My Dwarves are Roman
Well, actually, they’re not. They’re more like a Greek-Roman hybrid.
The stereotypical dwarves these days are vaguely Scottish; prior to that, Germanic-flavored dwarves were in vogue. But mine are inspired by ancient Greece and Rome.
I bring this up because of a recent post at Unclebear regarding the “vanilla”-ness of D&D settings. I disagreed with Berin’s implication that the restrictions on worldbuilding were intrinsic to the D&D system — I believe that such limitations are intrinsic to any system that goes beyond pure storytelling. Systems are made up of assumptions. Some, like the HERO system, make those assumptions primarily in the mechanics; without such assumptions, it’s impossible to model anything. Most assume more about the setting.
I think D&D falls well within the average, though. It can be used within nonstandard settings, but the more divergent a setting gets, the more work will need to be done to customize the D&D system to fit that setting.
Still, I think a game of D&D without elves or clerics (his examples) is fundamentally easier than a game of Vampire: the Masquerade without vampires (one of my counterexamples).
And then I got to thinking about it further. Because my dwarves are Romans.
Dwarves in Galadria are physically similar to the standard dwarf of fourth edition: short, stocky, solid. None of their statistics differ from the core 4e dwarves’. They don’t need to.
All of the assumptions a player might make regarding dwarves are more or less intact. They live underground; they’re famed for their work with stone and metal; they have a strong family structure; they’re fairly disciplined for the most part, but they’re also outrageously hedonistic at times.
Galadrian dwarves are noted for their smithing, but they’re more famous still as sculptors, architects, and engineers. The best roads that crisscross the Twelve Kingdoms of Tir Eselyn — the King’s Road, the Sea Road, the North Road, and the Sun Road — were dwarf-built, dating to the days of the first High Kings. The Granite Citadel of Galakahazra was designed by dwarves. Every noble of Iniho worth his title displays at least one dwarf-sculpted statue in his garden. Far-off Ravenspire, built near, upon, and within a dormant volcano, drew on dwarf expertise in the building.
Most dwarves live underground, but not because they have to. They do not live in dark, dank caverns. Their holdings are not merely hewn out of stone. The dwarves have their aesthetic, too, and they like their comforts. Oh, they are, by and large, willing enough to stoically do without — but the average dwarf sees no need to, if they don’t have to.
A dwarf holding is a palatial underground complex. Stone is, at the very least, smoothed and polished. Marble is common; decorative placements of crystal or precious metal and stone, almost as common. Larger settlements are surprisingly airy, consisting of open “streets” dividing separate “buildings”, each of the latter often carved from the stone — but sometimes separate. It is not unusual for beautiful and exotic stones to be brought in for temples, seats of government, and other important buildings.
Dwarf holdings near the surface almost invariably feature cunningly-built shafts and cleverly-placed mirrors which bring in sunlight, fresh air, and water. Nondwarf visitors are often stunned by the sight of subterranean gardens rivalling anything on the surface.
Most dwarves possess a strong sense of duty to family and to society — the former prioritized a little above the latter. While they do not typically refer to their families as “clans”, in actuality the extended family of the average dwarf acts in much the same way. A dwarf will be much more forgiving of an insult to himself than of one to his family; bloody vendettas between families over such insults are not unknown. Such conflicts usually do not spill over into the streets, however; the dwarves’ (superficial, at least) respect for law and tradition keeps such conflicts quiet. Of course, one of those traditions is an unofficial tolerance for such conflict, so long as neither family attempts to draw in outside aid, blatantly disturbs the peace to the point where the local governors can no longer ignore it, or creates a direct threat to the greater dwarvish nation (eg. in times of war).
Dwarves generally practice democracy, although in times of war, a single leader is appointed and granted broad powers. Artists and artisans, soldiers and smiths, miners and musicians, philosophers and priests are among the most highly regarded professions in dwarf culture. Wizards, scholars, miners, and masons are likewise respected. Dwarves do not practice slavery, although prisoners are sometimes sentenced to labor. Nondwarves who live among the dwarves are generally considered “half-citizens,” possessing a number of rights but to a lesser extent than do dwarves; it is possible to earn full citizenship by completing some task of merit. Artists, bards, and craftsmen tend to be the most common among “naturalized” citizens, but many an adventurer has been offered citizenship in thanks for aiding the dwarves.
Dwarves typically get along best with humans. They possess an aesthetic rivalry with the arctic elves of the northern reaches, and tolerate those few halfling boatfolk they might encounter (though always treating them with a certain air of superiority). They respect the goblins’ drive, but look down upon their perceived lack of coordination; the dwarves see the goblins as having the right idea, but executing it sloppily. They find the vulpine kynari exasperating, yet also entertaining. Their enemies are the drow below and the giants above, but their greatest enemies often tend to be opposing families of dwarves. In general, they tend to be somewhat chauvinistic regarding their culture. In the past, they’ve waged wars of conquest, but they’ve been rather peaceful for the last century or two.
All of the mechanics are the same. All of the assumptions work, even if they’re not all front-and-center. Is this vanilla?
I don’t think so.
Related posts:
- My Elves are… Odd
- Losing Your Religion
- Hanging in the Balance
- Renaissance Mandate
- 4E from One Year In
Categories: My Campaigns, Philosophy and Rants | Comments (10)
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I like! Overlaying humanesque cultures unto the races is a Very Cool thing to do.
My dwarves are made of stone. And they used to wear fake beards and make-up to blend in with the fleshy races. No, really.
Just goes to show how one core concept can be adapted in so many different directions.
That’s the fun thing about Vanilla though. It goes with everything.
Except bacon.
greywulf’s last blog post: Dragon Warriors Week Day Seven
Again – another post that stirs the imagination and that I 100% agree with. I also posted about this as well – dunno if you saw it (“Your Game World is (NOT) teh SuXXorz”), but basically I feel the same. The ‘Vanilla’ setting can be recast (shemp’ed?) as anything else you want. Newbie gamers will no doubt use the Vanilla setting and RAW often – but I believe most D&D campaigns will no doubt put their own spin on things.
Just Say No to Vanilla! =)
Laser Clerics FTW!
jonathan’s last blog post: McCainculus – A new D&D Humonculus
@greywulf: I remember chuckling at that post, a little while back. It is a cool concept.
@jonathan: I hadn’t seen it — must have overlooked it on the RPG Bloggers feed, somehow. Can’t say I disagree.
There’s nothing wrong with vanilla, though. Greyhawk, Mystara, and the Realms were all pretty vanilla, and they all brought some good things to the game.
D&D is pretty flexible in the end, though. You’d need to do a little work to run, say, a modern game with 4e, but I think it’d serve well once that work was done. And of course 3e’s system proved amazingly flexible — d20’s touched a wide array of genres.
Hmm, I like your greco-roman dwarves. I think I will steal this idea for the campaign I am working on.
By the way I know quite a few interesting books and roleplaying games that borrowed heavily from history and this usually works pretty well. Coming up with a totally original society is not easy and most often fails horribly.
I also agree with your post when the “vanilla” nature of the new D&D is concerned. In older iterations of D&D much more stuff was inclined in the rules.
Nicely done. I have used the Roman model for dwarves as well, but only as a distant background element at none of the players were dwarves and not of the adventures involved dwarves. *sigh*
Good read and look forward to reading more about your world.
Whilst its not traditional vanilla it certainly isn’t non standard. All you’ve effectively changed is one thing about the dwarves and that is their outlook on life. And even then only by a tiny amount. Where most people would thing of industrial, dark and well cavey homes you’ve had them take pride in their place of residence. It’s nothing I haven’t imagined on a small scale for the more well off dwarf about town but to carry it over to the whole race gives it a fresh feel without really changing a single thing about them.
Bob’s last blog post: Character Sheets – Just How Far Do You Go?
@Bob: You’re right, and that was part of the intent — a player can create a dwarf character for my world without needing to know about the culture beforehand, and that character will still be able to fit into the game world. The assumptions that are built into the system don’t prevent changes, and in this case, the change is possible without clashing with those expectations.
My elves took a bit more work, but that’s a future post. ^_-
My problem with doing something like that with elves is that someone somewhere has already written up every variant I can ever think of. The only version I haven’t seen is a version that knows its way around a steam engine and even that I’m sure someones already done.
Every slight change to keep them traditional has been explored and morphed into your high elves, dark elves, wild elves, half elves etc. So to say I’m intrigued with what you’ve done with them would be an understatement
Bob’s last blog post: Weapon Mastery for AD&D 2nd Edition
Well, I doubt it’s wholly original, but I think my take is different from the norm, at least. The post should be up within the next three days.