D&D 5E Halflings are the 7th most popular 5e race

[Tutara]

I don't think it's arbitrary. There are definitely classes which tend towards ranged attacks and Fighter isn't really focused on that mechanically. Their armor indicates they will be near enough to creatures to be targeted in melee. The small number of archery feats and the increase in the number of feats a fighter gets tends to tilt toward melee where there are many more feats to be found. Their subclasses, when they make a choice between melee and ranged, tend to make more choices towards melee.

You can absolutely make a great ranged-focus fighter. But I think it's fair to say the fighter as mechanically written along with the rest of the rules tends more towards melee than ranged focus. And that halflings have some somewhat arbitrary limits on their melee focused abilities as well. You can certainly make a melee halfling fighter, but I think it's correct to characterize the rules as somewhat discouraging that.

Then if you compare it to the data we got, halfling ranks last for Fighter choices, and is completely off the list for Paladin.

I'm not sure which written abilities of the fighter lend themselves to melee but not to ranged combat. As far as I can tell, they all work fine at range as well. The presence of the Archery Fighting Style, for example, seems to indicate that a ranged fighter is within the expected parameters. You could argue feats like Great Weapon Master or Polearm Master, but then there are feats like Crossbow Expert and Sharpshooter to counterbalance.

I'm not disagreeing - you can indeed make a great ranged-focus fighter. I'm just not sure what the rogue or ranger offers that makes them better at engaging at range.

 

[bedir than]

I don't think it's arbitrary. There are definitely classes which tend towards ranged attacks and Fighter isn't really focused on that mechanically. Their armor indicates they will be near enough to creatures to be targeted in melee. The small number of archery feats and the increase in the number of feats a fighter gets tends to tilt toward melee where there are many more feats to be found. Their subclasses, when they make a choice between melee and ranged, tend to make more choices towards melee.

You can absolutely make a great ranged-focus fighter. But I think it's fair to say the fighter as mechanically written along with the rest of the rules tends more towards melee than ranged focus. And that halflings have some somewhat arbitrary limits on their melee focused abilities as well. You can certainly make a melee halfling fighter, but I think it's correct to characterize the rules as somewhat discouraging that.

Then if you compare it to the data we got, halfling ranks last for Fighter choices, and is completely off the list for Paladin.

Fighters can definitely be ranged by design. That's why the starting equipment is for a Longbow archer, the fighting styles include Archery, etc etc

 

[Zubatcarteira]

The best fighting style as long as someone is willing to be the front line. Sometimes people play a certain build just to help out the rest of the team.

If you take the Crossbow Expert feat, you can stay at the front shooting without disadvantage if the party needs someone to take the melee hits. Not ideal, but it works out fine after you can take the feat. Until then, I guess just grab a Rapier when the monsters get close.

Edit: At lower levels the difference is smaller, but but by mid/high levels not having to run close to the enermy in larger maps and just shooting flying enemies is a godsend.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Surprised and happy to see how popular genasi are.

Gotta keep that genasi propaganda going.

Yeah Genasi are cool. I hope someday they make it into the PHB, TBH

 

[doctorbadwolf]

If you take the Crossbow Expert feat, you can stay at the front shooting without disadvantage if the party needs someone to take the melee hits. Not ideal, but it works out fine after you can take the feat. Until then, I guess just grab a Rapier when the monsters get close.

Edit: At lower levels the difference is smaller, but but by mid/high levels not having to run close to the enermy in larger maps and just shooting flying enemies is a godsend.

One of these days I’ll get to play the Kensei/Battlemaster Archer I built…

 

[bedir than]

Some other interesting information from the blog post

• Only 40 race/class combos are used 1% of the time or more.
• Humans are top two in every class, except the Barbarian where they are third.
• Tabaxi are the most common non-PHB, DMG, Elemental Evil (free) race
• The Homebrewed Mousefolk is more common than three official
• The only PHB class with a non-PHB race in the top 3 is the Monk, with Aaracockra. Genasi are in 4th for Monks.

 

[Hussar]

The main thing this list does for me is give me a sinking feeling that they're making a very big mistake leaving out the Half-Elf from OneD&D. I have a solution for them, though. The half-elf's abilities are not much like a human's nor an elf's.).

Thats not quite right though.

The only difference between an elf and a half elf is two skills. That’s it.

 

[James Gasik]

Most encounters don't start on an empty plain with no cover. Or if they do there's no reason the enemy wouldn't also have excellent long range combat skills in my game.

But I was just trying to say that what is "best" just depends on what you value. DPR isn't everything.

No that's fair, I can agree with you on that point. Best is what works best for your group. An all-ranged group is possible and I've seen some examples of it in play, but obviously, your DM has to be on board with the idea. Many players seem to like playing melee characters though, so even if you could bring out a spreadsheet and mathematically prove that ranged combat was better even without somebody standing in melee range, you'll still see melee characters.

It would be better if being Small didn't penalize you for using Heavy weapons, or, if in trade for giving up that benefit, you got something cromulent for warrior builds (3e's +1 to hit/AC/Hide bonus comes to mind), but that ship has sailed.

 

[Hussar]

Heh. I’ll forgive a lot. It’s a fantasy game and I’m not really worried too much about realism. But a two foot tall halfling using a six foot maul is a bit much.

Otoh my 3e binder used to do exactly that (because of magic) and I just found the visual hilarious.

 

[James Gasik]

Heh. I’ll forgive a lot. It’s a fantasy game and I’m not really worried too much about realism. But a two foot tall halfling using a six foot maul is a bit much.

Otoh my 3e binder used to do exactly that (because of magic) and I just found the visual hilarious.

I was in a one-shot high level game where someone was using the Titan bloodline from 3.5's Unearthed Arcana where they had a Pixie wielding a colossal maul. Completely ridiculous, and not only would it probably not fly in the vast majority of tables, it would take forever for the character to "come online", but it was a very fun game at least.