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Dwarf Army Project: Brainstorming Lore and Fluff

This post is going to be something of a ramble, as I’m working through my thoughts on the current dwarf army project I am embarking on.

On a recent episode of Hive Scum, there was some discussion about coming up with lore and story for armies on the table. One of the suggestions that I really liked was having names and histories for each unit. This helped resolve a bit of an issue I have been having with my dwarf army. Most of my army has been recently acquired, and I have more models than I know what to do with currently. I wanted to develop a narrative for my army, but I’m trying to figure out how to bring it all together.

I will probably be playing predominantly The Old World, so I picked up the Arcane Journal for the Dwarf Mountain Holds. In that book, they list two armies of renown (I think that’s what they were called), which are themed lists. The two lists are polar opposites, but they each get at something core to the dwarf sensibility.

The Royal Clans take no gunpowder. They rely on seasoned infantry, and some simple artillery like catapults and bolt throwers. No gyrocopters, handguns, cannons, or machines. You can also take a slayer king as the general, and then some slayer models become ‘core’ to the army. This is a great characterization of the tradition and conservatism of the dwarfs – a bunch of grumpy old men who complain about anything new.

The other army list is for the expeditionary force, which takes all of the guns, machines, and engineers that they can handle. This is the characterization of the craftsmen and builders of the dwarfs – and in the Warhammer lore, these dwarfs are often shunned for being too progressive and for changing tradition too quickly. This is where we get characters like the slayer engineer Malakai Makaisson, who creates airships, submarines, and axe throwers, which are alien to the dwarf sensibility.

I think these kinds of lists are flowing with character and help to define an army – my trouble is that I love aspects of both and want to bring them together. Of course I can do this, but how do I come up with that over-arching flavour?

Another way that can be used to provide character to a dwarf army is to focus on their mountain hold, or Karak. Karak Kadrin has the slayer king Ungrim Ironfist, and has the largest shrine to the slayer cult in the old world. Barak Varr is a mountain that touches the ocean, and has a harbour built into the side facing the water – filled with ironclad steamships. Karaz a Karak is the home of the high king of the dwarfs, and all of the royalty, tradition, and ceremony that accompanies the king.

So, my challenge will be to create an overarching thematic framework that the units in my army will fit into. I also want to give some character to the individual units, which brings me back to my opening idea. I don’t think I should come up with each unit all at once – I think a lot of the character should be developed through play – but there are a few ideas that have already struck me quite strongly and may contribute to the rest of my work.

One of the units I am currently building is the dwarf rangers. These units are odd ducks in dwarf culture, because they don’t spend much time in the mountains, but range around the forests of the old world, protecting dwarf mining interests and watching over the roads. They have a strong association with Bugman’s Brewery, which is a venerated institution (which is made obvious by the dwarf subreddit being called r/bugmansbrewery, and the largest dwarf forum also called bugmansbrewery.com). Bugman had a brewery that was built on a river in the empire, away from the dwarf holds, and was destroyed by a goblin army. Bugman spent the rest of his life as a ranger, hunting down goblins in the woods.

While I don’t necessarily want to just co-opt the Bugman story for my army, I am tinkering with the idea of a dwarf settlement outside of the mountains, with a strong presence of rangers to scout the forests and protect the populace. Seeing as I want to include lots of slayers and also war machines, I will need to come up with a story to tie all of this together – maybe expect my next post to be a bit more of a lore-dump for this army.

Along with my musings about this faction, I have also created my own physical ‘book of grudges’ to record each of the games I play, which system I use, who my opponent was, and what deeds or misfortunes occurred during play. These records will help me to flesh out who the dwarfs in this army actually are. 

 


 

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