Dwarves

**Dwarves**, sometimes called the **Stout Folk**, are a humanoid race common throughout all parts of the universe that decended from the Trife. Dwarves are a tough, tradition-abiding folk known for their strong martial traditions and beautiful craftsmanship.

## Description

### Physical characteristics

Dwarves were a short race, as their name implied, standing from 4'3" – 5'4" (1.3 – 1.65 meters) on average, with hill dwarves a bit shorter. What Dwarves lacked in height they made up for in bulk; they are, on average, about as heavy as humans. A dwarf could weigh anywhere from about 160 – 220 lbs (73 – 100 kg). Dwarven males were a bit taller and heavier than their female counterparts. Like humans, dwarves had a wide variety of skin, eye, and hair colors, typically pale among mountain dwarves and more tanned amongst hill dwarves. Hazel eyes are common throughout the race, with blue eyes more common amongst mountain dwarves and brown or green eyes found amongst the hill dwarves.

Male dwarves are often bald and grew thick facial hair sometimes used to display social status. Unusually for humanoids, both sexes naturally grew ample facial hair though the majority of mountain dwarf females shaved their beards off. This hair is often dark in hue, though among hill dwarves blond or red hair is just as common. hill dwarves take the care of facial hair to an extreme, carefully oiling and grooming it, with some adding perfume and ornamentations.

Dwarves are a long-lived race, though not so much as the Elvish people, and reach physical maturity somewhat later than humans. A dwarf is traditionally considered an adult once he or she reaches age fifty. Dwarves age much like humans but over a longer period of time, remaining vigorous well past 150 years. Most dwarves live to see their bicentennial and a few lived to be around 400.

### Abilities

Dwarves are unusually tough for humanoids, in more ways than one. Dwarven stomachs, for instance, are resistant to virtually all poisons and it takes less effort for a dwarf to get back on its feet than other races. Dwarves also have dense bodies and are difficult to push around as a result, as well as having the capacity to bear loads that other races might find hindering with little ill effect. Dwarves also have a sense about them that few races do, with a preternatural awareness of their surroundings useful for a subterranean race as well as good judgment all-around in general.

Many dwarves are difficult to like and lack the charm of many other smaller races, such as halflings or gnomes, though this is not a trait common to all dwarves and some possesses a great deal of charismatic power. Furthermore, dwarves are not entirely unsocial and more than a few have a natural knack for bartering or judging the value of an offer, something that sit well with their legendary crafting abilities.

Dwarves possess the ability to see in the blackest darkness, like a drow, so they have an affinity for the caverns in which they live, possessing a natural affinity for recognizing unusual patterns in stonework that could seem almost supernatural at times.

## Personality

Whether or not the dwarven claim that they were carved from the world’s stone was true, dwarves share many qualities considered similar to the stone they live with. Strong, hardy, and dependable dwarves are polite, particularly elders, and possess a wisdom beyond that of many other races. Dwarves value their traditions, regardless of the subrace they came from, and look for inspiration from ancestral heroes. Dwarves are also known for their stubborn nature and cynicism, traits widespread amongst the dwarves but which contribute to and are commonly offset by their bravery and tenacity.

Dwarven friendship is hard to earn, but is strong once won. Naturally dour and suspicious, the stout folk are slow to trust others, specifically towards those outside their family, suspecting the worst of an individual until the outsider proved many times their good will. Once this trust is gained, dwarves hold their friends to it and viewed betrayals, even minor ones, with a vicious propensity for vengeance. A common gnomish oath, remarking on this dwarven sense of justice, is “if I'm lying, may I cross a dwarf.”

For dwarves, loyalty is more than a word and that it should be both valued and rewarded. Dwarves believe it a gift and mark of respect to stand beside a friend in combat, and an even deeper one to protect that ally from harm. Many dwarven tales subsequently revolve around the sacrifice of dwarves for their friends and family. Just as dwarves are known for their dependability as friends and allies, dwarves also harbour grudges far longer than many other races. This may have been on an individual basis between a dwarf and one who had wronged him or against entire races, even if warfare with the enemy had long since ceased.

Dwarves are a careful and deliberate race, with a more serious disposition than other races, who they sometimes viewed as flighty or reckless. A dwarf does all things with care and a stubborn resolve, with brash or cowardly behaviour unusual for the race. However, dwarves do succumb easily to wrath or greed, which were the most common vices of the race.

Dwarves who left their homeland to become adventurers did so for a number of reasons. In part, a dwarf might have been motivated by simple avarice, given the dwarven love of beautiful things. As often, however, a dwarf might have been motivated by a drive to do what was right for others (particularly their clan) or a love of excitement for, as settled as dwarves were, they rarely tired of thrills. But even these wayward dwarves retained the spirit of their brethren, hoping that their accomplishments abroad could bring honor to themselves, their clan, or both. Given that successful dwarven adventurers were likely to recover rare items or defeat enemies of the dwarven people during such challenges, this was a hope not entirely without merit.

## Society

### ​Culture

Dwarves highly valued the ties between family members and friends, weaving tightly knit clans. Dwarves particularly respected elders, from whom they expected sound leadership and the wisdom of experience, as well as ancestral heroes or clan founders. This idea carried on to relations with other races and dwarves were deferential even to the elders of another, non-dwarven race. Likewise, dwarves, perhaps more so than most other races, turn to the Gods for guidance and protection. Individual dwarves might have been faithless, but the race as a whole, regardless of subrace, had a strong inclination for religion and almost every community maintained at least one temple or ancestral shrine.

### Clans

Most dwarven societies are divided into clans built along family ties and political allegiances. These clans are usually led by hereditary rulers, often monarchs of a sort and descended from the founder of the clan. Dwarves strongly value loyalty to these rulers and to the clan as a whole and even objective dwarves tend to side primarily with their kin over other races or communities.

These clan-structures promoted a tradition of inbreeding. This was so excessive, that it was considered one of the reasons for the dwarves' low birth rate. However not all clans and cultures believed in this practice.

Most dwarven clans focused on one or two kinds of crafting, such as blacksmithing, jewelry, engineering, or masonry. Dwarves strive to avoid overspecialization by sending some of their youth as apprentices to other clans, which also helps to foster racial unity. Because of the long age dwarves exhibit these apprenticeships might last decades.

### Homelands

Most dwarves prefer living in underground cities near the surface and above the Underdark, built around mines that provide much of their livelihood. Carved into stone, these cities might take centuries to complete but are practically ageless once finished. Though dwarves are typically a martial race by nature, these cities have civilian populations that composed about one fourth of the total population and which were made up primarily of the young, the elderly, or a few regular adults. Females typically composed as large a portion of the military as male dwarves did.

In their own homelands, dwarves continuously carve out new living space, mining the mountains’ riches as they do so. Dwarves in general stuck to these locales, disliking travel, particularly along waterways, but those who lived in human lands could find make themselves quite comfortable. Most who did made a living as mercenaries, smiths, or artisans of various kinds. Dwarves are eagerly sought after as warriors, their reputation of courage and loyalty making them excellent choices for bodyguards.

### Interracial Relations

Dwarves do not forgive past wrongs easily and the entire race had more or less declared war on Goblins and Orcs at some point, wiping them out where they found them. Many dwarves viewed these races as a foul infestation of their mountain homes and their duty to purge them, though in modern time this has decreased to just bad blood. Likewise, many dwarves viewed drow and grimlocks with a similar hatred and few dwarves have forgotten their ancestral hatred of the giants who once enslaved them across the universe. Because of this, dwarves generally viewed related races, such as half-orcs, with distrust.

In regards to their distant cousins the duergar, dwarven opinions vary. Many viewed their distant relations with sympathy yet on the other hand, duergar and dwarves had long been enemies and many dwarves viewed them with little more love than they did the drow.

Dwarves got along pretty well with gnomes , with whom they shared a love of fine crafting, and passably with humans , half-elves , elves and halflings . However, most dwarves commonly believe that true friendships can only be forged over long periods of time and a common saying is that “the difference between an acquaintance and a friend is about a hundred years,” meaning that few members of the shorter-lived races ever forge strong bonds with dwarves. There are exceptions, however, and some of the strongest friendships are those between a dwarf and a human whose grandparents and parents were also on good terms with the dwarf.

## ​Modern Times

Frost dwarves
Squat and hardy dwarves from the isolated northern reaches of Pavrin.
Hill dwarves
Strong and muscular dwarves from the warmer hills of Pretoya, largely in the Norse Empire area.
Mountain dwarves
Tall dwarves, by comparison, who populate the mountains of all of Pretoya.
Stone dwarves
Stocky and muscular dwarves living in caves, deep carverns and the Underdark.
Wild dwarves
Primitive dark-skinned dwarves primarily from the jungles of Iyoth.
Duergar
Duergar are a closely related race of humanoids, but separate from generations of divergence, slavery under the , and the infusion of demon blood. They hold themselves to be a separate race completely, and were often insulted if compared to surface dwarves.