It really sounds like the only way to play a kender without kender-hate is to play the character as if he/she is not a kender.
There's a lesson there...
The lesson is three fold.. You need a GM who's willing to set aside prejudice, Fellow Players who don't have a broomstick shoved up thier spinal cord, and a kender player who knows when to play the kender cards... and when to ease off. and to realise that character growth means evolving beyond the gimmicks and schticks.
Character class should reflect this as well. If by some miracle a Kender atually passes the Test of High Sorcery, it should be a kender who has evolved to survive that process.. and has learned to respect the rules of his Order.
Intriguing..But I disagree with that last part. Just because he respects the rules of the Order doesn't mean he ain't stealing everything that's not nailed down, especially when it comes to spell components.
Also, whither the Kendar? Are they in Taladas? Because I've only read the one trilogy, and while they played an important part in the series, it wasn't really ABOUT them, y'know.
Don't you mean [i]anything[/] that's nailed down? Kenders tend to grab random stuff, and end up with a fair amount of it, but they aren't taking away karts of crap or anything like that.
Intriguing..But I disagree with that last part. Just because he respects the rules of the Order doesn't mean he ain't stealing everything that's not nailed down, especially when it comes to spell components.
That was always a bit of a hole in the plot for me- just how much could kenders carry in their pockets? Were pockets of holding an item the race prized or something? And they were small too, does that mean they stole small things that they could fit in their pockets or what?
RPG Superstar 2009 Top 32, 2010 Top 8
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Also, whither the Kendar? Are they in Taladas? Because I've only read the one trilogy, and while they played an important part in the series, it wasn't really ABOUT them, y'know.
Ack, got my races confused. Kendar are from Chorane rifts, Marak Kender are what I was thinking of.
Reprinted from Time of the Dragon:
"Today, their friendly cheerfulness has vanished, replaced by grim suspicion. Although they remain incurably curious, it is the curiosity of fear and paranoia. They are curious not because they just want to know but because they want to know whether it will hurt or help them. If they meet a stranger, they want to know everything about him--who he is and what he has on him--to see if he presents a threat or danger. To this end they constantly peek, poke, and pilfer.
Their understanding of morals, especially regarding property, have not changed. Anything not nailed down is theirs if they want it. The rationalization has changed. Now they take things to ''check them out." Caught with his hand in the pouch of a wizard, the Marak kender says, ''I'm only making sure nothing in there is dangerous. Of course I kept this wand I found in there. After all, you might decide to use it against me sometime." The Marak naturally assume that everyone and everything is a potential threat against them."
More online here (Ross, please remove if you feel I've violated fair use) But the way I read the Marak Kender is they'll take it, determine if it's dangerous, then maybe put it back or toss it. They can work within a party since, even though they don't understand personal property, they can understand that the wizard may use that wand to fry things trying to hurt him. Still might complicate things in dealing with NPCs, but nowhere as disruptive.
Intriguing..But I disagree with that last part. Just because he respects the rules of the Order doesn't mean he ain't stealing everything that's not nailed down, especially when it comes to spell components.
Kender are not thieves and they aren't greedy. They pick up shinies but only things that catch them for the moment... and are just as likely to lose them as well.
A Kender who does not abide by the Orders' minimum rules of respect... won't last long enough to take the Test. Which means that the Handling tendencies get toned down in the Towers at the very least.
I guess we're just going to have to agree to disagree on the thievery part- to be clear, I never considered them malicious or anything like that, just that they were naturally larcenous despite their charming ways and such. Now, I don't think they necessarily know the value of the things they steal, and so have a better than 50/50 chance to steal things of absolutely no value to anyone other than the person they stole it from, but sometimes they have some genuinely useful stuff. A lot of this is going into my personal interpretation of Kender, though, so I realize there's going to be some disconnect. I'd be interested in running a DL game for you one day or even being in one that you ran, I think we're simpatico for the most part on Kender.
Hey, thanks for the link MM!! I'll be checking this out for days to come. I always enjoyed the Marak, even if I found them a bit hard to understand in game. I loved the look we got at their society in the Taladas Trilogy, I hope we see more, although I'll understand if we never do.
Several points...
1: I have no problem with the Goth Kender from near the steamwall. Members of that race could be Inquisitors. I would think they are out to get fire elementals and volcano worshippers.
2: Were-Squirrels only grab nuts, seeds, and truly useful to them things. Obviously, they shy away from silver. They throw cursed items into the deepest abyss they can find. They hate items that control their user.
3: Kenders would like wild magic. The Tower of High Magic probably is at war with wild magic users. If on the other hand, a Kender grabs the wrong thing in the Tower of High Magic, they will be possessed by it's original owner.
4: I will try to unload The Test of the Twins so it can find it's way to someone who will appreciate it.
My view on the Kender cleptomany is that they are less "grab importasnt/usefull thing" and more "ten years old left unsupervised", when you empty his pockets you may find a brooch ar something but mostly it will be seashells, shiny rocks, a hal-eaten piece of candy, crumpled paper with a funny drawing, chalk of a weird color, a small jar of unspecified goo he took from the mages pouch and a frog. And they are small so they carry only small items. It's not that thay have deep or magical pockets but that they have extra pockets, lots and lots o'them.
Also the No Fear thing? Does not mean thay are STUPID. Just because you are not afraid of the shiny lizard does not mean you can't understand the fact that he can swallow you without chewing, and that waking him up is a BAD IDEA. They are fearless and impulsive, not retarded. There's a difference and it makes me sad that some players confuse those.
The lesson is three fold.. You need a GM who's willing to set aside prejudice, Fellow Players who don't have a broomstick shoved up thier spinal cord, and a kender player who knows when to play the kender cards... and when to ease off. and to realise that character growth means evolving beyond the gimmicks and schticks.
+1000
Also the thing on Kevin Andrews story is not a kender. It's a demonspawn or something, but not a kender. Kender don't normally do sadness but they are capable of it and understand when other people are going through it. They ARE good at taunts and insults. Doesn't mean they are casually cruel, especially to the point of causing suicide. And why the hell would he blab everithing to the King? Is there any point in the race description that says they don't understand secrets or are incapable of holding secrets? Cuz I seem to have missed that.
I like how the actual post asks to refrain from the Kender hate and the first few posts are dripping with it. Haha - You guys are silly. :P
Better yet, it's in the thread title, you know the thing you see before entering the thread? And they still couldn't resist coming in foaming with rage and hate. Hilariously Trollerrific!
I like how the actual post asks to refrain from the Kender hate and the first few posts are dripping with it. Haha - You guys are silly. :PPosts that ask for no hate are practically begging for it.
The title is code for "Don't be yourself but respect Kender's right to be themselves." None of the Kender Hate seems ungenuine to me.
Introduction to the Kender Race
Kender have been called thieves since their creation by the Grey Gem or even before that magical stone which embodied the spirit of Chaos, and altered gnomes (and elves) into a new race. This new race was different than any other race on the face of Krynn. They had been inflicted with an immunity to fear, a strong curiosity, a inability to become magicians, and wanderlust, which inevitably caused other races to form a misunderstood annoyance with this relatively friendly race. Kender etiquette was a trait best learned by some races in order to get along with this emotional and sensitive race.
As mentioned above, kender are best known for their thief-like abilities, but much like a knight, being called a thief is a base insult. Even the mention of such a thing could cause the kender to unleash a flurry of insults back at the accuser. And though they never lie they have been know to be quite the Tale Spinners.Through out their history no kender thief has ever been known to exist. The problem therefore lies in the fact that kender find things that aren't theirs, and discover "lost" items, but they NEVER steal. Kender are not curious to find out what is in your pouch because they want to take your possessions, but because they just have a basic "need to know". Then they can become so enthralled with what ever it is that they forget to return it. So, they simply slip it into a pouch so it can be returned later...that is if they remember they have it. Sometimes this intense curiosity can usually get a kender into a lot of trouble. It might even get them killed. Kender are experts at picking locks, just ask any locksmith, and they usually try to get into anything they can.
Ansalon has two major Kender cities. The most famous was Kendermore. Unfortunately it was destroyed, and the kender survivors had to move to their sister city Hylo. As you can probably imagine kender cities are not quite the same as human settlements. Their are many more holidays and not much of a government. Kender moots, parades, and the ever popular Kender Toss are daily events. Not to mention the regular Kender Holidays for everything from lightning bugs to great Kender heroes like Uncle Trapspringer. Kender also dwell in nomadic tribes and tree villages through out Ansalon.
Pardon me, but I have to take Seroquel to avoid being sure that things are attacking me. Those things do not exist. If kender believe they can take other people's stuff without being thieves they are just as insane. So is the guy who designed Kender. Sorry for your pain.
Also the thing on Kevin Andrews story is not a kender. It's a demonspawn or something, but not a kender. Kender don't normally do sadness but they are capable of it and understand when other people are going through it.
To what degree? I wasn't talking about some mopey lady continually wandering about the castle weeping and snuffling into her lace handkerchief. Doing such an obvious bit of heart-on-your-sleeve sadness that even the kender can pick up that the young lady is sad would be suicide in a court intrigue, where daddy--who probably has a pretty good Sense Motive if he's the local lord--would also pick it up, figuring out his daughter's deadly secret in pretty short order.
Instead, the young lady has been using all the Bluff at her disposal to put on a face of false cheer, except when the kender steals her love token, at which point she flies into a rage fueled by grief and sorrow, but would still be lying while she did it. She would be saying that it wasn't that the little fair ring or scrap of lace or whatever it was that her lover gave her that's important, it's the principle of the thing, the kender is a thief from a race of thieves, etc.
That, actually, is a lie. If the kender had taken her silver hairbrush, she would wonder where she'd mislaid it or maybe one of her maids had taken it for polishing, and if it were one of her earrings, she'd be slightly annoyed, but would be enough of a politician that she could graciously retroactively bestow it on the kender as a favor.
But the love token? That's her precious.
They ARE good at taunts and insults. Doesn't mean they are casually cruel, especially to the point of causing suicide.
I was setting up a situation where the young lady would be rather cruel herself--as I said "snotty and haughty young noblewoman"--and would be tearing into the kender with every verbal cruelty that a high Diplomacy and Intimidate would let her come up with, completely out of scale with the theft of a cheap trinket that wouldn't cost more than a few coppers at the fair.
Would the kender taunt back? I think it's completely in character that he would.
As for the taunts driving her to suicide, it's a straw that broke the camel's back situation. If it weren't for what was going on in her life, she'd never contemplate it, but the kender's taunts were getting too close to the truth, if not actually stabbing at it, and killing herself is the only way she can think of, in her distraught state, to save her lover.
Yeah, maybe they could have eloped, but she's not in her right mind, and the kender helped to put her in that state.
And why the hell would he blab everithing to the King? Is there any point in the race description that says they don't understand secrets or are incapable of holding secrets? Cuz I seem to have missed that.
Here's what you missed: "Kender cannot keep secrets to save their lives and happily blurt out intensely personal information about themselves or anyone else."
So yes, it's right there in the racial character description. It's completely in character for a kender as written to do exactly that.
What we're just debating about is whether a kender would have 20/20 hindsight and feel guilty about it afterward or would just run off giggling, assuming no personal responsibility.
The fool blabbing confidences is an old part of medieval tragedy, and all I did was put the kender into the place of that fool.
I'll give you this. If they do not believe in the existance of private property, then they will react like someone called them Bigfoot, or the Loch Ness Monster. They will probably call their accuser a tea kettle.
I think what he's pointing out is that the race is hypocritical and while they understand the concept of personal property and thievery, they never apply it to themselves.
If they have no comprehension of personal property, then they should not understand what "thief" means either and should not be insulted by something that makes no sense.
I think what he's pointing out is that the race is hypocritical and while they understand the concept of personal property and thievery, they never apply it to themselves.
If they have no comprehension of personal property, then they should not understand what "thief" means either and should not be insulted by something that makes no sense.
Bingo!
So to remove the hate factor from the race, you have to play them as not believeing in personal property. Some tribes of American Indians felt that all property belonged to the tribe or nature.My Mom told a story of an ancester who whould tell people, "God has need of this!" and take something.
I think what he's pointing out is that the race is hypocritical and while they understand the concept of personal property and thievery, they never apply it to themselves.
If they have no comprehension of personal property, then they should not understand what "thief" means either and should not be insulted by something that makes no sense.
But in the end Kender are thieves. Dirthy filthy thieves. Just because you don't know you're stealing doesn't mean you haven't done the deed. Theft is taking someone else's property without permission. Nowhere in that definition does the taker need to understand the concept of property. Theft is not defined by intent but action.
If I made a race that had no concept of the sanctity of life, and in any situation their first response was to kill a sentient being, how much water would my argument that they are not murderers hold? Yes, I am saying that if Kender aren't thieves then sociopaths aren't and can't be murderers.
Even a kender made to understand, through patient tutelage, the importance of respect for others' property, they have an innate compulsion to break said ethical boundaries.
Kender are an abomination, and should only be allowed to be played if they have both hands and tongue cut out.
I think what he's pointing out is that the race is hypocritical and while they understand the concept of personal property and thievery, they never apply it to themselves.
If they have no comprehension of personal property, then they should not understand what "thief" means either and should not be insulted by something that makes no sense.
But in the end Kender are thieves. Dirthy filthy thieves. Just because you don't know you're stealing doesn't mean you haven't done the deed. Theft is taking someone else's property without permission. Nowhere in that definition does the taker need to understand the concept of property. Theft is not defined by intent but action.
If I made a race that had no concept of the sanctity of life, and in any situation their first response was to kill a sentient being, how much water would my argument that they are not murderers hold? Yes, I am saying that if Kender aren't thieves then sociopaths aren't and can't be murderers.
Even a kender made to understand, through patient tutelage, the importance of respect for others' property, they have an innate compulsion to break said ethical boundaries.
Kender are an abomination, and should only be allowed to be played if they have both hands and tongue cut out.
If they don't have free will about taking stuff, then yes you are right. It's like thoes surgically created creatures that are in so much pain they try to kill anything that moves.
Only because the Kender racists have been practicing their arguments for years :P
Right. No other race has to have "only evil people don't like them" built into their racial description. They don't need it. Kender, though, absolutely depend on that to avoid being ostracized if not outright killed by every other PC and NPC they come in contact with. It's like some bizarre mind-control that evil persons can shake off but everyone else is automatically affected by, no save. And look at defender's arguments - they all boil down to "everyone else must adjust to ME if I want to play a kender". It's never "I understand their point of view and will exercise due restraint so as not to ruin the experience of everyone else at the table". I've played a kender in a Dragonlance campaign, but only because I could play one of the ones who was affected by the destruction of Kendermore and, essentially, wasn't that kind of kender. Playing a manic ADHD kleptomaniac might be fun for a few hours or a session at a convention, but I'm not so selfish that I'd inflict it on the rest of my gaming group just because "that's just how they're written!" Right, and because I've read that, I know that no-one else wants them anywhere near them, period, full stop.
If they don't have free will about taking stuff, then yes you are right. It's like thoes surgically created creatures that are in so much pain they try to kill anything that moves.I think what he's pointing out is that the race is hypocritical and while they understand the concept of personal property and thievery, they never apply it to themselves.
If they have no comprehension of personal property, then they should not understand what "thief" means either and should not be insulted by something that makes no sense.
But in the end Kender are thieves. Dirthy filthy thieves. Just because you don't know you're stealing doesn't mean you haven't done the deed. Theft is taking someone else's property without permission. Nowhere in that definition does the taker need to understand the concept of property. Theft is not defined by intent but action.
If I made a race that had no concept of the sanctity of life, and in any situation their first response was to kill a sentient being, how much water would my argument that they are not murderers hold? Yes, I am saying that if Kender aren't thieves then sociopaths aren't and can't be murderers.
Even a kender made to understand, through patient tutelage, the importance of respect for others' property, they have an innate compulsion to break said ethical boundaries.
Kender are an abomination, and should only be allowed to be played if they have both hands and tongue cut out.
Ahh but if Kender don't have free will, how can they be a PC?
Wait what?
Yes kender understand something is yours or mine, they also see no offense in checking out your cool stuff, so absently (unintentionally) they might (borrow) pocket said interesting item or leave it in a strange location.
They do comprehend money, but socially prefer bartering, yes money is an interesting concept but not very practical.....
So yes they are upset to be insulted by being called a thief!
** spoiler omitted **
The fact that they might see no offense is immaterial. While it may at first start as innocence and cultural ignorance, at some point it moves into willful ignorance and cultural imperialism.
That the kender believe in community property is fine. If everyone in a kender village shares things in common, or just borrows them back and forth to the point where no one knows whose is what anymore than which child owns the toys in the daycare center toy chest, that can work. And any outsider who steps into a kender village should probably understand that's the way things work, and if he wants to keep hold of anything he finds truly important, he either has to hide it really well or go out of his way to locate it and borrow it back.
Once he moves into the outside world, however, a kender will realize that other cultures have other customs. Shops expect payment for items on display, kings take objection to anyone else wearing their crowns, and if there are a couple silver pieces on a dead child's eyes--even ones with particularly fascinating mint marks--removing them for even a second may cause an undead to spring up wailing about not having the fare to pay the ferryman.
There's another question--How routinely do kender desecrate the dead? If a locked door is a challenge, then a locked mausoleum must be a real challenge, with all sorts of fascinating things to be found inside. And a grave is just practically begging to be dug up.
The fact is, the desecration is not just taking something from the grave--whether or not you ever intend to put it back, if you ever remember to--but the opening of the grave itself.
If kender can't comprehend this, they're too stupid to live, and if they do comprehend it but believe that their own beliefs and customs are superior, then they're cultural imperialists of the first order and should just be given a LE alignment and left at that.
So, at the risk of sounding ignorant, I have to ask - what exactly is a Kender, and why the stigma?
As far as I can tell, they just seem like Dragonlance halflings, but I am admittedly ignorant of the setting. What differentiates them from the usual stock of stunted fantasy demihumans?
But in the end Kender are thieves. Dirthy filthy thieves. Just because you don't know you're stealing doesn't mean you haven't done the deed. Theft is taking someone else's property without permission. Nowhere in that definition does the taker need to understand the concept of property. Theft is not defined by intent but action.If I made a race that had no concept of the sanctity of life, and in any situation their first response was to kill a sentient being, how much water would my argument that they are not murderers hold? Yes, I am saying that if Kender aren't thieves then sociopaths aren't and can't be murderers.
Kender as a society, consider most stuff as Community Property. It is not unusually for Kender to appropriate each other stuff. In fact many Kender think it is strange that big humans get mad about their stuff being borrowed, instead of just borrowed the stuff back.
Alignment wise, there is no restriction on stealing (ah appropriating) someone else stuff. As long as it does not physical or mental damage the person in question. So a good kender will not take another person food, water, or potion of cure poison, if he knows you are going to need these things. On the other hand, Luxury items, like that nice shinny gem, or the toy box that makes people go to sleep, are fair game.
...........
On the other hand, a race that has no concept of the sanctity of life, would still be killing people. This is covered under the alignment system under good vs evil, and this society would be considered evil. Example... See Drow.
Thank you, sir! They sound very interesting conceptually, but I could see them becoming problematic as a PC race if they're played to the aforementioned stereotypes.
But in the end Kender are thieves. Dirthy filthy thieves. Just because you don't know you're stealing doesn't mean you haven't done the deed. Theft is taking someone else's property without permission. Nowhere in that definition does the taker need to understand the concept of property. Theft is not defined by intent but action.If I made a race that had no concept of the sanctity of life, and in any situation their first response was to kill a sentient being, how much water would my argument that they are not murderers hold? Yes, I am saying that if Kender aren't thieves then sociopaths aren't and can't be murderers.
Kender as a society, consider most stuff as Community Property. It is not unusually for Kender to appropriate each other stuff. In fact many Kender think it is strange that big humans get mad about their stuff being borrowed, instead of just borrowed the stuff back.
Alignment wise, there is no restriction on stealing (ah appropriating) someone else stuff. As long as it does not physical or mental damage the person in question. So a good kender will not take another person food, water, or potion of cure poison, if he knows you are going to need these things. On the other hand, Luxury items, like that nice shinny gem, or the toy box that makes people go to sleep, are fair game.
...........
On the other hand, a race that has no concept of the sanctity of life, would still be killing people. This is covered under the alignment system under good vs evil, and this society would be considered evil. Example... See Drow.
Drizit made a choice, and in that choice lies enlightenment.
See Dr. Who, enlightenment.You can't role play the fictionals because they don't choose.
Drizit made a choice, and in that choice lies enlightenment.
See Dr. Who, enlightenment.
You can't role play the fictionals because they don't choose.
And Jack and Jill ran up the Hill, to fetch a pale of water.
And Jack and Jill ran up the Hill, to fetch a pale of water.
Drizit made a choice, and in that choice lies enlightenment.
See Dr. Who, enlightenment.
You can't role play the fictionals because they don't choose.
They keep doing that because they are NPCs.
Don't design the Pathfinder Kender like Jack and Jill.By the way, a were-squirrel will give a coffer corpse a proper burial, possibly with an evil item the world is better off without. Being an evil undead is a violation of the deceased's free will.
Playing a manic ADHD kleptomaniac might be fun for a few hours or a session at a convention, but I'm not so selfish that I'd inflict it on the rest of my gaming group just because "that's just how they're written!" Right, and because I've read that, I know that no-one else wants them anywhere near them, period, full stop.Except I've played a six month (one session per week) campaign with a Kender in the party (not my character) and it was one of the most fun games I've ever been in.
Did I occasionally have my stuff taken? Yup.
Did my character react somewhat poorly (one time I locked the Kender in a headlock until he said he wouldn't do it again. It lasted one session lol)
By the end of the campaign, that Kender (who's name I don't remember, my guy always called him 'Runt') was my character's best friend, and my favorite party member.
Congratulations! You hit the lottery. It's not impossible to have a kender in the party that doesn't ruin the game. Just like it's possible to win the Lotto. It is, however, really d*mn unlikely. Every kender I've seen played (barring the emo version in later Ages) has been a distruptive jerk. 99% of all stories I've heard about parties that have a kender in them talk about, you guessed it, a disruptive jerk. Monopolizing DM time with "antics", stealing important things from party members, ruining diplomacy and stealth efforts, pulling dangerous levers - if a 5 year old pickpocket prodigy hopped up on coco-puffs and caffeine would do it for attention, pretty much assume it's going to happen. I hope they're having fun, be a shame if *no-one* did; and the rest of the group certainly isn't.
But! you cry. That's just how they're written!
No-one forced you to put "kender" in the race blank on your sheet. If you choose it willingly, you're choosing to be that guy. No blaming the authors of the rules, no appeals to external powers that demand such behavior, no "it's just what my character would do, I have no choice". You choose it, you own it. Maybe you can maintain the balance, have fun with it without being a pest and ruining it for others. Yay!
Maybe this lottery ticket in my pocket will pay off, too.
*Grabs a cookie* Thanks Zang! Some good trolls here, but you should see some of the ones that campaign against any new classes. Those guys are the real pros.
But! you cry. That's just how they're written!
But! I cry. That is not how they are written, that's how bad players choose to play them.
A good player like Kyrts friend can make the antics funny, especially if the campaign is on the lighter, having fun side (I'll admit that kenders aren't made for serious drama/horror campaigns) and if the party can run with it (throwing the kender and running is a classic).Also, you can't blame the levers on the kender. Mistery levers are made to be pulled :)
I will temper a bit of what I've been saying with the fact that in Dragonlance, after the destruction of Kendermore, there were the "afflicted" Kender, meaning that after you have a dragon burn down your town and most of your relatives, you don't escape without a little bit of PTSD. The "afflicted" Kender learned fear.
It's quite conceivable that, given a similar circumstance--such as, for example, extended jail time--a kender might learn such a concept as respect for personal property. Yes, it would probably be a LE kingdom that would do that--by the racial write-up, even LN judges would dismiss charges from such mischievous scamps and scalawags--but if the LE society got the lesson to stick, I think even the CG societies would be breathing a sigh of relief. Maybe not so much if the LE society started making Kender eunuch slaves, though there would probably be a little black comedy with the eunuch maker saying, "Oh, don't be upset. This is just a little custom in our society. I find these interesting so I'm going to just 'borrow' them for a while. After I'm done 'handling' them, I'll give them back. Or I'll forget where I put them. But wait, didn't you mean to give them to me as a gift? Yes, that's exactly what it is. These are 'a gift' and I thank you for letting me take them...."
After a few such examples, you'd think the rest of the Kender might get a clue as to other societies' views on 'personal property' and what you might want to not do when you're out of Kender lands.
What you also have to do is not have other societies with purported Good or even Neutral alignments giving Kender a free pass. Despite being a "childlike" race in terms of stature and outlook, one assumes a Good society wouldn't give them the same breaks as children. Equality before the law is an important thing, and it's the hallmark of a racist legal system if there's one law for Dwarves, another for Elves and a third for Kender. Being a stranger to the local laws and customs may grant some leniency for a first offense, but after that, you're on your own, and brainfarting on what the judge told you the first time is your problem.
There's also the trouble about the Kender "excuses" and how these compare to "lying," especially in a world where Zone of Truth and Detect Thoughts can do an excellent job of separating one from the other. In almost all cases, the Kender is actually lying in which case they should be treated the same as any other liar, especially one who does so before a judge while under oath. A good society doesn't pardon someone for perjury just because they look like a cute twelve year old.
The only other explanation is that the Kender's actively delusional and misremembering things based on a racial defect, in which case even a good society would want to confine them to a mental hospital for their own protection. The evil and even neutral ones would just order a summary execution for the criminally insane.
But! you cry. That's just how they're written!But! I cry. That is not how they are written, that's how bad players choose to play them.
A good player like Kyrts friend can make the antics funny, especially if the campaign is on the lighter, having fun side (I'll admit that kenders aren't made for serious drama/horror campaigns) and if the party can run with it (throwing the kender and running is a classic).Also, you can't blame the levers on the kender. Mistery levers are made to be pulled :)
Of course mystery levers are there to be pulled.
I have no problems with curious characters. Its the annoying ones that are a problem and Kender, even without all of the mary-sue-ing and uber-benefits, are just annoying as written.
And I'm going to threadjack here for a sec. I've forced my way though the first two trilogies and many of the short stories. ("But they're good" I was told...ugh).
Anyway, I think for me it comes down to this:
If you want to play a Kender, play a halfling. Play it as you wish. And if your annoying roleplaying pisses off the group, then suffer the consequences, jsut as if someone plays a murderer, slaver, or what have you. But don't be annoying and then chalk it up to "but it's how my race is played." Play and suffer the consequences. Take resposibility for being that player whose character everyone else hates.
And if they love you for it...GREAT! But it should be you and them, not some propped up racial trait that lets you act like a #$%#$$.