fiona was complaining about the d&d setting, in particular she doesn't like alignment (a commonly recognized problem), or the treatment of goblins.

I started thinking again about a framework I've somewhat codified that's hinted at or briefly discussed in pieces in d&d settings, which i think makes a number of things more palatable. Things like the treatment of goblins, and also my problem with the treatment of humans versus other races.

The framework is thus: in D&D, races age, each passing from Younger Race, into their particular age of glory, and on into the status of an Elder Race.

In nearly all D&D settings, it is currently the Age of Man: Humans are in their hey-day. This explains why Human are numerous, diverse, and default all out of proportion to other races (and is a more useful explanation than the alternative: dumb design).

The Age of Man began a few thousand years before present, most likely stepping into the gap left by the Dwarves as they brought their own age of glory to a close and ascended to become the youngest of the Elder Races. The Age of Dwarves was probably preceded by the Age of Elves.

The beginning of the Age of Elves is a very, very long time ago and history and myth begin to recede beyond recall, so it is hard to say what the prior ages might have been, or in what order. But there are indications that there are at least two other races that still walk in the sun who once had their own ages of glory: there are hints of an Age of Giants in the forgotten past; and, of course, the eldest of the Elder races that still walk in the sun are the Dragons. Beyond the Age of Dragons, even speculation fails. It may be that they are the First Race, or it may be that any race older is beyond our ken.

Side Note: when I was just talking about this with fiona, she called attention to the fact that both these known "extra-Elder" Races are very large: did they get bigger as they aged? Or have people been getting smaller? I suggested that maybe the biggest races "won the race" so to speak, they attained their ages first, possibly by virtue of having been the biggest to start with. fiona liked the idea of them getting bigger as they aged. We'll return to this.

When D&D 3rd edition came out, they strongly revised the feel of Halflings. They made them a more coherent race, for one thing; Halflings had always been torn between the two archetypes presented by Bilbo Baggins: the soft homebody, and the sneaky burglar. 3rd edition cohered Halflings by looking back in their history, presenting a race of Halflings much closer to the days of Littleman, and the Bad Old Days before him. (Or in Tolkienian terms, these are Halflings of closer the era of Marcho and Blanco and the founding of the Shire, and Smeagol and Deagol before them).

When I look at 3rd edition Halflings, I see a young, energetic, dynamic race waiting on the fringes, poised to have their own age, when the Humans step down. It sounds like fun.

Getting back to Goblins, what does this do for our understanding of them? Can we see them in a more palatable, or at least hopeful light? I believe so, and in a way that generalizes to many of the monstrous races. In many ways, an "evil" race (using "race" in the D&D usage, to mean a more or less intelligent species, with more or less of a society) is nonsensical. But if we think of Goblins as not just a Younger Race, but a Child, or even Infant Race, we can bring some sense to it. They are too young to have a morality, they haven't reached that level of maturity. One day, there will be an Age of Goblins, too. And by that day, Goblins will have reached a maturity of spirit allowing them to have a more coherent and workable morality.

Now, there are some problematic races in this model. When i first started formulating it under 2nd edition, both races of the Small Folk seemed problematic. With the rollback on Halflings, their status now seems much clearer, but the Gnomes are still something of a puzzle.

Gnomes seem to have characteristics of both Younger and Elder Races (and not entirely due to the schizophrenic influense of the Tinkner Gnome archetype). There's a dynacism to Gnomes tha seems Young, and in most settings at least, it's rare to hear of the ruins of an ancient Gnome Kingdom, they way you'd commonly hear of ancient Dwarf or Elf Kingdoms. On the other hand, they have extensive lifespans, and magical tricks, characteristics of Elder Races. There are also canonical highly magical subraces of Gnomes (e.g. the Svirfneblin, and, to an extent, the Forest Gnomes). This is also a trait that seems correlated with Elder Racedom (there are canonical highly magical subraces of Elves and Dwarves, but not of Human or Halflings).

It also occurs to me that Kobolds' status is unclear in this model. They have similarities to clear Younger Races, such as Goblins (diminutive stature and power, evilness, etc.) but at the same time they have a strong affinity for sorcerous magic, which may or may not indicate a degree of Elder-ness. And finally, with the release of Races of the Dragon, the relationship of Kobolds to Dragons is made canonical, which muddies their status: Are they related to an Elder Race, but themselves a Younger Race or what?

Then we stop to think about the idea brought up before. That Elder Races have gotten bigger, and they were much smaller in their own age. What if Kobolds are what Dragons were, when they were younger? There's a fascinating idea. What if, when Dragons were Humans, they were Kobolds?

This immediately suggests a parallel explanation for Gnomes. They, too, could be "left-behind" remnants of Elder Races at a younger stage. They have some affinities with Dwarves, but Dwarves seem too young to have split off something as different as Gnomes. It's hard to imagine Gnomes as remnants of the Elven Age either. Gnomes seem similar in age to Elves and Dwarves, so presumably what left them behind is a significantly older race. They could have been left behind by one of the speculated forgotten Elder Races.

Or... they could be remnants from the other known (more or less) Elder Race: Giants, fitting in with the idea that Giants were much smaller, before they were so Elder. But do we have any evidence to suggest that Gnomes are related to Giants? It seems a great leap to take with support.

As it turns out, we do. The evidence is fragmentary and suggestive, but could we really hope for more from the Age of Giants? I see at least two special connections between Gnomes and Giants. First, the 3rd edition Core Rulebook, Gnomes are given a special bonus for fighting Giants, specifically, above and beyond the standard bonuses for small things fighting big things. Unfortunately, Dwarves have a very similar special bonus versus Giants.

Another suggestive line of evidence is the Spriggan, creatures sometimes speculated to be the ghosts of old Giants. Spriggans in D&D* have two forms: a Giant form, and a small form. In their small form, they are very distinctly Gnomes. Again, this evidence is not very conclusive, but it lends a bit of credence to a theory suggested from another line of evidence.

*In their 2ed presentation, at least. I haven't looked at them in 3ed, I hear they're in the Fiend Folio, classified as Fey.

ETA: WotC's Races of Destiny talks about humans being future focused. It contrasts this with an examples of a dwarf being past-focused and a halfling being present-focused. I think this is exactly right, and a useful addition, for the framework I outline here:
Elder Races are past-focused: remembering and re-living former glories
Younger Races are present focused: surviving in the now
Dominant Races (races in their Age of Glory) are future-focused: striving toward accomplishment