Hill Dwarves

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Description:

Hill dwarves are stout, tough individuals like their mountain dwarven brethren, but are less off-putting and gruff in nature. Conversely, hill dwarves are often less agile than other dwarves. The average hill dwarf is about four feet tall (1.2 meters) and as heavy as a full-grown human, making them somewhat squatter than the more common mountain dwarves. Hill dwarves are also distinguishable by their light brown or tanned skin, significantly darker than that of most dwarves, and their brown or hazel eyes. Hill dwarves have black, gray, or brown hair, which fade to light gray over time. Hill dwarf males and some females can grow beards, which are carefully groomed and grown to great lengths.    

Psychology

Hill dwarves are both materialistic and ritualistic, valuing themselves and others by what they possess and by the reputation of their family. Hill dwarves are deeply conservative, rooting their values and beliefs in traditions. From infancy, hill dwarves are taught that their life is determined by tradition, from what their profession shall be to who they shall marry. Hill dwarves who lack faith in the old ways or who go so far as to challenge cultural taboos are seen as dangerous deviants unworthy of friendship or trust by the majority of hill dwarves, creating an enormous social pressure to conform.   In part because of their conservatism and staunch belief in their own cultural superiority, hill dwarves rarely venture outside of their homelands. The only motive for adventuring deemed rational to the average hill dwarf is the desire to seek out their fortune in unclaimed lands, perhaps to build a stronghold of their own.   Hill dwarves who do become adventurers are most often fighters, though clerics, paladins, rangers, rogues, or even sorcerers are not unheard of.    

Culture

Outsiders who wander into the strongholds of hill dwarves may be surprised to find a people far more confident and secure in their future than most dwarves. Hill dwarves have few doubts about their place in the world. As a result, hill dwarves can come off as haughty and almost elf-like in their pride, believing themselves culturally superior to all other races and lacking the fatalistic pessimism of their mountain dwarven cousins.    

Artisans of Great Skill

Hill dwarves are a deeply materialistic race who believe that the resources of the natural world exist only to serve the purpose of conscious beings. To a hill dwarf, there is no greater purpose than to fashion the minerals of the earth into things of beauty. Hill dwarf guilds take great care in their craftsmanship, often spending decades to perfect their work and mark it distinctively as their own, a practice which is carried down to even the most simple tools, marking such items with detailed runes and carefully shaped flairs.   Hill dwarf warriors employ a large number of finely crafted weapons and armor, often engraved with runes or prayers. Most commonly, dwarves employ weapons that can also be used as tools, such as axes, picks, or hammers.    

Magic

Dwarves are particularly superstitious of all types of magic, both divine and arcane. Arcane magic is seen as the work of Ran and a cheat to avoid hard work. Divine magic is viewed much in the same light. Those that are born with The Gift of Magic quickly learn to hide it in their communities.    

Religion

The All Father

The Religion of the True People is the native religion of most dwarven communities. It holds that while there may or may not be other gods, that The All Father specially created dwarves, that they are The True People and he has given them a special place in the world. They believe that The All Father has promised to lead, teach, and protect dwarves against a hostile world.   Dwarf religion focusses on the well being of drawves. It teaches dwarves to be honest, generous, and kind with each other. In dealings with non-dwarves, it is a little more ambiguous. But, most dwarves hold that The All Father commands those same virtues be applied to non-dwarves, as long as dwarven communities are protected.  

The Old Ways

Hill dwarf communities also have minorities of followers of The Old Gods and The Way of The Spirits, with small temples to various gods, goddesses, and spirits being found in hill dwarven cities. In particular, worship is focussed on Yaman - God of The Mountains.  

Younger Faiths

Also, many dwarves living in primarily human lands have converted to The Teachings of Chantrel and Unity. These dwarves are somewhat distanced from their homelands as they view themselves as Disciples of Chantrel or Children of The Great Father first and members of their drawven clan second.    

Relations with Other Races

Hill dwarves have a symbiotic relationship with their mountain dwarf brethren, below the surface. Hill dwarves often place their cities and villages on the foothills, near the entrance to the mountain dwarf subterranean cities. Through trade they will exchange goods that are unavailable to each individually. In particular, the hill dwarves will exchange the excess from their crops for the stone or ore from the mountain dwarf mines.  In addition, these communities will have mutual defense arrangements, where the hill dwarf village is the first line of defense against raiders, and the mountain dwarf citadel is used as a sanctuary for both communities in the case of more dire threats.   Hill dwarves regard most elves, particulars the dominant Lunesti, with an aloof caution, as their ways are alien to them. However, they have an atypically good relationship with Montesti valuing the often profitable trading arrangements they've had with Montesti clans. Similarly, hill dwarves are, as a rule, rather fond of halflings, seeing them as kindred of spirits due to the their propensity for industriousness and acquisitiveness. In addition, hill dwarves are intrigued by gnomes and their mechanisms.   One, exception to this is the drow, who the hill dwarves see as terrors from the Underdark. Similiarly, most hill dwarves hate and fear dragonborn, ocs, and goblins, who are seen as abominations. Likewise, humans are regarded with caution, as they are seen as desperate barbarians.    

Homelands:

Hill dwarves live in small surface villages and strongholds in the hills and foothills that are scattered throughout the known world, often having villages before the entrance to mountain dwarf citadels. Hill dwarves can also be found in the dwarven diaspora scattered across The Civilized Lands.