Gnome Toys?

[Gotterdammerung]

I was looking over the races of Stone casually, and i had a thought.

Archetypal Gnomes have kinda 6 subsets that i have seen in fluff here and there.

Illusionists

Earth Lovers

Giant hunters

Artisans

alchemists

Weird Steam punk inventors.

Now i have been seeing these archetypes pop up over the years, and i have found text to support pretty much all of these except 1.

The weird steam punk inventions.

It was kinda disappointing that the races of stone had a detailed review of gnomes and didn't add anything at all to the inventor side of gnomes.

I haven't seen any gnome inventor flavored prestige classes in official books.
There are magic items here and there and a few mundane creations that get blamed on these hard to find gnome inventors.

Over the years i have just fixed this with homebrew but i was curious if maybe i just missed a book, possibly in a different setting.


I don't mind a homebrew suggestion on topic if its really well done, but for the most part i can homebrew myself.

Mainly i am just wondering if there is a book with a gnome inventor societal expose, or some gnome inventor prestige classes, base classes, feats, items, magic items, ect.

P.S. I know there are some things that can be refluffed to fit gnomes like a maestro, that faerun inventor god guy prestige class with the mechwarrior sidekick, artificer, ect. I'm not really looking for things that need refluffing to fit.

[flumphy]

As far as I know, it was Dragonlance that really solidified the inventor gnome archetype. (Warcraft obviously helped too, but that's kind of tangential to TTRPGs.)

The official Dragonlance stuff is mostly 2ed, but the 3.5 Dragonlance Campaign Setting was, in fact, published by WotC. The rest of the 3.5 material is third-party. I don't own most of it, but I'm guessing that would be the place to start looking.

[Gotterdammerung]

As far as I know, it was Dragonlance that really solidified the inventor gnome archetype. (Warcraft obviously helped too, but that's kind of tangential to TTRPGs.)

The official Dragonlance stuff is mostly 2ed, but the 3.5 Dragonlance Campaign Setting was, in fact, published by WotC. The rest of the 3.5 material is third-party. I don't own most of it, but I'm guessing that would be the place to start looking.

Thanks, that was the kind of thing i suspected. There are several worlds i haven't ever played in. I never played in dragonlance because i've never really been enamored with dragon fluff, and when i read some of the weiss and hickman dragonlance novels, I found the heroes were psych head cases and didn't particularly enjoy it.

Anyway if you remember some specifics about which dragonlance books and names of 3rd party books please tell me. If not at least i have a breadcrumb to start sniffing.

Thanks again and keep it coming please everyone.

[Quirp]

Magic of Faerun has a gnome inventor class. It´s all about building crazy machines that need fuel and function like (low level) spells. It´s not that great, but at least something.

[flumphy]

Well, I just skimmed through the campaign setting, Age of Mortals, and Holy Orders of the Stars to make sure I wasn't forgetting anything. Nothing particularly gnomey in any of those beyond the basic blurb on gnomes in the campaign setting and how they've adapted to the Age of Mortals, I'm afraid. I'm guessing Races of Ansalon would be your best bet, but I don't actually have that one.

Come to think of it, you might also check out the Warcraft d20 stuff. I'm certain there was a tinker base class.

[gbprime]

Yeah, my current campaign is using gnomish Tinkersmithing as full-blown steam punk goodness. I had to scratch build the rules for it, but I came up with a fairly elegant way to do it, IMO.

[Urpriest]

Gnomes are fairly heavily involved in binding elementals into devices in Eberron. Something Scion of Zilargo maybe?

[Chronos]

At any table I DM, all gnomes automatically get a racial bonus to mechanical skills (some Crafts, Disable Device, and Open Lock), at least. And they had the equivalent of that in 2nd edition, in the official rules (not just rules for Faerun).

[erikun]

Gnome Artificer (Magic of Faerun)
Effigy Master (Complete Arcane)
Maester (Complete Adventurer)

I don't quite recall how the Gnome Artificer PrC works, but I believe it creates one-use or limited-use items that replicate magic spells. The Effigy Master PrC allows you to create, repair, and control effigies (constructs with stats of animals). The Maester PrC is the master craftsman, basically just giving you quicker crafting times. There are also several feats for reducing crafting costs, along with the Artificer base class from Eberron.

Dragonlance also had the Tinker Gnomes, although I don't think they had any specific classes for them.

[Ravens_cry]

Gnome Artificer (not to be confused with a Gnome who is an Artificer)
is one of the coolest PrC of all time for me.
Never got to play one, but they make unmagical items that replicate certain spells. "Flaming Hands? Nah, Lets just use my patented 'Multi Target Exothermic Reaction Device'. It also makes great toast in a snap!" "Colour spray? Who needs it? I got my "Multi-Spectrum Disorintation Inducer'! Also good for spicing up the louder kinds of musical performances."
It's expensive though, they cost twice what the magical device would normally I believe.

[hex0]

Gnome Artificer (not to be confused with a Gnome who is an Artificer)
is one of the coolest PrC of all time for me.
Never got to play one, but they make unmagical items that replicate certain spells. "Flaming Hands? Nah, Lets just use my patented 'Multi Target Exothermic Reaction Device'. It also makes great toast in a snap!" "Colour spray? Who needs it? I got my "Multi-Spectrum Disorintation Inducer'! Also good for spicing up the louder kinds of musical performances."
It's expensive though, they cost twice what the magical device would normally I believe.

I believe the main limitation is the weight of the artifacts you make. You can't cary them around easily...

I was going to play one but I played a Wizard/Techsmith instead and found it much more enjoyable.

Also, check out Races of Stone. And the Dragon Magazine about Gnomes. (can't remember the issue at the momen)