Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Chaosmancer" data-source="post: 8819992" data-attributes="member: 6801228">Okay, then name all the people you knew in your past lives. Where are they now? Would you be able to call them up and have them post on this forum confirming that they are indeed the people you knew in your past life? You are trying to make my statement into something it isn't, and then claiming a strawman. An elf doesn't believe they are a reincarnation, they ARE a reincarnation. They don't need to claim it, they can go and speak to the people from their past lives memories and reminiscence about those times. They don't need special spiritual awareness, they just are. This has NOTHING to do with religion and I'd appreciate you not trying to make this into some anti-hindu or anti-buddhist statement. Those belief systems have nothing to do with the biological and mental reality elves are dealing with. Because even in the context of those religious beliefs, elves are dealing with something ENTIRELY different.The fact that you are altering definitions of human to include whatever you feel like to descredit my points. Which you completely missed the sarcasm of me redefining shield and sword to be human. I thought at least that much would be obvious.No it isn't. And that ignores my point.You really should. He absolutely doesn't want halflings to be magical. If you want magical halflings you really should care that him and others would want to remove that as an option.Shadar-Kai don't come up because their history of recently being human is very confusing, since many people still imagine they are humans it is strange for them to think they are elves. Also, Pallid elves are not truly very different from other types of elves. They don't really need mentioning since they don't break the mold. However, in the assertion that all halflings are unremarkable and non-magical, magical halflings would break that mold and be quite notable.Wow that is a whole lot of saying nothing. Everything after your first sentence is just pointing out that there isn't a distinct halfling/gnome mixed race option, which is true for 99% of all mixed race options, so not exactly breaking ground. Then, instead of actually PRESENTING evidence, you simply say that their differences are cultural and mechanical. Which, hey, I can give you mechanical, halfling mechanics are pretty forgettable after all and don't really add much useful flavor compared to gnome mechanics, but can you actually... give some examples of what makes a forest gnome culture completely and utterly different from a lotusden halfling culture? And then explain why cultural differences aren't enough to make them simply sub-races like Mountain Dwarves and Hill Dwarves who only really had cultural and mechanical differences? Or is this just a "I assert I'm right and don't provide any evidence" sort of discussion?Which, again, I acknowledged. Do I need to go ahead and pre-acknowledge it for the next post too? The point is, nothing I said about what she can do would be seen as unusual for a DnD gnome. In fact, it fits perfectly into DnD gnomes and no one bats an eye at it. I should know, I put it into my DnD gnomes and not a single player ever went "wait, gnomes can't do that!". In fact, they just accepted it as a fact of gnomish life.Except that it isn't pointless. I'll agree with you that gnomes are no longer earth elementals, just like kobolds are no longer goblins. That isn't exactly a difficult point. Garden gnomes are a type of statuary, so also not relevant, just like garden dragon statues aren't dragons. As for the rest, what are their characteristics? What makes them different from other gnomes? I'm not familiar with them. Well, I think the Nomes of Oz do stick closer to their earth elemental roots, which is fine, and I would also not that Nomes not being Gnomes is the same as Porcs not being Orcs. Different names are different it turns out. Which leaves us with a slasher fic, probably based on garden gnome statuary, and then Discworld and Warhammer, both of which tend to have extreme deviations from normal fantasy. However, they are still called "gnomes" so there has to be a reason for that, right?So, I'm confused. See, for the last three threads I've been repeatedly berated about what the definition of a halfling is. It has been a major point of contention, because I want to change a few things about them, and I have been told that changing any of those factors would make them decidedly not halflings. However, now, you are berating me for sticking to the definition that I have had thrown at me over and over and over again. So, here, I'll just step back for a second. What is a halfling? Is a halfling just whatever you decide is a halfling, or is there some sort of definition for them? Because I'm not going to continue being yelled at for both using and not using the definition everyone else has. That way lies madness.So, halflings go to war. Because any halfling community bigger than a small village is typically depicted as part of a human community. Much larger than that and they would need things like... kings, armies, you know all those things that you claim they can't have. In fact, other than the Talentas barbarian halflings of Eberron, is there a halfling location you know of that is bigger than a couple of villages? I'll put forth that human villages also typically only have militias and not armies, though it isn't because humans as a race are peaceful, but because they can't support armies with a village's worth of supplies. I really feel like I'm dealing with Schrodinger's halflings here, since suddenly we have halfling cities and maybe even small halfling countries, when previously they just had small villages. Where is all of this coming from?Ah, you got me, egg on my face. I'm sure there are human settlements without halflings. In fact, humans seem to exist just fine without halflings. How many halfling cities with zero humans can we name? Not countries, cities.Can they overrule the king who commands the land their village sits on? "Sorry, High King Etheril, the Halfling Mayor of Gallybrooke said you are not allowed to go to war, we must call it off"So, if the human villages in the kingdom are considered to be going to war when the king declares war.... why aren't the halfling villages?Sure, maybe thousands of years ago halflings lived in this land and then the humans came in, waging war and conquering, and the halfling were like "sure, you can have all the land surrounding us, we weren't using it anyways" Of course, that still doesn't change the fact that when the humans, in the future, wage war and conquer that the halflings tend to follow them, which was my point.shrugMixed them up with Gaerdal IronhandShouldn't we know the answers to these questions instead of you having to answer me? Why is it that halflings turn to a life of crime so easily? Halflings live with humans constantly how do they interact with the humans and deal with their supposedly conflicting natures. Do human kingdoms make exceptions when they create peasant levies and ignore halflings? Why? How does this change the dynamic of the races? I can make up things, but if halflings are supposedly defined by their peacefulness and unwillingness to go to war (but not to kill things during adventures) then shouldn't this be a major thing discussed in the books?How is it on me? I didn't create halflings, you won't find my name listed in the PHB. Why is it my fault that halflings lack anything that can possibly define them besides just vague platitudes? And, again, if it is just cultural, why can't halflings be a sub-race of Gnomes, just like hill dwarves and mountain dwarves? It is all only cultural after all.So, I can't point to a better designed version of something to say that the other version is poorly done? Meanwhile, others are allowed to constantly harp on Tolkien like he was somehow involved in the writing of Dungeons and Dragons? And sure, halflings are "playable" but they aren't good. As we have been discussing, you don't even seem to have a consistent definition of what a halfling is, since they keep morphing every time you find another point of mine you don't like.To answer the first point, it is because halflings cooking for halflings isn't special. It would be like a human cooking for a human, kind of obvious. But, again, you decided to phrase it thusly, "So in that case, being the best, most cheerful hosts and chefs is equally as useful as whatever abilities elves and dwarfs are. Probably more useful, in fact, because you being able to change your gender over night doesn't affect me in anyway, but you being able to cook me a good breakfast does."You were the one who decided that the elvish expierence of Gender doesn't matter, because it can't provide anything for humans (or other races, I guess). That wasn't me. That was your take away. You need to defend that, especially since...<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Dragon's hoards are tied directly into their magic and their afterlife.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Mind Flayer's eat sentient brains, not just human brains.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Mimics look like treasure chests to lure in adventurers, adventurers are not solely human. Additionally, mimics can take on a variety of forms and adapt to what is most useful for their environment.</li> </ul>So... you were wrong about every single one of theseYep, common is the human language. Took them long enough to acknowledge that. Luckily, languages are not defining. Whether or not you speak common holds no bearing on whether you are an elf, dwarf, or dragon. As for the rest, yes, it is a game played by humans. So therefore the only way that halflings should be defined as a race is how useful they are to humans? I'm going to say yikes to that, and recommend you take a different stance, because that is a very very poor way to define a race of people.Why not? They are a fantasy race, if they aren't fantastical then what's the point? At that point they may as well just be humans.No, other people have declared that halflings need to be non-fantastical. That is there definition. I want them to be more fantastical, and you seem to think my pointing out the cognitivie dissonance between people insisting they are non-fantastical and the existence of rarely discussed fantastical options is somehow me trying to gas light you. Your understanding of the situation would be aided if you stop assuming I am a malicious agent.</blockquote>

Verification