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

[Cadence]

I never said I wouldn't. The only player who ever got to that part started telling me that his character wouldn't struggle with sunlight sensitivity because there was this really common magic item that they could buy to get rid of it. They were coming from an older edition and just barrelling ahead assuming that everything was the same.

When I told them that I had no idea what that item was and that it didn't exist in 5e, they immediately dropped their idea and switched to something else.

Besides, even if I did make magical goggles that let them ignore sunlight, if I gave it to them immediately at character creation like they wanted, I might as well have simply written the rule out of the race.

I'm imagining the list of fighting styles that go for called shots on anti-sunlight goggles, rules for how they interact with temperature changes and fog up, ...

 

[Hussar]

Me, I'm still waiting to see all this great information about halflings that exists. Because, well, it certainly doesn't exist in the adventures. Maybe halflings get a lot more love in the non-adventure books? I'm not really a book buyer, so, I don't pay too much attention. But, since we're being repeatedly told how halflings are this incredibly popular race just chock a block with flavor that makes them so enticing to play, I'm certainly interested in seeing it.

Can someone point it out to me?

 

[Hussar]

Also worth noting that after being nonexistent in the early adventures, dragonborn start to become more visible in Tomb of Annihilation, perhaps reflecting the increase in their real life popularity.

The funny thing is, the mentions of halflings in Waterdeep are almost all revolving around the were-rat gang of thieves that are also halfling were-rats. The main point being that they are were-rats, with halfling just kind of added on because.. well... reasons. Haltings on their own apparently were too boring to be a thieves guild.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

No I'm strongly tempted to play a forest gnome, just to see what I can do with one.

Well, should any of my current characters die, at least.

Minor illusion is really useful. I find the audio illusion part especially good, but also I’ve set up ambushes with minor illusion, creating a Boulder or even just a section of wall as it normally looks, etc.

 

[Neonchameleon]

Isn’t that the case for any creature that is given mechanics in the PHB? I mean, suppose the write-up for each race was just their mechanics. Wouldn’t it still be the case it would make good PCs?

To me, this is a trivial bar to clear.

Would just a collection of mechanics inspire any significant number of people to play them? Rather than just min-maxers.

You need several things for a good PC race:

• Thematically strong and inspiring enough to draw some people in
• Mechanically decent without being overwhelmingly strong.
• Distinctive enough to not appear redundant.
• Not being excessively obnoxious to put people off

Half orcs are the obvious failures here in part due to obnoxious theme. I fully advocate replacing them with orcs or, failing that, goliaths.

 

[Don Durito]

I reckon there'd be a lot more interest in playing forest gnomes if they could actually shapechange into small beasts and not just speak with them. Such creatures are often depicted as able to change shape in folkore.

Talking to beasts was probably enough for 1e, but in modern D&D, it's necessary to go bolder.

And it would hardly break the game any more than a wizard's familair does.

 

[Neonchameleon]

I reckon there'd be a lot more interest in playing forest gnomes if they could actually shapechange into small beasts and not just speak with them. Such creatures are often depicted as able to change shape in folkore.

Talking to beasts was probably enough for 1e, but in modern D&D, it's necessary to go bolder.

And it would hardly break the game any more than a wizard's familair does.

Absolutely. This would be the type of gnome I could thoroughly support. One that actually felt like a small magical person rather than the main example of their magic being a commonly chosen cantrip.

 

[Oofta]

I'm imagining the list of fighting styles that go for called shots on anti-sunlight goggles, rules for how they interact with temperature changes and fog up, ...

Not to mention not being able to see when it rains and forget about going swimming with them on!

 

[Chaosmancer]

Actually, it does. Jarlaxe has one, and he is in Waterdeep: Dragonheist.

Wasn't out at the time. And I don't own that, so I had no idea

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Wasn't out at the time. And I don't own that, so I had no idea

So, sunglasses?