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?

 

[Lanefan]

I think I like the Kithkin name better than Halfling. In any case, it sounds like they were originally supposed to be Hobbit-esque, so feels like they should definitely count.

View attachment 265128View attachment 265129
Quote from: Kithkin




For those wanting to see the MtG Gnomes...

t:gnome is:paperart

19 Magic cards found where the card types include “gnome” and the cards have art that has been printed in paper

scryfall.com

Looks like the MtG type includes both D&D Gnomes and Autognomes (all but one of them being the later, until the FR sets).

Huh.

I must have looked at that Amrou Kithkin card a thousand times or more and yet never once made the Hobbit connection.

Learn something every day.

 

[Chaosmancer]

If the bolded is true, the obvious questions to ask are twofold:

1. How did we get to this sad state of affairs?
2. What must be done to reverse course, to get halflings back to their core-four status?

1) They were under-utilized and forced to remain as Tolkien envisioned them. Hidden people that few knew about and no one paid attention to. When you do that for decades, you tend to make them unimportant.

2) Well, there are a few steps that can be taken. Making them more tied to the goings on of the settings, like elves, dwarves and humans would be a nice start. Changing some of their abilities to be more active. Doing more with their homes than "its a small farm". I mean I'm sure we could start a fifth thread asking for ideas, but I think the previous ones covered most of the ground.

 

[Chaosmancer]

Better for WotC, perhaps. I'm really more concerned about what's better for me, and other people who play the game and want a way to make a mixed-heritage character that isn't purely cosmetic.

Well, you can tell them that you don't want any new classes, adventurers, monsters or really any content at all for the next year or two while they write thousands of racial chunks for your mixed-heritage character.

However, I think people who play the game are better off with the plan of them making other content, and then if people really really really want to have mechanically mixed races, they can do it themselves or buy it from a 3pp.

 

[Chaosmancer]

My world, for one.

Say "Avatar" to me and I naturally assume you're talking about the James Cameron movie.

I don't even know what Avatar the Last Air Bender is, though I've heard the name a few times.

Sorry, "I haven't heard of it" is really not a strong argument. Many people haven't heard of the Rig Veda, that doesn't mean it isn't a huge deal to hundreds of millions.

Outnumbered, yes. Outshone? Not so much, though there have been some truly valiant and worthy attempts over the years.

Rose-tinted glasses are a powerful force indeed.

 

[Cadence]

Huh.

I must have looked at that Amrou Kithkin card a thousand times or more and yet never once made the Hobbit connection.

Learn something every day.

Apparently there is a post somewhere that the feet our furry (although it's hard to see).
Some of the others look very Halfling and the ones from Shadowmoor look creepy (t:kithkin) .

 

[Chaosmancer]

You may be right, but it doesn't matter. I mean halflings, gnomes and other small-sized lineages can be promoted if Hasbro thinks they are perfect to sell toys and merchandising of cute little magical girls.

It does matter to a degree. Because if we are going to say that halflings and gnomes are indistinguishable, there becomes less and less reason to keep halflings as opposed to gnomes.

Yeaaaa.....

For anyone not aware, Puella Magi Madoka Magica is NOT a cute show about cute magical girls. This thing is a dystopian horror about futility, obsession, and the pointless struggle against despair. It is DARK the more you dig into. It was created as a subversion of the magical girl genre.

Though some people hold out hope that the newest movie might give a happy ending instead of continuing the downward spiral.

 

[Chaosmancer]

Seriously, do you just have fun making these things up?

No, I don't have fun responding to people's ideas and assertions, only to get gaslit and told I'm insane and making things up. It is vastly frustrating.

Because I never said removing halflings would "fundamentally alter DnD". I think they are one of many creatures and tropes that are part of the D&D genre. Your posts about them not being in other representations of fantasy are not relevant. Beholders are pretty unheard of outside of D&D outside of an homage in Big Trouble in Little China but we're not getting rid of those either.

The fact that you seem unable to tell the difference between the usage of Beholders in the game and the usage of halflings in the game really confusing to me. Beholders do things. Beholders have multiple additional versions of themselves. Beholders have an entire section devoted to them in the Spelljammer book, and they have been used as iconagraphy for the DnD brand.

When was the last time a stylized halfling was put on the cover of a DnD brand product or used to promote a live stream?

And again, if your only argument is "halflings exist in DnD, so we shouldn't remove them because they exist" then you are arguing to keep EVERYTHING in DnD, and that is a bad argument because there is a lot of crap in DnD we don't need to keep.

There is no "fantasy standards committee" that decides what races are allowed or not. It's all make believe fiction, stuff authors have pulled from lore (i.e. little people) and their imagination. If that fiction was written for a rulebook, fiction based on the game or just stories at the game table its all just stories we tell ourselves about impossible worlds. Halflings are part of those stories for D&D and will continue to be a part.

Actually, there is a committee that decides what is and isn't allowed to be part of DnD, they are called "Wizards of the Coast".

But sure, much like the dreaded Duck Bunny, the famous Spider Horse and the terrifying Blindheim halflings are a thing that exists and were made up for a fantasy world. However, just because they were made up for a story, doesn't mean we need to keep them.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Well, you can tell them that you don't want any new classes, adventurers, monsters or really any content at all for the next year or two while they write thousands of racial chunks for your mixed-heritage character.

However, I think people who play the game are better off with the plan of them making other content, and then if people really really really want to have mechanically mixed races, they can do it themselves or buy it from a 3pp.

I think people are better off you using Level Up's origin system, but that's just my opinion, which miraculously holds just as much weight as yours.

 

[Micah Sweet]

No, I don't have fun responding to people's ideas and assertions, only to get gaslit and told I'm insane and making things up. It is vastly frustrating.



The fact that you seem unable to tell the difference between the usage of Beholders in the game and the usage of halflings in the game really confusing to me. Beholders do things. Beholders have multiple additional versions of themselves. Beholders have an entire section devoted to them in the Spelljammer book, and they have been used as iconagraphy for the DnD brand.

When was the last time a stylized halfling was put on the cover of a DnD brand product or used to promote a live stream?

And again, if your only argument is "halflings exist in DnD, so we shouldn't remove them because they exist" then you are arguing to keep EVERYTHING in DnD, and that is a bad argument because there is a lot of crap in DnD we don't need to keep.



Actually, there is a committee that decides what is and isn't allowed to be part of DnD, they are called "Wizards of the Coast".

But sure, much like the dreaded Duck Bunny, the famous Spider Horse and the terrifying Blindheim halflings are a thing that exists and were made up for a fantasy world. However, just because they were made up for a story, doesn't mean we need to keep them.

I think we should keep everything in D&D, so people can pick and choose what they want for their game. "Crap we don't need" is exceedingly subjective and personal, not the objective truth you are intimating.

 

[Chaosmancer]

each episode is about an hour long. each week they get about a billion minutes.

While you continue to insist that Tolkien isn't that popular more people are watching it than all of your shows combined. The second most popular fantasy right now is House of the Dragon, which is even less fantastical. The third most popular is Wheel of Time, which ended back in February. It still gets hundreds of millions of minutes of viewing a week.

Yes, anime is more popular than ever. It doesn't even chart.

Okay, so I had to try and figure out where the heck you keep getting these numbers from. I finally found something that said that 1.253 billion watch minutes for the first two episodes on this article. The Rings of Power Ratings Are In, and They’re Good

And this article says that House of the Dragon got 781 million watch minutes Nielsen Streaming Top 10: ‘House of the Dragon’ and ‘The Rings of Power’ Face Off for the First Time

Now, of course, you need to convert some of these numbers. For example, the first article says that those Rings of Power numbers translate to about 9.6 million people, over the three days of streaming. But hey, let's really drive those numbers and say that they are wrong and it is actually 20 million people. That's huge right?

Ever heard of Crunchyroll? Crunchyroll - Wikipedia

Crunchyroll is a single site that caters to Anime. It isn't the only site, in fact they made a huge accquistion recently where they will begin showing some of the stuff from Funimation.

You know how many users the site has? 120 million registered users. If we go back to the reported 9.6 million for Rings of Power, then we are looking at it having a mere 8% of "all of anime". Which one "doesn't chart?"

And you keep going on about watch minutes, because that's the thing that matters I guess. Well, here is a thing for you: 15+ Crunchyroll Statistics You Should Know in 2022

This? This states that EVERY MONTH 1.5 billion minutes of anime content are watched. And, if you scroll to read the actual fact instead of the blurb, you get this

Not among the newest facts about Crunchyroll, but this still gives us a pretty good idea of the service’s reach and magnitude. Several years ago, it was reported that on average, 1.5 billion minutes of content were watched every month. Now that anime’s popularity grew, that number probably grew much higher as well. We wouldn’t be surprised if it has even doubled by now!

I tried to highlight it, that 1.5 billion a month? That was information given "several years ago". So, we'll say, what? 5 years ago? The company is only 16 years old, so five years feels right.

That would by 60 months, meaning that is 90 billion watch minutes. On a single streaming service. This does not include anime watched on television, on Netflix, on Hulu, on Funimation, on Youtube, ect ect ect

Again, you want to claim that Tolkien's work is more popular than all of anime? Really?

Just another point of comparison. Watching all of the Peter Jackson Trilogies AND I'll just guess the twelve episodes of Rings of Power would take someone about 29 hours. Watching the entirety of One Piece, and all the movies? 435.6 hours. And that is just ONE of the "Big Three" from the early 2000's.

Look, I get it, Tolkien has been popular for a long time. I won't deny that. But Tolkien isn't so big that it crowds out every other possible source of fantasy inspiration. It isn't THAT big in reality.

 

[Oofta]

No, I don't have fun responding to people's ideas and assertions, only to get gaslit and told I'm insane and making things up. It is vastly frustrating.



The fact that you seem unable to tell the difference between the usage of Beholders in the game and the usage of halflings in the game really confusing to me. Beholders do things. Beholders have multiple additional versions of themselves. Beholders have an entire section devoted to them in the Spelljammer book, and they have been used as iconagraphy for the DnD brand.

When was the last time a stylized halfling was put on the cover of a DnD brand product or used to promote a live stream?

And again, if your only argument is "halflings exist in DnD, so we shouldn't remove them because they exist" then you are arguing to keep EVERYTHING in DnD, and that is a bad argument because there is a lot of crap in DnD we don't need to keep.



Actually, there is a committee that decides what is and isn't allowed to be part of DnD, they are called "Wizards of the Coast".

But sure, much like the dreaded Duck Bunny, the famous Spider Horse and the terrifying Blindheim halflings are a thing that exists and were made up for a fantasy world. However, just because they were made up for a story, doesn't mean we need to keep them.

Yep, WOTC decides what stays in D&D. Not you. My point was that there is no consistency to fantasy, D&D has echoed and amplified many of Tolkien's ideas while also adding in many of their own.

Take elves and dwarves. Before Tolkien elves were largely fey tricksters, literal small folk similar to leprechauns and fairies. Dwarves were in many ways similar, one main source for Tolkien was Norse mythology where the difference between elves and dwarves are fuzzy at best.

So yes, Tolkien added orcs (goblins were also trickster fey) and hobbits as extensions of a wide variety of folklore. But he also redefined elves and dwarves into the image we have today before that one of the most well known elves was Puck from a Midsummer's Night's dream.

So I think it's pointless to ignore half a century of lore. If they don't do anything for you don't include them in campaigns you're run and don't play them. I like having a race that are not the movers and shakers of the world.

 

[Chaosmancer]

Part of the reason for that is that so much fantasy written since their day has been more or less derivative of one or both of them; so might as well go straight to the original rather than a derivation...and in the case of Tolkein, to the tales and myths he based his own works on.

It is only as derivative of Tolkien and Howard as Tolkien and Howard were derivative of their predecessors. You might as well go read Gilgamesh, Beowulf, and the Nordic Sagas if you want to make a claim to reading the "originals"

Tolkien and Howard weren't super special insightful writers who wrote something completely original.

It seems odd to suggest D&D should be more like WoW given that WoW seems to be very much derived from D&D.

Why is that odd? WoW took aspects of DnD and made them popular, so why would it not make sense for DnD to look at the popular things in WoW and see if they work for DnD?

It is certainly no stranger than saying DnD should be more like Tolkien.

And, more importantly, much more original in their work than are many fantasy authors since. Note that this is not in any way intended as a slight against latter-day fantasy authors, but more as a pointing-out of how they are building their works on the same foundations as does D&D: a few highly-influential fantasy authors from the mid 20th century.

Now, a very good case can be made that there's some other pre-1974 fantasy authors who could be - and maybe should be - just as influential; but that's a whole other discussion for another time.

Further, anything written since about 1978 may well have D&D itself as an influence; which just makes the whole thing self-referential if D&D is then supposed to allow itself to be influenced in return.

Except it is actually entirely a slight against latter-day fantasy authors. You are trying to state that nothing written since 1974 is anything more than a derivation of later works, while at the same time ignoring that everything ever written builds and expands on earlier work. Meaning that all those "original" works were just derivative of their predecessors.

And, shockingly, many people writing today aren't pulling from Tolkien or Howard, but pulling from the same sources as Tolkien and Howard. Or, different sources. I certainly haven't seen a lot of egyptian mythology referenced in Tolkien or Howard, or much Journey to the West, or the Vedic texts. Yet I've read a lot of fantasy influenced by those things.

It is just pure elitism to claim that Tolkien and Howard were the high-water mark and no one has written any fantasy worth talking about since them.

 

[Chaosmancer]

I think we should keep everything in D&D, so people can pick and choose what they want for their game. "Crap we don't need" is exceedingly subjective and personal, not the objective truth you are intimating.

Yeah, no. There is a lot of chaff from DnD's history. It needs to be expelled, not weigh the game down.

There can be discussions about how to determine that, but we can accept it to be true and then discuss what needs to be removed without stating that nothing should ever be removed.

 

[James Gasik]

And, again, like I said waaaaaay upthread, if we're going to start excising unpopular races, there's a whole slew of ones less accessible and popular than Halflings and Gnomes. I mean, what about H̶a̶l̶f̶-Orcs?

And let's not forget that, at various times, H̶a̶l̶f̶-Orcs and Gnomes were excised from the PHB, only to be brought back an edition later. If you did kick Halflings out, I've no doubt there'd again be cries of dismay about how "D&D isn't D&D anymore!".

 

[Chaosmancer]

Yep, WOTC decides what stays in D&D. Not you. My point was that there is no consistency to fantasy, D&D has echoed and amplified many of Tolkien's ideas while also adding in many of their own.

Take elves and dwarves. Before Tolkien elves were largely fey tricksters, literal small folk similar to leprechauns and fairies. Dwarves were in many ways similar, one main source for Tolkien was Norse mythology where the difference between elves and dwarves are fuzzy at best.

So yes, Tolkien added orcs (goblins were also trickster fey) and hobbits as extensions of a wide variety of folklore. But he also redefined elves and dwarves into the image we have today before that one of the most well known elves was Puck from a Midsummer's Night's dream.

So I think it's pointless to ignore half a century of lore. If they don't do anything for you don't include them in campaigns you're run and don't play them. I like having a race that are not the movers and shakers of the world.

I'm not trying to ignore a half a century of lore. I'm trying to include two to three decades of lore that people keep trying to ignore because it isn't the right lore. I'm trying to expand lore instead of letting it stagnate.

And sure, the elves were fey tricksters.... in parts of europe. But Tolkien took the Alfair which were NOT fey tricksters. He didn't invent elves, he highlighted a different version of them. And lo and behold, DnD elves aren't even Tolkien elves. Not even close.

No, dwarves I'd give to Tolkien, he seems to have locked them in pretty sturdily. But, you know, a lot of people would like to do a bit more with dwarves than has traditionally be done.


Remember, I have not advocated for DnD to delete halflings. I've argued they should be updated and modernized. Because you might like a race of people that don't effect the world, but the rest of us would like them to matter a bit more.

 

[Chaosmancer]

And, again, like I said waaaaaay upthread, if we're going to start excising unpopular races, there's a whole slew of ones less accessible and popular than Halflings and Gnomes. I mean, what about H̶a̶l̶f̶-Orcs?

And let's not forget that, at various times, H̶a̶l̶f̶-Orcs and Gnomes were excised from the PHB, only to be brought back an edition later. If you did kick Halflings out, I've no doubt there'd again be cries of dismay about how "D&D isn't D&D anymore!".

And, notably, One DnD is removing half-orcs and making them just Orcs. Which is something I did years ago and has worked really well.

And updating a race doesn't mean it needs to be removed.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Yeah, no. There is a lot of chaff from DnD's history. It needs to be expelled, not weigh the game down.

There can be discussions about how to determine that, but we can accept it to be true and then discuss what needs to be removed without stating that nothing should ever be removed.

Short of explicit anti-inclusiveness (IRL) concerns, I don't see any aspects of the game we should all just accept need to be jettisoned. And what counts in that category can in some cases be debated.

 

[Lanefan]

The fact that you seem unable to tell the difference between the usage of Beholders in the game and the usage of halflings in the game really confusing to me. Beholders do things. Beholders have multiple additional versions of themselves. Beholders have an entire section devoted to them in the Spelljammer book, and they have been used as iconagraphy for the DnD brand.

And Beholders find Halflings to be very tasty indeed, if properly seasoned of course.

Halflings feature prominently on the covers of many a Beholder cookbook.

Actually, there is a committee that decides what is and isn't allowed to be part of DnD, they are called "Wizards of the Coast".

And a bajillion subcommittees, each one consisting of the DM (and, sometimes, players) at any given table; all of whom are independent of the uber-committee at WotC.

 

[Lanefan]

It is only as derivative of Tolkien and Howard as Tolkien and Howard were derivative of their predecessors. You might as well go read Gilgamesh, Beowulf, and the Nordic Sagas if you want to make a claim to reading the "originals"

Tolkien and Howard weren't super special insightful writers who wrote something completely original.

Tolkein was insightful enough to coalesce his various sources into something big enough to become almost its own mythos, which is no small accomplishment.

Why is that odd? WoW took aspects of DnD and made them popular, so why would it not make sense for DnD to look at the popular things in WoW and see if they work for DnD?

It is certainly no stranger than saying DnD should be more like Tolkien.

You're missing my point, I think.

Tolkein cannot possibly have been influenced by D&D, if for no other reason than he died before the game was invented. The influence only goes one way.

WoW, however, exists side-along with D&D; and if each is allowed to influence the other to any great extent it just becomes a self-referential loop. WoW drew heavily from D&D, thus D&D IMO should be very careful in drawing from WoW.

Except it is actually entirely a slight against latter-day fantasy authors. You are trying to state that nothing written since 1974 is anything more than a derivation of later works, while at the same time ignoring that everything ever written builds and expands on earlier work. Meaning that all those "original" works were just derivative of their predecessors.

Anything written since 1974 could be (not necessarily is, but could be) derivative of and-or influenced by D&D*, and therefore D&D using these works as influences risks becoming self-referential, even if unintentionally.

* - never mind there's some books out there which are openly fore-worded as being novelizations of the author's D&D campaign(s)!

And, shockingly, many people writing today aren't pulling from Tolkien or Howard, but pulling from the same sources as Tolkien and Howard. Or, different sources. I certainly haven't seen a lot of egyptian mythology referenced in Tolkien or Howard, or much Journey to the West, or the Vedic texts. Yet I've read a lot of fantasy influenced by those things.

It is just pure elitism to claim that Tolkien and Howard were the high-water mark and no one has written any fantasy worth talking about since them.

Tolkein was a high-water mark. There's been others, obviously, some of which are very recent indeed; but in most cases we can't know how much influence those recent ones took from D&D and thus how much influence they can reasonably be expected to provide in return.

 

[Lanefan]

Yeah, no. There is a lot of chaff from DnD's history. It needs to be expelled, not weigh the game down.

Disagree. Sure there's chaff, but whether you happen to like it or not it's still part of the game's history and has to be accepted as such.

Denial of history - bad though that history may be - is never the answer in any realm.

There can be discussions about how to determine that, but we can accept it to be true and then discuss what needs to be removed without stating that nothing should ever be removed.

And if not everyone agrees with your blanket statement (bolded), then what?