[RPG] Does a whisper gnome count as a gnome for meeting feats’ prerequisites

dnd-3.5efeatsraces

Two feats in Races of Stone have as one of their prerequisites being a whisper gnome. This made me wonder: Does a whisper gnome count as a (generic, untyped) gnome for meeting prerequisites or is whisper gnome an entirely different race from (generic, untyped) gnome and unable to meet (generic, untyped) gnome prerequisite?

Best Answer

All gnomes have a subrace like rock or whisper

There's no such thing as a gnome without a subrace. Although not called out as such by the Player's Handbook (16-17), the gnome race described therein is the rock gnome, "the most common variety" of gnome (Monster Manual 131), and the game includes a fairly large number of gnome subraces, yet the larger classification—the gnome race (and, perhaps, kind, what PH 310 calls a "subcategory of creature")—encompasses all gnomes in its warm, gnomish embrace.

This means both a whisper gnome and a rock gnome and any other kind of gnome are all broadly gnomes. This also means a whisper gnome can meet the prerequisites of feats that include gnome and whisper gnome, but a whisper gnome can't meet a feat's prerequisite if the feat's prerequisite were rock gnome like the feat Rock Gnome Trickster (Races of Faerûn 167). (Also see this question.)

Just in case further proof is needed, the Exemplars of Evil NPC Draen Ralgael is a wererat whisper gnome rogue whose subtypes include gnome (52-3).

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