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[COMPLETE] Looking back at the leatherette series: PHBR, DMGR, HR and more!
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<blockquote data-quote="Alzrius" data-source="post: 8178803" data-attributes="member: 8461"><p>As if to balance out how much I enjoyed the last entry in the series, <a href="https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/16931/PHBR6-The-Complete-Book-of-Dwarves-2e?affiliate_id=820" target="_blank"><em>PHBR6 The Complete Book of Dwarves</em></a> is one that I've never had very much use for. I have a vague recollection of walking into game store after game store and seeing it available (sometimes at a discount) and having the impression that I wasn't the only one who felt that way, either. I think I eventually picked it up just for the sake of completeness.</p><p></p><p>Leaving aside that this is where these books introduced an alternative titling mechanism ("The Complete Book of X" rather than "The Complete X Handbook") for no reason that I can tell, dwarves have <em>never</em> really done much for me. In all honesty, I don't think that D&D has had much use for them either. Back in the pre-3E days, how many books were really all about dwarves, besides this one? I mean, sure, the Known World had <a href="https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/16999/GAZ6-The-Dwarves-of-Rockhome-Basic?affiliate_id=820" target="_blank"><em>GAZ6 The Dwarves of Rockhome</em></a>, and the Forgotten Realms had <a href="https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/16822/FR11-Dwarves-Deep-2e?affiliate_id=820" target="_blank"><em>FR11 Dwarves Deep</em></a>, and Dragonlance had the <a href="https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/16962/Dwarven-Kingdoms-of-Krynn-2e?affiliate_id=820" target="_blank"><em>Dwarven Kingdoms of Krynn</em></a> boxed set, and there was that <a href="https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/17283/Axe-of-the-Dwarvish-Lords-2e?affiliate_id=820" target="_blank"><em>Axe of Dwarvish Lords</em></a> adventure, and there was <a href="https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/111269/L3-Deep-Dwarven-Delve-1e?affiliate_id=820" target="_blank"><em>L3 Deep Dwarven Delve</em></a> (an AD&D 1E adventure that was only published in 1999)...but other than those <s>what have the Romans ever done for us?</s> how popular have dwarves ever <em>really</em> been?</p><p></p><p>...okay, so it's probably just me, but I've never been a fan of dwarves! While Gary Gygax wrote (back in <em>Dragon</em> #95, if I recall correctly) that his dwarves were not derivative of Tolkien (something he'd repeat many years later on <a href="https://www.enworld.org/threads/questions-about-egg.14284/page-2#post-213493" target="_blank">these very forums</a>), everyone else who wrote them for D&D seemed to make them the same cut-rate Gimli in terms of their presentation, and that seemed to be the case with this book. While it tried to add some depth, some nuance, and even a little expansion, the end result seemed largely the same: your typical dwarf was a full-bearded, hard-fighting, hard-drinking, crafts-loving, goblin-hating, underground-dwelling, jolly-when-happy-but-either-taciturn-or-berserk-when-angry archetype, with only the names changing.</p><p></p><p>But I suppose I should try and focus more about this book in particular, shouldn't I?</p><p></p><p>It opens with a brief section on the creation of the dwarves, and then moves on to the dwarven subraces, and already I'm frowning. I know that the <em>actual</em> dwarven pantheon wouldn't be detailed until <a href="https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/16895/DMGR4-Monster-Mythology-2e?affiliate_id=820" target="_blank"><em>DMGR4 Monster Mythology</em></a> (which I'll talk about later) and expanded upon (with a Realms-specific twist) in <a href="https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/17534/Demihuman-Deities-2e?affiliate_id=820" target="_blank"><em>Demihuman Deities</em></a>, but it just feels weird how the traditional D&D dwarven gods are sidelined, not just in the opening section, but throughout the entire book. I understand that it's because this is trying to be world-neutral, as well as maintaining a more terrestrial focus, but it just comes off as being incomplete.</p><p></p><p>The subraces strike me as odd too, with there being six of them: hill dwarves, mountain dwarves, deep dwarves, sundered dwarves, duergar (i.e. gray dwarves), and gully dwarves. Now, hill and mountain dwarves I understand: they're both front and center in <a href="https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/183092/MC1-Monstrous-Compendium-Volume-One-2e?affiliate_id=820" target="_blank"><em>MC1 Monstrous Compendium Volume One</em></a> (don't ask me if they're in the <em>Player's Handbook</em>, however). Though I'll make a confession here: despite the name signifying geographical areas of division (and creating the interesting idea that demihumans, unlike humans, develop pronounced biological differences after sufficient generations live in a given environment long enough), I somehow got it in my head that hill dwarves lived only "a little" underground, and mountain dwarves lived "deeper" underground, though not in the Underdark.</p><p></p><p>Deep dwarves, by contrast, actually <em>do</em> live in the Underdark, though to be fair it doesn't ever come right out and say that here. Even so, I'm curious how these guys were so completely forgotten as D&D moved on. Even before subraces fell out of vogue (drow quite obviously notwithstanding), deep dwarves seemed like they were on their way out, which is a shame because other than svirfneblin they seemed like the only non-hostile civilization living that deep underground. Presumably the duergar, who have always been the dwarven equivalent of drow (except not as cool, despite them having a penchant for psionics that was also ignored here) wiped them out; the book says they "sometimes" lived below the deep dwarves, but I'm calling propaganda.</p><p></p><p>The sundered dwarves are a mystery to me, even now. These are surface-dwelling dwarves who are quite clearly not from there originally, but now have claustrophobia. I'm honestly tempted to guess that these are transplants from a particular campaign world, repackaged with a generic presentation, but if that's the case I can't find from where. As it is, the gully dwarves <em>are</em> such transplants, from Dragonlance, and I'm honestly shocked that they tried to make these guys suitable for any world. I mean, tinker gnomes in Spelljammer is one thing, but gully dwarves outside of Krynn? It just feels weird somehow.</p><p></p><p>Now, dwarves can be fighters, thieves, or clerics, which does give them <em>some</em> leeway outside of the usual "battlerager" type...oh, wait, there's the battlerager kit. This is the one that everyone knows thanks to Salvatore's archetypal character Thibbledorf Pwent from the Drizzt books. Don't be a Pwent, folks. There's also some nice new gear, but not much, and the proficiencies...I know the DriveThruRPG history mentions some of the worst ones, but there's a reason for that. A "pest control" proficiency? Really?</p><p></p><p>Overall, this book does the best it can, but simply doesn't have the space to do much besides lean into stereotypes. I mean, I'm one of the people who think that racial level limits and class restrictions had a point (long story short: they made humans the saiyans of the game world), and even I think there simply wasn't much to do with dwarves in terms of workable material. Unless you wanted to play up a clerical or thieving angle (and both could be multi-classed with fighter), you were everyone's conception of a dwarf.</p><p></p><p>Though I'll add that, as an industrious people with strong crafting skills and a love of alcohol, I still don't see why dwarves don't speak with German accents rather than Scottish ones.</p><p></p><p><em>Please note my use of affiliate links in this post.</em></p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Alzrius, post: 8178803, member: 8461"] As if to balance out how much I enjoyed the last entry in the series, [URL='https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/16931/PHBR6-The-Complete-Book-of-Dwarves-2e?affiliate_id=820'][I]PHBR6 The Complete Book of Dwarves[/I][/URL] is one that I've never had very much use for. I have a vague recollection of walking into game store after game store and seeing it available (sometimes at a discount) and having the impression that I wasn't the only one who felt that way, either. I think I eventually picked it up just for the sake of completeness. Leaving aside that this is where these books introduced an alternative titling mechanism ("The Complete Book of X" rather than "The Complete X Handbook") for no reason that I can tell, dwarves have [I]never[/I] really done much for me. In all honesty, I don't think that D&D has had much use for them either. Back in the pre-3E days, how many books were really all about dwarves, besides this one? I mean, sure, the Known World had [URL='https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/16999/GAZ6-The-Dwarves-of-Rockhome-Basic?affiliate_id=820'][I]GAZ6 The Dwarves of Rockhome[/I][/URL], and the Forgotten Realms had [URL='https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/16822/FR11-Dwarves-Deep-2e?affiliate_id=820'][I]FR11 Dwarves Deep[/I][/URL], and Dragonlance had the [URL='https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/16962/Dwarven-Kingdoms-of-Krynn-2e?affiliate_id=820'][I]Dwarven Kingdoms of Krynn[/I][/URL] boxed set, and there was that [URL='https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/17283/Axe-of-the-Dwarvish-Lords-2e?affiliate_id=820'][I]Axe of Dwarvish Lords[/I][/URL] adventure, and there was [URL='https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/111269/L3-Deep-Dwarven-Delve-1e?affiliate_id=820'][I]L3 Deep Dwarven Delve[/I][/URL] (an AD&D 1E adventure that was only published in 1999)...but other than those [S]what have the Romans ever done for us?[/S] how popular have dwarves ever [I]really[/I] been? ...okay, so it's probably just me, but I've never been a fan of dwarves! While Gary Gygax wrote (back in [I]Dragon[/I] #95, if I recall correctly) that his dwarves were not derivative of Tolkien (something he'd repeat many years later on [URL='https://www.enworld.org/threads/questions-about-egg.14284/page-2#post-213493']these very forums[/URL]), everyone else who wrote them for D&D seemed to make them the same cut-rate Gimli in terms of their presentation, and that seemed to be the case with this book. While it tried to add some depth, some nuance, and even a little expansion, the end result seemed largely the same: your typical dwarf was a full-bearded, hard-fighting, hard-drinking, crafts-loving, goblin-hating, underground-dwelling, jolly-when-happy-but-either-taciturn-or-berserk-when-angry archetype, with only the names changing. But I suppose I should try and focus more about this book in particular, shouldn't I? It opens with a brief section on the creation of the dwarves, and then moves on to the dwarven subraces, and already I'm frowning. I know that the [I]actual[/I] dwarven pantheon wouldn't be detailed until [URL='https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/16895/DMGR4-Monster-Mythology-2e?affiliate_id=820'][I]DMGR4 Monster Mythology[/I][/URL] (which I'll talk about later) and expanded upon (with a Realms-specific twist) in [URL='https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/17534/Demihuman-Deities-2e?affiliate_id=820'][I]Demihuman Deities[/I][/URL], but it just feels weird how the traditional D&D dwarven gods are sidelined, not just in the opening section, but throughout the entire book. I understand that it's because this is trying to be world-neutral, as well as maintaining a more terrestrial focus, but it just comes off as being incomplete. The subraces strike me as odd too, with there being six of them: hill dwarves, mountain dwarves, deep dwarves, sundered dwarves, duergar (i.e. gray dwarves), and gully dwarves. Now, hill and mountain dwarves I understand: they're both front and center in [URL='https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/183092/MC1-Monstrous-Compendium-Volume-One-2e?affiliate_id=820'][I]MC1 Monstrous Compendium Volume One[/I][/URL] (don't ask me if they're in the [I]Player's Handbook[/I], however). Though I'll make a confession here: despite the name signifying geographical areas of division (and creating the interesting idea that demihumans, unlike humans, develop pronounced biological differences after sufficient generations live in a given environment long enough), I somehow got it in my head that hill dwarves lived only "a little" underground, and mountain dwarves lived "deeper" underground, though not in the Underdark. Deep dwarves, by contrast, actually [I]do[/I] live in the Underdark, though to be fair it doesn't ever come right out and say that here. Even so, I'm curious how these guys were so completely forgotten as D&D moved on. Even before subraces fell out of vogue (drow quite obviously notwithstanding), deep dwarves seemed like they were on their way out, which is a shame because other than svirfneblin they seemed like the only non-hostile civilization living that deep underground. Presumably the duergar, who have always been the dwarven equivalent of drow (except not as cool, despite them having a penchant for psionics that was also ignored here) wiped them out; the book says they "sometimes" lived below the deep dwarves, but I'm calling propaganda. The sundered dwarves are a mystery to me, even now. These are surface-dwelling dwarves who are quite clearly not from there originally, but now have claustrophobia. I'm honestly tempted to guess that these are transplants from a particular campaign world, repackaged with a generic presentation, but if that's the case I can't find from where. As it is, the gully dwarves [I]are[/I] such transplants, from Dragonlance, and I'm honestly shocked that they tried to make these guys suitable for any world. I mean, tinker gnomes in Spelljammer is one thing, but gully dwarves outside of Krynn? It just feels weird somehow. Now, dwarves can be fighters, thieves, or clerics, which does give them [I]some[/I] leeway outside of the usual "battlerager" type...oh, wait, there's the battlerager kit. This is the one that everyone knows thanks to Salvatore's archetypal character Thibbledorf Pwent from the Drizzt books. Don't be a Pwent, folks. There's also some nice new gear, but not much, and the proficiencies...I know the DriveThruRPG history mentions some of the worst ones, but there's a reason for that. A "pest control" proficiency? Really? Overall, this book does the best it can, but simply doesn't have the space to do much besides lean into stereotypes. I mean, I'm one of the people who think that racial level limits and class restrictions had a point (long story short: they made humans the saiyans of the game world), and even I think there simply wasn't much to do with dwarves in terms of workable material. Unless you wanted to play up a clerical or thieving angle (and both could be multi-classed with fighter), you were everyone's conception of a dwarf. Though I'll add that, as an industrious people with strong crafting skills and a love of alcohol, I still don't see why dwarves don't speak with German accents rather than Scottish ones. [I]Please note my use of affiliate links in this post.[/I] [/QUOTE]
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