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Message: <blockquote data-quote="I'm A Banana" data-source="post: 6290900" data-attributes="member: 2067">Basically, yep, this. There is no generic answer. There is only ever specific answers. "They are hardy, resistant to poison, good at crafting stuff, and make good fighters" doesn't apply to every dwarf (the Klar, for instance, specifically make very undisciplined fighters -- they're better as barbarians. And the poison resistance can go entire campaigns without ever coming up, making it a pretty useless defining feature). Logistically, in practice, in terms of "books have a limited amount of space" this might look like picking one particular archetype to present up-front, while making it clear that it's a specific archetype that you choose to use, not an assumed archetype you choose to not use.What's a dwarf? Well, maybe the PH presents the Neidar as one kind of dwarf, calling it out as specific and particular (referencing the dwarf-wars and the exile status of the clan and maybe even a few proper nouns). It embraces its particularism and it presents the Neidar without worrying about all those other dwarves that it's not really modeling, without trying to say that gold dwarves and hill dwarves are all the same thing. It just says, "There are lots of dwarves. Here's one particular kind of dwarf that's like this. If you don't have anything else in mind, go ahead and use this, lots of folks like it." It never STOPPED being a mashup. OD&D mashed up a few specific stories, and as the game grew, it mashed up more and more, from sci-fi to film noir, from Babylonian myth to anime. It was never meant to be a cohesive whole, or an internally consistent genre with a specific identifiable and particular "feel," which is part of why every attempt to make it fit someone's mold for it has been quixotic at best. Think of it this way: there is no such thing as non-setting-specfic.That armored knight on the horse with his sword and shield? That's specific.That wizard in the tower pouring over forgotten tomes? That's specific.That thief skulking through the city streets looking for a mark? That's specific.The idea that these are somehow more generic or broader than other fantasy archetypes isn't true. They may be more POPULAR than other fantasy archetypes, but just because Beiber moves more singles than other singers doesn't make his music the "default music." Their popularity just means that their specific stories should probably be supported out the gate. Find the most awesome armored mounted sword-and-board knight in D&D, and use THAT as a possible expression for the archetype, without trying to pretend that every mounted knight in D&D needs to be this specific kind of mounted knight. Right. So, wouldn't it be great if D&D instead told players to not expect a default, and to instead come to every new table prepared to see what specific kind of setting this is? Rather than coming to you table with a preconceived notion of what, say, D&D dwarves have to be like (which you then have to contradict), they could just ask you what dwarves are like in this world, and build their characters with that in mind! It'd be pretty awesome, then, if D&D books abandoned this quixotic idea of a default entirely, and instead embraced the specificity that has really been bubbling under the surface this entire time, wouldn't it? I've got an idea about how that might be done...<img src="http://www.enworld.org/forum/images/smilies/glasses.png"  class="smilie" loading="lazy" alt="B-)" title="Glasses    B-)" data-shortname="B-)" /></blockquote>

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