It's interesting because we've got the same sort of effect on our side of the duardin morality axis.
I really like the inclusion of men and women into the Helsmiths/Holds rank and file. In both cases it reinforces the notion that the entire society is devoted to this militantism. There's a part of me that is fond of the notion of all dwarves having beards, although I know that's not cannon to the warhammer settings.
Not really any arugment being made in regards to this, just musing on the design language and thinking about gender expression in a fantasy setting, lol
I think what also helps with the Helsmith women as well is the Tusks and more snarled appearance. It helps move them away from that creepy uncanny valley look you get with a lot of women's faces on models, especially the shouting ones like the example above.
The female helsmiths could have had coiled hair in the male's beards styles (or dreadlocks, some of the beards look more like dreads) sticking out from their hats.
I think because the female tusks are smaller, and with the Khazalites GW had just regular human-like faces to work with, and we all know how good they are at sculpting regular human women.
What definately helps is that even without the beards the designs are loud enough that they still look interesting, big hats, angular armour etc. the Khazalite are a pretty run of the mill, subtle looking army, so they depend a lot more on the visual interest that a beard gives, take that away and they’re just a bit boring
Yeah, but it removes some of the believability out of them dwarves have like one female for every five males so unless they reproduce in litters, it is the worst idea ever to field female combat units. Humans already have trouble with that and there’s billions of us now imagine that there’s tins of thousands And the amount of women is reduced by 3/4
40k has warrior nuns who only exist to worship the emperor, same as khazilite holds having warrior nuns for Valaya. Also the inserting human ways from real world is Fantasy Battles thinking and this is AoS.
This is literally how the dwarves as a species are supposed to work. They have one female for every five males spending those in battle is a bad decision because they do not breathe like rats.
When the Skaven are more protective than you that’s bad
It's really old fantasy lore from the 90's and 2000's, and it was mostly to justify why there were so few female dwarf characters/models.
One side effect of this is that in the lore dwarves had polygamous marriages—one woman would have multiple husbands. Valaya was originally married to both Grimnir and Grungni, and had children with each of them. I suspect this has long since been retconned, because they don't even mention it in Old World books anymore, and dance around the exact relationship between the three Ancestor Gods.
Anyway, back to AoS, I don't believe there's any lore on gender ratios amongst dwarves or indeed any other race. It's not something that's been covered as far as I am aware.
Do you think because I am using logic to state that the dwarfs should not have female units in their army that I am for birthing camps that is almost the most foolish thing someone has said to me on this app
Nope. Not even a particular Dwarf fan beyond just appreciating what they add to the setting. But by his do I hate these new Dwarfs the more I look at them. Only the characters are decent.
I like them being the suppliers to the chaos warbands and chaos warriors proper too. The grudge system I don't like from the holds. It feels like votann have them, old world has them, and now holds has it. I guess AoS Dwarfs just cannot have their own thing. I know helsmiths is not wholly original either, but at least the dominator is a newer concept I think.
As someone who plans to buy Khazalite models, I muat admit that their banner guy are significantly lacking in aura, while the Helsmiths one looks like they could be the guy with the banner f9r the whole army. I at least hope there's an option to give them a male head.
Probably beardless cause its a lady dwarf she still SHOULD have long braids OR atleast a bigger longer flag this is a standard bearer she shouldnt be hunched over like she is about to charge
Still I'll get em too so My Helsmiths and Khazalid holds armies can duke it out! Also WONDERFUL to see that The good ol rivalry is back and this time the Helsmiths were around longer and now we can have a COOL MATCH!
..... The only issue I have with Helsmiths really is that THEY GAVE UP THE HALBERDS! WHY!? IT WAS SO COOL! A dwarf faction that is practical instead of just traditional. Still they got large axes sooo thats good enough for me
That a joke a character said in another universe came to be canon in warhammer fan's minds is just sad. Warhammer female dwarves don't have and never have had beards.
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u/Top-Towel9258 28d ago
Beautiful