D&D 5E What interesting niche do Gnomes have in your Homebrew Campaigns?

[Tales and Chronicles]

My gnomes gain most of the tropes of the dwarves as miners and craftsman and their relation to earth, stone and gems. They are tiny, though. They are Brownies, using fey-mirage to hide themselves while they work relentlessly on hundreds of tasks at the time.

On the other hand, Dwarves arent all that small. They are just called ''dwarves'' because they are the descendant of the folk enslaved by the Giant empire of old (taken from 4e lore). So they are more or less as tall a humans. That's also why dwarven dialects are written in Dethek, just like Giants. They are still inhabiting the converted ruins of Ostoria, keeping the themes of Mountain folk, stout & grim folk, lost treasures, wandering folk without a homeland etc

 

[toucanbuzz]

Like @Voadam I prefer Pathfinder's "bleaching fey" gnomes. They were a colorful (literally) fey race forced to leave the First World (fey realm) a long time ago. They have an enigmatic existence where if they aren't experiencing new things, they gradually fade away, called bleaching, where the color leaves them until they fade away. Their fey background seems instinctively to involve pranks and nonsensical jokes. Their existence is all about "action over inaction."

For my upcoming Dragonlance campaign, I'm adopting gnomes as-is from that setting, removing the "curse" that plagues the gnomes of Ansalon (wherein their inventions don't work). They're tinkers and makers, thinking faster than they can speak, and constantly thinking of the next great way to improve on something, often however overstepping prudence with progress.

 

[RoughCoronet0]

The gnomes of my world act very much like the cross between dwarves and elves as far as how they are portrayed. They are gruff craftsmen but typically of potions, herbal substances, and other alchemical items as well as more unconventional mechanical contraptions instead of weapons, armor and other more common crafts of the dwarves. They are fairly in touch with nature and the arcane but are not as isolationist or aloof as the elves typically are. They often act as liaisons between Dwarves and Elves.

 

[Omand]

Great topic.

I currently do not have gnomes in my homebrew as I have struggled with how to fit them in an portray them. With Halflings also around to fit the small people slot (and I use Kobolds as well), I have not been able to see a place for them.

I will have to consider some of the options in this thread.

Cheers

 

[jgsugden]

In my setting, the various heritages originated when the Gods discovered that free willed servants that worshipped them granted them greater power. My Gods use common names from Greyhawk and the Dawn War Pantheons, now, but those are reskins to make them more accessible to new players after I moved across the country. Originally they were all homebrew. Most gnomes tend to live in cultures with strong ties back to their origin, but a small percentage break from those origins and live independent of the influence of their origin.

Rock gnomes were crafted by Erathis, and their craftsmanship is part of their cultural homage to their origin. They tend to unite and build. They also work Spelljammers, as do another heritage that originated with Erathis - the Giff. They are strongly affiliated with the Giff. This Erathis ascended to Godhood from a Gold Dragon origin, and the Rock Gnomes have a touch of Gold Dragon embedded into their cultural iconography.

The majority of Forest Gnomes come from two origins. One set are culturally tricksters. Their heritage was crafted by Erevan Ilesere. They have ties to the Archfey and elves. They tend to come from smaller clans and splinter from their clans to form new clans at young ages. The lessons of their ancestors encourage them to sow chaos, but not animosity. However, these forest gnomes were copied from the creation of Obad-hai, who is alignde with very primal nature magics. They have a strong alignment with beasts and live in harmony with them in natural settings.

The Deep Gnomes originated as a creation of the God of Dark Magics, Wee Jas. This Wee Jas is a bit different than the one many of you know. The Dark Magics are born of twisted and evil Fey Pacts, and the Deep Gnome clans are the scribes and servants of these Dark Pacts. These Dark Fey Magics are often built upon blood sacrifices, murders, and forture - and many of the Deep Gnomes are influenced by constant exposure to those levels of evil.

 

[Ancalagon]

In one game I was a player, I had developed Gnomish culture - they lived in a rough area called the "red hills" (inspired by an unamed region between the Alay valley and the Tarim basin in the real world). In these arid and maze-like hills, fierce clans of gnomes lived. My PC was a guide (a ranger) who helped merchant travel the area and avoid the goblin tribes, for a hefty fee of course...

In another game, I play an Autognome - I am a space probe, sent to travel the stars and explore. I do not know who my creators are, but I have heard rumors of a vast empire that trade cookies. (the PC is a fathomless warlock, but instead of the sea it's space-themed, and his powers are mechanical based)

So why not play an artificer? Because in the same campaign we have a flesh and blood gnome artificer

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Welp…

 

[doctorbadwolf]

I like my buddy’s gnomes, so I’m stealing them.

They’re basically Irish tree folk.

 

[Greenstone.Walker]

In my world, the gnomes and the haflings are opposite reponses to colonialism. Both of them are very old races who inhabited the current region before elves and humans and dwarves moved in. As the "big people" expanded from their own homelands, the gnomes and the halflings responded differently.

Halflings integrated with the colonisers, abandoning their own customs and history. Today, halflings live in human and elven and dwarven settlements, following human and elven and dwarven customs. Few halflings know their own language any more.

Gnomes retreated into the woods and hills, hiding their communities away from the world. A village could be half a days walk from a gnome settlement and not know it.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

In a campaign I was working on, Gnomes were true fey, but not as inherently powerful as others of their kind. There were two kinds.

The Forest gnomes were everything we associate with that name- small, cap-wearing beings who could communicate with animals. More nature-oriented than Elves.

The Tinker gnomes were inspired by the ones from D&D, but with a twist. Their mechanical creations were still functional, but only worked for gnomes.