I did a deep-dive into Pathfinder's halflings. I'm both disappointed and horrified

Halflings have always struggled to stand out from the more lore rich Gnomes, which is a shame considering their origins as the heroes of Tolkien's world. But, when I saw a copy of Pathfinder: Halflings of Golarion, I thought "Hey, I can finally see what Paizo did to really set their halflings apart and make them really interesting to play! :D"

I did not find that.

Part 1, Disappointment

Turns out, halflings don't have an origin. They apparently just... have always been there with humanity. No cradle of life, no unique migrations, not even a single city to call their own. They exist in human societies and occasional very small hamlets, but that's all. Whatever achievements they have get attributed to the humans they live alongside instead. In fact, they're apparently happy fading into the shadows of history and never being acknowledged for anything.

Take a moment and think about that: One of the game's core ancestries effectively has no unique culture, no homeland, no major cities, nothing. Hell, even the gnomes have the city of Omesta in Kyonin.

Part 2, Horrified

So, if Paizo didn't give them any culture of their own, what DID they give them? Slavery. I swear I am not exaggerating: A single instance or combination of the words "Cheliax" "Servant" and "Slaves/Slavery" appears on every... single... page... of the 30 page book, Halflings of Golarion, outside the pages dedicated to gameplay mechanics like items and feats.

I was positively stunned that I could find those words repeated so often and so goddamn casually. Paizo has stated that they wanted to make fewer stories that involved slavery in second edition due to how often and central it was in a TON of first edition material, and now I can truly see why.

There's also some pretty absurd "OW the edge" level of writing here. When talking about enslaved halfling mothers in Cheliax, Isger, and Nidal, the book tells about how... well... trigger warning ahead.

"Halfing mothers must often work throughout their entire pregnancy and may suffer from beatings and malnutrition. Under these circumstances, approximately 1 out of every 10 halfling infants doesn't make it past a month, 1 in 5 doesn't live past the first year, one in 3 fails to live to age 5, and one out of every 50 halfling births ends in the death of the mother."

..........moving right along, if this book was meant to make players want to play halflings, I would say it leaves quite a bit to be desired. It's pretty clear that Paizo had absolutely no interest in even having halflings in their setting and only included them due to Tolkien/Grandfather Clause.

That is, they didn't. Thankfully, there is hope!

Part 3, From Mwangi With Love

Finally, an entire decade after Halflings of Golarion was published, halflings finally have a culture and place that they can entirely call their own.

The Lost Omens: Mwangi Expanse gave us the Song'o halflings, lovers of travel, generosity, and secrecy. They interestingly walk a line between wanting to do good and fight against evil, and keeping themselves safe and isolated. This already provides some solid options for character building outside of "I was/someone I knew was a slave", but they just keep building on it! Their clerics prefer to worship their ancestors instead of gods, they have unique colorful fashion and a love of huge hair, are great botanists/herbalists, and have a unique fighting style based on IRL Zulu martial arts!

Massive props to Laura-Shay Adams and the other authors of LO:ME. I am so proud of how far Paizo has come over the years. This feels like a genuine attempt at giving one of their core races the respect they deserve.

I just find it a shame that this will probably be it. Halflings were completely absent from LO: Tian-Xia, and the next big line of releases will be about the Shining Kingdom where, again, halflings just fade into the background with humans.

The dwarves, orcs, and elves all get their own Adventure Path times in the spotlight (Skyking's Tomb, Triumph of the Tusk, and Spore War, respectively). It's a darn shame that the true heroes of Tolkien's world will probably never really get a chance to shine anywhere else on Golarion.

...now I'm sad. :(