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

[Orius]

I could see dwarven women who live outside of dwarven land shaving because they're tired of the humans staring at them.

 

[Lanefan]

What about Círdan the Ship-wright? Not to mention Nastajia's dad Oberon (of 'The Dreamland Chronicles' fame)?

Fakes - all fakes.

I mean hell: every night Cirdan goes home, peels off his fake beard with a sigh of relief, and mutters something dark and sweary about having to keep up silly disguises just to look cool for the Humans...

 

[Gilladian]

In my campaign world, there are no female dwarves anymore. What happened is a campaign mystery. New dwarves are carved from stone by their parent and blessed alive by the priests in major rituals. So they are all male, all bearded, and a great quest for the whole race is to discover how to placate the gods and get the females back.

 

[jayoungr]

If you're playing in a setting where female Dwarves have beards, such as Tolkein LotR setting, then those females can have beards.

Tolkien's LOTR setting does not canonically have female bearded dwarves. That's just a fandom joke.

Peter Jackson =/= Tolkien. (And if I'm gonna be really snarky, Peter Jackson < Tolkien.)

 

[Marandahir]

Tolkien's LOTR setting does not canonically have female bearded dwarves. That's just a fandom joke.

Peter Jackson =/= Tolkien. (And if I'm gonna be really snarky, Peter Jackson < Tolkien.)

Actually, that's not true. Tolkien described female dwarves as having beards in War of the Jewels and in The Peoples of Middle-earth.

Tolkien Newsgroups FAQ: Story Internal Discussions: Creatures and Characters

tolkien.slimy.com

Dwarf-women

Dwarf-women were few among the Dwarves, kept in secret, and were seldom seen by other races.

tolkiengateway.net

"no Man nor Elf has ever seen a beardless Dwarf - unless he were shaven in mockery, and would then be more like to die of shame... For the Naugrim have beards from the beginning of their lives, male and female alike..." (JRR Tolkien, The War of the Jewels ("The Later Quenta Silmarillion: Of the Naugrim and the Edain", ~1951).

I agree with you that Tolkien > Jackson, though I'm still a big fan of the movies and think that the books as written were unfilmable. They're masterpieces, but different media require different tacts, and as many gripes as I have regarding BOTH Jackson trilogies, they're still quiet laudable in their achievements. Honestly, I think the books would be better suited to serialized adaptation, though - a 4 season TV show would probably be the best format for Hobbit+LotR. To that end, kinda looking forward to the Amazon series, though warily (because they've got far less JRR Tolkien language to draw upon, and the movies were at their best when they leaned into Tolkien's actual words rather than making up their own variations on it).

In my campaign world, there are no female dwarves anymore. What happened is a campaign mystery. New dwarves are carved from stone by their parent and blessed alive by the priests in major rituals. So they are all male, all bearded, and a great quest for the whole race is to discover how to placate the gods and get the females back.

I LOVE THIS! In my setting, Dwarves are forged upon their parents anvils. Instead of Warforged, we have robo-dwarves. Now that Theros is out, I can more easily model this by giving all Dwarves the anvilwrought supernatural gift instead of the bonus 1st level feat I often give my players.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Honestly, I think the books would be better suited to serialized adaptation, though

Check out the BBC radio version.

 

[Charlaquin]

I agree with you that Tolkien > Jackson, though I'm still a big fan of the movies and think that the books as written were unfilmable. They're masterpieces, but different media require different tacts, and as many gripes as I have regarding BOTH Jackson trilogies, they're still quiet laudable in their achievements. Honestly, I think the books would be better suited to serialized adaptation, though - a 4 season TV show would probably be the best format for Hobbit+LotR.

Damn... It’s too bad we’ll probably never get this given how prolific the Peter Jackson films are. I love the first trilogy and enjoyed the first of the Hobbit films, but I agree this would be a much better format to adapt the series to.

 

[jayoungr]

Actually, that's not true. Tolkien described female dwarves as having beards in War of the Jewels and in The Peoples of Middle-earth.

I admit I forgot about that, but I'd call it "secondary canon" at best--an idea Tolkien may have had at one point but didn't necessarily keep to.

I agree with you that Tolkien > Jackson, though I'm still a big fan of the movies and think that the books as written were unfilmable. They're masterpieces, but different media require different tacts, and as many gripes as I have regarding BOTH Jackson trilogies, they're still quiet laudable in their achievements.

I'm just salty because they thoroughly messed up my favorite part of the books (everything to do with the Stewards of Gondor). Well, except that they did a great job with Boromir, but then he came across as the best member of his whole family, which is also a problem... I blame Philippa Boyens and her obvious raging crush on Aragorn.

Check out the BBC radio version.

Yes! It's excellent.

 

[Dausuul]

I vastly prefer the movie versions of Aragorn, Boromir, and Faramir to the books. (Book Faramir is nothing but Aragorn Lite: Same bland heroism, 40% less lifespan. Yearning for Aragorn, but you can't compete with a hot 3000-year-old elf, even though you slew the Witch-King while she was sitting around in Rivendell? Just pick up an Aragorn Lite and your single days are over!)

I did feel that the movie gave Denethor short shrift, though. We only got to see the madness, not the greatness, which means we lose the sense of tragedy in his fall. Which I suppose is mostly a function of running time, and I agree that it would be awesome to have a LotR TV series.

As far as female dwarves in D&D go, I would generally leave it up to the player, but if I had to pick a default, I'd pick "no beards."

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Given that the Return of the King had 45 or so false endings (at least, that's how it felt in the theater), the only thing I think the movies are really missing is the Sharkey sequence. But, to me, the Lord of the Rings is mostly about the hobbit people coming into their own, which the Sharkey stuff completes.