A recent discussion on the forum about Dwarves caused me to pull out my file copies of D&D: Monsters and Treasure '74, Holmes Basic '77, and Moldvay Basic '81 so as to compare and contrast our TFT Dwarves to that of their basic D&D counter-parts.
The take-away of that research is that the D&D versions of Dwarves also have the following natural abilities:
- The rough equivalent of the Dark Vision spell (IQ 9)
- The rough equivalent of rolling one less d6 vs IQ to detect slanting passages, traps, shifting walls and new construction.
- The limited equivalent of the Spell Shield spell (IQ 14), but only enhancing resistance, and is not wholly preventative as in the TFT spell.
- Speaking Goblin and 2 other smaller humanoid-tongues for races TFT does not use.
While I am not endorsing any of these for our TFT Dwarves, I can see the logic behind Dwarves being underground dwellers, that the race - after multiple generations underground - might possibly develop genetics with enhanced vision in the dark.
Also, as dwellers (and one would assume the builders) of underground cities (See TFT:ITL page 50) the detection bonus to spot architectural or structural anomalies in the environment of the underground also seems reasonable to me.
I have no literary reference which I can recall off the top of my head as to why Dwarves should be magically-resistant; however, if this was so in TFT, should one also reasonably expect that Dwarves would also *use* magic at a disadvantage - making the magic-resistance work both ways?
As far as naturally knowing the languages of other races because they are also "small folks", but from a different race and culture, is a bit of a stretch for me; so unless there is some other reason for this natural ability I am unaware of, I can't figure out a rationale for this.
Thoughts?
JK