Is there any reason to have both gnomes and halflings?

Why can you have half-elves, but not half-dwarves?

>If two species can breed and create healthy off spring that just means they all one species, right?

Most mules are sterile.

>Why have half-orcs instead of just orcs
That's a great question.

True, but at least in most settings that i played aside from being scared about a 3 foot dragon most villagers didn't even heard about them if you compare with Orcs or Elfs

I don't think it originally had a reason beyond LOTR and its half-elves.
>If two species can breed and create healthy off spring that just means they all one species, right?
Well, they're called races, and not species, so that's probably the thinking behind it. There are no half-monsters for example, with Orcs being on the threshold of human and monster. What bothers me more is the inconsistency of it. Why are there no half-dwarves or half-halflings (quarterlings?). Why is everything half human?

To me it seems they should either have half-breeds in full or not at all.

Other question - any reason to not play large creatures and tiny ones? Giants and fairies or something.
Seems like it would spice things up and make for interesting team synergy.

>Why can Horses mate with Asses but not with Sharks?

I agree. The idea of a fantasy race is what jumble it all up.
I'm theory Fantasy Race is a species. Except 95% of them are either pretty much humans (elves, dwarves,gnomes, halflings, some orcs) or humanoid enough (furries and scalies).
Like, elves aren't more different from humans than indians different from japanese.
And so in our mind they fall under definition of a race as in a human with a number distinct physical details typical to their heritage.

Shit don't make no sense, man.

Except dwarves are just short humans and elves are just humans with pointy ears.

>Is there any reason to have both gnomes and halflings?
Not really. Which is why 4e only had halflings in the phb1.

>Why have half-orcs instead of just orcs?
It was originally done to basically separate PC orcs from NPC orcs.

>What's the point of half-elves?
Another holdover from LotR like hobbits/halflings.

>Why dragonborne and not any other monster race?
Dragon men and Demon/Devil-blooded are two of the most popular "nonstandard" pc races.

Mostly the assumption that PCs are most often interacting with things built for man-sized/medium or small creatures. Small and Medium creatures also use the same 5ft/1.5m squares in most systems so they follow pretty much all the same rules.

It gets hard to justify tiny creatures taking up a 5ft cube. Large creatures taking up a 10ft cube also causes problems.

Yeah, and cats are small tigers, yet they can't breed, weird.

And literally every insect is the same as any other insect for me, and they can't breed, super weird.

Half-dwarves do exist in the form of Muls in Dark Sun.

They are in a 5E supplement, I would have preferred if they replaced dragon born in the core though

In most settings aren't the races mostly the product of divine creation? Evolution and genetics probably isn't a thing, it's just who the gods will allow to interbreed and who they won't

Then you got your answer, no half human half dwarves because they gods don't want to

Becasue Tolkien hadn't these.
On my behalf half-elves could just cease to exist and orcs playable

>what are muls

You seem a bit pissy

>What's the point of half-elves?

The ears, though not as much as elves.

You totally can. Muls in Dark Sun, and Dragonlance has half-dwarves, too. They're just not common.

is it half wrong to kill a half orc baby?

>Is there any reason to have both gnomes and halflings?

Halflings are based on hobbits while gnomes are based on pre-Tolkien elves. They aren't all that similar aside from being short.

>Why have half-orcs instead of just orcs?

Orcs are traditionally pure evil. In a setting with noble savage orcs it's pretty pointless.

>What's the point of half-elves?

I agree, pretty pointless.

>Why dragonborne and not any other monster race?

Dragons are cool.

Some people get prissy when you question DND.

>Only DnD has halfelves but not halfdwarves
I was going to point out to LotR movies but I remembered you might be too young for them, lets not even talk about the books because your generation clearly don't read

Problem with Muls is that they work excellently in the Dark Sun setting and not as well outside of it. They're biologically ugly, kill their mothers in child birth, and their racial bonuses all reference their status as slaves.
They're flavorful and interesting in the context of Dark Sun, and a good starting point for homebrewing other half-dwarves, but I wouldn't use them as-is for a different setting. They're a bit grimdark.

4e made a more generic version.
>Ability Scores: +2 Constitution, and either +2 Strength or +2 Wisdom
>Skill Bonuses: +2 Endurance, +2 Streetwise
>Born of Two Races: Select either human or dwarf. You can take feats that have your choice as a prerequisite (as well as those specifically for muls), as long as you meet any other requirements.
>Mul Vitality: Increase your number of healing surges by one.
>Tireless: You need to sleep 6 hours in a 72-hour period(instead of a 24-hour period) to gain the benefit of an extended rest.

A sort of tireless workingman is a good enough archetype that it adds some flavour to the world. Sterility and slavery background is optional. I ran a game where muls were the most visible part of the dwarven race, as they would accompany dwarven masters who travelled the surface world building castles and cathedrals for the surface races. Muls had a difficult time reproducing on their own, but enough human women and dwarf men reproduced to make them a valuable part of the economy.

Gnomes are clever little bastards and tinkerers, whereas halflings represent the rural agrarian types. They're actually really different, flavor-wise. Mind you, I despise gnomes as a race, but the right player (I'm fortunate enough to have one in the party I DM for) can actually make them work well.

To have Big Stronk Scary Man without being necessarily evil. This could be solved by not having orcs be necessarily evil, but then it would ruin the point of orcs in the first place. So basically, to keep to villain convention while allowing an orc-lite option for players.

To be even more special than an Elf, I guess. Decent compromise between Elves and humans flavor-wise - definitely feels less weird to have a Half-Elf Paladin than a pure Elf.

No idea. Don't care for Dragonborn in principle, but once again, I have great players and one of them is playing a Dragonborn as an absolutely -fantastic- "mysterious, slightly monstrous outsider" character. Even -he- doesn't know where he came from, and his social understanding is decidedly skewed thanks to being raised and near-worshiped by Lizardfolk.

Any advice on a 5e conversion, if you happen to play it?

>There are no half-monsters for example
Have you ever even looked in a Monster Manual?

I like making gnomes extinct and using kobolds for all the tech

Half ogres and half dragons aren't playable races my friend. They're just monsters...

I don't. I don't even know the layout of how 5e races are done. CON bonus, some kind of Tireless port, and that's about all I can recommend.

Tieflings are half-demons. Dhampirs are half-vampires. Both are PC races. Half-dragons were playable in 3.5, part of Races of the Dragon.

Yes
Because
Why not
Because

>Is there any reason to have both gnomes and halflings?
Sure. Both can fill very different archetype niches if you're willing to think outside their traditional D&D boxes. Both 4e (gnomes are refugees from the Feywild, halflings are river-boating orphans of a divine tryst) and Pathfinder (gnomes are fae who got stranded in the mortal world, halflings are the ultimate slave-race) had some pretty distinct hooks for both races.

>Why have half-orcs instead of just orcs?
At this point? Tradition. It was to let players have a core "monster" option without discarding the "all orcs are evil, always" sacred cow. Given how crap pure-orc stats are, best to just take HO stats and reskin them as pure orcs.

>What's the point of half-elves?
Exotic humanoids, inherently magical Men, mythologies of changelings and faerie brides, blessed individuals like Merlin, etc.

>Why dragonborne and not any other monster race?
Because dragons have a more recognizable motif in D&D, and the grognardia of the fandom means that a new equivalent to The Complete Book of Humanoids isn't seen as a sufficiently profitable venture.

In a nutshell? "Muh precious Tolkien!" They have popped up here and there - Dragonlance and Dark Sun officially, Kingdoms of Kalamar (which also had half-gnomes, orc-elves and half-gnolls) unofficially. It's just not seen as a "traditional" D&D race.

There was also an article in Dragon specifically for introducing muls to non-Dark Sun settings, presenting an alternative background where Drow forcibly interbred human & dwarven slaves to make a superior slave race, except, whoopsy, it got out of control and butchered its way to freedom. Dwarves wouldn't take them in, so they've been doing it on their own ever since.

This is the best equivalent of a 5e Mul statblock I've come up with so far.

Mul
Ability Score Modifier: +2 Constitution, +1 Strength
Size: Medium
Speed: 30 feet
Vision: Normal
Tireless: A mul ignores the first level of Exhaustion it suffers, and regains two levels of Exhaustion when it completes a long rest.
Limitless Endurance: A mul increases its hit point maximum by 1 point and further increases it by +1 point each time it gains a level.
Dwarven Vitality: A mul has Advantage on saving throws against Poison and Resistance to Poison damage.

This!
Why people didn't grasp the potential of an halfbreed? The life of a wanderer/adventurer seems like the only consistent choice for this kind of characters: fits just perfectly

>starts life as a maggot
>w-why cant humans breed with them

A Mul Frenzy Barbarian sounds amazing.