[D'iversify]

Use Of Weapons, on 01 February 2013 - 10:45 PM, said:

When Pug and Tomas are on the way to Elvandar, they get separated underground when the party is attacked by a wraith (the only appearance of wraiths in the entire series, AFAIR). Tomas then finds the Valheru armour, and is found by the dwarves who are leading them through the cave system.

Am I right in thinking that not only is Magician the only Feist work where wraiths appear, but trolls, after playing a seminal part in young Pug's life, seem pretty thin on the ground afterwards.It seems that Feist thinks its OK to mention a non-human sentient speices once and then forget as if they ever existed, even if when they were encountered the characters are familiar with them and don't necessarily treat them as rare or little seen.

[Assail]

Feist stuck to the stereotypical ale-drinking, short, hardy, rough around the edges kind of dwarves. They lived in the foothills though, and only forayed into the mountains occasionally from my recollection. They did mine down there but that was about it. I felt he kind of made midget vikings with their long houses and shit.

[Cedz]

There are also mountain dwelling dwarves in Katherine Kerr's Deverry Series at some point. Not a bad series if you like old school fantasy more in line with Tolkien.

This post has been edited by Cedz: 08 February 2013 - 01:53 AM

[MTS]

Even if Feist had actually made more Tolkienesque dwarves, they're not exactly front and centre in any of the Midkemia books, even Magician. Feist is much more obsessed with his elves, so much so that every other book it seems there's yet another race of elves being discovered.

[MTS]

Briar King, on 08 February 2013 - 04:02 AM, said:

MTS, on 08 February 2013 - 03:08 AM, said:

Even if Feist had actually made more Tolkienesque dwarves, they're not exactly front and centre in any of the Midkemia books, even Magician. Feist is much more obsessed with his elves, so much so that every other book it seems there's yet another race of elves being discovered.

I like reading about Elves much more then Dwarfs personally. They are usually much more Elegant, but yes Feist seems to crank it up alot on his Elves.

Fair enough, my point was that I would have liked to have seen his dwarves more fleshed out rather than revisit a race he's already spent an inordinate amount of time on.

[D'iversify]

I think one one of the problems with dwarves for fantasy writers is that they seem less open to reinvention than elves. This is in part because elves are (following the formula of regarding non-human races as playing a similar role to aliens in science fiction, as 'Others') more distinct from humans, more unknowable and usually less hospitable. Elves have an interestingly different perspective on the world due to their usual longevity and perform well the role of a tragic people, once all powerful and wise but ultimately brought down by strife, misfortune and apathy. Dwarves, on the other hand, are usually thought as just short humanoids, sometimes with a slightly longer life than humans but not significantly so, who often also share an all too human avarice and quarrelsome nature that makes them both less alien and less overtly sympathetic if deployed as a tragic people. Dwarves tend therefore to be 'less interesting', particularly if much of the interaction between the more amiable fantasy races hinges on the 'alien' nature of the non-humans as its main source of interesting strife and concord. I'm not saying that dwarves can't be interestingly reinvented, but in a Tolkienesque set-up the elves tend to be the more visible and central of the friendly non-humanoids. I'd be interested to see what a trope-spinning author like Erikson could do with dwarves.

[Abyss]

Actually i think most writers are just put off by the whole 'Dwarf women have beards' thing, or possibly just the logistics of Dwarven reproduction as a whole.

[acesn8s]

Before GW published the whole Orks reproduce by spores, we always joked that Ork females must be the most beautiful creatures in the universe because there were always so many Orks.

I don't see why an author couldn't apply the same thing to female dwarfs.

[Mikkelinski]

Ye I don't get that trope with dwarves / dwarfs (?). I don't see any reason why people feel like having to pull of bearded women if they don't want to, you can't even blame Tolkien since he never showed any female dwarves. I actually think tolkiens dwarves in Silmarillion are some of the best. He makes them much more than just beer / ale loving, short, bearded, grumpy humans. All their tragedies, betrayals and stuff make them distinctly different from humans. But yeh, I'm with D'iversify it seems like that authors are much more reluctant to reinvent them.

Are any of the warhammer (fantasy, not 40k) books any good btw? Cause if so, at least they have plenty of dwarfs heh, and I might have to give them a read (I played the game, but never read any stories besides the ones in the rule and army books)

[D'iversify]

Mikkelinski, on 10 February 2013 - 11:23 AM, said:

Ye I don't get that trope with dwarves / dwarfs (?). I don't see any reason why people feel like having to pull of bearded women if they don't want to, you can't even blame Tolkien since he never showed any female dwarves. I actually think tolkiens dwarves in Silmarillion are some of the best. He makes them much more than just beer / ale loving, short, bearded, grumpy humans. All their tragedies, betrayals and stuff make them distinctly different from humans. But yeh, I'm with D'iversify it seems like that authors are much more reluctant to reinvent them.

I think it's admitted at one point that Thorin Oakenshield has an aunt (Dis), but apart from that, yes, it's like dwarf women don't exist.

Though its dwarves are hardly revolutionarily different from the standard, the first Dragon Age game actually nicely gives a much bigger role to dwarven women.

[Abyss]

Briar King, on 09 February 2013 - 02:16 AM, said:

Abyss, on 08 February 2013 - 05:45 PM, said:

Actually i think most writers are just put off by the whole 'Dwarf women have beards' thing, or possibly just the logistics of Dwarven reproduction as a whole.

I do believe that your just basically telling us without out right telling us that the idea of Dwarf women turns your knob...

Which version? The D&D Dwarf women are basically short female wrestlers with axes... i see no problem with any of that.
Relatedly, i think some of the D&D related books do feature female dwarf characters and they skip the whole beards thing in favour of basically 'feminine'. Couldn't tell you which books tho'.

[Obdigore]

Read the Dwarves book by Mark Heitz. It was ok. Nothing super impressive, and it was just short barbarian stoneworkers, really.

[Macros]

See above, its pants.

[Obdigore]

Macros, on 13 February 2013 - 04:42 PM, said:

See above, its pants.

What does 'its pants' mean? Whos pants are we talking about?

[D'iversify]

Obdigore, on 14 February 2013 - 11:59 AM, said:

Macros, on 13 February 2013 - 04:42 PM, said:

See above, its pants.

What does 'its pants' mean? Whos pants are we talking about?

I think Macros meant to include an apostrophe so as to say that 'It's pants', i.e. 'it is awful'.

[Macros]

Yes.
grammar, its for other people

[QuickTidal]

Macros, on 14 February 2013 - 02:56 PM, said:

Yes.
grammar, its for other people the normals.

Fixed that for you.

[Primateus]

You should definitely check out Dan Parkinsons Dwarven Kingdoms trilogy, it's really quite awesome. It's a Dragonlance trilogy that tells the story of the founding of Thorbardin, the largest and most mighty dwarven fortress in Dragonlance.

Y'know, I've actually never encountered a story, that I can recall, where dwarven women had beards. It just seems so utterly ridiculous to me.

Oh, and Warhammer dwarves are, in my opinion, quite interesting as they are, again my opinion, a bit different from dwarves in other mythos.

But Dan Parkinson, check him out!

[acesn8s]

I read the old TSR (both DL and FR) books so long ago, they would probably be new to me now. I'm so old...

[worry]

Have you watched Little People, Big World? They kind of have a kingdom. Of pumpkins.