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?

 

[doctorbadwolf]

The best reference to Goliath lore is still 3.5's Races of Stone, which has a great deal.

You can also find some here: Goliaths

Very true, and it’s a much better writeup than 5e’s, IMO.

Still, in our games we flip the whole “leave the injured to die” nonsense to a fiercely communal culture wherein hoarding is theft and theft is one of the worst crimes you can commit, and those who can contribute meaningfully on the move are taken by a couple hunters down to dwarven holds or human settlements or whatever.

In one setting there are a handful of clans that do things the canon way, and they tend to have shorter more brutal lives than the other clans as a result, and are often viewed as dangerous fools by most other Goliaths.

 

[Mind of tempest]

If they only lore you'll accept as lore is for a race that's had a dedicated book you'll never accept a new race as having enough lore.

The only lore that matters is what impacts gameplay.

Cosmology doesn't matter at a vast majority of tables because they are either homebrew or never travel the planes.

it helps with placing them or do you think the copy-paste nature of a lot of non human or monstrus races was odd?

The best reference to Goliath lore is still 3.5's Races of Stone, which has a great deal.

You can also find some here: Goliaths

thank you it is better than nothing origin still needs work and someone to explain how they relate to giants.

 

[bedir than]

it helps with placing them or do you think the copy-paste nature of a lot of non human or monstrus races was odd?

I have never noticed this at the table while playing the game.
My players interact with the creatures and peoples through play. When they meet a family of goliaths in a rough land the characters learn a bit about that land and the habits of that family. When they meet a goliath coffee roaster with two axebeaks that draw a cart, they interact with that character, who worships the god of rivers, mountains and life in my world.

What does it matter what planar beings they are connected to?

This is similar to the complaints about halflings. What they are as a peoples doesn't necessarily mean that's what they are as individuals. The most common complaint, so often thrown here, is "why would they ever adventure?" Because that's what that one person does!

It matters not that most are agrarian homebodies. Because my halfling, Kellamon Sqoques joined his friends on a journey. I'm telling his story, not the story of an ur-Halfling.

 

[Mind of tempest]

I have never noticed this at the table while playing the game.
My players interact with the creatures and peoples through play. When they meet a family of goliaths in a rough land the characters learn a bit about that land and the habits of that family. When they meet a goliath coffee roaster with two axebeaks that draw a cart, they interact with that character, who worships the god of rivers, mountains and life in my world.

What does it matter what planar beings they are connected to?

This is similar to the complaints about halflings. What they are as a peoples doesn't necessarily mean that's what they are as individuals. The most common complaint, so often thrown here, is "why would they ever adventure?" Because that's what that one person does!

It matters not that most are agrarian homebodies. Because my halfling, Kellamon Sqoques joined his friends on a journey. I'm telling his story, not the story of an ur-Halfling.

there is a difference between knowing individuals and knowing cosmic stuff, just because you do not care for or feel you need it does not mean I should not.

 

[Faolyn]

I don't think it would be a bad idea to remove halflings from the PHB. Not because I don't like them, I do. But it might stop people whining about them and wanting to change them if they weren't in the core rules, and therefore obvious they don't have to have them.

A problem that I see with that is that it's highly unlikely that D&D is going to have a brand new "default" setting for 6e. They'll almost certainly stick with the Realms, maybe with Greyhawk. Even if the settings aren't "officially" default like the Realms isn't the "official" setting of 5e, there's a chance that 6e will stick with the 5e trend of setting non-world books in those settings ("Volo's Guide to..." "Mordenkainen's Tome of..."). And halflings have a role in those settings, whether people like it or not; they weren't just added on. Which means that halflings will still be seen as "default," only players won't have the luxury of having their stats conveniently placed in the PHB. And that also means that every setting book published would have to have halfling stats reprinted over and over again because there's no guarantee that a player will have bought every single book put out for that setting.

Removing halflings from the PHB may actually have the effect of making them show up more often. At least now, people can ignore them.

 

[bedir than]

there is a difference between knowing individuals and knowing cosmic stuff, just because you do not care for or feel you need it does not mean I should not.

I'm not saying you should not care about it.

I'm saying that having a minimal amount of lore requirement that includes cosmology, a unique pantheon, and racial specific cultural traits means that there are only like 6 six acceptable races now.

 

[James Gasik]

it helps with placing them or do you think the copy-paste nature of a lot of non human or monstrus races was odd?

thank you it is better than nothing origin still needs work and someone to explain how they relate to giants.

Honestly, they aren't. Or at least, they weren't, when they were first created. They live in similar areas, and they have a legend of some members of their people being enslaved by Frost Giants, but the only connection is that Gol-kaa, their language, uses the same alphabet as Giantish.

The only real link between Goliaths and Giants noted in Races of Stone is the Feral Gargun, a half-breed creature that is descended from Goliaths and Giants (presumably giant-kin like Fomorians, Ogres, or Trolls), who are more bestial and savage.

 

[Faolyn]

I'm not saying you should not care about it.

I'm saying that having a minimal amount of lore requirement that includes cosmology, a unique pantheon, and racial specific cultural traits means that there are only like 6 six acceptable races now.

I don't think a cosmology/pantheon is necessary. That's world lore, not race lore.

IMO, each race should be given several cultures. Generic ones, at the least, to indicate how the race works and to give players ideas. For halflings, it could be (very generic examples): "shire farmers" who live in small villages and help to feed the big cities; "nomadic traders" who travel everywhere and know everyone, at least a little, and who are a font of knowledge about far-off places; and "street rats" who live in the cities of humans, often in "Halfling-towns," and often while engaging in less-than-legal, or outright illegal, activities.

 

[Maxperson]

So, you can quote me some rule that says you can't ignore your fear and attack anyways? Sure, you'll have disadvantage because of the physiological signs of fear, but no real-life person can ignore those either. You can't just be startled by something and decide "Nah, I'm not going to have a fight or flight response to this, brain, no adrenaline please." So, I don't see a meaningful difference.

You can't ignore the fear. The rules are both the frightened condition, which does not let you ignore it and the cause of the condition, which only lets you ignore it if you make the save. You can attack anyway, but again it's akin to the guy in the horror flick shooting over the top of the thing he's hiding behind and hoping he's going to hit. Firing a bow at the thing you are terrified of and hoping you get a lucky shot isn't brave. Brave is turning and moving towards it despite the feat and attacking anyway. You get to see that in horror movies when the frightened hero turns and faces the fear, attacking forward despite being afraid.

Here's an interesting question as well, let's say something like a Banshee floats through the wall parallel to the parties path, with their horrifying visage, and floats out of sight into the wall on the others side. Like a spooky ghost cat crossing their path. The character is frightened. Do they have disadvantage on anything? No, because the Banshee isn't in line of sight. Can the character move deeper into the structure? I'd say yes, because while they cannot move closer to the source of their fear, their fear is off to the left, and the path goes forward. They aren't moving closer to the creature, so they can continue just fine. At this point, they are frightened... but ignoring it and moving on.

Two things. First, they have no disadvantage because they aren't really frightened anymore, even though the condition is still on them. They are only suffering the effects of the condition(being scared) while they can see the source of their terror. So no, they aren't ignoring it, because if said banshee spent 60 feet of movement moving 5 feet through a wall back and forth, they would be scared every time the bashee came back into sight. Same if the banshee comes back 2 rounds later and they haven't successfully made a save yet.

It can only count as ignoring the fear if you can ignore it(and you can't) while the thing causing the fear is in sight.

So, I think you seem to be confused. Because Phobias, extreme fears that are the most prominent exampe similar to the frightened condition, can't just be ignored. A person cannot just decide to ignore their phobia. Just go watch a Dr. Phil episode where he terrorizes some poor person with a phobia under the guise of "helping" them. These sort of physiological responses can't be ignored. But, if the source of the fear isn't in sight, then the player can also just ignore the effects of the condition. Therefore... this seems to map pretty well to real-life situations that I am using.

As someone who has arachnaphobia, acrophobia and claustrophobia and , I can tell you that they can be controlled(within reason).

I have had times when startled by a spider and jumped halfway across the room. Once I have distance, though, I know the capabilities of spiders and can walk up to them and get close. If I absolutely had to, I could touch one. The whole time, though, I have the willies and still occasionally shudder involuntarily. Same with heights. I can use a ladder to climb onto the roof when. When climb back down onto the ladder, it's more risky and I generally have to pause and steel myself, then move more slowly than is necessary to get back onto the ladder.

This is something we could have discussed ages ago if I didn't have to keep repeating my argument til people understood it.

That's a real shame. This line of discussion is so much better than the other.

Personally, I'd remove this idea of it being bravery, because like I've said, this harms the narrative of the game. Instead I'd call it something like "unshakeable" and say they cannot have disadvantage on attacks or skills due to the frightened condition. It isn't full immunity, because the movement restriction is still in place, but it removes the biggest teeth from the frightened condition.

That's a good start, but I don't think the mechanic matches up entirely with the name. Someone who is unshakeable is also going to be able to advance on something causing the frightened condition. I'd actually rather see a limited immunity, like the 3x day auto save vs. frightened, or if that's too much, ignoring the requirement to not be able to move towards the source of fear and keep the disadvantage. Or drop disadvantage and impose a flat -2.

Where do warlocks come from? Why is it Paladin's can heal with a touch of their hand? Why does a Medusa's gaze turn you to stone? Why can Minotaurs always navigate a labyrinth? Why do hydra's grow new heads unless they are burned by fire? Why do Genie's offer wishes? Why does bardic magic work by playing an instrument?

I find it so disingenuous to continually get told that stories from literature don't matter in DnD, that the only thing that matters are the mechanics. You don't really believe that. You can't believe that and be able to truthfully answer the above questions. Heck, halflings only exist because of a novel.

So, no, I think it does matter to pull up DnD literature, and point to what it says halfling luck is like, then point to the game and say "this is nothing like that" and discuss how this is a potential problem. Because the narrative does matter. That's why you will never find a demon immune to radiant damage, because it would break the narrative of what those things mean, even though mechanically, radiant damage is no different from lightning damage.

I'm not arguing that inspiration isn't drawn in both directions. The D&D movie, TV shows, and comics all draw inspiration from D&D. D&D in turn draws inspiration from myths, fantasy books, movies, etc. Drawing such inspiration, though, doesn't make one into the other.

No matter how much inspiration was drawn by that comic to add in a dragon and halfling luck, the healthy dragon dying from a falling rock isn't something that is in D&D the game. It was a simple power of plot device for the comic book medium and has no bearing whatsoever on how a DM should run halfling luck in D&D.

He doesn't care for the stories halflings can tell. He prefers changelings and elves and he even played an old human paladin once. Calling him short-sighted because he is preferencing the stories he wants over the mechanics seems a bit rude to me.

Fair enough. He should probably still take the lucky feat, which matches changelings, elves and even an old human paladin.

 

[Maxperson]

Sure, but I know you specifically don't play 5e, so your homebrew rules for fear (because that isn't how 5e handles frightened) don't really change anything.

Additionally, I still stand by my original point on this, saving against the frightened condition =/= bravery. And so having a race that is "the brave one" is sort of like looking at a line-up of guys who are all 6'2" to 6"5' and looking for "the tall one". Even if you find one who is a little taller than the rest.... they are all tall It is a pointless description.

Again, it's not "brave" it's "braver." That applies to height. If you have a race that averages 7 feet tall and no other race gets taller than an average of 6'2", then that race is taller than other races, even though there are other races that are tall. Halflings as a race are braver than any other race out there.