Halflings - are the more than just short humans?

[Tsyr]

I see halflings as a little different from humans...

Warning, the below is how they are in *my* campaign world. I belive my view of them can be derived from the presentation of them invarious WotC products, but there is definetly a bit of reading between the lines and my own interperetation here and there.

To me, halflings are kind of the race of innocents. Yes, there are evil halflings, but by and large the race is a fairly good race... As pointed out, there really isn't an evil halfling god.

And they are omnipresent... There might be a clan of halflings living in any town, be it elves, dwarves, or humans. They exist in the world at large, but they aren't exactly a part of it. You could trust a halfling to be neutral in a situation where everyone else has too many vested interests to be neutral. Halflings would make the ultimate mediators and judges. Because of this detached nature, and because they tend to be fairly curious fellows, halflings make great detached observers. Elven records of a war might be more exact in details, dwarven records of a war might be more glorious, but halfling records are the ones the scholars go to to see what was really going on.

They're slow to anger, have few prejudices, and are always willing to give anyone a chance, until they have proved themselves untrustworthy... And halflings aren't fools, they don't continue to give the known troublemakers new chances 'just because'.

Halflings aren't the most brave folk, but they aren't cowards. They are pragmatists. They just don't see any reason to die when it wont change anything. When a halfling feels he's doing the right thing, and there is something important riding on it, halflings can be as brave as any of the larger races. Unlike a dwarf or an orc, he might be scared to death too, but he will still be brave.

And pragmatically, they have no objection to riding on the work of the larger races. They understand that they are small, fairly simple, not-terribly-strong people, and see the value of protection from the stronger races. Sometimes this causes people to think they are slackers, and don't do much real work, but a halfling isn't afraid of an honest days work if that's what is needed.

Socially, halflings tend to form large extended families that may be spread across half the world, but family is always family to a halfling, and there is a bond there that can never be broken. Halflings aren't the most prolific of the races, but in any place more than a family or two of halflings has settled, halfling children will be a fairly common sight. Except for rare cases where bad blood rises between two halfling families (And there is normally very strong social pressure to work out whatever the problems are), halfling children are raised by the entire community, with one member teaching them something they tend to be very good at, etc.

In the rare occasions halflings form entire towns on their own, the town is normally run in a democratic fashion, where anyone able to express an opinion may do so, and it will be given fair consideration. This is not to say that it is anarchy; there is normally a body of the eldest halflings in the town that make final decisions or arbitrate disputes when the need arises. Halflings normally prefer to enter extensive trading relationships with nearby towns of humans, dwarves, and elves if possible, even still, typically trading produce, jewelry, leather and cloth products, dyes, and other similar goods that are best made by hand, with care and time, for steel and large quantities of wheat and other agricultural products that take vast amounts of land and manpower to grow and harvest.

True nomadic halflings are rare, but do exist, typically owning several small beasts of burden, such as donkeys, and living out of wooden wagons. These nomadic halflings tend to be a bit more paranoid and reserved, in comparison to their settled cousins, as they are more vulnerable. A typical group of nomadic halflings is 2-4 families. Occasionally a nomadic family will decide to settle down in a town they visit, and occasionally one will decide to take to the road, so the numbers stay fairly balanced.

 

[Storminator]

Do Halflings actually have a niche beyond being short humans?

Yes! They are also annoying!

PS

 

[The_Gneech]

Eh, if I use them at all, they're Tolkien Hobbits™. That doesn't mean that individual halflings all have to be Bilbo Baggins; just that the overall culture is the "simplistic village folk" archetype.

-The Gneech

 

[AFGNCAAP]

I've kind of kept with the idea of the halflings as a "homeless folk," mainly dwelling in nations established by other races, but not in one of their own. However, part of my campaign's backstory explains why that is the case.

In addition, the halflings tend toward a nature-based belief system: thus there are many more halfling druids than there are halfling clerics (quite a few halfling clerics still revere nature, so they tend toward Animal, Plant, and elemental/nature-oriented cleric domains).

Also, for a bit of an added twist, I modified the backstory of gnomes: they're actually half-halfling, half-dwarf (with a bit of fey blood in the mix, for their innate magical abilities). The gnomes are the remnants/descendants of a nation of halflings and a large barbaric clan of dwarves that dwelled in the northern lands. Both groups were decimated in a war, and the survivors merged into a single community. The dwarves and halflings intermarried, and the community was closely allied with the local fey in the area. The end result, centuries later, is the gnomes. These gnomes, like their halfling ancestors, tend to have more druids than clerics.

(Basically, gnomes are just as they are in the PHB, except they have the shorter lifespan of svirneblin, and the "Dwarf Blood" trait, allowing them to use any, and be affected by, any magics specifically focused toward dwarves).

 

[Snapdragyn]

IMC, halflings are a somewhat kender-ish race of nomads & traders. They have an innate wanderlust, such that even the primitive tribal halflings of the Thundering Plains & [secret area L] are nomads within their homelands. Most of the halflings are more advanced, & either travel the lands in brightly painted wagons as the Gypsies of the setting, or sail the open skies between the Shards of terra firma.

Gnomes, otoh, take the more 'hobbit' role, with a bit of the tinker mixed in (more so in some regions than in others). They're also a somewhat more varied race (3 or 4 different subraces), & are more prone to living in their own regions with differing cultures -- though most of these are small city-states, with only 4 gnomish nations of any substantial size. Gnomes from one region are much stronger on the 'tinker' aspect (& have recently discovered the new magic of the artificer, /nod Eberron), while gnomes from another are commonly spies (the best connection I could work out for the 3.5 preferred class, /boggle gnome bards?!). There's also a region of feudal Asian-themed gnomes in [secret area Q].

Dwarves as a culture live entirely underground & have almost no contact with the surface world. Most surface dwellers have never met a dwarf, & the sight of one would be a Thing of Great Wonder. Knowledge of them survives from a time when they had a stronger prescence in the world above, as well as one or two surface nations who have (relatively recently) established traderoutes to dwarven realms in the Underdark.

 

[Gez]

My halflings are gypsies.


Gnomes, on the other hand, are sedentary. Their niche is lore and knowledge, they are the mystics and loremasters of the world (I'm happy to see Eberron took a similar angle, rather than the Pr. Nutty Von Kaboom approach of Dragonlance).

 

[Werther von G]

One of the campaign settings that I'm proudest of was an Arabian fantasy setting for 3e. Had its roots in Al Qadim, but grew from there. When developing the various niches for the races, I decided to assign them to analogues of medieval/chivalric Earth cultures. The heartland setting was dominated by humans, so they were the Arabian/Persian/Algierian sorts. Elves got the role of Ancient Egypt, still active in their eldritch cities. The dwarves ruled the stand-in for sub-Saharan Africa, and the half-orcs had Rus and the Mongol lands.

The halflings were the northern Europeans; the gnomes were the southern Europeans. All the pale folk were three feet tall, and I loved it. It gives a special credence to reports from European explorers. "The people there are *giants*! I swear, even the women are twice my size."

 

[Dark Psion]

I noticed there were no "Evil" halflings, despite all other races having a bad seed sub race (Drow, Duergar & Spriggians Oh MY!), so I created one.

Shyla Valley Halflings were a normal, shire-dwelling large group of halflings living in a large valley surrounded entirely by mountains. A war was raging between two human kingdoms and when one of the wizard-kings decided that the mountains were in his way, he removed them and Shyla Valley was revealled to the world. The fields and food stores of the halflings were quickly claimed by the armies and not having to fight for anything in centuries, they seemed to be doomed.

But they were saved, you see the halfling of Shyla Valley remembered the old ways and always honored the faerie and fae in all things. The fact that humans had forgot those ways may have also been a factor, but on the night of the full moon, every halfing in the valley disappeared.

The War came to an abrupt end when the wizard-kings tried to summon a dragon all at the same time and a flight of dragons was summoned, all rather pissed off. It took a centrury for the human kingdoms to recover and just as one of them decided to start the war again, the Halflings returned.

But where a hundred years had passed in the real world, a dozen generations had passed in the faerie lands for the halflings and they had "changed", they were creatures of Faerie now.

They had learned skill in both Arcane and Nature magics (favored class Sorcerer) and have learned many secrets of the Fae (They have access to the Faerie feats and Prestige classes in Faeries by Bastion Press). Oh and also, they do not like humans!

The human kingdom fell to the halflings very easily and with faerie enchantments, they made slaves of all those humans who could not escape. They have created and empire that is modeled on the Faerie courts and often visited by various creatures of both faerie kingdoms, both light and dark and this is reflected in the Shyla Halflings as well.

They are very flamboyant (think "Anime Halfings") and can be both noble and mallicious in the same evening. The have access to vast arcane powers as well as druidic magics, and they have lots of "little friends". All Shyla Halfings can cast Good Luck & Bad Luck (See Faeries, Bastion press) 3/ day combined and for every two character levels, they gain the Summon Fey (I to IX) spells in succession, each can be used 1/ day.

Their Racial Traits are:

+2 Luck Bonus to all Saves (except for Divine magic)
+2 Luck bonus to all Arcane and Nature Magical effects. (They are very vulnerable to Divine magic because they abandoned the Halfling pantheon)
+2 racial bonus to Spot, Search and Listen skill checks.
Languages: Halfing, Fae and Common
Favored Class: Sorcerer
Level Adjustment: +2

And just how much do these halflings not like humans? Well, have you ever noticed that humans are to haflings in size as horses are to men?

 

[Pbartender]

My halflings are gypsies.

Same here, for the most part...

Though for my next campaign, I'm taking a different tack.

Halflings are, by and large a race of servants. They are good at cooking and houskeeping and such. Not to mention, they are an extraordinarily inconspicous lot. There very stature and talent for hiding and sneaking keeps them out of sight and out of mind of the aristocrats that utilize them. And far from being looked down upon, they take great pride in the work they do, and demand a certain amount of professional respect from their employers.

All of this also, of course, makes them entirely suitable to being theives, rogues and spies.

Go watch Gosford Park... That's where I got the idea from.

 

[Anime Kidd]

IMC I have them as semi-nomadic hunter-gatherers of the arctic north who have very little, if any, contact with anyone else. Basically, the Furchin from the old 2e Complete Book of Gnomes & Halflings.