Obviously, not all of them are, but
enough that it is starting to really annoy me. I am not an anti-Dwarf
racist or anything, but when I was looking for Scottish Highlander
miniatures on EBay today I found these guys-
Apparently they are for a game called
Dwarf Wars, and only one of the factions is Highlander Dwarves, but
it got me to thinking. Dwarves aren't part of Scottish Highland
folklore, not D&D type Dwarves anyway. D&D type Dwarves come
straight from Norse and other Germanic sources via Tolkien's works,
and I rather prefer them to stay more Nordic; or at least be the
short bearded guy in the party that is otherwise indistinguishable
from the rest of the party in dress and weapons, maybe preferring the
axe, or the crossbow.
Now I understand there is a miniature
battle game put out by Fantasy Flight Games, their stuff is usually
top notch, right? This one, called Battlelore, is a fantasy version
of the Hundred Years War, where you get to hire Dwarf and Goblin
mercenaries, or so the box says, I haven't played it.
Their Scottish Wars Expansion pretty
much makes the case that all the Scots are Dwarves.
So does the Dwarven Battalion
Expansion.
I think I remember reading something in
a TSR novel set in the Forgotten Realms back in the early 1990s with
some Scottish Dwarves too, but I can't remember which one, if it ever
really happened at all.
Then I remembered Games Workshop and
their Warhammer Fantasy RPG and the ginger, Mohawk sporting Dwarves
there, so I did an image search and found this-
A definite Scottish look to him. I
might not mind this; although I have a buddy that's of Irish
extraction an only 5'8" and he has to deal with Leprechaun jokes
constantly from another friend of ours who is lucky she's a woman,
because he's kind of a bad-ass; but I might not mind Scottish
Highlanders being associated with Dwarves if I wasn't 6'6" tall.
I know it's stupid of me to take this as a personal affront, but I
kind of do anyway. Even my little brother is 6'3". My sister is
5'9".
I think it's more about both groups being psychos...
ReplyDeleteI think it had something to do with the flavor text in D&D having them live in clans (although so do elves and halflings, but you don't see them wearing tartan or calling everyone lad and lassie). Then Dragonlance came out with Flint Fireforge the dwarf, who called everyone lad and lassie. Down hill since then.
ReplyDeletePersonally, all my NPC dwarves sound like Hanz and Franz from SNL (or some other equally silly Teutonic stereotype voice). "Ja, girly man. Ve are going to PUMP... YOU UP!"
Another reason to hate Dragonlance then. All my Dwarves tend to be Teutonic/Nordic, based on the Rankin-Bass version of the Hobbit, with the exception of their trading guilds which employ what might be referred to as Dwarven Ninjas.
DeleteYup, there's that old John Cleese joke. Scots have two defcon settings: "Yer pi**en me off pal" and "Lets get the bu**ers!". Bit like dwarves really.
ReplyDeleteAnd they claim it's the Irish that're fighters :)
DeleteAh, Dragonlance. I wondered about this myself. I thought it started with the John Rhys-Davies version of Gimli, but I was told that this "trope" predates the Lord of the Rings films.
ReplyDeleteThe worst thing is I think I might have found a niche use for those Dwarven Highlander miniatures in my Garnia World campaign.
ReplyDelete