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Message: <blockquote data-quote="doctorbadwolf" data-source="post: 7639271" data-attributes="member: 6704184">Gnomish Cultures, and Their Places In The WorldNow, first, a quick note about the idea of a race needing to be the "XYZ" race. [sblock] IMHO, this is a nonsense concept. Orcs and Minotaurs and Goliaths and Firbolgs are all distinct, and them all being in dnd or in a specific dnd world has nothing at all to do with whether or not a new "big strong scary guy" race should be included, or a "monstrous looking and antagonistic to the pretty races" race. Just like the real world has several island dwelling fisher-gatherers, fantasy worlds can have as many or as few "small, quick, likeable" folk as a group wants. The world won't be any more or less good based on whether it has none, or several. Minotaurs don't talk to plants and disguise themselves as elves or have a knack for druidry, Goliath don't have a cultural association with labyrinths or a bestial nature, orcs aren't part of The Mountain, etc, but even if orcs and minotaurs were more similar than they are, so what? How weird would it be if there were only one (1) race per broad archetype? How much divine intervention would be required to make that even happen? Look at the real world! Look at all the flying species in the world, and how many of them have literally no relation to one another beyond the relation of literally all lifeforms on Earth by way of the first organism. What nonsense would it be if there were only birds, because bats and flying insects are redundant? Likewise, if aarakokra are the only flying intelligent tool users in a world where a dozen or more intelligent tool users evolved and share the world, how is that more realistic or more interesting than their being 3-4 races who "share" the air space, compete for aeries and resources, etc? I can't imagine finding the forest particularly interesting in dnd if they only "people" who come from there are elves. That being said, Gnomes are not "silly dwarves" or "magic halflings" or "small elves" or any such thing. They're just Gnomes. [/sblock]So, in brief, who are each of the Gnomish peoples? All Gnomes are inquisitive, creative, and incredibly intelligent. For each subrace, this manifests in different ways. Forest Gnomes are a bit more secluded than their Rock Gnome cousins, though not nearly so much as the Deep Gnomes. Still, they are quire friendly when they are interacting with other peoples, and make fast friends with the critters, elves, and friendly/good-spirited of the woods where they live. Their burrow-towns are more often root-burrows, similar to a series of root cellars, if a root cellar were converted into a home. They might also make home in tree hollows up in the limbs of a tree, in a forest with sufficiently large trees, but the classic image is much more David The Gnome. Forest Gnomes also have a particular knack for illusion, and can speak with small and smaller animals, and one must consider how that impacts their culture and day-to-day lives. They are unlike Wood Elves in several ways. For one, they are much smarter, not quite as graceful, and not as wise or intuitive. Beyond those things, though, they are not beings who live in harmony with the wood, but instead are beings who study and seek to truly understand, catalog, and categorize, the forest and all it's creatures and spirits. They are just as inventive as Rock Gnomes, but much less technically inclined. Instead, Illusions are their domain, both in terms of creation, and in terms of defending their communities. Generally, unwelcome visitors will never find a Gnomish community, but where Rock gnomes use ingenious architecture, and Deep Gnomes hide their cities behind walls of solid stone, Forest Gnomes use simple illusions to hide what little is otherwise visible of their homes, so that to a passerby it seems simply that there is nothing but untouched forest all around them. Similarly, when it becomes necessary to engage with an enemy, an army of Forest Gnomes and their animal and fey allies can appear out of every bush, root tangle, treeline, and pond in and around an enemy formation. By the time the invaders realize that these natural formations aren't real, it is much too late, and quiet soon returns to the wood. Rock Gnomes and Deep Gnomes are cool too, but I will return to them another time!</blockquote>

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