The Daily Grind: Are tiny races persecuted?

We've seen it across the MMO spectrum: Gnomes, Hobbits, Halflings, Dwarves, Asura, Sprites, Danny DeVito -- they're all ridiculed, mocked, and often targeted by other players driven to an inexplicable rage at the mere sight of them. Small races may be fiercely loved by a segment of the playerbase, but their presence serves to infuriate even more.

So what is it about short races that drives good men and women to near-madness? Is it their tenacity at overcoming odds? Their propensity for kicking shins? Or their "ooh lookit the cute widdle fella!" adorability? It's hard to say, although this writer personally loves them. So chew on that, tallies!

But that's not today's question; today's question is whether or not you think short races in MMOs have become persecuted, to an extent. Are they unfairly targeted just because of what they are, and if so, does that mean we've traded real-world prejudices for virtual ones?

Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!

Reader Comments (62)

well ... personally, I think that a lot of the hatred spawned originally from WoW gnomes looking like little twisted downs symdrome patients ... then after a gnome rogue ganked you 10 times in a bg, you decided that they looked like little EVIL twisted downs symdrome patients.

But, I like the Asura ... the Asura are a-ok with me :D

@Mikkhail

Agreed. Gnomes in general were never my favorite, at all.

However, the Dwarves are my favorite fantasy race. I was a little bummed when I finally seen the Race Roster in GW2 and didnt see the Dwarves...But I'll live.

@Mikkhail people hated lurikeens 10 years beefore anybody dreamed up wow.

@Mikkhail

This exactly. I remember being a total noob in WoW and getting ganked and camped by this little pink haired lvl 20-something gnome rogue with a curly mustache when my toon was like level 12. I have hated all gnomes in WoW ever since. I tried rolling gnomes several times to get over it, but I could never get into that toon.

All things being equal in a BG and if there was a choice, I always targeted gnomes first.

@Mikkhail

Agreed. The other short races do not bother me, in fact I even mained a Gobbo Shaman in WAR, and my only alt was a Dwarven RP.

I do not hate the short races, I just hate WoW gnomes.

Stupid, stupid gnomes.

Honestly, I think I could forgive the "quirkiness" of the gnomes, and even their horrifically annoying voices if it wasn't for one, teeny....tiny....thing:

Their owners always fall into the "LOL I PLAY A GNOME THEREFORE IM QUIRKY AND WEIRD!" cliche. I hate it so much. No, no you aren't weird. You are just annoying.

@Mikkhail

I couldn't disagreee with you more. I raised a small army of Gnomes (then later a small army of Goblins before I quit) in said game...they always behaved themselves. Granted there whare a number of those who played Gnomes, in particular the *males, who did not. But I never used my style or stature to be irritating and/or play unfairly. And I only reacted in hostillaty when the opposite faction became a nuisance....just think of an angry bee with pink pigtails. Though I am sorry your and everyone elses' experience posting here wasn't the same with our kind.

*Note: Granted I found the male Gnomes...or those who played them to be the most peverted and sexually vivacious. Not sure it was the Napoleon complex manifesting itself in very Freudian ways...but yeah , there should of been a way to top and tail them, even on the same faction, when they got like that. Sheesh. :(

@Faction 3

Agree, I'm a fan of dwarves in general so I'll always have one or two in any game that has them. The WoW gnomes were just so annoying that I never warmed to them and after a while grew to dislike like even seeing them.

@Faction 3
The Dwarves all turned to stone. I'll bet they're still hunkered down there fighting the Great Destroyer.

@alimantando Well technically it was only the Deldrimor dwarf faction that turned to stone. The Stone Summit dwarves didn't undergo that rite. If the recent videos of GW2 is any indication they're still around and we'll still be fighting them. But yea that rules them out as playable as they're a hostile faction.

@oddshrub I don't disagree that there were other races that were hated before wow gnomes ... Blizz just took it to a whole new scope, breadth and reach ... and wow's popularity brought hideous wow gnomes to the general masses.

@Utakata Yes, One of the last characters i created in WoW was a gnome mage, I loved it. I had tried creating several human mages, and hated them all. Gnomes had spice, and the general cuteness complicated the destruction coming out of your fingertips.

He was Arcane, and that was a great, and really fun spec at the time too. My gnome was male, (and had pink hair at that... wanted to be a frost mage with light blue hair, but I dont think the color was available so I went arcane) but he was a gentleman, helping horde players level and take down mobs, and the only innapropriate thing he did was dancing while waiting for someone in a dungeon.

@Mikkhail Gnomes Rule!!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JrNwQZpMSok&feature=fvst

@Mikx

You made them pink and blue based on spec too. I like you. /wiggles pigtails

Yes, but the developers don't exactly do much to prevent the issue seeing as they tend to use those very races as comic relief (I remember someone from Anet saying they did the Asura animations to make them a bit goofy; things like having to shift the weight of the big hammer they're holding because it's too heavy for them). So you can't really blame people for being annoyed by them if they think the game/story's supposed to be srs bsns.

Umm, at least in the case of the asura I think it's an entirely earned animosity resulting from rampant superiority complexes and a tendency to use "bookah" as a racial slur. ;)

They're still awfully cute, though.

@j1083

From my loftly height of 3ft I have correctly deduced that your opinion is wrong in 23 ways. Please keep your rampant ignorance to yourself, bookah.

(suffice it to say, I will be playing an asura)

I think it's sort of like, e-bullying, and it's mostly done in jest. I knew tons of people in WoW who used to bash on gnomes and go on and on all day about how much they hated them, wanted to punt them, etc. But then we'd go roll some ally characters and all of the sudden everyone wanted to be a gnome. I think that when people actually play the small characters, they love it because it's fun to be the "underdog" or the adorable character or whatever. But when they're playing against the small character, they don't want that tiny little punk to beat them. :P

Naaaaw. Though some small races are to be hated, the Asura animations on GW2 are the bestest thing on the world. You simply cannot hate someone that makes you laugh even when they walk.

@Pyzlnar I love that not only are they funny to watch, and incredibly adorable, but it all makes sense too because of their body structure. :P

I'd have to agree that, to an extent, short races have been persecuted and stereotyped, particularly as the cute or funny race of their respective settings. It doesn't help that this is more often than not the case either.

This leads to interesting scenarios where a viewer instantly decides said traits about a race that may as well be a bunch of megalomaniacal, magic robot building, midget land sharks *cough* Asura *cough*.

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The Daily Grind: Are tiny races persecuted?

Reader Comments (62)

Posted: Aug 30th 2011 8:23AM Mikkhail said

Posted: Aug 30th 2011 9:24AM Faction 3 said

Posted: Aug 30th 2011 9:52AM oddshrub said

Posted: Aug 30th 2011 10:00AM xBludx said

Posted: Aug 30th 2011 10:06AM MaddZ said

Posted: Aug 30th 2011 10:33AM Utakata said

Posted: Aug 30th 2011 10:39AM Celtar said

Posted: Aug 30th 2011 11:09AM alimantando said

Posted: Aug 30th 2011 12:31PM Seldra said

Posted: Aug 30th 2011 2:51PM Mikkhail said

Posted: Aug 30th 2011 3:03PM Mikx said

Posted: Aug 30th 2011 7:41PM alucard3000 said

Posted: Aug 30th 2011 10:21PM Utakata said

Posted: Aug 30th 2011 8:24AM Ehra said

Posted: Aug 30th 2011 8:24AM j1083 said

Posted: Aug 30th 2011 1:02PM Turbana said

Posted: Aug 30th 2011 8:24AM Seanikens said

Posted: Aug 30th 2011 8:27AM Pyzlnar said

Posted: Aug 30th 2011 8:31AM Seanikens said

Posted: Aug 30th 2011 8:30AM (Unverified) said

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