Corsairs - Dwarves?

While the setting seems to want to restrict itself to a human-centric playground, there is nothing to indicate we can't have some fantasy tropes as well.  One of my players sent me this really cool image and I want to accommodate him, plus riding flying whales (or cresters!) looks to be fun!

So while that may be an underwater scene in the original context, we now have Dwarves riding sky whales! And playing some more with mapping, they come from a northern floating island in the northern reaches of the Molten Sea. So far north that there is even ice despite the literally molten sea far below. While most of the humans use the sky ships. in this region sky whales are a thing. Though they also have ships.

So up north on the big map there were some islands that have ice it looked like, so here is one, home of this character. The island itself is less than 100x100 miles, and is really only livable in the southern part below the great cliffs. Yet ruins in the wastelands indicate they used to live further north, and in fact, those ruins have the remains of sky ship building facilities.

The native people are part of a larger loose confederation of a few more islands, and while the majority of them are Dwarves in the classic fantasy style, there are a few humans as well. They are a stoic race of engineers, though more in the vein of mining minerals other than the repellium that keeps their island afloat.  The empires to the south rarely interfere that far north: the travel is treacherous for sky ships and more than one has been lost. And they ride the mighty sky whales. And here there be dragons. Like Australia way back before the Pleistocene era , the flying fauna up north seems to grow a good deal larger than the rest of the islands.

From the player:

 I would kind of like to play that guy. Some kind of warrior/mechanic.

And in using the One Page Lore Fantasy Folk from Jesse Galena to give some info about our fine Dwarven race which we can pick and choose:

Dwarves  are  generally  stout,  strong,  and  dense.  Their compact  form  perfectly  fits  moving  around  tight  spaces. Their  dense  bodies  allow  them  to  have  impressive  bursts of   power,  which  aids  them  in  any  number  of   tasks.  The tallest dwarves usually don't surpass 4 ft., but often weigh twice as much as other people of  their size.

and:

Dwarves can see just as well in light as they can in the dark. They are colorblind and have impeccable vision close up. However, this comes at a cost. Dwarves are almost always nearsighted. In addition,  simply  because they can see in the dark doesn't mean they’re perceptive. Their sense of smell is often a dwarf’s most powerful sense.  Being able to sniff out exact ingredients, both    flavorful and dangerous, in food and drink is a common trait. Tasting it can offer an even greater amount of details. Some dwarves claim they can read the rings of a tree just by smelling it. Since  mites use pheromones to communicate, paths where many mites recently passed through or having several mites close by can disrupt a dwarf’s ability to smell what is around them.

There are some potential advantages and disadvantages. For Corsairs, I think this translates to being might as a lion for the 4D stat, and the others can be chosen. This means the skills of Grit, Sailing and Swordplay roll at least 4 dice to see how they do. That also feeds in with the sailing part, as those northern islands have all sorts of not only treacherous wind currents, but full sized dragons and the sky whales they eat and the Dwarfs ride. They would also be a bull in the China shop due a lack of finesse, as per the 1 page guide: Stout - maneuverability is not as easy as standing strong.

A note on the sky whales. They cannot go too far south. Between warming airs and winds not being as fierce, they lose mobility. And the dust mites they eat can't survive that far south either. The Dwarves have never gone conquering on the sky whales, though there are rumors about breeding smaller whales that can survive warmer temperatures.