I don't think this is what they are. I think they are prankster illusionist characters and tinkerers (which I wouldn't see as a mockery of science---though dragon lance executed that concept in a humorous way which I felt worked actually). I also can see them as eccentric academics. These are, in my opinion resonant and workable. At the very least they are as resonant and workable as 'arrogant and long lived forest recluses'
"Prankster illusionist" is resonant for an
individual character; it can be very difficult or even impossible to pull off as a
whole group characteristic. Even in an individual character, "prankster illusionist" is best used strategically. It gets old pretty fast otherwise.
"Tinkerer" can be resonant, but gnomes don't have
enough going on with it. What are they tinkering on? Why? It's not enough to just say they tinker.
Whether or not their humorous depiction worked in DL, that depiction has become Flanderized in nearly every other fantasy-related work that features them, and the joke is rarely (if ever) executed as well in those works as it was in DL. The key problem being, in order to portray a tinker in a humorous way, you generally need to make them either
incompetent or
unsafe, and both of these are not very interesting as character traits in a TTRPG party, the former being frustrating and the latter being outright problematic. Yes, it
can be workable, but there's a reason I made the analogy I made earlier to alternative sexual lifestyle choices: SOME people can do it, but a significant chunk of people who
try it are not ready for it or aren't capable of handling the responsibility. Kender are in a similar boat on this front.
"Eccentric academic" is, again, relatively niche, though more practical than the previous ones. The main problem is that it pigeonholes most gnomes into being...well, Wizards, or Artificers. There's not really any other options.
I don't think the fantasy zeitgeist is a good way to decide what races ought to be in a game.
Is that what's going on here? It seems to me that, instead, people are presenting their understanding of why it might be the case that gnomes don't have a good reputation in the community. One or two have, as a result, said that maybe gnomes aren't really a great fit as a "first core book" player race, and would instead be more appropriate as a supplemental race, in line with something like tortle or minotaur. That is, perfectly valid and worthy of support, especially since they feature prominently in famous settings, but not really something that needs to be featured front-and-center.
I don't think I've seen a single person say that gnomes should be
totally erased from the game. Even my proposal, which would "remove" gnomes, would simply merge them into the same group as halflings, while keeping most (though likely not all) of their unique features.
I think races that fit what the game is about and what you want people to be able to do with it (and what concepts you think will resonate and be useable) are far better than making races that fit peoples preconceived ideas from pop culture about gnomes, elves, etc.
Okay. That's completely valid, for
designing your own campaign world. I support that sort of stuff all the way. But it seems to me that people are saying that the "need" (as much as one can speak of such a thing) for gnomes can be satisfied with a supplemental book, rather than the PHB.
I don't see how having a race that matches what a random persons idea of something in the street is, is especially helpful for that (I think that is how you get a lot of boring gaming material).
Because the game is not just a toolbox. It is also a product. Products need to sell. Things sell better when they appeal to the interests of a variety of customers. There's a reason (even though people got SUPER PISSED about it back in the day) that 4e left gnomes for the PHB2 rather than featuring them in PHB1. They just aren't particularly popular, and there are good reasons why they aren't popular, even if those reasons don't logically apply to EVERY world ever created.
