D&D General why do we have halflings and gnomes?

[LuisCarlos17f]

Now D&D have got two subcultures, the peaceful peasants and the trade travelers.

And we have to remember they are very used to breed many children, even more twenty. Their women are fertile for more a century, and they haven't to save money to send their children to an expensive magic university. Maybe they can't go to a high-school, but with enough time thanks longer longevity in home-schooling could learn a lot.

If you think here there is something like a "plot-hole" then let's show some suggestion to fix it.

 

[Oofta]

Hand axes
Sickles
daggers
hammers
short bows
spears

None of that is "advanced" all of it is stuff that a small community of commoners might easily have access to. Some of those are even required. It isn't like they built their houses using rocks to pound the wood togther.

Hatchets*, knives*, sickles, light hammers all do he same damage as clubs. Short bows and spears? Depends on if they're allowed to hunt and are in a region where hunting makes sense. Even then, only a small percentage of the population would be likely to have them, your world may be different but 25 GP for a shortbow is not pocket change.

But I'm just using the rules from the MM that says commoners by default use clubs. If your commoners have access to implements that are only useful as weapons in your world then halflings should have them as well.

*Hand axes and daggers are specialized weapons that would not be useful as farming implements.

 

[Maxperson]

Luiren, one of the two major halfling kingdoms on Faerun, got flooded during the Spellplague (the other, Delmyr, never gets talked about for some reason). Some of the population were trapped on mountains that became islands known the Great Sea; the rest of them scattered across Faerun, most of them settling in Amn. The Chondalwood also got messed up by Akanûl slamming into it, and thenw as further devastated during the Wailing Years.

Sure, but I'm not talking about the kingdoms. I'm talking about all the small out of the way villages.

 

[Maxperson]

The holy act of "these are the tactics inspired by those stories that they use to defend their villages"

Ah yes, I always love when things called "tactics" are really "religious acts"

Yes. A religious rite based on the tactics from their stories. A rite which only uses sticks and stones.

 

[Minigiant]

You do realize that Azeroth and all the other expansions combined would easily fit inside the county of Los Angeles(probably just the city), right? It's tiny.

So?
Doesnt mean that farming villages didn't have militias and answer to a higher power that managed the safety of the region.

Minigiant,

I'm not saying to be snarky or mean or anything, but while you say you don't hate halflings, is it possible you harbor an unexamined bias against them?

No.
I mean I prefer a game where my adventurer PC makes sense existing.

And the halfling write up runs completely contrary.

Hell many of the old school DMs run pretty grim games that I can't deal with in long doses. Then many of them run halflings like careless buffons who die by the dozen the second they leave home.

I like heroic fantasy. And it requires some danger and people who at least mindful of it and act accordingly. So the more you have halfling act different then the norm, the more explanation for it is needed so they don't feel alien.

I realize I don't have to justify not liking gnomes. I don't have to prostheletize the unworthiness of gnomes. I can just plan hate them without trying to fight everyone that likes them

But I don't hate halflings.

I love 3e and 4e halflings.

 

[Maxperson]

So?
Doesnt mean that farming villages didn't have militias and answer to a higher power that managed the safety of the region.

What do you mean, "so?" When the entire world is 100ish miles around(and that's generous), there are no out of the way places. You're trying to compare apples and aliens(oranges are too close).

 

[Minigiant]

What do you mean, "so?" When the entire world is 100ish miles around(and that's generous), there are no out of the way places. You're trying to compare apples and aliens(oranges are too close).

We aren't arguing size.

We are talking about setting with major factions being alliances of nations who have to deal with raiding, invasions, and random monsters on basis rare enough so that they can function but often enough that they hold on to these alliances, hire adventurers, and maintain economic, social, diplomatic, and militaristic systems.

 

[Vaalingrade]

Hell many of the old school DMs run pretty grim games that I can't deal with in long doses. Then many of them run halflings like careless buffons who die by the dozen the second they leave home.

I've never seen this. Now I'm feeling like your auto correct has been replacing 'halfling' with 'bard' because bards are the character type that is pointlessly played for laughs.

Or gnomes. As described before, a lot of D&D setting explicitly play gnomes for laughs. I've never seen halflings being the butt of immature portrayals.

But I don't hate halflings.

I love 3e and 4e halflings.

That really doesn't come across in the thread. You tell us so, but I'm not seeing the love. It's not even that you sound like you dislike the flavor text. Every time you restate your complaint, your first words are 'child-sized' and then you go form there, as if this is the heart of the problem.

 

[Minigiant]

I've never seen this. Now I'm feeling like your auto correct has been replacing 'halfling' with 'bard' because bards are the character type that is pointlessly played for laughs.

Or gnomes. As described before, a lot of D&D setting explicitly play gnomes for laughs. I've never seen halflings being the butt of immature portrayals.

As a player, NPC gnome villages and bard troupes are not as common as groups of halflings. And many of my DMs didn't know what to do with them.

That really doesn't come across in the thread. You tell us so, but I'm not seeing the love. It's not even that you sound like you dislike the flavor text. Every time you restate your complaint, your first words are 'child-sized' and then you go form there, as if this is the heart of the problem.

Because they are small.

I could get Giants being carefree because the number of humanoids who can really scare them could be counted with Thier toes.

But a 3ft guy? A 3ft guys has to think about these stuff. And halflings in 3e and 4e kind of do. Not be in constant fear but be mindful.

 

[Maxperson]

We aren't arguing size.

We are talking about setting with major factions being alliances of nations who have to deal with raiding, invasions, and random monsters on basis rare enough so that they can function but often enough that they hold on to these alliances, hire adventurers, and maintain economic, social, diplomatic, and militaristic systems.

The size of Azeroth is directly related to whether or not 5e Halflings could survive there. Make Azeroth the size of Earth and you could have hundreds of Halfling villages live completely unaware of all of the events that have happened, living peacefully and ignored.