Plainspeople

The Plainspeople are a race of roughly humanoid creatures residing in the plains south of the Central Desert. They are related to the other People of Tairghol: the Mountainfolk, Snowfolk and creatures of the Fen Boroughs, Town-on-the-Water, Westforest and Eastforest.

The Plainspeople have always been far more cunning than most other races of the People; following the Great Gap the Plainspeople had made the human kingdoms of Kiba and Harvota their vassals, and despite no common values managed to keep the kingdoms under their heels for three hundred years.

The Plainspeople border more than a dozen different human nations: clockwise from due north, Kisvara, Sharaf, Kiba Nav, Kiba Sud, Cyclos, Frankvisk, Hojo, Kitabatake, Sukazu, Zaranikyie, Pyotrpod, Harvota and Dessar. The southern end of the Plainspeoples' territory is bounded by the Zapardian Mountains, which separate them from the fierce lands of Igashikuze, Zapadiy, Svinnya and Ghorny.

## Appearance

The Plainspeople stand around eight feet tall. They are humanoid in shape, though this is the limit of their resemblance to humans. They are covered in scales or feathers, dependent on location. They stand on scaled feet with four talons. Their legs appear to bend backwards in the same manner as many animals' rear legs do. The Plainspeoples' arms are of a similar design - muscled and scaly, ending in four taloned fingers.

The neck is long and bent forward, at the end of which is a small round head, with a sharp hooked beak and large eyes of a solid colour. This colour changes depending on where the individual is from.

## Society

The Plainspeople are known not to be simple dumb brutes. Their intelligence is on the same level as that of a man, so it can safely be assumed they live more complex lives than animals as well. Though the Plainspeople have never been observed in a peaceful state, their societal structure can be inferred partly through observations on the field of battle.

King Nikostratus Karkelas was the first to write about how the Plainspeople fought during his inaugural punitive expedition in 91CE. He reported that 'the creatures communicate through a series of screeches and growls, echoed once through the ranks to reach a single being at the rear of the formation'. Reports closer to the modern day - during the Battle of Thessenios in 683, Strategos Enceladas of Demelca recorded the same description of their command structure. During battle, then, the Plainspeople adopt a dual-tier command structure, with the commander relaying orders to sub-commanders, who then move formations of up to a thousand Plainspeople at once. Their language is succinct and precise, with complex orders able to be given in a matter of seconds.

These observations can be translated off the battlefield and into peacetime. The command structure indicates the Plainspeople have a distinct hierarchy, though democratic or otherwise is unknown. Their society can be assumed, therefore, to have a class system with assigned roles for each class. The need for orders means the Plainspeople are not a hivemind - they are individual beings, with their own desires and values.

Since no Plainspeople settlement has ever been found, it can be assumed the Plainspeople are nomadic. Scholars at the University of Arpia propose that the constant evolution and improvement of the Plainspeople precludes any need for a permanent settlement; that they are able to live while constantly on the move due to genetics.

Other, less popular theories suppose that they do live in permanent settlements, but these are torn down in a scorched-earth approach when humans are nearby. This is opposed by observations that the Plainspeople have never been seen to use tools of any kind, making construction beyond the reach of their society. Furthermore, in the thousand years of war between humans and the Plainspeople, one would think that humans would have discovered at least one settlement before it was demolished, or at least some ruins.