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

[Fanaelialae]

I think halflings have a useful niche. That being, not human, but human adjacent (obviously, I'm referring to typical halflings, not DS halflings).

I've known plenty of players over the years who don't want to play a human in a fantasy game because "that's what I am in RL". I think halflings provide a comfortable niche for someone who wants to play something a little more fantastical than themselves, without having to stray too far from their comfort zone and what they know.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

I think halflings have a useful niche. That being, not human, but human adjacent (obviously, I'm referring to typical halflings, not DS halflings).

I've known plenty of players over the years who don't want to play a human in a fantasy game because "that's what I am in RL". I think halflings provide a comfortable niche for someone who wants to play something a little more fantastical than themselves, without having to stray too far from their comfort zone and what they know.

Not really seeing how halflings fit than more than elves/dwarves/half-elves (the latter being the classic race for the type of player you describe) in 4E and 5E.

In earlier editions the fact that elves didn't mature until 100 and dwarves until like 50 (IIRC) did freak a certain number of people out, but since 4E, it's been a similar age to humans for both, they just live much longer. So perhaps that was justifiable as a "niche" in earlier editions, but I don't think it is any longer. And even in earlier editions, half-elves filled the niche better.

 

[Fanaelialae]

Not really seeing how halflings fit than more than elves/dwarves/half-elves (the latter being the classic race for the type of player you describe) in 4E and 5E.

In earlier editions the fact that elves didn't mature until 100 and dwarves until like 50 (IIRC) did freak a certain number of people out, but since 4E, it's been a similar age to humans for both, they just live much longer. So perhaps that was justifiable as a "niche" in earlier editions, but I don't think it is any longer. And even in earlier editions, half-elves filled the niche better.

I never said that elves or dwarves freak people out. However, their mindset is different from that of a human owing to a multitude of factors (including their long life spans). Half elves often fall into the "child of two worlds" archetype, so they have a bit of baggage.

Halflings are not human, but are closer to human in outlook (IMO) than any others. Obviously, you can have your elves and dwarves have human outlooks as well, if that's your preference, but I think a lot of people prefer to RP them as something a bit different.

 

[Cadence]

Not to derail, but I don't think that's quite right, because his views and way of life only partially line up with those of the hobbits, and he doesn't have every trait of theirs in an extreme form - or even many. Tom is basically, a straight-up return-to-nature utopian anarchist. He thus represents something more extreme than the hobbits, and which doesn't match up with the frequent small-minded-ness, xenophobia (not so much in the Fellowship hobbits, but certainly hobbits as a whole), and so on. He's lived free since the dawn of time, and he wants to continue to live free. Tolkien himself expressed strong anarchist sympathies (much as that may shock people). In letter 52 to his son, he specifically calls himself an Anarchist and also offers support for what would today be regarded as luddite terrorism (workers dynamiting factories etc.).

Well, let's be clear, when I say "no-one", I mean "a tiny percentage of players", not literally no-one. Apologies if that was confusing.

But your players are freakishly unusual, if that's true. Because every single time we've seen figures on this kind of thing, the number of players playing them is laughably small. Discounting one I made recently basically to be difficult (he's actually turned into a cool character lol), I've seen 2 halflings played in 30 years of D&D, and whilst that's more extreme than the figures we've seen, it's not much more.

EDIT - Wait you're saying 3 out of 19 is "extremely popular"? That's a lot higher than their popularity has ever been shown to be generally, but I still wouldn't call that "extremely popular". OTOH it's as many as I've seen played in D&D in my entire gaming life so there's that.

This is a perfect illustration of an unfortunately common attitude towards like virtually anything which is a problem in human society lol - "The thing people are complaining about isn't a problem, the complaining is!" without the slightest intellectual effort to consider what is being complained about. It's unhelpful at best.

Edit: Crossed-over your post above. In any case, if your argument is popularity, then Gnomes are certainly nuked before halflings. Half-orcs would have been nuked about the same time pre-2020. I wonder if there was a revolt caused by the discussion of their portrayal often being problematic.

One set of numbers from 2017 with a pretty graph of DnDBeyond data Is Your D&D Character Rare?
showed Halflings to be around 3/4 as popular as Dragonborn (77.5%) or Tieflings (72.3%) and around 3/5 as popular as Dwarfs (62.2%). Halflings were a bit more popular than Half-Orc and Halflings beat Gnomes by about what Dragonborn beat Halflings (Gnomes came in at 78.3% Halfling).

Looking at the numbers scree-plot wise, Humans and Elves certainly stood out, but then they started a slow gradual smear, with the aasimar falling off the end.

In 2019, it looks like Halflings still kicked Gnome butt (4.7% to 3.1%) and were about tied Half-Orc (4.7%). D&D 5E - D&D Beyond: Updated Character Popularity

Geeknative reported the top 5 in 2020 as being Human, Half-Elf, Dragonborn, Tiefling, and Half-Orc.

 

[Necrozius]

D&D has that whole "kitchen sink" approach of tossing in a pile of races/cultures without more elaborate thought about what the implications would be of such a mix. Add in the more recent desire for slightly gonzo, post-modernist take on fantasy races (friendly, benevolent spider people who love baking for friends UwU), and I'm starting to feel that all of this is becoming a kind of slightly shallow, Adventure Time experience. Which, if people want it, is totally fine! Not for me, however.

If the setting is a merging, or melting pot of worlds, like in Science Fiction, that's a different matter, of course. There's a reason why 13+ humanoid races are coexisting the in the same area somewhat harmoniously.

But a single planet with 13 (or more!) native, fully sentient races coexisting without too much trouble? Our own world only has a SINGLE RACE and we've had endless conflict that's shaped history and geography for millennia. People have started normalizing the differences, of course, but that's starting to feel like humans in funny hats, which, again, feels shallow to me. Racial ability score modifiers are gone now, for instance, but nothing else seems to be replacing them as a way to biologically and culturally make them unique from each other (besides stuff like weapon proficiencies and spell abilities). Not much in terms of helping the players understand that their elf or dwarf is several hundreds of years old and how they could consider roleplaying that! Or races who've previously been demonized as being evil... what interesting challenges would that bring to the game? Tieflings seem to be common place and trivial, but their origin (and nature) should be anything but trivial.

Even the exotic world of the Dark Crystal has more restraint than the Forgotten Realms. I'd like to see more fantasy worlds with more curated restraint, honestly, but that won't happen because the player crowd has spoken: "more races! more options! don't constrain us!". Oh well.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Edit: Crossed-over your post above. In any case, if your argument is popularity, then Gnomes are certainly nuked before halflings. Half-orcs would have been nuked about the same time pre-2020. I wonder if there was a revolt caused by the discussion of their portrayal often being problematic.

One set of numbers from 2017 with a pretty graph of DnDBeyond data Is Your D&D Character Rare?
showed Halflings to be around 3/4 as popular as Dragonborn (77.5%) or Tieflings (72.3%) and around 3/5 as popular as Dwarfs (62.2%). Halflings were a bit more popular than Half-Orc and Halflings beat Gnomes by about what Dragonborn beat Halflings (Gnomes came in at 78.3% Halfling).

Looking at the numbers scree-plot wise, Humans and Elves certainly stood out, but then they started a slow gradual smear, with the aasimar falling off the end.

View attachment 138128
In 2019, it looks like Halflings still kicked Gnome butt (4.7% to 3.1%) and were about tied Half-Orc (4.7%). D&D 5E - D&D Beyond: Updated Character Popularity

Geeknative reported the top 5 in 2020 as being Human, Half-Elf, Dragonborn, Tiefling, and Half-Orc.

What I find most surprising is the popularity of dragonborn. I have never seen a PC dragonborn. Ever.

 

[Krachek]

That sounds exactly like an "everyman", who is by definition a normal Human.

in DnD human is the perfect chameleon, and can decently mimic any race.
Halfling can be considered useless, but you will need an efficient lobby to pretend that Tolkien books and films never existed. Halfling race is backup by books and movies that assure them a place in fantasy game for ever.
But I agree that for a world building addict, halfling is not very glamour. You don’t build a fantasy world around halfling. Replicating the Shire thousand time, will create a nice place, with only cute gardens and farms. If you need drama, passion, betrayal, power, you go for human, elf, Tiefling.

 

[edemaitre]

There are a couple of issues worth noting regarding Halflings as a racial option in D&D5e:

-Any Game Master is free to pick and choose what to allow in his/her/their game. If the concept doesn't fit your world, don't use it. Since I've been running my homebrew setting for 38 years, I've got a lot of history using Halflings built with my players. I wouldn't retcon away the role of Meadow Rangers in the Seven Kingdoms War or the oppression of the Shan Sao by the Bakemono in the east. Newer races such as Tieflings, Dragonborn, and Warforged are rare, but players have requested them.

-Aside from story, the mechanical benefits of each race/subspecies within the rules may vary, but they're generally balanced, if not equally exciting to everyone. Role-players like having options, and even slight differences matter between a sneaky Halfling Rogue and a slick human Bard or a nimble Elven acrobat. If you want to reskin the standard fantasy races with human-animal hybrids, like badger folk (Dwarves), squirrel kin (Gnomes), cat people (Elves), etc., go for it!

-Don't get caught up in "edition wars." Every edition has its adherents, and our hobby is richer for them. Your campaign and your player group should find what makes everybody happy. That's part of the fun of tabletop RPGs -- each table has a unique combination of personalities, ideas, and rules. I get that some fans -- especially those of us who post to message boards -- like to argue, but keep it constructive.

-If you can't beat them... try it out! I've tried to play every race-class combo at some point, at least with memorable Non-Player Characters. My Cajun Halfling chef, punk Gnome Bard, or drunkard Half-Elf Fighter P.C.s all explored different aspects of myself, as well as fictional exaggerations or rules/role elements. Creative players can help flesh out cultures and find ecological or thematic/tactical niches.

-Nothing is written in stone. Try an all-human campaign, or one with everything but humans. You're only as good as your next session. Every scenario is a new opportunity to try out ideas and to see what works for you. Despite my fondness of tradition, I'm not running in the same way or the exact same characters I did years ago. If I did, I'd still be running "hack-and-slash roll-playing," which was fun at the time but would not satisfy me now. Styles change, and I've learned from every G.M. and even and especially the failed games. Good luck!

 

[FrozenNorth]

What do non-Duergar Dwarves do to push things ahead narratively that can't also be done by humans? (Or what do most humanoids do that can't be done by humans?). What do gnomes do that a short variant elf wouldn't do?

For Dwarves, I would describe the traits for which they are known in 5e as follows:

• Tradition;
• Piety;
• Worship of ancestors;
• Warrior Might;
• Craftsmanship;
• Living in Mountains/hills;
• Stubborness.

If you described a character that had all those traits but didn’t tell me the race, I would assume that you were a dwarf.

For Elves, I think we need to take subraces into account, since there is quite a bit of variety of flavor depending on subrace. Let’s take wood elves:

• Living in forests;
• Being very in tune with nature and fey;
• Otherworldly grace;
• Love of art and music;
• Good at magic;
• Ridiculously long-lived;
• Haughtiness.

If you described a charcter that had those traits, but didn’t specify the race, elf would be a pretty good guess.

 

[FrozenNorth]

I don't understand. That seems like a lot of writing to say "I don't want halflings in games I run," which is your prerogative (I don't have Dragonborn. A friend of mine is starting a game where humans are the only playable race).

Now if what you are trying to argue is that "no one else should play a halfling at a table in which I am a player either because I don't see a niche for them," well then. . . that seems off.

I would suggest that @AcererakTriple6 ‘s point is that when 6e comes out, perhaps dragonborn, tiefling or tabaxi should replace halflings as the 4th core race. I think there will always be a place for halflings in D&D, perhaps among goliaths and aasimar.