D&D General Why Do People Hate Gnomes?

[Vaalingrade]

and that's bad? To me that can only be positive, as it gives more options and inspiration to the player.

With no real pop cultural focus and identity, they're just a big ball of nothing.

 

[Bolares]

With no real pop cultural focus and identity, they're just a big ball of nothing.

you just said they have 10 identities... I'm sorry, I just don't get your point. They have too many identities or they are a big ball of nothing? Those two statements seem contradictory to me.

 

[Oofta]

I don't know if people hate them, I know I don't even if I do make fun of them now and then. But they are kind of a walking punchline with little or no identity, no matter how much I try to give them one in my own campaign world. Even when I've played gnomes they aren't very serious.

Short isn't taken seriously and the assumption is that short means childlike and immature somehow, not really threatening*. Elves used max out at a little over 5 foot. But now because they're a popular race they're just a couple inches shorter than your average human at most.

Since they can't be taken seriously and have never been given a more serious treatment, they get relegated to "cute" and comedic relief . Throw in the lack of coherent story and origin background and it's hardly a surprise they get no respect.

*Same thing happened with Star Trek's Ferengi. They were supposed to be a major new antagonist, but the guy who produced the episode they were introduced in turned them into cartoonish clowns.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

you just said they have 10 identities... I'm sorry, I just don't get your point. They have too many identities or they are a big ball of nothing? Those two statements seem contradictory to me.

They don't have an unifying core. Tell us what you think defines gnomes as a whole?

 

[Vaalingrade]

you just said they have 10 identities... I'm sorry, I just don't get your point. They have too many identities or they are a big ball of nothing? Those two statements seem contradictory to me.

The issue is one of focus. When you think elf, you think Legolas. When you think Dwarf, you think John Rhys Davis. There's a starting point. There's a base from which you can work.

With a gnome, you don't have anything solid to start with, just a nebulous cloud of (mostly) joke ideas. That's the big ball of nothing.

 

[Bolares]

The issue is one of focus. When you think elf, you think Legolas. When you think Dwarf, you think John Rhys Davis. There's a starting point. There's a base from which you can work.

With a gnome, you don't have anything solid to start with, just a nebulous cloud of (mostly) joke ideas. That's the big ball of nothing.

I get your point now, thanks. My different perspective is that I don't relate my D&D so closely to Tolkien. Rarely my elves and dwarves look like LotR characters and since I read the description of gnomes in 3.0 I took an interest to them. The lore in the PHB and in setting books was always suficient for me to play D&D, the notion of a race not having a seminal pop culture reference outside of the game mattering in game is kind of alien to me. Also, anyone who read Eberron has an example of deep and focused identities for their gnomes.

 

[Bolares]

They don't have an unifying core. Tell us what you think defines gnomes as a whole?

I don't really like races to have that strong unifying core. I like that gnomes can be tinkerers, pranksters, good hearted burrowing people with ties to small mammals, fey creatures... Eberron is my favourite setting, and the notions it stablishes kind of bleed in to the way I see the game as a whole, so cultural ties are way more important than racial ones to me, and I like that I can create many different gnome cultures and they can all be true at the same time.

 

[Seramus]

The issue is one of focus. When you think elf, you think Legolas. When you think Dwarf, you think John Rhys Davis. There's a starting point. There's a base from which you can work.

Or a Pantheon of Gods. A small number of gods is extremely memorable and has a strong identity. But when you add a dozen different Pantheons each with their own set of gods, it bleeds together into a mush.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

I don't really like races to have that strong unifying core. I like that gnomes can be tinkerers, pranksters, good hearted burrowing people with ties to small mammals, fey creatures... Eberron is my favourite setting, and the notions it stablishes kind of bleed in to the way I see the game as a whole, so cultural ties are way more important than racial ones to me, and I like that I can create many different gnome cultures and they can all be true at the same time.

But what does them being gnomes add to this? Why these exact same cultures cannot just be halfling cultures?

 

[Bolares]

But what does them being gnomes add to this? Why these exact same cultures cannot just be halfling cultures?

Couldn't the same be said of any race? being gnomes add to it because that was the lore (or lores) stabilished for gnomes. Any race could be given any culture (some would need a shift in mechanics though). I'm not trying to say everyone should like gnomes. You like what you like, and that's fine. I'm just trying to say that for some of us tolkien is not that important to the game...