Urdunnirs, sometimes known as ore-cutter dwarves, are a long-forgotten offshoot of shield dwarves who have become one with the earth and stone. Thanks to the blessings of Dumathoin, urdunnirs can walk through earth and stone as if it were air and shape metal and stone with their hands. Many orecutter dwarves are clerics of Dumathoin, expert smiths or expert gemcutters.
The Children of Dumathoin, as they call themselves, believe that the Silent Keeper transformed their ancestors in order to create a race of dwarves who could appreciate the true beauty of the subterranean landscape without needing to destroy it in the process. They have dwelt ever since in splendid isolation in Oldonnar, the legendary Lost Kingdom of Shanatar, deep beneath the Alimir Mountains.
Averaging 4½ feet tall but weighing much more than an adult human, orecutter dwarves are stocky and muscular. The skin of an urdunnir is light grey, and their eyes are always silver. Both genders wear their hair long, and males (and some females) have long, carefully groomed beards and mustaches. Hair colour is uniformly grey, with varying degrees of silver and black highlights.
Urdunnirs see the world as a work of living beauty, walking through stone and earth much as a diver might explore the wonders of the ocean depths. The Children of Dumathoin regard themselves as particularly blessed, for they are not forced to cling to the exterior of Dumathoin’s creation like other races but can wander through the heart of the world itself in an endless search to uncover the Silent Keeper’s hidden secrets (gems).
History: Shortly after Taark Shanat and his followers first claimed the caverns of Alatorin, Dumathoin transformed a small group of devout shield dwarves into urdunnirs, in hopes that they would be better able to appreciate the beauty of his creation. These early orecutter dwarves broke off from their fellows and set out to establish their own realm, deep in the heart of the world. Miles beneath the Alimir Peninsula, they discovered the Corundumdelve, a vast dodecahedron composed entirely of tightly packed amethysts, rubies and sapphires, each larger than a dwarven helm. Seeing this as a sign from the Silent Keeper, the urdunirrin established the kingdom of Oldonnar around the Hidden Gem of the Depths and have dwelt there in splendid, unchanging isolation ever since.
Outlook: Secure in their otherworldly fastnesses and isolated from external threats, orecutter dwarves have never experienced great wars with other races. As such, urdunnirs lack the martial traditions of their gold, grey and shield dwarven cousins. Strangely enough, urdunnirs share with druids and elves a deep understanding of the natural world. From a young age, orecutter dwarves are taught to live in harmony with their environment. They see Dumathoin’s vast creation as a great sea of earth and stone, ever-changing and always beautiful. They view their role in the world as that of both observer and artisan, working in harmony with Dumathoin’s creation to unlock the secrets the Silent Keeper has hidden within.
Thanks to their relative isolation, orecutter dwarves are rarely drawn to the adventuring way of life. However, those who encounter other races or stumble across doings in the Realms Above often find their curiosity piqued, becoming driven to understand those who have not been blessed by Dumathoin.
Characters: Their cultural focus on craft skills has made most urdunnirs experts in their trade. Others choose to serve Dumathoin directly as clerics. Fighters, rangers and paladins are relatively rare, for few orecutter dwarves have ever been forced to defend their holdings from other races. Those who practice the arcane arts are even scarcer, with those evincing the powers of sorcery usually tracing their powers back to creatures of elemental earth. Common multiclass combinations include expert/cleric and expert/fighter.
Favoured Class: An urdunnir’s favoured class is expert. Far removed from the endless battles that have plagued their kin, the deep-dwelling urdunnirs have the luxury of concentrating on their craft skills, forever seeking the buried treasures and secrets of Dumathoin.
Prestige Classes: Urdunnir characters rarely multiclass into prestige classes, but those who do favour divine disciple, hierophant, loremaster and runecaster.
Society: The isolation of urdunnirs has preserved traditional family and clan strictures in a form largely unchanged since the founding of Shanatar. In that respect, orecutter dwarves have more in common with their gold dwarf cousins than they do with the shield dwarves of the North. Class divisions are almost non-existent, for there is little concept of wealth among the Children of Dumathoin, but clan divisions are quite strong and govern most societal behaviour.
Orecutter dwarves are raised in tight family units, with clan elders playing a strong oversight role in the upbringing of each child. Book learning is common, albeit in forms not well understood in the Realms Above, and most children are apprenticed to learn a trade as they near maturity. The greatest artisans use their skills to unveil Dumathoin’s secrets and shape his creations into new and pleasing forms, all without disturbing them from their original resting place. As orecutter dwarves age, they are honoured for their wisdom and accorded respect for their past accomplishments. Families and clans are expected to honour their elders in death by weaving their bodies into gemstone veins that wind through the earth in a fashion befitting the deceased’s reputation and accomplishments.
Orecutter dwarves are almost unknown outside their own communities, but those who do leave usually seek out other dwarven communities in which to dwell. They typically organize themselves according to ancient clan strictures that suggest little understanding of the cultures in which they dwell or changes in the world since the birth of their race.
Language: Urdunnirs speak Dwarven and employ the Dethek rune alphabet. They also speak Undercommon, the trade language of the Realms Below. The only known urdunnir dialect, an archaic form of Shanatan, dates back to the founding of Shanatar. Common secondary languages include the dialect of Gnome spoken by the svirfneblin and Terran, the language of elemental earth. Some urdunnir learn the language of their foes, including the drow dialect of Elven, Kuo-Toan, Beholder and Aboleth. Few venture close to the surface, but those that do occasionally learn Common, Alzhedo or Illuskan.
All urdunnir characters are literate except for barbarians, who are very rare among this people.
Magic: To the urdunnir dwarves, magic has no inherent interest, but it is a useful tool to help them delve through the heart of the world. They favour divination magic to commune with Dumathoin, and illusions to keep the rest of the Underdark away.
Spells and Spellcasting: Orecutter dwarves have a strong divine spellcasting tradition, with many of the Stout Folk called to serve Dumathoin as clerics, runecasters or runesmiths. Arcane spellcasters are almost unknown.
Spellcasting Tradition: Urdunnirs favour spells that assist in craftwork or mining or enable close communion with Dumathoin, such as make whole, meld into stone and stone shape. Orecutter dwarves have created many divine spells over the years; one such example is commune with earth.
Many urdunnirs take the Runesmith feat because they have difficulty finding many material components so far beneath the surface.
Magic Items: Urdunnirs favour magic items that facilitate their craft skills or further their communion with Dumathoin. When they make weapons of war, they favour blades and axes with holy, lawful, mighty cleaving, sundering and thundering special abilities. They also wield hammers and maces with holy, impact, lawful, returning, sundering and throwing special abilities.
Common Magic Items: As befits their name, orecutter dwarves favour magic items that improve artisanship, such as anvils of the blacksmith, belts of dwarvenkind, forges of smithing, hammers of the weaponsmith, necklaces of prayer beads, tongs of the armourer and whetstones of keen edge.
Iconic Magic Items: Urdunnirs are unquestioned masters of magically enhancing dendritic armour, which they call earthskin. The lucky purchaser who can find the urdunnirs in the first place can obtain a 10% discount on such armour.
Religion: The Children of Dumathoin have always venerated the Silent Keeper and see him as the patron of their race. The Keeper of Secrets under the Mountain is revered by all urdunnirs, whose mythology holds (correctly) that he created their ancestors by transforming a small number of shield dwarves from ancient Shanatar. To the urdunnirs, Dumathoin’s “secrets” are literally gems buried within the strata. Their patron’s greatest gift was the ability to move through the earth, seeing the beauty of his creation that others can only experience through destructive mining.
Relations: The deep-dwelling urdunnirs have little exposure to other races aside from those that dwell in the Underdark. They are deeply suspicious of elves and half-elves thanks to centuries of dealing with their dark cousins. They get along well with shield dwarves and gold dwarves, but dislike the grey dwarves. Halflings, humans, half-orcs and most planetouched are almost unknown to the urdunnirs. However, they have good relations with earth genasi, whom they sometimes encounter exploring the depths of the earth.
Equipment: Urdunnirs encrust almost everything they make with gems and other treasures of the earth. They have almost no access to wood or other similar materials and find something as simple as a bow fascinating.
Arms and Armour: Urdunnirs favour a wide range of weapons, including battleaxes, gauntlets, shortspears, handaxes, heavy picks, light hammers, light picks, longswords, mauls, short swords, throwing axes and warhammers. More unusual weapons include dwarven urgroshes and dwarven waraxes. Unlike races that live closer to the surface, orecutter dwarves use metal even for the hafts of their bladed weapons. This increases their durability in combat (increase the weapon’s hit points by 50%) but doubles the weight of the hafted weapon.
Typical forms of armour include breastplates, chainmail, half-plate, full plate, large steel shields and small steel shields. More unusual forms of armour include dwarven plate, earthskin and large mithral shields. Urdunnirs commonly employ equipment such as armour lubricant and thunderstones.
Animals and Pets: Urdunnirs generally eschew pets and familiars, since their subterranean homes are inaccessible to most creatures not of the Elemental Plane of Earth. Those very few urdunnirs who turn to arcane magic sometimes employ earth or magma mephits as familiars.
Regions: Oldonnar, The Spine of the World
Source: Races of Faerûn (Page 20)
Your character can be either male or female.
Every player character starts as an adult. You can choose or randomly generate your character’s age. If you choose it, it must be at least the minimum age for the character’s race and class (see Table: Starting Ages). Your character’s minimum starting age is the adulthood age of his or her race plus the number of dice indicated in the entry corresponding to the character’s race and class on Table: Starting Ages.
Alternatively, refer to Table: Starting Ages and roll dice to determine how old your character is.
| Adulthood | Intuitive1 | Self-Taught2 | Trained3 |
|---|---|---|---|
| 40 years | +3d6 (43—58) years | +5d6 (45—70) years | +7d6 (47—82) years |
1 This category includes barbarians, rogues and sorcerers.
2 This category includes bards, fighters, paladins and rangers.
3 This category includes clerics, druids, monks and wizards.
With age, a character’s physical ability scores decrease and his or her mental ability scores increase (see Table: Aging Effects). The effects of each aging step are cumulative. However, none of a character’s ability scores can be reduced below 1 in this way.
| Middle Age1 | Old Age2 | Venerable3 | Maximum Age |
|---|---|---|---|
| 125 years | 188 years | 250 years | +2d% years |
1 -1 to Strength, Dexterity and Constitution; +1 to Intelligence, Wisdom and Charisma.
2 -2 to Strength, Dexterity and Constitution; +1 to Intelligence, Wisdom and Charisma.
3 -3 to Strength, Dexterity and Constitution; +1 to Intelligence, Wisdom and Charisma.
When a character reaches venerable age, the DM secretly rolls his or her maximum age, which is the number from the Venerable column on Table: Aging Effects plus the result of the dice roll indicated on the Maximum Age column on that table, and records the result, which the player does not know. A character who reaches his or her maximum age dies of old age at some time during the following year, as determined by the DM.
The maximum ages are for player characters. Most people in the world at large die from pestilence, accidents, infections or violence before getting to venerable age.
Choose your character’s height and weight from the ranges mentioned in the appropriate race description or from the ranges found on Table: Height and Weight. Think about what your character’s abilities might say about his or her height and weight. A weak but agile character may be thin. A strong and tough character may be tall or just heavy.
Alternatively, roll randomly for your character’s height and weight on Table: Height and Weight. The dice roll given in the Height Modifier column determines the character’s extra height beyond the base height. That same number multiplied by the dice roll or quantity given in the Weight Modifier column determines the character’s extra weight beyond the base weight.
| Gender | Base Height | Height Modifier | Base Weight | Weight Modifier |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Male | 4’ 2" | +2d4 (4’ 4"—4’ 10") | 180 lbs. | ×2d8 (184—308 lbs.) |
| Female | 4’ 0" | +2d4 (4’ 2"—4’ 8") | 150 lbs. | ×2d8 (154—278 lbs.) |
Source: Player’s Handbook (Page 109), Races of Faerûn (Page 21)