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?

 

[Faolyn]

This is not going to go over well at most tables.

And as Maxperson said: why not? If you (A) keep the luck from giving mechanical bonuses and (B) don't give the other players bad luck, there shouldn't be any problem.

Or, you know, you could just realize that "Lucky" doesn't have to have any more narrative ability than "Fey Ancestry" does. I mean, do you do special roleplaying for elves to justify their resistance to being charmed? Or do you just let them save with advantage?

 

[Minigiant]

It's not that Halflings are not lucky, nimble, or brave.

It's that the representation of halfling luck, nimbleness, and bravery in lore and mechanics were designed weak and to a standard of gamestyle D&D ain't anymore.

 

[Neonchameleon]

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.

And I don't think that anyone in a game I've played in or run has played a dwarf. Should I therefore, based on the fact that my groups appear to be outliers, start a thread about "the trouble with dwarves"? And how they are painfully stereotypical while very few of their tropes make any sense at all.

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.

Indeed. And the Lord of the Rings version works well to highlight a certain specific character. There is literally no problem I have ever seen integrating people, whether farmers, craftsmen, shopkeepers, or bureaucrats who are thrust into either the industrialised nightmare of mass warfare or the cyberpunk/magipunk dystopian where warbands and corporations are king or the dangerous world of spies, assassins, and agents. Or any other standard start to an adventure.

Kender. Kender Are the Problem​

Indeed. Good job halflings aren't kender.

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.

This is not a problem. This is a background. The refusal of the call is a classic stage on the Hero's Journey. And just because they come from folk of humble origins doesn't mean they can't stay adventuring.

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.

No it doesn't. It requires a lampshade. The last halfling in a campaign of mine went to the carnival and got cursed. The one before that fell asleep and woke up somewhere else where they didn't have a bed near them. The one before that started off trying to fend off bandits who wanted to burn their village. All you need to do is set them off on the path or ask the player.

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.

It takes literally almost no work. Halflings will try to integrate into any society that allows them - and a lack of halflings is a symptom of racism.

Do humans just treat them like children?

No. They treat them like people. People who they pay to do jobs. Or people who they pay to get services from. Or people who pay them for things. There are some jobs halflings aren't that good at due to being small and some they are due to being small.

But I think I see the core problem here. You say "Do humans" as if all humans think exactly the same way on most major issues. Me? I prefer more diversity of thought. And of society.

Would halflings want to be anywhere near a larger humanoids' dwellings as a result?

If the humans are asshats who treat them like children, no. But this is assuming the humans are asshats.

Or are halflings given mythical status like fey?

No. Next.

Or are they more like inveterate pranksters and tricksters,

No. They aren't kender.

treating them more like gnomes?

They aren't gnomes.

And if halflings are more like gnomes, then why have gnomes?

A question only 4e has managed to answer by making gnomes pointful.

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.

So ordinary people are a one-off. Your entire world must be pretty gonzo.

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?

By spreading them out and having them there. There's a lot less work required for people trying to get on with life than people trying to impose their order on the world the way elves and dwarves do. You're making a mountain out of a molehill.

 

[Chaosmancer]

This again?

They're lucky because having something truly catastrophic happen to them is incredibly rare. This is because they reroll nat 1s, which many tables still have as something extra-bad. Heck, I've had players give themselves critical failures when rolling a 1, even when I told them they didn't have to.

So a halfling will never be present when the King of a Nation is assassinated and the party set-up as the murderers? Because, that is something truly catastrophic happening, so the DM will always make sure that the halfling is known to be innocent, right?

Oh, wait no. They just re-roll 1's. Which, per RAW are no worse than rolling a 2. Sure, players may give themselves crit fails, but players also have their characters quote Monty Python, doesn't mean it exists in the game world. So, again, narratively, the halfling player is no luckier than any other player. Unless the DM narrates and explicitly goes out of their way to be luckier than normal.

If you want them to be luckier than that, then as a DM, narrate lucky but not game-altering events. If you're the player, do the same. "I steal an apple" <rolls well enough on Sleight of Hand to do so> "What luck! I got a perfectly-shaped apple with no blemishes!"

Like this, right here. The DM has to enforce the luck, or it doesn't actually matter. Sure, I as the player can insist on events being particularly lucky... but I can do that with any character? And what do I do if the DM tells me to stop? Is my entire race concept now under threat?

Are you seeing why just saying "they are lucky" is leading to problems? Because they aren't. DnD is a game based on luck, based on die rolls, and THAT enforces itself at the table. You could play a halfling who generally fails when it matters, just because the D20 doesn't swing your way. And the actually luckiest player at the table could be anybody. Unless the DM specifically enforces that your character is just luckier than your peers... you aren't.

But it does help them stand up to dragons, beholders, satyrs, blackguards, cloakers, androsphinxes, a whole bunch of undead, many demons, devils, and yugoloths and even arch fiends. It also protects them from several spells and spell-like abilities.

The Brave trait protects them from the frightened condition. It doesn't prevent them from being intimidated.

Right, so does anyone who succumb to the frightened condition lose the right to call themselves brave? Again, my ranger may be so scared his hands are shaking, but he is still shooting the dragon. Is that not bravery? And if that is bravery, then my ranger is also brave. So, why describe halflings as "the race that is brave" when every single adventurer is brave?

 

[Chaosmancer]

Of course the ability is proof of the narrative, and vice versa. Because that's how lore and mechanics work. Medusa has the narrative turn things to stone, and a matching mechanic of turn things to stone. Dragons have the narrative can fly and have breath a weapon, and matching mechanics of can fly and have a breath weapon.

With halflings there is a racial ability of bravery. That means that as a race, halflings are braver than humans, even if a human fighter succeeds in making his save. These are not multiple kinds of bravery. There is only one kind of bravery. Being brave. Halflings just have a supporting mechanic so that the race as a whole can be braver.

Nor does it matter if there are other mechanics than can help with saves vs. fear. Entire races don't have those. Halflings do.

So, the ranger who is shaking and terrified out of his mind while fighting the dragon, but is still fighting the dragon, is not brave. Because he doesn't have a mechanic that allows him to be brave.

Sure, we can say that halflings are "more likely to be brave" but again... 99% of adventurers are brave, so your halfling adventurer being brave is meaningless. So is everyone else who is eager to rush into the dragon's lair, kill it, and steal its hoard.

 

[Vaalingrade]

Are you seeing why just saying "they are lucky" is leading to problems?

Because people will overthink it waaaay too far to prove a point?

 

[Lanefan]

Dragonborn breath fire.
Tiefling have infernal magic
Goliaths lift like ogres
Genasi have elemental resistances and features
Aaracroka fly

And all of these are monsters which should never have been made PC-playable in any edition.

Making everything and the kitchen sink PC-playable is what's pushing the Hobbit to the sidelines, as there's so many other similar-ish species competing for the same niche-resources.

 

[Charlaquin]

Why not?

The player narrating the results of their own action? Kind of a reversal of the expected roles, is it not?

 

[Chaosmancer]

By that logic, dwarves are no sturdier against toxins, and gnomes have no magical resistance. They just have access to metagame manipulation of the game engine. Perhaps there is a point where we can accept that some connection exists between such manipulations and the traits they portray?

We can also realize that if the die rolls are spectacularly unlucky, they will negate most features from any source. If you can't roll above a 5 ever, most features that give advantage or proficiency will be ineffective. That does not mean those features did not exist. It is silly to suggest otherwise.

So, the halfling is not lucky unless the player is lucky. You seem to be coming around to getting my point with this. Taking half damage from poison is very different from "being lucky" because the poison damage is also itself a game mechanic. But luck isn't. Luck is what you deal with every time you roll the d20. And the halfling is no luckier than anyone else. Unless the DM goes out of their way to narrate that luck.

I realize I should have been more specific with.respect to the Dex bump. Specifically that the dex bump (+2), by itself impacts the modifier. I'd assumed that might be apparent by virtue of the other races referenced (ones which have the +2 which, not coincidentally, are also associated with stealth), but I see I was mistaken in this assumption. I hope this clarifies my position.

Ah, so now it isn't just a dexterity bump, but specifically a +2 Dexterity bump. Which, again, no longer matters in the game. But, we all know how the brightly colored Aarcrockra are known for their stealth right? I mean, bird people are always stealthy. And tielflings, one of thier most notable traits is their incredibly abilities at stealth and blending in. Especially the winged Tieflings who get +2 Dexterity. Nothing like massive batwings to make you stealthy. Plus Variant Humans with the Gunner trait. Nothing like firearm usage to make you incredibly sneaky.

I hope this also clarifies my position, because again, +2 Dex doesn't make you sneaky. Classes like Rogue make you sneaky.

 

[Charlaquin]

And as Maxperson said: why not? If you (A) keep the luck from giving mechanical bonuses and (B) don't give the other players bad luck, there shouldn't be any problem.

I guess. I feel like most DMs wouldn’t be too keen on players narrating the results of their own actions. But I’m sure it will vary from table to table.

Or, you know, you could just realize that "Lucky" doesn't have to have any more narrative ability than "Fey Ancestry" does. I mean, do you do special roleplaying for elves to justify their resistance to being charmed? Or do you just let them save with advantage?

Oh my. I seem to have stepped into a much more heated discussion than I realized. No, I don’t think either Fey Ancestry or Lucky need to be roleplayed in any particular way.