Whizbang Dustyboots
Gnometown Hero
Make kender a halfling subrace, you cowards.A kender, then we find out how far that appreciation goes
D&D General Short folk appreciation thread – what do you play?
- Thread starter Shades of Eternity
- Start date
Tonguez
A suffusion of yellow
how are they different, what makes them distinctive that isnt cultural flavour? Halflings are so named because they are small humans, the culture of the Shire is based on the English Midlands (who are human despite rumours to the contrary)
Mustrum_Ridcully
Legend
I liked the 4E take on them. IIRC, they were still lucky, but in the implied Points of Light setting, they were commonly found at and on rivers, traveling with boats, transporting people and goods.
They will meet many different people from possibly all walks of life that wish to use their services, and they are always moving, seeing a much larger variety than most, but can still be fairly familiar to some of these places because they visit regularly (assuming they stick to some regular routes). A lot of cities, towns and villages can be found along rivers, so they can appear in many places and they'll also likely be a fairly welcome sight, since they bring news and goods from the world.
I think that's an interesting niche for a species, and it's more adventure friendly than a "pirate" species (or otherwise aquatic/naval oriented species) or something like that would be, they aren't out at sea and visiting strange islands, they can be found all over the world. And that they don't go out at the high seas might also say something about them.
Whizbang Dustyboots
Gnometown Hero
It's a good niche.
As it was presented -- all your halflings are now watercraft peoples in dreadlocks -- it was a bit sudden, but it's really just an evolution of D&D halflings being the group that everyone gets along with and often have in and around their own enclaves. You probably wouldn't find dwarves and elves living together in AD&D, but you'd find halflings in both of their communities.
Halflings as the traders to everyone and, probably, as diplomats and other go-betweens (for legal transactions and otherwise) is something we don't see any other society doing on a broad scale, outside of specific campaign settings.
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Humans dismiss halflings and call them halflings as if they're half people.
Their very name within the game is a demonstration of how they are different from humans. It's clearly not what they call themselves.
Also, your choice to focus on only a single type of halfling, when there are dozens of different identities available is another demonstration of the placement of wee folk as unworthy -- one of the dominant identities others place upon them.
In the now dead thread calling for D&D to eliminate the race/species I wrote thousands of words in support of wee folk. I'm too lazy to look that up now. If you don't want them, that's fine.
For me, especially with my history stated earlier in this thread, having halflings is vital to my well being. They are also important for the tales in my homebrew world as it was halflings that discovered the bond of companionship as a way to overcome their weaknesses within the world.
Halflings in my world also embrace much more than a shire culture. There are caravan, desert, coop home, rafts & waterways, bridgers, tree house, spire lands and more.
Shades of Eternity
Legend
In the Hodgepocalypse, I built halfling culture around 1970's Trucker Culture, and it works far better than it had any right to be, complete with massive badass rigs. 
Whizbang Dustyboots
Gnometown Hero
Fun fact: In at least two of TSR's worlds, halflings call themselves the "hin," thanks to Ed Greenwood both writing the Forgotten Realms and Mystara's Five Shires book.
Shades of Eternity
Legend
And I'm building a charming halfling rogue with an ungo (sasquatch) companion called Han Golow. 
Mind of tempest
(he/him)advocate for 5e psionics
given tolkain and black sabbath are from the midlands them being seen as less than human feels odd, then again the nation it racked with such old faultlines based on more or less nothing.
lycanthropejeff
Explorer
I have really leaned into gnomes. One of my pals in my regular group and I have created a collection of lore regarding gnomish culture. Everything has a bit of a silly flavor but can be used in creative and serious ways as the tone of the game demands. We have published a few free 'gnomelore' items on DMs Guild and would love for anyone who is interested to take a look. Hopefully there is something there that will give you a chuckle or make your game a little more interesting.
I was hoping that D&D 2024 would give a better update to some of the older species that would make them as appealing as some of the new species that have incredible species traits like breath weapons, limited flight etc... I personally think the Speak with Animals trait for forest gnomes should be unlimited... oh well.... I'm curious what others might think about this. I haven't looked closely at the updates to halflings, does any feel the same way regarding halflings that I do about gnomes in D&D 2024?
I'll close with the link to the DMs Guild stuff. Enjoy!
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