My rant about dwarves

[The7DeadlyVenomz]

As I've said before, the project I'm working on currently will change a lot of that. I don't think everyone should contribute in a viewable form, for the simple reason that too many folks will not be suprised and so forth when and if it all goes in as it should.

I like submissions better as an idea.

[Anonymous]

Any thoughts? Good idea, bad?

Only a question... given your own argument, why didn't you just post this in ask the staff? >=D

[John]

Here's what I asked the staff

I'm wondering, why do newbie dwarves have so much difficulty with sirihish? What's the logic behind it? I don't know about other players, but my dwarves tend to interact a fair bit with humans in their background (they are, after all, the most populous race). There aren't any (commonly known) dwarven cities or towns.

Should the average dwarf grow up in the "dwarven quarter" of a city/town? Should they have mainly dealt with other dwarf's when growing up? If not, why don't I speak fluent sirihish?

Here's the reply I got

There was a long discussion on this and I think the consensus was to look at both increasing their starting skill, and working on building up reasons why dwarves would be separate from humans.

[Malken]

My idea was for something more 'permanent'.

Player submissions are great, but they tend to die out rather quickly when someone of importance of said clan dies.

Of course, if the Staff decides to make your submission a permanent clan, that new dwarf PCs can join in and all, then that's great, but I think they tend to prefer for clans to be part of the game for a long while before doing so.

[Anonymous kank with wings]

Okay, let's all be realistic here.. Ironsword and Thrain happened, what, about 10 years ago or so? (Wow, I've been playing for -way- too long, heh). That's a -very- long time ago, and we need to stop dropping references to Ironsword each time someone mentions changing something about the dwarves, because, frankly, after Thrain, I don't remember much happening that's been dwarf-related.

That doesn't mean it hasn't happened, though. A few years ago, for example, there was a dwarven leader. After consulting a bard, he organized a sizeable dwarven expedition into the Tablelands.

[LoD]

Here's my idea: Why instead of everyone raising their hands and saying, "I'll do it, I'll bring the dwarves back into history, I'll raise to the top and be the leader of a powerful tribe once again".. Why not ask the admins if they'd be willing to open up a forum for just this type of thing, changes related to dwarves.

Everyone interested in bringing changes and some type of dwarven tribe back to the game could have access to the forum, we could draft ideas about the history, the background, what they do, what they strive for, what are their long term goals.. Everyone pitches in..

Admins have access to this forum, so I don't know why there needs to be another one dedicated to ideas about them.  I'm sure the Imms will agree that IC events are the best way to bring about changes in game because it allows the rest of the world a chance to react/interact to the planned changes rather than everyone suddenly needing to accept a dwarven village or section of town that wasn't there two days ago.

And so that sets a rather weighty load on the shoulders of the folks desiring change with how the dwarven people are situated, perceived, and explained within the gameworld.  And rightly so.  Anything worth having involves some hard work and effort.  For whatever reason, the dwarven peoples have never seemingly been able to carve out a niche for their race within the world/civilizations and there are a few factors.  While Thrain's goal was to free the slaves from the Obsidian Mines, part of MY goal was the hope that those freed dwarves would then be used to create an almost all dwarven community somewhere in the game.  Unfortunately, that never seemed to materialize.

Dwarves Speak Poor Sirihishl

This would imply two things to me; that dwarves grow up in a predominantly mirrukim speaking household/environment, and that their daily activities don't require a fluency in the city's main language.  Arguements will be made that they live alongside humans and have no visible community within which to function efficiently without learning the language.  One of the benefits of not speaking sirihish very well is that dwarves aren't instantly able to interact/communicate with non dwarven characters.  This does remind the players that there is a difference between dwarves and humans besides strength and endurance scores.  It encourages dwarves to speak with one another, or at least struggle if they want to assimilate into the human community and associate with their "human" concerns.

If dwarves began with perfect sirihish, I believe players would more quickly release any notion that their dwarf was "different" and play them closer to a strong, hardy human.

Dwarves Have No Visible Community

This seems to indicate one of two things are true; dwarves are too concerned with their focii to ever maintain a group focus on the community, or the powers-that-be disrupt such organizations at an early stage for fear of what a collective dwarven focii could accomplish.  Humans are swayed by greed, laziness, corruption, decadence, power, and other faults that are balanced by their many advantages.  Dwarves have both strength and weakness within their ability to remain completely focused on an objective.  It allows them to accomplish incredible tasks with efficiency, precision, and attention to detail while it also makes them extremely difficult to deal with because all other matters come secondary.  It also consumes their lives, keeping them from banding together to support a common cause unless that cause somehow furthers their focus or dwarves are somehow able to "alter" their focus.

The dwarven focus may very well be the reason dwarves have not yet formed a community.  This may be "working as intended" or it may simply be a rationalization that has stood the test of time for lack of effort and/or attention placed on the situation.

History of Dwarves

Based loosely on historical events and how they might have shaped perceptions of that region, I would say that most dwarves in Allanak would probably be slaves.  After the attack of the Ironsword and Clear Waters Oasis tribes, and the ensuing riots within the city itself, I don't imagine the authority figures would be all that excited to see another dwarven movement.  What race would be interested in bowing to a statue of a dragon (the Highlord) holding in his grasp one of their own?  While the city-state may not enforce slavery on every dwarf they see, I do think they'd be none to sympathetic to a dwarven "community" forming.

Tuluk, on the other hand, has had quite a bit of support for the dwarves.  I'm not sure how much is considered "common knowledge" and so I will omit the particular events/organizaqtions that support this claim.  However, I will say there has been more than one occasion where the dwarven people were supported or entrusted with duties important to the region.  If any community were to be implemented, I would think Tuluk the most likely location for any such changes to be implemented based on their relationship with dwarves in the past.

I still stand by my suggestion for players to take matters into their own hands and forward any changes through IC events.  Allow the world to participate in the future of the dwarf.  Deciding to create a community out of thin air, or adding a village somewhere because it made "sense" might rob folks of a fair amount of RP and intriguing plots that involve several social and political participants.

-LoD

[Intrepid]

About a year back a friend of mine was talking to me about a dwarven tribe (possibly the one a lot of players were involved in), and there were no duplicate foci, but they were very carefully coordinated to make a functioning village.

I don't see how that negates my point.  I'm referring to similar/duplicate foci, you're
referring to coordinated foci.  Both are great ideas and even complimentary to one
another.

So instead of everyone going their own ways, everyone would be working together, this way, if one important PC dies while trying to get the tribe started, then it doesn't crumble down the way it did when Thrain died. This way we also help the staff instead of asking for this and for that. And this way, no one's orchestring something with their buddies via OOC either, the staff would see it being developed from the ground up.

Or...we could just do it ourselves and not use the imms as a crutch?  So what if it
doesn't have imm backing starting out?  Maybe it shouldn't until we see if the concept
catches on and can survive before bugging them.  And if there is more than one
dwarf clan as a result?  Good!  We have multiple elven and human clans too, each
with differences.  I'd rather see everyone approaching this differently.

[Anonymous]

Let me prefix this by saying:

Zalanthas is not Athas

=/

At any rate, this was a good Athasian Dwarf reference:

http://64.233.161.104/search?q=cache:3vJvLB6XkhEJ:www.realmsofevil.net/darksun3e/dwarves.cfm+%22dwarven+focus%22&hl=en&gl=us&ct=clnk&cd=10

and

http://64.233.161.104/search?q=cache:5ZD8gBkVeF0J:www.athas.org/releases/ds3/races.20021129.pdf+%22dwarven+focus%22&hl=en&gl=us&ct=clnk&cd=24