Races

There are numerous Great Races in the world.
== Playable Races ==
=== Humans ===
* The Humans: Solid and stalwart, the humans are a vastly diverse race... from the druids of the North, to the merchants of the South. They are hardy and adaptable. Humanity is a disparate people, with a wide range of skin colors, hair styles and appearances. In the north east, mankind tends to be pale skinned with brown or blonde hair. Their south eastern cousins are swarthier, with slimmer builds and almost jet black hair and eyes.
=== Rose Elves ===
* The Rose Elves: One of three races of elves, the Rose Elves are a major power. Their Kingdom is the Caerholme, a land of knights and castles. Their Rose Eyes grant them scattered visions of the future. The Rose Elves are a tall, graceful race with warm skin like honey and hair the color of amber. They wear intricate if archaic clothing or beautiful layered suits of armour engraved with symbology that tell of that individual's past deeds or family history. Most striking are their eyes which glow with a deep red blush. The Rose elves, so legends go, were cursed in the first times. Each elf, from childhood, sees visions of their own personal doom; the death that one day will befall them. As the visions grow in strength and their time approaches the red in their eyes grows, first tinting the iris then eventually filling the entire eye. Such a blood-marked elf makes peace with his or her gods and says farewell to their friends and family, their fate all but assured.
=== Barghest ===
* The Barghest: Battle-hardened beast-men of the north, the Barghest are a tribal and nomadic race that forms only scattered camps. They're fierce fighters, and one of the last of the beast-kin; animalistic servants of the vanished old gods. The Barghest appear as towering, wolf-faced humanoids, covered in fur that’s often painted with odd, swirls and symbols. Everything about them is big. Their teeth, their weapons, their laughter and death cries. Travelling with one is like meeting a friendly storm. Fighting one is like having a terrifying avalanche rush down towards you. They dress as their ancestors did in ancient times; kilts, bare chests, and pieces of beautiful golden and silver jewelry. Most of their warriors disdain armor as tools for the weak and cowardly rarely wearing more than light leathers adorned with feathers, paintwork and metal beadwork.
=== Ursus ===
* The Ursus: In the crumbling ruins of their ancestral home, remains the last of the noble Ursocs. Still guarding and protecting their dying way of life, they're fine warriors and shamans, master architects and great smiths that could forge mighty weapons. After the death of their corrupt god, Rebellum, they have agreed to join the cause against the growing darkness.
== Beast-Kin ==
The Beast-kin are a loose term for animalistic humanoids; each tribe a mixture of humans and one particular breed of creature. Their true origins are lost in the mists of history but most scholars believe they owe their existence to the Lost Gods, a vanished pantheon of beings who were once worshipped throughout the world. In the old days, so the tales go, each god or goddess chose a breed of animal to act as their servants. They blessed their chosen creatures, granting them the intelligence and dexterity of mankind while leaving them the craftiness and hightened senses of their beastial side.
These gods are long gone, their temples little more than crumbling ruins and most of the abilities they gave to their servants have faded like mist in the morning sun. As each generation of beast-kin goes by they regress a little more, become more savage, more brutal and increasingly lost.
In your journeys you might encounter several of them including:
=== Jackals ===
* The Jackals: Once messengers and heralds for a god of light, the Jackals are now a scurrying race of thieves, their ancient heroism vanished into a chorus of maddening yips and howls. They live to the north in small filthy packs, preying on any traveller foolish enough to travel through the deep woods on their own.
=== Arctic Jackals ===
* The Arctic Jackals: A hardier more reclusive version of the normal jackals. The Arctic tribes were feared by the normal jackals and considered too dangerous and insane to be tolerated. Several hundred years ago their tribe was driven into the Spine of the World where they have hung on, adapting to the ferocious weather. Their new homeland has tempered them, forged them into something worse. They are larger, faster, more creative with their traps and plots. Worse, they have largely lost the normal jackal fear of groups and never hesitate to raid entire merchant caravans or unwary adventurers staggering through the snow.
=== Ursoc ===
* The Ursocs: A ferocious and luckily fairly stupid species of bear-folk. In the 3rd age, the Ursocs were the champions of the beast-kin, their finest warriors and living symbols of honor and decency. These days are long gone. The modern Ursocs are stumbling, angry creatures, lashing out at everything around them. They live largely in the northern forests, forming small angry groups who only unite to tear into anyone foolish enough to stumble into their hunting grounds. Hunting grounds that have been expanding in recent years almost as if something is driving them down into the civilised lands.
=== Southpaw Ursoc ===
* The Southpaw Ursocs: Distant and slightly smaller cousins of the northern Ursocs, the Southpaw are the runts of the bear-folk. Most are those too weak, too idiotic or crippled in duels; those who are unable or unwilling to try and claim territory in their traditional homelands. These outcasts slink south seeking easier prey and have grouped together over the years into a loose collection of filthy tribes. Unfortunately for humans even a weaker Ursoc is still two tons of angry bear-man and most people give them as wide a berth as possible.
== Other ==
=== The Mirror ===
* The Mirror: No one really knows for certain what happened. All that’s truly known is that almost a week later creatures marched out of the empire’s ruins and laid waste to the world. Clad from head to toe in black armor, silent as a cat’s breath, they spread out corrupting and destroying all they encountered. The few survivors spoke of an aura around them, of their reflections in water or mirrors turning… ‘wrong’, as the creatures approached. They swore the images grinned at them and whispering of a new King rising in the West, a King who ruled these things and who sought to bring the lands under his dominion. Entire kingdoms fell at their feet and for a time all seemed lost. Only in a last desperate battle did the free people manage to fling them back, scattering their forces and sealing them behind a great magical wall.
These things would, forever after, be called the armies of the Mirror King and to this day they remain the bogey-men, the night terror and the tall tale horror for every easterner, from youngest child to grizzled soldier.
=== The Undead ===
* Undead Class: The undead are humans (usually) who swore an oath of one kind or another or died with something in their lives unfulfilled. Many were heroes and heroines in times past who sleep restlessly waiting for evil to return. Unfortunately as the years have ground on many have slipped into madness or confusion - they're neutral-ish and most attack friend and foe alike. They're definitely not 'evil' though - and one of the world's gods is served by necromancers.
Old warriors and magi from a lost age. They're powerful, occasionally malicious and slightly venerated by the living who hope they stay slumbering. Several of the more powerful undead (in the game) were famous heroes or heroines who still retain semblance of their old glory. Their maliciousness is sort of 'I judge this modern world and I judge it weak!' - they speak in rattling voices with lots of thees and thous.
Category:Basics
Category:Lore