i'm running a 3.5 homebrew and i was thinking of making gnomes all female and dwarves all male. this would make gnomes into dwarf wives or the like. no other races will be set up this way. how does that sound? would you as a player think it cheesy?
thanks
Is it just to be flavorful and funny?
Are you looking for a way of integrating both gnome and dwarf culture into your game without dealing with a whole other society?
Do you just think gnomes are girly and dwarves are manly?
Are there any gnome or dwarven players in your game?
How exactly will any gnome or dwarven PCs be affected?
If you are just trying to be funny, I agree with Magus that it could be funny. Unless you have some dwarf or gnome PCs, this isn't really a house rule so much as a house setting.
If you have some ulterior motive, I might agree with Crimson, though.
It's kind of weird how touchy the subject of gender in gaming is, so if you're just looking for a way of dealing with gnomes and dwarves with the same set, I would just make the society that the characters spend most of their time amongst half dwarf and half gnome. You can always make a few main NPC couples to show that dwarves and gnomes intermarry freely in that society, and that should still produce the same humor.
Here we have a most ingenius, clever and whimsical idea and it is followed for four or five posts trashing it, made by people who's tiny minds cannot conceive of the sense of it.
Sally. I think it's wonderfully clever! Absolutely love it. Wish there were more DMs as experimental as you are.
not looking for humor. it is mostly trying to have both races without making a new culture. there are no pcs of either race. the gnome trickster fluff will be thrown out and replaced by dwarf type fluff.
I think you can do whatever you want if there are no PCs.
You may not be looking for humor, but I wouldn't avoid it because it's going to be inevitable in that society.
You want to incorperate both races, but use only one culture.
You are also going to remove the Gnome "trickster" stuff and just replace it with "Dwarf" stuff.
So, in essence, Gnomes will be Small sized Dwarves, who are always female.
If you are going to remove all the Gnome fluff from the Gnomes anyway, why do you even need to do this? All that changes is that Dwarf woman are Small sized.
I love reading this forum. It reminds me how truly bland and unimaginative is the human race.
Here we have a most ingenius, clever and whimsical idea and it is followed for four or five posts trashing it, made by people who's tiny minds cannot conceive of the sense of it.
Sally. I think it's wonderfully clever! Absolutely love it. Wish there were more DMs as experimental as you are.
Easy there, Mr. No-human. First of all, there's no need to call names. Second of all, yes, I can't conceive the sense of it, because, as Rustmonster said, why the TC just don't say that all female dwarves are small sized? Simpler, easier, and wouldn't lead to the comical situations a gnome-as-dwarf-wife will surely lead to.
I love reading this forum. It reminds me how truly bland and unimaginative is the human race.
Here we have a most ingenius, clever and whimsical idea and it is followed for four or five posts trashing it, made by people who's tiny minds cannot conceive of the sense of it.
Sally. I think it's wonderfully clever! Absolutely love it. Wish there were more DMs as experimental as you are.
Well that was not called for. He asked what we thought, and some of us don't like it. Boo-hoo. Would you prefer we lie to him and tell him we like it even if we don't? Because that would defeat the entire purpose of the topic. Do you think he thought absolutely everybody would like it? If he did, he probably wouldn't have made the topic to begin with.
It's not that we're unimaginative for not liking it. Anybody could have any number of sound reasons for not liking it. My personal reason for not liking it is that I dislike sexism, and such extreme sexual dimorphism screams of it. I'm not saying the OP is sexist (though really, the men taking CHA penalty and women taking a STR penalty reasoning is suspect). I'm just saying that realistically, such extreme sexual dimorphism would lead to even more sexism issues in that fantasy world than we already have in the real world.
It can't be any worse than the matriarchal society the drow had in 3.5 edition.
There is sexual dimorphism in the natural world
Where it's bad enough, don't you think? :P
It can't be any worse than the matriarchal society the drow had in 3.5 edition.
You mean the "Alignment: Usually Neutral Evil" Drow? ;)
EDIT: I mean, I'm not saying or anything, I'm just saying. :P ;)
Where it's bad enough, don't you think? :P
The mean the "Alignment: Usually Neutral Evil" Drow? ;)
EDIT: I mean, I'm not saying or anything, I'm just saying. :P ;)
That is true
I say, if he builds them like shifters were made, then it should be fine. The only problem is that the genders would lean to different classes from each other that a player may not want to play.
But eh, I'll stick with playing the brd people I made (x'atl on the Race and Monsters section)
Sorry, keep imagining where a bunch of short women go around saying "Rawr, I'm a monster."
But for what you're trying to do (incorporate gnomes and dwarves without making two cultures), there are a lot easier ways to do this. Just make the culture 1/2 dwarf and 1/2 gnome, and cut out the fluff differentiating the two, if you'd like. Personally, I always imagined dwarves and gnomes living together (admittedly, World of Warcraft reinforced this concept for me). They'll be almost identical except for the major iconic differences - most of the dwarves will be gruff scottish-types, and most of the gnomes will be antsy little inventors and tricksters. That's not so hard to implement, is it?
It can't be any worse than the matriarchal society the drow had in every edition.
Fixed that for you.
You know, there is a general bias in pop media against the average-looking women and you want to take that a step further by removing all non-supermodel women directly out of your setting? And this is to be described as 'whimsical' or excused as sexual dimorphism? But it doesn't strike me that such is really the aim.
The real twist here is that the general concept for a Gnome is an older, white-haired bearded male with a pointy hat. To insist that all those small bearded pointy-hatted fellows are really women also strikes me as quite bizzare.
Overall it just doesn't seem like a good idea. Even if you were to use the sexual dimorphism reasoning, that would say rather nasty things about the culture-- to create that kind of dimorphism you'd have to have a culture where the males generally kill each other on sight and collect harems because that's the way you get the kind of sexual dimorphism in nature that you are talking about. If the species didn't require the males to be bigger and stronger in order to kill each other and ensure that only the biggest, strongest males mated while all females mated then this sort of dimorphism would never arise-- and if the species stopped behaving this way for even a dozen generations or so the dimorphism would quickly fade out.
Do you really intend for your Dwarf males to go around gutting each other over collecting the most females? Moreover, is that sort of barbaric race the kind you'd want to be one of the 'good guys' in your world?
you want to take that a step further by removing all non-supermodel women directly out of your setting?
Gnomes are super-models?
I guess it would only be sexist if he made one sex superior to the other, but if they are just different then its not too much of a big deal. There is sexual dimorphism in the natural world so as long as he approached it with neutrality and made both good at two different things or maybe the same thing, then its fine.
I missed the memo where it said you had become the arbiter of what is fine. What a person creates is no indicator of their motive for creating it. OP creates a racially dimorphic race and that is his right. Like Crimson_Concerto said, no one is obligated to like it, but they sure as hell are obligated to not waste his time telling him he's wrong for doing it unless they have proof. I refer you back to the second sentence. If you call someone a sexist or claim that his work is sexist, back it up.
Gnomes are super-models?
Take the picture of the Gnome woman in the PHB2 and then tell me that, eyes and ears aside, she couldn't have been ripped right out of an America's Next Top Model photoshoot.
Very interesting idea Sally! I honestly never even thought of it but it sounds like it's got lots of oppurtunity for roleplaying if you're planning on having your group interact with this dwarven/gnomish race.
The physical differences are easily explained that the female of the species is just smaller and less hairy. Your players shouldn't have problems grasping that.
The racial powers (regardless if your 3.5 or 4th you didn't say but I'm inclined to think you're planning this for 3.5? If I'm wrong just ignore these paranthesis) raise some questions. So, I suggest you come up with some flavor for this. Is there a deific reason? Some clever cultural fable about how the females got certain gifts and the males got different gifts? Something easy that could be provided with a History check might be ideal.
Don't be afraid to break the stereotypes, you're in fun unknown territory, enjoy it.
Also, thank you. I can't believe I never thought of it myself - different racial states for a sexually dimorphic race! eureka! I have a race of my own (Lapruni) where the females are physically different than the males and I've always been bothered by lumping the males and females under the same stats. Now I'm thinking about re-doing their 3.5 stats this way.
I would love to hear whatever fluff you come up for your dwarf/gnomes! post it here, unless it gets to flamey, in which case I invite you to PM me!