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

[Chaosmancer]

What do you think “we can assume” means? Because what it doesn’t mean is anything like the same thing as “we can posit” or “we can imagine” or “we can extrapolate”.

Yes it does? Making an assumption is the same as positing or extrapolating an answer.

 

[Chaosmancer]

Well, no. At most I could see saying they should be common, which they are. There is no reason they need to figure prominently in Realms Shaking Events.

Let us say that the DnD world is divided so that 20% are human, 20% are some type of elf, 20% are some type of dwarf, 20% are halflings and 20% for the miscellany.

A rough model, but one that shows that these four races are "common"

Humans play a major role in just about every single adventure
Elves play a major role in multiple adventures
Dwarves play a major role in a few adventures
Halflings have never played a major role in an adventure.

And this is odd to a lot of us. Heck, expand past 5e for a moment. We can likely list off major adventures and events in DnD history that have involved Humans, Elves and Dwarves for multiple days. I struggle to even imagine one that heavily involved halflings. They are "very common" and yet they are never involved. Not rarely involved, not often not involved. Never.

No major force attacks them. No lost lore or lost magic ever affects them. They never live too close to something dangerous. It is bizarre.

 

[Chaosmancer]

Dragoborn and Lizardfolk: why are dragonborn so cool and lizardfolk so lame? Why include lizardfolk (boring, bland, indistinguishable from dragonborn except for how lame they are) when you’ve already got dragonborn (objectively rad, lizardfolk dialed up to 11, better than lizardfolk in every way)? I demand answers from all the lizardfolk apologists out there! Discuss!

Also dragonborn don’t have lips! That’s factually unpossible!

Lizardfolk are not indistinguishable from Dragonborn. They are a primarily swamp dwelling race and adapted to being highly amphibious. They are also highly skilled crafters. Put a lizardfolk adult on a desert island and withing a day they are likely wearing armor and wielding a weapon.

While I hate their origin myth, their one patron deity being hermaphroditic and focused solely on survival while the other one literally becoming the race is an interesting bit of lore to explore. Lizardfolk lore also deeply involves a conflict between the deity and a demon lord.

Meanwhile, the Dragonborn have the potential issue of being split between two gods, Tiamat and Bahamut, which can cause some interesting conflicts, though it isn't explored. Their breath weapon and much more martial set up makes them seem like a more Roman style of culture.

So, actually, if it wasn't for the inherent value of dragon lore being tied to the dragonborn, the Lizardfolk would be a far superior option based off lore.

 

[Chaosmancer]

You are the one cherry picking. It's easy to cherry pick adventures with elves in, and it's easy to cherry pick adventures without elves in. Because some adventures have elves and some don't. Some adventures have halflings, and some don't.

But it is still completely irrelevant. If there is a PC of that race then that race has an important role in adventure, irrespective of what NPCs are standing around town with exclamation marks over there heads. Because PCs are always important.

You keep missing the point.

IT is easy to cherrypick adventures with elves? That's because Elves appear in major roles in some adventures.

Go ahead and cherrypick an adventure that features Halflings as prominently as Drow Elves are featured in Lost Mines, Out of the Abyss and Dragon Heist.

That's the point. Not that "this one adventure doesn't feature them" but that over ALL adventures they don't really appear in any meaningful way.

 

[Chaosmancer]

Do you believe that there are people out there who look at D&D, see that there's one race not specifically geared to generate endless weirdo PCs, and going 'no thanks' even when the kind of people who will perpetuate 100 page threads shouting at people about how they don't like halflings didn't.

Do I think that halflings are the doom of DnD and will lead to a plague of destruction yadda yadda yadda

Obviously not. They've existed in this state for nearly five decades.

Can we not look at them and say "huh, these aren't really working as well as some of the other major races. Maybe they could be rewritten to fit in better?" I mean, despite all the hatred thrown our way, the most extreme thing seriously put forth is rewriting them to integrate them better into the game and exploring things that would make them unique. I don't think pushing to have a halfling village set-up to take advantage of their lack of worry and agility with high-wire pathways and their smaller size letting them domesticate and use animals differently is really going to make them suddenly grimdark edgelords with a taste for human flesh, but it would make them more unique. It would make them suddenly occupying things that are uniquely for halflings.

 

[Mind of tempest]

There is no reason why a pure minmaxer would select a halfling ahead of an elf.

luck and dex are rogues greatest loves.

All I mean is that you are unsatisfied with the current number. I'd expect there to be a number you would be satisfied with whatever the underlying motivation.

If there isn't a number you'd be satisfied with, then this particular course of argument is pointless.

not just number presence that does not feel utterly replaceable with any other race, if saltmarshes hill had orc or Dragonborn villages would it change anything? not really, I desire proper setting place if they are to be considered common and lore that is not hobbits with the serial numbers filed off, the elves and dwarves at least had a new coat of paint and some minor back story stuff I want mood and character which not utterly identical to happy human presents as the is hell to include in a setting.
how hates them who backs them what thing beyond the immediate do they care about?

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Yes it does? Making an assumption is the same as positing or extrapolating an answer.

No, it doesn’t.

Let us say that the DnD world is divided so that 20% are human, 20% are some type of elf, 20% are some type of dwarf, 20% are halflings and 20% for the miscellany.

A rough model, but one that shows that these four races are "common"

Humans play a major role in just about every single adventure
Elves play a major role in multiple adventures
Dwarves play a major role in a few adventures
Halflings have never played a major role in an adventure.

And this is odd to a lot of us. Heck, expand past 5e for a moment. We can likely list off major adventures and events in DnD history that have involved Humans, Elves and Dwarves for multiple days. I struggle to even imagine one that heavily involved halflings. They are "very common" and yet they are never involved. Not rarely involved, not often not involved. Never.

No major force attacks them. No lost lore or lost magic ever affects them. They never live too close to something dangerous. It is bizarre.

It isn’t bizarre at all. A people that try to avoid such things, in a world of peoples that seek them out, will probably avoid them.

 

[ccs]

luck and dex are rogues greatest loves.

not just number presence that does not feel utterly replaceable with any other race, if saltmarshes hill had orc or Dragonborn villages would it change anything? not really, I desire proper setting place if they are to be considered common and lore that is not hobbits with the serial numbers filed off, the elves and dwarves at least had a new coat of paint and some minor back story stuff I want mood and character which not utterly identical to happy human presents as the is hell to include in a setting.
how hates them who backs them what thing beyond the immediate do they care about?

Man, you know what would be great? Some sort of game where an imaginative bunch of players could create worlds & fill them in with as much detail as they please..... If only such a thing existed. It'd probably make alot of $ too.

Oh, wait. IT DOES. It's called D&D!
It's just that some of those playing lack the creative spark and insist that others think & create for them. And then when they don't like what's been done/not done with a particular tool (like 1/2lings for ex) they pitch a fit & even argue that tool should be removed.

The problem isn't that TSR/WoTC/Paizo/etc hasn't filled reams of pages with interesting halfling lore. It's that you & yours haven't done so in the most important game of them all - yours'.

And if you insist upon only playing published adventures & don't like how many NPCs are described as being 1/2lings/elves/etc? Change the descriptions to suite the %s you like.

 

[ccs]

They never live too close to something dangerous. It is bizarre.

But.... Living too near such things would interfere with enjoying their creature comforts.

 

[lingual]

I still don't get it but perhaps I am of below average intelligence. If you don't like halflings remove them, don't play one, or change them until you do like them.

"Like" is a pretty subjective term in my opinion. I believe it is hard to prove how much ppl "like" halflings. The only objective stat we have is the number of halflings players on DnDBeyond. And 5.9 percent definitely seems like a pretty good number to me. Are 5.9 percent of players are objectively "wrong"?

If you have ideas on how to improve lore, please share them! Or ideas on how to increase the 5.9 percent...

If you are just arguing that a race doesn't belong in the PHB (which I can only assume which means you want them removed)...then that is something else. Most tables don't buy all the books, etc. A lot of ppl don't want to wait for a splat book to be able to play halflings. Well at least 5.9 percent of the ppl - which imo is a lot of ppl.

Trying to argue that someone is wrong with thinking halflings are fine is going to be fruitless. Sharing cool ideas on how you think they can be improved is something else entirely. I'm not sure which of the two is being proposed here