Dwarves as Golems: Dwarf PCs

Now that I've put out my dwarves, I figured some lunatic might actually want to play as one. Well, I've never been one to deny someone what they want.

Dwarven PCs

There are a few problems up front with using dwarf PCs.

Hmmm, not quite what I have in mind.

Dwarves are Really Powerful

As written, dwarves are seriously powerful creatures. For one, they have intimate knowledge of golemancy and enchantment. More importantly, they have a ton of immunities. They don't have to eat, drink or sleep or breathe. They don't fall sick or succumb to poison. They don't age, so they would be immune to aging attacks, and possibly to undead energy drain, depending on how you skin it. Hell, they're not technically alive. Should death magic affect them?

But at the same time...

Dwarves are Really Weak

They're not alive, not organic, and so don't have organic vulnerabilities. They also don't have organic advantages. They don't eat, therefore they don't get hit points back from lunches. They don't heal naturally. They most likely wouldn't benefit from healing magic either. Can a potion, any potion, affect you if you don't have a metabolism?

It would appear that dwarves are really swingy. There are some problems which can be entirely mitigated by having a dwarf in the party. But without healing, a dungeon will whittle a dwarf PC down and kill them in short order.

Here's my attempt to compromise them, with some variant rules I'm not decided between.

That's what I'm talking about!

Dwarf Race

Reroll: WIS

Bonus: +4 to Save vs Sleep and Aging.

Weakness: May only heal during [see below]

No need or benefit from rations. Cannot suffocate, starve, die of thirst, be poisoned or fall sick.

Healing Rules

Variant 1: Dwarves do not heal during lunches/short rests. They heal 1d6+Level HP per long rest, as they take time to repair their own bodies. They heal to full only during downtime.

Variant 2: Dwarves may heal only during downtime. You have CON times Level HP in total (up to four).

The first rule is better for combat heavy adventures and dungeon exploration. It allows dwarves to recover HP while still providing a significant tradeoff for their immunities. They're non-comparables, which I find always spices up gameplay. Make sure the party has an incentive to delve deep and not have a fifteen-minute workday.

The second fits better for adventures which are combat and damage-light. High-level dwarves can take a lot of punishment, but they still have to worry about being worn down.

I'm going to rule that magic potions affect dwarves just fine, and that injuries are similar enough you can use a normal death and dismemberment table.

Using Dwarves

These are by no means a core race. The dwarves are reclusive people with few adventurers among them. They're weird and swingy to play. Most importantly, I wouldn't use them if the players are going to encounter lots of dwarves.

If your campaign is surface focused, the odd dwarf would work. They're weird and out of place on purpose. In a Veinscrawl or other underground adventure though, I would probably limit dwarves to hirelings. Very expensive and hard to get hirelings. Probably just the soldiers. Maybe camp followers which can create simple golems.

Hirelings

Dwarven Soldier: HD 3 ATK 12 DEF 14 MOR 12 SAV 8
Physical Stats 14. Mental Stats 10. 10gp per month

Dwarven Golemancer: HD 2 ATK 10 DEF 12 MOR 8 SAV 6
Physical Stats 10. Mental Stats 14. 15gp per month. Can create simple golems given time.

Golemancy

If you have a crafting system, you may consider giving dwarves a bonus here. Additionally, if you want dwarves to create simple golems in downtime, that would fit quite well. I don't have rules for that, but I think using hireling stats with frontloaded creation costs would work in a pinch.