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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Neonchameleon" data-source="post: 8341880" data-attributes="member: 87792">Actually, now I come to think of it, in 3.X dwarves were the minmax fightery type in the PHB. Gnomes and halflings were both small and took Str penalties (which were far worse in 3.X than 5e), elves took a con penalty and dexterity was a lot less useful in combat, and half-orcs took two separate stat penalties. And the human feat was ... not that great.Meanwhile dwarves got a con bonus (best stat in 3.X), and a charisma penalty (more of a dump stat in 3.X than Int is in 5e) and an entire laundry list of bonuses such as darkvision, better weapons (the dwarven waraxe), a bonus to avoid being tripped, a bonus to saving throws, and more. They were comfortably the most powerful core 3.X fighter-race for minmaxers. In 4e this actually continued as the dwarven racial power was really effective, and the 4e version of stability was excellent.In 5e there's nothing wrong with dwarves unless what you are after is the best minmax race - which they still arguably are for fighter types, barbarian types, and cleric types. The Mountain Dwarf has possibly the best stat bonuses in the game and the Hill Dwarf is more of a cleric but may have the best hit points. They get darkvision, and a collection of other bonuses that definitely puts them on a level with their rivals.They just aren't overwhelmingly the best PHB fighter; the half orc is +2 Str and +1 Con (so behind the mountain dwarf) and can occasionally keep going and get better criticals (but is a stat point behind) and the dragonborn is +2 Str and +1 Cha (so not as tough as half-orcs or dwarves) and gets the occasional bout of halitosis. And variant humans get a feat.5e makes them a heavy battle tank; mountain dwarves have +2 Str +2 Con. They aren't comic relief. But what they also aren't is overwhelmingly the obvious choice if you are trying to min-max. Fighters are popular enough - and although mountain dwarf fighters are tougher than dragonborn or half-orc ones it's not a "why on earth would I want to play one of those?" level decision the way the half orc was in 3.X.And with actual competition that hasn't been handicapped mechanically the dwarf needs to compete on the appeal of the race. And it turns out that dragonborn are more popular and in 2020 even half-orcs were more popular.That the dwarves had a dozen little buffs to make them the munchkin's choice doesn't speak well of them. It means that they were being artificially held up through mechanical imbalance (as well as their competition being held back) to disguise how tired an archetype they were even then.</blockquote>

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