When Rumpelstiltskin began recruiting other 'little people' to join his organisation he told them that the world was wrong, that the little people were actually the normal ones and that those bigger people were aberrations.  He told the midgets and the dwarfs that he was going to create a place where they were of normal height, where they held the power.  He built Cavern City and the news began to spread.

All manner of little people began to flock to Dresden and Cavern City.  Some were angry little people while others were just tired of the surface world.  Whatever their background, Rumpelstiltskin imbued in them a sense of hatred for the surface world, and a growing kinship amongst those who lived beneath the surface.  The Gnome Associates grew.  They were male, female, old and young, German and from further afield.  And they were all under the spell of Rumpelstiltskin and his promise to deliver them a world where they would be 'normal'.

The Gnome Associates are generally volatile people who dislike the society above them.  Other personality traits vary as these people come from many different walks of life.

"Put your long, lanky, freakish arms up in the sky!  This is a stick up!"

The Gnome Associates are regular humans, although they are all a lot shorter, whether dwarfs or midgets.  They have access to advanced technology, equipment and weaponry as well as sophisticated personnel carriers call Earth Wyrms which can be adapted to tunnel through the earth (perfect for subterranean bank robberies).

While they all vary in appearance, none of the Associates stands above five feet tall.