So I’m using the Daggerheart setting, which unfortunately means there’s no real setting to plop the characters in and use, so I’m having to build from the basement on up, and I could use some feedback.
https://app.demiplane.com/nexus/daggerheart for folks who may want in on the rules, but I’m trying to phrase these questions/topics in a way that folks who haven’t also suddenly developed a hyperfixation on the Daggerheart System aren’t left scratching their heads.
So I’m gonna break this down into sections or segments, and I could use some feedback on if these seem too constricting, too complicated (my old enemy, I have to make things too complicated trying to make them more fun…), too dumb or too memey.
- The Setting
All good stories start in the ashes of some calamity, from Lord of the Rings being set after the disaster of Numenor, Star Wars being set after the fall of the Old Republic, WoW with the Sundering, and the Fall of the Titans to Sargeras, the list is endless.
On the Continents of Gholganneth and Yuuthan, that great disaster is the end of the ‘Age of Golden Thrones’ and the beginning of the ‘Age of Broken Promises’, an uncivilised and fragmented period in time where the aftermath of a devastating world war between the Old Empires of Man, Dwarf, Elf and Giant unleashed all kinds of horrors upon the world, but none worse than the Miasma.
Nobody knows who created it, if it was summoned from another level of reality, cooked up in a magi-tech lab, unearthed from some primordial trap deep in the earth or if it fell from the sky from realms unknown, but the Miasma ended not only the grinding race-war that had come to dominate the final centuries of the Age of Golden Thrones, but also changed how mortal societies functioned, on both a technological and social level. The Miasma had no consciousness, no motivation other than to spread to any and all forms of iron or other ferrous objects it could attract, or be attracted to, by its magnetic aura, and incorporate the iron into itself to create more Miasma. Inorganic structures became known as Ruins, functioning as not only hives for the Miasma to endure in once it ran out of viable infection targets, but also conserving its energy, while organic creatures suffered worse, mutating and twisting as the Miasma bound itself to the iron in their bodies and began altering them in chaotic ways. Most higher forms of life died, or were turned into unique monsters that, regardless of their original nature or allegiance, became obsessed with defending the Ruins and dragging both new victims, and any ferrous material they could find, back to their ‘hive’ to feed the Miasma and produce more monsters to defend the Ruin.
Thankfully, the Miasma is affected by magnetic fields due to its basic nature as a swarm of tiny metallic particles and ash fragments, and strong natural phenomena can also affect it, as the Miasma will quickly lose its power once the ‘swarm’ is split up, spread out too thinly, super-heated or exposed to strong negative magnetic fields or charges. The vast distance across the ocean diminishes and destroys any Miasma Storms that try to ‘leap’ to new continents, and while the northern lands of Ohn’naar remain hopelessly corrupted, the Miasma in other lands is confined to the Ruins where it can feed off of living hosts that produce just enough of a charge to sustain the ‘hive’ within a Ruin, but not enough, under most circumstances, to spread out across the lands again.
But iron became taboo in the dark years after the Age of Golden Thrones ended and society fell back into barbarism. Even a small iron or steel object like a dagger or a belt-buckle could be a magnet to a monster from a Ruin, in a very literal sense no less, and having to produce tools, weapons, armor and shelter without iron reduced many of the survivors to a hunter-gatherer lifestyle for many decades until older technologies and strategies could be enacted, or rediscovered. Copper, tin, zinc and a mineral known as adamant became the new metals of choice, forming bronze and brass for tools, weapons, and more, and the secret of adding adamant to the creation of bronze created an alloy known as orichalcum, a metal just as heavy as bronze, but able to hold an edge just like iron, entirely resistant to corrosion, and lacking any ferrous nature for the Miasma to latch onto.
Unfortunately, adamant may be widespread, but it takes a very long time and horrendous amounts of manpower to refine even a large amount of the mineral into a useable form, and as such, wide-spread use of this wonder-alloy is limited to the elite, the rich, and those on the front-lines trying to purge the Ruins of both Monster and Miasma for the safety of the lands around these warped monuments to the madness of the Old Empires.
The Dwarves, of course, still remember how to make adamantite from purified iron, adamant and rare earths, but iron can be corrupted by the Miasma with ease, if even purified by extreme heat and the blessings of the Priests, and the fall of the Old Empires also destroyed much knowledge from the Age of Golden Thrones. The only forges that still remain that can produce the heat and pressure to combine the necessary components to make the adamantite alloy were ancient even in the Previous Age, and the Dwarves know only how to make adamantite by rote, not understanding. Every time they make the alloy, there is the risk the Great Forges will degrade just a little bit more, or that a trace of the Miasma might have been brought in with the next delivery of iron, or that the crawling horrors unleashed by the other cataclysmic weapons used in the race-wars between the Old Empires may finally claw their way out from the twisting tunnels, shelters and supply silos the ancestors of the Dwarves carved out of the deep earth when the conflict with Men, Elves and Giants first began. And yet, adamant is not just immune to the touch of the Miasma, it is immune to all forms of magic, being unable to be enchanted or affected by magical barriers, and being so hard that recovered adamantite weapons from the Age of Golden Thrones are untouched by rust, corrosion or even the acidic compounds in the bellies of the beasts who ate them, and still hold their edge just as well as a newly-cast bronze axe or spear-head.
The Elves struggle as well, their fabled metal, mithril, is as much a biological product as a alloy made by artifice, and the trees that they use to combine powdered silver, iron, adamant and other alchemical ingredients are rare to begin with, delicate to environmental change, and slow to flower. But every mithril weapon is a raging bonfire against the Miasma, infused with the natural energies of the world and burning like a lightning bolt through the Miasma, decaying both its physical form by simple proximity, and disrupting the magnetic fields that hold the Miasma together. Even being touched by mithril can cause the monsters within a ruin to burst into blue flames, or be wracked with terrible agony that can break even their mindless ferocity and drive to spread the Miasma to everything they can see.
- The Threats
Not only does the Miasma shroud the northern lands in darkness and corruption, and threaten to spill out of the Ruins that dot the landscape, but other threats emerge from the shadows, from deep underground, and from within the very City-States that struggle to rebuild civilisation in a world that rages to return to a more primal state.
Corrupted by the Miasma, a type of parasite arose known as ‘Blood Worms’, that latch onto and feed off of the iron in the blood of their hosts. Normally a fatal infection, a very rare occurrence is the creation of a ‘Vampire’, a mortal who possesses the biological, mental and environmental traits necessary to reach equilibrium with the Blood Worms, and worse yet, Vampires are able to tell which mortal prey can survive the process, and which cannot. Every victim of a Vampire, be they those doomed to be drained of their blood and turned into vessels for the Miasma, rising as skeletons, zombies, ghouls or other Undead horrors, or new fledgling Vampires, are bound to obey their creator, the ‘Queen’ Blood Worm in every vampire subordinate to the Queen that sired them in the previous generation, all linked together by a subconscious hive-mind that ties them all to the will of the First Generation, Vampire Kings and Queens of truly ancient lineage that rule empires of corruption and unimaginable decadence in the corrupted, Miasma-shrouded lands of the Northern Continent, where hordes of slaves toil endlessly in twilight conditions, living, breeding and dying in an endless succession of horror and suffering as the Vampire Courts feast on their life’s blood and raise their remains into unflinchingly loyal armies that wait patiently for the next Blood Crusade to be launched against the fat, sun-drenched lands to the south.
The City-States of Gholganneth, and the Empire of Yuuthan, struggle against each other as much as they do the feral creatures of the lands they dwell in, against Vampire Cults that preach that only total submission to the Miasma will save your soul, against disease and calamity as they struggle to rebuild with only bronze as their most commonly useable metal for tools, weapons and armor, and internal disputes that set Temple against Temple, Merchant Guilds against Noble House, and soldiers against the very nations they are sworn to protect. Loyalty is worth more than silver or gold, for in a time where food, water, shelter and allies are hard to come by and even more difficult to hold onto, trust is priceless and irreplaceable.
The Undead and Aberrant monsters of the Ruins are not the only threat, even if the nations constantly arrange Crusades and Exterminations to cull the populations of Monsters and try to invade the Ruins to destroy the Miasma-infested ‘Cores’ within. Abominations made by the Old Empires as weapons of war lurk still, from ancient mechanical constructs that attack anything and everything on sight, not able to understand the war they were created to fight in is over for centuries now, to war-beasts forged from the flesh of mighty predators that have grown feral and become extant across the land, from gryphons and gorgons to colonies of predatory slimes and carnivorous plants that crawl across the land under the light of the moon, slowly encircling their prey day by day.
True Dragons, hunted to near-extinction by Man, Dwarf, Elf and Giant in the Age of Golden Thrones, first for their magic-rich bodies and powerful alchemical substances within, then as beasts of burden and transport for the arrogant and powerful, and then as weapons of war as the Old Empires turned on each other with all other threats to their dominions extinguished, and being ageless creatures with all the magical knowledge of the Old Empires at their disposal, the True Dragons have not forgotten who nearly extinguished their kind, and their lesser kin, from the world. As each True Dragon is a unique existence united only by their possession of six limbs, innate magical powers and incredible intelligence, there is no universal description for their forms, their nature, their abilities or their preferred terrain, but each True Dragon is loyal to their kind first, the world second, and any alliance or agreement with Mortals is strictly between the True Dragon in question and ‘their’ Mortals, so long as it does not violate the first two rules.
Some have taught Mortals how to befriend and ride Dragon-Kin, such as Wyverns, Basilisks, Hydras and Sea Serpents, while others have taken to ruling over the Mortals spawned from their essence in the Age of Golden Thrones, the Dragon-like Drakona, the turtle-like Galapa, and the frog- and salamander-like Ribbets, as well as converts from the other ‘Tribes’ of Mortals that cling to life in the Age of Broken Promises, creating the Dominion of Scales, where the True Dragons are treated a living Gods by ‘their’ Mortals and provide an abundance of food and finished goods tailored exclusively to the varied and highly individualised needs of each unique True Dragons both within and without the Dominion.
What can drive further conflict between the True Dragons and Mortals is that the reproductive quirks of True Dragons means that out of a clutch of a dozen eggs, only one or two may produce a True Dragon, with the rest hatching into Dragon-Kin such as Wyverns, Hydras and other beasts, all of which are either gently pushed to the outskirts of the True Dragon’s territory, or are ‘domesticated’ with a combination of sorcery and parental care to serve as guardians and war-beasts for the True Dragon’s servants and worshippers. Either way, the increase in monsters every time the True Dragons reproduce rarely means good times await for their neighbors, and even if the True Dragon in question does not intend to adopt or take care of their errant spawn, they still take a very dim view of Mortals killing their offspring, even if that offspring is a mere beast. Even more concerning is that the rate of mutation amongst these Dragon-kin born directly from a True Dragon is alarmingly high, meaning a population of Hydras that otherwise were just a deadly threat, after an introduction of a Pyro-Hydra from a True Dragon’s clutch to their gene-pool, can produce a generation afterwards that might bear dozens more flame-spewing hydras, or worse, hydras who might bear an alarming resistance to the touch of fire on their ever-regenerating wounds.
And finally, there is the Gods themselves, who mostly withdrew from the world as the Old Empires turned to war upon each other and ceased listening to the Gods. While Temples exist and the faithful prosper, many Gods have created Trials to weed out the unworthy from their flocks and identify worthy champions amongst the hopeful, and these are known as ‘Dungeons’. Each Dungeon is a specific demi-plane located in, under or near a Temple that is tailored to the domain and temperment of the God or Gods who created it, and exists to test the faithful and the ambitious who enter them. Within, challengers might face waves of foes, dangerous mazes, philosophical debates with sphinxes and long-dead saints and sages, and no two Challengers, or teams of Challengers, are ever given the same Trial, or experience the same layout within the Dungeon.
Those Challengers who overcome their Trials, however, are granted boons by the Goods, physical or supernatural gifts that tie to the nature and domains of the Gods whose Dungeon was ‘conquered’. For some, this could be the opportunity to become immune to disease or poison, or be able to fly, while others could be granted relics, weapons or magical items from the Age of Golden Thrones, or even the Ages before that. Many who enter come out changed, regardless of if they succeed in their Trials or not, either becoming devout followers of the Gods whose Dungeon they just entered, or finding their faith irrevocably shaken by the challenges they faced all for the sake of proving their devotion.
- The Tribes of a Darkened Age
Yuuthan, a continent of extremes, is home to the magic-warped Infernis, the porcine Orcs, the rat-like Goblins and the remaining families of Giants in the colder southern half of the continent, while to the equator, the lands turn hotter, wetter and are home to the monkey-like Simiah, the feline-like Katari, and the mysterious Fungril, mushroom-like plant-based Humanoids. Here, the Empire of Yuuthan dominates the continent, dividing it into Provinces and bringing an form of order to the land even as they struggle to domesticate the megafauna and wrangle a living from the sweltering tropical jungles, marshy swamps, frozen volcanic mounts and endless plains of wild grass and barley.
- Infernis: Daggerheart’s take on Tieflings. While they remain horned, tailed Humanoids of Human ancestry (mostly), they owe their uncanny appearances due to the tampering done to their ancestors by the Old Empires, who struggled to find a way to improve their soldiers for the grinding race-wars. As the Miasma crushed the Old Empires and drove Mortals from all Tribes to their knees, the surviving mutated soldiers banded together and escaped their commanders, breeding true and establishing themselves as the leaders of the ragged survivors of the Old Empires and the Tribes that had been enslaved to serve as labour, servants and soldiers to those Old Empires. While the Imperial Family of the Yuuthan Empire is almost entirely Infernis, many of the more important families and individuals within the Empire are Infernis, and there is a general sense of ‘class’ to their Tribe by the other peoples within the Empire, regardless of what position or rank the individual Infernis actually holds.
- Orcs Orcs in this setting have porcine heads, short body-hair that covers their whole body except the palms of their hands, the soles of their feet and the front of their short muzzles, an ancient race as old as the Elves and Dwarves, but one that fell short of advancement, preferring to dwell in symbiosis with their world rather than rule it, as the Elves tried, or dominate it, as the Dwarves attempted, and thus were quickly overwhelmed and reduced to brute labor and fodder troops by the Old Empires. While not noticeably taller than a Man or Elf, they are broad, barrel-chested and notoriously clannish, holding tightly to those who have proven themselves, even to the death, and form the backbone of the Empire’s armies and food production, taking pride in their strength, endurance and place of pride within the Empire.
- Goblins Some claim the Goblins were born of experimentation on Halflings and Dwarves by the Old Empires, others that they were created by the rampant corruption of the magi-tech facilities that turned simple rats and other vermin into bipedal humanoids. The Goblins claim they have always been, and will always be, because they’re smart enough to let others think what they want, while the Goblins avoid unnecessary conflicts and work to provide safety and shelter to their families and communities. Goblins appear like skinny humanoids with rat-like tails tipped with tufts of fur at the ends, with large, sail-like ears that are always twitching to hear any sounds around them, and expressive, dark eyes almost too big for their heads, and an over-abundance of energy that exhibits itself as twitches, nervous tics, pacing or similar.
- Giants While few of the Giants survived the conflicts of the Old Empires, those who dwell in Yuuthan were those who objected to the wars, and the slavery that had come to support and sustain the Old Empires in their final centuries, a fact that ensured their defeat in the conflict, and their salvation as the rebellious slaves took their chances to escape as the Miasma consumed the world around them. Standing eight to twelve feet tall, most Yuuthan Giants possess two eyes, although some families possess three, a third eye in the middle of their foreheads, a biological hold-over from the magical gifts of foresight their kind once possessed. While many in the Eastern Lands consider Giants barbarians and brutes, in Yuuthan, they are respected as scholars, great builders and protectors, and despite the difficulties of such large beings dwelling in a society where most of the other Tribes barely come up to their sternums, strive to remain as closely tied to the Empire’s political and religious systems as they can to ensure the mistakes of the past are not repeated again.
- Simiah and Katari can both trace their ancestry to the slavery of the Old Empires, with both Tribes created by Men and Elves to serve as companions, servants and pleasure-slaves, a fact that both the monkey-like Simiah and fline Katari find utterly revolting and humiliating, and their rivals across the ocean use as an excuse to treat them as merely intelligent beasts rather than the people they have become. The Simiah prefer to dwell in massive arboreal cities in their tropical jungle homes, often connected to trade-routes or -ports that allow the Simiah to export the wealth of their homes to the rest of the Empire and allow these clever and agile people to keep an eye on their allies and rivals, while the katari prefer to dwell as nomadic units of extended family that roam across the jungles, marshes and plains, herding megafauna or hunting them as their traditions dictate and preferring to remain as aloof and detached from the Empire as they can, seeing any leader not of their own kind as a potential slave-master and thus inherently untrustworthy as a result.
- Fungril A race rumored to predate even the Elves and the True Dragons themselves, Fungril have a humanoid appearance that can range from shockingly close to a nearly-perfect replica of an Elf, Man or Halfling, to ones that are only barely humanoid, but all possess some form of fungus-like appearance to their bodies, be it cap-like growths on their head, shelf-like protuberances as hair or growing down or along their limbs, and all possess a connection to an invisible, intangible network of Fungril spores that criss-cross any region where their kind have existed for some amount of time. Fungril possess the unique ability to extract memories from the dead, and the myconid network they are connected to also absorbs memories from any life-form that dies within its range, allowing their kind to not only act as a temporary bridge between the living and the dead, but also as a repository for knowledge too precious to be lost to accidents or foul-play, and their work as ‘Grave Speakers’ for the Empire ensures that their groves of fungal growths, and the feigned ignorance for how the Fungril assume humanoid forms and the ‘odd coincidence’ of corpses disappearing into said groves of fungal growths, continues unabated and unmentioned.
Gholganneth is a pair of continents linked by two thin land-bridges, the southern and larger continent wracked with constant conflicts and civil uprisings as the City-States of Men and Dwarves squabble and quibble over territorial disputes, resources and religious differences, while the populations of Halflings, Giants, Clanks and Firbolgs toil and labor in the fields, mines, fisheries and forests to earn their place of safety behind the thick stone walls that surround each City-State. The southern continent boasts thick forests of primeval oaks, pines and stranger trees, sloping mountains of thick brush and harsh, dry tundra, vibrant if cold wetlands that lead to river-deltas thick with rich silt .
The northern continent, closer to the equator, is home to scores of rivers, sub-tropical forests and semi-active volcanoes that belch rich ash down their slopes, and here fractious Queendoms of Elves struggle over whose claim to the Throne of Witchwood and Nettles is truest, leading to a form of intensely polite cold war between the factions, with layers to every interaction and exact phrasing the key to a firm alliance or a brutal and bloody series of betrayals. Despite their conflicts with one another, the Elves maintain a strict control over the region against all others, both within and without, and the Tribes of Faun, Faeries, Halflings and Humans within their territories are reminded, constantly, that the Elves are the oldest and wisest of the Tribes and the freedoms the other Tribes enjoy within the Elven Queendoms are found nowhere else in the known world, so pay your taxes and stay in line.
- Humans are both endemic to the continent, and also the most divided amongst the Tribes, often the first to leap for each other’s throats and just as often the first to leap to the defence of their allies, be they Men or otherwise. Ranging from pale-skinned in the south to darker hues in the north, the only thing that can truly be said to ‘unite’ Humanity is just how different they can be from one another while still being of the same blood.
- Halflings share a distant ancestor with Humans, but because of their shorter stature and naturally genial disposition, were quickly enslaved by their larger ‘cousins’, a fact that has caused no end of conflict and friction between Men and Halflings in the Age of Broken Promises. Still, despite the bad blood, Halflings tend to be both clannish and out-going, fiercely loyal to their families and friends, but offering what courtesy they can to those who are not immediately hostile or aggressive, ensuring that no matter where a Halfling goes, they’ll always have a friend somewhere. This also means that when a slaver winds up scattered across the city in a dozen different pieces, or a dirty captain of the guard is found hanging from a lamp-post in a hangman’s noose, few people believe the ever-friendly and accomodating Halflings could be behind such an act.
- Elves are slender, slightly taller than a Man, and possess fine-boned features and long, slender, sensitive ears, and that is where their similarities end. Elves from the far north have dark tones with natural green, blue or red highlights to their skin-tones and a preference for loose-fitting silks and adopting the saurian predators of their homes as mounts and companions, while the elves closer to the border with the southern continent of Gholganneth tend to possess pale blue, silver, purple or grey skin-tones, brightly chromatic hair colors and exclusively favour wooden constructs animated through sorcery as their defenders and companions, but despite these superficial differences, all Elves possess fundamentally the same biology. Oddly enough, Elves adapt to their environment, often within their own lifespan, and tales of Elves who went into the sea and have grown gills and fins abound in the docks and taverns, while whispers of Elves who adapted to the Miasma and have become bizarre monsters that are challenging the Vampires for control of the Ruins circulate amongst the mercenary dens and soldiers’ barracks. Regardless of the truth of such whispers and rumors, Elves are an ancient, adaptable and proud Tribe, as quick to reproduce as any Man or Goblin and just as prone to the heights of heroism and the depths of cruelty and selfishness.
- Clanks are the strange mechanical servants of the Old Empires, struck just as harsh by the Miasma as any organic race, but in the chaos of societies collapsing and old knowledge being lost, the Clanks found themselves in a unique position. Not only did they not tire, need food, air or water, and were capable of replacing their vulnerable iron parts with replacements made from bronze, wood, stone and even bone and ivory, but with the loss of the Old Empires, there was no longer anyone who knew how to make more of their kind but themselves. Leveraging their natures as to make themselves invaluable, many Clanks formed ‘Factories’, their version of a Guild or an extended family, and forced the other Tribes to acknowledge them as fellow Sapients, ensuring they would not be enslaved again, or at least, not without a fight. Many Clanks are made to a purpose, and formed to look similar to, but not too similar, the most numerous biological Tribe around their Factory, meaning many Clanks look similar to Humans, Dwarves or Halflings, but many more are shaped like Elves, Faun, or even Drakona. So long as their cores remain undamaged and a Clank can replace their damaged components, they remain effectively immortal, a fact that many other Tribes look to enviously and has allowed the Clank Factories to remain in possession of knowledge from the Old Empires that have been lost to the passage of time, bias and accident to the other Tribes, a fact they leverage relentlessly to ensure their continued freedom and an equal place in society.
- Giants in Gholganneth are rarely invited to polite society and tend to be relegated to the lower rungs of society, as brute labor, heavy soldiers or simple farmers. Unlike their kin in the western lands of Yuuthan, Gholganneth Giants tend to have either a single eye, or two eyes, and trace their ancestry to prisoners of the Human and Dwarven Old Empires who fought to freedom as the Miasma claimed the previous Age, and forced others to accept them by dint of their size, strength and stamina. Few Giants rise to positions of power and even the most educated Giant struggles to overcome the bias of the other Tribes towards their people, often being treated as simple idiots at best or dangerous violent brutes at worst, regardless of how they act around others or the place they occupy in society.
- Faun are goat-like creatures of humanoid build, with the lower legs, horns, eyes and ears of a goat, and the upper body and heads of a humanoid, although their features are a blend of Human and Goat, with older Faun tending to develop stronger and stronger goat-like features as they age. Created by the Elves in the early years of the Age of Golden Thrones, even the Faun do not know who or what their original ancestors were, but the infusion of Fey essence into their bloodline has emboldened the Faun Tribe with both a free-wheeling attitude and a burning distaste for monotony. Be it a place, a relationship or a job, anything that does not offer new opportunities, new vistas or experiences, will quickly wear away at a Faun’s mind until they either leave or are driven to distraction by the endless repetition of their day-to-day life.
- Firbolg are said to have been born of Elves and Giants who were enslaved, bred together and then bound to the essence of powerful beasts to make them more obedient and durable for their masters’ needs. Today, Firbolg are infamously calm and unflappable for the most part, but even their stoic natures and calm dispositions cannot hold forever, and a Firbolg in a furious rage is a terrifying sight indeed. Blending the lower legs of cattle and other bovine-like creatures and large, muscular bodies, many Firbolg possess bovine-like traits in their ears and faces, with some families possessing actual cattle-like heads, albeit with much shorter muzzles. All Firbolg possess horns, although most are short and blunt, some can reach truly dangerous lengths and must be capped or wrapped to prevent accidental harm to those around them. Despite their famously even tempers and calm minds, many Firbolgs make their livings as soldiers or mercenaries, their tough bodies and unflappable natures making them excellent, if laconic, troops able to make decisions calmly even in the heat of battle, and despite their heritage as a race born into slavery, many Firbolg Clans can claim good relationships with their neighbors and strong connections to powerful individuals or groups as a result.
- Dwarves are short, stocky humanoids with thick body-hair and a penchant to grow large amounts of facial hair, even their women, and traditionally organise themselves into strict Clans where rank and position is based upon bloodline, age, profession, wealth and ability, in that order. Inflexible to social change, a large number of those who either leave or have been exiled from their Clans form loose affiliations amongst their kind that serve as a more flexible form of ‘family’ structure, and ironically enough, these ‘Free Dwarves’ are rapidly coming to outnumber their more wealthier ‘Clan-Bound’ kin, and their more flexible attitudes mean they can access new markets and allies that their militantly traditional kin would never dream of. Despite their internal disputes, Dwarves tend to be a dominating force even when outnumbered by the other Tribes, being louder, having greater stamina and being generally stubborn to the point of exhaustion when they set their minds on a goal, even to the detriment of themselves and their allies. Few other Tribes can take as much punishment, or endure harsh conditions, as the Dwarves can, and their soldiers are the stuff of nightmares, able to shrug off blows that would kill a Man or Elf and reduce their enemies to ruined piles of shattered bone and wet flesh with their counterattacks. Dwarves do not shun magic, despite the rumors, but they detest chaotic and unpredictable things, and thus they prefer to focus on the esoteric arts that have reliable and reproducible results.
- Faeries are a race of True Fey with short lives, short attention-spans, and unusual appearances, being more akin to sapient beetle-people rather than the flower-clad miniature Elves told of in the old stories, but are no less whimsical or dangerously inquisitive as the tales say. Uniquely able to fly without magic like the other Tribes need and blessed with a purer connection to the Realm of the Fey than any Elf could boast of, and a connection they are quick to rub in the faces of their larger, ‘clumsier’ kin, Faeries are unnaturally lucky, and they need every scrap of luck. Being short-lived, rarely living past their 50th year, Faeries have no time for long-term plans or slow-moving things, preferring to live life to the fullest, and then some, and embrace life, with all its joys and all its tragedies, with a fervor that can make them appear manic to other Tribes. If it is in the middle of a bar-brawl swinging a tankard like a club, dancing in the air above a troupe of minstrels, being dragged out of a bordello, begging for five more minutes and blowing kisses to the staff, it is certain that a Faerie is either having the time of their life, or dragging even the most stoic of souls into a whirlwind of chaos and excitement.
The southern pole of the planet is the seat of the Dominion of Scales, the nation founded by True Dragons and populated by their Mortal descendants, and Dragon-worshipping Mortals of other Tribes. Little is known about the Dominion, only that it is filled with active volcanoes that the True Dragons keep under control with potent sorceries unknown to Mortals today, keeping the environment hot and humid and the lands covered in jungles and green fields of strange and bizarre plants and creatures of a far more primordial nature than the saurian creatures and the mammalian megafauna of Yuuthan and Gholganneth, often possessing elemental or highly magical natures. Few are allowed to enter the Dominion’s borders, and fewer still leave, either by choice or by force, and actual information of the number of cities, True Dragons or infrastructure of the southern-most continent is a mess of rumors and conjecture at best. What does emerge from the Dominion in large numbers is fleets of ships carrying merchants, explorers, ambassadors and a King’s ransom in trade-goods, refusing to engage in the conflicts between Yuuthan and Gholganneth, the City-States, the Queendoms and the Empire, seeking only trade and knowledge on behalf of their True Dragon ‘Gods’.
- Drakona are Humanoids whose appearance varies from Clan to Clan, some appearing like scaly humanoids with long tails and horns and scale-covered skins, others to bipedal reptilians with crests, horns, frills and feathers. All, however, possess an organ they inherited their True Dragon creators that enable them to breathe a magical breath-weapon, and unlike True Dragons, whose appearance, abilities and appearance can vary wildly between parent and offspring, Drakona maintain close similarity between parent and child, and their breath-weapons are likewise very similar unless two wildly different Clans intermarry, at which point what appearance the children will possess and what their breath-weapon will be can become entirely random. Bolts of negatively-charged electricity, gouts of flame, streams of sizzling acid, streams of cryogenically frozen water or even bolts of solid magical force have all been recorded, and stranger variations no doubt exist. Proud, imperial and regal, most Drakona strive to uphold the nobility and dignity of their draconic blood, but many Drakona who encounter the outside world adopt the cultural traits and quirks of their long-time trading partners or companions in an attempt to ‘fit in’, a trick made all the more difficult with their visibly reptilian heritage on display.
- Galapa are large, humanoid tortoises, or turtles, or terrapins, nobody is quite sure, and the Galapa just laugh when scholars ask them. Their most noticeable feature is their shell, which is of such defensive qualities that some shells are more durable and provide more protection than the current heavy armors that Mortals can make, but they are also very heavy, bonded directly to the Galapa’s spine, and possess nerve-endings that mean that even if the shell will not break and the blow will not do injury, the Galapa will still feel the strike regardless. The heavy shell and its curved shape force most Galapa into a hunched over posture, and the tribe possesses the unique ability to retract their head and limbs into the shell in an emergency to protect themselves, although this is wildly uncomfortable for the Galapa and renders them immobile and blind for the duration. Carvings, tattoos, ornamental plates and other decorations are often added to a Galapa’s shell to mark momentous events they have been involved in or commemorate beloved friends and companions, and truly travelled Galapa adventurers can look like walking piles of artwork, and will happily explain to onlookers what each and every memento represents if given the opportunity.
- Ribbets are given an unassuming name, but this is based more upon their native language sounding more like a chorus of frogs than a spoken language. With many bloodlines having the appearance of humanoid frogs, and a smaller number appearing like humanoid salamanders, axolotls or water-monitors, many overlook the Ribbets as a curiosity or a novelty, but their skins possess a unique feature that allows their Tribe to breathe underwater, and webbed digits and powerful limbs that make them expert swimmers. All Ribbets possess an extendable, sticky tongue that is strong enough to rip a weapon or shield out of an enemy’s hand, or even function as a third hand in a pinch. Despite being aquatic, Ribbets can function away from water for extended periods of time, up to and including several months, but they describe the process as increasingly uncomfortable, and remaining away from water for so long can make the Ribbet’s skin crack or flake and expose them to illness and disease.
- The Tech and the Magic
With iron being off the table and much of the advanced knowledge of Magi-Tech and advanced forms of Sorcery being lost to most of the population, and those that do have access to it not wanting a bunch of half-starving barbarians with the barest grasp of social constructs to remember how to make magical nukes again, most societies have access to basic 16th-17th century europe and china technology, various forms of machinery such as the printing press, crude microscopes, navigation tools such as compasses and sextons, even knitting ‘machines’, windmills, water-wheels and water-powered smithies. That said, being forced to use bronze as their primary metal for weapons, tools and armor also limits their options as the alloy is durable, but heavier and softer, in most of its forms, than an equal amount of iron, and certainly substandard compared to steel.
Animals have come back into the fray as the engine of industry and civilisation, with saurian creatures based upon more common dinosaurs such as hadrosauridae, smaller theropods like carntosaurus, stegosauridae, ceratopsians and smaller sauropods like bellusaurus taking the place of some mammalian livestock, pets and mounts in the hotter, wetter climates, while in the colder ones, megafauna like cave hyenas, moa, paraceratherium, glyptodons (famed for their bony shells which are farmed with some success to provide plates for armor and shields to cut down on the need for bronze, which is already absurdly heavy), wooly rhinos, muskox and auroch, as well as dire wolves, giant ravens and weasels and otters.
Merchant convoys with massive amounts of cargo carried on the backs of sauropods or paraceratherium, or in wagons pulled by hadrosaurs or auroch, guarded by soldiers mounted on the backs of giant cave-hyenas or carnotaurus, fending off raiding parties or bandits with giant crows pointing out the location of the convoy to their masters, or walls of ceratopsians with armored crests and heads forming both shield-walls against enemy fire and pulling siege-towers into place for an invading army to climb over the thick stone walls of a City-State. Flocks of moa providing meat, eggs and oil, herds of muskox providing milk, meat, hide and wool, broody little feathery dinosaur bastards rushing through fields, eating pests and vermin to earn their shelter on the farm or providing eggs and the occasional member for Grandma Orc’s famous roast microraptor dinner.
That’s not to say horses, cattle, sheep and goats don’t also exist, but in a setting like this, less adaptable or durable creatures aren’t going to last for long, and livestock have the double issue of being unafraid of people, which is a really bad thing to have when people are starving and don’t have plans more long term than “I want to eat something and not immediately die.”, and being neotenized by the domestication process, which makes them less adaptable than their wild or feral kin, although most species will ‘de-baby-fy’ themselves in three or four generations … assuming they can survive.
I also want you to imagine Gryphon Chickens. Four-legged winged chickens that fear neither Men nor Gods but do appreciate a good head-scratch, and is that mother-lovin’ bread you have for us?. Also I want you to imagine the hilarity of trying to remove a broody four-legged chicken from her eggs, or being chased by a four-legged rooster who has the power of God and Anime on his side.
Roll for initiative.
More magically inclined beasts, like Wyverns, Hydras, Basilisks and such require more advanced techniques to train and domesticate, and in the case of the more intelligent breeds, it is more like a partnership than a owner-and-animal relationship, especially when you get to Wyverns and the magically-inclined Dragonkin.
Monsters spawned by the Miasma, be they Humanoid or Beast in origin, cannot be saved, cured or tamed. The only thing you can do is give them a clean death and burn the bodies, because that is the only way you will free them from the Miasma and not get infected yourself.
Ruins (Old Empire structures, cities or outposts infected by the Miasma) will restock their monstrous guardians over time, and are repositories of lost knowledge of the Old Empires, but the goal is to crush the ‘Core’ that is keeping the Miasma contained and stable. Without the Core, the Miasma will begin to disperse safely as it will lack both the magnetic fields and the energy source to keep itself together and when dispersed, will crumble to dust and be unable to recombined to reform into more Miasma. Most Ruins are well-marked and only the bravest, most foolish or the best equipped tackle them.
The Miasma itself, and the Vampires who may or may not be controlling it or being controlled by it via the Blood Worms, is less of an enemy and more of a ‘Rolling Wall of Death, just run already.’ mechanic for the players to have to deal with. Yes, you can eventually develop ways and means to fight back against the Miasma and render yourself temporarily invulnerable to it, but that is always a bitterly brief solution and requires a stupid amount of gold and resources to pull off. Only the Temples and Sorcerer Guilds can actually fend off a proper Storm of Miasma, and the process of doing that is so mutually destructive that whole City-States have been left abandoned as a result of even a mostly-diffused Miasma Storm falling upon them, because the average person in the setting sees the Miasma as the end of the world itself, something to either be destroyed on sight or you run from it for as long and as hard as you can.
Magical knowledge and spell-craft has stepped up in the void caused by the loss of Magi-Tech knowledge, but training a spellcaster to perform certain roles with their magic is a time-consuming process, and many such spellcasters are thus too valuable and too rare to spread out across all of a nation or group’s territory.
A Messenger might be able to speed a flock of familiars to distant cities to carry messages, small parcels or trinkets, but anything larger than a glasses case needs to go overland, and that is slow. A team of druids might slowly comb the land, making sure fields and forests alike are allowed to recover and dangerous slash-and-burn practices are stopped before they get started, while a Sewer-cer might be mocked in general public, but the people who ensure the sewers and catacombs beneath a City-State or larger city remain unclogged and uninhabited have enough pull amongst the common people and the bureaucracy that nobody with more than two brains cells to rub together is going to give them 
to their face, unless you want to be swimming in your own , and whatever verminous horrors have come to feast on it now that the sewers aren’t regularly being cleansed with blasts of water and gouts of witch-fire.
But what are your thoughts? Any critiques? Issues? Random pieces of furniture to be thrown at my head? I could use some uninvolved opinions because Good Lord have I waffled on with this nonsense!