D&D (2024) No Dwarf, Halfling, and Orc suborgins, lineages, and legacies

[bedir than]

I've not seen TotV beyond what they released pre-kickstarter, but as a general rule I'm not a fan of the trend of combining previously separate races into one. I didn't like it when Pathfinder did it with aasimar/tiefling/nephilm, I don't like it with gnome/halfling.

They put the Smallfolk and Kobold playtest to the general public not just backers

ToV Playtest Packet #4: Smallfolk & Kobolds

All the folks at Kobold Press want to thank you from the bottom of our scaly hearts for showing us your love and faith in the Tales of the Valiant Kickstarter! ToV was born from the idea that nobody owns tabletop gaming. It truly belongs to you and everyone at your table. We can’t thank you...

koboldpress.com

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

They still break out into gnomes and halflings, essentially as subraces under "smallfolk." But you can have halflings that are crafty and work with machines, kobolds who like to tend to their crops and keep to themselves, gnomes who are servants of a greater power or pick one of the shortfolk to live in burrows.

Basically, instead of having to write up a bunch of subraces for halflings that are still pretty darn similar to one another, this puts those options, plus the kobold cultural options, in play for each.

TSR/WotC had a bad habit of pretending that having a different culture made you a different subspecies. ToV, like Level Up, gets away from that frankly kind of gross idea.

 

[bedir than]

They still break out into gnomes and halflings, essentially as subraces under "smallfolk." But you can have halflings that are crafty and work with machines, kobolds who like to tend to their crops and keep to themselves, gnomes who are servants of a greater power or pick one of the shortfolk to live in burrows.

Basically, instead of having to write up a bunch of subraces for halflings that are still pretty darn similar to one another, this puts those options, plus the kobold cultural options, in play for each.

TSR/WotC had a bad habit of pretending that having a different culture made you a different subspecies. ToV, like Level Up, gets away from that frankly kind of gross idea.

Also Ancestries and Culture does this too!

Spinning off nurture from nature seems so obvious -- it's harder due to the backwards compatibility mandate, but I don't think it's impossible

 

[Remathilis]

They still break out into gnomes and halflings, essentially as subraces under "smallfolk." But you can have halflings that are crafty and work with machines, kobolds who like to tend to their crops and keep to themselves, gnomes who are servants of a greater power or pick one of the shortfolk to live in burrows.

Basically, instead of having to write up a bunch of subraces for halflings that are still pretty darn similar to one another, this puts those options, plus the kobold cultural options, in play for each.

TSR/WotC had a bad habit of pretending that having a different culture made you a different subspecies. ToV, like Level Up, gets away from that frankly kind of gross idea.

So, I just took a look at the packet @bedir than linked me, and I can't say I'm overly impressed.

Now don't get me wrong, I'm fine with the lineage/Heritage system. The idea of a halfling with the scavenger or gnome with cottager isn't the problem.

It's that the linage itself is kinda meh. It feels like they took two species and stitched them together. It doesn't feel like a unique species, but a generic template for "short PC" Maybe the final book will spell it out better, but I fail to see what those two species have in common but "short" and perhaps "not overly popular". I mean, I could probably combine gnome and dwarf into one lineage and get the same result.

And as stated, I don't overly like the idea subraces/lineages/heritages/fnargs (God's I wished we had settled on one set of nomenclature!) to "limit" the number of playable creatures in the game. High elf and Drow should have separate stats, not be a bullet point in a generic one-size-fits-all "elf". This is doubly true for putting all planetouched in a single species, putting all goblinoids into a single species, etc. I can accept species choice point when it doesn't fundamentally change the species (your shifter trait or aasimar manifestation) for a species where presumably the subspecies differs on a visual, cultural, or biological level (elf vs drow, gnome vs halfling) make the choice more interesting than "darkvision vs poison resistance" or "what bonus spells I know".

Then again, this was always going to be the problem with separating "biological" and "cultural" traits; there aren't enough balanced biological options to make the differences meaningful without resorting weird pseudo-cultural traits like "the gods blessed them with proficiency in X" or "they have magical gift to cast Y spells".

 

[Hussar]

I know I keep getting in trouble for taking this position, but, at what point do we try something new?

No matter what has been tried, halflings and gnomes are not very popular. They just aren't. And it's not just from the player side of things. They aren't popular on the other side of the DM's screen either. Several of the 5e adventure paths had flying castles and flying ships. Yet, not a gnome to be found. The flying real estate is always "a wizard did it". ((Or a giant )) There are tons of dwarven ruins that are now dungeons. Elves are used in a number of adventures as background elements - history, culture, etc. Heck, the entire Spelljammer AP is based around elves.

But, for whatever reason, gnomes and halflings just never seem to get any love. If they are mentioned at all, it's almost as an afterthought.

Until such time as we get some real meat and potatoes adventures featuring halflings and gnomes, that really highlight them and make them interesting to the degree that the other races are, I don't think all the mechanics in the world are going to make any difference.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

I know I keep getting in trouble for taking this position, but, at what point do we try something new?

No matter what has been tried, halflings and gnomes are not very popular. They just aren't. And it's not just from the player side of things. They aren't popular on the other side of the DM's screen either. Several of the 5e adventure paths had flying castles and flying ships. Yet, not a gnome to be found. The flying real estate is always "a wizard did it". ((Or a giant )) There are tons of dwarven ruins that are now dungeons. Elves are used in a number of adventures as background elements - history, culture, etc. Heck, the entire Spelljammer AP is based around elves.

But, for whatever reason, gnomes and halflings just never seem to get any love. If they are mentioned at all, it's almost as an afterthought.

Until such time as we get some real meat and potatoes adventures featuring halflings and gnomes, that really highlight them and make them interesting to the degree that the other races are, I don't think all the mechanics in the world are going to make any difference.

What's the problem with having material in the PHB that not everyone will use? I don't think I'd want a PHB that was just humans, elves and dragonborn. I suspect not even the people who play those races almost exclusively would want that.

 

[Hussar]

What's the problem with having material in the PHB that not everyone will use? I don't think I'd want a PHB that was just humans, elves and dragonborn. I suspect not even the people who played those races almost exclusively would want that.

I get that.

But what’s the point of having things in the phb that virtually no one uses?

Even dwarves which aren’t played that much more than halflings still get used far more.

Put it this way. Name three modules that prominently feature halflings or gnomes. From any edition. They just aren’t used very much.

And until they are, no amount of tinkering is going to make them more popular. They need to be showcased the way the other races are. We need a couple of small folk centered campaigns.

 

[LuisCarlos17f]

I guess WotC realised not only halflings and gnomes but most of no-core PC species/races were too focused into a type of class or archetype, and they have tried to fix this allowing more flexibility.

I'm going to confess something to you: in my tabletop the D&D haflings and gnomes have got a special vibe, like some children cartoon from 80's, style "Maple Town Monogatari" or "the world of david the gnome", with that touch of innocence.

* Variant PC species are possible, The article "martial cultures", from Dragon Magazine #341 pag 92 showed some examples:

Gnome Barbarian: Speak with animals and other spell-like abilities replaced with "cure minor wounds, guidance, jump and resistance (self only)"

Gnome Ranger: Keep "speak with animals" but the other spell-like abilities replaced with "creater water, detect poison and purify food and drink".

* Could "lesser jumpt" to be a cartrip to be used by small humanoids to fight taller enemies?

 

[Hussar]

Thinking about it, about the only gnomish adventure location I can think of is Jzadirune from the Shackled City AP.

Now, that was a fantastic adventure. I really enjoyed it. And the gnomish traps in there were fantastic as well. The "Shaker" I think it was called - a weighted pit trap that swung from side to side after you fell in? Great idea. Loved the heck out of it. There were other bits there too although, to be fair, I played that a LONG time ago and don't remember too many of the details. But, I do believe if gnomes and halflings got more of that sort of thing, it would go a long way towards putting them into the forefront.

Think about it this way - Wave Echo Cave, the dungeon at the end of Phandelver, is home to the Forge of Spells. Now, this is called out as being a shared thing between dwarves and gnomes. Great. The whole Phandelver Pact works to really highlight things. But, there are actually no gnomes anywhere in the adventure. Even the zombies in Wave Echo are all specifically called out as dwarves. Despite the fact that this was supposed to be a gnomish as well as dwarven stronghold, gnomes don't actually appear anywhere inside.

This is the point I'm (poorly) trying to make. I do believe that part of the reason that halflings and gnomes aren't getting played that much (or at least played less than most other races? Not played as often? Sorry, not trying to pick a fight here) is because they just aren't featured very often. I mean, heck, I LIKE playing gnomes. My absolute favorite character was a gnome Binder in 3e. But, my personal preferences aren't really the issue here. It's that, for some reason, gnomes and halflings just aren't appealing to players the way other races are.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Name three modules that prominently feature halflings or gnomes

Tockworth’s Clockworks (Keys/Golden Vault), To Catch a Falling Star, Baldur’s Gate 3, Out of the Abyss. That’s four.

Name three that prominently feature Dragonborn.