Dwarves have almost nothing that differentiate them from humans in MtG. Kaladesh failed to make me interested in the subtype because their style was "ooh I work hard and don't need sleep for some reason".

Competent people (aka winners in conflict) tend to work hard, or do whatever they could to succeed at least.

So, stripping away the somewhat unnerving "we are better" style they have, they have nothing that differentiates them from the generic. Other biological types have something that makes them different. Elves have longer life spans and easier energy generation. Goblins can be used as grenades and reproduce really fast. Many other subtypes have features that clearly distinguish them visually and functionally from humans, whereas Dwarves, not really.

The kithkin were just different enough to not be anywhere near comparable to humans, fortunately. They have no pupils, the Mindweft, and the ability to share skills that make them really deadly.

The kor also have this problem but mechanically they often have massive amounts of significance and a very high focus to self-modification via enchantments/artifacts.
The kor have face tentacles.

I don't know. What should be done to make dwarves more marketable? Me personally, I'd make them have a biologically related ability like surviving without oxygen and with high pressures for long periods of time, and dump them to the bottom of the sea.

Only the twisted abominations of Shadowmoor


wait... having face tentacles counts less than having no pupils?


There's always something like what they did with the rock dwarves.
But what you want to avoid is anything like the duergar.

When it comes down to it though, the problem is Tolkien hammered the dwarf tropes in too hard, so distinguishing them from the vaguely scottish/jewish idea they were crafted from makes them nigh unrecognizable for marketing purposes. It's precisely the reason they don't do dwarves and when they DO deviate, like with Kaladesh and the Duergar.... people aren't happy

I'm not big on dwarves in general - they're one if my least liked fantasy races, along with elves, hobbits halflings kithkin, and anything else that can essentially be described as "slightly odd looking human". The problem with Kaladesh dwarves is that they didn't even go that far - I could barely tell what was a dwarf and what was a human by looking. It was also kind of bad trying to identify them as artificers on Kaladesh. What's the point of a race of artificers on a whole plane of artificers?

"What should be done to make XY more marketable?" probably sums up everything that is wrong with Magic these days.


I'm going to sound like a broken record by now, but I can't stress enough that I want dwarves to stay centered in red and that the classic fantasy dwarves that Magic used to do for the most part are what I want them to be. There is nothing wrong with them, no need for weird experiments. It's not like you can't give them depth or make their roles and cultures slightly different from plane to plane that way. Some bleeding into white (or pretty much any other colour really) is fine for all I care, but Kaladesh did it the wrong way around. I didn't engage much with Kaladesh anyway, but I guess dwarves felt a bit lost there, visually and worldbuilding-wise. I don't feel too strongly about the duergar one way or the other, I think they were sort of okay for Shadowmoor but wouldn't work on most other planes. Being a bit less ugly and deformed wouldn't have harmed them, though. They even have an excuse for changing them if they ever return to Lorwyn, because the two aspects of the plane have merged again.


Ironically, I think the best way to make dwarves more 'marketable' would be to just give people what they want and what they can instantly recognise and understand, and that would be the classic red Magic dwarves. Magic's elves are pretty generic, too, and that doesn't stop WotC from using them either. Why not handle dwarves just the same?

I liked kaladesih dwarves, they were stereotypical but bent in an interesting direction.

Remove humans from magic.

Well, for starters, dwarves in Magic and most other fantasy IPs (not to mention mythology) live for hundreds of years, and I'd argue that's quite an advantage over humans. Whatever area of expertise a dwarf puts his mind to, be it forging, architecture, magic, masonry, potion making, cutting gems, learning languages, fighting, strategy, becoming a scholar or a musician or a poet, from a human perspective he'll have entire lifetimes to achieve perfection. Think of the flavour text on Arcane Teachings (Judgment version). And I'd argue that's the real reason why dwarves are superior artificers and all that. That's not even talking about other, smaller advantages they might have, like being tougher and more enduring. Willpower might be another thing you could give to them, and they probably don't need quite as much sunlight to survive. When I say I want 'classic red Magic dwarves', I certainly don't mean parodies of dwarves. Having a drinking culture doesn't make them alcoholics (it's probably a lot harder for a dwarf to become addicted to pretty much any substance than for a human - in before someone says "gold"), being red doesn't make them perma-angry berserkers, being blacksmiths/miners doesn't mean they're always brandishing a hammer/pick, being short doesn't mean they all have a Napoleon complex. And yes, when you work hard, it's only fair that you'll also party hard. Besides, a realistic dwarven society would probably be a lot more specialised than just having blackmsiths and miners. There is no reason why it wouldn't. Just look at the things I listed above, and that's just a fraction of what would be going on there. You could even come up with different tribes or clans of dwarves that all dress differently and have different customs and all that and all come together in a big, sprawling melting pot of a dwarven metropolis underground. As to differentiating them from Vikings, that's actually pretty easy. I'd have the Vikings be mostly farmers, traders, fishermen, explorers, pirates etc., which is pretty much what they were historically. The only part where I see a significant overlap with dwarves (on planes that aren't Ulgrotha) would be the trading, and that's actually perfect because they'd produce very different goods that they could then exchange. And you could have a Viking trading ship with a dwarven interpreter on board who speaks 20 languages, that would be handy, but other than that, I don't see a lot of potential for them mingling too much. When it's all about battle and warfare, sure, I guess they would be a lot more similar, but it doesn't need to be all about that. War can make any culture look one-dimensional after all. And if that's still not enough, you could give the dwarves a funny fantasy skin colour like those purple rock dwarves Barinellos mentioned to set them apart visually.


Seriously, I won't stop fighting for dwarves being dwarves. Never.


Faaar oveeer the Misty Mountains cooold
to dungeons deeeep and caveeerns ooold
we muuust away
ere breeeaaak of dayyy
to find our long forgotten gold

Format your text better, please. Ow.

Okay, now I know what you are talking about, after splitting up your text so I can see each point you're making.

So, classic dwarves:

• Have long lives.
• (probably) Have slower metabolism and don't really need as much oxygen/sunlight to be healthy.

And coming from the flavor text for that card you showed me, it's possible that they communicate ideas more slowly.

That's just useful enough for them to have weaknesses that would differentiate them from humans and not be complete idiots or parodies, so I guess that's useful now.

It would also be funny to have a dwarf society that actually takes advantage of these differences. Like, a slowly-communicating society where these weaknesses create a stagnant, unchanging society ruled by a harsh dictator. Possibly with Dwarf Fortress style references to video game cruelty potential.

Oh, and dwarf/elf would be like cute little leprechauns! *frying pan* Ow! Ow! I'm sorry! I was kidding!

Make dwarves B/R pain cultists like I did

Or traditionalists like I did.

Dwarves a kind of boring.
Pavor Nocturnus brought up the long-lived thing, but that covers a ton of fantasy races. It's not often applicable to MTG either.

The only red thing about dwarves is their association with earth. Culturally they are base white. To make them less human, you can even go further with it.
Gnomes have sadly horned in on dwarvenkind's aspects in pop culture. I'm not sure how much of an issue that is though.
The third option I see is to play up the creepiness of these sequestered, obsessive dark-dwellers. Today we're familiar with the dwarf tropes and accept them, but in the old days of fantasy dwarves were super weird and fantastical. They've lost that since. Now they're just short people.

Are we seriously forgetting the stereotype of dwarves being drunks who are quick to get into fights and are obsessed with gold? How is that not red?

Precisely.

Though to me dwarves could be drunkards.

Random idea time that should be taken with a grain of salt:
I'm suddenly in the mood to see mini versions of Barba from Shadow of the Colossus. That is, look like they live in an area with little light, but not be ugly. With a more alien and kinder take on the ashen look than duergar. Also have these Barba dwarves be a race that habitually forget that other races don't have the same physical tolerances as they do. Have them not intend to be rough to interact with, but just slightly naive about how the rest of the races function. They're not really proud of their forging skill, they just can't fully grasp how someone doesn't have the knack for it or how someone can't handle a keg of beer for dinner. Don't have them be braggarts about it, or look down on others; just let them be slightly confused. Skill set wise, I'd guess they'd be stronger and have better spacial awareness than humans, but less nimble. They'd be able to be charismatic, but have a severe weakness when they have to change verbal tactics (Switching verbal tactics on them only giving an advantage when the Barba dwarf has to switch verbal tactics too.).

Granted, that probably would require having baseline dwarves around to compare them to. Even then though, I'd see the Barba dwarves more like the more quiet cousins of stereotypical dwarves who still get along with the more brash dwarves.

Dwarves focus on community and rigid structures are very white. Their battle prowess is white and red. Their associations with industry and short tempers are red. Their greed is black, but could also be done in red if you wanted. So to me dwarves are with a possible splash of at default.

And whoever mentioned gnomes: Gnomes are an artifact race in magic. Although if we ever get colored artifacts in abundance again I wouldn't mind seeing gnomes.

I don't buy gnomes as artifacts-only. Only 7/8 gnomes so far have been artifact creatures. That indicates that there are many artificial gnomes, but also at least a few real ones. It's not exactly a recent precedent either. Finally, I find it super weird that gnomes could be a common variety of construct not based on any creature, despite being based on a type of creature that people know about.

The dwarves delved too greedily and too deep tho.
That's important.

THe dwarves weren't to know balrogs were on the random encounter table.

The problem arises to 'what is a gnome?'
It's an earth spirit, in which case, dwarves do it better.
It's a chaotic tinkerer, in which case, goblins do it better.
It's a forest guardian, in which case, elves do it better.

Out of everything, that leaves deceptive wizard as a gnomish identity, which pretty much means blue. But does blue need gnomes?