#I really like gnomes and halflings

[awesomecopper]

I've been in a Forgotten Realms mood lately and decided to revisit the rpgs in the setting starting with Icewind Dale. I don't know how much of these two games I'll end up replaying since they're more dungeon crawlers than rpgs. But I still have a fondness for the party I created for them. Ulfur, Nigel, Poppy, and Greta are the members of this adventuring party! Backstories below the cut:

Ulfur Deepvein's first iteration was in my first party. The shield dwarf was raised in Mithral Hall, where he trained as a paladin of Moradin. After his training was complete he felt he had to travel beyond his home to study metalworking further. Hearing tales of the lost dwarven city of Dorn's Deep and its treasures found within, he decided to plan an expedition north in the hopes of uncovering lost dwarven lore.

Nigel Wobblesprocket is a rock gnome illusionist/thief who enjoys studying the traps and history of ancient ruins. Most adventurers were unwilling to sign on to a dangerous expedition led by such a novice leader, but Nigel's dump stat is wisdom for a reason. In my headcanon Nigel and Ulfur eventually become an adhd/autism type couple that started from a shared interest in tinkering.

Poppy Stoutkettle is a lightfoot halfling ranger. Like many halfling adventurers she has an insatiable wanderlust. Joining a novice party's expedition north sounded to her like the adventure of a lifetime.

Last is Greta Bluecap, a svirfneblin druid native to the Underdark. After her settlement was captured and enslaved in Dorn's Deep she escaped and decided to try and find help. She managed to find the party of adventurers just as they arrived in the north. She starts the first game a young adult by gnome standards, so Nigel especially becomes very protective of her throughout their journey.

[blujayonthewing]

[guy who lives in lowkey constant fear of being flanderized and infantalized and flattened and misunderstood and not taken seriously as an entire human person with complex thoughts and feelings in real life] yeah I dunno why I feel so strongly and get so defensive about Fantasy Racism and fantasy-race stereotyping it's just a really big sticking point for me for some mysterious reason

[acepalindrome]

Okay okay, now that I’ve finally given in and ordered a PS5 so I can play Baldur’s Gate 3….what should I play as? I’m still torn between college of lore bard or circle of spores druid. And I was pretty set on being a dwarf, but maybe a gnome or halfling would be a better fit if I’m playing a bard? I want to be travel sized.

[themyscrian]

maybe i shouldn't start trying to figure out gaelic equivalents for all the names for the D&D races at 11:30pm without having had a drink of water in like 6 hours

[gobbogoo]

I LOVE Dungeon Meshi's Realistic Fantasy Races

Ok, I had to stop for a moment to gush about the fantasy races of Dunmeshi, and all the consideration that's been put into them, because they actually follow a degree of natural/evolutionary logic not found in most fantasy stories!

Half-Foots (halflings/hobbits):

So we all know these fellows have excellent hearing and smell, but have you considered WHY? It's an adaptation to counteract their size. Humans (called tallmen in this setting) rely so much on eyesight because we're really tall compared to most animals, giving us a fantastic vantage of our environment. Half-Foots don't have this advantage, and therefore rely on their other senses. It's also much more important for them to be able to detect unseen threats and move quickly, because their size makes them ill-equipped for direct conflict.

Dwarves:

So Dwarves are depicted as MUCH stronger than tallmen despite their size, right? This is because strength is determined not by size, but by mass, and dwarven bodies are very dense! Yet this comes with the downside of their bodies burning more energy and overheating much faster, which is why dwarves are also shown to be heat-resistant, and why they tend to wear lighter clothing that exposes more skin! Their night-vision is also better than humans' due to their semi-underground lifestyle, while their hearing remains about the same since sound naturally carries in caves. Their hairiness is also likely a direct adaptation to counteract magic, as it's been shown to form a natural buffer when left unwashed.

Gnomes:

Gnomes are supposed to be evolutionary cousins to dwarves, and it shows! They share a similar height, but are less muscular and have peculiarly-shaped ears, almost mirroring the difference between human and elven ears. Their affinity with nature and spirits also makes sense, because physically they're in an awkward spot compared to the other short races, lacking both the hefty strength of dwarves and the light nimbleness of half-foots. Being less equipped both for fight and flight, it makes sense they'd instead adapt the instinctive ability to read their environments and mitigate its threats through cohabitation.

Elves:

Like gnomes, elves are in a physically awkward place, however it's even more extreme. Their relatively light and weak bodies make them ill-equipped for direct conflict, and while likely able to move faster than tallmen due to weight, they lack the half-foot's danger-detection senses. This makes them seemingly helpless, however interestingly it actually explains why they're so advanced compared to other races! They were basically forced to coordinate problem-solve, and control their environments out of necessity, which is reflected in their more controlling and direct relationship with magic and nature compared to gnomes.

This actually mirrors the real-world difference between humans and neanderthals. Anthropologists believe neanderthals weren't actually dumber than humans, but that their superior strength and durability meant they weren't forced to problem-solve or control their environments like humans, meaning they seemed less advanced.

[probablybadrpgideas]

What everyone's up to this Christmas:

Humans: The anguish, mostly.

Dwarves: Alas, as gruff, cold, work-focused creatures, every Dwarf has found themselves stranding in a Christmas-loving small town with a quirky love interest teaching them to embrace the true meaning of the Holidays. This happens every year and they're really sick of it.

Elves: "I have seen a hundred faiths and a thousand winters. I was here when this day was names Saturnalia, and I will be here when Christmas lies forgotten in the wake of younger gods" says the Elf, blatantly covering their ass over forgetting to get you a present.

Halflings: Sitting around stuffing themselves, smoking pipeweed and playing game...wait, what's this "Christmas" thing you're talking about?

Gnomes: Continuing to complain about the elves taking credit for all the toys they make for Santa. Those are clearly gnomes! This is slander and they demand compensation!

Goblins: Giggling and offering you a present that's making a weird hissing noise. Says its fine and then giggles again.

Dragons: Slightly worried that the Kobolds haven't picked up that they want gold for Christmas.

Kobolds: Hoping the dragon likes the giant sweater they all worked together to knit this Christmas!

Giants: Eagerly looking forward to unwrapping the snack-filled boxes (or "houses") the humans have left for them. You guys <3

Orcs: You know what, sure! They'll be a unambiguously evil force that provides uncontroversial narrative stakes for your adventuring party, just this once. Merry Christmas!

[sexyapostate]

Auntie Ethel's Race-Specific Vicious Mockeries

Because of this post by rpgchoices, I figured I'd compile all the other Vicious Mockery lines Auntiel Ethel can hit the player with. These don't include the origin companion specific ones. You can find those in the linked post.

DROW ELF

Filthy underscum!

Just another of Lolth's pretty harlots.

Slaver. Sadist. How dare you judge me?

DROW ELF (MALE)

Bare your throat, spider-bait.

Kneel, boy. Just like the matriarchs taught you to.

Bow to your betters, boy.

HALF-ELF DROW

Even the Underdark doesn't want you, half-breed.

Surprised you show yourself in public, abomination.

A half-drow? How grotesque.

DWARF

More beard than brains, the lot of you.

Bet you'd trade your friends for a trinket or two, gold-eater!

I'll squeeze that stone heart until it bleeds, dwarf.

DUERGAR DWARF

Bow your head, slave. You remember how, don't you?

Grey and useless as a stone comb.

Need a new master, illithid lover?

DRAGONBORN

Aww, where's your clan? Bet they'd exile you for that brainworm in a blink.

Bet that honour of yours shatters easy as your scales.

You foul-breathed little lizard!

GNOME

Disgusting burrow rat.

Bet your clan's happy you're gone!

Try laughing after I rip your throat out, gnome.

ELF 

Fancy yourself immortal? We'll see how long that lasts.

I'll show you what a true fey does, dearie.

Elves are so pretty. Pretty worthless!

HALF-ELF

I wonder which parent regrets you more, half-breed.

How revolting. Another thin-blooded mongrel. Half-elf. Half-human. All useless.

HUMAN

Another human rat infesting Faerûn.

A human! So desperate to be special.

Pity. That tadpole actually made you interesting.

HALFLING

No flabby dwarf's a threat to me.

Come closer, little softie. You'll be tender.

A tiny, sweet morsel. Just for me.

HALF-ORC

Come now, tusks-for-brains! Doesn't this make you angry?

All that bloodlust. A little tap, and I bet you won't know friend from foe!

Lumbering half-orc. Twice as ugly as your parents combined!

TIEFLING

I'll burn you alive and everyone will celebrate.

You're everyone's punching bag and no one's favourite.

I see the Hells spit out another tragic little tiefling.

These were included in the dialogue document and the races listed are exactly what's in the dialogue's trigger flags.

PLANAR (githyanki, warforged)

What kind of botched portal brought something like you here?

Are you lost, little one? Maybe your soul will make it back home.

I'll banish you for good, outsider!

RARE (aasimar, dragonborn, firbolg, genasi, githyanki, half-drow, half-orc, tiefling, triton, warforged, yuan-ti pureblood)

I'm one step closer to wiping your kind off Faerûn for good!

Freakish thing. I bet everyone stares when you walk by.

Not a lot like you. You'll be my prettiest trophy.

BEASTIAL (aarakocra, kenku, lizardfolk, tabaxi, tortle)

Think you're a person because you're walking on two feet? Adorable.

Can't wait to throw a collar on your neck and make you my familiar.

I'll tan your hide, beast!

BONUS: MINSC? FOR SOME REASON? I don't know why there seem to be unlabeled Minsc-specific Vicious Mockeries. Maybe Ethel played BG1/2 and just really hates him.

How quaint! The hamster has a pet.

Only evil here is what's inside you, ranger.

Go rub your rat, soft-skull.

[mischiefwife]

Barcus should be a full companion.

Baldur's Gate 3 is really cool and i like it but why do we get like 5 recruitable variations of elf and not ONE short race? Dwarves gnomes and halflings are right there guys! Barcus could be the perfect answer for a buncha reasons.

First, you can recruit him early on. He's right there in the blighted village closer than Karlach is, so it isn't like you'll get him super late. Even have a funny opportunity to totally blow it by hitting the wrong lever (like how you can fuck up saving Gale). As for his class he's admittedly not good at fighting but he makes his own explosives so maybe he could be a good skill monkey type character OR be an artificer if they add that class.

Second, he's got hits of story in all three acts that would work perfect with him there. He's arguably got more potential story beats than Karlach. Act 1 save him and rescue the others from Grymforge. Act 2 find Wulbren in Moonrise, meet the Ironhands at Last Light. Act 3 decide how to deal with the Ironhands and the Gondians. Plenty of good and bad choices.

Third, even though he's clearly got Bongle bussy on his mind, Wulbren does not feel the same. Imagine a romance where you help Barcus out and then at the end he's like why was i chasing this asshole around when YOU were right here the whole time! It sound so dumb but it'd be cute as fuck.

Thank you for coming to my ted talk.

[yarrayora]

So I love your thoughts on post king Laois and prince-elector Falin, and I propose some more options for prince-electors:

First, I think Laois would really try to get as many people from different races as possible, especially because it seems his kingdom has more diversity than others (it ends with him talking with an orc child, after all, so we know that along with "humans" there are at least some "demi-humans" as well)

So, the first prince elector is of course Falin. I don't think she represents either the Tallmen or demi-humans, given that she's. Well. A chimera. So I think later, her role would be filled by a family member close to the current ruler. Or maybe a random citizen! Who knows.

The next prince-elector is for the Tallmen. I want to say Kabru, but people might be worried he's too influenced by the elves (even though we know he isn't). Perhaps that goes to an advisor that Kabru carefully selects. Or maybe Kabru himself because Laois doesn't care about optics, he wants his friend Kabru to help him.

After that, a prince-elector for the Halflings. I think Laois, who knows how important Chilchuck's union work is to him, would want to make sure there's someone who can advocate for them. Chilchuck might not want to do it himself (I could see him going either way) but I think at the very least Laois would ask Chilchuck who to choose.

Prince-elector for the gnomes would be Mr. Tansu. Not just because he's one of the few named gnomes, but I think it's good to have someone who isn't completely won over by Laois.

For dwarves, you may think it's Senshi, but no. He's not the kinda guy who cares for that. Not Namari either. But Daya would be good, I think. She apparently was a "guardian of a dungeon" and I think Laois would like to keep someone who knows and respects dungeons on his elector board. Plus, unlike Senshi, I think she is more in tune with what the dwarves would need from a king.

Marcille might be another no-brainer for the elf rep, but she's also no at first. We know she's terrified of losing her friends, and I think she would be really upset at being put in the position of having to choose a "replacement" for her friends. So they set up Mithrun in there first, if only because he would be the hardest for the other elves to influence. After all, he supports Laois and how can you bribe someone who can't even say what he wants most of the time? But eventually, perhaps after a generation or two, Marcille will have enough time to distance herself emotionally from the kingdom and become ready to step up to being the elf prince-elector.

The orcs are a bit more of a headcanon. So, I love the concept of political marriages and the way society shapes the idea of what is platonic/sexual/romantic. So I think Laois would get politically married to Leed. Not only because he loves monsters, but because the other races tolerate each other's sentience. They have their racism, but at least all "humans" are considered human. But demi-humans or monsters like orcs--while they are considered *kinda* human, they're also not. They're treated as more monster than human. So I think if Laois wants to successfully establish orcs as equal citizens of his kingdom, he needs to show that they are truly equal to humans, regardless of how many bones they have. And I know Leed is scared of Laois, but we see that she's willing to "make the sacrifice" to be his wife when her brother suggests it for the good of their people. Bonus, it fills the slot of queen so one less thing for Kabru and Yaad to worry about. So, political marriage. And yes, Leed takes a while to warm up to the Devourer, but I think she'll eventually see that Laois does love her people. I think she would eventually come to love him the way Izutsumi and Falin do. And even if they did have little half orcs, I could see Laois being like "I'm not gonna raise my kids like my dad did, training them to force them into a position they don't want". His kids can make a bid to be the next ruler if they want, but he won't force them.

All this to say, he would let his wife, Queen Leed, choose the orc prince-elector.

Izutsumi has a chair. She doesn't sit in it though, because she's like Marcille in that she would hate being forced to choose a "replacement" for a friend. She also doesn't sit in it because she's a cat. Izutsumi.

yep! basically the plan is to keep an equal amount of humans and demihumans as prince-electors (years later the term demihumans will be contested, as it's basically a vague term used to discriminate against various short-lived races as subhuman) (it is a realization falin came across to when during her travel around the world various establishments refuse to serve her, citing her feathery neck as proof that she's a demihuman)

the thing about Falin is she might be a chimera but she grew up a tallman with the perspective of a tallman. she ABSOLUTELY represents the tallmen as a prince-elector. so instead of another tallmen, they choose a kobold as the second member of the electoral college

you're right about chilchuck though. his first reaction would be "WHAT THE HELL'S WITH THAT FANCY TITLE? GET OUT OF MY HOUSE" before finally sitting down and listen to laios' explanation of his plan. chilchuck REALLY doesn't want peerage, but he also honestly. kinda doesn't trust anyone else to represent the halflings... so he takes on the responsibility.

as for mr. tansu i don't think he'll ever leave kahka brud. in the end theyll choose a gnome completely unrelated to laios' party. same with the dwarf! though that one is based on daya's recommendation. because daya herself doesn't seem to be to keen on politics.

same with mr. tansu, mithrun belongs to the western elves. he will not be part of the electoral college because he's not a citizen there lmao. milsiril will try to move there because of kabru, though uh, she doesn't fit their criteria of a Prince-Elector either. i can see them inviting marcille's mother in the end, since she has the experience working at a royal tallmen's court before.

i do think if it's to give the orc an honorable position, laios would give in and get politically married but like... the whole thing with inventing the electoral college thing is so he doesn't have to fulfill the societal expectations of being a husband and a father. so if he got married to Leed and then fail to perform (in like, the way autistic people has to perform in society, ya feel) as a loving husband in front of his court, they'll think Leed doesn't have his favor and shoves their own daughters his way. Kabru would be aware of this and not pressure Laios to get a queen. In fact he would talk Yaad out of pressuring Laios lmao

so, no, i don't think he'll ever get politically married to anyone ever. not when he has painstakingly created a system of succession that ensure he won't have to get married and have sex for the next heir to be produced. The Prince-Elector is already an honorable title to have, having Leed as one is enough to show that the orcs are not being treated as second-class citizens.

and yeah i think it would be Leed because while originally Zon was the one who received the offer, he refuses citing the fact that he has the responsibility to look after his tribe and that responsibility will clash with the responsibility of a Prince-Elector. he nominates his sister instead.

for izutsumi ngl my idea for her is that she becomes this folktale kind of charming rogue character because she makes money by escorting caravans through the monster-infested land surrounding laios' kingdom. there are children's books about her. she doesn't know she's popular.

[seras-elessar]

Something I really appreciate about Dungeon Meshi is how it casually steps past the race issue common in fantasy in the general comic, and brings it up in a side comic.

Like, all character species are Human. There are orcs, elves, gnomes, halflings, dwarves and humans, but they're all classified as Human. Even on a magical soul level all humans are the same, no matter their body or culture.

And their cultures aren't monolithic either! We get to see nuance from everyone in each culture. We get to see that culture is more impactful than race in each character, and even have cross race families and relationships. Kaka and Kiki are tall-men but they're adopted by gnome parents, Marcilles parents are a tall-man and an elf. And it's... Normal.

It's also interesting that the relations between races still have a lot of prejudice and stereotypes, even in a world where all of these things are true. And these relationships are expanded upon more than "elves don't like dwarves, period" and are handled in interesting ways.

(And every "race" varies in skin colour. Good job! No more white only elves please and thank you.)

Like the classic elf and dwarf characters of being longer lived than others is also dealt with head on, how Marcille fears not death but the death of her friends and family.

It's amazing that Ryoko Kui made a western fantasy story with the classic fantasy "races" and solved that problem from like five angles at once. No "race" is a monolith, no "race" is fully separated from the others by nature, no "race" is inherently evil. By just putting her foot down and saying "no, they all see themselves and others as "human", that's it" solves so many of the issues of old school fantasy.

(I'm not super stoked about demi-humans as monsters, but I feel like they also dodge a huge problem bullet by not making them inherently evil either. I'll dig into that later.)

Dungeon Meshi/Delicious in Dungeon is a masterpiece and Ryoko Kui is a fantastic creator of a truly interesting world.

[chaoticstarlightwonderland]

Danganronpa Characters as the Dungeon Meshi races

Makoto - Half-foot/human hybrid because he is forever short and baby-faced. It's been confirmed in side material that tall-man are able to produce children with halflings and gnomes and the offspring can reproduce (unlike half-elves) so I think it makes sense to have Makoto connected to the most underestimated races. In an adventuring party, he does a lot of the halfling jobs like looking for and dismantling traps. I also think because of his caring nature and how accident-prone he is Makoto learned some healing spells from his party's mage. He has low mana thought (2/5) so it's really in case of emergencies or as a simple first aid until real help can come.

Nagito - A half-elf. I think it would suit his brand of luck; born with a natural lifespan of 1000 years but has to watch anyone and everyone he loves pass away. Because he still has his luck cycles, everyone is sure is some kind of curse but no mage can do anything about it, let alone even understand it. He probably would go through a lot, losing his parents, being discriminated against, being sold off into illegal slavery, and probably a bunch of health problems. But Nagito is still Nagito, he just keeps kicking away.

Hajime - A normal tall-man who was frustrated with the fact that he was never particularly special in anything. I think when he found out he had even a hint of magic he begged his parents to send him to a magic boarding school they could barely afford, only to find out first-hand how lacklustre his magic was compared to the kids. Hajime pushed himself to continue studying, which lead him down a path of dungeon hunting, and of demons. He made a deal which backfired on him, turning into a Lord of the Dungeon and slowly becoming "Izuru Kamukura-ised". If/when he gets out of the demon's thrall, his case is a lot like Mithrun's. Although he does have more skills outside of wanting to hunt demons, that was because of the initial deal he made. Hajime lost the ability to enjoy his talents or get satisfaction from being skilled. He is more talented than ever but he is incapable of enjoying it.

Junko and Mukuro - Demons. Junko is a demon that helps people achieve their hopes and desires and feeds on their happiness. This makes people think she is the nicer sister but that just means she enjoys giving people what they want and watching their despair as they lose the capacity to enjoy it. Mukuro is described as a 'war demon' because she grants humans their wishes with violence and feeds off their rage and the resulting bloodbath. However, over time she actually grew to love the humans (at least more than Junko) because it was so shocking to see the kindness that mortal beings can show each other, especially when she has seen first-hand the cruelty they are capable of.

Now for the shorter ideas that I still think are interesting:

Fuyuhiko - A half-foot that is the heir to a shockingly powerful crime/loan shark family. His family flew under the radar for a long while because the Elves and Gnomes kept underestimating them until they become so powerful they couldn't be handled.

Peko - A tall-man who was abandoned by her parents when she was young and was brought by Fuyuhiko's family to be his servant and bodyguard.

Chihiro - A Gnome mage who is very talented in communicating with spirits. He has one such spirit that he has raised all by himself that is this reality's 'Alter Ego'.

A minor thing, in a side comic it was said that the races consider music to be the thing that Tallmen are known for, so I think all the characters who have interest in music are Tallmen. That includes Kaede, Sayaka, Ibuki, Hiyoko, and Leon.

I'd love to hear people's thoughts and suggestions!!

[blujayonthewing]

me: [has a hundred other drawings I want to do or sketches I want to finish]

me: hmm time to draw my bard being aggressively flirty with an npc who's never shown any particular interest in her or in anything at all other than being a big nerd

[dullgecko]

I have some headcanons on slurs for Orcs, Tieflings, Goblins, and for any half human race.

Beasts: Typically for Orcs, half-orcs, saytrs, and werewolves. Extremely offensive and typically from the bigots who try to push controlling these races. Mostly against Orc/half-orcs since it’s mainly about the rage they’re born with, racists basically wanting to force them to wear shock collars (think the original plot for Zootopia) and muzzles to feel “safer”.

Monsters: More towards Goblins, but also used against Tieflings, vampires, goliaths, and sometimes ghosts. Used primarily to encourage other racists to do anything in their power to either kick them out of their city/town or to just straight up try to kill them. Goblins have also been pushed to wear muzzles, but it’s not as popular as trying to force Orcs and Werewolves to.

Dirty bloods/Scraps: Literally against anyone who is a half of something, typically humans. This is mostly from bigoted high elves seeing their blood as “pure” and that it shouldn’t be “tainted” by humans or demonic races or even from being infected with lycanthropy or bitten by a vampire.

Tiny terrors: Typically against gnomes, halflings, kobolts, or even dwarves. Mostly from people originally just saying “tiny”, then immediately getting their asses kicked for being rude. So, tiny terror.

This is all I have for now, but I think way too much about what the oppression and politics in Fantasy High is truly like so I might share more in the future.

:] 💚

If any of the bad kids hear anyone using slurs like that against their friends/party members shit is going down.

Gorgug generally doesnt have to deal with it much in Elmville because the population of half orcs is fairly high and he's a fairly quiet, chill guy who keeps to himself. He still gets it sometimes though but brushes it off as people just being assholes sometimes.

Riz gets it a lot worse. People like the Kristens parents are border patrol agents who's jobs involve making sure 'monsters' from the chaos mountains dont try to sneak into Elmville. One of the first cracks in the damn for Kristen, so to speak, was her parents telling her she shouldn't be associating with monsters like that (in reference to Riz) and all she could think was 'but he's so nice?'. He really tries to reign in his more feral tendancies so people regard him as less monster-y but bigots are going to be bigots either way.

[bob-the-seagull-king]

My Dnd Hot Take is that Gnomes are boring as hell and need to be weirder. 5e gnomes are just twink halflings, they should really go all in on the almost-fae concept.

Here’s what I think gnomes should look like, small nature/wood spirits that are one with some form of plant/fungi.

[cokoweee]

Bad notification guy here, to simply correct the last anon- HALF GNOME? REALLY? if you want a smaller dragonborn for mikey- go kobold. THEIR LITERALLY SMALL DRAGON PPL. besides the pack tactics and other abilities fits Mikey well imo.

(Also no real hate I think it's honestly hilarious how you mind went to half gnome and not halfling or dwarf lol. Maybe fairy- omg fairy dragon 0o0)

But ye another option- KOBOLD!!!

🐍

I don’t like gnomes, no hate to the guy who suggested it. Those little pointy hat fucks do nothing but stand in a garden looking DUMB

Put that pointy hat to work and kill your enemies instead of standing there

[y-rhywbeth2]

I'm now really attached to that idea that Durge is an intentional mockery of whatever race they seem to be as a middle finger from Bhaal to whatever pantheon has clearly pissed him off before he made them, in the same style that his first children Thorax and Shantu were mockeries of the Earthmother's children. Where hers were magical animals like unicorns, his were violent mix-n-match predatory abominations.

Which leaves the question of what traits demihuman Durges would be subverting and mocking.

Gnome Durge actually covers it in-game:

*Do you feel jolly? Aren't you meant to feel jolly? You don't make a very good gnome.*

Gnomes: joie de vivre, creative, communal.

They can actually overlap with dwarves, who are instinctually drawn to the beauty and skill of artistry and engineering. The corrruption/reversal of that would be Durge being driven to crush and destroy such things that the gnomes and dwarves hold to their hearts. Where a dwarf is raised to study the world around them with an eye to improving it, dwarf Durge would have that little voice in their head that points out nothing but flaws, and the way things can be made worse.

Elven and half-elven Durges are probably obligate carnivores - while they can and do eat it, elves don't really do meat, their natural diet is mostly plant matter with fish. The weird guy with the predatory vibe who's too into hunting and loves the taste of animal flesh is going to be very unsettling. I also like to imagine they do have the ability to commune, but the darkness in them and the fact that they're not a true child of Corellon makes them so fucking wrong to an elf that sharing their spirit is borderline traumatic. Also they're inevitably going to get branded hahlorkh - an indiscriminately violent brute who behaves in a completely un-elven fashion.

Half-orcs... lore on orcs is thin on the ground, but I have seen something about how, due to very high orcish tempers, amongst their own settlements it's imperative to be polite, insightful and calm in order to keep orcish clans functioning without self-destruction. Barbarian hordes sweeping into civilisation are usually the new generation of adolescents, who are being sent out to get the worst of it out of their system before they settle in. Durge would never be getting it out of their system. On the bright side, orcs and half-orcs are predominantly carnivorous, so Durge's cannibalism habits might fly under the radar even if they're a little frowned upon.

Hin... hmm. I don't know. Halflings are very clan and family based, they're cheerful, they share the joie de vivre of gnomes. They like money, and they like spending it on parties and gifts. Durge kind of tore their family apart at age 10 or something, and actively despises the world and the notion of being alive, which shows where that'd go.

Tiefling durge has significantly too much lower plane heritage to actually qualify for the word, but it's probably just that they look like one. Tieflings don't really have their own culture to fail to meet, they belong to human cultures. Which Durge can't fit in with on account of looking like a devilspawn. Shame they tend to kill real tieflings in their sleep, they might've fit in.

Dragonborn are clan based with a whole thing about comporting yourself with honour and competing to improve yourself. Durge is the antichrist, has no clan or ancestors, and uh... yeah. Self improvement and doing right by your family elders just translates to murder time really. Bhaal just wanted something big and scary with teeth and claws here.