Gnomes
Size: Small
Speed: 25 feet
Lifespan: 5000 years
Languages: Tanglish, Gnomish
Overview
TBD — DM
Physical Description
Gnomes appear basically like shorter humans, with disproportionately long arms and large ears that end with tufts of fur-like hair. Their stature is small, but they are surprisingly strong for their size. Their physical appearance is otherwise human-like, though their distinctive proportions and ear tufts make them easily recognizable.
Society and Customs
From an outside perspective, gnomes are known for being durable, resilient, intelligent, and secretive. They are known mainly for being nice and being adventurers. Even after thousands of years of coexistence, the other races remain unaware of the true power of gnomes—a fact that gnomes work hard to maintain through careful secrecy and selective revelation of their capabilities.
The Culture of Adventure
Gnomes have a strong cultural emphasis on adventure. This begins early in life—gnomish children frequently wander off for days or weeks, fully expected to come home eventually. This practice reflects the gnome cultural belief that exploration and self-reliance are essential to personal growth.
Gnomes teach their children survival skills from a young age, both for being lost in the wilderness and for dealing with human cities. This dual education prepares gnomish children for a life of adventure and exploration, wherever it may take them.
The highest gnomish aspiration is to delve the secrets of the past by conquering dungeons, or to discover lands untold. This drive for exploration and discovery is central to gnomish identity, pushing gnomes to become adventurers, explorers, and seekers of ancient knowledge.
Tinkering and Technology
Gnomes are natural tinkers with a keen sense of both the arcane and mundane technology. They have an intuitive understanding of how things work, whether magical or mechanical, and they excel at creating, modifying, and improving devices of all kinds. This talent for tinkering combines with their love of adventure to create gnomes who are often at the forefront of technological and magical innovation.
Gnomish Language and Patter
Gnomish language is complex. While on the surface it sounds like Tanglish, gnomes practice something they call Patter. Gnomish Patter is a combination of inflection, body language, facial expression, hand gesture, and possibly a little bit of telepathy that lets them layer a complete second set of information over anything they say.
Only gnomes can patter properly, but other races can pick up some of it with practice and careful observation. This layered communication system allows gnomes to convey complex information while appearing to speak in simple terms, contributing to their reputation for being both friendly and somewhat mysterious.
Secrecy and Organization
Gnomes are highly organized and coordinated, though the extent of this organization is carefully hidden from other races. They value secrecy and privacy, going to great lengths to keep their affairs private and avoid external interference. This secretive nature, combined with their empathic abilities, makes gnomes excellent at reading others while revealing little about themselves.
Naming Conventions
Modern gnome surnames are warm, pastoral compounds — Meadowmane, Brandybuck, Longfoot, Goodbarrow, Underbough, Cogwright — earthy two-part names built from hearth, field, root, and burrow. This is a relatively recent fashion: only within the last few centuries did gnomes broadly adopt the soft compound style, which spread alongside the warrens' growing trade with human settlements and largely displaced the older gnomish-tongue family names (knots of patter and click that outsiders could never pronounce and gnomes were never especially eager to share). A few deep-warren lines still keep the old names for private use. Given names tend to be short and fond — Pover, Tilda, Bexley, Aldermew — chosen for affection over meaning, and a gnome will cheerfully answer to three or four nicknames besides.
Because warrens raise their children in common, a shared surname marks a warren-household line more than a strict bloodline — a foundling folded into a family simply takes its name, which is how the Tiefling Valentine comes to be a Meadowmane.
Population and Distribution
TBD — DM
Role in the World
TBD — DM
Ability Score Increase
Your Constitution score increases by 2, your Intelligence score increases by 2, your Dexterity score increases by 1, and your Wisdom score decreases by 4.
Note: The Wisdom penalty reflects gnomes' tendency to prioritize adventure and exploration over cautious wisdom, though individual gnomes may vary.
Racial Traits
Darkvision
Accustomed to life underground, you have superior vision in dark and dim conditions. You can see in dim light within 60 feet of you as if it were bright light, and in darkness as if it were dim light. You can't discern color in darkness, only shades of gray.
Gnomish Resilience
Gnomes are extremely durable and resilient. Your hit point maximum increases by 1, and it increases by 1 every time you gain a level. Additionally, you have advantage on Constitution saving throws.
Regenerative Ability
Gnomes have remarkable regenerative capabilities. When you take a short rest, you can choose to spend Hit Dice to recover hit points as normal, or you can instead recover hit points equal to your Constitution modifier + your level (minimum 1). This represents your natural ability to heal quickly from injuries, regenerating damage at an accelerated rate.
Additionally, you regain all of your hit points after a long rest, regardless of how many Hit Dice you have remaining.
Disease Immunity
You are immune to disease and cannot be poisoned by disease. Your sophisticated immune system protects you from most illnesses and ailments that affect other races.
Poison Immunity
You are immune to poison damage and the poisoned condition. Your body can metabolize and neutralize toxins that would be deadly to other races.
Omnivorous Metabolism
You can eat almost anything. Your metabolism can process a wide variety of organic matter, including foods that would be inedible or toxic to other races. You have advantage on Constitution saving throws against effects caused by consuming unusual or potentially harmful substances, and you can gain sustenance from sources that would not provide nutrition to other races.
Gnome Cunning
You have advantage on all Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma saving throws against magic.
Natural Tinker
You have proficiency with tinker's tools. Additionally, you have advantage on Intelligence checks related to understanding, creating, or modifying arcane and technological devices.
Empathic Sense
You have a natural empathic ability that allows you to sense the emotions of others. You have proficiency in the Insight skill. Additionally, you can use this empathic sense to make a Wisdom (Insight) check to detect falsehoods or hidden emotions, even if you wouldn't normally be able to.
Gnomish Patter
You have mastered the art of Gnomish Patter—a complex communication system that layers additional information through inflection, body language, facial expression, hand gestures, and subtle telepathic elements. When speaking in Gnomish, you can convey a second layer of meaning that only other gnomes can fully understand. Non-gnomes who are familiar with gnomes and have spent time around them may pick up some elements of this communication, but they cannot use it themselves.
You can attempt to use Gnomish Patter even when speaking Tanglish, though the effect is less pronounced. When interacting with creatures who understand Gnomish or are familiar with gnomes, you have advantage on Charisma (Deception) and Charisma (Persuasion) checks, as your layered communication allows you to convey more nuanced meaning.
Appearance Alteration
Over the course of several days, you can voluntarily alter your skin, hair, and eye pigmentation. This process takes 3-7 days to complete and requires concentration and focus, but allows you to change your appearance significantly. This ability is often used by gnomes when they need to blend in or change their identity for adventure or secrecy.
Related: Races Index | Mechanics Index | Ability Scores