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?

 

[Oofta]

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.

So you've elected yourself to decide what everyone else should play? That the only important peoples in the world are warlike conquerors, the "movers and shakers"? The people that wield power? We have plenty of those. Besides, who is this "we" that wants to take away an option to play the overlooked everyman? Oh, and you need to make up your mind because depending on the post you want to either update them to something "modern" whatever that is or that they have no place because they don't appear very often in fiction outside of Tolkien and D&D.

Anyway, carry on. Have fun tilting at windmills. And halflings.

 

[bedir than]

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



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.

If you say that every registered user of Crunchyroll is someone actively watching anime then I'll just invent the fantastical position that everyone who watched 3 seconds of a Rings of Power trailer is a fan.

Both positions are wildly absurd and show a lack of knowledge about the breadth and popularity of the subject at hand.

There remains zero evidence that Tolkien is no longer popular or influential. There remains no evidence that D&D players are more influenced by anime than Tolkien.

There remains no evidence that halflings are the least popular player's handbook race.

 

[bedir than]

Want some inspiration for halflings?

Hobbit/Lord of the Rings with their few different varieties (Fallohides, Stoors, Breelander)
Rings of Power's Harfoots
Willow
Kithkin
Kender
Denham Tracts
Goblin Slayer's Rhea

There's plenty out there. Plus the various ideas presented in this thread and others.

In my world all halflings bonded with canines, because that partnership helped them keep up with the bigger peoples. Az and his dog Sel founded a nation together. They inspired other pairings, but the origin of what is now an entire group of people (human, goliath and halfling as Kin) bonding together is because one halfling and one mastiff took to each other in a way that was magical.

Now there are various dogs for retrieving, pulling, swimming, tracking, ratting, etc and etc.

I pulled on a couple threads of typical halfling lore and emphasized it. There's no massive change, just tiny people finding a way to be recognized as equals.

 

[Chaosmancer]

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.

So, except for things you think need to be jettisoned from the game you don't think anything should be jettisoned from the game.

So, you agree with me that some things should be jettisoned from the game, your list simply stops at "anti-inclusive content". Which is fair, that is a good section of the list to have and I'm glad that is included in your idea of what should be taken out.

My list simply also includes things that are badly made. There can be debate what is badly made, shocking no one ever, but that debate can happen with the acknowledgement that some things the game is better off without.

 

[Chaosmancer]

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.

Haha, it is funny because it entirely misses the point.

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.

Uh-huh. Well, weirdly as a DM and player at multiple different tables I've never been directly involved in the writing process for the Player's Handbook. Done a few surveys but somehow they've never consulted me on writing actual lore.

/s

Now, yes, obviously individual tables can do whatever it is individual tables want to do. But if you individual table wants to keep Hobbits exactly as they are in the game, then that doesn't mean that the rest of us need that for the book published by WoTC.

And we can discuss the fact that halflings aren't utterly perfectly designed and try and improve upon them I would hope. Well, I really don't hope because it seems that even getting to the point of recognizing there is a problem means slogging through endless repititions of "it isn't a problem, you are a problem"

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

Sure it isn't a small accomplishment.

I can name at least three, nope five authors, wait dang it, I ca go to seven authors...

Well, let's suffice to say that he isn't the only author to have ever created enough lore to have his own mythos.

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.

You keep saying "self-referential" like it is a bad thing.

Was WoW inspired by DnD? Certainly. Leveling systems in just about every medium come exclusively from DnD. Elves and Orcs come from DnD. As do trolls.

But WoW orcs aren't DnD orcs. WoW elves aren't DnD elves. WoW trolls aren't DnD trolls. WoW Draenei don't look like DnD anything.

And since DnD takes from general fantasy, looking at the good ideas WoW had won't hurt DnD. It can't hurt DnD. i'm not saying mirror everything they ever do, but if they are doing good storytelling and interesting concepts, you can be inspired by that. DnD has already evolved past what it once was, it has changed, it will change again. You know those "bajillion subcommittees" you mentioned? They are all self-referential DnD content. They make new content, DnD takes the things they are doing and adapts, and then they make new content off of the things DnD made in response to them.

This is how things are made.

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)!

Again, how is this in any way bad? You keep saying "self-referential" like it is always 100% bad.

For an example I can trivially think of, the New Star Trek shows likely looked at the successes and popular decisions of modern Science Fiction shows which were inspired by Star Trek. Because of course they did. The writers would be idiots to only look at Star Trek material and not to take inspiration from works that came later and improved on Star Trek stories.

There are many media companies that SHOULD be more self-referential. Thinking of Marvel and DC, they absolutely should be looking at some 3rd party superhero content and seeing how they can change, instead of always doing what they have always done for 70 years.

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.

Who cares how much influence they took from DnD?! That doesn't matter. If they have good ideas then they are good ideas, this isn't genetics, you can't in-breed stories by taking in ideas from outside sources.

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.

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

I'm not talking about a denial of history. I'm talking about getting rid of what doesn't work.

I don't deny the history of transportation. But I also don't think going to work in an ox-drawn wagon is terribly useful, and I don't think we need to continue having Ox-drawn wagon making factories in the modern United States. We have other tools that work better.

You may love your Spider-Horse DnD monster, and it is part of DnD's history for sure, but I see zero reason to look forward to it being published in a monster manual any time soon, because I think everyone will agree it isn't something we really need in the game anymore. I also don't need 100 different flavors of elf, seems excessive and pointless. That isn't denying history, that is simply saying we don't need those things anymore. We aren't denying history by not reprinting them.


And if you think that 100% of every single thing ever published for DnD must be brought forward into each new edition of DnD,c ompletely unaltered... well, then you and I have very different and completely incompatible ideas of what DnD should look like, because there is a lot in DnD's history that I do not want to see republished, whether because it sucks or for other reasons.

 

[Chaosmancer]

So you've elected yourself to decide what everyone else should play?

Yep, you caught me red-handed. All hail King Chaosmancer, guy who wants to talk about improving the game.

It is always amusing how "quite a few of us are having this problem, can we fix it" is always "So you have declared yourself the ruler of all fun and decider of everyting, but I say no, because I want the status quo"

That the only important peoples in the world are warlike conquerors, the "movers and shakers"?

Nope, strawman, that isn't what I said. You can be important WITHOUT being warlike conquerors. Unless you think Doctor's Without Borders or The Red Cross are completely unimportant to the larger world of Earth?

The people that wield power?

What do you mean by power? There is lots of different forms of power, and halflings even in official lore have a lot of it.

Besides, who is this "we" that wants to take away an option to play the overlooked everyman?

I'll get you a list of our membership at the next meeting. I'm sure it will be coming any day now.

As for the option to play the "overlooked everyman". We've had this discussion. The fact of the matter is that you are wrong about humans, elves, and dwarves not having "everymen" in them. Not every human on the surface of Faerun is a great and powerful warrior, or a wise sage. A lot of them are what they were for our world. Every day men and women trying to get by. You don't need a race of "everymen" because that defeats the entire concept of "everymen" and is bizarre in the context of the game to have a race of "everymen" that are overlooked and underestimated... and still produce the same heroes and fight the same forces of darkness that every other race fights.

Oh, and you need to make up your mind because depending on the post you want to either update them to something "modern" whatever that is or that they have no place because they don't appear very often in fiction outside of Tolkien and D&D.

That is because I am forced into two different conversations. Those posts talking about them not appearing in fiction outside of DnD are in response to the idea that we can't change halflings because they are vital to the public's perception of Fantasy. Which is hilariously off-base, as I have been arguing. Halflings basically only appear in Tolkien, that's it. Fantasy is larger than Tolkien. They are not vital at all to the idea of Fantasy itself.


If I could have a single conversation and not three, you may be less confused, but I've been consistent in my positions.

 

[Chaosmancer]

Well, it seems having fewer conversations will be easier than I thought, since Bedir than blocked me again.

However, I saw one snipped before his post disappeared that I want to address.

Yes, I think every registered user of an Anime streaming services watches anime. Just as I imagine every registered user of ENworld plays tabletop roleplaying games. It is sort of the entire point of the platform. I don't imagine we have many people on here who hate tabletop gaming and prefer American Football to be on this site as a registered user, it really isn't their kind of place. There is pretty much nothing on Crunchyroll EXCEPT anime, it bills itself on its access to anime titles and the creation of its own anime products. It would be really bizarre if the vast majority of its registered subscribers weren't registered so they could watch anime. It would be like joining a book club because you like painting. The two things don't really go together, so why join the book club instead of a painting club?

 

[Micah Sweet]

So, except for things you think need to be jettisoned from the game you don't think anything should be jettisoned from the game.

So, you agree with me that some things should be jettisoned from the game, your list simply stops at "anti-inclusive content". Which is fair, that is a good section of the list to have and I'm glad that is included in your idea of what should be taken out.

My list simply also includes things that are badly made. There can be debate what is badly made, shocking no one ever, but that debate can happen with the acknowledgement that some things the game is better off without.

My list stops where I stopped it. "Badly made", like your other arguments, is personal subjective opinion dressed as objective truth.

 

[Irlo]

You keep saying "self-referential" like it is a bad thing.

Was WoW inspired by DnD? Certainly. Leveling systems in just about every medium come exclusively from DnD. Elves and Orcs come from DnD. As do trolls.

But WoW orcs aren't DnD orcs. WoW elves aren't DnD elves. WoW trolls aren't DnD trolls. WoW Draenei don't look like DnD anything.

And since DnD takes from general fantasy, looking at the good ideas WoW had won't hurt DnD. It can't hurt DnD. i'm not saying mirror everything they ever do, but if they are doing good storytelling and interesting concepts, you can be inspired by that. DnD has already evolved past what it once was, it has changed, it will change again. You know those "bajillion subcommittees" you mentioned? They are all self-referential DnD content. They make new content, DnD takes the things they are doing and adapts, and then they make new content off of the things DnD made in response to them.

This is how things are made.
Again, how is this in any way bad? You keep saying "self-referential" like it is always 100% bad.

For an example I can trivially think of, the New Star Trek shows likely looked at the successes and popular decisions of modern Science Fiction shows which were inspired by Star Trek. Because of course they did. The writers would be idiots to only look at Star Trek material and not to take inspiration from works that came later and improved on Star Trek stories.

There are many media companies that SHOULD be more self-referential. Thinking of Marvel and DC, they absolutely should be looking at some 3rd party superhero content and seeing how they can change, instead of always doing what they have always done for 70 years.

Who cares how much influence they took from DnD?! That doesn't matter. If they have good ideas then they are good ideas, this isn't genetics, you can't in-breed stories by taking in ideas from outside sources.

All this?

 

[Lanefan]

Uh-huh. Well, weirdly as a DM and player at multiple different tables I've never been directly involved in the writing process for the Player's Handbook. Done a few surveys but somehow they've never consulted me on writing actual lore.

But your DM might have; or if you were the DM you've consulted yourself.

/s

Now, yes, obviously individual tables can do whatever it is individual tables want to do. But if you individual table wants to keep Hobbits exactly as they are in the game, then that doesn't mean that the rest of us need that for the book published by WoTC.

And we can discuss the fact that halflings aren't utterly perfectly designed and try and improve upon them I would hope. Well, I really don't hope because it seems that even getting to the point of recognizing there is a problem means slogging through endless repititions of "it isn't a problem, you are a problem"

Thing is, what some consider a problem (they're the "everyman") others consider their best feature.

You keep saying "self-referential" like it is a bad thing.

In this case, it is. If two things draw their influences from each other, what results is a feedback loop - otherwise and elsewhere known as an echo chamber.

Again, how is this in any way bad? You keep saying "self-referential" like it is always 100% bad.

It is, when considering what influences what.

For an example I can trivially think of, the New Star Trek shows likely looked at the successes and popular decisions of modern Science Fiction shows which were inspired by Star Trek. Because of course they did. The writers would be idiots to only look at Star Trek material and not to take inspiration from works that came later and improved on Star Trek stories.

There are many media companies that SHOULD be more self-referential. Thinking of Marvel and DC, they absolutely should be looking at some 3rd party superhero content and seeing how they can change, instead of always doing what they have always done for 70 years.

DC should look at Marvel, for sure. Marvel don't need to look at anyone, they're doing just fine as it is.

I'm not talking about a denial of history. I'm talking about getting rid of what doesn't work.

I don't deny the history of transportation. But I also don't think going to work in an ox-drawn wagon is terribly useful, and I don't think we need to continue having Ox-drawn wagon making factories in the modern United States. We have other tools that work better.

OK, but that's still no excuse to ban ox-drawn wagons from the roads; which in analogy seemed to be what you were trying to suggest.

You may love your Spider-Horse DnD monster, and it is part of DnD's history for sure, but I see zero reason to look forward to it being published in a monster manual any time soon, because I think everyone will agree it isn't something we really need in the game anymore. I also don't need 100 different flavors of elf, seems excessive and pointless. That isn't denying history, that is simply saying we don't need those things anymore. We aren't denying history by not reprinting them.

It sounded from your earlier posts like you wanted to excise things from D&D history altogether.

And if you think that 100% of every single thing ever published for DnD must be brought forward into each new edition of DnD,c ompletely unaltered... well, then you and I have very different and completely incompatible ideas of what DnD should look like, because there is a lot in DnD's history that I do not want to see republished, whether because it sucks or for other reasons.

There's a big difference between not republishing something and excising it from history. That said, full backward-forward compatibility between all editions would sure be nice.

 

[LuisCarlos17f]

Some D&D creatures from past editions may be really ridiculous, but always they can return in an article on April's Fool. And hiring the right designer the ridiculous spider-horse can be used to sell figures for collectors.

There is a really good marketing reason about halflings and gnomes shouldn't fall in the oblivion. If someday Hasbro wants to produce a family-friendly animated sitcom set in a D&D world (maybe in Witchlicht) then halflings and gnomes are the perfect choice, with the comingsoon ardlings.

A true creator has to can find any possible use in all the things within reach.

 

[FrozenNorth]

No she isn't.

Linzi

Jubilost Narthropple is the gnome.

Ah, I thought Linzi was the iconic Pathfinder druid, whose name is apparently Lini.

You can see my confusion.

 

[FrozenNorth]

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.

My dwarves take more from Russia than Scotland. They are stolid fatalists who see the value of enduring, despite the fact that their leaders are insane, the Underdark is trying to kill them, and most of their diet consists of fungi and fermented goat’s milk.

 

[Chaosmancer]

My list stops where I stopped it. "Badly made", like your other arguments, is personal subjective opinion dressed as objective truth.

No duh it is subjective. Why do you think I keep saying "and that can be discussed"? It is almost like, and stop me if I go to fast, I understand my opinion isn't the law of reality.

However, just because my opinion isn't objectively true doesn't mean I need to sit around silently while other people say "this is the way it should be, because I like it this way" because THEY aren't objectively right either. This may shock you, but advocating for the status quo is STILL advocating for something you like. This seems to be the thing you guys don't get in these conversations, just because I acknowledge everyone can have their own tastes and opinions doesn't mean all conversation stops and we go with your version of things. Because "I pick no change" is still picking something you prefer over something you don't.

This doesn't go "you aren't objectively right, end of conversation, I win". Nothing is perfect. Everything can be improved upon. But I have to spend so much energy just fighting the very notion that no one could possibly have found a real problem with halflings, and it is exhausting. By the way real =/=objective, so don't go trying to say that I'm twisting myself in knots here. But so few people are willing to actually engage in a proper discussion, instead they want to misreprent things and continue to act like nothing has changed in thirty years and everything they thought is true is forever true.

 

[Oofta]

No duh it is subjective. Why do you think I keep saying "and that can be discussed"? It is almost like, and stop me if I go to fast, I understand my opinion isn't the law of reality.

However, just because my opinion isn't objectively true doesn't mean I need to sit around silently while other people say "this is the way it should be, because I like it this way" because THEY aren't objectively right either. This may shock you, but advocating for the status quo is STILL advocating for something you like. This seems to be the thing you guys don't get in these conversations, just because I acknowledge everyone can have their own tastes and opinions doesn't mean all conversation stops and we go with your version of things. Because "I pick no change" is still picking something you prefer over something you don't.

This doesn't go "you aren't objectively right, end of conversation, I win". Nothing is perfect. Everything can be improved upon. But I have to spend so much energy just fighting the very notion that no one could possibly have found a real problem with halflings, and it is exhausting. By the way real =/=objective, so don't go trying to say that I'm twisting myself in knots here. But so few people are willing to actually engage in a proper discussion, instead they want to misreprent things and continue to act like nothing has changed in thirty years and everything they thought is true is forever true.

Saying "I [don't] like" or "I prefer" are subjective statements. Saying something is "badly made" sounds like dressing up opinion as objective fact.

 

[Chaosmancer]

But your DM might have; or if you were the DM you've consulted yourself.

Nope, I don't work for Wizards of the Coast and I don't know anyone who works for Wizards of the Coast. Any other interpretation is misunderstanding my point.

Thing is, what some consider a problem (they're the "everyman") others consider their best feature.

I am aware. I disagree with these people, as I have laid out. I even put up good reasons for my disagreement.

In this case, it is. If two things draw their influences from each other, what results is a feedback loop - otherwise and elsewhere known as an echo chamber.


It is, when considering what influences what.

It is impossible to have an artistic echo chamber if you pull from multiple media sources.

Let's just follow the rabbit hole a bit, shall we?

WoW was inspired by DnD, right? But what else was it inspired by? Well, it was inspired by Kung-Fu Panda. Which was inspired by Bruce Lee, and Kill Bill, and chinese mytholofy. So, what if DnD takes inspiration from WoW that was given to WoW by Kung-Fu Panda? WoW also has some pretty clear inspirations from some Christian Mythology. So does DnD. Would it bad to pass notes between the two things on better ways to use the same source material?

Final Fantasy may have been partially inspired by DnD, but it also many times has pulled inspiration from Japanese culture and even Hinduism. So, if we are inspired to take things from Final Fantasy, we aren't just getting DnD, we are getting DnD with specific things added into the mix, and we can then even look at those things added into the mix and follow them back to THEIR sources.

Even things that are purely American Fantasy can add elements that were not present in DnD, can give new takes on old ideas, and we shouldn't just ignore those. Because they can be better than what we have,

And even if all of it is inspired by DnD, grabbing from WoW, Final Fantasy and American Fantasy Novels gives you three different sources. And all those things are likely going to be pulling from everything around them as well. Because no art exists in a vacuum. You can't make art that doesn't rely on something someone else made. Tolkien stole from other artists as well. Blatantly.

DC should look at Marvel, for sure. Marvel don't need to look at anyone, they're doing just fine as it is.

Marvel Live-Action Movies? Sure. Marvel animated shows suck compared to DC's. And even Marvel Live-Action Movies have deep flaws in them that people are starting to notice after all these decades of them, and there are solutions out there for them, if they are willing to look at other properties and see what works.

OK, but that's still no excuse to ban ox-drawn wagons from the roads; which in analogy seemed to be what you were trying to suggest.

Um... we should absolutely ban ox-drawn wagons from the roads. It is illegal to go so far UNDER the speed limit for a reason. This has nothing to do with the analogy, just cold hard reality there.

But more to your point, if you want to keep your ox-drawn wagon, you have it. But we can update to cars in the production lines for other people. Because there is no need to keep telling them that this is the best form of transportation we can make. If people want the wagons, musuems exist, people have pictures of them, people will still have some sitting in their barns, but we don't need to keep making them.

It sounded from your earlier posts like you wanted to excise things from D&D history altogether.

You can't excise things from DnD's history. That doesn't make sense. You'd have to delete the old books, and no one is saying that.

What you do is make better stuff for the current version of the game. You don't reprint the stuff from the history, you update it.

There's a big difference between not republishing something and excising it from history. That said, full backward-forward compatibility between all editions would sure be nice.

Yeah, I know there is a difference. That's why I advocated for one, and not the other.

And sure, it would be nice, but it is also largely impossible to do in any official capacity. Too much changes, the fundamentals of the systems are incompatible.

 

[Chaosmancer]

My dwarves take more from Russia than Scotland. They are stolid fatalists who see the value of enduring, despite the fact that their leaders are insane, the Underdark is trying to kill them, and most of their diet consists of fungi and fermented goat’s milk.

That sounds awesome.

Man, thinking about Russian-style Dwarven Literature makes me grin like a loon.

 

[Chaosmancer]

Saying "I [don't] like" or "I prefer" are subjective statements. Saying something is "badly made" sounds like dressing up opinion as objective fact.

I'm sure someone thought this was well-designed, otherwise it wouldn't have gotten published

However, in my completely subjective opinion (as objective opinions don't exist) this is badly designed and doesn't deserve to be brought forward into the newer editions of DnD.

See, it is this strange thing that happens. If we can agree "some things are badly designed" even if that is purely a subjective judgement of something, then we can begin to discuss "is this thing badly designed?". Instead, you insist halflings are perfect and refuse to consider they could be improved, and the VERY IDEA that something in DnD's past COULD POSSIBLY have been badly designed has required me to make multiple posts and argue fervently that somethings are badly designed.

 

[Oofta]

I'm sure someone thought this was well-designed, otherwise it wouldn't have gotten published

View attachment 265176

However, in my completely subjective opinion (as objective opinions don't exist) this is badly designed and doesn't deserve to be brought forward into the newer editions of DnD.

See, it is this strange thing that happens. If we can agree "some things are badly designed" even if that is purely a subjective judgement of something, then we can begin to discuss "is this thing badly designed?". Instead, you insist halflings are perfect and refuse to consider they could be improved, and the VERY IDEA that something in DnD's past COULD POSSIBLY have been badly designed has required me to make multiple posts and argue fervently that somethings are badly designed.

Just trying to give you some advice. Take it or leave it, I'm not discussing this topic with you any more.

 

[Micah Sweet]

No duh it is subjective. Why do you think I keep saying "and that can be discussed"? It is almost like, and stop me if I go to fast, I understand my opinion isn't the law of reality.

However, just because my opinion isn't objectively true doesn't mean I need to sit around silently while other people say "this is the way it should be, because I like it this way" because THEY aren't objectively right either. This may shock you, but advocating for the status quo is STILL advocating for something you like. This seems to be the thing you guys don't get in these conversations, just because I acknowledge everyone can have their own tastes and opinions doesn't mean all conversation stops and we go with your version of things. Because "I pick no change" is still picking something you prefer over something you don't.

This doesn't go "you aren't objectively right, end of conversation, I win". Nothing is perfect. Everything can be improved upon. But I have to spend so much energy just fighting the very notion that no one could possibly have found a real problem with halflings, and it is exhausting. By the way real =/=objective, so don't go trying to say that I'm twisting myself in knots here. But so few people are willing to actually engage in a proper discussion, instead they want to misreprent things and continue to act like nothing has changed in thirty years and everything they thought is true is forever true.

As @Oofta mentioned above, your statements read like objective fact when they really aren't. If you didn't want people to call you out on that, I would suggest expressing your opinions as opinions.

A lot of things have changed in 30 years, that's actually objective. In general, I prefer 5e's ruleset to the 1e game that DL was made for and that I grew up on (although I do like Level Up better, and there are a number of things in 1e I like over 5e, including their design philosophy). I feel the 2e and 3e updates to DL worked hard to be additive rather then remove elements or add ones that were clearly stated as not being present.

5e is not doing this. The design philosophy has shifted in just the last 2-3 years. I strongly suspect that if Dragonlance had been released for 5e in, say, 2016, we would get a substantially different product than we are getting now, and likely one I would actually spend money on. But of course that's speculation.

The point is, people have different opinions on what game elements are or are not important, and what things should change or not change. In my opinion, relatively little in any established setting should be changed, mostly just the anti-inclusive stuff I mentioned, and even that can be additive (witness the new Ravenloft handling of the Vistani. They didn't actually remove the possibility of events happening as they did, but they did expand and enhance their culture so they weren't a bad stereotype). It gives players and DMs options they should have front and center without being prescriptive.

I stand by my opinion that orcs as anything more than a one-of-a-kind oddity are unnecessary and IMO unwanted for DL. A sidebar similar to Theros would be sufficient to deal with the issue to my satisfaction. For other stuff added to the general game over time? That can be a discussion I would be happy to engage in, but my answer is never going to be, "If it's in the PH, it's in every campaign setting".