1968 Springleaf Ironblood.

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I intend to answer the question that The Hobbit films left unanswered: what do half elf/dwarf babies look like? The answer? Hot humans.
In Tolkien’s stuff you can mix human and elf, but no mention is ever made of dwarves mixing with other races. I don’t know if a reason is ever given, but my guess is that they can’t mix because Dwarves weren’t created by Iluvatar, the god of that universe. They were created by Aule “the craftsman”. He made them in his image but wasn’t capable of giving them life as that was a power reserved for Iluvatar. When he was discovered he explained that since he was created in the image of Iluvatar he had the urge to create life, but couldn’t. To make amends he raised his hammer to smash the dwarves himself, but they cowered in fear because in that moment Iluvatar took pity on Aule and breathed life into the dwarves. Iluvatar then put the Dwarves to sleep. They would not awaken until after the Elves, firstborn of Iluvatar woke unto middle Earth. They are considered the adopted children of Iluvartar. Since they were created in Aule’s image they are able to resist the domination of evil, even though they are prone to evil like any other race. They resist domination much more than men, which is why they couldn’t become wraiths. At best their innate desire for precious metals and gems was what had to be manipulated in order to use them for evil aims, but even then their strong sense of honor could be appealed to and break the gold sickness. This is why Thorin comes to his senses after falling prey to it in the Hobbit.

In my little world Elves, Dwarves, and men are functionally different lines of a single race that have forgotten whatever common ancestor they shared. Capable of interbreeding with each other and several other humanoid races. It’s a real fuckfest buffet in this fantasy world.

52 Comments

“a real fuckfest buffet”

Some people have a way with words, and other people…oh, uh, not have way.

I wanna play D&D with Jackie!

Me, personally- I like Jackie’s creative use of words, in his author’s explanation-like comments, for this page.
A [real f*ckfest buffet] is a collection of words that show real creativity and…to me…innovation.
This is a creative and colorful phrase, that I would never have thought of. I think it’s really cool.

Oh good gravy!
I tried to create an updated crossbreeding chart for player races. And then I found our I had only covered half-ish of the official races from older editions, so I scrapped it and just outlined a set of rules for mongrelfolk/mixed breeding.

In the days that I still GM’d I had the distinct “pleasure” of riding Herd over a set of min-maxers/rules lawyers in a campaign that featured the Mad Wizard of something-or-other.
Inevitably, during the campaign I faced a Minor Revolution over monster stats and appearances, given that none of the stuff they encountered fitted their knowledge or expectations, which led to the classic phrase: “Listen, lads**….. Which bit of *Mad Wizard* did you fail to comprehend…..” .

Some of that lot never could get their heads around the concept of Mad Scierrrmm Wizardry…..

** Girl Nerds were *rare* in the early 80’s..

Yeah, Jackie has more mad Leet drawing skills than an elf, more passion for justice than a dwarf, and more charisma than just about anyone on the regular broadcast channels. (I dunno/can’t speak for premium channels). His understanding of the human gestalt passes all human understanding– or at least attempts to.
And in panel one someone’s ears are mighty pointy at the top. Is someone half human/ half-elf? Rather short for an half-elf.
I like her scar in the bottom panel, but is that an errant line, or is that a toothpick in her mouth? Looks like a toothpick, but not sure. A toothpick makes her look tougher. And a one handed sword is fine for melee, but a two handed is too big for most dungeons, a hand-and-a-half is perfect for everything except a barroom blitz, cuase it eneded in a barroom blitz.

I cannot resist to ask.
does she prefer a bastard sword because she is a bastard? (as in she was born out of wedlock?)

wow, an elf AND a dwarf?
I’m guessing massive amounts of alcohol were involved
(for the dwarf I mean, the elf was ready after the first glass)

to be fair, Elves and Men weren’t *supposed* to be able to hybridize in Tolkeins setting originally either, but Beren and Luthien were able to convince the gods to make an exception. and Luthien had to die and then come back as something less than an elf (and Beren come back from the dead) to take advantage of that. and even then, their kids still looked like elves and had to chose which race they’d be.

and i suspect that even that exception only worked because Luthien was half Maiar, basically a demigoddess. so not only did she have a bit more pull with the gods than a man, elf, or dwarf would have, but since maiar could interbreed with any of the races it made it more feasible in general.

I always had a theory that Gnomes were the crossbreed of Elves and Dwarves, but that it had to be assisted with magic or conception couldn’t happen.

Her background reminds me just a little of a character I made long ago, a human who was raised by dwarves.

Half elf, half dwarf… bastard sword. Clever girl, that Rulette. Also, thanks to TBD, I’ve caught Titansgrave: The Ashes of Valkana and very much remember Alison Haislip’s character of Kiliel, and googling Kiliel (to make sure I spelled Haislip & Kiliel correctly), I see that’s the official fanon “ship” name for Kili (dwarf) and Tauriel (elf) from The Hobbit… damn, I just lost nerd points for not knowing that beforehand.

“It’s a real fuckfest buffet in this fantasy world.” In Star Trek too, and that pretends to be science fiction rather than fantasy – half Andorran, half Klingon – no problem!

And of course, the whole topic of fantasy crossbreeds makes me think of this classic OOTS strip- http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0555.html

That does make me question:
if Spock was as smart, and as “logical”, as everyone said he was…wouldn’t he just have solved his unhappiness, about his parentage, by [just] hiring a good therapist for 5 years?
[ I know, I know- “that’s NOT in the script!” ] :)

Because logically, you can’t apply solutions to problems that are basically just “Spock goes to therapy for five years.” No one will watch that. Even Frasier had to throw in all that extra stuff about restaurants and ex-wives to get anywhere.

I could watch a Frasier/Spock combo.

Cool!
I wonder who would win in an argument between them: Spock or Frasier? :)

“Who is on the couch here, Mr Nimoy? Who has the pen and notebook? Please!”

“Dr Crane, I once met your ex-wife during PonFarr.”

“That’s something someone made up! You need to free yourself from these delusions!”

“Hello, bridge? Transporter, please.”

(wait)

“Will next week the same time be suitable?”

“Yes.”

I remember reading something about how a very early race in the ST universe “seeded” many planets across the galaxy. This common ancestry at least partially explained why multiple alien races could interbreed and produce viable offspring. (Not to mention why so many of them looked like humans with a little makeup and a prosthetic or two.) I don’t remember where I originally read this, and I have no idea if it is (or ever was) canon, but it sounded like as good an explanation as any. Of course, expecting Trek “science” to make too much sense is a fool’s errand.

It occurs to me that if one has magic powers, they never need help at the supermarket regardless of height. A good levitating disk will get you to the top shelf easy.

Looks like someone has read Book of Erotic Fantasy and Bastards and Bloodlines.

The former is infamous for having a lot of sexual content. The latter has some interesting half breeds. Both are able to work with any d20 system apparently.

my theory on tolkien-esque fantasy dwarves? they appear humanoid, but they are in actuality fungus. its why they prefer caves and mines, dark and humid where they cane scatter spores and grow unmolested.
it also explains why we dont see lady dwarves.

Wow.
That reminds me of the “theory” that pigeons in New York City are just rats that evolved into birds.
The idea being: 1) rats + pigeons are both scavengers, 2) you never see baby pigeons, and 3) both pigeons and rats seem to get everywhere. *shrugs*

nice. Seems these guys are getting into the game.

I’m just gonna call who I think the others will be before they are shown, if we have other characters show.

Thomas- Paladin (lives by his code, and shows leaderlike tendencies)

Carol- Barbarian (you wouldn’t like her when she’s raging)

Nina- Ranger (fast, versatile, and fits the amazon aesthetic)

John- Cleric (team player, and nothing sexier than not dying)

Reggie- Bard (embraces his wit, and that’s easily the most natural choice out of all of them)

Josie- Rouge (…need I say anything else?)

There was a story I read online years ago that gave a supernatural background to both the elves and the dwarves, that I think could have probably explained all the other races in fantasy worlds. Basically a couple of Fae siblings were having a squabble, and they moved apart while remaining different from the other. So every time they were visited by some one else, they would play up some trait they were proud of, being taller, being stronger, more graceful than the other, more solidly built, and like that they physically changed along with the conceit. I think this could totally be the origin for everything including humans in these kind of worlds, if we could just go back to their first ancestors, the founders of every one, it would probably be someone one upping another.

Woops, now it doesn’t sound right, meant to find another way of saying that they would obsess over each other, not just “different.” Anyway an example of dialog was like ‘What? I’m nothing like that fool down the street, I clearly much taller’ and when looking at that one, they did seem to be a bit taller than their twin on the other side of the hill.

No reflection on Jackie, but does anyone else find Jesse… tedious?

Sometimes, yes. What I mean is- she’s a flirt, she competes with her brother, she likes getting dates, but I wish that we could see her doing some other activities. No offense to the revved-up Jess fans.

Yeah, exactly. It just feels like every time there’s another character around trying to get some development in, she butts in and drags the spotlight back onto her again. And usually it’s just some form of cry for attention, so I just catch myself being like, “Oh, shut UP–Ed was talking!” I think I started disliking her after the flirting with Thomas in the store and harassing Jo–especially since part of me suspects that Jo isn’t nearly as important to her as she is to Jo? Maybe I just knew too many girls like her in college, I dunno. Lol

I know a few settings have dwarves be incompatible with men and elves on account of being created by different gods, like Iluvatar and Aule. I’ve seen it likened to different programming langauges, or sung languages. When I run, it’s generally just that their biology is so robust and acidic that conception with other races almost never happens, and even more seldom is carried to term. Ties in with all their resistances and bonuses.

On twitter, Jackie listed some wrestlers that he likes.
How about these wrestlers: the Fabulous Moolah, Superfly Snooka, Junkyard Dog, Paul Bearer, Andre the Giant, etc..

Jackie, you might find this interesting:
https://newatlas.com/lego-vw-t2-camper-van/58521/#p559293

There is also this story, where in 2009, UK TV host, James May…with other people, built a functioning house out of Legos:
https://lego.fandom.com/wiki/James_May

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