What's with the Gnome Hate?

[frankthedm]

Legion of the anti gnome.

Don't like em as PC races, don't like 'em more than 1' tall.

 

[Danceofmasks]

3e gnomes were awesome. My favourite PHB race.
4e gnomes ... *sigh* ... they didn't make the cut 'cos they seem too similar to tieflings mechanically, and a decision was made.
Here's to PHB2

 

[Talzar]

Basically, a lot of players of Gnomes tend to think that Gnomes should be funny in a slightly annoying way.

Two big problems exist with this:
Funny is difficult. There are some gamers who pull this off effortlessly. There are other gamers who couldn't be funny if their life depended on it. Worse, there are some people who think simply playing a Gnome ought to be hilarious in and of itself - you know the kind of person who tells you a joke, you don't laugh, so they repeat it louder as if that will make it funny? You don't laugh at those Gnomes, they'll try to do it bigger as if that will make it more funny.

Annoying is easy. Combine an annoying player with a Gnome and you don't get slightly annoying. You get really annoying.

That's why people hate Gnomes.

This is true for me. I do not dislike gnomes, so much as the way most people have played them. Same with halflings, to a greater extent. I blame Dragonlance for giving my friends strange ideas about how those two races should be played.

 

[Danceofmasks]

Bad dragonlance. Bad.
I blame dragonlance for putting into a vast number of folks' heads the idea that deus ex machina is an acceptable plot device.

 

[KingCrab]

2e Desert of Desolation: Prit (the gnome) may be my favorite module NPC of all time. That guy had class.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

There are fewer and fewer gnome haters all the time.

Quickly hides the knife.

What?

 

[small pumpkin man]

It's so much hate as disinterest. Why would I want to play a dorky looking 3 foot tall guy? Dwarves are tougher and humans are better magic users, there's no hook.

gnomes were never that hard to figure out. you have 2 real options:

1. Magical, and not very serious
2. Tinkering, and machine building

So the two major archetypes are "silly and mood breaking" and "likes to dabble with things which don't fit into most D&D settings". Is it that much of a shock the never got much love?

 

[AllisterH]

*Shrug*

You got to understand the history of gnomes to understand why they weren't that popular.

In 1e/2e, the gnome "niche" was that it was a spellcasting dwarf. Basically, the fluff said they were a cousin race to dwarves (In Mystara for example, the lore was that they were designed by Moridin as an offshoot for example) and they basically had the same stats as a dwarf and culture as well. Now, this wouldn't be so bad but there's one thing that really turned gamers off. While Dwarves prided themselves on their beard, gnomes prided themselves on the size of the NOSE. Needless to say, you're not going to get many gamers running around wanting to play it.

Throw in the image of the gnomes weren't that hot. For example, I dare anyone to look at the 2E PHB and not wonder why the gnomes looks likes a mini Santa. Then you had TSR's own portrayal of gnomes. 2E produced a lot of campaign settings but let's look at how gnomes were portrayed.

1. Dragonlance gave the abominable tinkergnome schtick which Spelljammer followed up on.

2. Forgotten Realms used a toned down version of the tinker gnome but the only time you went to their homeland was if you wanted guns in your FR. Needless to say, that ain't exactly popular among fans.

3. Ravenloft and Planescape retty much ignored gnomes. I'm honestly blanking in trying to remember a gnome NPC from either Ravenloft or PS.

4. Greyhawk and Mystara mentions them once or twice with regard to their connection to dwarves but after that, they just disappear from the setting.

1. Birthright and Darksun actually killed them off.

When 3E lifted the class race restriction, it actually helped kill off gnomes even faster. If you wanted a spellcasting dwarf, why play the gnome just play the real thing.

So later on, this "forest dwelling fey" niche seems to been latched on by WOTC but that itself started to horn in on the ELF niche (which the Eladrin represent). If you wanted to play said race, going back to 1E, elves were the "forest dwelling arcanist fey" race.

Again, the gnome was pretty much ignored in 2E, got screwed over by 3E and I think 4E finally said, "ok, let's go back to the drawing board and try to get it right"

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

So the two major archetypes are "silly and mood breaking"

You must have the only D&D game I've ever heard of that didn't dissolve into Monty Python quote fests, sophomoric humor involving bodily functions and stupid pranks pulled on other players.

"Mood breaking?" Based on most of the games I've participated in, most players are closer to gnomes than they are any other PHB race.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

4. Greyhawk and Mystara mentions them once or twice with regard to their connection to dwarves but after that, they just disappear from the setting.

Or not.