#but I based the elves on the small city. the gnomes and goblins on the elves. and the ogres on the goblins.

[thefanboyhub]

Que the random KOTLC HeadCannons again because I fucking can hoe.

Sophie still wear human shoes, so does Dex because he bonds with his mom dealing with human stuff. Keefe also prefers the style of them so he got custom made elf shoes that looks like human shoes.

KOTLC elves religion is the stars. I saw someone (I forgot who I'm sorry pookie) talk about that and I now accept that. On the flip side, Orgrs and Gnomes religion is nature. Hilarious because they "worship" it differently. Goblins religion isn't a thing but the concept of honor and pride. Trolls worship battle and intelligence. I hope this shit makes sense lol.

If Marella was in the human world she'd be addicted to vapes. I don't make the rules man.

Fitz, Dex, and the Twins have built a tolerance and became accustomed to violence and things that would shatter a normal elf's mind because they were exposed to it at a young age. Dex was through human movies/documentaries/books, Fitz from looking for Sophie, and the Twins because y'know their whole shtick.

Tam is asexual and homoromantic. Linh is lesbian. No further questions.

Fitz is Bi-Curious. No further explanation.

Dex is pan. He doesn't know it yet but he is.

Keefe is a bi king.

Keefe tried to have a hair dye phase but was quickly punished for it so yeah.

Bianna had purple hair at one point. She made Fitz have a purple streak in his hair too and that got him even more fangirls.

Fitz didn't know he was dating people ever. Like all the relationships hes been in were one sided and it was the delulu chick. He was clueless. So he was often confused when girls would randomly tell him it's over. Mans be like "?????"

Keefe would flirt but deny anyone the chance of dating him. He feels bad about it though cuz he could get the smallest wiff of their soul crushing and he hated doing it but he had to.

Dex knows how to sew. He's really good at anything to due with creation honestly. He's really handy to have around Ong.

Dex also thinks the weirdest creatures are cute. Mans will look at the ugliest weirdest thing and be like "Awhhh who's da baby!?"

Dex suffers from panic attacks, even before the whole getting kidnapped shit. He has GAD.

On the topic of disorders, there are therapists in the lost cities but uh. There isn't many. Mostly because the world is "perfect" so they don't see the need for it but there are a good handful to fit in one building.

Elves minds don't actually shatter from guilt per say but trauma and rumination. Something that fucked you up mentally? You constantly think about it? BAM GUILT!!! The better you are at coping, the less likely you are to shatter. Not only that but the younger you are when exposed to guilt shattering things the less you will shatter. (Based on my observations of KOTLC)

I ignore the whole Grady being blond thing. He's black hear girly.

After everything with Fitz, Keefe sees Ro as his best friend. He'll never tell her or anyone that but that's what he feels and thinks.

Fitz hates himself. A lot. He doesn't think he does but he also doesn't know that being self critical to the point of getting angry when his image is fucked up isn't normal.

Bianna doesn't hate herself but is more scared of how she's perceived. She thinks she's fine, mostly because Della and Alavar(mostly him) made sure to give her a lot of positive about herself. But people use to point out things about her that didn't live up to the Vacker name or just made her "weird" so she basically said fine I'll fit in a little bit lol.

Keefe has thought about yeeting himself before. Only briefly, never too long or in detail. He just wondered if the world would be any different if he didn't exist. Would anyone even notice he was gone? Probably not. I mean his family thinks he's a fuck up and most of his teachers only see him as a smart ass punk. The only time he even thought of a plan to kill himself though was when Sophie "died". The only reason he didn't was because a small gut feeling told him something didn't add up. That she was still there. They could still save her, and Dex. He was so grateful for the feeling when he found them both.

Dex use to have a habit of self harm. Not cutting no. He would bite, scratch, anything to cause pain when he was frustrated or upset. He was bullied a lot as a kid and constantly dealt with jerks in the store treating his family wrong. His mom got him out of it though. Now he just scratches himself when he's frustrated. He tries not to do it in public.

The twins have eaten meat before. They gotta do anything to survive before the gnomes found them. Linh cried every time though. Tam just felt a little sad but hey his sister was fed so he couldn't be happier.

Elwin in the best doctor in the lost cities. But he hates publicity and doesn't want to be stuck with snobs and rather deal with kids since he doesn't plan on having any children himself. (He's also gay and knows it but he is terrified of the backlash and whatever else that would happen to him if he came out.)

Stina has a hatred for most nobels, no on but one of her ex friends knows this though. Stina genuinely can't stand them, mostly because of how they would treat her dad and such. But she's a great actor. (ILY bbg)

Okay don't be mean to me but I forgot Dex's mom's name but she miscarried before having Dex. It's rare for that to happen to elves so it just added to her trauma and stuff. Her name is like Juliana or smt I know it. Fuck what's her name. Ugh. Curse you shit memory man.

Bronte use to be a lot more happy and loving, even had a girlfriend for a really long time. She was one of the few elves that have died in the many years the world has exited. That's what caused his shift in goals. He also sees parts of him and her in Sophie and that's what makes him not like her very much cuz she kind of looks like a child he could have had.

Bronte also had a thing for Fintan before the girl. He's bi. Fuck off.

Bronte is also emo/goth. The OG icon frfr.

Oralie use to be a very mean person because feeling everyone emotions even without touching them (even if the small waft of emotions isn't that intense) really upset her. She is one of the few people who got therapy and then she found out she wanted to change the world so she worked towards being a council member.

After and elf turns like 29 people don't really question the age gap of the relationship. Anything younger dating someone like hundreds of years older turns heads but people keep their opinions to themselves.

Weddings are like a fashion show to elves. Everyone, not just the bride, show up glammed ASF. Is a huge party event.

Some families do celebrate birthdays, but only by tens. You're born! Birthday party. You're ten years old? Birthday party! ECT. This is considered very old fashioned and traditional.

Most of the young adult elves live in Atlantis.

Oh and the other school in the lost cities are for those who don't plan on nobility or want to achieve a specific profession that isn't ability related. They do most of the stuff Foxfire does but instead of one on one teaching it's a small group of ten or five being taught at once, grouped based on abilities. They aren't very popular which makes them really easy to manage and stuff.

There are only a handful of ancients that still keep up with the world and ECT. They choose isolation because of the dark things they've seen and how long it has been. They are kind of.... Cooky. Lil crazy. Bonkers if you will.

The shades of blue can get really close to green and purple, even some lighting makes them look like that.

Intersex elves happen rarely but when they do they are asked what they wish to identify as when they are ten and will go in as that for the rest of their lives. Out of all of the elves population, twenty intersex people exist. Five of them are ancients and two are still not old enough to choose their identity yet.

It's not unheard of for every distant cousins to get married. (They gotta be like 6 times removed tho.)

Tis all. Ty. Bye bye now.

[bookwyrminspiration]

What do you estimate the population of each intelligent species to be? I know it said the dwarves were 200 something (or something like that, I don’t feel like checking) but I don’t think they have exact numbers for any other species.

Oo that's an interesting question!! And I'll look for you the dwarves were said to have a population of 329, but then 30 went missing and some have since died, so it's probably in the upper 200s. Which is still not a lot I've gotta admit

That being said! All of my estimations are based off of vibes and very unofficial math, so please take it all with a grain of salt! I tried to reason through some of it but also we're missing a lot of information so I'm fumbling in the dark!

that being said, under the cut is my strange math!

We don't have an estimate of elven population numbers, but if the school for elves is built like "a small city," a small city is defined as between 50k-99k people. But since humans are much much more prolific than all the other species, Let's say there are...10-15k school aged elves (11-18 ish), and at least in the U.S. school aged people account for about 25% of the population. So that would make, what, 30,000 adult elves if they had a human life span? But then you've got to add on all the elves from the past who haven't died, so I'm going to throw out 100,000 elves as just a very very rough estimate based on incredible flawed and unreasonable math.

And then we see a lot of gnomes on elven property, frequently outnumbering the elves but not in every home. There are also colonies out in the wild and people living on their own. Gnomes are always available to help with things, but given their no-sleep nature there wouldn't need to be as many to make them seem equal to the elves...so I'm going to say...35-40k? I know that's a lot higher than the 300-ish dwarves and the intelligent species seem to be very few, but given that gnomes live throughout many neutral territories and are always present, I think there's gotta be a fair number of them.

Then there's the trolls, who I'm thinking are kinda low in number. They have one hive (that isn't experimented on and is actually used normally, that is), which is at Luzia's place. So if an entire generation of their people can fit on a single elven property, that probably means they're closer to the dwarves than the gnomes in terms of numbers. It seems to have taken a few minutes for them to have walked through the whole hive to get to the transport pods in the back and that was moving at about top speed. So lets say it was 1/4 of a mile, about 16 pods on either side every 11 feet...that adds up to maybe 3.3k trolls in the hive at any given time? So if there are 3.3k trolls in each stage, and eight stages...that's a population of about 26,000, give or take a few thousand depending on death rates.

There's also the goblins, who I think have a good population size. There doesn't seem to be any shortage of goblins, given that whenever it's needed there can be more assigned to various elves and elven places while still maintaining militaries and cities back home. However, not everyone nor everywhere has a goblin bodyguard, in fact they seem quite rare. So I'm going to say...60k goblins overall? Enough to protect the elves who need protecting, but not everyone needs it so there are many back in Gildingham

And finally, the ogres. Their city is big enough that there are different sections and there are different class levels, working class and warrior and maybe more we don't know about. So I'm thinking there are a pretty good number? But also, goblins and ogres seem like they'd be evenly matched in a war, so their populations are probably similar. Given my goblin estimate of 60k, I'll put the ogres at maybe 50-55k? They seem more viscious than goblins (like Dimitar one-punching Sandor), but then again Brielle did kill three before she died. But for some reason I think there are slightly fewer, but a close number

A lot of this is also based on us only knowing about one city for each of the other species. They're called the capitals, but we don't hear about secondary cities that I can think of so I'm assuming their populations can fit into one city.

But hopefully my very questionable math is helpful! Shannon may have very different numbers, but I have no clue what that would be. They'd probably be a lot lower given that she put the dwarves at like 300, but hey I'm trying my best here !!

[dmsden]

Worldbuilding 15 – Sketching out the dance of history

Hullo, Gentle Readers. Last time, we started stirring up trouble between our friendly kingdoms and got the idea for how some of our various non-human kingdoms came to be. This time, we’re going to fill out a literal timeline, the better to get a sense for when things happened in our campaign world.

I begin by determining which events happened so long ago that they’ve faded into legend. I lump those into an age I simply refer to as “Mythological”. This involves things like the Creation of the world, the birth of most of the races, and the ancient War with Chaos. I put this together as follows:

The Mythological Age

·         Creation of Aerne from Chaos 

·         Creation of Dragons, Dwarves, Elves, Men, Halflings, Gnomes, Goblinkind 

·         Twisting of Orcs, Minotaurs, and many other monsters by Chaos 

·         War between the Gods & Chaos 

·         Vordos, Palaiani, and Maraea sacrifice themselves to give Chaos a weakness 

·         Creation of the Far Realm 

·         Some Minotaurs take Maeve’s Bargain and forswear Chaos 

 Now, I need someone to invent the concept of recording years and when events happened. I ultimately decide that, since the dwarves have the great fallen civilizations of this campaign, they will do it. I quickly work up the abbreviations YBD (Years Before Dragonhome) and DR (Dwarven Reckoning). Dwarves count the founding of Dwarvenhome as Year 0, and they count forwards and backwards as appropriate.

 With this in mind, I look at what events probably happened before Dwarvenhome was a place. I like the idea that dragons had their own empires, but it was so long ago, and they’ve lost interest for so long that they don’t even bother to record it. Dwarves remember it, however, and they note it in their calendar.

 The coming of goblinoids is something dwarves would be sure to remember. And ancient human kingdoms rose and fell during this Ancient Age, including Nath-Hilum, Basaria, and the fallen empire of Angkar Thast, which caused the creation of tiefling-kind in this campaign.

 The Ancient Age

10,000 YBD – The Dragon Empires, Creation of the Dragonborn 

6,000 YBD – The Goblin Armies invade from the east 

5891 YBD – Having led his people to victory over the goblin forces, a human priest of Aman-Heith named Khetaru founds the nation of Nath-Hilum.  

2310 YBD – A series of warring city-states are united as the Caliphate of Basaria 

506 YBD – The Blessing of Ardan & Mariella (First Half-Elves) 

402 YBD  – The Weavers are revealed as worshippers of Lolth. War amongst the Elves begins. 

376 YBD  – The Weavers, now called the Drow, are driven into the Underdark. 

129 YBD – The Fall of Angkar Thast; the Death of He Who Was; the Ascension of Asmodeus; the Creation of the Tieflings; the Cataclysm of the Three Circles 

 I decided to put in something about the first half-elves, coming up with a couple of names, even though I haven’t fleshed this out at all. I can do that down the road a bit. I put the creation of the Drow in here as well, as well as the Cataclysm that caused the three big circles on my map. Although the dwarves recorded the year it happened (probably because it coincided with a lot of big events, including the death of a god), they don’t know, or don’t remember what caused the actual physical circles. It seems plain what event precipiatated it – the death of a god and the rise of Asmodeus.

 After this, it’s time to start recording events beginning with the founding of Dwarvenhome. We’ll call this the Dwarven Age.

 The Dwarven Age

0 DR – Founding of Dwarvenhome 

75 DR – Many elves, wary of dwarven expansionism, withdraw from the forests they had claimed and head west. Those remaining behind become known as wood elves and officially declare the Kingdom of Aureon.

78 DR – Founding of Eldarros. Its inhabitants become known as the High Elves. 

151 DR – Founding of the Esoteric Order of Illuminated Sages 

200 DR- Founding of the Keeps on the Borderlands, Creation of the first Warforged 

298 DR – Founding of the Way of the Four Elements 

366 DR – Founding of the Way of Shadow 

630 DR – Dwarven rule forges a number of city-states and tribes into the vassal kingdom of Valkenholm 

842 DR – Founding of the Bardic Colleges 

867 DR – Halflings gather near the borders of Aelwyn, forming into small communities called shires.

1060 DR – At the first Thanemoot, the tribes of the north unite under the banner of Ailenkorra, the White Cat. She proclaims their region to be Kalemarren (Land of the Great Elk). 

1229 DR – Fall of Dwarvenhome. The gnomes of Kivilamythi hide their city underground, becoming the Svirfneblin 

 Notice that we have more new elements here, including a new hero for the kingdom of Kalemarren. I will likely develop this out further in the future.

 Finally, we come to the present – the Modern Age. Most of these elements have already been discussed in other articles.

 The Modern Age 

1230 DR – Dwarves form the kingdom of Khalladast near their friendly nation of Aelwyn, close to the ruins of Dwarvenhome. They will earn the name “Hill Dwarves.” 

1239 DR – Dwarves make their way to a great series of southern mountains and found Khalladro, becoming the Mountain Dwarves. 

1278 DR – Founding of the Way of the Open Hand 

1285 DR – The gnomes present Queen Ehlissa of Aelwyn with the Marvelous Nightingale 

1291 DR – Agents from Valkenholm are caught in Aelwyn trying to steal the Marvelous Nightingale 

1292 DR – Aureon and Valkenholm both attack Aelwyn, starting the Nightingale War; the halflings near Aelwyn declare themselves as the Nine Shires

1293 DR – Gnomes slip into the forests, becoming a hidden people, founding the region of Rivileru. Other flee south, across the Dividing Sea. 

1306 DR – The wandering gnomes settle near the Mountain Dwarves, becoming the Rock Gnomes, founding their land of Rivilasti. 

1433 DR – Sir Calen Whiteshield becomes the first Margrave of Calengard, his title invested to him by the agreement of Aelwyn, Khalladast, and Rivileru. Calengard nominally pays tribute to Aelwyn, and many knights flock to Calen’s banners. 

1571 DR – First War between Aureon and the Dragonborn 

1630 DR – Birth of Ioun 

1631 DR – Birth of Vecna 

1666 DR – Death of Ioun, Vecna becomes a lich 

1822 DR – The beginning of the Red Death 

1829 DR – Red Death largely over 

1830 DR – Warforged begin to become sentient 

1835 DR – Now  

 And there we have it. Going forward, any new bits of history I create will use this timeline as their basis. It came together very organically from the various bits of history I created as I found I needed or wanted them.

Starting next time, we’re going from a giant overview to begin zeroing in on a single region – the one I would start a new campaign in – the Margraviate of Calengard. This is the site of the Keep on the Borderlands, which I would use as a jumping off point. After that, we’ll zoom in even closer, creating a home base and a first adventure for the players.

[anarchomoop]

A D&D setting trope that I use a lot in my games that I always love and never see anyone else use:  Halflings are terrifying.

Like in your setting, instead of Halflings being tiny people who live in the woods and prefer comfortable living over everything: Halflings are a proto-fascist empire, whose military mostly gets by on volume, tactics, and excessive training where their physical stature may make them ill-suited to these ventures normally.  All halflings are raised in this military culture, their education system is meant to create soldiers first and other social roles second.  There’s a mandatory draft of all halflings, who get pushed into either infantry (most wind up there), Magic, or infiltration.  Infantry is trained from their late adolescence through their young adulthood, coming out to the frontlines with more training than other army infantry from other cultures.  Their magical divisions are usually considered particularly terrifying -- trying to pick out key targets like adepts/clerics with cure light wound wands or wizards with magic weapon wands (wands are a huge help for stretching an army’s limited caster pool and their limited spell slots pro-tip for D&D worldbuilding armies should spend money on wands) against an elven or human army is often difficult enough, but when they’re as small and fast as halflings this gets even more difficult.  And infiltration -- Halflings are naturally swift, naturally small, very good at sneaking.  Key targets like spellcasters, tacticians, well known adventurers will be found dead prior to invasion.  Tools will be tampered with.  Important magical items will be stolen.  Whole armories will have their stores rusted.  The Halfling’s army is already stronger than the rest of the realm, but their infiltration team makes sure that they never face a fair fight.

I’ve got another story I may be writing or may just leave alone that has a different kind of halfling.  The Elves call them “The whispers of the woods” and caution their children that “If you see one, expect twelve more you do not see.  If you see two, expect to soon see nothing.”  Elven soldiers are told that if they see a halfling, they are to politely and calmly ask how they halfling would prefer they leave the area, regardless of the size of the force they are with.  The dwarves call them “the forest’s children” and think they’re like dryads, that they come fully formed from the trees to tell loggers to leave and to never return, and that those who disobey will have their throats slit before they can blink.  The humans call them “delves” believing them to be the long descendants of a cross-breed of elves and dwarves, with the forest-ken, grace, and slender bodies of the elves but the tenacity, bluntness, and stature of dwarves.  Some humans call them “halflings” or “half-men” but only stupid city slickers who live nowhere near a forest.  The people of the country know that to call them such within earshot of the woods is to invite a knife between your ribs.  The orcs and goblins know them by many different names, some goblins have a myth based on the fact that halflings features resemble elves and humans, they claim that they’re actually the vengeful spirits of animals hunted for sport by humans or elves, whose furs and meat were never used, who have killed their hunters and taken on the appearance of the humanoid that killed them, existing as a living mockery of hunting trophies.  The mountain gnomes don’t speak of them at all, and are frankly happy to be nowhere near the woods.  The name the forest gnomes give them translates roughly to “company” and they claim them to be “right good blokes, although a bit quiet before they’ve got some drink in ‘em,” but as with most things it is hard to tell if this is how they really feel or if it’s all jokes and bluster.  Wood gnome artificers tell another story.  They claim there’s a reason why gnomish artifice is all about small gadgets and trinkets, not the hulking war machines and mining and logging tools of the dwarves or the art-deco city-building constructs of the elves.  It’s because they know that it’s impolite to upset company, and in the forest there’s a price to pay for rudeness.

In their own language, the halflings call themselves “the ones who lead small lives” or to translate less on literal meaning and more on context “the simple folk.”  They exist to confound the big folk, and to carve out a space where they can simply be small.  The elves are wrong.  For every whisper of the woods you see, there’s thousands you don’t, just yards away, quiet, and small, and peaceful.  There’s only twelve, nearby and out of site, knives ready, to let the rest know the peace that comes from a good, small life.

[talesfromthemanholecover]

1984 Warband Project Pt 1

The last few posts have featured the art from the Warhammer 2nd Edition box set that introduced me to the game. As is often the case with images and forms from childhood, these are burned into my brain, and there’s a particular pleasure in seeing them take solid form as miniatures, or having them painted and active on the battlefield.

It was paging through those booklets one day, and seeing the same figures posted on FB, that made me want to make a Dark Elf Exiles warband. It was a good size project, and now I want to do more. By keeping the forces small I could realistically do a warband for every army in the setting.

So in this post I’m going to go through the options for 2nd Edition warbands, maintaining a similar feel to the elves - 1982-1984, early oldhammer, and largely solid based. To start with let’s look at the sample army lists in the back of the book.

Pictures from other blogs are used here without permission, for reference and inspiration. I’ve provided credit and links where possible. If you see anything of yours and don’t want it shared, send an ask and I’ll replace it.

Old World Imperialists/Southern City States

These seem to be Medeival and Rennaissance historical armies respectively (almost a reversal of the later dynamic where the Empire gets the steam tanks and Bretonnia gets the knights).

Steve over at Ye Olde Skool Warhammer has made a nice Southern City States army using Burgundian historical figures.

Imperial Cathan

Imperial Cathay can’t seem to decide if it’s China or Japan. At this stage in development of the setting both sides use the same list, with Samurai and Vimto Monks.

Pictured:  Aly Morrison's Oriental Heroes from the first Citadel Open Day.

Goblin Raiders

Goblins have long been a favourite of mine, but my existing goblin collection is a Midhammer squigfest. Night goblins didn’t even have their famous pointy hoods back in ‘84. I’ve always loved Kev Adams’ goblin war machines with all the delightful plant and fungal life moulded into the bases, so maybe a Broken Nose warband based around the Skull Crusher and Lead Belcher?

Chaos Band

This list consists of beastmen and chaos warriors only. I have enough of both lying around to make a force, even before counting more recent purchases such as the Pantheon of Chaos. This will be a good project because it won’t cost anything and will get some beloved older figures painted.

Dark Elf Invasion

Already done. Though there are a couple of models I’d still like to add.

Sea Elves & High Elves

My memories of High Elves are more tied to 4th Edition and WAR than 2nd ed, but Sea Elves might be fun. I’m not sure what minis they had other than the famous Riolta Snow. There was a set of Marauder Sea Elves (MM82) though they’re from later in the 80s.

Orcs

The orcs of the era aren’t particularly exciting, though some of their armour designs in the art are interestingly ornate. Half-orcs, on the other hand, disappear in later editions and have some neat figures. I like C10 and their distinctive skull-and-ribcage shields.

Norse Dwarfs & Dwarven Warriors of Caraz-a-Carak

So the Dwarven Warriors have more seige engines and gnomes, and the Norse Dwarfs have shield maidens. The two miniatures I remember from the days of the manhole cover were dwarves - a C06 Dwarf Cleric, and one of Bugman’s rangers - which is a figure wonderful in its simplicity, a perfectly standard issue dwarf. 

I’ve got an Asgard DW11 dwarf arquebusier who might fit with the more technically inclined faction. The rest of the range looks interesting - particularly DW6 and DW9.

Finally I have an Dwarf Juggernaut, (the one seen here painted by Shaitan) which might I could try to build a Caraz-a-Carak or some sort of land pirate faction around.

Amazonian War Party

I have some Lustria-themed figures already - like the rogue Slann merchant and Power Weapon Bearer - but seeing these Amazons painted over at Shamutanti Helte inspires me to collect them. Always one of my favourite 2nd ed factions, I love the punk aesthetic and pink mohawks. I like the idea of Amazons allying with other natives but I don’t like the style of the old pygmy figures - questions of taste aside, they just seem too cartoony. The slaves of the Slann might make good auxiliaries, while being in keeping with the style of the other figures.

Slann Empire

There are some great ones being released these days, I like them better than the original Slann and they’re certainly cheaper. I have a set of Tim Prow’s Eru-Kin, but I’ll save those for 40k - they’re lizardy and high-tech. For old school Slann I want to go more frog than lizard, so I’ve picked up a set of the Bizaza Guard from Seán O'Sullivan’s Katsina Miniatures. Mine are still unpainted, and I feel like I’ll need some cold ones or slaves to round out the warband. 

[forevermagik]

Worldbuilding June Day 3

People and races! Tyrysius is full of humans, elves, (and people with some combination of those two races), dwarves, catfolk, and elementals. The most common elementals are air and water elementals, though some sentient fire elementals and earth-type elementals appear on the plane. 

Mixed among these races are the astrals--people with angelic or demonic blood in them. 

Prior to the cataclysm, there were races like orcs, goblins, gnomes, and lizardfolk, but these races largely did not survive the ice ages after the cataclysm. 

More discussion under the cut!

Humans survived the cataclysm purely because they’re stubborn. Also there was a lot of them. Their bodies are also fairly resilient. Humans as a race are slowly disappearing into the people on the part-human-part-elf spectrum. However, there are places where full humans are still born. Perinathia has only a 1 or 2% elf population. Berthingtonn, too, is a largely human place. So is Timernis. Eswaisil has some full humans, but most of them have migrated there. Geographically in Schmiedland, people more towards the human end of the spectrum tend to populate the southern area by the grainbelt, or the Northeastern area that borders Berthingtonn. Human “culture” is not specific to all humans. A human from Perinathia grew up in a completely different culture than a human from Schmiedland. Same goes for a human from Berthingtonn or Timernis, or any of the other smaller city-states on the planet. 

Paul Lubbock is primarily a human, near the grainbelt in Schmiedland. He might have a teensy bit of elf in him, but it’s not much. Killian is also about 97% human. He’s Timernian, but Schmiedland-raised. 

Elves survived the cataclysm by moving south to fairer weather, and procreating with the humans. There are less full elves than there are full humans on Tyrysius. Most “full elves” are actually somewhere in the 97-99% range. Though there are still a few purists. Elves reside primarily on Edanshe--where everyone is pretty much 90% or more elf, in Schmiedland, or in Eswaisil. Elves on Edanshe are actually fairly racist/classist and will ostracize elves who are “too human.” Ironic, considering they’re the descendants of people who left pre-Schmiedland for being targeted for being “too elf.” There are a few elves in Perinathia, Berthingtonn, and Timernis, but they make up only a small portion of the population of those countries. There are also a bunch of elves living in North Schmiedland that are trying to make Esternia a country again. (Good luck with that guys.) Island Elf culture is something that is pervasive all over Edanshe and is nothing like elf culture from Schmiedland, which is a minority group, or Eswaisil where elves and humans are seen more as equals. 

Rinnie is an elf from Edanshe. She’s aware of all the classist bullshit. She hates it, but will also forget about it sometimes when she’s benefiting from it. 

Part-Elves (I say because I haven’t come up with a better name yet) are very common on Tyrysius. Most people in Schmiedland are part-human-part-elf. The only way you can get elected King and Queen is if you’re part-elf. However, that does not prevent other races from holding office in the Reichstag. There are also a lot of part-elves in Eswaisil. Berthingtonn, Perinathia, and Timernis have a small population of part-elves--considering both have populations of elves and humans. Part-humans on Edanshe better be “elf enough,” otherwise they just move back to Schmiedland. (This happens a lot when an elf from Edanshe goes and has a kid with a mostly-human in Schmiedland, then the elf and the child stay in Schmiedland until the child is grown because of issues like this on Edanshe.)

Riela is nearly half elf-human. She’s from Eswaisil. Nathaniel Adler has enough elf in him to have pointed ears, but he doesn’t know the specifics. He’s from Schmiedland. 

Dwarves are the only people who inhabit the Yurels. The Yurels are entirely a dwarf state. There is also a large population of dwarves in Schmiedland. There’s also the Dwarf Trading Clans which trade all across the world. However, Trading Clans will either be based in the Yurels or in Schmiedland. There is a small population of dwarves in Berthingtonn and Timernis. There might also be a few dwarves scattered around Perinathia. Dwarf culture from the Yurels is entirely different than dwarf culture in Schmiedland. It’s actually offensive to infer that a dwarf is from one place when they are, in fact, from another place.

Mica is a dwarf from Schmiedland and so help you gods if you suggest she’s from the Yurels. 

Catfolk survived the cataclysm because they adapted well to colder climates. They live primarily in Perinathia. Most catfolk there worship cat demon lords. Catfolk who do not wish to submit to the demon lords trek north to join the (smaller) population of Schmiedish catfolk. Some catfolk also migrate to Berthingtonn. Perinathian catfolk have thicker furs, with more grey and white tones. Schmeidland catfolk have more browns in their furs. 

Elementals come to Tyrysius’ plane because they’re all such great gossips. They love a story and they love to hear a story. Water elementals will come near places of water. Edanshe has tons of water elemenetals. The coasts of Schmiedland, Perinathia, Berthingtonn, and Timernis see a lot of water elementals too. Air elementals like big cities. Fire elementals will come near forges and hearths for their stories. Elementals cannot procreate with any other species. When they die, they go back to their original plane of existence and come back to Tyrysius in a reincarnation-type of deal.

I also want to mention that dragons are a thing. However, dragons are a dying species. 1500 years ago, there were ten dragons. Now it’s harder to say. Mihelle, the Sky Dragon died during the Yurel-Thade War that led up to the cataclysm. Ludal the Swamp Dragon died in the cataclysm because they had been in the area that became the Crater Sea. (Not even a dragon is going to survive a meteor-like object falling on them.) Chesl the Forest Dragon was murdered by divine intervention in Eswaisil within the past century. No one has reportedly seen Raim the Mountain Dragon in like 5000 years. Her last known location was in Berthingtonn’s underground (which got wrecked by the cataclysm.) Similarly, no one has reported seeing Twaratha the Frost Dragon since the cataclysm. She was last seen in the (now ruined) Esternia. However, it should be noted that dragons can sleep for hundreds of years at a time. Dacer the Lightning Dragon is elusive, though was more or less recently seen in Perinathia. Miriantha the Steam Dragon is definitely still alive near one of Edanshe’s volcanoes. Eton the Volcano Dragon is similarly alive near one of the Yurels’ volcanoes. (The two of them are friends, though Edanshe and the Yurels don’t get along.) Varloc the Steel Dragon frequents forges in Northern Schmiedland. Tiluvor the Air Dragon is really good with technology and he’s in Thadenopolis. 

Orcs are kind of still around, but in small, insular societies at the fringes of civlization. They’re also, unfortunately, horribly inbred.

Astrals! Oh man, astrals. So... angels/demons can basically procreate with whatever race they feel like (barring elementals.) And, while pretending that they’re not all that involved, the gods are actually pretty involved in Tyrysius. Therefore, the gods’ angels are involved. Also, demons get involved too. Astrals are a byproduct. Astral traits can show up generations after the original halfsie, too. Demonic astrals are kind of given a short straw. They’re looked upon as dangerous, angry, and unpredictable. Many countries will kill them as soon as they’re recognized. Even more lenient countries like Schmiedland have rigorous rules to allow demonic astrals integration into society. Angelic astrals have it much more lucky. However, most countries want angelic astrals in their military because of their enhanced physical capabilities. Someone who’s a halfsie can manifest and ascend into an angel or demon if the god or ruling demon lord desires it. 

(Killian is an angelic astral.)