Can gnomes be evil? [Archive] - Wizards Community

Can gnomes be evil? [Archive] - Wizards Community

Post/Author/DateTime Post
mykol
03-04-07, 08:40 PM Ok, so i'm getting ready to start a melee gnome and i'm going to be playing in a lower alignment game. i'm pretty sure i'll end up going LE, and i've thought of a possible storyline involving something like my village gets raided when i'm very very young, i attack the raid leader with a dagger, he laughs, takes me with him figuring maybe he can find a use for me. raises me somewhat like the kid he never had/wanted. im not forced into evil things, but in being around that society, i fall into the culture (think last samurai), and end up becoming a functioning member of the society as far as training in weapons, my behavior, etc. the problem i'm having is, i can't seem to find ANY documentation online, in books, about gnomes of lower alignment, what their tendencies are, etc. all i can find is in the PHB it says "evil gnomes are as rare as they are frightning" obviously i can play this gnome anyway i choose, but does anyone have any thoughts/ideas/examples of evil gnomes i might be able to pilfer ideas from? thanks.
RoninFrosty
03-05-07, 12:25 AM I know there's some evil gnomes somewhere...maybe Deitied and Demigods, talking about Norse culture? I'm not sure. Could even be in the MM. Sorry I don't remember the exact reference, but I'm sure it's in one of those two books.
ToxicWiz
03-05-07, 11:26 AM There's one in BoVD somewhere. I played an evil gnome as insane, but it was a light-hearted game, so his completely macbre and random comments were brushed off.

There seem to be very few evil gnomes out there. Think your going to be out of luck on that one.

My current gnome is LE, but i haven't had a session with him. sorry i can't help more!
Sorn_Toril
03-05-07, 02:21 PM Hmm... The age old question of why is someone evil. There are an infinite number of reasons that your gnome could be evil. Perhaps after he was taken he actually became happy living with the man who killed his village. And from there determined that the only way to happiness was through such deeds. Perhaps he saw that by making others suffer in this society people got the things that they wanted. Self-fullfilment through being more powerful than others. The whole Darwin belief of survival of the fittest. With perhaps a Loki complex? ( Loki the Norse god of Chaos and pranks.)
mykol
03-05-07, 07:02 PM thanks for all the suggestions guys. i'm not looking for as much of why he's evil as "what traits make im evil" because if you read books you see gnomes are mechanical, usually good, out going, trickery, blah blah blah...i'm just delving into what habbits a gnome who is evil may have vs habbits of a human who's evil. for example, you may have an evil human caster bent on world domination who tries to become a lich, etc. but with a gnome...how often do you hear a little guy go "i wanna dominate the world!!!!" i'd tend to think they'd have smaller wants and different qwircks. THANK YOU everyone for the input.
Dither
03-05-07, 07:42 PM The most likely evil alignment for a gnome is chaotic evil.

gnomes tend to be tricksters, and it's easy to see a gnome crossing the line between playful prankster and sociopathic killer. Think of SAW, if you were unfortunate enough to see that movie.

I've built quite a few evil gnome wizards, and they tend to be chaotic evil evokers, necromancers, and transmuters... though for illusionists, I would tend to see them as neutral evil; not tending towards chaos, but rather using their racial tendency towards illusions as a means to an end.

I also see the binder and shadowcaster classes as having dark influences on gnomes, causing them to tend towards evil; in fact, I imagine shadowcaster would be the easiest explanation for a LE gnome, something I would otherwise discourage flavor-wise.

...

Other than that, honestly, bards, fighters, rogues can be of any alignment (except that bads cannot be lawful) and they typically fall through the cracks and become evil when life gets too tough to maintain morals.
Ensjak
03-05-07, 08:38 PM Uf you've ever played Baldur's Gate 2, there's a gnome illusionist who takes over a circus tent. He makes it look like a palace on the inside and turns everyone into illusionary monsters to serve him. He's definitely a quirky kind of evil. After you defeat him he talks about being angry over always being made fun of for being small.

Think about the quirkiness of gnome society and twist it. For example, an evil gnomish alchemist who can't stand that a human is as good or better at making potions might resort to other more nefarious means to ensure his business thrives. A gnomish meleer might pretend to be righteous about facing bigger folk in a fair fight to prove that a gnome is a human's equal all so that his opponents don't expect his blade to be poisoned during a duel. Gnomish engineers and mechanics could just as easily make complex torture devices as they could more benevolent machinery. I admit that some of these examples aren't that great but I've never really paid much attention to gnomes.
Regular_K
03-05-07, 10:41 PM Oh yeah. I had a gnome barowner and he murdered people and made them into pies. If that's not evil, I don't know what is.
trickydevl666
03-07-07, 01:04 AM Oh yeah. I had a gnome barowner and he murdered people and made them into pies. If that's not evil, I don't know what is.

So Sweeney Todd the Gnome?
Anansi
03-10-07, 02:36 PM In response to the title of this thread...

No, gnomes cannot be evil.

Any attempt at generating an evil gnomish character will immediately result in prosecution to the furthest extent of the law.

You have been warned.
fiendish_platypus
03-10-07, 02:48 PM In response to the title of this thread...

No, gnomes cannot be evil.

Any attempt at generating an evil gnomish character will immediately result in prosecution to the furthest extent of the law.

You have been warned.

You're a fruit.
JaracktheFoul
03-11-07, 04:22 PM I am currently playing an evil Fighter Gnome - the reason he is evil? He has a severe napoleon complex and has something to prove. He is vengeful and angry at the larger society around him and sees himself as big even though he is small even for a gnome.

But it is probably the funnest character I have ever played - the angry things he spouts are great and very gnomish.
Nived
03-11-07, 10:32 PM I know of an evil Gnome.

Spoilers for an Eberron Novel.

Professor Praxle d'Silvis. From the novel The Orb of Xoriat. Praxle is a cunning gnome sorcerer specializing in illusion magic. Through most of the novel you don't know whose side he's on but he turns out to be the BBEG. He's clever, outsmarts his foes and turns his enemies against each other. Why is he evil? Well he covets the Orb of Xoriat, an artifact from the Plane of Madness that devours souls... and if you know how to use it, you can absorb those souls and make yourself infinatly more powerful. He believes it can make him a god amongst men, and he doesn't really care who he has to kill to get there, though generally he gets people to kill each other allowing him to walk away with the goods.

Truly great uses of illusions in the novel too.

Bonus points for having a half orc manservant he calls Jeffers.
Sands_Of_Chaos
03-11-07, 11:56 PM I say that the gnomes, like any other being, would have great potential to be evil. However it means nothing if you dont unleash it!
mykol
03-12-07, 12:08 AM ok...so back to my original post...i need traits that an evil gnome melee char might have. i know that tricksters will use magic for this and that, but what about a melee? someone made the good point of "napolean complex" but that's just way to easy, i need something a bit more deep. lets get some Saap type responses =p
Devlonir
03-12-07, 04:34 AM Well I agree that an evil gnome would have a normal gnome's traits.. only twisted.

So what are the traits of a gnome?

They are curious beings, with a great thirst for knowledge and a certain form of envy towards the big folk. They often have a certain interest and drown themselves completely in it to be better at it than anyone else!

How would an evil melee character gnome be than? That's a tough one.. although the traits of an evil warrior Gnome arent as hard as why a gnome would become one..

I'd say that he enjoys hurting people. He likes the sound of a blade plunging into a body and to see the blood and guts. Maybe he has an interest for anatomy and sometimes even cuts open his foes to see how they look on the inside. His entire drive to kill people comes from a morbid interest in anatomy. He could believe that people's personalities are also defined in their anatomy and wants to test this by making notes of peoples personalities, than killing them and doing a deep going investigation of the body.

It is very twisted and just an idea i came up with, i hope it helps you in the right direction.
Anansi
03-12-07, 09:56 PM You're a fruit.
You're terminally humourless.
Sikyanakotik
03-13-07, 01:06 PM You're terminally humourless.

Oh my god, a talking apple!

:shifty:
Corlindale
03-15-07, 04:44 AM My Gnome went from CN to CE yesterday. His initial motivation was actually quite sympathetic - he was a clockmaker and had lost all his goods on a trade journey because the ship went into a storm, and he seeked to earn enough money to start his business anew.
However, the methods he used to aquire this money grew increasingly dishonest, though not necessarily evil. He double-crossed someone who'd rewarded him and a friend handsomely for saving his life earlier, and thereby came to throw an entire nation into civil unrest.
Later on, he got hired by an army to help them with their fortification(his skills with clockwork also made him an adept trapmaker). He was eventually asked to do an infiltration method into enemy lands, and on their soil the first thing he did was to sell detailed information about the fortifications he had made to the enemies. Then he joined their army, only to lead their soldiers into the arms of an enemy company. This is probably when pure Chaos started to become more of a motivation than gold for him.

He was pushed over the edge towards evil by his travelling companion, though, who had at this time become a cleric of Nerull, God of Death. I think their next step will be gathering a cult of followers and taking over the world... :devil:

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
mykol 03-04-07, 08:40 PM	Ok, so i'm getting ready to start a melee gnome and i'm going to be playing in a lower alignment game. i'm pretty sure i'll end up going LE, and i've thought of a possible storyline involving something like my village gets raided when i'm very very young, i attack the raid leader with a dagger, he laughs, takes me with him figuring maybe he can find a use for me. raises me somewhat like the kid he never had/wanted. im not forced into evil things, but in being around that society, i fall into the culture (think last samurai), and end up becoming a functioning member of the society as far as training in weapons, my behavior, etc. the problem i'm having is, i can't seem to find ANY documentation online, in books, about gnomes of lower alignment, what their tendencies are, etc. all i can find is in the PHB it says "evil gnomes are as rare as they are frightning" obviously i can play this gnome anyway i choose, but does anyone have any thoughts/ideas/examples of evil gnomes i might be able to pilfer ideas from? thanks.
RoninFrosty 03-05-07, 12:25 AM	I know there's some evil gnomes somewhere...maybe Deitied and Demigods, talking about Norse culture? I'm not sure. Could even be in the MM. Sorry I don't remember the exact reference, but I'm sure it's in one of those two books.
ToxicWiz 03-05-07, 11:26 AM	There's one in BoVD somewhere. I played an evil gnome as insane, but it was a light-hearted game, so his completely macbre and random comments were brushed off. There seem to be very few evil gnomes out there. Think your going to be out of luck on that one. My current gnome is LE, but i haven't had a session with him. sorry i can't help more!
Sorn_Toril 03-05-07, 02:21 PM	Hmm... The age old question of why is someone evil. There are an infinite number of reasons that your gnome could be evil. Perhaps after he was taken he actually became happy living with the man who killed his village. And from there determined that the only way to happiness was through such deeds. Perhaps he saw that by making others suffer in this society people got the things that they wanted. Self-fullfilment through being more powerful than others. The whole Darwin belief of survival of the fittest. With perhaps a Loki complex? ( Loki the Norse god of Chaos and pranks.)
mykol 03-05-07, 07:02 PM	thanks for all the suggestions guys. i'm not looking for as much of why he's evil as "what traits make im evil" because if you read books you see gnomes are mechanical, usually good, out going, trickery, blah blah blah...i'm just delving into what habbits a gnome who is evil may have vs habbits of a human who's evil. for example, you may have an evil human caster bent on world domination who tries to become a lich, etc. but with a gnome...how often do you hear a little guy go "i wanna dominate the world!!!!" i'd tend to think they'd have smaller wants and different qwircks. THANK YOU everyone for the input.
Dither 03-05-07, 07:42 PM	The most likely evil alignment for a gnome is chaotic evil. gnomes tend to be tricksters, and it's easy to see a gnome crossing the line between playful prankster and sociopathic killer. Think of SAW, if you were unfortunate enough to see that movie. I've built quite a few evil gnome wizards, and they tend to be chaotic evil evokers, necromancers, and transmuters... though for illusionists, I would tend to see them as neutral evil; not tending towards chaos, but rather using their racial tendency towards illusions as a means to an end. I also see the binder and shadowcaster classes as having dark influences on gnomes, causing them to tend towards evil; in fact, I imagine shadowcaster would be the easiest explanation for a LE gnome, something I would otherwise discourage flavor-wise. ... Other than that, honestly, bards, fighters, rogues can be of any alignment (except that bads cannot be lawful) and they typically fall through the cracks and become evil when life gets too tough to maintain morals.
Ensjak 03-05-07, 08:38 PM	Uf you've ever played Baldur's Gate 2, there's a gnome illusionist who takes over a circus tent. He makes it look like a palace on the inside and turns everyone into illusionary monsters to serve him. He's definitely a quirky kind of evil. After you defeat him he talks about being angry over always being made fun of for being small. Think about the quirkiness of gnome society and twist it. For example, an evil gnomish alchemist who can't stand that a human is as good or better at making potions might resort to other more nefarious means to ensure his business thrives. A gnomish meleer might pretend to be righteous about facing bigger folk in a fair fight to prove that a gnome is a human's equal all so that his opponents don't expect his blade to be poisoned during a duel. Gnomish engineers and mechanics could just as easily make complex torture devices as they could more benevolent machinery. I admit that some of these examples aren't that great but I've never really paid much attention to gnomes.
Regular_K 03-05-07, 10:41 PM	Oh yeah. I had a gnome barowner and he murdered people and made them into pies. If that's not evil, I don't know what is.
trickydevl666 03-07-07, 01:04 AM	Oh yeah. I had a gnome barowner and he murdered people and made them into pies. If that's not evil, I don't know what is. So Sweeney Todd the Gnome?
Anansi 03-10-07, 02:36 PM	In response to the title of this thread... No, gnomes cannot be evil. Any attempt at generating an evil gnomish character will immediately result in prosecution to the furthest extent of the law. You have been warned.
fiendish_platypus 03-10-07, 02:48 PM	In response to the title of this thread... No, gnomes cannot be evil. Any attempt at generating an evil gnomish character will immediately result in prosecution to the furthest extent of the law. You have been warned. You're a fruit.
JaracktheFoul 03-11-07, 04:22 PM	I am currently playing an evil Fighter Gnome - the reason he is evil? He has a severe napoleon complex and has something to prove. He is vengeful and angry at the larger society around him and sees himself as big even though he is small even for a gnome. But it is probably the funnest character I have ever played - the angry things he spouts are great and very gnomish.
Nived 03-11-07, 10:32 PM	I know of an evil Gnome. Spoilers for an Eberron Novel. Professor Praxle d'Silvis. From the novel The Orb of Xoriat. Praxle is a cunning gnome sorcerer specializing in illusion magic. Through most of the novel you don't know whose side he's on but he turns out to be the BBEG. He's clever, outsmarts his foes and turns his enemies against each other. Why is he evil? Well he covets the Orb of Xoriat, an artifact from the Plane of Madness that devours souls... and if you know how to use it, you can absorb those souls and make yourself infinatly more powerful. He believes it can make him a god amongst men, and he doesn't really care who he has to kill to get there, though generally he gets people to kill each other allowing him to walk away with the goods. Truly great uses of illusions in the novel too. Bonus points for having a half orc manservant he calls Jeffers.
Sands_Of_Chaos 03-11-07, 11:56 PM	I say that the gnomes, like any other being, would have great potential to be evil. However it means nothing if you dont unleash it!
mykol 03-12-07, 12:08 AM	ok...so back to my original post...i need traits that an evil gnome melee char might have. i know that tricksters will use magic for this and that, but what about a melee? someone made the good point of "napolean complex" but that's just way to easy, i need something a bit more deep. lets get some Saap type responses =p
Devlonir 03-12-07, 04:34 AM	Well I agree that an evil gnome would have a normal gnome's traits.. only twisted. So what are the traits of a gnome? They are curious beings, with a great thirst for knowledge and a certain form of envy towards the big folk. They often have a certain interest and drown themselves completely in it to be better at it than anyone else! How would an evil melee character gnome be than? That's a tough one.. although the traits of an evil warrior Gnome arent as hard as why a gnome would become one.. I'd say that he enjoys hurting people. He likes the sound of a blade plunging into a body and to see the blood and guts. Maybe he has an interest for anatomy and sometimes even cuts open his foes to see how they look on the inside. His entire drive to kill people comes from a morbid interest in anatomy. He could believe that people's personalities are also defined in their anatomy and wants to test this by making notes of peoples personalities, than killing them and doing a deep going investigation of the body. It is very twisted and just an idea i came up with, i hope it helps you in the right direction.
Anansi 03-12-07, 09:56 PM	You're a fruit. You're terminally humourless.
Sikyanakotik 03-13-07, 01:06 PM	You're terminally humourless. Oh my god, a talking apple! :shifty:
Corlindale 03-15-07, 04:44 AM	My Gnome went from CN to CE yesterday. His initial motivation was actually quite sympathetic - he was a clockmaker and had lost all his goods on a trade journey because the ship went into a storm, and he seeked to earn enough money to start his business anew. However, the methods he used to aquire this money grew increasingly dishonest, though not necessarily evil. He double-crossed someone who'd rewarded him and a friend handsomely for saving his life earlier, and thereby came to throw an entire nation into civil unrest. Later on, he got hired by an army to help them with their fortification(his skills with clockwork also made him an adept trapmaker). He was eventually asked to do an infiltration method into enemy lands, and on their soil the first thing he did was to sell detailed information about the fortifications he had made to the enemies. Then he joined their army, only to lead their soldiers into the arms of an enemy company. This is probably when pure Chaos started to become more of a motivation than gold for him. He was pushed over the edge towards evil by his travelling companion, though, who had at this time become a cleric of Nerull, God of Death. I think their next step will be gathering a cult of followers and taking over the world... :devil: