RPG Evolution: The Trouble with Halflings

Over the decades I've developed my campaign world to match the archetypes my players wanted to play. In all those years, nobody's ever played a halfling.

Picture courtesy of Pixabay.​

So What's the Problem?​

Halflings, derived from hobbits, have been a curious nod to Tolkien's influence on fantasy. While dwarves and elves have deep mythological roots, hobbits are more modern inventions. And their inclusion was very much a response to the adventurous life that the agrarian homebodies considered an aberration. In short, most hobbits didn't want to be adventurers, and Bilbo, Frodo, and the others were forever changed by their experiences, such that it was difficult for them to reintegrate when they returned home. You don't hear much about elves and dwarves having difficulty returning home after being adventurers, and for good reason. Tolkien was making a point about the human condition and the nature of war by using hobbits as proxies.

As a literary construct, hobbits serve a specific purpose. In The Hobbit, they are proxies for children. In The Lord of the Rings, they are proxies for farmers and other folk who were thrust into the industrialized nightmare of mass warfare. In both cases, hobbits were a positioned in contrast to the violent lifestyle of adventurers who live and die by the sword.

Which is at least in part why they're challenging to integrate into a campaign world. And yet, we have strong hobbit archetypes in Dungeons & Dragons, thanks to Dragonlance.

Kender. Kender Are the Problem​

I did know one player who loved to play kender. We never played together in a campaign, at least in part because kender are an integral part of the Dragonlance setting and we weren't playing in Dragonlance. But he would play a kender in every game he played, including in massive multiplayers like Ultima Online. And he was eye-rollingly aggravating, as he loved "borrowing" things from everyone (a trait established by Tasselhoff Burrfoot).

Part of the issue with kender is that they aren't thieves, per se, but have a child-like curiosity that causes them to "borrow" things without understanding that borrowing said things without permission is tantamount to stealing in most cultures. In essence, it results in a character who steals but doesn't admit to stealing, which can be problematic for inter-party harmony. Worse, kender have a very broad idea of what to "borrow" (which is not limited to just valuables) and have always been positioned as being offended by accusations of thievery. It sets up a scenario where either the party is very tolerant of the kender or conflict ensues. This aspect of kender has been significantly minimized in the latest draft for Unearthed Arcana.

Big Heads, Little Bodies​

The latest incarnation of halflings brings them back to the fun-loving roots. Their appearance is decidedly not "little children" or "overweight short people." Rather, they appear more like political cartoons of eras past, where exaggerated features were used as caricatures, adding further to their comical qualities. But this doesn't solve the outstanding problem that, for a game that is often about conflict, the original prototypes for halflings avoided it. They were heroes precisely because they were thrust into difficult situations and had to rise to the challenge. That requires significant work in a campaign to encourage a player to play a halfling character who would rather just stay home.

There's also the simple matter of integrating halflings into societies where they aren't necessarily living apart. Presumably, most human campaigns have farmers; dwarves and elves occupy less civilized niches, where halflings are a working class who lives right alongside the rest of humanity in plain sight. Figuring out how to accommodate them matters a lot. Do humans just treat them like children? Would halflings want to be anywhere near a larger humanoids' dwellings as a result? Or are halflings given mythical status like fey? Or are they more like inveterate pranksters and tricksters, treating them more like gnomes? And if halflings are more like gnomes, then why have gnomes?

There are opportunities to integrate halflings into a world, but they aren't quite so easy to plop down into a setting as dwarves and elves. I still haven't quite figured out how to make them work in my campaign that doesn't feel like a one-off rather than a separate species. But I did finally find a space for gnomes, which I'll discuss in another article.

Your Turn: How have you integrated halflings into your campaign world?

 

[Bohandas]

If it was intended as a more mundane Prime Material creature of the woods or plains I'd agree with you completely. But it's a Demon. Forget the normal physics - none of that applies to Demons!

The kicker is that it's actually not. It's based on a mythical demon but the roving mauler is actually a neutral aligned magical beast (refrence: Tome of Magic, page 86, column 2)

 

[Chaosmancer]

I know that.

But again, the creature’s anatomy may be variable. Standard knee joint when cartwheeling, rapidly (or instantaneously) changing to a B&S joint as needed. We’re just seeing it in a single moment.

I think of all those creatures from Asian sci-fi/horror/fantasy with impossible anatomy, like Zeiram, or Lovecraftian horrors.

The thing that bother me is if that was the intention, then they should have designed it in such a way to make that clear. If the intent was that it has shapeshifting legs, show that it has shapeshifting legs. Don't depict it "in a single moment" in such a way that makes it pure guesswork what you actually intended.

I wasn't aware of Zeiram so I looked it up, and that is a FAR superior design. The initial design is simple and conceals the monster's true nature, which is perfect for a horror monster that is supposed to have a reveal. However, even in that version you can see hints of something strange. Then there was another shot which depicted in in closer to a "true form" for the final battle.

But the best artwork that highlights what I'm talking about was actually this bit of fanart, which captures a moment that is exactly what you should do if you have a creature whose purpose is to have a strange anatomy and can only depict that quickly in a single pose

And action shot, which shows a blend between the two forms I mentioned from the movie screenshots. Because if I only have a single still frame to work with, then I need to show it in action if I want people to understand what it can do. I don't show it in a way that makes it trivially easy to misunderstand what the creature is, to the point where other people have to come in and make up new reasons that supposedly get to "the truth" about the creature.

 

[Chaosmancer]

I read your post. Do you think I was supposed to suddenly say "Wow, Chaosmancer was right all along!"?

No, I expected that if you disagreed with my points, you would discuss them in a mature manner. Instead

I asked what was wrong with it. Your answer was that it looks dumb, therefore it was objectively bad, because you didn't seem to get that it was a fantastic beast that doesn't have to fit real-world biology and you apparently didn't try to think about it.

You simplify my response into "it looks dumb" which I never said was the reason I disliked it, ignore all the reasons I actually gave for disliking it, put words into my mouth about "objectivity" that I never claimed, accuse me of ignorance AND of not thinking things through DESPITE my reasonings that I gave which clearly show I DID think it through to a large degree.

So, congrats, you have shown that you just wanted to waste my time. After all, you have never once engaged a single criticism I gave except for the impossible to see second head, and instead have devolved to insult after insult to try and beat me down into silence.

 

[Chaosmancer]

For my part, I'm quite up-front about having it that in my setting some things (e.g. sailing ships, armour, mapmaking) have been developed to a much "later" era than have other things (gunpowder, firearms, steam power); and that faux-cultures from widely different historical periods can and do exist at the same time, occasionally borrowing/stealing each others' tech.

Which I appreciate. But it does lead to bizarre situations. Steam power was discovered incredibly early, because of course it was. All it takes is boiling a pot of water with a lid on top to realize steam power is a thing. And you have sewers, so you have pipes. Now, maybe you don't have locomotives, because the boiler engine took longer, but you have sailing ships that use large sails, waterwheels, and steam. It therefore could be conceived that SOMEONE has figured out you can use steam to move a wheel made of sails. And once you add magic to the list, then there are things that can be logically put forth as happening.


I think what frustrates me is often running into DMs who don't realize that there are holes and inconsistencies already, and then react hostilely to a player who doesn't see a hole, but instead sees a thing that they can add to the story. And those DMs are often the same ones constantly telling us other DMs that our inspirations and the things we use to fill in those gaps are "not DnD" and therefore shouldn't count when discussing the game.

In Pirates III: At World's End there's a creature that, when first seen, looks and behaves like a smooth rounded stone maybe six or eight inches across.

It is in fact a small intelligent crab-like creature, as soon becomes evident in the film.

If I draw that creature as a stone, does that mean it's then not allowed to be designed as a crab?

If you just draw a stone, and expect me to realize that it is really a crab, you've made a bad design decision.

If instead, you do something like what was done for coin mimics

Where you show it as the disguised form AND as the mobile "true form" then you have made a good design decision. Because I don't have to guess what you mean by "this rock is a crab" I can see it.

Again, if you only have a single still image, and you have important information to convey, then you need to convey that information in that image. Whether it is secret crabs, mimic coins, fungi people with tentacle heads, or shapeshifting legs, you need to make sure your design gives the viewer everything they need to know about the creature's body. And if you can't do that in a single image, then you need to make multiple images.

 

[Chaosmancer]

Or..you can quite reasonably argue that artists' depictions are not the same as photographs and that the reason there aren't any photographs is that the creatures are bound by our imaginations rather than any kind of physical reality. Imagination trumps art.

When discussing an artistic design, imagination does not trump art.

I'm honestly flabbergasted by this entire squad of people telling me that the intent of the piece of art meant to tell us what this creature is was solely to make us read the text and imagine what the creature "really" looks like, because the art isn't supposed to do that, our imaginations are supposed to do that.

I expect better from artists than for them to give me crap and expect me to turn it into gold. That, or I simply am too used to amazing artists who can seemingly do this impossible thing of making a well-designed art piece that depicts a creature in a compelling way.

Art isn't bound to "physical reality" either. It is imagination given visual form.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Beholders are original to D&D, and thus don't share the halfling's issue of being transparently derivative. They also have the rule of cool in their favor, which halflings don't.

Oof. Hard opposite on that one. Beholders are one of the goofiest things in D&D, whereas halflings are cool.

I kind of like the idea that a demon's physical essence can be so chaotic that we can't make sense of it so our brain does it's best to make sense of it and it ends up looking like a pinwheel lion.

That’s how I treat angels, too, and most gods. It’s only the spirits of the land, trees, river, sky, moon, the hunt, as well as most Fey, Jinn, and similar creatures, that can really be honestly contended with by a mortal mind. Well, insofar as mortal minds contend with anything honestly.

One Angel can be described as a wheel of eyes, while another looks like a man with lightning for a face and glowing skin and 6 sets of wings, once covering their face.

A Watcher might appear as a man with 5 heads (and one of them’s a lion!) and several sets of wings.

In all cases they’re nature is ineffable, but our minds try to interpret it into something vaguely sensible. Something describable.

 

[Gammadoodler]

When discussing an artistic design, imagination does not trump art.

I'm honestly flabbergasted by this entire squad of people telling me that the intent of the piece of art meant to tell us what this creature is was solely to make us read the text and imagine what the creature "really" looks like, because the art isn't supposed to do that, our imaginations are supposed to do that.

I expect better from artists than for them to give me crap and expect me to turn it into gold. That, or I simply am too used to amazing artists who can seemingly do this impossible thing of making a well-designed art piece that depicts a creature in a compelling way.

Art isn't bound to "physical reality" either. It is imagination given visual form.

When I engage with a piece of rpg art of a creature that does not exist, I assume that art is inspirational not authoritative and is intended to complement the other descriptive material.

One aspect of the consideration of how I should use the art would be to be aware of the stylistic inspirations for the art in question. Is it photo-realistic comic book cover art, is it tarot art, tribal art, religious or occult iconography, medieval tapestry, mosaic, etc? The less recognizably representational the style, and the more exotic the creature, the less weight the art carries.

An image based on an engraving for an occult dictionary entry for a demon president of hell..doesn't carry a lot if weight for me.

 

[James Gasik]

And then there's art that's misleading, like people who insist (due to some D&D Mandela effect) that Kobolds used to be dog-men, despite always having been stated to lay eggs, based on the way their language is stated to sound, and their pre-3e art.

Also, creatures native to other planes have no particular need to conform to any biological logic, and often don't. Modrons are part machine and part biological, due to the nature of their plane of origin. Archons can be simple spheres of light, animal-headed, or fully humanoid. Indeed, as I recall, it used to be that certain extraplanar creatures, if encountered on the Prime Material, were not even in their actual bodies, but in temporary bodies composed of matter of the Prime, so that if they were destroyed, they simply reformed on their home Plane no worse for wear (though they may not be able to return any time soon).

In the Ethereal Plane, you can encounter something that looks like a skeletal platypus that can consume psionic ability, magical power, and Intelligence; despite it's weird appearance, it's certainly not undead!

So yeah, expecting a D&D critter to conform to any sort of logic is a bit suspect. This is a game where a Gorgon is a bull with a metal hide that breathes a gas that turns people to stone, after all!

 

[Chaosmancer]

When I engage with a piece of rpg art of a creature that does not exist, I assume that art is inspirational not authoritative and is intended to complement the other descriptive material.

One aspect of the consideration of how I should use the art would be to be aware of the stylistic inspirations for the art in question. Is it photo-realistic comic book cover art, is it tarot art, tribal art, religious or occult iconography, medieval tapestry, mosaic, etc? The less recognizably representational the style, and the more exotic the creature, the less weight the art carries.

An image based on an engraving for an occult dictionary entry for a demon president of hell..doesn't carry a lot if weight for me.

So, before I can understand an artwork that is supposed to help me understand a monster, I need to first do research on the artists inspiration and find out where they found the creature that they are just copying. Then I can decide whether or not the art is supposed to be trusted to give me an accurate depiction of the creature.

So, therefore I should absolutely discount the art of the Bullette and the Owlbear as holding any weight whatsoever, correct? They show me absolutely nothing of what those creatures look like, because the art for them was based on rpg art of a creature that does not exist, which was based on rpg art of a creature that does not exist, which was based on rpg art of a creature that does not exist, which as based on a plastic toy.

Or, and this may be a crazy idea, I can assume that an artist whose job it was to show me a creature and how it appears, did their job as an artist and showed me a creature and how it appears.

 

[Gammadoodler]

So, before I can understand an artwork that is supposed to help me understand a monster, I need to first do research on the artists inspiration and find out where they found the creature that they are just copying. Then I can decide whether or not the art is supposed to be trusted to give me an accurate depiction of the creature.

So, therefore I should absolutely discount the art of the Bullette and the Owlbear as holding any weight whatsoever, correct? They show me absolutely nothing of what those creatures look like, because the art for them was based on rpg art of a creature that does not exist, which was based on rpg art of a creature that does not exist, which was based on rpg art of a creature that does not exist, which as based on a plastic toy.

Or, and this may be a crazy idea, I can assume that an artist whose job it was to show me a creature and how it appears, did their job as an artist and showed me a creature and how it appears.

Is there anything in the post you are responding to that suggests that the art has zero weight?

If all the art was done as stained glass portraiture, or cartoon, or mosaic, would you suggest that artists have not "done their job" because they have not presented their assigned impossible creatures "how they really are"?

Do you judge portraiture, still lives, and landscapes by how closely the art resembles the subject?

Do you find it impossible to differentiate between more and less representational styles of art without doing any research?

Do you really think the only options are zero weight and whatever weighting you are using?

What I've suggested is that the art is there to provide fuel for the imagination, not to serve as evidence in a courtroom. And the amount of work your imagination may have to do depends on the art, the subject, and what you, the user, need to be satisfied.