Halfling
The comforts of home are the goals of most halflings’ lives: a place to settle in peace and quiet, far from marauding monsters and clashing armies; a blazing fire and a generous meal; fine drink and fine conversation. Though some halflings live out their days in remote agricultural communities, others form nomadic bands that travel constantly, lured by the open road and the wide horizon to discover the wonders of new lands and peoples. But even these wanderers love peace, food, hearth, and home, though home might be a wagon jostling along a dirt road or a raft floating downriver.
Small and Practical
The diminutive halflings survive in a world full of larger creatures by avoiding notice or, barring that, avoiding offense. Standing about 3 feet tall, they appear relatively harmless and so have managed to survive for centuries in the shadow of empires and on the edges of wars and political strife. They are inclined to be stout, weighing between 40 and 45 pounds. Halflings’ skin ranges from tan to pale with a ruddy cast, and their hair is usually brown or sandy brown and wavy. They have brown or hazel eyes. Halfling men often sport long sideburns, but beards are rare among them and mustaches even more so. They like to wear simple, comfortable, and practical clothes, favoring bright colors. Halfling practicality extends beyond their clothing. They’re concerned with basic needs and simple pleasures and have little use for ostentation. Even the wealthiest of halflings keep their treasures locked in a cellar rather than on display for all to see. They have a knack for finding the most straightforward solution to a problem, and have little patience for dithering.Kind and Curious
Halflings are an affable and cheerful people. They cherish the bonds of family and friendship as well as the comforts of hearth and home, harboring few dreams of gold or glory. Even adventurers among them usually venture into the world for reasons of community, friendship, wanderlust, or curiosity. They love discovering new things, even simple things, such as an exotic food or an unfamiliar style of clothing. Halflings are easily moved to pity and hate to see any living thing suffer. They are generous, happily sharing what they have even in lean times.Blend into the Crowd
Halflings are adept at fitting into a community of humans, dwarves, or elves, making themselves valuable and welcome. The combination of their inherent stealth and their unassuming nature helps halflings to avoid unwanted attention. Halflings work readily with others, and they are loyal to their friends, whether halfling or otherwise. They can display remarkable ferocity when their friends, families, or communities are threatened.Pastoral Pleasantries
Most halflings live in small, peaceful communities with large farms and well-kept groves. They rarely build kingdoms of their own or even hold much land beyond their quiet shires. They typically don’t recognize any sort of halfling nobility or royalty, instead looking to family elders to guide them. Families preserve their traditional ways despite the rise and fall of empires. Many halflings live among other races, where the halflings’ hard work and loyal outlook offer them abundant rewards and creature comforts. Some halfling communities travel as a way of life, driving wagons or guiding boats from place to place and maintaining no permanent home.Exploring Opportunities
Halflings usually set out on the adventurer’s path to defend their communities, support their friends, or explore a wide and wonder-filled world. For them, adventuring is less a career than an opportunity or sometimes a necessity.Customizing Your Origin
At 1st level, you choose various aspects of your character, including ability scores, race, class, and background. Together these elements help paint a picture of your character's origin and give you the ability to create many different types of characters. Despite that versatility, a typical character race in D&D includes little or no choice - a lack that can make it difficult to realize certain character concepts. The following subsections address that lack by adding choice to your character's race, allowing you to customize your ability scores, languages, and certain proficiencies to fit the origin you have in mind for your character. Character race in the game represents your character's fantasy species, combined with certain cultural assumptions. The following options step outside those assumptions to pave the way for truly unique characters.ABILITY SCORE INCREASES
Whatever D&D race you choose for your character, you get a trait called Ability Score Increase. This increase reflects an archetypal bit of excellence in the adventurers of this kind in D&D's past. For example, if you're a dwarf, your Constitution increases by 2, because dwarf heroes in D&D are often exceptionally tough. This increase doesn't apply to every dwarf, just to dwarf adventurers, and it exists to reinforce an archetype. That reinforcement is appropriate if you want to lean into the archetype, but it's unhelpful if your character doesn't conform to the archetype. If you'd like your character to follow their own path, you may ignore your Ability Score Increase trait and assign ability score increases tailored to your character. Here's how to do it: take any ability score increase you gain in your race or subrace and apply it to an ability score of your choice. If you gain more than one increase, you can't apply those increases to the same ability score, and you can't increase a score above 20. For example, if the Ability Score Increase trait of your race or subrace increases your Constitution by 2 and your Wisdom by 1, you could instead increase your Intelligence by 2 and your Charisma by 1.LANGUAGES
Your character's race includes language that your character is assumed to know, usually Common and the language of your ancestors. For example, a halfling adventurer is assumed to know Common and Halfling. Here's the thing: D&D adventurers are extraordinary, and your character might have grown up speaking languages different from the ones in your Languages trait. To customize the languages you know, you may replace each language in your Languages trait with a language from the following list: Abyssal, Celestial, Common, Deep Speech, Draconic, Dwarvish, Elvish, Giant, Gnomish, Goblin, Halfling, Infernal, Orc, Primordial, Sylvan, or Undercommon. Your DM may add or remove languages from that list, depending on what languages are appropriate for your campaign.PROFICIENCIES
Some races and subraces grant proficiencies. These proficiencies are usually cultural, and your character might not have any connection with the culture in question or might have pursued different training. You can replace each of those proficiencies with a different one of your choice, following the restrictions on the Proficiency Swaps table.PROFICIENCY SWAPS
For example, high elf adventurers have proficiency with longswords, which are martial weapons. Consulting the Proficiency Swaps table, we see that your high elf can swap that with another weapon or a tool. Your elf might be a musician, who chooses proficiency with a musical instrument - a type of tool - instead of with longswords. Similarly, elves start with proficiency in the Perception skill. Your elf might not have the keen senses associated with your kin and could take proficiency in a different skill, such as Performance. The "Equipment" chapter of the Player's Handbook includes weapons and tools suitable for these swaps, and your DM might allow additional options.
Proficiency Replacement Proficiency Skill Skill Armor Simple/martial weapon or tool Simple weapon Simple weapon or tool Martial weapon Simple/martial weapon or tool Tool Tool or simple weapon PERSONALITY
The description of a race might suggest various things about the behavior and personality of that people's archetypal adventurers. You may ignore those suggestions, whether they're about alignment, moods, interests, or any other personality trait. Your character's personality and behavior are entirely yours to determine.
Halfling Names
A halfling has a given name, a family name, and possibly a nickname. Family names are often nicknames that stuck so tenaciously they have been passed down through the generations. Male Names: Alton, Ander, Cade, Corrin, Eldon, Errich, Finnan, Garret, Lindal, Lyle, Merric, Milo, Osborn, Perrin, Reed, Roscoe, Wellby Female Names: Andry, Bree, Callie, Cora, Euphemia, Jillian, Kithri, Lavinia, Lidda, Merla, Nedda, Paela, Portia, Seraphina, Shaena, Trym, Vani, Verna Family Names: Brushgather, Goodbarrel, Greenbottle, High-hill, Hilltopple, Leagallow, Tealeaf, Thorngage, Tosscobble, UnderboughHalfling Traits
Your halfling character has a number of traits in common with all other halflings.Ability Score Increase
Your Dexterity score increases by 2.Age
A halfling reaches adulthood at the age of 20 and generally lives into the middle of his or her second century.Alignment
Most halflings are lawful good. As a rule, they are good-hearted and kind, hate to see others in pain, and have no tolerance for oppression. They are also very orderly and traditional, leaning heavily on the support of their community and the comfort of their old ways.Size
Halflings average about 3 feet tall and weigh about 40 pounds. Your size is Small.Speed
Your base walking speed is 25 feet.Lucky
When you roll a 1 on the d20 for an attack roll, ability check, or saving throw, you can reroll the die and must use the new roll.Brave
You have advantage on saving throws against being frightened.Halfling Nimbleness
You can move through the space of any creature that is of a size larger than yours.Languages
You can speak, read, and write Common and Halfling. The Halfling language isn’t secret, but halflings are loath to share it with others. They write very little, so they don’t have a rich body of literature. Their oral tradition, however, is very strong. Almost all halflings speak Common to converse with the people in whose lands they dwell or through which they are traveling.Subraces
The two main kinds of halfling, lightfoot and stout, are more like closely related families than true subraces. Choose one of these subraces or one from another source.Lightfoot Halfling
As a lightfoot halfling, you can easily hide from notice, even using other people as cover. You’re inclined to be affable and get along well with others. In the Forgotten Realms, lightfoot halflings have spread the farthest and thus are the most common variety. Lightfoots are more prone to wanderlust than other halflings, and often dwell alongside other races or take up a nomadic life. In the world of Greyhawk, these halflings are called hairfeet or tallfellows.Ability Score Increase
Your Charisma score increases by 1.Naturally Stealthy
You can attempt to hide even when you are obscured only by a creature that is at least one size larger than you.Stout Halfling
As a stout halfling, you’re hardier than average and have some resistance to poison. Some say that stouts have dwarven blood. In the Forgotten Realms, these halflings are called stronghearts, and they’re most common in the south.Ability Score Increase
Your Constitution score increases by 1.Stout Resilience
You have advantage on saving throws against poison, and you have resistance against poison damage.Halfling Subrace: Mark of Healing
If you're a halfling with the Mark of Healing, you have this subrace, with the following traits.Ability Score Increase
Your Wisdom score increases by 1.Medical Intuition
When you make a Wisdom (Medicine) check or an ability check using an herbalism kit, you can roll a d4 and add the number rolled to the ability check.Healing Touch
You can cast the cure wounds spell with this trait. Starting at 3rd level, you can also cast lesser restoration with it. Once you cast either spell with this trait, you can't cast that spell with it again until you finish a long rest. Wisdom is your spellcasting ability for these spells.Spells of the Mark
If you have the Spellcasting or the Pact Magic class feature, the spells on the Mark of Healing Spells table are added to the spell list of your spellcasting class.Mark of Healing Spells
| Spell Level | Spells |
|---|---|
| 1st | cure wounds, healing word |
| 2nd | lesser restoration, prayer of healing |
| 3rd | aura of vitality, mass healing word |
| 4th | aura of purity, aura of life |
| 5th | greater restoration |
Halfling Subrace: Mark of Hospitality
If you're a halfling with the Mark of Hospitality, you have this subrace, with the following traits.Ability Score Increase
Your Charisma score increases by 1.Ever Hospitable
When you make a Charisma (Persuasion) check or an ability check involving brewer's supplies or cook's utensils, you can roll a d4 and add the number rolled to the ability check.Innkeeper's Magic
You know the prestidigitation cantrip. You can also cast the purify food and drink and unseen servant spells with this trait. Once you cast either spell with this trait, you can't cast that spell with it again until you finish a long rest. Charisma is your spellcasting ability for these spells.Spells of the Mark
If you have the Spellcasting or the Pact Magic class feature, the spells on the Mark of Hospitality Spells table are added to the spell list of your spellcasting class.Mark of Hospitality Spells
| Spell Level | Spells |
|---|---|
| 1st | goodberry, sleep |
| 2nd | aid, calm emotions |
| 3rd | create food and water, Leomund's tiny hut |
| 4th | aura of purity, Mordenkainen's private sanctum |
| 5th | hallow |
Basic Information
Anatomy
The diminutive halflings survive in a world full of larger creatures by avoiding notice or, barring that, avoiding offense. Standing about 3 feet tall, they appear relatively harmless and so have managed to survive in the shadow of empires and on the edges of wars and political strife. They are inclined to be stout, weighing between 40 and 45 pounds.
Halflings' skin ranges from tan to pale with a ruddy cast, and their hair is usually brown or sandy brown and wavy. They have brown or hazel eyes. Halfling men often sport long sideburns, but bears are rare among them and mustaches even more so. They like to wear simple, comfortable, and practical clothes, favoring bright colors.
Halfling practicality extends beyond their clothing. They're concerned with basic needs and simple pleasures and have little use for ostentation. Even the wealthiest of halflings keep their treasures locked in a cellar rather than on display for all to see. They have a knack for finding the most straightforward solution to a problem, and have little patience for dithering.
Halfling Traits (for players)
Ability Score Increase Your Dextery score increases by 2. Age A halfling reaches adulthood at the age of 20 and generally lives into the middle of his or her second century. Size Halflings average about 3 feet tall and weigh about 40 pounds. Your size is small. Speed Your base walking speed is 25 feet. Lucky When you roll a 1 on the d20 for an attack roll, ability check, or saving throw, you can reroll the die and must use the new roll. Brave You have advantage on saving throws against being frightened. Halfling Nimbleness You can move through the space of any creature that is of a size larger than yours. Languages You can speak, read, and write Common and Halfling. The Halfling language isn't secret, but halflings are loath to share it with others. They write very little, so they don't have a rich body of literature. Their oral tradition, however, is very strong. Almost all halflings speak Common to converse with the people in whose lands they dwell or through which they are travelling.Subraces
Lightfoot Halfling
As a lightfoot halfling, you can easily hide from notice, even using other people as cover. You're inclined to be affable and get along well with others. Lightfoots are more prone to wanderlust than other halflings, and often dwell alongside other races or take up a nomadic life. Ability Score Increase Your Charisma score increases by 1. Naturally Stealthy You can attempt to hide even when you are obscured only by a creature that is at least one size larger than you.Stout Halfling
As a stout halfing, you're hardier than average and have some resistance to poison. Some say that stouts have dwarven blood. Ability Score Increase Your Constitution score increases by 1. Stout Resilience You have advantage on saving throws against poison, and you have resistance against poison damage.Ghostwise Halfling
Naturally stealthy, Ghostwise halflings are much less outgoing than their cousins, instead living in isolated communities and keeping to themselves. Those who do go out in the world tend to be assassins and thieves, but there are always exceptions to the rules. Ability Score Increase Your Wisdom score increases by 1. Silent Speech. You can speak telepathically to any creature within 30 feet of you. The creature understands you only if the two of you share a language. You can speak telepathically in this way to one creature at a time.Civilization and Culture
Naming Traditions
A halfling has a given name, a family name, and possibly a nickname. Family names are often nicknames that stuck so tenaciously they have been passed down through the generations.
Male Names: Alton, Ander, Cade, Corrin, Eldon, Errich, Finnan, Garret, Lindal, Lyle, Merric, Milo, Osborn, Perrin, Reed, Roscoe, Wellby
Female Names: Andry, Bree, Callie, Cora, Euphemia, Jillian, Kithri, Lavinia, Lidda, Merla, Nedda, Paela, Portia, Seraphina, Shaena, Trym, Vani, Verna
Family Names: Brushgather, Goodbarrel, Greenbottle, High-hill, Hilltopple, Leagallow, Tealeaf, Thorngage, Tosscobble, Underbough
Lifespan
100 years
Average Height
3 feet
Average Weight
40 to 45 pounds
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