Help me name a race

[ILM]

Man, I have trouble with names. -_-

My world, by and large, is a vanilla, rules-as-written D&D world (allowing for a few balancing houserules), but there's one thing among others that I want to change: the mix of available races.

There's approximately a billion player races in 3.5e, and from a world-building point of view it doesn't make much sense to me to have so many. In an old world, between epidemics, famines, wars and interbreeding (and that's not even going into magical threats), you're bound to have them whittled down to just a handful. With that in mind, I endeavoured to simplify the main groups - but I want to keep the underlying mechanics because they're necessary and/or desirable.

Initially, I just refluffed all the humanoid races into humans. So elves would still get their +2 to dex, but they'd be agile humans instead of pointy-eared tree-loving creatures who live hundreds of years, for example. Unfortunately, this brought me to the problem of size. Refluffing, say, gnomes as humans has a bunch of weird consequences on the rules when it comes to size. Bad enough they'd inexplicably get attack and armor bonuses, but for instance they could still technically ride dogs. Except they'd be 5 or 6 feet tall, which makes no sense.

So, I've settled on this solution: all medium humanoids (humans, elves, kalashtar and whatever) are fluffed as humans (but keep their stats). All small humanoids (gnomes, halflings, etc.) are fluffed as [insert name here]. Orcs get grouped with other monstrous humanoid races (ogres, giants, etc.); the other types stay mostly the same but are bundled together in their creature type (so black dragons and copper dragons don't have such strong identities; they're just dragons, only with different abilities).

Unfortunately, I'm drawing a blank when it comes to naming my new, pint-sized humanoid race. I'd like to avoid 'dwarf', 'gnome' or even 'elf' since these names carry too much D&D history. For context, they're likely to be inhabitants of the colder regions of the world (high latitudes and altitudes, basically), but I don't particularly need the name to refer to that. Any great ideas?

[jqavins]

Man, I have trouble with names. -_-

Man, I hear ya.

My world, by and large, is a vanilla, rules-as-written D&D world (allowing for a few balancing houserules), but there's one thing among others that I want to change: the mix of available races.

There's approximately a billion player races in 3.5e, and from a world-building point of view it doesn't make much sense to me to have so many.

Amen, brother!

... So, I've settled on this solution: all medium humanoids (humans, elves, kalashtar and whatever) are fluffed as humans (but keep their stats). All small humanoids (gnomes, halflings, etc.) are fluffed as [insert name here]... Any great ideas?

Why not stick with halfling or hobbit? (You can use hobbit, since your own world won't have the same copyright issues that keep TSR/WoTC from using it.) And, the halflings/hobbits/whatever-you-choose could collectively be fluffed as a distinct race of diminutive humans. Come to think of it, you could use pygme if you don't mind being rather politically incorrect. Or oompa-loompa

[Red Fel]

Unfortunately, I'm drawing a blank when it comes to naming my new, pint-sized humanoid race. I'd like to avoid 'dwarf', 'gnome' or even 'elf' since these names carry too much D&D history. For context, they're likely to be inhabitants of the colder regions of the world (high latitudes and altitudes, basically), but I don't particularly need the name to refer to that. Any great ideas?

Well, there are four options that spring directly to mind.

• Name them for a physical feature. "Shortfolk" is an obvious choice, which includes the pejorative "Shorties" and similar. Consider things that compare them with children or contain diminuitives - "Woodchildren," "Grasskids," or "Sandlings," for example. If they have an unusual complexion, or ear shape, or other distinguishing feature, or if they have a disturbing habit (like decorating themselves with bones), that works too, but "Shortfolk" is a pretty easy one.
• Name them for their environment. Are they indigenous to plains or jungles? "Plainsfolk," "Treefolk," and so forth work for that. A particular geographical area? Simply calling them "Northerners" works, and people will understand that Northerners are a mite shorter than most.
• Name them for a famous forebear. To drop the name of a D&D deity, "Garl's Children" is an option, or "The People of Ehlonna." You can just as easily use the name of a famous figure of their race within your setting; pick a famous settler who carved out the modern society of their people.
• Give them a nickname. Not every race needs to have an actual name, and chances are they just call themselves "people," so just come up with something people call them. Again, "Shorties" comes to mind.

[ILM]

Well, there are four options that spring directly to mind.

• Name them for a physical feature. "Shortfolk" is an obvious choice, which includes the pejorative "Shorties" and similar. Consider things that compare them with children or contain diminuitives - "Woodchildren," "Grasskids," or "Sandlings," for example. If they have an unusual complexion, or ear shape, or other distinguishing feature, or if they have a disturbing habit (like decorating themselves with bones), that works too, but "Shortfolk" is a pretty easy one.
• Name them for their environment. Are they indigenous to plains or jungles? "Plainsfolk," "Treefolk," and so forth work for that. A particular geographical area? Simply calling them "Northerners" works, and people will understand that Northerners are a mite shorter than most.
• Name them for a famous forebear. To drop the name of a D&D deity, "Garl's Children" is an option, or "The People of Ehlonna." You can just as easily use the name of a famous figure of their race within your setting; pick a famous settler who carved out the modern society of their people.
• Give them a nickname. Not every race needs to have an actual name, and chances are they just call themselves "people," so just come up with something people call them. Again, "Shorties" comes to mind.

Yeah, my thoughts were going in a similar direction. Thing is, they wouldn't call themselves 'Shortfolk' - they'd call everybody else 'Tallfolk'. For the moment my two options were either a made-up name (I was going with 'Quinns' because I thought it sounded nice) or 'Frostlings' ('Frostfolk'? 'Frostkin'?) in keeping with the whole cold regions / mountains. 'Northerners' (/Northmen/Northfolk/Nor'ers) might work well too.

Why not stick with halfling or hobbit? (You can use hobbit, since your own world won't have the same copyright issues that keep TSR/WoTC from using it.)

Tolkien kind of ruined those names for me. They immediately elicit images of short, plump, hairy-footed people obsessed with song and breakfast. I'm thinking more small elf-like creatures with ferocious survival instincts and cunning minds; not necessarily unfriendly (on the contrary, life in the North would probably give rise to fairly comprehensive hospitality rules) but ruthlessly practical and with appropriate gravitas.

[arkham618]

Man, I have trouble with names. -_-

My world, by and large, is a vanilla, rules-as-written D&D world (allowing for a few balancing houserules), but there's one thing among others that I want to change: the mix of available races.

There's approximately a billion player races in 3.5e, and from a world-building point of view it doesn't make much sense to me to have so many. In an old world, between epidemics, famines, wars and interbreeding (and that's not even going into magical threats), you're bound to have them whittled down to just a handful. With that in mind, I endeavoured to simplify the main groups - but I want to keep the underlying mechanics because they're necessary and/or desirable.

Initially, I just refluffed all the humanoid races into humans. So elves would still get their +2 to dex, but they'd be agile humans instead of pointy-eared tree-loving creatures who live hundreds of years, for example. Unfortunately, this brought me to the problem of size. Refluffing, say, gnomes as humans has a bunch of weird consequences on the rules when it comes to size. Bad enough they'd inexplicably get attack and armor bonuses, but for instance they could still technically ride dogs. Except they'd be 5 or 6 feet tall, which makes no sense.

So, I've settled on this solution: all medium humanoids (humans, elves, kalashtar and whatever) are fluffed as humans (but keep their stats). All small humanoids (gnomes, halflings, etc.) are fluffed as [insert name here]. Orcs get grouped with other monstrous humanoid races (ogres, giants, etc.); the other types stay mostly the same but are bundled together in their creature type (so black dragons and copper dragons don't have such strong identities; they're just dragons, only with different abilities).

Unfortunately, I'm drawing a blank when it comes to naming my new, pint-sized humanoid race. I'd like to avoid 'dwarf', 'gnome' or even 'elf' since these names carry too much D&D history. For context, they're likely to be inhabitants of the colder regions of the world (high latitudes and altitudes, basically), but I don't particularly need the name to refer to that. Any great ideas?

Why not go Greek? The little guys can be pygmies; the big, ugly guys, troglodytes (trogs, for short).

[the_david]

Yep, you found one of my D&D pet peeves. Monster bloat.

I'm gonna totally agree with you on the dragons. I'd much prefer the idea of unique dragons to keep the players guessing. This also works for many other races. Demons and devils being very similar to each other comes to mind. It adds some symmetry to the lower planes which would imply some kind of order even though demons are chaotic. (At least that's how I think about it. I don't like it, at all.)

Your solution however is not one I would use. I'd just use humans, add a new small race that has some of the traits many small races have. (Living in caves or burroughs for example, combined with darkvision. Being fond of gems and gold, etc.) For the monstrous race you could cheat by making several races that represent mutations of a single race. Much like goblins, hobgoblins and bugbears except that they can interbreed. A single tribe would have an inclination for a certain genotype, but there's a relatively high rate of variation. The first tribe would have loads of goblins, with some bigger siblings. The second might be more like orcs with few smaller goblins and an ogre or an ettin as leader.

As for names, how about Neblin? (Gnome in some Greyhawk language. Svirfneblin literally means deep gnome, and rock gnomes and forest gnomes had names ending with Neblin too. Although the gnomes referred to themselves as the Noniz.)

[jqavins]

Your solution however is not one I would use. I'd just use humans, add a new small race that has some of the traits many small races have. (Living in caves or burroughs for example, combined with darkvision. Being fond of gems and gold, etc.) For the monstrous race you could cheat by making several races that represent mutations of a single race. Much like goblins, hobgoblins and bugbears except that they can interbreed. A single tribe would have an inclination for a certain genotype, but there's a relatively high rate of variation.

So, true races? In the real world, the saying "Race is fiction; racism is real" is quite accurate, but among the monsterous humanoids of a fantasy world race would be real, while they're all the same species. Is that the idea?

[Selkirk]

Well, there are four options that spring directly to mind.

• Name them for a physical feature. "Shortfolk" is an obvious choice, which includes the pejorative "Shorties" and similar. Consider things that compare them with children or contain diminuitives - "Woodchildren," "Grasskids," or "Sandlings," for example. If they have an unusual complexion, or ear shape, or other distinguishing feature, or if they have a disturbing habit (like decorating themselves with bones), that works too, but "Shortfolk" is a pretty easy one.
• Give them a nickname. Not every race needs to have an actual name, and chances are they just call themselves "people," so just come up with something people call them. Again, "Shorties" comes to mind.

i love the idea of racial nicknames ...the race has a name and then something they are referred to as (either by themselves or by other races). grasskids is a great name.