Parent Pages: Rules : Races

Gnome

Most of the Gnomes of the Archipelago are talented creators of advanced technology and are full of enthusiasm for any kind of new gadget.

Their Technology is two tech levels ahead of most of the rest of the Archipelago, but suffers from quirks that make them unreliable and/or dangerous. Very rarely, their gadgets actually explode when used. This is the reason for the extremely poor reputation the Gnomes suffer from.

Most Gnomes live deep underneath the Dwarven tunnels of Iron Peak, as part of the Tinkers, but there are scattered groups of them everywhere. The Gnomes of Iron Peak are an agoraphobic sort, having spent their entire lives underground.

Gnomes and Pixies get along quite well due to a shared love of pranks.

Gnomes that use magic suffer from Social Stigma (Freak) [-10] (unless they're Forest Gnomes), because everyone expects Gnomes to be obsessed with technology. Their own society barely tolerates them, because magic doesn't have a clear scientific explanation. Gnomish mages are fond of Illusion, Synthetic, Technological and Golem magic. Their Golems are usually at least partly machines.

Gnomes do not get along well with Goblins and Kobolds.

The Advanced Goblins that live underground often compete with the Gnomes for the resources required for advanced technology, leading to a certain level of intolerance. This intolerance has extended to surface Goblins, but without much reason.

Sub-Races

Forest

Forest Gnomes live in the forest, in harmony with nature. They get along well with Elves of all kinds and are just as devoted to protecting nature, if not more so.

Their views of magic and technology are inverted, as compared to the other Gnomish sub-races. They openly embrace magic, especially illusion magic, and avoid technology, as it offends their sensibilities.

Rock

Rock Gnomes are the most common Gnomes, especially on the surface. The Tinkers are Rock Gnomes with a small number of Deep Gnomes mixed in.

Deep (Svirfneblin)

Deep Gnomes live very far underground and are rarely seen. They're quite reclusive and frightened by open spaces and sun light. They have a few magical abilities, such as a level of Enhanced Dodge and an obscuring aura that prevents them from being detected by Clairsentience and other detection abilities.

Origin

Most of the Gnomes of the Archipelago believe that they were created in a laboratory by “The Gear God”, the god of all machines. The Forest Gnomes do not share this belief and tend to worship nature gods instead.

As the story goes, this Gear God was breeding them to be the perfect laboratory assistants, but after a while, it forgot all about them, becoming quite busy with another project. Having received no food for several days, they escaped from their cages and made their way to the mortal realm via a portal their creator mysteriously left open in the same room. Some Gnomes pray to the Gear God for forgiveness for escaping from the lab. Others simply don't care, because their creator completely forgot about them. Still others think the whole thing was a test that the original Gnomes passed with flying colors.

Some non-Gnome scholars have found reference to a “Gear God” that is supposedly the leader of the Modrons. No one is sure what to make of this piece of information. It may be the same being, or another being that happens to share the same title.

More recently, another hypothesis has been gaining ground with the younger generations. This boils down to a simple fact: when Dwarves and Elves interbreed, the result is startlingly similar to a Gnome. So similar, in fact, that they look exactly like Gnomes. This new hypothesis suggests that Gnomes are simply the result of inter-breeding. There is a small group of researchers under Iron Peak looking for evidence of this hypothesis. Genetic testing has found a great deal of similarity between the few half-breeds available and modern Gnomes.

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