popular for halflings. I also wonder why given that your metric is a Reddit community size r/ImaginaryTieflings has 10 members and r/ImaginaryDragonborn doesn't exist.