RPG Evolution: The Trouble with Halflings

Over the decades I've developed my campaign world to match the archetypes my players wanted to play. In all those years, nobody's ever played a halfling.

Picture courtesy of Pixabay.​

So What's the Problem?​

Halflings, derived from hobbits, have been a curious nod to Tolkien's influence on fantasy. While dwarves and elves have deep mythological roots, hobbits are more modern inventions. And their inclusion was very much a response to the adventurous life that the agrarian homebodies considered an aberration. In short, most hobbits didn't want to be adventurers, and Bilbo, Frodo, and the others were forever changed by their experiences, such that it was difficult for them to reintegrate when they returned home. You don't hear much about elves and dwarves having difficulty returning home after being adventurers, and for good reason. Tolkien was making a point about the human condition and the nature of war by using hobbits as proxies.

As a literary construct, hobbits serve a specific purpose. In The Hobbit, they are proxies for children. In The Lord of the Rings, they are proxies for farmers and other folk who were thrust into the industrialized nightmare of mass warfare. In both cases, hobbits were a positioned in contrast to the violent lifestyle of adventurers who live and die by the sword.

Which is at least in part why they're challenging to integrate into a campaign world. And yet, we have strong hobbit archetypes in Dungeons & Dragons, thanks to Dragonlance.

Kender. Kender Are the Problem​

I did know one player who loved to play kender. We never played together in a campaign, at least in part because kender are an integral part of the Dragonlance setting and we weren't playing in Dragonlance. But he would play a kender in every game he played, including in massive multiplayers like Ultima Online. And he was eye-rollingly aggravating, as he loved "borrowing" things from everyone (a trait established by Tasselhoff Burrfoot).

Part of the issue with kender is that they aren't thieves, per se, but have a child-like curiosity that causes them to "borrow" things without understanding that borrowing said things without permission is tantamount to stealing in most cultures. In essence, it results in a character who steals but doesn't admit to stealing, which can be problematic for inter-party harmony. Worse, kender have a very broad idea of what to "borrow" (which is not limited to just valuables) and have always been positioned as being offended by accusations of thievery. It sets up a scenario where either the party is very tolerant of the kender or conflict ensues. This aspect of kender has been significantly minimized in the latest draft for Unearthed Arcana.

Big Heads, Little Bodies​

The latest incarnation of halflings brings them back to the fun-loving roots. Their appearance is decidedly not "little children" or "overweight short people." Rather, they appear more like political cartoons of eras past, where exaggerated features were used as caricatures, adding further to their comical qualities. But this doesn't solve the outstanding problem that, for a game that is often about conflict, the original prototypes for halflings avoided it. They were heroes precisely because they were thrust into difficult situations and had to rise to the challenge. That requires significant work in a campaign to encourage a player to play a halfling character who would rather just stay home.

There's also the simple matter of integrating halflings into societies where they aren't necessarily living apart. Presumably, most human campaigns have farmers; dwarves and elves occupy less civilized niches, where halflings are a working class who lives right alongside the rest of humanity in plain sight. Figuring out how to accommodate them matters a lot. Do humans just treat them like children? Would halflings want to be anywhere near a larger humanoids' dwellings as a result? Or are halflings given mythical status like fey? Or are they more like inveterate pranksters and tricksters, treating them more like gnomes? And if halflings are more like gnomes, then why have gnomes?

There are opportunities to integrate halflings into a world, but they aren't quite so easy to plop down into a setting as dwarves and elves. I still haven't quite figured out how to make them work in my campaign that doesn't feel like a one-off rather than a separate species. But I did finally find a space for gnomes, which I'll discuss in another article.

Your Turn: How have you integrated halflings into your campaign world?

 

[Gammadoodler]

The problem is like you said the package is undertuned.

Let's look at the goblin: It's traits are its favorability to darkness, anger to bigger folk, and nimbleness.

So it has Darkvision, Fury of the Small, and Nimble Escape. So whether you make a goblin fighter or goblin wizard, you can feel and play that angry little monster jumps out the darkness to backstab foes and runs away screaming if in a bad situation.

With the halfling, you can easily go a whole session without displaying your halflingness. Because the halfling package is reactive and passive but lacks the power to shine brightly.
The Dwarf's races are reactive and passive but big and constantly on display The Hill dwark has more HP. The Mountain Dwarf has a big STR boost and usually better AC. nd wih Tasha's you can even trade out redundantdwarf features for ones you want to use more.

Solution 1: Lucky gives you a luck point instead of a passive reroll.
Solution 2: Brave affect all allies within your walking speed.
Solution 3: Halfling Nimbleness lets you Disengage as a bonus action


Naaaaah.
Pf2 Ancestries rely on optional feat for power and it makes members of a race share way too little in common.

Solution 1: I like
Solution 2: I think is unnecessary
Solution 3: Is fine I think, but I like "naturally stealthy" for the lightfoots better.

I'd agree the goblin is a stronger package and I like what they did with it, but the halfling came first. The goblin and the new kobold are power crept options the halflings haven't kept up with, but I'm not sure that most of the phb races kept up with it.

As far as the dwarf stuff. I'm struggling to think of a single feature that doesn't cause drowsiness. The ASIs and darkvision are the most notable things I can come up with and that's just..sad.

As it relates to pf2e, the heritages provide the baselines for what all members of the subtype have in common, and the feats provide great ways to choose how you become a dwarfier dwarf as time goes on. I'd say there are definitely too many feats to choose from, but I like the baked in diversity within the families. Seems like our mileage have varied.

 

[Gammadoodler]

There was a 3k post last year about errata-ing halflings out of the Players Handbook.

Basically - some insisted that halflings get errata'ed out of the Players Handbook - so you would basically have to buy a splat book to play them - I forget the details.

There might have been a few. I believe the range of opinions went from what you describe to "Halflings shouldn't be a 'core four' race (whatever that means)", to "Hallings are cool and don't have to just be Hobbits", to "I love Hobbit halflings, they're my favorite thing".

In between, there was literary criticism, propositional mythology, "realistic" fantasy wargaming, probably some war crime about putting pineapples on pizza, etc.

We're starting to work through some of the beats. Folks might be able to just start re-linking some old posts...Efficiency ftw

 

[Minigiant]

Solution 1: I like
Solution 2: I think is unnecessary
Solution 3: Is fine I think, but I like "naturally stealthy" for the lightfoots better.

I'd agree the goblin is a stronger package and I like what they did with it, but the halfling came first. The goblin and the new kobold are power crept options the halflings haven't kept up with, but I'm not sure that most of the phb races kept up with it.

As far as the dwarf stuff. I'm struggling to think of a single feature that doesn't cause drowsiness. The ASIs and darkvision are the most notable things I can come up with and that's just..sad.

As it relates to pf2e, the heritages provide the baselines for what all members of the subtype have in common, and the feats provide great ways to choose how you become a dwarfier dwarf as time goes on. I'd say there are definitely too many feats to choose from, but I like the baked in diversity within the families. Seems like our mileage have varied.

But even the old goblin and kobold had more flavor and power than the halfling.

I think the halfling and to a lesser extent dwarf and elf suffered for 5e's early push to bring in 2e and 1e fans. So they were designed with boring weak passive racials.

Dragonborn, Tiefling, and the exotic races were designed and redesigned for the late 3.5, 4e, and new fans who liked fantastical, dynamic, and major racials.

Like the Hallfing's Second Chance ability from 4e was left off the base race and readded in XGTE as a feat. Same with Bountiful Luck. So it seems that WOTC sees the halfling as a little sneaky walking lucky charm but downplayed it to cater to old school fans.

 

[Gammadoodler]

But even the old goblin and kobold had more flavor and power than the halfling.

I think the halfling and to a lesser extent dwarf and elf suffered for 5e's early push to bring in 2e and 1e fans. So they were designed with boring weak passive racials.

Dragonborn, Tiefling, and the exotic races were designed and redesigned for the late 3.5, 4e, and new fans who liked fantastical, dynamic, and major racials.

Like the Hallfing's Second Chance ability from 4e was left off the base race and readded in XGTE as a feat. Same with Bountiful Luck. So it seems that WOTC sees the halfling as a little sneaky walking lucky charm but downplayed it to cater to old school fans.

More mechanical power, probably (though original kobold had sunlight sensitivity, so I'm inclined to call that one a wash). More mechanical flavor, agree to disagree.

From my perspective, halflings could use a little bit more/better mechanical support and maybe a lore entry that doesn't seem like an act of editorial malpractice, and it'd be good to go.

I mostly think they're fine, but could use some pretty minor investment to get them into a significantly better place (for me). As we've seen already though, there are plenty of folks who think they are great just the way they are.

 

[Chaosmancer]

But not everyone has advantage on saving throws vs. fear effects.

But that's mechanics, not story. My ranger may be pissing down his leg from fear effects, but he is still standing and shooting at that dragon. Are you going to try and claim that feeling and being affected by fear makes you not brave? Or do we still hold that doing something despite fear is bravery?

I won't deny advantage on saving throws is mechanically good. But story-wise, everyone who decides to go and fight the darkness for the good of those who can't is brave.

Some of them at least can hide when obscured only by a medium or larger creature. That’s unique, I think.

Some of them can hide in a crowd. But they can't hide any better in any other circumstance. And again, a halfing Paladin isn't sneakier than a Bugbear rogue, or a dragonborn rogue, or an elven rogue, or a human rogue. Because "I am a rogue" is more important to being sneaky than "I am a halfling" So how is it a defining part of their racial character if it is something determined by class?

Or enforced by a feature like the ability to reroll ones on attacks, saves, and ability checks.

Can you re-roll a 2? A 3? What if you re-roll that one and still fail?

Yes, again, it is a good mechanic. However, it doesn't really fit into the story easily. The halfling isn't any luckier than an orc fighter who rolls a 1 on their save and uses indomitable. Unless the DM forces it into the story, which is incredibly awkward to do, by determining randomly which events are "halfling luck" and which are just.... normal luck.

 

[Chaosmancer]

Guess I should have scrolled down and seen this was two responses

So it probably helps to look at how the mechanics of their features actually work.

"Bravery", mechanically, means that halflings are less likely to become debilitated by fear. It's not just that they are willing to do dangerous things, it's they do they physiologically/psychologically experience fear differently than other creatures.

Yes, this is the mechanic. However, "experiencing fear differently" isn't "bravery" and like I said, my ranger may be "debilitated" by fear, but he is still fighting. And fighting despite fear is bravery. Must PCs are "brave" because they go out and face murderous monsters the size of houses on the regular.

"Naturally Stealthy" (Lightfoot only), mechanically means they can hide around larger creatures. Put a stealthy lightfoot halfling and any other stealthy in a room full of boxes, and, sure, they are equivalent; put them in a crowded bar, and it's a difference of night and day. They just know how to avoid people's eyeballs.

And put them in the forest with a wood elf, and the wood elf is stealthier.

And again, if I build a cleric or paladin halfing and have them try and hide in a crowded bar, while a half-orc rogue tries to hide in the same bar... Rogue is more likely to succeed.

And as you note, this is only a specific sub-race of halflings. So it can't even be used to describe all halflings if I concede the point, just a single sub-race out of six. So, 5/6 halflings are not particularly stealthy at all.

"Halfling Luck", mechanically, means that they are less likely to encounter guaranteed or worst-case failures. They just have way fewer terrible no-good really bad days than other races. I'd agree that it's a weak characterization of being lucky since it's passive and only comes up maybe 5% of the time, but it is, at least, distinct in what it does. I wish it was a little stronger or had more of an active application, but it isn't bad.

But again, mechanics aren't the story. Unless the DM is pushing the narrative by having unusual and "lucky" things happen to the halfling on the regular, they aren't any luckier than any other PC. Heck, they are less lucky than a human who takes the Lucky feat.

I've seen halflings in game, and seen this ability only come up once... and they failed the check anyways. It just doesn't provide a strong narrative to hang the race off of.

 

[Maxperson]

D'oh! Bad memory. Still, there's nothing stopping a 20 strength pixie.

That's why I raised the stat cap to reflect racial bonuses. You may have a 20 strength pixie, but no pixie can physically match the 22 strength goliaths.

 

[Dragonhelm]

They're fearless, but they lie immediately to get out of trouble.

Is it a lie if they honestly believe it? Dictionary.com defines "lie" as "a false statement made with deliberate intent to deceive; an intentional untruth. "

Key word there is "deliberate."

Kender will often say something like "You must have dropped it" or "I was afraid someone else would take it."

Per Dragonlance Adventures...

"All of these lines are delivered with an innocent sincerity that is all the more maddening because the kender really is sincere! A kender might not necessarily remember where he found something, even if he picked it up half a minute before, and such responses are often delivered as part of a subconscious defense mechanism. Intense curiosity is a trait ingrained in their souls and minds from their racial creation by the Greystone of Gargath."

As there is no deliberate telling of an untruth, no lie present.

They have no sense of personal property, but they don't give things away; they only take things. They should be as willing to give things to other people as they are to take them.

Kender can give items away just as easily as a human.

They're as intelligent as a human, but can't seem to understand that other races have different thoughts about concepts such as personal property. They should be able and willing to not take everything that they come across.

Let's look to history for this one. The colonizers of the Americas and the Native Americans had different understandings of owning land. The Europeans have an understanding as we do now. The indigenous peoples thought that land belonged to everybody. (And I may be misremembering this some.)

Point is, two peoples who are as intelligent as each other, yet who have different views on the concept of land ownership.

As far as I can tell, they never had a penalty to either Intelligence or Wisdom to explain this lack of self-control. Additionally, since they have normal levels of Intelligence and Wisdom, they shouldn't believe their lies.

In the Dragonlance Campaign Setting and Races of Ansalon sourcebooks for 3.5, kender had a -2 to Wisdom.

They're totally innocent, but somehow are able to string together insults to make even the most hardened of souls angry. In reality, an "innocent" kender's taunts should be as insulting as a toddlers. But they're (magically?) infuriating.

No magic about it, contrary to the first Heroes of Krynn article for Unearthed Arcana.

 

[LuisCarlos17f]

I feel we are talking as if we couldn't agree about how to cook certain recipe.

Maybe halflings can have the same genotype and showing different phenotypes. Then we could to have two halflings with the same stats, game mechanical and racial traits, but a different look, one of them as a hobbit clone, and the other as a kender clone.

Somebody could publish in the next year a new webcomic about halflings surviving a zombie apocalypse as a mixture of epic fantasy and parody of D&D stereotypes and zombies movies, and then halflings would become more popular. Or a webcomic as parody is magical girls and isekai when a human woman in the new world becomes a female halfling (or reincarnated because druid's spell was cheaper than the true resurection).

There was a canon evil version of the halflings, the jerren, from 3rd Book of Vile Darkness, and they were very "grimm", they could be like the no-contagious version of the "Crossed" gore horror comic.

How could we create a variant subrace replacing any racial traits to become better spellcaster than the classical stealthy hero?

* Maybe in a future WotC desings magitek "exosuits" or "powered armors" as contruct monster mounts, and later to sell toys of transfomers D&D monsters.

 

[Gammadoodler]

Guess I should have scrolled down and seen this was two responses



Yes, this is the mechanic. However, "experiencing fear differently" isn't "bravery" and like I said, my ranger may be "debilitated" by fear, but he is still fighting. And fighting despite fear is bravery. Must PCs are "brave" because they go out and face murderous monsters the size of houses on the regular.



And put them in the forest with a wood elf, and the wood elf is stealthier.

And again, if I build a cleric or paladin halfing and have them try and hide in a crowded bar, while a half-orc rogue tries to hide in the same bar... Rogue is more likely to succeed.

And as you note, this is only a specific sub-race of halflings. So it can't even be used to describe all halflings if I concede the point, just a single sub-race out of six. So, 5/6 halflings are not particularly stealthy at all.



But again, mechanics aren't the story. Unless the DM is pushing the narrative by having unusual and "lucky" things happen to the halfling on the regular, they aren't any luckier than any other PC. Heck, they are less lucky than a human who takes the Lucky feat.

I've seen halflings in game, and seen this ability only come up once... and they failed the check anyways. It just doesn't provide a strong narrative to hang the race off of.

Your ranger who is still fighting despite being frightened is rolling with disadvantage, and cannot move closer to the source of their fear. They are debilitated while the halfling is not (or at least are more likely to be debilitated holding all other things equal). Sure they are brave, but not the way that halflings are brave.

Would changing the feature name to "unshakeable" or something ease the semantic angst related to this ability? Because, unless I'm missing something, the whole issue seems to revolve around the definition of "bravery" rather than anything related to the effect of the ability.

Yes, a wood elf has a similar feature to improve stealth in the woods. And that wood elf gets less use out of that feature when they are a paladin or cleric too. It does not make the wood elf feature any less definitive for a wood elf. And, yes it is one subrace. IIRC, from what little and godawful lore there is, it is the predominant one, so probably(?) not 5/6 but who knows really. In either case, the other subraces have other things they can do with varying effectiveness.

The lucky thing is a fine narrative with a weak mechanic. Improving the mechanic to support the narrative is an easy fix, and I'd like it I'd there was one. But such a fix should require no adjustment to the narrative.