Why are they making demi-humans taller?

[kennew142]

I've always thought that 3' was too small for a halfling. On the other hand, I like 5' tall elves. Of course, if I weren't afraid that WOTC ninjas would storm my house and slaughter my entire gaming group, I would just set these purely descriptive statistics at whatever I felt was appropriate for my setting.

 

[kennew142]

Well there appears to be a suggestively-dressed halfling woman on the cover of Dragon 285 - at least, she's a thief and it's an issue dedicated to halflings. I don't know if anyone was charged over it though.

I remember a comment when that issue came out that the cover suggested the halfling's favoured class was "prostitute."

I have to say that this issue does creep me out just a little. One adventure I was playing in (three years ago) had a halfling prostitute in it. One of the characters seemed very interested. At that moment, the fact that my 4 year old daughter was almost exactly the same size struck me like a bucket of ice water. It was a pretty creepy moment. I'm not saying that this is a good reason to change the default description of halflings. I'm just saying - creepy.

 

[Merlin the Tuna]

One of the points of playing a halfling was that you weren't always a potent melee threat, so you used stealth and trickery. They were a rewarding challenge to play. Challenging the player appears to be antithetical to the 4th edition design philosophy, however.

Please don't poop on the floor.

 

[JohnSnow]

the Races and Classes book explains that the 3e heights and weights made the halfling the equivalent of a 3 year old and the elf the equivalent of a 12 year old, neither of which worked thematically or from a practical point of view either.

Note from the Lord of the Rings - when he arrives at Minas Tirith, Pippin is mistaken for a lad of about 9 years old (the average British nine year old boy is currently 4' 5"). Now, Pippin may have been a bit larger than normal at this time because of the ent-draught, but it seems that 4ft is a much better average size for halflings (and a believable adventurer size too).

Cheers

I was just looking at the internal evidence, pursuant to the same discussion on the WotC boards. When he arrives in Minas Tirith, Pippin gives his own height to a young man as "four feet, and not likely to grow much more, save sideways."

When Sam and Frodo return, Sam repeatedly checks Merry and Pippin's heights against his and Frodo's, and says "Can't understand it at your age, but you're both three inches taller than you ought to be." Coupled with Pippin's comment, we can infer he was three foot nine when they left the Shire.

Based on the prologue, "Concerning Hobbits," Bandobras Took (Bullroarer) was four foot five, and unsurpassed among Hobbits, "save by two famous individuals, whose queer story is told in this book." Obviously, this means Merry and Pippin. Hence, by the time the story ends (and after a few more swigs of ent-draught), we can assume that they're both taller than four foot five.

But yeah, Tolkien's hobbits were closer to four feet than three.

 

[Badkarmaboy]

Please don't poop on the floor.

HA! That was funny enough to get a good old fashioned laugh..no lols here! Seriously.

One of the points of playing a halfling was that you weren't always a potent melee threat, so you used stealth and trickery. They were a rewarding challenge to play. Challenging the player appears to be antithetical to the 4th edition design philosophy, however.

Might just be me here, be even the new, taller, "super" halflings described don't exactly seem like a potent melee threat. If challenged by a full grown adult human or an adult halfling-I'd still keep my eye on the human.

Trying to say that the height adjustment = less player challenge seems silly (at least to me).

And please, like Merlin said...no floor pooping.

 

[Celebrim]

The simple answer is to make them cooler.

The longer answer takes into account several issues:

1) Modern humans are much larger than humans historically have been. Average human height is something like 5' 0" to 5' 4" depending on gender and race, historically, and through much of the world even to this day. By contrast, modern dutch males run around 6'2" on average. Other modern Westerners average around 5'11". So the relative proportions of 5', 4' and 3' adults to what we expect adult size to be seems alot smaller than it should. We aren't thinking in terms of medieval humans anymore.

2) The comparison to children is very very misleading. A better comparison would be to an actual Dwarf or Midget. A healthy male adult 'dwarf' could well bench press 300 lb+ despite being 4'6". There are very few 12 year olds that could do that. Similarly, I bet you can find little people in the 3'6" range who can bench press 120 lbs or more. Below that, you are getting into the range where humans can't really be described as 'healthy', but that's because we aren't designed to be that small. A humanoid race that naturally matured at 3' - 3' 6" would likely be stronger than humans of that size.

3) Neither drawfs or hobbits are proportionally identical to humans of the same height. Dwarfs look like human 'dwarfs', which is what you'd expect. The have large barrel chests relative to the length of thier limbs. Hobbits are described as having large hands and feet (and I would presume heads) for thier size, and I would presume that they have wrists and ankles to match. A halfling male might not be much bigger than my 2 year old, but it isn't unreasonable to presume that they would be about 5 times as strong and have agility not far removed from some of the medium sized cats (like a Caracal, for example).

4) The natural habit of players is to go for the 'kewl' factor. Speaking as a DM, I've never once had a player who played a character who wasn't at or near the upper end of height for a member of his race. Not once. Height in humans translates instinctually to authority. Almost noone wants to play someone who is 'lowly'. I've done it, but only as a conscious rejection of the trend once I noticed it, and that doesn't count (since standing apart is another way to be 'kewl' in modern society). The designers are just giving in to the overall wishes of the fan base.

 

[Celebrim]

I was just looking at the internal evidence, pursuant to the same discussion on the WotC boards. When he arrives in Minas Tirith, Pippin gives his own height to a young man as "four feet, and not likely to grow much more, save sideways."

When Sam and Frodo return, Sam repeatedly checks Merry and Pippin's heights against his and Frodo's, and says "Can't understand it at your age, but you're both three inches taller than you ought to be." Coupled with Pippin's comment, we can infer he was three foot nine when they left the Shire.

Based on the prologue, "Concerning Hobbits," Bandobras Took (Bullroarer) was four foot five, and unsurpassed among Hobbits, "save by two famous individuals, whose queer story is told in this book." Obviously, this means Merry and Pippin. Hence, by the time the story ends (and after a few more swigs of ent-draught), we can assume that they're both taller than four foot five.

All of which is true, but Pippin also says that he is accounted 'uncommonly large'. He's also a 'Fallohide' stock, which is the tallest of the three mentioned halfling ethnic groups. We can presume that even Pippin's 3'9" is something like 6'4" would be today. By the time he gets to 4'0" he's the Shaquil O'Neal of hobbits, and by the time he passes 4'5" he's a legendary giant.

I don't think you can assume that "Tolkien's Hobbits are closer to 4' than 3'" using legendary heroes as examples of average height, unless you are also prepared to assume that ordinary humans and not merely ones legendary for thier size are 7'-8' tall. If they are much bigger than 3' feet, then it doesn't seem like anyone should have coined the name 'halfling'.

My assumption has always been that Halfling Males are about 3'3"-3'6" in height, and halfling females are somewhat shorter.

 

[kennew142]

I don't think you can assume that "Tolkien's Hobbits are closer to 4' than 3'" using legendary heroes as examples of average height, unless you are also prepared to assume that ordinary humans and not merely ones legendary for thier size are 7'-8' tall.

I thought that we had already established in another thread that all the characters in the LoTR were not heroes or legends, but rather simple everymen from beginning to end.

If they are much bigger than 3' feet, then it doesn't seem like anyone should have coined the name 'halfling'.

I think you are being too literal here. I think a human, looking at a race of 4' tall folks would easily coin the term halfling for them. I doubt they would pull out a measuring tape to be sure that they were exactly half the size of a human. Sometimes we call people shrimps, when they are neither crustaceans, nor one inch tall.

Besides, a race that was about 4' tall would still be less than half human size if you were counting mass or weight.

 

[Dormammu]

I was just looking at the internal evidence, pursuant to the same discussion on the WotC boards. When he arrives in Minas Tirith, Pippin gives his own height to a young man as "four feet, and not likely to grow much more, save sideways."

Some good evidence, but this is the one part I wouldn't track too literally. Pippen may well mean something like "about four feet" rather than "four feet and zero inches on the button". He could easily be like 3'10" for example, and this would alter the numbers significantly within the range you are discussing. Or converselely, perhaps 4'2"ish is what he's used to but the ent-draught already has him even bigger and then you don't have to assume he grew even more by the final portions of the book.

 

[Ahglock]

I'd rather them keep them smaller but it isn't a huge issue.