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

Dannyalcatraz said:

And to clarify: the reason most such changes wouldn’t work as well for the species as for a few communities is that they somewhat subvert the bucolic nature of halflings. You NEED those ”mostly harmless” halflings as described in the PHB in order for the changes to have the proper narrative effect. You have to have the mundane & expected in order for the plot twist to have any impact.

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okay, but can we have a better flavour of mundane & expected as the one we got is somehow blander than water which is impressive.

Mind of tempest said:

okay, but can we have a better flavour of mundane & expected as the one we got is somehow blander than water which is impressive.

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That's part of their natural defense system. If they were exciting they'd attract too much attention.

…all of which reminds me, most if not all of my suggestions gave a darker side to halflings. Perhaps a more neutral or even positive alteration can be found…

1) Halflings are descended from good-aligned extraplanar beings who surrendered their nature to become mortals to avoid being drawn into the machinations of their peers. Their avatars became their entirety, and they retreated from the world to live in quiet isolation. Over the ensuing generations, their origins have been lost, but remnants of their nature remain, manifested mainly in their luck, theor accuracy with thrown objects, and their mind-boggling appetites.

2) Halflings are the descendants of the Damned who escaped eternal torment but who made the conscious decision to improve themselves instead of returning to the evil of their former lives. They adopted an almost monastic way of life to purify and reform themselves. Over time, this penitent way became their customary way.

Hey, I'm just saying.

If'n they gonna be 80% farmers, have the lore say they trade the extra food to the big'uns.

Mind of tempest said:

okay, but can we have a better flavour of mundane & expected as the one we got is somehow blander than water which is impressive.

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That bland flavor is part of the camoflage. They are different from the commoners of humans (and some other races) largely only in their semi-subterranesn architecture.

Minigiant said:

Hey, I'm just saying.

If'n they gonna be 80% farmers, have the lore say they trade the extra food to the big'uns.

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Surely, something like that should be campaign or DM specific.

“What do they do with the extra food?” is the kind of question that could be the foundation of an adventure or campaign subplot. Consider Empire of the Ants.

Dannyalcatraz said:

Surely, something like that should be campaign or DM specific.

“What do they do with the extra food?” is the kind of question that could ge the foundation of an adventure or campaign subplot. Consider Empire of the Ants.

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They have to feed all the big intruders they captured something...

Chaosmancer said:

I get that we are threading a needle a bit, to be expected when one race is trying to be an ideal. I was trying to get at why we are saying the halflings are the "ideal", what makes them "the perfect commoner" that simply isn't possible to do with the other races. But, let's not just abandon the line of thought we have here. What story calls for a halfling? That could not be done by a specific character of another race. That seems to be our sticking point.

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Somewhere up thread @Cadence (I think?) made some references to Thanksgiving Dinner. I think comfort food provides a good analogy to what I like about halfling culture. If you eat nothing but mac and cheese or mashed potatoes and gravy and pot roast all the time, 1)It eventually becomes less appealing than the first meal you had, and 2)There will be negative consequences to your health and well-being. So I'm talking about halflings as being comfort food with no consequences. They are (for the most part) care free, content with what they have, accepting of others, generous, humble, reluctant to get involved with the troubles of the wider world, and so on, and as many have pointed out, that kind of attitude towards the world would likely have negative consequences for other cultures, BUT for whatever reason, it's not a problem for halflings. They can go on being their trusting, guileless, maybe kind of complacent, maybe naive, selves and major hardship seldom befalls them. This may not comport with everyone's views of halflings, but that's how I think of them. They are, as it goes, lucky and plucky and brave and optimistic because they have little reason not to be.

When I said that I think of them as the distillation of the ideal of the commoner, I was thinking about the typical commoner not really having much privilege, but working hard to scrape out a living. (Which, by the way is a great commoner archetype and a more appropriate commoner for some stories IMO than a halfling would be) But every common person who is working their hardest just to get by certainly wishes that everything could just be a little easier. For many people, the ideal life is not to be rich and famous it's just to be able to work a little less hard and worry a little less and to just be able to enjoy life. That's what halflings get that other D&D races don't.

For me, I guess humans come closest to being able to fill a similar role, but humans just don't have the same culture to build off of. If halflings are guilt free thanksgiving dinner that tastes as good the seventh time you've had it in a week as it did the first, Humans are steamed broccoli and a grilled chicken breast, or a salad, or a bowl of raisin bran with skim milk.

Dannyalcatraz said:

Surely, something like that should be campaign or DM specific.

“What do they do with the extra food?” is the kind of question that could ge the foundation of an adventure or campaign subplot. Consider Empire of the Ants.

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I thought it was well known what they do with the extra food.

Chaosmancer said:

Using Prestidigitation to get clean means they had to have gotten dirty in the first place.

And, as I said in another post. Elves do blacksmithing. Elves build buildings. Elves hunt. Elves go to war. Elves weave. Elves domesticate animals.

Elves do work. They do hard work.

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I view elves as telekinesing and shaping wood, stone, etcetera, to build tree house towns, supertower spires, and floating cities. Elves build by means of magical rituals.

Wood Elves hunt, but similar to Legolas still smell good and look polished while doing it.

Elves weave, especially weave fate, and the fabrics are pristine and precise.

Do elves domesticate animals? I say, no. But elves befriend wild animals, and sometimes shapeshift into wild animals.

Elves do metalwork. And various technologies. But if elves can keep themselves clean in mud, they can probably stay clean while working metal.

Elves go to war. In folkbelief, they only fight be means of magic. Properly, elves are fullcaster mage classes only. But the High Elf Eldritch Knight engages the martial power source in combat. Ancient Paladin is appropriate too. Of course, the elf knight prioritizes combat effectiveness over appearance. Nevertheless, the elf knight has magical ways to stay clean during combat, and to clean up after combat. For example, the elf chain armor of the knight is probably the Mage Armor spell, that appears pristine clean under any circumstance.

Elves do magic. They dont work hard in the same ways that humans work hard. If an elf ever looks unkempt, it is because the elf has an urgent circumstance, or else, the elf is having fun. Occasionally, an elf looks awry because an other elf cursed their fate to look that way, and then the awry elf prioritizes a remedy. Elves are like human actors on movie sets. For the elf, that is who they are.

Looking good and wearing fashionable clothing is an aspect of the charm factor, for the aura of mystery.

The charm and glamor of an elf is their true self, not a role.

Chaosmancer said:

I don't see the point in trying to dismiss this

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The more one acculturates an elf into human ways of doing things nonmagically, the less elf the elf becomes.

For an elf, magic is the solution to every problem. Magic is fate.