D&D General Should Bearded Female Dwarves be the Default?

[Oofta]

In other words, dwarves don't have (large) boobs.

Or they all do.

 

[Blue Orange]

Given the generally progressive nature of most D&D worlds, I would imagine most gay dwarves, whatever their gender, would have no need for a beard.

 

[el-remmen]

the only people who could tell the difference between dwarf men and dwarf women were dwarves.

This is how lizardfolk (who replace dragonborn in my setting) are to non-lizardfolk (or at least any who have not made a close study of the colorations and variations of crests that might give such sex differences away) in my game - inspired by how a player in one of my games many years ago didn't realize his pet water dragon was female until she started laying eggs a few years after he first got it.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Or they all do.

Nah, dwarves are all lactose intolerant, their infants gain all the nutation they need from beer.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

This is how lizardfolk (who replace dragonborn in my setting) are to non-lizardfolk (or at least any who have not made a close study of the colorations and variations of crests that might give such sex differences away) in my game - inspired by how a player in one of my games many years ago didn't realize his pet water dragon was female until she started laying eggs a few years after he first got it.

Actually, that also happened to Flinx in one of Alan Dean Foster's Commonwealth novels!

 

[Marandahir]

The trope in Tolkien, and Pratchett, is that female dwarves are pretty much indistinguishable from male dwarves. Hence no need to have gendered minis.

I do think the Hobbit movies missed a trick by not having some of the Thorin's company played by women. No other change, just have women under the beards.

Tolkien was pretty explicit that all the 13 dwarves in the Company were male. Changing the gender of a travelling companion is a far cry different from replacing Glorfindel functionally with Arwen or adding a female character like Tauriel to a relatively undetailed part of the story.

I'd love it if Tolkien had had more mixed-gendered parties, but I also think it's very important to not fundamentally change characters…

 

[GMforPowergamers]

yeah this, some people just want to play alt-human and call it dwarf or elf or tiefling, when things like female dwarfs having beards emphasizes that they arent really humans at all.

YOU DON"T GET TO GATE KEEP WHAT OTHERS PLAY!!!
Women who don't want to mix up secondary sexual features are not "Less roleplaying" then you if you choose to mix the secondly features...

 

[Tonguez]

Yeah sure, and you don’t need to use all caps either, it’s a choice.
Also I’m not sure how stating that “some people like artificial vanilla“ makes me gatekeeper on your choice of flavour.

also who said dwarf beards are a secondary characteristic? That’s a singular assumption based on human physiology

YOU DON"T GET TO GATE KEEP WHAT OTHERS PLAY!!!
Women who don't want to mix up secondary sexual features are not "Less roleplaying" then you if you choose to mix the secondly features...

 

[GMforPowergamers]

That’s a singular assumption based on human physiology

its humans playing the game

 

[Quartz]

So after getting the Wildemount book I decided to read summaries of past Critical Role episodes. In the course of this I've discovered that in the world of Exandria it is apparently the norm for female dwarves to grow beards, which I'll admit is a detail I'm not a fan of. Personally I preferred the 4E take, where female dwarves often had very long and ornate hair styles. It also kind of bothers me that the short and stocky race is the only one whose females are bearded by default.

Out of curiosity, how do you all feel about this topic?

The best response I’ve seen to this was a cartoon where the female dwarf said that she did indeed have a beard - braids, ringlets and all - but it was not above but below.